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Adam Dodd, co-founder of wealth technology app Freetrade, is stepping down as CEO.

Freetrade

LONDON — The boss of U.K. stock trading service Freetrade is stepping down and leaving the company with immediate effect, the company told CNBC exclusively Monday.

Adam Dodd, who co-founded the company with business partners Davide Fioranell and Viktor Nebehaj in 2016, will be replaced by Nebehaj, currently Freetrade’s chief marketing officer, as CEO, pending customary regulatory approvals.

Dodd remains the largest individual shareholder in Freetrade, owning a roughly 12% stake, according to company filings. He won’t be involved in the day-to-day operations of the company from now, however a Freetrade spokesperson said he’ll continue to support the company’s evolution from the “outside.”

‘We almost died so many times it’s hard to count’

Dodd felt it was the right decision to leave the company and have Nebehaj take the reins as it enters the next stage of its growth trajectory, which includes plans to push out new products including bonds and mutual funds, tax wrappers, and its web platform, as well as grow its core profitable U.K. userbase.

The Freetrade logo on a smartphone screen.

Rafael Henrique | Sopa Images | Lightrocket | Getty Images

“When reflecting on the journey from idea to over a million users with billions in assets, it’s getting through the tough times you remember the most,” Dodd said in comments shared with CNBC. “We almost died so many times it’s hard to count.”

“Now, after putting up our first profitable quarter and with the business on a strong sustainable footing, it’s time to hang up my skates. Freetrade is default alive and ready to take on the incumbent platforms in the UK with self-sustaining growth,” Dodd said.

Dodd added: “I’m very happy to say Viktor will be stepping up to take over the helm as CEO. I’ll be doing everything I can to support him and the company from the board. As for me I’m looking forward to getting to know my kids better, annoying my wife on the farm, and finally getting my pilot license.”

Nebehaj, Freetrade’s incoming CEO, applauded Dodds’ eight-year run as CEO and said that “it’s natural that different stages of a company’s growth require different leaders.”

“With our first profitable quarter behind us, I’m excited about the size of the opportunity ahead,” Nebehaj said in a statement. “Our talented and high-quality team is building the right product for our customers.”

Perry Blacher, Freetrade’s board chairman, said that Nebehaj “is ideally placed to lead Freetrade from strength to strength.”

Wild few years

Dodds’ departure follows a wild ride for the company in recent years. Dodds took Freetrade from a scrappy startup in the early days seeking to disrupt the world of wealth management, to a 500-person company with over 1.4 million users.

In 2020, Freetrade was onboarding thousands of users a day as retail trading activity boomed in the wake of the GameStop stock-trading saga, which saw a community of hardcore fans of the U.S. video game retailer drive up the price of the company’s share price.

More recently, it’s been forced to tighten its belt as the reality of a gloomier macroeconomic environment set in. In 2022, Freetrade announced measures to lay off 15% of its workforce as sought to push toward profitability.

The following year, Freetrade raised £2.3 million ($2.9 million) in a crowdfunding round on Crowdcube at a valuation of £225 million — a 65% discount to its earlier £650 million valuation. Freetrade at the time blamed a “different market environment” plagued by higher interest rates and inflation.

More recently, the firm has had news to cheer about. Freetrade reported its first-ever quarter of profit in the three months through March, according to unaudited financial statements shared with CNBC in April. Preliminary revenues hit £6.7 million for the quarter.

Freetrade still generated an annual loss of £8.3 million in 2023, down from the £28.8 million loss it racked up the year prior, while revenues climbed 45% to £21.6 million in the same timeframe.

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Google hires Windsurf CEO Varun Mohan, others in latest AI talent deal

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Google hires Windsurf CEO Varun Mohan, others in latest AI talent deal

Chief executive officer of Google Sundar Pichai.

Marek Antoni Iwanczuk | Sopa Images | Lightrocket | Getty Images

Google on Friday made the latest a splash in the AI talent wars, announcing an agreement to bring in Varun Mohan, co-founder and CEO of artificial intelligence coding startup Windsurf.

As part of the deal, Google will also hire other senior Windsurf research and development employees. Google is not investing in Windsurf, but the search giant will take a nonexclusive license to certain Windsurf technology, according to a person familiar with the matter. Windsurf remains free to license its technology to others.

“We’re excited to welcome some top AI coding talent from Windsurf’s team to Google DeepMind to advance our work in agentic coding,” a Google spokesperson wrote in an email. “We’re excited to continue bringing the benefits of Gemini to software developers everywhere.”

The deal between Google and Windsurf comes after the AI coding startup had been in talks with OpenAI for a $3 billion acquisition deal, CNBC reported in April. OpenAI did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

The move ratchets up the talent war in AI particularly among prominent companies. Meta has made lucrative job offers to several employees at OpenAI in recent weeks. Most notably, the Facebook parent added Scale AI founder Alexandr Wang to lead its AI strategy as part of a $14.3 billion investment into his startup. 

Douglas Chen, another Windsurf co-founder, will be among those joining Google in the deal, Jeff Wang, the startup’s new interim CEO and its head of business for the past two years, wrote in a post on X.

