Consumer Tech (Aug 17-21): Walmart & Alibaba Posts Earnings, Trump Targets U.S. Space Launch Growth & More

President Donald Trump signed a new policy Thursday aimed at growing U.S. space launches and expanding re-entry capacity, including directing agencies to consider federal land for new launch sites.

The U.S. is reportedly planning to cut tariffs on Canadian auto imports into the country to 15%, with Steel and Aluminum tariffs being reduced to 25% as the deadline to reach an agreement looms.

California Gov. Gavin Newsom slammed President Donald Trump as the ongoing tensions with Iran over the Strait of Hormuz continue to affect oil and fuel prices in the U.S.

Economist Mohamed El-Erian said the U.S. Treasury Department’s surprise move to double its bond buybacks this week is a short-term fix that does nothing to address the root causes of soaring long-term interest rates and the federal government’s mounting debt and deficits.

Retail, Gaming & Financial Services

• Walmart Inc. (NASDAQ:WMT) Walmart reported adjusted earnings of 81 cents per share, beating the consensus estimate of 74 cents. Sales reached $187.9 billion, topping the $186.8 billion estimate. The company said that customers using its artificial intelligence (AI) assistant Sparky spend 40% more per order than those who don’t, highlighting the retailer’s growing push to turn AI into a shopping and sales tool.
• Amazon.com Inc.‘s (NASDAQ:AMZN) Prime Air, a drone delivery service, is set to expand its operations to nearly 500 cities and towns across the U.S. by the end of 2026.
• Amazon said Tuesday it increased its planned investment in northwest Louisiana to $18 billion from $12 billion. The expansion includes a third data center campus in Shreveport.
• A recent report says Stripe and Advent International are in talks to buy PayPal Holdings, Inc. (NASDAQ:PYPL) after a July proposal of $60.50 per share was viewed as too low, with negotiations now centered on a potentially higher price.
• NetEase Inc. (NASDAQ:NTES) reported mixed second-quarter results, as revenue topped Wall Street expectations but adjusted earnings missed estimates.
• Alibaba (NYSE:BABA) reported fiscal first-quarter 2027 revenue of $39.64 billion, up 9% year over year and above the $38.63 billion analyst estimate. However, adjusted earnings per ADS fell 42% to $1.26, missing expectations of $1.85. Adjusted net income declined 38% to $3.05 billion, while adjusted EBITA fell 30% to $4.03 billion. Net income plunged 75% to $1.54 billion.
• Futu Holdings Limited (NASDAQ:FUTU) reported revenue of $918.16 million, beating the analyst estimate of $775.99 million. Revenue rose 35.6% year over year to 7.20 billion Hong Kong dollars, while gross profit increased 33.9% to 6.21 billion Hong Kong dollars ($792.5 million).
• Nokia (NYSE:NOK) plans to cut most of its mainland China workforce and close operational sites in stages by year-end, the South China Morning Post reported, citing sources familiar with the matter.

Software, Technology & Semiconductor

• Meta Platforms, Inc. (NASDAQ:META), Alphabet Inc.’s (NASDAQ:GOOG) (NASDAQ:GOOG) Google and Snap Inc. (NYSE:SNAP) scored a major legal reprieve after a 15-year-old New Jersey girl dropped her lawsuit alleging their social media platforms contributed to addiction, depression and self-harm.
• A California trial is putting Meta’s legal exposure back in focus after 29 state attorneys general accused the company of illegally collecting children’s data and misleading consumers about safety, with U.S. District Judge Yvonne Gonzalez Rogers set to decide the case alongside a nonbinding advisory jury verdict. Meta has said potential damages could reach $1.4 trillion.
• NVIDIA Corp. (NASDAQ:NVDA) is exploring a potential partnership with South Korean AI chip startup Rebellions as CEO Jensen Huang continues to broaden the company’s reach across the AI ecosystem through technology agreements and investments.
• India has reportedly ordered Alphabet Inc.‘s (NASDAQ:GOOG) (NASDAQ:GOOGL) Google to shut down hundreds of Firebase accounts after officials linked the platform to a wave of bank-impersonation scams.
• SK hynix Inc. (NASDAQ:SKHY) is considering a potentially large manufacturing expansion in Japan as it evaluates ways to increase memory-chip capacity amid rising global demand. Also, the South Korean memory chipmaker’s announcement of plans to buy back and cancel 40 trillion won ($29 billion) worth of its treasury stock.
• Broadcom Inc. (NASDAQ:AVGO) is discussing a financing package with lenders that could include $60 billion to $70 billion of senior secured debt and roughly $30 billion of junior debt, according to people familiar with the matter. The structure could bring the total financing to as much as $100 billion.
• Former Alphabet Inc.’s (NASDAQ:GOOG) (NASDAQ:GOOGL) Google software engineer Linwei Ding received a major legal reprieve after a federal judge overturned his economic espionage convictions.
• The U.S. bankruptcy court has delayed a hearing on Alphabet Inc.‘s (NASDAQ:GOOGL) (NASDAQ:GOOG) Google‘s proposed $10 million purchase of Spirit Aviation Holdings Inc.‘s (OTC:FLYYQ) internal business data.
• Analog Devices, Inc. (NASDAQ:ADI) reported fiscal third-quarter revenue of $4.02 billion, up 40% year over year and above the $3.92 billion consensus estimate. The quarter marked the company’s first time topping $4 billion in revenue.
• Palo Alto Networks, Inc. (NASDAQ:PANW) formed its first strategic alliance of this kind with a global systems integrator, NTT DATA. It targets $1 billion in combined business by the end of 2029.
• Marvell Technology, Inc. (NASDAQ:MRVL) announced an expanded, long-term partnership with Google to develop custom chips that support Google’s Tensor Processing Unit, or TPU, ecosystem.
• Super Micro Computer, Inc. (NASDAQ:SMCI) announced that it has completed an independent investigation tied to export-control allegations.
• Nebius Group N.V. (NASDAQ:NBIS) priced an upsized $5 billion convertible senior notes offering to fund its expanding artificial intelligence infrastructure business.
• Wolfspeed, Inc. (NYSE:WOLF) reported an adjusted loss of $2.26 per share, beating the consensus estimate for a loss of $2.45. Revenue totaled $149.6 million, missing the $224.48 million Street estimate.
• Samsung Electronics Co. Ltd. (OTC:SSNLF) is using stronger AI-chip demand, tighter industry capacity, and improving manufacturing performance to raise prices and strengthen the economics of its foundry business as it works to narrow the gap with Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company Ltd. (NYSE:TSM).
• Kingsoft Cloud (NASDAQ:KC) reported revenue of 3.07 billion Chinese yuan ($452.75 million), up 30.8% year over year. Revenue beat the analyst consensus estimate of $447.80 million.
• Cerebras Systems Inc. (NASDAQ:CBRS) has doubled down on its push to challenge Nvidia Corp (NASDAQ:NVDA) in AI inference with a new server system built around its massive wafer-scale chips.

