US president-elect Donald Trump has selected Tesla CEO Elon Musk to co-lead his newly created department of government efficiency.
In a statement released on X, the social media platform owned by Musk, Trump said that Tesla's CEO would lead the department with former Republican presidential candidate Vivek Ramaswamy.
Trump said that the department, which has the acronym "DOGE" — a reference to Musk's favourite cryptocurrency dogecoin (DOGE-USD) — "would provide advice and guidance from outside of government".
Musk said: "This will send shockwaves through the system, and anyone involved in government waste, which is a lot of people."
Tesla shares closed Tuesday's session down 6% but were back up nearly 3% in pre-market trading on Wednesday morning. The stock rallied on the back of Trump's election win last week, taking the company's market valuation past the $1tn (￡784bn) mark.
Susannah Streeter, head of money and markets at Hargreaves Lansdown, said: "Elon Musk is well-known for having a finger in many pies, but now he’s also at Trump’s top table there will be renewed concern about the potential for messy decision-making at his companies.
"He’s taking multi-tasking to a whole new level, and these worries are showing up in Tesla’s share price, which has fallen back, erasing some recent gains on news of his appointment."
Tech company Apple is reportedly gearing up to launch an AI wall-mounted display with the ability to control appliances at home and handle video calls.
Bloomberg reported that Apple was looking to announce this new product as early as March and it is said that the new device would look like a square iPad.
Shares in Apple were flat in pre-market trading on Wednesday.
The report said that the new device would spotlight the company's new Apple Intelligence AI platform.
A higher-end version of the product could reportedly cost as much as $1,000 depending on the components included, though a display-only device would cost far less than that.
This launch would come to a market where other tech giants already have their own home devices, including Amazon's (AMZN) Echo Show and Echo Hub, along with Alphabet-owned (GOOG, GOOGL) Google's Nest Hub.
A spokesperson for Apple was not available to respond to Yahoo Finance UK's request for comment at the time of writing.
Shares in chipmaker Nvidia were up 2% by the end of Tuesday's session, following the news that Japanese tech conglomerate SoftBank (9984.T) would be the first to receive its AI Blackwell chips.
Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang said during a keynote speech at the chipmaker's AI Summit in Japan, that SoftBank would be using its Blackwell platform to build Japan's most powerful AI supercomputer.
In addition, Nvidia also revealed that SoftBank, using the chipmaker's AI Aerial computing platform, had piloted the world's first combined AI and 5G telecom network.
Demand for Nvidia's chip amid the AI boom, has propelled the company's shares higher, leading it to overtake Apple as the world's most valuable company last week, with a market capitalisation of $3.64tn (￡2.86tn).
Investors will now be looking ahead to Nvidia's third quarter earnings, which are due out next Wednesday, as the last of the Magnificent 7 tech behemoths to report this earnings season.
Music streaming service Spotify reported a record operating income of €454m (￡378m) in its third quarter results, released on Tuesday.
Spotify said it had outperformed across key metrics, also logging a record high gross margin of 31%, on the back of a 19% rise in total revenue to €4bn. The company said it was on track to achieve its first full year of profitability.
In terms of user numbers, Spotify said its monthly active users were up 11% year-on-year to 640 million, while subscribers had increased 12% to 252 million.
Daniel Ek, CEO and founder of Spotify, said: "We’re where we set out to be — if not a little further — and on a steady path toward achieving our long-term goals."
Shares were up nearly 6% in pre-market trading on Wednesday morning.
Hargreaves Lansdown's Streeter said: "As a showcase for musicians’ work, the Swedish music streamer is fending off the competition, and growing its subscriber base fast.
"Volumes are being turned up right across the business and it's now in reach of turning profitable this year, marking a real coming of age given it launched 18 years ago."
Shares in Canadian e-commerce platform Shopify surged 21% on Tuesday, following the company's latest results.
Shopify logged 26% year-on-year revenue growth in its third quarter at $2.2bn and a 19% free cash flow margin. The tech company posted gross profits of $1.1bn and operating income of $283m.
Harley Finkelstein, president of Shopify, said the company's third quarter was "outstanding, further establishing Shopify as a leader in powering commerce anywhere, anytime".
Looking ahead to the fourth quarter, Shopify said it expected revenue to grow at "mid-to-high-twenties" percentage rate year-on-year, while gross profits were anticipated to increase at a similar year-on-year rate to Q3.
Streeter said: "More e-commerce firms are lapping up its services, which provide essential internet infrastructure.
"Offering easy to build and maintain transactional websites has been a winning formula and Shopify is providing the backbone for their growth."
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Other companies in the news on Wednesday 13 November:
