Snippings

Costco is diversifying its precious-metals business by selling ounce bars of platinum for $1,090. (Platinum is trading at around $1,000 per oz so it’a fair price.)

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The news that Walmart plans to step up its online pay-by-bank option in 2025 by hooking into both The Clearing House Real-Time Payments network and the Federal Reserve’s FedNow instant payments network has heated up the instant pay agenda in the payments business — and in a hurry.

Payments experts foresee significant implications for banks and credit unions, consumers and other merchants. Many fully expect this approach will migrate to Walmart’s in-store payments experience in its Walmart Pay mobile app before long.

From: Walmart Revs Instant Pay By Bank to Cut Out Mastercard and Visa.

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The sneaker resale market alone is expected to grow to $30 billion by 2030, as reported by Cowen Equity Research. However, the sneaker market has a major challenge, the counterfeit shoe market has risen by an astounding 1,200% from its $46.1 billion value in 2013 to a near $600 billion in 2023, as reported by Run Repeat.

From: Luxury Brands Are Fighting Counterfeits With AI And Computer Vision.

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wire a $398,359.58 down payment to a JPMorgan Chase

From: Real estate wire fraud: Silicon Valley exec had $400,000 stolen.

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So who should be held to account when such a fraud occurs?

Some would argue that it is the customer. After all, the customer did not double check that the account details were correct and did not do what I have done it similar circumstances (eg, buy a Jaguar car) and send $10 first then call to see that it had arrived before sending the balance.

Some would argue that it is the real estate agent who sends unecrypted and unsigned e-mails with sensitive financial details in them. E-mail is known to be unsafe and there really is no excuse for using it for such transactions. Using iMessage or WhatsApp or Signal or anything else would be better than using e-mail.

Some would argue that it is the banks because they do not provide a suitable request-to-pay service so that the real estate agent can request payment and that request would show up in the customer’s chosen banking application so that they know they can trust it.

Some would argue that is law enforcement, who do not have the resources. After all, as the story makes clear, the money was sent to JP Morgan Chase account. Since JP Morgan Chase have excellent know-your-customer (KYC), it should be straightforward for the cops to arrest the account holder (who is likely a mule, but unless the mules are punished they  

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Experts are warning foragers to avoid using Google Images to identify mushrooms after the search engine is delivering misleading AI-generated results.

Searches for a number of common edible mushrooms return wildly inaccurate images as the top result, despite these images being flagged as AI-generated.

Foraging experts warn this could lead to dangerous, if not deadly, errors for foragers trying to identify safe mushrooms to eat.

From: Urgent warning from scientists: Google is showing AI-generated images of mushrooms that look nothing like the real species – which could have deadly consequences | Daily Mail Online.

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Electric vehicles (EVs) represent a new paradigm of connected experience. The ongoing transformation in the automotive industry is more than just a transition from gasoline to electricity — it’s evolving how consumers interact with their vehicles.

Payments, along with commerce, sit squarely at the forefront of this technological shift.

“EVs represent a tremendous amount of opportunity for the payments ecosystem,” Julius Alexander III, the head of emerging payments at Discover® Global Network,

From: Discover Global Network: Payments Are Foundation of EVs.

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The idea, therefore, that there is a “constituency” of crypto voters needing to be pandered to, whose top issue is making sure that exchanges and other companies aren’t too heavily regulated, is fanciful.

From: The farce that is America’s ‘crypto election’.

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For Project Sid, the company populated a Minecraft world with 1,000 autonomous AI agents to see what they would do if left to their own devices. The result is astonishing.

From: A company gave 1,000 AI agents access to Minecraft — and they built a society | Tom’s Guide.

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The agents in the simulation formed alliances, collected items in Minecraft, and even set up gems as a common currency so they could trade together. There were even crooked priests who bribed other AI townsfolk to gain an unfair advantage.

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The colossal campaign spending from the cryptocurrency industry is showing up in dominant fashion in Ohio’s U.S. Senate race, where its political action committees have devoted $40 million to support Republican Bernie Moreno’s opposition of Sen. Sherrod Brown (D-Ohio), the crypto-skeptical chairman of the Senate Banking Committee.

From: Crypto PACs Dominate Ohio Senate Race, Spending $40M on Sherrod Brown’s Foe.

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People looking to murder their partner, relative or a boss have paid out £400,000 to fraudsters running a bogus hitman-for-hire website on the dark web.

From: Fraudsters make £400,000 from fake hitman-for-hire website that claims you can have a partner, relative or boss killed for a fee | Daily Mail Online.

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