The Verge’s latest insights into the ideas shaping the future of work, finance, and innovation. Here you’ll find scoops, analysis, and reporting across some of the most influential companies in the world. Our coverage also includes interviews with innovators and policy makers at the frontiers of business and technology on Editor-in-Chief Nilay Patel’s Decoder; a behind-the-curtain look at Silicon Valley with Alex Heath’s Command Line; and exclusive reporting on Microsoft’s strategy in Tom Warren’s Notepad.
The Federal Housing Finance Agency’s director has ordered Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac to prepare a framework for considering crypto as an asset in homebuying. “Pulte also instructed the agencies that their mortgage risk assessments should not require cryptocurrency assets to be converted to U.S. dollars.” Great to see crypto is getting what it paid for! If only we all could buy elections, am I right?
The head of Hinge on AI, monetization, and the future of online dating.
to readers of Katherine Losse’s The Boy Kings. The Financial Times makes a compelling case that loser-bro Zuck is who he has always been. Also, his feelings were very hurt when we all had a good laugh about Meta’s avatars (“Legs coming soon!”). No wonder he wants AI friends, who’ll never mock him like that.
This CNBC article describes some of the workarounds you might see with companies navigating higher taxes on imports, as the difference between a raincoat and a windbreaker, for example, can add up.
However, it quotes supply chain strategist Andrew Wilson saying that “consumer good and garments, apparel and footwear sectors” are easier targets for these changes than cars and electronics, because “even minor changes may require extensive validation and approval” that add months of waiting to get certified.
Out at Vice Media: former CEO Bruce Dixon. In: new CEO Adam Stotsky, “A lot of the sort of messy stuff has been cleaned up,” Stotsky told The Wall Street Journal. We’ll see about that — when I wrote about Vice last year, there was still plenty of mess under Dixon.
Amid the announcement of a “Trump Mobile” phone service, Trump’s media company has revealed that it submitted an SEC filing seeking approval of an exchange-traded fund (ETF) with 75 percent of assets invested in Bitcoin and 25 percent in Ether. Crypto.com will store and trade the assets on Trump Media’s behalf.
The retail giants are looking into ways they could use or issue stablecoins — a cryptocurrency pegged to the US dollar or another asset, according to a report from The Wall Street Journal. As noted by the WSJ, the move could allow Amazon and Walmart to receive payments faster, while avoiding fees from credit card transactions.
The layoffs on Tuesday impact around 3.5 percent of Paramount’s global workforce, with the company having laid off around 2,000 US employees last year. In an internal memo seen by Deadline, Paramount execs said the cuts were driven by linear TV declines and broader economic concerns as the company focuses its efforts on streaming.
“These changes are necessary to address the environment we are operating in and best position Paramount for success.”
[deadline.com]
The head of the Ikea-owned gig work platform on AI automation, the state of the gig economy, and the future of labor.
JW Zhang, founder of US-based Aventon, now has control over UK-based Gocycle — the financially troubled maker of premium, fast-folding electric bikes. “Aventon is going to help Gocycle unleash its true potential and bring more exciting products to people in the future,” said an unidentified Aventon spokesperson speaking to Cycling Electric.
What comes next is unclear, but it should accelerate global expansion for both brands once the deal is settled, and finally make Gocycle’s CX lineup of electric folding cargo bikes a reality.
[cyclingelectric.com]
Isn’t it funny how all these tech and science men have ties to Epstein? I wonder why! Anyway, Epstein invested with Thiel’s Valar Ventures — and that investment hasn’t previously been disclosed. Guess what that means? “There’s a good chance much of the windfall will not go to any of the roughly 200 victims whom the disgraced financier abused when they were teenagers or young women.”
Deadline reports on another round of mass layoffs at Disney, affecting hundreds of people. “...across divisions of Disney Entertainment, including marketing for both film and television as well as television publicity, casting and development,” as well as corporate financing.
This latest round comes just weeks after 200 employees were laid off in the TV and ABC News divisions.
The head of Airbnb on his company’s new redesign and the quest to sell you much more than travel.
As reported by The Information and Axios reporter Sara Fischer, CEO Barbara Peng emailed staff on Thursday announcing Business Insider is “scaling back on categories that once performed well on other platforms” and mostly exiting its search-reliant Commerce business in an apparent acknowledgement of Google Zero, despite Sundar Pichai’s rebuttals.
Now it’s shrinking, noting “70 percent of our business has some degree of traffic sensitivity,” while going all-in on AI with a push to use Enterprise ChatGPT, gen-AI site search, an AI paywall, and other products.
[theinformation.com]
Journalist Megan Greenwell’s new book Bad Company explores the ways private equity has transformed American business.
The Information reports that three years ago, Musk offered Apple an 18-month exclusive connection via SpaceX in return for $5 billion up front, and $1 billion per year after that to support satellite-connected iPhone features. If Apple didn’t take it within 72 hours, he threatened to announce a competing feature.
Apple went forward with Globalstar (the report also mentions a canceled “Project Eagle” effort with Boeing that would’ve delivered full-blown internet service), and before the iPhone 14 launched, Starlink announced a deal with T-Mobile. Later that year, Musk and Cook met at Apple HQ to discuss Twitter’s App Store presence, “among other things.”
[theinformation.com]
In the midst of Donald Trump’s tariff chaos, prices are rising at retailers like Walmart, Amazon, and Home Depot, according to data provided to The Verge by Bright Data, which tracks prices week over week. As of May 11th, for example, 21.5 percent of the 1.5 million tracked Amazon products had increased in price. Check out an interactive chart here.
“We’re constantly adjusting pricing,” Target CEO Brian Cornell said during an earnings call on Wednesday, as reported by CNBC. “Some are going up, some will be reduced, but that’s an ongoing effort that takes place each and every day.”
Last week, Walmart’s CFO directly linked tariffs with the potential for price increases, sparking a warning from Trump, who told the retailer to “eat the tariffs.”
Gerrit Kazmaier on what AI can really do and the quest to make enterprise software suck less.
The New York Times walked through one business owner’s tariff bill, breaking out all the taxes that stack on top of each other. On April 27th when the shipment arrived in the US, the total cost of tariffs was $34,389. Today, the tariff rate would be $12,954 now that Trump has slashed rates. His frequent tariff changes mean everyone is in a constant state of uncertainty.
[nytimes.com]
Warner Bros. Discovery did the right thing today — people mostly hated when HBO was cut from “HBO Max.”
Match Group, which owns Match.com and other big dating apps, announced its quarterly earnings today and announced a workforce reduction that new CEO Spencer Rascoff said will reduce “around 1 in 5 managers overall.” Based on its 2024 filing, Bloomberg says that’s about 325 jobs.
The company said recent developments have included rolling out a new AI-powered recommendation system for Hinge that “has driven a 15 percent increase in matches and contact exchanges.” Meanwhile, new “AI-enabled Discovery, Double Date, and The Game Game” launches for Tinder are targeting Gen Z users with “more social, low-pressure experiences.”
[ir.mtch.com]
President Paul Bascobert on distribution, press freedom, and the value of facts.
OpenAI board member Fidji Simo will transition from her Instacart role over the next few months to join OpenAI later this year, where Sam Altman says she will “focus on enabling our ‘traditional’ company functions to scale.”
