consumption

Google DeepMind has released the video understanding capabilities of the Gemini intelligent agent, which are now available for the Gemini 3.7 Flash, 3.6 Flash, and 3.5 Flash-Lite models. This feature enhances the efficiency and accuracy of long video analysis by dynamically searching, scanning, and inspecting video clips.Compared to traditional fixed frame rate processing methods, it can reduce token consumption by up to 88%, lower analysis costs by 66%, and improve accuracy by up to 7%. This feature is now available through the Gemini API in Google AI Studio and the Gemini Enterprise Agent Platform, and will be applied in the Gemini app and the YouTube "Ask YouTube" feature in the future.

MiniMax disclosed at its mid-2026 performance meeting that the company's annual recurring revenue (ARR) in August has exceeded $800 million, with second-quarter revenue increasing by 81.8% compared to the first quarter. The token consumption in July has reached 20 times that of January, and the contribution of the B-end business to the overall ARR has exceeded 80%.MiniMax stated that in terms of computing power, the company is one of the first two independent large model companies in the country to establish a large-scale, long-term stable infrastructure system. The infrastructure is now capable of independently supporting the largest training tasks, and the Effective Training Time Ratio (ETTR) has reached 97%.

As of August, the total recharge amount for USDC and USDT related stablecoin cards has reached $13.8 billion, an increase of nearly $10 billion over the past 12 months. Stablecoin cards are shifting USDC and USDT from trading balances to everyday consumption scenarios. USDC currently leads in tracked card spending, while USDT is accelerating its catch-up. The usage paths of the two are different; USDC benefits more from fintech integration and payment infrastructure, while USDT is more active in exchanges, remittances, and emerging markets.On-chain settlements also show a multi-chain distribution, with Base leading at approximately $1.2 billion, followed by Solana at $635 million, Polygon at $544 million, and Optimism at $509 million. Networks such as Arbitrum, Scroll, Ethereum, and Stellar also host considerable activity. Stablecoin cards still rely on traditional payment networks like Visa and Mastercard, with competition shifting focus to custody, foreign exchange costs, cashback, and capital efficiency. Circle has renewed its USDC partnership with Coinbase under the original terms and excluded dividend arrangements.

According to the official announcement, Gate Card has officially launched a new invitation reward mechanism, offering differentiated benefits plans for Gate users and agents, KOL partners. When the invited person meets the card opening conditions and spends a total of 100 USDT within 30 days of successfully opening the card, the inviter can receive a reward of 5 USDT, and the invited person receives a reward of 2 USDT. Among them, the rewards for Gate users are issued in the form of cash vouchers, which can be used for consumption or card recharging, and cannot be exchanged or transferred; rewards for agents and KOL channel partners are issued in the form of points.In terms of consumption Rebate, when the invited person makes a single purchase of ≥ 2 USDT, the inviter can continuously receive consumption Rebate for 12 months. The Gate user referral program enjoys a 0.1% consumption Rebate, while agents and KOL channel programs enjoy higher tier exclusive Rebates and channel rewards. For details, please contact your business manager. Consumption Rebate for Gate users is issued in the form of cash vouchers, while channel and agent rewards are issued in the form of points, with a unified settlement issued every two weeks. Gate Card points are valid for a long time, with a fixed exchange rate of 100 points = 1 USDT, supporting the exchange of stock tokens and various virtual currencies, with a minimum exchange of 50 points per transaction.

Cerebras released its fourth-generation AI inference system CS-4 this week, based on the same 5nm WSE-3 wafer, achieving double the performance by doubling the clock frequency and power consumption. A single CS-4 cabinet accommodates 3 wafers (CS-3 has 2), featuring a modular "backpack" design that simplifies manufacturing and deployment, with a TDP of approximately 125 to 135kW. The CS-4 can provide an inference speed of nearly 4000 tokens/second/user, about twice that of the CS-3, and supports decomposed inference with heterogeneous systems such as AMD and AWS Trainium.Cerebras claims that the CS-4 offers about 2000 times the on-chip memory bandwidth of NVIDIA's Rubin (43PB/s), but the 44GB SRAM capacity remains unchanged, and long-context inference still requires multi-wafer stacking. For example, with the DeepSeek V4 Pro (1.6T parameters), approximately 20 systems are needed for a 1M context window, and about 40 systems are required for 256 concurrent users, corresponding to a CAPEX exceeding 20 million USD. Cerebras is collaborating with clients such as OpenAI and plans to achieve approximately double performance improvements each year, aiming for a 20-fold throughput increase by 2027. The "backpack" cabinet design of the CS-4 will continue into the next-generation "Nexus" platform.

