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The price of bitcoin rose to start the week, edging even closer to its all-time high after the rally took a breather over the weekend.

The flagship cryptocurrency was last higher by 5% at $66,042.60, according to Coin Metrics. Earlier, it rose to as much as $66,332.00, its highest level since November 2021. Ether advanced 1.5% to $3,525.21.

Both coins are coming off their best week in almost a year (bitcoin gained about 21% and ether 16%) but paused their run over the weekend as the market digested two days of steep outflows from the Grayscale Bitcoin ETF that were offset by inflows into other “newborn” bitcoin ETFs.

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Bitcoin is edging toward its all-time high

“With the birth of these nine new ETFs the big moves now tend to take place during the normal trading week rather than the weekends,” said Antoni Trenchev, cofounder of crypto exchange Nexo. “What we’re seeing today … might well be a rerun of early last week when bitcoin surged $10,000 in the space of a couple of days. We’re in that sort of environment when a day or two of sideways consolidation can precede explosive price action thanks to the voracious demand of these new spot ETFs.”

Investors have been extra eager to see bitcoin approach its all-time high. At $66,000 it’s sitting about 4% off its November 2021 intraday record of $68,982.20.

Some analysts have suggested that while it could keep rising in the short term, bitcoin may may cool in the next few weeks, as unrealized profit margins approach extreme levels. Bitcoin’s realized price is sitting at just about $42,700, according to CryptoQuant.

Nevertheless, long-term investors are confident that the combination of increasing demand for bitcoin through the new U.S. exchange-traded funds and a tighter supply expected after the April halving event will push the price of bitcoin to a new all-time high.

Crypto has also been getting a slight bid from the stock market, where the tech-heavy Nasdaq Composite reached an all-time high on Friday, becoming the last of the major stock indexes to hit a record close this year. David Duong, head of institutional research at Coinbase, said that although March could be a month of sideways grinding for bitcoin, the cryptocurrency is benefitting from an AI- and blockchain technology-driven productivity boom he expects is here to stay.

Large-cap cryptocurrency moves Monday were more modest, although prices of smaller coins, particularly meme coins, have swelled. Dogecoin jumped 8%, while Shiba Inu coin surged 18%. Analysts point to their performance as evidence that retail investors, who have been absent for much of the recent crypto rally, are starting to return to the crypto market.

Crypto equities rode the bitcoin wave. Coinbase and Microstrategy rose 6% and 18%, respectively. In the mining group, CleanSpark and Marathon Digital each traded about 6% higher and Riot Platforms added 3%.

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Here’s how to turn off public posting on the Meta AI app

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Here's how to turn off public posting on the Meta AI app

This photo illustration created Jan. 7, 2025, shows an image of Mark Zuckerberg, CEO of Meta, and an image of the Meta logo.

Drew Angerer | Afp | Getty Images

AI generated images of women kissing while mud wrestling and President Donald Trump eating poop are some of the conversations users are unknowingly sharing publicly through Meta’s newly launched AI app.  

The company rolled out the Meta AI app in April, putting it in direct competition with OpenAI’s ChatGPT. But the tool has recently garnered some negative publicity and sparked privacy concerns over some of the wacky — and personal — prompts being shared publicly from user accounts.

Besides the mud wrestlers and Trump eating poop, some of the examples CNBC found include a user prompting Meta’s AI tool to generate photos of the character Hello Kitty “tying a rope in a loop hanging from a barn rafter, standing on a stool.” Another user whose prompt was posted publicly asked Meta AI to send what appears to be a veterinarian bill to another person.

“sir, your home address is listed on there,” a user commented on the photo of the veterinarian bill.

Prompts put into the Meta AI tool appear to show up publicly on the app by default, but users can adjust settings on the app to protect their privacy.

Here’s how to do it:

To start, click on your profile photo on the top right corner of the screen and scroll down to data and privacy. Then head to the “suggesting your prompts on other apps” tab. This should include Facebook and Instagram. Once there, click the toggle feature for the apps that you want to keep your prompts from being shared on.

After, go back to the main data and privacy page and click “manage your information.” Select “make all your public prompts visible only to you” and click the “apply to all” function. You can also delete your prompt history there.

Meta has beefed up its recent bets on AI to improve its offerings to compete against megacap peers and leading AI contenders, such as Google and OpenAI. This week the company invested $14 billion in startup Scale AI and tapped its CEO Alexandr Wang to help lead the company’s AI strategy.

The company did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

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Amazon reorganizes health-care business in latest bid to crack multitrillion-dollar market

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Amazon reorganizes health-care business in latest bid to crack multitrillion-dollar market

A One Medical clinic location is pictured in Emeryville, California on February 16, 2024.

Loren Elliott | The Washington Post | Getty Images

For the better part of a decade, Amazon has been trying to carve it’s way into the U.S. health-care market, through billions of dollars worth of acquisitions, big-name hires and high-profile partnerships. It’s been a slog at times, and the company’s long-term strategy hasn’t always been clear.

Following a series of executive departures, Amazon is now restructuring its health business, telling CNBC that Amazon Health Services will be divided into six new units, with a goal of creating a simpler structure.

As part of the effort, the company has tapped a number of longtime Amazon leaders and elevated some One Medical executives to oversee the divisions. Neil Lindsay, senior vice president of Amazon Health Services told CNBC in an interview that the company has been working on the overhaul for the past several months.

“Our leadership team has been focused on simplifying our structure to move faster and continue to innovate effectively,” Lindsay said in a video chat. “One of the problems we’re trying to solve is the fragmented experience for patients and customers that’s common in healthcare.”

Amazon said it hasn’t conducted broad layoffs as part of the changes.

