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Sir Isaac Newton’s “Universal Law of Gravitation” states that whatever goes up must come down. Obviously, Sir Isaac has not been to the grocery store lately.

Prices are climbing well above the official inflation rate — and not always for the reasons companies claim. The real question isn’t why prices are rising. It’s whether they have to at all.

Prices Are Rising Fast — and Not Just Because of Inflation

While the official inflation rate sat at approximately 2.4% to 2.7% in early 2026, businesses across sectors have implemented price hikes in the high single digits or even double digits. The Adobe Digital Price Index recorded its largest monthly online price increase in a dozen years in January, driven by electronics, appliances, and furniture.

Specific examples tell the story:

  • Video streaming subscriptions jumped 30% year-over-year
  • Dell and HP confirmed PC price increases of 15%–20%, citing memory chip shortages
  • Beef prices rose by double digits; instant coffee surged 24%
  • Dining out climbed 4.6%, with health care, insurance, and electricity also spiking

More than half of small business leaders surveyed by Vistage Worldwide in December said they planned further price increases within three months.

“Greedflation” Is Real — and Hotly Debated

The key factors driving this trend include “tariff pass-throughs”. Companies like Levi Strauss and McCormick & Co. have cited new import tariffs as a primary reason for increasing prices by amounts that exceed the general inflation rate. Another is rising operational costs. Significant jumps in health insurance premiums (up to 14%) and labor costs have pushed businesses to raise their own rates to maintain margins. Then there are corporate profit margins. A 2024 FTC report found that some grocery retailers used rising costs as an opportunity to further hike prices and increase profits, with revenues outpacing costs by more than 6% to 7% in recent years.

Whether corporations are responsible for “greedflation”—defined as firms using the cover of inflation to hike prices and expand profit margins beyond what is necessary to cover higher costs—is a subject of intense debate among economists, politicians, and researchers, with evidence suggesting a significant role in certain sectors but dispute over its overall impact on inflation.  macroeconomic policy that had led spending to explode, forcing up all prices in the medium-term.

Inarguably, certain categories such as food (especially dining out), electricity, natural gas and shelter have increased above the average Consumer Price Index (CPI) over the last twelve months. One must add to that the phenomenon of “frequency of exposure” from behavioral economics whereby consumers are highly sensitive to price changes in frequently purchased items (bananas) but less attuned to price adjustments in infrequent, high-cost, or financed purchases (cars). 

Companies That Are Beating Inflation Without Raising Prices

Whatever the case, the larger question is: Can a company remain profitable today without raising prices?  In many cases, the answer is yes — and the playbook is well-established.

Operations efficiency. Food and CPG manufacturers are lowering ingredient, manufacturing, and logistics costs through better sourcing and process improvements, absorbing inflation without passing it to consumers.

Supply chain optimization. Tight inventory management and better demand forecasting free up margin without sacrificing quality.

Data-driven promotions. Retailers and brands are using analytics and AI to fine-tune discounts and channel strategies rather than implementing across-the-board price hikes.

Product and packaging innovation. Lush, the British cosmetics retailer, introduced solid shampoos and conditioners that are more compact, reduce packaging costs, and deliver more uses per unit than liquid equivalents — boosting perceived value while supporting premium positioning and sustainability credentials.

Other standout examples include IKEA, Aldi, Honda, Toyota, Mint Mobile, Lands’ End, and Patagonia — firms that have built durable customer loyalty by prioritizing value over margin extraction. As Benjamin Franklin put it: “The bitterness of poor quality remains long after the sweetness of low price is forgotten.”

The Real Variable Is Leadership

While corporations are generally profit-maximizers, evidence suggests that in the post-pandemic, high-inflation environment, some corporations with high market power engaged in opportunistic pricing, contributing to higher and more persistent inflation than would have occurred otherwise. That is human nature; and now with conflict in the Middle East there will be companies that see this unfortunate development as yet another reason to jack up prices. 

The above examples clearly illustrate that corporations can, indeed, enhance profitability without hiking prices and all the while maintaining and even boosting quality. How companies respond does not depend upon U.S. fiscal and monetary policy but on corporate leadership. It’s up to corporations alone to do the right thing, for their customers and shareholders.

The opinions expressed in Fortune.com commentary pieces are solely the views of their authors and do not necessarily reflect the opinions and beliefs of Fortune.

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At the turn of the century, educational technology initiatives put laptop keyboards at the fingertips of U.S. schoolchildren. Now, 25 years later, the next generation of students have turned to AI—and education experts warn unrestricted use of the technology could atrophy critical thinking skills.

AI use among students has become ubiquitous following the 2022 release of ChatGPT. More than half of teenagers are using the technology for schoolwork, a Pew Research Center report released last month found. Of the nearly 1,500 parents and teens interviewed for the survey, 57% of teen students use AI to search information, and 54% use it for schoolwork.

While access to AI chatbots makes homework as easy as plugging a question into one’s phone, the frictionless retrieval of information using AI has raised concerns among educators: Rather than aid in learning, could AI actually hinder the process?

A Brookings Institute study published in January laid bare anxieties around the potential harms of AI in the classroom. Analyzing data from interviews and focus groups with more than 500 educators, parents, and students across 50 countries, as well as from more than 400 studies, the researchers found at this point, “risks of utilizing generative AI in children’s education overshadow its benefits.”

The report gave credence to early research—including a February 2025 Microsoft study—finding AI use was associated with worse judgement and critical thinking skills.

“The cognitive offloading, and the cognitive decline that’s associated with that, the decline in critical thinking, and just even reading and writing and knowledge of basic facts—I absolutely believe that,” to be the case, Mary Burns, an education consultant and co-author of the Brookings Institute study, told Fortune.

EdTech under scrutiny

Computer use in schools has come under recent scrutiny following a Congressional testimony in January from neuroscientist Jared Cooney Horvath, who noted, citing Program for International Student Assessment data, that Gen Z is the first generation in modern history to be less cognitively capable than their parents. He blamed unfettered access to classroom technology, noting a stark correlation in lower standardized testing scores and more screen time in school. A 2014 study surveying 3,000 university students found that two-thirds of the time students spend on their screens were on off-task activities.

“This is not a debate about rejecting technology,” Horvath said in his written testimony. “It is a question of aligning educational tools with how human learning actually works. Evidence indicates that indiscriminate digital expansion has weakened learning environments rather than strengthened them.”

Horvath, author of the 2025 book The Digital Delusion: How Classroom Technology Harms Our Kids’ Learning—and How to Help Them Thrive Again, told Fortune the rise of EdTech was a result of tech companies creating a narrative around the need for screens in the classroom to bolster learning. The push for computers in schools began in 2002, when Maine became the first state to introduce a statewide program providing laptops to schoolchildren in the classroom. Following a slow rollout, Google began reaching out to educators to test its low-cost Chromebook with free Google apps, and asked teachers and administrators to promote the product. In partnership with schools, Google’s Chromebook became commonplace in classrooms, accounting for more than half of digital devices sent to schools in 2017.

There have been more than 100 years of evidence showing the failures of automated learning, Horvath argued, beginning with the 1924 invention of the “teaching machine” by Ohio State University psychology professor Sidney Pressey. Students learned to answer the questions the machine would generate when fed a piece of paper, but were unable to generalize that knowledge outside the device.

“Kids would be very good so long as they were using the tool, but as soon as they went off the tool, they couldn’t do it anymore,” Horvath said.

Burns, the education consultant, said AI was, in some ways, a natural extension of the argument tech companies have made about the need for computers in school, which is that students are able to learn at their own pace, or seek out information of interest to them to initiate their own learning.

“[Tech] companies keep talking about, AI is personalizing learning,” she said. “I don’t think it’s personalizing learning. I think it’s individualizing learning. There’s a difference there, and that’s kind of a classic carryover from educational technology.”

Integrating AI into classrooms

According to Horvath, student AI use is not conducive to learning because it mirrors the failures of the 20th century “teaching machines.” Students’ learning was individualized—they answered questions from the device at their own pace and independently from other students—but were unable to synthesize knowledge taught outside the device. Similarly, Horvath said, giving AI to students without clear instructions or parameters teaches students how to rely on the device, not their own critical thinking.

“The tools experts use to make their lives easier are not the tools children should use to learn how to become experts,” Horvath said. “When you use offloading tools that experts use to make their lives easier as a novice, as a student, you don’t learn the skill. You simply learn dependency.”

Burns—a proponent of EdTech—said it’s futile to eschew the technology altogether. The Brookings Institute study found that despite educators having real fear that students will use AI to cheat, teachers are using AI to create lesson plans. Data on AI in the classroom is limited, but there are benefits, she added. For English language learners, for example, teachers can use AI to alter the lexile level of a reading passage.

“To say that technologies are a failure is not true,” Burns said. “To say technology is a mixed bag is true.”

This story was originally featured on Fortune.com

On:

At the turn of the century, educational technology initiatives put laptop keyboards at the fingertips of U.S. schoolchildren. Now, 25 years later, the next generation of students have turned to AI—and education experts warn unrestricted use of the technology could atrophy critical thinking skills.

AI use among students has become ubiquitous following the 2022 release of ChatGPT. More than half of teenagers are using the technology for schoolwork, a Pew Research Center report released last month found. Of the nearly 1,500 parents and teens interviewed for the survey, 57% of teen students use AI to search information, and 54% use it for schoolwork.

While access to AI chatbots makes homework as easy as plugging a question into one’s phone, the frictionless retrieval of information using AI has raised concerns among educators: Rather than aid in learning, could AI actually hinder the process?

A Brookings Institute study published in January laid bare anxieties around the potential harms of AI in the classroom. Analyzing data from interviews and focus groups with more than 500 educators, parents, and students across 50 countries, as well as from more than 400 studies, the researchers found at this point, “risks of utilizing generative AI in children’s education overshadow its benefits.”

The report gave credence to early research—including a February 2025 Microsoft study—finding AI use was associated with worse judgement and critical thinking skills.

“The cognitive offloading, and the cognitive decline that’s associated with that, the decline in critical thinking, and just even reading and writing and knowledge of basic facts—I absolutely believe that,” to be the case, Mary Burns, an education consultant and co-author of the Brookings Institute study, told Fortune.

EdTech under scrutiny

Computer use in schools has come under recent scrutiny following a Congressional testimony in January from neuroscientist Jared Cooney Horvath, who noted, citing Program for International Student Assessment data, that Gen Z is the first generation in modern history to be less cognitively capable than their parents. He blamed unfettered access to classroom technology, noting a stark correlation in lower standardized testing scores and more screen time in school. A 2014 study surveying 3,000 university students found that two-thirds of the time students spend on their screens were on off-task activities.

“This is not a debate about rejecting technology,” Horvath said in his written testimony. “It is a question of aligning educational tools with how human learning actually works. Evidence indicates that indiscriminate digital expansion has weakened learning environments rather than strengthened them.”

Horvath, author of the 2025 book The Digital Delusion: How Classroom Technology Harms Our Kids’ Learning—and How to Help Them Thrive Again, told Fortune the rise of EdTech was a result of tech companies creating a narrative around the need for screens in the classroom to bolster learning. The push for computers in schools began in 2002, when Maine became the first state to introduce a statewide program providing laptops to schoolchildren in the classroom. Following a slow rollout, Google began reaching out to educators to test its low-cost Chromebook with free Google apps, and asked teachers and administrators to promote the product. In partnership with schools, Google’s Chromebook became commonplace in classrooms, accounting for more than half of digital devices sent to schools in 2017.

There have been more than 100 years of evidence showing the failures of automated learning, Horvath argued, beginning with the 1924 invention of the “teaching machine” by Ohio State University psychology professor Sidney Pressey. Students learned to answer the questions the machine would generate when fed a piece of paper, but were unable to generalize that knowledge outside the device.

“Kids would be very good so long as they were using the tool, but as soon as they went off the tool, they couldn’t do it anymore,” Horvath said.

Burns, the education consultant, said AI was, in some ways, a natural extension of the argument tech companies have made about the need for computers in school, which is that students are able to learn at their own pace, or seek out information of interest to them to initiate their own learning.

“[Tech] companies keep talking about, AI is personalizing learning,” she said. “I don’t think it’s personalizing learning. I think it’s individualizing learning. There’s a difference there, and that’s kind of a classic carryover from educational technology.”

Integrating AI into classrooms

According to Horvath, student AI use is not conducive to learning because it mirrors the failures of the 20th century “teaching machines.” Students’ learning was individualized—they answered questions from the device at their own pace and independently from other students—but were unable to synthesize knowledge taught outside the device. Similarly, Horvath said, giving AI to students without clear instructions or parameters teaches students how to rely on the device, not their own critical thinking.

“The tools experts use to make their lives easier are not the tools children should use to learn how to become experts,” Horvath said. “When you use offloading tools that experts use to make their lives easier as a novice, as a student, you don’t learn the skill. You simply learn dependency.”

Burns—a proponent of EdTech—said it’s futile to eschew the technology altogether. The Brookings Institute study found that despite educators having real fear that students will use AI to cheat, teachers are using AI to create lesson plans. Data on AI in the classroom is limited, but there are benefits, she added. For English language learners, for example, teachers can use AI to alter the lexile level of a reading passage.

“To say that technologies are a failure is not true,” Burns said. “To say technology is a mixed bag is true.”

This story was originally featured on Fortune.com

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It was a glorious time to make money. From early summer 2023 to the close of January 2025, private equity stocks staged what may rank as the single biggest surge, over a tight time frame, in the annals of financial services. In that eighteen month span, Blackstone notched total returns 58.2%, Ares, Apollo, and Blue Owl achieved 68.1%, 77.9%, and 80.6% respectively, and KKR led the charge at 103.4%. Then the cyclone came. Starting in September of last year, an historic selloff that from their peaks sent down Apollo 41%, Blackstone 46%, and Ares and KKR 48% each, while Blue Owl dropped by two thirds. The wipeout has erased over $265 billion in market cap; Blackstone and Blue Owl are now trading far below their levels of late 2021, and the sudden drop left KKR, Apollo and Ares showing puny, market-trailing gains over that near half-decade.

To be sure, the PE business has suffered from overpaying for its buyout picks in the period of ultra-low interest rates, a problem that’s forcing them to hold their portfolio companies for extended periods, and curtailed profits when they’re sold. But until recently, it was the tremendous growth in private debt that far more than offset the slump in their traditional franchise, and accounted for the wondrous performance of their stocks. Now, panic is roiling the funds holding loans to software outfits perceived to be threatened by AI, and investors, especially newly-recruited retail folk, are demanding their money back. “It resembles a run on a bank,” says Matt Swain, co-head of Equity Capital Solutions at investment bank Houlihan Lokey.

The problem is that the regular folk drawn to these funds high yields, in many cases, are proving far less patient than the super-long term holders that are the traditional pillars of private credit. Now enough of those newcomers are seeking large redemptions that it’s causing major distress at the PE world’s biggest and most profitable funds. The demands are so big that in many cases, the industry’s giants are shutting the gates, further raising worries and spurring the hunger to flee. 

So how did things go south so quickly? And, can anything stem the bleeding? As always on Wall Street when someone is selling, someone else is buying at the right price—and some think that so-called “secondary” funds will be the winners here. “These deals may make a lot of sense for the secondary funds,” says David Feirstein, founder and managing partner at Ronin Capital Partners, a major New York PE firm. “The best opportunities are in markets where people get a little scared.”

Blackstone, KKR, Apollo are gating the exits—and retail investors are trapped inside

In the past, PE investors were mainly large institutions that garnered high interest payments for allowing their money to be tied up for, say, 8 or 10 years. But three or four years ago, the PE titans saw high net worth and middle class investors as a huge potential market for these products, and succeeded in attracting immense inflows from the retail realm. For example, Blue Owl garnered around 40% of its over $300 billion in assets under management from individuals. The whole idea, as Morgan Stanley states on their website, was to “democratize” the market by giving average people access to the same products as say, pension funds or multi-billionaires. The appeal was obvious: the Blackstone Private Credit Fund (BCRED) has delivered annual returns of 9.8% since its inception. 

This new category became known as “semi-liquid” vehicles. They come in a number of flavors. Among them a type of Business Development Companies or BDCs that don’t trade on an exchange. Instead, investors can make requests to redeem all or part of their shares, but the PE managers typically cap total withdrawals per quarter at a fixed percentage of their net asset value, often 5%. Hence the term “semi-liquid.” According to Morningstar, semi-liquids became one of the hottest financial products on the planet, surging from AUM of just $200 billion at the start of 2022 to $500 billion in Q3 of last year.

The trouble began in September of last year via the back-to-back bankruptcies of two companies fueled by loads of cheap debt, much of it held by PE funds, subprime auto lender Tricolor, and car-part-maker First Brands. Then, the fear that AI could render swaths of the software trade outmoded moved a wave of the savings-for-retirement crowd to demand their money back. 

First hit was the biggest retail shop, Blue Owl. In November, the firm restricted withdrawals, and in February bought back 15% of the outstanding shares in one fund to refund cash, and in another vehicle, ended its regular quarterly liquidity payments. At Blackstone’s BCRED, investors sought to pull out $3.8 billion or 7.9% of the assets. The firm took the extraordinary step of raising $400 million from its own capital and its senior executives to satisfy all the requests. Then the trouble began to spread from beyond the PE world to a variety of fund managers, including some of the world’s biggest names. Shareholders in alternative asset manager Cliffwater’s $33 billion flagship private credit fund are seeking to withdraw 7% of their stake. In early March, BlackRock restricted withdrawals on its $26 billion HPS Lending Fund. Morgan Stanley got repurchase requests for 10.9% of the shares in its North Haven Private Income fund. It returned $169 million in investor money, capping the payouts at 5%. In Canada, where around $30 billion invested in private real estate funds, about 40% of the total, is now gated as managers limit distributions and halt redemptions.

When J.P. Morgan said it would restrict its lending to the private debt funds, it had the feel that the longtime CEO was exactly right when he warned that when “cockroaches” like the September bankruptcies surface, more cockroaches are likely lurking nearby.

The plunging market for private investments might have an unlikely savior

These semi-liquid funds didn’t lend to the giants of the tech world like the Oracles and Intels. Instead, they parked a lot of their investor cash with mid-sized software companies, a debt category that looked like a great risk until late last year. One aspect that may have augmented the funds’ difficulties. It’s long been common for funds to hold around 10% of their assets in cash, usually in short-term treasuries, to fund redemptions. But industry sources told me that in some cases, managers found those super-safe cushions an unnecessary drag on their returns, since loads of money was pouring in, and only a trickle leaving. So they placed the “reserves” in syndicated debt that showed better yield. The problem: Those pools also included lots of software bonds that were dropping in value. Hence, when the funds sold those bonds to raise cash, they got far less than the 100 cents on the dollar that they invested. That shortfall may have tightened the liquidity available to meet redemptions.

