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On Monday, a Washington, D.C., district court unsealed two federal indictments charging a North Korean bank official for his alleged role in cryptocurrency laundering conspiracies. 

The first indictment charges Sim Hyon Sop (Sim), a representative of North Korean Foreign Trade Bank (FTB), with allegedly laundering funds “stolen from virtual asset service providers,” transferring the funds into U.S. dollars and using them to purchase goods, together with a group of over-the-counter crypto traders, according to the court filing. The alleged actions are in violation of current sanctions against North Korea by both the U.S. and United Nations. 

The recently unsealed indictments represent a broader pattern in recent years of North Korean workers using virtual private networks (VPNs) and other tools to illegally gain remote employment and redirect revenue to North Korea. 

Operatives working on behalf of the country have also orchestrated other crypto-focused hacks in recent years, making off with an estimated $1.7 billion in crypto in 2022, according to a release by the US Treasury Department. And in late 2017, hackers in North Korea gained access to approximately $75 million in virtual currency via a phishing campaign, per the first indictment. 

Sim, as part of the second indictment, was charged with conspiring with a group of North Korean IT workers to launder about $12 million in illegally-earned wages from IT development work in the U.S. The workers allegedly assumed fake identities to gain employment at blockchain development firms based in the U.S. and abroad between 2021 and March 2023. 

The IT workers requested that their salaries be paid in cryptocurrency – for instance, in stablecoins like USD Tether and USD Coin – via U.S.-based crypto exchanges, according to the indictment and a release by the U.S. Department of Justice. They then allegedly worked with Sim to launder the earnings and redirect them to North Korea, in part to “generate revenue for North Korea’s ballistic missile and WMD programs,” according to the indictment. 

Nearly every month so far this year, North Korea has run tests of its intercontinental ballistic missiles, the latest taking place in mid-April. 

While the FBI continues to investigate the crypto laundering cases, the money laundering charges are punishable by a maximum of 20 years in prison, according to the DOJ release. Sim and others charged are unlikely to face trial, as they were reportedly based in China and Hong Kong when the alleged crimes occurred, and the U.S. has no existing extradition treaty with China. 

“The charges announced today respond to innovative attempts by North Korean operatives to evade sanctions by exploiting the technological features of virtual assets to facilitate payments and profits, and targeting virtual currency companies for theft,” Kenneth A. Polite, Jr., Assistant Attorney General in the DOJ’s criminal division, said in a release. “We will continue to work to disrupt and deter North Korean actors and those who aid them by following the money on the blockchain and shining a light on their conduct.” 

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Intel is getting a $2 billion investment from SoftBank

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Intel is getting a  billion investment from SoftBank

Masayoshi Son, chairman and chief executive officer of SoftBank Group Corp., speaks during the company’s annual general meeting in Tokyo, Japan, on Friday, June 27, 2025.

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Intel and SoftBank announced on Monday that the Japanese conglomerate will make a $2 billion investment in the embattled chipmaker.

SoftBank will pay $23 per share for Intel’s common stock, which closed on Monday at $23.66. The shares rose about 6% in extended trading to $25.

The investment makes SoftBank the fifth-biggest Intel shareholder, according to FactSet. It’s a vote of support for Intel, which hasn’t been able to take advantage of the artificial intelligence boom in advanced semiconductors and has spent heavily to stand up a manufacturing business that’s yet to secure a significant customer.

“Masa and I have worked closely together for decades, and I appreciate the confidence he has placed in Intel with this investment,” Intel CEO Lip-Bu Tan said in a statement, referring to SoftBank founder Masayoshi Son.

Intel shares lost 60% of their value last year, their worst performance in the company’s more than half-century on the public market. The stock is up 18% in 2025 as of Monday’s close.

Tan took over as Intel CEO in March after his predecessor, Pat Gelsinger, was ousted in December.

Intel has been a major topic of discussion in Washington of late, due to the company’s role as the only American company capable of manufacturing the most advanced chips.

However, Intel’s foundry business, which is designed to manufacture chips for other companies, has yet to secure a major customer, a critical step towards stabilization and expansion. Last month, Intel said it would wait to secure orders before committing to certain future investment in its foundry.

Tan met with President Donald Trump last week after the president had called for the CEO’s resignation. The U.S. government is considering taking an equity stake in Intel, according to reports.

SoftBank, meanwhile, has become an increasingly large player in the global chip and AI markets.

In 2016, SoftBank acquired chip designer Arm in a deal worth about $32 billion at the time. Today the company is worth almost $150 billion. Arm-based chips are part of Nvidia’s systems that go into data centers.

And in March of this year, SoftBank announced plans to acquire another chip designer, Ampere Computing, for $6.5 billion.

