Micron's $41.5B Blowout Reignites the AI Trade. Nasdaq Futures Jump 2% and Oil Breaks Below $70.

Thursday, June 25, 2026, written pre-market around 7:30am ET. The verdict is in, and it was emphatic. Micron’s fiscal Q3 print last night did not just clear the lowered bar from Tuesday’s rout, it vaulted over it, and the AI-memory complex is roaring back this morning. Nasdaq 100 futures are up about 2.1 percent near 30,600, S&P 500 futures are firmer by roughly 0.7 percent near 7,490, and the Dow is up a more modest 137 points as the gains concentrate in technology. Micron itself is indicated up 17 to 18 percent pre-market, Qualcomm is up double digits on a separate data-center bombshell from its investor day, and the entire storage and memory chain is ripping in sympathy. As always with a pre-open note, these are overnight and futures levels and they can move by the bell, and this morning there is a live wildcard, with core PCE due at 8:30am ET.

Top Call: Micron Settled the AI-Memory Argument, and It Was Not Close

The single most important thing for PMs this morning is that the print everyone was holding their breath for came in as a genuine blowout, and it reframes Tuesday’s selloff as exactly the positioning flush we argued it was. Micron reported revenue of roughly $41.5 billion against a Street near $35.7 billion, non-GAAP EPS of $25.11 versus about $20.49 expected, and an operating margin of 81.2 percent, with revenue up 74 percent sequentially and a staggering 346 percent year over year. Crucially, management did not just deliver the quarter, it guided the next one higher and confirmed that HBM4 is already in volume production for Nvidia’s Vera Rubin platform and ramping roughly twice as fast as HBM3E did. This is the cleanest possible answer to the bubble question that cracked the tape on Tuesday. The demand is real, the pricing power is intact, and the margin structure held at a level that leaves no room for the bears to argue erosion. We stay constructive and read this as a buy-the-flush confirmation, with one caveat we flag below: the rally now has to get past core PCE this morning, and a hot inflation number is the only thing standing between this print and a clean trend day higher.

Semiconductors: Micron Validates the Whole Chain, and Qualcomm Widens the Bid

Start with the numbers because they are the story. Micron put up its largest quarter in history by a wide margin, and the composition matters as much as the headline. Operating income reached roughly $33.7 billion on an 81.2 percent operating margin, free cash flow was a record near $18.3 billion, and the company reiterated that its calendar 2026 HBM output is effectively sold out under multi-year contracts. The single number we cared about most heading in was gross margin, because it is the cleanest read on whether HBM pricing is holding, and at these levels it confirms the answer is yes. The forward commentary is what turns a good quarter into a regime signal. HBM4 in volume production for Vera Rubin, ramping at double the pace of the prior generation, tells you Micron is no longer playing catch-up to SK Hynix on the Nvidia roadmap, it is supplying it at scale today. After Tuesday’s de-grossing wiped out anyone leaning the wrong way, the marginal buyer is now stepping back in with conviction.

The sympathy move is broad and that breadth is the bullish tell. SanDisk is indicated up more than 16 percent and Western Digital up roughly 13 percent pre-market, with Seagate up high single digits, as Micron’s blowout signals that the upcycle extends past DRAM into NAND and storage. This is not one name being squeezed, it is the whole memory and storage chain repricing higher on a demand read that nobody can dismiss. The read-through for the AI infrastructure trade is constructive into quarter-end, and it lands on a tape that was pricing in the opposite outcome only 48 hours ago.

Then there is Qualcomm, which delivered a genuine surprise at its investor day and is up 10 to 12 percent pre-market on it. Management nearly doubled its fiscal 2029 non-handset revenue target to $40 billion from a prior $22 billion, set a $15 billion data-center sales goal for that year, and unveiled a data-center CPU called Dragonfly C1000 that Meta will deploy starting in 2028. It also bought Modular, a software startup positioned as an alternative to Nvidia’s CUDA. Our take is that Qualcomm just repositioned itself from a smartphone-cycle story into a credible AI-infrastructure name, and the market is rewarding the diversification. The strategic logic is sound, though we would temper the enthusiasm with a reminder that 2029 targets are a long way out and Nvidia’s software moat is the part of the story still to be proven. For today, the practical effect is that the AI bid has visibly broadened beyond the usual handful of names, which is healthier for the trade than another narrow melt-up.