In a recent interview, Jon Gray, Blackstone’s president and CEO, has argued persuasively that the withdrawal caps are “really a feature, not a bug, in these products. What you’re doing is trading away a bit of liquidity for higher returns. That’s the same tradeoff institutional investors have made for a long period of time.” In fact, despite the software woes, these funds are highly diversified and so far, we’re seeing no signs that companies whose debt the fund owns are in danger of defaulting. In effect, Gray is arguing that the restrictions are in place to ensure the LPs get full value by holding their shares for a long period and pocket the premium, as opposed to selling early at a big discount.

Still, if swarms of retail investors who aren’t used to that tradeoff and get scared by the AI news sell en masse, the funds’ net asset values will keep dropping, even if they don’t deserve to based on actual credit performance. 

Naturally, the PE firms dread dumping bonds way before they mature at fire-sale prices to meet the redemptions. That would hammer returns for the institutions and non-selling small shareholders that remain. Now, an industry that’s grown rapidly of late is poised to step in as buyers, at a discount of course. They’re what’s called “secondary funds” that traditionally buy stakes from limited partners that want to exit before the fund sells all its assets, and closes down. Though the secondary players have mostly specialized in equity shares, they’re also increasingly active in credit.

Secondaries divide into two parts. The first and best known simply purchase positions, one at a time, from people who want out early. The second are what’s known as “Continuation Vehicles.” Here’s how CVs work today. Say a PE firm has held Company X in its portfolio for a long time, and it’s done well, but some of the original investors have waited long enough, and want to cash out. The sponsor and most of the investors see a lot more value in holding and improving Company X and want to stay. So the sponsor recruits a new group to replace those who want to go. The concept has clicked big time. CVs are one of the fastest growing segments in financial services. The industry’s grown ten-fold over the past decade to $100 billion, and represents around one-fifth of all PE exits. So far, the model’s mostly been deployed in equity, but it work in credit as well. As in equities, a credit CV that purchases part of the shares in a private credit fund from those desiring to leave establishes a new separate fund, comprising the new buyout investors, that’s still managed by the PE firm that raised and ran the original pool.

That’s where players like Matt Swain at Houlihan Lokey come in. His company does a brisk business in raising money PE sponsors to purchase companies they can vastly improve, and also for CVs (you can read Fortune’s feature about him here.) He sees both regular secondaries and CVs as a solution to giving both sides what they need, the retail crowd a way out, and the fund managers a route towards providing them that option sans the forced dumping of bonds, and managing money for the new group comprising the CV.

“The CV investors are often a different breed from the people who want to get out,” Swain told Fortune in a recent interview. “They’re chiefly family offices, endowments, and foundations, sophisticated players who will want to stay in these deals. They’re also highly opportunistic, and they’ll seize the chance to purchase at discounts that generate superior returns in the long-term.” In other words, Swain thinks that it’s the support of CVs that could stabilize the market, reassure anxious limited partners that they’re not going to get locked in, and stem a descent into spiraling demands to flee.

Houlihan Lokey got into CVs early, and it’s a major fund-raiser for PE firms seeking candidates to replace the investors looking to leave. “CVs are the option that the market hasn’t priced in yet,” says Swain. “It’s what could prevent a big drop in the value of these funds. It will allow the LPs to take out 100% of their liquidity. If a firefighter wants to get their $25,000 out of the semi-liquid fund, they’ll be able to do it. The panic happens when people think the liquidity isn’t available.” He notes that the CV investors will still want good prices from the sellers. He believes that the skepticism around some of the software debt is legitimate, so shares could sell at a discount. Feirstein agrees that CVs could provide a good match for the funds where redemption requests are running high. “I think it would be of interest where you have a bunch of investors getting nervous about software credit, for example, and want out,” he says. “It could be a way solving some retail uncertainty.”

The big PE firms, notably Blackstone and Apollo, harbor their own “secondary” funds that purchase shares from investors that want to leave their and other funds early, before all companies in their portfolios are sold. These secondary pools also put new investors into continuation vehicles. These firms hasn’t announced any plans to participate in secondary purchases of private credit shares.

Fortune reached out to both Apollo and Blackstone for comment, but did not immediately receive an immediate response. However, the big firms are known for having excellent risk controls; their fundamental model consists of funding assets such as real estate projects, rail cars, aircraft and sundry other hard assets that produce durable cash flow, where the rents, leases and other income streams they’re collecting provide a wide cushion over the interest paid to their investors. Plus, the loans are generally secured by the underlying assets. So most of the sources I spoke to for this story said this is not a situation where they would expect to see a huge wave of defaults.

Besides the giants, a large group of private markets firms manage CV funds, and appear likely purchasers of shares from investors seeking redemptions. The list encompasses HarbourVest Capital, Coller Capital, Pantheon Ventures, all of the U.S., Tikehau Capital and Ardian.

One potential problem: Private credit is a $1.8 trillion domain. The secondary market totals around $200 billion, about evenly divided between equity and credit. If demands for paybacks really take off, it’s unclear that the secondary buying space is big enough to fully bolster and balance the market. Swain believes, however, that the investors will pour lots of new money into secondary funds as they see the good deals spread, giving them more capacity to help absorb the selling. Still, Swain already sees deals developing where CVs are purchasing surprisingly large portions of existing funds, in some cases replacing 85% or 90% of the existing investors.

But the CV investors are marathoners. Swain notes that many of those interested will be family offices that eschew investing in traditional PE funds where an Ares or Carlyle pick the companies. They’d much rather make the choices themselves by evaluating existing enterprises that already have a track record. These family offices will be examining packages of known assets, or perhaps even bonds in individual companies. That’s just the kind of individual, one-by-one deals they’re looking for.

And unlike many retail investors, they’re in it for the marathon, not just a sprint.

This story was originally featured on Fortune.com

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Too often leaders—even the best ones—can get stuck on little power struggles and personality conflicts. It’s understandable and human but not in service to our goals.

The strategy I often refer the leaders I coach to is called “Beat the plan.” When you have many important issues and not infinite time, “Beat the plan” is a way for leaders and teams to speed up decision making and, at the same time, increase quality of those decisions and camaraderie of the team. I refined the approach from Sylvia Mathews Burwell. If you have not heard of Sylvia it’s due only to her humility as she was a Rhodes Scholar, a President of the Gates Foundation,  Walmart Foundation and best known for running OMB at the White House. She was so well liked and regarded by Republicans and Democrats alike, she was sent over to run HHS.

Syl explained it this way. In the White House, one might have a million decision points, all important and not as much time as you want for each. As example, say   “What are we going to do with a surplus when we balance the budget?” (Yes that happened, she said!) is the question of the day. Hypothetically, instead of OMB getting a proposal shot down, the “plan beats no plan” approach or “beat the plan” gets leaders to come to the conversation with baked ideas and strategies, ensuring people become more aligned, and has the added benefit of strengthening proposals.

Here’s how “Beat the plan” works. Whoever’s in charge of an area develops a plan, usually with a solid frame but imagine it’s like 60-80% developed and directionally correct. That person would then drop the plan on the table and say “Beat the plan.”  Then everyone (having pre-read) can make suggestions.

  • They can make it a little better with small tweaks.
  • They can suggest more significant changes.
  • They can propose big changes.
  • Or they can propose an entirely new plan.

If no one says boo, that is the plan and no one can give you grief later that they didn’t have a chance to help shape the plan. All suggestions have to beat the existing plan. This helps get away from power struggles and “whose idea” it was. If I have a B+ plan and everyone helps get it to A- or A, great. If someone wants to propose a completely different plan, also OK, but it should be an A- or better plan, not something the group would see as a B- or worse.

Every person and every situation is different but you see the benefits.

  • It speeds things up. Most of us can frame a plan that is directionally correct quickly, so the plan is 60, 70, 80% there. Then the team can crowd source think and make it stronger quickly as well.
  • You get increased group buy in and trust. Everyone will spot stuff you didn’t consider. This pairs well with the RACI model, since you are activating the ask of input for other stakeholders.

What are the keys to make it work well? Think “strong view, loosely held.”

It’s important that the owner of the plan have a solid POV and be open to better. If you reject all input, especially stuff that actually would make it better, people will be reluctant next time.

Equally, the folks giving the input have to learn to give and then let go. As our friend Ray Chambers says “detach yourself from the outcome.”

All leaders are control freaks in some ways. It’s part of what makes you so effective but also becomes limiting if you’re not also mentally strong enough to let go. Most input can be heard but only some can realistically be incorporated so give and let go.

This came up from a coaching I had with an SVP for a large firm in London.

  • Alison   “I tried to give my CEO input—he didn’t listen so I am not doing that again.”
  • BH           “Can I offer a different way to think about that?”
  • Alison   “Of course,” Alison said.
  • BH           Your choice of basketball, futbol/soccer or baseball analogy.”
  • Alison   “Soccer.”
  • “BH         Name one of the all-time greats.”
  • Alison   “Mmmm… Lucy Bronze.”
  • BH           “OK, every time Lucy touched the ball did it go in the goal?”
  • Alison   “No, lol.”
  • BH           “But you said she was an all time great. Did I not hear you right?”
  • Alison   “That’s not how it works!”
  • BH           “Exactly. She might touch it 30 times, 7 attacking shots, 4 actual shots on goal and 2 get through.”
  • Alison   “Yes.”
  • BH           “It’s the same with input. Give 30 pieces of input. 7 will be heard. 4 will be considered. 2 will be implemented. So what’s the right mindset to have when you have input to share?”
  • Alison   “Take the shot and keep playing.”
  • BH           Goal!!

Bill Hoogterp is a bestselling author, an entrepreneur, and one of the top executive coaches worldwide. He has advised dozens of Fortune 500 CEOs, and last year, his company LifeHikes offered trainings at more than 100 global companies in 47 countries and seven languages. In his series for Fortune, he answers real questions from executives striving to become better leaders. To learn more about Bill, visit lifehikes.com. To reach Bill email bill_hoogterp@lifehikes.com.

This story was originally featured on Fortune.com

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Meta is reportedly weighing layoffs that could impact at least 20% of its workforce as the tech giant looks to offset rising artificial intelligence costs.

The cuts come as the technology company aims to offset the cost of artificial intelligence infrastructure and prepare for greater efficiency brought about by AI-assisted workers, three sources familiar with the matter told Reuters.

The outlet added that the timing and size of the potential layoffs have not been finalized.

When reached for comment, a Meta spokesperson told FOX Business, “This is a speculative report about theoretical approaches.”

META CUTS OVER 1,000 JOBS IN MAJOR METAVERSE RETREAT

According to Reuters, top Meta executives recently shared plans for the proposed layoffs with other senior leaders at the company.

If the company were to slash 20% of its employees, the layoffs would amount to Meta’s largest restructuring since 2022 and early 2023, the outlet said.

Meta laid off 11,000 workers in November 2022 — around 13% of its workforce at the time, Reuters reported.

The company cut another 10,000 jobs months later.

JUDGE BLOCKS META FROM INTRODUCING ‘EXAGGERATED’ CLAIMS IN SOCIAL MEDIA TRIAL

Meta employed nearly 79,000 people as of Dec. 31, according to its latest filing.

Other major companies, including Amazon, have recently announced large-scale layoffs tied to AI developments.

In January, Amazon cut around 16,000 jobs and signaled at the time that more reductions could follow.

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The company previously announced a first round of cuts totaling about 14,000 white-collar layoffs in October, bringing its corporate reductions to roughly 30,000 roles.

In making the cuts, which represented nearly 10% of its white-collar workforce, Amazon cited efficiency gains from artificial intelligence and broader cultural changes.

FOX Business’ Bradford Betz contributed to this report.

This post was originally published here. 

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On Friday, Michael Saylor defended Bitcoin (CRYPTO: BTC) after former UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson described cryptocurrencies as a “giant Ponzi scheme” in a column.

Boris Johnson Questions Bitcoin’s Value

In a Daily Mail column, Johnson argued that Bitcoin and other digital assets rely largely on belief rather than inherent value.

He said cryptocurrencies function similarly to a Ponzi scheme because their value depends on a steady flow of new investors willing to buy in.

“I have always suspected from the outset that all cryptocurrencies were basically a Ponzi scheme,” Johnson wrote, adding that such systems depend on “a constant supply of new and credulous investors.”

Former UK Prime Minister Shares Bitcoin Loss Story

To illustrate his concerns, Johnson shared an anecdote about a man from his village who invested roughly £500 (about $660) in Bitcoin after meeting someone in a pub who promised the money would double.

According to Johnson, the investor later lost nearly £20,000 (around $26,000) after paying various fees while trying to …

Full story available on Benzinga.com

This post was originally published here

On:

On Friday, Michael Saylor defended Bitcoin (CRYPTO: BTC) after former UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson described cryptocurrencies as a “giant Ponzi scheme” in a column.

Boris Johnson Questions Bitcoin’s Value

In a Daily Mail column, Johnson argued that Bitcoin and other digital assets rely largely on belief rather than inherent value.

He said cryptocurrencies function similarly to a Ponzi scheme because their value depends on a steady flow of new investors willing to buy in.

“I have always suspected from the outset that all cryptocurrencies were basically a Ponzi scheme,” Johnson wrote, adding that such systems depend on “a constant supply of new and credulous investors.”

Former UK Prime Minister Shares Bitcoin Loss Story

To illustrate his concerns, Johnson shared an anecdote about a man from his village who invested roughly £500 (about $660) in Bitcoin after meeting someone in a pub who promised the money would double.

According to Johnson, the investor later lost nearly £20,000 (around $26,000) after paying various fees while trying to …

Full story available on Benzinga.com

This post was originally published here

On:

The immediate shock of the U.S. and Israeli war with Iran is felt most acutely in fuel prices. As the fighting drags into a third week, however, the ripples are spreading across a broader swath of the economy, threatening to affect everything from groceries and work schedules to stock markets and interest rates. 

Even stagflation—the dreaded S-word that plagued American consumers during the 1970s Middle East oil crisis—is in the air again, as business leaders, analysts, and policymakers reassess the scope and duration of a conflict that the U.S. government seems to have underestimated.

At the center of the widening crisis is the false belief that the Strait of Hormuz—the narrow choke point separating 20% of the world’s oil and liquefied natural gas from global markets—would be left untouched from the conflict, said Bob McNally, former White House energy adviser under George W. Bush and founder of the Rapidan Energy Group.

“Even the possibility that a hostile power could choke traffic in Hormuz—by far the world’s most vital energy and commodity artery—was considered to be absurd,” McNally told Fortune, largely because it hadn’t happened before. “When I would tell people our analysis shows that, in a military conflict with Iran, Hormuz would be shut for weeks, people looked at me like I was high on crack cocaine.”

With crude oil benchmarks hovering near $100 per barrel—up 70% since early January—prices may rise to all-time highs of $150 or greater by the end of March if the strait remains effectively closed with no clear end in sight, McNally said. If anything, he said, prices are still artificially lower than they should be: “The world can’t grow without 20% of its energy—not in the short term. People are just unwilling to come to grips with the idea that we’re not going to get 20% of our energy back really fast.”

Oil forecaster Dan Pickering, founder of the Pickering Energy Partners consulting firm, noted that the effects in the U.S. are relatively muted thus far thanks to domestic oil and gas supplies. While U.S. fuel prices are up nearly 35% from January lows and still rising, there are no shortages or long lines at gas stations. That is not the case in much of Asia, where dependence on Middle Eastern supplies has led to skyrocketing prices and a cascade of other effects. Shortages of fuel, cooking gas, and electricity, have led to work from home directives, school closures, and conservation requests in countries such as Vietnam, the Philippines, and Pakistan. Shortages of fertilizer shipments will trickle down into food and grocery costs.

“Compared to a week ago, the situation looks more challenging and longer lasting. An easy solution to the straits does not appear on the horizon,” Pickering said. “With that, there’s fear of inflation, fear that stocks might be overvalued, and you’re hearing ‘stagflation’ a lot. It’s rippling through sentiment, and it’s putting a higher floor on pricing whenever this conflict ends.”

A previously robust stock market is starting to show signs of disquiet: The Dow Jones Industrial Average, for instance, is down 6% in a month and expected to dip further at least as long as the war extends. The exception, of course, is energy producers capitalizing off the price surges, as Exxon Mobil, Chevron, and many other U.S. oil and refining stocks jumped to record highs.

Open for transit, aside from the shooting

Member countries of the International Energy Agency agreed to release a record-high, 400 million barrels of oil from strategic reserves, including 172 million barrels from the U.S., but doing so will take at least four months to pull from storage. “Oil can’t come out fast enough to offset the closure of the straits. You have some help that will come over the next three to six months, but this crisis is happening now,” Pickering said.

It’s been more than a week since President Donald Trump announced plans for government-backed, oil tanker insurance and potential naval escorts through the strait with little tangible progress. The U.S. is currently in the process of sending more warships and Marines to the Middle East.

The military is currently focused on weakening Iran’s defenses, and naval escorts for tankers may begin as soon as the end of March, U.S. Energy Secretary Chris Wright said March 12. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth downplayed the problems more, saying on March 13 that he’s not concerned about the strait.

“The only thing prohibiting transit in the straits right now is Iran shooting at shipping. It is open for transit should Iran not do that,” Hegseth said with a straight face during a press conference.

Later March 13, Trump was asked on Fox News when he would know the war is over. His response, “When I feel it in my bones.”

Getty Images

What comes next?

Iran responded to the war—including the death of its supreme leader and other top officials—by firing missiles at its energy-producing, neighboring Gulf states and then at tankers within the strait.

Although he has yet to be seen and is believed by the Trump administration to be injured, Iran’s new Supreme Leader Mojtaba Khamenei issued a statement pledging to keep the strait closed, using both mines and bombing attacks from ground forces. A handful of tankers from non-enemy nations, including India, were strategically allowed through.

“Iran is demonstrating that it controls the Strait of Hormuz, and not the United States,” McNally said. “It does that by both periodically attacking ships in the strait—re-instilling fear among tankers and insurers and keeping them from moving—and apparently allowing certain tankers to go through.”

White House spokeswoman Anna Kelly countered to Fortune that the U.S. has destroyed over 20 of Iran’s mine-laying vessels with more to come. “President Trump is fully prepared to provide U.S. Navy escorts through the Strait of Hormuz if he deems it necessary,” she reiterated.

Carolyn Kissane, associate dean of the New York University Center for Global Affairs, said the markets are no longer taking White House statements “at face value”—as was the case during the first week of the war—and are recognizing that Iran is “going for the jugular.”

