skyrocketed

In 2022, the gas crisis skyrocketed the price of electricity in Spain. In 2026 we have a “green shield” but also a serious problem

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Just when in Spain we began to breathe a sigh of relief, convinced that we had overcome the inflationary trauma of 2022 “after cutting energy ties” with Russia, history repeats itself. This week a “black Monday” began that has shaken international markets. This time the epicenter is not in eastern Europe, but in the Persian Gulf, after the recent attacks that have been forced to paralyze QatarEnergy facilities. The impact on our country has been devastating. According to data collected in OMIEthe price of electricity in the wholesale market has jumped 60% in just 24 hours, climbing to 90.14 euros per megawatt hour (MWh). To put it in perspective, this represents a 1,300% increase in price compared to what we paid just a month ago. The President of the Government, Pedro Sánchez, has already warned that We must prepare for a “long war” with serious global economic consequences. And the fear is already palpable in the street with the long lines that yesterday we observed of drivers trying to fill their tank at gas stations low cost before prices continue to rise. If the gas goes up, why does the electricity go up? To understand why a conflict thousands of kilometers away makes our electricity more expensive almost instantly, you have to look at how our system works. As explained The Confidential in a very didactic way: the European electricity market is “marginalist”. This means that the most expensive technology that needs to be used to cover the demand of a specific day is the one that sets the final price of all energy. If the sun or wind is not enough and the gas plants have to be turned on, all electricity is paid for at the price of gas. And the gas, right now, is trapped in a war funnel. As we have already explained these days20% of the liquefied natural gas (LNG) and 25% of the world’s oil transit through the Strait of Hormuz (the epicenter of the current tension). Any threat of a blockade in that area generates a domino effect that triggers reference prices in Europe. The energy expert Joaquín Coronado explained in LinkedIn that this panic is already real: The prices of electricity futures for the rest of 2026 have suddenly risen by 24%. As he himself points out, “only the price of gas has changed,” but that is enough to drag down the entire system. The hit in the pocket. All this macroeconomics lands directly in the bank account of citizens. As pointed out The Countrythere are more than 11 million users in Spain who have regulated rates (the PVPC for electricity and the TUR for gas) who will notice this increase almost immediately, since their contracts reflect the daily fluctuations of the market. The calculations about what this crisis is going to cost us are already on the table: The OCU, in statements to The Newspaperestimates that if these prices are maintained, the average electricity bill with a regulated rate will jump from the 62 euros we paid in February to around 82 euros in March. An increase of 30% in a single month. A platform report Roams figures the monthly impact about 12 euros extra for electricity (17% more) and increases of up to 18% on the gas bill. The worst scenario is drawn the comparator Selectra: If the conflict drags on and we return to the panic levels of 2022, the electricity bill could skyrocket by 200%. But energy is just the first domino. Financial Times collect warnings from the chief economist of the European Central Bank (ECB), who already assumes a short-term rebound in general inflation. As oil rises, transportation rises: from fuel at the pump (gas stations already assume extra costs of 12 cents per liter) to maritime freight of goods and plane tickets, which on some routes to Asia have quadrupled in price. So, are we the same as in 2022? The good news is that we are not exactly at the same starting point as when the Ukrainian war broke out. As analyzed elDiario.esSpain today has three “mattresses” that cushion the first impact: the arrival of spring (which reduces the use of heating), some reservoirs 83% full (which allow generate a lot of hydroelectric energy cheap) and an electric mix where more than 50% of energy is already renewable. Furthermore, the PVPC formula was recently renovated so that it does not depend only on the daily market, softening the extreme peaks a little. The bad news is that we have exchanged one problem for another. To stop depending on Russia, we throw ourselves into the arms of the United States. As the economist José Carlos Díez warns in the chain Vibe Zero44% of the gas we consume today comes from the US. This places us in a position of extreme vulnerability to the new geopolitical “black swan”: the anger of Donald Trump. The refusal of the Spanish Government to give up the military bases of Rota and Morón for the offensive against Iran has caused Trump to threaten to cut off all trade with Spain. If the United States turns off the tap on LNG ships, José Carlos Díez warnsSpain does not have the physical capacity or infrastructure to replace a supplier that gives us almost half of our gas from one day to the next. The social shield and our pending duties. Faced with the threat of the crisis becoming entrenched, the Government is already moving. According to Expansion, If the conflict lasts more than four weeks, Pedro Sánchez’s Executive has on the table reactivating the “social shield” of previous crises: reductions in VAT on electricity, fuel discounts and direct aid. However, fiscal patches do not hide the underlying problems. In Xataka We have put our finger on two great absurdities of our system. On the one hand, we are an “energy island” since we have seven regasification plants capable of receiving ships from all over the world and helping Europe, but we do … Read more

