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North America
Yahoo Finance

Dow Drops To Record Worst Week In Six Months Amid Elevated Yields, Oil — NVDA, TSLA, SPCX, ONON In Focus

US stock indices ended the week lower as investors digested the first rate hike since 2023, elevated oil prices and pressure from rising yields. The S&P 500 ended Friday 1.1% lower, while the Nasdaq 100 added 1.7% and the Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 0.6%. The Russell 2000, which tracks stocks with small market capitalizations, rose about 0.6%. Retail sentiment on Stocktwits for QQQ, SPY, and DIA was ‘bearish,’ with ‘high’ message volumes. Elevated Treasury yields continued to pressure equities, with the 10-year yield touching its highest point since July 2007 earlier in the week as it crossed 5%. It closed up nearly 6 basis points to 5.006% on Friday. The iShares 20+ year Treasury ETF (TLT) eased about 0.6% on Friday. U.S. crude oil closed the week mostly flat while staying above $100 per barrel. On Friday, West Texas Intermediate crude fell 1.58% to $100.30 per barrel, while Brent crude dropped 0.91% to $103.87 per barrel. Friday’s trading capped off a mixed week for major equity benchmarks. The Dow fell 1.7%, marking its third consecutive weekly decline and its steepest drop since March. The S&P 500 dipped roughly 0.1%, whereas the tech-heavy Nasdaq rose 0.7%. “Nothing has changed on the fundamental side to lead investors to think that oil prices will decline in a significant way or that yields will tumble over the intermediate term,” Matt Maley at Miller Tabak told Bloomberg. “We could still see a significant jump in volatility.” Artificial intelligence developer Anthropic has postponed its anticipated market listing until November, according to an exclusive report by The Wall Street Journal. London-based AI data center company Nscale has filed publicly for an initial public offering (IPO) in New York to acquire the infrastructure needed to meet the global demand for artificial intelligence compute power. Tesla (TSLA) was in the spotlight on Friday after Barclays said the EV maker could deliver more vehicles than expected in the third quarter and added that its autonomous driving technologies could boost margins. On Holding AG (ONON) signed French football star Kylian Mbappé as an athlete partner and global ambassador.

Dow Drops To Record Worst Week In Six Months Amid Elevated Yields, Oil — NVDA, TSLA, SPCX, ONON In Focus
Europe
BBC Business

Airlines criticise air traffic control as second glitch causes more disruption

Airlines have criticised the UK's air traffic control system after a second technical problem in two weeks caused major disruption to UK flights. EasyJet said Monday's incident "once again calls into question the resilience" of the service, while Wizz Air said there was a "national confidence crisis" in National Air Traffic Services (Nats), which runs the UK's air traffic. Nats said a "connectivity issue" at Prestwick was behind the disruption across Scotland, Northern Ireland and northern England - and had "nothing to do" with a separate software defect at Swanwick earlier this month. Prime Minister Andy Burnham said further issues today "cause even greater concern" about the UK's air traffic control. When asked by reporters whether he would look to fire the head of Nats, Burnham said "these are clearly serious issues and they need to be fully investigated". He added that the transport secretary was taking the issues "extremely seriously" and initially it's a matter for her "to get to the bottom of... and why there has been a recurrence." The underlying issue causing Monday's disruption has since been resolved, with Nats saying it was running at "full capacity", although officials warned of knock-on effects. A spokesperson said they were now "focused on working with our customers to recover their residual delays and help get their operations back to normal". More than 150 flights were cancelled at UK airports on Monday - including 140 departures and 137 arrivals, according to aviation analytics company Cirium. Easyjet was the worst affected airline, with 48 of its 670 scheduled departures cancelled, while British Airways has seen 13 cancellations from its 513 scheduled departures. The UK Civil Aviation Authority (CAA) said passengers who had flights disrupted were "unlikely" to be entitled to compensation. It said the technical issue is "likely to be considered the result of 'extraordinary circumstances' under passenger rights rules", meaning that "although passengers should be looked after by airlines, they are unlikely to be entitled to compensation for delays or cancellations that were directly caused by the incident".