“This is historic that Iran is targeting Gulf states and the Strait of Hormuz, which has always been the worst, worst, worst-case scenario,” Kissane said. “If there’s no conclusion in the next two-to-three weeks, we are looking at much higher prices, and a lot of insecurities across supply chains for the foreseeable future. There are going to be some very huge ripple effects.”

One of those ripple effects is the political implications in a midterm election year in the U.S., especially since this is clearly recognized as a “war of choice,” she said.

While just a few weeks ago, voter concerns about AI data centers and rising utility costs seemed to be replacing gas prices at the pump as the new political bellwether, now surging fuel prices are the focus again. Former President Joe Biden took a big political hit from high fuel costs when Russia invaded Ukraine in 2022, and that obviously wasn’t an American military decision.

That said, it’s because of those very reasons that this war might still conclude within a couple of weeks or so, said Pavel Molchanov, energy analyst at Raymond James. Trump has always focused acutely on keeping fuel prices low.

“When prices at the pump spike, presidential approval ratings go down. And now, the price of oil is the highest in four years,” Molchanov said. “The longer Americans feel pain at the pump, the more political pressure there will be on the White House to end the war.”

And while the level of Iran’s military response has surprised some observers, the country needs resolution as well. After all, Iran isn’t moving its oil through the strait either, Molchanov said.

“Iran needs to export its oil. They need the money.”

This story was originally featured on Fortune.com

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President Donald Trump said the US had bombed military targets on a critical Iranian outpost in the Persian Gulf and threatened additional strikes targeting oil infrastructure if Tehran continued to block energy flows, in the latest escalation of the two-week conflict that has upended the region.

Trump said American forces had “executed one of the most powerful bombing raids in the History of the Middle East,” including destroying military targets on Kharg Island. Trump, writing in a social media post, added that “for reasons of decency, I have chosen NOT to wipe out the Oil Infrastructure on the Island,” though he warned Iran’s leaders that he would immediately reconsider that decision if they interfered with ships transiting the Strait of Hormuz.

The president told reporters earlier Friday evening the US would continue its campaign as long as necessary, while also insisting “we’re way ahead of schedule.” He also suggested the US Navy would begin escorting ships through the Strait of Hormuz “very soon.”

Read more: Why a Strike on Kharg Island Would Shake Oil Markets

The 14th day of the war marked the largest attacks yet against the Islamic Republic, with the US and Israel hitting around 15,000 targets since the war began, according to US Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth. 

In Iran, officials were defiant. Pictures posted on social media showed Ali Larijani, the secretary of the Supreme National Security Council, and several government ministers participating in rallies on Friday.

The assault on military sites on Kharg Island but not the energy facilities there amounts to a warning shot to Iran and a threat that the US may be willing to strike targets that are part of the country’s energy infrastructure, something Trump had so far sought to avoid doing.

Kharg Island is off the coast of the Iranian mainland and deep in the Persian Gulf. Oil pipelines that terminate there handle the vast majority of Iran’s energy exports, making it crucial for the country’s economy.

Steven Wills, a navalist at the Center for Maritime Strategy, said the island was set up to process about 90% of Iran’s oil shipments. If the island were to be captured or destroyed, “it could, in theory, take out a significant ability of Iran to export oil, and that’s what they live off of.”

The strike is a gamble. Energy analysts have warned that attacking civilian infrastructure on the island or taking it over could send oil prices even higher.

Efforts by the Trump administration and other governments to tame soaring energy costs for consumers have so far had little effect. Asian countries are grappling with shortages of cooking gas and road fuel. In the US, gasoline prices are already at the highest levels in about two years.

Brent crude settled above $100 a barrel for the second straight session, ending the day at the highest level in more than three years while US crude futures settled near the highest since July 2022. Millions of barrels of oil remain trapped in the Persian Gulf and traffic through the vital Strait of Hormuz is effectively at a standstill. 

Iran’s Supreme Leader Mojtaba Khamenei on Thursday said the Islamic Republic would seek to ensure the Strait of Hormuz remains effectively closed. In his first public comments since succeeding his father, he also warned Tehran would look to open other fronts in the war if the US and Israeli attacks continue.

Read More: Iranians Navigate War and Regime Threats Under a Blackened Sky

Hegseth said Iran’s supreme leader was “likely disfigured” at some point in the US-Israeli operation, and the fact that he had only released a written statement suggested his injuries prevented him from making public appearances. 

The US is also sending the 31st Marine Expeditionary Unit from Japan to the Middle East, a voyage that’s likely to take at least a week. The unit has up to 2,400 troops and its command vessel, the USS Tripoli, carries a squadron of F-35 fighters, V-22 Ospreys and helicopters.

Almost 2,600 people have died in the war, most of them in Iran, latest tolls from officials and non-government agencies show. Almost 700 people have been killed in Lebanon, where Israel is battling Iran-aligned Hezbollah. A dozen Israeli civilians and two soldiers have been killed, according to the health ministry. Several more people in other Arab countries have also died.

The US also announced that the death toll for its military operation rose. US Central Command in a statement said all six crew members aboard a US refueling aircraft that crashed in western Iraq Thursday were killed, bringing to 13 the number of American service members who have died. The loss of the plane wasn’t from enemy or allied fire, the military said. 

Pro-government rallies were held across Iran on Friday to mark Quds Day, an annual pro-Palestinian event. An explosion was reported a few blocks away from a march in Tehran, and Iran’s Tasnim news agency said a woman was killed in a US-Israeli attack. 

The blockage of the Strait of Hormuz has disrupted the flow of millions of barrels of oil a day, causing what the International Energy Agency described as the biggest hit to global supply on record. Saudi Arabia, Iraq, Kuwait and the UAE have all had to curb crude output.

The price surge has also been felt at US gas stations, where the average cost of a gallon of gas at the US pump has risen to $3.63, the highest since May 2024, according to American Automobile Association data.

Several back channels have opened between Tehran and US allies in recent days about reopening the Strait of Hormuz, according to people familiar with the matter, but they were downbeat the attempts would succeed. An Italian government official separately denied reports on talks with Iran.

CNN reported Iran was considering allowing a limited number of oil tankers to pass through the strait, provided that the oil cargo is traded in Chinese yuan.

The leaders of Germany, Canada and Norway criticized the US decision to temporarily loosen sanctions against Russia in a separate attempt to curb surging oil prices. The US has issued its second authorization for buyers to take Russian oil cargoes already at sea, expanding a temporary waiver given last week to India.

Saudi Arabia, Oman and Turkey are leading mediation efforts, with the support of European countries and France taking a lead role. Qatar backed off from talks after it came under repeated attack. 

Strikes on three commercial ships in the Arabian Gulf over the past two days have highlighted the risk of expanding disruptions to maritime transport.

A French military staffer was killed in an attack in Iraq’s Erbil region, French President Emmanuel Macron said in an X post. Reuters reported at least six French soldiers were wounded in a drone strike.

Turkey’s defense ministry said the North Atlantic Treaty Organization neutralized an Iranian ballistic missile that entered the country’s airspace on Friday, the third such interception since March 4. 

In Oman, two people were killed after drones crashed in the Sohar region, state media said on Friday. Oman’s Port of Sohar has suspended operations. Dubai, the financial hub of the United Arab Emirates, reported missile threats and Saudi Arabia intercepted more than a dozen drones in its airspace. 

And the US Central Command has assigned investigators to look into an attack on an all-girls elementary school on the first day of strikes on Iran that killed about 180 people.

This story was originally featured on Fortune.com

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Right in the middle of the ongoing feud between the Silicon Valley AI company Anthropic and the U.S. Department of Defense over whether the military will use—or not use—Anthropic’s large language models is yet another company: Palantir.

Palantir, the Miami-based data analytics and artificial intelligence platform, is a key software provider for the Department of Defense—and the main channel by which the Department has been using Anthropic’s large language model, Claude.

“We are legitimately still in the middle of all this,” CEO Alex Karp said in an interview with Fortune on the sidelines of the company’s twice-a-year AIP conference on Thursday. “It’s our stack that runs the LLMs.”

Karp says he had been in numerous discussions with all parties involved—discussions he declined to give specifics about, as he says he doesn’t want to “out conversations” or “bash people.”

But Karp does want to make one thing clear: The Defense Department is not using AI for domestic mass surveillance on U.S. citizens—and, to his knowledge, it has no plans to.

“Without commenting on internal dialogs, there was never a sense that these products would be used domestically,” Karp said. “The Department of War is not planning to use these products domestically. That’s a completely different kettle of fish…  The terms the Department of War wants are completely focused on non-American citizens in a war context.”

Palantir has a vast business doing work for the U.S. government, including the DoD. Anthropic partnered with Palantir in 2024 to offer its AI technology to the DoD via Palantir. Anthropic also began working directly with the DoD last year to create a version of its technology designed for the Defense Department.

The contentious back-and-forth between Anthropic and the Defense Department has been ongoing since around January, and the two sides don’t agree on what set it off. Statements that Undersecretary of Defense for Research and Engineering Emil Michael made last week allege that Palantir had notified the Pentagon that Anthropic was inquiring about whether its models had been used for the U.S. military mission to capture Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro. (Anthropic has refuted this characterization, asserting it hasn’t discussed the use of Claude for specific operations “with any industry partners, including Palantir, outside of routine discussions on strictly technical matters”). Ever since, the two sides have been locked in a fight over whether Anthropic can write contractual limits on how its models are used.

Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei has published multiple blog posts on the matter, including an initial statement at the end of February asserting that the Defense Department had refused to accept safeguards that its LLMs not be used for domestic mass surveillance or the deployment of fully autonomous weapons. Pete Hegseth, the Secretary of Defense, later designated Anthropic a “supply-chain risk,” threatening many of the company’s commercial relationships, and prompting Anthropic to sue the Pentagon over the designation.

‘Totally in favor’ of domestic terms of engagement

Palantir, which was funded by the CIA’s venture capital arm early on and whose software has been used in counter-terrorism efforts abroad, has long been accused of helping government and intelligence agencies spy on civilians and potential domestic suspects. Karp has repeatedly rebutted such claims for over a decade and has spoken about the importance of setting technical guardrails around technology that could be used in the U.S. for domestic surveillance. Palantir early on created a “Privacy and Civil Liberties” team—an interdisciplinary group of engineers, lawyers, philosophers, and social scientists—tasked with building privacy‑protective features into its products and fostering a culture of responsible use. The team helped set up internal channels, including an ethics hotline, for employees to flag work they viewed as crossing ethical lines.

Civil liberties groups, however, continue to accuse the company of doing the opposite—by helping the government surveil. The company’s relationship with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, in particular, which began under the Obama Administration, has invited intense scrutiny and criticism from both external critics and the company’s own employees—criticism that has only escalated over the last year as the Trump Administration has pushed ICE into an aggressive crackdown in cities like Minneapolis.

Karp told Fortune he is “very sympathetic with arguments against using these products inside the U.S.” and said that he is “totally in favor” of setting terms of engagement and limits to how domestic agencies can use artificial intelligence. 

“Quite frankly, I think we should self-impose them,” Karp said of these terms of engagement. “The Valley should have a consortium: This is what we’re going to do, and this is what we’re not going to do,” he said.

But Karp drew a sharp distinction between whether tech companies should set terms with domestic agencies and whether they should set them with the Department of Defense, which is primarily focused on managing the United States’ relationships with other countries and its adversaries.

“What we’re talking about now is using products vis-a-vis someone who’s trying to kill our service members,” Karp said, noting that he personally supports “wide license” of usage for the Department of Defense specifically. 

“If we knew China and Russia and Iran wouldn’t build them, I would be in favor of very heavy—very heavy—legal constraints,” Karp said. But he points out that American adversaries will build them and use them against the U.S. anyway. “I don’t think this is an opinion. I think this is a fact, and that fact means I think the Department of War should have wide license to use these products.”

This story was originally featured on Fortune.com

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A ground stop issued at several airports in the Washington, D.C., region on Friday has been lifted after a chemical odor disrupted air traffic control operations.

The temporary ground stop affected Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport (DCA), Washington Dulles International Airport (IAD), Baltimore-Washington International Airport (BWI) and Richmond International Airport (RIC), according to Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy.

The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) later downgraded the alert to ground delays for the Washington-area airports as operations gradually resumed.

FUEL CRISIS FORCES AIRLINES TO ANNOUNCE MAJOR FARE INCREASES, FLIGHT CANCELLATIONS AS IRAN CONFLICT ESCALATES

The FAA website showed significant delays as of 8:40 p.m. Friday, including average ground delays of about 222 minutes at DCA and more than 150 minutes at BWI.

Earlier in the day, Duffy said the FAA was investigating a strong odor detected at the Potomac Terminal Radar Approach Control (TRACON) facility, which manages air traffic in the area..

“[FAA] is working to address the source of a strong odor coming from Potomac TRACON that is impacting operations at the three airports,” he said.

MAJOR AIRPORTS ISSUE GROUND STOPS DUE TO AIR TRAFFIC CONTROLLER STAFFING SHORTAGES AMID GOVERNMENT SHUTDOWN

TRACON, located in Warrenton, Virginia, provides air traffic control services across the Baltimore-Washington and Richmond-Charlottesville areas, according to FOX 5.

An FAA spokesperson confirmed the ground stop was implemented after a strong chemical smell at the facility affected some air traffic controllers.

“The FAA has temporarily stopped traffic at Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport (DCA), Washington Dulles International Airport (IAD) and Baltimore-Washington International Airport (BWI) because of a strong chemical smell at the Potomac TRACON that is impacting some air traffic controllers,” the spokesperson said.

AUSTIN AIRPORT GRIDLOCK: SECURITY LINES STRETCH OUTDOORS AS DHS SHUTDOWN HITS ONE-MONTH MARK

Airport officials said flights are now resuming, though passengers should expect lingering delays as airlines work through the backlog.

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“Airlines are once again resuming regular operations and preparing departures. Expect residual delays this evening,” BWI Airport said in a post on X. “For flight-specific updates, please confirm flight status with your airline. We appreciate the patience of passengers impacted by the delays.”

This post was originally published here. 

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A ground stop has been issued at several airports in the Washington, D.C., region, Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy announced Friday evening.

The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) is currently investigating a strong odor at Potomac Terminal Radar Approach Control (TRACON), a facility that manages air traffic in the area, according to Duffy.

The ground stop currently affects Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport (DCA), Washington Dulles International Airport (IAD), Baltimore-Washington International Airport (BWI) and Richmond International Airport (RIC), according to Duffy.

FUEL CRISIS FORCES AIRLINES TO ANNOUNCE MAJOR FARE INCREASES, FLIGHT CANCELLATIONS AS IRAN CONFLICT ESCALATES

“[FAA] is working to address the source of a strong odor coming from Potomac TRACON that is impacting operations at the three airports,” Duffy said.

Airports are expected to remain on a ground stop until 8 p.m. EDT, according to the FAA’s alert page.

MAJOR AIRPORTS ISSUE GROUND STOPS DUE TO AIR TRAFFIC CONTROLLER STAFFING SHORTAGES AMID GOVERNMENT SHUTDOWN

TRACON, located in Warrenton, Virginia, provides air traffic control services across the Baltimore-Washington and Richmond-Charlottesville areas, according to FOX 5.

Earlier Friday, an FAA spokesperson said traffic was halted because of a strong chemical odor at the Potomac TRACON affecting some controllers.

AUSTIN AIRPORT GRIDLOCK: SECURITY LINES STRETCH OUTDOORS AS DHS SHUTDOWN HITS ONE-MONTH MARK

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“The FAA has temporarily stopped traffic at Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport (DCA), Washington Dulles International Airport (IAD) and Baltimore-Washington International Airport (BWI) because of a strong chemical smell at the Potomac TRACON that is impacting some air traffic controllers,” the spokesperson said.

This post was originally published here. 

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Exclusive: The White House is expecting to announce an expansion of the drugmakers offering discounts on TrumpRx.gov, FOX Business has learned.

As early as today, Amgen and GSK will be added to the list of prescription drug manufacturers offering discounts on the government website. That makes a total of 54 prescription medications from six pharmaceutical companies that have signed on to the Most-Favored-Nation pricing under pressure from President Donald Trump and the threat of tariffs.

Amgen will offer medication on the website that cuts 80% off the retail price. Amjevita has an original price of $1,484.18, but will be available on TrumpRx.gov for $299. The medication treats rheumatoid arthritis, psoriasis and ulcerative colitis.

The company plans to list Aimovig and Repatha as well, for discounts of 62%.

GSK will discount Incruse at 55% of the retail price. The drug treats COPD and will be listed at $159.20.

GSK also plans to list Annuity, Relenza and Anoro at discounts ranging from 10% to 51%.

“GSK and Amgen connecting with TrumpRx.gov to offer prescription drugs directly to consumers at Most Favored Nations pricing marks another milestone for President Trump’s affordability push,” White House spokesman Kush Desai told FOX Business. “TrumpRx.gov is just the beginning, however, as Americans are set to even greater drug pricing discounts, lower insurance premiums, and more transparency when Congress passes President Trump’s Great Healthcare Plan.”

The Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America represents major drug companies.

CEO Stephen Ubl believes, “Government-imposed Most Favored Nation policies would undermine U.S. competitiveness while doing nothing to address insurance practices that deny care and raise costs for patients.”

“These policies would siphon billions from American R&D, slow the pace of cures and increase reliance on China for future innovation,” Ubl added.

The White House is pushing ahead with announcements to TrumpRx.gov as Americans look for ways to cut medical costs.

Under the Biden administration, the Bureau of Labor Statistics data shows prescription drugs increased 10.4% from January 2021 to January 2025. Under the Trump administration, prescription drug prices increased 0.2% from January 2025 through the latest data from February 2026.

This post was originally published here. 

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The Trump administration has discussed trading in the oil futures market as a strategy to help curb surging crude prices amid the war in Iran, Interior Secretary Doug Burgum said.

Burgum, however, said he wasn’t aware whether the US had actually intervened in the market at this point.

“I would say there has been a discussion. We have a lot of smart people working in this administration — a lot of smart people work in the energy trading market,” Burgum said during an interview with Bloomberg Television in Tokyo on Saturday. “An intervention to try to manipulate and lower prices would require enormous amounts of capital. That is all I will say on that front.”

His comments come as US and Israeli attacks on Iran continue to upend the global energy landscape, trapping millions of barrels of oil in the Persian Gulf, with the Strait of Hormuz effectively blocked.

Global crude futures have surged more than 40% in the nearly two weeks since the conflict began, driving US gasoline prices to their highest level in 22 months.

