spawns/iStock via Getty Images By Ewa Manthey , Commodities Strategist and Warren Patterson , Head of Commodities Strategy Energy – Oil falls on optimism over Iran war Oil prices fell after US President Trump signalled a potential end to the war with Iran. Brent slipped to below $100/bbl on Wednesday morning, and WTI also traded below $100 after Trump said the US could leave Iran within two to thr...
spawns/iStock via Getty Images By Ewa Manthey , Commodities Strategist and Warren Patterson , Head of Commodities Strategy Energy – Oil falls on optimism over Iran war Oil prices fell after US President Trump signalled a potential end to the war with Iran. Brent slipped to below $100/bbl on Wednesday morning, and WTI also traded below $100 after Trump said the US could leave Iran within two to three weeks, suggesting an agreement with Tehran may be reached but is not required for the conflict to end. The President is due to address the nation at 9pm ET today with an update on Iran. The Wall Street Journal also reported that the UAE has urged the US and European and Asian military powers to form a coalition to open the Strait of Hormuz by force. Meanwhile, China and Pakistan jointly called for an immediate ceasefire and for shipping through Hormuz to be safeguarded. On Tuesday, Trump warned allies to buy US jet fuel or risk losing access via the Strait, telling countries reliant on oil to “start learning how to fight for yourself.” Even if the Strait reopens, clearing the vessel backlog would take time, with production, exports and LNG flows normalising only gradually rather than immediately. Meanwhile, Saudi Aramco ( ARMCO ) may raise the official selling price of Arab Light for Asian buyers next month, while key US crude grades are trading at their strongest premiums since the Covid‑19 period. In US inventory data, API figures showed crude stocks rose by 10.3mb last week, far above expectations for a 1.3mb build. Gasoline and distillate inventories fell by 3.2mb and 1.04mb, respectively, which should continue to support product cracks. The EIA report is due later today. In gas markets, European prices fell sharply, with TTF down more than 7.7% on Tuesday amid favourable weather forecasts and hopes of de-escalation in the Iran conflict. Strong wind generation could weigh on gas demand for power, while weaker industrial demand and a lighter maintenance season in Norw...
ismagilov/iStock via Getty Images US insurance regulators are taking steps to better understand the industry's exposure to private credit as investments in the asset class grow. Exposure to private credit has sparked investor concern across industries as the asset class experiences rising defaults and heightened investor redemptions. The National Association of Insurance Commissioners has made sev...
ismagilov/iStock via Getty Images US insurance regulators are taking steps to better understand the industry's exposure to private credit as investments in the asset class grow. Exposure to private credit has sparked investor concern across industries as the asset class experiences rising defaults and heightened investor redemptions. The National Association of Insurance Commissioners has made several changes to how it analyzes investment risk, including the formation of new task groups and changes to reporting requirements, to increase transparency and ensure regulators have the right tools to assess risk. The changes will allow insurance regulatory oversight to be more "nimble and responsive," according to Carrie Mears, an investment specialist with the Iowa Department of Insurance and Financial Services. Identifying risk Because NAIC reporting data is categorized by asset class instead of the means of origination, it can be difficult to parse out exactly how much US insurers have invested in private credit. The best way to determine how much exposure underwriters have in private credit is to look at the prevalence of their holdings of loans and securities that have been assigned private placement number identifiers. US insurers have been steadily increasing their investments in loans and securities with these private placement number identifiers over the past several years. Bonds with private placement numbers made up 23.4% of insurers' total admitted bonds in 2025, up from 18.3% in 2021. The NAIC's existing system to identify private bonds holdings casts a considerably wider net to incorporate straightforward investments that are freely tradable among institutional investors. This yields materially higher reported allocations that may not be fully indicative of heightened complex or liquidity risk. Moving forward it should be easier to analyze private credit exposure as the NAIC on March 5 adopted new reporting requirements that will provide more specific classi...
Fear is in the air. Sure, the S&P 500 (SNPINDEX: ^GSPC) is holding up pretty well in the face of significant uncertainty. However, implied volatility has risen sharply in recent weeks. Should investors stay away from all stocks with a 10-foot pole? Nope. Here are three dividend stocks you can buy with no hesitation. Image source: Getty Images. Continue reading
Fear is in the air. Sure, the S&P 500 (SNPINDEX: ^GSPC) is holding up pretty well in the face of significant uncertainty. However, implied volatility has risen sharply in recent weeks. Should investors stay away from all stocks with a 10-foot pole? Nope. Here are three dividend stocks you can buy with no hesitation. Image source: Getty Images. Continue reading
Chancellor says the government is looking at ways they can support people based on household income Good morning. Keir Starmer is giving a press conference this morning where, according to No 10, he will discuss the Iran war, and how the government is supporting people at home. Now we are in April, the new financial year is starting, and the government is highlighting measures it has introduced th...
