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An in-line inflation print removed a tail risk but gave BTC little reason to rally, leaving Jackson Hole, jobs data and the next CPI release as the market’s next catalysts.

TUMI is looking beyond luggage with Adatto, everyday bags and personalisation as it competes to win premium travellers long before they reach the airport.

With All In nearing, how would AEW Dynamite continue the build to the show? Who would headline this episode from Las Vegas?

When people far from casework decide how digital forensics gets done, the errors land on defendants and victims. A veteran digital forensics examiner is pushing back.

Existing-home sales make up about 90% of home sales, writes the National Association of Realtors. Data about existing-home sales gives Americans insights into the U.S. housing market, including trends surrounding pricing, buying, and selling activity.Monthly existing-home sales decreased by 1.7% in July, according to the NAR — but rose 0.7% year over year.”Home sales have been remarkably stable, even amid the rising mortgage rate environment of the past few months,” NAR chief economist Lawrence Yun said in a statement.So, is this steadiness good or bad news?I reached out to the NAR to ask whether July’s existing-home sales are a sign of a stable market — or a frozen one?”A more normal level would be around 5 million existing-home sales, compared with the current pace of about 4 million,” Yun told me. “Transactions are still happening, but sales are neither meaningfully rising nor falling.”The housing market is far from where it should be. But considering that mortgage rates increased throughout July, the market could be much worse.Why high mortgage rates didn’t crush existing-home sales Mortgage rates held at over 6.5% in July. The National Association of Realtors noted that the average 30-year fixed mortgage rate was 6.54% in July, according to Freddie Mac data.The housing market is struggling, but it’s a bit surprising that existing-home sales weren’t worse in July. Especially since current mortgage rates are higher than many Americans had expected at the beginning of 2026.”Many eager buyers are no longer waiting on the sidelines, as they don’t expect mortgage rates to decline in any meaningful way and don’t want to risk being priced out,” Yun told me.Related: Zillow warns 2026 housing market has officially peakedThe 6.54% FRM average is 0.05% higher than June. However, it’s actually a decrease from July 2025, when the average was 6.72%.This could be a major reason why homebuyers were more active than one might have expected in July. Compared to this time last year, mortgage rates have actually improved.”Still, lower mortgage rates are needed to help more potential homebuyers qualify,” Yun said.

Existing-home sales data is crucial for understanding how the housing market is performing.UCG / Getty Images

‘It’s all about mortgage rates:’ What’s next for the housing marketWhat needs to happen for the U.S. to get on track for 5 million existing-home sales in 2026 rather than the current pace of 4 million?”In the short term, it’s all about mortgage rates,” Yun told me.So far, Freddie Mac mortgage rates have only gotten higher in August. The 30-year fixed mortgage rate increased three basis points to 6.69% on Aug. 6.But that could soon change.On Aug. 12, the average 30-year FRM was 6.74%, according to Mortgage News Daily (MND), a 0.05% decrease from the previous day. This was also the lowest MND rate in the last three weeks.MND published it several hours after the Bureau of Labor Statistics released the July Consumer Price Index (CPI).More Mortgage Rates:Zillow predicts major mortgage rate, housing market changeAmericans face 3 major takeaways after mortgage rate newsMortgage rate forecast resets after Fed decision”CPI is one of the two big inflation reports on any given month (the other being PCE) and it has more potential to cause a reaction because it comes out 2 weeks before PCE,” wrote Matthew Graham for MND.Year-over-year core inflation increased 2.5%, according to the July CPI. This was in line with economists’ expectations. It was also lower than the 2.6% core inflation rate for June and the 2.9% rate for May.”There was no additional improvement in bonds after the data, but arguably a fair amount of improvement in anticipation of just such a result,” Graham wrote.The July inflation data could help mortgage rates decline slightly in August — which would also boost home sales.”Anything that brings down inflationary pressures will be impactful,” Yun said. “Even a softer job market, if accompanied by falling inflationary pressure and lower mortgage rates, could be supportive, as home sales generally respond more favorably to lower rates.”NAR releases home sales, housing market dataThe following July data from the National Association of Realtors provides more insight into crucial housing market indicators.Total housing inventory: July inventory came in at 1.54 million units, which was down 1.9% from June and 0.6% from last July. This results in a 4.6-month inventory supply, which is flat since last month and last year.Median sales price: The median existing-home sale price was $434,100 for all home types (single-family housing, condos, and co-ops). This is a year-over-year increase of 2% — marking 37 straight months of price increases.Housing affordability: Affordability improved nationwide, with the largest growth in the West (7.3%) and the South (6.1%).Single-family home sales: Month-over-month single-family home sales decreased 1.9% in July to a seasonally adjusted rate of 3.69 million. Year-over-year sales increased by 0.8%.Condo and co-op sales: There was no monthly or annual change in the rate of condo or co-op sales in July. The seasonally adjusted annual rate was 370,000. The yearly median price increased by 2.2% to $371,800.
Source: National Association of Realtors
Related: How the South became America’s biggest buyer’s market

Target (TGT) has spent the past year trying to convince shoppers and investors that its turnaround is real. On Tuesday, it made a move to prove it.The retailer named its first-ever chief artificial intelligence officer, pulling a senior executive away from a direct rival to run the job. It also promoted a second leader to keep that technology focused on how people actually shop.For a company that has struggled with inconsistent sales growth and declining customer visits, the message was clear. Target wants AI to sit at the center of its strategy, not as a side project.The stock has already responded to the broader comeback, climbing more than 50% in 2026. The question now is whether one hire can turn a rebound into something that lasts.Here is what the appointment means, why Wall Street reacted the way it did, and what you should watch before treating it as a reason to buy.What Target actually announced about its new AI leaderTarget named Chandhu Nair as its first chief AI officer and senior vice president, according to CNBC. The appointment will be effective August 24, 2026.Nair joins from home-improvement rival Lowe’s, where he spent more than six years. He most recently led stores, data, AI, and innovation. He earlier held roles at Staples and Gap.Alongside Nair, Target promoted Purvi Shah to senior vice president of user experience. Both will report to chief information and product officer Prat Vemana, Target confirmed.That pairing matters. Instead of bolting AI onto existing apps, Target is tying it directly to design, so the technology shows up as something shoppers and workers actually find useful.

Target is placing AI at the center of a multiyear turnaround aimed at winning back shoppers.Kevin Carter / Getty Images

Why Target is putting AI in the C-suite nowTarget is not early to this. Rivals have been building AI teams for a while, and the company said as much when it framed the hire as a way to bring “greater focus and coordination” across the business.Walmart (WMT), Gap (GAP), and Best Buy (BBY) have all pushed generative AI into shopping and operations. Naming an AI chief hints that Target intends to defend its share of the market rather than watch faster competitors pull ahead.More AI Coverage:BofA names Datadog its top software pick ahead of earningsGoogle stock price faces major AI test ahead of earningsThe whole chip trade is waiting on one reportThe appointment fits inside CEO Michael Fiddelke’s turnaround plan, which added an additional $2 billion in operational and capital investment for 2026, CIO Dive reported.Target already runs AI tools, including Target Trend Brain for forecasting styles and a conversational shopping feature built into ChatGPT. Nair’s job is to connect those scattered efforts into one plan.His core priorities are improving inventory efficiency, streamlining employee tools, and accelerating executive decision-making.What the move could do for Target’s marginsFor shareholders, Target’s recent problems have been about execution, and AI is aimed at the parts of the business that quietly drain profit.Better demand forecasting means fewer overstocked shelves and fewer deep markdowns to clear them. It also means fewer moments when a shopper wants something and finds it out of stock.Three areas where AI could lift Target’s resultsGross margin: Sharper inventory forecasting reduces markdowns and cuts the cost of unsold goods.Digital sales: Personalized recommendations and conversational search can raise how often browsing turns into buying.Operating expenses: Automating routine store and back-office tasks frees up labor and lowers overhead.Early results show the turnaround is working. Target posted first-quarter net sales of $25.4 billion, up 6.7% from a year earlier, Retail TouchPoints reported.AI only needs to fix one of these areas to move Target’s profit.How Wall Street reacted to the announcementAnalysts moved quickly, and the reaction was mostly positive.Oppenheimer analyst Rupesh Parikh reiterated an Outperform rating and raised his price target on Target to $170 from $140, Benzinga noted. He was not alone. In recent weeks, Wells Fargo lifted its target to $165, BMO Capital moved to $150, and TD Cowen raised its figure to $155. Wolfe Research also upgraded the stock to Outperform.The stock has backed up the optimism. Target shares are up more than 50% in 2026 and closed near $152 on Monday, above any level recorded last year, Yahoo Finance reported.That run also raises the bar. With much of the recovery already priced in, the AI plan needs to produce real results to justify further gains.The risks investors should weigh before buyingA management announcement is not the same as a finished product, and Target’s plan carries real execution risk.Digital transformations are expensive, and the spending competes with other priorities. Shareholders should watch whether rising tech budgets pressure cash flow or slow dividend growth.There is also a people problem. When AI tools get to the sales floor, workers sometimes see them as one more thing to manage rather than something that helps. Related: Goldman Sachs revamps SpaceX stock price target for 2026Other retailers have run into that exact friction during early rollouts.Nair’s real test is turning the plan into measurable savings and sales, not just launching features.For anyone holding or considering the stock, here are a few practical guidelines you can apply:How to judge Target’s AI bet as an investorTreat the hire as one input, not a guarantee of stock gains.Watch gross margin, digital growth, and expense control over the next two to three quarters.Compare Target’s AI progress against Walmart and Amazon, which have a head start.Keep the position sized within a diversified portfolio rather than betting on a single catalyst.The next earnings report is the first real checkpoint. If the numbers start reflecting the strategy, the case strengthens. If they don’t, the appointment stays a headline rather than a turning point.Related: Bank of America revamps AMD stock price target for 2026