Macro: The Fear Bid Unwinds, but PCE at 8:30 Is the Gatekeeper

The cross-asset picture this morning is the textbook mirror of Tuesday’s all-correlations-to-one panic. Gold has slid to roughly $4,038, down about 2.7 percent, Bitcoin has dropped near $60,150, off close to 4 percent, and the VIX has eased to 18.44 as the haven bid that swelled during the rout drains back out. When equities rip and gold, crypto, and the fear gauge all fall together, that is risk appetite returning, not a new worry, and it reinforces the read that Tuesday was about positioning rather than fundamentals. Treasuries are firmer too, with the 10-year easing a few basis points toward 4.45 percent as lower oil takes some pressure off the inflation math.

The reason we are not calling an all-clear is the data wall this morning. Core PCE for May lands at 8:30am ET alongside final Q1 GDP, expected near 1.6 percent, weekly jobless claims around 225,000, and durable goods orders. The PCE print is the one that matters, with consensus looking for something in the 2.6 percent year-over-year range on the core. Remember the backdrop: the Fed under Kevin Warsh has leaned hawkish, lifted its inflation forecast, and tilted the dot plot toward a hike, and markets are pricing meaningful odds of a September move. A hot core PCE this morning would hand the higher-for-longer camp a fundamental anchor and could cap or even reverse the chip-led rally before the cash open, while an in-line or cooler number would clear the runway and likely let the AI trade run into quarter-end. We are constructive on the equity tape but would respect the 8:30 print as the session’s true pivot, since this note is written an hour before it drops.

Oil: The Slide Pushes Below $70 for the First Time Since February

Crude extended its decline overnight, with WTI slipping below $70 to roughly $69.42 and Brent easing toward $73.43, both at fresh multi-month lows. The drivers are unchanged and structural. Tankers are moving freely through a reopened Strait of Hormuz, the US Treasury’s 60-day license authorizing Iranian crude sales is clearing a path for more sanctioned barrels, and OPEC is still adding supply against a trimmed 2026 demand outlook. Oil has now unwound essentially the entire war premium it built in the spring. For portfolios the read-through is the familiar and, this morning, the helpful one. Cheaper energy is a clean disinflationary tailwind that feeds directly into the PCE math due at 8:30, even as it keeps draining the energy equities that have been the weakest corner of the market all month. The one caveat is the geopolitics below, where the inspection dispute is the headline that could put a bid back under crude.

Geopolitics: The Iran Inspection Dispute Hardens

The optimism that drove this month’s war-premium unwind hit another snag overnight, and the gap between Washington and Tehran is now wider, not narrower. IAEA Director General Grossi said his inspectors will visit Iran’s enrichment sites, insisting the memorandum signed by both presidents explicitly places nuclear activities under IAEA supervision. Vice President Vance went further, claiming Iran had agreed to readmit inspectors and that contact could begin as soon as Monday. Tehran pushed back hard. Iran’s Foreign Ministry spokesman Baghaei said there is no schedule, that Iran has not met with Grossi, and that any visit would only follow a final deal, not precede it. That is a meaningful hardening from the framing earlier in the week.

Our read is that the market impact stays limited for now because the parts that move oil are still working, namely the open strait and the crude license, which is why energy keeps bleeding lower rather than spiking. But the substance of the nuclear file, especially enrichment and the uranium stockpile that experts believe is large enough to matter, is now visibly contested in public by the two governments that signed the deal. This is the live tail risk into quarter-end. A breakdown in the inspection question is the single headline that could reverse the oil slide and rebuild the haven bid in gold that just unwound this morning.

