Connect with us

Published

on

Kanye West, the superstar rapper who has made several inflammatory and antisemitic comments in recent weeks, has agreed in principle to buy conservative social media platform Parler, the app’s parent company said in a statement Monday.

“In a world where conservative opinions are considered to be controversial we have to make sure we have the right to freely express ourselves,” said West, who now goes by Ye, in a statement released by Parler.

The move comes after Ye was locked out of his Twitter and Instagram accounts for making antisemitic remarks. In one post, Ye played into a long-standing antisemitic conspiracy theory that fellow rapper Sean “Diddy” Combs is being controlled by Jewish people. On Twitter, meanwhile, Ye’s account was restricted after he said he would go “death con 3 on JEWISH PEOPLE.”

A representative for Ye didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment.

Ye’s net worth is reportedly $2 billion. Much of his fortune comes from from his Yeezy sneakers brand and partnerships with Gap and Adidas. However, Ye severed business ties with Gap recently, and Adidas said it’s also reviewing its business relationship with him. JPMorgan Chase also cut ties with the rapper.

Parler is one of several right-wing-friendly platforms to emerge during the Donald Trump era, as the former president’s supporters claim unfair treatment by Twitter and other apps. There’s also Gettr, which is run by former Trump advisor Jason Miller, and Trump’s own app, Truth Social, whose parent company is under federal investigation as it seeks to go public. Conservative-friendly video platform Rumble went public last month.

Parler was swept in controversy last year over the role it played in the Jan. 6, 2021, riots at the Capitol building. That led a slew of tech companies, including Google and Amazon, to blacklist the service, rendering its app and website inaccessible.

In September, however, Google reinstated the app on its Play Store, stating the company modified some of its content moderation policies and enforcement. Apple restored the app on its App Store platform in April 2021.

Parler has sought to reduce its dependence on technologies from other firms by establishing its own cloud infrastructure in-house. The company set up a new parent company in September, called Parlement Technologies, aimed at providing its own cloud service for online business. “The future is uncancelable,” the company said at the time.

Ye and Parler’s parent company expect to finalize the deal before the end of the year, the company said. The terms of the deal include technical support for Parler from its parent company, as well as the use of its private cloud services, according to the Monday announcement.

After Ye’s suspension from Instagram, the rapper turned to Twitter, posting for the first time since 2020. “Look at this Mark How you gone kick me off instagram,” he wrote, referring to Mark Zuckerberg, the CEO of Instagram parent Meta.

Elon Musk, a friend of Ye’s, responded saying: “Welcome back to Twitter, my friend!”

Ye was then locked out of his Twitter account for a violation of its policies, after which Musk tweeted he had talked to Ye and “expressed my concerns about his recent tweet, which I think he took to heart.”

Musk is currently pursuing an acquisition of Twitter. That takeover was revived last week after the Tesla CEO said he would buy the social media platform at the $54.20 a share price they initially agreed on back in April. The billionaire, who calls himself a “free speech absolutist,” has said he wants to make Twitter a “digital town square” that promotes free expression.

Commenting on the agreement Monday, Parlement Technologies CEO George Farmer said it “will change the world, and change the way the world thinks about free speech.”

“Ye is making a groundbreaking move into the free speech media space and will never have to fear being removed from social media again,” Farmer said in a statement. “Once again, Ye proves that he is one step ahead of the legacy media narrative. Parlement will be honored to help him achieve his goals.”

Farmer is married to the American conservative activist Candace Owens, one of Ye’s advocates on social media. He is also the son of Michael Farmer, a British Conservative politician who sits in the upper chamber of the British Parliament.

Continue Reading

Technology

Benioff says he’s ‘inspired’ by Palantir, but takes another jab at its prices

Published

on

By

Benioff says he's 'inspired' by Palantir, but takes another jab at its prices

Salesforce CEO Marc Benioff on what the market is getting wrong about AI

Marc Benioff is keeping an eye on Palantir.

The co-founder and CEO of sales and customer service management software company Salesforce is well aware that investors are betting big on Palantir, which offers data management software to businesses and government agencies.

“Oh my gosh. I am so inspired by that company,” Benioff told CNBC’s Morgan Brennan in a Tuesday interview at Goldman Sachs‘ Communacopia+Technology conference in San Francisco. “I mean, not just because they have 100 times, you know, multiple on their revenue, which I would love to have that too. Maybe it’ll have 1000 times on their revenue soon.”

Salesforce, a component of the Dow Jones Industrial Average, remains 10 times larger than Palantir by revenue, with over $10 billion in revenue during the latest quarter. But Palantir is growing 48%, compared with 10% for Salesforce.

Benioff added that Palantir’s prices are “the most expensive enterprise software I’ve ever seen.”

“Maybe I’m not charging enough,” he said.

Read more CNBC tech news

It wasn’t Benioff’s first time talking about Palantir. Last week, Benioff referenced Palantir’s “extraordinary” prices in an interview with CNBC’s Jim Cramer, saying Salesforce offers a “very competitive product at a much lower cost.”

The next day, TBPN podcast hosts John Coogan and Jordi Hays asked for a response from Alex Karp, Palantir’s co-founder and CEO.

