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# The Chip Race Gets Expensive, AI's Tab Comes Due, Liability Season
- URL: https://adjacent.media/scan/2026-06-24-am/
- Published: 2026-06-24T10:10:54.000Z
- Updated: 2026-06-24T10:10:54.000Z
- Description: Markets are flashing red, AI is eating jobs and keystroke logs, and Qualcomm wants to buy its way into the chip race at a 2.5x markup. Wednesday has that particular flavor of chaos where everything is moving at once — and not all of it upward.
- Author: Jonathan Greene
- Tags: #scan-am, #scan

Markets are flashing red, AI is eating jobs and keystroke logs, and Qualcomm wants to buy its way into the chip race at a 2.5x markup. Wednesday has that particular flavor of chaos where everything is moving at once — and not all of it upward.

> **10%** — South Korea's Kospi index fell this much overnight, dragged down by SK Hynix and Samsung, with ASML and STMicro dropping \~7% in sympathy. *(CNBC)*

---

### Connected World

#### [Qualcomm in Advanced Talks to Acquire Modular at \~$4B](https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2026-06-22/qualcomm-is-said-to-near-deal-for-ai-chip-startup-modular?ref=adjacent.media) (paywall)

That's a 2.5x step-up from Modular's $1.6B valuation just nine months ago, showing how fast AI infrastructure M&A is heating up. *(Bloomberg)*

#### [South Korea's Kospi Falls 10%, Tech Stocks Slide in Pre-Market](https://www.cnbc.com/2026/06/23/tech-stocks-sell-off-mag7-samsung-sk-hynix.html?ref=adjacent.media)

The selloff is broad enough to rattle US pre-market trading. *(CNBC)*

#### [Trump Signs Two Executive Orders to Accelerate Quantum Computing](https://www.wsj.com/politics/policy/trump-seeks-to-boost-quantum-computing-with-new-executive-orders-b2200634?ref=adjacent.media) (paywall)

The orders push development timelines and address security risks from quantum-capable adversaries — long overdue federal attention to a slow-burning race. *(WSJ)*

#### [AlpSemi Raises $19.5M to Build Power Switches for AI Data Centers](https://siliconangle.com/2026/06/23/alpsemi-raises-19-5m-make-semiconducting-power-switches-ai-data-centers/?ref=adjacent.media)

The French startup is targeting the power infrastructure layer that every new GPU cluster depends on. *(SiliconANGLE)*

### Machines & Minds

#### [Meta Pauses Employee Keystroke Tracking After Internal Data Exposure](https://www.wired.com/story/meta-accidentally-let-employees-access-each-others-keystroke-data/?ref=adjacent.media)

The program was meant to train AI on worker inputs — instead it briefly exposed those inputs to other employees, which is the kind of sentence that ends programs. *(Wired)*

#### [UN Urges AI Firms to Come Clean on Environmental Costs](https://thenextweb.com/news/un-warns-ai-environmental-costs?ref=adjacent.media)

The United Nations is pushing for mandatory environmental disclosure, framing voluntary commitments as insufficient cover for an industry burning through water and power at scale. *(The Next Web)*

#### [The Running List: Major Tech Layoffs in 2026 Citing AI](https://techcrunch.com/2026/06/22/the-running-list-major-tech-layoffs-in-2026-where-employers-cited-ai/?ref=adjacent.media)

TechCrunch's tracker is getting longer — this is the document your marketing team's CFO has already bookmarked. *(TechCrunch)*

#### [Inside ChatGPT's Ads Push](https://open.substack.com/pub/sourcesnews/p/inside-chatgpt-ads-push)

OpenAI is reportedly moving toward advertising at a moment when the industry is debating whether AI search can coexist with ad-supported models. *(Alex Heath / Sources)*

### Connected World

#### [Shareholders Sue Uber's Board Over Sexual Assaults and Safety Failures](https://techcrunch.com/2026/06/22/shareholders-sue-ubers-board-over-sexual-assaults-other-incidents/?ref=adjacent.media)

A Detroit pension fund is leading the suit, alleging that compliance cuts created systemic exposure — framing rider safety as a governance failure, not just a PR one. *(TechCrunch)*

#### [UK iCloud Users Could Claim £77 Each as Apple Case Heads to Trial](https://www.macrumors.com/2026/06/23/apple-3-billion-uk-icloud-case-cleared-for-trial/?ref=adjacent.media)

The £3 billion ($3.9B) class action covering 40 million UK users has been certified — Apple's pricing practices in cloud storage are now a courtroom problem. *(MacRumors)*

#### [Tesla Autopilot Fatal Texas Crash Now Under Federal Investigation](https://www.nytimes.com/2026/06/22/business/tesla-texas-autopilot-crash-nhtsa.html?ref=adjacent.media) (paywall)

NHTSA is investigating, Tesla is pushing back on the Autopilot framing, and the gap between those two positions is where the story will live for months. *(NYT)*

#### [Netflix Buys a 'Hot Ones' Spinoff](https://www.nytimes.com/2026/06/22/business/media/hot-ones-sean-evans-netflix.html?ref=adjacent.media) (paywall)

The streaming giant continues its pivot from prestige drama to things people actually watch on a Tuesday night — spicy chicken wings included. *(NYT)*