Brian Boyle

brian@thedailyupside.com

Brian Boyle (he/him) is Lead Reporter at The Daily Upside. His writing has previously appeared in outlets such as Vice, Slate, and The Los Angeles Times, where he was a contributing writer on the opinion section. He lives in Los Angeles.

Indicators

Consumers Aren’t Buying Stable Job Market Data

Photo via Lindsey Nicholson/UCG/Universal Images Group/Newscom

On Tuesday, The Conference Board said its consumer confidence index fell to its lowest level in 12 years in September.

1 min read
Artificial Intelligence

Nvidia Develops Tools to Tackle Rogue AI Risks

Photo via Jonathan Brady / PA ROTA – B68 / Avalon/Newscom

Its Open Agent Safety Platform is a training sandbox designed to prevent the breaches that have led to hacks at Hugging Face and elsewhere.

2 min read
Media & Entertainment

Netflix Struggles to Regain Engagement Momentum, Escape YouTube’s Shadow

Photo via Xinhua/Sipa USA/Newscom

The company’s stock has received two recent analysts downgrades, after both flagged increased competition from YouTube.

2 min read
Artificial Intelligence

The Gig’s Up: Robotaxis, Delivery Drones Reshape the Side-Hustle Market

Photo illustration by Connor Lin / The Daily Upside, Photo by Chanakon Laorob via iStock

One study from George Washington University found that the transition to robotaxis could “decrease frontline jobs by 57% to 76%.”

4 min read
Technology

Cybersecurity Stocks Soar Amid Mounting Concern Over AI Hacks

Photo via Yichuan Cao/Sipa USA/Newscom

Both OpenAI’s Sam Altman and Anthropic’s Dario Amodei urged the United Nations Security Council this week to adopt new AI safety standards.

1 min read
Consumer

Wall Street Isn’t Biting on McDonald’s NEXT Menu

Photo via IMAGO/Manfred Segerer/Newscom

CEO Chris Kempczinski told CNBC Wednesday the company expects inflation and mediocre traffic to continue for the foreseeable future.

1 min read
Artificial Intelligence

Can Alibaba Become a Serious Hyperscaler?

Photo via IMAGO/VCG/Newscom

Alibaba says it plans to operate more than 20 gigawatts of data center capacity by 2032, roughly equivalent to China’s total capacity today.

1 min read
Media & Entertainment

Superman, Harry Potter and a Pile of Debt: What Paramount Won in WBD Settlement

Photo via Brad Weaver

The conglomerate’s $80 billion debt load will be equal to roughly 6.5 times EBITDA, according to most estimates.

2 min read
Technology

IBM Takes a Billion-Dollar Step Toward Becoming Quantum’s Foundry King

Photo via IBM

The federal government handed IBM $1 billion last week to help the build the first pure play quantum wafer foundry in the US.

2 min read
Energy

Generac Soars After $2.4B Deal to Provide Backup Power for Amazon

Photo via Generac Industrial Energy

In its last earnings call, Generac said that its data center backlog already totaled $1.6 billion before accounting for the Amazon agreement.

1 min read
Energy

Fed Raises Interest Rates for First Time in Three Years as Diesel, Gas Prices Surge

Photo via Paul Weaver/Sipa USA/Newscom

It’s the central bank’s first increase since 2023, a move that looked far from certain as recently as one week ago.

2 min read
Semiconductors

Intel-Backed Altera Joins IPO Tsunami

Photo via DPST/Newscom

The Altera debut will add to more than $160 billion raised for US IPOs so far this year excluding SPAC launches, according to Bloomberg data.

1 min read
Artificial Intelligence

Will Doomsayers Derail Anthropic’s Mega IPO?

Photo via Vincent Isore/ZUMAPRESS/Newscom

Anthropic’s S-1 filing with the SEC is expected to be released publicly in the coming days or weeks, and it will likely face new scrutiny.

2 min read
Artificial Intelligence

Meta May Be an AI Winner After All: Morgan Stanley

Photo via Louis Grasse/ZUMAPRESS/Newscom

Morgan Stanley’s determination that Meta may win a large piece of the $30 trillion consumer AI pie buoys a firm viewed as an AI also-ran.

2 min read
Real Estate

Post-Pandemic, ‘Living at the Office’ Takes on New (and Lucrative) Meaning

Photo illustration by Connor Lin / The Daily Upside

Are extreme office makeovers truly a solution to the housing shortage synonymous with life in large US cities today?

5 min read
Industrials

Musk’s Boring Company Scores $23 Billion Valuation Despite Slow Progress

Photo via The Boring Company/X

The most recent funding round for Elon Musk’s Boring Co. valued it at $23 billion, an almost four-fold increase from its last round in 2022.

2 min read
Industrials

Thiel, Andreessen-backed Defense Startup Promises Cheap Missiles as US Rebuilds Arsenal

Photo via Covenant

Covenant says its factories will be capable of producing 1,000 missiles each next year, with the goal of scaling up to 5,000 missiles a year.

1 min read
Industrials

GE Aerospace Makes $12B Play in Clogged Market for Cast Metal Parts

Photo via IMAGO/dts Nachrichtenagentur/Newscom

For GE Aerospace the acquisition represents a critical chance to it expand its own production capacity amid booming demand.

2 min read
Electric Vehicles

As China Sales Sag, BYD Gains Global Edge

Photo via Lucio Tavora / Xinhua News Agency/Newscom

In its recent earnings call, the BYD reported that its overseas sales trumped its domestic sales for the first time in its history.

2 min read
Social Media

Can YouTube Catch TikTok in the Live Shopping Wars?

Photo via Kyodonews/ZUMAPRESS/Newscom

Sales on TikTok Shop accounted for 2% of all US e-commerce sales in July, according to Consumer Edge, more than Costco or Target.

2 min read

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