September 14, 2025: Rally Appears To Be Broadening

Last week, Dow Jones rose 0.95%, S&P 500 gained 1.6%, and Nasdaq composite was up 2%. The rally appears to be broadening out, even as indices generally slipped Friday on a lower than expected reading of the University of Michigan’s September consumer sentiment survey. Risk appetite stayed firm across IPOs and AI infrastructure plays. Gemini raised US$425M, and opened +32%, on a >20× oversubscribed IPO. Figure rose +44% on a US$787.5M IPO. Klarna was up +15% on its US$1.37B IPO. StubHub set a US$22–25 IPO price range (~US$9B value). Fermi filed to IPO as a REIT to fund a Texas “private grid campus” (1 GW by 2026; up to 11 GW by 2038), after securing US$100M equity and US$250M debt from Macquarie. OpenAI committed US$300B of compute to Oracle marking the largest cloud deal ever, which is tied to the “Stargate” build-out, sending Oracle stock up ~35–40% and doubling YTD. Microsoft inked a US$17.4B multi-year GPU-rental pact with Nebius (through 2031, financing-contingent) and will use Anthropic models for some 365 Copilot features (via AWS). Databricks closed US$1B Series K round at >US$100B valuation, and disclosed US$4B annualized sales (+50% YoY) and US$1B AI ARR. Perplexity secured US$200M at US$20B. Nvidia unveiled Rubin CPX—a first inference-focused GPU (availability end-2026). Apple announced its thinnest iPhone (“iPhone Air” at 5.6 mm), which given its eSIM only architecture may not be available in China. Zoox opened free driverless public rides on the Las Vegas Strip. Netflix will sell inventory via Amazon’s ad tech. Nasdaq proposed enabling tokenized securities trading on a national exchange. SpaceX will buy EchoStar spectrum for US$17B. In Canada, Sophic Client, Plurilock sold CloudCodes assets to Scope for ~US$1.78M (cash + shares).

Sophic Client Plurilock (PLUR-TSXV, PLCKF-OTCQB) announces closing of CloudCodes asset sale to Scope Technologies Corp.

Plurilock Security announced the closing of its previously disclosed asset purchase agreement dated August 20, 2025 with Scope Technologies Corp. (CSE: SCPE) (OTCQB: SCPCF) (“Scope”) for the sale of certain CloudCodes assets (the “Transaction”). Under the terms of the Transaction, Scope acquired Plurilock Security Private Limited and certain assets associated with the CloudCodes business. In exchange, Plurilock received total consideration valued at approximately $1,780,000, consisting of a combination of cash and common shares of Scope. In connection with the Transaction, the Company issued to Canaccord Genuity Corp. 200,000 common shares of the Company at a share price of $0.20 as an advisory fee of $40,000. All of the securities issued in connection with the Transaction will be subject to a hold period under applicable Canadian securities laws of four months and one day from the date of issuance. The Transaction reflects Plurilock’s continued execution of its strategic plan to concentrate on Critical Services, which represent the Company’s primary growth driver. The divestiture also aligns with Plurilock’s focus on serving large enterprise, defense, and public sector clients across North America and allied international markets. https://t.co/JyNUmgbWuQ

LocusX raises $3 million seed round to debug game code with AI.

Montréal-based gaming tech startup LocusX has raised $3 million to fund its artificial intelligence (AI)-powered debugging software for game developers. LocusX is the brainchild of two gaming enthusiasts and the two Montréal venture firms that co-led the round: venture builder Diagram Ventures and entertainment tech-focused Triptyq Capital. The funding closed at the end of July. https://tinyurl.com/2jka9tjx

Crypto exchange Gemini surges 32% after US$425 million IPO.

Gemini, the crypto exchange founded by Cameron and Tyler Winklevoss, jumped 32% in its opening trade after raising US$425 million in an initial public offering, giving it a market value of more than US$4 billion. Gemini, which is listed on the New York Stock Exchange under the ticker GEMI, opened trading at US$37 per share, above its IPO price of US$28. It surged to as high as US$45.90 per share, before closing at US$32 Friday. The company allocated a larger and usual portion of its IPO shares to retail investors, Bloomberg and the Wall Street Journal reported. Founded in 2014, Gemini is one of the oldest crypto exchanges in the U.S. It’s smaller than competitors Coinbase and Kraken. Several crypto stocks, such as blockchain lender Figure Technology and stablecoin issuer Circle, surged after their debuts this year. https://tinyurl.com/5en4pk2d

IPO of Winklevoss-founded crypto exchange Gemini over 20 times oversubscribed.

