Hey {{ first name | friends}} - happy Friday. The only existence we know with absolute certainty is right now. Enjoy it.

🌎 The Big Picture

Here's what you need to know this week:

• The housing market is shifting toward buyers, but high mortgage costs are keeping most people on the sidelines.

• Business costs jumped hard in August, and diesel was the culprit.

• Small business owners are still feeling good, but hiring gaps, rising costs, and slowing sales mean a more cautious fall ahead.

• Subscription spending is quietly turning into one of the fastest-growing chunks of the household budget.

▶️ The housing market is shifting toward buyers, but affordability is keeping most people on the sidelines.

The National Association of Realtors reported that existing home sales dropped for the second straight month in August. At the same time, unsold homes have stacked up to a 4.9 months' supply, the highest we've seen in over a decade. More supply means more choices, less competition, and real room to negotiate.

Prices are moving down. The median list price in August came in at $424,500, down 1.3% from a year ago. That's ten consecutive months where prices have come in lower than the same month the year before.

So why aren't buyers jumping on this? Mortgage costs. The average 30-year mortgage rate climbed back to 6.67% in August, up from 6.05% in February.

The rest of 2026 is probably going to stay quiet. Zillow reported that newly pending sales, a solid forward-looking signal of deals getting agreed on, fell 2.6% below a year ago in August.

If you're a first-time buyer, run the numbers on what 6.67% means for your monthly budget before you fall in love with a price. If you're selling, pricing strategy matters way more than it did two or three years ago, so don't skip that conversation.

▶️ Small business owners are still optimistic, but hiring gaps, rising costs, and slowing sales mean a more cautious fall.

Every month, the National Federation of Independent Business surveys small business owners across the country on hiring, sales, costs, and confidence. August's reading dipped a bit from July, but July was the most optimistic owners had felt in a year.

Hiring plans are still ambitious, with a net 17% of owners planning to add workers over the next three months, well above the historical average.

But they can't find people. About 1 in 4 named finding quality staff as their single biggest challenge, and 35% said they had open positions they simply couldn't fill. That's 11 points above the historical average.

Costs are back on owners' minds too. Roughly 1 in 6 named inflation as their top concern, more than double the long-run average, and it's tied with taxes as the second-biggest thing keeping owners up at night. And sales slowed: more owners reported falling revenue than rising revenue, by the biggest gap since late 2025.

Even with all of that, owners are still slightly more optimistic than their long-run average. But when you put together open jobs that can't be filled, mounting cost worries, and slowing sales, Main Street is clearly heading into fall with more caution. For workers, that could mean a slower hiring market. For shoppers, it probably means prices unlikely to come down.

▶️ Subscription spending is quietly turning into one of the fastest-growing chunks of the household budget.

Bank of America Institute dug into millions of customer card transactions and found that Americans' subscription bills in July were up 7.7% from a year earlier, outpacing overall card spending by more than a point and a half. And that faster growth has held for two straight years now.

A few things jumped out in the data:

• Streaming and big retailer memberships now make up 43% of all subscription spending, up from 41% over the prior two years.

• Gen X still spends the most on subscriptions overall, with older Millennials right behind them.

• Gen Z's total subscription spending jumped nearly 14% in July, about four times faster than a year ago.

• The reading and information category, which includes AI tools, is the smallest slice at 7%, but it's growing faster than every other category.

There are still real open questions about where this goes, especially as more services raise prices and people start auditing what they actually use.

But here's the thing about subscription spending: it flies under the radar in most budget reviews. It compounds quietly across categories, and when you add it all up, the total is almost always higher than you expected.

When did you last do a full audit of your recurring digital bills?

🏭 The Companies Everyone’s Talking About

Apple raised prices for Apple TV and its Apple One bundle, again making streaming more expensive for subscribers.

Apple joins other major streaming services in raising prices this year, hiking the cost of Apple TV and its Apple One bundle. Apple TV now costs $14.99 a month, up 15% from $12.99, while its annual plan rose 20% to $119 from $99. Apple One's individual plan, which bundles Apple TV with iCloud storage and Apple Music, rose to $21.95 per month, an increase of about 10%. This is the fourth time Apple has raised the price of Apple TV in four years. The numbers are not out of step with the rest of the industry. Last year, Apple raised Apple TV's monthly price by 30%; this year's 15% monthly increase is smaller by comparison. Amazon Prime Video, another major streaming service, raised the price of its ad-free tier by nearly 70% this year, one of several hikes across the industry.

Southwest is opening its first airport lounges, its latest step away from budget flying toward luxury travelers.

Southwest is opening its first airport lounges, the next step in its shift from a budget carrier to serving luxury travelers. The first four will open in Austin, Baltimore, Nashville, and Honolulu, and will require a new Chase credit card to enter. Southwest already flies more passengers through the first three than any other airline. Elliott Investment Management, an activist investor, pushed Southwest to adopt seat assignments, bag fees, and other industry practices. Southwest has since ended free checked bags, now charging $45 for a first bag and $55 for a second, and open seating, with extra-legroom seats available for a fee. Southwest is catching up to other major US airlines that have operated lounges for years. CEO Bob Jordan has floated ideas such as first-class seating and long-haul flights, some of which would be funded by the new credit card partnership.

Ford is finally recovering from a supplier fire that forced it to rely on tariffed imported aluminum.

Ford's truck plants are back in full swing after years of supply chain pain. When fires took out its supplier Novelis's aluminum plant in Oswego, New York, it gutted F-Series output. It cost the automaker up to $2 billion through 2025, with another $1.5 billion hit expected this year. Novelis sourced aluminum from South Korea and Europe to compensate, but the material faced a 50% import tariff. Despite that pressure, Ford's Kentucky plant turned out more Super Duty pickups than in any month since 2006, while its Dearborn plant hit a two-year high for F-150 output. US sales, however, fell for an eighth straight month.

❔ The Big Question of the Week

Scoops app users: We have taken the beta app offline for a short period for some major updates. Can’t wait to show you all what we’ve been working on! Reach out if you have any questions.

We’re going to switch up the content in this spotlight for a bit to make sure you all have the info you need to master your week.

Hey {{ first name | friends}} - what are you doing on your phone? This is the weekend to celebrate your labors, not continue them.

I love the fall. But my wife would be a beautiful lizard on a rock in the sun if she could be an animal. So, we’re going to be out soaking up the last moments of summer. Go be a lizard.

🌎 The Big Picture

Headlines have been dramatic, but the underlying story of the economy has been pretty steady:

• No one’s really hiring

• But they’re not really laying people off

• Costs keep climbing, steadily, but more slowly

• Rents have calmed down

• Borrowing money won’t get cheaper anytime soon

• No one’s really buying or selling homes right now

• Business is fine

• No end in sight for the war in the Middle East

• AI is booming

▶️ Companies are increasingly blaming AI for layoffs, but it's often just an excuse. 

Revelio Labs, a workforce data firm, dug into the hiring records of companies that publicly cited AI as the reason for job cuts and found a messier story than the headlines suggest. More than half of these companies were genuinely restructuring: they brought in AI specialists while trimming other roles, and AI jobs made up roughly double the share of their workforce compared to industry peers. That pattern held up before and after the layoffs, which tracks with a real shift toward automation.

But for nearly half of the companies in the study, the story doesn't hold up. 

Those companies shrank their AI teams or fell behind their own industries in AI adoption before making the cuts, which directly contradicts what their executives said publicly.

Meanwhile, peer companies that never announced AI-driven layoffs hired AI specialists faster overall while keeping their non-AI workforce intact. So yeah, some of this is real transformation, but a big chunk of employers are probably just dressing up different business decisions to make them look smart.

▶️ Employers have mostly hit pause on hiring this summer, but they're holding onto their workers. 

The Labor Department reported 7.3 million open positions across the economy in July, a solid rebound from a five-year low of 6.5 million back in December. It's nowhere near the wild hiring surge of more than 12 million job postings in 2022, but it's pretty normal.

That said, actual hiring is moving at a crawl. Employers brought on 5.1 million people, a pace that mirrors 2010 and 2011, when unemployment was more than twice what it is today.

The August jobs report showed a big jump in the number of people working, but the month-to-month is volatile. The number of people working has grown by only 31,000 a month over the past year. Economists used to think ~150k/month was ideal.

That's slightly faster than 2025, which was the weakest hiring year outside a recession since 2002.

Layoffs, though, have stayed historically low, just 1.7 million in July, a rate of 1.0%. So while finding a new job isn't easy right now, most people's jobs are safe.

▶️ Fewer Americans are moving. 

Bank of America tracked address changes and card transactions among its customers and found that household moves slowed again in the second quarter of 2026, with families across every income level and generation pulling back. Lower-income households cut back the hardest, followed by middle-income earners, while higher earners stayed relatively steady. Millennials cut back on moves the most.

Put it all together, and it looks like Americans are choosing to renovate and stay put rather than take on the full cost of picking up and moving.

▶️ Borrowing's probably not getting cheaper anytime soon.

Fed Chair Kevin Warsh used the central bank's annual Jackson Hole gathering to warn that prices are still rising too fast and the Fed's got more work to do. The Fed's main tool for fighting inflation is raising interest rates to cool borrowing and spending. Investors now put a 66% chance on a rate hike at the September meeting, nearly double the 35% they expected before Warsh spoke.

When the Fed moves its benchmark rate, it hits credit cards, business lines, and short-term borrowing almost immediately. 

Longer-term rates like mortgages are mostly driven by bond market investors, but the Fed's decisions have a real pull there too. Mortgages mainly track the 10-year Treasury yield, which investors pushed to 4.75% on Monday, one of its highest levels in five years. Freddie Mac put the average 30-year fixed mortgage rate at 6.66% as of the week of August 27, much higher than the start of the year, though only slightly above last year's 6.56% average.

Homebuyers aren't facing a dramatic new shock right now, but businesses and households should expect higher costs when borrowing for big purchases.

▶️ Surging corporate profits pushed stocks higher last month, even with war headlines and wild oil swings. 

August closed out a turbulent summer with the S&P 500 up 2.6% for the month and up over 12% for the year, a strong result given everything investors had to deal with. Oil prices whipsawed all summer as Middle East tensions flared and cooled repeatedly. Global benchmark Brent crude briefly surged past $100 in July before diplomacy stepped in, then climbed again after U.S. military strikes, settling around $90 a barrel on August 31. The tech-heavy Nasdaq dropped roughly 7% in July as investors worried AI spending was getting ahead of real returns, then fully snapped back in August.

What actually drove markets higher was the fundamentals: huge profits. 

America's biggest companies reported surging profits. FactSet reported that S&P 500 companies collectively earned 52% more profit in the second quarter than they did a year ago, far ahead of what analysts had expected. Major tech companies proved AI is generating real returns.

But the story stretched beyond the tech giants. The smaller 493 companies in the broad S&P 500 index also earned 31.8% more than they did a year ago, their strongest profit growth since late 2021.

So how is the economy doing? Depends on who you ask.

🏭 The Companies Everyone’s Talking About

Wendy's new chief executive is overhauling the burger chain after letting food quality slip.

Wendy's is fighting for a turnaround. Once second only to McDonald's among America's biggest burger chains, Wendy's has slipped to third place behind Burger King after six consecutive quarters of falling sales at established restaurants. CEO Bob Wright publicly acknowledged the chain cut corners on ingredient quality and leaned too hard on discounts, weakening its competitive advantage. His recovery plan hits five fronts: food quality, store upgrades, operations, marketing, and digital sales, backed by a new marketing chief poached from McDonald's. To fund it, Wendy's cut its dividend and pulled its full-year financial outlook, signaling the turnaround will cost real money before it pays off.

Nvidia is acquiring Hugging Face for $12.9 billion, pushing the chipmaker into owning AI software and models.

Nvidia is acquiring Hugging Face, the open-source AI hub where developers share and test AI models, for $12.9 billion, a price nearly three times Hugging Face's last known valuation. The deal marks a major strategic shift, pushing Nvidia beyond chip manufacturing and into owning AI software and models directly. The move comes as major AI companies like Anthropic and OpenAI build their own chips to reduce reliance on Nvidia, making this acquisition a clear signal that Nvidia is building a broader business to stay indispensable across the AI industry.

Moderna's personalized cancer vaccine succeeded in its first major late-stage trial, offering new hope for melanoma patients.

Moderna just scored a landmark win for its mRNA technology, this time against cancer. The company's personalized melanoma vaccine, developed with Merck, succeeded in the first major late-stage trial for any mRNA-based cancer therapy. Built from a patient's own tumor, the vaccine teaches the immune system to recognize and fight their specific cancer alongside Merck's existing melanoma drug Keytruda. Moderna's chief executive expects regulatory approval as soon as 2027, and the company is already testing the approach against lung, bladder, and kidney cancer.

Salesforce is growing faster as its AI tools win over businesses and drive demand for pricier plans.

Salesforce is leaning hard into artificial intelligence and growing faster because of it. Its AI tool, Agentforce, is on pace to bring in around $1.5 billion this year, and Salesforce deepened its partnership with Anthropic to help salespeople access customer data through the Claude AI model, making it easier for clients to adopt higher-tier plans. CEO Marc Benioff dismissed fears that AI is cannibalizing the business, pointing to strong customer retention, and the company is forecasting even stronger sales in the months ahead.

❔ The Big Question of the Week

Scoops app users: We have taken the beta app offline for a short period for some major updates. Can’t wait to show you all what we’ve been working on! Reach out if you have any questions.

We’re going to switch up the content in this spotlight for a bit to make sure you all have the info you need to master your week.

Hey {{ first name | friends}} - happy Friday. Thanks for giving me the week off last week. It was 110 in Dallas but 68 inside the conference center, so I saw exactly none of the city. I will have to return to try the BBQ and TexMex. Met some great CFPs from the Financial Planners Association and showed off our newest tools for planners and advisors.

🌎 The Big Picture

Some good, bad, and weird things for you this week:

✅ Renting's gotten a bit more manageable lately. 

Realtor.com found that the national median rent hit $1,695 a month in July, down 1.4% from a year ago and the 36th month in a row of declines. Studios, one-bedrooms, and two-bedrooms are all running 3% to 5% below their 2022 peaks, which is real relief after years of brutal increases. That said, renters are still paying about 15% more than they were pre-pandemic.

If you're trying to decide between renting and buying, renting's still the cheaper monthly option. 

Renters paid $858 less per month than buyers in July, though that gap's shrunk from $923 a year ago as sellers cut prices and mortgage costs came down a bit. Buyers paid about $89 less per month on a starter home this July compared to last year. In eight metro areas, wages have climbed enough and home prices have come down enough that buying's starting to make real financial sense, even if renting's still the more affordable call for most people right now.

🤔 Young investors are increasingly confusing gambling with investing, and it's costing them. 

A new Betterment survey found that nearly one in four Gen Z investors treat sports betting as a deliberate part of their long-term financial strategy. Gen Z is way more likely than older generations to weave sports betting into their financial plans. More than half of young investors moved money they'd set aside for investing into sports betting over the past year. Only about a third of Gen Z investors said they avoid sports betting altogether, compared to 63% of all investors surveyed.

Betterment's CEO put it plainly: sports betting keeps people chasing a quick win instead of building real wealth over time. For young investors, that's a genuine cost, as money going toward bets isn't going toward retirement or long-term goals, right at the moment when building that foundation matters most.

The most important thing: know where this money fits within your budget. It is an expense, not an investment.

Spending money on stuff for entertainment is totally worth it, but you just have to monitor how much you’re spending. Investing in diversified stocks has always been a win over the long term. Sports betting is almost always a loss.

And if you’re doing it on an app, really pay attention.

Big tech corporations are currently paying tens of billions to settle lawsuits over how they made looking at photos of your friends addictive. What do you think they’re capable of doing with something that was already profoundly addictive?

🍻 Americans are quietly drinking less, and the alcohol industry's not loving it.

Gallup found that just 54% of Americans say they drink today, down sharply from 62% in 2023 and the lowest share in recent decades. It's finally leveled off after three years of steady decline, but the damage is already done. Brown-Forman, which makes Jack Daniel's, along with Molson Coors and Boston Beer, the company behind Samuel Adams, have all reported falling sales and sliding stock prices.

It's a mix of tight budgets, shifting attitudes, and new competition. 

More than half of Americans now see alcohol as harmful, up from fewer than 30% before 2020, and THC beverages have pulled in people who used to reach for a beer or cocktail. For anyone in hospitality, this doesn't look like a passing trend; it looks like a lasting shift in how Americans spend on food, drinks, and lifestyle.

