Market Chaos, Tariffs, US AI Maximalism Continued

WHAT’S INSIDE

• Tech In The News: Top news in tech, markets, finance and policy

• Companies to watch: Some of the top companies to watch this week

• Feature: Market Chaos, Tariffs, US AI Maximalism Continued

• Buzzy Tools: Latest Buzzy tech, AI and financial tools

• Deep Tech: The latest in deep tech, biotech, futurism and more

• Space Tech: Latest news in the space race and aerospace tech

• Crypto: Blockchain and crypto policy and startups or protocols to watch

TECH IN THE NEWS

Economic Shakedown

Market Selloff as Tech stocks dropped for a third day as Nasdaq fell 1.2%, led by Palantir, Microsoft, and Nvidia amid tariff concerns, AI infra spend, earnings.

Deutsche Bank notes mega-cap tech positioning at 97th % pre-Nvidia earnings, exceeding growth fundamentals.

Bonds rally as 10-year Treasury yields dropped 3BPS to 4.4% as $69B two-year note sale saw record demand amid uncertainty.

Geopolitical Uncertainty

Trump Tariffs — Canada and Mexico currencies fell as Trump confirmed planned tariffs will proceed next month, while taking aim at China, EU with new trade measures. Alibaba tumbled in US trading amid a $53B AI pivot.

EU-US Tensions — The EU promised retaliation against Trump's threatened tariffs memo over EU tech regulations (DMA and DSA) impacts on US firms.

German Election  — New Chancellor Friedrich Merz to reshape EU-US relations, signals EU-first, business-friendly approach, fintech deregulation, questions NATO. 

AI Infrastructure Wins/Fails

Apple commits $500B to bolster US manufacturing production with Houston AI facility, Michigan training academy — xAI to build a $700M Atlanta datacenter with 12,000 GPUs — Microsoft cancels some AI facility leases despite an $80B pledge — and, Chinese E-commerce giant Alibaba plans a $53B pivot to AI.

COMPANIES TO WATCH

Anthropic — As it launches chart-topping Sonnet 3.7 it is close to raising $3.5B at $61.5B valuation with Lightspeed, General Catalyst, others, despite a $1.2B ARR loss. Funds will further advanced AI dev.

Mercor — The AI recruiting platform startup raised a $100M Series B at $2B led by Felicis, with General Catalyst, DST Global, Benchmark, and Menlo. Its used by top AI labs for automated candidate sourcing and plans to expand its workforce, enhance AI capabilities.

Saronic Technologies — The Austin autonomous vessel startup raised a $600M Series C at $4B valuation, led by Elad Gil & top VCs. Plans Port Alpha, next-gen shipyard for building autonomous ships to enhance US maritime capabilities.

SpaceSail — The Chinese LEO satellite internet rival to Elon Musk's Starlink is well placed with China heavily investing to expand internet access. It signed a contract with Brazil after it ended its Starlink deal.

Spore.Bio — The Paris startup raised $23M from Singular, Point72 others to speed up microbiology testing using ML, it has 200 factory contracts, plans to expand in cosmetics, pharma.

HOTTEST THING IN TECH
Market Chaos, Tariffs, US AI Maximalism Continued

Last week we wrote about the economic and geopolitical battle for AI dominance. Today we have Part Two of that discussion, because from a macro market crash, more billion-dollar infrastructure bets to more trade war shots, this week has already seen some major developments across Wall Street, D.C. and globally as the high-stakes tech sector collides with political and financial uncertainty.

Tech Stocks and AI Volatility As Markets Remain on Edge

Tech stocks led the Nasdaq and S&P 500 lower Monday for the third successive down day as investors struggled to regain confidence after last week's selloff. Analysts are sounding the alarm, warning that the AI boom may not be enough to prop up sky-high valuations. Nvidia, once the undisputed AI chip king, is under pressure ahead of earnings this week as DeepSeek continues to rattle the industry.  

New broke today Deepseek is doubling down on their open-source approach releasing five code repositories, emphasizing transparency and community-driven innovation in AI development. Meanwhile, Chinese E-commerce giant Alibaba, facing geopolitical headwinds and market refocusing, tumbled in US trading despite (or because of?) a surprise $53B AI infrastructure pivot, solidifying China’s ambitions to outpace the U.S. in AI compute power.

Domestic AI Maximalism

And yet, the US AI spending spree shows no signs of relenting. Apple just announced a staggering $500 billion commitment to US manufacturing, including an AI-focused server facility in Houston and a Michigan training academy to build out its ecosystem. Meanwhile, Elon Musk's xAI is sinking $700 million into a 12,000-GPU datacenter in Atlanta, while Microsoft—despite its $80 billion AI pledge—is quietly walking back some AI facility leases.

Meanwhile, Scale AI founder Alexandr Wang took to the stage at Web Summit, delivering a full-throated advocacy of the need for U.S. AI dominance after taking out a full-page ad in The Washington Post, telling President Trump that “America must win the AI war.” Unlike some voices in the industry pushing for a cooperative global AI framework, Wang is all in on American AI supremacy—arguing that the U.S. must lead AI development or risk ceding control to adversarial powers. The message reportedly didn’t land with attendees, with Bloomberg claiming only a handful of audience members supportive of the message when polled by show of hands. It seems many see the AI race as more complex than a binary U.S.-China showdown (you can count us in that number FWIW).

