Four Tech Prints That Could Reset Your Watchlist This Week

A lidar order book, a boring compounder, a test-and-measurement read on AI, and an AI-BNPL debut.

August 18, 2026

Four names report or move on catalysts you can actually trade around, spanning autonomous driving hardware, community bank software, and the first public quarter from a headline BNPL lender.

Each one sets up differently, and the risk you accept depends entirely on which story you believe.

Elon’s Supply Chain (Sponsored)

Most people know Elon Musk for rockets, EVs, Neuralink, and tunnels.

But his newest move may be tied to something completely different.

This technology is already being rolled out in multiple states, demand is rising fast, and major AI players are racing to secure access.

A few little-known companies control the supply chain behind it.

That means anyone who wants in, including Musk, Sam Altman, or other AI leaders, may need to go through them first.

Click here to see the little-known stocks tied to Elon’s next big move.

*This ad is sent on behalf of Altimetry, 110 Cambridge Street, Cambridge, MA 02141. If you would like to optout from receiving offers from Altimetry please click here.

Consumer Technology

Apple Gives AirPods a Pair of AI Eyes 

Apple (NASDAQ: AAPL) appears to be preparing camera-equipped AirPods designed to feed visual information into Apple Intelligence.

A demo discovered inside macOS Tahoe 26.7 shows the earbuds using Visual Intelligence to recognize an object and let Siri save information about it.

The cameras are expected to capture low-resolution visual data rather than traditional photos or videos. AirPods could effectively become another set of sensors for Siri, allowing Apple’s AI to understand what is happening around the wearer.

Siri Gets Some New Senses

Visual Intelligence could let users ask questions about objects, signs, products, or places simply by looking at them. Siri could then identify what is visible, remember information, or help with tasks without requiring the user to pull out an iPhone.

The technology could also support navigation and real-time environmental assistance. AirPods would move beyond audio input and output into a wearable AI device that can hear, speak, and understand visual surroundings.

The Earbuds Get a Bigger Job

The unreleased AirPods reportedly resemble thicker AirPods Pro models with longer stems to house the camera hardware. Apple has not officially announced the product, so the final design and feature set could still change.

Finding an Apple-made demonstration inside system software makes the project particularly interesting.

Apple appears to be preparing AirPods for a future where Siri interacts with the physical world, not just whatever appears on a screen.

Smart Technology

Comcast Turns Wi-Fi Into a Home Security Sensor

Comcast (NASDAQ: CMCSA) is expanding Xfinity with a new security platform called Xfinity Shield. The system combines cybersecurity, family controls, and Wi-Fi-based motion detection inside the same home network.

Its Wi-Fi Motion technology watches for changes in wireless signals moving between the Xfinity gateway and connected devices.

When someone moves through the home, those signal patterns change, allowing the network to detect motion without requiring a separate sensor.

Wi-Fi Learns a New Trick

Traditional motion detectors rely on dedicated cameras or infrared sensors. Comcast is using the Wi-Fi equipment already sitting inside millions of homes to create another layer of awareness.

The system can recognize activity across connected spaces while keeping the underlying technology tied to the home network. That gives Xfinity customers a simpler way to add basic motion monitoring without filling every room with extra hardware.

Security Moves Into the Network

Xfinity Shield also brings device protection and family controls into the same platform. Users can manage connected devices, monitor network activity, and control how different people access the internet from one place.

Comcast is turning broadband equipment into more than a connection point. The home router is becoming part security hub, part motion sensor, and part control center for the connected house.

Next Money Flow (Sponsored)

A pioneer who spent $17 million building AI-powered market tools — part of a platform used by 180,000 people worldwide — is stepping forward with an urgent warning.

He says the biggest AI stocks are about to become the market's biggest losers, and he's identified where the real money will flow next.

Get the full details now.

*This ad is sent on behalf of TradeSmith at 1125 N. Charles Street, Baltimore, Maryland 21201. If you're not interested in this opportunity, please click here.

Quantum Computing

D-Wave Sends Quantum Power Into the Mobile Network

D-Wave Quantum (NYSE: QBTS) is powering a new production system for NTT DOCOMO that uses quantum computing to improve mobile network operations. The technology helps decide how hundreds of base stations should handle location registration and paging activity.

Instead of treating quantum computing as an experimental research project, DOCOMO is using D-Wave technology inside a real operational workflow.

The system combines quantum processing with traditional computing to solve complex optimization problems.

Hundreds of Towers, One Big Puzzle

Mobile networks must constantly decide how to distribute resources as users move between different areas. With hundreds of base stations involved, the number of possible configurations can quickly become difficult for conventional systems to optimize.

D-Wave’s hybrid quantum system can study those combinations and search for more efficient arrangements. In one representative task involving 333 base stations, the optimization was completed in roughly five minutes.

Quantum Gets a Second Real Job

This is DOCOMO’s second production application built with D-Wave technology, pushing the relationship beyond testing and demonstrations.

The new deployment shows how quantum systems can tackle operational problems without replacing an organization’s entire computing infrastructure.

D-Wave is positioning quantum computing as another tool inside the enterprise technology stack.

Telecom networks provide a strong proving ground because they generate exactly the kind of complicated optimization problems quantum systems are designed to handle.

