Category: 3. Business

Snapchat has launched “Buddy Passes” for members to boost the Snapchat+ subscription. This feature will allow subscribers to gift a free one-week trial of Snapchat+ to their friends.

It’s a great strategic move by Snapchat to ramp up its membership by allowing potential members to glimpse what the subscription plan offers without any cost.

The platform explained to the users, “If you’re a Snapchat+ subscriber, you can give your friends free access to Snapchat+ using a buddy pass. On the first day of each month (on an annual plan or the first day of each billing cycle (on a monthly plan), you’ll get three Buddy Passes to give to friends that will allow them to use Snapchat+ for free for 7 days.”

Currently, the app has over 15 million Snapchat+ members, and the new feature Buddy Passes could bring 45 million new users to try out premium features, with a possibility that they will convert to paying subscribers.

Of course, not everyone is going to use all passes; therefore, it’s a good promotion as an option for Snapchat users.

The social media platform is good at outperforming the competitors who are offering similar packages, such as Meta Verified and X Premium.

The service is particularly appealing to a younger audience, offering them add-on enhancements, exclusive features, and early access to experimental tools.

Subscribers can send Buddy passes from the Snapchat+ management pages within the app. Follow the process given by the app:

1. “Go to your Snapchat+ management page
2. Tap ‘Send Buddy Passes’
3. Select three friends who aren’t already Snapchat+ subscribers
4. Send them your Buddy Passes!”

Remember! Once a Buddy is sent, it would be impossible to take it back. The Snapchat support team does not help in this regard.

Is Snapchat bigger than Instagram?

No, Instagram has a significantly bigger number of users than Snapchat.

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“Benevolent leadership,” combined with best practices, can improve overall organizational well-being, researchers determined from a study of 350 respondents at knowledge-worker institutions. These findings were published on Aug. 13, in the journal Scientific Reports.

For the purposes of the study, benevolent leadership was defined as a style “characterized by warmth and a paternalistic approach.” Ultimately, researchers found that this approach can create the kind of workplace environment that encourages knowledge-sharing and promotes organizational learning.

The Scientific Reports study fills in “a significant gap” in existing organizational research, which tends to focus on “transactional” leadership styles, the report noted.

The findings can help guide employers when it comes to creating a learning and development strategy. Business leaders have a direct impact on company culture and workplace learning, the report found. 

“Leaders shape formal policies and informally influence the social norms that can foster an environment conducive to learning,” researchers said.

And in general, learning is increasingly crucial in talent attraction. More than half of Generation Zers said they’re prioritizing roles with personal development opportunities in their job search, according to an August report from Flexa.

More specifically, Gen Zers were 68% more likely than their millennial, Gen X and baby boomer counterparts to seek jobs with concrete L&D benefits, such as language lessons, mentor programs and study leave.

From the researchers’ perspective, these findings challenge the idea that benevolent leadership “inherently promotes a learning environment.” Instead, it takes benevolent leadership, plus trust and open communication, the report finds.

Regarding trust, benevolent leaders are the type to empower workers by “delegating meaningful tasks and providing the necessary resources and autonomy to complete them, making them feel valued and part of the organization’s goals.” 

And regarding open communication, researchers said that benevolent leadership inspires a workplace culture where “knowledge is not hoarded but shared freely among peers.” Knowledge sharing and open communication cannot exist without each other, researchers said.

Artificial intelligence is beginning to help doctors screen patients for several routine diseases. But a new study raises concerns about whether doctors might become too reliant on AI.

The study looking at gastroenterologists in Poland found that they appeared to be about 20% worse at spotting polyps and other abnormalities during colonoscopies on their own, after they’d grown accustomed to using an AI-assisted system.

The findings, published in the journal Lancet Gastroenterology and Hepatology, suggest that even after a short period of using AI, experts may become overly dependent on AI to do certain aspects of their jobs.

“We were quite surprised,” says Marcin Romańczyk, an M.D.-Ph.D. gastroenterologist at H-T Medical Center in Tychy, Poland, who led the study.

But not everyone is convinced that the paper proves doctors are losing critical skills because of AI.

“I think three months seems like a very short period to lose a skill that you took 26 years to build up,” says Johan Hulleman, a researcher at Manchester University in England who has studied human reliance on artificial intelligence.

