Washington rewrites the rules of silicon, then buys a piece of it.

Huawei and TSMC. America's new rule on Huawei's chips is a clever weapon, but each use of it teaches the world to build around American tools Read more on Foundry and loathing ›

Section 230. Mr Trump's order asks a regulator to rewrite a law that Congress wrote plainly, and if it worked it would make platforms more cautious editors, not more neutral ones. Read more on Label and liable ›

AMD and Xilinx. AMD is right to pay in its own richly valued shares for Xilinx, and regulators should let a deal that makes Intel's life harder go through. Read more on Programmable profits ›

Nvidia and Arm. Regulators were right to stop Nvidia buying Arm, but the next owner of a chip standard should be one that every rival can trust. Read more on Arm's length ›

The CHIPS Act. America is right to pay for chip factories, but the tax credit will do more good than the grants, and the real test is whether Washington knows when to stop. Read more on Chips on the table ›

Export controls. America's sweeping new chip controls on China make strategic sense, but unlike the cold war's embargo they have only one government behind them Read more on The silicon curtain ›

Meta and EU data transfers. Ireland's record fine on Meta punishes a company for a conflict that only governments can settle, and Europe should fix the treaty, not fine the tenant. Read more on A fine mess ›

Nvidia. Nvidia's guidance proves the AI boom is real, but no single supplier should be priced as if it owns the whole of it. Read more on Chip off the old bloc ›

Europe's Digital Markets Act. Brussels was right to name its gatekeepers, but it should be judged on whether rivals win customers, not on how many rules the six firms obey Read more on Gate expectations ›

Arm's flotation. Arm's return to the stockmarket is a fair price for a great business, but SoftBank is selling a toll road with a lot of its traffic in one lane. Read more on An arm and a leg ›

Biden and artificial intelligence. Mr Biden's AI order is sensible where it asks developers to show their homework and hollow where it pretends a presidential pen can do Congress's job. Read more on Order, order ›

Pranjali Awasthi. A $450,000 raise by a 16-year-old founder shows that investors will bet on a story; it does not yet show that Delv.AI has a business. Read more on Seed money ›

Europe's AI Act. Europe has passed the world's first comprehensive AI law by a wide margin; its real test is whether a rulebook written before the products existed can bind the firms that now write the products Read more on Act of faith ›

America and TikTok. Congress was right to make ownership the issue with TikTok, but it should have written a rule for every foreign-owned app and not a statute with one name on it. Read more on Sell-by date ›

AI and electricity. Microsoft's restart of a reactor at Three Mile Island is the right way for a data centre to buy power, and regulators should make it the rule, not the exception, so that ordinary households stop paying for the machines' appetite Read more on Meltdown on the meter ›

California and AI regulation. Gavin Newsom was right to veto a bill that regulated AI by the size of the cheque, but wrong to leave the vacuum to a panel of experts Read more on Safety in numbers ›

OpenAI's funding round. OpenAI's investors are paying a record price for a company that does not yet make money, and have written a fallback into the contract. Read more on Raising the stakes ›

Intel's chief executive. Pat Gelsinger's departure leaves Intel with the same problem and two temporary people to solve it; the board should use the interval to split the firm. Read more on Retiring early ›

Stargate and AI spending. Stargate's $500bn is a promise, not a budget, and America should judge it by the data centres that get built and keep Washington out of the cheque-writing Read more on Open sesame ›

DeepSeek and Nvidia. A cheap Chinese model has rattled the AI trade, but it makes computing cheaper rather than pointless, and the bill for the boom will still be paid Read more on Less is Moore ›

TSMC in Arizona. Tariff-driven factory pledges buy goodwill and a headline, not wafers, so Washington should demand schedules and count each dollar once. Read more on Pledge allegiance ›

CoreWeave and the AI-cloud trade. CoreWeave's cut-price flotation is a fair test of whether renting out Nvidia chips is a business or merely a boom, and one customer is sitting the exam for it. Read more on Cloud cover ›

Young Americans and crypto. Crypto is not a youth movement but a young man's hobby, and the best evidence says it has been shrinking since 2021. Read more on Coin of the realm ›

Roy Lee and Cluely. A 21-year-old suspended by Columbia for cheating has raised $15m on the strength of an advertisement, and the more interesting defendant is the technical interview, not the student. Read more on Cheat sheet ›

Meme coins and the young. Launching a meme coin is open to anyone with a phone, and that is the problem: the platform collects its fees whatever happens, while almost everyone else, the launchers included, ends up with a token nobody wants. Read more on Pump and circumstance ›

America's stablecoin law. The GENIUS Act is a sound bargain, full reserves in exchange for legal certainty, and its real test will be how strictly the new regulators apply it. Read more on Coin flip, resolved ›

Chips and China. An export licence is a judgement about security, not a toll, and a government that takes 15% of what it permits has a reason to permit more. Read more on Duty free ›

Intel and the state. Washington's stake in Intel should be a short loan of patience, with a public timetable to sell, not a permanent seat at the chipmaker's table Read more on Government inside ›

The H-1B fee. A flat $100,000 charge on new H-1B petitions will cull the cheapest hires and the poorest employers, when a wage-based allocation would target the abuse the White House says it wants to stop. Read more on Price of admission ›

Nexperia and the state. The Netherlands was right to stop a Chinese-owned chipmaker moving its crown jewels abroad, but a scarcity law is the wrong tool, and The Hague should now give the intervention a deadline and a proper legal home Read more on Dutch courage ›

Teenage app builders. Students building apps with AI are acquiring a useful habit and a modest line on a university application, and almost none of them are acquiring a business. Read more on Hello, world, again ›