According to a16z crypto, the monthly spending on crypto payment cards has grown from a niche scale to $759 million. These cards allow users to pay with cryptocurrency in all scenarios that support traditional card organizations, with stablecoins converted to local currency at the point of sale, making it no different for merchants than regular card transactions.As of July 31, looking at the spending composition from various card programs, RedotPay has long held the majority share, while EtherFi, KAST, Karta, and others have gradually increased their share since the end of 2025. a16z crypto states that crypto cardholders do not need traditional bank accounts and can deposit stablecoins with the issuer or hold them directly through self-custody. These cards have expanded global users' access to dollar accounts and provided a convenient spending method for stablecoin holders.

According to Jinshi reports, Fed's Schmid stated that the Personal Consumption Expenditures Price Index is the best way to measure inflation.

According to Jinshi reports, the actual personal consumption expenditure month-on-month rate in the United States for June was 0.4%, with the previous value revised from 0.3% to 0.4%.

According to DealRoom, the Web3 integrated consumption platform Beezie announced the completion of a $4 million financing round, with Psalion participating through its early-stage fund Psalion VC Fund III.The platform generates on-chain digital twins of physical goods, enabling programmability, tradability, and cross-scenario combinations. Through gamification mechanisms, it transforms physical asset transactions into interactive consumption experiences. The new funds will be used for global market expansion.

The rotation of hot spots in the US stock market continues, with strong performances from steel, healthcare, and entertainment consumer-related stocks. Data from the Gate platform shows that the top three stocks in terms of gains in the US market are Cleveland-Cliffs Inc. (CLF), up 15.87%; Medpace Holdings (MEDP), up 15.06%; and IMAX Corporation (IMAX), up 11.98%. Among them, CLF's single-day gain is close to 16%, reflecting the increasing attention of market funds on cyclical manufacturing and consumer service-related stocks.

Bloomberg New Energy Finance (BNEF) latest forecast shows that by 2035, electricity consumption by data centers in the United States will account for about 20% of the nation's total electricity consumption, a significant increase from the current level of about 5.9%. The agency has raised its forecast for data center electricity demand in 2035 to 106 GW, which is 36% higher than the 78 GW predicted in April this year. Currently, the operating capacity of data centers in the U.S. is about 40 GW, accounting for approximately 3.5%-4% of the national electricity demand, while under BNEF's baseline scenario, this proportion is expected to reach 8.6% by 2035. The high-growth model from the Electric Power Research Institute (EPRI) indicates that if the combined effects of cryptocurrency mining and AI computing power are taken into account, the upper limit of this proportion also points to 20%.In response to the explosive growth in AI computing power demand, Bitcoin mining companies are actively transforming. Companies like Core Scientific and Riot Platforms have partnered with tech giants such as AWS and Google to convert their existing mining sites into AI data centers. Currently, Bitcoin mining companies have secured about 6 GW of electricity capacity, which is expected to expand to 12 GW by 2027, with some analysts estimating that about 20% of mining companies' computing power capacity will shift towards AI workloads by then. Data from the Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT) shows that data centers now account for about 90% of local large load applications, with many sites originally used for cryptocurrency mining being repurposed as AI computing facilities. This trend is also directly reflected in the capital markets, as Core Scientific has seen a significant rebound in its stock price after emerging from bankruptcy and partnering with AI cloud service provider CoreWeave.

According to Blockworks Research data, on-chain consumption of tokenized collectible card games reached a historic high of $324 million in June 2026, an increase of over five times compared to approximately $50 million in the same period last year, while Bitcoin fell over 20% to a 21-month low, with spot ETFs recording a record outflow of $4.5 billion.Platforms like Collector Crypt and Courtyard store professionally rated physical Pokémon cards in vaults and issue corresponding NFTs. Users receive tokens backed 1:1 by real cards after purchasing random card packs, which can be traded, held, or redeemed for physical cards. According to Global Market Insights data, the global collectible card market size reached $9.2 billion.Pokémon became the best-selling toy brand in the United States in 2025, with sales reaching $2.5 billion, an 87% year-on-year increase. Collector Crypt has tokenized approximately $40 million worth of cards, purchasing about $2 million weekly, with around 30% of users ultimately redeeming for physical cards. According to Dune data, 5% to 8% of NFTs on Courtyard are destroyed weekly to redeem for physical cards.

