What will Nvidia's earnings mean for AI?
We're all waiting to see.
It's World Business Express from the BBC World Service.
I'm Leanna Byrne.
The boss of one of the world's largest logistics firms says global trade turbulence is far from over.
And in Paris, a court stops the auction of a rare calculator.
It's a big day on Wall Street today.
Investors are waiting for the chipmaker NVIDIA.
That's the world's most valuable company to report its latest earnings.
And the reason why this feels like such a big moment is because investors, they're nervous.
For the past week, tech stocks have taken a hit because there's a big question about whether all this spending on AI is actually going to pay off.
Alison Van Diggelen is a journalist who covers tech in Silicon Valley.
Alison, hello.
Hello, Leanne.
Great to join you.
Well, thank you very much for joining us from Silicon Valley, the home of big tech, which makes up more than 40 of NVIDIA's sales.
So what are you hearing on the ground?
Well, in Silicon Valley, there's still a big belief in the transformational potential of AI.
And as long as NVIDIA remains the go-to source of AI chips, the price is justified.
But Jensen has to satisfy everyone and quell all the anxiety in the market this afternoon in Silicon Valley.
There's been a lot of talk about AI bubbles.
What are people saying in Silicon Valley?
Are they worried about it at all?
Well, some are worried.
It depends who you talk to.
But the big picture is the Silicon Valley big tech companies are fighting for dominance in the AI.
It's like a gold rush here once again.
We've got Ross Mould, Investment Director at AJ Bell with us as well.
Hello, Ross.
Ross, what exactly are investors worried about when we're talking about an AI bubble?
Three things.
One, where does the money come from to fund it?
$420 billion was spending this year, $510 billion next year.
Where's the money coming from and will they get a return on that?
Secondly, if they don't get a return on that or the money dries up, will that hit the US economy?
Because AI building on data sensors and chips and diggers and earth movers and cooling systems, is helping the American economy grow.
And third, if both of those go wrong, what does that do to the stock market that's had a fabulous run, sits near record highs but does look quite expensive?
So, hypothetically, if NVIDIA beats expectations, does this quell all this concern?
It will certainly help.
The company's got a happy knack of doing so.
But the stock market, the options market, is kind of looking at what NVIDIA may do.
They're currently pricing in a swing of between up 6%, down 6%.
That's a move of about $250 billion in value.
So on the flip side, what if NVIDIA does not beat expectations?
That would frighten an awful lot of people.
You would perhaps worry about NVIDIA's share price, but also the knock-on effect upon some of its AI competitors and some of its AI supplies as well, even possibly companies who provide the earth-moving equipment that helps get the data centres ready.
Alison, Russ makes a good point about the money behind it all.
Where does it come from and what's being done with it?
Can you just describe how that AI investment is being put to use?
Yes, these companies in this gold rush for AI, they're investing a lot of money.
We're talking, they're anticipating.
Some estimates say 7 trillion of cumulative spending in AI by 2030.
Four companies Amazon Alphabet, Meta and Oracle already spent 81 billion.
They've taken debt to fund their expansion of these AI data centres.
And NVIDIA at the moment has very dominant market power.
But as we've always learned in Silicon Valley, things change.
And NVIDIA, there's so much focus on NVIDIA.
When NVIDIA sneezes, when and if it sneezes, the stock market catches a cold.
And the reason is because it, when it comes to chip making and those AI chips, they're the only person in town.
You know, they're the big dogs, aren't they?
They have a very dominant market power, but there are companies snapping at their heels.
AMD, Intel, Microsoft, Google, they're all making inroads with their in-house chips.
So it's a situation that is not sustainable, but it's a question of when.
When that's going to change.
Alison Van Diggelen, journalist who covers tech in Silicon Valley, thank you so much for joining us.
Ross Mould is still with us.
Now one story that I thought was quite interesting the owner of the discounter TJ Maxx and Marshalls doing very well.
So what is that telling us about the US economy?
It's a good question.
Boss Ernie Herman said that he felt the company was doing well on two fronts.
Firstly, it was providing really good value to its customers, so it was very price competitive.
And secondly, it was sourcing product very well to help it offset the effective tariffs upon its own business and again provide value to its customers.
And it's doing that at a time when it's facing lots of competition from traditional department stores as well as online rivals like say, China's Xian or, they won't say it Amazoncom.
And it can be in bellwether discounters, can't they?
Yeah, very much.
If people do think that times are more difficult, they might spend a little bit less, or they'll try and make their money go further by going to a discounter.
And you look at the University of Michigan's Consumer Confidence Survey in the USA, it's at levels below where it got to during the last six recessions.
So the American consumer is feeling the squeeze from inflation and is worried.
Ross Mould, Investment Director at AJ Bell.
Thank you so much.
European Union court has confirmed that the online retail giant Amazon must comply with the bloc's digital content rules.
The European General Court dismissed Amazon's request to be exempt from the EU's Digital Services Act.
The legislation requires large online platforms, such as media sites, to put firm measures in place to prevent the spread of illegal and harmful content.
Now, the boss of the logistics giant DHL says global trade turbulence is far from over.
The company has seen revenues soften as shipments slow from weaker US-China trade to fewer small parcels heading to America.
CEO Tobias Meyer, who's investing 116 billion in India, told the BBC's Archana Shukla that Asia is still their main growth engine.
The response in Asia has been much more immediate, much more dynamic than the response in the West, including in the United States.
I think in the United States many business leaders were not prepared for this scenario.
But they also have a more complicated equation, a more complicated problem to solve, because these companies already have a global manufacturing footprint and readjusting that footprint isn't that easy.
In Asia, and particularly also in China, there was a clear... understanding we have to diversify.
We cannot rely on a single production out of China.
And that's happening now at a rapid pace.
The back and forth in U.S.-China trade relations, how has that impacted your business and numbers?
It has impacted our customers and thereby us quite profoundly.
So our volumes from China to the US are also down materially.
Our deliveries in the United States are down.
We have months now where we collect more duties and taxes for the US government than we have revenue.
There is a certain decoupling between China and the US particularly, and that is really visible in the trade now.
But I would also say that there's a certain decoupling of the US as a whole, because the These tariffs also make production in the US more costly and thereby harming US exporters.
It's not only the consumers who will pay that price.
Has some of the loss in business between US and China been offset by some of the other countries or trade increasing from, let's say, the Southeast Asia?
We see offsetting factors, but also we see the resiliency of trade.
We see customers looking for new markets.
Vietnam has become a much bigger supplier to the U.S. when it comes to electronics.
India as well, mobile phone manufacturing.
How do you think 2026 is going to be as compared to 2025?
We do not think that this period of volatility and also geopolitical shift is over.
That was Tobias Meyer, CEO of DHL.
Now, we love numbers on World Business Express, so we were quite interested in this story.
A Paris court has halted the auction of La Pascaline, an extremely rare 17th century calculating machine built by Blaise Pascal.
The sale was expected to fetch around £348 billion, but judges suspended the export licence, meaning any buyer would be unable to take it out of France.
Only nine Pascalines still exist and this is the only one in private hands.
And that's it from World Business Express with me, Leanna Byrne.
Thank you so much for listening.
