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Michael Dell, along with his wife, Susan, announced on Tuesday that they are donating $6.25 billion to so-called “Trump accounts”a program that gives $1,000 of “free money” from the federal government to children in the U.S. born on, or after, January 1, 2025, through the end of 2028, while President Donald Trump is in office. The Dells’ contribution will allocate about $250 per child to 25 million children. The accounts are basically long-term savings vehicles. Michael Dell is the founder, chairman, and CEO of Dell Technologies, known for its computer equipment and services. Parents will be able to contribute to the accounts starting in July 2026, according to USA Today. That money will be invested in stock market mutual or index funds. Here’s what to know. Who is eligible for a “Trump account”? Accounts are available to all children in the U.S. younger than 18 with a Social Security number, and will be managed and activated through the U.S. Treasury, according to the fact sheet for Invest America. The contributions come as part of Trump’s One Big Beautiful Bill Act (OBBBA), which was signed into law this past summer. The $250 Dell Foundation contribution is separate and will go to children born from 2016 through 2024 in zip codes where the median household incomes are below $150,000 per year, according to The New York Times. What are the contribution rules? Parents “and community” (such as employers) can collectively contribute up to $5,000 per year to an Invest America account. There is no cap or limit for philanthropists, charitable organizations, or state or local government contributions. At what age can the money be withdrawn? Can it go toward college? Starting at age 18, a child with one of these accounts can use a portion of the savings for education or job training, starting a business, or buying a first home. Note: The accounts automatically convert into traditional IRAs, or individual retirement accounts, at age 18, allowing any unused funds to continue to grow. (A traditional IRA is a tax-advantaged personal savings plan in which contributions may be tax-deductible.) How can parents open an account? Learn more about the “Trump accounts” at the website for investment firm Charles Schwab, which notes: “At this time, it isn’t clear who will open the account or where it will be held.”
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E-Commerce
Apples AI boss, John Giannandrea, is stepping down after seven years on the job. Apples stock price got a slight boost on the news, as some investors saw Apple signaling a new urgency to bring AI to its devices. Following a transition period, Giannandrea will retire next spring, Apple said in a press release Monday. Most of Giannandreas AI group will now be tucked into Craig Fedherigis software development group, which owns development of the various operating systems in Apple devices. While the reasons for Giannandreas departure are no doubt complicated, its a wonder he lasted so long. For years, hes been linked to Apples failure to seize on generative AI to improve its Siri voice assistant and make the iPhone and other iDevices smarter and more personalized.He may have made errors in judgement. Reports said he waffled several times on the preferred architecture for Siri — on how much of the assistants AI processing should run on the device versus a server in the cloud. But its also possible that his plans for integrating AI into Apple products encountered friction from other Apple leaders, or were hampered by fears among the leadership team that generative AI would compromise user privacy or create new legal exposure. At any rate, by 2024 Apples leadership — including Tim Cook — had lost confidence that Giannandreas group could turn AI research into useful (and safe) AI features and products. Before coming to Apple, Giannandrea had been prolific as the head of search and AI at Google. Under his leadership, the search giant began relying on AI to refine its understanding of certain user-preferred search terms, in hopes of returning more relevant and useful results. He was at the helm of Googles AI efforts when its researchers invented the transformer language model architecture that sparked the generative AI boom and new apps like ChatGPT. Apple poached Giannandrea in 2018 to inject new life into its floundering AI efforts. This gave Apple the time and leadership it needed to develop its own models and inject its devices and services with new intelligence. Apple combined the Siri and AI/machine learning groups and put them under Giannandreas control, creating a single point of accountability for infusing the companys operating systems, services, and developer tools with AI. Giannandreas work during his first years at Apple was kept largely under wraps by the company. Fast Company, which had been granted meetings with the companys AI group, was repeatedly denied access to Giannandrea. As the starting gun of the generative AI revolution sounded with the release of ChatGPT in late 2022, Apple stayed largely silent and remained so even as its peers raced to develop their own large AI models and apps. Then in June 2024, Apple announced at its developer conference that it would bring Apple Intelligence” features to its devices, enabling them to offer intuitive and proactive help based on the users personal data. It also announced plans to use generative AI to create a smarter next-gen Siri. For a time, hope was restored that Apple would catch up with the AI revolution. But neither Apple Intelligence nor next-gen Siri have shown up. (Apple now says theyll arrive in 2026.) In lieu of its own AI, Apple tried to integrate OpenAIs ChatGPT into Siri, but the user experience is clunky. In March, Apple announced it would be taking Siri out of Giannandreas control and placing it inside Fedherighis software group. Just six weeks later, Apple removed its robotics research group (which it hoped would lay the groundwork for future Apple home devices) from Giannandreas AI group. Apple believes Amar Subramanya, the Microsoft executive theyve tapped to replace Giannandrea, can and will get things back on track. A 16-year veteran of Google, Subramanya led engineering for the companys Gemini Assistant. He has an impressive resume, and very likely a price tag to match. His hire, along with Giannandreas departure, should be read as Apples acknowledgment of falling behind its peers in AI — and a signal that it intends to catch up. Interestingly, it was Giannandreas departure that got top billing in the press release Apple put out Monday, not the arrival of a new AI chief in Subramanya. Apple stock got a slight bump on the announcement, closing up $4.25 (1.52%) at $283.10. Giannandreas departure is very much about what kind of tech company Apple wants to be in the long term. Does it want to develop and control its own AI models, or pay to rely on big AI models like Googles Gemini? Apple has distinct advantages with its sticky and trusting relationship with users, and control over both its software and hardware, including the chips inside the devices. Its in a unique position to leverage smaller, more specialized AI models running on those chips to deeply understand and effectively assist users. Whatever the move, you can expect to see a lot more focus and pressure within Apple to realize new AI features and a smarter Siri in iDevices.
