Axios

After Nvidia hit a $3.3 trillion valuation this week — briefly taking the crown as the world's most valuable company — its stock has fallen 9.6%.

• In market cap terms, that's equivalent to shedding the entire market cap of General Motors... four times.

Between the lines: There's been no bad news around Nvidia to spark the drop.

• It could be thanks in part to profit taking.
• And it could be some portfolio rebalancing. Seligman Investments' Paul Wick told Bloomberg that they're trimming some NVDA simply because at this valuation, the company's concentrated revenue base presents just a bit more risk than megacap peers like Microsoft and Google.

Home prices hit a new record high in May.

Driving the news: The median price of an existing home was $419,300 last month, the highest price ever recorded and the 11th consecutive month of year-over-year price gains, according to the National Association of Realtors.

• That's up 5.8% from May 2023.

Existing-home sales slipped 2.8% from a year ago, and 0.7% from the previous month, to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 4.11 million.

• Inventory ended the month at 1.28 million units, up 6.7% from April and 18.5% from one year ago. Unsold inventory sits at a 3.7-month supply at the current sales pace, up from 3.5 months in April.

What they're saying: "I thought we would see a recovery this spring," said Lawrence Yun, chief economist at the NAR, per CNBC. "We are not seeing it."

The lines between work and time off are blurring with the latest workplace and TikTok trend — "quiet vacationing."

Why it matters: Americans aren't taking all of their PTO and now some are going to extremes to hide their getaways while they work.

How does one introduce the Ethereum blockchain to the masses? Two providers of digital-asset ETFs just launched advertisements that take a stab.

Why it matters: As more crypto assets get ETF wrappers, investment pros are increasingly shaping the narrative behind blockchain technology.

Meme coin traders should mind the gap between bid-ask spreads on various crypto venues, lest they get wrecked.

• Pros usually do the math on the cost of trading, before they trade.

Why it matters: Meme coins with staying power, like dogecoin, are on various major exchanges like Binance, Coinbase and Kraken, but there are some places that offer better liquidity for certain coins over others.

By the numbers: Average bid-ask spreads for select meme coins on those exchanges over the last 30 days ended June 12, exceeded 2 basis points, or 0.02%, according to Kaiko.

Consensys' lawsuit against the SEC marches on as planned, though the agency said this week that it closed its investigation around Ethereum 2.0.

• "Consensys will press ahead with its lawsuit until we get the full relief we are seeking," the company's founder and chief, Joe Lubin, said in a statement sent to Axios yesterday.

Why it matters: It matters to Lubin and Consensys, because while the SEC closed its investigation of the blockchain, it hasn't necessarily backed off the firm developing software around it.

Behind the scenes: One SEC investigation has concluded: The one related to ether's status as a security post-Merge.

Everybody is waiting for rent relief to help bring overall inflation down. It might take longer than conventional wisdom suggests.

Why it matters: A surge in market rents in 2021 and 2022 still has a ways to go in fully working its way through the economy, despite moderation in market rents since then, a new paper from a Boston Fed economist finds.

There's an "unprecedented" scramble underway to find defense industry workers, per a new FT report and survey of nearly two dozen U.S. and European companies in the sector.

Why it matters: Russia's invasion of Ukraine more than two years ago coupled with evolving geopolitical risk have pushed global military spending to new highs.

Former President Trump's call to eliminate taxes on workers' tips is the kind of Vegas gamble a casino would never allow: It has multiple potential payouts and it's being made, essentially, with house money.

Why it matters: Trump is signaling to working class voters — many of whom are frustrated by high inflation — that he wants them to keep more of the money they earn.