The number of new apps coming to the App Store has skyrocketed. We have a culprit: “vibe coding”

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The arrival of tools based on generative artificial intelligence has caused a real explosion in mobile application stores, especially since we have development environments with AI that allow us to create and deploy applications without needing to know programming. According to data from venture capital fund Andreessen Horowitz (a16z), new apps launched in the iOS App Store in the United States increased 60% year-on-year in December, after remaining practically stagnant for the previous three years. The accumulated year-on-year growth in the last twelve months reaches 24%. The person responsible has a name: the “vibe coding“, that way of programming in which AI does much of the work. What is happening. 2025 has been the year in which “sensation programming” has exploded. And it is that in environments of ‘agentic programming‘ or vibe coding, just explain to an AI tool what application you need and the machine takes care of writing the code. Platforms like CursorBolt, Google AI StudioClaude Code or V0 have democratized app creation to the point that anyone with an idea can turn it into a working prototype without writing a single line of code. This opens many doors, as thousands of new developers without technical training are publishing applications in stores. That’s also a problem. Going back to 2008. As points out a16z, the situation evokes the early days of the iPhonewhen Apple launched its SDK and in a matter of months went from 500 applications to downloads that exceeded 1,000 million. That ecosystem ended up generating hundreds of billions of dollars in revenue. Here the phenomenon is even more overwhelming, since the creation of applications is no longer ‘limited’ to experienced developers, which means that in an afternoon we can create any simple app, as long as we know what to ask of the AI. Image: a16z The problem. Things are clear: you will not be able to create a complex application in one sentence. And now he told us Miguel Ángel Durán, a software engineer known as midudev, in March of last year: “don’t think that just saying something without knowing anything about programming is going to give you the next Airbnb.” As my colleague Javier Pastor mentioned some time ago, the case of Leoa user who created an entire SaaS platform with vibe coding and even got paying customers, perfectly illustrates the risks, since two days after bragging about his achievement, he had to ask for help because his app displayed public API keys, had an easy-to-jump paywall, and crashed his database due to basic programming errors. Quality matters. “You can do very basic things. We have tried Cursor, Bolt, etc., and you reach a level that one may think is advanced, but in reality what usually happens is that they are cloning a Github repository and changing its colors,” we say. counted Some time ago Daniel Ávila, co-founder of CodeGPT. There is a flood of low-quality apps, much more than before, since now many more inexperienced people can easily publish them in any app store. And the problem is that many of these applications do not even reach the prototype level, being unfinished products that work superficially and then end up accumulating all kinds of technical errors. Even worse if the app has a paywall. Between optimism and caution. “Vibe coding is super interesting to extend the prototyping of ideas and empower people,” we say. explained last year Nerea Luis, doctor in computer science. But he also recognizes that “it has risks” because completing these projects requires knowledge that neither the user nor the AI ​​possess. On the other hand, Omar Pera, Chief Product Officer of Freepik, was more optimistic: “vibe coding turns top engineers into 2x or 3x engineers.” Does it democratize access to application development? Yes, of course. The problem comes when the AI-generated application of someone without experience goes from a project to learn, as a hobby, or as an app development for one’s own use, to a project that encompasses more ambition and seeks to attract many clients. Cover image | James Yarema In Xataka | We believed that the AI ​​talent war is about engineers and developers. Actually, it’s about plumbers and electricians.

