PCE Inflation Ticks Higher as NVIDIA Prepares to Report Q2 Earnings

Jefferies started coverage on Ambiq Micro with a Buy rating and a $90 price target, sending the semiconductor firm into the spotlight on Wednesday. Analyst Kevin Garrigan wrote that Ambiq's SPOT architecture runs standard CMOS at a 2-5x power advantage on edge devices, where available power limits AI, and said the company is moving from a niche ultra-low-power MCU supplier toward an edge AI compute platform. Garrigan noted that Ambiq's top three customers, believed to be Google, Garmin and WHOOP, made up 77.5% of sales in the second quarter, but revenue outside those top three grew 143% year-over-year while overall revenue rose 90% year-over-year. He forecast revenue rising from $72.5M in FY25 to $249M in FY28, a 51% CAGR, with non-GAAP gross margin expanding from 45.0% to 48.7%, operating margin improving from -33.2% to 0.7%, and non-GAAP EPS moving from -$2.62 to +$0.53. Ambiq holds about $367M of cash and no debt, which Garrigan said funds the roadmap through breakeven.

Nvidia is set to benefit from a planned $40 billion SpaceX fundraising led by Apollo aimed at securing exclusive access to Nvidia chips. SpaceX is seeking US$40b in new capital to more than double its Nvidia-powered compute footprint for large scale AI and space data projects, effectively treating Nvidia as the default compute layer for those efforts. Separately, OpenAI has chosen Nvidia hardware over Cerebras to run its new Ultrafast AI model, reinforcing Nvidia's role in large model training and its full stack platform anchored by CUDA and TensorRT. The key test for investors is whether these headlines turn into disclosed, multi year capacity commitments that show up in data center segment demand and long term supply agreements, with concrete contract details from SpaceX and further large scale model deployments from OpenAI that explicitly reference new Nvidia platforms such as Blackwell or Rubin. The developments sit inside a wider build out of AI plumbing across data centers and cloud platforms.

Global semiconductor sales surpassed $1 trillion through August for the first time in history, the Semiconductor Industry Association reported. Sales totaled $159.7 billion in August, up 8% sequentially from July's $147.9 billion and up 144.3% year over year from August 2025's $65.4 billion. SIA president and CEO Michael Robbins said the global market grew for the 18th consecutive month in August, with sales into the Americas, the Asia Pacific, and China driving strong and sustained year-to-year growth, and the association projects sales to hit more than $1.6 trillion by the end of 2026. The August figure followed an exceptional first half of 2026, when global semiconductor sales reached $403.3 billion in the second quarter and $298.5 billion in the first quarter, representing sequential increases of 33.1% and 25%, respectively. Against that backdrop, Zacks named four chip stocks with upside: Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company Limited, Analog Devices, NVIDIA Corporation and MACOM Technology Solutions Holdings, Inc.

DA Davidson lifted its price target on Micron to $3000 from $2100, citing the memory-chip maker's growth prospects as AI drives demand for memory. The $3000 target implies about 195% upside from Micron's shares, which were trading at $1018 before the bell on Wednesday. Analyst Gil Luria said Micron is on a growth trajectory for the next 3-5 years that the market has not yet acknowledged, and the brokerage expects memory demand to exceed supply in 2027 and 2028. DA Davidson values Micron at about 19 times its fiscal 2027 earnings estimate and reiterated its Buy rating, noting that longer-term supply agreements with customers should make the business more predictable and that demand is coming from the largest companies, including Amazon, Microsoft, Google, Nvidia, and Apple. The firm also said de-specing, or chipmakers' use of less memory per AI processor, should not necessarily weaken Micron's outlook, since using less memory could reduce AI system performance and eventually push customers to buy more. Micron shares have risen 266% this year.

SpaceX is reportedly seeking about $40B to finance a major Nvidia chip purchase, with Apollo Global Management expected to lead the financing. The package could include roughly $10B of bank loans and $30B of investment-grade debt, the Financial Times reported, adding another large financing commitment to the AI infrastructure buildout. Separately, David Ellison said technology will be central to Skydance's strategy following the completion of its $110B acquisition of Warner Bros. Discovery, noting in a memo obtained by Business Insider that technology is changing how content is created, distributed, and consumed. Constellation Energy jumped 12.2% Tuesday after announcing a 20-year power purchase agreement with Google tied to 890 MW of additional nuclear generation, lifting Talen Energy, Vistra, and NRG Energy by 12.4%, 10.7%, and 7%, respectively, while the State Street Utilities Select Sector SPDR rose 3%. Chevron agreed to sell interests in Hess Midstream and its DJ Basin crude midstream assets as it restructures related contracts, with revised Bakken agreements expected to cut midstream costs for its Bakken operations by roughly half. Ray Dalio warned the AI investment cycle is approaching a point where rising interest rates and heavy borrowing could trigger a reversal.