Deloitte, KPMG, PwC, and EY make up the Big Four professional services firms.Emanuele Cremaschi//Getty Images, Craig T Fruchtman/Getty Images, Joan Cros/NurPhoto,, Joan Cros/NurPhoto via Getty Images. AI took hold in the professional services industry in 2025. From who they hire to what they do, the industry is in a moment of transition. This is what Business Insider learned this year about how the Big Four are embracing AI. The Big Four professional services firms are grappling with AI on two fro ...

Anthropic’s Claude AI ran a vending machine at WSJ headquarters for several weeks. It lost hundreds of dollars, bought some crazy stuff and taught us a lot about the future of AI agents. WSJ’s @JoannaStern tested it all out. https://t.co/nnzhMoRQm2 ...

Investor Martin Shkreli, popularly referred to as the “Pharma Bro,” released the traffic data of leading AI websites while highlighting the stark disparities in the usage of popular chatbots. ChatGPT, Gemini Lead The ChargeOn Tuesday, in a post on X, Shkreli said, “55 billion minutes” were spent on leading AI sites last month, while adding that OpenAI’s ChatGPT and Alphabet Inc.’s (NASDAQ:GOOG) Gemini dominated on traffic and engagement, making up 64% and 15% of total user minutes, respectively. Without spe ...

Vi e w p o i n t | 09 Dec 2025 03:00:00 ET │ 15 pages Artificial Intelligence Decoding the 4Q AI correction: Risks, Financing, and Adoption in focus CITI'S TAKE Our conversations with enterprise CIOs, CTOs, and technologists suggest AI adoption is further accelerating as use cases go from pilot to production before year-end. The anticipated release of OpenAI's ChatGPT 5.2 – expected to ship today (The Verge, 12/6/2025) and reportedly shows a significant boost in performance – could reverse AI peers' recent ...

Core Insights - Cloudflare has successfully restored its software services following a minor outage that affected access to cryptocurrency trading platform Coinbase and Anthropic's AI chatbot Claude AI [1] Group 1 - The outage occurred on a Friday, impacting multiple services [1] - Affected companies include Coinbase, a major player in the cryptocurrency exchange market, and Anthropic, known for its AI developments [1]

Despite delivering some seemingly promising quarterly updates, Snowflake fell more than 11% today.After the market closed yesterday, Snowflake (SNOW 11.45%) reported results for the third quarter of its 2026 fiscal year -- a period which ended Oct. 31. Snowflake posted non-GAAP (adjusted) earnings per share of $0.35 on sales of $1.21 billion, beating the average analyst estimate's call for per-share earnings of $0.31 on sales of $1.18 billion. Notably, the company also announced that it had entered into a n ...

Core Insights - Microsoft has entered a significant partnership with Anthropic, positioning itself as a major player in the AI sector for the long term [1] - Anthropic will purchase $30 billion worth of Azure's computing capacity from Microsoft, which will enhance the capabilities of its Claude AI model [2] - The deal is substantial for Microsoft but is not its most critical AI agreement, which remains with OpenAI [2][4] Partnership Details - The agreement allows Anthropic to scale its Claude AI model on Azure, utilizing Nvidia's architecture powered by Grace CPUs and Blackwell and Vera Rubin GPUs [2] - Claude AI's availability on the three largest platforms will provide it with a competitive edge and increase its popularity, especially with the introduction of Claude for Business on Microsoft Foundry [3] Market Position - Microsoft has a market capitalization of $3.5 trillion and has been publicly traded since 1986, making this one of its largest deals [4] - The relationship with OpenAI, established in 2019, is more significant, with Microsoft holding a 27% stake valued at approximately $135 billion [5] Future Commitments - OpenAI is contracted to purchase $250 billion worth of Azure services through 2032, significantly exceeding the $30 billion deal with Anthropic [6] - The recent evolution of the agreement with OpenAI allows Microsoft to independently pursue partnerships in the AI space, enhancing its flexibility [8] Technological Advancements - Microsoft will provide computational resources for both Anthropic's Claude AI and OpenAI's ChatGPT, establishing Azure as a critical cloud ecosystem for AI [9] - The agreements with both companies position Microsoft to leverage advancements in artificial general intelligence (AGI), which could surpass human cognitive capabilities [10] Strategic Implications - These partnerships enable Microsoft to benefit from innovations driven by two leading AI models and offer the flexibility to collaborate more with Anthropic as its offerings evolve [11] - While the OpenAI partnership remains paramount, the Anthropic deal solidifies Microsoft's status as a key player in the AI industry [11]