✅ Americans earned meaningfully more in July.

The Bureau of Economic Analysis reported households took home 0.4% more income in July after adjusting for inflation, the strongest increase since January.

But higher prices are eating through those gains.

Actual spending barely budged once higher prices were factored in, pulling back after strong buying in May and June. With prices 3.7% higher than a year ago, well above the Fed's 2% target, more of that bigger paycheck's just going toward covering everyday costs rather than buying more.

And families are still saving way less than they historically have.

Households did save a little more, setting aside 3.0% of their income in July, up from 2.7% the month before. That sounds decent, but it's still less than half of what Americans typically saved each month historically.

🏭 The Companies Everyone’s Talking About

Nvidia had another blockbuster quarter while expanding into open-source AI, orbital computing, and new financing deals.

Nvidia had another blockbuster quarter, earning $96.22 billion in revenue. The company has more than tripled its revenue in two years and expects another 70% growth in sales next year, fiscal 2028. Looking to expand even further, the company released its first open-source AI model, Nemotron 3.5 Lightning, free to download and run. Nvidia and SpaceX designed specialized computing hardware for the Starmind AI satellite, set to launch next year, and Nvidia teamed up with six financial firms that have pledged up to $500 billion to help fund AI infrastructure. The company is also in early talks with South Korean chip startup Rebellions about a possible partnership, investment, or acquisition. Every quarter, Nvidia has delivered results that would define most companies' whole year.

Citigroup is more than halfway toward its ten-year plan to fund clean energy and community projects.

Citigroup is more than halfway toward its goal of putting $1 trillion toward "sustainable financing" by 2030, after directing $647.2 billion since 2020. As the third-largest U.S. bank, Citigroup is closer to hitting that target than JPMorgan Chase and Bank of America, with similar pledges, per Trellis. The bank added $91.3 billion in 2025, putting the largest share into renewable energy. Trying to practice what it preaches, Citigroup hit six of eight in-house targets for reducing its environmental footprint, though it missed narrower goals for reusing water and diverting landfill waste. The bank streamlined its funding rules and, betting on future growth, launched a team to finance AI data centers. Citigroup has stayed the top U.S. affordable housing lender for years, backing seniors, veterans, and those with special needs.

Walmart is cutting prices on thousands of items, even though it just reported its slowest sales in years.

Walmart is leaning into price cuts even as sales slow. Government-mandated drug price reductions hurt Walmart's pharmacy business enough to drag its overall U.S. sales growth to 2.6%, the slowest in more than six years. Though shoppers kept showing up to the country's largest retailer. Strip out pharmacy, and the rest of the business grew 3.4%. Walmart cut prices on more than 11,000 items this quarter and plans more reductions ahead, funded by tariff refunds. Meanwhile, advertising revenue jumped 38%, and membership fees rose 17%. The company still raised its sales and profit forecast for the full year.

Target is showing real signs of a turnaround, following five quarters without sales growth.

Target is showing real signs of a turnaround after a lengthy sales slump. Comparable sales, which track results at stores open for at least a year, grew 3.8% this quarter, the second straight quarter of growth after five quarters without any, though slower than the prior quarter's 5.6% gain. Controversy over Target's diversity rollback kept some shoppers away last year, contributing to that slump. Chief executive Michael Fiddelke took over at the beginning of February, right as the recovery began. A large tariff refund boosted earnings this quarter. The retailer also cut prices on more than 10,000 items and rolled out new products across food and beauty to win shoppers back. Fiddelke told reporters two strong quarters aren't the goal, saying the company is after sustained growth over time.

TJX's sales and profit grew this quarter, but a sharp slowdown at T.J. Maxx and Marshalls raised questions.

TJX's sales and profit grew this quarter, but comparable sales at its T.J. Maxx and Marshalls stores rose only 1%, down sharply from 6% the previous quarter. HomeGoods saw strong growth, but the weakness at T.J. Maxx and Marshalls overshadowed it. Chief executive Ernie Herrman called the slowdown self-inflicted, saying stores were missing basic and "impulse-driven" items shoppers wanted. But one analyst cautioned it could also reflect a wider consumer pullback, with shoppers spending less per trip after months of rising prices. TJX still raised its profit forecast for the year and plans to open more stores next year, a bet that deal-seeking shoppers will keep coming regardless of which chain they walk into.

❔ The Big Question of the Week

Scoops app users: We have taken the beta app offline for a short period for some major updates. Can’t wait to show you all what we’ve been working on! Reach out if you have any questions.

We’re going to switch up the content in this spotlight for a bit to make sure you all have the info you need to master your week.

Hey {{ first name | friends}} - I’ll be down in Dallas next week demo-ing for the Financial Planners Assoc at their next-gen conference. If you’ll be there, let’s link up.

There won’t be a Scoops Spotlight next Friday, though. Hopefully you won’t even notice because you’ll be out enjoying the last weekends of the summer. Go enjoy this one!

🌎 The Big Picture

Some good and not-so-good trends starting this summer.

👎 Americans are really falling behind on their debts. 

The Federal Reserve Bank of New York reported that total household debt dipped slightly to $18.8 trillion in the second quarter, the first quarterly decline in years. That’s the headline, but the absolute number doesn't ever really mean much. Balances include stuff that’s not a problem, like charges on a credit card that you pay down before interest hits. And it’s very dependent on the actual cost of stuff. If stuff costs more, the debt is higher. A decline is nice, but it’s just one month. They go up every month even if things are good. The thing you want to look at is how many people are behind on their payments, and how quickly more people are falling behind. Right now, those numbers are bad. People are struggling to keep up with credit cards, auto loans, and student debt.

Balances more than 90 days past due have hit some of the highest levels on record outside of a recession.

Credit card delinquencies reached 13% of all balances in the first half of the year, the highest in 15 years.

Student loan delinquencies climbed to 10.6% in Q2, the highest since 2020 (not an impactful point, given payments were paused during that time, but delinquencies are rising).

Auto loans aren't looking great either, with 5.5% severely past due, the most in at least two decades.

People aren't falling into delinquency faster than usual, which is what policymakers watch for, because it signals a notable turning point of things getting worse. But the steady climb of past-due balances makes it clear: borrowers just can't keep up when living costs and interest rates won't quit rising. And things are just getting steadily worse.

👍 Americans caught a small break from rising prices this summer, mostly because gas prices pulled back from their peak.

The Bureau of Labor Statistics reported that CPI rose just 0.1% for the month, after falling 0.4% in June. Things are cheaper overall compared to earlier this summer, but the cost of living's still 3.4% higher than a year ago. Rent and housing costs have driven most of that inflation.

Energy's the main source of relief, still down from its war-driven peak last spring.

Gasoline fell 2.9% in July, but you're still paying nearly 25% more at the pump than a year ago.

Groceries got a tiny bit cheaper too, down 0.1% in July.

Core prices, which strip out food and energy, rose 0.2% for the month and 2.5% over the past year. Even with these improvements, prices are still rising faster than the 2% annual rate policymakers consider healthy.

Medical care rose 0.4%, and airfare jumped 2.2%, two spots where costs are still outpacing the rest of the household budget.

For families, it's a welcome breather from the relentless squeeze on purchasing power, but it's not enough to change behavior until it becomes a real trend.

Businesses got the same break this summer too, meaning these stable prices could hold for a little longer.

The Producer Price Index, which tracks what companies pay for goods and services before they reach consumers, held flat in July after edging down slightly in June. This slowdown is welcome news for businesses' bottom lines and puts a little less pressure on businesses to pass on higher costs to customers.

👍 Small business owners are feeling optimistic again. 

The NFIB Small Business Optimism Index jumped to 99.8 in July, its highest point in 11 months and back above the 52-year average. The turnaround's real: owners planning to hire jumped to 20%, the highest since October 2022 and way up from pandemic-era lows of 9% just two months ago. Capital investment plans also bounced back from some of their weakest levels since the Great Recession, with 25% of owners now ready to put money into infrastructure, equipment, and growth.

Costs have a lot to do with it. Inflation worries have eased for the first time this year, dropping to 14%. Even with uncertainty still running higher than normal, small business owners are clearly ready to push through it.

Feeling confident and acting on it are two different things, though.

Finding good workers is now the top challenge, with 27% of owners pointing to labor quality or availability as their biggest problem, and 36% reporting unfilled job openings.

That matters a lot, since small businesses employ nearly half the workforce, so a real pickup in hiring plans is encouraging for job seekers navigating a sluggish market.

If you’re looking for a job, small businesses may be the best place to look right now.

🏭 The Companies Everyone’s Talking About

Meta heads to court this week over claims that it addicted children to its apps and misused their data.

Meta heads to court this week, facing its biggest legal threat yet. Colorado, Kentucky, California, and New Jersey accuse it of designing Facebook and Instagram to addict children and lying about the risks. A broader coalition of 29 states alleges Meta illegally collected children's data. Together, they want a court order for age restrictions and an end to infinite scrolling. Meta says damages could reach $1.4 trillion, almost as much as the company is worth. The company just lost multiple related cases, including New Mexico rulings totaling nearly $950 million and a separate California jury verdict. If the states win here, the changes sought could reshape Facebook and Instagram for any young user, not just in the states involved.

Nvidia's working with Wall Street to help customers finance purchases of its chips.

Nvidia is teaming with six major Wall Street firms to create financing platforms that will help customers buy its chips without paying full price upfront. The setup works like this: customers use Nvidia's computing power as collateral to borrow money for purchases, while Nvidia itself backstops up to $125 billion of these deals to reassure lenders. This effectively removes the price barrier for enterprises and governments that need AI infrastructure but lack the cash on hand. Tech firms are spending over $730 billion on AI this year, and Nvidia is positioning itself to capture that demand by making purchases easier to finance.

Rocket Lab grew revenue sharply this quarter, but its next rocket launch may be pushed into 2027.

Rocket Lab grew revenue sharply this quarter, setting a new record. The company builds and launches rockets and makes satellite components for government and commercial customers. Product sales nearly doubled, while service revenue grew more modestly. Revenue reached $234 million, up 62% from a year ago, while the company lost only $49.3 million in the quarter, down from $66.4 million a year earlier. The company's next rocket, Neutron, may not fly before the end of 2026 after all, pushing its debut closer to 2027. CEO Peter Beck called it a difficult, complex program but said the company is still pushing hard for a launch this year. Rocket Lab is also betting big on the future, agreeing to buy satellite operator Iridium to challenge SpaceX's satellite network.

❔ The Big Question of the Week

Scoops app users: We have taken the beta app offline for a short period for some major updates. Can’t wait to show you all what we’ve been working on! Reach out if you have any questions.

We’re going to switch up the content in this spotlight for a bit to make sure you all have the info you need to master your week.

Hey {{ first name | friends}} - happy Friday. Here’s my favorite saying lately:

Don’t confuse being tired with being unhappy.

🌎 The Big Picture

The attacks-peace-talks-attacks cycle driving oil prices up and down continues. Not sure when it will end. Here’s the rest of the news this week.

The US job market is way healthier than those AI doomsday headlines suggest. 

The official July jobs report came out today, and very few employers are hiring. It has been a consistent state for a while. Healthcare is the industry that's hiring the most right now. Finding a job is taking so long that a growing number of people have stopped looking or "participating in the labor force" - not a good trend, but not recession stuff. Wages are not keeping up with the rising cost of living. Less hiring, less movement, less salary negotiating power.

But low hiring does not mean layoffs. Unemployment is historically low.

Challenger, Gray & Christmas tracks corporate layoffs and hiring announcements, and here's what they found: employers announced just 33,429 job cuts in July, the fewest in two years. Meanwhile, companies announced 16,095 planned hires, the most for any July since 2022, and hiring announcements this year are running 25% ahead of last year. Yeah, AI got blamed for 10,970 of those July cuts, making it the fifth straight month at the top of the list, but the bigger picture? Companies are bringing people on faster than they're showing them the door.

And fewer people are filing for unemployment, too. 

New unemployment claims stayed below 200,000 for a third straight week, a streak we haven't seen since 1969, and the four-week average just dropped to its lowest point since September 2022.

Translation: jobs are more secure right now, and hiring's picking up.

More young Americans are building their own thing. Facing a tough job market and sky-high costs, they're launching businesses at a wild rate, with new business applications jumping nearly 15% year-over-year in June on a three-month moving average. Gen X still starts the most businesses, but Gen Z is closing that gap fast. In 2020, Gen X outnumbered Gen Z founders 26 to 1. Now it's nearly 4 to 1, with Gen Z applications growing by two-thirds over the past year, a far bigger jump than other generations.

The cost-of-living crunch is clearly pushing people to find new ways to earn. Lower-income households now start nearly one in four new businesses, up from about one in five in 2020, and lower- and middle-income households are driving most of the recent growth.

Solo entrepreneurship is exploding. Business applications from people who don't plan to hire anyone are growing faster than from those who do, and that gap's widest in the information sector. AI and tech tools are probably letting founders launch leaner without staffing up right away, which means this entrepreneurship wave might actually create fewer jobs than past ones did.

The good news is that it’s easier than ever to start a business. The unfortunate side is that it’s also more necessary than ever to cover the cost of living.

🏭 The Companies Everyone’s Talking About

Hims & Hers faces a lawsuit over its handling of private health data.

Hims & Hers made its name by shipping prescriptions for weight loss, hair loss, and other conditions straight to customers' doors. Now the company is defending itself against a federal and state lawsuit nearly three years in the making. The FTC, Utah, and Los Angeles County allege the telehealth company shared customers' private health information with Meta and Snap, and billed people for prescriptions before they had ever consulted a healthcare provider. The case puts the company's core business practices under a legal microscope.

Jersey Mike's just went public in a $1 billion stock offering, one of the largest restaurant deals ever.

Jersey Mike's just went public, raising $1 billion. It's one of the largest restaurant stock offerings ever. The move, known as an initial public offering, or IPO, lets a company sell shares to the public for the first time. The sandwich chain has nearly 3,300 locations, the second-largest hoagie chain in the country after Subway. Many restaurant chains have struggled as diners cut back on eating out, but Jersey Mike's kept growing, thanks in part to a higher-income customer base, according to CEO Charlie Morrison. The company plans to pay down debt and grow toward 15,000 locations worldwide, doubling its United States footprint.

Palantir's business exploded this quarter as more companies leaned into AI.

Businesses don't want AI companies reading their secrets, and that's becoming very good business for Palantir. The company built its name selling advanced data analytics software to the U.S. government and military, but lately its regular business customers are catching up fast. More companies want to implement AI without having to trust their private data to large third-party AI firms like OpenAI and Anthropic. That shift is paying off. Revenue is up 93% from a year ago as more companies signed on. The growth marks a turnaround after a rough year for Palantir's perception among investors worried that AI spending across the industry was slowing. This quarter suggests otherwise, and company leaders expect the current pace of growth to hold at least into early 2028.

SpaceX's first public financial report showed surging revenue alongside big spending.

SpaceX just had its first financial report as a public company, and the numbers told two different stories. Revenue grew 92% from a year ago, and the company's newer AI computing business more than tripled in size. But SpaceX also poured billions into building out that AI infrastructure, more than investors expected, and shares fell as Wall Street questioned how long the company's satellite business could keep funding that spending. Company executives pushed back on the worry, saying new computing investments are already paying for themselves in under a year. Whether that holds up may determine how much patience investors have left as SpaceX continues to spend aggressively on both rockets and computing power.

Meta expects slower sales ahead, and it's burning through cash

Meta is spending aggressively on AI while absorbing a costly stretch of layoffs and legal charges, and the strain is showing. Severance payments and a $2.4 billion legal charge drove profit down from a year ago and left the company with its smallest cash cushion since 2022. Finance chief Susan Li noted that without those one-time hits, profit would have grown 9%. Rather than pulling back, Meta is pushing forward: the company raised its annual spending target on data centers and AI infrastructure to at least $130 billion, with CEO Mark Zuckerberg pointing out that outside businesses are already paying a premium to rent Meta's surplus computing power.

❔ The Big Question of the Week

Scoops app users: We have taken the beta app offline for a short period for some major updates. Can’t wait to show you all what we’ve been working on! Reach out if you have any questions.

We’re going to switch up the content in this spotlight for a bit to make sure you all have the info you need to master your week.

Hey {{ first name | friends}} - these summer weekends have been absolutely dialed in here in the northeast this year. We’re in for another gorgeous one ahead. I hope the sun is shining wherever you are. If not, let the sun shine in your head.

Lately, I’ve been getting interested in a combination of neuroscience, quantum physics, and our shifting understanding (or lack thereof) of reality. Our reality is what we make it.

🌎 The Big Picture

Not going to spend time on gas prices and the war, because it’s just the same loop.

Peace talks, oil prices down > peace breaks, oil prices up. No clear end in sight.

The bottom line is that even if there is some sort of pact made, the risks around transporting through the Strait of Hormuz (previously a fifth of global oil and very important for many other supplies) are permanently higher. Now, it’s just a question of how much higher. Traffic shutting down unpredictably? Tolls? One out of ten ships might get attacked? Or just the risk that whatever pact there is breaks and it happens all over again.

Prices are based on risk. Business decisions are based on risk. So, higher risk means higher prices and businesses likely needing to restructure their supply chains. There are a million things that influence prices at the pump, so no one can actually tell you where that goes, but the conflict is just one more thing likely to make everything a little more expensive forever.

Borrowers hoping for cheaper loans got no relief this week, and where rates go from here is anybody's guess. 

The big news this week is the Fed. They didn’t actually change anything, but a rare split in Federal Reserve unity, plus less guidance from the Fed's new chair, left everyone wondering what's next. The committee voted 9-3 to hold the key interest rate steady. Fed policymakers don't usually fracture like that when they're setting the baseline rate for the economy, so three dissenting votes is a big deal. The Fed raises rates to make borrowing more expensive, which slows spending and investment - the Fed’s go-to move for fighting inflation. After cutting borrowing costs for over a year, they've now looking at raising rates instead.

Prices have been climbing above the Fed's target inflation rate for more than five years now, and things got worse thanks to tariffs and higher energy costs tied to the Middle East conflict. Chair Kevin Warsh said rates could still go up if inflation doesn’t calm down, but he didn't give any kind of timeline. Investors had been pricing in nearly 100% odds that the Fed would hike at its next September meeting, if not this one. After this week? That dropped to around 57%, a pretty clear sign that nobody really knows what's coming.

Here's the bottom line from this meeting: the assumption that borrowing costs keep trending lower is done. 

If you've been sitting around waiting for cheaper mortgage rates, car lease deals, credit card rates, or a business line of credit, you may need to re-evaluate.

Americans are getting more financially illiterate. (😠)

The latest TIAA Institute and GFLEC report found that U.S. adults answered only 47% of personal finance questions correctly, the worst score in the survey's entire ten-year run.

And the fallout from that is very real. 

People with weaker financial knowledge were four times more likely to struggle with monthly bills and three times more likely to have no way to cover a surprise $2,000 expense. That's the gap between staying afloat and one car repair spiraling into debt.

Younger people are getting hit the hardest. More than a third of Gen Z scored in the weakest financial knowledge category of any group, and women trailed men by six percentage points overall.

Retirement planning is where the knowledge gaps really show up. Adults averaged just over two correct answers out of six retirement questions. Those who scored higher, four or more, were way more likely to save consistently and feel good about retirement.

Getting a grip on how money works is one of the most practical things anyone can do for their future.

You’re already reading scoops, so I’d bet you’re all in the top percentile. Keep it up.

🏭 The Companies Everyone’s Talking About

Apple's iPhone sales surged in Tim Cook's last quarter as CEO.

Apple's iPhone business continued to grow rapidly, with customers embracing the new iPhone 17 lineup. Revenue reached $109.4 billion, up 16% from a year earlier, a total the company called a June quarter record. Shortages of memory chips and computer processors are now limiting how much Apple expects to grow next quarter, and those shortages already forced the company to raise prices on Macs and iPads last month. That momentum didn't carry everywhere. Sales in China grew from last year but missed forecasts, and Apple's outlook for next quarter came in low due to supply constraints. Long-time CEO Tim Cook now hands the company to John Ternus on September 1, passing him strong sales momentum alongside ongoing supply chain challenges.

Amazon's cloud business grew at its fastest pace in years as artificial intelligence spending continues to climb.

Amazon's cloud computing arm posted its fastest growth in nearly five years. Sales rose 37% as more businesses signed on for computing power to run artificial intelligence projects. Advertising sales grew 26% as more companies paid to promote products on Amazon's sites, and total sales topped $200 billion in a single quarter for the first time. Profit jumped, though most of the gain came from the rising value of Amazon's investment in artificial intelligence company Anthropic. The core business also grew strongly on its own this quarter. Amazon kept pouring money into data centers and chips to meet AI demand, raised its 2026 spending forecast to $220 billion from $200 billion, and ended up spending more cash than it brought in over the past year.

SK Hynix made a record profit, but investors still weren't happy.

SK Hynix saw profit soar. The company, a major maker of memory chips used in AI computers and data centers, posted operating profit more than six times higher than last year, a new record. But that still wasn't enough. SK Hynix made less money than investors expected, and its stock price dropped after the news came out. There's another factor behind that record profit. Some of it came from selling its stake in a Japanese chip company, a different kind of memory chip maker. That one-time sale added billions to SK Hynix's bottom line, on top of the money it made from its regular chip business. Delays shipping its newest chips kept it from raising prices as much as it wanted. The company plans to build more factories and lock in longer deals with customers. Meanwhile, investors are watching to see how much longer big tech companies can keep spending huge amounts of money on AI.

Visa cut thousands of jobs while reporting surging sales.

Visa just let go of about 2,600 workers, or 7% of its staff. That happened the same day the payments company said its sales grew 14% from a year earlier. Visa also spent billions of dollars buying back its own stock and paying dividends, common ways companies reward the people who own their stock. But cutting jobs wasn't free. Visa paid $563 million in severance, money given to workers who lose their jobs, and that expense slowed profit growth this quarter. Visa plans to put money into cross-border payments, business services, and stablecoins, a type of digital currency tied to the U.S. dollar for reliable cryptocurrency exchange rates. Visa said artificial intelligence is helping speed up product development, one factor in the wider changes at the company. Other payment companies have made similar cuts this year, too, as the industry looks for ways to run leaner.

❔ The Big Question of the Week

Scoops app users: We have taken the beta app offline for a short period for some major updates. Can’t wait to show you all what we’ve been working on! Reach out if you have any questions.

We’re going to switch up the content in this spotlight for a bit to make sure you all have the info you need to master your week.

Hey {{ first name | friends}} - it’s a beautiful Friday morning. I’m doing class outside today. Birds are chirping. The sky is blue. I’m drinking coffee again. The ides of summer.

🌎 The Big Picture

Slow week this week, but next week is packed with big data releases to give us a full picture of everything going on with the economy.

Stock markets had a rough Thursday.

The geopolitical drama and some ugly tech earnings rattled investors pretty hard. 

The broad S&P 500 stock market index dropped 1.21%, and the tech-heavy Nasdaq slid 2.15%, dragged down by some disappointing reports from big tech names. Alphabet (Google's parent) tanked 7% after saying it plans to drop ~$200 billion on AI infrastructure, which spooked investors who are already getting skiddish about how much money big tech is burning through and whether it makes sense. Tesla fell 14% on weak profit margins and a lot of spending too.

The Middle East war took a turn for the worse this week, now 12 straight rounds of airstrikes in, and it's been pushing oil prices steadily higher since early July.

That likely means higher prices for pretty much everything. 

Houthi attacks on Saudi tankers and military threats sent Brent crude surging 7% past $100 for the first time since the ceasefire. It bottomed out during the ceasefire near $70, meaning it has climbed more than 40% in just a few weeks. That will hit prices at the pump any day now. Pricier oil makes everyday stuff more expensive, and investors are getting nervous that policymakers might hike interest rates to fight inflation. Higher rates make mortgages, business loans, and car leases more expensive, among other things. The idea is that more expensive borrowing slows spending, and less spending gives businesses less pressure to raise prices.

Job security's looking solid right now, with fewer people filing for unemployment than at almost any point in decades. 

Initial unemployment claims dropped to 187,000 last week, the lowest since 1969. Companies are clearly holding onto their people rather than cutting.

Even smoothing out the weekly noise, layoffs have been low. The four-week average, which irons out the weekly swings, fell to one of its lowest readings in five years.

Finding a new job, though? Still really tough. 

A lot of people dropped out of the workforce last month, and fewer job seekers means fewer new claims. Continuing claims, which track people collecting benefits week after week, held steady near 1.8 million. Bottom line: if you've got a job, it looks secure. If you're hunting for one, brace yourself for a long road.

Americans are spending with real confidence, and cheaper gas gave household budgets a nice boost in June. 

Retail sales rose 0.2% for the month, which sounds underwhelming, but gas prices were quietly dragging that number down. When people pay less at the pump, those savings just don't show up in retail data. Strip out gas stations, and spending actually jumped a much healthier 0.7%.

A lot of that extra cash went toward non-essentials, exactly the kind of spending that shows people feel good about their finances. Bank of America's card data backed that up, with overall spending up 6.3% year-over-year, the fastest one-year jump in more than four years. They did flag that one-off events like the World Cup gave June a temporary lift. But still, the bigger picture is that people are holding up pretty well financially, and that's good news for business owners and anyone counting on Americans to keep opening their wallets.

Gas prices are consistently volatile, so there’s still room for this conflict to cool off and lower the impact on the broader economy.

🏭 The Companies Everyone’s Talking About

Tesla is sacrificing profits to go all-in on AI and robotics.

Tesla is pouring money into robots and self-driving technology, and for now that spending costs more than it brings in. Revenue rose 26% to $28.2 billion last quarter, and Tesla delivered more than 480,000 vehicles, well above expectations, but profit fell as the company spent aggressively on Optimus robots, the Cybercab, and its robotaxi service. Operating costs jumped 47%; Tesla posted its first quarterly cash deficit in two years, and investors reacted with concern. Tesla CEO Elon Musk called this a massive investment year, as the company plans to spend over $25 billion on factories and AI infrastructure.

Taco Bell is facing lawsuits after lettuce was linked to a nationwide illness outbreak.

Taco Bell, owned by Yum Brands, is facing a wave of lawsuits after health officials linked its lettuce to a Cyclospora outbreak, a parasite that causes stomach illness and diarrhea. Three law firms filed suits within hours of the announcement, and lawyers call it the largest Cyclospora outbreak in U.S. history, with more than 140 people hospitalized so far. The lawsuits don't have to prove Taco Bell caused the contamination. They only need to show the food was unsafe when it reached customers, a lower bar than most negligence cases. Past outbreaks tied to McDonald's and Walmart never had an exact cause pinpointed, and the bagged salad lawsuits settled confidentially, with one attorney saying similar cases have settled for $25,000 to more than $1 million.

Alphabet is pouring money into artificial intelligence, but investors are watching closely to see if the spending pays off.

Alphabet is betting big on AI, but the math isn't working yet. The cloud division surged 82% as customers rushed to tap AI capabilities, yet the company burned through $5.9 billion more cash than it generated. To keep up with demand, Alphabet raised its spending plan to as much as $205 billion and will rent extra computing power from outside providers this quarter, even though that will squeeze its profits in the near term. That combination of higher spending and negative cash flow has investors on edge, even as $514 billion in signed cloud contracts suggests the bet could still pay off.

General Motors is walking back Cadillac's all-electric promise, bringing back gas-powered models.

General Motors is walking back its Cadillac brand's promise to go all-electric by decade's end. GM will start selling gas-powered CT5, XT5, and revived XT6 models next spring, alongside Cadillac's electric lineup, as buyers stayed lukewarm on electric vehicles and government rules supporting them went away. That reversal isn't free. General Motors has spent nearly eleven billion dollars unwinding its electric vehicle plans since last year, and those costs are still dragging down its profit forecast. Strip out the one-time charges, and the business looks sturdier, with steady pricing and less spent repairing vehicles under warranty pushing core profit higher this quarter. GM is shifting more SUV production to Michigan as it refocuses on the gas engines it once expected to phase out.

❔ The Big Question of the Week

Scoops app users: We have taken the beta app offline for a short period for some major updates. Can’t wait to show you all what we’ve been working on! Reach out if you have any questions.

We’re going to switch up the content in this spotlight for a bit to make sure you all have the info you need to master your week.

Hey {{ first name | friends}} - coming to you with about two hours of cumulative sleep. That’s progress from last week. At least the sky’s not on fire lol.

🌎 The Big Picture

Some good signs this week.

Things actually got cheaper for Americans in June, thanks to a big drop in fuel prices. 

The Bureau of Labor Statistics reported the Consumer Price Index (CPI) fell 0.4% for the month, the biggest drop since April 2020, while annual inflation slowed to 3.5% from 4.2% in May. Shelter costs rose just 0.1%, the smallest monthly gain since January 2021, easing pressure on housing costs for renters and homeowners alike.

Most of that good news came straight from the gas pump, where prices tumbled nearly 10% after a U.S.-Iran ceasefire briefly calmed things down in the Middle East.

That ceasefire's since fallen apart, and gas prices are already creeping back up in July. After falling steadily from a spring peak of $4.56 a gallon, AAA put the national average back at $3.84, still about 68 cents higher than this time last year. We're still well below the spring peak, but the renewed tension could shut the door on any further relief at the pump.

On the food side, things are finally settling too, with grocery prices rising just 0.2% in June after a rougher 0.5% jump in April.

The good signal: For the first time in a while, the everyday cost of living stopped rising so fast, and it's not just because of a temporary dip in gas prices. 

Core prices, which strip out volatile food and energy, were up only 2.6% from a year ago, much closer to what we'd consider normal. Core goods got cheaper, and services held steady after months of creeping higher. June's real win for most households? Steadier prices on housing and everyday stuff, even if gas doesn't keep falling.

Small business owners were feeling a little more upbeat in June, though they are also raising prices at the fastest pace in over two years. 

The National Federation of Independent Business's Small Business Optimism Index climbed to 97.4, a solid bounce back from May and just shy of its long-run average. Cheaper fuel helped lift the mood, and more owners are expecting better conditions ahead.

That said, inflation is back to being owners' single biggest worry, with price increases ticking up for four straight months. Since small businesses employ nearly half of America's private-sector workers, their confidence and pricing decisions ripple out into hiring, wages, and what we all pay day to day. So even if your local shop owner is feeling more hopeful, don't be surprised if prices there keep climbing.

For workers, things are still slow.

Owners remain cautious about hiring and spending, given that borrowing costs have stayed high. June's confidence bounce is real, but it's sitting right next to rising costs, a reminder that Main Street's optimism is still pretty fragile until prices calm down for good.

🏭 The Companies Everyone’s Talking About

Costco says thousands of its longtime hourly workers have built retirement accounts worth more than $1 million.

Costco is turning some checkout workers into millionaires. The company's chief financial officer says thousands of its hourly workers have built 401(k) retirement accounts worth more than $1 million, mostly by steadily contributing part of their paychecks over decades. A 401(k) lets workers set aside earnings into an investment account that grows over time, often with added contributions from an employer. One longtime cashier who started decades ago earning under $6 an hour now makes $32.90 an hour and has himself surpassed the milestone. Costco says the pattern shows up broadly among workers who stay long term, a sign that steady saving and time in the market can matter more than a high salary.

Apple sued OpenAI for allegedly stealing trade secrets.

Apple is suing OpenAI for stealing trade secrets to build hardware. The company claims over 400 former employees jumped to OpenAI, with Apple alleging that departing employees were coached to evade security processes when leaving the company. OpenAI's hardware chief, a former Apple executive, allegedly directed job candidates who were still working at Apple to bring actual parts from Apple to their interviews for show-and-tell sessions. This marks a dramatic flip from 2024, when the two companies partnered on iPhone features. Apple already replaced OpenAI with a different AI assistant this year and is now seeking damages and a court order to block OpenAI from using its confidential information.

Strategy abandoned its Bitcoin buy-and-hold model, selling $216 million as holdings plunged in value.

Strategy is breaking from the buy-and-hold-only approach that made it the largest public holder of bitcoin, selling $216 million worth of the cryptocurrency last week in its largest sale ever. The move helps fund promised dividends to shareholders and rebuild cash reserves instead of only adding to its stockpile. It follows a rough quarter: Strategy posted an $8.32 billion loss on its bitcoin holdings as the token fell 14% over three months and remains down more than 45% from a year ago. Strategy's own shares have fallen about 75% over the past year, and the company bought most of its bitcoin at an average price well above today's level. The shift suggests that preserving cash now matters as much to Strategy as growing its bitcoin stockpile does.