It just went public and its value has skyrocketed by 688%

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A few days ago we said that the Chinese company Moore Threads Had an Amazing Stock Market Debut. Today history repeats itself with Meta X, a GPU manufacturer and another of the companies that wants to hold the title of “the Chinese NVIDIA.” If Moore Threads already surprised by shooting up 500% in the stock market, MetaX has just said “hold my cap.” MetaX goes public. We have talked about the company in the past and today they are in the news because, as we said, they have gone public following in the footsteps of Moore Threads. The market response has seen its share price skyrocket from 104.66 yuan to a whopping 824.50 yuan, an increase of 688% that has raised its valuation to 280 billion yuan, almost $40 billion. According to South China Morning Postis the third most successful Star Market debut so far this year. Why is it important. The market reaction to companies such as MetaX or previously Moore Threads highlights the interest in creating domestic alternatives to NVIDIA chips. Furthermore, it happens at the moment when The US has given permission for NVIDIA to sell its H200 chips. Although there are companies that prefer American chipsthe appetite for creating competitive alternatives is fierce. MetaX. It was founded just five years ago by three former AMD employees, including Chen Weiliang, the company’s current CEO. Its main product is GPUs intended for training and executing AI models. Just like NVIDIA, MetaX operates under the ‘fable’ modelthat is, they do not have factories and what they do is design the GPUs from their headquarters in Shanghai, so that they are manufactured in third-party plants such as TSMC’s in Taiwan. Compatibility. Its first GPU intended for AI training, the C500, was launched in 2023 and stood out for its compatibility with CUDA, NVIDIA’s programming platform. This allows them to run existing software without having to rewrite the codeis the same path that Moore Threads took with its own GPUs. The new model, the C600, is about to enter mass production and the C700 is already in the development phase. They also have the N line, which are more basic chips for inference and video processing. Power. They count in Nikkei Asia that MetaX has recognized that its technology is still behind what NVIDIA offers, but by how much? The C500 GPU offers 15 TFLOPS of power, which is about 75% of the power of the NVIDIA A100. In the case of the N100, it offers approximately 50% power of the NVIDIA A30. It is far behind the American giant, but that has not stopped investors. A big ‘but’. Not everything is so pretty. MetaX is in the same situation as many AI companies: it is not yet generating revenue. So far this year they have invoiced 1,230 million yuan, a figure that is five times that of 2024, but with losses of 345 million. Moore Threads is in a similar situation and despite its big IPO, it warned investors that its chips have not yet generated revenue, which caused the share price to drop 20%. In the end it seems that the high expectations about the AI ​​boom are not just an American thing. Image | MetaX In Xataka | Moore Threads is the real NVIDIA of China. So much so that the US considers it a threat

The nougat promised them happiness in their search for impossible flavors. Until almonds and eggs skyrocketed in price

