Immigration Is the Only Thing Propping Up California's Population
'We paid a lot of money to get him here so we want our return on investment,' quipped Darren Kimura, CEO of a Silicon Valley startup called AI Squared. His just-arrived chief technology officer, Nagendra 'Nag' Dhanakeerthi, settled into a meeting with a customer.
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AI leader stuns Google with move that could reshape the internet
AI leader stuns Google with move that could reshape the internet originally appeared on TheStreet. It's tough to see Google () potentially selling Chrome, but that's not exactly the point. When a rising AI search startup lays down a whopping $34 billion all-cash offer for the world's most popular browser, it's more about sending a message. 💵💰💰💵 The battle for the internet's future has everything to do with distribution. Chrome is the gateway to more than 3 billion users globally, and has become the default path to search, ads, and answers. Whether the deal ever goes through doesn't matter as much as the optics in the AI arms race. Moreover, it's not just about building better models anymore, but also about owning the front door. AI is redrawing the future of search and the internet itself It's safe to say that search has officially entered its post-Google era. Though Alphabet's () Google dominates with roughly an 89.54% global market share, its grip is being tested not by links but by answers. Since I/O 2025, Google has been aggressively rolling out AI Overviews, which are live for 1.5 billion monthly users across more than 200 claims outbound links have been relatively stable, but publishers have seen referral traffic dry up over the past year. In fact, a Pew report shows that users who see AI summaries are 50% as likely to click through (8%) compared to those who choose not to (15%). On the flipside, OpenAI's ChatGPT has gone from a mere AI chatbot to a full-blown search rival. As of early August, it boasts roughly 700 million weekly active users along with an eye-catching $12 billion revenue run rate. Perplexity eyes ChatGPT's throne Perplexity AI is a more direct competitor to Google's Search business and has grown at a stupendous pace. The AI search upstart sports: 30 million monthly users. North of 780 million monthly queries. A valuation near $18 billion, positioning it as a true juggernaut in the AI-native search space. Other players, like Elon Musk's xAI with Grok 4, are layering in real-time news and web data, which takes things up a notch in seamlessly balancing chat, search, and decision-making. Also, with 58% of web usage now mobile, the fight to control the browser, keyboard, or app entry point is imperative. SEO is splitting wide open, and it's now all about showing in AI answers, getting cited, and building content that is machine-readable. On top of that, Ad dollars are evolving from classical link ads to embedded shopping and context-based results. In the meantime, we're seeing publishers at loggerheads with companies claiming credit for their work, as AI lifts it without consent. In the future, we may see AI agents taking over the internet that don't just find info, but can book, buy, and do the job for you. Perplexity AI makes $34 billion offer for Google Chrome Perplexity's jaw-dropping $34 billion all-cash offer for Google's Chrome browser is less about a potential deal and more about making an emphatic statement. The AI search startup just floated the massive unsolicited offer for Chrome, backed by investors. Additionally, it also reportedly threw in sweeteners like keeping Chromium open-source, throwing roughly $3 billion into development, and keeping Google as the default search engine for real play is at Chrome's 3 billion+ users, and owning that browser is effectively owning the front door to the internet. The offer comes at an opportune time, too, when a U.S. court recently ruled that Google maintains an unlawful monopoly in search. Though Google plans to appeal the decision, some reports suggest that a DOJ remedy may involve divesting Chrome, with Perplexity offering itself as a friendly buyer. For Google, it's a major pressure point. Chrome is at the core of its big initiatives in AI Overviews, data pipelines, and ad targeting. Any crack in that control will result in swifter movement on critical issues like publisher attribution and traffic sharing. Skeptics will contend that the offer is a long shot and perhaps even a PR stunt, but the strategic signal is clear. The offer also adds to Perplexity's brand equity, giving weight to its upcoming Comet browser launch. Whether or not the deal closes, the message is clear that AI search is now well and truly a game of distribution, funding, and policy leverage. Google's antitrust pressure is piling up across the U.S. and Europe That said, Google is up against some major legal fire on multiple fronts, and the stakes are only getting higher. More News: JPMorgan drops 3-word verdict on Amazon stock post-earnings Billionaire Bill Ackman floats bold fix for the housing market crisis Goldman Sachs revamps Nvidia stock price target ahead of earnings Back in August 2024, U.S. District Judge Amit Mehta ruled that Google illegally maintained its search monopoly. Remedy hearings are slated for this spring, with reports showing that DOJ floated the idea of a Chrome divestiture. .Google, in turn, responded with its own proposal, defending its distribution deals. The ad-tech case is even worse. Following a September 2024 trial, a federal court ruled in April 2025 that Google had effectively monopolized the 'ad tech stack,' which is a massive win for the DOJ, which Google is now appealing. If you thought things couldn't get any worse, on the app-store front, the Ninth Circuit upheld a three-year injunction against particular Play Store incentives after a jury found Google in violation during Epic Games v. Google. In Europe, things are also getting heated. Publishers in the region filed a complaint in July over AI Overviews, citing traffic losses, and the EU's DMA rules threatening major fines with up to 10% of global sales. The broader risk is that regulators could potentially impose structural or behavioral changes that could reshape how Google delivers search, ads, and AI leader stuns Google with move that could reshape the internet first appeared on TheStreet on Aug 13, 2025 This story was originally reported by TheStreet on Aug 13, 2025, where it first appeared. Error in retrieving data Sign in to access your portfolio Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data
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Cross Timbers: Q2 Earnings Snapshot
DALLAS (AP) — DALLAS (AP) — Cross Timbers Royalty Trust (CRT) on Wednesday reported profit of $893,000 in its second quarter. On a per-share basis, the Dallas-based company said it had profit of 15 cents. The express trust posted revenue of $1.3 million in the period. _____ This story was generated by Automated Insights ( using data from Zacks Investment Research. Access a Zacks stock report on CRT at
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'Bonuses are obviously going up,' according to UFC CEO Dana White, but by how much?