SK Hynix debuted on the Nasdaq, raising $26.5 billion in one of the largest ever foreign listings on the US stock market.

SK Hynix began trading on the Nasdaq last week, raising $26.5 billion in one of the largest US listings ever by a foreign company. The chipmaker priced its American shares at $149 each, with investor demand strong enough to oversubscribe the offering several times over before trading began. The company plans to use the proceeds to expand production, including a new advanced packaging plant in Indiana. Memory chips act like short-term storage in phones and computers, holding information a device needs quickly. Artificial intelligence systems need a more powerful version of that memory to process massive amounts of data at once, and demand has outpaced supply.

JPMorgan Chase posted record profits and revenue, signaling strong banking momentum despite economic headwinds ahead.

JPMorgan Chase posted its highest quarterly profit ever, earning $21.2 billion in net income as stock traders blew past expectations. The bank's stock-trading revenue jumped 86% from a year earlier to $6.03 billion, pushing total trading revenue to a record $12.1 billion. A long-held stake in Visa added another $4.6 billion to the bottom line, after JPMorgan cashed in part of the stake it has held for nearly two decades. Revenue climbed to $58 billion for the quarter, with every part of the bank's business posting record results. Despite the strong results, CEO Jamie Dimon flagged a growing list of risks building beneath the surface, including geopolitical conflicts, persistent inflation, large government deficits, and elevated asset prices, warning that they could cause real disruption if those pressures collide.

❔ The Big Question of the Week

Scoops app users: We have taken the beta app offline for a short period for some major updates. Can’t wait to show you all what we’ve been working on! Reach out if you have any questions.

We’re going to switch up the content in this spotlight for a bit to make sure you all have the info you need to master your week.

Hey {{ first name | friends}} - coming to you with about an hour of cumulative sleep. Don’t let your baby get bug bites. She’s happier this morning. We ride on.

🌎 The Big Picture

Spoke to my team this week to sanity check whether we’re leaning pessimistic or negative. We’ve already built a process with automated tone checks and required contextualization to ensure we’re not leaning into any negative headlines that cherry-pick a one-month data point that’s not relevant to extrapolate meaning. We always try to give the historical context. We came to the conclusion that we’re still keeping it real. The challenge right now is just that a lot of numbers are actually historically bad. Plenty are historically normal. So I’m always trying to make sure we’re delivering the most balanced perspective.

Anyways, I digress… here’s what I think is worth knowing this week. Some of the stuff that sounded historically bad and also perfectly normal this week. When there’s something historically good, you know I've got you.

🏠

Soaring housing costs have kept millions of working adults in their childhood bedrooms. 

Realtor.com counted a record 25.2 million adults under 35 still living with their parents last year, topping even pandemic-era numbers. Among adults aged 30 to 34, that share's nearly doubled since 2000, hitting 12.7%. The Federal Reserve found almost half of adults under 30 were living with a parent in 2025, up sharply from 37% in 2019.

Having a job doesn't fix it. About 70% of young adults living at home were employed, per Realtor.com.

The problem is affordability. Median rent prices have climbed 17% since 2019, and median home prices have increased twice as fast. Mortgage costs doubled over five years. This is reshaping household budgets and pushing back milestones like family development, homeownership, and independent retirement savings.

Home prices just hit a record in June, but buyers still caught a small break. 

Falling mortgage rates pushed the typical monthly payment down 2.5% from a year ago, per Zillow. That's a little breathing room, even with the median home selling at a record $440,600 according to the National Association of Realtors.

Prices are high, but they're not climbing as fast. 

Wages have been outpacing home price growth lately, which has helped affordability improve overall despite the record price tag. That's a rare win for buyers who've felt completely priced out for years.

💼

Companies putting the most money into AI are also hiring the fastest. 

A study from Ramp and Revelio Labs tracked spending and employment at more than 21,000 companies and found a clear positive link between AI spending and headcount growth. It's hard to know if AI investment drives hiring or if fast-growing companies just happen to spend more on AI, but either way, their headcount grew about 10% in the two years after ramping up AI investment. The biggest AI spenders were already larger, faster-growing, and more likely to have outside investors before they even adopted it.

AI spending isn't squeezing out younger workers, either. 

Entry-level employees made up a slightly larger share of heavy-AI companies' workforces, up about one percentage point compared to companies that hadn't adopted AI yet. Companies spending little on AI saw no hiring bump at all, and their entry-level share slipped instead. Researchers are careful to note this doesn't prove AI caused the hiring, since big spenders were probably going to grow anyway. But if you're job hunting, a company's AI investment might signal it's growing and bringing people on, even at the entry level.

Layoffs stayed broadly low last week, which is good news for workers' peace of mind.

The Labor Department reported initial unemployment claims dropped to 215,000, a small dip from the week before and right in line with where filings have been sitting all year. The four-week average has been trending lower, now well below last summer's levels. Continuing claims ticked up slightly but stayed below year-ago levels. Put it all together, and you've got a job market that's neither booming nor breaking down; employers are holding onto their people, just hiring slowly.

^🎓

Student loan borrowers, your repayment options just got an overhaul. 

The Department of Education replaced its old system with two streamlined plans starting July 1, 2026. You can pick the Tiered Standard Plan, which spreads payments over 10 to 25 years based on loan size, or the Repayment Assistance Plan, which ties your monthly payment to your income. Under the income-based plan, payments run between 1 and 10% of your income and can drop as low as $10 a month, with extra reductions if you've got dependents. Pay on time, and you get an interest waiver. If your payment falls short, the government kicks in up to $50 a month toward your principal. That means balances won't keep snowballing the way they did under old income-driven plans, where three out of four borrowers still owed more after six years, according to federal loan data cited by the department.

The catch? Forgiveness takes longer. Under the new income-driven plan, you won't qualify for forgiveness until you've made payments for thirty years, longer than the 20-to-25-year timelines on the plans it's replacing. Parents and students will want to dig into these new options as they plan for tuition costs ahead.

🏭 The Companies Everyone’s Talking About

Walmart is cutting prices on thousands of summer items, including ground beef, cherries, and soda.

Walmart is cutting prices on thousands of items, including a 12% cut to ground beef, cheaper cherries, and discounted Coca-Cola and Pepsi products, as record-high beef prices squeeze household budgets. The cuts follow a drought-driven shrinking of U.S. cattle herds that could take years to rebuild. The savings span groceries, household goods, outdoor living, toys, and apparel. Economists and investors often watch Walmart's pricing moves as a signal of how U.S. shoppers are holding up. Sam's Club is cutting prices on more than 250 items, too, from chicken wings to pork ribs. Walmart says the goal is to help families save on every gathering, big or small.

Rivian asked investors for another $1.3B to build a new factory in Georgia.

Rivian is building a new factory in Georgia, backed by a Department of Energy loan of up to $4.5 billion. The company builds electric trucks and SUVs, including its newer, lower-cost R2 model. The loan's terms require Rivian to put up some of its own capital before it can draw on the federal funds, so the company sold 75 million new shares to raise about $1.3 billion toward that requirement. Because Rivian issued new shares to raise capital, existing shareholders now own a slightly smaller percentage of the company than before, though the value of their holdings isn't necessarily affected. The sale came right after Rivian reported stronger deliveries and raised its full-year sales targets.

Toyota is investing billions to move some truck production from Mexico to Texas.

Toyota is investing $3.6 billion in a new Texas factory to move Tacoma production out of Mexico. A move that could help offset the up to 25% tariff Mexican-built vehicles face when entering the U.S. The expansion is expected to create 2,000 jobs by 2030, building on a $10 billion pledge Toyota made last year to grow its U.S. manufacturing presence, and Toyota will keep building Tacomas as usual at its second Mexican plant in Guanajuato. The news lands as the U.S. and Mexico let a key trade-pact deadline lapse, leaving cross-border auto production in limbo, and Texas is offering a $20 million grant to sweeten the deal.

❔ The Big Question of the Week

Scoops app users: We have taken the beta app offline for a short period for some major updates. Can’t wait to show you all what we’ve been working on! Reach out if you have any questions.

We’re going to switch up the content in this spotlight for a bit to make sure you all have the info you need to master your week.

Hey {{ first name | friends}} - happy birthday to America! Hope you’re out crushing hot dogs and making memories. Try to make it to Monday with all your fingers.

🌎 The Big Picture

Here’s what to catch up on this week:

Hiring's slowing and tech layoffs are surging, but most industries are holding onto their people.

Employers added 57,000 workers in June, above last year's monthly average of 36,000, but way below May's revised 129,000 and April's revised 148,000. Those two months got revised down by a combined 74,000, so the picture's not nearly as good as it looked a few weeks ago.

Unemployment's still low, but nobody's quitting, and that just means things are frozen.

The unemployment rate held at 4.2%, hanging in the 4.1%–4.3% range it's been stuck in for almost a year, which is a decent sign of stability. But the Labor Department's May JOLTS report showed the quitting rate dropped to just 1.9%, a level we haven't seen since the mid-2010s when unemployment was sitting much higher, around 5.5%. Bottom line: people don't feel safe enough to walk away from their jobs right now. If you're hiring, your search just got harder. If you're job hunting, it's gonna take longer than you'd like.

Layoffs are low overall, but tech's cutting jobs fast, and AI's reshuffling everything.

Initial unemployment filings came in at 215,000 last week, well below where they were a year ago, and the monthly average has stayed low. The May JOLTS report showed actual layoffs holding flat at a 1.1% rate, near historic lows.

But placement firm Challenger, Gray and Christmas reported 443,604 layoff announcements through June, the second-highest January-to-June total since 2020. Tech makes up roughly a third of those, up 83% from the same stretch last year. AI was cited in one of every three June job cut announcements, making it the leading reason for the fourth month running.

Here's the flip side, though: AI is also driving more hiring.

Revelio Labs found that companies making the biggest AI investments grew headcount by about 10% after adoption. This looks less like a jobs massacre and more like a restructuring.

The cost of living is climbing at its fastest pace in over two years.

The Bureau of Economic Analysis reported that the PCE Price Index, policymakers' go-to inflation gauge, climbed 4.1% over the past year through May. That's the fastest pace since April 2023 and more than double the target. Strip out food and energy, and core prices are still up 3.4% from a year ago, the fastest since October 2023.

Spending's up, and incomes are holding, but Americans are saving at a near four-year low.

Paychecks are growing. Disposable income jumped 0.7% in May, and even after inflation, real purchasing power grew 0.3%. Americans spent 0.7% more in May too, with real spending up 0.3%, so it's not just sticker shock padding the numbers.

The catch? People are saving a whole lot less to keep up. The personal saving rate sat at just 3.0%, nearly a four-year low and less than half the pre-pandemic average of over 7%. Incomes are keeping pace for now, but if you're not actively protecting your savings, it's worth a hard look. And if you run a business, keep a close eye on how your customers' habits start shifting if costs keep climbing.

Buying a home still beats renting over the long run, but the math is totally different depending on where you live.

Zillow's research shows that nationally, homeowners break even with renters in about 6 years with a typical 5%–20% down payment at current median home prices and mortgage costs. Stay put for 30 years, and homeowners build roughly $735,000 in net wealth, while renters fall about $1.15 million behind. Bank of America found that 53% of Americans now prefer buying over renting, up from 48% last year, and 90% see a home as a valuable investment.

But location changes everything. In Columbus, Memphis, and Buffalo, you can break even with renting in just 3.5 to 4.2 years. In San Francisco and San Jose, buying doesn't pay off even over three decades.

For millions of households, homeownership just isn't an option right now.

The National Association of Home Builders found that 52% of U.S. households can't afford a $300,000 home, putting ownership out of reach for millions. For those who can make it work, a bigger down payment builds more long-term wealth, but a smaller one keeps more cash on hand and can get you to break even faster.

Stepping back, there's a clear thread running through this week's news: household finances are getting squeezed from every direction. A job market that's slowing and frozen in place. Inflation running well above normal. People putting away the smallest portion of their paychecks in years. And homeownership costs that are simply out of reach for many. None of these things is a crisis on its own, but together, they're worth paying real attention to as you figure out where you stand heading into the second half of the year.

🏭 The Companies Everyone’s Talking About

Bayer won a major Supreme Court ruling that blocks most cancer lawsuits over its Roundup weedkiller.

Bayer just won a major legal victory in a decade-long fight over whether its Roundup weedkiller causes cancer. The Supreme Court ruled 7-2 that federal pesticide labeling rules take precedence over state law, meaning consumers cannot sue Bayer for failing to warn them about cancer risk on the product's label. The ruling blocks the most common type of claim, though lawsuits based on negligence and product defects can still move forward. Bayer has already paid more than $10 billion settling earlier Roundup cases and has a separate $7.25 billion settlement pending court approval that could effectively close the litigation for good.

JPMorgan is investing its own capital in defense and national security companies.

JPMorgan is putting its own money into companies it considers critical to national security, launching a $10 billion investment fund alongside a $1.5 trillion, ten-year financing push for defense and other strategic industries. The move comes as the United States faces a shortage of weapons stockpiles, made worse by the Iran conflict, and follows the government itself taking direct stakes in a handful of companies it considers strategically important. So far, JPMorgan has invested in a gold and antimony mine in Idaho and an artificial intelligence drone maker, and has advised on the Pentagon's stake in missile maker L3Harris. The initiative is widely seen as central to Dimon's legacy, and he may stay involved even after he steps down as CEO.

Micron's revenue more than quadrupled over the past year, fueled by insatiable AI demand for memory chips.

Memory shortages are Micron's secret weapon. The chip maker's revenue quadrupled to $41.46 billion as AI demand for memory chips hit fever pitch, while gross margins nearly hit 85% as supply constraints kept prices climbing. Next quarter looks even stronger: the company is guiding $50 billion in revenue, blowing past analyst expectations by roughly $6 billion. To protect that windfall, Micron locked in 16 multiyear customer contracts that cover about half its future sales through 2028. CEO Sanjay Mehrotra expects supply tightness to persist through 2028, meaning the company's pricing advantage isn't going anywhere.

Qualcomm is acquiring AI software startup Modular, pushing beyond smartphones into data centers.

Qualcomm is making a bold move beyond smartphones with its $3.9 billion stock purchase of AI software startup Modular. The deal gives the chipmaker a tool to compete directly against the dominant AI platform that locks developers into a single supplier; Modular's software runs AI across chips from multiple makers without requiring code rewrites. By acquiring this technology, Qualcomm is signaling its push into data centers, where the real growth in AI computing is happening.

Comcast is splitting into two companies.

Comcast is splitting itself into two public companies. NBCUniversal, home to Universal's theme parks, film studios, NBC, Telemundo, and Peacock, plus the European media business Sky, will operate independently, while Comcast will keep its cable, broadband, and wireless business. The move reverses a strategy Comcast built over more than a decade, owning both NBCUniversal's shows and movies and the cable and internet lines that carry them into people's homes. That pairing has been strained by cord-cutting and streaming competition. Comcast will hold up to 19.9% of NBCUniversal for a year after the separation, which is expected to close in about a year. Comcast's chairman said the split gives each business room to move faster and pursue its own growth.

❔ The Big Question of the Week

Scoops app users: We have taken the beta app offline for a short period for some major updates. Can’t wait to show you all what we’ve been working on! Reach out if you have any questions.

We’re going to switch up the content in this spotlight for a bit to make sure you all have the info you need to master your week.

Hey {{ first name | friends}} - thanks for your patience with me getting this out. Bouncing back from being a little under the weather. Hope you’re having a great morning.

🌎 The Big Picture

Here’s what caught my attention this week:

American companies are raking in massive AI profits, but they’re not that interested in sharing with their workers. Investors think they should.

A 2026 Just Capital survey of over 1,000 Americans, professional investors, and executives found a pretty stark divide over who should benefit from all that AI money. Nearly two-thirds of investors and everyday people said reinvesting in workers should be a top priority. Corporate leaders? Not so much. They ranked R&D first, shareholder returns second, and only about half even put workforce reinvestment on their list.

That gap between what people want and what's happening is showing up in the job market right now. 

Tech companies have cut tens of thousands of jobs this year while collectively dropping hundreds of billions on AI infrastructure, according to CNBC. Just Capital found that most of the public, and nearly half of professional investors, think companies should put more than 5% of their AI spending toward helping displaced workers through retraining, severance, or transition support. Fewer than one in five corporate leaders are committed to that. The good news? That number has nearly doubled since last fall, so executives might be coming around. Either way, both businesses and workers need to get ready for what's coming.