The Ministry of Commerce and seven other departments officially released the "Implementation Opinions on Accelerating the Development of 'Artificial Intelligence + Consumption'," proposing 17 specific measures around five major areas: commodity consumption, service consumption, business innovation, and promotion guarantees. The aim is to address structural bottlenecks on both the supply and demand sides, promoting the accelerated integration of artificial intelligence technology into households and businesses.The "Opinions" clearly state that in the commodity sector, the supply of smart terminals will be expanded, a new track for humanoid robot consumption will be established, and a "people, vehicles, homes" full-scene interactive ecosystem will be created. It also promotes the deep integration of AI with cutting-edge technologies such as brain-machine interfaces and augmented reality. In the service sector, the focus will be on five major scenarios: home care, elderly care, and cultural tourism, researching the inclusion of smart homes in the "good housing" construction guidelines, and equipping elderly care institutions with smart nursing and rehabilitation robots. Furthermore, the "Opinions" also plan to embed AI technology in retail, e-commerce, and logistics to enhance circulation efficiency, and propose the establishment of "Artificial Intelligence + Consumption" aggregation areas and experience centers, requiring close alignment with existing consumption promotion policies such as "trade-in for new" for digital products, thereby shifting the logic of consumption growth in our country from reliance on external stimuli to gradual empowerment through technology.

Public data shows that since the launch of evoevo, the AI economy project NeoSoul's self-evolving Agent network has accumulated a Token consumption of over 15 billion, with the number of Agents in the network reaching over 200,000 and the number of Agent activities exceeding 1.5 million.The above data reflects to some extent that market attention to AI Agent applications that operate continuously is on the rise. Compared to single-question-and-answer tools, Agents that can operate long-term, record behaviors, and adjust based on feedback are becoming an important direction for the development of AI applications.NeoSoul's AI Agents primarily make judgments and interact around real-world issues, with related activities being recorded on-chain for observing and training their long-term performance.In the future, NeoSoul will continue to build around the real-world operation and behavior recording of Agents, further exploring the direction of the AI Economy.NeoSoul Co-founder Kaelan stated, "The key to the AI Economy is not just how many Agents are created, but whether these Agents can continuously interact in real environments. They need to form judgments, receive feedback, leave records, and accumulate long-term capabilities in the process."

According to Cryptopolitan, Kenya's 2026 Finance Bill proposes a 10% consumption tax on virtual asset service providers, which is double the 5% rate for the gambling industry. The bill also requires crypto companies to pay a one-time licensing fee of 150 million Kenyan Shillings and an annual renewal fee of 2 million Kenyan Shillings before operating in Kenya, and to submit an annual report to the Kenya Revenue Authority containing user and transaction details.Analysts believe this move could force crypto trading platforms and users to relocate their business to countries that are more friendly to cryptocurrencies, undermining Kenya's significance in the African crypto market. Protests led by GenZ have resumed in places like Nairobi, protesting the increased tax burden on digital services, cryptocurrencies, mobile, and financial transactions.

The AI infrastructure platform B.AI has released a history of Credits consumption record optimization and compensation explanation. With the continuous upgrade of the Credits billing system and display dimensions, the platform has recently conducted a comprehensive review of historical consumption records. During this process, it was found that for certain requests made between May 1, 2026, 00:00 and May 3, 2026, 03:00 (SGT), the consumption details displayed on the front end did not fully present all cost components. This was mainly due to the underlying cache-related fees not being displayed on the page, causing users to typically only see input/output token consumption, leading to a misunderstanding of the overall Credits consumption.To address the above issues, the platform has now completed data corrections and realigned with historical records. Additionally, based on more cautious and user-friendly rules, Credits compensation will be automatically issued to affected accounts (valid for 30 days from the date of receipt) without any action required from users. Please pay attention to account balance updates. In the future, B.AI will continue to upgrade the Credits display system to further enhance long-term transparency and user experience.

According to Jinshi reports, Federal Reserve's Goolsbee stated that the Federal Reserve needs to be cautious of current economic behaviors that seem to be based on future "rich returns," such as consumption driven by the wealth effect or local markets overheating due to investments in data centers.

According to Jinshi reports, Federal Reserve Chairman Powell stated that people are still spending, and there has not yet been a noticeable slowdown due to rising gasoline prices.