Burgum, who is in Tokyo ahead of Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi’s March 19 visit to Washington, will attend the first-ever US-sponsored Indo-Pacific Energy Security Ministerial and Business Forum this weekend. The event comes as the White House pushes to reduce US dependence on China and diversify supply chains for critical minerals used in mobile phones, batteries and other products.

Read More: Asia Set to Pledge $30 Billion in Energy, Mineral Deals With US

Separately, Burgum said that while it’s been discussed, any kind of Treasury intervention is lower on the administration’s list of possible moves to mitigate the surge in oil prices, below other options. He declined to specify what those other possibilities might be.

This story was originally featured on Fortune.com

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FIRST ON FOX: The origins of a fraud-fighting technology now used by one of the world’s largest insurers trace back to a deadly insider attack during the Iraq War.

Clearspeed founder Alex Martin was serving in the Marine Corps. when his close friend, Capt. Warren Frank, was killed by an Iraqi soldier who turned his weapon on American forces during a joint patrol. The Iraqi had passed coalition vetting procedures.

“Warren met his future wife at my house,” Martin recalled to FOX Business. “Learning he’d been killed by an Al-Qaeda infiltrator we’d brought into his formation – it shook me. I couldn’t accept that insider attack as inevitable.”

So-called “green-on-blue” attacks, in which supposedly vetted local forces turned on coalition troops, became one of the Global War on Terror’s most vexing threats. Between 2008 and 2017, such incidents killed more than 150 coalition service members in Afghanistan alone.

“I became obsessed with our vetting process and realized our traditional playbook simply couldn’t keep pace with the operational tempo, language barriers and risks of counterinsurgency warfare,” Martin said.

His solution was to flip the model: quickly establish trust for the majority who posed no threat, while focusing expert scrutiny on the small fraction requiring deeper review.

After leaving active duty, Martin partnered with Stanford professor Charles Holloway to develop a voice-based vetting tool designed to quickly assess risk across languages and high-stakes environments.

The company’s first major customer was U.S. Special Operations Command. In 2018, Clearspeed screened 715 Afghan commando recruits in less than 20 hours – a process that would normally take months. Several individuals flagged as high-risk later deserted.

The success attracted investment from retired Gen. David Petraeus, the former CIA director and commander of U.S. forces in Iraq and Afghanistan. The company has since raised $110 million and counts the Department of Defense and U.S. intelligence agencies among its customers.

TRUMP URGES IMMEDIATE RATE CUTS AMID IRAN CONFLICT

Now, the technology is being used beyond the battlefield.

Insurance giant Allianz recently disclosed it identified more than £92.6 million (about $115 million) in fraudulent claims during the first half of 2025, with executives crediting voice-screening technology from San Diego-based Clearspeed as central to its fraud detection strategy.

Clearspeed is a voice-based vetting platform originally developed for U.S. military use. During an automated phone call, individuals answer a short series of yes-or-no questions while the system analyzes vocal characteristics in real time.

It flags potential risk indicators for human review, allowing low-risk respondents to move through quickly while directing additional scrutiny to higher-risk cases.

“We needed to make our organization a really hostile place for people to try to commit fraud,” Allianz Chief Claims Officer Matt Cox said at an industry conference in London, according to InsurancePOST. “Technologies such as Clearspeed have given us the opportunity, for the first time, to dial up that disruption.”

The move comes as insurers face what analysts describe as an escalating “arms race” with fraudsters, many of whom now use artificial intelligence and digital tools to perpetrate fraud. A Deloitte study predicted generative AI could help drive U.S. fraud losses as high as $40 billion next year.

The growing commercial adoption has also drawn attention in Washington.

Clearspeed has been engaging policymakers about deploying the technology to combat benefits fraud and strengthen screening processes, according to people familiar with the discussions. The company spent about $272,500 on federal lobbying in 2025, according to data compiled by OpenSecrets.

The push comes amid growing political pressure to crack down on fraud in federal programs. In January, the administration announced a new Department of Justice division focused on national fraud enforcement targeting fraud against federal programs and private citizens.

ORACLE BRACES FOR MASSIVE LAYOFFS AMID AI CASH CRUNCH

Rep. Pat Harrigan, R-N.C., a former Army Green Beret who served in Afghanistan, said his combat experience shapes how he evaluates emerging technologies.

“During my time in the Special Forces, I saw firsthand how advanced technology saves lives and gives us a decisive edge,” Harrigan told FOX Business. “My priority in Congress is making sure we identify the most effective tools and put them to work for our troops and taxpayers.”

Harrigan said he has met with Clearspeed and is exploring ways the technology could help protect warfighters and reduce fraud.

“The fact that the world’s largest insurer turned to American military technology to solve its fraud problem tells you everything about how powerful these tools are,” he said. “If they can help Allianz identify nearly $100 million in fraud, imagine what they could do for the American people – whether that’s cracking down on benefits fraud, vetting visa applicants or securing our border.”

Rep. Russell Fry, R-S.C., said technologies that strengthen fraud detection and vetting could play a role in broader border security efforts.

“As President Trump continues delivering on his promise to make America safe again, we must ensure law enforcement has access to the most reliable and efficient tools available,” Fry told FOX Business. “Technologies like this could help combat fraud at our border, strengthen visa vetting and keep our country secure.”

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For Martin, the growing interest from insurers and policymakers alike represents a continuation of a mission that began years ago on the battlefield.

“We built this because lives were on the line,” he said. “Putting that same technology to work protecting taxpayers and making our country safer is exactly the mission we’re here to serve.”

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A federal judge on Friday quashed Justice Department subpoenas issued to the Federal Reserve in January, a severe blow to an investigation that has already attracted strong criticism on Capitol Hill.

The investigation into testimony last June by Chair Jerome Powell about a $2.5 billion building renovation has also delayed Senate consideration of Kevin Warsh, President Donald Trump’s pick to replace Powell when his term ends May 15.

Judge James Boasberg said that the government has “produced essentially zero evidence to suspect Chair Powell of a crime” and called its justifications for the subpoenas so “thin and unsubstantiated” that they were simply a pretext to force Powell to cut interest rates, as Trump has repeatedly demanded.

“There is abundant evidence that the subpoenas’ dominant (if not sole) purpose is to harass and pressure Powell either to yield to the President or to resign and make way for a Fed Chair who will,” he wrote.

The unprecedented investigation into Powell and the Fed is the latest in a series of moves by the Trump administration pressure the central bank, which has for decades been considered as independent from day-to-day politics. Trump has also sought to fire Lisa Cook, a member of the Fed’s governing board, after a member of his administration accused her of mortgage fraud, though no charges were ever filed. The Supreme Court has blocked Cook’s firing for now.

Boasberg’s ruling blocks U.S. Attorney Jeanine Pirro, who issued the subpoenas, from obtaining records from the Fed related to the building renovation. Pirro blasted the ruling at a news conference and said she would appeal it.

Pirro said an “activist judge” has quashed the subpoenas, and has “neutered the grand jury’s ability to investigate crime“ and leaves Powell “bathed in immunity.”

“This is wrong and it is without legal authority,” she said.

The Justice Department’s investigation centers on testimony last June by Powell before the Senate Banking Committee, when he was asked about cost overruns on the Fed’s extensive building renovations. The most recent estimates from the Fed suggest the current estimated cost of $2.5 billion is about $600 million higher than a 2022 estimate of $1.9 billion.

Powell at the time disputed that the renovation included “rooftop gardens … VIP elevators” and other amenities. But administration officials charged that earlier construction plans included some of those features, suggesting Powell was either lying or hadn’t filed updated building plans.

Pirro, in her news conference, said she wanted to investigate “an atrocious cost overrun of $1 billion.” In a filing unsealed Friday, the government said it was investigating “possible fraud and false statements” by the Fed and Powell.

Pirro’s plan to appeal and continue the investigation could further delay the Senate’s consideration of Warsh’s nomination. Powell can remain as Chair past May 15 if no replacement has been approved.

Powell revealed the investigation in an unprecedented video Jan. 11, which prompted Senator Thom Tillis, a North Carolina Republican and member of the Banking committee, to block consideration of Warsh until the investigation is dropped.

Tillis said the ruling confirmed “just how weak and frivolous the criminal investigation of Chairman Powell is.” Tillis has vowed to blockade all Federal Reserve nominees until the criminal probe into Powell is dropped.

“We all know how this is going to end and the D.C. U.S. Attorney’s Office should save itself further embarrassment and move on,” Tillis said Friday. “Appealing the ruling will only delay the confirmation of Kevin Warsh as the next Fed Chair.”

Tillis has also said that seven Republican members of the banking committee have said no crime was committed by Powell at the June hearing.

On Tuesday, Tillis met with Warsh and said he “possesses impeccable credentials and a clear vision for maintaining the Fed’s independence while achieving its dual mandate,” which is to seek low inflation and maximum employment. But he reiterated he couldn’t support Warsh until the investigation is completed.

With Republicans holding only a 13-11 majority on the committee, Tillis can block Warsh’s nomination from being forwarded to the Senate if all Democrats vote against it.

In his ruling, Boasberg said he offered to let the government submit further evidence against Powell directly to him, so that they wouldn’t have to tip their hand to the Fed or Powell. But the government declined to submit evidence under those conditions.

“The Court is thus left with no credible reason to think that the Government is investigating suspicious facts as opposed to targeting a disfavored official,” the judge wrote in his ruling.

In one of the filings unsealed Friday, there was a tantalizing reference to a key question that has surrounded Powell for months, which is whether he will step down from the governing board when his term as Chair ends. It was included in a government filing in response to the Fed’s move to throw out the subpoenas.

Powell is serving a separate term as a Fed governor until January 2028. Most chairs resign from the board when their time as chair ends, but Powell has refused to answer if he will do so. Remaining on the board would enable Powell to deny Trump the opportunity to appoint a new governor.

In recounting a meeting between a lawyer for the Fed and Pirro, the filing says that the Fed’s attorney indicated that: “The Chair feels like he would not leave the board when his term as Chair expires, if he was still under investigation.”

The filing went on to say that Powell wouldn’t commit to leave the board if he was not under investigation, but added that, “it would be a different look to the Chair if he was not facing criminal investigation and the Chair would be free to make a decision that would focus on his family.”

Boasberg, who was nominated to the bench by Democratic President Barack Obama, has been at odds with the White House on other legal fronts since Trump returned to office last January. The Justice Department sought Boasberg’s removal from a high-profile case in Washington after he barred the Trump administration from carrying out a wave of deportation flights under wartime authorities from an 18th-century law.

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The American military has ordered 2,500 Marines and an amphibious assault ship to the Middle East, a U.S. official said Friday, in a major addition of forces in the region after nearly two weeks of war with Iran.

Meanwhile in the Iranian capital, a large explosion rocked a central square where thousands were gathered for an annual state-organized rally to support the Palestinians and call for Israel’s demise. Israel had warned that it would target the area in central Tehran.

There were no reports of casualties. But the decision to proceed with the mass demonstration attended by some senior government officials, and Israel’s threat to target the area, underscored the fierce determination on both sides in a war that has rattled the global economy and shows no sign of letting up.

Iran has continued to launch widespread missile and drone attacks on Israel and neighboring Gulf states, and has effectively closed the Strait of Hormuz, through which a fifth of the world’s traded oil passes, even as U.S. and Israeli warplanes pummel military and other targets across Iran.

The humanitarian crisis in Lebanon deepened, with nearly 800 people killed and 850,000 displaced as Israel launched waves of strikes against Iran-backed Hezbollah militants and warned there would be no let up.

In an interview with Fox News, U.S. President Donald Trump said the war would end “when I feel it in my bones.” He was also more measured about the prospect of opponents toppling the Islamic government.

“So I really think that’s a big hurdle to climb for people that don’t have weapons,” Trump said, citing Iran’s paramilitary Basij force, which has played a central role in crushing recent nationwide protests.

Marines and assault ship will add to US forces

Elements from the 31st Marine Expeditionary Unit and the amphibious assault ship USS Tripoli have been ordered to the Middle East, according to the U.S. official, who spoke to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive military plans.

Marine Expeditionary Units are able to conduct amphibious landings, but they also specialize in bolstering security at embassies, evacuating civilians and disaster relief. The deployment does not necessarily indicate that a ground operation is imminent or will take place.

The new Marine deployment was first reported by The Wall Street Journal.

The 31st Marine Expeditionary Unit, as well the Tripoli and other amphibious assault ships carrying the Marines, are based in Japan and have been in the Pacific Ocean for several days, according to images released by the military. The Tripoli was spotted by commercial satellites sailing alone near Taiwan, putting it more than a week away from the waters off Iran.

Earlier in the week, the Navy had 12 ships, including the aircraft carrier USS Abraham Lincoln and eight destroyers, operating in the Arabian Sea. Should the Tripoli join this flotilla, it would be the second-largest ship behind the Lincoln in the region.

While the total number of U.S. service members on the ground in the Middle East is not clear, Al-Udeid Air Base alone, one of the largest in the region, typically houses some 8,000 U.S. troops.

Explosion rocks area of mass demonstration

The explosion in Tehran rocked the Ferdowsi Square area midday, where thousands had gathered for an annual Quds Day rally, chanting “death to Israel” and “death to America.”

Israel had issued a warning on a Farsi-language X account for people to clear the area shortly before the blast. But few Iranians would have seen it, as authorities have almost completely shut down the internet. Footage showed people chanting “God is greatest,” as smoke rose in the area.

The Israeli military later posted a second message in Farsi, noting the head of Iran’s judiciary was at the rally and criticizing Iran for blocking many from seeing their warning.

The hard-liner who leads Iran’s judiciary, Gholamhossein Mohseni Ejei, was giving an interview on state television at the demonstration when the strike happened. His bodyguards encircled him, as he raised his fist and said Iran “under this rain and missiles will never withdraw.”

US says 15,000 targets struck in Iran since the start of the war

Israel earlier announced another wave of strikes in Iran targeting infrastructure, and said its air force had hit more than 200 targets in the last 24 hours, including missile launchers, defense systems and weapons production sites.

In Washington, U.S. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said that over 15,000 enemy targets have been struck — more than 1,000 a day since the war began.

He also sought to address concerns about the bottling of the Strait of Hormuz, telling reporters: “We have been dealing with it and don’t need to worry about it.”

All six crew of US refueling plane confirmed dead after crash

The U.S. military confirmed on Friday that all six crew members of an American KC-135 refueling plane were killed when it crashed in Iraq, bringing the U.S. death toll to at least 13 service members.

U.S. Central Command said the crash wasn’t related to friendly or hostile fire, and that two aircraft were involved, including one that landed safely.

The KC-135 is the fourth publicly acknowledged aircraft to crash as part of the U.S. military’s operations against Iran. Last week, three American fighter jets were mistakenly downed by friendly Kuwaiti fire.

New Iranian attacks across the region

Iran continued its daily attacks on oil and other infrastructure across the Gulf. In Oman, two people were killed when two drones crashed in the Sohar region, the Oman News Agency reported.

The U.S. Navy destroyer USS Oscar Austin shot down an Iranian ballistic missile over Turkey on Friday, a U.S. official said on condition of anonymity in order to discuss ongoing military operations. It was the third such interception over the NATO member in the last two weeks.

Residents in the southern Turkish city of Adana reported hearing a loud explosion and sirens sounding at Incirlik Air Base, which is used by U.S. forces.

Fighting escalates between Israel and Hezbollah

At least eight people were killed in an Israeli strike on Lebanon’s southern coastal city of Sidon, Lebanon’s Health Ministry said Friday. The toll could rise as rescuers search the rubble.

The ministry said 773 people — including more than 100 children and 62 women — have been killed since fighting erupted between Israel and Iran-backed Hezbollah militants 10 days ago. More than 1,900 have been wounded, it said.

Some 850,000 have been internally displaced in Lebanon, according to United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres, who launched a $325 million humanitarian appeal during a surprise visit to the country.

Lebanese Prime Minister Nawaf Salam urged Israel to halt strikes on his country and criticized Hezbollah for firing rockets at Israeli targets.

“There is no justification in holding an entire nation hostage,” he said.

Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz said earlier that the strikes were “just the beginning.”

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Google on Friday announced it will invest $1 billion within the next two years to expand its data center infrastructure in North Carolina.

The investment will focus on the expansion of a data center facility in Lenoir, North Carolina. Google has had a presence in the area for 15 years between the data center and an office in Durham.

The Google data center in Lenoir helps support Google services including Maps, Photos, Search, Workspace, YouTube and more, according to the announcement.

“Google’s latest investment in the City of Lenoir and Caldwell County underscores a deep commitment to North Carolina’s continued growth and success,” said City of Lenoir Mayor Joseph Gibbons. “This funding will enhance our workforce, expand economic development opportunities, and ensure North Carolina remains a leader in innovation.”

MAJOR TECH COMPANIES BACK TRUMP PLEDGE TO PAY MORE FOR DATA CENTER ELECTRICITY AHEAD OF SIGNING

Caldwell County Commission Chairman Randy Church said that investments like this one from Google are “critical for strengthening our community” and added that it “will bring new opportunities for local workers and help drive long-term economic success in our region.”

In addition to Google’s data center investment, the company announced it will provide $2 million to an Energy Impact Fund in collaboration with Blue Ridge Community Action, Blue Ridge Energy and Advanced Energy.

AMERICANS HIT WITH SOARING ELECTRICITY BILLS AS PRICE HIKES OUTPACE INFLATION NATIONWIDE

The fund will help scale and accelerate energy initiatives in Caldwell County and focus on energy affordability, weatherization upgrades and energy efficiency for both low- to moderate-income households and K-12 schools. Rising electricity costs are driven in part by increased demand from data centers, particularly amid the artificial intelligence (AI) boom.

Google’s funding will also help expand existing community solar programs, reducing the energy burden and promoting renewable energy access for residents of the county.

Jon Jacob, director of marketing for Blue Ridge Energy, said that the support from Google is a “perfect reflection of our cooperative spirit: members helping members, supported by a partner who shares our commitment to making life better for our local community.”

DATA CENTERS IN OUTER SPACE EMERGE AS SOLUTION TO AI’S MASSIVE ENERGY REQUIREMENTS

Other community investments by Google included in the announcement include a three-year, $270,000 grant to Communities In Schools of Caldwell County (CISCC).

The funds will establish the CISCC Workforce Development & Digital Equity Fund, which will work with the local schools and Caldwell Community College & Technical Institute (CCC&TI) to reduce technological and financial barriers for students pursuing vocational training through 2027.

Mark Poarch, president of CCC&TI, said that the collaboration “ensures that local students have the resources they need to transition seamlessly into the workforce. This fund is more than a grant; it is an investment in the long-term resilience and economic vitality of our entire community.”

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Additionally, investments also include a $100,000 donation to the City of Lenoir to renovate the city’s historic high school.

