TheChek News Flow

The clunky GPS timepiece remains the industry standard when it comes to durability, wearability and reliability

“What watch are you wearing?” So said a commercial real estate executive I met while dining at a counter restaurant in Arizona recently. His wrist was furnished with a beautiful steel Rolex; on mine, a thick black rubber GPS smartwatch called the Garmin Forerunner 55.

My dining mate said he’d noticed it because it was “nerdy” and at odds with the rest of my outfit. He had a point. I got it while training for the Chicago Marathon some years ago. Now, this clunky £115 timepiece — aesthetically the humble BlackBerry of the watch world given you can’t browse the internet on it — is my most worn accessory. Alongside my rose gold Oura ring, I never take it off.

I’m not alone. This black fitness watch is something of an unlikely status symbol. There’s a battle for bodily real estate happening and what wearable you wear to work out says something about you. Tech bros and finance types opt for minimalist Oura rings and Whoop armbands, while upstarts such as Coros have fast become popular with those training for fitness performance. (Only a watch can track and show your running pace in real time — the Apple Watch is, in running circles at least, considered a bit lame.) In a Runner’s World “best watch” report for this year, Garmin came out top. 

Yet even its biggest fans acknowledge that Garmins are fairly ugly. Nicola Strange, the co-founder of Studio Beyond, an insights agency that works with brands including On, Lululemon and Nike, said her best friend calls her Garmin Fenix 6x Pro “the outfit ruiner”. Like the rest of us, she doesn’t really care.

Jessie Hyman, co-founder of the running label Pruzan, recently teamed her Garmin with a voluminous white cotton Bode dress with a delicate embroidered trim. Fashion buyer Feyisola Latunji wore her Garmin to her hen do.

“Accessories give a wink to the world about who we are. My Garmin tells people that I’m the kind of person who prioritises an athletic lifestyle,” says Strange.

Riding the global running boom, Garmin’s total sales for the fitness line soared 42 per cent to $547mn in the first quarter of 2026. Founded in Kansas in 1989 by electrical engineers Gary Burrell and Min Kao, Garmin initially focused on marine and aviation GPS. Its first running watch was released in 2003 but the company’s sales of fitness watches have been steadily increasing since the pandemic: between 2020 and 2021, revenue of the segment went from $1bn to $1.5bn. Today, models span the still popular Forerunner 55 (£119.99 on sale, released in 2021) to the highest-spec Marq Athlete (Gen 2) (£1,999 on sale, released in 2022). Versions exist for hikers and cyclists but runners wear theirs daily.

Like most wearables, a Garmin tracks steps to calorie burn and sleep. But runners benefit from the fact that the watch tracks pace and distance. You can also sync it to Strava, the fitness social app. The trajectory of marathon runners turning to fitness competitions and communities such as Hyrox means Garmins are increasingly showing up in the gym, too. Out in the wild, these types like to recognise their own.

“I met someone recently who was wearing a Garmin and I automatically thought, ‘Oh, he must be a runner,’” says James Irlam, a six-time major marathon runner and former watch collector from Cheshire. Irlam also owns an Apple Watch and a Coros but returned to the Garmin that he first bought in 2021 because he preferred its tracking and intuitive functionality. Heart rate monitors, popular with fitness bros, can feel performative (they’re generally paired with a topless torso), as can expensive luxury watches.

Now, Irlam wears his Garmin instead of his Rolex even when he’s not exercising. His idea of success has also changed since he took up running during the pandemic. “I’d be embarrassed to wear my Rolex now,” he says. “A Rolex feels flashy. Garmin shows a different sort of success that has been earned.”

Most Garmin wearers like Irlam, Strange (and me) remove it only to charge — and mine has a 14-day battery life. When I brandished my bare wrist at a wedding in May, there was a thick tan line. Matt Willocks, co-founder of Good Sport, a creative agency and print magazine based in Melbourne, Australia, suggested that to some, a Garmin tan line is “the wealthiest watch you can buy. It’s a signifier of exercising and being outside.”

More refined takes on sports watches are coming to market. Hong Kong upstart Amazfit recently tasked New York jeweller David Perry with creating a custom diamond dial for British runner Josh Kerr, who recently broke the world record for the one mile at the Diamond League in London. Codex just launched the XBand on Kickstarter — it’s a Whoop-like wearable band with a sensor, designed to sub in for the strap on your luxury watch. The idea is uninterrupted data without sacrificing parading traditional luxury bling. Brands such as Tag Heuer, via its Connected watch, offer elegant steel timepieces with sports functionality. In theory, it’s the best of both worlds and you can easily switch between rubber and steel straps, but it does cost more: the cheapest model is £1,350, and extra straps cost £180.

