Tim Robberts Stock index futures were mixed ahead of the open as traders kept a close watch on any updates related to the U.S.-Iran conflict amid reports of fresh strikes. Now, here are 5 news stories that broke overnight to watch out for: Russian drone strikes NATO member Romania: A Russian drone struck an apartment building in the eastern Romanian city of Galati early Friday, injuring two people...
Tim Robberts Stock index futures were mixed ahead of the open as traders kept a close watch on any updates related to the U.S.-Iran conflict amid reports of fresh strikes. Now, here are 5 news stories that broke overnight to watch out for: Russian drone strikes NATO member Romania: A Russian drone struck an apartment building in the eastern Romanian city of Galati early Friday, injuring two people. Romania, which joined the European Union in 2007, is also a NATO member. “We will order proportionate measures in relation to the Russian Federation,” Romanian President Nicusor Dan declared. Oil prices may rise on shrinking inventories: Crude prices could climb in the next two months as inventories fall due to the U.S.-Iran war, according to Chevron ( CVX ) CEO Mike Wirth and Exxon ( XOM ) senior vice president Neil Chapman at a Bernstein conference Thursday. “The buffers and the shock absorbers are being steadily drawn down, and the ability for the market to absorb this imbalance is drastically diminished today versus where we started,” Wirth said. Tesla robotaxi fleet trails Waymo in Texas: Tesla’s ( TSLA ) authorized robotaxi fleet in Texas is less than one-tenth the size of Waymo’s ( WAYMO ), according to a Texas Department of Motor Vehicles database. Tesla has 42 authorized robotaxis in the state, while Alphabet-owned ( GOOGL ) Waymo has 577 registered vehicles. Nebius-owned ( NBIS ) Avride has 317, Nuro has 47, and Amazon’s ( AMZN ) Zoox ( ZOOX ) has 35. SpaceX targets $1.8T IPO valuation: SpaceX ( SPCX ) is targeting a valuation of at least $1.8T for its upcoming IPO, Bloomberg reported, citing people familiar with the matter. The target is below the more than $2T valuation reported earlier in April, reflecting feedback from advisers and prospective investors during the IPO planning process. Valuation and deal size remain subject to change as marketing progresses. Blue Origin rocket explodes during test: Blue Origin’s ( BORGN ) New Glenn rocket exploded during a g...
China’s Wingtech Technology says it has developed an independent management operation for Nexperia ’s Chinese unit, in a bid to insulate the local business as it fights to regain control of the Dutch chipmaker. Wingtech chairwoman Ruby Yang Mu said on Friday that the core management, research and development and production teams at Nexperia China were now fully based in the country and possessed “...
China’s Wingtech Technology says it has developed an independent management operation for Nexperia ’s Chinese unit, in a bid to insulate the local business as it fights to regain control of the Dutch chipmaker. Wingtech chairwoman Ruby Yang Mu said on Friday that the core management, research and development and production teams at Nexperia China were now fully based in the country and possessed “complete operational decision-making authority”. “Today I am confident to say that Nexperia China has largely established an independent operating system,” Yang said at an annual summit on Friday hosted by JW Insights, a Chinese chip industry consultancy. Advertisement According to Yang, the Chinese unit’s production capacity and delivery capabilities were recovering steadily as it built out a full-stack supply chain designed to operate on a dual model of “China for China” and “China for global”. “We believe that the more turbulent the times, the more crucial it is to have a solid foundation,” Yang said. Advertisement Her remarks come amid an ongoing dispute that erupted late last year between Netherlands-based Nexperia and its Chinese arm.
Prediction market traders are pricing a 78% chance that SpaceX closes its first day of trading above $2 trillion, a valuation that would rank it among the ten most valuable companies in the world, ahead of Saudi Aramco, Tesla, and Meta Platforms. Polymarket contracts also show a 15%...
Prediction market traders are pricing a 78% chance that SpaceX closes its first day of trading above $2 trillion, a valuation that would rank it among the ten most valuable companies in the world, ahead of Saudi Aramco, Tesla, and Meta Platforms. Polymarket contracts also show a 15%...
Intech Investment Management LLC increased its stake in Oracle Corporation (NYSE:ORCL - Free Report) by 57.6% during the 4th quarter, according to its most recent filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The fund owned 510,763 shares of the enterprise software provider's stock after buying an additional 186,621 shares during the period. Oracle accounts for about 0.9% of Intech Investment ...