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If you like to celebrate Christmas with nougat, bad news: this year it will be your turn scratch your pocket more. Quite a bit more, in fact. It doesn’t matter if you prefer soft or hard bars, you love chocolate, you have a favorite manufacturer or you don’t mind trying the white label of your supermarket. You will almost certainly have to pay more. This is concluded by several studies of Facua and the OCUwhich show that Christmas sweets are not immune to the ups and downs of the market. Although it is not the general trend, in their reports they warn of some specific cases in which prices have skyrocketed. above 50%threatening to sour one of the great pleasures of the holidays. The sweet, less sweet. There is no Christmas without nougat, but this year it will be much more expensive to bring it to the table. It reflects it clearly a recent report of the OCU that warns that, on average, the classic almond nougat has become more expensive by 16%. To be more precise, the organization detected an increase of 15.8% in the price of hard tablets and 16.1% in soft tablets. The variants that dispense with added sugars also increased (although to a lesser extent), in which honey or sugar is replaced by sweeteners: in those cases the price has increased, although somewhat less, by 13.6%. One piece of information: €23/kg. The calculations start from an OCU studywhich has dedicated itself to analyzing the prices of more than a hundred nougats. The study focused specifically on the most classic varieties, the almonds, both Alicante (hard) and Jijona (soft). Then their technicians dedicated themselves to purchasing the prices of each tablet with the records they stored from 2024. With the new prices, the average kilo of nougat is in €23/kgalthough if we talk about “brand nougat” that indicator rises to €33/kg. Same photo, different details. Although the report shows a general increase in price, the rise has not been equally intense in all tablets. It influences (a lot) what brand we talk about. The best ones are white label nougat, those sold under the distributor’s labels. In that case the increase has been close to 9.4%. It is a considerable increase, but it pales when compared to the 24.3% increase in the average price of manufacturer brand nougat. Within this category, notable differences are also seen depending on the company and product. Can it go further? Yeah. According to the OCUthe nougats from El Almendro’s “Own Harvest” line cost 37% more than in 2024. The cake, however, goes to El Lobo, which has products in its catalog that cost 57% more today. The organization recognizes in any case that this percentage has an explanation: in its 2024 analysis it appeared as the cheapest, which explains why it has experienced such a pronounced price update. “These increases have turned the price of traditional branded nougat into a luxury item. Manufacturer’s nougat now costs €33/kg on average, compared to €15/kg for supermarket white label nougat,” they explain from the consumer organization. The average value of almond nougat is around €23/kg. Far beyond nougat. The OCU has not been the only one that has taken out the calculator to study how much more we will have to pay for sweets these holidays. FACUA has carried out a similar exercise, which in November I already warned that Christmas desserts had become 15.4% more expensive in large distribution chains. That was at least the average, and the organization was able to detect specific cases with exorbitant “peaks of rise”, of up to 65.3%. The study It analyzed 185 items, including nougat, but also chocolates, mantecados and Polvorones available in several supermarket chains, such as Mercadona, Dia, Hipercor, Alcampo, Eroski and Carrefour. “Only three have gone down”. “Of the total prices analyzed in the months of October 2024 and 2025, only three have decreased compared to last year and eight remain the same. The rest, 174 out of 185, are more expensive,” FACUA warnswhich warns of increases in Hipercor, Alcampo, Carrefour, Eroski, Dia and Mercadona. The clearest case was detected in a Supreme Quality toasted yolk nougat El Corte Inglés Selection from Hipercor: from 2.39 euros in 2024 it went to 3.95 euros, which represents an increase of just over 65%. In general, the organization detected an average increase in the price of sweets of 22.6% since October 2023. Searching for the causes. That nougat is experiencing such a steep price rise is no coincidence. Although there are several factors that come into play, to the OCU and CaixaBank There is one that stands out: the drift in the price of one of its main raw materials, almonds. In fact, the OCU recalls that in higher category tablets it represents more than 60% of the weight, which explains why fluctuations in its price are felt in the rates. Has it risen that much? “Its price has increased significantly: from 90-95 euros per 100 kg of shelled almonds between January and August 2024 to about 120 euros in 2025, with peaks of 138 euros in June,” argues the organizationwhich ensures that varieties such as Marcona, Largueta and Comuna have seen their prices rise from 15 to 25%. It’s not no surprise if we take into account that the almond has reached values ​​not seen since 2019. CaixaBank remember that frosts and droughts have marked the harvest of recent campaigns, affecting prices. If in the 2024-2025 season farmers received an average of 5.6 euros per kilo of communal almonds (the cheapest), in previous seasons that same value hovered around 4.09 or 2.95 euros per kilo. The change in weather conditions has improved the prospects for the campaign that began in September, but this effect has not yet been noticeable in the 2025/26 Christmas nougat campaign. Almonds… and something else. To be fair, almonds are not the only ingredient that has become more expensive in the last year. He has done it too (and not … Read more

Cheese and oil have skyrocketed so much in Türkiye that travel agencies have a star destination: a Lidl in Greece