“Most of Windsurf’s world-class team will continue to build the Windsurf product with the goal of maximizing its impact in the enterprise,” Wang wrote.

Windsurf has become more popular this year as an option for so-called vibe coding, which is the process of using new age AI tools to write code. Developers and non-developers have embraced the concept, leading to more revenue for Windsurf and competitors, such as Cursor, which OpenAI also looked at buying. All the interest has led investors to assign higher valuations to the startups.

This isn’t the first time Google has hired select people out of a startup. It did the same with Character.AI last summer. Amazon and Microsoft have also absorbed AI talent in this fashion, with the Adept and Inflection deals, respectively.

Microsoft is pushing an agent mode in its Visual Studio Code editor for vibe coding. In April, Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella said AI is composing as much of 30% of his company’s code.

The Verge reported the Google-Windsurf deal earlier on Friday.

WATCH: Google pushes “AI Mode” on homepage

Google pushes "AI Mode" on homepage

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Nvidia’s Jensen Huang sells more than $36 million in stock, catches Warren Buffett in net worth

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Nvidia's Jensen Huang sells more than  million in stock, catches Warren Buffett in net worth

Jensen Huang, CEO of Nvidia, holds a motherboard as he speaks during the Viva Technology conference dedicated to innovation and startups at Porte de Versailles exhibition center in Paris, France, on June 11, 2025.

Gonzalo Fuentes | Reuters

Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang unloaded roughly $36.4 million worth of stock in the leading artificial intelligence chipmaker, according to a U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission filing.

The sale, which totals 225,000 shares, comes as part of Huang’s previously adopted plan in March to unload up to 6 million shares of Nvidia through the end of the year. He sold his first batch of stock from the agreement in June, equaling about $15 million.

Last year, the tech executive sold about $700 million worth of shares as part of a prearranged plan. Nvidia stock climbed about 1% Friday.

Huang’s net worth has skyrocketed as investors bet on Nvidia’s AI dominance and graphics processing units powering large language models.

The 62-year-old’s wealth has grown by more than a quarter, or about $29 billion, since the start of 2025 alone, based on Bloomberg’s Billionaires Index. His net worth last stood at $143 billion in the index, putting him neck-and-neck with Berkshire Hathaway‘s Warren Buffett at $144 billion.

Shortly after the market opened Friday, Fortune‘s analysis of net worth had Huang ahead of Buffett, with the Nvidia CEO at $143.7 billion and the Oracle of Omaha at $142.1 billion.

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The company has also achieved its own notable milestones this year, as it prospers off the AI boom.

On Wednesday, the Santa Clara, California-based chipmaker became the first company to top a $4 trillion market capitalization, beating out both Microsoft and Apple. The chipmaker closed above that milestone Thursday as CNBC reported that the technology titan met with President Donald Trump.

Brooke Seawell, venture partner at New Enterprise Associates, sold about $24 million worth of Nvidia shares, according to an SEC filing. Seawell has been on the company’s board since 1997, according to the company.

Huang still holds more than 858 million shares of Nvidia, both directly and indirectly, in different partnerships and trusts.

WATCH: Nvidia hits $4 trillion in market cap milestone despite curbs on chip exports

Nvidia hits $4 trillion in market cap milestone despite curbs on chip exports

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Tesla to officially launch in India with planned showroom opening

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Tesla to officially launch in India with planned showroom opening

Elon Musk meets with Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi at Blair House in Washington DC, USA on February 13, 2025.

Anadolu | Anadolu | Getty Images

Tesla will open a showroom in Mumbai, India next week, marking the U.S. electric carmakers first official foray into the country.

The one and a half hour launch event for the Tesla “Experience Center” will take place on July 15 at the Maker Maxity Mall in Bandra Kurla Complex in Mumbai, according to an event invitation seen by CNBC.

Along with the showroom display, which will feature the company’s cars, Tesla is also likely to officially launch direct sales to Indian customers.

The automaker has had its eye on India for a while and now appears to have stepped up efforts to launch locally.

In April, Tesla boss Elon Musk spoke with Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi to discuss collaboration in areas including technology and innovation. That same month, the EV-maker’s finance chief said the company has been “very careful” in trying to figure out when to enter the market.

Tesla has no manufacturing operations in India, even though the country’s government is likely keen for the company to establish a factory. Instead the cars sold in India will need to be imported from Tesla’s other manufacturing locations in places like Shanghai, China, and Berlin, Germany.

As Tesla begins sales in India, it will come up against challenges from long-time Chinese rival BYD, as well as local player Tata Motors.

One potential challenge for Tesla comes by way of India’s import duties on electric vehicles, which stand at around 70%. India has tried to entice investment in the country by offering companies a reduced duty of 15% if they commit to invest $500 million and set up manufacturing locally.

HD Kumaraswamy, India’s minister for heavy industries, told reporters in June that Tesla is “not interested” in manufacturing in the country, according to a Reuters report.

Tesla is looking to recruit roles in Mumbai, job listings posted on LinkedIn . These include advisors working in showrooms, security, vehicle operators to collect data for its Autopilot feature and service technicians.

There are also roles being advertised in the Indian capital of New Delhi, including for store managers. It’s unclear if Tesla is planning to launch a showroom in the city.

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