Business & Markets — August 12, 2026

July inflation report due this morning. Economists expect Wednesday's 8:30 a.m. ET CPI report to show July inflation cooled to 3.4%, with energy prices the key swing factor ahead of the Fed's next move.

Business Insider notes the reading arrives as the Federal Reserve weighs its next policy step, making the print a potential input into rate decisions. Forecasters see energy costs as the main variable that could push the headline figure above or below the anticipated 3.4% pace, so markets will be watching that component closely when the data is released.

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Foxconn Q2 profit rises 35%. Taiwan's Foxconn, the world's largest contract electronics maker, reported a 35% rise in second-quarter profit Wednesday. Strong AI demand drove the beat, and the company expects it to keep fueling growth this year.

Reuters reports the result exceeded analyst forecasts, underscoring how demand tied to artificial intelligence has become a central driver of the Taiwanese manufacturer's business. Foxconn also offered a forward-looking signal, telling investors it anticipates AI-related demand will continue to propel its performance through the rest of the year, giving markets a gauge of the broader hardware supply chain.

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CoreWeave revenue doubles. Shares of the AI cloud provider rose sharply after revenue doubled and topped expectations, with its CEO declaring the results "an important inflection point."

MarketWatch reports the quarter reinforced the company's position as a beneficiary of spending on artificial intelligence infrastructure, with the top-line beat prompting a strong market reaction. The CEO's characterization of the results as a turning point, as quoted by MarketWatch, framed the quarter as evidence of accelerating momentum in demand for AI-focused cloud computing capacity.

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Nvidia lines up $500 billion in financing. Nvidia announced a plan to arrange $500 billion in AI financing by pitching its GPUs as revenue-generating collateral lenders can underwrite -- an approach Wall Street has begun endorsing.

CEO Jensen Huang told CNBC the company's chips amount to an 'investable asset,' arguing the hardware is widely adopted, flexible and transferable enough for lenders to treat compute capacity as collateral that generates revenue. If the model takes hold, it could open a new channel for funding AI infrastructure buildouts, and CNBC reports some Wall Street firms have already begun backing the concept.

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