Google torches $6bn a quarter chasing AI

Alphabet is spending faster than it can justify on an earnings call, and the banks financing the arms race are already looking to offload the risk. Google burned roughly $6bn in cash last quarter as it raised AI infrastructure spending yet again, while banks are reportedly trading pieces of a $35bn AI chip financing deal rather than holding it on their own books. AMD's move to put up to $5bn into Anthropic, structured as a chip supply tie-up rather than a straight investment, means compute providers now need equity stakes to guarantee demand. The pattern across Google, AMD and the banks is the same: everyone wants exposure to AI infrastructure, nobody wants to hold the full risk alone. If the banks are already slicing up $35bn of chip debt for distribution, someone senior has done the maths on what happens if utilisation disappoints.

UK inflation eased in June to its lowest reading in 15 months as food and fuel prices fell, and the government used the moment to confirm the £2 bus fare cap in England returns from January. Economists are already flagging that food prices, while down this month, are expected to rise again, and airport drop-off fees have jumped by a third at some sites, squeezing the same commuters the bus cap is meant to help. The bus subsidy is a political choice with a fixed cost to the Treasury; food inflation is not, and it's the one that actually moves household budgets month to month. Families in outer London boroughs are already leaving in numbers as living costs bite, a trend the bus cap won't reverse and wasn't designed to.

New licensing requirements have slammed the brakes on India's silver imports, one of the world's largest physical silver markets, at the same time gold is holding its gains as investors hedge against war-driven inflation fears. Indian jewellers and industrial buyers now face a supply squeeze that Chinese and Middle Eastern buyers don't, handing a pricing advantage to whoever can still get silver into their market without a licence queue. Gold's resilience despite dip-buying pressure suggests the war premium in precious metals isn't fading soon, a cost every importer of industrial metals should be pricing in now rather than after the next spike.

Southwest just trimmed its full-year outlook after fuel expenses ate into second-quarter profit, notable because Southwest is usually the airline with the hedging book everyone else envies. Rising fuel costs are hitting margins even at carriers that planned for volatility, which says more about the current oil price environment than about Southwest's own operations. Airlines with weaker hedging positions than Southwest's are due worse guidance cuts in the coming weeks, and that makes this quarter's number the floor for the sector, not the exception.

ServiceNow grew sales on higher contract values and Texas Instruments posted a stronger quarter on higher sales, both signs that enterprise software and semiconductors are still finding pricing power. Molina Healthcare went the other way, posting lower profit and revenue as membership declined, a reminder that US managed care faces genuine enrolment headwinds rather than a cyclical blip. Businesses that can raise prices on existing customers are outperforming those exposed to volume and enrolment, and that split will separate winners from laggards through the rest of this reporting season.

Aston Martin has secured a £550m loan deal in the face of explicit creditor objections, which means the carmaker judged its cash position urgent enough to override the people it owes money to. Creditor pushback rarely gets overridden unless a company is genuinely close to a liquidity cliff. Separately, Mercedes now faces the prospect of a US sales ban under a Senate China bill, a different kind of pressure that lands on a balance sheet already stretched by EV transition costs and tariff exposure. Aston Martin buys time; Mercedes is staring at a market it might lose outright if the bill advances.

IBM's chief executive conceding publicly that company culture was too slow to change is a rare admission from a firm that's spent a decade insisting its transformation was on track. Macquarie, meanwhile, has named its banking head to succeed Shemara Wikramanayake as CEO, a succession built for continuity rather than the shake-up IBM appears to be gesturing at. Lloyd's also disclosed that its former CEO failed to declare a close relationship with an employee, adding governance scrutiny to a market that prides itself on discipline. Boards across three very different institutions are done tolerating ambiguity about who's really in charge.

The Clarity Act, the closest the US has come to a comprehensive crypto market structure bill, is stuck on a provision about barring the president from selling crypto assets while in office. That's a remarkably specific sticking point for a bill meant to give exchanges and custodians regulatory certainty, and it shows how personal conflicts of interest have become inseparable from crypto policy at the federal level. Separately, the $13bn question of where Venezuelan oil money actually sits remains unresolved, complicating any US energy or diplomatic play in the region. Both fights share the same problem: personal and geopolitical entanglements keep blocking a clean vote.

Peter Beck is scaling Rocket Lab into direct competition with SpaceX and Blue Origin, a bet that the launch market has room for a third serious player.

Taco Bell is pulling supply trucks to contain contamination, the latest fast-food chain forced into a costly recall over a parasite linked to fresh produce.

Nicotine pouch competition is denting the one product line that was supposed to carry Philip Morris past its cigarette decline.

CN gets expanded network access in exchange for standing down, clearing a major obstacle to the biggest US rail consolidation in decades.

The lawsuit's withdrawal doesn't clear Meta of the broader litigation wave, dozens of similar cases are still queued up against the company.