July Jobs Report Lands Amid the Fed’s Most Divided Vote Since 2016
The US labor market just handed new Federal Reserve Chair Kevin Warsh an unwelcome test of his authority and the timing could not be worse.
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USDC Merchant Adoption Hits 39% of US Businesses
USDC merchant adoption in the United States is shifting from isolated pilot programs to infrastructure-level integration. Adoption remains early-stage compared with card payments, but the mechanics of accepting the stablecoin have changed substantially over the past year. Merchants no longer need to build separate crypto integrations. USDC is increasingly available as a native checkout option […]
Amazon’s Custom AI Chips Business Surpasses $20B Run Rate
Amazon’s investment in custom silicon is quickly turning into one of the company’s most important growth engines. In the wake of its latest earnings report, the company revealed that its custom chip portfolio, including Trainium AI accelerators, Graviton CPUs, and Nitro networking processors, has now exceeded a $20 billion annual revenue run rate.
Q2 GDP 2026 & June PCE: What Today’s Data Means After the Fed Split
The Bureau of Economic Analysis publishes the Q2 GDP advance estimate and the June Personal Consumption Expenditures (PCE) price index at 8:30 a.m. ET today, according to BEA’s official release schedule. The data release timing is less than 24 hours behind Wednesday’s Federal Open Market Committee decision to hold the federal funds rate at 3.50%-3.75%.
Many Of Today’s Finance Companies Are Still Operating On Tech Platforms That Are Severely Outdated
Finance companies built on tech platforms architected decades ago are confronting a growing set of pressures: aging infrastructure that resists modern tooling, calculation logic that may no longer reflect current compliance requirements, and a workforce of institutional experts approaching retirement. According to a 2026 industry survey on platform migration and modernization in consumer finance, 87% […]
PSE Consulting: 89% Still Trust Seller Brand Over AI Picks
Merchants’ fear of AI shopping agents is just a ‘hallucination’, four-wave international study finds. Based on responses from 4,250 consumers across the UK, US, France and Germany, the research explores the emerging ‘shortlist economy’ and how AI is reshaping the path to purchase.
Clearwater Analytics: 66% Of Fund Managers Fear Firms Are Over-Investing In AI
Vast majority (66%) of fund managers believe their firms are over-investing in AI, while 25% believe their organizations are not investing enough, according to new global AI investment research from Clearwater Analytics.
AI News Digest: Central Banks, Data Centers & Frontier Models
Artificial intelligence (AI) dominates the news agenda this week. Financial regulators warn that agentic AI is moving faster than rulemaking, the UK’s FCA ties the technology’s future to tokenized money, a skilled-labor shortage emerges as a bottleneck for the data centers powering AI systems, and SpaceXAI launches a new model aimed at capturing finance and […]
$1.1 Trillion For Fossil Fuels: UNDP Warns Energy Crisis Is Reversing Climate Progress
Governments worldwide are on track to spend $1.1 trillion on fossil fuel subsidies in 2026, a new report from the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) finds. If oil prices climb to $110 a barrel, up from a current average of $88.60, that figure could even reach $1.43 trillion.
A2A Payment Statistics 2026: Account-to-Account Payments in Numbers
Account-to-account (A2A) payment systems are spearheading a fundamental shift in global payment infrastructure. They change the familiar payment patterns through the use of direct bank transfers that bypass card networks altogether. Three examples of this rapid evolution occurred in late 2025 and early 2026.
Consumers Prefer Independent Shopping Assistants, Challenging Retail Embedded AI Tools Push
Consumers favour independent AI shopping assistants over AI tools embedded within retail, travel and delivery platforms for product discovery, but continue to rely on marketplaces to complete transactions, according to new international research from PSE Consulting.
Shoptalk Europe 2026 Predictions: AI Agents, GLP-1 Drugs, Recommerce and the Future of European Retail
Shoptalk Europe 2026 unveiled five major predictions for the next decade of European retail at its Barcelona event, outlining how AI shopping agents, GLP-1 weight-loss drugs, the recommerce economy, personalised physical stores, and AI-driven supply chain transformation will reshape retail by 2036.
As US-Iran Negotiations Move Forward Amid Lebanon Ceasefire, Report Projects Up to $700 Billion in Additional Energy Costs
A new analysis from climate advocacy group 350.org suggests that elevated oil and gas prices could continue to impose substantial costs on households and businesses through the remainder of 2026, even as diplomatic efforts between the United States and Iran advance and shipping through the Strait of Hormuz resumes.
Rezolve Ai Data Shows 70% of Online Purchases Now Follow a Single Search
AI commerce company Rezolve Ai has released shopper behaviour data indicating that purchase patterns in e-commerce are shifting.
PSE Consulting: 43% of Consumers Accept Ad-Influenced AI Shopping Tools Over Paid Alternatives
Nearly half of consumers surveyed across four major Western markets would choose a free, advertising-influenced AI shopping assistant over paying for fully impartial recommendations, according to new research from payments consultancy PSE Consulting.
DECTA Study: 77% Of Digital Banking App Users Have Had a Payment Blocked, Chatbots Resolved Issues Just 11% Of The Time
Payment infrastructure company DECTA has published findings from a study examining two specific failure points in digital banking and payment apps: the frequency with which automated systems block or decline user transactions, and the rate at which AI chatbots subsequently fail to resolve the resulting issues.