SoftBank was also part of President Trump’s Stargate announcement in January, along with OpenAI and Oracle.

The three companies committed to invest an initial $100 billion and up to $500 billion over the next four years in the AI infrastructure project. Two months later, SoftBank led a $40 billion investment into OpenAI, the largest private tech deal on record.

“This strategic investment reflects our belief that advanced semiconductor manufacturing and supply will further expand in the United States, with Intel playing a critical role,” Son said in a statement.

WATCH: Intel’s message to Washington

Intel's message to Washington

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Palo Alto Networks reports earnings beat, says founder Nir Zuk retiring from company

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Palo Alto Networks reports earnings beat, says founder Nir Zuk retiring from company

Nikesh Arora, CEO of Palo Alto Networks, looks on during the closing bell at the Nasdaq Market in New York City on March 25, 2025.

Jeenah Moon | Reuters

Palo Alto Networks reported better-than-expected quarterly results and issued upbeat guidance for the current period. The cybersecurity software vendor said Nir Zuk, who founded the company in 2005, is retiring from his role as chief technology officer.

The stock rose about 6% in extended trading.

Here’s how the company did compared to LSEG estimates:

  • Earnings: 95 cents adjusted vs. 88 cents expected
  • Revenue: $2.54 billion vs. $2.5 billion expected.

Revenue in the fiscal fourth quarter rose 16% from about $2.2 billion last year, the company said in a statement. Net income fell to about $254 million, or 36 cents per share, from about $358 million, or 51 cents per share, in the year-ago period.

The company also issued upbeat guidance for the fiscal first quarter. Earnings per share will be between 88 cents and 90 cents, Palo Alto said, topping an 85-cents estimate from StreetAccount.

For the full year, Palo Alto said revenue will range from $10.48 billion to $10.53 billion on adjusted earnings of $3.75 to $3.85 per share. Both estimates exceeded Wall Street’s projections.

Palo Alto said that for the fiscal first quarter, remaining purchase obligations, which tracks backlog, will range between $15.4 billion and $15.5 billion, surpassing a $15.07 billion estimate.

Last month, the company announced plans to buy Israeli identity security provider CyberArk for $25 billion. It’s the largest deal Palo Alto has made since its founding, and most ambitious in an acquiring spree that ramped up after CEO Nikesh Arora took the helm of the company in 2018.

Shares sold off sharply after the news broke and have yet to recover previous highs. The stock is down about 3% this year as of Monday’s close.

“We look for great products, a team that can execute in the product, and we let them run it,” Arora told CNBC following the announcement. “This is going to be a different challenge, but we’ve done well 24 times, so I’m pretty confident that our team can handle this.”

Lee Klarich, the company’s product chief, will replace Zuk as CTO and fill his position on the board.

WATCH: Power check on Palo Alto, Viking Holdings and Estee Lauder

Power Check: Palo Alto Networks, Viking Holdings, and Estee Lauder

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Musk’s Starlink suffers apparent outage as SpaceX launches more satellites

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Musk's Starlink suffers apparent outage as SpaceX launches more satellites

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Satellite internet service Starlink, which is owned and operated by Elon Musk‘s SpaceX, appeared to suffer a brief network outage on Monday, with thousands of reports of service interruptions on Downdetector, a site that logs tech issues.

The outage marked the second in two weeks for Starlink. SpaceX did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

The network’s July 24 outage lasted for several hours, with SpaceX Vice President of Starlink Engineering Michael Nicolls blaming the matter on “failure of key internal software services that operate the core network” behind Starlink.

That outage followed the launch of T-Mobile‘s Starlink-powered satellite service, a direct-to-cell-phone service created to keep smartphone users connected “in places no carrier towers can reach,” according to T-Mobile’s website.

SpaceX provides Starlink internet service to more than six million users across 140 countries, according to the company’s website, though churn and subscriber rates are not publicly reported by the company.

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The SpaceX Starlink constellation is far larger than any competitor. It currently features over 7,000 operational broadband satellites, according to research by astronomer Jonathan McDowell.

On Monday, Musk’s SpaceX successfully launched another group of satellites to add to its Starlink constellation from the Vandenberg Space Force Base in Southern California.

SpaceX is currently aiming to increase the number of launches and landings from Vandenberg from 50 to about 100 annually.

On Thursday last week, the California Coastal Commission voted unanimously to oppose the U.S. Space Force application to conduct that higher volume of SpaceX launches there.

The Commission has said that SpaceX and Space Force officials have failed to properly evaluate and report on potential impacts of increased launches on neighboring towns, and local wildlife, among other issues.

President Donald Trump recently signed an executive order seeking to ease environmental regulations seen by Musk, and others, as hampering commercial space operations.

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