Finding a home you can afford in America is getting harder. 

Harvard University's Joint Center for Housing Studies dropped its annual State of the Nation's Housing report this week, and they summed up the market in one word: subdued. Construction's down, sales are sluggish, and costs just keep climbing.

Renting is getting brutal. 

Nearly half of all renter households, around 22.7 million, spent more than 30% of their income on housing in 2024, a record high for the fourth year running. Over 12 million of those households are spending more than half their income just on rent, leaving almost nothing for food, healthcare, or savings. The number of rentals under $1,000 a month has shrunk by 7 million units over the past decade, and what's replacing them is way out of reach for most working families.

Buying isn't the escape hatch it used to be, either. 

Existing home sales have been stuck near a 30-year low since 2023, and the median age of a first-time homebuyer has hit an all-time high of 40. Home prices are up 54% since 2020, and monthly payments on a median-priced home now cost more than double what they did five years ago. Single-family construction dropped 7% last year. For younger Americans especially, the gap between what housing costs and what paychecks cover has never been this wide.

For the first time ever, America's getting more electricity from the sun than from burning coal. 

Solar supplied 12.8% of the national grid's electricity compared to coal's 12.2% in May 2026, according to Ember, an energy think tank that crunched government data. Five years ago, solar generated less than half of what it does now, while coal was handling nearly 20% of the grid.

Batteries are the real story here. 

Solar paired with battery storage made up 91% of all new US electricity capacity installed in the first quarter of 2026, per the Solar Energy Industries Association and Wood Mackenzie. Even with the White House committing $700 million last week to prop up coal, including funding for the first new coal plants in 13 years, solar's economics just kept winning. Natural gas still dominates at 37% of the grid, so fossil fuels aren't going anywhere fast. But the direction is clear: cheaper solar and better batteries are changing how Americans power their lives.

Prices are squeezing American budgets harder than they have in over two years. 

The Bureau of Economic Analysis reported that the Personal Consumption Expenditure (PCE) Price Index, policymakers' go-to inflation gauge, climbed 4.1% over the past year through May, the fastest pace since April 2023. That's more than double what policymakers are hoping for.

It's not just gas prices. Strip out food and energy, and core prices are still 3.4% higher than a year ago, the fastest since October 2023.

Higher prices aren't stopping people from spending, but savings are taking a real hit. Paychecks are still growing. Disposable income surged 0.7% in May, and even after accounting for higher prices, real purchasing power grew 0.3%. Spending's booming, too. Americans spent 0.7% more in May, and real spending rose 0.3%, not just inflation padding the numbers. But keeping up with higher costs means people are putting less away. The personal saving rate held at 3.0%, nearly a four-year low and less than half the pre-pandemic average of over 7%.

Incomes are keeping pace for now, but households need to make sure they're still building a cushion for the future, and businesses should expect spending habits to shift if costs keep climbing.

🏭 The Companies Everyone’s Talking About

Chevron is building a dedicated natural gas power plant to fuel a massive Microsoft data center in West Texas.

Chevron has found a new way to serve the fast-growing AI industry. It has signed a 20-year deal with Microsoft to develop a co-located natural-gas-fired power facility for a data center in West Texas. The project, called Project Kilby, would generate up to 2.67 gigawatts of electricity, enough to power roughly 2 million homes, and run entirely off-grid, serving only the Microsoft facility. Chevron expects to announce a final investment decision by the end of this year, and if it proceeds, construction is expected to support more than 6,000 jobs over five to seven years, along with hundreds of permanent operational roles.

Fox agreed to buy streaming platform Roku, combining content and distribution under one company.

Fox agreed to buy Roku for $22 billion in its largest acquisition in roughly seven years. Fox is paying $160 per share in a mix of cash and stock. The company would also take on up to $12 billion in new debt to close the dea Streaming now accounts for nearly 50% of all US TV viewing, and Fox is betting that owning both content and the platform people use to watch it positions it to better compete for advertising dollars as viewers shift toward free, ad-supported options. The deal creates what the companies say will be the third-largest television company in the US by viewing share. CEO Lachlan Murdoch said the deal will transform the company, with closing expected in the first half of 2027.

Yum Brands is selling Pizza Hut to a private equity firm.

Pizza Hut is getting eaten by private equity. Yum Brands is selling Pizza Hut in two deals with a combined price tag of $2.7 billion, splitting the brand by geography: private equity firm LongRange Capital takes the U.S. and all international operations outside mainland China, while a separate buyer acquires the China business. The sale follows 10 straight quarters of declining U.S. comparable-store sales, as competitors and delivery apps steadily eroded the brand's footing. Though Pizza Hut China told a different story, growing operating profit 19% last year and posting its highest operating profit margin since 2016 under local ownership. Yum keeps Taco Bell and KFC, its stronger-performing chains.

❔ The Big Question of the Week

Scoops app users: We have taken the beta app offline for a short period for some major updates. Can’t wait to show you all what we’ve been working on! Reach out if you have any questions.

We’re going to switch up the content in this spotlight for a bit to make sure you all have the info you need to master your week.

Hey {{ first name | friends}} - hope your employer gave you the day off today for Juneteenth. Writing to you from my laptop sitting outside in the sun and breeze in Long Island. Coming to you a little later in the morning today.

🌎 The Big Picture

Here’s the latest:

Gas prices are finally dropping, and the end of the Middle East war is why. 

AAA just confirmed the nationwide average dipped below $4 a gallon for the first time since late March, snapping a brutal 28-day stretch that peaked at $4.56 in May. The relief came from a US-Iran deal to end the war and reopen the Strait of Hormuz, that narrow waterway whose closure triggered the biggest oil supply disruption in history, cutting off roughly 20% of global oil. When the Strait shut down in late February, crude prices shot up nearly 70% in just two weeks, and pump prices followed right along.

But it will still hurt for a bit. 

Prices are still sitting about 30% above where they were before the US and Israel attacked Iran on February 28, and experts don't see a full return to pre-war levels before 2027. The gap between states is stark: California drivers are paying $5.64 a gallon while Indiana drivers pay $3.39. With crude inventories still 6% below the five-year average and summer driving demand picking up, there's a real ceiling on how much further prices can fall right now.

Borrowing costs aren't coming down anytime soon, sorry. 

The Federal Reserve, aka the central bank in charge of our whole money system, held its benchmark interest rate steady at 3.5% to 3.75% at its June 17 meeting under new Chair Kevin Warsh, and the committee is hinting the next move could be to raise borrowing costs, not lower them, as has been the expectation for a while. The Fed's been sitting tight, waiting on the cost of living to stop rising so quickly, but it now expects core prices to rise 3.3% this year, way up from the 2.7% projection just three months ago, which means inflation's a bigger problem than they thought. If you're carrying credit card debt, financing a car, holding off on a business loan, or waiting for mortgage rates to get cheaper, waiting might not make things better.

Even the experts will have a more difficult time figuring out the future of interest rates.

Warsh, who took over as Fed chair in May 2026, also made a quieter but real shift: the Fed's done telegraphing its next moves. The latest policy statement shrank from 341 words to 130, with all the forward guidance stripped out. Warsh announced five task forces to study Fed communications, the balance sheet, existing data sources, productivity and jobs, and inflation frameworks, with findings due by year-end. Until prices stop climbing so fast, borrowing costs are expected to stay high.

Home insurance is getting way more expensive and way less useful when you need it. 

Nearly half of all claims filed with the five biggest US insurers went unpaid in 2025, up from 36% a decade ago, according to a Wall Street Journal analysis. Insurers are hiking premiums an average of 6% a year (more than double overall inflation, and some states like Colorado are seeing 21% jumps) while quietly tightening what they'll cover. Higher deductibles, stricter roof rules, and percentage-based deductibles tied to your home's full value mean you're absorbing more risk and getting less in return. If a storm or fire hits, you're getting squeezed twice: the deductible's bigger, and it’s now a coin flip whether your claim gets denied anyway.

Homeowners and insurers are heading for a real fight. 

Property and casualty insurers posted their highest underwriting profits in nearly two decades in 2025, even as customers struggle to keep up with premiums. That gap between record insurer profits and shrinking customer payouts has caught political attention; New York and Oklahoma both floated profit caps on insurers in early 2026.

Do yourself a favor: stress-test your cash reserves against what you'd owe out-of-pocket if a claim got denied, and think through whether that high-deductible plan makes sense for the real risks your home faces.

🏭 The Companies Everyone’s Talking About

Apple is raising prices on its devices to offset quadrupled memory chip costs driven by AI server demand.

Apple is raising prices on its products as memory and storage chip costs have become unsustainable to absorb. Since 2025, competition from Google, Microsoft, Meta, and Amazon for AI server components has quadrupled these chip prices. The next iPhone Pro could jump $270 to $1,299, while Mac and iPad increases could arrive even sooner. This isn't a surprise; the company flagged in May 2026 that memory costs would weigh heavily on its business. With chip prices expected to keep climbing into 2027, Apple is choosing to pass these costs onto customers rather than risking less profit per product.

SpaceX raised $75 billion in the largest stock market debut in history, beginning trading on June 12.

SpaceX went public for the first time, raising $75 billion by selling shares of the company to outside investors, the largest stock market debut in history, and more than double the previous global record. Going public means anyone can now buy a piece of the rocket and satellite company, which has been privately held for over two decades. The company led by Elon Musk instantly becomes one of the largest companies on the market. At $135 per share, it entered markets at a valuation of roughly $1.8 trillion. Last year, the company earned only about $19 billion in revenue, mostly from its Starlink satellites with 10.3 million users. The AI space tech giant isn't profitable, losing nearly $5 billion in 2025, thanks to its xAI division. Demand for a piece of Elon Musk's empire was enormous: investors tried to buy more than four times the shares available, and retail investors alone submitted $100 billion in orders. SpaceX plans to expand its Starship launches and build AI data centers in space, though the company has not yet turned a profit.

Robinhood is cutting 300 jobs to trim middle management while its trading business hits record volumes.

Robinhood is cutting about 300 jobs, roughly 10% of its workforce. CEO Vlad Tenev said the business has never been stronger, and June trading volumes across stocks, options, and prediction markets are at record levels. The cuts target middle management, the layers of directors and managers between senior leadership and the teams building products. By removing those layers, Robinhood expects decisions to get made faster and products to reach customers more quickly. Robinhood is the latest financial technology company to cut jobs this year, though, unlike many of its peers, it is not blaming AI for the reductions. The cuts will cost roughly $28 million in severance and related expenses. To reduce its reliance on trading revenue, which swings with market conditions, Robinhood has expanded into retirement accounts, wealth management, and credit cards.

Snap launched $2,195 augmented reality glasses, betting people are tired of staring at their phone screens.

Snap introduced Specs, its first augmented reality glasses for everyday consumers. Augmented reality glasses project digital images into the wearer's field of vision, layering information on top of the real world. Think directions, messages, or weather appearing in your line of sight without looking down at a phone. The lenses shift between clear and tinted depending on lighting. Specs go on sale this fall at $2,195 with a $200 refundable deposit. CEO Evan Spiegel called Specs the computer of the future, arguing that nearly 20 years after the iPhone, people are ready to think about computing differently. Snap has not turned a profit since going public, and its first glasses launched at $130 in 2016 and never caught on. Several much larger technology companies are competing in the same space.

Anthropic disabled its two most powerful AI models following a US government order related to national security.

Anthropic abruptly shut off access to its two most powerful AI models late Friday. After the US government ordered the company to bar all foreign nationals from using them. The Commerce Department issued the directive, citing national security concerns about Fable 5 and Mythos 5, two systems Anthropic had publicly launched just three days earlier. Because cloud platforms cannot verify a user's nationality in real time, Anthropic said it had to pull the models for every customer worldwide, including US citizens, to comply. The company's other AI models remain available. The shutdown is Anthropic's second major run-in with the federal government this year. The Department of Defense earlier labeled the company a national security risk, a designation that Anthropic is suing the White House to reverse. The timing is awkward: Anthropic confidentially filed paperwork to go public earlier this month.

❔ The Big Question of the Week

Scoops app users: We have taken the beta app offline for a short period for some major updates. Can’t wait to show you all what we’ve been working on! Reach out if you have any questions.

We’re going to switch up the content in this spotlight for a bit to make sure you all have the info you need to master your week.

Hey {{ first name | friends}} - The city is electric right now. Knicks, World Cup, literal lightning storms.

🌎 The Big Picture

Some good, some bad, some warnings. All stuff to prepare you and make life easier.

Paychecks aren't keeping up with the cost of living, and the war is why.

The Labor Department reported the Consumer Price Index climbed 4.2% over the past year through May, the worst inflation we've seen since early 2023. And it's almost all about energy: gas prices have shot up 40.5% from a year ago, and energy costs alone drove more than 60% of last month's price increase. The Middle East conflict has thrown global oil supplies into chaos, and those higher fuel costs are showing up everywhere, with tomatoes up 32%, lettuce up 25%, and coffee up 17.5%. Grocery bills grew a little more slowly in May than April, but they're still going up. Since the war began, the overall cost of living has risen more than three times faster than what's considered normal.

Wages just aren't keeping up. After adjusting for inflation, paychecks have lost 0.7% of their purchasing power over the past year. That's a real pay cut for most workers.

Here's the silver lining: the damage is still contained, for now. Strip out food and energy, and core prices rose just 0.2% for the month. That tells us the energy shock hasn't spread widely through the economy yet. New vehicles, furniture, and prescription drugs got cheaper in May, which hints that tariff-driven price pressures might be easing up.

Still, with prices rising this fast, investors now think it's more likely that interest rates go up than down by year's end. That means don't expect it to get cheaper to borrow money anytime soon - mortgages, credit cards, car leases, business loans. It might actually get more expensive.

Social Security's retirement fund is running out of money faster than anyone expected.

The Social Security Administration says the retirement trust reserve is now projected to run dry in late 2032, three months sooner than they thought just a year ago. Every paycheck you get, Social Security taxes come out, and that money goes straight to 70 million retirees, disabled people, and survivors. For years, those tax collections brought in more than the program paid out, building up a healthy reserve. But now there are way more retirees, payouts exceed incoming taxes, and the program is eating through that reserve to cover the gap.

The backup funds are draining faster every year. Falling birth rates, lower net immigration, and recent federal tax cuts have all shrunk the tax revenue flowing into Social Security, forcing deeper and deeper draws on the reserve. If that reserve hits zero, incoming taxes would only cover 78% of scheduled benefits, meaning a 22% cut to monthly checks. For roughly one in four retirees, those checks are their only income. More than 60% rely on them for at least half. Medicare's hospital fund is in a similar spot, projected to cover only 89% of inpatient costs after mid-2033. The disability trust fund is fine through at least 2100, but retirees are in real trouble if Congress doesn't step up.

Congress still has time, but not forever. The fixes are raising payroll taxes, trimming benefits, tightening eligibility, or pulling in other federal revenue. None of those are politically fun, so don't count on an easy solution. Anyone in or approaching retirement can't afford to tune this out.

The housing market had its strongest month in a while this May, but don't get too comfortable.

The National Association of Realtors reported 4.17 million existing home sales, up 3.2% from both April and a year ago. That burst of activity traces back to April, when mortgage rates briefly dipped after spiking in March following the U.S.-Iran conflict. Buyers who'd been sitting on the sidelines jumped at the opening.

Prices are still climbing, just not as fast. The national median sale price hit a record $429,300, but that 1.3% gain is pretty modest compared to recent years, and wages are finally starting to close the gap. Affordability improved the most in the West, up 11%, and the South, up 8.4%. First-time buyers made up 35% of May sales, up from 30% a year ago, though economists say 40% is the benchmark for a truly healthy market. Cash buyers accounted for 25% of sales, a touch lower than last year.

Things could cool off fast. Zillow's data shows new listings are down 4.1% from a year ago, and they're warning that inventory could peak in June, earlier than usual, which would shrink choices and slow sales in the back half of the year. If you're buying, there's more supply than a year ago, but competition is creeping back. If you're selling, prices are still near record highs, just know the window for peak activity may be closing sooner than you'd like.

🏭 The Companies Everyone’s Talking About

SpaceX raised $75 billion in the largest stock market debut in history, beginning trading on June 12.

