Odaily News, Citrini analyst jukan posted on X platform, according to Korean media reports, SK Hynix is preparing a shareholder return program worth approximately 100 trillion Korean won ($71 billion), including share buybacks and cash dividends. The company is expected to buy back approximately 40 trillion Korean won ($28.4 billion) in shares, accounting for just over 2% of total shares, close to the 2.5% proportion of new shares issued through its American Depositary Receipt offering.

Odaily News, Citrini analyst Jukan stated on the X platform that the market may have to adopt a "short memory, long optical" trading strategy in the short term, with some hedge funds already positioning in this direction, primarily based on three reasons:

First, after Korea's leveraged ETF market largely ceased to function, related investors are facing redemption pressure, which may lead to additional selling outflows. Adjustments in the capital chain of leveraged products could still put pressure on Korean memory stocks.

Second, Nvidia is adjusting its next-generation AI system architecture. Nvidia may reduce the HBM configuration per cabinet for Rubin Ultra and connect multiple cabinets via optical interconnect technology, keeping Rubin Ultra cluster-level performance ahead. Even if the HBM reduction stems from supply constraints rather than declining demand, optical communications could still become a key beneficiary in AI infrastructure.

Third, the market is forming a consensus that memory prices may peak within the next two quarters.

However, the long-term outlook for the storage industry remains positive, though the short-term view is cautious. AI infrastructure investment is gradually shifting from a sole focus on HBM storage capacity to the overall efficiency of data center architecture, including high-speed optical interconnects and other components, which may drive funds to rotate from memory chips to optical communications in the short term.

Odaily News: U.S. July nonfarm payrolls unexpectedly decreased by 23,000, significantly missing market expectations. Although seasonal factors and the fading of the World Cup dividend disrupted the data, this still notably weakens the Federal Reserve's momentum for a September rate hike, shifting market focus to next week's CPI.

Despite the "dismal" surface data, the unemployment rate unexpectedly fell to 4.1%. This seemingly contradictory phenomenon is actually attributed to a cumulative 0.7 percentage point decline in the labor force participation rate since the beginning of the year.

Analysts are divided in their interpretation of this "terrible" report. Thomas Ryan, Senior Economist at Capital Economics, stated bluntly that although the current weakness has not yet shown up in broader indicators, it is sufficient to prompt Fed officials to reassess the health of the labor market and reduce their willingness to further tighten monetary policy in the near term.

In the face of this report, which Adam Crisafulli, founder of Vital Knowledge, called "extremely terrible," the capital markets demonstrated typical contrarian logic. As traders bet that the rate hike process would stop here, U.S. stock futures rose accordingly, and Treasury yields collectively declined. According to data from CME Group's tools, the market-implied probability of a September rate hike has rapidly fallen from 55% on Thursday to 44%.

Odaily News - Ethereum Improvement Proposal EIP-8363 ("Tapered Issuance Burn") has triggered strong backlash from the community, becoming one of the most contentious debates over Ethereum's economic model since The Merge. The proposal, put forward by Ethereum Foundation researcher Justin Drake, ETHCC co-founder Jerome de Tychey, and others, aims to gradually reduce validator rewards as the ETH staking ratio rises, ultimately bringing new issuance down to zero when staked ETH reaches 50% of the total supply.

However, the proposal has drawn opposition from DeFi developers, staking service providers, and institutional investors alike. Critics argue that lowering staking yields could weaken the network's decentralization, disrupt Ethereum's DeFi ecosystem, and heighten market uncertainty around ETH's monetary policy. Opponents believe market mechanisms can already naturally regulate staking demand. Berryman noted that as yields decline to around 2%, new staking demand may naturally taper off, without the need for protocol-level changes to issuance policy.

Ether.fi founder Mike Silagadze stated that the proposal is "detrimental to decentralization, Ethereum adoption, and the network's reputation." Bitwise Ethereum business lead Steve Berryman also pointed out that institutional investors require policy certainty, and adjusting the issuance mechanism could introduce additional uncertainty. Greg Koumoutsos, technical research lead at the Lido Labs Foundation, noted that Ethereum pays not only in "slashable ETH" but also in decentralization, node diversity, censorship resistance, and network resilience. Aave founder Stani Kulechov also warned that reducing ETH staking yields could impact the DeFi ecosystem, as a large volume of staking derivatives has become an integral part of lending and yield strategies.

Additionally, the community is concerned that lowering staking rewards could paradoxically intensify centralization. Since individual validators lack economies of scale, declining yields may drive smaller nodes to exit, while large exchanges and institutional staking providers—backed by greater business demand—could continue expanding their market share.

Currently, EIP-8363 involves not only staking reward adjustments but has also sparked broad discussions over Ethereum's long-term monetary policy, governance stability, and institutional confidence. The community believes that such a significant change to the economic model requires more thorough debate and a longer evaluation period. (Cointelegraph)

Odaily Planet Daily News The U.S. Digital Asset Market Clarity Act (CLARITY Act) failed to seize a critical advancement window before the Senate's summer recess, and the market is now focusing on whether the U.S. crypto industry can continue to develop even if the bill ultimately fails.

