Business

(Reuters) – Bank of America named co-leaders for the initiative on increased connectivity between its investment bank and wealth management units, according to an internal memo seen by Reuters on Monday. Jim Rourke and Michael Liu are set to lead the initiative named Private Client Partnership Development, according to the memo. The co-heads will be responsible for maximizing opportunities between the Global Corporate & Investment Banking, Merrill Wealth Management and Private Bank units. Investment banking … Read more…

By Krystal Hu and Kenrick Cai (Reuters) – OpenAI’s new financing round is expected to come in the form of convertible notes, according to sources with direct knowledge of the matter, who said its $150 billion valuation will be contingent on whether the ChatGPT-maker can upend its corporate structure and remove a profit cap for investors. The details of the conditions of the $6.5 billion funding, which have not been previously reported, shows how far … Read more…

By Aditya Kalra NEW DELHI (Reuters) – Samsung, Xiaomi and other smartphone companies colluded with Amazon and Walmart’s Flipkart to exclusively launch products on the e-commerce firms’ Indian websites in breach of antitrust laws, according to regulatory reports seen by Reuters. Antitrust investigations conducted by the Competition Commission of India (CCI) have found that Amazon and Flipkart violated local competition laws by giving preference to select sellers, prioritising certain listings, and steeply discounting products, hurting … Read more…

By Saqib Iqbal Ahmed NEW YORK (Reuters) – Nvidia’s huge stock rally is still exerting an outsized influence over the S&P 500 index , reinforcing concerns that broader markets could be hurt if the chipmaking giant’s fortunes turn. This year’s 140% surge in shares of Nvidia, whose chips are seen as the gold standard in artificial intelligence applications, has accounted for about a quarter of the S&P 500’s 17% gain. Nvidia showed its powerful hold … Read more…

By Jonathan Stempel (Reuters) – Ajit Jain, the longtime top insurance executive at Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway, sold more than half of his Class A shares in the conglomerate this week. According to a Wednesday night regulatory filing, the 73-year-old Jain sold 200 Berkshire Class A shares on Sept. 9 for about $139.1 million, at an average price of $695,418 per share. The sale included 104 shares Jain held directly and 96 held by family … Read more…

(Reuters) -Microsoft-backed OpenAI said on Thursday it was launching a series of AI models designed to spend more time processing to solve hard problems. The models, dubbed o1 and o1-mini, can reason through complex tasks and solve harder problems than previous models in science, coding and math, the AI firm said. The o1 will be available in ChatGPT and its API starting Thursday. “We trained these models to spend more time thinking through problems before … Read more…

(Reuters) -Amazon.com said on Thursday it will increase the compensation to its Delivery Service Partners (DSP) through a $660 million investment over the next year.Amazon’s package delivery is done mostly by DSPs, small businesses that employ drivers and set their salaries. As a result of the investment, Amazon expects the national average earnings for drivers to increase by at least another $1.50 to nearly $22 per hour, depending on the location, which represents a 7% … Read more…

By Jody Godoy ALEXANDRIA, Virginia (Reuters) – A Google executive told colleagues the goal for the company’s then-nascent online advertising business in 2009 was to “crush” rival advertising networks, according to evidence prosecutors presented at the tech titan’s antitrust trial on Wednesday. The statements underscored the U.S. Department of Justice’s claim that Google has sought to monopolize markets for publisher ad servers and advertiser ad networks, and tried to dominate the market for ad exchanges … Read more…

By Allison Lampert (Reuters) – Boeing faces a possible strike as early as Friday if most of the U.S. planemaker’s factory workers in the Pacific Northwest vote on Thursday to back a work stoppage and reject a tentative deal that has enraged many of them. Roughly 30,000 workers who produce Boeing’s 737 MAX, 767 and 777 jets in Portland, Oregon, and the Seattle area will vote on their first full contract in 16 years. A … Read more…