Chancellor says the government is looking at ways they can support people based on household income Good morning. Keir Starmer is giving a press conference this morning where, according to No 10, he will discuss the Iran war, and how the government is supporting people at home. Now we are in April, the new financial year is starting, and the government is highlighting measures it has introduced that will help people with the cost of living. The Conservatives have an alternative list, and they are claiming this morning that “Keir Starmer and his chancellor have piled on extra costs leaving families almost £1,000 worse off this year”. The chancellor, Rachel Reeves , has been doing her own media too. She is on the Jeremy Vine show later, but she has already given an interview to BBC Breakfast in which she gave a marginally clearer idea of what she is planning to do to help people with energy bills than she did when she made a statement to MPs last week. From July to September, gas usage, especially by families and pensioners, is the lowest of any months of the year because it is the summer months … It will be really from the autumn onwards that people’s gas usage starts increasing. So at the moment we are working on a range of contingencies. And we are looking at more targeted measures. We are looking at ways we can support people based on their household income. I want to learn the lessons of the past because when Russia invaded Ukraine, the richest, the best-off third of households got more than a third of the support. That makes no sense at all. Continue reading...
Mozambique repaid early and in full about $701 million it owed the International Monetary Fund, implying the cancellation of a mission to the southeast African nation targeted for August, according to Standard Bank Ltd. The IMF and the government have yet to release further details about the settlement, Fáusio Mussá, chief economist at the bank’s local unit, said in a research note dated March 27 ...
Mozambique repaid early and in full about $701 million it owed the International Monetary Fund, implying the cancellation of a mission to the southeast African nation targeted for August, according to Standard Bank Ltd. The IMF and the government have yet to release further details about the settlement, Fáusio Mussá, chief economist at the bank’s local unit, said in a research note dated March 27 that cited data from the Washington-based fund in assessing that Mozambique had fully cleared its debt. The finance ministry and IMF didn’t immediately respond to requests for comment about the development, which raises questions about future relations between the fund and the Mozambican authorities. Other countries that settled their IMF debts in full historically have mainly done so for two reasons: Either because their finances recovered after a bailout from the fund — Iceland and Thailand are examples — or because of a deterioration in relations, such as Argentina in 2006. It’s unclear what Mozambique’s motive is, and what the move means for its ambitions to agree to a new IMF program, having prematurely ended the previous one last year. World Bank Says Mozambique Overruns Pose a $50 Billion Risk Mozambique Overtakes Senegal as Africa’s Riskiest Sovereign IMF Sounds Alarm on Mozambique Debt Distress, Budget Crisis The gas-rich nation is facing a fiscal crunch, with the Washington-based lender having warned in February that Mozambique’s debt was already in distress and on an unsustainable path. Last month, the World Bank cautioned that the current economic trajectory put $50 billion in gas projects at risk. While Mozambique has built up arrears to bilateral and multilateral creditors, the nation’s foreign exchange reserves were $4.15 billion at the end of January, near a record high. Standard Bank calculated that these would fall to $3.5 billion after the IMF payment. Sign up here for the daily Next Africa newsletter, and subscribe to the Next Africa podcast on Apple , S...
Would you feel anxious if a car with no driver showed up to take you to your destination? If so, you're not alone. A recent survey conducted by legal firm Murphy & Prachthauser found that 7 in 10 Americans would be at least somewhat apprehensive about riding in an autonomous rideshare vehicle. However, the numbers look much better with people who have actually ridden in a self-driving vehicle. Alt...
Would you feel anxious if a car with no driver showed up to take you to your destination? If so, you're not alone. A recent survey conducted by legal firm Murphy & Prachthauser found that 7 in 10 Americans would be at least somewhat apprehensive about riding in an autonomous rideshare vehicle. However, the numbers look much better with people who have actually ridden in a self-driving vehicle. Although 85% said they were nervous initially, 64% felt comfortable during their most recent experience. The bottom line of this survey is that Americans appear to be warming up to robotaxis. And that's big news for two of the biggest self-driving car stocks -- Alphabet (NASDAQ: GOOG) (NASDAQ: GOOGL) and Tesla (NASDAQ: TSLA) . Continue reading