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The cost of living has skyrocketed. Except the cocaine marketa multitude of basic products have risen in price when salaries have not grown at the same level. In Spain we have a year-on-year inflation of around 3%. In Türkiye, on the same date, it is 33%, and that is leading thousands of Turks to travel to Greece every week, and not for pleasure. But to Lidl for make the purchase. Supermarket migration. In the mid-2010s, the Greek economy was a drama. The purchasing power is collapsed and the country’s debt crisis forced many households to squeeze every euro. Neighboring countries that also used the euro were no consolation, so they looked east: to Türkiye. Within the economic context, the lira was cheap and the euro strong, so many Greeks, especially from the islands, went to Turkish bazaars and supermarkets to buy clothes, utensils and food. The ferries they were bursting. It is estimated that the cost per visit was about 120 euros and, since filling the shopping cart in Turkey was considerably cheaper, the Greeks bought large shipments of cheese, oil, meat and sausages. One of the “supermarket corridors” was Lesbos-Ayvalik, and in the middle of the decade spoke up to 100,000 visits annually. Now, the tables have turned. The tragedy of the lyre. More than two decades of controversial policiesamong other factors, have led to the collapse of the lira. The cost of imports has multiplied and the inflation rate does not reach 80% of a few years agobut it has stagnated at that more than 30% that is suffocating the population. It is something that is disproportionately affecting food, including basic necessities. Now it is the Turks who have enormous problems when buying fresh productsmeats, cheese and oil. The situation does not seem to be changing in the short term due to massive debt, default rates (with the penalty that entails) and that price increase in subsistence products. It is the “typical”: products that increase a lot and stagnant salaries, the perfect combination to ruin the purchasing power of families. To Lidl in the neighboring country. What is happening? That this dynamic of cross-border purchases has been completely reversed. If a decade ago it was the Greeks who crossed the border, now it is the Turks who, with a euro that is not so buoyant, but enough to make it worth it compared to the prices in their local markets, flock to Greece to make that weekly purchase. In a report by Bloomberg There are concrete figures that compare a Lidl in Alexandroupolis (about 40 kilometers from the Turkish border) and a Turkish Carrefour. For example, minced meat costs 9.36 euros per kilo in Greece, compared to 12.10 in Türkiye. Greek sausages cost half as much as Turkish ones, Gouda cheese costs a third and oil makes one of the biggest differences: 10 euros per liter in Greece compared to 20 in Turkey. Social networks. Social networks are a loudspeaker – let them tell it to the influencers from Australian mines-, and those who visit Greek cities to make purchases share their experience through networks such as TikTok. The word spreads and more citizens are encouraged to take the leap. For Alejandrópolis, it represents an injection of money for both food businesses and restaurants. Bloomberg details how, after a day of shopping, Turks have a drink in Greek restaurants while sharing the experience. and it esteem that there are 3,000 Turks who are making this weekly trip. travel agencies. Because if we have to define this it is as a need, yes, but also with that word: experience. Because although it may be something private for a family to do, travel agencies are organizing tours to Greek cities, with groups of supermarket tourists who do not want to visit the city, but rather the Lidl on duty. For about 50 euros, buses loads of Turkish shoppers leave on Friday afternoons and arrive in Greek cities on Saturday morning and spend three and a half hours in the supermarkets. Then they spend some free time around the citythey can go to eat and, in the afternoon, on the way home with a full cart. The biggest annoyance? Apart from having to go to another country to buy because in yours the cost of living is very expensive, of course, it is the line at border control. How long will this last? Türkiye trust to halve inflation by 2026, but it will still remain extremely high. We will see how long this situation lasts, which, from January to September of this year, has carried to the fact that 6% of the Turks who visited Greece did so only with the aim of filling the car. Images | Zoshua Colah, Aldin Nasrun In Xataka | Private labels are having an unexpected effect on the food industry: the biggest price drop since 2014

Work absenteeism in ITV workshops has skyrocketed in some autonomous communities. The solution: private detectives

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The public company SITVAL, in charge of managing technical inspections of vehicles in the Valencian Community, has put out to tender a contract of 140,000 euros to hire detective agencies to investigate possible unjustified absences, incompatible activities or fraudulent situations among its staff. Just like inform from El Español, the measure seeks to tackle an absenteeism problem that has skyrocketed since the ITVs went under public management in February 2023. The underlying problem. Since Ximo Puig’s Government reverted service to the public sector, work absenteeism in Valencian stations has skyrocketed to between 16% and 18% on average, according to share the middle. The figure doubles the regional average for absenteeism in the community, which stands at 6.4%, and is well above the national 7%. The result is a collapsed service with waits exceeding eight weeks for heavy vehicles, according to the Valencian Federation of Transport and Logistics Entrepreneurs (FVET). What will the detectives do? The contract, published On October 27 on the Public Sector Contracting Platform, it commissioned the agencies to observe, monitor and prepare documentary and audiovisual reports on SITVAL personnel. Just like share El Español, detectives must collect truthful information about possible unjustified absences and, if necessary, appear before administrative or judicial bodies to ratify their reports. The contract is divided into three lots, one for each Valencian province, with an execution period of two years. It is not an isolated case. The Valencian Generalitat is not the first administration that uses private investigation services to control absenteeism in public ITVs. The Government of Andalusia launched a similar service in August of last year, divided into two lots for the western and eastern areas of the community. Consequences. The middle emphasize That the reversal of the service, which occurred three months before the 2023 regional elections, has generated an unexpected effect: the massive relocation of inspections. According to data Officially, in 2024 a total of 291,662 vehicles chose to pass the ITV in other autonomous communities such as Murcia, Castilla-La Mancha or Tarragona, which means less income compared to the 2,332,087 inspections that were carried out in 2022. Qresion in it transportation sector. The situation has led the Valencian Federation of Transport and Logistics Entrepreneurs (FVET) to announce the departure of its presidentCarlos Prades, from the board of directors of SITVAL at the end of October. “We pay more than in other communities for a less efficient, slower service that generates uncertainty,” denounced Prades, who added that “Valencian stations are no longer a real option for many companies.” The figures don’t add up. Puig’s Government justified the transition to public management arguing that it could generate up to 40 million euros per year in operating income for the Generalitat, compared to the 7 million euros paid by private concessionaires together. Although it seems that the forecasts have not taken into account the impact of absenteeism, the drop in inspections carried out or additional costs such as this investigation services contract. Cover image | FVET In Xataka | Yes, there is a way to check if the V-16 beacon is working correctly. And you are not going to alert the DGT or the emergencies about it.