Intech Investment Management LLC increased its stake in Oracle Corporation (NYSE:ORCL - Free Report) by 57.6% during the 4th quarter, according to its most recent filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The fund owned 510,763 shares of the enterprise software provider's stock after buying an additional 186,621 shares during the period. Oracle accounts for about 0.9% of Intech Investment Management LLC's holdings, making the stock its 14th largest holding. Intech Investment Management LLC's holdings in Oracle were worth $99,553,000 as of its most recent filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission. Get Oracle alerts: Sign Up Other hedge funds and other institutional investors also recently made changes to their positions in the company. HFM Investment Advisors LLC grew its stake in shares of Oracle by 290.9% in the 4th quarter. HFM Investment Advisors LLC now owns 129 shares of the enterprise software provider's stock worth $25,000 after buying an additional 96 shares during the last quarter. FSA Wealth Management LLC bought a new position in Oracle in the 3rd quarter valued at approximately $28,000. Joseph Group Capital Management bought a new position in Oracle in the 4th quarter valued at approximately $29,000. Investors Research Corp lifted its position in Oracle by 465.5% in the 4th quarter. Investors Research Corp now owns 164 shares of the enterprise software provider's stock valued at $32,000 after acquiring an additional 135 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Mpwm Advisory Solutions LLC lifted its position in Oracle by 76.9% in the 3rd quarter. Mpwm Advisory Solutions LLC now owns 115 shares of the enterprise software provider's stock valued at $32,000 after acquiring an additional 50 shares in the last quarter. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 42.44% of the company's stock. Oracle Stock Performance Shares of NYSE:ORCL opened at $203.42 on Friday. The firm has a 50 day moving average of $169.35 and a 200 day moving average of...
Garden centres are full of flowers that will require a lot of energy. Here’s what you should plant instead … We’re on the brink of June: long days, start of summer, often wetter than people bargain for – and time to act on the gaps that can appear in borders in July if we’re not careful. It’s awkward that summer is both the time most people think about gardening and the worst time to plant anythin...
Garden centres are full of flowers that will require a lot of energy. Here’s what you should plant instead … We’re on the brink of June: long days, start of summer, often wetter than people bargain for – and time to act on the gaps that can appear in borders in July if we’re not careful. It’s awkward that summer is both the time most people think about gardening and the worst time to plant anything: you really want reliable rainfall and moist soil to get things off to a good start. But if you have had a spectacular spring and aren’t expecting much to turn up over summer, now is the time to act. My advice is slightly vicarious: I’m currently on a plant-buying ban. My garden will probably be an inaccessible building site for most of the summer, so it seems daft to indulge when everything feels so expensive. I have, however, bent the rules slightly for plants grown and sold by local charitable gardens: 100 Gladiolus murielae corms, and two packets of Chiltern Seeds’ easy-peasy mix after the neighbouring cats turned my wildflower patch into a litterbox. Apart from that, I’m sticking to donations and volunteers. Continue reading...
Education should prepare young people for dealing not only with practical things such as insurance, pensions and taxes but also with tech and mental health What is it about ex-ministers that they suddenly know how to run the country? Tony Blair hurls thunderbolts at his successor, Keir Starmer. His former colleague, Alan Milburn, is shocked that a million young people aged 16-24 are not in educati...
Education should prepare young people for dealing not only with practical things such as insurance, pensions and taxes but also with tech and mental health What is it about ex-ministers that they suddenly know how to run the country? Tony Blair hurls thunderbolts at his successor, Keir Starmer. His former colleague, Alan Milburn, is shocked that a million young people aged 16-24 are not in education, training or a job – one in seven of them with degrees: a rate double that in Ireland and three times that in the Netherlands. Meanwhile the former prime minister, Rishi Sunak, complains that pupils are never taught “financial literacy”. They are left unprepared for life outside the school gates. Sunak is clearly right, though we might wonder what he did about it when he was in Downing Street. His proposed numeracy project aims to teach children how to handle money, a skill at which he sees Britons in the dark ages compared with Germany and elsewhere. His only obsession is to believe this requires mathematics taught to the age of 18. Continue reading...