For me, emotional attachment to my Garmin comes from its simplicity. I haven’t upgraded to a newer, slicker style because my 2021 model does everything I need without the frills; it’s not like an iPhone, where out-of-date software stops it working. My Oura would only log my heart rate and I am not interested in text or email alerts on an Apple Watch. I appreciate the fact it isn’t another smartphone on my wrist. It feels original and analogue in this era of mass AI slickness and corporate polish. The silhouette reminds me of a ’90s Baby G watch. It’s also a great conversation starter and, as I found, an easy way to find common ground with strangers.

The $20bn hedge fund manager’s wild ride ended with a call to Ken Griffin

Leopold Aschenbrenner made his name on his ability to predict the future. But the trader dubbed the “Nostradamus of AI” would have been hard-pressed to foresee how quickly his high-flying hedge fund would run into trouble.

The OpenAI alumnus, with no trading experience, had over two years become a Wall Street sensation, racking up gains of over 400 per cent for his more than $20bn hedge fund Situational Awareness in the first six months of this year alone.

But his debt-fuelled bets on a dazzling future for AI put Aschenbrenner on the wrong side of a brutal market sell-off in recent weeks.

A drumbeat of pressure from the fund’s bankers, and efforts to rapidly sell chunks of its portfolio, culminated late Wednesday night when Aschenbrenner got on the phone with Citadel’s Ken Griffin.

The 24-year-old wunderkind and one of Wall Street’s most feared investors hammered out a deal to sell much of Situational Awareness’s portfolio to Griffin’s hedge fund.

Citadel’s swoop for the bulk of Situational Awareness’s public stock holdings, which were once estimated at $16bn, beat out rivals Millennium Management and Jane Street and marks one of the largest and most sudden stock transactions in Wall Street history.

The firm’s rapid downward spiral is a familiar tale, as Silicon Valley and Wall Street once again threw their weight behind a bright-eyed but untested investor who promised this time would be different.

“Everybody always wants to find the next golden child,” said one longtime hedge fund executive. “It just keeps happening.”

Situational Awareness and Aschenbrenner did not respond to requests for comment.

Aschenbrenner captivated his investors with bold ideas about AI drawn from his network comprising effective altruism adherents — the controversial “do good” philosophy whose devotees populated both the collapsed crypto exchange FTX and AI powerhouse Anthropic.

After graduating from Columbia University at 19, he briefly worked for the FTX Future Fund, the philanthropic arm of Sam Bankman-Fried’s empire before it collapsed in late 2022 in a multibillion-dollar fraud case.

Around this time Aschenbrenner met his wife-to-be Avital Balwit, who now works as chief of staff to the CEO of Anthropic. He later joined OpenAI’s “Superalignment” team before being fired over an alleged leak.

Aschenbrenner’s career took a turn in 2024 when he wrote a 165-page treatise on how AI, and especially artificial general intelligence, would dramatically reshape society in the coming years.

The essay, titled “Situational Awareness”, took off. Aschenbrenner capitalised on his newfound popularity by raising money for a hedge fund, with anchor investments from former GitHub chief executive Nat Friedman and Patrick and John Collison, who founded Stripe.

The Gen Z investor — who was described as the “Nostradamus of AI” as recently as last month — brushed off a question about whether he would succumb to the same fate as others, such as tech billionaire Peter Thiel’s hedge fund, which collapsed during the 2008 financial crisis.

“Obviously not blowing up is sort of like task number one and two, or whatever,” Aschenbrenner said during the fourth hour of a popular tech podcast in 2024, a few months before he officially launched his fund. “Done right, I think a lot of money could be made.”

Situational Awareness’s assets snowballed to $24bn, as Aschenbrenner poured money into bets on the winners of the AI trade.

But by July some of the hedge fund’s biggest stock positions, according to its last regulatory filings, appeared to be collapsing.

The fund — run by seven investment professionals and 20 employees — at one point held hundreds of millions of dollars in Bloom Energy and Sandisk, which had fallen about 40 per cent since the end of June to the start of this week.

