Elon Musk has never liked Tesla being identified as purely a carmaker — and now he could distance the company even further from its automobile heritage with a deal to invest in his AI startup xAI.

Why it matters: Musk is proposing that Tesla help back xAI, which owns the social media platform X and the ChatGPT competitor Grok.

• Tesla investors will need to approve the deal in a shareholder vote, he said Sunday on X: "It's not up to me. If it was up to me, Tesla would have invested in xAI long ago."

The intrigue: Musk's endorsement of a Tesla investment in xAI comes days after high-profile Tesla bull and Wedbush Securities analyst Dan Ives floated the possibility of a merger (an idea Musk didn't exactly embrace).

• An investment would bring them closer together, though, without the regulatory hassles.

By the numbers: xAI is expected to burn about $13 billion in 2025 as it invests heavily in Grok, Bloomberg reported. The company is pursuing a valuation of up to $200 billion, FT and Reuters reported.

Between the lines: Tesla is not exactly a fountain of cash on its own.

• The company's vehicle sales have been plunging in 2025 amid a backlash to Musk's association with President Trump — but if he's concerned about the drop-off, he's not showing it.
• He's stated repeatedly that the company's future is predicated on autonomy — with all the value in the AI capability and none in actual car production.

Reality check: You can't have self-driving cars without the car part.

What's next: Tesla set its annual meeting in November, where investors will presumably vote on a possible xAI investment.

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U.S. tomato prices will likely rise as the country officially retreats from a long-standing trade agreement with Mexico.

Why it matters: Americans buy a lot of tomatoes, and this tariff, which goes into effect today, will likely hike the cost of everything from salsa to Caprese salad.

State of play: The U.S. Department of Commerce in April announced the termination of a nearly 30-year-old trade agreement between the U.S. and Mexico.

• "It's possible that the price of tomatoes goes up for the short term," Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins told reporters this month.
• But in the longer term, ensuring "that our international partners are being fair and following the rules and ensuring that they're meeting their obligations is paramount."

Zoom in: Consumer prices could jump by about 10%, Timothy Richards, a professor of agribusiness at Arizona State University, told CNN.

• NatureSweet CEO Rodolfo Spielmann told Bloomberg News that, given the company's slim profit margins, "there's no scenario" where the company can "absorb those tariffs."

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"It's not something you can just turn the switch on."