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The reorganization comes after Amazon lost several senior health leaders in recent months. Dr. Vin Gupta, who joined in 2020 and served as chief medical officer of Amazon Pharmacy, left in February, followed by Trent Green, whose last day as CEO of Amazon’s primary care chain One Medical was in April.

Aaron Martin, vice president of health care at Amazon, announced internally last month that he plans to leave his role. Dr. Sunita Mishra, Amazon’s chief medical officer, also departed in May. 

Mishra and Martin’s departures have not been previously reported, and neither responded to requests for comment. Amazon doesn’t plan on naming a new CEO of One Medical following Green’s departure.

Martin, who lives in Nashville, Tennessee, said in a memo to staffers that he’ll remain at Amazon “for a while” to help with the transition.

“I then plan to take some time off this summer and hang out with my wife and my kids, finally get a cover band going in Nashville, and then possibly do something new,” Martin wrote in the memo, which was shared with CNBC.

Ambitious efforts

Amazon has for years been on a mission to crack the multitrillion-dollar U.S. health-care industry, which is notoriously complex and inefficient.

While it had long served providers and others in health care with its cloud-based technology, Amazon’s first big splash directly into the market came in 2018 with the the acquisition of online pharmacy PillPack for about $750 million. Two years later, it launched its own offering called Amazon Pharmacy.

The company then bought One Medical for $3.9 billion in 2023, among its largest acquisitions ever, giving Amazon access to a chain of brick-and-mortar primary care clinics and a robust membership base.

There have been some major setbacks. The company shuttered its telehealth service, Amazon Care, in 2022. That came a year after it disbanded Haven, the joint health-care venture between Amazon, Berkshire Hathaway and JPMorgan Chase. The announcement of Haven in 2018 sent shockwaves through the medical world, pushing down shares of health-care companies on fears about how the combined muscle of leaders in technology and finance could wring costs out of the system.

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In the areas where Amazon continues to operate, competition is fierce and, in the case of primary care, margins are very slim.

PillPack founders TJ Parker and Elliot Cohen, who left Amazon in 2022, recently launched a new health-care marketplace called General Medicine that will compete with Amazon. Mishra confirmed to STAT News that she advised the nascent startup. Amazon declined to comment on whether Mishra’s involvement with General Medicine was related to her departure. 

Lindsay characterized the recent departures as part of the natural evolution of Amazon’s health business. He added that there’s “no shortage of depth of talent” within his organization.

“We’re a fast-evolving organization because the opportunity is so big,” Lindsay said.

Under its new structure, Amazon Health Services will be focused around the six groups, or what the company calls “pillars.” 

  • One Medical Clinical Care Delivery, led by Dr. Andrew Diamond
  • One Medical Clinical Operations and Performance, led by Suzanne Hansen
  • AHS Strategic Growth and Network Development, led by John Singerling
  • AHS Store, Tech and Marketing, led by Prakash Bulusu
  • AHS Compliance, led by Kim Otte
  • AHS Pharmacy Services, led by John Love

Amazon declined to share financial figures for its health business, but Lindsay said it is seeing “very strong growth” across the offerings.

One Medical went public in 2020, and it was still losing money when it was bought by Amazon. At the end of 2022 in its last quarter as a standalone entity, it reported a net loss of $101.1 million on revenue of $272.4 million.

Since joining Amazon, One Medical has been working to open new offices in states including New Jersey, New York and Ohio. 

Amazon said in January of 2024 that its pharmacy business “doubled the number of customers” it served in the past year, though it didn’t share specific figures. The company is opening pharmacies in 20 new cities this year, and about 45% of U.S. customers will be eligible for same-day medication delivery.

“If we can make one thing a little bit easier for a lot of people, we’ll save them a lot of time, a lot of money, and some lives,” Lindsay said. “And if we stack these changes up over time, it’ll feel like a reinvention.”

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Archer drops as much as 15% on $850 million share sale following Trump air taxi pilot program

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Archer drops as much as 15% on 0 million share sale following Trump air taxi pilot program

Archer Aviation co-founders Brett Adcock (L) and Adam Goldstein (R) unveil the Archer Maker on June 10, 2021 in Hawthorne, California.

Patrick T. Fallon | AFP | Getty Images

Archer Aviation‘s stock dropped as much as 15% on Friday after the air taxi maker said it sold $850 million worth of shares.

The electric vertical takeoff and landing vehicle, or eVTOL, company said Thursday it plans to use the financing to support new infrastructure and the rollout of an artificial intelligence-based aviation software platform. The money will also support its Launch Edition program, including an official partnership to provide air taxi services during the 2028 Olympics in Los Angeles.

Archer said the funding round included the sale of 85 million shares at $10 apiece and gives the company a pro forma liquidity position of roughly $2 billion.

“We now have the strongest balance sheet in the sector and the resources we need to execute both here in the U.S. and abroad,” said founder and CEO Adam Goldstein in a release. “Archer’s future couldn’t be any brighter.”

The stock offering comes after President Donald Trump recently signed an executive order that created a pilot program to support developing and deploying more eVTOL vehicles in the U.S. Shares of both Archer and competitor Joby Aviation rallied this week on the heels of the news.

Demand for eVTOL companies has ballooned in recent years as developers tout the technology’s ability to reduce emissions and cut down traffic congestion. The technology faces numerous regulatory and safety hurdles in the process.

Archer has already partnered with United Airlines to roll out an airport air taxi service. Last month, competitor Joby Aviation said it received the first $250 million from a $500 million contract with carmaker Toyota to support certifying and producing eVTOLs.

Archer is slated to display its Midnight eVTOL aircraft at the Paris Air Show this month. The United Arab Emirates will be the company’s first launch market.

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