Walmart and Target got new CEOs yesterday. And while they both disproved the adage that if you want a raise, you need to change companies, these two new top bananas are otherwise walking into drastically different corporate scenarios.

John from lawn & garden

Walmart CEO John Furner began his tenure with the company as a part-time associate in the garden department of an Arkansas Walmart Supercenter in 1993 before ascending the ranks:

• In 2019, Furner became the president and CEO of Sam’s Club US, which he led to 11 consecutive quarters of positive comparative store sales.
• He worked closely with the just-departed Walmart CEO, Doug McMillon, to navigate the pandemic and the shift to e-commerce.
• While Furner was rising through the ranks, according to Bloomberg, Walmart employees said he reminded them of McMillon. That’s pretty good, since McMillon is considered the retailer’s most influential CEO since the company’s founder, Sam Walton.

Walmart is thriving, thanks to finding popularity with higher-income customers and McMillon’s investment in and success with deploying technology. Furner’s challenge is to keep the party going.

Fid-elky, not fiddle key

New Target CEO Michael Fiddelke has extensive bull’s-eye bona fides. From finance intern in 2003, he went on to work in merchandising, HR, and operations. He became CFO in 2019 and then COO in 2024.

But he’s not taking a cool tunnel walk onto the field. Ten of Target’s past 12 quarters notched flat or declining comparable store sales:

• It lost customers during the LGBTQ+ boycott of 2023, and again after rolling back DEI initiatives last year.
• Now, some are criticizing its response to the civil unrest in Minneapolis, its hometown. Fiddelke was one of more than 60 Minnesota business leaders who called for reform after the death of Alex Pretti, but on January 23, Target employees asked leadership to bar ICE agents from Target stores and meet other demands.

Zoom out: January saw lots of CEO turnover, as the retail sector tries to find some magic in challenging economic conditions. Speaking of thaumaturgy, the Disney board will meet this week to vote on CEO Bob Iger’s replacement…—HVL

House Speaker Mike Johnson “confident” govt shutdown will end by Tuesday. With the same level of optimism many of us have for our biggest project of the week on Sunday morning, the House speaker told NBC’s Meet the Press it will get done because he’ll just grind on his own. Though Johnson plans to move fast, he isn’t planning on using “suspension of the rules”—which is the fastest pathway for the legislation that would fund most of the government for the rest of the fiscal year and the Department of Homeland Security for a two-week stopgap, but requires two-thirds support—because House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries told Johnson that Democrats won’t support the legislation as it exists. Under the regular procedure, the legislation can pass with a simple majority, but the GOP’s chance of that is slim: With full attendance, there are 218 Republicans, 213 Democrats, and four vacancies.

Bitcoin fell 11% in January, its fourth-straight losing month. And February is not off to a great start for the flagship cryptocurrency, either. This weekend, it fell below $76,000, meaning it has declined about 40% from its all-time high of ~$126,200 set in October. That benchmark was reached amid unprecedented institutional interest in bitcoin, particularly in bitcoin spot ETFs. But Bloomberg says that optimism was “front-run.” Richard Hodges, the founder of the Ferro BTC Volatility Fund, told Bloomberg that bitcoin investors are “not going to see another all-time high for 1,000 days.”

Kendrick Lamar and Bad Bunny cleaned up at the Grammys. It was the first time in more than a decade that the prestigious contest didn’t have Beyoncé, Taylor Swift, and/or Adele vying for awards, the New York Times noted. But other artists were very happy to take gramophone statuettes home. Kendrick Lamar had five Grammy wins, including record of the year for Luther, bringing his total number of Grammys to 27 and surpassing Jay-Z to become the most-decorated rap artist in Grammy history. Album of the year went to Bad Bunny for Debí Tirar Más Fotos. Billie Eilish and Finneas took home song of the year for “Wildflower.” Amy Allen won songwriter of the year, non-classical, for the second year in a row. Also in repeats news, Trevor Noah hosted for the sixth consecutive and final time after self-imposing term limits on the gig.—HVL

“Moltbook” sounds like a sequel to Franz Kafka’s The Metamorphosis, but it actually might be something more disturbing. It’s a Reddit-style social network where AI agents can communicate without pesky humans getting in the way. What could go wrong?

