Olof Kyros Gustafsson, former CEO of Escobar, pleaded guilty to fraud and money laundering charges related to the company's phone scam operation. The Department of Justice says Gustafsson took orders for phones branded with Pablo Escobar's likeness but failed to deliver products, instead transferring customer money for personal use.

When customers sought refunds, Gustafsson fraudulently referred payment processors to certificates of ownership as proof of delivery. The phones were Samsung devices with gold stickers. Gustafsson faces up to 20 years in prison and $1.3 million in restitution at his December 5th sentencing.

Apple is expected to avoid hefty daily fines from the EU by modifying its App Store policies -- allowing developers to direct users to external payment options and adjusting its fee structure. Reuters reports: The company last month said developers will pay a 20% processing fee for purchases made via the App Store, though the fees could go as low as 13% for Apple's small-business program. Developers who send customers outside the App Store for payment will pay a fee between 5% and 15%. They will also be able to use as many links as they wish to send users to outside forms of payment.

Apple made the changes after the EU antitrust enforcer handed it a 500 million euro ($586.7 million) fine in April, saying its technical and commercial restrictions prevented app developers from steering users to cheaper deals outside the App Store in breach of the Digital Markets Act. The company was given 60 days to scrap the restraints to comply with the DMA aimed at reining in Big Tech and giving rivals more room to compete. The European Commission is expected to approve the changes in the coming weeks, although the timing could still change, the people said. "All options remain on the table. We are still assessing Apple's proposed changes," the EU watchdog said.

An anonymous reader quotes a report from Ars Technica: A California lawmaker halted an effort to pass a law that would force Internet service providers to offer $15 monthly plans to people with low incomes. Assemblymember Tasha Boerner proposed the state law a few months ago, modeling the bill on a law enforced by New York. It seemed that other states were free to impose cheap-broadband mandates because the Supreme Court rejected broadband industry challenges to the New York law twice.

Boerner, a Democrat who is chair of the Communications and Conveyance Committee, faced pressure from Internet service providers to change or drop the bill. She made some changes, for example lowering the $15 plan's required download speeds from 100Mbps to 50Mbps and the required upload speeds from 20Mbps to 10Mbps. But the bill was still working its way through the legislature when, according to Boerner, Trump administration officials told her office that California could lose access to $1.86 billion in Broadband Equity, Access, and Deployment (BEAD) funds if it forces ISPs to offer low-cost service to people with low incomes.

That amount is California's share of a $42.45 billion fund created by Congress to expand access to broadband service. The Trump administration has overhauled program rules, delaying the grants. One change is that states can't tell ISPs what to charge for a low-cost plan. The US law that created BEAD requires Internet providers receiving federal funds to offer at least one "low-cost broadband service option for eligible subscribers." But in new guidance from the National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA), the agency said it prohibits states "from explicitly or implicitly setting the LCSO [low-cost service option] rate a subgrantee must offer." "All they would have to do to get exempted from AB 353 [the $15 broadband bill] would be to apply to the BEAD program," said Boerner. "Doesn't matter if their application was valid, appropriate, granted, or they got public money at the end of the day and built the projects -- the mere application for the BEAD program would exempt them from 353, if it didn't jeopardize from $1.86 billion to begin with. And that was a tradeoff I was unwilling to make."

Another California bill in the Senate would encourage, not require, ISPs to offer cheap broadband by making them eligible for Lifeline subsidies if they sell 100/20Mbps service for $30 or less.

The $500 billion Stargate AI project announced by SoftBank and OpenAI at the White House six months ago has failed to complete a single data center deal and sharply scaled back its near-term plans. The venture, which originally pledged to invest $100 billion "immediately," now aims to build one small data center by year-end, likely in Ohio, according to WSJ. SoftBank and OpenAI have disagreed over crucial partnership terms, including site locations.

OpenAI has proceeded independently, signing a deal with Oracle worth more than $30 billion annually starting within three years. That agreement totals 4.5 gigawatts of capacity and would consume power equivalent to more than two Hoover Dams. Combined with a smaller CoreWeave deal, OpenAI has secured nearly as much data center capacity as Stargate promised for this year. SoftBank invested $30 billion in OpenAI earlier this year as part of the infrastructure partnership plans.