“We are very focused on value creation, and we ask to be modestly compensated for that value,” Karp said.

The companies sometimes compete for government deals, and Benioff touted a recent win over Palantir for a U.S. Army contract.

Palantir started in 2003, four years after Salesforce. But while Salesforce went public in 2004, Palantir arrived on the New York Stock Exchange in 2020.

Palantir’s market capitalization stands at $406 billion, while Salesforce is worth $231 billion. And as one of the most frequently traded stocks on Robinhood, Palantir is popular with retail investors.

Salesforce shares are down 27% this year, the worst performance in large-cap tech.

Stock Chart IconStock chart icon

hide content

Salesforce and Palantir year to date stock chart.

We're seeing an incredible transformation in enterprise, says Salesforce CEO Marc Benioff

Continue Reading

Technology

Gemini, the Winklevoss’ crypto exchange, pops more than 40% in Nasdaq debut

Published

on

By

Gemini, the Winklevoss' crypto exchange, pops more than 40% in Nasdaq debut

Gemini Co-founders Tyler Winklevoss and Cameron Winklevoss attend the company’s IPO at the Nasdaq MarketSite in New York City, U.S., Sept. 12, 2025.

Jeenah Moon | Reuters

Shares of Gemini Space Station soared more than 40% on Thursday after the exchange operator raised $425 million in an initial public offering.

The stock opened at $37.01 on the Nasdaq after its IPO priced at $28. At one point, shares traded as high as $40.71.

The New York-based company priced its IPO late Thursday above this week’s expected range of $24 to $26, and an initial range of between $17 and $19. That valued the company at some $3.3 billion before trading began.

Gemini, which primarily operates as a cryptocurrency exchange, was founded by the Winklevoss brothers in 2014 and held more than $21 billion of assets on its platform as of the end of July. Per its registration with the Securities and Exchange Commission, Gemini posted a net loss of $159 million in 2024, and in the first half of this year, it lost $283 million.

The company also offers a U.S. dollar-backed stablecoin, credit cards with a crypto-back rewards program and a custody service for institutions.

Gemini co-founders Tyler & Cameron Winklevoss: Bitcoin is gold 2.0, can easily go 10x from here

The Winklevoss brothers were among the earliest bitcoin investors and first bitcoin billionaires. They have long held that bitcoin is a superior store of value than gold. On Friday morning, they told CNBC’s “Squawk Box” they see its price reaching $1 million a decade from now.

In 2013, they were the first to apply to launch a bitcoin exchange-traded fund, more than 10 years before the first bitcoin ETFs would eventually be approved. The Securities and Exchange Commission’s rejection of the application, which cited risk of fraud and market manipulation, set the stage for the bitcoin ETF debate in the years to come.

Even in the early days, when bitcoin was notorious for its extreme volatility and anti-establishment roots and shunned by Wall Street, the Winklevoss brothers were outspoken about the need for smart regulation that would establish rules for the crypto-led financial revolution.

Don’t miss these cryptocurrency insights from CNBC Pro:

(Learn the best 2026 strategies from inside the NYSE with Josh Brown and others at CNBC PRO Live. Tickets and info here.)

Continue Reading

Technology

Opendoor board chair Rabois says company is ‘bloated,’ needs to cut 85% of workforce

Published

on

By

Opendoor board chair Rabois says company is 'bloated,' needs to cut 85% of workforce

Opendoor chairman Keith Rabois: We're going to get back to merit and excellence

Opendoor co-founder and newly minted board chair Keith Rabois said remote work and a “bloated” workforce have been a drag on the company’s culture, as he vowed to slash headcount.

“There’s 1,400 employees at Opendoor. I don’t know what most of them do. We don’t need more than 200 of them,” Rabois told CNBC’s “Squawk on the Street” on Friday.

The online real-estate platform on Wednesday appointed former Shopify executive Kaz Nejatian as its new CEO after investor pressure caused his predecessor, Carrie Wheeler, to resign last month. Opendoor also named Rabois as chairman and said Eric Wu, who served as the company’s first CEO before stepping down in 2023, would return to the board.

The announcement sent Opendoor shares soaring 78% on Thursday, before the stock slid more than 12% on Friday. It is still up almost 500% this year, after an army of retail investors pushed up the stock price when hedge fund manager Eric Jackson began touting the company.

Stock Chart IconStock chart icon

hide content

Opendoor year-to-date stock chart.

Opendoor’s business involves using technology to buy and sell homes, pocketing the gains.

Nothing has fundamentally improved for the company since Jackson bought shares of Opendoor in July. Opendoor remains a cash-burning, low-margin business with meager near-term growth prospects.

Rabois said he has a “high level view of the strategy” that’s needed to transform Opendoor, and that the headcount reductions are necessary to resolve the company’s cash burn.

“The culture was broken,” Rabois said. “These people were working remotely. That doesn’t work. This company was founded on the principle of innovation and working together in person. We’re going to return to our roots.”

He added that Opendoor “went down this DEI path,” referring to diversity, equity and inclusion.

“We’re gonna fix all that,” Rabois said.

Don’t miss these insights from CNBC PRO

Continue Reading

Trending