Morning Scan

AI is dominating the Monday market and the weekly news cycle. Hardware is getting strange: foldable phones, swappable batteries, humanoid robots going public. China is tightening controls on its own AI outputs, and sanctioned nations found a surprisingly large crypto ATM.

$100B+ — Crypto received by addresses linked to Iran, Russia, North Korea, and other sanctioned entities last year — nearly 8x the 2024 figure. (Chainalysis / WSJ)

Machines & Minds

The UN Says AI Is Moving Faster Than the Rules

The headline finding from the UN's new AI report is, essentially, that the headline finding was obvious — but now it's official and documented. (The Next Web)

ByteDance and Alibaba Are Killing Their Human-Sounding AI Agents by July 15

China's anthropomorphic AI interaction rules kick in this month, and even the biggest platforms have to comply — a reminder that Beijing moves fast when it wants to. (SCMP)

How Kalshi Infects the News

CNN and CNBC struck deals with the prediction market platform in December, and the conflict-of-interest questions haven't gotten quieter since. (Popular Information)

Amazon's Mechanical Turk Is Now on Life Support

The human-powered task marketplace that predated the AI wave is being phased out by the thing it helped train. (SiliconAngle)

Connected World

Nvidia's Kyber AI Rack Slips to 2028 — One Circuit Board to Blame

A single board is holding up Nvidia's next flagship AI machine — a supply chain problem or a quality control problem, depending on how generous you're feeling. (The Next Web)

Smart Glasses Maker Even Realities Hits $1B Valuation on $150M Round

An ex-Apple team building camera-free smart glasses just got a unicorn valuation from Meituan and Tencent — Meta's Ray-Bans now have a well-funded Chinese rival. (TechCrunch)

China's Biren Raises ~$893M to Challenge Nvidia on GPUs

The Shanghai-based chipmaker's stock is up 150%+ since its January Hong Kong IPO, and it's now flush with capital to make that challenge credible. (SCMP)

Agility Robotics Is Going Public — Via SPAC, No Promises on Home Robots

The CEO is selling the industrial use case, not the sci-fi one. (TechCrunch)

“Foldable iPhone may repeat the iPhone X story.” — Ming-Chi Kuo

Connected World

Uber's European Expansion Has Hit a Speed Bump

Five of seven planned 2026 European market launches are now in question — European regulators remain a different kind of obstacle. (TechCrunch)

How Fox Got the World Cup for Half Price

The 2026 World Cup is already the most attended in FIFA's 122-year history, which makes Fox's bargain-rate rights deal look like the sports media steal of the decade. (Huddle Up)

Connected World

The Zombie Unix Lawsuit Is Alive Again

SCO's legal successor Xinuos is asking courts to let it take another bite at IBM over Unix copyright claims that most of the industry assumed were dead and buried. (The Register)

EY Sacked Staff for Allegedly Accessing the Australian PM's Bank Account

No further context needed, really — that sentence is doing all its own work. (The Register)