Trump just declared 100% war on cheap foreign generic drugs
Kalshi just made midterm election betting insanely easy
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Trump just declared 100% war on cheap foreign generic drugs
President Donald Trump said in a social media post Tuesday that the United States plans to impose a 100% tariff on imported generic drugs beginning in August 2028 to bring production back home.
Rate doubles next year: The levy would then double a year later to 200% in August 2029 as a penalty for companies that decide not to build plant and equipment within the stated period.
Reshoring is the goal: Trump stated the measure is done in order to reshoring generic pharmaceutical production into America and penalize firms that fail to invest domestically on time.
Patented drugs unchanged: The president said his administration’s tariff plans related to patented drugs would remain unchanged from previous positions.
Social media disclosure: Details of the new tariff timeline and purpose were outlined by President Trump in a social media post on Tuesday.
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AI CRASH WARNING: Man who predicted COVID 19 Crash warns of new crisis
A former advisor to the CIA and Pentagon just released an AI Black Paper.
It’s going viral, because if he is right…
It means – as soon as July 29th at 6:30 PM– the entire system could go down.
And it’s going to start with the massive bubble popping in AI
Click below to view his analysis and see the 3 steps you can take to prepare.
Trump’s AI chip push is crushing TSMC’s margins
Pressure from President Donald Trump to manufacture advanced semiconductors in the United States is raising costs and diluting margins at TSMC even as the company posts record AI-driven profits.
$200 billion U.S. total: TSMC has announced $200 billion in total U.S. manufacturing commitments since 2025, including a $100 billion investment in advanced facilities unveiled last week.
Overseas fabs dilute margins: CFO Wendell Huang said gross margin dilution from overseas fab ramp-ups will be 2% to 3% early on, widening to 3% to 4% over the next several years.
U.S. chips cost more: Analysts estimate TSMC’s U.S.-made chips cost 20% to 50% more than those produced in Taiwan, with customers expected to absorb a large share of the higher expenses.
Record quarterly profit: Second-quarter profit jumped 77.4% year on year to a record while gross margin reached 67.7%, though expansion continues to offset some gains from the AI boom.
$60 billion backlog and margin raise send Supermicro soaring
Supermicro stock jumped 15% in premarket trading Wednesday after the AI server maker said it expects gross margins to nearly double while working through a record order backlog.
Record quarterly orders: Backlog rose to record levels at the end of fiscal 2026 with total new orders in excess of $60 billion received during the fourth quarter of fiscal 2026.
Margins nearly doubled: The company expects gross margin in the range of 15% to 17%, significantly higher than prior guidance of 8.2% to 8.4%, primarily due to a favorable customer and product mix.
AI server specialization: Supermicro designs and builds servers and data center systems that incorporate semiconductors from chipmakers like Nvidia, Intel and AMD.
Year-to-date pressure: Despite the AI boom, shares are down nearly 13% year to date after tumbling in June following an equity raise to fulfill AI server orders.
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Kalshi just made midterm election betting insanely easy
Prediction market platform Kalshi is launching a Midterms Hub that displays maps of trader odds on individual Senate and House races along with polling averages and fundraising data ahead of the November elections.
Map of race odds: The central page will show a map of what traders think the odds are in individual races for both the Senate and House of Representatives based on the latest markets.
Most visitors just watch: About three quarters of all visitors to the platform come just to see the odds on individual events while only one in four actually trade on contracts.
CEO on crowd wisdom: Kalshi CEO Tarek Mansour said prediction markets cut through polarization and show what the wisdom of the crowds actually believes, backed by real money not rhetoric.
Early midterm volume: More than $30 million has already been traded on contracts tied to which party will win the House and Senate in the 2026 midterm elections.
The Anthropic - Physical Intelligence rumor that just broke AI Twitter
A weekend rumor that Anthropic was acquiring robotics startup Physical Intelligence spread rapidly across AI Twitter even after a denial from the company’s CEO.
Talks held this spring: Anthropic and Physical Intelligence actually held acquisition talks this spring according to The Information, giving the rumor a factual basis even if details differed.
Denial via Slack gif: CEO Karol Hausman told employees the reports were not true in a Slack message that contained a gif of a character from The Office shaking her head no.
Startup scale and model: Co-founded by Lachy Groom, Physical Intelligence has raised more than $1 billion and its π0.5 model ranks among the more widely used robot brains in research.
Deal and IPO activity: Anthropic has made four known acquisitions this year and confidentially filed for an IPO on June 1, while OpenAI has acquired at least 17 companies since 2023.
Jamie Dimon warns next credit losses will be far worse
Jamie Dimon has repeatedly warned that losses on leveraged lending in the next credit cycle are likely to be worse than people expect even as the largest U.S. banks posted strong second-quarter profits.
Banks post strong profits: The nation’s largest banks continued to report strong second-quarter earnings, showing the sector remains resilient despite volatile markets and rising consumer costs.
Trading desks benefit: Many large banks saw trading revenue rise from periods of elevated market activity and investor uncertainty that create more opportunities for portfolio adjustments.
Wealth fees climb sharply: Bank of America credited a 12% increase in global wealth and investment management revenue to higher asset management fees, up 15% to $4.2 billion.
Preparing for hard times: JPMorgan Chase is still preparing for a possible recession even as Chairman and CEO Jamie Dimon declined to predict whether the U.S. was heading for one.
The brutal AI chip crash the market is quietly ignoring
A sharp sell-off in semiconductor stocks erased $3.3 trillion from global chip values and drove volatility premiums near records while the broader U.S. equity market remains resilient with strong breadth.
Chip volatility gap widens: The gap between the Cboe SMH Volatility Index and the VIX recently hit nearly 47 points and remains near 45, showing traders expect far larger moves in chips than the S&P 500.
Trillions wiped from chips: The sell-off erased roughly $3.3 trillion from global chip stocks as the PHLX Semiconductor Index broke below its key 12,000 level before climbing back above it.
Momentum basket collapses: Goldman Sachs high-beta momentum basket of recent winners fell roughly one-third from its June peak, marking the worst July decline since April 2009.
Broad market holds firm: Roughly two-thirds of stocks in the S&P 500, S&P 400 and S&P 600 remain above their 200-day moving averages while the advance-decline line recently hit a record high.
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There should be NO drugs in this country made by China. you can't trust them.
My feeling is that Trump needs to encourage the cheap generics, especially for those of us on a fixed income! Maybe then the drug companies, who are making billions in profits, will come to their senses and realize the market they are losing.