Where Europeans plan to spend money and on what — an analysis of McKinsey's State of Retail 2024 – Europe report.

Where

📍On average, in 2023, 20-30% of Europeans planned to increase their spending across various retail channels.

📍For non-food multi-brand stores, this figure ranges from 22% (France and Spain) to 28% (Poland).

📍The same figure for brand-owned non-food stores ranges from 22% (France and Spain) to 26% (Poland).

📍Only in Italy do non-food channels outpace all others in terms of forecasted spending growth.

📍In Germany, France, Spain, and Poland, the "other" category leads, mostly consisting of grocery stores.

📍The British stand out by planning to increase spending on online resellers more than on other channels.

What

📍In 2023, European consumers were more likely to plan to reduce their spending over the next three months than to increase it.

📍The share of Europeans looking to save was highest for categories like furniture (47%), consumer electronics (45%), and DIY (42%).

📍They were least inclined to save on pet products (17%), children’s products (18%), and food (19%).

📍The leaders in planned spending growth were children’s products (23%) and travel (19%). In other categories, the figure ranged from 8-11%.

📍Almost across all categories, the spending delta ("plan to increase" minus "plan to reduce") grew by 1-4 percentage points over the year.

📍Exceptions were leisure goods (-2 percentage points) and pet products (no change).

French President Emmanuel Macron has pledged to invest €109 billion in the AI sector over the next five years.

The announcement was made during the opening of the international Artificial Intelligence summit in Paris, the "AI Action Summit." According to Macron, the majority of the funding for new projects, including the construction of data centers, will come from off-budget sources. Among them are expected investments ranging from €30 to €50 billion from the UAE sovereign fund, €20 billion from the Canadian investment fund Brookfield Asset Management, as well as investments from local businesses, including French companies Mistral AI, Iliad, Orange, and Thales.

The French president compared this program to the similar Stargate initiative, in which Trump promised to attract a record $500 billion for building U.S. AI infrastructure. He added that Paris is also considering cooperation with investors from China and India.

How Europeans Save on Non-Grocery and Grocery Categories.

A Look at the Latest Part of the McKinsey Report "State of Retail 2024 – Europe"

Essential Goods

📍This segment, which includes food and pet products, has the lowest percentage of consumers saving (57%).

📍TThe most popular ways to save are changing purchase volumes or packaging formats (31% and 28%, respectively), as well as switching retailers.

📍T"Buy Now, Pay Later" (BNPL) services are not very popular in this segment (3% and 5%).

Partially Non-Essential Goods

📍TThis includes beauty and health products, as well as leisure items. Overall, 61.5% of consumers are willing to save in this segment.

📍TInterestingly, the percentage of "savers" in the beauty and health category is the lowest among those examined (56%), while in the leisure goods category, it's one of the highest (67%).

📍To save on this segment, Europeans are ready to change the volume of their purchases or packaging format, as well as switch retailers. However, the first option is more common in the beauty category, while the second is typical for leisure goods.

Non-Essential Goods

📍TThis category includes furniture, DIY, electronics, sports goods, and fashion. The average willingness to save in this segment is 64.2%.

📍TConsumers are most likely to save on sports goods (70%). This category also shows the clearest preference for the saving method (switching retailers, 36%).

📍TThis strategy is also the most popular across the entire segment. Other common approaches include temporarily refraining from purchases and changing purchase volumes.

📍TInterestingly, switching brands is even less popular in this segment than BNPL. Such services are commonly used only by those purchasing furniture (17%).

Trump's meme coin caused $2 billion in losses for investors.

A total of 813,294 wallets holding the coin are in the red. While traders were losing, Trump was making money. The president's family earned $100 million in commissions alone — they received $1 for every $20 spent by investors. Currently, $ TRUMP is priced at $16, which is 4.5 times less than its peak value.

The global artificial intelligence market is growing at a rapid pace.

While in 2022, the annual growth rate (CAGR) of the AI market in the medium term was estimated at 35-40%, by 2024, forecasts have risen to 60-85%. According to the Bain Technology Report, by 2027, it could reach $1 trillion.

