Markets remained cautious ahead of the U.S. Non-Farm Payrolls (NFP) release and the implementation of the U.S.-Iran deal, with the three major U.S. stock indexes closing lower across the board. SanDisk and Western Digital slumped sharply following their earnings reports, dragging down the storage sector.

Optical network startup Lumilens announced it has completed over $700 million in Series C funding, with a valuation reaching $5.51 billion. The round was co-led by Atreides Management, Bain Capital Ventures, Meritech, Seligman Ventures, and Spark Capital, bringing the company’s total raised capital to over $900 million. Headquartered in San Jose, California, Lumilens designs and manufactures optical and networking products that enable data centers to achieve faster data transmission with lower power consumption. The company said it has been supplying a hyperscale cloud provider under a multi-billion-dollar deal, but declined to disclose the specific name, only confirming the client is one of the four major hyperscale cloud providers. CEO Ankur Singla pointed out: "The bottleneck in AI has shifted from how many GPUs you can purchase to how many GPUs you can connect. Hyperscale cloud providers have told us they need two key things: a significant increase in their existing network’s optical capacity, and a path to connect thousands of GPUs directly into the same cluster." Lumilens also revealed it has recruited executives and engineers from firms including Cisco, Juniper, Meta, Marvell, Lumentum, and Coherent to enhance its expertise in photonics and large-scale networking. The proceeds from this funding round will be used to expand the company’s engineering and manufacturing operations.

According to EmberC's monitoring, 433,000 HYPE tokens (valued at $24.25 million) that Hyperliquid development team HyperLabs requested to redeem from staking a week ago arrived in its address early yesterday. Early this morning, these 433,000 HYPE tokens were distributed to nine wallet addresses. Based on prior unstaking transfer records, these HYPE tokens are expected to flow into centralized exchanges (CEXs) via market maker Flowdesk or will be sold imminently.

According to US media outlet MS NOW, two Middle Eastern diplomats familiar with the negotiations said Oman has agreed to reach a framework deal with Iran to temporarily reopen the Strait of Hormuz. An Iranian government official stated the agreement will establish a new shipping corridor by allowing merchant vessels to enter the Persian Gulf via an Iran-controlled route and exit via an Oman-controlled route. The deal does not include tolls for merchant ships seeking safe passage through the waterway. The proposal is a "temporary agreement" that would lay the groundwork for Washington and Tehran to announce a new ceasefire and restart nuclear talks. Iranian officials added that the International Maritime Organization (IMO) and the US will participate in the official announcement of the agreement. A Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) government official said the arrangement has been endorsed by GCC member states. Officials have not yet disclosed when the agreement will be announced. However, whether the US will support the strait management deal depends on final details. A US official noted that Washington will only back a temporary agreement to reopen the strait under the conditions of unimpeded access and no tolls.

Binance has once again renewed its USD1 airdrop campaign. Eligible users will share a total prize pool of 170 million WLFI tokens. The campaign runs from 8:00 on August 7 to 8:00 on September 4. During the campaign period, WLFI rewards will be distributed to qualified users holding USD1 before 2:00 every Saturday. To earn a 1.2x boosted annualized return, users must hold USD1 in their Binance futures or margin accounts and maintain a daily open interest of at least 300 USD1 on the USD1 trading pair.

According to Lookonchain monitoring, crypto mining firm MARA, which holds 36,303 Bitcoin (BTC) valued at $2.34 billion, deposited 200 BTC worth $12.86 million with institutional custody platform NYDIG 10 hours ago. Mining peer Riot Platforms has also been continuously sending Bitcoin to NYDIG, depositing 381 BTC worth $24.51 million 10 hours ago.

Cathie Wood’s Ark Invest purchased approximately $21 million worth of Block Inc stock on Thursday amid a 6% drop in Block’s share price, alongside buying around $2.3 million in SpaceX shares. According to market data from BIT (bit.com), SpaceX rallied more than 6% on Thursday following a 13% slump the day before.