>>> Strategy Inc provides update to MSTR equity guidance

Strategy Inc provides update to MSTR equity guidance
  • Update to MSTR Equity Guidance: Strategy today announced an update to its prior guidance with respect to its intended use of proceeds from the Common ATM. When mNAV (as defined on Strategy.com) is below 2.5x, Strategy will tactically issue MSTR Shares to
    • (1) pay interest on debt obligations,
    • (2) fund preferred equity dividends, and
    • (3) when otherwise deemed advantageous to the Company.
  • Co also disclosed it sold 179,687 STRK shares, sold 162,670 STRF shares, sold 140,789 STRD shares, and bought 430 BTC during period August 11, 2025 to August 17, 2025.

>>> Europe : Brokers Upgrades & Downgrades - 18th of August 2025 V2(++)

>>> Up
* Autostore Raised to Equal-Weight at Morgan Stanley; PT 8 kroner
* Boozt Raised to Buy at SEB Equities; PT 100 kronor
* Dr Martens Raised to Buy at Peel Hunt; PT 112 pence
* Genova Property Raised to Buy at Kepler Cheuvreux; PT 51 kronor (++)
* Hapag-Lloyd PT Raised to 72 euros from 70 euros at JPMorgan
* Kesla Raised to Reduce at Inderes; PT 2.80 euros (+)
* Nexstim Raised to Reduce at Inderes; PT 12.50 euros
* Pandora Raised to Buy at Jyske Bank; PT 1,150 kroner (+)
* Permanent TSB Raised to Outperform at KBW; PT 2.90 euros
* Reply Raised to Buy at Quirin Privatbank AG; PT 178 euros (++)
* SpareBank 1 Nord Norge Raised to Hold at Arctic Securities (+)
* TAG Immobilien Raised to Buy at M.M. Warburg; PT 19.70 euros (+)
* Tokmanni Raised to Buy at SEB Equities; PT 12 euros
* Tokmanni Raised to Hold at DNB Carnegie (++)
* Tulikivi Raised to Reduce at Inderes; PT 42 euro cents
* Xerox Raised to Neutral at Citi; PT $4.50

>>> Down
* Bakkafrost Cut to Hold at Pareto Securities; PT 470 kroner
* Close Brothers Cut to Sector Perform at RBC
* Commerzbank Cut to Hold at Deutsche Bank; PT 35 euros (+)
* Crest Nicholson Cut to Hold at Stifel; PT 190 pence
* Eli Lilly Cut to Neutral at Daiwa; PT $700
* Equinor Cut to Neutral at SpareBank; PT 270 kroner
* Fractal Gaming Group Cut to Hold at ABG; PT 45 kronor
* Hoegh Autoliners Cut to Hold at Arctic Securities
* Lanxess Cut to Sell at Van Lanschot Kempen; PT 16.70 euros (+)
* Northern Oil & Gas Cut to Underweight at Morgan Stanley; PT $27
* Occidental Cut to Equal-Weight at Morgan Stanley; PT $52
* Segro Cut to Underweight at Barclays; PT 550 pence
* SpareBank 1 Helgeland Raised to Hold at Arctic Securities (+)
* Spirent Cut to Hold at Canaccord; PT 199 pence
* U-blox Cut to Hold at Bank Vontobel; PT 135 Swiss francs (+)
* Vestas Cut to Hold at Fearnley; PT 110 kroner (+)

>>> Initiation
* Babcock Rated New Outperform at RBC; PT 1,200 pence
* Cirsa Enterprises Rated New Overweight at Barclays; PT 20 euros
* Cirsa Enterprises Rated New Outperform at Mediobanca SpA
* Cirsa Enterprises Rated New Buy at Jefferies; PT 20 euros
* Cirsa Enterprises Rated New Buy at BTIG; PT 19 euros
* Cirsa Enterprises Rated New Buy at Alantra Equities (+)
* EchoStar Rated New Hold at Baptista Research; PT $30.70
* Magna Intl Rated New Hold at Baptista Research
* Oshkosh Rated New Hold at Baptista Research; PT $154.90
* Wendel Rated New Neutral at Autonomous; PT 93.70 euros

