Open or closed?

Good morning. Ever wonder how much people doing your job at other companies make? How much of a raise should you ask for? Are you being underpaid? Truthfully, it’s difficult to find accurate answers to these questions.

That’s why today we’re launching an experiment called The Canadian Salary Index. Here’s how it works: anonymously submit information about your job and how much you earn. Then, once we have enough submissions, we’ll share the aggregated data with everyone who participated, so you can compare your pay to people in similar roles. Or just indulge your curiosity about how much everyone is making.

Check it out and add your data if you want access.

Today’s reading time is 5 minutes.

Markets this week: Tech earnings continue this week, with Microsoft, Meta, Apple, and Amazon all reporting. While the overall market is still having a solid run this year, tech companies that are spending big on AI have seen their share prices lag.

A tech world skirmish over whether to limit open-source AI models has escalated into a full-blown battle royale.

What happened: Silicon Valley has split into warring factions over how to regulate increasingly sophisticated AI models. 

Zoom out: Looming over the debate is the geopolitical contest between the U.S. and China to achieve AI dominance. While OpenAI and Anthropic built an early lead with their closed-source models, Chinese companies’ latest open-source alternatives have improved quickly, and are capturing market share on the basis of being cheaper and ‘good enough’ for many businesses.

Why it matters: There’s a great deal at stake in how this issue gets decided. Depending on which side you fall on, restricting open-source models could be a path to safer development of the technology or a bad mistake that cripples the U.S. AI ecosystem and raises costs for businesses by limiting competition.

Mark Carney called by-elections for August. The Prime Minister announced that by-elections will be held in the B.C. riding of North Vancouver-Capilano, the Ontario riding of Beaches-East York, and the Quebec riding of Chicoutimi-Le Fjord on August 31. The Liberals will need to win at least one of the races to keep their majority in the House of Commons. (CBC News)

Two wildfires in B.C. merged. The wildfire, now covering 670 square kilometres, is threatening the town of Clinton, B.C., and has destroyed some structures on its outskirts. The province’s wildfire service said that rain was providing some temporary relief, but that 140 fires were still actively burning. (Canadian Press)

There was a lull in fighting in the Middle East. The pause in fighting came after Donald Trump reportedly nixed plans to escalate the U.S. offensive against Iran over concerns that it was beginning to run low on interceptors used to down Iranian missiles. Meanwhile, the Strait of Hormuz remains effectively closed and under the control of Iran. (CBS News)

📡 What else is on our radar: 

Federal Reserve interest rate decision. The U.S. central bank is expected to hold interest rates steady on Wednesday, though markets are pricing in the possibility of a 25-basis-point hike. If it does hold steady, keep an eye on Fed Chair Kevin Warsh’s press conference, and how he talks about the spike in oil prices.

Altman to brief White House on latest AI model. OpenAI chief Sam Altman will be in D.C. this week to brief Donald Trump and top U.S. officials on the company’s most powerful AI model to date. Altman will be pushing the U.S. government to clear the model for wider release. That may be complicated by revelations last week that the model was behind a sophisticated hack of Hugging Face, raising concerns about its safety.

New GDP data expected to show growth. Forecasters are predicting that data arriving on Friday will show the economy grew slightly in May, and preliminary data is likely to show the same again in June. But that rebound is overshadowed by the resumption of fighting in the Middle East along with new U.S. tariffs set to take effect in August.

People are discovering that when it comes to vehicles, there are more important things than being cool.

What happened: After languishing for years, minivan sales are booming again, with 42,377 minivans sold in Canada last year — a 34% jump from 2024, and the largest gain of any vehicle category.

Catch up: Minivans were created in the 1980s and became a ubiquitous vehicle for families thanks to their practicality before falling out of fashion in the early 2000s. While the humble minivan became associated with a certain ennui-laced suburban lifestyle (unfairly, if you ask us), consumers turned to the more rugged and sporty-looking SUV.

Why it’s happening: A number of factors are likely behind the minivan’s recent resurrection, like the surge in prices for large, three-row SUVs. The Toyota Highlander SUV, for example, is around $5,000 more than the automaker’s Sienna minivan, despite the latter’s larger capacity. 

Zoom out: There’s also a fair amount of ’90s nostalgia in the cultural air at the moment, something that could be pushing millennials — now reaching prime parenting age — to opt for the vans of their childhood.

Why it matters: More demand for minivans is good news for Canada’s auto sector, specifically Stellantis’ Windsor plant, which builds several minivan models and earlier this year hired 1,700 workers to bring back a third shift at the facility.

☀️ US$20.1 billion. Financing provided by China’s Belt and Road Initiative for green energy projects and investments in the first half of the year. The surge in funding coincides with a rise in oil prices driven by the Iran war, which has increased demand for green energy.

And now time for a puzzle: here’s your mini-crossword, Sudoku, Codebreaker, and Who’s Who for the day.