Big Tech stock buybacks are falling as companies prioritize spending on artificial intelligence, shifting from capital-light approaches to more capital-intensive strategies. Among Alphabet, Microsoft, Meta and Amazon, only Microsoft repurchased shares in the first quarter. Microsoft’s $3.4 billion buyback was the smallest total within the group in nearly a decade, according to data compiled by Bloomberg.

Abu Dhabi-backed AI investor MGX is weighing a multibillion-dollar acquisition of DayOne, which operates a data center in Singapore. The deal would be MGX’s first acquisition in Asia. It would underscore intensifying competition to secure the data center infrastructure needed to support AI growth.

Japan on June 19 outlined a plan to direct 10.5 trillion yen ($65.1 billion) in combined public and private funding into physical artificial intelligence across 17 strategic sectors by fiscal 2040, according to Nikkei Asia. The initiative is intended to address labor shortages tied to Japan’s shrinking workforce, including in manufacturing, logistics, healthcare, and eldercare. It is also the fifth major policy move under Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi’s government within four days.

Microsoft is carving out an unusual role in the U.S.-China AI rivalry by selling OpenAI’s GPT models to major Chinese internet companies through its Azure cloud service. With OpenAI and Anthropic declining to enter China directly, firms such as ByteDance, Ant Group and Tencent can still access their technology via Microsoft. At the same time, some U.S. developers are moving to lower-cost Chinese models such as DeepSeek. Beijing is also rolling out new policies aimed at speeding AI adoption across the broader economy.

A proposal dubbed Root Reborn would reshape how Bittensor validators handle yield by reinvesting subnet proceeds instead of automatically selling them. Under the plan, validators would select baskets of subnets to support, resembling portfolio managers, while stakers could still convert returns back to TAO when they choose. The change would shift subnet economics by replacing persistent sell pressure with reinvestment flows.

Solana’s engineering team released new consensus research that challenges the traditional “leader handoff” design and explores an architecture that does not require each block to reference its immediate parent. In a 10-node test cluster spanning Asia, Europe, and North America, the team demonstrated 10ms slot times with block leaders rotating every 10ms despite cross-region delays exceeding 100ms. The work is positioned as research only and does not change the project’s direction for Constellation, but it shows a potential path to moving beyond the network-delay Δ constraint.

The Trump administration opted not to add Chinese AI startup DeepSeek, memory chipmaker ChangXin Memory Technologies (CXMT), and 100 other companies to the U.S. Commerce Department’s Entity List, which targets entities deemed national security risks. The decision was driven by diplomatic considerations amid tariff- and export control-related friction in talks with Beijing. DeepSeek and CXMT had already cleared an interagency review for listing, but the additions were never published, according to reports.

A new cohort of technology companies is starting to displace Wall Street’s long-standing favorites. The shift comes as the sector absorbs a major IPO, a $60 billion buyout, and a U.S. government order that cut off access to one of the country’s most powerful AI systems. Investors have long rallied around the Magnificent Seven, but attention is increasingly turning to a new “FAB 10” grouping.