>>> Call
* Autostore is Moving Past the Trough, Morgan Stanley Upgrades
* Babcock Has Strong Prospects for Success, New Outperform at RBC
* Close Brothers Upside Now Limited, Cut to Sector Perform at RBC
* Oppenheimer AM Sees Rally in US Small Caps on Fed Rates Outlook (++)

CNBC : OpenAI’s Sam Altman sees AI bubble forming as industry spending surges

OpenAI’s Sam Altman sees AI bubble forming as industry spending surges

Key Points
  • OpenAI CEO Sam Altman has reportedly said that he believes AI could be in a bubble, comparing market conditions to those of the dotcom boom in the 1990s.
  • “Are we in a phase where investors as a whole are overexcited about AI? My opinion is yes. Is AI the most important thing to happen in a very long time? My opinion is also yes,” he’s quoted as saying.
  • Alibaba co-founder Joe Tsai, Bridgewater Associates’ Ray Dalio and Apollo Global Management chief economist Torsten Slok have all raised similar warnings.

OpenAI CEO Sam Altman thinks the artificial intelligence market is in a bubble, according to a report from The Verge published Friday.

“When bubbles happen, smart people get overexcited about a kernel of truth,” Altman told a small group of reporters last week.

“Are we in a phase where investors as a whole are overexcited about AI? My opinion is yes. Is AI the most important thing to happen in a very long time? My opinion is also yes,” he was quoted as saying.

Altman appeared to compare this dynamic to the infamous dot-com bubble, a stock market crash centered on internet-based companies that led to massive investor enthusiasm during the late 1990s. Between March 2000 and October 2002, the Nasdaq lost nearly 80% of its value after many of these companies failed to generate revenue or profits.

His comments add to growing concern among experts and analysts that investment in AI is moving too fast. Alibaba co-founder Joe Tsai, Bridgewater Associates’ Ray Dalio and Apollo Global Management chief economist Torsten Slok have all raised similar warnings.

Last month, Slok stated in a report that he believed the AI bubble of today was, in fact, bigger than the internet bubble, with the top 10 companies in the S&P 500 more overvalued than they were in the 1990s.

In a Monday email to CNBC, Ray Wang, research director for semiconductors, supply chain and emerging technology at Futurum Group, said that he thought Altman’s comments carry some validity, but that the risks are company-dependent.

“From the perspective of broader investment in AI and semiconductors... I don’t see it as a bubble. The fundamentals across the supply chain remain strong, and the long-term trajectory of the AI trend supports continued investment,” he said.

However, he added that there is an increasing amount of speculative capital chasing companies with weaker fundamentals and only perceived potential, which could create pockets of overvaluation.

Many Fears of an AI bubble had hit a fever pitch at the start of this year when Chinese start-up DeepSeek released a competitive reasoning model. The company claimed one version of its advanced large language models had been trained for under $6 million, a fraction of the billions being spent by U.S. AI market leaders like OpenAI, though these claims were also been met with some skepticism.

Earlier this month, Altman told CNBC that OpenAI’s annual recurring revenue is on track to pass $20 billion this year, but that despite that, it remains unprofitable.

The release of OpenAI’s latest GPT-5 AI model earlier this month had also been rocky, with some critics complaining that it had a less intuitive feel. This resulted in the company restoring access to legacy GPT-4 models for paying customers.

Following the release of the model, Altman has also signaled more caution about some of the AI industry’s more bullish predictions.

Speaking to CNBC, he said that he thought the term artificial general intelligence, or “AGI,” is losing relevance, when asked whether the GPT-5 model moves the world any closer to achieving AGI.

AGI refers to the concept of a form of artificial intelligence that can perform any intellectual task that a human can — something that OpenAI has been working towards for years and that Altman previously said could be achieved in the “reasonably close-ish future.″

Regardless, faith in OpenAI from investors has remained strong this year. CNBC confirmed Friday that the company was preparing to sell around $6 billion in stock as part of a secondary sale that would value it at roughly $500 billion.

In March, it had announced a $40 billion funding round at a $300 billion valuation, by far the largest amount ever raised by a private tech company.