When Intel reported strong earnings on July 23, its share price surprisingly fell and speculation began to mount that someone was aggressively selling into the market.

That seller was Aschenbrenner, according to multiple people familiar with the matter. “He was trying to recover his losses,” one of the people said. “He had the illusion of still being in control . . . he didn’t have control at all.”

Despite the AI rout, Aschenbrenner on July 24 sent his investors a letter that rattled off the fund’s wild returns — 439 per cent for the year to the end of June, 1,551 per cent since its founding — before giving a hint that trouble was already brewing.

“It’s more important than ever to recognise the potential for volatility in the future,” he wrote. Aschenbrenner acknowledged that his firm had not been “immune” to the recent tech sell-off but said the unwinding in the market was a “particularly good time to add funds”.

Two investors who spoke with the FT at the time said they felt reassured by the letter.

But shortly after, the situation at the fund had deteriorated. Aschenbrenner called a number of investors to solicit fresh capital or sell certain assets, according to people with knowledge of the process. The calls were ad hoc, offering direct investors different deals.

“He was offering me a deal and a completely different one to another investor,” said a person who was called by the hedge fund seeking help.

Some of the Wall Street banks that had extended financing against Aschenbrenner’s portfolio had already been on alert. Lending to hedge funds had become extraordinarily lucrative, making up an ever-bigger portion of banks’ balance sheets.

But at least one prime broker put Situational Awareness on a “watch list” due to the highly volatile and concentrated nature of its bets on AI stocks.

The prime broker called for additional margin to support its positions several times over the past year, according to an executive at the bank, including this week.

“People on our side were not comfortable with the exposure given the portfolio composition and credit profile [of the firm],” said the executive.

By Wednesday, Situational Awareness’s troubles came to a head. As tech stocks continued to fall further, investors complained that they could not get through to Aschenbrenner’s fund.

“Leopold just stopped taking calls,” said one investor in the fund.

Instead, Aschenbrenner was talking to some of Wall Street’s most aggressive operators — Jane Street, Millennium and Citadel — seeking a swift deal to sell all or large chunks of the portfolio, said people briefed on the matter.

Jane Street had earlier backed the fund, in a rare move for the proprietary-trading outfit, and is among investors facing losses.

Several other financial groups also began circling Situational Awareness’s assets on Wednesday evening, and were in discussions to potentially buy certain portions of its private stake holdings, according to two people familiar with the matter.

Multiple investors said Aschenbrenner was exploring a sale of some or all of his coveted Anthropic stake, though at a premium to its last valuation of $900bn.

Citadel’s billionaire founder Griffin was “heavily involved” in the swirl of negotiations, which lasted through the night. Shortly after dawn, Citadel emerged with a deal.

Situational Awareness was left with a small slice of unlevered public stock holdings and its private stakes, according to two people familiar with the matter. One person close to the firm said it “wasn’t over”.

Another person involved in the negotiations said the question left by the episode was not how the deal was structured, or how much money Citadel would make on the transaction, or where Situational Awareness would go from here.

“The real question is how did anyone invest so much money, and then lend so much money, to a . . . kid with no personal experience and no infrastructure?”

Google, Amazon, Microsoft and Meta have vastly increased their investments since the AI boom began in 2023

The four big hyperscalers have ploughed more than $1tn into capital investments since their race to dominate AI began three and a half years ago, as America’s largest tech groups bet their future on the technology.

Combined capital spending by Google, Amazon, Microsoft and Meta from the beginning of the AI boom in 2023 to the end of June hit $1.1tn, according to earnings reports from the four companies in the past two weeks.

The massive expenditure is a mark of both the scale of their AI ambitions and the speed with which the US tech giants have turned from capital-light businesses into huge investors in physical infrastructure.

“There is basically no end in sight for the growth in capex,” said Rishi Jaluria, an RBC Capital analyst. “Investors need these companies to toe the tight line between investing in AI and not compromising the things that have made them successful.”

The four companies combined plan to spend $745bn on capex, mainly data centres, advanced chips and the power to run them this year, after both Google and Amazon increased their projections this quarter.

The success of this bet remains partly contingent on the ability of start-ups OpenAI and Anthropic to keep raising funds to meet vast, multiyear commitments to buy computing power, as both AI labs plot their public listings.

