Hi r/Shopify - I'm Paul and I follow the e-commerce industry closely for my Shopifreaks E-commerce Newsletter, which I've published weekly since 2021.
I was invited by the Mods of this subreddit to share my weekly e-commerce news recaps (ie: shorter versions of my full editions) to r/Shopify. Although my news recaps aren't strictly about Shopify (some weeks Shopify is covered more than others), I hope they bring value to your business no matter what platform you're on.
Let's dive into this week's top stories...
STAT OF THE WEEK: Global e-commerce startup funding is down 80% from its peak in 2021. Crunchbase reports that so far this year, there have been around $7.3B in global e-commerce related startup funding rounds, putting 2025 on track to deliver the sector's lowest investment tally in years, and down to a fraction of its peak in 2021.
Amazon rolled out a new agentic shopping feature in Rufus that will automatically buy products for shoppers when they go on sale. Users can open a product detail page, tap the chat bubble to launch Rufus, and type a requst like "Buy these headphones then they're at least 30% off." From there, Rufus monitors the price of the item every 30 minutes until it meets or exceeds your pricing criteria and buys the item for you. I think this is a great initial agentic use case for Rufus. I'm not quite ready as a consumer to send an agent out into the wild and shop for me without restraints. However I do love the idea of choosing a specific product that it can buy for me automatically when it reaches a certain pricing threshold. It feels like I'm still steering the ship.
Amazon unveiled Ads Agent, an AI-powered tool designed to automate media planning and campaign creation. Ads Agent can create & optimize campaigns using text prompts like "pause all campaigns with ROAS less than 200%," assist with campaign targeting, and enable advertisers to use natural language to ask questions and receive real-time guidance and insights to simplify analysis. Ads Agent is available to all users with access to Amazon Marketing Cloud and U.S. users of Multimedia Solutions with Amazon DSP.
Amazon also announced an update to its Campaign Manager – which it revamped into a new centralized hub that brings together sponsored ads and multimedia solutions with Amazon DSP into one single ad platform. The new interface replaces fragmented workflows with unified setup, optimization, reporting, and cross-channel visibility, offering features like smart search, guidance cards, multi-account management, and a universal campaign creation button. Amazon said that early testing shows smart search cut bid-optimization workflow time by 26%. The beta version of the new Campaign Manager is available to select advertisers, with a wider rollout planned for later this year.
Apple launched a new Mini Apps Partner Program that offers app developers a better fee (15% instead of 30%) in exchange for using some of its technology to build their mini apps. The partner program adds new requirements for the mini apps to support specific Apple technologies including its Advanced Commerce API, Declared Age Rating API, and in-app purchase system, as well as send information about a user's in-app purchase to Apple when refunds are requested. One one hand, Apple positions the program as a way for developers to grow their business, leverage Apple's trust and safety tools, and benefit from reduced commissions. On the other hand, it helps ensure Apple retain its ability to extract a commission from mini applications by creating and enforcing an infrastructure around them.
Walmart announced that its CEO Doug McMillon will retire early next year, to be replaced by John Furner, the company's current U.S. CEO, who will take over as head of the retailer on Feb 1st. McMillon, who is now 59, stepped into the role of CEO in February 2014 and helped pioneer the company's digital revolution to eventually become Amazon's top online competitor in the U.S. During his tenure, Walmart's shares have risen more than 300% despite the Covid pandemic, supply chain disruptions, high inflation, and tariff changes. Furner, who is now 51, has been the CEO of Walmart's U.S. business since 2019, during which he's overseen the company's more than 4,600 stores in the U.S., which is its largest market. Ready to learn something really interesting? Both McMillon and Furner started at Walmart as hourly associates and then spent the next three decades with the company! It's fascinating how Walmart shaped these young men into leaders over the course of their careers, as opposed to making outside hires.
Shopify and Liquid AI announced a partnership to license and deploy the startup's flagship Liquid Foundation Models across Shopify workflows including search and other multimodal use cases. Liquid AI is a Boston-area startup spun out of Massachusetts Institute of Technology that builds “liquid neural networks,” which are a form of foundation model designed to run efficiently on devices and embedded hardware. Shopify actually participated in Liquid AI's $250M Series A round in December 2024 and subsequently began co-developing its technology together for Shopify-specific use cases. As part of the partnership, Shopify and Liquid AI built a new recommendation engine together that beats its older recommendation tools and led to more shoppers clicking and buying the products it suggested, as well as a super-fast text model that helps improve search result speed and accuracy. Shopify is also testing other Liquid AI models that can work with multiple types of data, such as customer profiles, product images, and store information, to power things like smarter recommendations, better product tagging, and more accurate customer insights.