All leading large language models (LLMs) showed a very low percentage of correct answers to test questions. The highest result was 53.17% correct answers, achieved by Qwen2-72B-instruct-q4_0 from the Chinese company Alibaba, while the lowest was 3.7% from Llama 2-13b by the American company Meta.

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Amazon opened an offline store in Milan, Italy.

The digital giant has launched a physical Amazon Parafarmacia & Beauty store. It will feature cosmetics and skincare products from popular brands, as well as over-the-counter medications and dietary supplements.

Amazon has already experimented with brick-and-mortar bookstores, pop-ups and clothing stores. With the launch of Amazon Parafarmacia & Beauty, the company hopes to replicate the category's online success offline.

Telegram users spent more than $5 million on gifts for Valentine's Day Over the past 24 hours, messenger users spent more than $5 million on limited gifts.

So, the most expensive “hearts” at $200 were sold out in just 6 minutes, and 35 thousand “rings” at $20 disappeared from sale within an hour.

It’s worth making a reservation right away: limited gifts in Telegram are not a mass product. Their main target group is young users (especially Generation Alpha) who are active in cryptocurrency, participate in NFT trading, and buy and resell nicknames. For them, gifts are one of the ways to exchange capital and an opportunity to invest it better.

According to the expert, the market is not concentrated in largely extends to Asia, Africa and even Latin America.

Amazon Studio and Reese Witherspoon have completed the casting for the lead role in the prequel series "Elle," based on "Legally Blonde."

The role of the young lawyer Elle Woods will be played by Lexi Mientry.

Channels about the future of the global market.

Keep an eye on the latest updates on Amazon, eBay, AliExpress, and other marketplaces. Want to stay informed about important changes in the global e-commerce market? Interested in the rapid development of artificial intelligence around the world, and betting on the bright future of cryptocurrency?

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Gen Z massively rejecting managerial positions.

Generation Z is increasingly turning down managerial roles in large companies, according to a report by the Financial Times. A survey revealed that young professionals under the age of 27 are no longer eager to take on middle management positions.

Instead, they prefer maintaining a balance between career and personal life and focusing on developing professional skills.

Career success is no longer associated with climbing the corporate ladder. Gen Z observes the burnout faced by older generations and is unwilling to follow the same path.

Young professionals are more inclined to pursue individual career growth, work in horizontal structures, or move into freelancing, where they find greater freedom and more time for "life."

Would you like to become a top manager at Amazon?

Grants for mini-apps transitioning to TON.

Starting from February 21, TON will become the exclusive blockchain platform for Telegram mini-apps.

To support projects transitioning from other blockchains, the TON Foundation has launched a special grant program. It will help teams get everything they need to migrate their mini-apps to TON.

The integration of TON Connect opens up all the advantages of the ecosystem to developers: fast transactions, high scalability, and a wide audience. Additionally, grant recipients can count on technical and marketing support.

Teams with an already functioning Telegram mini-app on another blockchain can apply for the grant. To qualify, they must integrate TON Connect and commit to a full transition to TON.

American fashion has taken a right turn.

Society has grown tired of activist lectures – this is the conclusion drawn by The New York Times, describing the revival of the trend for natural fur coats. Just a few years ago, a celebrity could be "canceled" on social media for publicly wearing fur. Luxury brands began phasing out natural fur starting in the 2000s.

Now, with the cold weather in New York, more and more pop stars and influencers are seen walking in vintage natural fur coats. Rihanna, Kendall Jenner, and Hailey Bieber have all been spotted. And there’s no criticism.

Now, brands have every chance to restore sales of natural fur coats, analysts say.

Crocs brand reports record sales in 2024.

The Crocs brand has announced the best results in its history for the past year. The company’s revenue reached $4.1 billion, which is 4% higher than in 2023. The brand's profit has been growing for the fifth consecutive year, which indicates that Crocs have finally transformed from "ugly shoes" into a fashion trend.