The rush of investment has strained supply chains and driven up costs, causing a shortage of memory chips, which hurt Apple, even as the iPhone maker sits out the AI race. Its warnings of lower sales and margins due to cost increases sent the stock falling 6.3 per cent on Thursday.

But Big Tech’s financial results showed these investments are beginning to translate into accelerating revenue growth, particularly in cloud computing.

Google, Amazon and Microsoft all reported rising growth in their cloud units, selling computing power to everyone from OpenAI and Anthropic to corporations embracing AI. The figures boosted Amazon and Microsoft stock.

Meta, which does not have a cloud business, said AI was helping it to target advertising, with total revenue up 28 per cent year-on-year to $61bn in the quarter.

CEO Mark Zuckerberg hinted at a leap into leasing out data centre space, telling investors that Meta was fielding “a large number of offers” to rent out its compute “at a meaningful premium over what we paid”.

He added, however, that “there will continue to be a significantly higher margin on selling intelligence rather than selling compute directly”.

Dec Mullarkey, managing director at asset management firm SLC Management, said the lack of a clear plan from Meta to rent out computing power was partly responsible for its 8 per cent share price decline on Thursday after earnings. “They are a bit all over the place,” he said. 

“For investors it’s no longer growth at any cost, they want to see the spending flowing through to results, like at the Big Three,” he said, referring to Google, Microsoft and Amazon. 

The search giant’s cloud business added $11bn of revenue on last year’s sales, but investors still sold off shares as it reported its first quarter burning cash since going public over two decades ago, posting negative $6bn of free cash flow for the period.

Google, like its peers, also disclosed huge increases in its future financial commitment linked to AI investments, which ballooned by about $500bn from three months before. The bulk of the new contracts involve long-term purchase commitments for technical infrastructure, as well as energy for data centres.

Meta signed $233bn of new commitments in the quarter. The additions include $96bn in leases for data centres and network infrastructure that will move on to its balance sheet as they come into use, $112bn in purchase commitments, mostly for third-party cloud capacity servers, and other infrastructure, as well as $25bn in new debt.

The group then added another $68bn in data centre leases in July.

Microsoft, meanwhile, signed more than $130bn of new data centre leases in the second quarter in a huge expansion of its commitments.

Together the three companies agreed close to $900bn of new AI-related obligations in the three-month period alone, binding their balance sheets to the AI race for years to come. Amazon has yet to post these detailed disclosures.

Several top executives acknowledged to analysts that the outlay on AI would continue to sap free cash flow in coming quarters. The free cash flow metric is closely watched as a measure of the cash companies have left to service debt or return to shareholders after covering their operating costs and capital spending.

The four groups’ combined free cash flows fell to a decade low of just $7bn during the period, with only Microsoft and Meta bringing in more than they spent.

Amazon chief Andy Jassy told investors that the group would have to absorb free cash flow pressures for some time as it raced to build “many data centres simultaneously” with a two-year lag from commissioning a facility to installing servers that enabled it to charge customers.

“In the short term . . . we’ll spend a lot of capex and encounter free cash flow headwinds until these data centres come online,” he said.

The significant lag between Big Tech’s massive upfront data centre investment and any associated revenue means that investors who have proven fickle in recent weeks amid an AI-led rout will have to be prepared to wait years for meaningful returns on their investment.

“Investors are being forced to rethink their own timelines,” Jaluria at RBC added.

Custom services set to account for as much as 20% of revenue, Italian luxury-car maker says

Ferrari said it expected to generate more profit than expected this year after customers, including the new AI super-rich, splurged on expensive custom features for their supercars.

The Italian luxury group became the only European carmaker to lift its full-year guidance with its order book covered for the whole of 2027, as it rides a wave of hyper-personalisation.

Chief executive Benedetto Vigna said the new AI wealth was “a good opportunity” for Ferrari, although he added that the company was seeing greater interest “from all the clients, not only from the AI situation, to personalise more and more cars”.

Ferrari said it now expected an adjusted operating profit of at least €2.26bn this year rather than €2.22bn, giving the group an industry-beating margin of at least 29.5 per cent. 

The results help settle nerves among investors about whether Ferrari would be able to maintain its ultra-high profit levels as the industry shifts to electric vehicles.

Vehicle shipments during the second quarter fell 3.7 per cent from a year earlier to 3,366 units but the company’s operating profit rose 10 per cent to €605mn due to spending to customise vehicles. 