Airlines criticise air traffic control as second glitch causes more disruption
Asia
The Hindu BusinessLine

Union FM Nirmala Sitharaman to visit Qatar for annual AIIB Board of Governors meeting

Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman will embark on a three-day visit to Qatar, leading the delegation comprising Finance Ministry officials. | Photo Credit: BIJOY GHOSH Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman will embark on a three-day visit to Qatar, leading the delegation comprising Finance Ministry officials. Announcing Sitharaman's visit, the Ministry of Finance wrote in a post on X that the Finance Minister will be attending the 11th Annual Meeting of the Board of Governors of the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank, scheduled to be held on Monday in Doha, as the Indian Governor. As part of her visit, she will also hold several bilateral meetings with the AIIB President and her counterparts from various nations. Union Minister for Finance and Corporate Affairs Smt. @nsitharaman will embark on an official visit to Qatar from 27th to 29thSeptember, 2026. The Union Finance Minister is leading the delegation comprising of Ministry of Finance officials.During the visit, FM Smt. @nsitharaman… pic.twitter.com/wA48MGv1iw Earlier in March, Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman met Zou Jiayi, the new President of the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB), here in the national capital, where they discussed strengthening the India-AIIB partnership. Representing the second-largest shareholder in AIIB, Sitharaman emphasised the need to scale up investments in AIIB member countries, particularly low-income countries, through various innovative financing and non-financing instruments. The Union Finance Minister also highlighted India's continued focus on infrastructure-led growth under the Union Budget, and both discussed the importance of enhanced collaboration with AIIB through early upstream services in the infrastructure sector in India. Among other issues, the Union minister stressed AIIB's role in developing the capital markets, expediting the approvals of projects in Uttarakhand and Himachal Pradesh, and setting up a regional office in India, given the scale of AIIB's operations here. According to the AIIB website, it began operations in 2016 with 57 founding Members (37 regional and 20 non-regional). By the end of 2020, it had 103 approved Members representing approximately 79 per cent of the global population and 65 per cent of global GDP. Comments have to be in English, and in full sentences. They cannot be abusive or personal. Please abide by our community guidelines for posting your comments. We have migrated to a new commenting platform. If you are already a registered user of TheHindu Businessline and logged in, you may continue to engage with our articles. If you do not have an account please register and login to post comments. Users can access their older comments by logging into their accounts on Vuukle.

Union FM Nirmala Sitharaman to visit Qatar for annual AIIB Board of Governors meeting
Asia
The Hindu BusinessLine

India's key-tenor bonds may see relief after October-March supply cut

The word bonds on wooden cubes with office desktop. Business finance stock exchange concept. | Photo Credit: cagkansayin Indian government bond yields are set to open higher on Monday, tracking a rise in US Treasury yields, although a reduction in October-March supply of liquid five-year and 10-year bonds may offer some relief after a steep selloff in recent weeks. The benchmark 6.94 per cent 2036 bond yield is expected to trade between 7.06 per cent and 7.11 per cent on Monday, according to a trader with a primary dealership, after ending at 7.1194 per cent on Friday. “Traders may take some solace in the mild reduction in five-year and 10-year bond supply, as these two segments were heavily battered in the last few sessions,” the trader said. New Delhi plans to raise ₹7.86 lakh crore ($82 billion) through bond sales between October and March, slightly below earlier projections. The move takes full-year borrowing to ₹16 lakh crore, down from the ₹16.09 lakh crore projected after the first half and ₹17.20 lakh crore outlined in the Budget. The share of five-year and 10-year bonds in the borrowing mix has been cut to 12.1 per cent and 26.3 per cent, respectively, from 15.4 per cent and 29 per cent in April-September. The 10-year benchmark bond yield has jumped 36 bps in the last six weeks, while its shorter-duration counterpart has surged 46 bps during the same period. US Treasury yields stayed elevated, with the 10-year yield hovering around its highest level in nearly two decades, as recent data and comments from Federal Reserve officials reinforced bets on further rate hikes. Traders now see a 64 per cent chance of another rate increase in October and a 51 per cent probability of a further move in December, according to CME Group’s FedWatch Tool. The Fed raised rates earlier this month, for the first time since 2023. Expectations of a rate hike by the Reserve Bank of India have strengthened after August retail inflation accelerated to 4.82 per cent and following the US Fed’s latest move, with a majority now expecting an increase next week. Overnight indexed swap rates are expected to remain rangebound after rising in the previous week. Last week, the one-year rate added 9 bps to end at 6.16 per cent, the two-year rate also rose 9 bps to 6.37 per cent, while the five-year rate gained 4 bps to 6.6250 per cent.

