Argentina's bailout, a new way to cool data centers, and a cold holiday hiring season

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0:32This is The Indicator for Planet Money. I'm Adrian Ma, and today I'm joined by the wondrous Weyland Wong. What an intro. Thank you. And the dazzling Darian Woods. I'm here to dissect. I'm here to analyze. You're not here to make friends. You're here to talk about the news. Friends are incidental. They could come along as well. Would you say friends are a positive externality to talking about the news? Friends were the positive externality we made along the way. Put that on a tote bag. I think we just found some new merch. And for all that analysis and friendship, it is Indicators of the Week.

1:13It is that show where we parse the most fascinating financial numbers in the news. On today's show, Argentina needs a bailout. A new way to cool data centers. And holiday retail hiring is not looking so festive so far. That is after the break. This message comes from Vanguard. Capturing value in the bond market is not easy. That's why Vanguard offers a suite of over 80 institutional quality bond funds, actively managed by a 200-person global team of sector specialists, analysts, and traders. They're designed for financial advisors looking to give their clients consistent results year in and year out.

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2:42Waylon Wong, why don't you go first? My indicator is$20 billion. dollars. That is the size of a lifeline the U.S. might throw to Argentina. Argentina, as you might know, is kind of a perennial economic basket case. Its current president, Javier Malay, is a close ally of President Donald Trump. And so the U.S. has a particular interest in helping out Argentina right now. Could you just recap what sort of help does Argentina need right now? Yeah, so the Argentine peso has been plummeting in value. Earlier this month, Buenos Aires province held elections, they were pretty important. And Malay's party lost very badly.

3:20And that sparked a sell-off in the peso. Now, Malay, you might remember, came into office with really big plans. He was going to tame inflation, balance the budget. But then voters were unhappy with the austerity measures he put in. And then there's been this huge corruption scandal involving his sister who's in the government. She's been accused of taking bribes. And so all of this is taking a toll on investor confidence and the Argentine peso. So how is the U.S. government going to help out? Well, as of this recording, the two countries don't have a finalized deal. But U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Besant announced on social media that they're negotiating this$20 billion swap line.

3:59This is a kind of loan where essentially the U.S. gives American dollars to the Argentine Central Bank. Argentina then uses those dollars to buy pesos. And that would have the effect of pushing up the value of the peso? Exactly. And the Argentine Central Bank has already spent more than a billion dollars of its own money trying to prop up the currency. But with the peso still falling, it's like, you know, throwing money down a hole. And so this is kind of a break from recent news with the U.S. The administration has been hostile to the idea of foreign aid, or America first. Yeah, I mean, we got rid of USAID, right?

4:34But President Trump really likes Malay. On True social, he called Malay a very good friend, and he said he will never let you down. Never let you down? I mean, tell that to the Argentine peso. It sounds like a rickrow. What, are you talking about this song?

4:57Is that what we're talking about? The American taxpayer has been rickrowed. Okay, I think, Darian, you have just nominated yourself to go next. So I want to talk about an innovation that might help with the world's energy problems. We are in the middle of this global surge in electricity demand due to all those data centers being built for artificial intelligence and video calls and so on. And a lot of that power is used for cooling. Right. Nobody wants an overheated computer chip. Yeah. As we all know, our phones and laptops don't work well when they're hot. as much as 40 % of the electricity used in data centers can be for cooling in some cases.

5:37That's my indicator of the week. So if you could reduce that 40 % of energy used for cooling in data centers, that is a lot of power saved. And just this week, Microsoft announced a possible way to do just that. Microfluidics. Ooh, I've never heard that term before. Yeah, it sounds future-y. It's kind of exciting what they're doing. So rather than having a cooling plate over the entire silicon chip, they're funneling these tiny channels of coolant into the silicon itself. So imagine tiny braided rivers, the width of a piece of hair or like the veins of a leaf. That's the way the coolant might be delivered to chips in the future to stop them overheating.

6:18So how real is this right now? Is it really happening? It's just in the lab at the moment, but the lab results are good. Microsoft's announcement said that the company's microfluidics were up to three times better than cold plates at removing heat. And investors seem to be taking that news seriously. A company called Vertiv Holdings provides cooling systems for data centers, and its stock price fell about 5.5 % on the day of Microsoft's announcement. Bad news for Vertiv, but good news for running data centers more cheaply. That's some very cool news, Darian. See what I did there? Thank you. Okay, well, that I guess just leaves me in my indicator of the week, which has to do with the upcoming holiday shopping season.

7:04So the indicator is 500 ,000. Around this time each year, big retailers start hiring tons of temporary seasonal workers to help them deal with the oncoming hordes of holiday shoppers. But a staffing firm called Challenger Gray and Christmas, they predict that for the first time since 2009, which is just after the Great Recession, for the first time since then, retailers will hire fewer than 500 ,000 seasonal workers. And they're basing this in part on the fact that fewer companies right now are announcing their holiday hiring plans. Then the company name has nothing to do with Christmas itself, I'm assuming.

7:46No, but it's like a perfect name for a holiday job support, actually. Nominative determinism, where I guess their name has determined what they're doing. That's so fun to say. Challenger Great in Christmas says this could be a sign of uncertainty among companies who are dealing with all sorts of things right now, including tariffs and inflationary pressures. And it could also be a sign that they're planning on relying more on automation and permanent staffers to try and get through the holidays. In short, they say that it looks like companies right now are planning to do more with less during the holidays.

8:22Ominous sign for the economy. I mean, it's not totally bleak on the hiring front. There are some companies that have announced their hiring plans. For example, there is Spirit Halloween, which a lot of people know. They sell Halloween stuff. And they said they'd be hiring 50 ,000 seasonal jobs this year. And also Bath and Body Works is looking for 30 ,000 seasonal jobs. So that is a lot of scented candles. We're going to have to buy some more scented candles, Adrian. We are the problem. Do you guys have a favorite Bath and Body Works scent? Are you, you know, sun-ripened raspberry, cucumber melon, or do you go for, you know, their like masculine branded scents, like oak and teak and whatever, mahogany?

9:09Dynamite. Booch. Burnt steak. I just have a set of candle called Clenched Fist.

9:21This episode was produced by Angel Carreras and engineered by Robert Rodriguez. It was fact-checked by Tyler Jones. It was edited by Cake & Cannon and the Indicators of Production of NPR.

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