Holiday spending slowdown

Programming supported by Minnesota Carlson and their first Tuesday speaker series at the University of Minnesota, featuring candid conversations with some of the biggest names in business. More at z.umn.edu/firsttuesday. Marketplace is supported by Genesis of Minneapolis. Still driving that luxury vehicle that looks like every vehicle on your block? Time for an upgrade. Genesis of Minneapolis is flipping the script with bold style, smart tech, and VIP treatment that actually feels VIP. We're talking head turning design, intuitive features, and red carpet service. Why blend in when you were born to stand out? This isn't just luxury. It's luxury with a pulse. Genesis of Minneapolis. Luxury that dares to be different. Visit genesisofminneapolis.com today. Today on the show, we'll talk about crypto, retail, AI scams, and we'll talk about a company placing a bet on the idea that it will outlive us all. From American Public Media, this is Marketplace. In New York, I'm Kristen Schwab in for Kai Rizdahl. It's Tuesday, February 10. Good to be here with you. Okay. Humor me here. Grab your crystal ball. Can you tell me where the economy will be in one year? Yes? No? Then how about in one hundred years? An impossible task, I know. Because there's no way of understanding what economic policy will look like, how AI will shape our work, or even whether the companies we work for will still be here. Well, Alphabet is promising it will be around in a century, making tech products and services and also making interest payments on corporate debt. The parent company of Google is issuing tens of billions of dollars worth of bonds this week, including some in The UK with a 100 year maturity date. Marketplace's Daniel Ackerman looks into why Alphabet is going so long on its debt and who would actually buy these bonds. Alphabet has plans to spend big, says Dan Ives, a tech analyst with Wedbush Securities, on big data centers. They're essentially building out new cities. It's like building Vegas from the desert in the nineteen fifties. And that is gonna take a lot of cash over the course of many years. We're gonna be building out data centers for a long time to come. Gilluria is an analyst with DA Davidson, and he says Alphabet's sale of century long bonds is something of a flex on its competitors in the AI race. They wanna communicate to everybody else. We're in it for the long haul. This is a big old game of chicken. We are gonna drive as fast as we can. I'm gonna borrow for a hundred years because I'm that confident that I'm gonna win. That's what Google is doing. There are buyers interested in bonds that won't mature until 2126. Gerald Cohen, an economist at the University of North Carolina, says some money managers think very far ahead. Insurance companies, pension companies have very long dated liabilities. Alphabet had no problem finding buyers for its century bonds today, according …