The U.S. Department of Defense’s fiscal 2026 budget request, for the first time, creates a standalone $13.4 billion line item for “autonomy,” spanning drones, counter-drone systems, unmanned vessels and enabling software. Mercury Systems is cited as an early beneficiary, with last quarter’s bookings up 74% year over year, book-to-bill at 1.48 and backlog at a record $1.6 billion, pointing to front-loaded demand in defense electronics. The broader backdrop includes rising global military spending—$2,887 billion in 2025—and a shift toward “consumable” intelligent platforms, according to the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute.

China’s DRAM maker ChangXin Memory Technologies (CXMT) is seeking to use an AI-driven memory shortage to win positions in global OEM supply chains, but U.S. restrictions that keep ASML EUV lithography tools out of China leave it with higher DDR5 costs and delayed progress in HBM. That dynamic limits its ability to dislodge Micron, Samsung and SK Hynix in the high-margin AI memory segment. Micron’s current high gross margin has structural support, but China’s expanding capacity could raise competitive pressure over the medium to long term.

Micron’s latest fiscal Q3 results were strong, with revenue rising 4x year over year and gross margin hitting 84.6%, as AI-driven demand lifted high-bandwidth memory pricing. The analysis argues that Samsung, SK Hynix and Micron are simultaneously ramping investment toward roughly $130 billion in a single year, far above prior cycle peaks. It warns that this scale of capacity build-out could flip supply-demand dynamics later and pressure DRAM prices and profitability if AI infrastructure spending undershoots expectations.

U.S. stocks fell on Tuesday as a broad tech selloff weighed on the market, with investors uneasy ahead of chipmaker Micron’s earnings report. The decline intensified after South Korea’s Financial Supervisory Service warned about risks in leveraged ETFs tied to memory chip companies, adding to a global chip-stock retreat. Micron’s shares sank more than 13% in the session.

Four Federal Reserve economists said in a June 4 technical note that mortgage servicing rights (MSRs) are highly sensitive to changes in forecasts for how quickly borrowers refinance. They estimated MSR values fall about 4% for every 1 percentage-point rise in the expected refinancing rate, and could decline by as much as 13% in a severe recession scenario. Because MSRs do not have real-time market quotes, their book values rely on models of borrower behavior, which can directly affect quarterly earnings and dividend durability for mortgage REITs that hold large MSR portfolios, such as Rithm Capital.

Several international oil majors, including Equinor, BP and Shell, are adjusting their energy-transition strategies by reducing capital spending on renewables and refocusing on more profitable core oil and gas operations. BP has sold its U.S. onshore wind assets, Equinor has dropped its 2030 installed renewables capacity target, and Shell has scaled back hydrogen and offshore wind projects. The shift reflects a renewed emphasis on capital discipline aimed at improving shareholder returns and cash flow.

Technology investor Chamath Palihapitiya said on the All In Podcast that Tesla and SpaceX could merge, calling the outcome “glorious.” With SpaceX not publicly traded, Tesla remains the only listed vehicle for investors referenced in the discussion. The commentary suggested a merger could create a top-five global company by size and highlighted a combined 30,000 bitcoin position, while noting the claim is rumor-driven with no official confirmation or transaction milestone.

Agentic AI is moving from an infrastructure-led buildout to application-layer commercialization, as enterprises begin paying at scale for AI-enabled software. Microsoft’s Copilot products reached a $37 billion annual revenue run rate in Q1 2026, up 123% year over year, pointing to a shift from pilots to paid deployments. While NVIDIA continues to dominate AI compute infrastructure, the next phase of outsized gains is increasingly tied to software companies with distribution, vertical specialization, and proven ARR growth.

The Iran war damaged Qatar’s Ras Laffan LNG complex, triggering force majeure and disrupting about 10.2 mtpa of LNG supply to Asia, with some outages expected to last through late summer. Asia spot LNG prices have climbed to near three-year highs, prompting utilities to lean more on coal-fired power. Japan and South Korea’s May coal imports are tracking more than 50% and 20% above year-ago levels, respectively. Rystad Energy estimates the region could face a 35 mtpa LNG supply gap in 2026 that is increasingly being filled by higher coal use.