Raphael Stevens

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    Eli Lilly, Nvidia partner to build supercomputer, AI factory for drug discovery and development

    Eli Lilly and Nvidia are partnering to build what the companies call the pharmaceutical industry’s “most powerful” supercomputer and so-called AI factory to help accelerate drug discovery and development across the broader sector.
    It’s the latest stride by Nvidia and the pharmaceutical industry to harness AI to try to shorten the time it takes to bring cures to patients, while reducing costs at every stage of the drug discovery and development process.
    The supercomputer will power the AI factory, a specialized computing infrastructure that will develop, train and deploy AI models at scale for drug discovery and development.

    Lilly Chair and CEO Dave Ricks speaks during a press conference for Eli Lilly and Company in Houston, Texas, U.S., Sept. 23, 2025.
    Antranik Tavitian | Reuters

    Eli Lilly and Nvidia are partnering to build what they call the pharmaceutical industry’s “most powerful” supercomputer and so-called AI factory to help accelerate drug discovery and development across the sector, the companies announced Tuesday. 
    It’s the latest stride by Nvidia and the pharmaceutical industry to harness AI to help shorten the time it takes to bring cures to patients, while reducing costs at every stage of drug discovery and development. The process typically takes about 10 years on average from dosing the first human with a drug to its launch on the market, said Diogo Rau, Eli Lilly’s chief information and digital officer, in an interview. 

    Eli Lilly expects to complete the buildout of the supercomputer and AI factory in December. They will go online in January. But the new tools likely won’t yield significant returns for the company’s business and that of any other drugmaker until the end of the decade.
    “The things that we’re talking about discovering with this kind of power that we have right now, we’re really going to see those benefits in 2030,” Rau said. 
    The industry’s efforts to use AI to bring medicines to people faster are still in the early stages. There are no drugs on the market designed using AI, but progress is evident in the number of AI-discovered drugs entering clinical trials, recent AI-focused investments and partnerships among drugmakers.
    Eli Lilly will own and operate the supercomputer, which will be powered by more than 1,000 Blackwell Ultra GPUs – a newer family of chips from Nvidia – connected on a unified, high-speed network. The supercomputer will power the AI factory, a specialized computing infrastructure that will develop, train and deploy AI models at scale for drug discovery and development.
    The supercomputer “is really a novel scientific instrument. It’s like an enormous microscope for biologists,” said Eli Lilly’s Chief AI Officer Thomas Fuchs. “It really allows us to do things we couldn’t do before at that enormous scale. 

    Scientists will be able to train AI models on millions of experiments to test potential medicines, “dramatically expanding the scope and sophistication” of drug discovery, according to a release from Eli Lilly. 
    While finding new drugs isn’t the only focus of the new tools, it is “where the big opportunity is,” said Rau.
    “We’re hopeful that we’ll be able to discover new molecules that we never would have with humans alone,” he said. 
    Several AI models will be available on Lilly TuneLab, an AI and machine learning platform that allows biotech companies to access drug discovery models that Eli Lilly has trained on years of its proprietary research. That data is worth $1 billion.
    Eli Lilly launched that platform in September as a way to expand access to drug discovery tools across the sector. 
    “It’s really powerful to be able to give that extra starting point to these startups that, you know, otherwise could take a couple of years burning their capital to get to that point,” said Kimberly Powell, Nvidia’s vice president of health care, adding that the company is “delighted to participate” in that effort. 
    In exchange for access to the AI models, biotech companies are expected to contribute some of their own research and data to help train them, Rau noted. The TuneLab platform employs so-called federated learning, which means that companies can take advantage of Lilly’s AI models without either side directly sharing data.
    Eli Lilly also plans to use the supercomputer to shorten drug development and help get treatments to people faster. 
    The company said new scientific AI agents can support researchers, and advanced medical imaging can give scientists a clearer view of how diseases progress and help them develop new biomarkers — a measurable sign of a biological process or condition — for personalized care. 
    “We would actually like to deliver on that promise of precision medicine,” Powell said. “Without an AI infrastructure and foundation, we’ll never get there, right? So we’re doing all of the necessary building, and now we’re seeing this true lift off, and Lilly is an exact example of that.”
    Precision medicine is an approach that tailors disease prevention and treatment according to differences in a person’s genes, environments, and lifestyles. More