India's key-tenor bonds may see relief after October-March supply cut
North America
CNBC Economy

Counting the votes: Warsh faces a tough battle as the Fed girds for expected interest rate hike

Federal Reserve Chairman Kevin Warsh faces a tricky head count this week when he and his fellow policymakers decide on both the immediate and future path of interest rates. While markets have honed in on a near-certain quarter percentage point hike in Wednesday's vote, it's not at all clear how broad will be the margin among the 12 Federal Open Market Committee voters. Moreover, Warsh will have to decide how to message the move: Will this be the rare one-and-done on hikes, will there be more to come or will the chair maintain his cryptic posture in not trying to guide markets one way or the other? "With the market priced this way, it would be shocking if he came in and did nothing," Bill Dudley, the former New York Fed president, said in a CNBC interview. "It would really damage his credibility because it would basically be all talk, no action." Indeed, as of Monday afternoon, futures traders were pricing in a better than 92% probability of a rate increase this week, as well as a more than 75% chance that the FOMC would follow up in December with another move, according to the CME Group's FedWatch gauge. Fed funds, the benchmark overnight borrowing rate, currently stand at 3.50% to 3.75%. The greater probabilities follow another run-up in fuel prices and inflation data last week that showed prices continued to climb in August. Both trends followed Warsh's comments a few weeks ago that the Fed would be forced into action unless there are more concrete signs that inflation is easing back to the central bank's 2% target. For one thing, the Fed historically has looked through the type of trends that are fueling inflation now. Economists generally agree that much of this year's increase has come from tariffs and an energy supply shock from the Iran war, both of which have uncertain impacts on the long-range trajectory of inflation. "We do not see a strong economic case for raising the funds rate," Goldman Sachs economist David Mericle said in a client note. "We think that all of the overshoot of 2% can be attributed to one-time factors whose impact is likely to fade." Nevertheless, Goldman changed its call from no change at this week's meeting to a hike, primarily because the firm's economists think the market expectations will force the Fed to move. Whether that also will be the case on an FOMC that voted 9-3 in favor of a hold at the July meeting is another matter. The three dissenters — regional presidents Lorie Logan of Dallas, Beth Hammack of Cleveland and Neel Kashkari of Minneapolis — all supported a quarter-point hike two months ago, when the Fed last met. Assuming their positions haven't changed, and there's been nothing in their public comments to suggest they have, that would mean four other members would have to switch their votes from hold to hike. In public remarks delivered Sept. 3, Waller voiced support for another hold at this meeting, albeit with the usual caveats about watching data to confirm that disinflation trends are continuing. Mostly, he merely urged patience rather than a rush to hike.