Meta is revamping its Facebook Marketplace in an attempt to make it more “social and collaborative” and appeal to “young adults” on the platform. Updates include Group Collections that work similar to group Pinterest boards, Collaborative Buying that allows friends to join chats with sellers to coordinate pickup and negotiate prices, Reactions & Comments on the listings themselves instead of just on the shared versions in the buy and sell groups, and Suggested Questions To Ask, which suggests questions beyond the annoying "Is this item still available?" question that has plagued sellers for years. My favorite new feature is AI Insights for Car Buyig, which gathers information about engine options, safety ratings, transmission type, seating, cargo capacity, reviews, and price insights and displays them on the listing itself. This feature turns a crappy seller listing with no details into a comprehensive listing with everything you need to know about the car sans-Google search.
ElevenLabs unveiled its Iconic Voice Marketplace, a new platform that lets brands license the voices of public figures like Liza Minnelli and Michael Caine for use in marketing and entertainment. The marketplace allows brands to negotiate directly with the owners of the voices and their talent representatives before using their replicas, so not everyone can use the celebrity voices for anything they'd like. The weirdest part of Iconic Voice Marketplace is that it includes voices from deceased celebrities like Judy Garland, Baby Ruth, and Maya Angelou, after having partnered with the estates. In fact, most of the voices are from deceased public figures! IP rights aside, is it respectful of the dead to sell their voices to promote products that came out decades after they lived? And is it a good look for a brand to use a deceased celebrity's voice in their marketing campaign? Are customers going to be like, “Is that Dorothy from Wizard of Oz promoting a weight loss program?”
Beehiiv released 10 new products & updates at its Winter Release event, aiming to reposition itself as the “operating system for the content economy,” as well as better compete with Substack, Squarespace, Patreon, Shopify, and other tools in various ways. Updates include the ability to sell digitao products, an AI website builder, podcasts, website analytics, a link in bio tool, new templates for newsletters and landing pages, dynamic content to cater to readers based on their location, interests, and subscription tier, and automations for upgraded welcome series and workflows. Adweek notes that beehiiv's business is split between its SaaS subscriptions, which is comprised of 15,000 paying customers and generates $22M annually, and its newsletter ad network, which generates between $800k and $1M per month.
Google introduced new AI shopping features across Search and the Gemini app just in time for the holiday season. The update lets users shop conversationally in Search using AI Mode, which can generate shoppable images, comparison tables and real-time product data from the Shopping Graph. Google also added local availability checks by having its AI call nearby stores and expanded agentic checkout, which can track prices and automatically complete purchases with user approval. Awesome idea for local availability checks, except for the fact that local businesses are trained for years now to ignore all calls from Google! So good luck with that one, LOL.
PayPal relaunched in the UK with a unified online and in-store payment experience and introduced its first loyalty program, PayPal+. The program lets nearly 30M UK customers earn and redeem points across PayPal balance, cards and Buy Now Pay Later purchases, with higher tiers offering increased point values and perks. PayPal also launched its first UK debit and credit cards, expanded PayPal Credit for in-store use and announced brand partnerships including Live Nation festival benefits. The relaunch comes nearly two years after PayPal restructured its operations in the UK following Brexit, transferring all of its services from its Luxembourg-based entity to PayPal UK Ltd in anticipation of the expiry of permissions by the UK government to allow EEA-based firms to operate in the country for a limited time following Brexit.
A Berlin court ruled that Google must pay €465M to Idealo and €107M to Producto for abusing its dominance in price comparison search. The case was originally filed because Idealo alleged that Google favored its own Shopping service on search results pages from 2008 to 2023, diverting traffic and harming rival comparison sites. Idealo, which sought €3.3B in damages, said it will continue its legal action. Google rejected the rulings and said it plans to appeal, arguing that it had made changes in 2017 to ensure rival comparison shopping services were given the same opportunity as its own Google Shopping to display ads on its search results page.
OpenAI's video generator tool Sora 2 can't fix its copyright infringement problem because it was trained on stolen content, according to 404 Media's Emanuel Maiberg. 404's testing found that Sora 2 continues to produce copyrighted characters and likenesses despite new guardrails that require rights-holder opt-in and that users can bypass restrictions with simple misspellings or indirect prompts, enabling videos resembling Animal Crossing, American Dad and real people. Maiberg says, “For OpenAI to actually stop the copyright infringement it needs to make its Sora 2 model ‘unlearn' copyrighted content, which is incredibly expensive and complicated” and “would require removing all that content from the training data and retraining the model.” Sorry OpenAI, but not our problem!
