Author: Art Ryan

American consumers spent more this holiday season while using cross-channel shopping and artificial intelligence (AI) tools for bargain hunting and convenience, according to separate analyses by Mastercard and Visa. Mastercard SpendingPulse found that U.S. retail sales excluding automotive increased 3.9% year over year from Nov. 1 through Dec. 21, according to a Tuesday (Dec. 23) press release. Visa Consulting and Analytics (VCA) reported that holiday retail spending increased 4.2% during the seven weeks from Nov. 1 through Dec. 20, per a Tuesday press release. Its analysis is based on retail merchants’ data, excluding auto, gasoline and restaurants. Both analyses include all payment types and figures that are not adjusted…

As peak holiday demand stretches supply chains to their limits, global retailers like Amazon, Walmart and Target are leaning heavily on artificial intelligence (AI) and robotics to move goods faster, reduce errors and protect workers from physically demanding tasks.  What was once experimental technology has become core infrastructure, reshaping how companies handle seasonal surges across warehouses, transportation networks and returns operations. AI Orchestrates Holiday Fulfillment For large retailers, holiday success increasingly depends on AI systems that can anticipate demand and coordinate thousands of moving parts in real time. At Walmart, an AI-driven orchestration network connects forecasting models, routing algorithms and decision agents to manage what the company described as its fastest holiday deliveries yet. The system continuously analyzes signals such as historical sales, local demand patterns,…

Bank of America expects artificial intelligence (AI) to have a growing effect on the economy next year and beyond. Speaking Monday (Dec. 22) with Bloomberg Television, Bank of America CEO Brian Moynihan said that AI had an increasing impact this year and that it will accelerate in the coming years. Moynihan said this while sharing that Bank of America expects the U.S. economy to grow 2.4% in 2026, up from 2% this year, Bloomberg reported Monday. “AI is kicking in more and more, and so it’s not all attributable to AI, but that’s having a marginal impact that’s pretty strong,” Moynihan said, per the report. The…

Key Highlights: It’s not hidden anymore that AI browsers are slowly making their way into the market. Earlier this year, AI companies like Perplexity and OpenAI launched Comet AI browser and ChatGPT Atlas, respectively. The idea behind AI browser is quite fascinating but is it reliable enough to make users transition to these options for everyday web browsing is still a big question. Here’s how OpenAI is blocking prompt injection attacks in ChatGPT Atlas That’s especially true when the browser market is alone dominated by Google Chrome, which is already making strides by adding AI features. But, for AI-powered browsers that alone…

Key Highlights: Countries in the Middle East are increasingly working to bolster plans for future innovations in advanced technology, AI, and other areas. One such example is the UAE. The country is partnering with some of the top tech giants from the U.S., like Microsoft and OpenAI, to make it more efficient in the AI sector. More recently, Microsoft announced $15.2 billion investment in the UAE to expand its AI footprint in the country. That’s not all; the company is also aiming to build trust and make people aware of AI and turn the UAE into an AI-ready nation. Speaking of AI,…

Key Highlights: After demand from China soared high, followed by some leniency in the H200 chip export rule by the Trump administration, NVIDIA has once again found itself in a position where it has to adjust its AI chip strategy. However, the approval from the U.S. government isn’t straight-forward. The Trump administration has set a condition of 25% fee on each sale. After Trump eases China export rules, NVIDIA plans to ram-up production of H200 AI chips Last week, reports came in that NVIDIA reportedly has told Chinese customers that it was mulling over the idea of ramping up the production…

Key Highlights: Ever since AI picked up the hype, Microsoft has been one of the frontrunners in the race, alongside some of the big names, like OpenAI, Google, Anthropic, and more. At this point, the company has been pushing AI so much that Windows users have started feeling annoyed with everything Microsoft has to announce about Copilot. Last month, Windows chief Pavan Davuluri took to X and shared a post mentioning that Windows is evolving into an agentic OS. That very post didn’t sit well with already-frustrated Windows users, who called out the company under Davuluri’s post about forcing users…

Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 had earned another Game of the Year award by the Indie Game Awards last week, but the organization has since announced that the award would be retracted because developer Sandfall Interactive used generative AI during development. The Indie Game Awards also rescinded the Debut Game award given to Expedition 33. Here is the Indie Game Awards’ explanation, from an FAQ: The Indie Game Awards have a hard stance on the use of gen AI throughout the nomination process and during the ceremony itself. When it was submitted for consideration, a representative of Sandfall Interactive agreed that no gen AI…

Agentic AI is often portrayed as a ‘wait-and-see’ game. As PYMNTS Intelligence data shows, CFOs have expressed their curiosity and a limited amount of trust, but they’ve yet to take their hands off the wheel.  And maybe some never will. But over the past week The Prompt Economy saw some new use cases in the financial services sector that are beyond “wait and see.” For example in a recent blog post, Amazon Web Services argues that agentic AI is moving financial institutions beyond experimentation and into practical, production-ready systems that outperform traditional generative AI for complex, regulated work. Citing a Moody’s study, AWS notes that financial firms are prioritizing AI…

Corporate finance has a paradox problem. Businesses move faster than ever, yet the teams responsible for tracking, validating and reporting the money still operate as if speed were optional. While sales, marketing and customer support have spent years layering automation and AI onto their workflows, finance remains anchored to spreadsheets, manual reconciliation and systems that were never designed to work together. Even as 2026 approaches, the office of the CFO is still defined by labor-intensive processes and fragmented technology. Unlike more automated enterprise functions, finance teams continue to stitch together data from ERPs, CRMs, billing platforms, contract repositories and banking systems —…

