What you Need to Know for August 26

Wednesday: Nvidia, CrowdStrike, Salesforce, Synopsys, Trip dot com,
Williams-Sonoma, HP, Okta, JM Smucker, Dycom, Abercrombie & Fitch, Bath & Body Works, Kohl's

Thursday: RBC, Marvell, TD, Autodesk, Workday, Dollar General, Affirm, Dollar Tree, Ulta Beauty, Burlington Stores, Rubrik, Best Buy, IREN, SentinelOne, Gap, Hyperliquid Strategies, Petco, Build-A-Bear

Here’s a look at economic data this week (estimates are in quotations).

Wednesday: Durable Goods (0.5%), 2nd estimate GDP (1.5%), Personal Income M/M% (0.2%), Consumer Spending M/M% (0.1%), PCE Price Idx M/M% (0.1%), PCE Price Idx Y/Y% (3.6%), PCE Core Price Idx M/M% (0.2%), PCE Core Price Idx Y/Y% (3.3%)

Thursday: Weekly Jobless Claims (206K), Advance U.S. Trade Balance in Goods, Wholesale Inventories, Retail Inventories, Kansas City Fed Survey

Friday: Kevin Warsh’s Jackson Hole Speech (10am ET), Chicago Business Barometer ISM-Chicago Business Survey Chicago PMI (57.9), U. Michigan Final Consumer Survey (51)

Curated deal flow of high-potential startups

Invest alongside well known lead venture firms in these deals

No cost to see deals

No obligation to invest

Dick’s Sporting Goods $DKS ( ▼ 30.68% ) Missed on the top and bottom lines, with revenue of $5.59B vs. $5.65B and EPS of $3.53 vs. $3.76. The core business remained strong, with comparable sales up 4.9%, but results were dragged down by Foot Locker, where comps fell as fewer product launches and weakening demand for legacy footwear styles led to excess inventory and heavier discounting. The broader athletic footwear and apparel market also became increasingly promotional, forcing lower prices to remain competitive. Mgmt. cut guidance and now expects Foot Locker comps to be flat to down. Shares sunk heavily on the miss.

Intuit $INTU ( ▼ 3.37% ) Beat on the top and bottom lines, with revenue of $4.35B vs. $4.27B and EPS of $4.03 vs. $3.58. Results were driven by QuickBooks Online Accounting revenue, which rose 20% on higher pricing, customer growth and favorable mix, while Credit Karma grew 16% on strength in personal loans, auto insurance and credit cards, yet Mailchimp remained a drag on growth as demand remained weak, with revenue expected to be flat to down 1% next year. Despite the beat, Mgmt. guided FY27 revenue below expectations, implying growth will slow to 9%-10% from 14% in FY26, while Q1 revenue guidance also came in below consensus.

Zoom $ZM ( ▼ 3.73% ) Beat on the top and bottom lines. Results were driven by enterprise revenue growth of 7.8%, its fastest pace in three years, as larger corporate customers adopted more of Zoom’s AI-powered products. Mgmt. raised its FY outlook, but Q3 EPS guidance came in below expectations as continued AI investment weighed on near-term profits.

Analyst moves: $MRNA ( ▲ 14.36% ) climbed on continued cancer vaccine momentum paired with BofA’s PT hike to $170 (from $40), and William Blair’s upgrade to Outperform. $AMD ( ▲ 4.91% ) was upgraded to Strong Buy by Raymond James at $641 (from $565), and $JMKE ( ▼ 5.61% ) picked up new coverage from Goldman Sachs at Neutral with a $26 PT.

Richtech Robotics $RR ( ▲ 21.61% ) popped after announcing a $12M share buyback, a meaningful figure for the small-cap robotics company with a market cap under $400M.

Bath & Body Works $BBWI ( ▼ 8.29% ) fell for a fifth straight session ahead of Wednesday’s Q2 earnings. Consensus calls for EPS of $0.24, a 35% YoY decline, on roughly flat revenue of ~$1.5Bn.

Nuclear stocks $OKLO ( ▲ 11.54% ), $SMR ( ▲ 8.4% ), and $UEC ( ▲ 6.08% ) rallied in a sector bounce off heavy YTD losses. NuScale separately announced deployment of nuclear-specific AI tools that cut information retrieval time by up to 80%.

LyondellBasell $LYB ( ▼ 4.06% ) rose after reports it submitted an offer for Shell’s US chemical assets alongside ExxonMobil in a deal valued near $8Bn.

Robinhood $HOOD ( ▲ 8.17% ) jumped on continued crypto strength after Bitcoin climbed above $77k, boosting volumes for retail brokerages. Goldman Sachs and Needham both carry $123 PTs.

