CE 100 Index Posts Slight Gain as DraftKings Slides and Shopify Surges

The CE 100 Index barely budged this past week, gaining a relatively slight 0.1% as six segments lost ground, and five pillars moved ahead.

The Have Fun segment led the declining segments, sliding 4%. DraftKings gave up 16.7%. Financial sites such as Bloomberg reported last week that online sports betting platforms are facing competitive pressure from predictions markets such as Kalshi.

Payment Networks Give a Boost

The Pay and Be Paid segment tacked on 1.8%.

Mastercard rolled out Commerce Media, a new digital media network aimed at delivering personalized advertising and offers based on permissioned purchase data, letting consumers activate incentives on their enrolled cards with full conversion attribution.

It also expanded its Small Business Navigator tools into Canada, providing SMBs there access to cost-saving, cybersecurity and market insights. Additionally, Mastercard and Corpay broadened their near real-time payments alliance, enabling participants to send fast payments across 22 more global markets. Shares in Mastercard gained 2.6%.

Visa launched its Commercial Solutions (VCS) Hub, a new platform combining invoice, supplier and payments tools under a generative artificial intelligence (AI)-enabled architecture for issuers and FinTechs.

And in the SMB lending space, Visa-backed Truist introduced a new premium business, Visa Infinite card for small enterprises, marking the first super-regional bank to offer that tier. Visa shares gained 2.9%.

Affirm’s stock gave up 1.5%. PYMNTS reported that Ace Hardware has struck a new partnership with Affirm to offer buy now, pay later options for in-store hardware purchases. Shoppers in participating Ace locations can scan a QR code at checkout, complete a real-time eligibility check, and then select installment payment options for purchases of $50 or more.

The Enablers segment advanced by 2.5%.

Starting Dec. 16, Meta will begin using users’ voice and text interactions with its AI products to help generate personalized ads and content across Facebook and Instagram.

These AI-based signals will join existing inputs (like likes and follows) to refine what users see, though Meta says it will exclude chats about sensitive topics (e.g. religion, politics, health) from ad targeting. Users will be notified ahead of the change, and controls like Ads Preferences will remain available. The stock lost 4.1%, offset by a 12% gain for C3.ai.

Apple shares gained 1.1% amid reports that Apple has quietly paused its overhaul of the next Vision Pro headset in favor of shifting engineering resources into development of smart glasses, reflecting a recognition that lightweight, AI-driven eyewear may be the next frontier. The move comes amid Meta’s growing momentum with its Ray-Ban Display glasses, which have intensified competitive pressure in the AR/AI wearables space.

Shopify’s stock surged more than 15%. PYMNTS reported that OpenAI has embedded Shopify (alongside Etsy) directly into ChatGPT’s “Buy It in ChatGPT” feature, allowing U.S. users to view and purchase Shopify-merchant products without leaving the chat interface. The system uses Stripe’s Agentic Commerce Protocol to power in-chat checkout flows, collapsing discovery and payment into a conversational experience.