Hulleman believes statistical variations in the patient data might be part of the explanation for why the numbers appear to drop. Factors such as the average age of the patients used in different sections of the study might explain the variation, he says.

AI in medicine

Artificial intelligence is becoming increasingly common for a number of routine medical scans. The next time you get a scan for your eyes, breast cancer, or colon disease, there’s a decent chance that AI might be analyzing the images.

“AI is spreading everywhere,” Romańczyk says. At the same time, many doctors are playing catch-up, because learning how to use the technology wasn’t part of their training.

“We’ve been taught from books and from our teachers,” he says. “No one told us how to use AI.”

A few years ago, four clinics in Poland tried out an AI system to detect polyps and other abnormalities during colonoscopies. The AI works in real time, analyzing video from a camera inside the colon.

If it spots something, it will highlight the area for the clinician to see.

“In this particular one there’s a green box, showing where the polyp might be,” he says.

In the box

The clinics were collecting data on whether the AI system worked. It turns out it did, but when Romańczyk and his colleagues reanalyzed the data, they found something else: After the system was introduced, doctors became significantly worse at detecting possible polyps when the AI was switched off.

According to their analysis, after doctors got AI, detection rates of possible polyps fell from 28.4% to 22.4% when their new AI system was switched off. In other words, the doctors seemed to become quickly dependent on AI systems catching the polyps. Romańczyk says he’s not quite sure why it’s happening, but he has some theories.

“We are subconsciously waiting for the green box to come out to show us the region where the polyp is and we’re not paying so much attention,” he says.

There are other examples that support that idea: A similar study has shown that nonexperts do a worse job scanning mammograms if they know they can get an AI system to help them with the push of a button.

Johan Hulleman, who helped lead that mammogram study, describes it as a “safety-net effect.” He says these latest results could be interesting, but he’s skeptical. The study of colonoscopies took place over three months, and the doctors participating had decades of experience. He thinks statistical variations due to a number of factors, such as age of the patients, might be behind the apparent drop.

Additionally, he says, “We don’t know how many polyps there really were, so we don’t know the ground truth.” By that he means it’s unclear how many of the possible polyps that doctors supposedly missed were actually medically important.

The study’s author, Romańczyk, does believe the drop is real — though he admits that studying AI in a clinical setting like this can be tricky. There are a lot of variables the researchers couldn’t control.

He’s not against using AI. He actually thinks the little green boxes help him to do better colonoscopies. But he thinks that there should be more studies like these examining how AI might be changing the way doctors work in the real world.

“Because look what’s happening,” he says. “We have AI systems that are available, but we don’t have the data.”

Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell is slated to speak on Friday at the Fed’s annual gathering of central bankers in Jackson Hole, Wyoming, and Evercore ISI warns that market participants might not love what he has to say. 

Powell “is likely to indirectly signal a 25bp rate cut” at the Fed’s next policy meeting in mid-September, argued Evercore analysts led by Julian Emanuel in a note on Sunday. “For a market that was eager to embrace ’50 in Sept,’” referring to market chatter about the likelihood officials would cut rates by 50 basis points, or half a percentage point, next month, “a balanced view could catalyze a near term -7% to -15% pullback into October.”

The Economic Outlook Is ‘Muddled’

“The stakes … are high with both sides of the Dual Mandate muddled,” the analysts wrote, referring to the Fed’s job of balancing stable prices and maximum employment. 

Inflation data last week painted a muddy picture of how tariffs are affecting prices; the Consumer Price Index rose less than expected in July, while wholesale prices climbed much faster than forecast. 

Labor market data is not much clearer. Weekly initial unemployment claims have held steady this year. Meanwhile, job growth has fallen to its slowest 3-month pace (outside of the pandemic shock) since 2010, when the unemployment rate was about 9%, double what it is today.

President Donald Trump is adding to the uncertainty. Since returning to the White House in January, Trump has repeatedly criticized Powell, whom he appointed in 2019, and called on the Fed to lower rates. In early August, Trump fired the head of the Bureau of Labor Statistics after a disappointing jobs report, alarming some economists concerned that political interference could skew official economic data. 

How to Weather an Autumn Fall

High stock prices and seasonal weakness are additional causes for concern, says Evercore. 

“Pedal to the metal equity market bullishness in August typically runs into the realities of September,” which is historically the worst month of the year for stocks, the analysts wrote. And Wall Street’s post-“Liberation Day” rally, fueled by trade deals and resilient corporate earnings, has stock valuations near their highest levels since the Dotcom Bubble. 

