Amazon Joins AI Race Spurred by ChatGPT

Market Movers

• Amazon joins AI race spurred by ChatGPT. Amazon’s ($AMZN) Amazon Web Services is targeting corporate customers.* In addition to new AI tools, the company is expanding access to custom-made chips that it says can run AI software more efficiently and cheaply than competitors. It says it wants to act as a neutral platform for businesses that want to incorporate generative AI features.

• JPMorgan Chase posts record revenue that tops expectations. The bank said profit jumped 52% to $12.62 billion, or $4.10 per share, in the first three months of the year. That figure includes $868 million in losses on securities. Companywide revenue rose 25% to $39.34 billion, driven by a 49% rise in net interest income to $20.8 billion, thanks to the Federal Reserve’s most aggressive rate-hiking campaign in decades.

• Wells Fargo shares rise after bank’s first quarter profit and revenue top the Street. Wells Fargo increased its net income by more than 30% to nearly $5 billion in the first quarter from a year ago. The bank said its net interest income, what it makes lending money minus what it pays out to customers, increased 45% on the back of soaring interest rates.

• UnitedHealth first-quarter earnings, revenue up as company added members. The healthcare and insurance company, the first industry heavyweight to report first-quarter results, said Friday that revenue rose 15% to $91.93 billion. That topped analysts’ expectations of $89.70 billion, according to FactSet. Growth was boosted by member growth* at its UnitedHealthcare insurance business and its Optum health-services arm.

• Retail sales report shows Americans pulled back on big-ticket purchases. American consumers pulled back on purchases of vehicles, furniture, appliances and gasoline amid rising interest rates. Purchases at stores, restaurants and online declined a seasonally adjusted 1% in March from the prior month, the Commerce Department said Friday.

What to Watch

• Boeing falls 6% after warning that production problem will likely slow deliveries. Boeing warned it will likely have to reduce deliveries of its 737 Max airplane in the near term because of a parts problem. It’s the latest in a string of production issues for Boeing and its customers amid an industry-wide shortage of new jets.

• Walmart selling Bonobos for $75 million to Express. Walmart is selling Bonobos to the fashion retailer Express Inc. and the management firm WHP Global, the companies said. WHP Global will buy Bonobos’s brand for $50 million, while Express will acquire Bonobos’s operating assets and assume the related liabilities of the business* for $25 million.

• Homebuyer mortgage demand perks up as rates retreat. Homebuyer demand for purchase loans up 8% last week even after adjusting for the expected seasonal boost from the spring homebuying season. The futures markets tracked by the CME FedWatch Tool are pricing in a 69 percent* chance that Fed policymakers will approve one final 25 basis-point increase on May 3.

• BP commits to Gulf of Mexico as $9bn platform comes online. Oil giant BP yesterday started pumping crude oil through a new $9bn offshore platform in the US Gulf of Mexico. It’s the first one the company has opened in the region since the disastrous Deepwater Horizon explosion 13 years ago. And it’s a sign of BP’s decision to slow down its transition away from fossil fuels. Source(0:50)

• AutoGPT has automated prompt itself. What Auto GPT can do that's different is it can string together prompts so if you go to chatGPT you prompt it one at a time and what the human does is you get your answer and then you think of your next prompt and then you kind of go from there and you end up in a long conversation. But what if the AI could basically prompt itself? That’s the basis for autonomy and that's what this project is designed to do. Source(4:25)