Looking for help with today’s New York Times Wordle? Here are some expert hints, clues and commentary to help you solve today’s Wordle and sharpen your guessing game.

The helicopter crashed in central Texas after taking off from Fort Hood.

Nebius Group (NBIS) has trained its investors to brace for disappointment on days when the headlines look strong.In May, the company reported blowout first-quarter results, only to watch its stock fall almost 9% the following Monday. That pattern is exactly why the reaction stood out on Wednesday, August 12.Nebius reported second-quarter 2026 results before the open, and the market did not hesitate.Shares surged as much as 16.5%, according to an Investing.com recap of the earnings call, pulling the stock back toward levels it had not touched since before a brutal summer slide. For once, good news behaved like good news.Related: Michael Burry issues blunt warning as he bets against 2 AI favoritesRevenue reached $582.3 million for the quarter, up 454% from a year earlier, according to a press release. That topped the $573.8 million analysts had penciled in, based on estimates from Zacks Investment Research, the Associated Press reported.The loss narrowed just as sharply. Nebius posted a GAAP net loss of $190.4 million, or 68 cents per share, but the adjusted loss came to just 12 cents, far better than the 67-cent loss Wall Street expected, the Associated Press reported.That gap matters because it shows the core business is burning far less cash than the headline number implies.Wall Street had good reason to expect another selloffHeading into the report, Nebius was still down roughly 36% from its June record high near $300, according to TipRanks. Short interest stood at 28.8% of the available float, among the most heavily bet-against AI infrastructure names on the market, according to Schaeffer’s Investment Research.Investor Michael Burry had also disclosed a short position in Nebius. Every prior stumble had given short sellers fresh ammunition.Shares were even down 12% over the trailing month heading into the report, reflecting lingering unease about the pace of its spending, according to TipRanks.Those episodes built a narrative that Nebius was spending its way into growth rather than earning it. Wednesday’s report took most of that ammunition away.

Nebius shares jumped as much as 16.5% after revenue surged 454% and losses narrowed sharply in its second-quarter 2026 report.Bloomberg / Getty Images

The numbers behind the turnaroundAdjusted EBITDA swung to a profit of $236.2 million, compared with a $21 million loss in the same quarter last year, according to the press release. The adjusted EBITDA margin climbed to 41%, up from 32% just one quarter earlier.That improvement did not come from cutting spending. Nebius still spent $5.66 billion on property and equipment during the quarter, more than ten times what it spent a year earlier.It scaled revenue faster than it scaled costs, which is the harder trick to pull off in AI infrastructure.Pricing power is the signal that matters mostThe most important detail in the release was not the headline beat. Nebius said a recent capacity auction cleared 15% above its previous high price for Nvidia Blackwell chips, while short-term capacity deals fetched $40 million to $50 million per megawatt, according to the Investing.com recap.That is direct evidence that demand, not just capital spending, is driving the business.Nebius also raised its year-end contracted power target to 5 gigawatts, up from roughly 4 gigawatts previously.Management reaffirmed full-year revenue guidance of $3 billion to $3.4 billion and kept its capital expenditure plan at $20 billion to $25 billion, unchanged from prior guidance.That combination, rising prices alongside unchanged spending plans, tells a different story than pure capacity expansion.It suggests Nebius is selling scarce compute rather than discounting it to fill data centers, a distinction that matters more to margins than growth alone.Rival neocloud CoreWeave posted its own strong results a day earlier, and its rally spilled into Nebius shares before Wednesday’s numbers even landed, according to TipRanks.That sequencing shows investors are now pricing the neocloud group on evidence of real pricing leverage, not just future revenue growth.More AI:Nvidia just made a move Wall Street wasn’t ready forMicrosoft just took sides in AI policy fightOpenAI just disclosed something genuinely alarmingThe broader test for neocloud investorsNot every doubt disappeared. D.A. Davidson analyst Gil Luria has warned that construction delays at Nebius’s Vineland facility could slow the conversion of contracted power into revenue-generating capacity, a risk he does not expect to resolve this year, according to TipRanks.Nebius also depends heavily on a few large customers, including a five-year compute deal with Meta Platforms and a strategic investment from Nvidia, according to The Motley Fool.That concentration is worth watching precisely because it is the flip side of Wednesday’s good news.The same customers whose commitments justified today’s rally could just as easily slow their spending if their own AI budgets tighten, and Nebius has limited ability to control that timeline.Nebius’s swing from sell-the-news to buy-the-beat says less about one company and more about where investors are drawing the line in AI infrastructure. Growth alone no longer earns the benefit of the doubt.What moved this stock was proof that pricing, not just capacity, is scaling with demand. The neoclouds that can show the same thing at their next report will be the ones that keep defying their own history too.Related: Nebius lands $1 billion AI deal as one major risk looms

