State boosts support: Louisiana lawmakers have increased direct state support for college sports championships, rodeos and other entertainment events to at least $12.1 million, up from $10.4 million. Recent approvals include $2 million for the Hondo Rodeo Fest, $500,000 for college basketball championships and funding for the Independence Bowl, while $8.5 million is earmarked for four other events. The state also moved $25 million into its Major Events Incentive Fund, leaving room for additional event subsidies. Louisiana Illuminator has the full story.
Trillion-dollar milestone: Holiday retail sales are expected to surpass $1 trillion for the first time, growing 4.5% year over year despite inflation and weaker consumer confidence. Much of the increase reflects higher prices, while shoppers are becoming more value conscious through discounts, private-label brands, smaller baskets and more frequent trips. AI is also reshaping holiday shopping, with consumers increasingly using it to research products and compare prices, while buy-now-pay-later spending is expected to reach a record $21.3 billion. CNBC has the full story.
OpenAI accuses Moonshot: OpenAI accused Chinese AI company Moonshot AI of coordinating thousands of attempts to extract hidden reasoning data from its GPT models, with activity peaking at 16,000 requests in July. The allegations come amid broader U.S. concerns that Chinese AI firms are using distillation to replicate capabilities from American models, as competition intensifies from lower-cost rivals such as Moonshot, DeepSeek and Minimax. OpenAI says it shared information about the incident with industry and government partners, while Moonshot and Chinese officials have rejected similar accusations of unfair AI development practices. Bloomberg has the full story.
