AnalytixInsight

Last week, Dow Jones was up 2.9%, S&P 500 rose 3.9% (its best weekly gain in 2024), and Nasdaq composite gained 5.3% — all strong gains from Aug. 5 lows. Investors are back lavishing millions onto megacaps as the high-flying tech stocks resume their climb, shrugging off the vestiges of last week’s market meltdown. Traders poured a net US$210 million into the Invesco S&P 500 Top 50 ETF on Monday, the biggest one-day influx in the fund’s nearly 20-year history. Among the fund’s biggest holdings are Apple, Meta Platforms, Nvidia, Alphabet, Amazon and Microsoft — the leaders of the so-called Magnificent Seven which have accounted for the bulk of the market’s gains this year. In Canada, Sophic Client OneSoft entered into an Arrangement Agreement to be acquired by irth Solutions for $0.88/sh in cash, a premium of 42% and 28% to the closing price and 20-day volume weighted average closing price of the Shares. Sophic Client UGE International announced the closing of its Plan of Arrangement to be acquired at $2/sh. Sophic Client, Intermap announced 125% revenue growth in Q2. Sophic Client, NowVertical Group, reported Q2 results, revenue was up 2% y/y adjusted for recent divestitures. Income from Operations was US$0.7 million, a 125% y/y increase due to gross margin and administrative expense improvements. Sophic Client ADM Endeavors reported Q2 results – Revenue was US$1.2 million, a 5% decrease y/y, but up 16% q/q. Sophic Client, Plurilock filed a Nonprovisional Patent application for AI-driven cloud access security broker technology for generative AI – hitting a new 52 week high. Well Health plans to spin out, and publicly list its SaaS and services business in 2025. Bitcoin miner Riot Platforms raised its stake in rival Bitfarms to 18.9%. Toronto based Radical Ventures, raised almost US$800 million for a new fund, according to Bloomberg. Radical Ventures was an early backer of model maker Cohere, recently valued at US$5.5 billion.

After a brutal Monday, due to fears of the yen-carry-trade unwinding and an Nvidia AI chip delay, the market ended the week well above Monday’s lows. Dow Jones fell 0.6% last week, S&P 500 ended the week almost flat, and Nasdaq composite lost 0.2%. WeRide, a Chinese autonomous driving company, is getting ready for its U.S. IPO. The company is selling almost 6.5 million American depositary shares, priced between US$15.50 and US$18.50 each. Shares of AI chipmaker Black Sesame tumbled as much as 35% on their Hong Kong debut, dealing a blow to Hong Kong’s efforts to lure more technology listings. Nvidia shares dropped 6% Monday after reports that the company’s upcoming AI chips are facing production delays by at least three months due to design flaws. Groq, an Nvidia challenger, raised US$640 million in Series D funding at a valuation of US$2.8 billion. Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway slashed its stake in Apple in half as part of a selling spree in Q2. A federal U.S. judge ruled Monday that Google has illegally held a monopoly in two market areas: search and text advertising. Later in the week, Palantir’s shares surged on a rosy profit outlook signaling AI demand. Uber posted sharply higher profits, and Airbnb warned of a U.S. growth slowdown. In Canada, Shopify’s revenue grew 21% y/y, beating the company’s own outlook of high-teens growth, sending its shares up more than 20% on Wednesday morning. Sophic Client UGE International announced that the closing of its previously announced go private transaction, is now expected to occur on or about August 14, 2024, as opposed to on or about August 8, 2024. Sophic Client Intermap closed the final tranche of its Private Placement, for a total of ~$3.3 million raised. Sophic Client Clear Blue Technologies’ stakeholders provided a financing package of $2.2 – $2.9 million.

Despite a bullish Wednesday, markets had a bad week. Dow Jones lost 2.1%, as did S&P 500. Nasdaq composite was down 3.35%, and is now in traditional correction territory. Cerebras, an Nvidia rival that develops AI chips, has filed confidentially for an IPO. Elliott Management, a hedge fund, said Nvidia and other megacap technology stocks were in “bubble land,” according to a letter viewed by the Financial Times. Microsoft shares fell 4% in after-hours trading Tuesday after it said revenue from enterprise software and cloud server rentals rose more slowly in Q2 than in Q1. Shares of Nvidia and other chip firms jumped Wednesday after Microsoft said Tuesday night that it plans to continue spending tens of billions of dollars on new data centers and chips for AI. Meta’s revenue rose 22% in Q2, and Apple revenue rose 5% despite weak iPhone results. Amazon Web Services revenue grew 19% y/y to US$26.3 billion in Q2, AWS’s fastest growth since 2022 but still significantly lower growth than at smaller cloud rivals Microsoft and Google. AMD projected higher AI chip sales. Qualcomm reported earnings on Wednesday that beat Wall Street expectations. Intel said Thursday that it would cut 15,000 jobs or more than 15% of its workforce over the next two years and embark on a US$10 billion cost-reduction plan to improve its competitiveness. Morgan Stanley will allow financial advisors to offer Bitcoin ETFs. In Canada, Sophic Client, Plurilock appointed a 35-year veteran of enterprise technology IT and solutions sales to its industry advisory council. Sophic Client Xcyte Digital, announced advanced AI-powered captioning and translation features. We also sat down with CEO, Randy Selman, to discuss recent acquisitions and future milestones for the company.

Last week, Dow Jones rose 0.6%, S&P 500 lost 0.8%, and Nasdaq composite fell 2.1% despite Friday’s rebound. Upcoming earnings from big techs including, Apple, and Microsoft this week and the Fed rate outlook will likely determine if the Nasdaq can turn around or heads into correction territory. Honeywell is considering an IPO of its majority-owned quantum computing firm Quantinuum as soon as next year at a US$10 billion valuation. Revolut, already the world’s second most-valuable fintech startup after Stripe, is in talks to sell the shares to new shareholders at a US$45 billion valuation. Wiz has ended deal talks with Google after the tech giant offered to acquire the startup for US$23 billion. Southeast Asia’s biggest ride-hailing and food delivery firm, Grab, has bought Singaporean dining reservation platform Chope for an undisclosed price. Anthropic projected to burn more than US$2.7 billion in cash this year. IBM shares rose 5% in extended trading on Wednesday, after Q2 results surpassed analysts’ predictions. Google’s ad revenue growth softened slightly in Q2, the company also reversed its decision to end ad trackers in Chrome. OpenAI is launching a search engine, taking direct aim at Google, sending Google shares down 3%. Tesla CEO Elon Musk said he will ask the company’s board of directors to consider investing US$5 billion in xAI. Reddit is partnering with several major sports leagues to bring more video content to the site in hopes of boosting advertising revenue. In Canada, Sophic Client, Kraken’s long thesis was highlighted by Deep Sail Capital in their Q2 investor letter. Sophic Client, Plurilock provided a corporate update, and was recognized by industry analysts for the fifth year. Sophic Client Xcyte Digital announced a strategic partnership with Pixel Canvas. Cohere raised US$500 million at US$5.5 billion valuation, and announced staff cuts. Clio topped a $4-billion valuation with the largest software funding round in Canadian tech history.