OpenAI has reportedly seen better margins from its paid offerings this year. A report Sunday (Dec. 21) from The Information — also cited by Bloomberg News — says the artificial intelligence (AI) startup has improved on its “compute margin,” an in-house metric for the share of revenue after it factors in the cost of running AI models for its paying corporate and consumer users. As of October, that margin came to 70%, the report said, citing a source familiar with the matter. That’s up from 52% at the end of 2024, and double the rate in January of last year. The Information added…

China’s Bold Move Toward Embodied AI China is aggressively pursuing a new frontier in artificial intelligence known as embodied AI—a fusion of AI systems with physical agents like robots, drones, and autonomous vehicles. Unlike the dominant trend in the United States and Europe where large language models (LLMs) are seen as the gateway to artificial general intelligence (AGI), China is investing in alternative paths that integrate intelligence with physical form. This approach centers on the belief that true intelligence emerges from the interaction between a system’s body, brain, and environment. Embodied AI thus becomes not only a technological endeavor but also…

The AI Revolution Demands More Than Just Technology The global race to lead in artificial intelligence (AI) is not just about who builds the best algorithms or owns the fastest processors. Increasingly, it’s about who can deliver the power—literally—to support this revolutionary technology. According to leading tech executives, including Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella, the biggest bottleneck in deploying state-of-the-art AI systems is not hardware but the electricity grid that powers it. Without a robust and scalable electric grid, AI infrastructure sits idle, and with it, the potential for economic growth, job creation and innovation. New York stands at a critical crossroads:…

Amazon Announces Major AI Leadership Transition Amazon has initiated a significant leadership change within its artificial intelligence division. CEO Andy Jassy informed employees that Rohit Prasad, who has led the company’s artificial general intelligence (AGI) initiative since 2023, will be stepping down at the end of the year. Prasad, a long-time Amazon executive, previously served as the chief scientist behind the Alexa voice assistant’s development and played a pivotal role in shaping the company’s AI direction, including spearheading the Nova model series. Taking over the reins is Peter DeSantis, a seasoned executive from Amazon Web Services (AWS). DeSantis will head a newly formed organization focused…

BNP Paribas has rolled out an internal artificial intelligence (AI) portal designed to speed up pitch preparation for its investment bankers, according to a Friday (Dec. 19) report from Financial News. The move is part of the firm’s wider strategy to embed generative AI into core workflows and leverage partnerships with AI model providers. The tool aims to reduce the time teams spend on manual research and slide creation by enabling rapid retrieval of relevant historical content, allowing bankers to focus more on strategic analysis and client relationships. The new AI platform functions like an intelligent search system that helps bankers uncover and…

Consumers are increasingly comfortable completing purchases directly inside artificial intelligence (AI) platforms, signaling a potential shift in how digital commerce journeys are structured. A new PYMNTS Intelligence survey of 1,425 U.S. adult consumers conducted from Oct. 14 to Oct. 29 shows that more than half of AI users would prefer to make purchases within a dedicated AI platform rather than being redirected to a merchant’s website, highlighting growing trust in AI-driven shopping experiences and a willingness to trade traditional browsing for convenience and personalization. The findings suggest AI is beginning to reshape not just product discovery but also transaction flow…

Twenty-four organizations have either expressed interest in or are already participating in projects related to the Genesis Mission, a national effort announced by the White House in November that will use artificial intelligence (AI) to make advancements in science, energy and national security. Among the organizations that have signed agreements are Anthropic, Amazon Web Services, Google, Microsoft, Nvidia, OpenAI and xAI, the Department of Energy (DOE) said in a Thursday (Dec. 18) press release. Michael Kratsios, assistant to the president and director of the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP), said in the release that these research partnerships are “only the beginning” and that the Genesis Mission aims to include companies, universities, non-profits and federal…

OpenAI opened its ChatGPT App Directory on Wednesday (Dec. 17), which is a marketplace of third-party applications that run directly within the ChatGPT interface. The move allows developers to submit apps for review and publication, and users to discover and use those apps without leaving ChatGPT, shifting how digital services and AI interactions can be delivered and monetized. The ChatGPT app store, accessible via the tools menu in ChatGPT or at chatgpt.com/apps, includes integrations that span utilities such as music playback, food ordering, research assistance and more, integrating services from major brands directly into the AI chat experience. Apps are not simple plugins;…

OpenAI reportedly aims to raise as much as $100 billion at a valuation of about $750 billion. The artificial intelligence (AI) startup is in early talks with investors about a funding round, and nothing has been finalized, The Information reported Wednesday (Dec. 17), citing unnamed sources. OpenAI did not immediately reply to PYMNTS’ request for comment. The Wall Street Journal reported Thursday (Dec. 18), citing unnamed sources, that OpenAI is seeking as much as $100 billion in a funding round that could value the company at $830 billion. It was reported Tuesday (Dec. 16) that Amazon is in discussions to invest around $10 billion in OpenAI and…

Visa is on track to offer artificial intelligence-enabled commerce to consumers within months and expects that millions of consumers will be using AI agents to complete purchases by the end of 2026. The company said this Thursday (Dec. 18) while announcing that it and several partners have successfully completed hundreds of agent-initiated transactions. “This holiday season marks the end of an era,” Rubail Birwadker, senior vice president, head of growth products and partnerships at Visa, said in a Thursday press release. “In 2026, AI agents won’t just assist your shopping — they will complete your purchases, powered by Visa’s global scale, standards leadership…