This week’s world-famous-news-haiku-competition™ is about how Americans are spending more money on hobbies despite economic pressure. Send me your entry — to haiku at cheddar dot com — by noon ET Thursday, for consideration by your Cheddar peers.

But first? News!

Matt Davis — Need2Know Chedditor

Table of Contents

• Stocks Hit Record Highs Again

• This ‘Temu Range Rover’ Is Britain’s Best Seller

• Ba-Da-Ba-Ba-Busted? McDonald’s Sued Over AI Price- …

• Inside Elon Musk’s $17B Chip Bet

• Job Seekers Are Going Nuts Over AI Screeners

• Poll of the Day: How Did You Get Your Job?

• Poll of the Day: Quelle Surprise

What’s the Stock Market Up To, Eh?

$SPX ( ▲ 0.58% )  $DJI ( ▲ 0.49% )  $NDX ( ▲ 1.59% )  

Companies Mentioned in Today’s Newsletter

 $META ( ▼ 0.41% ) $TSLA ( ▲ 0.52% ) $AMZN ( ▲ 1.95% )  $MSFT ( ▲ 0.78% )  $NVDA ( ▲ 0.14% )  $MRVL ( ▲ 5.81% )  $AMD ( ▲ 2.8% )  $CEG ( ▲ 12.25% )  $GOOG ( ▲ 0.22% )  $OPCH ( ▲ 32.65% )  $MCK ( ▲ 0.68% )  $TSLA ( ▲ 0.52% )  $F ( ▲ 1.07% )  $MCD ( ▼ 0.25% )  $SPCX ( ▲ 0.49% )

Stocks Hit Record Highs Again

Just when you thought the stock market couldn't possibly squeeze any more juice out of the AI hype train, it could. Both the benchmark S&P 500 $SPX ( ▲ 0.58% ) and the Nasdaq $NDAQ ( ▲ 0.09% ) leaped to shiny new record highs as Treasury yields stalled and oil prices slipped.

David Miller, chief investment officer at Catalyst Funds, told Reuters, "The economy continues to be more resilient than many expected, and corporate earnings remain strong, but the big change is rising interest rates." He added, "Investors are now dealing with meaningfully higher long-term rates.… I am still bullish on equities, but the hurdle has gone up significantly.”

Naturally, the “Magnificent Seven” were leading the victory lap, with Meta $META ( ▼ 0.41% ) , Tesla $TSLA ( ▲ 0.52% ) , Amazon $AMZN ( ▲ 1.95% ) , and Microsoft $MSFT ( ▲ 0.78% ) all floating higher. Meanwhile, AI heavyweight Nvidia $NVDA ( ▲ 0.14% ) climbed 1.1%, casually nudging its market cap toward an eye-watering $6 trillion valuation. Not to be outdone in the silicon arms race, chip designer Marvell Technology $MRVL ( ▲ 5.81% ) surged 6.5% after raising its 2028 revenue forecast to $20 billion, while AMD $AMD ( ▲ 2.8% ) gained 3.6% after CEO Lisa Su promised the company plans to "substantially increase chip supply in 2027" to meet surging AI demand. Even power grids and healthcare got invited to the party. Constellation Energy $CEG ( ▲ 12.25% ) shot up 13.9% as the S&P’s top gainer thanks to a massive 3,590-megawatt power deal with Alphabet’s Google $GOOG ( ▲ 0.22% ) . Over in healthcare, Option Care Health $OPCH ( ▲ 32.65% ) skyrocketed 32.7% following a $5.8 billion buyout agreement involving drug distributor McKesson $MCK ( ▲ 0.68% ) .

They can only go up from here, of course. Or down. They can also go down. #NotFinancialAdvice

Quote of the Day

This ‘Temu Range Rover’ Is Britain’s Best Seller

Move over, traditional luxury. Britain’s car buyers have spoken, and they prefer a discount over prestige. The Jaecoo 7 SUV, affectionately dubbed the “Temu Range Rover” for mirroring the sleek looks of a Range Rover Velar at roughly half the sticker price, just claimed the title of Britain’s best-selling new car for September.

Notching up 10,813 deliveries last month, the Chinese-built crossover managed to comfortably outpace Elon Musk’s Tesla Model 3 $TSLA ( ▲ 0.52% ) and the long-favorite Ford Puma $F ( ▲ 1.07% ) . In fact, Chinese automakers stormed the UK market, capturing 23% of all new-car sales. Victor Zhang, managing director of Jaecoo UK, gleefully told the Daily Mail that the brand is "no longer a newcomer" in Britain, adding that the goal now is to "turn rapid growth into lasting strength" through expanded retailer networks and after-sales support.

There is, however, a slight catch that might leave bargain-hunters sweating. Despite dominating the sales leaderboard, the Jaecoo 7 was ranked the sixth least dependable model overall in a What Car? survey of 40,000 drivers, with owners complaining about electrical glitches, infotainment meltdowns, and week-long repair delays. Still, it’s cheap. And it looks good. What could possibly go wrong?

Ba-Da-Ba-Ba-Busted? McDonald’s Sued Over AI Price-Fixing

Did you think your Big Mac was getting pricier just because of inflation or your local franchise owner’s personal whim? Think again. McDonald's $MCD ( ▼ 0.25% ) has been slapped with a proposed nationwide class action lawsuit in Chicago federal court, alleging the fast-food giant uses an AI-powered pricing algorithm to illegally coordinate menu prices across nearly 14,000 restaurants.

