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Barry Silbert, Founder and CEO, Digital Currency Group 

Anjali Sundaram | CNBC

Crypto trade publication CoinDesk is exploring a potential sale, hiring advisors at Lazard to weigh a move that would remove it from Barry Silbert’s Digital Currency Group.

“Over the last few months, we have received numerous inbound indications of interest in CoinDesk,” CEO Kevin Worth said in an emailed statement. The Wall Street Journal was first to report on the media company’s hiring of Lazard.

CoinDesk, which launched in 2013, broke the first story about potential balance sheet improprieties at Sam Bankman-Fried’s Alameda Research. That reporting sparked a downward spiral at crypto exchange FTX, ultimately leading to the collapse of the company in November, the arrest of Bankman-Fried and multiple regulatory probes.

The contagion from the FTX meltdown hit CoinDesk sister company Genesis, a crypto lender also owned by DCG that’s hired advisors for a potential bankruptcy filing after freezing withdrawals and loan originations. Genesis is also the subject of a Securities and Exchange Commission charge alongside crypto exchange Gemini.

Worth said Lazard will help CoinDesk “explore various options to attract growth capital to the CoinDesk business, which may include a partial or full sale.”

A representative for DCG did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

WATCH: The SEC charges Genesis for unregistered securities sales

Genesis has been operating in a non-solvent way since June '22, says Lisa Braganza

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SoftBank Group shares plunge over 9% as Asian tech stocks decline

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SoftBank Group shares plunge over 9% as Asian tech stocks decline

The logo of Japanese company SoftBank Group is seen outside the company’s headquarters in Tokyo on January 22, 2025. 

Kazuhiro Nogi | Afp | Getty Images

Shares of SoftBank Group plunged as much as 9.17% Wednesday, as technology stocks in Asia declined, tracking losses in U.S. peers overnight.

The Japanese tech-focused investment firm saw shares drop for a second consecutive session, following its announcement of a $2 billion investment in Intel. Intel shares rose 6.97% to close at $25.31 Tuesday stateside.

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SoftBank Group shares

Other Japanese tech stocks also declined, with semiconductor giant Advantest falling as much as 6.27%. Meanwhile, shares in Renesas Electronics and Tokyo Electron were last seen trading 2.46% and 0.75% lower, respectively.

Technology companies in South Korea, Taiwan and Hong Kong, also fell after U.S. tech stocks dropped overnight spurred by declines in artificial intelligence darling Nvidia‘s shares.

U.S. Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick is considering the federal government taking equity stakes in semiconductor companies that get funding under the CHIPS Act for building plants in the U.S, sources familiar with the matter told Reuters. The U.S. CHIPS and Science Act seeks to boost the country’s semiconductor industry, scientific research and innovation.

Shares of Taiwanese chip company TSMC and manufacturer Hon Hai Precision Industry — known globally as Foxconn — declined 1.69% and 2.16%, respectively. TSMC manufactures Nvidia’s high-performance graphics processing units that help power large language models, while Foxconn has a strategic partnership with Nvidia to build “AI factories.” 

Meanwhile, South Korean tech stocks mostly fell with shares of chipmaker SK Hynix down 3.33%. Samsung Electronics, however, rose 0.75%.

TSMC, Samsung and SK Hynix are among companies that have received funding under the CHIPS Act.

Over in Hong Kong, the Hang Seng Tech index lost 0.87% in early trade.

The worst performing stocks on the index were Kuaishou Technology which declined 4.8%, JD Health International which dropped 3.31% and Horizon Robotics which lost 2.29%.

Losses were also seen tech majors Alibaba Group, down 1.44%, and Xiaomi Corp which lost 1.34%.

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Palantir stock slumps 9%, falling for a fifth straight day from record

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Palantir stock slumps 9%, falling for a fifth straight day from record

CEO of Palantir Technologies Alex Karp attends the Pennsylvania Energy and Innovation Summit on the campus of Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania on July 15, 2025.

Andrew Caballero-reynolds | Afp | Getty Images

Palantir‘s stock slumped more than 9% on Tuesday, falling for a fifth straight day to continue its pullback from all-time highs.

The artificial intelligence software provider’s stock has slid more than 15% over the last five trading sessions, after a stellar earnings report earlier this month propelled shares to all-time highs. The report was Palantir’s first-ever $1 billion revenue quarter.

Tuesday’s dip coincided with a broader market pullback.

Palantir is the most significant gainer to date in the S&P 500 in 2025, up more than 100%.

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Shares have more than doubled as the company benefits from ongoing AI enthusiasm, scooping up government contracts with President Donald Trump pushing to overhaul agencies.

Palantir’s ascent has pushed the company into a list of top 10 U.S. tech firms and 20 most valuable U.S. companies, while also making shares incredibly expensive to own. Its forward price-to-earnings ratio, which tracks future earnings relative to share price, has soared past 245 times.

By comparison, technology giants such as Microsoft and Apple carry a P/E of nearly 30 times and rake in significantly greater quarterly revenues. Meta‘s and Alphabet‘s P/E ratios hover in the 20s.

What to know about Palantir's engineer-led sales strategy

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Databricks says it’s valued at over $100 billion in latest funding round

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Databricks says it's valued at over 0 billion in latest funding round

Ali Ghodsi, CEO of Databricks speaks on CNBC.

CNBC

Databricks has just entered an exclusive club.

The data analytics software vendor said Tuesday that it’s raising a funding round that values the company at over $100 billion. That would make Databricks just the fourth private company to eclipse the $100 billion mark, following SpaceX, ByteDance and OpenAI, according to data from CB Insights.

Databricks CEO Ali Ghodsi told CNBC’s Brian Sullivan that the total round will exceed $1 billion. The company was last valued by private investors at $62 billion in a $10 billion financing round late last year.

In June, Databricks executives told investors the company was forecasting $3.7 billion in annualized revenue by July, with 50% year-over-year growth.

Snowflake, one of Databricks’ top rivals, is expected to generate $4.5 billion in revenue for the fiscal year that ends in January, representing annual growth of 25%, according to LSEG. Snowflake currently has a market cap of about $65 billion. Other competitors include cloud providers such as Amazon and Microsoft, which are also Databricks partners.

Ghodsi said he heard from a lot of interested investors following Figma’s IPO late last month. Shares of the design software company more than tripled in their New York Stock Exchange debut, a sign that public investors are seeking out tech offerings after in extended lull in the IPO market.

“My phone was blowing up,” Ghodsi said on Tuesday. “So yes, there’s definitely been a big push from outside.”

Figma shares have since retreated from their initial $115.50 closing price. The stock is trading at about $70, still more than double the $33 IPO price.

Ghodsi said the round will help Databricks invest in products that clients can tap when using artificial intelligence models.

Founded in 2013 and based in San Francisco, Databricks ranked third on CNBC’s 2025 Disruptor 50 list. As of June, the company employed 8,000 people. Existing investors Andreessen Horowitz, Insight Partners Thrive Capital and WCM Investment Management are buying shares, a spokesperson said.

WATCH: Databricks CEO on AI: VCs are wondering if agentic AI will actually automate work

Databricks CEO on AI: VCs are wondering if agentic AI will actually automate work

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