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All six crew members of a KC-135 refueling aircraft that crashed while supporting operations against Iran are dead, the U.S. military said Friday.

U.S. Central Command, which oversees the Middle East, said the crash in western Iraq on Thursday followed an unspecified incident involving two aircraft in “friendly airspace” and that the other plane landed safely.

The crash brings the U.S. death toll in Operation Epic Fury to at least 13 service members, with the seven others killed in combat. About 140 U.S. service members have been injured, including eight severely, the Pentagon said earlier this week.

The KC-135 has been in service for more than 60 years and has been involved in several fatal accidents, most recently in 2013. Adding to concerns about their reliability, the aircraft don’t always carry parachutes.

Here’s what is known so far about the tanker, which is the fourth U.S. military aircraft publicly acknowledged to have crashed since the war against Iran began on Feb. 28:

Cause of crash not immediately known

U.S. Central Command said the circumstances of the crash are under investigation but that the loss of the aircraft was “not due to hostile or friendly fire.”

A U.S. official, who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss the developing situation, said the other plane involved was also a KC-135. Yechiel Leiter, the Israeli ambassador to the U.S., wrote on X that the other plane landed safely in Israel.

Gen. Dan Caine, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, told reporters at the Pentagon on Friday morning that the crash occurred “over friendly territory in western Iraq, while the crew was on a combat mission” and reiterated that hostile or friendly fire was not the cause.

Speaking at the same news conference, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth called the crew heroes.

“War is hell. War is chaos,” Hegseth said. “And as we saw yesterday with the tragic crash of our KC-135 tanker, bad things can happen. American heroes, all of them.”

Hegseth and Caine spoke to reporters before the deaths of the six crew member had been made public.

Yang Uk, a security expert at South Korea’s Asan Institute for Policy Studies, said it would be rare for a refueling tanker to be downed by enemy fire because such operations are usually conducted in the rear of combat zones.

Last week, three U.S. F-15E fighter jets were mistakenly downed by friendly Kuwaiti fire. All six crew members ejected safely.

The KC-135 is a long-serving tanker plane

The KC-135 Stratotanker is a U.S. Air Force aircraft used to refuel other planes in midair, allowing them to travel longer distances and maintain operations longer without landing. The plane is also used to transport wounded personnel during medical evacuations or conduct surveillance missions, according to military experts.

“The last of these planes were produced in the 1960s,” Yang said.

Based on the same design as the Boeing 707 passenger plane, the KC-135 is set to be gradually phased out as more of the next-generation KC-46A Pegasus tankers enter service.

According to the Congressional Research Service, the Air Force last year had 376 KC-135s, including 151 on active duty, 163 in the Air National Guard and 62 in the Air Force Reserve.

A basic KC-135 crew consists of three people: a pilot, co-pilot and boom operator. Nurses and medical technicians are added in aeromedical evacuation missions.

Refueling typically happens at the back of the plane, where the boom operator is located. A fuel boom is lowered to connect with fighters, bombers or other aircraft. On many of the planes, the boom operator works lying face down while looking out of a window on the underside of the plane.

Some KC-135s can also refuel planes from pods on their wings. The tankers have room to carry cargo or passengers if needed.

Refueling tankers could play an increasingly important role if the Iran war drags on, as U.S. aircraft may need to fly longer missions to pursue Iranian forces retreating deeper into the country, said Yang.

A question about parachutes

KC-135s have been involved in several fatal accidents. The most recent occurred on May 3, 2013, when one crashed after takeoff south of Chaldovar, Kyrgyzstan, while supporting the war in Afghanistan.

In that crash, the crew experienced problems with the plane’s rudder, according to a U.S. Air Force investigation. While the crew struggled to stabilize the plane, the tail section broke away and the plane exploded midair, killing all three onboard.

The most serious mid-air collision involving the plane happened in 1966, when a B-52 bomber carrying nuclear bombs struck a tanker near Palomares, Spain.

The accident caused the tanker to crash, killing four onboard. The disaster led to an extensive decontamination effort to clean up nuclear material dispersed when conventional explosives in the hydrogen bombs detonated after hitting the ground.

The plane has a good safety record overall, is well-maintained and has been updated often with new equipment, said Alan Diehl, a former investigator for the Air Force Safety Center who examined mishaps that involved KC-135s.

But Diehl said an important question is whether this KC-135 was carrying any parachutes. The one that crashed in Kyrgyzstan was not, according to the investigation.

Diehl said the reasoning for not always requiring parachutes, at least in the 1980s and 1990s, included the expense of maintaining them and training to use them. He said K-135s are designed with an escape hatch on the flight deck and a spoiler to help airmen jump clear of the fuselage.

A 2008 news release from an air refueling unit said the Air Force was pulling parachutes from KC-135s, noting that it was statistically safer to stay with the aircraft, “especially when flying over enemy territory.”

“Removing parachutes from military aircraft may sound peculiar, but KC-135s are not like other aircraft,” the news release stated. “They seldom have mishaps, and the likelihood a KC-135 crew member would ever need to use a parachute is extremely low.”

Diehl stressed that it’s unclear whether parachutes would have helped the crew over Iraq. But he said the second plane landing safety suggests the collision may not have been catastrophic.

When asked if the plane that crashed had parachutes, the military would say only that the cause of the incident was still under investigation.

As for why the KC-135 that crashed had six people on board, Diehl said some could have been back-up crew, given that the aircraft can stay in the air for many hours.

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Egg prices have declined rapidly over the last year as the market normalizes following a significant avian flu outbreak that began in 2022, though the threat of a resurgence in the virus could lead to volatility later this year.

The Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) on Wednesday reported the consumer price index (CPI) for February, which showed egg prices declined by 3.8% in the month and are down 42.1% from a year ago. By contrast, headline CPI inflation was 2.4% higher than it was a year ago.

Bernt Nelson, an economist with the American Farm Bureau Federation, told FOX Business that the U.S. egg industry has been on a “rollercoaster of avian influenza detection” since 2022, with detections ranging from about 20 million birds affected to nearly zero birds, depending on the time of year.

“Because of this, we’ve had times when the laying flock was damaged enough to really drive prices higher,” Nelson said. He added that a dozen eggs cost around $4.14 in December 2024 and climbed to a high of $6.22 a dozen in March 2025 – but those have since declined to about $2.50 a dozen, according to data from the BLS and the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s (USDA) Economic Research Service.

FEBRUARY INFLATION BREAKDOWN: WHERE ARE PRICES RISING AND FALLING THE FASTEST?

Nelson added that as of December 2025, egg prices were about 12% below the five-year average as the market recovered from the avian flu-related price shocks. The stabilization of the market comes as the USDA has stepped up detection activities to help mitigate outbreaks.

“USDA has made some dramatic improvements in the last year,” he explained, noting that the agency offers a wildlife assessment that looks for ways wild birds may infiltrate an egg farm as well as a domestic assessment that considers ways to promote agricultural hygiene such as undertaking a foot bath before entering an egg layer house.

“USDA offers these free of charge and then it becomes up to the egg farmer to implement the changes that they need to help secure their farm,” Nelson said, adding that it has “dramatically improved the ability to keep supplies in the pipeline.”

INFLATION HELD STEADY IN FEBRUARY AND REMAINED ABOVE THE FED’S TARGET

In the last six months, the slowdown in avian flu cases has allowed production to recover and increase, bringing prices below the level they were at before the larger outbreak began. 

However, the USDA’s wildlife monitoring has found a very high viral load in wild migratory birds passing through all four of the flyways that cross the U.S. from south to north in recent months, which can impact the egg, turkey and broiler industries.

Nelson noted that in the last 30 days there have been about 14 million birds affected, which was higher than some of the lower caseload months during the supply chain normalization. 

HOW THE IRAN WAR COULD HIT AMERICANS’ GROCERY BILLS

He said there have been about four million detections in March overall, mostly attributed to two relatively large avian flu detections announced this week that covered four million birds at egg production facilities. 

“What that demonstrates is that you can have almost no detections going on, it can be just a really low, smooth sailing situation, and all of a sudden you can have a detection at one of these bigger farms and when that detection it can take a lot of layers out of the pipeline very quickly,” Nelson said.

“We’re not seeing the impacts of that supply change yet, but if we see avian influenza continue to affect houses like that where you’re seeing a high number of birds affected month to month, it can very well push prices back up,” he added.

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Nelson said that when egg farmers’ flocks are impacted by avian flu it can take an emotional toll on the farmers as well as cause financial harm, as USDA indemnity programs cover things like cleanup costs but doesn’t cover the production stoppage that can last up to six months.

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Bitcoin trimmed earlier gains late Friday after fresh reports of escalating military tensions in the Middle East weighed on risk sentiment.

Cryptocurrency Ticker Price
Bitcoin (CRYPTO: BTC) $71,191
Ethereum (CRYPTO: ETH) $2,106
Solana (CRYPTO: SOL) $88.83
XRP (CRYPTO: XRP) $1.39
Dogecoin (CRYPTO: DOGE) $0.09586
Shiba Inu (CRYPTO: SHIB) $0.055951

Notable Statistics:

  • Coinglass data shows 107,056 traders were liquidated in the past 24 hours for $450.16 million.
  • SoSoValue data shows net inflows of $53.9 million from spot Bitcoin ETFs on Thursday. Spot Ethereum ETFs saw net inflows of $115.9 million.
  • In the past 24 hours, top gainers include OFFICIAL TRUMP, Render and DeXe.

Notable Developments:

Full story available on Benzinga.com

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Travelers planning summer getaways may want to lock in flights sooner rather than later as surging oil prices threaten to drive airfares higher.

Under normal conditions, travel website The Points Guy (TPG) recommends booking domestic flights one to three months in advance and international trips three to six months ahead. 

But with fuel prices climbing, travelers may want to secure tickets even earlier, TPG travel expert Clint Henderson told FOX Business.

“Book now for the rest of the year,” Henderson said. “We expect prices to rise quickly as oil prices continue to rise. Remember, you can always get a trip credit if the price drops before your trip. Just don’t book basic economy!”

Henderson noted many airlines allow travelers to receive trip credits if fares fall after purchase.

FUEL CRISIS FORCES AIRLINES TO ANNOUNCE MAJOR FARE INCREASES, FLIGHT CANCELLATIONS AS IRAN CONFLICT ESCALATES

Despite a long-standing myth, Henderson said there is no “magic time” that consistently guarantees the cheapest airfare.

However, flying on Saturdays, Tuesdays and Wednesdays is often cheaper because there are typically fewer business travelers, he said.

Travelers can also monitor price changes by setting alerts on Google Flights, which notifies users when fares drop. 

Flying during off-peak seasons can also help reduce costs, according to Henderson.

As airfare prices rise, Henderson said travelers may also find value in redeeming credit card rewards or airline miles.

“You’ll get the best value from your points and miles by using them instead of paying cash when prices are high,” he said. “Unfortunately, some airline miles are now priced dynamically, so they rise when cash prices rise, but you can still sometimes get a great deal using points or miles instead of paying cash.”

IRAN THREATENS $200 OIL BARRELS AS US PREPARES MASSIVE RELEASE OF EMERGENCY PETROLEUM RESERVES

One of the most common — and costly — mistakes travelers make is waiting until the last minute to book flights, according to Henderson.

“Airfares are generally highest in the two-week period before the flight,” he said. ” . . . That’s when last-minute business trips happen, and airlines know that businesses have deep pockets and sometimes can’t plan ahead.”

The escalating conflict involving Iran is already rippling through global energy markets, threatening to hit American travelers’ wallets.

Oil markets have been rattled by halted shipments through the Strait of Hormuz and attacks on Middle Eastern oil facilities and tankers as U.S. military forces continue Operation Epic Fury.

Global benchmark Brent crude topped $100 per barrel on Friday, marking a more than 60% increase since the start of the year. 

TRUMP SAYS US ‘LARGEST OIL PRODUCER IN THE WORLD,’ BUT PRIORITY REMAINS STOPPING IRAN NUCLEAR CAPABILITIES

Jet fuel is one of airlines’ largest expenses, meaning rising oil prices could soon translate into more expensive tickets. Domestic airfares would need to rise at least 11% to offset current fuel prices, according to Skift Research.

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International carriers Qantas and Scandinavian Airlines have already announced they are raising fares, though U.S. airlines have not yet broadly done so.

FOX Business’ Kristen Altus contributed to this report.

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Airport security lines in Austin stretched outside the door early Friday with passengers waiting hours to board their flights amid pressure on Congressional lawmakers to reach a deal to reopen the Department of Homeland Security (DHS). 

Video footage posted online showed Transportation Security Administration (TSA) lines at Austin-Bergstrom International Airport well outside at least one terminal building.

“Thanks to the Democrats’ reckless shutdown, security lines at Austin-Bergstrom International Airport are stretching OUT THE DOOR,” a DHS post on X states. “The Democrats’ political games are making spring break travel a NIGHTMARE as they continue to withhold funding from DHS and refuse to pay our @TSA officers.”

AIRLINES CANCEL FLIGHTS, ISSUE TRAVEL WAIVERS OVER MIDDLE EAST UNREST

DHS saw its funding lapse a month ago, having a direct impact on TSA workers, who have not been paid, and the traveling public.

Extended lines at the airport began around 5 a.m. local time, but cleared up around two hours later, the airport said. 

Throughout the morning, the airport posted videos of seemingly empty checkpoints and some with a few passengers. 

The airport warned passengers departing on Saturday to arrive at least 2.5 hours before their flight amid an expected busy day. The busiest time will be between 4 a.m. and 8 a.m., it said. 

Growing lines at airports across the country have ratcheted up pressure on lawmakers to reach a deal to fund DHS as members of both parties continue to hear complaints from their constituents. 

More than 300 TSA have quit since the DHS shutdown began and callouts are approximately double the normal rate, a TSA spokesperson told FOX Business. 

“Today, 100,000 DHS workers will not get paid, missing their first full paycheck as a result of the Democrat DHS shutdown. This amounts to $1 BILLION in unpaid wages each month,” the spokesperson said in a statement. “TSA employees have been forced to work without pay three times in six months due to Democrats’ reckless shutdowns.”

The wait times for security lines will worsen as the shutdown continues, the spokesperson said, while accusing Democrats of playing politics.

The lack of funding stems from the political impasse over demands by Democrats to reform U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) amid the Trump administration’s deportation campaign. 

“We are in a negotiation. However, we are not close,” Sen. Brian Schatz, D-Hawaii, said at one point. “You may think this is some issue that we think we’re going to turn to our political advantage, but I promise you, when we saw Renee Good and Alex Pretti killed, this became an issue that was beyond politics.”

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Meanwhile, some Republicans have said they will oppose changes to ICE sought by the Democrats. 

“Let me be clear, we are going to do nothing — nothing — that kneecaps ICE’s ability to enforce our immigration laws,” said Sen. Eric Schmitt, R-Mo.

The TSA website and app paused operations on Feb. 17. The site “will not be updated until after funding is enacted,” the TSA says on its site — leaving travelers high and dry when it comes to finding wait time information.

“Today, tens of thousands of TSA employees are receiving empty paychecks. Zero dollars,” Airlines for America President and CEO Chris Sununu said in a statement Friday. “Two weeks ago, these same TSA employees received partial paychecks. Last fall, they had to survive 43 days without pay.

“This failure of government to simply pay federal aviation employees is wrong. It is unfair,” added Sununu, the former governor of New Hampshire. “And it is a disgrace that Congress cannot reach an agreement or act on viable bipartisan solutions that have already been introduced.”

The Associated Press contributed to this report. 

This post was originally published here. 

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Home prices are still climbing, even as mortgage rates have eased slightly and inventory shows early signs of improvement, underscoring just how tight the U.S. housing market remains.

The median sales price for all existing homes last month hovered just below $400,000, marking the 32nd consecutive month of year-over-year price increases, according to the National Association of Realtors.

That persistent affordability squeeze is putting renewed pressure on homebuilders to help get the American dream back on track.

TRUMP PLEDGES TO MAKE HOUSING AFFORDABLE WHILE KEEPING VALUES UP

Despite softer consumer sentiment and elevated borrowing costs, the homebuilding industry is signaling cautious optimism heading into the year.

“A lot of builders, many of these small businesses, men and women building homes across this country, had some of the best January they’ve had in a while,” National Association of Home Builders CEO Jim Tobin told FOX Business.

Industry leaders say part of that momentum stems from growing acceptance that interest rates are likely to stabilize rather than surge higher. A resilient stock market and steady job growth have also helped support buyer confidence on the margins.

Meanwhile, a structural shift in the market is giving new construction a competitive edge.

For the first time in modern housing cycles, newly built homes in some markets are now cheaper than existing homes. Builders say “rate lock” dynamics are a major factor: millions of homeowners are reluctant to give up ultra-low 3% or 4% mortgages for rates closer to 6% or higher, limiting resale inventory and pushing more buyers toward new builds.

“A lot of people have more confidence in what their house should cost, and what we’re seeing right now is that new homes are the only game in town,” Tobin added.

HOMEBUYERS REFUSE TO BACK DOWN AS MORTGAGE RATES CONTINUE HOVERING STUBBORNLY NEAR 6% MARK

The supply imbalance remains severe. The U.S. is estimated to be roughly 4 million homes short, according to industry estimates, keeping upward pressure on prices even as construction activity fluctuates.

Still, builders face significant headwinds of their own, including high land costs, elevated labor expenses, material prices and regulatory hurdles at the local, state and federal levels.

At this year’s NAHB International Builders’ Show, the world’s largest annual light construction event, the industry is spotlighting new strategies aimed at improving affordability. Those include the use of alternative building materials, artificial intelligence in design and planning, and the expansion of smaller, more efficient housing models such as smart and tiny homes.

One of the most notable shifts is the steady downsizing of new homes.

AMERICAN HOMEBUYERS GAIN MOST PURCHASING POWER SINCE 2022

Following the Great Recession, the average new home size reached roughly 2,700 square feet, according to Census data and an NAHB analysis. That fell to about 2,565 square feet during the pandemic housing boom and is projected to decline further to around 2,400 square feet by the end of 2025, according to the latest data available.

Builders are also cutting costs by simplifying designs, reducing or streamlining design teams, and increasingly leveraging AI-driven planning tools to improve efficiency.

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As a result, the average price of a newly built home is now estimated to be roughly $30,000 lower than the average existing home in certain markets, a reversal that would have been nearly unthinkable in previous housing cycles.

With resale inventory constrained and affordability still strained, builders are increasingly positioning innovation, efficiency, and smaller footprints as the blueprint for easing America’s housing shortage.

This post was originally published here. 

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This rom-com formula is now a staple of holiday TV programming: a busy professional from the big city goes back home for Christmas and falls for a local guy after admitting her current boyfriend wasn’t her true soul mate.

