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Greetings loved ones,

If beer is so bad for me, then why does it stop me from shaking?

I think Gandhi said that at some point or another. Or was it Nelson Mandela?

Anyway, here’s the news you need to know from this week, delivered in a way that actually makes you want to read it.

⏰ Today's reading time is 7 minutes

Moderna, a name you probably haven’t heard since 2021, has seen its share price surge 177% this week after reporting successful results from a late-stage trial of its skin cancer vaccines.

Yes, you heard us. Cancer vaccines.

According to the FT, the jab has been developed jointly with Merck and uses mRNA technology to give a patient’s immune system targeted “training” on how to fight a given cancer.

What messages the jab delivers to a patient’s immune system can reportedly be highly tailored for their particular tumours, essentially providing custom-made vaccines for each patient.

Given the nature of this proposed treatment, it’s hoped that the technology could be deployed in other contexts and revolutionise how cancer is treated.

This does seem to warrant the jump in share price, and leaves Moderna as the second best performing stock in the S&P 500 this year, behind only SanDisk. And they say that there’s an AI bubble!

This follows a tough year for Moderna, as its Covid-vaccine focused business has drawn the scrutiny of RFK and the worms eating his brain. It was also the S&P 500’s most shorted stock in 2025. 

It also gives us immense pleasure that a proper company seems to be curing cancer ahead of Anthropic.

The Russian embassy in London stated this week that “London’s actions will inevitably carry consequences for which it will have to answer”, following reports that UK-supplied drones have been used by Ukrainian forces to carry out strikes in Russia. 

Prime Minister Andy Burnham responded defiantly, saying “go on, have a swing then” that the UK will continue “100 percent” with its support for Ukraine.  

This isn’t the first time that Russia has engaged in sabre-rattling over the supply of arms to Ukraine, but Britain’s supply of drones to Ukraine has stepped up this year. 

The Ministry of Defence announced in April that 120,000 drones were being sent to Ukraine, and a £572m funding package was announced in June to help Kyiv acquire another 150,000 drones by 2027. 

The drones have clearly been effective too. Russian logistics and oil production facilities have been heavily damaged recently, and the chief economist at Russia’s state development bank has publicly claimed that Russia now cannot win a war of attrition. 

While he's looking for a new job (and hopefully not standing near any hotel room windows), the Kremlin is rumoured to be considering its first draft since 2022 to boost troop numbers.  

Something for Putin to ponder on his summer holiday, no doubt. 

A surprising story from the still-warm corpse of Spirit Airlines this week is that Google has agreed to buy a package of Spirit’s business data for $34m. 

Spirit ceased trading in May after filing for bankruptcy, and as part of sorting out the company’s assets to generate some cash for the company’s creditors, Spirit’s “Enterprise Dataset” was put up for sale. 

As well as technical data and software code, the dataset also includes internal emails and Teams chats. Google’s spokesperson confirmed that, among other uses, the data would be used to train its LLMs. 

The sale is yet to receive the court’s approval but it has raised concerns among former employees, even though any data delivered to Google would be scrubbed of all personal identifiers beforehand. 

This deal is of course terrible news for anyone who uses Google’s LLMs, as training an LLM on a budget airline’s customer service communications seems like the quickest way imaginable to ruin the user experience. 

However, this clearly points to the value and scarcity of good quality data for companies training LLMs. It's fair to ask at this stage whether operating companies may also start selling off user data for LLM training, particularly if companies are struggling.

At least Google isn’t scanning and shredding rare books like its competitors. Or, at least as far as we know. 

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The first four words of that headline may seem like a scientific impossibility, but it turns out that small boat crossings in the English Channel are starting to slow down thanks to French efforts.

The Home Office has credited French authorities with intercepting 185 potential crossings involving 4,300 migrants this summer over four separate weeks, as well as stopping 12 boats at sea using new techniques.

Footage released by French police shows officers racing across a beach in jeeps to intercept a launch. Once the boat is abandoned, an officer slashes it lengthways with a baguette.

The Conservatives described the announcement as a "joke" and said Channel crossing preventions were "down by half over the past year".

To be fair, the Conservatives are the definitive experts on channel boat crossings, considering the figures peaked (48,000) when they were in government.

The Director of Maritime and Small Boats at the Border Security Command said that stormy weather was also a factor. So we can’t give France all the credit thank god.

Earlier this month Reform UK said if it was in power it would intercept boats crossing the English Channel and return migrants to French ports, even if France disagreed.

Given how famously agreeable and passive the French are, Deform UK’s policies would no doubt be a roaring success.

A war could be ending this week. Sadly, it’s not in Iran. 

Instead, South Korean President Lee Jae Myung proposed talks to formally end the 77-year old conflict between North and South Korea. 

We didn’t know that it was still going on either, but this comes at a time of uncertainty in in U.S.-South Korean relations.  

The U.S. has historically been a strong backer of South Korea, with 27,000 troops stationed there.  

However, Trump is reportedly unhappy that South Korea didn’t assist the U.S. in Iran, and he cut short the countries’ joint annual military exercises this week.  

Trump has also indicated that he could re-engage in talks with North Korea about its nuclear programme, so scaling down joint exercises could be an olive branch for Kim Jong Un.  

Pyongyang of course celebrated this in typical fashion by firing ten ballistic missiles into the sea.  

South Korea may be softening its position towards Pyongyang to stay in step with the U.S. president.  

This could also signal that South Korea is shaping its foreign policy around diplomacy, rather than relying on U.S. military deterrence if it views the U.S. as an unreliable security partner.  

Either way, we’re looking forward to the inevitable “Rocket Man” -esque memes from Trump if he and the chubby kid from Up Kim Jong Un start fresh talks.  

The government borrowed more than expected in July, according to the latest figures, as Chancellor John Healey draws up his first Budget.

Water is wet. Bear found shitting in the woods. UK government continues to borrow money at a rate that would make an IMF-vassal state developing country green with envy.

The number crunchers over at the Office for National Statistics (ONS) said borrowing, the gap between what the government spends and what it collects in tax, was £1.8 billion during the month.

Official forecasters had expected a surplus of £500 million, meaning the government borrowed £2.3 billion more than predicted.

Add ‘Economist gets prediction wrong’ to that list of obvious stuff.

Our new slaphead Chancellor Healey has made it clear he will oversee "strong fiscal discipline" at the Budget, which is a more reassuring message than “Arrrrrghhhhhhhh fuck fuck fuck we are so buggered aarrhhhhh. Can I borrow a tenner per chance?”

He has adopted his predecessor Rachel ‘from accounts’ Reeves' fiscal rules, which commit the government to funding all day-to-day spending through tax receipts by the end of the decade.

Talk about playing on hard mode, especially when the UK has the third highest debt servicing costs amongst the ‘advanced’ economies.

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Niu Lai, a low-budget animation film about a cow in a dream sequence has seen a huge jump in ticket sales after going viral for its weird plot and terrible graphics.

It grossed just 7,705 yuan ($1,140; £843) in the first 10 days after its release, but has now grossed more than 11.4 million yuan, according to the movie-tracking site Mao Yan.

That means it is holding ground against Hollywood blockbusters like The Odyssey and Spider-Man: Brand New Day.

Pretty impressive stuff considering that in the scene pictured above, the eponymous protagonist is discussing the taste of his mothers breast milk with his father.

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Thanks to Jeff & Faris