Gemini Space Station, the cryptocurrency exchange founded by Cameron and Tyler Winklevoss, has drawn over 20 times as many orders for its planned U.S. initial public offering as there are available shares, people familiar with the matter said on Thursday. The strong demand, ahead of the IPO’s pricing later on Thursday, shows investors’ huge appetite for crypto company listings. Gemini and its bankers have stopped taking new orders for shares and, in an unusual move, the IPO proceeds will be capped at US$425 million, the sources said. Any further price increase will instead reduce the number of shares sold, the people added, asking not to be identified as the information is not public. Without the cap, Gemini would have been set to raise as much as US$433 million in the first-time share sale, based on its filings with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. That figure excludes the US$50 million Nasdaq has committed to invest in a private placement at the time of the IPO. The company has already raised the proposed price of the 16.67 million shares being sold to between US$24 and US$26 each, up from a range of US$17 to US$19, due to strong demand. https://tinyurl.com/45ex6tn8

Klarna shares pop in long-awaited IPO.

Shares in Klarna rose 15% on the buy now, pay later lender’s first day of trading on the New York Stock Exchange. The stock closed at US$45.82, above the US$40 initial public offering price, representing a successful but more muted debut than some recent venture-backed IPOs. Shares of design software firm Figma shares tripled on their first day of trade in July, while those of crypto firm Circle rose 170%. Shares in the latter two companies have since pared some of these gains. Klarna raised US$1.37 billion in the IPO, which included a mix of shares sold by the 20-year-old company and its biggest investors, including Sequoia Capital. At the close of trade on Wednesday, Klarna’s market cap stood at roughly US$17.5 billion. At its peak in 2021, Klarna was valued at US$45.6 billion. https://tinyurl.com/3akju5p2

Blockchain-based lender Figure jumps 44% after IPO.

Figure Technology, the blockchain-based lender co-founded by former SoFi CEO Mike Cagney, jumped 44% in its opening trade after raising US$787.5 million in an initial public offering. Figure, listed on Nasdaq under the ticker FIGR, started trading Thursday at US$36 per share, above its IPO price of US$25 apiece, giving it a market value of about US$7.6 billion. Founded in 2018, Figure makes home loans on its blockchain and runs a crypto exchange. Several fintech and crypto companies have seen first-day pops after their IPOs this year. https://tinyurl.com/2evk3sdw

StubHub sets IPO pricing range at US$9 billion valuation.

StubHub set the preliminary pricing for its initial public offeirng at between US$22 and US$25 a share, valuing the company at around US$9 billion, well short of the US$16 billion valuation it had hoped for last year when it was first planning an IPO. Then, StubHub was hoping to be valued in line with its late-2021 valuation of US$16.5 billion, although asset prices have generally fallen sharply since then. While a post-pandemic boom in live events helped drive growth in its business, its growth has slowed sharply. At the same time, however, the IPO market has bounced back in recent weeks, after a spring slowdown affected by the Trump administration’s tariff regime. StubHub is expected to list in a week or so. https://tinyurl.com/mr3zs4tf

Data center site developer Fermi files for Initial Public Offering.

Fermi America, a data center site developer co-founded by former Texas governor Rick Perry, filed Monday for an initial public offering to help raise money for what the startup is calling the “world’s largest private grid campus.” Fermi, which was incorporated this year, said it has leased a 5,263-acre site in Amarillo, Texas, for a development called Project Matador that will have access to 1 gigawatt of power by the end of 2026 and potentially up to 11 gigawatts by 2038. The potential listing is a rare example of a company focusing on the power needs of artificial-intelligence data centers entering the public markets. Several publicly-traded bitcoin mining companies such as TeraWulf are trying to repurpose their power resources and real estate for AI data centers Fermi hasn’t generated any revenue yet. It previously raised a US$100 million round of funding led by the Australian bank Macquarie Group, along with a loan facility of up to US$250 million from Macquarie’s commodities and global markets business. UBS, Cantor Fitzgerald and Mizuho are acting as the lead book-running managers for the planned IPO on the Nasdaq exchange under the ticker FRMI. It will be structured as a real estate investment trust. https://tinyurl.com/ycx5zbcv

GE Vernova to sell Proficy to TPG for US$600 million, shifts focus to grid software.