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    The Fed has a rate cut plus a bunch of other things on its plate this week. Here’s what to expect

    Markets are assigning a nearly 100% probability that the Federal Open Market Committee will approve a second consecutive quarter percentage point at its meeting this week.
    Beyond that, policymakers are likely to debate the future path of reductions, the challenges posed by a lack of economic data and the timetable for ending the Fed’s balance sheet runoff.
    “There’s dissent between people who want to cut now, and people who want to wait and see a bit more,” said former Fed official Bill English.

    Jerome Powell, chairman of the US Federal Reserve, during the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and World Bank Fall meetings at the IMF headquarters in Washington, DC, US, on Thursday, Oct. 16, 2025.
    Kent Nishimura | Bloomberg | Getty Images

    The easy part for the Federal Reserve on Wednesday will be announcing an interest rate cut when it wraps up its two-day policy meeting. The hard part will be taking care of other details that are presenting substantial challenges to policymaking these days.
    Markets are assigning a nearly 100% probability that the Federal Open Market Committee will approve a second consecutive quarter percentage point, or 25 basis point, reduction in the federal funds rate. The overnight lending benchmark is currently targeted between 4%-4.25%.

    Beyond that, policymakers are likely to debate, among other things, the future path of reductions, the challenges posed by a lack of economic data and the timetable for ending the reduction in its asset portfolio of Treasurys and mortgage-backed securities.
    Underlining all of those deliberations will be a growing divergence of opinion over what the future holds for monetary policy.
    “They are at a moment in the policy cycle where there’s genuine disagreement between people who are thinking we will probably cut rates but I’m not ready to cut again just yet, and people who think even though there’s risks, it’s time to do more now,” said Bill English, a Yale professor and the Fed’s former director of monetary affairs. “There’s dissent between people who want to cut now, and people who want to wait and see a bit more.”

    Judging by recent statements and prevailing Wall Street sentiment, newly appointed Governor Stephen Miran is likely to dissent in favor of a bigger cut, as he did at the September FOMC meeting.
    At the same time, regional Presidents Beth Hammack of Cleveland, Lorie Logan of Dallas and Jeffrey Schmid of St. Louis have expressed reluctance to go much further on cuts, though it’s far from clear whether they will vote against a cut this week. Only Miran, who wanted a half-point reduction, actually dissented in what was an 11-1 committee vote last month to cut by a quarter point.

    Left to try to straddle the difference will be Chair Jerome Powell, who in a recent speech gave an implied nod to an October cut when he expressed worry over the state of the labor market.
    Investors will look to the central bank chief, who will leave the position in May 2026, for guidance on the prevailing sentiment.
    “I would expect him to try to walk a middle ground, not tip his hand necessarily, on December,” English said, referring to the next policy meeting after this one. “I don’t think he wants to be locked into a rate cut in December. But on the other hand, it does seem like he’s worried about the labor market and about the outlook for real activity, so he doesn’t want to come across as hawkish.”
    Markets currently also are pricing in a near-certainty of a December reduction, according to the CME Group’s FedWatch tool, so it would take a lot do dissuade Wall Street from anticipating more Fed easing.
    Worries about jobs
    One big reason officials are in the mood to lower is concern over the labor market. Even with an absence of data, there are clear signs that inflation is slowing even if layoffs, judging by state-level jobless claims submissions that are still ongoing despite the federal shutdown, do not appear to be accelerating.
    In fact, worries over jobs could keep the Fed cutting well into 2026, said Luke Tilley, chief economist at Wilmington Trust.
    “We expect 25 [basis points Wednesday] and then again in December, and then again in January and March and April,” Tilley said. “Then that would bring them down to what we think of as the neutral range to 2.75% to 3%.”

