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Tesla entered its fourth week of layoffs. More employees took to social media Monday to announce they were out of jobs at Tesla, marking a month of firings at Elon Musk’s electric vehicle maker.
The U.S. SEC is cracking down on Robinhood’s crypto division. The Securities and Exchange Commission sent the trading platform a notice for selling unregistered securities — and a lawsuit could follow.
Bitcoin banked a small recovery. The cryptocurrency is back up to $64,000, after taking a tumultuous rise and tumble in recent weeks.
American renters have all but given up hopes for home ownership. A new survey from the New York Federal Reserve finds that renters’ optimism about being able to buy a home is now at a record low.Â
Trump Media dumped its audit firm. Well, only after American regulators permanently banned the accounting company, BF Borgers, for “massive fraud.”
Google’s antitrust allegations get an airing-out
Legal eyes have been on U.S. vs. Google, the potentially historic antitrust case alleging that Google holds a monopoly over the search engine market. But although closing arguments ended Friday, the U.S. Department of Justice is getting a few last jabs in against the tech giant — with the release of its closing presentation.
Over a sprawling 370 pages, the presentation doesn’t just make the DOJ’s case for Google’s alleged monopoly. It also offers a revealing look at the digital giant’s business maneuvers, Laura Bratton writes. Among the takeaways:
📲 Google gave Apple a lot of money to stay Safari’s #1 searcher. In 2016, Google inked a deal with the iPhone maker to be the default search engine in Safari — and paid up more than $20 billion in 2022 alone to keep that spot.
🥊 The search giant also reportedly knocked Microsoft’s Bing out of competition. Emails suggest that a Google team priced out what it would take for Bing to rival Google’s deal with Apple.
đź’° Now Google allegedly holds a near-90% share of the market. And monopoly allegations can start as soon as a company has a comfortable 50%.
But that’s not all. Take a peer through the other revelations on Quartz.
Climate change is sending olive oil prices to new heights
Droughts have been hitting Spanish olive fields — and now consumers may be feeling the residual heat in the grocery aisle. That’s because the dry spells are pushing up prices for one product in particular: Olive oil.
One gauge of olive oil prices tracked by the International Monetary Fund is double what it was just two years ago, to nearly $10,000 a metric ton.
Quartz’s Melvin Backman explains what The Olive Oil Times — yes, a real industry newspaper — has to say about it.
More from Quartz
đźš— A Tesla rival in China is eyeing a $5 billion IPO in the U.S.
đź“ş Disney and Comcast want someone else to decide how much Hulu is worthÂ
đź’Ş Equinox just launched a $40,000 gym membership to slow down aging
🏥 Steward Health Care is seeking a bailout in one of the largest hospital bankruptcies in decades
🔎 Yahoo’s search engine was Apple’s first choice for Safari — not Google, DOJ says
Surprising discoveries
Bumblebees pull their weight on team projects. Finnish researchers observed the buzzing insects learn to push around Lego blocks in pairs — and found they can be just as collaborative as humans.
The Stone Age may as well have been named the Wood Age. A new analysis of Neanderthal artifacts suggests that our predecessors carved more sophisticated tools than history gives them credit for.
Remote work is taking over Disney World. An increasing number of Disney adults are bringing their Zoom calls (and their double monitors) inside the theme parks.
Edible bug enthusiasts are gearing up for the forage of a lifetime. With a trillion cicadas about to emerge in the United States, insect chefs are ready to ferment, sautée, and stuff them all for gourmet dishes.
AI could remake the art of the diss track. Yes, we’re talking about the beef between rappers Kendrick Lamar and Drake.
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Our best wishes for a productive day. Send any news, comments, edible bug recipes, and olive oil sales (please) to talk@qz.com. Today’s Daily Brief was brought to you by Gabriela Riccardi.