Asia and Europe Overnight

Asia ripped, and the leadership came from exactly where the pain was on Tuesday. Korea was the standout, with the Kospi rallying roughly 6 percent as Micron’s print lit a fire under the memory names that had collapsed earlier in the week, SK Hynix surging nearly 16 percent and Kioxia adding more than 6 percent. This is the clearest evidence yet that Tuesday’s circuit-breaker limit-down was a positioning event, since the same stocks that triggered the global selloff are now leading the recovery on a fundamental catalyst. Japan firmed, with the Nikkei 225 up about 1.6 percent near 72,450 as the chip complex carried the index higher, and Greater China advanced, with the Hang Seng up roughly 1.4 percent to 23,900 and the CSI 300 up about half a percent near 4,742. Europe opened higher in sympathy but more cautiously, the Stoxx 600 up about 0.3 percent and the DAX firmer near 24,980, with German and French consumer confidence and Spain’s final Q1 GDP on the regional calendar. The transatlantic pattern is intact: Asia led hard on the memory read, Europe followed at a fraction of the move, and the US is set to open with the largest gains concentrated in the Nasdaq.

Geopolitical Tracker

US-Iran: The 60-day ceasefire memorandum holds and the Strait of Hormuz stays open, but the inspection question has hardened into a public standoff. The IAEA and Washington say Iran agreed to readmit inspectors to its enrichment sites; Tehran says there is no schedule and any visit comes only after a final deal. Enrichment and the stockpile remain the unresolved core and the live tail.

Ukraine-Russia: Still structurally unresolved and overshadowed by the Iran track. Combat continues along the eastern axes and a pending US security-assistance package is the item to watch for fresh headline risk.

United Kingdom: Keir Starmer remains in office pending the Labour leadership contest that opens July 9, with Andy Burnham the front-runner. A domestic story with limited US spillover.

Taiwan Strait and South China Sea: PRC coast guard pressure near the Pratas Islands continues at a low simmer with no major escalation.

Quick Take: Micron (MU) Q3 FY26, Reported Last Night After Close

Our Take: This is as clean as a print gets, and it settles the bubble debate that cracked the tape on Tuesday. Revenue up 346 percent year over year with margins held near 81 percent and HBM4 already ramping at scale for Nvidia is a demand signal, not a sentiment story. We read Tuesday’s flush as a positioning unwind and this as the confirmation, and we stay constructive on the memory and storage chain into quarter-end. The only thing that can spoil it today is a hot core PCE at 8:30.

Quick Take: Qualcomm (QCOM) Investor Day, June 24

Our Take: Qualcomm just repositioned from a handset-cycle story into a credible AI-infrastructure play, and the market is paying for it. The Meta CPU win and the Modular deal give the data-center pitch real substance. We would temper the move because 2029 is far off and Nvidia’s CUDA moat is the part still to be proven, but the strategic direction is right and it broadens the AI bid beyond the usual names, which is healthier for the trade.

Key Events Ahead

Thursday pre-market note, June 25, 2026, drafted around 7:30am ET. Levels shown are pre-open futures and overnight prices and may shift by the cash open. S&P 500 futures +0.7% near 7,490, Nasdaq 100 futures +2.1% near 30,600, Dow futures +0.3% as Micron’s blowout reignites the AI trade. Micron reported Q3 FY26 with revenue near $41.5B versus ~$35.7B expected, non-GAAP EPS of $25.11 versus ~$20.49, an 81.2% operating margin, and revenue up 346% year over year; the stock is indicated +17% to +18%. Qualcomm is +10% to +12% after lifting its FY29 non-handset target to $40B and unveiling the Dragonfly C1000 data-center CPU with Meta as a 2028 customer. SanDisk +16%, Western Digital +13%, Seagate high single digits. The Kospi rallied ~6% with SK Hynix +16%; Nikkei 225 +1.6% to ~72,450; Hang Seng +1.4% to 23,900. WTI below $70 at ~$69.42 and Brent ~$73.43 at fresh lows after the US authorized Iranian crude sales for 60 days. Gold slid to ~$4,038, Bitcoin to ~$60,150, VIX 18.44, 10Y 4.45%, DXY ~100.10. Core PCE for May is due at 8:30am ET; the IAEA and Tehran publicly dispute whether inspectors will return to Iran’s enrichment sites. For internal use only. Not investment advice.