overcrowded homes have skyrocketed

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In full housing crisis and with the registry growing thanks basically to immigration pushSpain has encountered a problem: it has more and more overcrowded homessomething that is usually considered an indicator of poverty and that basically tells us about housing “overcrowded”. The Eurostat data show that the Spanish ratio is still far from that of the EU or neighboring countries such as Italy, Germany or France, but even so the trend is revealing. Overcrowded homes? Correct. EITHER “overcrowded”another way to identify them. Basically both labels refer to the same thing: homes in which so many people live that their inhabitants exceed the capacity for which they were ideally designed, at least for comfortable coexistence. Said like this it may sound abstract, but both the INE as Eurostat They use some agreed criteria to recognize them. An “overcrowded home” is one that does not have a room per couple, for each tenant over 18 years of age or for each two young people of the same sex between 12 and 17 years old. There are more guidelines but they all point in the same direction. Thanks to them, technicians can then calculate their impact on society as a whole, the “overcrowding rate”. Year Spain France Portugal Italy Germany EU 2010 5 9.2 14.6 24.3 7.1 19.1 2015 5.5 7.4 10.3 27.8 7 18.1 2020 7.6 9.6 9 26.1 10.2 17.4 2024 9.1 10.4 11.2 23.9 11.5 16.9 And what do the statistics say? That in Spain this rate (the percentage of the population that lives in overcrowded homes) has not stopped growing in recent years. In fact the data from Eurostat show that in 2024 the indicator reached its highest level since 2004. If in 2010 the Spanish overcrowding rate was 5%, in 2020 it had risen to 7.6% and last year it stood at 9.1%. It may not seem like a high figure, but as remember The Confidential It is equivalent to millions of people (4.4) living in saturated environments. Why is it important data? More than because of the data itself (which is not especially high), because of the trend. Spain is far from being one of the European countries with the most overcrowded homes. The rate is considerably higher in Italy (23.9%), Germany (11.5%), Portugal (11.2%) or France (10.4%). Even the average of the 27 EU countries (16.9%) clearly exceeds the Spanish figure; but our country does stands out for its evolution recent. And not for the better. Between 2009 and 2024 the Spanish overcrowding rate increased by 75%, while in the EU as a whole and many other surrounding nations this same indicator decreased. What’s more, if we take into account the set of countries analyzed by Eurostat there is only one that has experienced an increase in the overcrowding rate greater than Spain: Netherlands, where it went from 1.7% to 4.6%. The palm in terms of volume goes to the Baltic countries. Eurostat map with data from 2023. Can it go further? Yes. Eurostat allows us to go further and that reveals to us that the rate of overcrowding does not affect the entire population equally nor does it have the same footprint throughout the country. As precise The Confidentialits incidence seems higher among those who live in rented houses (at market rents) than among those who live in their own homes, whether with or without a mortgage. If we go down to detail we also see that it is easier to find foreigners (especially non-EU) living in overcrowded homes than people born in Spain and who, therefore, have a family support network. Among the latter (Spanish) the worst part goes to the young people. A few months ago Foessa Foundation I already warned in a report on “households that are forced to share apartments with more people, return to parents’ or relatives’ homes to live with them, resort to so-called ‘nano apartments’ or that are unable to look for another home when the family increases.” According to their data, 3.4 million people (7%) live in “crowded conditions.” What are the causes? That the footprint of overcrowded homes has increased in Spain responds to several factors, but it is undeniable that the phenomenon has coincided above all with two clear trends. The first is the gradual increase in price of the home. According to the Idealista portal, on average rents have increased by 10.9% in the last year, which places the residential square meter (m2) at the highest values ​​since at least 2006. If we talk about the purchase and sale market, photography It’s not very different. This translates into stressed markets, fast pace and in which access is complicated to housing, especially among young people. In fact, for many, the only way to achieve home ownership is through a paternal donation. And the other factor? Population growth. At the end of the first half of 2025, 49.3 million people lived in our country, “the maximum value in the historical series,” as recognizes the INEwhich also remembers that this increase has a clearly identified demographic driver: immigration. The INE data does not leave room for many doubts. The number of people born in Spain has decreased, so the increase was mainly based on residents arriving from abroad. A revealing case is that of the Community of Madrid, which at the end of 2024 reached a historical milestone: surpassed one million people born in Hispanic America. 25 years ago there were not even 82,000. Is it the only reality? No. Paradoxical as it may be, in recent years not only has the rate of overcrowded homes grown. Those on the opposite pole have also done so: single-person householdspeople who live alone. This is clearly reflected in the Continuous Population Statistics published in July by the INE, which shows that in our country there are 5.54 million homes in which only one person resides. The data is already close to that of the most common household format, those made up of two people. Today they still remain … Read more