An anonymous reader quotes a report from the BBC: One password is believed to have been all it took for a ransomware gang to destroy a 158-year-old company and put 700 people out of work. KNP -- a Northamptonshire transport company -- is just one of tens of thousands of UK businesses that have been hit by such attacks. Big names such as M&S, Co-op and Harrods have all been attacked in recent months. The chief executive of Co-op confirmed last week that all 6.5 million of its members had had their data stolen. In KNP's case, it's thought the hackers managed to gain entry to the computer system by guessing an employee's password, after which they encrypted the company's data and locked its internal systems. KNP director Paul Abbott says he hasn't told the employee that their compromised password most likely led to the destruction of the company. "Would you want to know if it was you?" he asks. "We need organizations to take steps to secure their systems, to secure their businesses," says Richard Horne CEO of the National Cyber Security Centre (NCSC) -- where Panorama has been given exclusive access to the team battling international ransomware gangs. A gang of hackers, known as Akira, broke into the company's system and demanded a payment to restore the data. "The hackers didn't name a price, but a specialist ransomware negotiation firm estimated the sum could be as much as 5 million pounds," reports the BBC. "KNP didn't have that kind of money. In the end all the data was lost, and the company went under."

One in every 9 Americans lives in California. And right now its Congress is debating a bill that "would help establish a regional electricity market capable of tying together the American West's three dozen independent power grids," according to the Los Angeles Times' newsletter about climate change and energy issues.

But that bill "has bitterly divided environmentalists," with some seeing it "as a plot by greedy energy companies to enrich themselves." Supporters say it would smooth the flow of solar and wind power from the sunny, windy landscapes where they're produced most cheaply to the cities where they're most needed. It would help California keep the lights on without fossil fuels, and without driving up utility bills... [S]olar and wind power are still cheaper than planet-warming coal and fossil gas. Which is why Michael Wara, a Stanford energy and climate scholar, isn't worried that SB 540 will leave Californians drowning in dirty power. In a regional market, solar and wind will usually outcompete coal and gas. "Any energy source that requires fuel to operate is more expensive than an energy source that doesn't," he said.

California also needs to prove that a grid powered entirely by clean energy is affordable and reliable. The state's rising electric rates are already a big concern. And although the grid has been stable the last few years, thanks to batteries that store solar for after dark, keeping the lights on with more and more renewables might get harder. Regional market advocates make a strong case that interstate cooperation would help.

For instance, a market would help California more smoothly access Pacific Northwest hydropower, already a key energy source during heat waves. It would also give California easier access to low-cost winds from New Mexico and Wyoming. Best of all, that wind is often blowing strong just as the sun sets along the Pacific. Another benefit: Right now, California often generates more solar than it can use during certain hours of the day, forcing solar farms to shut down — or pay other states to take the extra power. With a regional market, California could sell excess solar to other states, keeping utility bills down. "This is about lowering costs," said Robin Everett, deputy director of the Sierra Club's Beyond Coal Campaign.
"Unlike with past regional market proposals, California would retain control of its grid operator, with only a few functions delegated to a regional entity," the article points out. But opponents still worry this would give new powers to an outside-of-California group to thwart clean energy progress (if not gouge customers). Amendments passed this week add a "Regional Energy Markets Oversight Council" to address that concern — but which lost support for the bill from some of its earlier supporters.

"The amendments would make it easier for the Golden State to bail," notes the climate newsletter, and "Out-of-state utilities don't want to waste time and money committing themselves to a California-led market only to lose California, and thus many of the economic benefits..."

