$ADBE

Adobe CEO Shantanu Narayen will transition to chair after 18 years, with an interim CFO adding execution risk. Q2 GAAP EPS was pressured by a $70 million goodwill impairment, while non-GAAP EPS rose 18% YoY. The article compares Adobe with Microsoft and Autodesk and cites a $306.24 price target and $262.32 bear case.

Reuters reports Silver Lake is in potential acquisition talks for Workday. Workday shares rose nearly 18% on Thursday after the report, valuing the company at over $51 billion. Analysts said a buyout at a substantial premium could support software valuations amid AI disruption fears and follow strong earnings from peers like ServiceNow and others.

Stocks ended lower ahead of Wednesday’s CPI. Oil fell briefly after Pakistan said the US and Iran are close to an arrangement to reopen the Strait of Hormuz, but Iran said it would keep it shut until conditions are met. Treasuries rose on CPI anticipation. Notable movers included DDOG, ADBE, ORCL, KKR, APO, and ONON after weak sales; AMTM cut guidance; RPD raised EPS outlook.

Security researchers say hackers are attempting to exploit Adobe Commerce and Magento flaw CVE-2026-71362, an incorrect authorization issue that could let attackers switch customer sessions and access private data. Adobe issued an August 2026 security update and says it has not seen exploits in the wild. Sansec says its WAF blocks attempts and notes no auth or user interaction is needed.

Adobe issued urgent security updates for ColdFusion 2025 and ColdFusion 2023 to address multiple critical vulnerabilities, including unauthenticated OS command injection (CVE-2026-48362, CVSS 10.0) and eval injection (CVE-2026-48273, CVSS 9.9), plus other flaws that could enable code execution, privilege escalation, and denial of service. Fixes are in Adobe Security Bulletin APSB26-90.

U.S. stocks closed mostly lower, with the Nasdaq down 0.60% to 26,445.45, the Dow down 0.34% to 53,797.39, and the S&P 500 down 0.32% to 7,728.18. The Russell 2000 rose 0.32% to 3,027.13. On Holding fell 20.29%, while Consolidated Water gained 6.85% after Q2 results. Tech weakness and fading U.S.-Iran optimism weighed; investors await Wednesday’s CPI.

Adobe launched “Adobe for ChatGPT” on Aug. 6, 2026, adding more than 70 Creative Cloud tools to ChatGPT via an @Adobe plugin. It lets users edit images, create PDFs, and produce short videos using server-side execution, with full access tied to a Creative Cloud subscription. Adobe says it is for quicker everyday tasks, not a replacement for desktop apps.

Leopold Aschenbrenner’s AI hedge fund, Situational Awareness, reportedly fell from about $45B in early July to around $10B by late July after margin calls tied to leveraged (up to 400%) concentrated bets in NBIS, SNDK, CRWV and SK Hynix, with shorts including ADBE. The fund says it is not taking new money for now, while deploying $500M into private firms and retaining stakes including Anthropic.

Adobe expanded its ChatGPT integration by releasing an “Adobe plugin in ChatGPT” that lets users access 70+ Adobe features via @Adobe. The plugin bundles Photoshop, Express, and Acrobat plus Firefly, Premiere, Lightroom, Illustrator, and InDesign entry-level tools. Adobe also plans updates for Claude, Copilot, Gemini, and Slack. The article cites SaaS pricing shifts at Salesforce and going-private moves at Douzone Bizon and Hancom.

Barclays said S&P 500 returns have been positive in every Fed rate hike cycle since the 1990s, with annualized gains from 0.1% to 7.8% and a median of 5.6%. It noted sector performance depends on whether markets view the Fed as ahead or behind the curve. Barclays also updated a Resilient Software Basket including Palantir, Datadog, Adobe, Intuit, Salesforce, and others.