Ten AI startups have skyrocketed their valuation by $1 trillion in 12 months

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Logic tells us that companies that they lose money consistently should have a black future. What is happening in the world of AI is just the opposite, and right now ten startups in very red numbers They have achieved something unusual in one year: in one year they have grown by one trillion dollars in their joint valuation. It is something simply extraordinary… and disturbing. The big three. OpenAI is of course the protagonist of this select group, and today it is estimated that its valuation amounts to half a billion dollars. Elon Musk’s company, xAI, is valued at 200 billion, while Anthropic is also close to that figure according to a Financial Times study. In one year the valuation of these AI startups has skyrocketed. Source: Financial Times. And his immediate followers. Databricks, which was founded in 2013, was quick to join that segment and now has an estimated valuation of $100 billion. Figure (robotics), SSI (Sutskever’s startup), Scale AI, Perplexity, Thinking Machine Lab (Mira Murati’s startup) or Cursor complete this group of new startups (almost all of them) and with skyrocketing valuations. Investment fever. This growth in its valuation is due, of course, to the fact that all of these firms have raised multimillion-dollar investment rounds by firms that trust in a future full of AI. In fact, venture capital and investment companies in the US have injected 161 billion dollars throughout this year, and they have done so without being able to see even a hint that their bet is going to be a winner. All these AI companies They burn money like there’s no tomorrowand its profitability—and future—is an absolute unknown. bubbles are good. “Of course there is an (AI) bubble.” The person who says it is Hermant Taneja, president of the venture capital firm General Catalyst. His firm has invested in Anthropic and Mistral, and has done so without batting an eye because according to him, “Bubbles are good. Bubbles align capital and talent into a new trend, which causes some carnage, but also creates new lasting businesses that change the world.” Maybe it is, but only for a few.. Sam Altman, co-founder and CEO of OpenAI, also think there is a bubblebut it coincides with that positive vision because it is probably him who will benefit (if everything explodes). Robin Li, CEO of Baidu, already indicated a year ago that the bubble will end up bursting and that only 1% of companies will survive. Bezos adds to that perception: “this is the good type of industrial bubble that is totally contrary to financial bubbles. The banking bubble, the crisis of the banking system, that is simply bad, as happened in 2008. These bubbles are the ones that society must avoid.” It happened with dotcoms. The analogy with the dotcom bubble It’s inevitable. At that time something similar happened with the inflated valuations of internet companies, and when the bubble burst only a few survived, but those that did managed to become the mistresses of the world. ANDThis bubble is much bigger. At least, from the point of view of the figures invested. In the dotcom fever, venture capital companies invested 10.5 billion dollars, which if we adjust for inflation becomes about 20 billion dollars. In 2021, these same firms invested 135 billion in startups in the SaaS (Software as a Service) segment. This year, investment in AI companies will likely exceed $200 billion, according to PitchBook. One of the directors of these firms describes this with a strong word. “This is FOMO“. And the valuations are skyrocketing. Startups that have $5 million in annual recurring revenue are seeking investment rounds that value them at $500 million. That they pursue those valuations that are 100 times their income makes ridiculous the excesses that already occurred in 2021, for example. Although venture capital firms know that they will lose money on most of their bets, they also hope that one or two that they get right will more than make up for that entire bet. Not investing is losing forever. Mark Zuckerberg shares this vision of venture capital firms, and his company is making colossal investments to avoid missing out on AI. The founder and CEO of Meta recently explained that He doesn’t care about losing 200,000 million dollarsbecause it would be much worse to be left behind in this race. Marc Benioff, co-founder and CEO of Salesforce, agrees and believes that a trillion dollars of investment will end up wasted, but AI will end up producing 10 times that in value: “The only way we know to create great technology is to try as many things as possible, see which ones work, and then focus on the ones that succeed.” Time will tell if they were right and if this bubble, as investors defend, is “a good one.” In Xataka | OpenAI is making the tech industry unite its destiny with yours. For the sake of the global economy, it better work

Europe has found the antidote to Russian drones. So demand for a 100-year-old gun has skyrocketed.

