Black or White - Shein Acquires Everlane, Vietnam FDI Growth & Sodium-ion Batteries #216

Plus Water & Phosphorus Crisis

Trí and Anh Ng. from Tocco

May 25, 2026

Four stories that matter this week:

Shein is acquiring Everlane for $100 million. Everlane built its entire identity on “radical transparency,” ethical supply chains, and what it called “Cleaner Fashion,” while Shein is definitely not anywhere close to that. They produce an estimated 1 billion items per day, and their Scope 3 emissions increased 170% in 2023 and 2024. They have already acquired stakes in Forever 21 and Missguided, and shown interest in Topshop. The pattern? Shein absorbs struggling Western fashion IP to acquire brand equity, customer data, and geographic preferences that feed its algorithmic production engine (a practice that Zara made famous).
We covered Allbirds’ collapse (and rebirth into an AI company) a few weeks ago, and now it’s Everlane. Another moment of “you’re supposed to fight them, not join them”. But it was true before, and it’s still true now: “sustainability” brands that don’t make money will get bought by the rivals they set out to defeat.
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Speaking of capital, Vietnam posted its strongest FDI numbers in five years, with $18.24 billion in registered foreign capital across 1,249 projects. But the headline hides a deeply bifurcated landscape. We found 5 interesting graphs and numbers to depict the picture. One of those is how Thai Nguyen Province topped the country with $6.07 billion across just 12 projects. Meanwhile, Ho Chi Minh City pulled in $3.75 billion but across 656 projects, roughly only $5.7 million each. Read our full analysis here.
With these readings, we are excited to bring a private delegation to Vietnam’s industrial corridors in summer 2026. If you have a specific project or agenda for Vietnam, send us your case at [email protected], and we’ll see if it’s a fit.
Moving up North. In China, sodium-ion batteries reach mass production viability with a 60 GWh storage deal. By eliminating the need for lithium, cobalt, and nickel, sodium-ion offers a structurally different cost and safety profile. Procurement teams evaluating grid and cold-climate storage should treat the second half of 2026 as an active evaluation window, as this proven alternative will soon place significant pricing pressure on the default lithium iron phosphate (LFP) market. More details are found here in our analysis.
On the other side of the world, the US Environmental Protection Agency announced plans this week to rescind Biden-era drinking water limits on four PFAS “forever chemicals” and delay compliance deadlines for two others until 2031, claiming the previous rules were rushed and legally vulnerable. The timing creates a rather confusing regulatory landscape:
- While the US federal government is rolling back water standards, state attorneys general are pursuing PFAS in consumer products, as we covered with the Texas investigation into Lululemon’s apparel just weeks ago.
- The EU, meanwhile, is moving forward with a broad restriction process covering over 10,000 PFAS substances across multiple industrial sectors.
We’ll keep covering these PFAS restrictions in the upcoming months.

Have a nice week ahead. Stay sharp, and keep building.

Tri & Anh

On behalf of the Tocco team

Conversation with Janet A. Ginsburg 🦋

This week on Long Game: Leon, Tocco CEO, had a chat with J.A. Ginsburg a strategist, systems thinker, and award-winning journalist on:

Why the world’s singular focus on “net zero” and “circularity” is not enough
Why we are quietly undergoing a massive, planet-altering “material transition”.
Why fresh water and phosphorus are the two ultimate limiting factors for human survival
The devastating impact of U.S. political instability on long-term science and innovation funding, and how it is crippling the research pipeline.

And so many more fascinating topics. This episode is also available on Spotify and Apple.

Follow Janet’s Substack here : Resilient Futures | J.A. Ginsburg

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