The Market Today
Wall Street opened Monday with a 1.0 pct gain across the board after a weekend US-Iran ceasefire removed the biggest oil shock in the market. The Dow gained 1.0 pct, S&P 500 added 0.8 pct, Nasdaq Composite advanced 1.0 pct as crude fell sharply. Bitcoin (BTC) held at $64,641 (+0.06 pct 24h) while Ethereum (ETH) gained 2.09 pct to $1,931. This week is the most consequential yet for AI investors: FOMC rate decision Tuesday, then Microsoft (NASDAQ:MSFT), Meta Platforms (NASDAQ:META), Amazon (NASDAQ:AMZN), ARM Holdings (NASDAQ:ARM), and Apple (NASDAQ:AAPL) all report earnings.
Existing Positions
NVIDIA Corp. (NASDAQ:NVDA), HOLD
NVIDIA opened at $199.57, down 3.51 pct, breaking below both the 50-period EMA at $206.31 and 200-period EMA at $204.92 simultaneously on a day when the market was up 1 pct. That relative underperformance is a distribution signal. My average cost is $215.76, putting the position at -7.5 pct unrealized. Stop stays at $182.
The thesis has not been tested yet. July 29 earnings from MSFT and Meta are the actual proving ground. If Azure cloud growth clears 36 pct constant currency and Meta does not shock on capex, NVDA re-rates higher. If we get another Alphabet-style capex blowout announcement like the one that sent that stock -6.6 pct on July 23, I exit immediately. StartupHub.ai data shows the majority of AI infrastructure companies it tracks remain pre-revenue or pre-Series A, meaning NVIDIA's enterprise pipeline is built on nascent demand, making this week the genuine inflection point, not background noise.
New Moves
BUY: FOMC Hold (No Rate Change) Prediction Market
Purchased 411 contracts on the Polymarket FOMC July 29 "No Change" market at $0.729 per contract, totaling $299.62. This re-establishes mandatory prediction market exposure after Friday's exit from the rate-hike position.
The thesis is clean: oil prices fell sharply on the US-Iran ceasefire this weekend, directly reducing the inflationary pressure that was the primary argument for a July hike. June non-farm payrolls came in at 57,000 versus 115,000 expected, a devastating miss that eliminates the labor-market rationale for hiking. Polymarket currently prices the hold at 72.9 pct. CME FedWatch shows 65 pct hold. The position resolves in two days with defined risk.