USPS is planning to open its last-mile network to more shippers as it pursues negotiations with UPS and other companies to handle expanded Ground Saver and retailer deliveries. Postmaster General David Steiner said the agency wants to grow same-day and next-day last-mile options while better monetizing its nationwide reach. Steiner described an effort to build broader partnerships without reverting to pre-DeJoy consolidator arrangements and said the USPS could also expand its role in returns through its 33,000-facility first-mile network. Also, USPS is planning to raise shipping rates in January 2026 and plans to ask Congress and regulators for greater pricing flexibility as it faces current rate-setting limits.
Walmart, Target and Kroger promoted lower-cost Thanksgiving meal bundles this year by replacing several national-brand items with private-label alternatives. Walmart’s basket dropped from about $55 in 2024 to roughly $40 in 2025 with the same amount of items by swapping out brand-name products for cheaper store brands, while Target and Kroger made similar substitutions to keep prices flat. President Trump took credit for the price reduction on Truth Social, calling it a “very powerful statement” that's “better than a poll,” but failed to mention the substitutions (or didn't know about them).
Reddit released a new WooCommerce integration that lets merchants connect their stores directly to Reddit Ads to reach shoppers researching products on the platform. The tool automates Reddit Pixel and CAPI setup, syncs WooCommerce product catalogs for Dynamic Product Ads, and enables easy campaign creation through Reddit Ads Manager. Reddit says over half of all online purchase-related discussions happen on its platform, giving WooCommerce merchants access to a large, high-intent audience in time for the holiday season.
Alibaba unveiled a new “AI Mode” that embeds agentic AI directly into its B2B platform, enabling buyers to compare suppliers and generate sourcing recommendations through natural language queries. The feature, powered by Alibaba’s Accio AI search engine, launches in December as the company reports a 57% YoY rise in European orders and a 50% increase in global supplier participation. Alibaba said AI Mode will unlock the “hidden product shelf” by surfacing specialized SMEs previously overlooked by keyword-based search, advancing its goal of making AI the “operating system” of global trade.
commercetools introduced Agentic Jumpstart, a new enterprise tool that connects product and pricing data to major AI platforms like ChatGPT, Perplexity, and Copilot and provides secure infrastructure for AI-initiated transactions through its AI Hub and Agent Gateway components. Early adopters include Frasers Group and Liverpool, and launch partners such as Accenture, EPAM, Orium and Valtech will support enterprise deployments as agent-led shopping grows. In other commercetools news, the company announced that it processed more than $75B in annualized GMV as of September 2025, marking a 60% YoY increase, alongside an average 30% annual revenue gain among customers.
Airbnb will soon be testing a new service with Instacart called “kitchen stocking” that lets guests at some U.S. rentals order groceries through the app ahead of and during their stay. During the three-month pilot program, which begins Jan 5th, Airbnb will pay hosts $25 for every completed order if they receive a guest's pre-order and put away the groceries before they check in. Guests will be able to place an Instacart order within the Airbnb app up to three weeks before their stay. Really cool idea! Whenever I rent Airbnbs for my friends and family who visit me in Cuenca, I always check-in early and fill their fridges with groceries for their stay. It's a nice touch that saves them from having to go find a grocery or convenience store after a long day of travel.
Amazon Music launched a new feature called Fan Groups in beta in Canada, bringing dedicated communities where where people can “discover, share, chat, and listen to music” in the iOS and Android app, with plans to roll out in the U.S. and additional markets globally in 2026. Fan Groups can be made for artists, songs, or genres, and group members can save music recommendations and instantly stream recommended music. Do people actually want to join communities based around a single song? And does Amazon really want to be in the business of moderating group chats on its music platform? Save that for Reddit.
Amazon introduced a centralized returns dashboard that gives sellers ASIN-level insights, performance metrics, and recovery data across FBA and merchant-fulfilled channels. The tool includes return reasons, critical review rates, and Grade and Resell recovery metrics, and arrives as Amazon’s holiday return policy allows purchases made between November 1 and December 31 to be returned through January 31. Some sellers welcomed clearer reporting, while others voiced frustration that inaccurate return reasons and refund-first policies continue to create costs and abuse across the marketplace.
