Market Beats | Meta Cuts 8,000 Jobs in Global AI Pivot; Target Sales Post Best Gain in Four Years; Scion and Ares Acquire US Student Housing Portfolio for $910mn; Harvard Faculty Votes to Cap Undergraduate A Grades to Curb Grade Inflation; Pentagon to Reduce US Troops in Europe to Pre-2022 Invasion Levels; OpenAI Prepares Confidential IPO Filing Targeting Fall Market Debut; Fed Minutes Show Rising Concerns Over Potential Rate Hikes

—— Meta Cuts 8,000 Jobs in Global AI Pivot; Target Sales Post Best Gain in Four Years; Scion and Ares Acquire US Student Housing Portfolio for $910mn; Harvard Faculty Votes to Cap Undergraduate A Grades to Curb Grade Inflation; Pentagon to Reduce US Troops in Europe to Pre-2022 Invasion Levels; OpenAI Prepares Confidential IPO Filing Targeting Fall Market Debut; Fed Minutes Show Rising Concerns Over Potential Rate Hikes

1. Meta Cuts 8,000 Jobs in Global AI Pivot

Meta Platforms Inc. is alerting thousands of employees that they’re being laid off, part of a previously announced restructuring aimed at reducing costs while the company invests heavily in artificial intelligence. The company began notifying workers around the world Wednesday morning, starting with employees across Asia, who got the note at 4 a.m. Singapore time. US-based staff are also expected to receive word during their morning, according to an internal memo. The company is planning to cut about 20% of its Irish workforce, or as many as 350 jobs, the Irish Times reported. Dublin serves as Meta’s European headquarters. Representatives for Meta did not respond to a request for comment.

Staff are being encouraged to work from home while the company cuts roughly 8,000 roles globally. This latest round of cuts is expected to hit Meta’s engineering and product teams in particular and additional layoffs could come later in the year, said people familiar with the company’s plans. “Automators like Meta risk no longer being an employer of choice as it’s being revealed that they will cut out the human when the opportunity presents itself,” said Jan-Emmanuel De Neve, professor of economics and behavioral science at the University of Oxford. “Doing so might well lead to short-term cost savings but risks longer-term growth potential by undermining employee wellbeing and engagement.” On Monday, Meta informed staff that some 7,000 workers have also been reassigned to newly formed teams that are focused on AI initiatives, including products and agents.

The company, which has committed well in excess of $100 billion to AI capital expenditures this year, had just under 80,000 employees at the end of March, ahead of the reassignments and layoffs.

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2. Target Sales Post Best Gain in Four Years

Target Corp.’s turnaround bid is gaining traction, with the company posting its best comparable sales growth in four years and boosting its outlook. The retailer that has been struggling to revive growth after a pandemic-fueled boom showed Wednesday that it’s making progress. Comparable sales jumped 5.6% last quarter, the biggest increase since the end of 2021 and triple the gain analysts were expecting. The chain also raised its annual revenue guidance by 2 percentage points to about 4%.

Last quarter was the retailer’s first under new Chief Executive Officer Michael Fiddelke and shows the chain’s strategy, which includes freshening up merchandise and stores and integrating more technology operations, is paying off. Target is looking to win back increasingly selective shoppers amid resurgent concerns about inflation as the conflict in the Middle East boosts gas prices. Competitors such as Walmart Inc. and Costco Wholesale Corp. have been gaining market share with low prices, increased online options and expanded selections. The stock rose about 2% in premarket trading. Investors have been turning more positive on Target’s turnaround prospects.

The shares had gained 30% this year through Tuesday’s close, compared with about a 7% increase for the S&P 500 Index.

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3. Scion and Ares Acquire US Student Housing Portfolio for $910mn

The Scion Group and an Ares Management Corp. fund bought 12 US student-housing properties for roughly $910 million, the first deal for their newly formed partnership. The venture purchased the properties — with a total of 7,578 beds — from Harrison Street Asset Management, according to a statement Wednesday. The sites are near schools including the University of Notre Dame outside of South Bend, Indiana, Ohio State University in Columbus and James Madison University in Harrisonburg, Virginia.

The new partnership will focus on acquiring off-campus buildings that are near top universities with growing enrollments, and in markets where the supply of new housing is limited. Scion, one of the world’s largest owners of off-campus student properties, will be the operating partner. Institutional investors have been drawn to student housing, which is often seen as recession-proof because college enrollment tends to rise during economic downturns. Andrew Holm, head of US diversified equity for Ares Real Estate, said the fund is “well-positioned to unlock value across this portfolio and capitalize on the continued institutionalization of the student housing sector.” Scion, based in Chicago, has been raising money from institutional investors to expand its holdings, which total more than 105,000 beds.

Since 2016, the firm has deployed $10.2 billion, about a third of that in the past two years, according to the statement.