Analysts also said Ferrari was in a good position to capture demand from new customers emerging from the wealth created by the surge in artificial intelligence-related shares in the US. 

Among its special-edition models, Bernstein analyst Stephen Reitman said the 296 Speciale was probably enjoying “extremely high levels of personalisation, especially in the USA”.

“A good set of results and a small raise in guidance were certainly welcome after concerns have been raised about the health of the luxury consumer and about the cadence of Ferrari’s own margin development,” Reitman said, predicting that the group was likely to raise its guidance again in the third quarter.

Vigna said the personalisation demand was driven both by “aesthetics” needs, such as the type of leather, and “functional” needs such as the number of cameras in a vehicle. 

Ferrari’s chief financial officer Antonio Picca Piccon said personalisation was likely to account for more than 20 per cent of its annual revenue.

Regarding demand for its first electric vehicle model, Vigna said he was satisfied with the level of uptake, which he claimed was coming from various regions across the world. But he declined to comment on how many EVs had been sold so far.

The FT reported on Wednesday that Ferrari achieved this year’s sales target for the Luce off the back of strong demand from China despite a polarising design that drew a backlash from investors and enthusiasts. 

The Swiss firm plans to open four stores in California over the next three months and its first three Brazil locations this year.

Just days after opening its first store in Dubai, On is doubling down on its investment in physical retail in California and expanding into the Brazilian market.

On Thursday, the Swiss sportswear brand said that it will open four new stores in California over the next three months in a move to deepen its connection with the West Coast’s running and outdoor communities.

The first shop to open as part of On’s new California expansion plan is a 2,800 square-foot store at 2061 Chestnut Street in San Francisco. Located steps from the water in city’s Marina District, the company noted that the Chestnut Street store takes inspiration from the red-orange tones of the Golden Gate Bridge and the energetic vibe of the surrounding neighborhood.

Now open, the space offers a full assortment of On footwear, apparel and accessories for running, tennis, training, outdoor and all-day lifestyle. Select products from partner collaborations will also be available in limited quantities.

Then, in September, On will open two more stores in the state. First is a 4,000 square-foot location at The Village at Corte Madera shopping center in Marin County. On said the design on the store will take inspiration from Northern California’s coastal redwood trees and rugged trails with warm timber accents seen throughout the space.

Next, On will unveil a 3,300 square-foot store at Westfield UTC in San Diego. The company noted that this location will take inspiration from the sun-drenched beaches and ocean cliffs of the city and will feature an airy layout with sand-toned finishes and lots of natural light.

Finally, in October, the company will open the doors to a 3,500 square-foot store at Westfield Century City in Los Angeles. This location will take inspiration from brutalist architecture with warm touches, sweeping curves and polished concrete.

Dan Schade, vice president and general manager of the Americas at On, said in a statement that the company’s retail expansion in California allows for it to cater to the state’s movement culture.

“Expanding our retail presence in California allows us to deliver premium, personalized experiences and equip athletes and movers for the road, trail, studio and court,” Schade said. “From San Francisco to Los Angeles to San Diego, our stores are designed to serve as active hubs for anyone pushing their limits.”

These new locations are in addition to the three retail stores that On currently operates in California, including Palo Alto, Abbot Kinney in Los Angeles and Fashion Island in Newport Beach.

This announcement is the latest California-centric move for On this year as the company aims to ramp up its presence in the state ahead of the Summer Olympic Games in Los Angeles in 2028.

In May, On launched a partnership with L.A.-based organic grocer and café Erewhon on a new collaborative collection and the launch of a wellness club. On said at the time that the new On x Erewhon Wellness Club will “engage Erewhon’s wellness-focused community through a series of running, training, and recovery events across L.A.”

And in addition to a run collection of shoes and apparel, On and Erewhon also introduced a co-branded juice, designed to promote recovery post-run.

That same month, On also introduced its first professional sprint team via the On Athletics Club (OAC) Sprint initiative. Based in Los Angeles, this new elite squad is “built to compete on the sport’s biggest stages and spark the cultural conversation with a young, diverse global audience,” On said in May.

The four new California store openings also come at the same time as the company’s plans to expand into Brazil. On Thursday, On said it would open its first two stores in São Paulo, the first of which opened today at JK Iguatemi shopping center. The 2,690 square-foot store draws its main inspiration from SESC Pompeia cultural center, incorporating its stone brutalist aesthetic reflected in the venue’s signature walkways and bridges.

