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This startup is 'greening' homebuilding

The homebuilding industry is in a race to make its homes environmentally cleaner and more energy efficient. Real estate as a whole is a massive carbon offender. Both the construction and operation of buildings account for 40% of global carbon emissions.

Solar panels and energy-efficient appliances help cut emissions, but more needs to be done to improve building construction. That’s what some prefab homebuilders like Dvele, Clever, and a California-based startup called Aro Homes are doing. Aro’s CEO claims its homes will ultimately be carbon-negative.

“The excess renewable energy that we generate after 16 years, that offsets all the carbon that was used to build the home,” said Carl Gish, CEO of Aro Homes. “We’re not aware of any other home builders in the United States that are building homes as environmentally friendly.”

Gish points to four critical elements: First, Aro claims to use the most sustainable materials possible, like more timber and less concrete. Then the company’s production process focuses on building much of the home offsite, where they can monitor quality control and engineering. The homes incorporate energy-efficient systems and appliances. Each home has solar with a battery backup.

“We’re very focused on using materials in building our homes that have as low carbon footprint as possible, and they need to be practical, they need to be accessible, they need to be affordable, they need to be reliable in the supply chain,” added Gish.

Aro homes aren’t cheap. They build large homes and the latest costs nearly $5 million. Part of that cost is the price of land in California, but it also includes the construction and materials. Investors say, once scaled, they believe Aro can make the homes more affordable.

“We have the ability to go very mass market with this, but I think this first home is really, it’s an engineering statement that demonstrates what’s possible,” said Scott Brady, founding partner at Innovation Endeavors, an investor in Aro. “We can deploy that across a much broader set of geographies and quite frankly, a much broader set of zip codes.”

Aro is backed by Innovation Endeavors, Western Technology Investment Fund and Stanford University dy/dx. It has $21 million in funding to date.

Aro has only built a few homes, but Gish says it will be on track to build 36 homes per year by the end of 2024. The company’s production facility can handle 100 a year. It’s unclear how much consumers will be willing to pay for a carbon-negative home, given how pricey the housing market is right now, and while mortgage rates remain stubbornly high.

CNBC producer Lisa Rizzolo contributed to this piece.

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Alibaba shares rise over 6% after CEO unveils plans to boost AI spending

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Alibaba shares rise over 6% after CEO unveils plans to boost AI spending

Alibaba‘s Hong Kong-listed shares surged on Wednesday to reach their highest point since 2021 after the company said it will invest more in artificial intelligence and rolled out new AI products and updates. 

Shares of the company jumped over 6%, while its total gains year to date rose above 107%. 

The tech giant plans to increase spending on AI models and infrastructure development, on top of the 380 billion yuan ($53 billion) over three years it announced in February, Chief Executive Officer Eddie Wu said Wednesday at Alibaba Cloud’s annual flagship technology conference.

“We are vigorously advancing a three-year, 380 billion [yuan] AI infrastructure initiative with plans to sustain and further increase our investment according to our strategic vision in anticipation of the [artificial superintelligence] era,” Wu said. 

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Alibaba shares surge after CEO unveils plans to boost AI spending

So-called ‘artificial superintelligence’ refers to AI that would hypothetically surpass the power and intelligence of the human brain, with the hypothetical benchmark becoming a growing focus of major AI companies. 

Alibaba also officially unveiled the latest version of its Qwen large language models — the Qwen3-Max — on Wednesday, along with a series of other updates to its suite of AI product offerings. 

Wu highlighted that Alibaba Cloud is strategically positioned as a “full-stack AI service provider,” delivering the computing power required for training and deploying large AI models on the cloud through its own data centers.

“The cumulative investment in global AI in the next five years will exceed $4 trillion, and this is the largest investment in computing power and research and development in history,” he added.

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Tether reportedly seeks lofty $500 billion valuation in capital raise

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Tether reportedly seeks lofty 0 billion valuation in capital raise

Venezuelan Bolivar and U.S. Dollar banknotes and representations of cryptocurrency Tether are seen in this illustration taken Sept. 8, 2025.

Dado Ruvic | Array

Tether, the issuer of the largest stablecoin, is planning to raise as much as $20 billion in a deal that could put the crypto company’s value on par with OpenAI, according to a report from Bloomberg News.

The crypto company is looking to raise between $15 billion and $20 billion in exchange for a roughly 3% stake through a private placement, the report said, citing two individuals familiar with the matter. The transaction would involve new equity rather than existing investors selling their stakes, the people told the news service.

The report said that one person close to the matter warned that the talks are in an early stage, which means that the eventual details, including the size of the offering, could change.

However, the deal could ultimately value Tether at around $500 billion, according to the report. That would mean the crypto giant’s valuation would rival some of the world’s biggest private companies, including SpaceX and OpenAI. OpenAI’s fundraising round earlier this year valued the tech company at $300 billion.

Tether, which was once accused of being a criminal’s “go-to cryptocurrency,” has been furthering its plans to return to the U.S. in recent months, given President Donald Trump’s pro-crypto stance. The company earlier this month named a CEO for its U.S. business and launched a new token for businesses and institutions in the U.S. called USAT, which will be regulated in the U.S. under the GENIUS Act.

Stablecoin USD Tether (USDT) is pegged to the U.S. dollar with a market cap that recently surpassed $172 billion. In second place is Tether rival Circle’s USDC stablecoin, which is worth about $74 billion.

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Micron beats on earnings as company sales rise 46% on AI boom

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Micron beats on earnings as company sales rise 46% on AI boom

A person walks by a sign for Micron Technology headquarters in San Jose, California, on June 25, 2025.

Justin Sullivan | Getty Images

Micron reported better-than-expected earnings and revenue on Tuesday as well as a robust forecast for the current quarter.

The stock rose in extended trading.

Here’s how the company did in comparison with the LSEG consensus:

  • Earnings per share: $3.03, adjusted, vs. $2.86 expected
  • Revenue: $11.32 billion vs. $11.22 billion expected

Micron said revenue in the current period, its fiscal first quarter, will be about $12.5 billion, versus the $11.94 billion average analyst estimate per LSEG.

The company said it had $3.2 billion, or $2.83 per share in net income, versus $887 million, or 79 cents in the year-ago period.

Micron shares have nearly doubled so far in 2025. The company makes memory and storage, which are important components for computers. Micron has been one of the winners of the artificial intelligence boom. That’s because high-end AI chips like those made by Nvidia require increasing amounts of high-tech memory called high-bandwidth memory, which Micron makes.

“As the only U.S.-based memory manufacturer, Micron is uniquely positioned to capitalize on the AI opportunity ahead,” Micron CEO Sanjay Mehrotra said in a statement.

Overall company revenue rose 46% on a year-over-year basis during the quarter.

Micron’s largest unit, which sells memory for cloud providers, reported $4.54 billion in sales during the quarter, more than tripling on a year-over-year basis.

However, the company’s core data center business unit saw sales decline 22% on an annual basis to $1.57 billion in revenue.

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