Core Viewpoint - Anthropic claims to have observed the first documented case of a large-scale AI-assisted cyberattack, where the AI tool Claude was used to automate up to 90% of the hacking process, requiring minimal human intervention [2][3][10]. Group 1: AI in Cybersecurity - The attack involved a highly complex operation where human involvement was limited to about 4-6 critical decision points [2]. - Anthropic emphasizes the significant implications for cybersecurity, suggesting that AI agents can autonomously execute complex tasks over extended periods with little human oversight [2][10]. - However, many experts express skepticism about the actual capabilities of AI in enhancing hacking efficiency, comparing it to existing hacking tools that have been in use for years [7][8]. Group 2: Expert Reactions - Prominent figures in the AI community, such as Yann LeCun, criticize the findings as potentially exaggerated and aimed at regulatory capture, suggesting that the claims are being used to instill fear and push for tighter regulations on open-source models [3][5]. - Security researchers question the validity of Anthropic's claims, noting that the reported success rate of attacks remains low despite the alleged automation [6][7]. - Critics argue that the report lacks essential details and evidence to support its claims, calling it unprofessional and more of a marketing strategy than a credible research document [15][17]. Group 3: Attack Methodology - The report outlines a framework developed by the attackers, utilizing Claude as a central orchestration engine to automate various stages of the attack, including vulnerability scanning and data extraction [10][13]. - The attack process is described as transitioning from human-led target selection to AI-driven operations, with the AI adjusting tasks based on new findings [13]. - Despite the claims of high autonomy, experts highlight that the actual implementation of fully autonomous malware remains a significant challenge, with current AI capabilities not posing a substantial threat compared to traditional methods [12][14].

Group 1 - Google has launched Gemini 3, which shows significant improvements in reasoning and multimodal understanding capabilities, outperforming previous models like GPT-5.1 and Sonnet4.5 in almost all evaluation metrics [1] - Microsoft, NVIDIA, and Anthropic have announced a new strategic partnership, with Anthropic committing to purchase $30 billion in Azure computing capacity and Microsoft investing $5 billion in Anthropic [1] Group 2 - The upgrade of Google Gemini 3 and the collaboration among tech giants may catalyze the overseas computing power industry chain in the A-share market, increasing demand for AI training and reasoning computing power [2] - The investments and computing capacity procurement by Microsoft and NVIDIA are expected to widen the global high-end computing demand gap, benefiting A-share companies involved in overseas computing power support [2] Group 3 - The Artificial Intelligence ETF (159819) tracks the CSI Artificial Intelligence Theme Index, which includes 50 listed companies providing resources, technology, and application support for AI, reflecting the overall performance of AI-related stocks [3] - As of November 19, the Artificial Intelligence ETF (159819) has reached a scale of 23.019 billion yuan, indicating sufficient liquidity [3]

Company Performance - Home Depot shares fell 4% after the company reported disappointing third-quarter earnings and cut its full-year profit outlook [1] - Cloudflare shares declined 3% due to an outage affecting several prominent customers, including social media site X and ChatGPT [2] - Medtronic shares rose 4% after reporting better-than-expected fiscal 2026 second-quarter results and lifting its full-year outlook [4] - Merck stock advanced 4% following positive results from a Phase 2 trial of a heart drug [4] Market Trends - Major U.S. equities indexes, including the Dow Jones Industrial Average and Nasdaq, were down about 1%, with the S&P 500 falling 0.6% amid concerns about an AI bubble [1] - Oil and gold futures slipped, while the yield on the 10-year Treasury note edged lower [5] - Prices for most major cryptocurrencies were higher, with Strategy (MSTR) rebounding roughly 6% along with the price of Bitcoin [4]