Welcome to anti-office Fridays and quiet vacationing

Companies have worked hard to pull workers back to the office to ensure "collaboration" and "culture." Some workers have fought back.

• This post originally appeared in the Insider Today newsletter.
• You can sign up for Business Insider's daily newsletter here.

Happy Friday! Here's hoping you have some fun MDW plans. But if they involve seeing some savagery at the NYC-Dublin portal, you might be disappointed.

In today's big story, we're looking at the push for WFH Fridays and how that plays into the "quiet vacationing" phenomenon.

What's on deck:

• Markets: Wall Street is suspicious of how cloud giants might be juicing their cloud revenue numbers.
• Tech: OpenAI's defense of the ScarJo debacle isn't much better than what we initially thought.
• Business: How to spice up your cold emails.

But first, I won't be in the office today.

If this was forwarded to you, sign up here.

The big story

Anti-office Fridays

With all due respect to summer Fridays, we've found a year-round replacement: WFH Fridays.

Fridays are a ghost town at many offices, as white-collar workers declared the last day of the workweek best spent at home, writes Business Insider's Juliana Kaplan and Noah Sheidlower.

It's not just about working from your PJs on Fridays. Workers are sneaking in midday spa treatments and booking workout classes.

The result is a bustling work-from-home Friday economy, giving some businesses a noticeable boost at the end of the week. For a country that's seen many of its downtowns decimated, it's a welcome change.

And it's not just impacting mom-and-pop stores. Big chains like Starbucks and Sweetgreen have even seen an uptick on Fridays.

But WFH Fridays' staying power remains to be seen.

Companies have worked hard to pull workers back to the office to ensure "collaboration" and "culture." Some workers have fought back against losing their remote privileges.

Solidifying Friday as a remote day could be the middle ground employees and employers have struggled to find during the hybrid-work era.

WFH Fridays coincide with another growing workplace trend: "quiet vacationing."

More than a third of millennials recently polled said they've taken time off without telling their boss, writes BI's Kelsey Vlamis.

Starting your vacation a bit early without burning a full day of PTO isn't an entirely new concept. Let those who haven't left work early to catch a flight or avoid traffic cast the first stone.

Remote work has supercharged the concept, though. Employees have gotten strategic about scheduling messages or keeping their statuses active, even if they're only working on cocktails and a good tan.

Which brings us back to WFH Fridays. As summer approaches, it's not hard to see employees leveraging their remote privileges to get a jump start on weekend travel plans. Driving to the shore during Friday rush-hour traffic is a special kind of hell.

But how far will employees push it? Because let's be honest, they're going to push it.

What starts as cutting out a few hours early on Friday suddenly turns into missing the whole day. Do you know the best way to beat Friday traffic? Leave Thursday night!

That evolution might be tough for companies to stomach. We're still a long way from fully adopting four-day workweeks.

The end result could be employers saying abuse of WFH Fridays means they need you back in the office… for good.

3 things in markets

1. Getting a foot in the door at Goldman Sachs remains incredibly hard. Only 0.9% of applicants nabbed a summer internship this year, a record low. It shows the prestigious bank is still a top target among aspiring bankers despite some of its recent turmoil.
2. Wall Street is asking tough questions about Big Tech's cloud revenue numbers. A recent note from RBC Capital asked if big investments in AI startups were artificially boosting cloud growth figures. It's called revenue round tripping, and it's when money is invested in something that uses the cash on services from the initial investor.
3. Germany has a solar panel problem. The country has installed more solar capacity than demand requires, SEB Research found. That's pushed prices into negative territory during peak solar production hours.

3 things in tech

1. Good news: OpenAI wasn't lying about using a fake Scarlett Johansson voice. Bad news: It's just incompetent. OpenAI's response to the ScarJo saga is Sam Altman didn't know what he was doing, which is troubling, to say the least. That kind of bumbling argument works for a young startup but is tougher for a company meant to lead us into the future.
2. A LinkedIn Copilot might be on the way. According to a planning document viewed by BI, Microsoft lists "LinkedIn" among existing Copilots. It's unclear what the reference to LinkedIn Copilot exactly means, but a person familiar with the planning said it suggests the company has bigger plans than its existing AI tools.
3. Keep it secret, keep it SAFE. AI startups are reviving the funding mechanism, pioneered by Y Combinator, to raise money in a more founder-friendly way. Rather than a conventional equity investment, investors commit a certain amount of funding, like a warrant, and in return, receive stock in the company at a future date.

3 things in business

1. How a former Meta and Google employee got Mark Cuban to respond to his cold email. They may seem daunting or even pointless, but a Meta and Google alum says cold emails helped him secure those jobs and grow his network by 100x. He shared the magic formula he uses — which includes a great hook and a clear ask.
2. Why did Vivek Ramaswamy invest in BuzzFeed? The former presidential candidate owns a 7.7% stake in BuzzFeed. But why? We have some unverified theories, including one involving the massively popular show Hot Ones.
3. It's the summer of meal deals. Burger King is launching its own $5 meal, just two weeks after it was reported that McDonald's would roll out a similar promotion. The set will include a sandwich, chicken nuggets, fries, and a drink and will run for several months, according to an internal document seen by Bloomberg.

In other news

• James Gorman is bringing his 18-year stint at Morgan Stanley to an end.
• Elon Musk's X is making 'likes' private so people can like NSFW posts without worrying.
• Pet insurance is booming. It's also mostly worthless.
• 'AI revolution just getting started': Here's what Wall Street is saying about Nvidia's 1st-quarter earnings blowout.
• 14 music-tech startups helping to shape the business as it's shaken up by AI.
• A sports bettor scored an 80,860% gain on a $100 parlay ticket for the NBA Championship.
• China's military is surrounding Taiwan, sending its new president an unmistakable message.
• Elon Musk says he didn't ask for Biden's tariff on electric vehicles from China.
• From more inventory to lower prices, here are 3 signs the housing market may be getting better for buyers.

What's happening today

• G7 Finance Ministers and Central Bank Governors Meeting continues.

The Insider Today team: Dan DeFrancesco, deputy editor and anchor, in New York. Hallam Bullock, senior editor, in London. George Glover, reporter, in London. Grace Lett, associate editor, in Chicago. Laine Napoli, associate producer, in New York.