GE Vernova said on Thursday it will sell its Proficy industrial software unit to private equity firm TPG for US$600 million and reinvest the proceeds in grid software. Proficy, which accounts for about 20% of GE Vernova’s electrification software revenue, helps manufacturers monitor and optimize production. Electrification software revenue in 2024 was US$7.55 billion. The company, spun off from GE last year, has been working to offset rising costs tied to tariffs and inflation. In April, it forecast a US$300 million to US$400 million increase in costs in 2025 and said it planned to raise prices and streamline operations to protect margins. GE Vernova is also investing in its supply chain and in January announced a $600 million upgrade to its U.S. factories over two years to meet rising global electricity demand. https://tinyurl.com/59xbz39h

Microsoft and OpenAI announce tentative deal as startup aims to restructure.

Microsoft and OpenAI have reached a tentative, nonbinding agreement about the two companies’ partnership, the two companies announced on Thursday, as the ChatGPT maker moves to restructure its business so it can eventually go public. The restructuring would turn OpenAI’s stock from profit-sharing units to traditional equity. OpenAI said Thursday that the nonprofit that controls its for-profit arm, which operates ChatGPT, will receive a stake in the restructured entity worth at least US$100 billion, or at least 20% of the current private value of the company. That figure appears to meet some of the demands of advocacy groups that have said the OpenAI nonprofit should have a stake worth at least that much, based in part on arguments that OpenAI co-founder-turned-rival Elon Musk made publicly earlier this year. The tentative agreement between Microsoft and OpenAI suggests the companies are closer to reaching a deal that would allow OpenAI to complete its restructuring, a key part of its plan to raise more money and eventually go public. As OpenAI’s largest investor, Microsoft needed to approve OpenAI’s restructuring. The two companies have been locked in negotiations in recent months over the size of Microsoft’s stake in the restructured startup as well as over how much access it will get to OpenAI’s technology—a source of contention between them. https://tinyurl.com/mkhscnju

Perplexity finalizes US$20 billion-valuation round.

Perplexity, which runs an artificial intelligence-powered search engine, has secured commitments from investors for US$200 million in new funding at a US$20 billion valuation, according to a person with knowledge of the matter. The new capital comes less than two months after the three-year-old startup raised money at a US$18 billion valuation. The frequent but relatively modest financings, at increasingly high valuations, extend a fundraising spree for the San Francisco startup. The firm has raised money once roughly every two months for the past half year, and in total has raised over US$1 billion. AI startups have increasingly raised funding rounds months apart, as investors make unsolicited offers and founders seek capital to underwrite the steep costs of running AI. The startup could use the capital to do acquisitions. Over the last year, it’s acquired a company working on a browser, Sidekick, bought Carbon, a startup whose software lets large language models ingest data from different applications, and hired employees from Rhymes AI, an AI app and model development company. https://tinyurl.com/y9d5fd9t

Databricks reports US$4 billion in annualized sales, rising 50% year over year.

Databricks, an artificial intelligence and database provider, announced it has closed US$1 billion in Series K funding co-led by Andreessen Horowitz, Insight Partners, MGX, Thrive Capital, and WCM Investment Management, at a valuation of more than US$100 billion. For the first time, Databricks also shared details about its AI business, which recently passed US$1 billion in annualized sales. This includes products that let Databricks customers use AI models to query and analyze their data, as well as one for building AI agents that was launched earlier this year. The disclosure suggests that Databricks is well ahead of Snowflake, its main rival, in selling AI products to large companies. Snowflake executives earlier this year set a goal for its AI products to generate US$100 million in annual recurring revenue for its fiscal year ending in January, and the company was just over halfway to that goal at the end of July. Databricks also said it passed US$4 billion in annualized sales in its July quarter, growing 50% year over year, and became cash flow positive over the previous 12 months. Snowflake is forecasting around US$4.4 billion in product revenue for its fiscal year, which typically ends in late January, up 27% from a year earlier. Snowflake has a US$75 billion market capitalization. https://tinyurl.com/4r2ycxau

ASML invests US$1.5 billion in Mistral.