Alibaba $BABA ( ▲ 0.82% ) slid Monday and hasn’t recovered after announcing a $10.2Bn share placement with all proceeds going towards AI investments.

Marvell Technology $MRVL ( ▲ 4.84% ) climbed after Susquehanna raised its PT to $265 from $230 ahead of Thursday’s Q2 earnings, citing AI networking demand and a Google agreement worth up to $120Bn through 2033.

Oura is seeking to raise $3Bn in a US IPO as early as September, valuing the company at $16Bn, with revenue expected to reach $1.5Bn in 2026, tripling 2024’s $500M.

Lambda is in talks to raise up to $3Bn in a pre-IPO round at a $12Bn+ valuation, setting up a potential IPO as soon as next year. The Nvidia-backed neocloud is expected to earn $1.5Bn+ in revenue this year.

Aggreko filed for a US IPO that could value the Glasgow-based power equipment rental firm at ~$15Bn. Revenue hit $1.92Bn with $80M net income in H1 2026, a swing from a $189M loss on $1.5Bn a year earlier.

Canada retaliated against Trump’s tariffs with new duties of 15-50% on $20B of US goods, effective September 8. The measures target steel, dairy, appliances, agricultural equipment, and electronics. The move comes days after the US imposed 50% tariffs on a wide range of Canadian products.

Investor Stanley Druckenmiller criticized the Treasury’s move to double long-dated bond buybacks to $4Bn, calling it “price management” rather than genuine liquidity support and political procrastination on entitlement reform as yields round-tripped within a day. The catch - Druck took a lot of heat for his WSJ op-ed being AI-generated….

Citadel’s Nohshad Shah argues the Bessent Treasury buyback expansion is a “Treasury-led Operation Twist,” not QE, since it’s financed by shifting issuance to short-dated bills, which flattens the curve and puts pressure on the dollar rather than resolving the underlying fiscal contradiction.

LeBron James’s LLC borrowed nearly $300M in 2017 and 2022 from life insurers advised by Guggenheim Partners against future income from off-court deals like his Nike lifetime partnership. We weren’t exactly expecting LeBron to be caught up in the Mark Walter saga, but the plot thickens…

Guggenheim Investments told lenders that affiliates may buy its distressed loan, which dropped to as low as 73 cents on the dollar this week. The firm calls it an “attractive investment opportunity” as investigations continue into Mark Walter’s businesses.

Carlyle’s bond deep dive: Bond investors are waiting for the Fed to restore forward guidance at Jackson Hole. Treasury yields are being driven higher by the real term premium rather than inflation expectations, and forward real yields sit above 2.5% as investors brace for another possible rate shock.

OpenAI’s head of data centers Chris Malone has left the company. His exit adds to a wave of senior executive departures, including Brad Lightcap, Fidji Simo, and Kevin Weil in recent months.

The SEC subpoenaed Goldman Sachs, JPMorgan, Citigroup, and Bank of America over their roles in Situational Awareness’ near-collapse, seeking details on the fund’s trades, leverage, and lender communication.

Sycamore Tree Capital warns that the AI buildout’s massive capital needs carry significant credit risk, particularly “rating-designation risk” from private credit scores that could be revised or challenged, drawing parallels to the telecom bust of the late 1990s.

JPMorgan warns of a fall S&P 500 selloff, flagging a growing divergence between AI hardware/chip makers and heavy AI capex spenders that mirrors the 1999-2000 tech crash, alongside rising Treasury yields and deteriorating market internals.

BlackRock is sounding out buyers for TCP Capital Corp’s $671M of loans, with advisers pitching the assets in early-stage talks. TCPC is also weighing reinvesting in the portfolio, returning capital to shareholders, or merging with another entity as the fund struggles with steep markdowns and DOJ scrutiny.

Ares is leading a $2.2B direct loan to pharmacy benefits manager MedImpact in one of the largest private credit deals of the year. The loan will fund MedImpact’s acquisition of Medical Card System without PE backing, and the second-lien portion could pay at least 8% over the baseline rate.

Clearlake-backed Ivanti’s Q2 revenue fell 11% YoY to $189MM, with pro forma EBITDA down 21% to $72M, as its shift to a subscription-based model continues to strain its ability to service debt.

DC-based Awani Capital Management raised nearly $600M for its inaugural fund. The firm targets controlling stakes in middle-market companies and was launched in 2025 by alums of Bethesda’s RLJ Capital Partners.

JPMorgan is hiring Dan McDow from Citi to head its east coast tech investment banking business. McDow spent the past four years as Citi’s global head of software investment banking.