The Guardian (June 11)
“Since the historic Nato summit in The Hague one year ago this month, European leaders have pledged massive increases in defence spending in the face of increasingly acute threats of Russian aggression. Yet the reality is that key west European governments – especially the UK, France and Italy – are not putting their money where their mouth is for fear of undermining lenders’ confidence in their national debt.”
Tags: Assistance, Bitter, Conflict, Europe, Grim, Incalculable, Invasion, Milestone, Perished, Prove, Putin, Russia, Success, Suffering, U.S., Ukraine, Waver, WWI
Wall Street Journal (June 10)
“A sharp fall in China’s crude oil imports during the Iran war has been instrumental in holding down oil prices and keeping the global economy humming.” China has essentially been “propping up the world economy” by reducing its oil imports by roughly three million barrels a day, “but analysts aren’t sure how long it can keep going.”
Tags: 3 MM bbl, China, Crude oil, Fall, Global economy, Imports, Instrumental, Iran war, Prices, Propping up, Reducing
Gizmodo (June 8)
AI mania “is running up against some hard economic realities. In recent weeks, big tech companies have been forced to admit that spending on tokens—the basic unit of measurement for AI usage—has gotten out of control.” As companies grow more cost conscious, big tech is waking up to the need “to find a new way to sell people on the future of AI without the exorbitant token costs. If they don’t, companies and users will just switch to some open model they can use for free.”
Tags: Admit, AI, Big tech, Companies, Cost conscious, Economic realities, Exorbitant, Free, Future, Mania, Open model, Spending, Switch, Tokens, Usage
New York Times (June 8)
“It’s no wonder grads are booing their commencement speakers” who champion the wonders of AI.” They should be worried, but the truth is “none of this is as inevitable as it seems. Remember putting everything on the blockchain? Remember NFTs? Hell, some of us are old enough to remember that the world was supposed to end in the year 2000.”
Tags: AI, Blockchain, Booing, Commencement, Grads, Inevitable, NFTs, Speakers, Truth, World, Worried
Barron’s (June 5)
“Markets have soared toward the rare air last breathed by investors in the mid-1980s, but the stalling tech rally is bringing stocks back down to Earth.” It was “a series of quarterly updates on Wednesday that punctured a hole in the AI trade that has powered markets higher since the end of March.” The “market’s angst” was compounded by “stubbornly high Treasury yields, the lack of an agreement on ending the U.S. war with Iran, and a near 10% gain for global crude prices since last Friday’s close.”
Tags: 1980s, AI trade, Angst, Crude, Investors, Iran, Markets, Punctured, Quarterly updates, Rare air, Soared, Stalling, Stocks, Tech rally, Treasury yields, U.S., War
Inc. (June 5)
“AI is now more expensive than the laid-off human labor it’s replacing. The bill for AI as labor replacement is coming due, and it’s an actual, big bill with many zeroes.”
Tags: Actual, AI, Due, Expensive, Human labor, Laid-off, Replacement, Replacing
The Economist (June 4)
“You are having too many babies. For decades that crude message was drilled into the minds of Indians by their rulers.” Slogans on schools proclaimed, “Two or three children, enough.” There were even forced sterilizations in the 1970s. “But when Indian school textbooks are reprinted this summer, they will carry a very different message. They will warn not of the dangers of having too many babies, but of the risks of having too few.” The “surprise baby bust” taking place in India “is a warning to the world. It is not just rich places that are becoming less fertile.”
Tags: 1970s, Babies, Baby bust, Children, Fertile, Forced sterilizations, India, Rich places, Schools, Slogans, Surprise, Textbooks, Warning
Investment Week (June 3)
“The OECD revised its 2026 global GDP growth figure down from 3.4% to 2.8%, as prices of energy and other key agricultural and industrial inputs have soared and pushed up inflation.” The organization “provided two scenarios for the global economy in its outlook; a time-limited disruption scenario, in which disruptions are assumed to remain relatively short-lived, and a prolonged disruption scenario, where broader disruptions last well into 2027 and have much longer-lasting negative consequences.”
Tags: Negative consequences
The Guardian (June 3)
“Although western Europe is now mostly free from last week’s heat dome – which shattered temperature records for May in the UK and Ireland – it is already bracing for yet another sweltering summer. Oppressive days, restless nights and furious fires are brewing.” Though there are some “exceptions to the collective denial,” Europe is “still not ready for extreme heat.” It must get fully prepared. “Heat kills more people in Europe than almost any other issue you worry about – from crime to terror attacks – with many tens of thousands of early deaths each year.”
Tags: Crime, Deaths, Extreme heat, Fires, Heat dome, https://www.theguardian.com/world/2026/jun/03/why-is-europe-still-not-ready-for-extreme-heat Europe, Ireland, May, Oppressive, Restless, Shattered, Summer, Sweltering, Temperature records, Terror attacks, UK
Wall Street Journal (June 2)
“Exxon Mobil shareholders last week voted to support management’s decision to move its corporate domicile to Texas from New Jersey. It’s a smart move that raises a question for other companies: Is it becoming a corporate governance duty to leave states that punish business for states that don’t?” While some companies may opt for higher taxes and costs to take advantage of talent clusters, “don’t be surprised if Exxon is a harbinger of more shareholder-driven relocations.”
Tags: Companies, Corporate domicile, Corporate governance, Costs, Duty, Exxon Mobil, Harbinger, New Jersey, Punish, Relocations, Shareholders, Smart move, Taxes, Texas, Voted