SpaceX went public for the first time, raising $75 billion by selling shares of the company to outside investors, the largest stock market debut in history, and more than double the previous global record. Going public means anyone can now buy a piece of the rocket and satellite company, which has been privately held for over two decades. The company led by Elon Musk instantly becomes one of the largest companies on the market. At $135 per share, it entered markets at a valuation of roughly $1.8 trillion. Last year, the company earned only about $19 billion in revenue, mostly from its Starlink satellites with 10.3 million users. The AI space tech giant isn't profitable, losing nearly $5 billion in 2025, thanks to its xAI division. Demand for a piece of Elon Musk's empire was enormous: investors tried to buy more than four times the shares available, and retail investors alone submitted $100 billion in orders. SpaceX plans to expand its Starship launches and build AI data centers in space, though the company has not yet turned a profit.

OpenAI filed to go public, setting the stage for one of the largest market debuts in history.

OpenAI filed confidentially with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) for an initial public offering, the first formal step toward going public. A confidential filing allows a company to submit its financials to regulators before making them public, giving OpenAI the option to debut as early as the fourth quarter without committing to a timeline. OpenAI says it hasn't decided on timing, noting some things are "likely easier as a private company."The timing comes with pressure. OpenAI has raised more than $180 billion and is still burning through cash to build the infrastructure its AI models require. Rival AI giant Anthropic recently surpassed OpenAI in valuation for the first time and announced plans to go public, tightening an already competitive race to market. CEO Sam Altman framed this as a third phase for OpenAI, focused on making AI abundant and affordable for everyone.

PepsiCo is now running driverless trucks commercially, the first major US consumer goods company to do so.

PepsiCo is operating 41 fully driverless trucks across Arizona, Texas, and Arkansas. The first major US consumer goods company to use autonomous trucks commercially on public roads, the fleet shuttles products between bottling plants, warehouses, and retail locations with no driver or safety observer in the cab. The partnership with autonomous trucking company Gatik began in 2022 with human safety drivers and went fully driverless in June 2025. The trucks have had no accidents on public roads and a 99% on-time delivery rate. PepsiCo expects to hire fewer drivers over time, drawing strong opposition from truck driver unions. They have lobbied several states to require a human operator in any commercial autonomous vehicle.

Apple is finally delivering a rebuilt Siri, two years after its original AI rollout fell short.

Apple unveiled Siri AI at its annual developer conference. The rebuilt assistant can tap into personal information, on-screen content, and web data, with a dedicated app and chatbot-style experience launching in beta this fall, initially unavailable in the EU and China. After concluding its AI models were far below industry standards, Apple replaced Siri's entire leadership team and rebuilt the assistant from the ground up, moving it onto a major search company's servers. For a business that has long made privacy and ownership of its core technology a selling point, that is a significant concession. Apple software chief Craig Federighi insisted that the company is building AI on its own terms, with a focus on practical features.

Meta is launching its first paid AI product for businesses, betting it can finally build revenue beyond ads.

Meta launched its first paid AI product for businesses: a tool called Meta Business Agent. The tool lets companies respond to customers, recommend products, and book appointments across WhatsApp, Messenger, and Instagram. Larger businesses will pay based on the volume of data the agent uses, while smaller businesses will pay for it on a subscription basis. The launch matters because Meta still earns about 98% of its revenue from digital advertising, and its AI spending is expected to run into hundreds of billions of dollars over the next few years. CEO Mark Zuckerberg said the agent will eventually help businesses run their whole operation, not just answer customer messages. Meta's existing base of over one billion active business conversations happening on its apps every day gives it a distribution advantage as it makes this push.

❔ The Big Question of the Week

Scoops app users: We have taken the beta app offline for a short period for some major updates. Can’t wait to show you all what we’ve been working on! Reach out if you have any questions.

We’re going to switch up the content in this spotlight for a bit to make sure you all have the info you need to master your week.

Hey {{ first name | friends}} - Knicks game 2 tonight. The city is feeling it.

🌎 The Big Picture

There’s been some good news on the jobs front, and a lot of data showing the scary headlines might not be the real narrative.

The job market seems to be improving.

Unemployment stayed very low last month, and hiring has picked up in the past few months. The official jobs report from the Labor Department this morning also showed wages growing more quickly - not enough to keep up with the cost of living, but that’s still better.

Tech companies are announcing aggressive job cuts tied to AI, but broad layoffs are still historically low.

The Department of Labor clocked 225,000 initial unemployment filings for the week ending May 30, a four-month peak, though it's mostly down to Memorial Day timing and end-of-school-year patterns. The four-week average is still well below last year's. Meanwhile, job placement firm Challenger, Gray & Christmas found that tech companies announced 38,242 planned layoffs in May alone, with AI getting the blame for 40% of all announced cuts across the whole economy.

There's a real difference between announcements and actual filings, though. Challenger tracks positions companies say they'll cut. The Department of Labor tracks real people who lost jobs and filed claims. And despite months of scary layoff headlines, fewer people are filing for unemployment right now than they were a year ago.

The job market looks very different depending on where you work.

Tech is reshuffling fast. Yes, it’s cutting a lot of roles, but also simultaneously posting the biggest hiring plans of the year for AI-focused positions. Everywhere else, layoffs are low, but hiring is slow too. If you've got a job, you're probably fine. If you're looking for a new one, expect the search to take a while.

Young college grads are having a rough time finding work, and remote work is a big reason why, not AI.

The Federal Reserve Bank of New York dug into unemployment trends and firm-level hiring data to figure out what shifted after the pandemic. Companies got reluctant to bring on entry-level workers because training and mentoring someone over video call is just harder than doing it in person. That reluctance hit workers under 29 with college degrees hard, pushing their unemployment rates up even while experienced workers kept finding jobs just fine. The gap showed up almost entirely in remote-friendly fields like tech and finance, not in hands-on work that requires showing up in person. One large company's data even showed it pulled back on junior hiring during office closures and only picked it back up once people came back.

That first-job struggle ripples forward for years.

Workers who have a rough start tend to earn less and move up more slowly for years afterward, even compared to equally qualified peers who just happened to enter the workforce at a better time. Youth unemployment started climbing before generative AI really took off, so right now, remote work looks like the main culprit, not technology.

That doesn’t mean it won’t make things worse though.

But for now, these numbers and trends are decently positive trends cutting through the noise.

🏭 The Companies Everyone’s Talking About

BP removed its chairman of eight months over governance and conduct concerns, adding to years of boardroom instability.

BP removed its third chairman in three years with immediate effect. The board cited serious concerns about governance standards, oversight, and conduct. Albert Manifold, who had been in the role for just eight months, was replaced by interim chair Ian Tyler while BP searches for a permanent successor. Manifold pushed back publicly, saying he accepted the board's decision but rejected what he called lies about his conduct, noting that no one at the company had raised any issues with him directly during his time in the role. The dismissal adds another chapter to a turbulent stretch at BP as the company executes a major strategic pivot back to oil and gas and away from renewables. New CEO Meg O'Neill, who took the role in April, remains in place, and the board says the company's strategic direction is unchanged.

Alphabet is raising $80 billion in equity to fund an AI spending race.

Alphabet is raising $80 billion to fund an AI spending race that is outpacing the cash the business generates. The Google parent is structuring the raise in three parts: a $10 billion private placement with one of the world's most respected investment firms, $30 billion in underwritten public offerings, and a $40 billion program to sell shares gradually into the open market starting in the third quarter. The scale of the spending is hard to overstate. CEO Sundar Pichai has said compute capacity is what keeps him up at night, and the numbers back that up. Alphabet updated its investment spending forecast for this year to as much as $190 billion, and its finance chief has said spending in 2027 will be significantly higher still, with some estimates putting it near $300 billion. That would exceed the company's operating cash flow, meaning Alphabet is pouring more money than it can make to build the infrastructure it believes AI demand requires.

Nvidia is entering the PC market with a new chip designed to bring AI agent capabilities to everyday computers

Nvidia is entering the personal computer market with a new processor called the RTX Spark. It combines two types of processors into one device, handling both graphics and general computing tasks. It debuts this fall in laptops and desktops from six major PC brands. The chip uses less power than the processor design that has powered most Windows PCs for decades, enabling thinner, lighter machines. It is also designed to run AI models directly on the device rather than sending that work to a data center. For Nvidia, the move extends its dominance in AI chips beyond the data center and into the hands of everyday users. CEO Jensen Huang called it the start of a PC shake-up that could rival the arrival of the smartphone, a self-described milestone for a company whose quarterly sales now roughly match the combined annual totals of its two largest PC chip rivals.

McDonald's unveiled a new global growth strategy built around better food, service, technology, and restaurant design.

McDonald's unveiled its new global growth strategy, called McDonald's Next, at its biennial convention for franchisees in Las Vegas. The plan centers on four areas: improving food and drink quality, listening more closely to customers' needs, upgrading restaurant design to streamline operations, and training employees to deliver better hospitality. The fast food giant is also testing an AI-powered ordering system at five drive-thru locations, part of a broader effort to free up employees for customer-facing work. McDonald's faces a more competitive landscape, but has held its ground with four straight quarters of same-store sales growth.

❔ The Big Question of the Week

Scoops app users: We have taken the beta app offline for a short period for some major updates. Can’t wait to show you all what we’ve been working on! Reach out if you have any questions.

We’re going to switch up the content in this spotlight for a bit to make sure you all have the info you need to master your week.

Hey {{ first name | friends}} - made it through a short week. Nice.

🌎 The Big Picture

Here’s what I’ve been watching:

Americans are spending more and saving less as prices keep climbing.

The Bureau of Economic Analysis reported that the cost of living is rising so fast that incomes and spending can barely keep up. Policymakers' preferred inflation tracker, the Personal Consumption Expenditures price index, climbed 0.4% in April, up 3.8% over the past year, the biggest one-year increase in the cost of living in three years. Gasoline prices surged 5.5% in a single month and are up more than 50% since the Iran war began in late February, driving up costs across the economy. Tariffs are also still pushing goods prices higher. Even when excluding volatile energy and food prices, so-called core inflation has climbed by the most since 2023.

Americans spent more in April, but it was mostly because of higher prices.

And after adjusting for inflation, incomes actually declined for the third straight month. That means every paycheck buys less stuff. To keep up, many households are drawing down their savings and putting away less of each paycheck. The personal saving rate fell to just 2.6%, one of the lowest levels on record. With prices rising nearly twice as fast as policymakers consider normal, investors expect the Federal Reserve to keep borrowing costs higher for longer.

Mortgage costs keep climbing, stalling home buying.

The Mortgage Bankers Association reported that total mortgage applications fell 8.5% last week as the average 30-year fixed rate climbed to 6.65%, its highest point since August 2025. Rates have now risen 0.3% over five consecutive weeks, and the cumulative effect hit refinancing hardest. Government-backed loans felt the sharpest drops, with Federal Housing Administration applications falling 18% and Veterans Affairs applications dropping 34%. Applications barely moved, but the record average loan size of $473,600 signals that mostly higher-budget buyers are still active. Borrowers with smaller down payments and tighter budgets are stepping back as higher rates shrink the pool of homes they can afford. The spring homebuying season is getting put on ice again by high home prices and expensive mortgage rates.

🏭 The Companies Everyone’s Talking About

Target is grading employees on friendliness as CEO Michael Fiddelke pushes to win shoppers back.

Target wants friendlier stores, and now it's putting that on employees' performance reviews. The retailer is rolling out a formal assessment that scores workers on how they greet and engage with shoppers, alongside reliability, teamwork, and execution. Workers are also now expected to smile, make eye contact, and greet any customer within 10 feet, and a new dress code requires red shirts with jeans or khakis. These softer changes sit atop a harder set of fixes already underway. CEO Michael Fiddelke has been adding staffing hours and working to keep shelves stocked after shoppers complained about longer checkout lines and empty shelves. Target plans to open more than 30 new stores and remodel more than 130 locations this year as part of the broader effort to win customers back.

McDonald's is admitting it will miss its 2030 target for reducing its fossil fuel pollution.

McDonald's is falling well short of its 2030 goal to reduce its air pollution. The fast-food giant has reduced the fossil fuel emissions generated across its supply chain by only about 3% since 2018, when it was planning to cut that pollution in half. About 95% of McDonald's locations are franchises, and the beef, agriculture, and energy powering that vast network make up nearly all of its emissions. The company is framing the miss as an industry-wide problem rather than a failure of ambition, pointing to slow clean energy growth and fragile global supply chains. McDonald's still hopes to reduce its net fossil fuel emissions to zero by 2050 and will back that with at least $1 billion in investments in its supply chain over the next decade, focused on regenerative agriculture for beef, soy, palm oil, and coffee.

Snowflake reported surging revenue and signed a huge cloud deal as businesses ramp up AI spending.

Snowflake may not have name recognition, but its numbers are making headlines. Snowflake helps businesses store, manage, and analyze all their data in one place. When a company wants to build an AI tool that automates inventory decisions, for example, that AI needs to sit close to the data and process it quickly. Demand for that kind of service is growing fast, with revenue climbing 33% from a year ago to $1.39 billion. The company also raised its full-year forecast, driven by more businesses running their actual AI projects on its platform rather than just testing the waters. The bigger headline is a five-year, $6 billion commitment to the leading cloud provider, Amazon's AWS. The agreement gives Snowflake access to custom AI chips and deeper infrastructure ties at a moment when compute capacity is tight across the industry. CEO Sridhar Ramaswamy called the quarter a clear turning point, with AI moving from experimentation to real business use.

Dell posted its fastest sales growth since going public, driven by surging demand for AI servers.

Dell Technologies just posted its fastest revenue growth since going public in 2018. Companies are rushing to buy the specialized servers needed to build and run artificial intelligence systems, and AI server sales grew 757% year over year as cloud companies, governments, and enterprises continued placing large orders throughout the quarter. The broader business held up too, with laptop and PC sales growing 17%, a sign that demand runs deeper than just AI infrastructure. Dell raised its full-year revenue outlook by roughly $25 billion in a single quarter and lifted its AI server target for the year to $60 billion, reflecting how central the company has become to building the world's AI infrastructure.

Eli Lilly is buying three vaccine developers and stepping back into infectious disease prevention.

Eli Lilly is spending up to $3.8 billion to acquire three small vaccine developers. Curevo is building a shingles vaccine designed to cause fewer side effects than the current standard shot. LimmaTech is working on vaccines for staph infections and bacteria increasingly resistant to antibiotics. Vaccine Company is developing a vaccine against the Epstein-Barr virus, a common infection linked to certain cancers and neurological diseases. The deals are part of a bigger 2026 acquisition run for Lilly, which has accelerated on the back of strong sales from its obesity drugs. Lilly says the strategy is aimed at preventing disease at its source rather than treating its consequences.

❔ The Big Question of the Week

Scoops app users: We have taken the beta app offline for a short period for some major updates. Can’t wait to show you all what we’ve been working on! Reach out if you have any questions.

We’re going to switch up the content in this spotlight for a bit to make sure you all have the info you need to master your week.

Hey {{ first name | friends}} - if you’re reading this and it’s Friday, get out of here. Enjoy the weekend. If it’s Tuesday, well done. Welcome back.

🌎 The Big Picture

It was a relatively light week, but there are some bigger trends worth highlighting that caught my eye this week:

American businesses hit the brakes in May, and the strain is showing.

S&P Global's monthly Purchasing Managers Index (PMI), which tracks business activity across the U.S. economy, came in at the same sluggish level as April, pointing to economic growth of barely over 1% annualized for the second quarter. That's a serious slowdown from where we started the year.

The U.S.-Israeli conflict with Iran has thrown shipping through the Strait of Hormuz into chaos, squeezed global supply chains, and pushed energy prices up. Factories scrambled to stockpile inventory before costs got any worse, which gave manufacturing output a temporary bump to a four-year high.

That stockpiling bump isn't real demand. Orders crept up slowly, exports dropped, and service businesses, where most Americans work, had their worst showing since late 2023. Business input costs jumped at their steepest pace since the brutal inflation stretch of late 2022, and companies passed those costs onto customers with the fastest price hikes in nearly four years. Workers felt it too, especially in services, where employers started cutting jobs rather than absorb the higher costs.

Rising prices paired with slowing demand is a rough combination that's squeezing household budgets and business margins alike.

Vet costs are rising faster than most prices, and there's a clear reason why.

Bank of America's analysis of card transactions across millions of customers found that vet services got 6% pricier over the past year through April 2026, well outpacing overall inflation and much faster than wages. It's no accident. Large corporations and private equity firms now own roughly 25 to 30% of all vet practices and about 75% of specialty clinics. As they've squeezed out local competition, prices have climbed and pet owners have lost any real leverage.

