Two years after purchasing 10 million shares of Apple then-valued at $1.1 billion — and with numerous incremental additions since — Warren Buffett's Berkshire Hathaway's stake in the company is now worth nearly $50 billion, CNN reports, citing a regulatory filing.
Why it matters: Earlier this week, Apple became the first-ever U.S. company to have its market cap hit $1 trillion. Berkshire's stake in Apple is the largest of its substantial investment portfolio.
Correction: This article has been updated to note that Berkshire purchased stock multiple times after its purchase two years ago.
Amazon has pulled items from its website that showed "white nationalist and neo-Nazi paraphernalia," Vice News reports.
The backdrop: Rep. Keith Ellison (D-MN) criticized Amazon last month, BuzzFeed reports, telling CEO Jeff Bezos he was "alarmed that hate groups can make money by selling propaganda...and that Amazon is able to profit from these transactions."
Multiple experts cited artificial intelligence as a force multiplier amplifying existing threats. Axios Future Editor Steve LeVine explains how AI creates a danger all its own:
For the U.S. and China, AI is the equivalent of the Cold War arms race. The security and political apparatus in both countries view dominating the AI future as both an economic and military imperative.
The Democratic National Committee sent a notice to Democratic candidates advising them to not use phones or devices produced by ZTE or Huawei, which intelligence leaders, including the FBI, NSA, and CIA Director, have labeled a national security threat, CNN reports and a Democratic source confirmed to Axios.
Why it matters: The DNC sent the notice after it learned a Democratic organization was considering buying ZTE phones for staffers, per CNN. Candidates and campaigns typically don’t have a lot of resources to commit to cybersecurity expertise while running tight budgets. Although concerns have been raised about Chinese phone makers, thus far no one has shown any improper use of data on phones from Huawei or ZTE.
Google is in talks with major Chinese companies Tencent and Inspur to bring its cloud business to China, Bloomberg reports.
The big picture: Google is eager to tap into the Chinese market. Partnering with China's domestic champions would lock in powerful allies if Google has to lobby the Chinese government to let it operate in the country.
Apple briefly topped $1 trillion in market cap, becoming the first U.S. company to do so. In and of itself, it's an arbitrary and not terribly meaningful milestone. But Apple's size really does matter.
The bottom line: A trillion dollars in market cap means Apple has both the cash and stock to buy anything it wants. That will be very important if the company decides to venture further into areas like self-driving cars or video content. (This NYT interactive graphic puts $1 trillion in perspective, showing all the things that amount would buy.)