    Fed officials in September indicated, through the “dot plot” of individual members’ expectations, that they won’t get to a rate that neither pushes nor restrains growth — the so-called “neutral” rate — until 2027, and even then it will be a quarter point above where Tilley sees.
    However, he thinks the Fed won’t have any choice but to react to labor market weakness, particularly as it poses a challenge to surprisingly strong economic growth seen in the second half of this year.
    Worries over jobs have taken more of the Fed’s focus even as inflation remains well above the central bank’s 2% target. The Bureau of Labor Statistics reported last week, in the only official data release during the shutdown, that the annual inflation rate as measured by the consumer price index was stuck at 3% in September.
    Lack of data challenge
    Outside of the CPI report, central bankers face the additional challenge of the data blackout that has accompanied the government shutdown.
    “It’s hard to make policy to achieve two goals … when you’re not getting data about about at least one of them,” Tilley said, referring to the Fed’s dual mandate to maximize employment and keep prices stable, and the absence of the September nonfarm payrolls report due to the shutdown.
    “I expect that to be communicated as more uncertainty about the path forward, that they have to be ready to pivot and hold rates, if need be, or to reduce them faster when they finally do get data,” Tilley said.
    Finally, markets will be looking for more definitive answers on when the Fed will stop reducing its $6.6 trillion balance sheet, most of which is in Treasurys and mortgage-backed securities. Nicknamed quantitative tightening, or QT, the process has entailed allowing proceeds from maturing securities to roll off rather than being reinvested as usual.
    In a recent speech, Powell indicated the time is getting closer to where the Fed will want to stop QT. While financial conditions are largely still solid, there have been some small signs lately that short-term markets are tightening up. With the Fed’s overnight funding facility nearly drained, officials are likely to signal this week that QT is in its final stages.
    Market commentary was split over whether the Fed will announce the actual end of the program, or signal a future date when it will cease.
    “There are signs that they’re getting close to bottom, so to speak, in terms of getting through ample reserves and actually getting some tightness and liquidity. So that’s why I would expect an announcement, if not action,” Tilley said. More

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    Home prices lag inflation, meaning homeowners are losing out on their investment

    Home prices rose nationally in August, but the growth is weakening and is slower than the rate of inflation.
    Prices rose the most in the New York metropolitan area in August, with a 6.1% annual gain, followed by Chicago at 5.9% and Cleveland at 4.7%.
    The average rate on the 30-year fixed mortgage started June at just below 7% and fell to 6.5% by the end of August, according to Mortgage News Daily.

    Homes in the south suburban Chicago area on April 26, 2023.
    Brian Cassella | Tribune News Service | Getty Images

    A home is most Americans’ single largest investment. The returns are losing ground.
    Home prices nationally rose 1.5% in August compared with the same month last year, down from the 1.6% annual gain recorded in July, according to the S&P Cotality Case-Shiller U.S. National Home Price NSA Index.

    While home prices aren’t yet falling, they’re weakening — rising at a slower pace than the current 3% rate of inflation. That means that housing wealth eroded in real terms for the fourth consecutive month, according to the index.
    Home prices in nearly all of the metropolitan markets highlighted in the index fell month to month in August. Only Chicago saw price gains. Home prices are seasonal and usually drop this time of year, but this weakness was more significant than typical seasonal patterns.
    Much of that is due to stubbornly high mortgage rates, which stagnated over the summer, when much of this index was measured. (The index is a three-month running average.) Rates have since declined, but not by a lot. The average rate on the 30-year fixed mortgage started June at just below 7% and fell to 6.5% by the end of August, according to Mortgage News Daily. It is now at 6.19%.
    “Mortgage rates remaining above 6.5% continue to weigh on buyer demand, even during what should be the busy summer season. The combination of high financing costs and prices that remain near record highs has limited transaction activity,” wrote Nicholas Godec, head of fixed income tradables and commodities at S&P Dow Jones Indices, in a news release.
    August prices rose the most in the New York metropolitan area, with a 6.1% annual gain, followed by Chicago at 5.9% and Cleveland at 4.7%. On the flip side, prices in Tampa, Florida, fell 3.3% year over year, Phoenix dropped 1.7% and Miami declined 1.7%.