Automobile, Defense & Spacecraft

• Advance Auto Parts Inc. (NYSE:AAP) reported mixed second-quarter results and affirmed its fiscal year 2026 sales guidance, which was below estimates. Adjusted EPS of $1.03 beat the consensus of 81 cents. Meanwhile, sales of $2.00 billion fell short of the $2.039 billion estimate.
• Alphabet Inc.’s (NASDAQ:GOOG)(NASDAQ:GOOGL) Waymo has revealed its first custom-designed robotaxi chip, a purpose-built 5-nanometer ASIC delivering more than 1,000 TOPS of machine-learning performance for front-end sensor processing in its newest Ojai vehicles.
• Tesla Inc. (NASDAQ:TSLA) has reportedly discontinued its Solar Roof tiles, telling third-party installers that it will supply conventional solar panels instead.
• Elon Musk made a fresh pitch for Starlink in India on Friday, saying the Space Exploration Technologies Corp. (NASDAQ:SPCX) satellite service could help close rural connectivity gaps as the company renews its push for satellite approval.
• CEO Elon Musk says that the commercial spaceflight company has targeted conducting 30 launches of the Starship rocket per day by 2030.
• Rocket Lab Corporation (NASDAQ:RKLB) CEO Peter Beck said the company’s acquisition of Iridium Communications Inc. (NASDAQ:IRDM) would help the Space Exploration Technologies rival expand its satellite communications business.
• Uber Technologies Inc. (NYSE:UBER) and Baidu Inc. (NASDAQ:BIDU) launched fully driverless Apollo Go robotaxis on Uber’s platform in Dubai on Thursday.
• Elon Musk has denied that the commercial spaceflight company tried to acquire artificial intelligence (AI) startup Cognition AI.
• Lyntris Inc. (NYSE:LYNX) began trading Wednesday after a bumpy path to the public markets, with shares falling 11.4% on debut and a valuation settling near $1.78 billion, well below the $2.5 billion target set earlier this month, according to Reuters.
• Pony AI Inc. (NASDAQ:PONY) reported an adjusted loss of 10 cents per share, beating the consensus loss estimate of 27 cents. Revenue rose 68.8% year over year to $36.22 million but missed the $67.03 million consensus estimate. Growth in Robotaxi and Robotruck services drove the increase.

Artificial Intelligence, Bitcoin & Healthcare

• SharonAI Holdings, Inc. (NASDAQ:SHAZ) announced the completion and customer acceptance of its initial AI Cloud deployment for a global technology customer.
• Twist Bioscience Corp (NASDAQ:TWST) shares surged Wednesday after Anthropic named the company an independent evaluator in a new AI-driven protein design campaign.
• OpenAI has imposed a two-week pause on frontier-model development after internal signals indicated that an upcoming system known as Astra could reach a “Critical” level of cybersecurity capability under the company’s Preparedness Framework. 
• Moderna Inc. (NASDAQ:MRNA) more than doubled after the biotech company and Merck & Co. Inc. (NYSE:MRK)  said their personalized mRNA cancer vaccine intismeran autogene, combined with Keytruda, met both its primary endpoint of reducing melanoma recurrence and its secondary endpoint on distant metastasis in a Phase 3 trial of more than 1,100 post-surgical patients.
• Robinhood Markets Inc. (NASDAQ:HOOD) stock traded higher on Wednesday, primarily driven by momentum around its newly launched Robinhood Chain blockchain platform.
• Datavault AI Inc. (NASDAQ:DVLT) reported second-quarter 2026 results that missed Wall Street estimates. Revenue surged 287% year over year to $6.72 million from $1.74 million but missed the $30.25 million estimate.
• Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei could receive super-voting shares ahead of the AI company’s potential IPO, giving him and other co-founders greater control even as their ownership stakes remain relatively small.