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4. Harvard Faculty Votes to Cap Undergraduate A Grades to Curb Grade Inflation

More than two-thirds of Harvard University faculty voted to cap the proportion of A-grades in undergraduate courses, instituting one of the strongest policies against grade inflation in US higher education in decades. Starting in the fall of 2027, no more than 20% of a class, plus four additional students, can receive an A. Just under 70% of the votes were in favor of the policy in a week-long electronic vote that concluded Tuesday. The proposal has rocked Harvard, where roughly 60% of undergraduate grades were an A in the academic year that ended in mid-2025. A faculty committee proposed the cap in February, arguing that the current system fails to adequately measure student performance. Students overwhelmingly oppose the change, contending it will lead to unnecessary stress and discourage them from pursuing the most challenging majors.

Grade point averages have risen steadily at universities nationwide over the past half-century, a trend that a handful of elite schools have sought and failed to curb. Professors, researchers and even Trump administration officials have expressed optimism that if one of the nation’s most prestigious universities tackles grade inflation, other schools will follow suit. In April, a Yale University committee proposed requiring a mean campus-wide GPA of 3.0. Princeton University and Wellesley College put caps on high grades in the 2000s only to backtrack later in the face of student pushback. Administrators worry that reforming grading in isolation will hurt students’ post-graduation prospects.

They’ve also expressed concern a crackdown will scare away applicants at a time when a looming demographic cliff threatens enrollment.

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5. Pentagon to Reduce US Troops in Europe to Pre-2022 Invasion Levels

The Pentagon said on Tuesday that it would reduce the number of US soldiers stationed in Europe to levels last seen before Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine. The defence department said the decision to reduce the number of brigades on the continent from four to three was “the result of a comprehensive, multi-layered process focused on US force posture in Europe”. It marks the latest move by the Trump administration to pressure European allies to take more responsibility for military defence, although critics warned that it would weaken Nato deterrence against Russia. The announcement comes following a week of confusion after the US abruptly cancelled the planned rotation of 4,000 US troops to Poland, blindsiding officials in Warsaw.

Pentagon spokesperson Sean Parnell on Tuesday said the delayed deployment to Poland was temporary and came as a result of the decision to reduce the overall number of Brigade Combat Teams in Europe. He said the “final disposition” of US forces would be “based on further analysis of US strategic and operational requirements, as well as our allies’ own ability to contribute forces towards Europe’s defence”. The US deployed additional troops to Europe following the Russian annexation of Ukraine’s Crimean peninsula in 2014 and sent more troops after Moscow’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022.

Jim Townsend, deputy assistant secretary of defence for Europe and Nato policy during the Obama administration, said the deployments “are based on our concept of the threat to Europe, and the role the US needed to play in Europe with force structure, to deter the Russians”.

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6. OpenAI Prepares Confidential IPO Filing Targeting Fall Market Debut

OpenAI is preparing to file for an initial public offering in the coming weeks and is targeting a public debut sometime in the fall, according to a person familiar with the plan. The ChatGPT creator is working with Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley to make a confidential IPO filing as soon as Friday, but the exact timing remains uncertain, the person said, asking not to be identified because the information isn’t public. OpenAI said in a statement: “We regularly evaluate a range of strategic options. Our focus remains on execution.”

OpenAI has been laying the groundwork to go public as soon as this year as part of a broader effort to raise more capital and pay for its costly push for more chips, data centers and talent, Bloomberg News has previously reported. Rivals Anthropic PBC and SpaceX are also preparing for listings. SpaceX’s IPO paperwork may be made public as soon as Wednesday. OpenAI eliminated an overhang to its IPO plans earlier this week when a jury shot down Elon Musk’s lawsuit against the company and co-founder Sam Altman. Musk, an early investor in OpenAI, had claimed that the company under Altman’s leadership betrayed its mission to benefit the public by morphing into a for-profit business. A jury ultimately rejected his case, finding that he waited too long to sue the company.

Since the release of ChatGPT, OpenAI has evolved into one of the world’s most valuable and powerful AI companies. In April, the AI model developer completed a deal to raise $122 billion from investors at an $852 billion valuation, marking the company’s largest funding round to date by far.

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7. Fed Minutes Show Rising Concerns Over Potential Rate Hikes

The Trump administration is adding generic medications to its direct-to-consumer drug sales website TrumpRx, and billionaire Mark Cuban is set to attend the White House rollout Monday afternoon, according to people familiar with the matter. The administration has been touting its deals with pharmaceutical companies to reduce their prices for government programs and sell drugs directly to consumers as part of an effort to address healthcare affordability ahead of the midterm elections this fall. A White House official said President Donald Trump would announce an expansion of TrumpRx’s offerings. The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services and Cuban didn’t immediately respond to requests for comment.

Cuban, through his Mark Cuban Cost Plus Drug Company, sells mail-order medications directly to consumers for transparent prices.

Democratic Senator Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts criticized Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. for the TrumpRx platform’s lack of generic options in a hearing last month.

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