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Jeff Bezos will serve as co-chief executive officer of a new artificial intelligence startup that focuses on AI for engineering and manufacturing of computers, automobiles, and spacecraft, the New York Times reported on Monday. The company, called Project Prometheus, has garnered $6.2 billion in funding, partly from the Amazon founder, making it one of the most well-financed early-stage startups in the world, the report said, citing three people familiar with the company. This is the first time Bezos has taken a formal operational role in a company since he stepped down as the CEO of Amazon in July 2021. Though he is involved in Blue Origin, his official title at the space firm is founder. With the new startup, Bezos is entering a crowded AI market with several smaller firms attempting to break through with new software and products while in a race with industry mainstays such as the Microsoft-backed OpenAI, Meta, and Google. Reuters could not independently verify the report. Bezos and a representative did not immediately respond to a Reuters request for comment. Bezos’ co-chief executive is Vik Bajaj, a physicist and chemist who worked closely with Google’s co-founder Sergey Brin at Google’s X, a research effort often called The Moonshot Factory, the report said. Project Prometheus has already hired nearly 100 employees, including researchers from top AI firms such as OpenAI, DeepMind, and Meta, according to the Times. Zaheer Kachwala, Reuters
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Five students at U.S. military academies and three each from Yale University, Harvard University, and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology are among the 32 American winners named Sunday as 2026 Rhodes scholars. The group includes students focused on housing, health outcomes, sustainability, and prison reentry programs. They include: Alice L. Hall of Philadelphia, a varsity basketball player at MIT who also serves as student body president. Hall, who has collaborated with a womens collective in Ghana on sustainability tools, plans to study engineering. Sydney E. Barta of Arlington, Virginia, a Paralympian and member of the track team at Stanford University, who studies bioengineering and sings in the Stanford acapella group Counterpoint. Barta plans to study musculoskeletal sciences. Anirvin Puttur of Gilbert, Arizona, is a senior at the U.S. Air Force Academy who serves as an instructor pilot and flight commander. Puttur, who is studying aeronautical engineering and applied mathematics, also has a deep interest in linguistics and is proficient in four languages. The students will attend the University of Oxford as part of the Rhodes scholar program, which awards more than 100 scholarships worldwide each year for students to pursue two to three years of graduate studies. Named after British imperialist and benefactor Cecil John Rhodes, the scholarship was established at Oxford in 1903. The program has more than 8,000 alumni, many of whom have pursued careers in government, education, the arts, and social justice.
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Want more housing market stories from Lance Lamberts ResiClub in your inbox? Subscribe to the ResiClub newsletter. When I recently reached out to Moodys Analytics chief economist Mark Zandi for his updated home price forecast, he said his long-term outlook for the U.S. housing market remains largely unchanged: he expects a prolonged period of stagnation as affordability gradually improves. Following the historic run-up in prices during the Pandemic Housing Boom and the subsequent mortgage rate shock, Zandi believes resale activity/existing home sales will likely stay frozen for several more years. Affordability has to be restored for housing to regain its mojo, Zandi told ResiClub. Flat home prices [adjusted for inflation] is the healthiest path forwardits the only way for incomes to catch up. Zandi expects nominal national home prices to move sideways over the next 12 to 24 months, with local variation: markets in the South and West, where building has been stronger, seeing some modest declines, while tight-inventory markets in the Northeast and Midwest remain more stable. The worst of the pain in the housing market might be now and in the next six to nine months. After that, things will begin to feel a little betterbut not good, Zandi said. The housing market will heal . . . but its going to take timeand a lot of patience. Over the next decade, Zandi projects U.S. home prices will rise roughly in line with inflation, meaning no real [adjusted for inflation] house price gains for around 10 years. While Zandis team at Moodys Analytics expects U.S. home prices not to rise on a real (i.e., inflation-adjusted) basis, the firm is forecasting that nominal U.S. home prices will increase +23.5% between December 2025 and December 2035. (Note: Real home prices are adjusted for inflation, and nominal home prices are not adjusted for inflation. All the charts below are forecasts for nominal home prices.) In the chart above, you can see where Moodys latest forecasts would take U.S. home prices by the end of 2035and in the chart below, how the forecasted annual gains compare to the historical performance of the asset class. Moodys forecast for annual home price changes: 2026 > +0.48% 2027 > +1.35% 2028 > +2.39% 2029 > +2.78% 2030 > +2.86% 2031 > +2.71% 2032 > +2.44% 2033 > +2.18% 2034 > +2.05% 2035 > +2.08% Outside of affordabilitythe primary headwind Zandi believes is restraining real home prices and the broader housing markethe also highlighted additional challenges: a restrictive immigration environment that could limit the future construction labor force, particularly in the South and West, and elevated long-term Treasury yields connected to long-term fiscal risks. He said the latter could keep mortgage rates closer to 6.0% than 5.5%which had been his previous long-term outlook for the average 30-year fixed mortgage ratefor the foreseeable future. How does Moodys forecast vary by market? Check out the interactive below. window.addEventListener("message",function(a){if(void 0!==a.data["datawrapper-height"]){var e=document.querySelectorAll("iframe");for(var t in a.data["datawrapper-height"])for(var r,i=0;r=e[i];i++)if(r.contentWindow===a.source){var d=a.data["datawrapper-height"][t]+"px";r.style.height=d}}}); Financial forecasts looking out even one year often struggle to get it rightlet alone those stretching out a full decade. So with any forecast like this, its best to approach it with some skepticism, or at least avoid treating it as a certain destiny. Whether or not the exact numbers play out, Moodys broader message is clear: The firm doesnt expect a 2008-style housing crash or another explosive housing boom in the coming years. Instead, it anticipates the housing market will continue to gradually recalibrate following the historic Pandemic Housing Boom.
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