"Five-Alarm Fire": China's Secret Manhattan Project Revealed

Top stock picks for 2026

China’s secret EUV project

UK calls for expanded censorship

Acadia Pharmaceuticals (ACAD): Top healthcare pick, driven by growth in new drugs and potential mid-2026 readout from Alzheimer's psychosis trial.

Alliant Energy (LNT): Leading utilities name, undervalued amid data center demand boom with 2-4GW upside expected in coming announcements.

Amazon (AMZN): Sole Magnificent Seven inclusion, poised for gains from AI, sports licensing, and e-commerce delivery improvements.

American Tower (AMT): Communications services standout, benefiting from 5G rollout and rising mobile data usage.

Capital One Financial (COF): Financials leader, leveraging Discover merger synergies for lower funding costs and expanded payments platform.

PepsiCo (PEP): Preferred consumer staples over Coca-Cola, offering superior top-line and EPS growth at a discounted valuation.

Deckers Outdoor (DECK): Consumer discretionary turnaround play, with Hoka and UGG brands set to drive EPS surprises.

General Motors (GM): Industrial/auto top pick, resilient via cost improvements and reduced EV exposure in a lower-rate environment.

Ovintiv (OVV): Energy sector favorite, strengthened by recent deals enhancing balance sheet and capital returns.

Woodward (WWD): Defense/industrial beneficiary from aerospace aftermarket visibility and surging power generation demand.

⭐ Editor’s Pick: Trump approved an $11.1 billion arms package to Taiwan—the largest in U.S. history—including howitzers, missile systems and drones to bolster defenses. (NW)

Trump announced $1,776 "warrior dividend" checks for over 1.4 million active-duty military members before Christmas. (X)

Billionaire Ray Dalio pledged $75 million to fund "Trump accounts" for 300,000 Connecticut children. (BW)

Trump said the next chairman of the Federal Reserve will be someone who believes in lower interest rates "by a lot." (INV)

⭐ Editor’s Pick: Zacks highlighted U.S. Bancorp and KeyCorp as solid 2026 picks, citing resilient consumer spending and recovering credit demand. (ZCK)

ATB Capital Markets named Galaxy Sheridan Digital, Bitfarms, and Docebo as top stock picks for 2026, betting on AI compute demand. (CAN)

Chris Blumas of Raymond James highlighted Constellation Software and Abbott Laboratories as top picks, citing strong cash flows, opportunistic growth. (BBG)

⭐ Editor’s Pick: The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences struck a deal to stream the Oscars live on YouTube starting in 2029, ending a decades-long broadcast run on ABC. (THR)

Warner Bros. Discovery rejected Paramount's $108 billion hostile bid as undervalued, accusing the Ellisons of misleading shareholders by claiming a "full backstop" from the family that "does not, and never has" existed. (NYT)

Micron posted stronger-than-expected fiscal Q1 results, with adjusted earnings of $4.78 a share and revenue of $13.64 billion amid surging AI-driven memory demand. (CNBC)

General Motors committed over $242 million to expand apprenticeships aimed at rebuilding America's shrinking skilled trades workforce. (FBN)

⭐ Editor’s Pick: Power bills for about a fifth of Americans are expected to continue rising after PJM Interconnection's latest capacity auction cleared at a record $333.44 per megawatt-day. (RTS)

Trump administration is asking U.S. oil companies if they’re interested in returning to Venezuela once leader Maduro is gone, but low prices and better opportunities elsewhere yield no takers. (POL)

BMO Capital Markets forecasts gold spot prices could exceed $4,600 an ounce as soon as the first quarter of 2026, citing robust demand and a continuing mining supercycle. (INV)

⭐ Editor’s Pick: Coinbase introduced U.S. stock trading, prediction markets via a Kalshi partnership, and in-app Solana DEX access, advancing its ambition to build an "everything exchange" app. (CD)

Federal Reserve withdrew guidance that limited certain banks from engaging in the crypto sector. (TB)

Former Alameda Research CEO Caroline Ellison was quietly transferred from federal prison to community confinement after serving only 11 months of her two-year fraud sentence. (CT)

CFTC Acting Chairman Caroline Pham will depart the agency to join MoonPay as chief legal and administrative officer once her successor is confirmed. (CRY)

Prototype completed in early 2025, now generating EUV light but not yet producing viable chips; built by former ASML engineers who reverse-engineered the Dutch firm's monopoly technology.