    There was also weakness in the West, with prices in San Francisco down 1.5%, Denver fell 0.7% and San Diego dropped 0.7%. Seattle also turned very slightly negative.

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    “Markets that experienced the sharpest pandemic-era gains are now seeing the largest corrections, while more affordable metros with stable local economies are holding up better,” Godec said. “This adjustment may ultimately lead to a more sustainable market, but for now, homeowners are watching their real equity erode while buyers face the dual challenge of elevated prices and high borrowing costs.”
    A separate survey from the Federal Housing Finance Agency, or FHFA, that measures prices of homes with conforming loans showed house prices rose 2.3% in August year over year and 0.4% from July.
    “This relative strength on a month-on-month basis reverses the recent weak trend and shows some stabilization in home prices across the US after several months of month-on-month declines,” said Eugenio Aleman, chief economist at Raymond James, in a statement. “We may see some more stability in home price appreciation during the rest of the year as the effects of lower mortgage interest rates support increased housing activity.” More

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    UPS stock soars on third-quarter earnings beat, turnaround plan

    UPS on Tuesday beat Wall Street estimates in its third-quarter earnings report.
    The company said it’s cut around 34,000 jobs from its workforce as part of its plan to turn around the business.
    Shares of the company soared following the release.

    A UPS worker pushes a cart in New York, US, on Monday, Oct. 27, 2025.
    Michael Nagle | Bloomberg | Getty Images

    United Parcel Service on Tuesday reported earnings that topped Wall Street’s estimates ahead of its busy holiday season.
    Shares of the package delivery giant surged 10% in premarket trading.

    Here’s how the company performed in its third quarter, compared with what Wall Street was expecting based on a survey of analysts by LSEG:

    Earnings per share: $1.74 adjusted vs. $1.30 expected
    Revenue: $21.4 billion vs. $20.83 billion expected

    For the period ended Sept. 30, the company reported net income of $1.31 billion, or $1.55 per share, compared with $1.99 billion, or $1.80 per share, the year prior. Adjusting for one-time items, including costs of its transformation strategy, the company reported profit of $1.48 billion or $1.74 per share.
    UPS estimates its fourth quarter revenue to be $24 billion with an operating margin of 11% to 11.5%.
    The company also on Tuesday laid out details of its previously announced turnaround plan and said it cut its operational workforce by 34,000 jobs, greater than its previous estimate of 20,000, as part of its plan to trim down its work with Amazon, previously its largest customer. The company also cut 14,000 jobs from its management workforce.
    In the third quarter, Amazon’s total volume with UPS declined 21.2%, executives said on an earnings call, compared with a 13% decline for the first half of the year.

    UPS also initiated a sale-leaseback transaction in the third quarter for five properties as part of its broader strategy, which resulted in a $330 million pre-tax gain on sale in its supply chain solutions division. It said Tuesday that it has now closed daily operations at 93 leased and owned buildings through September as part of the initiative.
    UPS said its turnaround plan has resulted in $2.2 billion in savings through the end of the third quarter, with an estimate of achieving $3.5 billion total year-over-year cost savings in 2025.
    “We are executing the most significant strategic shift in our company’s history, and the changes we are implementing are designed to deliver long-term value for all stakeholders,” CEO Carol Tomé said. “With the holiday shipping season nearly upon us, we are positioned to run the most efficient peak in our history while providing industry-leading service to our customers for the eighth consecutive year.”
    The courier’s strong results come as the parcel industry faces a volatile tariff environment and sluggish demand, in addition to impacts from the end of the de minimis loophole. Rival FedEx said last month that it incurred $150 million in headwinds from the global trade environment.
    “The third quarter brought a wave of tariff changes, some expected, others unforeseen, and our team navigated these complexities with exceptional skills and resilience,” Tomé said on the call, adding that the company is incorporating artificial intelligence into its daily operations to adapt to the surge in customs entries. More

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    Wayfair stock rises 10% as earnings beat, revenue jumps

    Online home goods company Wayfair beat Wall Street estimates and said revenue jumped 8% in the third quarter.
    Excluding the impact of the company’s exit from Germany, Wayfair said its revenue grew 9% year-over-year.
    CFO Kate Gulliver told CNBC the company doesn’t believe the growth is driven by any macro-related factors like tariffs or interest rates and instead is a result of initiatives like its loyalty program and shift to physical retail.

    Online home goods company Wayfair reported a jump in third-quarter revenue on Tuesday, as it beat Wall Street estimates on the top and bottom lines.
    The company said total net revenue increased 8.1% year-over-year.

    Here’s how the company performed in its third quarter, compared with what Wall Street was expecting, based on a survey of analysts by LSEG:

    Earnings per share: 70 cents adjusted vs. 43 cents expected
    Revenue: $3.12 billion vs. $3.02 billion expected

    Wayfair shares climbed 10% in premarket trading.
    For the period ended Sept. 30, Wayfair reported a net loss of $99 million, or 76 cents per share, compared to a loss of $74 million, or 60 cents per share, the year prior.
    The company’s U.S. revenue rose 8.6% year over year to $2.7 billion, while international revenue climbed 4.6% year over year to $389 million. Wayfair said its total net revenue excluding its Germany exit jumped 9% year over year.
    The revenue increase comes as the overall home goods sector has seen recent struggles, partly due to rising inflation and lower home turnover during a stretch of high interest rates. The sector has also faced challenges in President Donald Trump’s furniture tariffs, in addition to other duties — though rates on imported goods from many countries are now lower than Trump proposed earlier this year.

    CFO Kate Gulliver told CNBC that the company doesn’t credit the growth to any macro-related factors like tariffs or interest rates.
    “We think it’s really being driven by our share gain, and that, we believe is really coming from a confluence of factors and initiatives that we started over a year ago that are now starting to bear fruit,” Gulliver said.
    Those initiatives include what Gulliver calls the company’s “core recipe” – price, product availability and speed – in addition to growth from its loyalty program, site improvement and physical retail. The retailer opened its first large store in Illinois last year to ride the wave of physical stores’ comeback. Based on that success, it plans to open another location in Yonkers, New York, in early 2027.
    Though tariff policy has created uncertainty for the company, she said it has been able to lean on the strength of its model: operating as a marketplace on the back end and as a retailer on the front end.
    Wayfair saw a post-pandemic slump in sales in what was a “somewhat challenged” time for the home goods category, Gulliver said, but the past year has brought increased momentum. Despite tariff volatility, Wayfair’s stock had gained roughly 95% this year as of Monday’s close.
    CEO Niraj Shah added in the earnings release that the company’s delivered orders for the quarter grew 5% year-over-year.
    “Our 6.7% Adjusted EBITDA margin marks the highest level achieved in Wayfair’s history outside of the pandemic period,” Shah said on a call with analysts. “As we’ve promised, substantial profitability flow through is powered by a strong contribution margin and fixed cost discipline as our business has returned to growth.”
    Wayfair said its active customers totaled 21.2 million at the end of the quarter, a 2.3% decrease year over year.
    Shah added on the Tuesday call that Wayfair’s growth plan is driven by “Wayfair-specific factors” and is “not reliant upon a recovery in the housing market.” He said the company saw few isolated examples of early purchases to avoid tariffs like a “short-lived” increase in large appliance sales in the early spring.
    “We see our outperformance as structural share capture driven by our strong day-to-day execution against the core recipe, the early success of the new programs we’ve been able to launch and from the broad gains we have brought to bear from our technology team,” Shah said. More