Venmo introduced a new rewards program called Venmo Stash that offers cashback of up to 5% to its Mastercard Debit Card. Initially customers earn a whopping 1% cash back when they spend their Venmo balance, but then rewards grow to 2% when they turn on auto reloads to keep their balance replenished, followed by 5% when they opt to receive Direct Deposits on Venmo each month. Instead of offering cashback based on spending category like a lot of cashback programs, Venmo Stash has customers pick from curated bundles of their favorite brands, such as a bundle that includes McDonald's, TikTok Shop, Uber, and Uber Eats, or another bundle that offers Amazon, DoorDash, Domino's, and Walgreens. Cashback rewards are capped at $100 per month, and users can switch bundles each month.
Mercor, a startup that helps AI companies train their large language models by contracting humans to tag and categorize text, images, and videos, told thousands of its contract workers that they would no longer be working on a big project for Meta due to “project scope changes,” and then offered the contractors work on a similar new project that would pay $16 an hour, $5 less than their previous hourly rate. Mercor, which was recently valued at $10B, said that the information was “inaccurate,” but didn't add any additional details. I guess it turns out there's only so many things to label.
Cash App introduced new features during its fall update including Moneybot, an AI assistant that analyzes spending, income, and savings patterns and helps users take actions like splitting bills or checking balances, and tools to help users find merchants that accept Bitcoin and pay in Bitcoin using USD through the Lightning Network. Cash App is also launching a new benefits program called Cash App Green with perks including higher borrowing limits, free overdraft coverage, ATM access, and up to 3.5% APY, with roughly 8M accounts eligible for the benefits.
TikTok is partnering with iHeartMedia to feature TikTok creators on its podcasts, broadcasts, and live events, including the launch of a TikTok Podcast Network. The announcement describes the endeavor as “a station where listeners will feel like they are scrolling on TikTok, but with their ears,” featuring songs that are popular on TikTok as well as “trend-driven storytelling and emotional context behind the music.” The two companies also plan to work together to add creators to iHeart events like its Music Festival and Jingle Ball.
Samsung is preparing to launch its own credit card in the U.S. in partnership with Barclays and Visa, according to WSJ sources. The card is expected to challenge the Apple Card with cash-back rewards and a feature that allows users to transfer their rewards to a Samsung savings account, which they could then use for discounts on future Samsung products like phones, TVs, and home appliances. The same sources say that Samsung is also exploring launching a high-yield savings account, a digital prepaid account, and a BNPL product to encourage consumers to use its digital wallet more often.
Mozilla Firefox is building an AI browsing feature called AI Window that includes an assistant and chatbot, which it calls an opt-in “intelligent and user-controlled space” that is being built “in the open” with user input. Mozilla is attempting to position itself as a respectful browsing company that gives users the option to use as much or as little AI as they want, while other browsers “are building AI experiences that keep you locked in a conversational loop.” AI Window will be one of three browsing experiences offered to Firefox users in addition to classic and private windows.
Index Exchange, a Toronto-based global supply-side ad tech platform, is suing Google for allegedly illegally tying its publisher ad server to its ad exchange, seeking monetary damages and injunctive relief following a federal court's determination in April that Google illegally monopolized digital advertising markets. The lawsuit alleges that Google's systematic ongoing anticompetitive conduct prevented the company from competing fairly in markets worth over $104B annually and that Google's conduct artificially suppressed its growth and forced the company to invest substantial resources in developing workarounds to Google's anticompetitive restrictions.
Former GroupM executive Richard Foster filed a $100M lawsuit accusing WPP of firing him for objecting to what he described as improper rebate practices tied to media buying. Foster alleged that WPP retained $1.5B to $2B in rebates that should have gone to clients and said his dismissal coincided with GroupM’s rebrand to WPP Media. WPP denied the accusations and said it will defend the case, noting that Foster was let go as part of a broader restructuring and rejecting any link between his termination and rebate concerns.
Meta, TikTok, Google, and YouTube are suing California to challenge its new Protecting Our Kids from Social Media Addiction Act, arguing that its requirement for parental consent before minors can access personalized feeds violates the First Amendment and restricts minors' access to protected speech. Meta's complaint argues that just as the state can't dictate how a library orders its books, it also can't dictate how Meta organizes speech on its platform. Good augment Meta — because kids have a history of getting addicted to library bookshelves! California’s attorney general maintains the statute is aimed at safeguarding children from addictive design features, and the Ninth Circuit has previously signaled that key elements of the law are likely to survive legal challenges.