On Aug. 6, the company will then open its second store in the city at Morumbi Shopping center. The 3,282 square-foot store draws direct inspiration from São Paulo’s iconic Copan Building, designed by the legendary architect Oscar Niemeyer.

Fiorella Palacios, senior director of Latin America at On, noted in a statement that Brazil is a “key market” for the company in the region as it becomes “increasingly connected” to the latest trends in sports.

“Bringing On stores to Brazil is a fundamental step in our global retail expansion, allowing these local communities of athletes and movers to experience and test our technology firsthand through the premium brand experience that only On can offer,” Palacios said. “We are incredibly excited about this new milestone for the brand in Brazil.”

On added that it is also set to open a third Brazilian store before the end of the year at Leblon Shopping center in Rio de Janeiro, as the company works towards its goal to increase its store base to approximately 100 by the end of 2026.

The company’s business keeps accelerating, as does the beauty market.

NEW YORK — L’Oréal’s business — and that of the beauty market — keep picking up speed.

The company’s second-quarter revenues broadly beat market expectations, registering 6.3 percent adjusted like-for-like growth to 11.62 billion euros. That compares to consensus of 5.6 percent.

The market smiled on L’Oréal’s results a day after their release. Its stock closed Thursday up 2.7 percent to 394 euros.

“Our second quarter kept the strong rhythm of the first, and we delivered the promised acceleration versus 2025,” said Nicolas Hieronimus, L’Oréal chief executive officer, addressing financial analysts and journalists during a call on Thursday morning.

He highlighted that since the start of 2025, adjusted like-for-like growth has been gaining speed semester after semester, from 3.2 percent to 4.9 percent to 6.5 percent in first-half 2026.

The global beauty market growth has also been accelerating since the beginning of last year. It stood at about 4.5 percent in the first six months of this year.

“The grimmer the economic and geopolitical headlines, the more consumers crave an affordable feel-good treat — or as I like to call it, the ‘dopamine effect’ of beauty,” Hieronimus said.

For the first half, sales at the maker of Lancôme, Kiehl’s and Garnier products were 23.78 billion euros, up 6.5 percent on an adjusted like-for-like basis.

Net profit, excluding non-recurring items, amounted to 4 billion euros, with diluted earnings per share coming in at 7.40 euros, up 4.8 percent compared to first-half 2025.

L’Oréal’s three developed geographic regions posted solid adjusted like-for-like growth. “At 6.1 percent, Europe remains very robust,” said Christophe Babule, L’Oréal chief financial officer. “At 6.7 percent, North America maintained its strong rhythm, thanks in particular to Professional Products and Dermatological Beauty.”

In North Asia, sales grew 4.6 percent, or 6.1 percent without travel retail. “The key contributor was the acceleration in China, driven by the continued recovery in Luxe,” Babule said. “Emerging markets was the most dynamic region, growing at close to 10 percent. [The South Asia Pacific, Middle East, North Africa and sub-Saharan Africa region] advanced at an impressive 13.8 percent and in a more challenging context.”

Hieronimus gave a shoutout to Vietnam, which was up more than 50 percent, and to India, which had a strong acceleration of 17 percent, well ahead of the market there.

Latin America, which grew at 5.2 percent, was the only region that was at a level below 2025, but L’Oréal is starting to see the first signs of stabilization there.

“In that context, we increased our outperformance and expanded our market share,” Hieronimus said.

Every one of L’Oréal’s divisions grew on an adjusted basis in the first half.

Professional Products posted growth of 11.6 percent, boosted by the ongoing boom of premium hair care. It outperformed the professional market more than twofold. Consumer Products advanced 4.3 percent, with L’Oréal Paris delivering exceptional growth driven by hair care. L’Oréal Luxe was up 5.1 percent, boosted by the recovery in China and the continued dynamism of fragrance. L’Oréal Dermatological Beauty registered 10.6 percent gains, marking a third consecutive quarter of double-digit growth, with both skin care and hair care contributing. That was led by CeraVe.

Each of L’Oréal’s product categories progressed, too. With an uptick of 15.6 percent, hair care was the most dynamic. “Each division contributed strongly, growing in double digits,” Babule said.

“Fragrances maintained their double-digit pace at 10.3 percent, with strong contributions from Prada, Valentino and Aesop,” he said. “Skin care accelerated strongly to 5.8 percent, as Dermatological Beauty maintained its double-digit rhythm and Luxe gradually improved.”