Dutch semiconductor equipment giant ASML has invested US$1.5 billion in French artificial intelligence developer Mistral, valuing it at US$11.7 billion, up from a US$6 billion valuation last year, Reuters reported. ASML will be the startup’s biggest outside shareholder and will take a board seat, the report said. It wasn’t immediately clear how the companies could assist each other, given they have wildly different businesses and technology. Earlier this year, however, Mistral joined a joint venture with UAE-backed MGX, France’s sovereign wealth fund Bpifrance, and Nvidia to construct what is planned to be Europe’s largest AI data center near Paris. And Mistral has discussed developing a cloud service for customers using Nvidia chips, which are produced in Taiwan facilities that use ASML technology. Mistral is at the center of the “sovereign AI” trend, where nations and regions aim to develop their own AI capabilities to reduce dependency on U.S. technology. But Mistral doesn’t appear to have had nearly as much traction in getting businesses to adopt its AI models, relative to its American rivals. The company, founded by former researchers from Meta and Google’s DeepMind, has emphasized its open-source models as a key differentiator from competitors like OpenAI. It isn’t clear how much revenue Misral is generating at the moment, but it has exceeded US$40 million in annualized revenue. It previously raised US$1 billion in capital, and the ASML-led funding round will be US$2 billion in total, the report said. https://tinyurl.com/2vep24a3

CoreWeave starts venture arm offering funding, computing credits.

CoreWeave is starting a venture fund to invest in artificial-intelligence startups, including through what it calls compute-for-equity models. The venture fund will invest in startups building AI models and applications, CoreWeave said Tuesday. The company said it could make traditional venture investments or those where its investment comes in the form of computing credits. CoreWeave’s approach is similar to how large cloud companies like Google and Microsoft have struck deals with AI developers Anthropic and OpenAI through a mix of direct investments and computing credits. Magnetar Capital, CoreWeave’s largest investor before its March initial public offering, last year also started a US$235 million venture fund that offered exclusive access to a cluster of Nvidia chips managed by CoreWeave. Shares in CoreWeave are up about 150% since the IPO, though the stock has fallen by about half from its June peak. https://tinyurl.com/4vyj44ty

OpenAI commits to US$300 billion compute deal with Oracle.

OpenAI has committed to purchasing US$300 billion in computing power to train and run its artificial intelligence models from Oracle, one of the partners to OpenAI’s Stargate data center project, according to The Wall Street Journal. The contract, which spans roughly five years starting in 2027, is the largest cloud deal ever signed. OpenAI and Oracle had previously said that they planned to develop an additional 4.5 gigawatts of data center capacity in the U.S., increasing their earlier agreement by nine times. This means that the Oracle data centers used by OpenAI would consume as much power as Microsoft. Oracle’s CEO Safra Catz said on Wednesday the company added US$317 billion in contracts during its last quarter ending on August 31 but didn’t name the customers. Oracle shares jumped by 35% on Wednesday as a result of the increased contracted revenue. https://tinyurl.com/37k3n2jf

Oracle stock soars 40%.

Oracle stock rocketed as high as 40% above US$335 in Wednesday morning trading, in the wake of the company’s long-range revenue projections that showed its small cloud business growing rapidly through 2030. That growth is thanks to several cloud deals Oracle has struck with companies like OpenAI. As of Wednesday morning, Oracle stock has doubled this year, giving the 48 year old tech company a market capitalization of just under US$945 billion. Oracle chairman and founder Larry Ellison’s 41% stake is worth US$386 billion. Bloomberg reported that Ellison at one point was worth more than Elon Musk, making the Oracle chairman the world’s richest man. https://tinyurl.com/4rzcbuee

SpaceX to buy EchoStar spectrum for US$17 billion.