If you have pets and haven't reviewed your budget for veterinary care lately, this is a good moment to do that.

Americans are falling behind on debt, and student loans just got much worse.

The Federal Reserve Bank of New York reported that total household debt barely budged, rising just 0.1% to $18.8 trillion in Q1, the slowest growth in years. But the share of people missing payments keeps climbing toward territory not seen since the Great Financial Crisis. Over 13% of all credit card balances are more than 90 days overdue, and retail debt like department store credit and installment loans isn't far behind at 9.8% over 90 days delinquent. That doesn't even count Buy-Now-Pay-Later balances, which don't show up on credit reports at all. Auto loans are the worst of all, with 5.6% of balances 90 or more days past due, a record going back over 20 years.

The housing market is holding up relatively well.

Mortgage and home equity line of credit balances are mostly being managed, with only about 1% more than 90 days past due on both. Credit card and mortgage delinquency rates ticked up gradually in Q1, and auto loans were roughly flat, so the deterioration is happening slowly enough that it hasn't set off alarm bells for policymakers just yet.

Student loans are a whole different situation.

The share of student loan balances 90 or more days overdue jumped to 10.3%, up from 9.6% at the end of 2025. About 2.6 million more borrowers fell into default in just the first three months of this year, on top of the million who defaulted last quarter. That kind of debt stress is going to start showing up in consumer spending, and businesses will feel it.

Stepped back, the picture across this week's data is consistent: slowing growth, rising costs, and households under increasing financial pressure.

🏭 The Companies Everyone’s Talking About

SpaceX filed to sell shares publicly in the biggest deal ever.

SpaceX filed paperwork to sell shares to the public in what would be the biggest such deal ever. Private companies don't have to share their finances, so the filing gives outsiders their first real look at how SpaceX makes and spends money. The Elon Musk-led company is aiming to raise $75 billion at a valuation near $2 trillion when it lists on Nasdaq under the ticker SPCX. SpaceX is really three businesses: a profitable satellite internet service called Starlink, a cash-burning rocket business, and a money-losing AI division built around the recently acquired xAI. Starlink is the only one making money and is funding everything else, including Musk's plans for orbital data centers and a Mars colony.

Nvidia posted record revenue and a 92% jump in its data center business as AI demand continues to surge.

Nvidia's growth keeps shattering records as it pushes deeper into new markets. The chip giant's data center business revenue jumped 92% from a year ago to a record $75 billion, fueled by surging demand for AI computing from the largest tech companies. Now Nvidia is moving beyond those few giant customers, betting that governments, enterprises, and AI-focused cloud companies will become its next major source of growth. The company is also moving into central processing units, the chips that run most of the world's computers, and expects to bring in $20 billion in CPU sales this year alone. CEO Jensen Huang called the rush to build AI data centers "the largest infrastructure expansion in human history."

Walmart grew sales across every income level last quarter, even as fuel prices squeezed shoppers and profits.

Walmart is gaining shoppers across all income levels as families turn to its stores and app for groceries and essentials. Sales jumped 7.3% to $177.8 billion last quarter, with online orders up 26% and fast delivery now reaching 60% of the US population within 30 minutes. Higher fuel prices hit Walmart on two fronts: they took a $175 million bite out of operating profit as the company moved goods across the country, and they changed how shoppers behave at the pump, with average fill-ups dropping below 10 gallons for the first time since 2022. Walmart absorbed nearly all of the added costs and offered 20% more discounts than a year ago, but warned that shelf prices may rise if fuel prices stay high.

Deere's construction business is booming on AI demand while big farm equipment sales keep dropping.

Deere's business is splitting in two: construction equipment is booming on AI data center demand, while big farm equipment sales keep dropping. Net sales rose to $11.8 billion last quarter, with construction and forestry up 29% as builders race to put up data centers and infrastructure, while large tractor and combine sales fell 14%. Crop farmers have been squeezed for years by low crop prices and high costs, and the conflict in Iran is now pushing fuel and fertilizer prices higher, leaving growers reluctant to spend on new equipment. The world’s biggest farm machinery maker held its full-year profit outlook steady and still expects 2026 to be the bottom of the farm downturn.

NextEra is buying Dominion for $67 billion in the largest power deal ever, driven by AI data center demand.

NextEra Energy has agreed to buy Dominion Energy for $67 billion in the largest power utility deal in US history. The acquisition is intended to help NextEra keep up with the massive electricity demand from artificial-intelligence data centers. The deal gives NextEra the exclusive right to provide power across Virginia and the Carolinas, where many of the country's largest AI data centers are being built, driving electricity demand to record highs. Owning Dominion gives NextEra access to a region it could not otherwise serve. Together, the two companies plan to build massive amounts of new power generation over the next decade, almost all of it to power new AI data centers. CEO John Ketchum called the deal "a defining moment" for US energy infrastructure.

❔ The Big Question of the Week

Scoops app users: We have taken the beta app offline for a short period for some major updates. Can’t wait to show you all what we’ve been working on! Reach out if you have any questions.

We’re going to switch up the content in this spotlight for a bit to make sure you all have the info you need to master your week.

Hey {{ first name | friends}} - thanks for giving me a pass last week. Took the weekend off to make some memories with my wife and our new little girl. It’s been a crazy month. Plus the launch of the new Share Scoops for financial advisors. Doing 5-10 demo calls a day.

🌎 The Big Picture

Here's what you need to know this week:

Gas prices are back to record 2022 levels, and some states are getting hit much harder than others.

AAA reported the national average hit $4.53 per gallon on May 14, up more than $1.35 from a year ago and pretty much right back to the gut-punch levels we saw in 2022. If you're in California ($6.14), Washington ($5.77), Hawaii ($5.64), Oregon ($5.34), or Alaska ($5.26), you're getting hit the hardest right now.

A global oil supply crisis is the main driver, and lower-income families are feeling it most.

The near-closure of the Strait of Hormuz, following the U.S. entry into military conflict with Iran on February 28, triggered the crisis. Before things escalated, about one-fifth of the world's oil flowed through that waterway. Now it's down to a trickle, crude oil has pushed into the $100-per-barrel range, and real people's budgets are feeling it. Low-income families are getting squeezed the most, handing over a bigger chunk of every paycheck every time they pull up to the pump.

A proposed federal gas tax suspension could help, but the savings may be smaller than advertised.

President Trump proposed suspending the federal gas tax, which would knock about 18 cents off the price per gallon. It's not huge, but it matters for a lot of families. Fair warning, though: experts say the actual savings could be smaller once retailers and distributors take their share. It's also worth knowing that the tax funds highway construction and maintenance, so suspending it means tradeoffs we'd all feel down the road. And with AAA saying Americans are planning to travel in record numbers over Memorial Day weekend, all that extra demand could push prices even higher before things ease up.

New listings outpaced home sales for the first time this year, as mortgage costs pushed buyers to the sidelines.

Zillow reported 426,000 new homes hit the market in April, up 2.1% from a year earlier, but 0.4% fewer homes actually sold compared to last April. It's been a tough, slow spring for anyone trying to navigate the housing market.

Home prices are still rising, but the pace has slowed, and monthly payments are down from a year ago.

The typical U.S. home value rose 0.7% over the past year to $366,712, great if you already own, but increasingly discouraging if you're a first-time buyer trying to break in. The silver lining: the monthly mortgage payment on a typical home came in at $1,829, down 3.4% from a year ago, thanks to lower rates earlier this year.

Buyers have more inventory and more negotiating power than last spring, though climbing rates are cooling the rebound.

Active inventory rose 3.7% from April 2025, and 23.5% of listings saw a price cut in April, which means sellers are more open to negotiating than they used to be. Still, with rates climbing back above 6% following the conflict with Iran, the spring sales rebound Zillow had hoped for probably isn't going to play out the way anyone wanted.

Employers added more jobs than expected in April, but the broader hiring trend has cooled significantly.

The Bureau of Labor Statistics reported 115,000 new jobs last month, down from a strong 185,000 in March but well above the 65,000 economists were expecting. Over the past 12 months, though, employers have averaged only 22,000 new jobs per month, a fraction of the pace we saw in stronger years. Healthcare led hiring again, followed by transportation and warehousing. Federal government employment kept sliding, shedding another 9,000 jobs and bringing total federal losses to 348,000 since October 2024.

Wages are growing, but not fast enough to keep pace with what most workers are dealing with.

Average hourly pay rose just $0.25 for the month, up 3.6% over the past year, a touch slower than economists had expected.

Unemployment is still relatively low, but the number of people who want more work than they can find is climbing.

The unemployment rate held at 4.3%, but the number of people actually out of work did climb. More folks said they've stopped actively looking for a job altogether. And maybe most telling: the number of workers stuck in part-time jobs because they can't find full-time work jumped by 445,000 to 4.9 million, a real reminder that a lot of people out there want more hours and more stability than the market is giving them right now. Most employers are holding onto the people they have, but if you're out there job hunting, it's tougher than it was not that long ago.

Taken together, the picture this week is one of cost pressure hitting from multiple directions. Energy prices are squeezing household budgets and business bottom lines at the same time, the housing market is cooling but not in a way that makes it easier for buyers, and a job market that looks acceptable on the surface is showing real signs of strain underneath. None of these trends exists in isolation, and together they add up to an environment worth watching closely in the weeks ahead.

🏭 The Companies Everyone’s Talking About

PayPal is cutting 20% of its workforce as a new CEO pushes for investing in AI.

PayPal is cutting roughly 4,760 jobs, about 20% of its workforce, as a new CEO pushes the payments company to invest more in AI. The cuts will roll out over the next two to three years and aim to save $1.5 billion, money PayPal plans to pour back into modernizing its technology. CEO Enrique Lores, who took over in March after the previous CEO was pushed out for moving too slowly, told investors PayPal has "underinvested in its technology platform" and is falling behind rivals. His plan: remove layers of middle managers and accelerate the use of AI across the company's operations. This is one of PayPal's biggest workforce cuts ever as the company tries to become a technology leader again.

Coinbase is cutting 14% of its workforce as it rebuilds around AI.

Coinbase is cutting roughly 700 employees, about 14% of its workforce, as AI enables smaller teams to do the work. The crypto exchange also faces a weaker trading market, with falling prices eroding its primary revenue stream. But the bigger story is how Coinbase is rebuilding itself for the AI age. The company is reducing layers of middle managers, so fewer leaders oversee more people. It is also creating small teams where a single employee directs AI agents that handle the work of engineers, designers, and product managers combined. CEO Brian Armstrong said the company needs to "return to the speed and focus of our startup founding, with AI at our core." This is not the first time Coinbase has cut staff during a crypto downturn, but it is the first time AI is the bigger story behind them.

Cisco is having one of its best quarters in years as it becomes a key supplier behind the AI buildout.

Cisco is having one of its best quarters in years as the AI boom turns the networking giant into a key supplier behind the scenes. The company that makes the switches, routers, and chips that connect data centers reported record quarterly revenue of $15.8 billion, with its networking division growing 25% on surging orders from the largest AI data center operators. Cisco nearly doubled its full-year forecast for AI infrastructure orders to $9 billion. The company is also cutting about 4,000 jobs, less than 5% of its workforce, but framing it as a shift of money and people into AI, security, and chip design rather than a downsizing. CEO Chuck Robbins said the companies that win the AI era will be the ones with the focus and urgency to keep moving investment toward the strongest demand.

Cloudflare's revenue just hit a record high, yet the company is cutting 1,100 jobs and reshaping itself around AI.

Cloudflare is cutting 1,100 jobs, about 20% of its workforce, even though revenue just grew 34% from a year ago. The internet infrastructure company says AI agents have taken over enough work that many roles are no longer needed. Internal use of AI tools jumped by more than 600% in just three months across teams such as engineering, finance, HR, and marketing. CEO Matthew Prince said the cut roles "just aren't the roles that we need for the future," joining a growing list of profitable tech companies pointing to AI as the reason for layoffs.

Hims & Hers lost $92 million as it shifted from cheap copies of weight-loss drugs to brand-name versions.

Hims & Hers is going through a rocky transition after settling a legal fight that forced it to change how it sells weight-loss drugs. The telehealth company built a booming business selling cheap copies of brand-name weight-loss drugs made by compounding pharmacies. But one of the big weight-loss drug makers sued Hims, and the two settled in March. Hims agreed to stop advertising the cheaper copies and instead sell the brand-name version, which costs more and yields less profit per sale. Demand is strong, with Hims fulfilling more than 125,000 shipments in six weeks. But the lower profit per sale partially led to a $92 million loss for the quarter.

❔ The Big Question of the Week

Scoops app users: We have taken the beta app offline for a short period for some major updates. Can’t wait to show you all what we’ve been working on! Reach out if you have any questions.

We’re going to switch up the content in this spotlight for a bit to make sure you all have the info you need to master your week.

Hey {{ first name | friends}} - it’s May. I know, I had no idea either.

🌎 The Big Picture

The big story this week was no major change in direction. Stocks are still soaring, borrowing costs aren’t coming down, and big corporations are making more money than ever. One really nice piece of news is that the AI job-stealing headlines are exaggerated.

Stocks finished April by climbing to new record highs.

Strong corporate profits and solid spending gave investors just enough to feel good about things, even with a messy economic backdrop. The broad S&P 500 index finished the month up 10.4%, its best monthly run since November 2020, and the Nasdaq popped 15.3%, its strongest April since 2020.

Financial reports from America's biggest companies have driven most of the optimism, with S&P 500 companies on track for the best revenue growth in years and the best profit margins on record, according to FactSet. The latest updates from Big Tech showed that the main thing driving the economy, AI spending, hasn't let up. And the Commerce Department also confirmed that the US economy accelerated this year after a slow fourth quarter.

For regular folks, the picture's still mixed. The economy's growing, but it doesn't feel even across the board. Energy costs are still very high thanks to ongoing tensions in the Middle East, and borrowing rates are staying stubbornly high. So, investors are excited about corporate profits and are broadly looking past some of the risks from rising costs, with the consensus assumption that the conflict in the Middle East is on a positive path.

It's not getting any cheaper to borrow money, but savings accounts will keep paying well.

The Federal Reserve kept borrowing costs unchanged for the third meeting in a row, and the vote made clear that policymakers are genuinely split on what comes next. The central bank kept its baseline rate range at 3.50-3.75% for the third meeting in a row, leaving borrowing costs roughly where they have been since the end of last year, with eight members voting to hold and four dissenting for opposite reasons. One governor wanted to cut rates immediately, while three regional bank presidents opposed any language suggesting cuts were coming at all. That much dissent has not happened since 1992, showing how uncertain policymakers are right now.

The Federal Reserve started bringing down interest rates last year to restrict borrowing and spending less, as inflation finally started to calm down. However, the ongoing Middle East conflict pushed gasoline prices up 21.2% in a single month, the largest jump on record, driving the cost of living higher and raising concerns for policymakers. Until energy prices settle, the Fed does not see a clear path to cutting rates. Meanwhile, Jerome Powell is stepping down as chair, with Kevin Warsh expected to be confirmed by the Senate the week of May 11. How Warsh leads the committee, and whether energy costs cool off, will shape whether borrowing finally gets cheaper later this year for businesses, homeowners, and spenders.

AI is spreading through American businesses, but it hasn't actually had a big impact on workers yet.

The Census Bureau released new data from its Business Trends and Outlook Survey covering November 2025 through January 2026, offering the most detailed look yet at how companies are actually using the technology. About 18% of firms reported using AI in a business function during that period, a share that rises to 32% when weighted by how many people those companies employ, meaning larger businesses are leading adoption. Large firms in finance, professional services, and information are the heaviest users, with adoption rates ranging from 50% to 60%.

Even among companies that do use AI, most are applying it to a narrow set of tasks, most often writing, editing, and searching for information. Only about 2% to 3% of all businesses reported using AI to automate a task that an employee previously handled. Just 1% of firms changed their staffing levels because of AI, with increases and decreases happening in roughly equal numbers. The biggest reason most businesses have not adopted AI is straightforward: they do not see it as useful to their work.

While this data captures a single moment early in a long adoption process, it should calm some of the headline-induced anxiety about AI sparking mass layoffs.

🏭 The Companies Everyone’s Talking About

Spirit Airlines is close to a $500 million government loan that could give the US a 90% stake.