Against that backdrop, Evercore recommends investors hold a core portfolio of “AI Enablers, Adopters and Adapters” in the communication services, consumer discretionary, and tech sectors. Big names in the category include Amazon (AMZN), Alphabet (GOOG), and Micron (MU).

They recommend supplementing those core holdings with attractively priced stocks with positive earnings revisions. They note healthcare companies, including Pfizer (PFE) and Cigna (CI), are overrepresented in the list of stocks that meet these criteria. They suggest funding those purchases by selling pricey stocks with less attractive earnings outlooks, including retail investor favorites like Palantir (PLTR), Tesla (TSLA), and Strategy (MSTR).

Pakistan State Oil (PSO), the nation’s trusted energy partner, successfully navigated complex market dynamics to achieve steady financial results, showcasing its strategic agility and adaptability. The Board of Management convened on August 19, 2025 in Karachi to review the group’s performance for the fiscal year ended June 30, 2025.

Despite navigating policy uncertainty, trade tensions, and financial market volatility, the company delivered robust financial results, reporting a notable profit after tax of PKR 20.9 billion. The Board of Management announced a dividend of PKR 10 per share, representing a payout ratio of 22.5% for the financial year 2024-25.

On a consolidated basis, including Pakistan Refinery Limited (PRL), the group achieved a profit after tax of PKR 16.4 billion, yielding an Earnings Per Share (EPS) of PKR 35.03.

PSO continued to lead the market, securing a 44% share of the liquid fuel market in FY25. The company continued its dominance across key petroleum segments, capturing a 45.7% share in the white oil segment and solidifying its position in a highly competitive landscape.

PSO with a 40.8% market share, sold 3.2 million metric tons in the motor gasoline segment. The company also sustained its leadership in diesel with a 46% market share and sales of 3.1 million metric tons. Even in the black oil segment, where demand declined due to the country’s shift towards alternative energy sources, PSO supplied 131,000 metric tons, demonstrating its adaptability and market resilience.

PSO cemented its unparalleled leadership in the jet fuel market, commanding a remarkable 99% market share while delivering seamless refueling operations at 15 strategically located airports nationwide. In a bold and innovative stride, the company launched a state-of-the-art mobile jet fuel refueling facility at the New Gwadar International Airport (NGIAP), driving Pakistan’s infrastructure development and aviation ambitions forward.

PSO’s strategic initiatives drove remarkable growth in the lubricants sector, boosting market share to 29% and sales volumes to 41,000 metric tons. Meanwhile, the company’s LPG business achieved a major milestone in FY25, with volumes surging to 60,000 metric tons, representing a substantial 22.4% year-on-year (YoY) increase.

In a landmark collaboration, PSO and the State Oil Company of the Azerbaijan Republic (SOCAR) are establishing a joint trading company in Singapore, strategically positioned to strengthen Pakistan’s energy security and leverage global market opportunities. This innovative venture is designed to optimize energy procurement, drive efficiency, and cultivate enduring trade partnerships.

PSO’s 427-kilometer White Oil Pipeline project, a strategic partnership with Frontier Works Organization (FWO), has achieved a significant benchmark with the completion and review of the Front-End Engineering Design (FEED) draft. The pipeline, stretching from Machike to Tarujabba, aims to enhance the efficiency and safety of oil transportation, reduce traffic congestion, and minimize environmental pollution. Once operational, it will play a vital role in Pakistan’s energy security and supply chain infrastructure.

PSO continued to strengthen its storage and logistics infrastructure, achieving an impressive operational availability rate of over 90% throughout the year. Key highlights include the rehabilitation of 7 tanks, increasing total storage capacity to 1.24 million tons. This enhancement will enable PSO to better manage supply chains, reduce bottlenecks, and ensure a steady fuel supply to meet customer demands.

PSO completed fuel handling facilities at 8 strategic railway sites, significantly enhancing intermodal efficiency and streamlining nationwide fuel distribution. This upgrade enables seamless logistics operations, reducing transit times and costs while improving supply chain reliability.

In FY25, PSO aggressively expanded its retail footprint, adding 107 new outlets to reach a total of 3,649 across the country. With over 310 convenience stores, PSO is reimagining fuel stations as one-stop destinations for everyday essentials, elevating the customer experience and setting new standards in retail sector.