In The Verge article on Friday, the OpenAI CEO also discussed OpenAI’s expansion into consumer hardware, brain-computer interfaces and social media.

Altman also said that he expects OpenAI to spend trillions of dollars on its data center buildout in the “not very distant future,” and signaled that the company would be interested in buying Chrome if the U.S. government were to force Google to sell it.

Asked if he would be CEO of OpenAI in a few years, he was quoted as saying, “I mean, maybe an AI is in three years. That’s a long time.”

>>> US Gapping down

Gapping down
In reaction to earnings/guidance:
  • RSKD -8.7%, BTDR -0.7%
Other news:
  • COIN -1.7% (files prospectus supplement relating to resale of up to 10,997,856 Class A shares by the selling stockholders)
  • NAMS -1.5% (discloses in filing that it entered into a supply agreement with A. Menarini International Licensing; Under the terms of agreement, company agreed to supply Menarini with obicetrapib monotherapy and obicetrapib and ezetimibe fixed-dose combination finished products in bulk tablet form)
  • MP -1.5% (files prospectus supplement relating to offer and sale of 24,521,672 shares by the selling stockholders)
  • AAPG -1.3% (Announces Global Registrational Phase III Study of Lisaftoclax for First-line Treatment of Patients with Higher-Risk Myelodysplastic Syndrome Cleared by US FDA and EMA)
  • RBLX -0.9% (report SEC case concluded in May, according to Bloomberg)
  • TLS -0.9% (has no current plans or needs to raise cash proceeds through the issuance of dilutive capital)
  • BHVN -0.7% (files prospectus supplement relating to resale of 3,588,688 shares issued to the selling shareholder under the Knopp Amendment)

>>> US Gapping up

Gapping up
News:
  • BTAI +32.8% (Announces Positive FDA Pre-sNDA Meeting Comments for sNDA Submission for BXCL501 in Agitation Associated with Bipolar Disorders or Schizophrenia)
  • EM +16.6% (announces receipt of a preliminary non-binding proposal to acquire the company from Hillhouse)
  • SHCO +16% (signs definitive take-private agreement; Holders of common stock of the Company will receive $9.00/share in cash)
  • TNXP +6.7% (resumes trading and spikes higher by 20% in after-hours action after announcing before the close that the FDA granted approval of Tonmya (cyclobenzaprine HCl sublingual tablets) for the treatment of Fibromyalgia)
  • FFAI +5.4% (Launches its "EAI + Crypto" Dual-Flywheel & Dual-Bridge Ecosystem Strategy; Provides Livestream Information for its Major Strategy Upgrade Announcement on August 16th)
  • VNDA +5.3% (appeals court overturns FDA's order denying approval of Hetlioz for the treatment of jet lag disorder)
  • NVO +3.1% (FDA approves a new indication for Wegovy; approved for the treatment of noncirrhotic MASH with moderate to advanced liver fibrosis)
  • SAFX +3.1% (to delay 10-Q filing)
  • ENTG +3.1% (New Duquesne (Stanley Druckenmiller) position)
  • LUMN +2.9% (CFO disclosed Friday the purchase of 82,000 shares at $4.20 - $4.53 worth about $358K)
  • FGEN +2.9% (announces that the China State Administration for Market Regulation approved the sale of FibroGen International to AstraZeneca (AZN) Treasury Limited)
  • WULF +2.7% (announces that Fluidstack exercised its option to expand at the company's Lake Mariner data center campus; intends to offer $400 mln aggregate principal amount of convertible senior notes due 2031) EU +1.8% (expands Alta Mesa Uranium Project)
  • MITT +1.6% (files for 2,027,676 share common stock offering by selling shareholders)
  • JRVR +1.4% (files for 21,334,134 share common stock offering by selling shareholders)
  • ENLT +1.3% (provided updates for IRS changes)
  • FSM +1.2% (drills 4.5 g/t Au over 37.4 meters at Kingfisher and 11.2 g/t Au over 5.6 meters at Sunbird)
  • GCT +1.1% (authorized new share repurchase program of $111 mln of Class A ordinary shares over the next three years)