According to Martha Gimbel, executive director of the Yale Budget Lab, this trope could also describe the bond market’s feelings about U.S. debt.

During a Senate hearing this week, she was asked what might trigger a debt crisis and why it hasn’t happened yet despite the explosion of borrowing in recent years. Gimbel replied it’s basic supply and demand, and investors are settling for the easier option, even if it doesn’t meet all their needs—they simply don’t have a better option right now, but that may not always be the case.

“The way that I sort of put it is we are currently the boyfriend at the beginning of the Hallmark movie in the big city where the girlfriend is still going out with him even though she knows that it’s wrong,” she explained. “But at some point she’s gonna go home to the small town and find the nice firefighter and realize that there’s another option.”

For now, as Gimbel explained, investors are settling for the status quo, but it’s only a matter of time before we hit a Sleepless in Stagflation moment and investors find better options. Much like a would-be suitor exaggerating how big their heart is, publicly held debt is pretty substantially—it already is as large as the U.S. GDP, and it will exceed the all-time record set after World War II in the comings years. Publicly held debt then will continue marching higher with no sign of abating as retiring baby boomers drive up entitlement spending.

Like the big-shot professional visiting the small town, treasury bonds are still in high demand, especially for now as a safe-haven asset, despite all the turmoil from President Donald Trump lately. The U.S. debt market remains by far the largest and most liquid, underpinned by the dollar’s status as the world’s reserve currency.

While Gimbel said she doesn’t know when U.S. debt will fall out of favor, the eurozone has been trying to make its debt more appealing to investors.

Europe is a top holder of U.S. debt, so any shift away from Treasuries could worsen the outlook by sending yields higher and adding to borrowing costs.

In 2021, Europe launched the Next Generation EU borrowing program financed through joint debt issuance. While intended as a pandemic-era stimulus program, the breakthrough measure was seen as boosting the euro’s status as reserve asset.

To be sure, other countries also have safe haven assets, including Germany and Scandinavia. But individually, their debt and currency markets aren’t big enough to fill the needs of global finance.

Gimbel pointed out that investors have piled into Switzerland lately, adding that the U.S. is fortunate that Swiss financial markets can’t absorb that much capital.

Helped by low debt levels and a reputation as a secure financial hub, Switzerland has long been seen as a safe haven. That sent the Swiss franc soaring 12.7% against the dollar last year as Trump’s trade war jolted markets. It shot up further this year after Trump threatened to seize Greenland from Denmark.

The war on Iran could worsen the U.S. debt outlook as additional military spending adds to the deficit, while higher bond yields due to oil-fueled inflation translate to bigger interest costs.

“The more we make ourselves less attractive to markets, the more likely it is that you will have a fiscal crisis,” Gimbel warned. “We are literally relying on the fact that markets have no place to go.”

This story was originally featured on Fortune.com

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A previously inactive crypto wallet generated roughly $2.5 million in unrealized profit after buying millions of TRUMP (CRYPTO: TRUMP) tokens shortly after the project announced a gala event for top holders.

Dormant Wallet Makes $7 Million Bet

A dormant wallet accumulated about 2.2 million tokens of Official Trump shortly after the project announced a gala luncheon at Mar-a-Lago.

According to on-chain data from Arkham Intelligence, the wallet, inactive for five months, began purchasing tokens from Binance on Mar. 13.

The whale executed four transactions, starting with a smaller test buy before making two purchases of roughly 1 million tokens each, followed by another 200,000-token acquisition, totalling …

Full story available on Benzinga.com

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XRP (CRYPTO: XRP) may be nearing a potential rebound as key support levels hold against Bitcoin (CRYPTO: BTC) and gold.

XRP Holds Key Range Against Bitcoin

Bitcoin has been trading within a defined range since early February, repeatedly testing both the upper and lower boundaries, trader Cryptoinsightuk said in a recent podcast.

While range highs often act as areas for potential reversals, they can also become breakout zones if buying pressure strengthens.

Meanwhile, XRP is currently trading near the lower boundary of its range against …

Full story available on Benzinga.com

This post was originally published here

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Individual income taxes accounted for more than half of the total revenue collected by the U.S. government in 2025. At a total of $2.6 trillion, they make up the largest share of government revenue. But income tax hasn’t always played a key role in tax revenue. In fact, it wasn’t even introduced as a concept until about 100 years into the country’s history after President Abraham Lincoln signed the very first federal income tax—a 3% flat tax on incomes exceeding $800—to fund the Civil War. Just as income tax didn’t always exist, it also may not last forever.

That’s if ex-presidential candidate and CEO of Noble Mobile Andrew Yang gets his way. In an interview on CNBC’s Squawk Box, Yang said it’s time for the U.S. to drop taxes on labor, in favor of taxes on AI. He argued that taxation is a tool used to discourage certain behaviors, and with human employment under threat, the government should stop penalizing the hiring of people. 

“We’re going to be in a position where we want to shore up labor in every quarter, in every organization and environment,” he said. “We should actually try to stop taxing labor,” and instead, start taxing AI.

Yang isn’t the first to float the idea of dropping taxes on labor. It’s a cause that’s caught the attention of billionaires and politicians alike. Sen. Cory Booker (D-NJ) recently introduced a bill that would eliminate income tax on the first $75,000 of earnings. Khosla Ventures founder and billionaire Vinod Khosla said in a recent interview with Fortune Editor-in-Chief Alyson Shontell that presidential candidates should run on a platform to remove income tax for those making less than $100,000. 

However, those making $100,000 or less only contributed to about 15% of the total income tax revenue last year, according to the think tank Bipartisan Policy Center. Business leaders and AI entrepreneurs predict AI will soon take over many jobs in the white-collar workforce, potentially raising unemployment to 20% (according to Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei). Microsoft AI chief Mustafa Suleyman thinks most white-collar work could be replaced within 18 months. And Yang has recently made a similar prediction. His warnings come from his own observations of the AI industry. 

“I just came from an AI conference out west, and holy cow!” he said, just after agreeing to the host’s question reconfirming his stance to shift the tax to AI. “They said to me that what we’re going to see in the next six months outstrips what we’ve seen in the last ten years, because the rate of change is on a hockey stick and heading up.”

While the labor market has been persistent in recent months, it’s shown signs of wavering, with unemployment ticking up to 4.4% last month, and employers posting 91,000 job losses. And several major tech companies have attributed mass layoffs to AI. Jack Dorsey’s Block last month cut nearly half of its workforce citing productivity gains from AI. And earlier this week, Australian-American tech firm Atlassian cut 10% of its global workforce. (Although Sam Altman of OpenAI has warned some companies are  “AI washing” or blaming layoffs on AI when, in reality, they’re thanks to another cause).

Beyond the AI era: a tax system for humanoid robots

Despite Yang’s thoughts to shift the tax scheme from laborers to AI companies, some tech leaders think taxing AI is unfeasible. But some think the labor threat isn’t coming from the chatbots, but rather the robots, and that the U.S. should actually plan to tax the labor humanoid robots could perform. 

AI-powered tech firm AskHumans founder Zak Kidd is proposing a tax on tasks, where businesses are levied a fee for every specific activity performed by a humanoid robot that replaces a human worker. AskHumans has been used by The World Bank, Fidelity, and The Ned, according to Kidd, who said he is actively pitching governors around the country on his task tax idea. This “tax the task” model is designed to replace the government tax revenue lost when an employer decides to swap a human employee for a mechanical system. 

“What we want to do is actually levy a tax on each of those activities that’s paid back to the state to replace that fiscal gap,” Kidd told Fortune, referring to tasks robots may one day be able to perform that will replace human labor.

Kidd uses a hotel like Marriott to illustrate his proposal, noting that replacing a $28-per-hour human housekeeper with a $2-per-hour robot results in a significant loss of tax revenue. But even with a slight tax on the business, the costs incurred would still total less than the human worker. 

Unlike Yang, Kidd thinks taxing AI raises too many logistical questions because, as more companies integrate AI into workflows, it’s harder to denote where the AI stops and the human interpretation starts. He thinks that while AI threatens white-collar work, robots could come for physical labor. 

“I see AI as an augmentation of knowledge work,” he said.  “But I see robotics, humanoid robotics as a replacement for manual work.”

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Americans have footed the bill for President Donald Trump’s tariffs, and now they’re demanding a refund.

The Supreme Court ruling striking down tariffs imposed under the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA) opened the door for U.S. companies to snap up refunds from the approximately $180 billion in import tax revenue. Now customers who experienced higher prices from the tariffs are demanding their fair share. 

Overwhelming data, including a report from the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, indicated that U.S. importers paid for the majority of the tariffs—up to 90%—with many passing down the increased costs to American consumers. Goldman Sachs estimated the tariffs added a 0.7% increase to inflation over 10 months, with prices to increase another 0.1% in 2026 because of levies.

Some U.S. consumers have taken matters into their own hands to recoup the extra costs they paid on tariffed goods over the last year, including pursuing litigation against U.S. companies, suing for tariff refunds. On Wednesday, plaintiff Matthew Stockov, an Illinois resident, filed a lawsuit against Costco, alleging the big-box retailer raised prices as a result of the tariffs and would receive “double recovery” if it collected the import tax refunds without distributing it back to consumers.

The complaint, filed in the U.S. District Court of the Northern District of Illinois, said Stockov purchased electronics, food, appliances, household items, and hygiene products at inflated prices due to tariffs.

“Costco was able to expand margins during the peak of the IEEPA tariff regime by selectively raising prices on tariffed goods,” the complaint said. “The higher prices consumers paid were a consequence of Costco’s increased cost of importation. Absent the imposition of the unlawful IEEPA tariffs, Costco would not have needed to raise prices on consumers in this way.”

According to the lawsuit, the proposed class could contain more than 100 Costco customers allegedly owed more than $5 million in tariff refunds.

Consumers’ fight for tariff refunds

In May 2025, Costco CFO Gary Millerchip told investors the retailer raised prices on some discretionary products like flowers as a result of the levies, but held prices steady on some tariffed produce items like bananas that were staples for shoppers.

The complaint pointed to previous reporting from Fortune, which cited a Goldman Sachs projection from August 2025 indicating consumers had absorbed 22% of total tariffs costs, but were projected to bear 67% of those costs by October 2025 as more costs were passed down.

Costco did not respond to Fortune’s request for comment, but has indicated plans to pass along tariff refunds to customers. The retailer was among the first companies to sue the Trump administration prior to the Supreme Court ruling in February with the goal to ensure the distribution of tariffs and avoid future uncertainty around the eligibility of refunds. In an earnings presentation earlier this month, CEO Ron Vachris said the company would return recovered tariff payments to shoppers through lowered prices, despite the fact that the “future impact of tariffs remains extremely fluid.”

It’s not just Costco that shoppers want on the hook for distributing refunds. Last month, a consumer similarly sued EssilorLuxottica, the maker of Ray-Ban sunglasses, claiming he was entitled to a tariff refund because the price of one sunglasses model increased from $287 in March 2025 to $304 in May. The plaintiff bought his glasses in August.

FedEx customer Matthew Resier in Miami also filed a proposed class action against the shipping company, alleging FedEx acted as a “customs broker,” collecting $36 in import taxes and fees on a pair of German shoes he had shipped to him. FedEx was one of the first of thousands of companies to sue the Trump administration following the Supreme Court ruling. FedEx sought a court order that would force Customs and Border Protects to repay the full amount it paid in tariffs, which executives previously estimated to be near $1 billion.

The company said it is planning to return tariff charges to customers if the government issues refunds.

“Our intent is straightforward: if refunds are issued to FedEx, we will issue refunds to the shippers and consumers who originally bore those charges,” a spokesperson told Fortune in a statement. “When that will happen and the exact process for requesting and issuing refunds will depend in part on future guidance from the government and the court.”

EssilorLuxittica did not respond to Fortune’s request for comment.

Will American consumers see tariff refunds at all?

Other companies have been explicit about intentions to give refunds to customers. Cards Against Humanity—a game maker which manufactures its products primarily in China—said following the ruling it would transfer recovered tariff charges back to its customers, asking them to fill out an online form with proof of payment during the tariff window.

“When the Trump Administration gives us our tariff refund, we won’t keep it,” the company said in an online post. “We’ll give 100% of the money back to you, our loyal customers, who actually make our business possible.”

Dame Products, a sexual health and wellness company which collected $70,000 in tariff surcharges from customers last year, plans to return the sum to consumers, according to CEO Alexandra Fine. 

Details on how and when the government will disperse the refunds, however, remain unclear. The Supreme Court was mum in its decision on any details about the refunds, leaving it to lower trade courts to determine the process to recover charges. Judge Richard Eaton of the U.S. Court of International Trade ruled last week that importers were indeed entitled to tariff refunds.

Trump previously indicated he would fight the refunds, with courts potentially taking years to litigate them. Supply chain experts said it may take 12 to 18 months.

Meanwhile, the tariff revenue, sitting in the U.S. Treasury, is accruing interest as a result of federal regulations. According to a Cato Institute report this month, the refunds are racking up $700 million in interest each month, which will also be passed down to 130 million American taxpaying households.

Cards Against Humanity acknowledged the uncertainty around the refund timeline: “Unfortunately, not even God Himself knows how long that will take.”

This story was originally featured on Fortune.com

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BlackRock CEO Larry Fink isn’t losing sleep over the possibility that some of the biggest players in AI could go bankrupt. In fact, he’s counting on it.

During a panel discussion at BlackRock’s 2026 Infrastructure Summit this week, the CEO of the world’s largest asset manager made it clear that as AI transforms the economy, at least “one or two” bankruptcies are inevitable.

“That’s capitalism. We’re going to have some huge successes, and we’re going to have a couple failures. OK. I’m good with that,” Fink said.

But that doesn’t mean he wants Big Tech to put a stop to its sky-high AI infrastructure investment. Instead, he wants more investment, which he said is especially important for the U.S. to beat China in the AI race. 

“They may in the short run overinvest, but the long-term demand will catch up,” Fink said.

One CEO of an unnamed hyperscaler told Fink they were happy to keep spending, even if it turns out they are overinvesting. “The one thing I can tell you with certainty, I can’t be third,” Fink said the CEO told him.

The BlackRock CEO’s comments come as capital expenditures from hyperscalers like Microsoft, Alphabet, Amazon, and Meta are predicted to reach $650 billion over the next 12 months, according to investment banking advisory firm Evercore ISI. That’s nearly a 70% increase from the $380 billion they invested in 2025. Some analyses say this spending could reach the trillions in the next three to five years.

For Fink, this type of competition and investment is fundamental to the way the U.S. economy is supposed to work.

“This is the beauty of capitalism, my gosh, having our five hyperscalers, six hyperscalers, and a new entrant beating up each other to try to have the best model. That is capitalism at its best,” he said.

BlackRock did not immediately respond to Fortune’s request for comment.

Yet, the heavy spending on AI is putting some Big Tech companies at risk of going cash flow negative by spending more than they bring in, Evercore noted in a report last month. While this doesn’t mean a company is unprofitable, Evercore said it is a “red flag” for their stock valuations.

For now, these tech companies have corporate debt levels below the median of S&P 500 companies, but these levels are also rising because of the increased capital expenditures, Evercore noted.

Amazon, Alphabet, Meta, Microsoft, and Oracle issued $121 billion in corporate bonds in 2025, significantly higher than the $28 billion the companies averaged over the previous five years, according to Bank of America analyst Yuri Seliger. 

Oracle, in particular, stands out among the group, having issued $26 billion in debt last year with plans to issue between $45 billion-$50 billion this year, Fortune reported. To be sure, Oracle in its most recent quarterly earnings reported a 22% year-over-year increase in its overall revenue fueled by surging cloud infrastructure revenue, which is closely tied to AI.

That helped ease concerns about debt-fueled spending eventually paying off. For his part, Fink isn’t worried.

“Their return on equity is still better than mine and I have a pretty good return on equity,” he said with a laugh.

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On Friday morning, the flashy crypto conference Token2049 Dubai, scheduled for late April, announced that it would not take place until 2027 amid war in the Middle East, according to a statement. On March 6, organizers had told Fortune that the event was taking place as planned, despite a week of escalating conflict in the region. 

The conference said that it made the decision due to “ongoing uncertainty in the region and its impact on safety, international travel and logistics”, according to the statement. 

Token2049 is not the first event to be canceled amid the violence in the region. Several others, including an entrepreneurship and innovation conference in Dubai and Abu Dhabi called the Megacampus Summit, were also shut down. Sporting events were also canned, most notably after tennis star Daniil Medvedev was stuck in Dubai after a tournament. 

After the U.S. and Israel struck Iran on February 28, violence spilled into other parts of the Middle East. A suspected airstrike partially damaged Dubai’s main airport, and four people were injured after missile debris came down on Palm Jumeirah, a Dubai island filled with luxury hotels. 

When Token2049 organizers told a Telegram group of its ticket holders on Sunday that the event was going on as planned, someone responded in the chat, “What are you talking about. Iran is still hitting the Dubai airport,” according to reporting by the Wall Street Journal. 

In 2025, over 15,000 people attended the conference, and the organizers called it a “festival-like environment.” Some of the headline speakers slated for this year’s conference were Eric Trump, Polymarket CEO Shayne Coplan, and Tether CEO Paolo Ardoino.

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XRP (CRYPTO: XRP) is up 2% on Friday despite ETF outflows on Thursday as derivatives volume exploded 35% over the last 24 hours.

The ETF Outflow Problem

XRP spot ETFs recorded $6.08 million in net outflows on March 12, extending a streak of redemptions even as technical momentum improved. 

Total net assets sit at $967.77 million, but flow patterns have been unstable with big inflows on March 6 and 9 totaling $34.73 million, then outflows on March 5, 10, and 12.

U.S.-listed XRP ETFs recorded roughly $3.9 million in outflows during the session. The negative flows suggest institutional investors are trimming positions despite the price rally.

The Short Squeeze Catalyst

Derivatives data shows where the real action is. Trading volume surged 35% to $4.45 billion while open interest rose 9.37% to $2.66 …

Full story available on Benzinga.com

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The Strait of Hormuz is too dangerous right now, even for the mighty U.S. Navy, which has been called upon to secure the narrow waterway and bring relief to the worst oil disruption ever.

Since the U.S.-Israel war on Iran started two weeks ago, traffic around the Persian Gulf choke point has come to a virtual standstill as the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps attacks commercial ships and tankers, keeping 20% of global oil supplies bottled up.

President Donald Trump and administration officials insist the Navy can escort ships, perhaps later this month as airstrikes continue to degrade Iran’s ability to launch missiles and drones.