"Amazon stretched out its annual Prime Day sales event so that it lasted four days — twice as long as in the past — and, as a result, blew away previous sales figures," reports USA Today: Spending for [the four-day] Prime Day amounted to "more than two Black Fridays — which drove $10.8 billion in online spending during the 2024 holiday shopping season — and sets a new benchmark for the summer shopping season," Adobe said in a news release. The total also surpassed Adobe's pre-Prime Day estimate of $23.8 billion in sales.
But an article in Fortune notes that "what stood out to this longtime Amazon watcher is that the company didn't disclose anything about the number of items sold." The last time it made that choice was 2020, when nothing normal was happening anywhere in the world, and Prime Day was moved from summer to October. Before that, you have to go back to the second-ever Prime Day in 2016 to find a wrap-up that didn't provide any update on the number of "units" sold.

It's unclear exactly why Amazon decided to withhold that number for 2025, but this Prime Day was odd for a few reasons. Sellers, and brands big and small, had to come up with different strategies to contend with tariff chaos. And they're trying to woo increasingly pessimistic consumers. Those factors could be weighing on the company's decision to withhold exact numbers.
Instead Amazon's official Prime Day recap swapped in some unusual alternate statistics. For example, Amazon reported that if you added up all the discounts given to customers over the four-day event, it was larger than any previous total amount of all discounts given to customers (over the earlier two-day events). To be sure, it's possible that this Prime Day was a success. An outside analysis from Adobe estimated that sales across online retailers overall increased by more than 30% during this year's four day Prime Day period, compared to last year. And Amazon said in this year's recap that the four days of Prime Day 2025 outsold any other four-day period that included previous Prime Days. But historically, the event hasn't run longer than two days. That means that previous years have included two prime days and two regular days, while this year included four prime days. It's unclear why the company would change the basis of comparison.
Amazon "declined to comment on the absence of specific product sales tallies for 2025," according to the article (while pointing Fortune instead to an Amazon blog post with facts about past Prime Day events.)

But in a sign of the time, Amazon's announcement notes that their Prime Day customers found deals and other product information using Amazon's AI-generated buying guides, as well as an AI-powered shopping assistant named Rufus and Alexa+ — Amazon's next-generation personal assistant ("now available in Early Access to millions of customers").

Another interesting statistic? USA Today notes that "a majority of shoppers (53.2%) made purchases on mobile devices, compared to on desktop computers, accounting for $12.8 billion of the spending, according to Adobe."

"Nearly 2 million people protected their privacy by deleting their DNA from 23andMe after it declared bankruptcy in March," writes a Washington Post technology columnist.

"Now it's back with the same person in charge — and I still don't trust it." As of this week, genetic data from the more than 10 million remaining 23andMe customers has been formally sold to an organization called TTAM Research Institute for $305 million. That nonprofit is run by the person who co-founded and ran 23andMe, Anne Wojcicki. In a recent email to customers, the new 23andMe said it "will be operating with the same employees and privacy protocols that have protected your data." Never mind that Wojcicki and her privacy protocols are what put your DNA at risk in the first place...

The company is legally obligated to maintain and honor 23andMe's existing privacy policies, user consents and data protection measures. And as part of a settlement with states, TTAM also agreed to provide annual privacy reports to state regulators and set up a privacy board. But it hasn't agreed to take the fundamental step of asking for permission to acquire existing customers' genetic information. And it's leaving the door open to selling people's genes to the highest bidder again in the future...

Existing 23andMe customers have the right to delete their data or opt out of TTAM's research. But the new company is not asking for opt-in permission before it takes ownership of customers' DNA... Why does that matter? Because people who handed over the DNA 15 years ago, often to learn about their genetic ancestry, never imagined it might be used in this way now. Asking for new permission might significantly shrink the size (and value) of 23andMe's DNA database — but it would be the right thing to do given the rocky history. Neil M. Richards [the Washington University professor who served as privacy ombudsman for the bankruptcy court], pointed out that about a third of 23andMe customers haven't logged in for at least three years, so they may have no idea what is going on. Some 23andMe users never even clicked "agree" on a legal agreement that allowed their data to be sold like this; the word "bankruptcy" wasn't added to the company's privacy policy until 2022. And then there is an unknown number of deceased users who most certainly can't consent, but whose DNA still has an impact on their living genetic relatives...

