US Captures Venezuela’s Maduro, Samsung’s AI Push Doubles, Flutterwave’s Rare Fintech Exit & Tech Billionaires Cash Out Big

5th January 2025

Global markets and geopolitics opened the year on edge after the United States announced the capture of Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro, triggering international backlash and raising questions about America’s long-term role in the country’s leadership transition. In tech, Samsung is doubling down on artificial intelligence, aiming to roll out Galaxy AI features across 800 million devices as competition with Apple and Chinese rivals intensifies. Africa’s startup ecosystem notched a rare win as Flutterwave acquired Mono in a landmark fintech exit, deepening its payments and data infrastructure stack. And amid a relentless AI-driven rally, tech executives quietly turned soaring stock prices into real cash, unloading more than $16 billion worth of shares in 2025. All this and more in today’s Read It And Eat!

Major Headlines

• The US has captured Venezuelan leader Maduro

  
  

President Donald Trump announced Saturday that the US will “run” Venezuela after capturing President Nicolás Maduro and his wife in a large-scale military operation, a stunning development that plunged the country into uncertainty after weeks of spiraling tensions. “The United States of America has successfully carried out a large scale strike against Venezuela and its leader, President Nicolás Maduro, who has been, along with his wife, captured and flown out of the Country,” he wrote on Truth Social early Saturday morning. 

Trump later said the US would play a central role in running the country indefinitely until a formal transition of power can take place, while declining to rule out the possibility of longer-term military involvement in Venezuela. “We’re going to be running it,” he said from his Mar-a-Lago club in Florida.Venezuela requested an urgent meeting of the United Nations Security Council in response to the attack, Foreign Minister Yván Gil Pinto said. “No cowardly attack will prevail against the strength of this people, who will emerge victorious,” he said on Telegram, sharing the letter sent to the UN. Venezuelan Vice President Delcy Rodríguez demanded the “immediate release” of Maduro and his wife, Cilia Flores. Rodríguez, who Trump said earlier was sworn in as president, said Venezuela’s territorial integrity was “savagely attacked” by the US operation.

A new indictment filed in the US District Court for the Southern District of New York and shared by Attorney General Pam Bondi alleges that Maduro ran “state sponsored gangs” and facilitated drug trafficking in the country. Trump said he did not notify members of Congress until after the strike, saying at his news conference at Mar-a-Lago that “Congress has a tendency to leak. It would not be good if they leaked.” Democratic lawmakers demanded an immediate briefing and criticized the administration for not seeking congressional authorization before the attack, while Republican lawmakers largely applauded the action. CNN

• Samsung to double AI mobile devices to 800 million units this year

  
  

Samsung Electronics plans to double this year the number of its mobile devices with "Galaxy AI" features largely powered by Google's Gemini, its co-CEO said, which would give the U.S. firm an edge over rivals as the global race in artificial intelligence heats up. 

The South Korean company, which had rolled out Gemini-backed AI features to about 400 million mobile products, including smartphones and tablets, by last year, plans to boost that figure to 800 million in 2026. "We will apply AI to all products, all functions, and all services as quickly as possible," T M Roh told Reuters in his first interview since becoming Samsung Electronics  co-CEO in November. 

The plan by the world's largest backer of Google's Android mobile platform is set to give a major boost to its developer Google, which is locked in a race with OpenAI and others to attract more consumer users to their AI model. Samsung seeks to reclaim its lost crown from Apple (AAPL.O) in the smartphone market and fend off competition from Chinese rivals not only in mobile telephones, but televisions and home appliances, all overseen by Roh.It will offer integrated AI services across consumer products to widen its lead over Apple in such features, though the latter was set to be the top smartphone maker last year, according to market researcher Counterpoint. Reuters

• Flutterwave buys Nigeria’s Mono in rare African fintech exit

  
  

Africa’s largest fintech company, Flutterwave, has acquired Nigerian open banking startup Mono in an all-stock deal valued between $25 million and $40 million, according to people familiar with the transaction. The acquisition brings together two of Africa’s leading fintech infrastructure companies. Flutterwave operates one of the continent’s widest payments networks, while Mono, often described as the “Plaid for Africa,” has built APIs that allow businesses to access bank data, initiate payments, and verify customers.

Mono has raised about $17.5 million from investors, including Tiger Global, General Catalyst, and Target Global. Sources close to the deal said the acquisition allowed all its investors to at least recoup their capital, with some early backers realizing returns of up to 20x. Mono will continue to operate as an independent product, the companies said in a statement. Founded in 2020, Mono, like Plaid, uses APIs that allow users to consent to sharing their bank information, enabling financial institutions to analyze income, spending patterns, and repayment capacity.

According to CEO Abdulhamid Hassan, nearly all Nigerian digital lenders now rely on Mono’s infrastructure. The company claims to have powered more than 8 million bank account linkages, covering roughly 12% of Nigeria’s banked population. It also claims to have delivered 100 billion financial data points to lending companies and processed millions in direct bank payments. Customers include Visa-backed Moniepoint and GIC-backed PalmPay. For Flutterwave, which powers local and cross-border payments across more than 30 African countries, the deal deepens its vertical integration. In addition to payments, the company can now offer onboarding and identity checks, bank account verification, data-driven risk assessment, and one-time or recurring bank payments within a single stack. TechCrunch

• Tech billionaires cashed out $16 billion in 2025 as stocks soared

  
  

While tech stocks were busy setting records in 2025, the executives behind those companies were equally busy turning their paper fortunes into actual cash more than $16 billion worth, according to Bloomberg’s analysis of insider trading data. Jeff Bezos led the way. 

The Amazon founder sold 25 million shares for $5.7 billion in June and July, right around the time he was getting hitched to Lauren Sanchez in Venice. Oracle’s former CEO Safra Catz wasn’t far behind at $2.5 billion, followed by Michael Dell at $2.2 billion. Nvidia’s Jensen Huang watched his company become the world’s first $5 trillion business, and sold $1 billion along the way. Arista Networks CEO Jayshree Ullal cashed out nearly $1 billion as demand for the company’s high-speed networking gear soared and her personal net worth crossed $6 billion. 

Most of these sales happened through pre-arranged trading plans that executives file in advance; they weren’t spur-of-the-moment decisions. Meta’s Mark Zuckerberg sold $945 million through his foundation, while Palo Alto Networks CEO Nikesh Arora and Robinhood co-founder Baiju Bhatt each pocketed over $700 million. The common thread was an AI-fueled rally that kept pushing tech stocks higher throughout the year. TechCrunch

Minor Headlines 

• Britain and France launch strikes on Isis facility in Syria Financial Times 

  
  

• Denmark tells Donald Trump to stop threatening to seize Greenland Financial Times

  
  

• EU recycling backfires as Chinese buyers snap up aluminium scrap Financial Times 

  
  

• Berlin suspects ‘leftwing extremists’ of causing huge power outage Financial Times 

  
  

• US asset managers break M&A spending record Financial Times

  
  

• Consumer Electronics Show (CES), kicks off this week in Las Vegas  Yahoo.Finance

  
  

• Venezuela's interim president seeks US cooperation after Trump says further strike possible Reuters

  
  

• Some Greek flights resume after air traffic radio collapse Reuters