Elon Musk’s SpaceX is to buy a big chunk of wireless spectrum from beleaguered EchoStar for US$17 billion in cash and stock, a move that advances Musk’s ambitions to launch a satellite-to-cell service. At the same time, The two companies struck a deal under which EchoStar’s cell service Boost Mobile will get access to the next generation of SpaceX’s Starlink direct-to-cell service. SpaceX president Gwynne Shotwell said the deal would allow spaceX to improve the coverage it offers customers anywhere in the world. EchoStar has been struggling under a heavy debt load, difficulties that were exacerbated a few months ago when the Federal Communications Commission said it would investigate whether it was using its satellite to phone spectrum as it was supposed to. The FCC’s inquiry had been sparked by complaints from SpaceX. https://tinyurl.com/57h7bmar

Microsoft signs major GPU deal with Nebius.

Shares of cloud provider Nebius rose more than 40% in after-hours trading Monday after the firm said it signed a multi-year deal to rent out servers with Nvidia graphics processing units to Microsoft. The deal is the latest example of a large technology firm like Microsoft spreading out the risk associated with AI data center investments by letting another firm build and own a costly facility. Microsoft also has long term contracts to rent GPU servers from CoreWeave, though Microsoft still primarily develops its own facilities. Microsoft plans to rent GPUs from a Nebius data center in New Jersey, which will bring GPU clusters online this year and next year. The total contract value of the deal is US$17.4 billion through 2031, as long as Nebius can build its data centers fast enough, the company said. Nebius now plans to use the Microsoft contract to raise debt at better terms, the company said, which is similar to what other competitors have done. TeraWulf last month signed a data center deal involving Google, which is helping it get better financing terms. Nebius said in a filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission that its deal with Microsoft won’t commence until it has raised the debt it needs for the project. When the markets closed Monday, Nebius had a market capitalization of more than US$15 billion. https://tinyurl.com/8238d5at

Microsoft to pay for Anthropic models to power Office 365 Copilot.

Microsoft is planning to use models from OpenAI’s chief rival, Anthropic, to power AI features in its Office 365 software, after previously relying on OpenAI’s models for the AI features. The move reflects how Microsoft is partially shifting to other providers for AI features in the software, known as Copilot, integrated into products like Word, Excel, and PowerPoint. The decision stems from the fact that Anthropic’s latest models, specifically Claude Sonnet 4, performed better than OpenAI’s on complex tasks like automating financial functions in Excel and generating more aesthetically pleasing PowerPoint presentations, according to people involved in the effort. The move also comes amid ongoing negotiations between Microsoft and OpenAI over the startup’s plans to restructure for an eventual IPO. Microsoft will pay for the AI from Amazon Web Services, which hosts Anthropic’s models, to power the products. Microsoft has previously tapped Anthropic to power advanced “agent” features in GitHub Copilot and has been exploring alternatives for its consumer-facing Copilot app, including models from xAI and its own in-house models, dubbed MAI-1. https://tinyurl.com/3v7uk9rn

Nvidia unveils first chip for AI ‘inference’.

Nvidia on Tuesday unveiled a new graphics processing unit designed to power existing artificial intelligence, known as inference workloads. The move signals that Nvidia believes data centers of the future need a specific chip for running AI-powered applications like ChatGPT rather than its general purpose GPU, which companies such as OpenAI and xAI use to handle inference workloads and to train new AI models. Nvidia’s new chip could dampen the efforts of numerous chip rivals such as Google, Amazon, Microsoft, Groq and Cerebras. Those rivals developed inference-focused chips, aiming to exploit the lack of an Nvidia chip for such workloads. OpenAI and Apple also have been developing inference chips with the help of chip designer Broadcom. On stage at the AI Infra Summit in Santa Clara, Nvidia executive Ian Buck said the new GPU, Rubin CPX, is based on the company’s next-generation Rubin chip and would be available at the end of 2026. The CPX chip is better at workloads that require massive amounts of context processing, which can be helpful for software coding and video generation startups, he said. Buck said firms including Cursor, Runway, Fireworks and Together plan to use the upcoming chip. https://tinyurl.com/4x7jwdmx

Apple announces its thinnest iPhone.