According to the complaint, Mickey D’s conspired with independent franchisees to fix prices by feeding algorithms nonpublic transaction data. Lark Turner, a lawyer for the plaintiffs, didn’t hold back, declaring that McDonald's is "leveraging its troves of data and its franchised system to nickel-and-dime consumers down to the last French fry." The lawsuit firmly reminds the burger titan that "independent businesses must set their prices independently.”

McDonald’s, however, dismissed the suit as a side order of nonsense. Calling the allegations "speculative and uninformed," the company fired back in a statement: "AI does not set the price of a Big Mac or any other menu item." McDonald's maintained that franchisees make their own pricing decisions, insisting that pricing recommendation tools and analytics are widespread across industries.

This lawsuit is just the latest in a growing wave of class actions targeting companies for allegedly using algorithms to coordinate rates on everything from hotel rooms to apartment rentals.

Song of the Day: Miranda Lambert, Ella Langley, ‘Snakeskin Boots’

"Snakeskin Boots," the fiery opening track from Miranda Lambert’s 11th studio album, Crisco, is a cinematic, Western-meets-disco duet featuring rising star Ella Langley. Described by Lambert as "Thelma and Louise if they didn't drive off the cliff," the track brings a swaggering outlaw energy that blends late-1960s grit with Studio 54 dancefloor rhythm. So, it’s a lot like this newsletter.

Inside Elon Musk’s $17B Chip Bet

When ordinary tech moguls run into a supply chain bottleneck, they lobby suppliers or complain on social media. When Elon Musk faces a shortage of AI silicon, he decides to build a colossal 100-million-square-foot semiconductor facility in Texas. Welcome to TerraFab, Musk’s mega-project aimed at vertically integrating chip production across Tesla $TSLA ( ▲ 0.52% ) , SpaceX $SPCX ( ▲ 0.49% ) , and xAI.

The ambition is staggering — the proposed facility is roughly 30 times the size of TSMC’s major chip fab in Arizona and could ultimately carry a $100 billion price tag. Why build something so massive? Because fueling autonomous robotaxis, Optimus humanoid robots, and orbital Starlink data centers requires scaling AI compute power by a factor of 1,000. As Barron’s Associate Editor Al Root explained, "Whenever Elon sees something that he feels like is a bottleneck, I mean, he vertically integrates it."

Targeting operational production around late 2027 sounds borderline delusional for semiconductor manufacturing. Yet, as Root points out, "Elon companies go faster than anybody else," recalling how Musk brought his Colossus AI data center online in a jaw-dropping 122 days — a feat that left Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang admitting, "I can't believe he did it this fast.”

Of course, Musk is famously optimistic regarding timelines. Root acknowledges that while Musk often misses initial deadlines, "Elon always gets there, sometimes slower than expected." Summarizing the internal synergy between Tesla and SpaceX, Root added, "This is Elon talking to himself and then he goes and does it."

I’ll certainly agree with the “talking to himself” part. In other news, he just cut the mother of four of his children completely dead and she’s all over X.com about it…

Free Yourself From Advertising Forever!

Job Seekers Are Going Nuts Over AI Screeners

Today, finding work takes an average of 26.1 weeks — roughly six exhausting months — leaving candidates stranded in employment limbo. AI was supposed to be the job hunter’s ultimate superhero, but right now it feels more like a chaos agent. With generative tools enabling candidates to blast hundreds of generic applications at a single click, recruiter inboxes are drowning in a "flood of applications." The resulting application fatigue has gotten so bad that over half of Gen Z and millennial job seekers regularly abandon applications midway through.

Matt Berndt, Lead Career Strategist at Indeed, notes that "the uncertainty in the current job market is greater than I've ever seen" in his 30-year career. He explains that while nervous workers are "job hugging" — holding onto current roles for dear life — desperate applicants are spraying AI-generated boilerplate everywhere, creating a wall of white noise.

Berndt’s prescription? Treat AI as an assistant, not an autopilot. "AI tools provide the greatest first draft of any resume that you might have," Berndt explains, but candidates must then "build your own authenticity into that document.”

At the same time, companies need to stop ghosting applicants. Berndt urges employers to pay "closer attention to their entire candidate journey" and close the loop with candidates so job seekers aren't left stranded.

Used wisely, AI is a "ridiculously wonderful research tool" for mock interviews and company prep. But until recruiters and applicants reintroduce human authenticity, the job hunt remains a frustrating battle of the bots.

Or you could, you know, call up that guy you went to college with and beg him for a favor. That’s how people are really getting jobs these days, guys. Same as it ever was.

Should You Check Your 401(k) Today?

👍️ 

Yes. It’s nearly back to its record high of mid August…

Poll of the Day: How Did You Get Your Job?

Poll of the Day: Quelle Surprise

We asked: Do you expect Skydance will make better movies than Warner Bros.?

You answered:

⬜️⬜️⬜️⬜️⬜️⬜️ Define 'better.' If you mean will they make Digger 2 then I think it's safe to say, "no." But does that mean "yes."? I think it means "yes." (28)
🟨⬜️⬜️⬜️⬜️⬜️ Warner Bros. made Barbie. It made $1.44 billion. It was terrible. How could Skydance be worse? (51)
⬜️⬜️⬜️⬜️⬜️⬜️ Warner Bros. spent $90 million to make Batgirl and then shelved it as a tax write-off. I hope Skydance releases it. (23)
🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩 No. (269)
371 Votes via @beehiiv polls

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