US stocks traded mixed on Tuesday as investors digested fresh jobs data and waited for new Fedspeak to cement or dent growing hopes for future interest rate cuts.

The S&P 500 (^GSPC) fell about 0.2%, while the tech-heavy Nasdaq Composite (^IXIC) hugged the flat line in late morning trade, coming off fresh records for the two gauges. The Dow Jones Industrial Average (^DJI) reversed earlier gains to fall roughly 0.4%.

Job openings rose by 372,000 to 7.74 million in October compared to estimates of 7.52 million, according to BLS data released on Tuesday.

The Job Openings and Labor Turnover Survey (JOLTS) also showed fewer hires were made during the month while the quits rate, a sign of confidence among workers, rose to 2.1% from 1.9% in September.

The JOLTS data serves as the first in a wave of key signals this week that culminates in Friday’s all-important monthly US payrolls report.

Traders are now pricing in about a 69% chance that the Fed lowers rates by a quarter percentage point at its Dec. 18 meeting, compared with 62% a day ago, per the CME FedWatch tool.

Those odds could shift after Fed policymakers Austan Goolsbee and Adriana Kugler appear later on Tuesday, which will set the stage for Fed Chair Jerome Powell’s panel discussion on Wednesday.

On the corporate front, Tesla (TSLA) stock slipped in early trading after shipments of the EV maker’s China-built models fell again, putting sales targets in doubt. In addition, CEO Elon Musk’s $56 billion pay deal was rejected again by a judge.

Meanwhile, shares in US Steel (X) fell about 8% on the heels of President-elect Donald Trump’s promise to “block” its $15 billion takeover by Japan’s Nippon Steel (5401.T, NPSCY). Trump said tax incentives and tariffs will enable the American steel giant to thrive on its own.

Sometimes, the easiest way to find a great idea for a startup is to look beyond the current problem you’re solving for your customers.

That’s exactly what worked for the founders of KPay. Davis Chan and his co-founders previously helped small and medium-sized merchants optimize their revenue and traffic in Asia, but they eventually noticed how inefficient managing payments and finances was for their customers.

Traditional financial solutions for merchants and SMBs do not effectively cater to the modern needs for business agility, integration, and data-informed decision-making, Chan said. “This fragmented approach results in inefficiencies, higher costs, and a lack of actionable business insights.”

That insight led them to start KPay, a one-stop financial management platform for merchants and SMBs. The company has seen decent traction in the three years since its inception: It now serves 45,000 merchants in Hong Kong, Singapore, and Japan, and partners with more than 150 SaaS providers, banks, and financial service firms. The company says it aims to increase its partnerships to serve more businesses in Asia.

“We’re investing in payment technologies that offer greater flexibility, speed, and security to merchants to accept all major payments, supporting payroll, bill settlement, and both local and global remittance as a unified financial management platform,” Chan told TechCrunch.

Investors certainly seem to have noticed the opportunity here: KPay recently secured $55 million in a Series A round led by London-based investment firm Apis Partners.

The fresh cash from the Series A will be put toward product development, as well as enhancing its go-to-market speed, improving customer experience through organic growth, and expanding into new Asian markets and supporting inorganic growth strategies such as strategic mergers and acquisitions, Christopher Yu, CFO of KPay, told TechCrunch. In addition, the startup is exploring how AI will improve the merchant experience, increase operational efficiency, and boost revenues.

Yu did not provide specific details about KPay’s revenue and profitability but said its revenue had achieved a compound annual growth rate of 166% since its inception.

“Looking ahead, our goal is to enable 1 million merchants within the next five years, creating an inclusive digital economy where neighborhood businesses have the same opportunities as major brands,” Chan said.

The company has about 440 staff across its bases in Hong Kong and Singapore.

Top lawmakers on the House Financial Services Committee are using the stretch run of this congressional term to address the impact artificial intelligence has on the finance and housing sectors.

Reps. Patrick McHenry, R-N.C., and Maxine Waters, D-Calif., the chair and ranking member of the committee, respectively, announced Monday the introduction of a resolution to acknowledge the rising use of AI in financial services and in the housing industry, as well as a bill that calls on financial regulatory agencies to study the benefits of the technology within the sector.

The resolution and bill are the culmination of nearly a year of work from the committee’s bipartisan AI working group and come just days before a hearing that will explore how the technology is framing the future of finance.

“Artificial intelligence holds the promise to revolutionize our financial system,” McHenry said in a statement. “As firms increasingly leverage AI, lawmakers and regulators tasked with oversight of the financial services industry must constantly evaluate the risks and benefits this technology poses. These bills are a small, but critical, step forward to empower the financial system to realize the numerous benefits artificial intelligence can offer for consumers, firms, and regulators.”

The resolution, introduced by McHenry and co-sponsored by Waters, spells out the House Financial Services Committee’s responsibilities when it comes to AI, covering everything from how housing market participants leverage the technology for underwriting and tenant screening to scrutinizing how financial institutions’ use of AI could increase herding behavior in the markets.

The committee, McHenry and Waters write in the resolution, will make sure financial regulatory agencies are carrying out their enforcement powers and have the right tools to do so as AI usage in the sectors proliferates. They’ll also consider reforms to data privacy laws “given the importance of data, especially consumer data, to AI,” collaborate with regulators on AI’s impact on the workforce and do what they can to make sure the United States leads globally on the development and use of AI in the industries.

“Artificial intelligence is growing rapidly, and people across America are already seeing its use in our nation’s housing and financial services sectors, with impacts on mortgage lending, credit scoring, and more,” Waters said in a statement. “Our committee will continue to collaborate closely with the federal government to identify the risks and benefits of AI and to explore further legislation needed to protect people and our communities.”

The Analysis and Improvement Act of 2024 — or the AI Act of 2024 — would require the Federal Reserve, the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp., the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau and the National Credit Union Administration to deliver a report to the House Financial Services Committee that examines a variety of AI-related issues in the agencies’ respective sectors.

Those issues include the use of AI in home valuation, loan underwriting and servicing, how banking institutions use AI to identify fraud, money laundering and cybercrime, and how AI is used in debt collection and foreclosures. There are also callouts in the bill for how AI can mitigate bias and discrimination in banking services, how the technology can level the playing field between small and large financial institutions, and how it can benefit cybersecurity risk management.

The bill would also require the Securities and Exchange Commission to produce a report on AI’s risks and benefits to the markets and have the Treasury Department study the technology’s ability to secure the country’s financial system from national security threats. 

Another provision of the bill calls on the Department of Housing and Urban Development, the Federal Housing Finance Agency, the Rural Housing Service of the Department of Agriculture and the CFPB to report on the risks and benefits of AI on housing and mortgage regulators.

“I look forward to passing these bills and continuing to work in a bipartisan manner on this important issue next Congress,” Waters said.