Chips Lead, Shorts Retreat, Cisco in Focus

US Market Highlights

The dominant theme across markets today is the AI chip trade. NVDA, MU, and AMD are attracting the heaviest bullish options flow of the week. Analysts are reinforcing the trade. MRVL now carries a $257 consensus target. All 38 analyst recommendations on Marvell are Buys. Optical component maker LITE saw its target jump $22 to $1,148 on surging data-centre demand.

Tonight's big macro event is CSCO's earnings release. The networking giant carries a ~$475 billion market cap. Its results will set the tone for enterprise tech spending sentiment. Optical name COHR also posts numbers today.

On the short side, CHWY saw 15 percentage points of short interest unwind in a single week. SI fell from 110.9% to 95.6% of free float. That is still extreme — but the direction signals bears are nervous. WOLF tells the opposite story. Short interest sits at 82.9% of free float and still climbing, with bears adding 4 more points this week.

APP is absorbing heavy put flow. The ad-tech firm is down 53% year-to-date. RSI sits at 28 — deep oversold territory. Options traders are not calling a bottom yet.

European & Global Spotlight

The FT reports volatility is tumbling. The VIX "fear gauge" has fallen to pre-war levels even as oil holds near $90 a barrel. Markets appear to be shrugging off Middle East risks — a possible sign of complacency, some investors warn.

In corporate insider activity, ACS Chairman Florentino Perez filed $92 million in personal share purchases across eight transactions between July 29 and August 7. That scale of concentrated CEO buying is hard to ignore.