Trivia: Amazon was incorporated in 1994 under a different name — one Jeff Bezos changed after his lawyer kept mishearing it as a word associated with dead bodies. What was the original name?

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Recent Tech Movers

Jack Henry & Associates (NASDAQ: JKHY)
Fiscal Q4 Print Drops Today

Jack Henry reports fiscal Q4 after the close today, with the Street looking for about $1.47 in adjusted EPS on roughly $642 million in revenue.

Stock has drifted sideways for weeks, which is exactly the kind of setup you want going into an earnings print from a name with a 30-year track record of double-digit earnings growth.

Community banks and credit unions run on Jack Henry software. Switching cost is essentially infinite. That's why margins keep expanding even in a soft loan environment.

Card services and payments continue to outgrow the legacy processing line, and management has been reallocating capital toward those higher-multiple businesses. 

Risk here is boring. Any commentary about small-bank deposit outflows would compress the multiple. But if you want steady tech compounding hedge funds haven't crowded into, this is the print to watch.

Keysight Technologies (NYSE: KEYS)
Fiscal Q3 Lands After the Close

Keysight reports fiscal Q3 after the bell today, with the Street looking for about $2.52 in adjusted EPS on roughly $1.77 billion in revenue. You get the whole day to position before the number prints.

Here is why this one matters more than a typical hardware print. Keysight sells the test and measurement gear that every chip, network and 800G optical design has to pass through before it ships.

That makes this release one of the cleanest reads you can get on whether the AI datacenter buildout is still accelerating at the design stage, months ahead of when it shows up in anyone's revenue.

Watch orders and the commentary on communications versus aerospace and defense. Strong order growth tells you the design pipeline is full and the next two quarters are already spoken for.

The stock is trading within a few percent of its 52-week high of $375, so a merely fine quarter gets sold. If you want the exposure, wait for the print rather than buying into it.

Ouster (NYSE: OUST)
Rev8 Orders Flip AV Story

Ouster moved higher yesterday off news that its new Rev8 lidar platform already booked multimillion-dollar orders from new and existing customers. The product is still in early volume production. Which means the numbers you see today are the first inning of what management is teeing up.

The mix is what you want to focus on. Rev8 is landing in industrial, robotics, and smart infrastructure customers, not just automotive. That diversification is what separates Ouster from being just another AV pure play, and it's finally showing up in the order book instead of the earnings deck.

Risk is real. Ouster still burns cash, competition from Hesai is fierce, and lidar has always been a boom-bust cycle. If you missed the move, don't chase at current levels. Wait for a meaningful pullback before stepping in ahead of the Q3 print.

Retirement Stock Revealed (Sponsored)

For years, Berkshire Hathaway was one analyst’s favorite retirement stock.

Now he says he may have found an even better long-term opportunity—one tied to AI and another critical U.S. industry.

He believes the company offers both strong dividend income and significant upside in the years ahead.

See the Name and Ticker of America’s Next Great Retirement Stock.

*This ad is sent on behalf of Stansberry Research, 1125 N Charles St, Baltimore, MD 21201. If you would like to optout from receiving offers from Stansberry Research please click here.

The Speculative Play

Klarna Group (NYSE: KLAR)
Your First Look at the AI-BNPL P&L

Klarna reports its first quarter as a public company after the close today. This is the kind of setup where you either want a small position or you want no position. Consensus is looking for a small loss on roughly $1 billion in revenue. 

Klarna's whole thesis is whether AI-driven credit decisioning can push BNPL loss rates below traditional card issuers while the top line grows 20%-plus. Management has spent months telling the market it replaced hundreds of customer service seats with in-house AI agents.

Tonight is when you find out if that shows up in the operating margin or just in the press release. If the credit metrics are clean and the AI cost saves are real, this rerates immediately.

Risk is stacked. Sezzle just launched SezzleCash and the upcoming Send product, Affirm keeps taking merchant partnerships, and Apple is finally treating BNPL as a real category.

Klarna has to prove it can price credit better than all of them. Size your position accordingly.

Everything Else

  • 📊AI infrastructure spending is on track to add $15.7 trillion to the global economy by 2030, more than China and India's combined GDP, and the chips, memory, and networks behind it are where the real money is landing.

  • 🧠 Anthropic’s revenue run rate topped $65 billion by the end of July as demand for Claude keeps accelerating ahead of a possible IPO later this year.

  • 🤖 Unitree unveiled a new high-speed humanoid days before the Chinese robotics company begins trading on Shanghai’s STAR Market.

  • 🎙️ AI voice startup Wispr Flow reached a $2 billion valuation in its latest funding round as investor appetite for voice-to-text technology continues to grow.

  • 🛡️ Defense-tech startup Smack raised $61 million to expand AI-powered battlefield tools as the Pentagon pushes to diversify its artificial-intelligence suppliers.

  • ☁️ Major money managers are looking beyond the biggest chipmakers toward cloud and AI infrastructure companies as concerns about the returns on massive tech spending begin to ease.

That's our coverage for today; thanks for reading! Reply to this email with feedback or any tech stocks you want me to check out.

Best Regards,
—Noah Zelvis
Tech Stock Insider