Tesla revenue jumped on record vehicle deliveries in the second quarter, but the company saw a significant dip in operating profit as it continues to invest heavily in AI and robotics.

📊 Zoom in: Tesla reported Q2 revenue of $28 billion, up 23% year over year.

• Net income was $1.1 billion, down 5% compared to a year ago, and essentially flat with the last three quarters.
• Operating margin fell to just 1.4%, compared to 4.1% a year ago.

🗣️ CEO Elon Musk, in a letter to shareholders, indicated he's "never been more optimistic about the future," but acknowledged the investments could lead to uneven results.

• "Scaling will be non-linear," he wrote. "And we are focused on long-term value creation."

🚕 Zoom in: Tesla began production of its driverless Cybercab in Texas during the quarter. It said the Tesla Semi remains on track for production later this year at a new factory in Nevada.

• 🔋 The company said it's making progress to expand battery pack manufacturing capacity, which it called "the main limiting factor to near-term vehicle production volume increase."
• 🤖 Tesla tore out assembly lines for its discontinued Model S and X cars at its Fremont, California, factory and expects Optimus humanoid robot production to begin there later this year.

📉 The impact: Tesla shares were down over 4% in extended trading. They're down almost 17% since the start of July.

What we're watching: Tesla plans to open its own semiconductor fab plant in Austin, which it says is critical to ensure reliable long-term supply of essential logic and memory chips for its products.

• 📞 Tesla's earnings call for analysts and investors is underway.

Google parent Alphabet reported 82% growth in its cloud business, a closely watched indicator for broader AI industry demand, Axios' Pete Gannon writes.

Why it matters: Google's earnings provide the first real look this earnings season at the state of play in AI.

Zoom in: The growth in cloud revenue is an acceleration from the 63% growth seen in the first quarter.

• CEO Sundar Pichai touted Gemini user growth, with monthly active users reaching 950 million, well above estimates of 920 million.

Yes, but: Another number investors are watching — search — brought in $63.3 billion, up 17% from a year ago, but slightly below Wall Street's expectations.

• And free cash flow turned negative in the quarter, a reflection of the company's massive spending on its AI buildout.
• 📉 Shares took a nosedive in extended trading when Google raised its full-year capex guidance by $15 billion at both ends of its range, to $195 billion–$205 billion.

🇪🇺 Paramount Skydance's $110 billion takeover of Warner Bros. Discovery won conditional approval from the European Union. (CNBC)

📱 Samsung today debuted three new foldable smartphones, as the company looks to solidify its leadership in the space before the expected debut of a foldable iPhone later this year. (Axios)

🌮 Taco Bell is offering its stuffed tortilla Enchirito for $1 as it faces declining U.S. foot traffic and souring consumer confidence following the cyclospora outbreak. (Bloomberg)

Kalshi today launched a new elections data service called its Midterms Hub, where visitors can track political forecasts on the prediction market.

State of play: Initial data gives the Republicans a 56% chance to control the Senate and Democrats an 82% chance to control the House.

The intrigue: The real-time service could pose a threat to conventional pollsters, though they say their services are different from prediction markets.

• 🗣️ "Polling is not getting replaced by prediction markets," Republican pollster Kristen Soltis Anderson said this morning at a Kalshi launch event I attended in D.C.
• "What I do as a pollster — 99.9% of it is not trying to predict. It's not trying to tell you what the future will be. It is trying to tell my clients how to change that future."

💭 Nathan's thought bubble: The symbiosis between polls and prediction markets is inescapable — the former greatly shapes the latter. But the public perception that conventional polls are becoming increasingly unreliable is a serious challenge for the industry.