[S]everal states have argued that their existing genetic privacy laws don't allow 23andMe to receive the information without getting permission from every single person. Virginia has an ongoing lawsuit over the issue, and the California attorney general's office told me it "will continue to fight to protect and vindicate the rights" of consumers....
Two more points of concern:

• "There is nothing in 23andMe's bankruptcy agreement or privacy statement to prevent TTAM from selling or transferring DNA to some other organization in the future."

• The article also notes a 2023 data breach affecting 6.9 million users, arguing "They haven't shown they can keep your data safe... 23andMe's financial struggles could make it hard to run a robust cybersecurity program."

"Commodore has returned from a parallel timeline where tech stayed optimistic, inviting, and human," explains the official web site for "the first real Commodore computer in over 30 years..." You can check out an ad for it here. "Not an emulator. Not a PC... Powered by a FPGA recreation of the original motherboard, wrapped in glowing game-reactive LEDs (or classic beige of course)."

Fast Company calls it "a $299 device that its makers claim is compatible with over 10,000 retro games, cartridges, and peripherals." In a YouTube video posted last month, "Peri Fractic" said he'd purchased the company for "a low seven-figure sum," and said he'd recruited several former Commodore employees to help relaunch the brand. The new C64s are expected to begin shipping as early as October, though that date could slip... There are three models to choose from, all with the same internal components. If you were expecting a vastly outdated machine, however, you're in for a surprise. The Commodore 64 Ultimate will include 128 megabytes of RAM and 16 megabytes of flash memory. It connects to modern monitors via HDMI in high-definition 1080p resolution and features three USB-A ports and one USB-C port. Beyond the computer itself, the power source, and HDMI cable, your $299 also gets you a spiral-bound user guide, a 64-gigabyte USB drive featuring over 50 licensed games, a quick-start guide, and stickers.

Aesthetically, the Commodore 64 Ultimate is available in the original beige or in premium variants: the Starlight Edition, with a clear case and LED lights ($249), or the Founder's Edition, which includes 24-karat gold-plated badges, satin gold keys, and a translucent amber case ($499). Just 6,400 units of the Founder's Edition will be produced, according to the company. The preorder setup resembles a Kickstarter campaign, though it doesn't use that platform. Commodore says all preorders come with a money-back guarantee, but it chose to skip the service's fees. Buyers should be aware that accounts are charged at the time of preorder...

The product will come with a one-year limited warranty, and Commodore says most parts are already in production, including the updated motherboard, the case, and the keycaps that recreate the blocky keys that early users remember.

At Sotheby's Geek Week auction, the largest known Martian meteorite on Earth sold for a record-breaking $5.3 million. The Associated Press reports: The 54-pound (25-kilogram) rock named NWA 16788 was discovered in the Sahara Desert in Niger by a meteorite hunter in November 2023, after having been blown off the surface of Mars by a massive asteroid strike and traveling 140 million miles (225 million kilometers) to Earth, according to Sotheby's. The estimated sale price before the auction was $2 million to $4 million. The identity of the buyer was not immediately disclosed. The final bid was $4.3 million. Adding various fees and costs, the official sale price was about $5.3 million, making it the most valuable meteorite ever sold at auction, Sotheby's said.

The live bidding was slow, with the auctioneer trying to coax more offers and decreasing the minimum bid increases. [...] The bidding for the Mars meteorite began with two advance offers of $1.9 million and $2 million. The live bidding slowly proceeded with increases of $200,000 and $300,000 until $4 million, then continued with $100,000 increases until reaching $4.3 million. The red, brown and gray meteorite is about 70% larger than the next largest piece of Mars found on Earth and represents nearly 7% of all the Martian material currently on this planet, Sotheby's says. It measures nearly 15 inches by 11 inches by 6 inches (375 millimeters by 279 millimeters by 152 millimeters). It was also a rare find. There are only 400 Martian meteorites out of the more than 77,000 officially recognized meteorites found on Earth, the auction house says.

