These days, Apple and Google probably have similar dating app profiles: “Big Tech leader lacking confidence in AI capabilities seeks same.” And it looks like they may have found their match.

Yesterday, Bloomberg reported that Apple is in talks to license Google’s Gemini AI for iPhones and other Apple devices with the forthcoming iOS 18. This may have OpenAI CEO Sam Altman sweating, but for Apple and Google, it could be the answer to their generative AI troubles: Alphabet shares rose over 7% following the news, and Apple’s rose more than 2% (though both gave up some of those gains before the market closed).

It’s not their first time teaming up: Google reportedly pays $18 billion to Apple every year to be the default search engine on its devices. A deal involving Gemini could help both companies overcome OpenAI’s seemingly big head start in the AI race.

What’s in it for Apple? It could help shift investors’ perception that the company is an AI laggard. Tim Cook said last month that the company is “investing significantly” in AI…but Apple’s products are inferior to the leading models, according to Bloomberg. Apple could still use its own AI for on-device tasks and use Gemini for more complex features in the cloud (like text-to-image generation).

How about Google? This deal could be for Gemini what The Ed Sullivan Show was for The Beatles. It would be the AI model’s highest-profile partnership and its best chance at getting ahead of the white-hot competition.

• If the deal happens, Gemini could be on 2+ billion iPhones around the world.
• Another plus would be some reputation rehab: Gemini briefly shut down last month due to controversy over the model generating historically inaccurate images.

What could get in the way? As regulators clamp down on Big Tech, there could be pushback to Google and Apple getting even cozier. Their search engine deal is already the subject of a DOJ lawsuit.

But…Apple has also considered using OpenAI’s model, and any deal probably won’t be announced until Apple’s Worldwide Developers Conference in June.—CC

The original shark from Shark Tank, Kevin Harrington, that is. And Kevin’s calling this golf investment one of his “favorite opportunities right now.”

The opportunity? Investing in GolfSuites.

The reason why Kevin’s so excited is pretty simple. Golf is booming, especially away from the traditional golf course. And GolfSuites is tapping into this $16.7b boom. Their elite venues bring golf entertainment nearly anywhere, from big outdoor ranges to downtown bars.

They’ve already opened three profitable venues. Now they’re ready to scale up massively. Over 200 cities are in their crosshairs for expansion opportunities.

You can invest like a shark by becoming a GolfSuites shareholder. Learn what makes GolfSuites such an exciting investment opportunity here.

Nvidia showed off its next-gen chip. Jensen Huang, the CEO of the AI explosion’s big winner so far, Nvidia, revealed its latest tech to keep the good times rolling at its developer event yesterday, dubbed the “Woodstock of AI” by analysts. Speaking in a packed arena, Huang showed off Blackwell, Nvidia’s new, more powerful graphics processor chip design, which the company says is significantly faster than the chips that support most of the AI out there now. The old design—which propelled Nvidia to its spot as the world’s third-most valuable company—was good, Jensen told the crowd, but “we need bigger GPUs.”

SCOTUS probably won’t limit government contact with social media companies. During oral arguments yesterday, the justices seemed skeptical of claims made by Republican-led states that the federal government had acted improperly and sought to censor conservative viewpoints when trying to get social media companies to remove misinformation and harmful posts from their platforms. The case could see the Supreme Court draw a new line between what is considered acceptable persuasion versus unlawful coercion. It’s one of several cases this term that asks the court to grapple with how free speech works on the internet.

Trump can’t find an insurer to back $464 million appeal bond. Attorneys for Donald Trump told a court yesterday that no one is willing to underwrite a bond to cover the $464 million verdict against him in New York’s civil fraud suit (it’s the case accusing him of inflating the value of his assets) while he appeals it. He’s talked to 30 companies, but they want Trump to use cash rather than properties as collateral, the former president’s lawyers said. They’re asking the court to delay the judgment until the appeal is over or accept a smaller bond of $100 million—otherwise, the New York attorney general’s office could try to collect by seizing assets.

Amazon’s streaming service has been struggling to make content that gets noticed, but it’s hoping to turn things around by bringing on YouTube’s most-followed creator: MrBeast, the 25-year-old stunt philanthropist behind viral videos like “Survive 100 Days Trapped, Win $500,000” and “1,000 Blind People See For The First Time.”

MrBeast, aka Jimmy Donaldson, just inked a deal with Amazon MGM Studios to host and executive produce Beast Games for Prime Video, the studio announced yesterday. Considering Donaldson hosted a real-life Squid Game contest in 2021 that got 588 million YouTube views, he’s qualified for the job.

There’s no release date yet, but Beast Games will pit 1,000 people against each other for a $5 million grand prize—the largest “in the history of television and streaming,” per Amazon.

Going mainstream

Donaldson said one of his goals is to “prove YouTubers and creators can succeed on other platforms.”

While it can be tough for influencers to pivot to Hollywood, Donaldson is better positioned than most:

• The MrBeast empire, which includes monetized videos and branded merchandise and snacks, grossed $82 million from June 2022 to June 2023—more than double that of any other digital creator, according to Forbes. (The executive chairman of Morning Brew invested in his snack line.)
• Plus, he already has 245 million subscribed fans.

Amazon is counting on it: The company has spent billions of dollars in recent years on original content that’s consistently failed to crack most-watched lists.—ML

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Houston, we have descent: Austin’s housing prices are finally coming down to Earth after a meteoric rise during the pandemic. Buying and renting a dwelling in the ever-weird Texas boomtown has become less expensive, per the Wall Street Journal.

A couple of years ago, Austin’s economic dynamism and allure to West Coast transplants made its residential real estate sizzle amid historically low interest rates. From late 2019 to mid-2022, home prices shot up 66%.

But now it’s as if someone blasted the A/C:

• Rents fell 7% over the last year, the biggest drop of any US city, per Apartment List.
• Home prices have fallen over 11% since 2022, more than any other metro in the country, according to the Freddie Mac House Price Index.

Why the cooldown?

Austin’s homebuilding boom is helping it avoid the severe supply crunch seen nationwide. It’s expected to add more new apartments as a proportion of existing units this year than any other city.

Plus, after decades of rapid population growth, more people are looking to move out of Austin than in, per Redfin data from last fall.

Good deals are uneven…Austin’s rents are declining faster for shiny luxury apartments than they are for more affordable housing options, the WSJ reports.—SK

Quote: “If you used too much ketamine, you can’t really get work done, so I have a lot of work.”

Don Lemon released the uncomfortable interview with Elon Musk that caused the mercurial billionaire to cancel X’s partnership with the show—and Musk’s use of ketamine was just one of the touchy topics discussed. Musk insisted he only took the drug as prescribed to treat low moods, was nearly always sober when making late-night social media posts, and that, given Tesla’s success, “from an investor standpoint, if there is something I’m taking, I should keep taking it.” You can watch the whole thing here.

Stat: The ocean keeps smashing records like it’s Caitlin Clark. But unlike Clark’s, we’re not rooting for these ones: For the past year, the ocean has broken a new temperature record every day, CNN reports, based on data from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) and the University of Maine’s Climate Reanalyzer. The unbroken string of daily heat records since last March likely stems from human-caused climate change as well as natural heatwaves and the El Niño phenomenon. Globally, average ocean temps went up 0.25 degrees Celsius in 2023—or about 20 years’ worth of typical warming, an NOAA oceanographer told CNN.

Read: What the data says about pandemic school closures, four years later. (New York Times)