Picture this: It's 2007 and UFC lightweight Leonard Garcia has just received a $35,000 bonus for his Fight of the Night performance against Roger Huerta on the undercard of UFC 69. He lost the decision, but fought his heart out — as he always did — and the UFC rewarded him for it. Garcia felt pretty sure he was rich. I mean, $35,000? He had plenty of years when he didn't make nearly that much combined. That was some people's whole salary, and they worked hard for it. 'I just blew through that money real fast,' Garcia told me back in 2010. 'Coming from being in the smaller shows and then getting all that money all at once, it seemed like it was never going to run out. I just rode it into the dirt.' He learned from it, though. So three years later, when the UFC's parent company gave him a $65,000 bonus for another Fight of the Night, this time in what many also hailed as the Fight of the Year against Chan Sung Jung, he saved and invested it. He opened a three-year CD. He renovated his bathroom. You know, adult stuff. The last performance bonus Garcia received from the UFC was in 2011, when he lost another decision in another Fight of the Night, this time against Nam Phan at UFC 136. This time the bonuses were all $75,000. In other words, the bonuses had more than doubled in the span of four years. Garcia and other fighters could be forgiven, then, if they assumed this trend would continue. After all, the UFC and its parent company at the time only made more and more money each year. The events went from being broadcast on a niche men's-interest cable network like Spike TV to a major network TV partner in Fox. Then from there the UFC moved on to an even more lucrative deal with ESPN. And in 2026, as we learned this week, it will essentially double its broadcast rights revenue in a deal with Paramount. But in 2025, UFC bonuses are stuck at $50,000. With the exception of special events like UFC 300, they've held steady at that level for over a decade now. When adjusted for inflation, the $75,000 that Garcia and others received in 2011 is worth approximately $110,000 in today's money. While some events around the same time handed out bonuses worth far less, even the $35,000 Garcia received in 2007 would have been worth around $56,000 in 2025 money. All that is about to change, according to UFC CEO Dana White. Speaking to reporters Tuesday night, White promised some unspecified revisions to UFC fighter pay in the wake of this blockbuster deal with Paramount. But he did make one concrete financial promise: 'Bonuses are obviously going up, so that will be big.' White did not say how much bonuses would increase by. But clearly, these bonuses are a big deal to fighters. It's why they regularly plead for them in post-fight interviews. UFC featherweight Dan '50K' Ige even incorporated it as his nickname. Conor McGregor, the biggest star in either MMA or UFC history, delivered an iconic and oft-imitated moment early on in his career, following an impressive TKO win with the exhortation: 'Dana, 60 G's, baby!' (Again, that was 2013, when $60,000 had the the purchasing power of about $88,000 today.) So how much would UFC performance bonuses actually have to increase in order for it to be a true improvement on those handed out in the past? One starting point is to perform the simplest math available. The UFC's new broadcast rights deal is bringing in double the money of the previous one? Fine, double the bonuses. That would get us to $100,000 per bonus. But even that would fall short of keeping pace with inflation when compared with those 2011 bonuses. The biggest performance bonuses the UFC ever handed out were at UFC 300 last year, when each one was worth $300,000. (Max Holloway pocketed two of the four bonuses available, for a total of $600,000 for his knockout win over Justin Gaethje.) If that became the standard, it would mean $1.2 million in bonuses for every UFC event. Multiplied by 43 events per year, that comes out to $51.6 million per year in performance bonuses, which, to a lot of people, probably sounds like a lot. But it's also about 5% of the UFC's average yearly take in this new broadcast rights deal with Paramount. And that doesn't even factor in any of the other revenue sources, like ticket sales or site fees or international broadcast rights. Would the UFC actually consider a bonus increase of that magnitude? Based on everything we know it seems … doubtful. That's likely not just because TKO would rather keep the money than pay it out to people who have no real leverage or recourse to force such a reckoning. It's also probably because a fighter who suddenly has $300,000 in the bank is a lot less compliant when it comes to things like stepping in on short notice to plug holes in upcoming fight cards. Then again, hasn't the UFC told us again and again that it's a meritocracy where you 'eat what you kill'? The whole idea behind the performance bonuses is to motivate fighters to fight hard and put on a show for the fans. Imagine how much harder a prelim fighter making $20,000 to show would fight if you gave him a crack at a $300,000 bonus. And imagine what a bunch of fights like that might do for Paramount+ subscriptions.