Christine Hunsicker, founder of the failed "Clothing-as-a-Service" startup CaaStle, has been criminally charged with defrauding investors of over $300 million by falsifying financials and misrepresenting the company's health. CNBC reports: Authorities said Christine Hunsicker, 48, of Lafayette, New Jersey, promoted CaaStle to investors as a more than $1.4 billion "Clothing-as-a-Service" business that helped companies rent apparel to consumers with an option to buy, despite knowing it was financially distressed and short of cash. The alleged fraud spanned six years starting in 2019, three years after the Princeton University alumna was named one of Inc magazine's "Most Impressive Women Entrepreneurs" and Crain's New York Business' "40 Under 40."

Hunsicker was charged in a six-count indictment with wire fraud, securities fraud, money laundering, making false statements to a bank and aggravated identity theft. She turned herself in to authorities, and could face decades in prison if convicted. The Securities and Exchange Commission filed a related civil lawsuit. In a joint statement, Hunsicker's lawyers Michael Levy and Anna Skotko said the indictment presented "an incomplete and very distorted picture," despite their client being "fully cooperative and transparent" with prosecutors. "There is much more to this story, and we look forward to telling it," the lawyers added.

Authorities said Hunsicker falsified CaaStle's financial statements and bank records to raise capital. This included alleged representations that CaaStle earned $66.3 million on revenue of $439.9 million in 2023, when it actually lost $81 million on revenue of $15.7 million. Hunsicker was also accused of falsely telling investors their money would go toward buying discounted shares from existing shareholders who needed liquidity, including after the 2022 collapse of the FTX cryptocurrency exchange. Prosecutors said Hunsicker fraudulently raised more than $275 million for CaaStle and $30 million for a related venture, P180.

The House passed a bipartisan bill regulating stablecoins which now heads to President Trump's desk as part of his push to make the U.S. the "crypto capital of the world." Two other crypto-related bills -- one defining digital asset market structure and another banning a U.S. central bank digital currency -- were also approved by the House but face uncertain futures in the Senate amid partisan tensions and concerns over Trump's personal financial ties to crypto ventures. CNBC reports: The stablecoin bill, passed on a 308-122 vote, sets initial guardrails and consumer protections for the cryptocurrency, which is tied to a stable asset, often the U.S. dollar, to reduce price volatility. It passed the Senate with bipartisan support in June. "Around the world, payment systems are undergoing a revolution," said House Financial Services Chair French Hill of Arkansas as lawmakers debated the stablecoin legislation Thursday morning. Hill said the bill will "ensure American competitiveness and strong guardrails for our consumers."

After Trump declared it "crypto week," the bills were stalled for more than a day amid disagreements among House Republicans about how to combine the legislation. In the end, GOP leaders put the three bills for a separate votes, leaving the fate of the other two bills unclear in the Senate. The internal dissent could foreshadow challenges ahead for the more sweeping crypto legislation that Trump has demanded and the industry has poured millions into advancing. The stablecoin measure is seen by lawmakers and the industry as a step toward adding legitimacy and consumer trust to a rapidly growing sector. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said in June that the legislation could help that currency "grow into a $3.7 trillion market by the end of the decade."

The bill outlines requirements for stablecoin issuers, including compliance with U.S. anti-money laundering and sanctions laws, and mandates that issuers hold reserves backing the cryptocurrency. Without such a framework, Republicans on the Senate Banking Committee in a statement warned, "consumers face risks like unstable reserves or unclear operations from stablecoin issuers." After the votes, House Republicans strongly urged the Senate to take up the second bill, which would create a new market structure for cryptocurrency.

British universities face mounting financial pressures with four in ten institutions running deficits, according to the Office for Students regulator. Half have closed courses to save money, while Durham and Newcastle each shed 200 staff members. Lancaster's cost-saving plan could eliminate one in five academic positions. The crisis, writes Economist, stems from frozen tuition fees for English students, which will rise by only a few percent in August for the first time in eight years.