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    PayPal shares surge 14% after OpenAI deal to become the first payments wallet in ChatGPT

    PayPal and OpenAI have signed an agreement to embed the payments wallet into ChatGPT.
    Starting next year PayPal buyers and sellers will be able to complete transactions through the AI tool.
    PayPal CEO Alex Chriss told CNBC the agreement means customer protections for users including package tracking and dispute resolution.

    Sopa Images | Lightrocket | Getty Images

    PayPal has signed a deal with OpenAI to have its digital wallet embedded into ChatGPT so users can pay for items found through the leading consumer AI tool, the company told CNBC exclusively.
    Shares of the company jumped as much as 14% in premarket trading on the news.

    The agreement, sealed over the weekend, means that starting next year, both sides of PayPal’s ecosystem can plug into ChatGPT: PayPal users can purchase items through the AI platform, and its merchants can sell on it, with their inventory listed there, according to PayPal CEO Alex Chriss.
    “We’ve got hundreds of millions of loyal PayPal wallet holders who now will be able to click the ‘Buy with PayPal button’ on ChatGPT and have a safe and secure checkout experience,” Chriss said in an interview.
    The move makes PayPal an early part of OpenAI’s efforts to broaden ChatGPT’s use for e-commerce. The thinking is that its 700 million-plus weekly users can lean on artificial intelligence to help them find items, similar to a human personal shopper. Last month, OpenAI said its users could buy from Shopify and Etsy merchants, and two weeks ago it announced an e-commerce deal with Walmart.
    “It’s a whole new paradigm for shopping,” Chriss said. “It’s hard to imagine that agentic commerce isn’t going to be a big part of the future.”
    PayPal is attempting to position itself as a payments backbone for the coming era of agentic AI shopping, announcing recent deals with Google and artificial intelligence firm Perplexity. The fintech firm, which also released third-quarter results Tuesday, issued a release on its OpenAI deal after CNBC’s report.

    The company will also manage merchant routing, payment validation and other behind-the-scenes aspects of payment processing for PayPal sellers on ChatGPT, so individual merchants don’t have to sign up with OpenAI, the firm said.
    Chriss touted the fact that both consumers and merchants have been verified by the fintech firm, reducing the risk of fraud for either group. Users can pull funds from linked bank accounts or credit cards, or stored balances, to pay for purchases, and they’ll get protections, package tracking and dispute resolution.
    “It’s not just that a transaction can happen,” Chriss said. “It’s that this is a trusted set of merchants, the largest merchant network in the world from PayPal, that are verified, with the largest set of verified consumers in a consumer wallet.”
    PayPal also said it is expanding the use of OpenAI’s enterprise AI products for its employees to speed up product cycles. More

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    BlackRock-linked tokenization firm Securitize to go public via SPAC deal

    Watch Daily: Monday – Friday, 3 PM ET

    The fintech firm will merge with Cantor Equity Partners II, Inc., a blank-check company sponsored by an affiliate of Cantor Fitzgerald.
    The deal values Securitize’s business at $1.25 billion in pre-money equity.
    Following the merger, the combined entity Securitize Corp.’s stock will trade on the Nasdaq under the ticker symbol SECZ. 