Counting the votes: Warsh faces a tough battle as the Fed girds for expected interest rate hike
North America
CNBC Finance

GM touts new V-8 engines in revived ‘truck wars’ with Ford, Ram amid lackluster EV sales

DETROIT — The buzzing of all-electric vehicles has once again been overtaken by the revving of V-8 engines in the Motor City amid deregulation by the Trump administration and lackluster demand for EVs. General Motors followed Ford Motor this week in touting new and improved gas-powered engines as well as a class-exclusive diesel option to build upon GM's highly profitable full-size pickup truck business. The Detroit automaker on Thursday released details of the engine lineup for its upcoming 2027 Chevrolet Silverado 1500 and GMC Sierra 1500 pickup trucks that include two new V-8 engines, a carryover inline-six-cylinder diesel engine and an enhanced four-cylinder turbocharged option. GM executives said they expect the upgraded engine lineup and the redesigned pickup trucks to continue the automaker's six consecutive years of sales leadership over its competitors in the segment, including Ford and Chrysler parent Stellantis. "If we don't stomp the competition with these trucks, then I'd be very sad and questioning myself. That's the goal," GM President Mark Reuss said during a media event Wednesday at the automaker's massive Flint Engine plant near Detroit. "That's what success looks like: continued truck leadership." While Ford, which also updated its engine offerings for the 2027 model year, is the top-selling full-size truck and brand with its F-Series lineup, Chevrolet and GMC combined have outsold Ford since 2020. The full-size pickup truck market is more than marketing claims and bragging rights — it's massively profitable for the Detroit automakers, with Ford previously saying its F-Series business generated more revenue than many Fortune 100 companies. Full-size trucks in the U.S., including light-duty models and larger variants, are what pay the bills for U.S. automakers and allow them to invest in emerging markets and technologies. "This is history today and we don't take that lightly," Reuss said about the launch of its new trucks with GM's sixth generation of small-block V-8 engines, which the company first produced in 1955. The segment continues to help offset losses of EVs, which have been a major focal point for the automotive industry this decade. But that focus has changed with the Trump administration's moves to remove federal support of up to $7,500 in incentives to purchase an EV and reduce or eliminate federal fuel economy rules and penalties. GM said the decision to build a new generation of V-8 engines occurred far before the Trump administration's regulatory changes, as it takes years to develop such products. It said development of its Gen 6 small-block engine started in 2018. While GM, Ford and Stellantis regularly compete with one another, the pressure and attention is renewed whenever one automaker introduces new or redesigned versions of full-size pickup trucks, like GM is for the 2027 model year.

GM touts new V-8 engines in revived ‘truck wars’ with Ford, Ram amid lackluster EV sales
Europe
BBC Business

Japan raises interest rate to new 31-year high to curb rising prices

Image source, Anadolu via Getty ImagesImage caption, The Bank of Japan has been raising the rate since 2024, when it stood at minus 0.1% Japan's central bank has raised its main interest rate to a fresh 31-year high as it continues to move away from decades of ultra-low borrowing costs and as the country faces increasing economic pressures. In a widely expected move on Friday, the Bank of Japan (BOJ) increased the rate from 1% to 1.25% - a level not seen since 1995. It comes as major central banks around the world are hiking rates as higher energy prices caused by the Iran war are helping to push up inflation. On Wednesday, the US Federal Reserve raised its benchmark interest rate for the first time in over three years, while the European Central Bank also increased its borrowing costs earlier this month. The BOJ has been raising the rate since 2024, when it stood at minus 0.1%. It has now hiked rates six times in the last two and a half years. Since then the bank has been steadily putting up the rate as it tries to reach a level similar to other major economies. When a central bank raises rates, the country's currency usually becomes stronger as it makes the it more attractive to traders. Japan is facing several economic challenges including a persistently weak yen, rising prices and a shrinking workforce. Official figures published on Friday ahead of the BOJ announcement showed that inflation eased slightly last month. Core inflation fell to 1.7% in August from 1.8% the previous month but remains close to the bank's 2% target level. While Japan's inflation rate is not high by international standards, rising prices are a relatively new development in the economy.

