Economy

The cuts
Trump's budget proposal gets the green light in the House of Representatives

The US House of Representatives votes through Trump's criticized budget proposal "big, beautiful bill" by a narrow margin. This is reported by several media outlets.

The proposal was voted through on Thursday morning American time with the score 215-214 in favor of the Republicans, with two Republicans voting against and one abstaining.

The budget proposal contains several trillion dollars in tax cuts, investments in the military, mass deportations and the abolition of taxes on tips and overtime. The package also proposes major cuts to the national health care program Medicaid, the abolition of the green tax credit and the debt ceiling being raised by 4 trillion dollars.

After two months of work and intensive negotiations, the budget package is now being sent to the Senate.

Open AI's future
Altman talks about "AI companion" in leaked recording

Together with the high-profile Apple designer Jony Ive, OpenAI plans to launch an "AI tool" that it hopes will become a part of people's everyday lives. CEO Sam Altman said this at a meeting for employees where the billion-dollar purchase of Ives' AI startup IO was presented, writes the Wall Street Journal, which has seen a recording.

Altman stated, among other things, that OpenAI employees have a chance "to do the biggest thing we've ever accomplished as a company".

Exactly how the AI ​​tool looks or works is unclear. But WSJ has previously written that it is not a smartphone and that OpenAI's goal is to "wean customers off screens". Altman calls it an "AI companion" and the ambition is to sell 100 million units.
 

The development of electric cars
BYD overtakes Tesla in Europe – by a hair

For the first time ever, Chinese BYD has sold more cars in Europe than rival Tesla. This is reported by the Financial Times, citing figures from the analysis group Jato Dynamics.

Last month, 7,231 electric cars were registered in Europe, compared to 7,165 registered Teslas. Jato analyst Felipe Muñoz tells the newspaper that this is a clear turning point for the European electric car market.

– Especially considering that Tesla has led the market for battery-powered electric vehicles in Europe for several years, while BYD officially started its operations outside Norway and the Netherlands only at the end of 2022.

Tesla's future
Tesla trades in Cybertrucks: "Insane depreciation"

The electric car manufacturer Tesla has started to accept used Cybertrucks in exchange, after previously refusing, international media reports. At the same time, the data shows that the model has lost value – with a decline of between 35 and 45 percent.

“The decrease in value is insane,” writes Elektrek.

The Independent refers to data from Tesla-info.com that points to unsold Cybertrucks worth $800 million, equivalent to 7.6 billion kronor.