    Carlos Domingo, chief executive officer of Securitize Inc., speaks during the Messari Mainnet summit in New York, US, on Thursday, Sept. 21, 2023. Photographer: Michael Nagle/Bloomberg via Getty Images
    Bloomberg | Bloomberg | Getty Images

    Securitize, the “real world assets” platform that powers BlackRock’s tokenized money market fund, will go public through a merger with a special purpose acquisition company, CEO Carlos Domingo told CNBC in an exclusive interview.
    The fintech firm will merge with Cantor Equity Partners II, Inc., a blank-check company sponsored by an affiliate of Cantor Fitzgerald that trades under the CEPT ticker. The deal values Securitize’s business at $1.25 billion in pre-money equity.

    “Tokenization is what everybody’s talking about … but there’s nobody publicly traded that does it,” Domingo told CNBC. “We will do well in the public market because people want to index themselves to tokenization the same way that people are buying Circle because they want to index themselves to stablecoins.”
    Tokenization refers to the registration of ownership rights to real-world assets such as stocks, bonds or gold on a blockchain. The process enables more transparent and around-the-clock trading versus traditional methods, according to its proponents — among whom are Robinhood Markets CEO Vlad Tenev and BlackRock CEO Larry Fink.
    Following the merger, the combined entity Securitize Corp.’s stock will trade on the Nasdaq under the ticker symbol SECZ. Shares could begin trading on the exchange as soon as January, according to Domingo. 
    The company will book $465 million in gross proceeds from the deal. That includes $225 million from private investors including Borderless Capital and Hanwha Investment, and $240 million in the SPAC’s trust account, assuming no redemptions. 

    RWA tokenization takes off

    The deal comes as tokenized RWAs boom. The combined market value of tokenized U.S. Treasurys has climbed to roughly $8.6 billion as of writing time, up more than 200% over the past year, according to data provider RWA.xyz.

    The RWA tokenization market as a whole has ballooned 135% over the past year and is now worth $35 billion, the data shows. Citi analysts see massive growth for the tokenized RWA market, saying it could grow to almost $4 trillion by 2030.
    That positions Securitize — which Domingo says has been profitable in recent quarters — to jump into the fray of firms aiming to capitalize on growing demand for digital assets. Earlier this year, Circle debuted on the New York Stock Exchange, raising about $1.1 billion in its blockbuster IPO. Cryptocurrency exchanges Gemini and Bullish also went public earlier in 2025.
    Tapping public markets will create winners and losers as the digital asset space continues to grow and mature, Domingo added.
    “The crypto industry needs to consolidate,” he said. “If you’re publicly traded and you have access to stock capital markets as well as cash, you can be on the side that is consolidating and not be consolidated by somebody else.”

    ‘A better ledger’

    Founded in 2017, Securitize has facilitated several large financial firms’ first forays into tokenized funds. 
    In March 2024, BlackRock launched its USD Institutional Digital Liquidity Fund (BUIDL) on the Ethereum blockchain in partnership with Securitize, enabling qualified investors to digitally hold U.S. Treasurys and earn yield. The firm has also tokenized more than $4 billion in assets through partnerships with Apollo, Hamilton Lane, KKR and VanEck on their tokenized funds. 
    Securitize is the largest tokenization platform, dominating 20% of the RWA tokenization market, per RWA.xyz.
    The company plans to also digitize its own equity, a move designed to demonstrate how the public company process and trading can move on-chain, Domingo told CNBC. The executive sees a future in which everything is brought on-chain.
    “There’s $400 trillion out there of assets that could potentially be tokenized,” Domingo said. “It’s an upgrade … within the next five to 10 years, you will see everything will be on-chain, because it’s just a better ledger.” More

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    The end of the rip-off economy

    IF YOU KNOW how to use artificial intelligence, it can save you a lot of time and money. Leasing a new car? Be sure to upload a photograph of the contract to ChatGPT first. Need help with a leaky tap? AI often understands the issue—and at a lower cost than a handyman. Parents with a fussy baby can now use chatbots to answer questions in seconds, rather than waiting for a doctor’s appointment. Giving Claude a PDF of a wine list is a great way to find the best-value bottles. More