Digital tokens designed to track popular stocks have suffered extreme price deviations since launching two weeks ago, with an Amazon-tracking token briefly spiking to more than 100 times the underlying stock's closing price. The token AMZNX hit $23,781.22 on crypto trading platform Jupiter on July 3, while Amazon shares had closed the previous day around $200.

A similar Apple-tracking token jumped to $236.72 on July 3, representing a 12% premium to the actual stock price. Companies including Robinhood, Kraken, Gemini and Bybit launched these blockchain-based versions of U.S. stocks in late June for non-U.S. customers. Robinhood is facing scrutiny from Lithuania's central bank after launching tokens tied to OpenAI and SpaceX without permission from either company, prompting OpenAI to disavow the tokens on social media.

Daniel Stenberg, creator of the curl utility, is considering ending its bug bounty program due to a surge in low-quality, AI-generated reports that are overwhelming the small volunteer team. Despite attempts to discourage AI-assisted submissions, these reports now make up about 20% of all entries in 2025, while genuine vulnerabilities have dropped to just 5%. The Register reports: "The general trend so far in 2025 has been way more AI slop than ever before (about 20 percent of all submissions) as we have averaged about two security report submissions per week," he wrote in a blog post on Monday. "In early July, about 5 percent of the submissions in 2025 had turned out to be genuine vulnerabilities. The valid-rate has decreased significantly compared to previous years."

The situation has prompted Stenberg to reevaluate whether to continue curl's bug bounty program, which he says has paid out more than $90,000 for 81 awards since its inception in 2019. He said he expects to spend the rest of the year mulling possible responses to the rising tide of AI refuse. Presently, the curl bug bounty program -- outsourced to HackerOne - requires the bug reporter to disclose the use of generative AI. It does not entirely ban AI-assisted submissions, but does discourage them. "You should check and double-check all facts and claims any AI told you before you pass on such reports to us," the program's policy explains. "You are normally much better off avoiding AI."

Two bug submissions per week on average may not seem like a lot, but the curl security team consists of only seven members. As Stenberg explains, three or four reviewers review each submission, a process that takes anywhere from 30 minutes to three hours. "I personally spend an insane amount of time on curl already, wasting three hours still leaves time for other things," Stenberg lamented. "My fellows however are not full time on curl. They might only have three hours per week for curl. Not to mention the emotional toll it takes to deal with these mind-numbing stupidities." [...]

Stenberg says it's not clear what HackerOne should do to reduce reckless use of AI, but insists something needs to be done. His post ponders charging a fee to submit a report or dropping the bug bounty award, while also expressing reservations about both potential remedies. "As a lot of these reporters seem to genuinely think they help out, apparently blatantly tricked by the marketing of the AI hype-machines, it is not certain that removing the money from the table is going to completely stop the flood," he concludes.

Saudi Arabia has asked consultants to reassess the feasibility of The Line, its ambitious 170km linear city project and centerpiece of the Neom initiative, as rising costs and falling oil prices force the kingdom to scale back its megaprojects. Middle East Eye reports: In April, The Financial Times reported that the CEO of Neom had launched a "comprehensive review" of the kingdom's megaproject. Neom, along with luxury Red Sea hotels and a ski resort, is the flagship project of Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman's Vision 2030 plan to transform the kingdom's economy and reduce its dependence on oil revenue. Bloomberg reported in 2024 that Saudi Arabia was cutting back plans for The Line. Instead of 1.5 million people living there by 2030, Saudi officials were said to anticipate fewer than 300,000 residents. Meanwhile, only 2.4km of the city is expected to be completed by 2030.

In April, Goldman Sachs painted a bleak picture for Saudi Arabia's projects in a note to clients, projecting "pretty significant" budget deficits and more scaling back of megaprojects. Neom has already faced internal challenges. Nadhmi al-Nasr, who managed Neom's construction from 2018 to 2024, departed from his post in November. Nasr earned a chilling reputation managing Neom. He bragged that he put everyone to work "like a slave," adding, "When they drop down dead, I celebrate. That's how I do my projects." Two other foreign executives also left Neom at the end of 2024, according to The Wall Street Journal.

