Slope, a lending startup that uses artificial intelligence to vet businesses, is partnering with Amazon starting Tuesday to provide a reusable line of credit to Amazon sellers, backed by a JPMorgan Chase credit facility, the company told CNBC exclusively.

The new relationship means eligible U.S. Amazon vendors can apply for and access capital directly through their Amazon Seller accounts with real-time approvals.

Slope was co-founded by CEO Lawrence Lin Murata, who said said he saw the ups and downs of running a small business while he was growing up in São Paulo.

Lin Murata helped his parents at their family’s toy shop, which they’ve been running for more than three decades. As he gained more insight into the finances of the business, he said he realized that cash flow was a large pain point for his parents and other small businesses.

That led him to start Slope, an AI-powered lending platform backed by OpenAI CEO Sam Altman and JPMorgan Chase, with co-founder Alice Deng.

“Leveraging AI, we’re able to underwrite these businesses, and we’re able to handle all the complexity of assessing the risk for a business,” Lin Murata said. “At the same time, [we’re] providing a very easy, real-time experience to them.”

The lines of credit will start at an 8.99% APR, according to Slope, and require vendors to be in business for at least one year with more than $100,000 in annual revenue. Once approved, Amazon sellers can draw from the line as needed and choose a term ranging from three months to a year to align repayment with their inventory cycle. Scope did not disclose the financial aspects of its deal with Amazon.

“Most people don’t realize that sellers, independent sellers, are kind of the backbone of Amazon and e-commerce in general,” Deng told CNBC. “More than 60% of Amazon’s sales are driven by independent sellers.”

Deng said Slope is filling a gap with the new partnership. Currently, Amazon sellers can use some third parties to access capital, though Deng said those initiatives are more focused on smaller sellers, while Slope is focused on mature sellers, some of whom reach hundreds of millions of dollars in revenue and require bank-grade financing.

Deng said when Amazon did its own lending around four years ago, the total addressable market was between $1 billion and $2 billion. With Slope taking over the program, the company expects that number to grow.

“We’re excited about our work with Slope, which expands the financing tools available to Amazon selling partners,” an Amazon spokesperson told CNBC. “Whether they are just starting out or looking to grow, access to sufficient capital is a critical need for small business owners, and we’re always evaluating new ways to empower sellers to thrive in the Amazon store.”

With Slope’s new deal, sellers can take a few minutes directly on Amazon Seller Central to apply for capital and get approved almost instantly, using proprietary Amazon performance data and Slope’s in-house large language model, Lin Murata said.

“That is one of the reasons why we’re able to give a more compelling offer than if you were outside of the Amazon dashboard,” Lin Murata said. “And then we give real-time decisions, so we analyze Amazon performance, data, and cash flow in real time.”

It’s a process that the Slope co-founders said is easier, faster and more integrated than having to apply for loans at banks as a small business. With the granular data that Amazon provides, like a breakdown of sales by product, they said the AI model is able to make a more informed decision on financing than a bank would based on overall financial documents.

With the new deal, Amazon joins a growing slate of Slope’s customers, which already include Samsung, Alibaba, Ikea and more.

Deng and Lin Murata said the company has trialed the new Amazon integration, and though the trial has been live for just a few weeks, the pair said it’s seen significant demand and applications growing 300% week over week.

“Going back to the initial inspiration of my parents, I think we want to be the credit intelligence layer for these businesses,” Lin Murata said. “Ultimately, what we’re really doing is helping these businesses grow by giving them fair, affordable, fast and very easy access to different forms of financing.”

New Delhi: Well stocked granaries, low oil prices and longer-lasting drivers of core disinflation are likely to keep India inflation benign in FY27 as well, according to a new report. 

HSBC Global Investment Research said in its report that “we do not forecast more RBI repo rate cuts, but the risks, if any, are of more easing, if growth disappoints”.

November CPI inflation came in at 0.7 per cent (on-year), in line with market expectation. Despite a sequential uptick of 0.4 per cent (on-month), the annual prints remained depressed due to base effect.

Excluding gold, headline CPI remained in deflation (-0.1 per cent in November compared to -0.6 per cent previously).

“Deflation in food prices continued for a third month in annual terms. Sequentially, food prices rose 0.5 per cent on-month after two months of contraction. Vegetables prices picked up after falling for two straight months along with a rise in the prices of protein items like egg, meat and fish,” said the report.

“Gold prices kept core inflation elevated. With a weight of 1.1 per cent in the CPI basket and prices up 59 per cent in November, gold alone explains c63bp of CPI inflation. Our preferred definition of core (excluding food, energy, housing and gold) had been steady at 3.2 per cent y-o-y in 3Q25, and has now fallen to 2.5 per cent in November,” said the report.

Following a sharp fall in October, November goods inflation remained benign.

According to the report, strong cereal production, well-stocked granaries, and winter disinflation are likely to help keep a lid on food inflation over the near future.

“And it is not just easing food prices. The high base of last year is likely to keep CPI inflation soft for the next few months. Global oil prices, too, have been low, and cheaper imports from China will likely keep core inflation soft for a prolonged period,” it noted.

The RBI has lowered H1 FY27 inflation forecast by 50 bp (4.5 per cent previously to 4 per cent now).

“However our forecasts are 50 bp lower than the RBI’s (at 3.5 per cent). If we are correct, and the RBI eventually makes further downward adjustment to inflation, there would be space to ease further, if growth requires it,” said the report.

Three members of Ben & Jerry’s independent board will no longer be eligible to serve in their roles, after the ice cream company introduced a new set of governance practices.

These include a nine-year limit set on board members’ terms. Chair Anuradha Mittal, who earlier said she had no plans to resign under pressure, is among those affected.

The move was criticised by the company’s co-founder Ben Cohen, who called it a “blatant power grab designed to strip the board of legal authority and independence”.

His remarks are the latest in a long-running row between Ben and Jerry’s and its owner over the Cherry Garcia maker’s social activism and the continued independence of its board.

The BBC understands that Ms Mittal will leave the company immediately, while board members Mr Dodson and Ms Henderson will go at the end of this year.

“Anuradha Mittal, Daryn Dodson, and Jennifer Henderson have served this company with integrity and courage. Over many years, they helped the board make bold, often difficult decisions to uphold Ben & Jerry’s social mission,” said Mr Cohen.

Ben & Jerry’s said the move is aimed “to preserve and enhance the brand’s historical social mission and safeguard its essential integrity.”

The Vermont-based firm is now owned by The Magnum Ice Cream Company, after a spinoff from Unilever last week that created the world’s largest standalone ice cream maker.

A spokesperson for Magnum said the firm wanted to build and strengthen Ben & Jerry’s “powerful, non-partisan values-based position in the world”.

But Ben & Jerry’s would be destroyed as a brand if it remains with Magnum, Mr Cohen told the BBC.

Ben & Jerry’s was sold to Unilever in 2000 in a deal which allowed it to retain an independent board and the right to make decisions about its social mission.

Since the sale there have been deepening clashes between the Vermont-based brand and Unilever, with this conflict now inherited by Magnum.

In 2021, Ben & Jerry’s refused to sell its products in areas occupied by Israel, resulting in its Israeli operation being sold by Unilever to a local licensee.

Co-founder Jerry Greenfield left Ben & Jerry’s in September after almost half a century at the firm, deepening a dispute with parent company Unilever.

In a letter shared on social media by Mr Cohen, Mr Greenfield said Ben & Jerry’s had lost its independence after Unilever put a halt to its social activism.