But the U.S. military has reportedly turned down requests for protection so far. Defense officials told The Wall Street Journal Navy escorts aren’t currently feasible because Iran can still attack ships, adding they won’t happen until the threat of Iranian fire has eased.

Navy officials also told the Journal earlier this week U.S. warships and commercial vessels would face enormous risks, describing the Strait of Hormuz as an Iranian “kill box.”

The Pentagon responded to a request for comment by referring to remarks from a press briefing on Friday. Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Gen. Dan Caine acknowledged the threat in the strait while pointing out the military has effectively wiped out Iran’s naval fleet and destroyed its mine-laying ships.

“We’ve made progress, but Iran still has the capability to harm friendly forces and commercial shipping and our work on this effort continues,” he told reporters.

Caine later said: “It’s a tactically complex environment. Before we want to take anything through there at scale, we want to make sure we do the work pursuant to our current military objectives to do that safely and smartly.”

Despite reports saying Iran has started laying mines, the Pentagon has said there’s no evidence of that yet. But MIT professor Caitlin Talmadge said Iran has thousands of small vessels that could potentially be used to lay mines, adding that they could have been dispersed before the war started.

“Iran has extensive tunnel networks to protect and launch such vessels surreptitiously, including midget submarines and other submersibles useful for mine laying,” she posted on X on Wednesday.

There are also other threats that are potentially even more serious. For example, Iran’s coastal areas offer spots for launching anti-ship missiles, which can be fired from close distances and provide little time for a defensive response.

Nikolas Kokovlis/NurPhoto via Getty Images

Iran’s Shahed aerial drones, which have a longer range, can also be launched deeper inland and have been used to damage U.S. military and diplomatic targets around the region as swarms of the low-cost aircraft have overwhelmed defenses in some cases.

And despite losing much of its naval capabilities, the regime still has underwater and surface drones, which were used to attack oil tankers off the coast of Iraq, as well as small fast-attack boats that can threaten much bigger ships.

In fact, an Iranian vessel sailed close to the USS Abraham Lincoln aircraft carrier in the Arabian Sea, prompting an accompanying Navy destroyer to fire its 5-inch cannon, according to CBS News. But it missed multiple times, and a helicopter had to be sent to fire missiles at the Iranian boat.

To be sure, the Navy has long planned for an Iranian blockade of the strait and previously escorted ships through the Persian Gulf in the past during the so-called tanker wars in the late 1980s.

But Iran’s military capabilities weren’t as sophisticated as today’s, and the Navy’s fleet was twice as large. Meanwhile, numerous ships are still carrying out operations in the Caribbean.

In addition, there are more than 300 ships stranded in the Gulf due to Iran’s de facto blockade, and the slower pace required to escort them though the strait means getting all of them out could take months—or even years.

Top commodity analyst Jeff Currie, chief strategy officer at Carlyle Energy Pathways, told The Economist the cost of a single escort would exceed the value of the cargo it trying to protect.

This story was originally featured on Fortune.com

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Bitcoin (CRYPTO: BTC) is up 4% on Friday as PCE inflation fell to 2.8%, oil prices dropped, $3 billion in options gamma triggered dealer hedging and ETF inflows hit four consecutive days.

PCE Inflation Falls Below Estimates

The Personal Consumption Expenditures index increased 2.8% year-over-year in January 2026, according to data released today by the Bureau of Economic Analysis.

Month-over-month, PCE rose 0.3%.

Core PCE, excluding food and energy, rose 3.1% year-over-year and 0.4% month-over-month, remaining well above the Fed’s 2% target.

The data suggests inflation is moderating but remains a concern ahead of next week’s FOMC meeting, where the Fed is widely expected to hold rates steady despite President Trump’s calls for an emergency rate cut.

Oil Prices Drop On Russian Waiver

WTI crude oil futures fell more than 1.5% while Brent oil slipped 1% on Friday.

The decline followed the …

Full story available on Benzinga.com

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Tech CEOs have lauded that AI will turn workers into “superhumans” where work is optional, and more time dedicated to innovating the world—but so far, the opposite has been true for most. 

AI is actually increasing strain for most employees, as the tools add more time to menial tasks, and actually takes away from deep-focus work. Since adopting AI into their workflows, time spent across every job responsibility shot up anywhere from 27% to 346%, according to a recent ActivTrak report that analyzed 10,584 users 180 days before and after their AI adoption. 

The time spent toiling on grunt work like emails increased by 104%, while chatting and messaging climbed by 145%, and using business management tools rose 94%. 

There wasn’t a single activity category where using AI actually saved users time, with the report reaffirming that: “The data is unambiguous: AI does not reduce workloads.” Instead, professionals are now multitasking at a greater rate, and spending less of their days concentrating on complex problems.

“The prevailing assumption about AI and modern work is that both make the workday lighter. Shorter. More manageable. AI handles repetitive tasks, collaboration tools reduce friction and employees do more with less effort,” the ActivTrak report notes. 

“It’s a compelling story. It’s also not what the behavioral data shows.”

To fit these longer routine tasks in their workdays, employees have had to actually sacrifice deep-thinking time—despite CEOs promising AI would increase it. The length of the average focused, uninterrupted work session fell by 9%, and focused work hours dropped by an additional 2%, according to the report. This is a continuation of a three-year downward trend, as the share of time spent “in the zone” fell to 60% in 2025. 

CEOs say AI tools will bring an efficiency wave—and even shorter workweeks 

Tech leaders working fast to win the AI race have been spreading day-dreamy predictions about the future of the world. 

The CEO of Google DeepMind, Demis Hassabis, predicted that we’re only four years away from a “golden era” of prosperity, where the tech will help us “colonize the galaxy” and make people “superhuman” in their roles. And xAI founder Elon Musk believes that traditional work will be completely voluntary in the next 10 to 15 years thanks to the new tools, likening jobs to a hobby. And if AI only continues to get better, even “money will stop being relevant.”

“My prediction is that work will be optional. It’ll be like playing sports or a video game or something like that,” Musk said at the U.S.-Saudi Investment Forum in Washington this year. 

“If you want to work, [it’s] the same way you can go to the store and just buy some vegetables, or you can grow vegetables in your backyard,” he continued. “It’s much harder to grow vegetables in your backyard, and some people still do it because they like growing vegetables.”

Leaders are even speculating that AI efficiency gains will be so great that workweeks will shorten across the board. Zoom CEO Eric Yuan predicts that AI will lighten the load, enabling staffers to only come into the office a handful of days a week. 

“I feel like if AI can make all of our lives better, why do we need to work for five days a week?” Yuan told The New York Times last year. “Every company will support three days, four days a week. I think this ultimately frees up everyone’s time.”

Workers are dealing with ‘AI brain fry’ and burnout 

While some workers are having luck being more productive with the AI tools, they could be burning themselves out.

As employees tap into efficiency gains, they also take on more work in their daily routines, which could lead to burnout, according to a study from the University of California at Berkeley published this year. Burdened by a larger variety of tasks, they’re using the time typically spent for taking natural breaks to complete more AI prompting. Employees need time to recharge—otherwise they run the risk of actually becoming less productive. 

“AI brain fry” has also crept up as an issue in tech-forward workplaces. Employees are overwhelmed by intense oversight of AI tools, and it’s worsening their mental fatigue, according to a 2026 study from Boston Consulting Group. And the data showed that the number of AI tools doesn’t always necessarily link to increased productivity; those who used three or fewer AI tools self-reported improved efficiency, while it plummeted for those who used four or more.

“People were using the tool and getting a lot more done, but also feeling like they were reaching the limits of their brain power, like there were too many decisions to make,” Julie Bedard, study author and managing director and partner at Boston Consulting Group, told Fortune this year. “Things were moving too fast, and they didn’t have the cognitive ability to process all the information and make all the decisions.”

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SOLAI Limited (NYSE:SLAI) shares are down on Friday morning following a preliminary non-binding proposal from Chaince Digital Holdings Inc. to acquire all outstanding shares at a price of $3.069 per ADS.

• SOLAI stock is feeling bearish pressure. What’s behind SLAI decline?

The proposal represents a purchase price that is 110% of the company’s net asset value per ordinary share as of Sept. 30, 2025.

The final purchase price will be adjusted based on the most recent quarter-end net asset value, with a cap not to exceed $3.20 per ADS.

In addition, the board of directors has yet to make any decisions regarding the proposal, indicating that there is no guarantee of a definitive offer or agreement being executed. This uncertainty may contribute to the stock’s decline as investors weigh the implications of the potential acquisition.

Cash and Cryptocurrency Assets

As of Sept. 30, 2025, the company had cash and cash equivalents of $3.8 million, compared with cash and equivalents of $1.8 million as of Dec. 31, 2024.

As of Sept. 30, 2025, the company had cryptocurrency assets of …

Full story available on Benzinga.com

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Bitcoin’s (CRYPTO: BTC) four-year market cycle still appears intact, but 2026 may be too early to declare the end of the bear market, according to a prominent analyst.

Bitcoin Cycle Still Aligns With History

Benjamin Cowen said on Thursday that Bitcoin’s long-standing cycle pattern remains largely consistent with previous market cycles, despite claims on social media that the structure has broken.

According to Cowen, many investors believe the cycle failed because Bitcoin did not reach the extreme price targets they expected or because altcoins underperformed.

However, historical data suggests the cycle has followed a similar timeline to past market peaks.

Cowen noted that Bitcoin’s major cycle tops have historically occurred in Q4 of the post-halving year, including …

Full story available on Benzinga.com

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Cryptocurrency trading platform Coinbase Global (NASDAQ:COIN) is seeing elevated bets against the public company with short interest doubling in 2026. Here’s what that could mean for a share rally and potential short squeeze.

Coinbase Short Interest Rises

Investors continue to look for stocks with high short interest that could see short squeezes as prices rise. While Coinbase is not among the most shorted stocks overall yet, the stock is seeing elevated short interest.

A new report from S3 Partners shows that Coinbase’s short interest was around 5% in December and is now around 10%, doubling to start the 2026 year.

The rising short interest comes amid Coinbase stock down 18.3% year-to-date, compared to a 16.7% decline for Bitcoin (CRYPTO: BTC) and a 2.5% decline for the SPDR S&P 500 ETF Trust

Full story available on Benzinga.com

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Token2049 postponed its Dubai crypto conference from April 2026 to April 2027 citing ongoing uncertainty in the region as the United Arab Emirates faces missile strikes from Iran, with around 15,000 attendees expected at the event.

The Safety Decision

Organizers announced the postponement Friday “in light of the ongoing uncertainty in the region and its impact on safety, international travel and logistics.” The two-day event will now take place April 21-22, 2027.

Dubai authorities reported at least two strikes Thursday morning after residents received missile alerts overnight, underlining the threat to the financial and tourist hub long seen as a safe haven. 

Dubai also reported further missile threats on Friday, as well as a “minor incident” in its central area.

“The safety and experience of our community always comes first,” Token2049 said …

Full story available on Benzinga.com

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When Anthropic announced that its Claude® Code tool could help “break the cost barrier” to COBOL modernization, markets reacted as if a long-standing enterprise problem had finally met its silver bullet. The prospect is compelling: AI that can rapidly map, analyze, and refactor decades-old code running mission-critical systems in banking, government, and airlines.

But moments like this often compress complexity into a single narrative. The story quickly became less about what AI is uniquely good at and more about what people hoped it might magically replace.

The truth is both simpler and more exciting: AI isn’t the end of software; it’s the beginning of a new era for it. 

We’ve Never Been Here Before

We’re living through one of the most exciting moments in the history of software. There has never been a better time to work in this industry. AI is reshaping what’s possible, and the level of investment pouring into technology rivals some of the most transformative public infrastructure efforts in modern history.

The national highway system, for instance, didn’t just move cars—it connected economies, created industries, and multiplied human potential. The same is true of AI now.

AI is creating similar conditions for an unprecedented acceleration of innovation. And we should welcome this moment. Every new advance from Anthropic’s breakthroughs in reasoning algorithms to cloud-scale automation makes the entire software ecosystem stronger.

These investments lift everyone working in the software industry, making technology more accessible and extending its benefits across society. But progress, especially rapid progress, often invites misunderstanding.

AI Isn’t a Silver Bullet — It’s a Multiplier

AI is often portrayed as an ultimate solution; a tool that can singlehandedly modernize legacy systems or replace the need for deep architectural work. It’s an appealing idea, but a misleading one.

In practice, AI helps organizations navigate complexity. It can map, refactor, and analyze codebases faster than humanly possible, reducing friction and accelerating discovery. But understanding logic is not the same as redesigning systems. 

Consider a global bank modernizing its risk management platform. AI can read millions of lines of code, identify dependencies, and propose refactoring strategies in hours instead of months. But deciding how that system should evolve, how data should flow, how governance must adapt, and how compliance risk is mitigated requires human reasoning.

Real modernization demands context—reasoning about how applications interact, how governance and data integrity are maintained, and how change unfolds safely across an enterprise. Just as the highway system required sound engineering beneath the asphalt, AI depends on durable infrastructure beneath its models. Intelligence on its own doesn’t guarantee reliability; it amplifies the value of what’s already stable, secure, and well-designed.

This Is a Renaissance, Not a Replacement

This is more than an AI revolution; it’s a renaissance in software itself. For the first time in decades, the industry is rediscovering the power of systems thinking, recognizing that lasting innovation requires harmony between new intelligence and existing architecture. Modernization isn’t about replacement; it’s about evolution at scale.

At Rocket Software, we’ve long viewed modernization as an estate-level discipline—looking across the entirety of an organization’s applications, not just individual programs or platforms. That means understanding how systems depend on one another, how data moves and is governed, and how changes in one layer ripple across the environment. Our focus on explainable AI, governed insights, and architectural visibility helps organizations move forward without abandoning the stability and reliability their businesses depend on. In that sense, modernization is as much about preservation as progress.

The Real Advantage Goes to Builders, Not Chasers

Every major shift in enterprise technology follows a familiar pattern: new capabilities emerge, expectations skyrocket, and then the industry rediscovers the enduring value of the foundations beneath them. AI is the latest and most powerful expression of that cycle.

The opportunity ahead is not to chase disruption, but to build the next generation of systems with intention and reasoning, combining the speed of AI with decades of enterprise software experience. The organizations that will win are the ones that blend speed with structure, innovation with governance, and intelligence with architectural discipline.

It’s a remarkable time to work in software. But the real advantage will go to those who understand that AI is not the finish line, it is the catalyst. The next decade belongs to those who know how to harness its power while strengthening the systems that support it. 

The opinions expressed in Fortune.com commentary pieces are solely the views of their authors and do not necessarily reflect the opinions and beliefs of Fortune.

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For generations, AT&T has occupied a familiar place in American business: the phone company, the network operator, the connective tissue behind much of daily communication. But in COO Jeff McElfresh’s telling, that description is no longer big enough. The company’s latest move, a sweeping $250 billion commitment through 2030 tied to fiber, 5G, resilience, public safety, workforce development, and AI era infrastructure, is meant to do more than reinforce its position in telecom. It is designed to position AT&T as the infrastructure layer beneath commerce and AI workloads.

That ambition is framed internally not so much as a pivot but as an escalation. McElfresh describes the decision as a reaffirmation of a role the company has played for decades: investing in the systems that made the modern internet possible in the first place.

He argues that many people still misunderstand what the internet actually is, seeing only the services on top of it rather than the networks that connect servers, devices, and the end users and locations. It is also the pathway through which people and businesses reach cloud computing resources, data centers, AI workloads, and large language models.

That framing matters because it speaks to a deeper strategic question facing AT&T, and really every incumbent in an era defined by AI exuberance. Is the company still best understood as a traditional telecom operator, or is it becoming something more like a connectivity platform or essential digital infrastructure? McElfresh’s answer is expansive. “All the above,” he says.

AT&T remains a telecom company, but one whose future depends on blending wireless and fiber into a single connectivity platform. More than that, McElfresh is making the case that AT&T wants to be the essential network layer of the AI economy. “Our vision is that AT&T becomes the highway upon which commerce and AI workloads traverse,” he tells Fortune.

It is a remark that captures both the scale of the opportunity and the risk. In the AI economy, attention tends to flow toward model makers, chip designers, hyperscale cloud companies, and app developers. But none of those businesses operate in a vacuum. They depend on resilient, high-capacity networks that can quickly and reliably move vast amounts of data. If McElfresh is right, the winners in the next phase of AI will include both those building the intelligence and those building the roads.

From AT&T’s perspective, the company has already been laying the groundwork for that thesis. McElfresh, who has spent some 30 years at AT&T, points to a strategic refocusing over the past several years on its core business of connectivity and convergence, with the company investing heavily in high-performing fiber. Today, he says, AT&T has connected 36 million locations with fiber and aims to reach more than 60 million endpoints, spanning homes, apartment buildings, schools, and government facilities.

The scale of the physical project is striking. Every month, McElfresh says, AT&T is physically installing more than 3,300 miles of fiber optic cable, roughly the distance from New York to Los Angeles. That analogy cuts through the abstraction that often surrounds conversations about AI. Somebody still has to build the underlying network. Permits have to be filed, trenches have to be dug, fiber has to be laid, workers have to be hired, and capital has to be allocated.

That is where the AI narrative shifts from theoretical to operational. McElfresh argues that AT&T is not only building the infrastructure required for an AI-driven economy, but also using AI internally to improve its ability to do so. The company uses AI to support technicians during home visits, assist engineers in determining where to place cell sites, and optimize fiber deployment. He says those tools are already improving productivity and enabling more accurate capital allocation decisions than the company was making just a few years ago.

For all the anxiety surrounding AI’s impact on jobs, McElfresh frames the technology first as a productivity engine that augments work already being done. AI is also becoming part of the machinery that helps AT&T execute its enormous spending plan more efficiently.

The company is already seeing AI begin to alter how data moves across its systems. During the pandemic, AT&T watched remote work redirect network use from downtown business districts to suburban neighborhoods in real time. Now, in the AI era, AT&T is seeing more data fed into the network rather than simply pulled from it, as connected cars and AI-driven software systems upload video, images, and other information to train models or receive their next instructions.

That emerging reality requires AT&T to transform itself alongside the network it is expanding. And that is where one of the interview’s central tensions comes into focus. Spending $250 billion over a decade suggests ambition. Still, it also raises a classic corporate problem: How can a company with the scale and infrastructure footprint of a utility maintain the speed and adaptability of a tech firm?

McElfresh says the challenge is not new, noting that AT&T’s longevity over roughly 150 years has depended on its repeated ability to reinvent itself. He traces that evolution from copper-based voice service to data over copper, then to mobility, and now to fiber-optics and gigabit-speed connectivity.