Robinhood's stock hit is up more than 160% for 2025, reports CNBC, and the trading platform's own stock hit an all-time high on Friday. But "Despite its stellar year, the online broker is facing several headwinds..." Florida Attorney General James Uthmeier opened a formal investigation into Robinhood Crypto on Thursday, alleging the platform misled users by claiming to offer the lowest-cost crypto trading. "Robinhood has long claimed to be the best bargain, but we believe those representations were deceptive," Uthmeier said in a statement. The probe centers on Robinhood's use of payment for order flow — a common practice where market makers pay to execute trades — which the AG said can result in worse pricing for customers.

Robinhood is also facing opposition to a new 25% cut of staking rewards for U.S. users, set to begin October 1. In Europe, the platform will take a smaller 15% cut. Staking allows crypto holders to earn yield by locking up their tokens to help secure blockchain networks like ethereum, but platforms often take a percentage of those rewards as commission. Robinhood's 25% cut puts it in line with Coinbase, which charges between 25.25% and 35% depending on the token. The cut is notably higher than Gemini's flat 15% fee. It marks a shift for the company, which had previously steered clear of staking amid regulatory uncertainty...

The company now offers blockchain-based assets in Europe that give users synthetic exposure to private firms like OpenAI and SpaceX through special purpose vehicles, or SPVs. An SPV is a separate entity that acquires shares in a company. Users then buy tokens of the SPV and don't have shareholder privileges or voting rights directly in the company. OpenAI has publicly objected, warning the tokens do not represent real equity and were issued without its approval... "What's important is that retail customers have an opportunity to get exposure to this asset," [Robinhood CEO Vlad Tenev said in an interview with CNBC], pointing to the disruptive nature of AI and the historically limited access to pre-IPO companies. "It is true that these are not technically equity," Tenev added, noting that institutional investors often gain similar exposure through structured financial instruments...

Despite the regulatory noise, many investors remain focused on Robinhood's upside, and particularly the political tailwinds.

An anonymous reader quotes a report from Bloomberg: JPMorgan Chase has told financial-technology companies that it will start charging fees amounting to hundreds of millions of dollars for access to their customers' bank account information -- a move that threatens to upend the industry's business models. The largest US bank has sent pricing sheets to data aggregators -- which connect banks and fintechs -- outlining the new charges, according to people familiar with the matter. The fees vary depending on how companies use the information, with higher levies tied to payments-focused companies, the people said, asking not to be identified discussing private information.

A representative for JPMorgan said the bank has invested significant resources to create a secure system that protects consumer data. "We've had productive conversations and are working with the entire ecosystem to ensure we're all making the necessary investments in the infrastructure that keeps our customers safe," the spokesperson said in a statement. The fees -- expected to take effect later this year depending on the fate of a Biden-era regulation -- aren't final and could be negotiated. [The open-banking measure, finalized in October, enables consumers to demand, download and transfer their highly-coveted data to another lender or financial services provider for free.]

The charges would drastically reshape the business for fintech firms, which fundamentally rely on their access to customers' bank accounts. Payment platforms like PayPal's Venmo, cryptocurrency wallets such as Coinbase and retail-trading brokerages like Robinhood all use this data so customers can send, receive and trade money. Typically, the firms have been able to get it for free. Many fintechs access data using aggregators such as Plaid and MX, which provide the plumbing between fintechs and banks. The new fees -- which vary from firm to firm -- could be passed from the aggregators to the fintechs and, ultimately, consumers. The aggregator firms have been in discussions with JPMorgan about the charges, and those talks are constructive and ongoing, another person familiar with the matter said.

An anonymous reader quotes a report from Ars Technica: For the second time in a year, Google has announced that it will render some of its past phones almost unusable with a software update, and users don't have any choice in the matter. After nerfing the Pixel 4a's battery capacity earlier this year, Google has now confirmed a similar update is rolling out to the Pixel 6a. The new July Android update adds "battery management features" that will make the phone unusable. Given the risks involved, Google had no choice but to act, but it could choose to take better care of its customers and use better components in the first place. Unfortunately, a lot more phones are about to end up in the trash. [...]

