The nuclear tape split cleanly — fuel-cycle, enrichment and SMR names rallied on the HALEU and Section 232 tailwind while the AI-power merchant utilities sold off with the broader capex scare.

NANO Nuclear led the basket, up 7.7% to $16.79, at the front of a broad bid across the SMR and fuel-cycle chokepoints rather than on a single headline — its KRONOS microreactor is in NRC construction-permit review and it has been building out fuel logistics. The move was cohort-wide: Centrus, the only US uranium enricher, rose 7.4% to $175.98; Lightbridge 6.9% to $8.02; NuScale 5.6% to $8.54; Oklo 3.9% to $41.81. The through-line is HALEU — the high-assay low-enriched uranium that advanced reactors need and that Russia still dominates — where a pending Section 232 domestic-sourcing decision and Centrus's blowout Q1 (backlog reported near $3.8 billion) have put a policy bid under the enrichment chokepoint.

The laggard came from the other end of the vertical: Vistra fell 3.9% to $157.08 and Talen 3.6% to $347.07 — the merchant restart-and-AI-power utilities that rise and fall on datacenter demand. On a session when a WSJ report on Nvidia backstopping a $250 billion OpenAI buildout reignited AI-capex fears, the names whose thesis is selling power to those datacenters were sold with the AI complex, while Constellation eased 1.6% to $270.00. The chokepoint split is the read: the fuel and reactor supply chain rallied on policy, and the power-offtake trade de-rated on demand doubt.

The uranium-supply chokepoint firmed across the board — Uranium Energy up 4.2% to $9.91, enCore/EU 4.4% to $1.19, Energy Fuels 3.6% to $11.71, Cameco 1.7% to $89.35 — consistent with contract pricing near multi-year highs and the pledge by 38 countries to triple nuclear capacity by 2050. X-Energy added 4.4% to $15.20 in fuel fabrication. The zirconium-cladding and forgings names lagged the rally, ATI off 2.6% to $192.64, tracking the broad industrial tape rather than the nuclear bid.

Earnings arrive in a wave. NextEra reports July 29; ATI, Constellation and Mirion on July 30; Cameco on July 31 (watch the Westinghouse equity contribution). Then BWXT (August 3), Centrus — the enrichment read the whole HALEU trade rides on — around August 4–6, Talen (August 6), X-Energy's first full quarter public (August 6), Oklo (August 10) and NuScale (August 12). Beyond earnings, the Section 232 status report is the policy catalyst that could formalize domestic-sourcing rules and reprice the enrichment chokepoint; the World Nuclear Symposium in London (September 9–11) frames global supply.