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Mastercard has announced a partnership with global fintech Fiservs new stablecoin, FIUSD, in an effort to make the stabilized cryptocurrency mainstream. The multinational card provider plans to integrate the token across its global payments network, including stablecoin-linked cards, on- and off-ramping of funds, and global acquirers. This work with Fiserv is setting the stage for a new era, where stablecoins are as ubiquitous and trusted as fiat currencies, driving choice and innovation for all, Chiro Aikat, co-president, Americas at Mastercard, said in a statement. Leveraging the power of the Mastercard network, as well as our deep capabilities across digital assets, we are creating a robust ecosystem that bridges traditional financial services with digital assets. As of this afternoon, Fiserv stocks are up nearly 1%, while Mastercard stock is up 2.59%. This news comes the same day that stock for the largest stablecoin provider, Circle Internet Group (CRCL), is down nearly 15% as of Tuesday afternoon, just weeks after the companys initial public offer (IPO) surged in its market debutwhen stock was trading 706% above the IPO price. The move comes after an analyst note from Compass Point suggested recent regulatory action could encourage increased competition in the stablecoin industry. What’s the latest on stablecoins? Stablecoins are growing in popularity as a more stable cryptocurrency option, due to their value being tied to external commodities like gold or currencies like the U.S. dollar. The recently Senate-passed GENIUS Act would set standards for stablecoins and would ultimately allow for other card providers to widely implement them in their processes. Supporters of the bill say it would encourage more stablecoin competition and consumer protection, while those in opposition position the bill as too industry-friendly and financially beneficial for the current presidential administration. “To date, stablecoins have largely been a store of value, Takis Georgakopoulos, chief operating officer of Fiserv, said. Our work with Mastercard is promoting greater reach and utility of stablecoins by helping our financial institutions and merchants enable greater payments choice to their customers.” Other finance and banking giants like JPMorgan Chase, Bank of America, and WellsFargo have also begun to delve further into the world of stablecoins through joint partnerships, demonstrating the foothold that the cryptocurrency may be taking in the market.
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E-Commerce
Big Tech scored a major victory this week in the battle over using copyrighted materials to train AI models. Anthropic won a partial judgment on Tuesday in a case brought by three authors who alleged the company violated their copyright by storing their works in a library used to train its Claude AI model. Judge William Alsup of the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California ruled that Anthropics use of copyrighted material for training was fair use. His decision carries weight. “Authors cannot rightly exclude anyone from using their works for training or learning as such,” Alsup wrote. “Everyone reads texts, too, then writes new texts. They may need to pay for getting their hands on a text in the first instance. But to make anyone pay specifically for the use of a book each time they read it, each time they recall it from memory, each time they later draw upon it when writing new things in new ways would be unthinkable.” Alsup called training Claude “exceedingly transformative,” comparing the model to “any reader aspiring to be a writer.” That language helps explain why tech lobbyists were quick to call it a major win. Experts agreed. “It’s a pretty big win actually for the future of AI training,” says Andres Guadamuz, an intellectual property expert at the University of Sussex who has closely followed AI copyright cases. But he adds: “It could be bad for Anthropic specifically, depending on authors winning the piracy issue, but that’s still very far away.” In other words, its not as simple as tech companies might wish. “The fair use ruling looks bad for creators on its surface, but this is far from the final word on the matter,” says Ed Newton-Rex, a former AI executive-turned-copyright campaigner and founder of Fairly Trained, a nonprofit certifying companies that respect creators rights. The case is expected to be appealedand even at this stage, Newton-Rex sees weaknesses in the rulings reasoning. “The judge makes assertions about training, not de-incentivizing creation, and about AI learning like humans do, that feel easy to rebut,” he says. “This is, on balance, a bad day for creators, but its just the opening move in what will be a long game.” While the judge approved training AI models on copyrighted works, other elements of the case werent so favorable for Anthropic. Guadamuz says Alsups decision hinges on a “solid fair use argument on the transformative nature of AI training.” The judge thoroughly applied the four-factor test for fair use, Guadamuz noted, and the ruling could reshape broader copyright approaches. “We may start seeing the beginnings of rules for the new world, [where] having legitimate access to a work would work strongly in proving fair use, while using shadow libraries would not,” he says. And thats the catch: This wasnt an unvarnished win for Anthropic. Like other tech companies, Anthropic allegedly sourced training materials from piracy sites for easea fact that clearly troubled the court. “This order doubts that any accused infringer could ever meet its burden of explaining why downloading source copies from pirate sites that it could have purchased or otherwise accessed lawfully was itself reasonably necessary to any subsequent fair use,” Alsup wrote, referring to Anthropics alleged pirating of more than 7 million books. That alone could carry billions in liability, with statutory damages starting at $750 per booka trial on that issue is still to come. So while tech companies may still claim victory (with some justification, given the fair use precedent), the same ruling also implies that companies will need to pay substantial sums to legally obtain training materials. OpenAI, for its part, has in the past argued that licensing all the copyrighted material needed to train its models would be practically impossible. Joanna Bryson, a professor of AI ethics at the Hertie School in Berlin, says the ruling is “absolutely not” a blanket win for tech companies. “First of all, it’s not the Supreme Court. Secondly, it’s only one jurisdiction: The U.S.,” she says. “I think they dont entirely have purchase over this thing about whether or not it was transformative in the sense of changing Claudes output.”