A talky, performance-driven two-hander manages to find specificity and spark in what could have felt like an overly familiar throwback Hollywood is currently in an odd but oddly exciting place, where no one is quite sure what types of “films they don’t make anymore” they should actually start making again. We’ve seen historical epics such as Oppenheimer, erotic thrillers such as The Housemaid and ...
A talky, performance-driven two-hander manages to find specificity and spark in what could have felt like an overly familiar throwback Hollywood is currently in an odd but oddly exciting place, where no one is quite sure what types of “films they don’t make anymore” they should actually start making again. We’ve seen historical epics such as Oppenheimer, erotic thrillers such as The Housemaid and female-led workplace comedies such as The Devil Wears Prada 2 all make blockbuster bank and we’re in the middle of a bumper year at the box office, edging towards a pre-pandemic total. But around the edges or in-between the cracks, there are brackets of films that might once have been given a spotlight, yet are still being left in the dark. A film such as Miss You, Love You – a talky comedy drama about adults navigating adult issues – would never have been a smash hit exactly, but it would have occupied a space which has now mostly faded, a space where specialty releases slowly turn strong reviews into good word of mouth that in turn allows for minor, yet, impressive numbers, a sleeper hit with awards buzz. Made over two years ago and then screened for buyers at this year’s Sundance, with the help of Julia Roberts, whose husband acts as cinematographer, it was ultimately bought by HBO and shuffled into an early summer TV premiere, where it will likely go the unfortunate route quietly laid out by the network’s other purchased titles. Continue reading...
Often I’m asked if I think that the novels of the future will all be written by AI. It’s not so much a question as a provocation. Do I worry that a machine can do what I do, only better? I usually say something like: “No algorithm is going to write Anna Karenina!” which is also not a real answer. So I’m grateful to Pope Leo XIV, the American pope, for his recently issued letter to the world, Magni...
Often I’m asked if I think that the novels of the future will all be written by AI. It’s not so much a question as a provocation. Do I worry that a machine can do what I do, only better? I usually say something like: “No algorithm is going to write Anna Karenina!” which is also not a real answer. So I’m grateful to Pope Leo XIV, the American pope, for his recently issued letter to the world, Magnifica Humanitas: On Safeguarding the Human Person in the Time of Artificial Intelligence. It’s a long (more than 40,00 words), intelligent and thoughtful encyclical in which the pope addresses the uses and misuses of a rapidly developing technology. Now when someone asks my opinion of AI, I can refer them to the pope’s letter, or at least chapter three. The encyclical begins with an appropriately biblical reference to the tragic consequences of a breakdown in human communication. Humanity faces a “pivotal choice: either to construct a new Tower of Babel or to build a city in which God and humanity dwell together”. What follows is a detailed account of the evolution of the views of Pope Leo’s predecessors, of the Vatican’s ideas about labor, authority, government, science, power and our moral obligation to one another. It cites the work that the church has done in defense of human dignity and freedom. The third chapter, Technology and Dominance. The Grandeur of Humanity in Light of the Promises of AI, delivers on the promise of the encyclical’s title. In an eloquent (and most often quoted) passage explaining what AI is not, the pope essentially defines what it means to be human. “So-called artificial intelligences do not undergo experiences, do not possess a body, do not feel joy or pain, do not mature through relationships and do not know from within what love, work, friendship or responsibility mean.” AI does not have a moral conscience nor does it show any guiding concern for the greater human good. The letter proceeds to say the most important and necessary things about w...
On Saturday, Donald Trump said talks with Tehran were going well and an agreement to end the war was ‘largely negotiated’. On Sunday, the US launched strikes on Southern Iran. By Thursday, Donald Trump had circulated a draft peace agreement for the war with Iran among allies. This week, as the US-Iran deal remains in a precarious state, Jonathan Freedland speaks to Ali Vaez of the International Cr...
On Saturday, Donald Trump said talks with Tehran were going well and an agreement to end the war was ‘largely negotiated’. On Sunday, the US launched strikes on Southern Iran. By Thursday, Donald Trump had circulated a draft peace agreement for the war with Iran among allies. This week, as the US-Iran deal remains in a precarious state, Jonathan Freedland speaks to Ali Vaez of the International Crisis Group about why Trump keeps changing his mind on what to do to end the war Continue reading...