Skin care contributed one-third of L’Oréal’s growth in the first half.

Hair color was up 3.5 percent, driven by Consumer Products, while Professional Products gradually picked up pace. Makeup grew by 2.5 percent, penalized by service levels in the Americas.

“Since our beauty stimulus plan kicked into gear at the start of last year, the change in sales contribution from new products has been accelerating each semester, from 100 basis points to 200 basis points in ’25 to 250 basis points in the first half of 2026,” Hieronimus said.

E-commerce is beauty’s fastest-growing retail channel — an area where L’Oréal has leadership, overindexes and outperforms.

The group’s e-commerce grew by 18 percent, almost twice as fast as the market, and reached 7.4 billion euros. Versus the first half of last year, that’s an increase of more than 200 basis points for the group. Concurrently, in emerging markets, the rate of e-commerce rose by more than 400 basis points.

L’Oréal’s brick-and-mortar business gained 2.5 percent, thanks to strong partnerships with key retailers.

Hieronimus highlighted the group’s consumer engagement as being at the heart of what L’Oréal does. He said it’s where “we are winning, thanks to the unique combination of our scale and agility.”

“In an increasingly fragmented landscape, we master every facet of consumer engagement, from our Lorealistar community that brings together thousands of influencers worldwide to AI-based innovations that pioneer the way people experience beauty,” he said. “We are continuously growing our share of beauty influence, which stands approximately at 29 percent. And we are building the future of the consumer journey.”

Hieronimus described L’Oréal’s multidivision category conquest.

“We continue to double down on hair care, as the category becomes more sophisticated,” he said, citing an example: “Thanks to our broad-based innovation strategy, our brands are winning in each division — whether Elseve in mass; Kérastase in professional, and Dercos and CeraVe in derma — all are growing well into double-digits.”

Hieronimus said L’Oréal enters the second half of 2026 with confidence, and that it intends to keep its pace.

“In the full year, we expect the global beauty market to grow somewhere between 4.5 percent and 5 percent, and we expect to keep outperforming this market,” Hieronimus said. “So far, July is off to a very good start, and our teams are confident for the rest of the year.”

The reasons are manifold, according to the executive. For one, L’Oréal’s beauty stimulus plan remains in full swing. Skin care will reaffirm its comeback, in part thanks to the rollout of some of the group’s smaller brands. Dr.G, Korea’s number-one skin care brand, will be launched in China and the U.S. in the second half.

“Medik8, a star performer since its acquisition, will start its global expansion,” Hieronimus said. The brand is currently present in only two countries.

“Acquisitions will pull their full weight,” Hieronimus said. “Creed will be consolidated for the whole of the second half, and the brand is currently growing double digits.”

The acquisition of Innovist in India will be consolidated, too.

“North Asia will continue to support growth,” Hieronimus said. “The recovery in China continues, and it’s driven by Luxe, which clearly plays to our strengths. In addition, we expect a return to normal in travel retail Asia over the course of the second half, especially in the fourth quarter.”

He said L’Oréal is more ready than ever to keep winning in the long run.

“First, beauty runs on two engines — dopamine, or pleasure, and health, feel-good and live-well,” Hieronimus said. “Dopamine is beauty as indulgence: a scent you love, a texture you enjoy. Health is beauty as wellness — a quest for longevity and skin rejuvenation. L’Oréal is well-positioned to fire on both engines, and there is no other company that can do that.

“We have decades of olfactory science and texture of innovation to fuel the indulgence of beauty at scale, and our best-in-class R&I drives the extension of beauty into health,” he said.

Hieronimus believes L’Oréal is only scratching the surface of its adjacencies in body care, where consumers are looking for more performant products.

“In the first half, body care grew in double digits across all divisions,” he said.

Hieronimus said L’Oréal’s portfolio keeps becoming ever stronger. The Gucci fragrance and beauty license starts within the group on July 1, 2027, and the transition to that begins this September.

“Gucci is one of the most iconic brands in luxury, and we have an unrivaled track record of turning beauty licenses into success stories,” Hieronimus said. “Prada and Valentino went from less than 100 million to over 700 million euros in sales in just four to six years. YSL is a 3-billion-euro brand in beauty, on a par with fashion, so the potential is huge, given that for Gucci, sales in beauty are only a fraction of [those] in fashion.”