Project likened to China's "Manhattan Project," coordinated by Huawei under government oversight, involving thousands of engineers and state institutes with a goal of fully domestic advanced chip production.

Relies on salvaged parts from older ASML machines, secondary markets, and domestic breakthroughs in optics, though precision components remain a key hurdle.

Recruits, including retired ASML experts, work under aliases in high-security facilities; aggressive talent poaching since 2019 offers massive bonuses and subsidies.

Thiel ally Blake Masters warned that China's rapid progress toward mastering EUV lithography is a "five-alarm fire" and "terrifying" for Washington.

Targets working chips by 2028 (official) or more realistically 2030—potentially years ahead of Western analysts' decade-long estimates.

⭐ Editor’s Pick: Palantir CTO Shyam Sanka said AI is sparking a blue-collar productivity surge in manufacturing by optimizing labor and accelerating training, enabling more shifts and hiring rather than widespread job losses. (FBN)

Visa said its new AI-powered shopping tool successfully processed hundreds of consumer transactions in a pilot, with plans for broader adoption next year. (CNBC)

Takeda Pharmaceutical's AI-discovered oral psoriasis drug zasocitinib succeeded in late-stage trials, clearing skin significantly better than placebo. (BBG)

Google launched Gemini 3 Flash, a faster and more cost-efficient variant of its flagship AI model, delivering improved multimodal capabilities on key benchmarks. (SA)

⭐ Editor’s Pick: Chinese researchers claim to have achieved a breakthrough in wireless brain-computer interfaces, enabling a paralyzed patient to control multiple robots with thoughts in real-world tasks. (SCMP)

Connectome pioneer Sebastian Seung is launching Memazing to build a digital brain by emulating the fruit fly's connectome in software, with long-term ambitions toward human-scale intelligence. (CM)

CATL achieved the world's first large-scale deployment of embodied AI humanoid robots on battery production lines. (CNC)

Skana Robotics unveiled SeaSphere AI software enabling secure, long-range underwater communication for robot fleets without surfacing. (IE)

⭐ Editor’s Pick: Senate confirmed Jared Isaacman as NASA's 15th administrator in a 67-30 bipartisan vote. (RTS)

A new profile on Palmer Luckey details how the Anduril founder's quest for the U.S. to become "the world's gun store" has renewed tech-sector enthusiasm for military projects. (BI)

PowerLight Technologies achieved a key milestone in laser power beaming, demonstrating in-flight recharging for military drones under a U.S. program. (NGD)

⭐ Editor’s Pick: OpenAI discussing raising tens of billions of dollars in new funding at a $750 billion valuation. (TI)

General Intuition, an AI startup specializing in spatial reasoning for agents, is in talks to raise several hundred million dollars at a valuation exceeding $2 billion. (SOU)

Meta's outgoing chief AI scientist Yann LeCun is in talks to raise €500 million for his new venture, Advanced Machine Intelligence Labs, at a €3 billion valuation. (FT)

Tebra, a provider of practice management software for healthcare providers, raised $250 million in a mostly equity round led by Hildred Capital. (FIN)

MPs claimed the OSA safeguards free expression and child safety without restricting speech, yet demanded expansions to address so-called misinformation, foreign influence, racism, and generative AI "gaps."

Recurring calls targeted VPNs for age verification or curbs, viewing privacy tools as obstacles to supervision.

Speakers advocated broader platform moderation, including forced removal of falsehoods or slander, and backdoors in end-to-end encryption.

One MP acknowledged the law's chilling effect—driving 300 small forums to close or migrate—but stopped short of supporting repeal, favoring reforms instead.

⭐ Editor’s Pick: Irish pastor Clive Johnston shared his story of how he stands trial for preaching near a hospital buffer zone, insisting the prosecution is about silencing the Gospel rather than abortion protests. (TCI)

Six Republican-led states—Indiana, Iowa, Missouri, Oklahoma, Tennessee, and Texas—are advancing legislation to prohibit public funding for DEI offices at state universities. (CR)

White House AI czar David Sacks slammed Democrat-led states like Colorado for injecting woke ideology into AI regulations. (FBN)

Private Equity Stakeholder Project, a left-leaning watchdog critical of the industry, is fundraising for potential lawsuits as it braces for a Trump administration probe into politically active nonprofits' tax-exempt status. (NYP)