Spirit Airlines is fighting to survive a second bankruptcy in under two years, and the federal government may end up owning most of it. The Trump administration is working on a $500 million loan that could give the government a 90% stake in the budget carrier once it emerges from bankruptcy. A jump in jet fuel costs, tied to the conflict in the Middle East, pushed the airline toward possible shutdown just as it was emerging from its most recent bankruptcy. Spirit has already cut its flight volumes roughly in half from a year ago, and some industry watchers say $500 million may not be enough to keep it flying for long.

Amazon's cloud business is growing at its fastest pace in years as AI companies pour money into its infrastructure.

Amazon's cloud division is growing at its fastest pace in over three years. The surge is driven by artificial intelligence companies that have committed hundreds of billions to future infrastructure spending. The e-commerce and technology giant is pouring $200 billion into data centers this year, a bet so large it has wiped out almost all of its spare cash. Amazon's own AI chips have already lined up over $225 billion in customer orders, putting it in the rare position of competing with the dominant chipmaker that powers most of the AI world. CEO Andy Jassy said the early years of building this kind of infrastructure always squeeze cash flow, but called the company "unusually well positioned" for the AI boom now in its early stages.

Meta is pouring more money than ever into AI, even as users dip and Wall Street questions the payoff.

Meta is going all-in on artificial intelligence at a scale that is changing how the company spends money. The social media giant raised its full-year spending target to as much as $145 billion. The jump comes from higher chip prices and its push to build the massive data centers needed to train and run AI. The company is also cutting roughly 8,000 jobs to offset rising costs. Daily users across Meta's apps fell from the previous quarter, the first decline the company has reported, partly due to government internet restrictions in Iran and Russia. Revenue grew at its fastest pace since 2021. But CEO Mark Zuckerberg admitted he does not have a precise plan for how all this spending will eventually turn a profit, even as the company prepares to take on tens of billions in new debt to fund it.

Alphabet's cloud and search businesses are both surging, fueled by booming demand for AI tools.

Alphabet had its strongest quarter ever for Google Cloud, its business of renting computing power and software to other companies. Google Cloud passed $20 billion in quarterly sales, up 63% from a year ago, as businesses rushed to buy AI software and computing power. Search queries hit an all-time high after Google added AI-generated answers to its results, easing fears that chatbot rivals would eat into its core business. The internet giant is spending heavily to keep up, raising its 2026 infrastructure budget to as much as $190 billion, nearly double what it spent in 2025. Even with that, CEO Sundar Pichai said the company still cannot make enough computing power to meet customer demand, with much larger spending planned for 2027.

Intel is bouncing back as huge AI demand for its server chips fuels its first real growth in years.

Intel is growing again, powered by huge demand for the server chips that run AI behind the scenes. Sales to data center customers jumped 22% from a year ago, as companies building AI tools rediscovered Intel's chips as a key part of the puzzle. CEO Lip-Bu Tan took over a year ago after Intel spent years watching rivals take over the AI chip market. Since then, the company has stabilized its finances with billion-dollar investments from the federal government and a top AI chip rival, and is now scrambling to make enough chips to meet customer orders.

❔ The Big Question of the Week

Scoops app users: We have taken the beta app offline for a short period for some major updates. Can’t wait to show you all what we’ve been working on! Reach out if you have any questions.

We’re going to switch up the content in this spotlight for a bit to make sure you all have the info you need to master your week.

Hey {{ first name | friends}} - btw, we’re doing some cool things on the business side. If you’re a financial advisor, check out our new pro platform that helps you stay visible and earn more referrals without having to become a marketer.

🌎 The Big Picture

The market is up. But nothing feels good out there.

It's time for a reminder that the stock market is not the economy. It makes sense once you understand what the market actually measures.

When people say "the market," they usually mean the S&P 500 index that tracks the market values of the 500 largest public companies in the US, weighted by the size of the company.

Not small businesses. Not your local economy. Not how most people are actually feeling day to day.

Small businesses make up roughly 99% of all US businesses and employ nearly half of all private sector workers. None of them is in the S&P 500.

So when the market rises, it's reflecting the performance of large public companies, not the broader economic experience most people are actually living.

And it gets more concentrated than that. The ten largest companies out of those 500 often make up more than a third of the index's total value. So when a handful of giants are doing well, the “market” can keep “going up” even if the rest of the picture is mixed.

One more layer: Stock prices don't reflect how the economy feels right now. They reflect investors' expectations about the future.

Specifically, it's about their expectations for corporate profit growth.

When investors are confident that America's biggest companies will keep growing their profits, they tend to buy shares of their stock to benefit from that growth, driving stock prices higher. So the market and the economy can move in different directions at the same time.

And America's biggest companies are off to a strong start this earnings season with massive profits.

According to FactSet's latest Earnings Insight report, profits for companies in the S&P 500 are on track to grow 13.2% in the first quarter compared to a year ago, which would mark the sixth quarter in a row of double-digit profit growth.

Only 10% of companies have reported their first-quarter financial results so far, but the early results are strong. So far, 88% of companies have reported higher profits than analysts expected, well above the usual rate of around 78%. Sales are also up nearly 10%, the best revenue growth since 2022. Banks and tech companies are leading the way, while energy companies are the one weak spot, with lower oil profits pulling that sector down. Corporate profits are the main driver of stock prices over the long term, so strong profit growth can be a positive sign for investment portfolios.

Meanwhile, Americans’ confidence in the economy fell to a record low in April,

driven by fears that the Iran conflict would push energy prices higher and keep the cost of living elevated. The University of Michigan’s Surveys of Consumers showed sentiment dropped 10.7% from March, with every component of the index declining and setbacks reported across all ages, income levels, and political affiliations. People reported feeling worse about their personal finances, less willing to make big purchases like cars and appliances, and more concerned about where prices are headed.

The biggest concern is about the cost of living. People expect prices to rise by 4.8% over the next year, up a full percentage point from the month before and the largest one-month increase in inflation expectations since last spring’s tariff announcements. Policymakers watch inflation expectations closely because they can become self-fulfilling, as people shift their spending habits and businesses raise prices in anticipation.

It is worth noting that 98% of interviews were completed before a ceasefire was announced on April 7, so the data largely reflects peak anxiety. These expectations could make policymakers less eager to bring down borrowing costs, and businesses may need to adapt to shifting customer preferences.

And small businesses are pulling back in the face of higher fuel costs.

Bank of America's latest analysis of its transaction data across millions of customers found that fuel expenses, freight costs, and tariff-related inventory bills all climbed sharply in March, leaving small business owners with less room to hire, invest, or expand. Firms spent 23% more last month on gas than they did last March. Agriculture and trucking companies got hit the hardest. Those higher fuel costs did not stay contained. Since the start of the war in the Middle East, truck freight costs have surged nearly 50%, pushing up the price of moving goods across the country.

Business owners responded by pulling back. Payroll spending broadly declined for the third consecutive month. Some industries were looking to hire. Construction and manufacturing increased hiring, with recruiting-related spending at its highest in about a year. On the positive side, profits at small businesses are still growing, but only at about a quarter of the pace of the first quarter last year. Small businesses employ nearly half of all private-sector workers, so when owners pause on hiring, it gets harder for people to find work. For now, business owners are being cautious.

🏭 The Companies Everyone’s Talking About

Meta is capturing employee keystrokes and screen activity across hundreds of apps to train its AI models.

Meta is turning its own employees into a training dataset. The social media and technology giant is installing software on US staff computers to capture mouse movements, keystrokes, and screen snapshots across hundreds of work apps and websites. They are using that data to teach their AI models how humans actually navigate computers. The effort sits at the center of a sweeping internal transformation that includes laying off 10% of its global workforce, the creation of a new AI engineering team, and a push to replace traditional job roles with a general-purpose title called AI builder. The tech giant says the data will not be used for performance reviews, but employees have raised concerns about privacy and the exposure of sensitive personal information.

Live Nation lost a major antitrust trial and now faces hundreds of millions in damages and a potential breakup.

Live Nation lost a landmark antitrust trial, with a federal jury finding that the concert and ticketing giant illegally dominated the live events industry and overcharged fans. The verdict, driven by a coalition of 33 states after the federal government settled early, leaves the company facing up to $700 million in damages and a potential forced sale of Ticketmaster. The largest US concert promoter plans to appeal, but the judge still must determine penalties and remedies, meaning the company could be fighting this legal battle for years.

Boeing is finally delivering more planes and losing less money than it has in years.

Boeing is delivering more planes and burning through less cash than it has in years. This is a big turnaround for a company that has been stuck in crisis mode for most of the past decade due to quality control failures that led to crashes and high-profile investigations. For years, the planemaker has been spending more money than it brings in. Airlines only pay for jets when they actually receive them. So the 143 planes it shipped in the first three months of the year, its most since 2019, are finally helping close the gap. Boeing plans to build 47 of its top-selling 737 jets each month this summer, up from 42, with two new models on track for government approval by year's end.

Best Buy is picking a longtime insider as its next CEO to turn around years of sluggish sales.

Best Buy is picking a 27-year company insider to pull it out of a years-long sales slump. Jason Bonfig, who built the retailer's online marketplace and advertising business, takes over as CEO at the end of October, replacing Corie Barry after more than seven years at the top. Sales at the electronics chain have dropped in 14 of the past 16 quarters as cautious shoppers, a slow housing market, and higher tariffs cut into demand for TVs, computers, and appliances. The company is banking on a new wave of AI-powered phones and laptops to bring buyers back into stores.

Apple is replacing its CEO for the first time in 15 years.

Apple is handing its top leadership role to an engineer who spent 25 years building its most iconic products. John Ternus, who shaped the iPhone, Mac, and Apple Watch, takes over as CEO on September 1, with Tim Cook shifting to executive chairman after 15 years leading the company. The transition puts a product-focused engineer in charge at a moment when Apple has fallen behind in artificial intelligence, even as it continues generating more than $400 billion in annual sales, nearly four times what it generated when Cook took over. In his current role, Ternus has been reorganizing product teams around AI and overseeing a new lineup of AI-focused wearables and home devices.

❔ The Big Question of the Week

Scoops app users: We have taken the beta app offline for a short period for some major updates. Can’t wait to show you all what we’ve been working on! Reach out if you have any questions.

We’re going to switch up the content in this spotlight for a bit to make sure you all have the info you need to master your week.

Hey {{ first name | friends}} - spring is sprangin’ here in NYC. Cherry blossom petals are snowing all around. Let’s close up early today.

🌎 The Big Picture

US investors pushed stocks to record levels this week as hopes grew for a resolution to the Iran war.

The broad S&P 500 stock market index crossed 7,000 for the first time on Wednesday and closed even higher on Thursday, while the tech-heavy Nasdaq stock index posted its longest winning streak since 2009. The gains reflect a broad shift in investor optimism as the White House signaled that US-Iran talks could resume as soon as next weekend, and Israel and Lebanon agreed to a short-term ceasefire. The increased confidence that the end of the war is in sight made investors more comfortable taking risks and moving more money into stocks, lifting prices.

But the optimism comes with a clear warning from the latest economic reports and executive commentary: the economic damage from months of conflict has not disappeared. Businesses across industries have already raised prices to cover higher energy and commodity costs, and leadership teams have raised concerns on earnings calls. But right now, investors are feeling good.

But the conflict in the Middle East is making businesses across the US nervous.

Companies are holding off on hiring and new investment, taking a wait-and-see approach. The Federal Reserve released its Beige Book this week, a report that checks in on economic conditions across its 12 regions by talking to businesses and community groups. Eight regions reported small amounts of growth, two saw little change, and two got slightly worse. Gas and fuel prices shot up in all 12 regions, making it more expensive to ship goods and produce things like plastics and fertilizer. Businesses saw their costs rise too fast to pass them on to customers, eating into their profits and forcing them to cut back their spending and hiring. Most companies stopped adding permanent workers and instead hired temporary staff, with some using AI to get more done without hiring anyone at all.  

High gas prices slowed spending for people with lower incomes, while wealthier shoppers kept buying travel and luxury goods. The real estate market cooled off, too. Home sales slowed as higher mortgage costs and uncertainty kept buyers away. Overall, the Federal Reserve didn't ring any alarm bells, and sees the economy still going slow but steady.

Fewer Americans bought homes in March, and those who did paid record prices.

The National Association of Realtors reported that there were 3.6% fewer sales of previously owned homes last month, the weakest pace since June 2025. The median sale price rose to $408,800, a new record high for March and 1.4% above where it stood a year ago. With mortgage costs climbing sharply since the start of the conflict in Iran, buyers who had just begun benefiting from lower rates earlier this year are finding homes less affordable again.

Sellers, meanwhile, are not listing in large enough numbers to bring prices down; there are still not enough homes for sale to give buyers much negotiating room. More of the purchases were investors and second-home buyers, while the share of first-time buyers slowed to roughly one-third of all purchases, reflecting how difficult it remains for them to enter the market. The realtors dramatically dialed back their sales expectations for the year, slashing their full-year sales forecast from 14% growth to just 4%. It remains a slow housing market for buyers and sellers as mortgage costs and prices climb.

🏭 The Companies Everyone’s Talking About

Allbirds is becoming an AI company after its shoe business failed.

Allbirds is walking away from shoes. The once-celebrated sustainable footwear brand peaked at a $4 billion valuation before sales fell nearly 50% between 2022 and 2025, and it sold off its brand and intellectual property last month for just $39 million. Now the company is remaking itself as a business that buys and rents out powerful computer hardware to tech companies, under the new name NewBird AI. To fund the new direction, Allbirds is raising up to $50 million. In a final break from its roots, the company also plans to remove all references to its environmental mission from its charter, since the energy demands of AI computing directly conflict with the sustainability commitments on which the brand was founded.

Snapchat is cutting 1/6th of its employees and blaming AI.

The company behind Snapchat is cutting 16% of its full-time employees as it tries to become consistently profitable for the first time. The social media giant is letting go of about 1,000 workers and closing more than 300 open positions, with CEO Evan Spiegel pointing to advances in artificial intelligence as a reason the company can now do more with fewer people. AI is already writing more than 65% of Snap's new code, allowing smaller teams to handle work that previously required larger ones. The cuts are expected to reduce the company's annual costs by more than $500 million, which Snap says will put it on a clearer path to profitability.

PepsiCo's proving cutting prices can drive more sales.

PepsiCo's price cuts are working. After dropping prices on Doritos, Lay's, and other staples by as much as 15% earlier this year, more people are buying its snacks again for the first time in over two years. Beverages are still struggling, though, with fewer people buying its drinks in North America than a year ago. PepsiCo is responding to a broader shift toward healthier eating by reformulating products to remove artificial colors and rolling out new lines that are higher in protein and fiber. The company also overhauled its Gatorade brand, introducing new products focused on better hydration and lower sugar. PepsiCo didn't change its financial forecasts for the rest of the year, but said a more uncertain economy is something to watch.

JPMorgan Chase had its best trading quarter ever while its CEO warned of growing risks ahead.

JPMorgan Chase had its best trading quarter ever, pulling in $11.6 billion, nearly $2 billion more than its previous record, as volatile markets drove clients to trade more actively across stocks, bonds, and other markets. The largest US bank also saw fees from advising companies on mergers and acquisitions more than double, while everyday customers continued to open new accounts and take out loans at a healthy pace. Despite the strong quarter, the bank trimmed its forecast for how much money it expects to earn from charging interest on loans this year, a key driver of bank earnings. Walking back a projection it had raised just two months earlier. CEO Jamie Dimon acknowledged the economy is holding up well but flagged a growing list of concerns, including trade uncertainty, energy price swings, and geopolitical tensions, as reasons to stay cautious about the road ahead.

Goldman Sachs is riding high on trading fees.

Goldman Sachs is having a historic moment in its stock trading business, with its traders posting the highest revenue quarter on record for the second consecutive quarter. Wild swings in financial markets driven by the Iran conflict pushed investors to trade more actively, and Goldman's trading desks captured that activity at a scale no bank has matched before. Goldman's business of advising companies on major deals like mergers and acquisitions is also coming back to life after years of quiet. Activity surged, driving a sharp jump in advisory fees and suggesting more companies are pursuing deals despite the uncertain environment. One area did struggle, though. The part of the business that trades bonds and interest-rate products had a down quarter.

❔ The Big Question of the Week

Scoops app users: We have taken the beta app offline for a short period for some major updates. Can’t wait to show you all what we’ve been working on! Reach out if you have any questions.

We’re going to switch up the content in this spotlight for a bit to make sure you all have the info you need to master your week.