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As the Iran conflict escalates, Brent crude oil has broken through the $100 per barrel mark for the first time, pushing US Treasury yields to their highest level this year. Risk aversion is rampant in the market.

Combined with a sharp drop in tech stocks, this has dragged down the Nasdaq.

The Singapore stock market continues to perform exceptionally well. Although it was pulled lower by last night's US market open, it showed resilience in the afternoon session, indicating that the Straits Times Index remains vibrant.

Fingers crossed that tonight's US market isn't a Black Friday.

Last night, the earnings reports for Google and Tesla were released. Both major tech companies exceeded sales expectations, but AI spending continues to rise. Wall Street is focused on capital expenditure bills: $200 billion for Google and negative cash flow for Tesla. Wall Street remains unwilling to bow to the high expenses of tech companies. Market short-selling sentiment persists.

But this is all normal; human technological progress is unstoppable, and this will also be reflected in stock market trends.

The cryptocurrency sector surged after US Treasury Secretary Bessent stated that the 'CLARITY Act' has entered the 'final stage' in the Senate.

Bitcoin rose +2% to approximately $66,400.

Cryptocurrencies began showing positive sentiment only after a long period of stagnation, waiting for this market to turn around.

Singapore Airlines (C6L) → Will hold a shareholders' meeting on July 24 to defend its stake in Indian Airlines, which has dragged down FY25/26 performance with a loss share of S$945.2 million; the book value of its 25.1% stake dropped from $2.02 billion to $1.13 billion.

Indian Airlines dragging down Singapore Airlines' stock price has happened repeatedly. Will this round also result in paying the price?

Singapore Airlines' stock price has currently returned to rationality, but negative factors such as oil prices, international conflicts, and Indian Airlines continue to weigh it down.

On Friday, Apple's market cap briefly surpassed Nvidia's to become the world's most valuable company. Driven by the rise of consumer-grade AI, Apple avoids the massive capital expenditure bills borne by cloud service and chip giants.

This represents a healthy regression in contrast to the substantial cost expenditures associated with AI infrastructure and storage chips.

Can this new order be maintained? Or will it have to compete fiercely with the market's profit-driven frenzy?

SpaceX (SPCX) -3% → closed at $131.11, marking the first time it has ever closed below its $135 IPO price, following the cancellation of the Starship test flight due to an engine failure to ignite; after-hours trading saw the stock price drop to around $124.

Is this the right time to enter the market?

Starlink has always been a profitable performer, but due to the implications of space launches and AI investments, SPCX has suffered a heavy blow just after its listing.

Despite volatility in regional chip stocks, the Singapore stock market remains resilient, approaching historical highs, with local bank stocks being the main driving force. Coupled with the simultaneous push from several blue-chip stocks such as Singapore Airlines and ST Engineering, the next wave of correction is expected to take some time.

Singapore's second-quarter GDP grew 5.7% year-on-year (preliminary estimate), slowing from 6.3% in the first quarter but exceeding expectations of 5.5%. The manufacturing sector led with a +12.2% growth rate, driven by strong performance in the electronics and precision engineering industries fueled by demand for AI chips.

The three major Singaporean bank stocks have been rising continuously, driving gains in the Straits Times Index.

Several strong signals have fueled the next wave of market movement.

Intel (INTC) → announced an investment of 5 billion euros (5.7 billion US dollars) to expand its campus in Leixlip, Ireland, for the production of next-generation Xeon chips, in an attempt to maintain competitiveness in the AI race.

INTC's valuation is already high. Will increasing AI investment again affect investment orientation?

Gold → closed at around $4,112 on Friday, then fell towards $4,060 at the beginning of this week due to rising inflation and interest rate hike expectations triggered by escalating tensions in the Strait of Hormuz, which pushed up real yields (this is a headwind for gold in 2026).

With the war and interest rate hikes and cuts being unpredictable, and as storage/computing power stocks surged and chip stocks provided strong support, the US dollar index weakened, and the safe-haven appeal of precious metals declined.

The Straits Times Index continued to rise, driven by bank stocks (led by UOB), breaking through the 5,400 point mark. The bigger headline is: Temasek's investment portfolio hit a record high of S$518 billion (an increase of S$49 billion), with a one-year total shareholder return of 10.5%, primarily benefiting from its listed Singapore assets.

Benefiting from growth in non-oil exports and two-way growth in oil derivative exports, coupled with the strong performance of the three major bank stocks, the Singapore stock market hit new highs for consecutive days!

Foundation Healthcare (FHH) → The IPO on the Singapore Exchange was oversubscribed 9.4 times (public offering portion), raising S$242 million; trading began on July 8.

Even though recent IPOs were oversubscribed, they all slid to new lows after public trading, giving a feeling of 'fading after exposure.' I wonder what the reason is?

SpaceX (SPCX) → first day in the Nasdaq-100; despite ~$4.3B of expected passive buying, it only edged up ~1% to $158.77, still well below its IPO-week highs.

SpaceX is driving space stocks and even AI growth stocks, and should have great potential.