Hello, AI enthusiasts from around the world.

Welcome to this week's newsletter for the AI and the Future of Work podcast.

2025 was supposed to be AI’s year. The moment when we would see its full potential take shape in everyday life.

From AI-powered refrigerators that optimize how we store food, to EVs that adapt in real time to crowded streets, the vision felt close. A true Internet of Things, finally coming together.

But that moment hasn’t arrived yet. Part of the reason is where attention has gone. The focus has shifted, and some players have pulled the conversation in different directions. Still, the trajectory remains clear. We are moving toward that future.

When we get there, the impact will go beyond convenience. It will reshape how we live, how we work, and how we make decisions as customers.

In today’s conversation, we explore what the future of AI looks like, and how financial markets have influenced where we are today, just as they have with past technologies.

Let’s dive into this week’s highlights! 🚀

🎙️New Podcast Episode With Emmanuel Daniel, Founder of TAB Global

With everything AI can do today, would you believe we haven’t unlocked even a fraction of its potential?

For years, we’ve heard how AI would improve our lives. The vision has been clear. AI handling daily, mundane tasks, from managing what’s in our refrigerator to guiding our EVs.

A true Internet of Things, finally taking shape. Many believed 2025 would be the year it all came together.

It didn’t. So what happened?

According to Emmanuel Daniel, the answer lies in the financial markets. Not in cost, but in where attention has gone. These markets pulled focus away from what AI can truly do.

Emmanuel Daniel is a global thought leader, author, and advisor focused on geopolitics, the future of finance, and how both shape business and society.

As the founder of TAB Global and a recognized Top 10 global influencer in the Fintech Power50, he has spent decades studying the global economy to understand how nations and institutions interact.

He sat down with Dan Turchin to explain why 2025 didn’t meet expectations. Many assumed AI would disintermediate large organizations by redefining roles.

Instead, financial markets captured the tokenized economy, assigned it value, and shifted attention away from AI’s broader potential.

Emmanuel believes we are now turning a corner. The story is not about smarter devices. It is about how AI empowers consumers to relate to products and companies in new ways.

In this conversation, we discuss:

• Why, when the real agentic AI disruption arrives, large organizations will face a fundamental shift.

• Why the end user no longer interacts directly with a bank’s app, and what this means for every institution investing in UX.

• Why Emmanuel argues that debt is the economy, and why the conversation around U.S. debt-to-GDP is asking the wrong question.

• Why China’s eCNY pilot program shows how state-backed digital currencies are structurally set up to fail, largely due to the limits of government-led innovation.

• Why stablecoins have created a parallel global economy that traditional banking missed, and what this signals for institutions still controlling the rails.

• Why originality of thought remains a uniquely human strength, and why AI has little value if you cannot ask the right questions.

Listen to the full episode to learn more about customer empowerment and how greater decision-making autonomy will drive change across industries, including consolidated systems like banking.

📖 AI Fun Fact Article

Globalization? More like De-Globalization?

Mas Arsyarrahman Setiawan explores a compelling idea: what if AI leads us to rethink globalization itself?

Globalization and the global supply chain made AI possible. Research from the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) shows that 91% of the world’s semiconductor sales come from just five countries: the United States, Japan, China, South Korea, and Taiwan.

Without that global supply chain, AI development would not have reached this point.

So, why is the author discussing de-globalization, the opposite concept to the marked expansion of the world’s economy, politics, and social and cultural links?

Because it remains a real possibility. In global trade, globalization supports fewer barriers and open markets. De-globalization moves in the other direction, toward tighter restrictions and more protectionist policies.

As the current leader in AI, the United States will seek to maintain its position. At the same time, China’s rapid progress in AI introduces new competitive pressure. The U.S. frames China as a risk not only to national security, but to international stability as well.

Meanwhile, regions such as the Global South often lack the resources to invest in AI at scale. Without stronger collaboration, they risk falling behind, even though international cooperation would benefit both developed and developing economies.

PeopleReign CEO Dan Turchin believes the best products and ideas win. Let’s stop defining policy, AI and beyond, as us versus them. Innovation benefits everyone, while protectionism hurts everyone.

When we assume our adversaries can never be allies, we create artificial boundaries that make cooperation feel like a weakness.

If we instead assume others have good intentions, just as we do, we will spend less time on the politics of fear and hate, and more time making the world safer, healthier, and hopefully more prosperous for everyone.

Worth A Watch

Worth Checking Out

Until next time, stay curious! 🤔

That's a Wrap for This Week!

We waited for 2025 to show how AI would change our lives, and it didn’t happen. At least, not in the way many expected.

This week’s conversation looks at how AI has already reshaped key areas, while major players have also pulled attention away from the deeper drivers of change.

We also explore why that change is still close. When it arrives, it will reshape everything, including us.

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