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E-Commerce
The U.S. stock market is holding relatively steady on Tuesday as both bond yields and Bitcoin stabilize. The S&P 500 rose 0.1%, coming off its first loss in six days. The Dow Jones Industrial Average was up 115 points, or 0.2%, as of 1:02 p.m. ET, and the Nasdaq composite was 0.5% higher. MongoDB helped lead the market and jumped 23.4% after the database company delivered stronger results for the latest quarter than analysts expected. United Natural Foods also climbed after reporting a stronger profit than expected, and it rose 7.3%. They helped offset a 4% drop for Signet Jewelers, which gave a forecast for revenue in the holiday shopping season that fell short of analysts expectations. The jeweler said its expecting a measured consumer environment. Another potential warning about U.S. shoppers’ strength came from the chief financial officer of Procter & Gamble, the giant behind Tide detergent, Ivory soap, and Oral-B toothbrushes. Andre Schulten said the landscape for U.S. consumers is volatile” at the moment, though still within the company’s expectations. Procter & Gamble fell 2.3%. The U.S. economy has been holding up overall, but thats masking sharp divisions beneath the surface. Lower-income households are struggling with inflation thats still higher than anyone would like. Richer households, meanwhile, are benefiting from a stock market thats within 1% of its all-time high set in late October. In the bond market, Treasury yields were calming following their jumps the day before. The 10-year yield was holding at 4.09%, where it was late Monday, while the two-year yield eased to 3.52%, from 3.54%. Higher yields can drag prices lower for all kinds of investments, and those seen as the most expensive can take the biggest hit. Bitcoin, which tumbled below $85,000 on Monday as bond yields worldwide marched higher, pulled back above $91,000. That helped stocks of several crypto-related companies bounce back from sharp slides on Monday. Strategy Inc. climbed 6.9% and more than made up for Monday’s loss. Coinbase Global gained 3.3%, and Robinhood Markets rose 3.6% to recover much of their drops from the day before. Mondays climb in yields came after the Bank of Japan hinted that it may raise interest rates there soon. But hopes are still high that the U.S. Federal Reserve will cut its main interest rate when it meets in Washington next week. What comes after that for the Fed, though, is uncertain. The Fed has already cut its overnight interest rate twice this year in hopes of shoring up a slowing job market. But lower rates can fan inflation higher, and inflation has stubbornly remained above the Feds 2% target. Complicating things is the U.S. governments earlier shutdown, which delayed reports on the job market and other areas of the economy. Investment giant Vanguard said its data suggests the U.S. labor market remains stable but is still soft compared with last year. Overall, hiring numbers are slower on a month-to-month basis. But fewer workers are going after job openings because of weaker immigration and an uptick in retirements, according to Adam Schickling, a senior U.S. economist at Vanguard. That, in turn, means hiring doesn’t need to be as strong in the past to keep the unemployment rate steady. In stock markets abroad, indexes moved modestly across much of Europe and Asia. South Koreas Kospi was an outlier and jumped 1.9% for one of the worlds bigger moves. Tech stocks helped lead the way, including rises of 2.6% for Samsung Electronics and 3.7% for chip company SK Hynix. By Stan Choe, AP business writer AP Business Writers Matt Ott and Elaine Kurtenbach contributed.
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E-Commerce
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