Community engagement

Good morning. The Canadian National Exhibition starts today in Toronto, which means it’s time for one of our fave annual traditions: gawking at its tummy-ache-inducing food offerings. 

Some confections that caught our eyes (and not necessarily in a good way) include the Blue Heat Taki chicken tenders, the beef butter tart, and Booster Juice’s Kraft Dinner smoothie. If we had to try just one thing though, it might be the foot-long butter chicken taquito (which actually looks really good).

Today’s reading time is 5½ minutes.

Markets: After a brief reprieve, Canada’s main stock index was back in the red yesterday as bond market turmoil continued to rattle investor confidence. Meanwhile, shares in Walmart fell 9.2% after the retailer reported its weakest quarterly U.S. sales growth in more than six years.

The world’s top AI company is trying to get Canadians psyched about having a data centre in their backyard.  

Driving the news: Anthropic has set its sights on Canada for the next phase of its data centre buildout, hiring staff in the country to identify sites, secure processing power, and lobby local communities to host the increasingly controversial facilities. 

Why it matters: A recent Angus Reid poll found that 68% of Canadians would oppose a large AI data centre within a few blocks of their home — companies like Anthropic are now desperate to convince the public that there are benefits to hosting them.

Zoom out: Meta is planning to build a $13 billion data centre campus outside of Edmonton, but has faced backlash from locals. Another proposed data centre in Olds, Alberta, was just rejected this week by the province's utility commission, citing a lack of proper community consultations.

Bottom line: The race for data centre dominance could ultimately come down to which company can be the most persuasive with municipalities and local residents.—LA

U.S. booze is coming back to Canadian shelves. Provinces have agreed to restock American alcohol as a “sign of good faith” while the two countries try to iron out the details of a trade agreement. Manitoba Premier Wab Kinew struck a different tone, urging Canadians not to buy U.S. booze even if it's back on shelves. Canada-U.S. Trade Minister Dominic LeBlanc said yesterday that the two sides are “very close” to finalizing a deal. (CTV News)

China’s YouTube is expanding to English-speaking countries. Popular Chinese video platform Bilibili has relaunched its international app and is planning to roll out a new English-language site, part of its plan to challenge YouTube in European and North American markets. The platform, which already has 376 million monthly active users, is currently hiring in cities like Los Angeles, London, Mexico City, and Tokyo. (Semafor)

Australia is forcing tech companies to pay publishers for news. The Australian government passed a law that will fine tech giants like Alphabet and Meta millions of dollars if they fail to reach deals with local news publishers for access to their content. Meta banned news on its platforms after Ottawa passed a similar (albeit less strict) law, a move that cost local news publishers in Canada over half of their online engagement. (Reuters)

📡 What else is on our radar: 

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Star AI researcher Sanja Fidler raises US$90 million to launch robotics startup Veeda Innovation. Fidler — who previously led Nvidia’s Toronto research lab for eight years — will helm the Toronto-based startup, which will train humanoid robots for the real world in digital environments. 

Why it matters: There’s a lot of money to be made in humanoids — take China’s Unitree which went public this week — as heavy industry looks to bots for labour solutions. Training these bots is no easy feat, though, which is where companies like Veeda come in. If its “The Matrix for Physical AI” systems work, it could quickly become a Canadian tech heavyweight.

Lenders are worried that crooked bankers have a new avenue for insider trading. 

Driving the news: Several top Canadian banks and financial institutions, including RBC, TD, and Manulife, have updated employee policies to address prediction market use, per the Globe and Mail. The changes follow similar moves from top U.S. banks and hedge funds.

Zoom in: Some institutions, like RBC, are barring prediction market platforms entirely for any employee subject to personal trading policies that govern how they can trade securities. Others, like Scotiabank, only bar speculation on financial markets, indexes, or companies.

Why it matters: Wealthsimple and Interactive Brokers Group are the only brokers currently certified to run prediction markets in Canada, and can only offer three categories of bets. However, two of them — economic forecasts and financial indicators — are ripe for potential insider trading from finance employees in the know, hence the banks’ proactive new policies.

Bottom line: Company policies are just one piece of a broader apparatus needed to crack down on insider prediction market trading, potentially including new laws and certainly including self-reporting by platforms. In the case of the latter, leading platform Kalshi has referred 32 instances of possible insider trading to the Commodity Futures Trading Commission.—QH

🌍 Hint: This Mediterranean island is home to ancient palaces, pink sand beaches, and olive trees that are believed to be thousands of years old. Local delicacies include sheep cheese with honey, fried snails, and a twice-baked barley bread. The island was famously the site of one of history’s first major airborne invasions during WWII.

Have an idea where we brought you this week? Lock in your guess here.

⚖️ 56. People sentenced to prison in China yesterday for charges relating to the collapse of property developer Evergrande Group. The most high-profile sentencing was for founder Hui Ka Yan — once Asia's richest man — who received life imprisonment after pleading guilty to eight charges including fraud and bribery.

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