For L’Oréal, AI means accelerated innovation. The group’s R&I has been the most augmented by AI over the last four years. “The number of molecules we have analyzed has increased exponentially,” he said. “This allows us to launch more new products faster every year and to keep outperforming the global beauty market.

“AI also means augmented imagination,” Hieronimus said. L’Oréal creates more than 500,000 pieces of content monthly to drive social-first engagement across its key platforms.

“We were an early adopter of AI, and as with every tech disruption, we quickly accelerated its adoption across the entire organization,” he said. “We are on a roll. Our innovation engine is running at full steam.”

Deal comes after Leopold Aschenbrenner’s investment firm held overnight crunch talks with investors

Ken Griffin’s Citadel has swooped in to buy a large portion of hedge fund Situational Awareness’ $16bn public equity holdings after Leopold Aschenbrenner’s investment firm was wrongfooted in the AI sell-off.

Citadel, a $71bn multi-strategy hedge fund, forged the crunch deal within the past 24 hours, according to multiple people familiar with the matter, in one of the largest rushed stock transactions in Wall Street history.

The deal comes after Situational Awareness held urgent talks with multiple investors late on Wednesday about selling a significant portion of its public holdings, the people familiar with the matter said.

Situational Awareness also has private stakes in companies including a $5bn Anthropic holding. It will continue to run as a private investment firm, said one person familiar with the matter.

Citadel, one of the world’s largest hedge funds, is known for its ability to mobilise its vast resources to take advantage of huge sell-offs or other dislocations in markets. Its decision to pounce on Situational Awareness’s assets came during a moment of turbulence in markets, with AI stocks having sustained heavy losses in recent weeks.

The tech-heavy Nasdaq 100 soared more than 3 per cent on Thursday, in a move partly fuelled by relief that Situational Awareness would not need to rapidly unwind its holdings into the market because of the Citadel transaction.

The FT first reported on Wednesday that Situational Awareness, known for large, concentrated positions in AI stocks, was in talks with investors to sell assets or raise fresh capital. It also used significant amounts of borrowing to increase its returns, leaving it vulnerable during the recent downturn in tech shares.

Situational Awareness halted the conversations with some smaller investors in its fund overnight on Wednesday and shifted its attention to getting a deal done with one large buyer in an effort to speed up the process and minimise losses, said people briefed on the matter.

At least three multibillion-dollar hedge funds including Millennium Management held talks with Situational Awareness over the past 24 hours to get a deal done, said people briefed on the matter.

Goldman Sachs and JPMorgan Chase, two of Situational Awareness’s prime brokers, were involved in the negotiations to sell the public equity book, some of the people added.

Situational Awareness did not immediately respond to requests for comment. Goldman, JPMorgan Chase, Citadel and Millennium declined to comment.

Hedge funds borrow from prime brokers to finance their purchases of stocks on public markets as a way to magnify returns, but banks can also work with firms to sell positions in an orderly manner.

Aschenbrenner struck an upbeat attitude with investors as recently as last Friday when he disclosed in a letter returns of 439 per cent from the start of the year to the end of June.

In the letter, he encouraged investors to inject more money into the fund.

“PS. At times we call out opportunities that seem like a particularly good time to add funds, if you have been waiting for one,” he said, offering investors the ability to invest new cash on August 1.

The hedge fund has operated with a skeleton staff, with only four investment professionals and a total of eight employees, according to its most recent regulatory filing.

Aschenbrenner, who had no previous trading experience before starting the fund, worked for the FTX Future Fund, the philanthropic arm of Sam Bankman-Fried’s empire before it collapsed in late 2022. He later joined OpenAI’s “Superalignment” team before being fired over an alleged leak.

The German-born investor became well known in Silicon Valley in 2024 after writing an essay titled “Situational Awareness” that detailed how he expected AI to dramatically reshape society in the coming years.

The sale to Citadel is a dramatic reversal for the investor, who had until recently enjoyed a cult following in Silicon Valley and on Wall Street for his prescient and aggressive bets on AI-linked companies. He was a frequent guest on podcasts and had amassed more than 250,000 followers on X.

“Before long, the world will wake up,” he wrote when he first launched the fund in 2024. “But right now, there are perhaps a few hundred people, most of them in San Francisco and the AI labs, that have situational awareness. Through whatever peculiar forces of fate, I have found myself amongst them.”