*By Michael Teich*
Amazon inked a new partnership with American Express, but don't expect the financial industry to be the next area the tech giant jumps into.
"The thing that people misunderstand is that tech companies don't want to manufacture financial products," said Lex Sokolin, Global Director of Fintech Strategy at Autonomous Research. "It's about making the ecosystem and the platform more powerful, and finance is just a feature inside of that."
American Express announced Tuesday it will launch a co-branded Amazon credit card for small businesses. The move accelerates Amazon's foray into financial products and strengthens its position as a lender. The goal, Sokolin said, is to enable small businesses to finance their activities, getting more products on Amazon's platform, and ultimately driving more commerce.
Plus, the opportunity costs of devoting itself to the financial industry are too high.
"Amazon has tremendous high-growth, super interesting, blue oceans to explore,” he said. "They could be investing in building a mortgage business, or they can build artificial intelligence business."
For the full segment, [click here.](https://cheddar.com/videos/amazon-bolsters-financial-prowess-with-new-credit-card)
Sylvia Jablonski, Co-Founder & CIO of Defiance ETFs, discusses the many challenges markets face in 2022, and how inflation is impacting consumer spending and tech demand.
More declines in big technology stocks pulled major indexes lower on Wall Street, driving the market further into the red on the first week of the year.
Federal Reserve policymakers at a meeting last month said the U.S. job market was nearly at levels healthy enough that the central bank's low-interest rate policies were no longer needed.
Stocks closed lower on Wall Street Wednesday after minutes from the Federal Reserve’s last meeting raised expectations that the central bank will move faster to raise interest rates to fight inflation.
A record 4.5 million American workers quit their jobs in November, a sign of confidence and more evidence that the U.S. job market is bouncing back strongly from last year’s coronavirus recession.
Starbucks says its U.S. workers must be fully vaccinated by Feb. 9 or face a weekly COVID testing requirement
American activists are appealing to Tesla Inc. to close a new showroom in China’s northwestern region of Xinjiang, where officials are accused of abuses against mostly Muslim ethnic minorities.
Slumping technology stocks left the S&P 500 slightly lower on Wall Street Tuesday, even as the Dow Jones Industrial Average of 30 blue-chip companies marked another record high.
AT&T and Verizon said Monday they will delay activating new 5G wireless service for two weeks following a request by Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg, who cited the airline industry’s concern that the service could interfere with systems on planes.
In a case that exposed Silicon Valley’s culture of hubris and hype, Elizabeth Holmes was convicted Monday of duping investors into believing her startup Theranos had developed a revolutionary medical device that could detect a multitude of diseases and conditions from a few drops of blood.