Analysts believe that if the CLARITY Act fails to pass, it would be a significant setback for the crypto industry, but not a fatal blow. The bill was designed to clarify the boundaries between securities, commodities, and other categories of digital assets, determine the agencies responsible for overseeing related businesses, and grant the U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) clearer regulatory authority over crypto commodity trading.

Currently, the bill's progress has stalled, and the likelihood of comprehensive crypto market structure legislation being enacted before the end of the year is declining. This means the U.S. may still lack a clear digital asset regulatory framework, particularly regarding oversight of trading in major crypto assets such as Bitcoin (BTC) and Ethereum (ETH), where jurisdictional gaps remain between the CFTC and the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC).

However, industry insiders point out that even if the CLARITY Act fails, the SEC and CFTC are still likely to continue advancing industry development through policy statements, regulatory guidance, and existing enforcement authority.

In recent years, both agencies have issued multiple pieces of guidance clarifying the regulatory boundaries of business models such as crypto mining, Meme coins, and staking rewards. One of the most significant measures among these is the digital asset taxonomy framework, which seeks to establish standardized regulatory classifications for different types of digital assets. (CoinDesk)

Odaily News: One week after the implementation of regulatory measures on single-stock leveraged and inverse ETFs in South Korea, trading activity in related products has noticeably cooled, with trading volume falling below 1 trillion KRW for two consecutive trading days.

According to data from the Korea Exchange (KRX), on August 7, the combined trading volume of 16 single-stock leveraged and inverse ETFs in the Korean market stood at 941.2 billion KRW, marking the second consecutive trading day below 1 trillion KRW after the previous day's 919.8 billion KRW.

Market observers believe the decline in trading volume is mainly attributed to the new regulatory measures implemented on July 31. The new rules raise the capital threshold for ordinary retail investors to participate in single-stock leveraged ETFs, increasing the base margin requirement from 10 million KRW to 30 million KRW in cash.

Data shows that on the day before the regulation took effect (July 30), the trading volume of the 16 related ETFs reached as high as 12.45 trillion KRW. On the first day of regulation (July 31), it plummeted to 3.15 trillion KRW, and has continued to decline since, dropping to 1.39 trillion KRW and 1.26 trillion KRW on August 3 and 4 respectively, before falling below 1 trillion KRW in recent days.

Meanwhile, the share of single-stock leveraged and inverse ETFs in the overall Korean ETF market turnover has also dropped significantly, falling to 5.6% on August 7, compared with 30% to 40% before the regulation.

However, Korean securities institutions point out that investment demand has not completely disappeared. Instead, there is evidence of "regulatory arbitrage" or a "balloon effect," with funds shifting toward semiconductor leveraged ETFs and overseas-listed leveraged products.

Jung Hyun-jong, a researcher at Korea Investment & Securities, stated that while single-stock leveraged ETF trading volumes have declined following the regulation, semiconductor leveraged ETF trading volume has actually increased, indicating that some capital is rotating into alternative products. Overseas market products may also become targets for capital flows. Jung noted that since overseas-listed ETFs are not subject to domestic Korean regulatory restrictions, investors may turn to overseas single-stock leveraged ETFs. Among them, the Hong Kong-listed CSOP SK Hynix Daily (2x) Leveraged Product is currently one of the largest single-stock leveraged ETF products globally by market capitalization. Domestic Korean regulatory measures alone are unlikely to fully curb investor demand for semiconductor cycles and high-leverage strategies, and the long-term effectiveness of the regulation will require continued observation. (Daum)

Odaily News: Bitcoin's volatility has recently neared zero, but market risks have not been resolved. Data shows that spot Bitcoin ETFs have not seen any outflows in the first week of August, with cumulative net inflows of approximately $754 million. However, Bitcoin's price remains around $64,700, while the options market is heavily focused on downside protection near $62,000 and $63,000.

Market signals are showing divergence: on one hand, demand for spot ETFs has picked up again; on the other hand, derivatives traders are positioning in advance for a potential pullback, especially ahead of the latest U.S. employment data release.

However, looking at the overall positioning structure, the market still leans bullish. Bitcoin call options account for approximately 60.7% of total open interest, indicating that investors' long-term expectations remain positive, with recent trading more concentrated on short-term risk hedging. Meanwhile, the cost of volatility protection remains low. Deribit's DVOL index, which reflects Bitcoin's expected volatility over the next 30 days, is currently around 35—a significant drop from the high of 90 earlier this year—suggesting that the market sees limited potential for major swings in the short term.

That said, U.S. macroeconomic data could break this balance. The market expects U.S. non-farm payrolls for July to increase by approximately 97,500, up from 57,000 in June, with the unemployment rate expected to hold at 4.2%. If the employment data comes in stronger than expected, it could push U.S. Treasury yields higher and reinforce expectations of Fed rate hikes; if the data is weak, it could push yields down, but also heighten concerns about slowing economic growth.

Currently, the Bitcoin market presents a pattern of "ETF inflows underpinning spot prices while the options market hedges against downside." Potential risks remain a concern in a low-volatility environment. With low market participation and insufficient liquidity, even small changes in supply or demand could trigger sharp swings in asset prices. (CoinDesk)