Apple is slimming down. At the company’s annual September hardware event, Apple announced its thinnest iPhone ever at 5.6 millimeters—two millimeters slimmer than its regular phones. It also introduced three other iPhone models with proportions similar to its existing family of smartphones–—the iPhone 17, 17 Pro and 17 Pro Max. It appears that Apple is making some tradeoffs for battery life with the iPhone Air’s thinness. The company said it has “all day battery life,” but the most specific figure it provided—40 hours of video playback—requires the iPhone Air to be paired with an external battery pack. Meanwhile, Apple said that the iPhone 17 Pro Max had 39 hours of video playback without any external battery. With the new thin iPhone, Apple is beginning a period of more aggressive design changes to the iPhone. A foldable iPhone is expected next year, according to The Information’s past reporting, and the 20th-anniversary iPhone in 2027 is expected to have a major update of an all-glass design, according to analysts. In a potentially telling move John Ternus, a senior vice president of hardware engineering at Apple, introduced the iPhone Air at Apple’s event. Ternus is considered the most likely candidate to become Apple’s next CEO. Entrusting him to announce the company’s most important product could be an indication that Apple is preparing him to assume a bigger role. https://tinyurl.com/3kmkyj59

Amazon’s Zoox launches to public in Las Vegas.

Amazon’s autonomous ride-hailing company Zoox said Wednesday started to accept rides from members of the public for stops along the casino-lined Las Vegas Strip. Riders can call for a Zoox pick-up on the new Zoox smartphone app. The self-driving cars, which resemble large toaster ovens and don’t have steering wheels, had previously only taken Zoox employees and their families and friends in Las Vegas as passengers. Zoox riders currently do not have to pay as the company awaits regulatory approval. In January it applied for a permit to charge passengers for rides within Nevada. The company said riders can also join the Zoox waitlist for San Francisco. The Las Vegas launch moves Zoox one step closer to competing with Alphabet’s Waymo, which has already launched commercial operations in several cities. While Waymo has a clear lead, other companies are racing to catch up. Also Thursday, Lyft started offering autonomous rides in Atlanta through a partnership with May Mobility. https://tinyurl.com/ycydshs5

Netflix partners with Amazon’s advertising technology.

Netflix struck a deal allowing advertisers to buy Netflix’s ad space through Amazon’s advertising technology platform. Netflix competes with Amazon’s Prime Video for viewers and ad dollars, but the two companies don’t compete in ad tech. The deal highlights Amazon’s ambition to be a central broker for digital ads. The deal follows partnerships struck earlier this summer by Amazon to sell ad space on both Roku and Disney. Netflix also works with other advertising technology companies, like Google, Yahoo and The Trade Desk to sell ad space. Shares of The Trade Desk, Amazon’s closest rival in advertising technology, fell 11% today. https://tinyurl.com/4rydnc3r

Nasdaq makes push to launch trading of tokenized securities.

Nasdaq is working with U.S. regulators to introduce trading of tokenized securities, becoming the latest major financial player on Wall Street to double down on a boom in tokenization amid an easing of crypto regulations under the Trump administration. If approved, the move would mark the first instance of tokenized securities being allowed to trade on a major U.S. stock exchange, and also signify the most ambitious attempt yet by an exchange operator to bring blockchain-based settlement into the national market system. Nasdaq on Monday filed a proposal with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission to tweak its rules to allow for trading of listed stocks and exchange-traded products on its main market in “either traditional digital or tokenized form.” The filing comes days after the SEC unveiled its rulemaking agenda, which included a potential amendment of its rules to allow for crypto to be traded on national securities exchanges and alternative trading systems. Investor demand for tokenized assets is rising globally. Proponents of the crypto industry have argued that tokenization can improve liquidity in the financial system. Coinbase, the largest U.S. crypto exchange, has also previously sought permission from the SEC to offer “tokenized equities” to its customers. Some major global banks, including Bank of America and Citigroup have said they could explore launching tokenized assets, including stablecoins. https://tinyurl.com/nr8kvurt