Home improvement and hardware store chains have battled lower sales in the last year as a sluggish housing market and consumers’ reluctance to spend on renovation projects in uncertain times affects their business.Smaller hardware chains also face fierce competition from big-box stores, like Home Depot and Lowe’s. Other challenges, such as litigation, can affect a retailer’s business as well.Woodcrest Ace Hardware, which operates two Southern California Ace Hardware stores, filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection after facing an alleged and disputed product liability and negligence lawsuit regarding Roundup herbicide, according to the debtor’s petition.The petition did not list any other details regarding the product liability and negligence lawsuit.

The operator of two Southern California Ace Hardware stores files for bankruptcy protection. Sundry Photography/Shutterstock

Hardware store operator files bankruptcyThe debtor, which a part of Ace Hardware’s retailer-owned hardware cooperative, did not cite increased competition, financial distress or any other specific reason for filing for Chapter 11 bankruptcy in its petition. The Riverside, Calif.-based debtor filed its petition in the U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the Central District of California on Aug. 11, listing $1 million to $10 million in assets and debts. Woodcrest Ace Hardware operates a store at 18845 Van Buren Blvd., Suite B5, in Riverside, Calif., and Wildomar Ace Hardware at 23881 Clinton Keith Road, in Wildomar, Calif., according to its petition. The debtor also owns a uniform retailer P&P Uniforms in Riverside.Debtor will assume its leasesLeases for all three businesses were listed on the debtor’s petition, with Woodcrest Ace Hardware planning to assume the lease contracts. The stores continue to operate as normal.Woodcrest Ace Hardware’s largest unsecured creditors include the Ace Hardware Corporation, owed over $620,000; CFT NV Developments, owed over $176,000; CVS Longs Drugs, owed over $121,000; 5.11, owed over $36,000; and American Express, owed over $20,000.The debtor’s Woodcrest Ace Hardware location faces competition from a nearby Home Depot store, located about 5 miles away at 3323 Madison in Riverside. The closest Home Depot to the Wildomar Ace Hardware is about 3.8 miles away at 27738 Clinton Keith Road in Murrieta, Calif.The company’s CEO Paul D. Shanabarger was not immediately available for comment.Woodcrest’s second bankruptcy filingThis is Woodcrest Ace Hardware’s second trip to bankruptcy court, as it previously filed for Chapter 11 protection on April 12, 2019. The first case was closed with the approval of a final decree on Sept. 14, 2020, according to Inforuptcy. Home Depot dominates the home improvement sector, capturing 28% of the market share in 2025, with Lowe’s owning 17% of the market and Amazon generating 11% of the sector’s sales, according to the Numerator Home Improvement Tracker.Ace Hardware holds 2% of market shareAce Hardware captured about 2% of the market share in 2025, according to the tracker.Home Depot’s Chief Financial Officer Richard McPhail discussed problems with the housing market, which have led to home improvement store economic issues, during a February 2026 earnings call.“The housing turnover has remained at historic lows since 2023, which has significantly reduced demand for projects and other purchases associated with buying and selling a home,” McPhail said in the company’s quarterly earnings call, according to MarketBeat.Related: 63-year-old popular restaurant chain files Chapter 11 bankruptcy