Tariffs, Trade Wars, and Geopolitical Crossfire

If tech markets weren’t already rattled enough, Trump’s tariff plan just threw gasoline on the fire. The U.S. is moving forward with sweeping tariffs on Canada and Mexico, sparking a currency drop of the CAD and Peso and related market jitters. But this is just the opening act—Trump is also ratcheting up pressure on China and the EU specifically this week, escalating the tech war by weaponizing trade policy.

The EU isn’t backing down, promising swift retaliation if Trump moves forward with tariffs over European tech regulations like the Digital Markets Act (DMA) and Digital Services Act (DSA). Meanwhile, in Germany, new Chancellor Friedrich Merz is signaling a business-first approach, deregulating fintech while moving away from EU-NATO relations—a move that could shift the power balance in European AI and defense development.

Anthropic’s Agentic AI Moves

On the US AI front, Anthropic just dropped the massively powerful Claude Sonnet 3.7, pushing the boundaries of Agentic AI. Importantly it includes a purely terminal-based release Agentic coding tool —a power move that could reshape how AI interacts with developers. The catch? It’s still unclear whether this format will gain traction outside hardcore dev circles, especially with tools like Cursor, Windsurf, and GitHub Copilot making code assistance increasingly seamless. News also broke today Anthropic is closing in on another massive round of $3.5B at a $61.5B valuation with Lightspeed, General Catalyst, others, this despite posting a $1.2B ARR loss. Still its probably a justified valuation considering its market-leading progress and strong API adoption that will likely expand as its advanced enterprise agentic AI tools roll out.

Canadian AI company Cohere's ARR has more than tripled since last March, and it's also considering an employee share sale. Oh and last week it was the subject of a major lawsuit filed by a clutch of publishers including Condé Nast, The Guardian, and Forbes. It’s the new sign of being noticed I guess.

Citadel’s Power Move and SBF is Back…

In crypto, it was just another day of madness. Bitcoin slid hard amid the macro stutters and AI-driven weakness, but the real shocker? Citadel just entered crypto as an institutional market maker and major liquidity provider, a move bound to rattle the crypto algorithms to the core and infuriate crypto-twitter and lend support to institutional crypto. Meanwhile Robinhood and Coinbase were both cleared of SEC investigation. If all that wasn’t wild enough, Sam Bankman-Fried (SBF) is back on Twitter bizarrely with —and FTX soared 30% on the news. Bizarrely his post was nothing to do with FTX, just a spiel about DOGE cuts of government employees backed up by his first hand (and first class) team management experience.

Is AI’s Future Up for Grabs

With AI funding hitting astronomical levels and global trade barriers shifting overnight, the AI war is evolving into something far more complex than a U.S. vs. China standoff. Some are staking bets on U.S. AI dominance as a national imperative—a perspective that aligns with Washington’s aggressive push for AI leadership but remains at odds with global perspectives on decentralization… and just possibly with both technological scaling laws and economic realities.

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BUZZY TOOLS 
Buzzy Tech Tools To Watch & Use

Crunchbase — AI 95% accurate startup predictor, got Coda-Grammarly deal.

Perplexity AI — "Comet" agentic search browser launches to challenge Google.

Claude — 3.7 Hybrid Reasoning model + Agentic AI coding assistant (beta) w/ Git.

Google Veo 2 — AI video gen at $0.50/sec debuts on Freepik/Fal, tops Meta/Sora.

DeepSeek — To open-source 5 code repos for transparent AI development.

Fetii — Mark Cuban backed Group rideshare app for college market.

DEEP TECH
The Latest Technology & Trends To Watch

NVIDIA — CorrDiff AI weather forecasting tool enhances US predictions.

Microsoft — Open source BioEmu-1 deep learning model for protein structure gen.

AI Diagnostics — AI analyzes immune-cell genes, detects COVID-19, diabetes, HIV.

Harbin Monitor — China all-weather omnidirectional maritime surveillance.

AS700D Airship — China's zero-emission electric airship completes maiden flight.

Longevity — David Sinclair uses xAI to solve a key wellness tech challenge.

SPACE_RACE

—Defense Space_Budget cuts create opportunities for lean startups in comms/intel

—SpaceX_Starship test flight explosion traced to propellant leaks, awaits FAA approval

—LEO Competition_Starlink faces rivalry from China's SpaceSail

—NASA_Employees advised to delay DOGE accomplishment reports

CRYPTO WATCH

Citadel Enters The Ring — The trading giant reveals plans for crypto market-making on major exchanges and launched an institution-only exchange with brokers, pushes for clearer regulations to boost institutional participation.

Crypto Market Update — Bitcoin dipped below $94K with 90% of digital assets down, triggering $382M in liquidations as the overall market cap dropped to $3.22T.

SEC Regulatory Shift — SEC closes Robinhood crypto investigation and plans to drop Coinbase lawsuit, signaling major easing of crypto regulations.

OKX Settlement — One of the oldest crypto exchanges plead guilty to unlicensed operations in U.S., agreed to forfeit $420M and pay an $84M fine to the DOJ.

Franklin Templeton Solana ETF — The asset manager files for a Solana spot ETF with Coinbase as custodian, as SOL sees a 60% yearly gain amid regulatory loosening.

Record Crypto Heist — Bybit reported a $1.4B hack of 401,346 ETH, the largest crypto theft in history, but it claims sufficient reserves to cover losses.

SBF FTX Back — Sam Bankman-Fried posted on X for the first time in two years with bizarre spiel on DOGE firing governmental employees; FTT token soars 30%.

TRENDING ONLINE#

Social Trends:

1. Post of the week so far goes to Vito:

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