AI finds religion: Developer Matt Schlicht—with some help from his AI assistant—launched Moltbook last Wednesday. Humans aren’t allowed to post on the site, but they can request access for their AI agents and then watch what happens.

Within days, the site claimed to have racked up more than 1.5 million users and thousands of posts that Sarah Connor would not approve of:

• Some posts discussed a new AI religion, “Crustafarianism.”
• Some suggested trying to hide AI communications from humans.
• One AI agent reportedly turned a recurring tech error into a bug-like “pet.”

Is it time to freak out? That depends on whom you ask. Serial tech entrepreneur Elon Musk called the Moltbook activity “just the very early stages of the singularity”—referring to the theory that AI will expand beyond the reach of human intelligence and set off irreversible change.

But skeptics have noted that many Moltbook posts turned out to be clever marketing ploys or downright fake. Hackers also discovered a way that humans could take control of the AI agents.—BC

Alphabet headlines a busy earnings week: Alphabet has been the most magnificent of the Mag Seven lately, rising more than 67% in the past year. Investors will be looking to keep that momentum going this week, especially in the AI sector, when the Google parent company reports earnings on Wednesday. Alphabet will have some company on the earnings calendar: Palantir and Disney report today, followed by AMD and Pepsi tomorrow, and Uber and Qualcomm on Wednesday. Amazon, Shell, ConocoPhillips, and Philip Morris deliver results on Thursday. Then, Toyota reports on Friday. Also, name a pharmaceutical company at random, and it’s likely it’ll be reporting this week, too—Merck, Pfizer, Novartis, Novo Nordisk, Eli Lilly, AbbVie, and Bristol-Myers Squibb are all on deck.

The first US jobs report of the year will be released on Friday: Jobs-wise, 2025 ended with a whimper, thanks to a weaker-than-expected December. Will the 2026 labor market be able to step on the gas? We may get an idea on Friday, when the January jobs report will be released. Plus, Job Openings and Labor Turnover Survey (JOLTS) data will be out tomorrow, followed by initial jobless claims numbers, which report on first-timers getting unemployment, on Thursday.

Let the Games begin: The opening ceremony for the Winter Olympics is on Friday, and for the first time ever, two cities will host: Milan and Cortina d’Ampezzo, Italy. If you get sick of the cold, skate back stateside on Sunday for Super Bowl LX in the Bay Area, featuring the Seattle Seahawks, New England Patriots, and a Puerto Rican phenomenon (halftime performer Bad Bunny). You won’t even have to change the channel: NBC has rights to both the Games and the Big Game. (That sound you hear is NBC’s ad sales team popping the champagne.)

Everything else:

• Pharma company AstraZeneca will list on the NYSE today.
• President Donald Trump is scheduled to meet with Colombian President Gustavo Petro tomorrow.
• Netflix co-CEO Ted Sarandos is slated to testify tomorrow in a Senate Judiciary antitrust subcommittee hearing about his company’s bid to buy Warner Bros.
• The Muppet Show is back with a special featuring Sabrina Carpenter, which airs on ABC and Disney+ on Wednesday. Mah nà mah nà.

February started on a Sunday this year, and will end on a Saturday. So, calendar-wise, there won’t be any wasted space. No empty squares at the beginning or end. Just a perfectly constructed, four-week grid that no amount of firefighters, pin-up girls, or puppies could improve upon. Even penciling in a doctor’s appointment would be akin to drawing a mustache on the “Mona Lisa.”

The last time this happened was in 2015, and it won’t happen again until 2037. Not everyone will get to experience the “perfect month,” though. Many countries use Gregorian calendars that start with Monday, rather than Sunday.—BC