GoDaddy owes Express Mobile $170M for infringing on two of its patents relating to website building tools. A Delaware federal jury found that GoDaddy’s web-design features violated patents owned by Express Mobile, which sued in 2019 over technology developed by its founder and former IBM engineer Steven Rempell. GoDaddy said it disagrees with the verdict and plans to challenge it in court, while Express Mobile called the outcome a validation of its patents. The company previously won a $40 million verdict against Shopify in 2022, though that ruling was later overturned.
TikTok users who accused the company of collecting sensitive data through its in-app browser withdrew their lawsuit after independent experts concluded the browser code did not in fact capture the information alleged in the complaint. Maybe they should have gotten those experts involved before filing the lawsuit! The class action, which originally filed in 2022, claimed TikTok secretly tracked keystrokes and activity on third-party sites, citing research that showed the app’s browser was capable of such logging. After reviewing TikTok’s code during discovery, the plaintiffs’ experts reported that the data of concern was not collected, leading both sides to agree that continuing the case was unwarranted.
MrBeast is on a hiring spree, bringing on board new executives from TikTok, Snap, and NBCU, as part of his goal to build a Disney-style entertainment business. His company, which raised an estimated couple hundred million dollars earlier this year at a $5B valuation, has been pushing to turn its media business profitable, staffing up in certain areas to close more brand deals, recruit creatives, and expand production work. I fully support the development of a new media empire! The existing ones have gone stale.
X launched a new “Bangers” badge, which rewards creators for “the very best posts that move the timeline, ranked by authentic interactions,” and appears on the creator's profile for one month. Only updates from personal accounts (not brand accounts) are eligible for the award, and only engagements by X Premium accounts, which comprise less than 1% of users on the platform, count as “authentic interactions.” Honestly I can't even hate on this. It's kind of nice to have a social media company not be a bland sterile ripoff of every other network and come up with its own vibe.
Nebius Group, a Netherlands-based AI infrastructure and cloud computing company that provides GPU-optimized compute for AI firms, signed a $3B deal with Meta to provide the company with AI infrastructure over a five-year period, noting that the size of the contract had to be limited to the capacity that Nebius had available. The deal follows a similar $17.4B deal with Microsoft in September. Nebius reported a 355% jump in revenue to $146.1M in Q3 and is targeting up to $9B in ARR by the end of 2026.
The European Union is accelerating its plan to abolish the de minimis exemption, which lets packages under €150 enter the region duty free, and may now end it as early as the first quarter of 2026, two years ahead of schedule. The move comes as France has been pushing for stronger action against platforms like Shein and Temu and follows the U.S. endings its own de minimis loophole earlier this year in May. Once implemented, every low-value package entering the EU would be subject to a customs charge, with the European Commission proposing a flat-rate duty and France lobbying for a fixed fee of around €5 per parcel, arguing that Chinese exporters frequently lie about the declared value of their goods. A separate €2 handling fee is also under discussion.
Meta is getting ready to launch third-party integration with WhatsApp in Europe during the next few months, as required by the Digital Markets Act, beginning with BirdyChat and Haiket. WhatsApp users in the region will eventually see a notification in the settings that that will explain how to opt-in to third party messaging, which will work on mobile apps, but not on desktops, web, or tablets. Meta says its partnerships are a result of more than three years of work with the European Commission to build a solution to third-party chats that meet the requirements of the DMA, while preserving privacy and security for users.
PayPal introduced its BNPL service Pay in 4 in Canada, allowing shoppers to split purchases up to $1,500 into four interest-free payments with any merchant that uses PayPal, joining Affirm, Klarna, and Afterpay in serving the Canadian market. PayPal launched pay in 4 in the U.S. in August 2020, but has offered installment payments in select European markets as far back as 2016 under different branding.
🏆 This week's most ridiculous story… A TikToker from North Carolina named Brenay Kennard has been ordered to pay $1.75M to the ex-wife of her manager for ruining her marriage. Kennard was sued by Akira Montague, the former wife of her manager, who accused her of having an affair with her husband, Tim Montague, which in turn ended their marriage. The ex-wife claimed in the lawsuit that Kennard “engaged in behavior designed to seduce” her former husband and “flaunted her affair and romantic relationship … in public and private places.” Nearly two years after filing the lawsuit, a jury found Kennard liable of alienation of affection and criminal conversation. Only six states other states recognize the alienation of affection law, which allows a spouse to sue a third party for intentionally interfering with their marriage.
I hope you found this recap helpful. See you next week!
PAUL
PS: If I missed any big news this week, please share in the comments.