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The war in Ukraine has become an immense laboratory for new war technologies, but it has also reminded us that beyond the sophistication of modern artillery, the experience of the past remains a weapon as powerful as any missile. we have seen optical illusionsthe return of the horses or weapons 1940’s vintage. In fact, Europe is arming itself against Russia’s hybrid war with a 100-year-old weapon. The resurgence of a legend. The war in Ukraine has returned a veteran of more than a century to the front line: the M2 heavy machine gun Browning, symbol of 20th century war engineering and now a key piece in the arsenal of modern armies. Designed in 1921 by John Moses Browning and mass produced during World War II, the M2 (capable of firing .50 caliber projectiles at a rate of up to 600 rounds per minute) has once again proven indispensable, especially on the Ukrainian front, where it is used on civilian trucks to shoot down Russian Shahed drones. Its mechanical simplicity, extreme reliability and devastating power have made it a weapon with no direct substitute, and its use has contributed to a surge in global demand reminiscent of the most intense years of the Cold War. Industrial boom. The rebirth of this icon runs parallel to the FN Browning expansionthe historic Belgian firm that from its headquarters in Herstal manufactures not only the M2, but also the FN MAG and FN Minimi (known in the United States as M240 and M249) along with FN SCAR rifles and ammunition of standard NATO calibers. After decades of relative calm, its production of machine guns has been doubled compared to 2022, and the demand for ammunition has quadrupled. Although the company does not sell directly to Ukraine, its contracts with allies such as the United States, the United Kingdom or France have grown exponentially. France, for example, has recovered thousands of M2s abandoned by US troops in 1945 for FN to modernize and return them to service with “like new” guarantees. The conflict has revived interest not only in new generation weapons, but also in those that have proven to be reliable under any circumstances. Economy of rearmament. The war has awakened a cycle of massive rearmament in Europe, with more than 930,000 million of dollars committed through 2030, and FN Browning has become one of the epicenters of this military reindustrialization. Despite a stable business volume (1.3 billion euros in 2024, after the acquisition of the ammunition producer Sofisport), the company is expanding its workforce and increasing the production of weapons and ammunition by thousands of units annually. The stagnation of its sports division, which flourished during the pandemic, contrasts with the avalanche of state contracts that consolidate its strategic role within the European defense ecosystem. The machine gun market, relegated for years, is experiencing a second youth marked by the urgency of replenishing depleted arsenals after the massive shipment of weapons to Ukraine and the perception of a persistent Russian threat. Classic weapons, modern warfare. The Ukrainian conflict has shown that even in the era of artificial intelligence and drone swarms, classically designed weapons still play a critical role. The M2 they have adapted to unmanned ground platforms and remote stations controlled by AI to improve precision in the fight against drones. F. N. Browning collaborates with technology firms to integrate automatic target recognition systems into their turrets, anticipating a convergence between mechanical tradition and algorithmic warfare. At the same time, European militaries, after decades of disinvestment, are faced with the need to rebuild their heavy fire capabilities from the ground up. From the past to the future. The longevity of the M2 It is a testament not only to its design, but also to a cyclical military reality: modern wars continue to depend on the reliability of steel and gunpowder. From the beaches of Normandy to the fields of Donetsk, this machine gun has accompanied Western armies through a century of changing conflicts, and today it once again symbolizes resistance in the face of technological adversity. For FN Browning, the resurgence of its most emblematic weapon marks not only the most active moment since the end of the Cold War, but also the beginning of a new era in which war tradition and digital innovation march, once again, at the same pace. Image | Wikimedia Cominos In Xataka | Europe has decided to take action against Moscow’s hybrid war. So Germany has started hunting for Russian drones In Xataka | “Why don’t we shoot?”: in the face of Russian drone incursions, Ryanair has its own alternative to the European wall

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