Hi there, this is your daily ☕️ Finpresso.
In today's newsletter:
🤝 OpenAI offers the US government a 5% stake
🇺🇸 US won't renew $2T North American trade deal
🏦 Fed's Warsh says inflation risks have eased
☁️ Meta is building a cloud business to sell spare AI compute
🤖 Robinhood launches its own blockchain for tokenized stocks
Plus: 🌍 5 macro news, 🏢 7 corporate news, 💰 4 deal flow, and 📑 6 research & reports.
📰 Top News
| 🤝 OpenAI offers the US government a 5% stake LINK |
- OpenAI is in talks to hand the U.S. government a 5% ownership stake, according to the Financial Times, as CEO Sam Altman courts the Trump administration in meetings with the president, Treasury chief Scott Bessent, and Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick.
- The framework could extend beyond OpenAI, potentially asking other U.S. AI firms to grant comparable 5% stakes, and echoes Senator Bernie Sanders' push for public ownership of AI profits via a proposed sovereign wealth fund valued at roughly $7 trillion.
- The move follows the administration's pattern of taking equity in private firms: a 9.9% Intel stake bought for $8.9 billion in 2025 is now worth about $55 billion, alongside positions in MP Materials, Lithium Americas, Trilogy Metals, and U.S. Steel.
| 🇺🇸 US won't renew $2T North American trade deal LINK |
- The US is expected to let the USMCA free-trade pact lapse, ending an arrangement that governs roughly $2 trillion in annual trade among the US, Mexico and Canada and ranks among the world's biggest trading blocs.
- President Donald Trump signaled Washington saw no reason to renew, saying the country didn't "need anything" its partners offered, despite repeated attempts by Mexico City and Ottawa to extend the deal struck during his first term.
- Unwinding the agreement could take several years, but experts warn the decision alone may deter the multibillion-dollar investments the bloc courts, since, as one told Politico, "uncertainty makes it hard for businesses to plan."
| 🏦 Fed's Warsh says inflation risks have eased LINK |
- Federal Reserve Chairman Kevin Warsh said inflation risks have eased over the past four weeks, with price expectations coming down, speaking at the European Central Bank's annual forum in Sintra, Portugal, while pledging the Fed will deliver price stability.
- The Fed's preferred inflation gauge still showed prices up 4.1% from a year earlier, with core prices excluding food and energy up 3.4%, but energy and gasoline costs have plunged recently as the US and Iran held peace talks.
- Warsh declined to signal whether a rate hike is coming at the July 28-29 meeting, refusing to offer "forward guidance," even as half of 18 Fed officials projected a rate increase this year with inflation at its fastest since 2023.
| ☁️ Meta is building a cloud business to sell spare AI compute LINK |
- Meta is planning to launch a cloud business that sells its spare AI computing power, joining hyperscaler rivals, and the stock is surging in early trading after Bloomberg reported the move CEO Mark Zuckerberg called "definitely on the table" in May.
- The report hit AI infrastructure providers whose entire purpose is selling compute, with CoreWeave, Nebius, IREN, and Cipher Digital dropping, while chipmakers Micron, Nvidia, Broadcom, AMD, Marvell, Intel, ASML, and TSMC also fell on fears Meta may curb its AI spending.
- Investors read the surplus compute as a sign Meta could cut its capex bill, but the article notes cloud businesses require scale, meaning the move is arguably a bet on sustained AI demand rather than a clean signal of lower future spending.
| 🤖 Robinhood launches its own blockchain for tokenized stocks LINK |
- Robinhood launched the public mainnet of Robinhood Chain, its own Ethereum-based network built on Arbitrum's technology, alongside new Stock Tokens that let eligible users outside the US trade tokenized shares around the clock and use them within decentralized finance.
- The Stock Tokens, available in more than 120 countries but barred in the US, Canada, the UK, Switzerland and the UAE, are tokenized debt securities that track stock prices without granting holders any legal ownership of the underlying shares.
- The global push follows a weak quarter in which Robinhood's crypto revenue fell 47% year-over-year to $134 million and app crypto trading volume dropped 48% to $24 billion, plus plans to cut about 10% of staff at a $28 million restructuring cost.
🌍 Macro News
- U.S. private payrolls rose 98,000 in June, missing estimates, ADP reports. LINK
- Taiwan approves comprehensive Virtual Asset Service Act to regulate crypto sector. LINK
- Japan spent a record $73.5 billion in April-May defending the yen. LINK
- Euro-zone inflation cooled more than expected, easing pressure for another ECB hike. LINK
- Gold and silver futures surged as soft jobs data cooled rate-hike bets. LINK
🏢 Corporate News
- EU top court upholds record €4.1 billion antitrust fine against Google. LINK
- Alibaba and Ant's U.S. payment unit to pay $600 million DOJ settlement. LINK
- Schneider Electric buys Norway's Cognite for $3.1 billion in major AI deal. LINK
- Microsoft plans thousands of job cuts next week to fund AI spending. LINK
- Abu Dhabi's MGX closes $49 billion AI investment vehicle, beating its target. LINK
- Klarna wins $1.97 billion antitrust damages from Google in Swedish court. LINK
- Circle shares plunge 16% as rivals launch competing Open USD stablecoin. LINK
📈 Stocks
💰 Deal Flow
- KKR to control new $1.3 billion South Korean renewable energy platform. LINK
- EDF sells US and Canada renewable assets to KKR for $4.2 billion. LINK
- Quantum Systems raises $1.2 billion, doubling valuation to about $8 billion. LINK
- Together AI raises $800 million led by Aramco Ventures, valuation hits $8.3 billion. LINK
📑 Research & Reports
- JPMorgan warns AI stock split echoes pattern seen before dot-com crash. LINK
- Gartner says AI agents could threaten $234 billion in SaaS spending by 2030. LINK
- UBS finds 60% of firms are throttling AI spending amid thin returns. LINK
- Fed data show US noncash payments tripled since 2000, reaching 236.6 billion transactions. LINK
- Citi cuts bitcoin and ether price targets on weakening ETF demand. LINK
- McKinsey and QED warn AI and fintech convergence threatens traditional banks. LINK