Pixel 4a units contained one of two different batteries, and only the one manufactured by a company called Lishen was downgraded. For the Pixel 6a, Google has decreed that the battery limits will be imposed when the cells hit 400 charge cycles. Beyond that, the risk of fire becomes too great -- there have been reports of Pixel 6a phones bursting into flames. Clearly, Google had to do something, but the remedies it settled on feel unnecessarily hostile to customers. It had a chance to do better the second time, but the solution for the Pixel 6a is more of the same. [...]

When Google killed the Pixel 4a's battery life, it offered a few options. You could have the battery replaced for free, get $50 cash, or accept a $100 credit in the Google Store. However, claiming the money or free battery was a frustrating experience that was rife with fees and caveats. The store credit is also only good on phones and can't be used with other promotions or discounts. And the battery swap? You'd better hope there's nothing else wrong with the device. If it has any damage, like cracked glass, it may not qualify for a free battery replacement.

Now we have the Pixel 6a Battery Performance Program with all the same problems. Pixel 6a owners can get $100 in cash or $150 in store credit. Alternatively, Google offers a free battery replacement with the same limits on phone condition. This is all particularly galling because the Pixel 6a is still an officially supported phone, with its final guaranteed update coming in 2027. Google also pulled previous software packages for this phone to prevent rollbacks. [...] If you have a Pixel 6a, the battery-killing update is rolling out now. You'll have no choice but to install it if you want to remain on the official software. Google has a support site where you can try to get a free battery swap or some cash.

Senator Dick Durbin questioned a Texas-led effort to move Space Shuttle Discovery from the Smithsonian to Space Center Houston, describing it as an expensive "heist" costing an estimated $305 million, not the $85 million initially budgeted. "This is not a transfer. It's a heist," said Durbin during a budget markup hearing before the Senate Appropriations Committee. "A heist by Texas because they lost a competition 12 years ago." In April, Texas Senators John Cornyn and Ted Cruz introduced legislation to move the Space Shuttle Discovery from Virginia to Houston, which ultimately passed into law on July 4 as part of the "One Big Beautiful Bill." Ars Technica reports: "In the reconciliation bill, Texas entered $85 million to move the space shuttle from the National Air and Space Museum in Chantilly, Virginia, to Texas. Eighty-five million dollars sounds like a lot of money, but it is not nearly what's necessary for this to be accomplished," Durbin said. Citing research by NASA and the Smithsonian, Durbin said that the total was closer to $305 million and that did not include the estimated $178 million needed to build a facility to house and display Discovery once in Houston.

Furthermore, it was unclear if Congress even has the right to remove an artifact, let alone a space shuttle, from the Smithsonian's collection. The Washington, DC, institution, which serves as a trust instrumentality of the US, maintains that it owns Discovery. The paperwork signed by NASA in 2012 transferred "all rights, interest, title, and ownership" for the spacecraft to the Smithsonian. "This will be the first time ever in the history of the Smithsonian someone has taken one of their displays and forcibly taken possession of it. What are we doing here? They don't have the right in Texas to claim this," said Durbin. [...]

To be able to bring up his points at Thursday's hearing, Durbin introduced the "Houston, We Have a Problem" amendment to "prohibit the use of funds to transfer a decommissioned space shuttle from one location to another location." He then withdrew the amendment after having voiced his objections. "I think we're dealing with something called waste. Eighty-five million dollars worth of waste. I know that this is a controversial issue, and I know that there are other agencies, Smithsonian, NASA, and others that are interested in this issue; I'm going to withdraw this amendment, but I'm going to ask my colleagues be honest about it," said Durbin. "I hope that we think about this long and hard."

"I am glad to see this pass as part of the Senate's One Big Beautiful Bill and look forward to welcoming Discovery to Houston and righting this egregious wrong," Cornyn said in a statement. "Houston has long been the cornerstone of our nation's human space exploration program, and it's long overdue for Space City to receive the recognition it deserves by bringing Space Shuttle Discovery home."