PSO introduced its innovative VIBE concept stores in Karachi, Lahore, and Islamabad, redefining the convenience shopping experience. These stores set a new benchmark in retail innovation, offering customers a unique blend of fuel services and everyday essentials in a modern, customer-centric environment.

Leading Pakistan’s clean mobility drive, PSO, in partnership with BYD Pakistan and HUBCO Green, unveiled the country’s first New Energy Vehicle fast-charging station on the M2 motorway. With plans for 128 DC fast chargers and 50 stations operational by December 2025, the company is setting the standard for EV charging infrastructure.

The company has launched the first phase of Asaan Safar, a travel enhancement program designed to elevate the overall travel experience across Pakistan. Through the Fuelink app, travelers can effortlessly plan their trips, while upgraded stations now boast executive restrooms, curated essentials, and fully stocked stores, ensuring a comfortable and convenient journey.

LPG Blue made its mark in Gilgit-Baltistan with the launch of Pakistan’s first e-commerce platform for pre-ordering LPG cylinders with last-mile delivery. This innovative platform complements PSO’s doorstep services, offering customers a seamless experience.

CERISMA (Pvt.) Limited, a PSO subsidiary, has achieved a key milestone in its Electronic Money Institution (EMI) journey, successfully completing the pre-pilot inspection. With final regulatory approval pending, CERISMA is poised to launch pilot operations, marking a major step forward in Pakistan’s fintech landscape.

PSO Renewable Energy (Pvt.) Limited is spearheading Pakistan’s transition to clean energy, driving the development and deployment of renewable energy projects in line with national low-carbon goals. Focused on solar energy, the company is committed to boosting profitability, creating new revenue streams and contributing to Pakistan’s renewable energy growth.

Pakistan Refinery Limited’s (PRL) Refinery Expansion and Upgrade Project, supported by the Government’s Brownfield Refining Policy, is advancing steadily. The project is currently evaluating EPCF bids to ensure timely and efficient implementation, aiming to enhance refining capacity and meet growing energy demands.

PSO’s digital transformation journey gained momentum with noteworthy advancements, including the automation of 2 terminals, installation of 498 dispensing controllers across 137 outlets, and deployment of 20 smart radar gauges. Additionally, core processes were streamlined, enhancing operational efficiency and setting a new standard for digital excellence in the industry.

PSO continued its philanthropic efforts, investing PKR 500 million in FY25 to support critical initiatives in healthcare, education, disaster relief, community development, and environmental conservation. Through strategic partnerships with NGOs, the company reinforced its commitment to giving back to society and driving positive change.

PSO demonstrated strong financial stewardship, improving receivables and liabilities management, leading to a 20% reduction in power sector circular debt and a decrease in SNGPL exposure by PKR 24.7 billion.

PSO management extends its gratitude to the Board of Management, Government of Pakistan, Ministry of Energy (Petroleum Division), shareholders, employees, and all stakeholders for their continued trust and support.

Gold prices in Pakistan dropped on Tuesday, following a decline in the international market. In the local market, the price of gold fell by Rs. 1,100 per tola, settling at Rs. 356,600.

According to the All-Pakistan Gems and Jewellers Sarafa Association (APGJSA), the price of 10 grams of gold also slipped by Rs. 943, closing at Rs. 305,727.

A day earlier, gold had risen by Rs. 1,500 per tola, reaching Rs. 357,700 on Monday.

Globally, gold prices also moved down. The international rate was recorded at $3,339 per ounce, including a $20 premium, reflecting a decline of $11, APGJSA reported.

Kot Addu Power Company Limited (PSX: KAPCO) Tuesday said it has submitted a binding offer, along with Fauji Foundation (FF), to Pharaon Investment Group Limited S.A.L for the approved consideration in connection with the proposed purchase of the seller’s entire shareholding in the Attock Cement Pakistan Limited consisting of 84.06 percent of the total issued and paid-up capital.

The offer follows KAPCO’s earlier disclosure on June 3, 2025, and the Public Announcement of Intention issued through Integrated Equities Limited, Manager to the Offer.

As per the public announcement of intention (PAI) submitted to the PSX, the acquirers intend to purchase 84.06 percent shareholding with both acquiring 42.03 percent each of APCL.