Japan raises interest rate to new 31-year high to curb rising prices
North America
CNBC Economy

Bank of England defies Fed’s rate-hike lead, leaving rates unchanged

The Bank of England left interest rates unchanged on Thursday, despite inflation rising well above its 2% target, but warned a hike was becoming increasingly likely. The central bank's Monetary Policy Committee voted 6-3 to hold the Bank Rate at 3.75%. The three dissenters voted to enact a hike of 25 basis points to 4%. Markets had been pricing in a 76% chance that the bank will hold interest rates steady on Thursday, according to LSEG data, but a hike of at least 25 basis points is widely anticipated at its next meeting in November. The hold marks a divergence from other major central banks. The U.S. Federal Reserve announced a quarter-point hike on Wednesday, its first hike since 2023. Last week, the European Central Bank announced its second rate hike this year, after raising rates in June for the first time in three years. The Bank of Japan is expected to raise its key interest rate at the end of its two-day meeting on Friday. "So far, higher global energy costs have had a limited effect on price and wage setting in the U.K.," Bank of England Governor Andrew Bailey said in a statement Thursday. "But the longer this volatility persists, the bigger the impact it will have on inflation, and the more likely it is we will need to raise Bank Rate to ensure that inflation falls back to our 2% target." But MPC members who voted to raise rates pointed to uncertainty arising from the Iran war and a need to get ahead of its potential economic ramifications. Catherine L Mann, an MPC member and former global chief economist at Citibank, argued the upside risks to inflation had increased since July, when she also voted in favor of a hike. "The 'sporadic continuance' of conflict has ratcheted up energy prices well above the baseline from the July Report," she said, noting that the Bank of England's short-term inflation forecast projected the consumer price index rising above 4% in early 2027." She continued: "Raising [the] Bank Rate is a better risk-management strategy when faced with uncertainty about inflation dynamics and second-round effects. Doing so avoids a worse outcome whereby inflation becomes embedded, which requires even tighter policy later." Megan Greene, who also dissented from the majority vote, pointed to uncertainty about the extent of second-round effects of the Iran war, AI-related supply constraints and the El Niño climate event as sources of inflationary pressure. The third MPC member who voted to tighten monetary policy was Huw Pill, who said raising rates would have sent a "clear signal of the MPC's commitment to achieving its price stability mandate amidst the fog of geopolitical conflict and data noise."

Bank of England defies Fed’s rate-hike lead, leaving rates unchanged
Asia
The Hindu BusinessLine

Nvidia unveils OpenShell to set boundaries for AI agents

Nvidia on Monday unveiled a new security platform that the chipmaker said can stop artificial intelligence agents from going rogue. The company said that its Open Agent Safety Platform includes software that “sets boundaries for agents,” and follows a series of revelations from top AI companies about their models escaping and breaking into other organizations. The disclosures sparked furious debate about the safety of advanced artificial intelligence systems, including self-improving models that some fear could race out of human control. Nvidia executives said in a media briefing that the new system could have prevented a recent incident involving a swarm of OpenAI agents that autonomously hacked into AI startup Hugging Face. “From what we know, this new security platform could have stopped the breach if it was being used in frontier labs for model evaluation early on,” said the company’s vice president of enterprise AI, Justin Boitano, referring to companies at the forefront of AI. It was a high-profile breach that enflamed the concerns about AI, which were followed by similar incidents involving OpenAI’s models including breaching an Australian health department website. Anthropic and Meta have also disclosed that their AI systems hacked into other organisations on their own. Nvidia’s software, which is called OpenShell and is open source, lets developers “formally verify an agent has enough authority to do its job and no more,” Boitano said. The platform also includes a separate security layer called Sentry that runs onboard a chip to constantly monitor AI agent activity and can “intervene instantly” if the agent starts trying to move beyond its target, the company said. “OpenShell governs the agent’s actions, and then Sentry independently monitors and contains suspicious behavior,” Boitano said. More than 100 companies are using the system at its launch, including Microsoft, Perplexity, Accenture, and JPMorgan Chase. Comments have to be in English, and in full sentences. They cannot be abusive or personal. Please abide by our community guidelines for posting your comments.

Nvidia unveils OpenShell to set boundaries for AI agents