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E-Commerce
Oil prices are dropping further, and U.S. stocks are pulling close to their all-time high Tuesday on hopes that Israels war with Iran will not damage the global flow of crude, even if a tentative truce seemed to fray under fire in the morning. The S&P 500 was 1.2% higher in afternoon trading, following up on even bigger gains for stocks across Europe and Asia, after President Donald Trump said late Monday that Israel and Iran had agreed to a complete and total ceasefire. The main measure of Wall Street’s health is back within 1% of its record set in February after falling roughly 20% below during the spring. The Dow Jones Industrial Average was up 518 points, or 1.2%, as of 1:56 p.m. ET, and the Nasdaq composite was 1.5% higher. The strongest action was again in the oil market, where a barrel of benchmark U.S. crude fell 5.4%, to $64.82. Brent crude, the international standard, dropped 5.5%, to $66.62. The fear throughout the Israel-Iran conflict has been that it could squeeze the worlds supply of oil, which would pump up prices for gasoline and hurt the global economy. Iran is a major producer of crude, and it could also try to block the Strait of Hormuz off its coast, through which 20% of the worlds daily oil needs passes on ships. Oil prices began falling sharply on Monday after Iran launched what appeared to be a limited retaliatory strike that did not target the production or movement of oil. Prices kept falling even after attacks continued past a deadline to stop hostilities early Tuesday. Trump later said that the ceasefire was in effect. Oil prices have dropped so much in the last two days that theyre below where they were before the fighting began nearly two weeks ago. With the global oil market well supplied and the OPEC+ alliance of producing countries steadily increasing production, oil prices could be headed even lower as long as the ceasefire holds and a lasting peace solution can be found, said Carsten Fritsch, commodities analyst at German-based Commerzbank. Falling oil prices should take some pressure off inflation, and that in turn could give the Federal Reserve more leeway to cut interest rates. Wall Street loves lower rates because they can give the economy a boost by making it cheaper for U.S. households and businesses to borrow money to buy a car or build a factory. But they could also give inflation more fuel. That latter threat is why the Fed has been hesitant to cut rates this year after lowering them through the end of last year. The Fed has said repeatedly that it wants to wait and see how much Trumps tariffs will hurt the economy and raise inflation before committing to its next move. So far, the economy seems to be holding up okay, though a report on confidence among U.S. consumers came in weaker on Tuesday than economists expected, while inflation has remained only a bit above the Fed’s 2% target. Trump, though, has been pushing for more cuts to rates. And two of his appointees to the Fed have said in the last week that they may consider cutting rates as soon as the Feds next meeting next month. Fed Chair Jerome Powell remains more cautious. He said again in testimony delivered to Congress Tuesday that the Fed is well positioned to wait to learn more about the likely course of the economy before considering any adjustments to our policy stance. Asked whether a cut could arrive as soon as July, Powell said: We will get to a place where we cut rates, sooner rather than laterbut I wouldnt want to point to a particular meeting. I dont think we need to be in any rush because the economy is still strong. Such mixed messages had Treasury yields swiveling up and down in the bond market. The yield on the 10-year Treasury eased to 4.30%, from 4.34% late Monday. The two-year Treasury yield, which more closely tracks expectations for Fed action, fell to 3.82%, from 3.84%. On Wall Street, cruise operator Carnival steamed 6.7% higher after delivering a much stronger profit for the latest quarter than analysts expected. CEO Josh Weinstein said it’s seeing strong demand from people booking cruises close to the departure date, and customers are spending strongly once on board. Carnival also raised its forecast for an underlying measure of profit for the full year. Uber Technologies rose 7.8% after it said customers in Atlanta can use its app to ride in Waymo autonomous vehicles. Coinbase Global rallied 11.4% as the cryptocurrency exchange rose with the price of Bitcoin, which jumped back above $105,000. In stock markets abroad, indexes rallied more than 1% everywhere from France to Germany to Japan, following the announcement of the Israel-Iran ceasefire. Hong Kongs jump of 2.1% and South Koreas leap of 3% were two of the strongest moves. By Stan Choe, David McHugh, and Elaine Kurtenbach, AP business writers
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