This success is largely linked to global changes in fashion and lifestyle: people increasingly value comfort and convenience, as well as unconventional clothing combinations. Let’s not forget the ugly shoes trend, which only strengthened Crocs’ popularity.

Finally, a huge part of the success can be credited to their clever marketing. Crocs released dozens of cool collaborations – from "Shrek" to Balenciaga – making their clogs truly desirable.

The UAE has topped the ranking of countries with the fastest internet.

Russia, with a speed of 36 Mbps, ranks 87th, between Egypt (38.9 Mbps) and Sri Lanka (35.5 Mbps). The mobile data speed in the UAE is 546 Mbps.

💻The top three countries include Qatar (521.5 Mbps) and Kuwait (314 Mbps). The internet speed ranking was compiled by specialists from Ookla.

Amazon surpasses Walmart in revenue – is this the end of traditional retail?

For the first time in history, Amazon has overtaken Walmart in revenue! In Q4 2024, Walmart reported $180.6 billion in revenue, but it wasn’t enough to maintain its leadership. Amazon posted a record-breaking $187.8 billion, becoming the world’s largest retailer.

This rivalry has been going on for years. Walmart dominated offline retail, while Amazon led in online sales. However, over time, their business models began to overlap, intensifying the competition. Back in 2015, Amazon first surpassed Walmart in market capitalization, and later, according to WSJ, even secretly spied on its competitor.

The weekly audience of ChatGPT has reached 400 million people.

⏮️In December 2024, this figure was 300 million, and in August, it was 200 million.⏭️

A particularly high growth in active users is noticeable in the corporate segment: currently, OpenAI serves 2 million business clients, which is double the number from September.

In 2025, OpenAI has an ambitious goal — to reach 1 billion users. To achieve this, the company plans to release GPT-4.5 and GPT-5 models, as well as continue work on the AI agent Operator and integrate ChatGPT into Apple devices.

Amazon has restocked T-shirts for those who believe in the power of Toncoin.

Jeff Bezos, the founder of Amazon, is influencing the real estate market.

One of the greatest players in the history of American football, Tom Brady, is looking to sell his mansion, the "Billionaire Bunker," for $150 million. This was reported by Bloomberg.

The agency notes that the athlete began considering selling his property on Indian Creek Island in Florida after its value sharply increased following the arrival of billionaire Jeff Bezos, the founder of Amazon.

According to people familiar with the situation, the property at 26 Indian Creek Island Road is being shown to a small group of potential buyers. The recently built home has already received offers over $150 million, three people, who requested to remain anonymous, have reported.

It is noted that negotiations are ongoing, and there is no guarantee that they will lead to a sale.

Alibaba Group has demonstrated the fastest revenue growth in the past year.

The Chinese tech giant, co-founded by Jack Ma, is taking another step toward recovery after years of instability. For the third fiscal quarter, which ended in December, the company increased its net profit by 3.4 times, while its adjusted earnings and revenue surpassed analysts' expectations, according to Bloomberg.

The company reported higher-than-expected revenue growth in its two key divisions: e-commerce and cloud services, which host its AI ventures. This suggests a rebound in Chinese consumer spending from the post-COVID slump and initial success in pushing back competitors such as ByteDance Ltd. and PDD Holdings Inc., which have undermined its market share in recent years.

Alibaba Group Holding plans to invest over $50 billion in cloud and AI infrastructure over the next three years.

According to a company statement, the investment will total at least 380 billion yuan ($53 billion). This will exceed Alibaba’s total investments in these areas over the past decade.

The announced plans demonstrate the company’s focus on growth through AI development and its intention to become a leading global provider of cloud services, the statement noted.

Alibaba revealed its plans to increase investment in AI development last week along with its financial report for the third fiscal quarter, but did not specify the amount of the planned investment at that time.

"The company expects AI to play an increasingly important role in its operations in e-commerce, corporate services, and consumer applications, driving business efficiency, innovation growth, and user engagement," the press release states.

Alibaba's shares fell by 1.6% at the close of trading in Hong Kong on Monday. Over the last 12 months, their value has increased by 83.8%.