Waymo Targets Corporate Travel, PayPal's BNPL Play, Amazon's Big Settlement
Portfolio News #7
Hi All
Welcome to our brief overview of portfolio news from the past few days.
PayPal: BNPL momentum continues
PayPal announced a two-year agreement where Blue Owl Capital will purchase approximately $7 billion of its U.S. “Pay in 4” Buy Now Pay Later (BNPL) receivables.
Paypal is offloading credit risk from its balance sheet while BNPL momentum continues. BNPL volume was $33 billion in FY24, up 21% YoY and Q2’25 still grew by 20% YoY. Paypal’s distribution network remains a key advantage, with its BNPL solutions available nearly everywhere PayPal is accepted, giving it a significant edge over standalone BNPL providers.
Alphabet: Waymo Expansion and EU Regulatory Pressure
Waymo is launching “Waymo for Business” targeting corporate travel. The new service allows organizations like employers, universities, and event organizers to partner with Waymo to help streamline their transportation needs for employees, students, and guests. This expansion is built on a foundation of rapid growth. During its Q1’25 earnings call, the company reported that it was already safely serving over 0.25 million paid passenger trips each week, a fivefold increase from the prior year.
On another note regulatory challenges persist in Europe for Alphabet. Reports indicate that Google is likely to face a second fine under the EU’s Digital Markets Act in the coming months. The charges are related to allegations that Google favors its own services, such as Google Shopping and Google Flights, over those of its rivals. This follows a recent €2.95 billion fine for similar anti-competitive practices in its ad-tech business.
Amazon Settles FTC Prime Lawsuit
Amazon has agreed to a $2.5 billion settlement to resolve the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) lawsuit accusing it of deceiving customers into signing up for its Prime subscription and intentionally complicating the cancellation process. The agreement, one of the largest in FTC history, includes $1 billion in fines and $1.5 billion in compensation for affected customers.
While the figure is substantial, this settlement is a net positive for the company. It resolves a significant legal challenge and removes the uncertainty that has been an overhang on the stock.
AMD Expands Enterprise AI Push with Cohere
AMD is deepening its collaboration with Cohere, a security-first enterprise AI company. Under the expanded partnership, Cohere’s full suite of AI models will be available on infrastructure powered by AMD Instinct GPUs. In a vote of confidence, AMD will also integrate Cohere’s North platform into its own internal AI portfolio to be used for engineering workloads.
This strategy, albeit at a smaller scale, it mirrors the playbook of Nvidia, which recently announced a landmark letter of intent to invest up to $100 billion in OpenAI. By securing partnerships with top AI developers, chipmakers are looking to lock in key players and build a competitive moat around their hardware ecosystems.
Other Updates
Crocs: Shares rose after the company’s HeyDude brand launched a new marketing campaign featuring actress Sydney Sweeney as the “Director of Dudes”. The move reflects marketing strategy to leverage popular influencers to drive brand awareness and sales.
Semiconductor Policy: The Trump administration is reportedly considering a new policy to accelerate the reshoring of semiconductor manufacturing. The proposal would require chipmakers to match the volume of chips their customers import with domestic production or face significant tariffs. This policy could directly benefit chipmakers with significant U.S. manufacturing capacity, such as Intel.
One last thing, our September deep dive is coming out a bit late, but we expect to release it by the beginning of next week.
That's a wrap. See you soon.