A library of snippets
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I think what will happen over time is that you’ll find most retailers will have their own agents, and then you’ll also have third-party agents. And we’ll see over time how many people want to shop their retail on a generalized agent versus where they go every day and see the product.
From: My Interview With Andy Jassy: OpenAI, Trump, Power and the Future of AWS — The Information.
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Sony is reportedly preparing to launch a US dollar-pegged stablecoin. The development comes as the global entertainment and technology giant tightens its strategic footprint across financial services, including its recent filing for a US banking licence.
On December 1, Japanese media outlet Nikkei suggested Sony intends to issue the token via its partner Startale Labs, a company it has backed through Sony Network Communications.
Startale is already co-developing the Astar blockchain and has previously outlined ambitions to build global infrastructure for real-world asset issuance, including fiat-backed digital currencies.
Sony has built the regulatory foundations needed for such a launch. In 2023, its financial arm acquired WhaleFin Japan, a licensed crypto exchange, bringing token custody and issuance capabilities under a fully regulated entity. The timing coincides with Japan’s newly operational stablecoin regime, which allows banks and licensed providers to issue fiat-backed tokens under strict reserve requirements.
While Sony has not commented publicly, the reported product is expected to be a USD-pegged token rather than yen-backed. That decision reflects the broader trend in global markets where dollar liquidity and interoperability still dominate cross-border settlement and digital asset use cases.
What makes a Sony stablecoin strategically distinct?
Sony’s potential differentiator is not the token itself but the scale of the ecosystem it could move through. PlayStation Network, Sony Music, Sony Pictures, and Sony Bank each offer large-volume payments environments, from digital downloads to subscription billing and user-generated marketplaces.
The company has also filed patents covering NFT transfers between game consoles, digital asset marketplaces, and blockchain-supported authentication layers. A regulated stablecoin could act as the transaction engine behind these systems, reducing reliance on card schemes and enabling lower-cost, real-time settlement between users, creators and developers.
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Met tests show the technology is so accurate that only around one in 33,000 scans results in a false alert.
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Since October more than 146,000 faces of the public walking down the high street in Croydon have been scanned in 13 deployments.
In that time the cameras have generated more than 132 alerts.
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Roughly 47 million Americans are considered “subprime” borrowers, meaning they are high credit risks. Under a blanket 10% rate cap, many of these consumers would be shut out of the credit card market altogether, even though they currently benefit from the responsible use of credit cards. A recent academic study of large card issuers shows that loss rates for the lowest credit-score borrowers routinely exceed 10%. Once you layer in funding costs of roughly 2% for credit unions, a 10% interest rate cap makes lending to subprime borrowers unprofitable, cutting off access to credit for the very consumers these policies claim to help. That loss of access would ripple through the economy, crippling consumer spending and damaging an economy that is facing significant headwinds.
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Making digital ID compulsory removes the incentive to make it genuinely useful for people.
From: Digital ID should aim to win public support, not force it.
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Scott Simpson is President & CEO of America’s Credit Unions
Policymakers must be careful that their efforts to lower costs do not end up severing access to affordably priced loans altogether.
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Some fret that too much digital payment leaves Europe dependent on the likes of Visa and MasterCard, American firms with unpredictable political masters. (The ecb is mulling a “digital euro” in response, though that will take years.) In the Baltics and Nordics, where angst focuses on Russian sabotage, digital payments systems now work for a time even when power is cut. But nothing beats cash when it comes to resilience. Swedes have long been advised to store enough in notes and coins to get through a week, a move the eu now recommends.
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in December ministers from the eu’s 27 member states reiterated their desire to ban businesses from refusing notes and coins. As part of a forthcoming law, shops and restaurants will still be able to indicate they prefer digital payments, but will need also to accept old-fashioned cash.
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An ever-growing number put out “no cash” signs: across Europe, 12% of all businesses flatly refused cash in 2024, up from 4% just three years earlier.
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