Perhaps the clearest sign of AT&T’s seriousness about its AI plans is the accounting. McElfresh says that beginning in 2026, AT&T will separate its financial reporting into an advanced connectivity profit-and-loss statement and a legacy one, giving investors a clearer view of where future services are growing and where older parts of the business are shrinking. That move suggests a company trying to force discipline around transformation. Separate reporting creates visibility for investors and gives management a scoreboard, making it harder to hide behind the inertia of a mixed legacy-and-growth portfolio.

There is a cultural dimension to all of this that McElfresh returns to repeatedly. He is a second-generation AT&T employee and has spent roughly three decades at the company, a fact that seems to inform both his reverence for the institution and his impatience with complacency. Asked what a company with this much history needs to guard against if it wants to define the next era rather than merely preserve the last one, he answers without hesitation.

“It’s being too comfortable with maintaining the status quo and managing the company that you have today, as opposed to stepping forward with a clear lens on the market, what kind of competition or technology is orbiting around your industry, and charging ahead on that to go build the company you want.”

That, he suggests, is the central challenge behind AT&T’s infrastructure push. The risk is not any single threat. Cyber threats, infrastructure failures, and geopolitical disruptions are real, but familiar. What keeps McElfresh up at night is the organization’s pace. “What AI is doing to us as a publicly-traded company, as an industry, or just in general, is the expectation that we can all move at a quicker clock speed, which requires a little level of discomfort.”

That brings him back to the $250 billion commitment, which he describes as a bet that AT&T, as both a telecom company and a connectivity platform, will remain central to the future it is helping build.

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At 8:30 a.m. Eastern Time on March 13, 2026, oil was priced at $99.84 per barrel with Brent serving as the benchmark (we’ll explain different benchmarks later in this article). That’s a rise of $1.08 compared with yesterday morning and around $29.47 higher than the price one year ago.

Oil price per barrel % Change
Price of oil yesterday $98.76 +1.09%
Price of oil 1 month ago $67.92 +46.99%
Price of oil 1 year ago $70.37 +41.87%

Will oil prices go up?

It’s impossible to forecast oil prices with detailed precision. Many different elements affect the market, but ultimately it boils down to supply and demand. When worries about economic recession, war, and other large-scale disruptions increase, oil’s path can shift fast.

How oil prices translate to gas pump prices

Gas prices at the pump don’t only track crude oil. They also include what it takes to refine and move that fuel, the taxes layered on top, and the extra markup your local station adds to stay in business.

Since crude oil generally makes up a majority of the per-gallon cost, changes in its price have an outsized impact. When oil surges, gas prices typically rise in tandem. But when oil retreats, gas prices often lag on the way down, a trend sometimes described as “rockets and feathers.”

The role of the U.S. Strategic Petroleum Reserve

In case of emergency, the U.S. has a store of crude oil known as the Strategic Petroleum Reserve. Its primary purpose is energy security in case of disaster (think sanctions, severe storm damage, even war). But it can also go a long way toward softening crippling price hikes during supply shocks.

It’s not a long-term answer and is more meant to provide temporary relief, assisting consumers and keeping critical parts of the economy running, like key industries, emergency services, public transportation, etc.

How oil and natural gas prices are linked

Both oil and natural gas are key sources of the energy we use every day. Because of this, a big change in oil prices can affect natural gas. For example, if oil prices increase, some industries may swap natural gas for some segments of their operations where possible, which increases demand for natural gas.

Check Out Our Daily Rates Reports

Historical performance of oil

To gauge oil’s performance, we often turn to two benchmarks:

  • Brent crude oil, the main global oil benchmark.
  • West Texas Intermediate (WTI), the main benchmark of North America

Between these two, Brent better represents global oil performance because it prices much of the world’s traded crude. And, it’s often the best way to track historical oil performance. In fact, even the U.S. Energy Information Administration now uses Brent as its primary reference in its Annual Energy Outlook.

Looking at the Brent benchmark across several decades, oil has been anything but steady. It’s seen spikes due to factors such as wars and supply cuts, and it’s also seen crashes from global recessions and an oversupply (called a “glut”). For example:

  • The early 1970s brought the first big oil shock when the Middle East cut exports and imposed an embargo on the U.S. and others during the Yom Kippur War.
  • Prices dropped in the mid-1980s for reasons such as lower demand and more non-OPEC oil producers entering the industry.
  • Prices spiked again in 2008 with increased global demand, but it soon plummeted alongside the global financial crisis.
  • During the 2020 COVID lockdown, oil demand collapsed like never before—bringing prices below $20 per barrel.

All to say, oil’s historical performance has been anything but smooth. Again, it’s hugely affected by wars, recessions, OPEC whims, evolving energy initiatives and policies, and much more.

Energy coverage from Fortune

Looking to stay up-to-date regarding the latest energy developments? Check out our recent coverage:

Frequently asked questions

How is the current price of oil per barrel actually determined?

The current price of oil per barrel depends largely on supply and demand, including news about potential future supply and demand (geopolitics, decisions made by OPEC+, etc.). In the U.S., prices also move based on how friendly an administration is to drilling, as it can affect future supply. For example, 2025 saw the Trump administration move to reopen more than 1.5 million acres in the Coastal Plain of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge for oil and gas leasing, reversing the Biden administration’s policy of limiting oil drilling in the Arctic.

How often does the price of oil change during the day?

The price of oil updates constantly when the “futures” markets are open. A futures market is effectively an auction where people agree to buy or sell oil in the future. As long as people and companies are trading contracts, the oil price is changing.

How does U.S. shale oil production affect the current price of oil?

In short, shale is rock that contains oil and natural gas. Think of shale as energy yet to be tapped. The more shale the U.S. accesses, the more energy we’ll have—and the more easily oil prices can keep from spiking as much thanks to a greater supply.

How does the current price of oil impact inflation and the broader economy?

When oil is expensive, it tends to make everyday items cost more. This can be related to energy (your heating, gas utilities, etc.), but it’s also due to the logistics involved with making those items accessible to you. Shipping, for example, can affect the price of things at the grocery store, as it’s more expensive to get those products from warehouses and farms onto the shelf.

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Good morning. Just as more than 100,000 U.S. financial advisors are expected to retire over the next decade, Thrivent is racing to hire the next generation.

The Minneapolis-based financial services company announced this week plans to hire 600 financial advisors in 2026 as part of an effort to expand its workforce. The company exceeded the same hiring target in 2025 and said continued recruitment will help meet rising demand for purpose-driven financial advice.

“This is part of our growth plan,” Nick Cecere, Thrivent’s chief distribution officer, told me. “Adding new advisors is how we continue to grow our business.”

Thrivent recruits advisors through both its traditional field network and a newer Virtual Advice Team, an employee channel where advisors serve clients remotely rather than through a traditional in-person practice. Participants typically spend 12 to 24 months in the program before joining an established advisor team or launching their own practice.

The program attracts both early-career professionals and second-career candidates, Cecere said, like teachers, coaches and business professionals, for example, seeking a career focused on helping clients.

The hiring push also reflects a broader talent shortage in the financial advice industry, as many veteran advisors approach retirement. According to McKinsey, addressing this gap requires changing the advisor operating model to increase productivity (lead generation, teaming, and an AI- and technology-enabled shift toward value-adding activities) and also attracting new talent to the industry faster than before.

Thrivent, No. 388 on the Fortune 500, is led by CEO Terry Rasmussen. It has more than $212 billion in assets under management and advisement, more than 4,500 employees, and serves 2.4 million clients. Thrivent was founded in 1902 as an aid association for Lutherans, and its banking and investment services are open to nonmembers, regardless of religious affiliation, according to the company.

It operates regional hubs in Atlanta, Dallas, Denver, Minneapolis and Milwaukee that support the virtual advice program, and the company is considering further expansion.

Thrivent is investing in AI to support, not replace, its advisors. “We’ve made the strategic decision to hire more financial advisors because it will enable us to serve even more people,” according to David Royal, Thrivent’s EVP and chief financial and investment officer. 

The personal relationships and trust between Thrivent’s advisors and clients are “deeply important” for planning the future, building legacies, and improving their communities, Royal said. Technology, including AI, helps modernize the business and “gives our teams better tools so they can focus on high‑value, purpose‑driven work,” he said.

Strong advisor retention and client satisfaction remain central to Thrivent’s long-term growth strategy, Cecere said, as the industry adapts to changing demographics and new digital tools.

Have a good weekend.

Sheryl Estrada
sheryl.estrada@fortune.com

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The Iran war is reshaping global flight paths, posing a threat to Southeast Asia’s key tourism sector. Iranian missile and drone attacks have shut down key Middle Eastern aviation hubs like Dubai, Abu Dhabi and Doha, cutting off popular travel routes for European and U.S. travelers to get to Southeast Asia’s beaches and temples. Travel experts now fear that countries like Thailand, Cambodia and Indonesia may soon see a dip in tourists. 

“There aren’t non-stop flights between Europe and destinations like Bali and Cambodia,” Brendan Sobie, a Singapore-based independent aviation analyst, tells Fortune. “These countries, which are heavily dependent on tourism, are also more impacted due to the trickle down effect on their economies.”

Tourism is a mainstay of Southeast Asia’s economy. In 2024, tourism accounted for 9.4% of Cambodia’s GDP, and 12% of Thailand’s. 

Major Gulf carriers including Emirates, Qatar Airways and Etihad have scrapped thousands of flights to and from the Middle East. This has ripple effects on some Southeast Asian carriers; Malaysia Airlines, for instance, relies on Qatar Airways to move tourists from the U.S., Europe, and the Middle East into Southeast Asia.

“Malaysia Airlines doesn’t fly into Europe much, except for London and Paris,” said Mayur Patel, the Asia head at aviation consultancy OAG. “A lot of their codeshares were through Doha with Qatar Airways, and if airplanes can’t fly into Doha, it would certainly put a constraint on traffic flow.”

How have global airlines been hit?

Airline networks worldwide have been rattled by airspace closures and skyrocketing jet fuel prices, which have doubled since the Iran conflict began. Airlines are suspending some routes to the Middle East for weeks, if not months. Carriers are also slapping fuel surcharges on flights, and Air New Zealand pulled its guidance on Tuesday due to increased fuel costs.

“In the first week of the war, we saw a 50% drop in total bookings,” said Lucy Jackson Walsh, the co-founder and managing director of Lightfoot Travel, a luxury travel firm with offices in Dubai, London, Singapore and Hong Kong. Bookings for Middle Eastern destinations—about 15% of Lightfoot’s business—vanished almost immediately.

“We’re shifting our focus towards Asia‑to‑Asia regional travel and also trips to further‑flung destinations like Australia which don’t have to route through the Middle East,” she said.

Supply chain disruptions from closed airspace and waterways are also delaying aircraft maintenance, repair and operations (MRO), and exacerbating existing aircraft delivery delays from manufacturers like Airbus and Boeing.

“There’s a shortage of aerospace spare parts and components, which may be delivered from Europe or the U.S.,” Kent Yar, an independent aerospace consultant, told Fortune. “To manufacture airplane parts, you also need raw materials… everything boils down to supply chain issues.” He estimates that airplane spare parts have seen a 15% jump in price since the Iran war began.

Do any airlines stand to benefit?

Still, some Asian carriers like Singapore Airlines and Hong Kong’s Cathay Pacific, which fly several non-stop routes between Asia and Europe, might have an edge over other disrupted carriers. “Existing non-stop flights between Asia and Europe have already re-routed in light of the Russia-Ukraine war, and don’t necessarily use Iran or Middle Eastern airspace,” Sobie explained. 

But this will be a slim silver lining compared to the overall hit to the sector. 

“I don’t think anybody’s happy,” Sobie said. “Some airlines will have routes that see an extra surge in load factor and revenue—and that’s natural—but it does not offset the negative of how this crisis has impacted the overall industry.”

Even so, some in the industry hope things will recover when, or if, the conflict dies down. 

“What I’m hoping is that we’ll see revenge travel after the conflict dies down,” says Walsh of Lightfoot. “Like after the COVID‑19 pandemic, when markets came back, travel took off again.”

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Strategy Inc. (NASDAQ:MSTR) shares are trending upward in Friday’s premarket session. The move follows a recovery in Bitcoin (CRYPTO: BTC) prices.

The digital asset climbed 3.22% over the last 24 hours to trade at $72,180.87. Nasdaq futures are up 0.18% while S&P 500 futures have gained 0.21%.

Massive Bitcoin Acquisition Boosts Sentiment

Investor confidence grew following Strategy’s last week’s $1.28 billion Bitcoin purchase. The company acquired 17,994 BTC at an average price of $70,946. This marks the firm’s 11th consecutive week of accumulation.

Strategy now holds Bitcoin valued at $52.65 billion, exceeding its $47 billion market valuation.

Executive Chairman Michael Saylor commented on the price action via X on Thursday evening. …

Full story available on Benzinga.com

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Solana’s (CRYPTO: SOL) official X account teased the cryptocurrency as a kind of “precious metal” on Thursday, sparking curiosity across the community.

‘Solanamaxxing’ In The Air

Solana’s post quoted Phantom wallet’s “precious metal maxxing” image with its own version showing metal bars arranged to resemble the Solana logo.

When asked whether the “intern” was “Solanamaxxing,” the handle replied, “Always.”

Several custom metal-themed artworks …

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Kash Razzaghi, Chief Commercial Officer of Circle Internet Group Inc. (NASDAQ:CRCL), said cryptocurrency’s next chapter will be defined by payments and utility rather than speculation.

All About Solving ‘Real-World Problems’

Mastercard (NYSE:MA) on Thursday revisited an exchange it had with Razzaghi in January after returning from the World Economic Forum in Davos.

“It was really all about infrastructure and how blockchain technology and digital assets can solve real-world problems or enhance capabilities of money movement, store of value and access to financial systems and tools,” Razzaghi talked about the event.

Razzaghi noted that clearer regulations are opening the door for institutions, while the …

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Shark Tank’s Kevin O’Leary urges couples to think about their future together before they shell out for a big wedding. 

The investor and founder of O’Leary Ventures, who is known for his blunt takes on everything from remote work to Gen Z, has some characteristically frank advice for young couples: Save your wedding money.

“What’s the number one mistake that people make before they get married?” asked O’Leary in a video published Wednesday. “I’m talking about just before they get married, they plan a huge wedding. What a waste of money.” 

Instead, O’Leary said couples should think small for the sake of their future selves, opting for a civil ceremony and a party afterwards with just a small group of friends.

“Be very selective on who you invite. They got to be meaningful to you, and forget the big extravaganza,” he said.

O’Leary’s comments come as the price of a wedding in the U.S. has jumped to above $30,000. The average cost of an American wedding stood at $36,000 as of 2026, according to wedding planning platform Zola. This price tag includes renting a venue, the wedding dress, as well as flowers and photography. A separate Zola study of 11,500 couples from January found 84% also believe their wedding will cost more this year compared to two years ago because of the economy or tariffs.

Still, Zola’s head of brand Sammi Kobrin said when it comes to bringing family and friends together at their wedding, “the vast majority say it will be well worth the cost.” 

But when couples are dropping so much money on their weddings, and often going over budget, according to Zola, the strain has jumped not just for couples and their families—but also wedding guests, who are increasingly being asked to comply with demanding expectations related to the dress code and the gifts they receive.

In this context, O’Leary said couples should skip the stress and use the money they would have spent on their wedding for something big down the line.

“Instead of spending a lot of dough, you spend a small amount, take the difference and invest it in your mutual future, maybe a deposit on a house,” he said.

For couples looking to buy a home, skipping a wedding instead of resorting to a downpayment fund on their wedding registry, may make financial sense, even if it may not feel good emotionally. 

The average age of a first-time home buyer has risen to an all-time-high of 40 years old, which may be no surprise as the median sales price of an American home reached $405,000 in the last quarter of 2025, according to the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis. A person looking to put up the optimal 20% down payment on a median priced home would have to save $81,000 to avoid paying private mortgage insurance (PMI).

While the conventional 30-year mortgage rate has fallen to about 6% from a high of 8% in 2023, home prices have risen so much that more than half of six-figure earners say buying a house is out of reach.

Even after the wedding, O’Leary said a dream honeymoon should also be out of the question. Why take a luxury vacation, he asked, if the couple is still not established financially? 

“Once you actually stabilize and you get yourselves in order, then take a vacation,” he said. “But putting yourselves in massive amounts of debt just to get married is really stupid.” 

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Sea mines are “simple, uncool weapons,” Scott Savitz, a naval marine warfare expert at RAND who was stationed in Bahrain in 2001, told Fortune. They predate World War I and haven’t advanced much since; they look like the spiky metal balls you’d imagine from the movies, small enough to slip neatly into a fishing boat and packed with TNT and ammonium nitrate. 

But when they go off, they can snap ships straight in half, Savitz said. They have a “much greater effect, typically, than a missile,” and can inflict millions of dollars worth of damage for just a few thousand bucks a pop. And they’re pretty effective too: naval mines have caused 77% of all U.S. Navy ship casualties since 1950, per the Strauss Center at the University of Texas. 

As the 13th day of the Iran conflict draws to a close and with no end in sight, Iran is looking towards old tech to elevate its position in a war that has so far been dominated by hypersonic missiles. The sea mine isn’t flashy, but right now it could be Iran’s most dangerous weapon in the military conflict against the United States.

Some U.S. intelligence officials told CNN that Iran has begun laying mines in the Strait of Hormuz, the chokepoint that carries a fifth of the world’s oil and is currently the subject of the standoff between Iran and the U.S. Iran has attacked several oil tanker ships in and around the Strait in recent days, including two Iraqi oil tankers in the Persian Gulf that left one crew member dead. Nearly a quarter billion barrels per day of crude has been stranded in the Gulf since the war began nearly two weeks ago, commodity expert Rory Johnston has estimated. Crude oil prices have spiked, at the time of writing hovering just under $100 a barrel, and gas is up 20% due to the blockage. Across the Pacific, the situation is more dire: Pakistan has closed schools and mandated 4-day-work weeks; India is closing restaurants and hotels across the country to preserve oil for cooking; and Thailand has asked government bureaucrats to forego the elevator. 

The Strait of Hormuz isn’t actually “closed” by Iran, Savitz said. “It’s the decision of individual users whether or not they are willing to bear the risk. If they can raise the risk, or the perceived risk, to a level such that commercial traffic decides that they will not go through that strait, then that’s sufficient.”

The current risk level in the Strait has already scared off most major marine war insurers, who have pulled their coverage of ships in the Strait. Freight rates have soared to record highs, and a very large crude carrier heading from the strait to China can earn half a million in revenue a day. Yet, if true that Iran has laid mines in the Strait, that would turn a temporary blockade into something even harder to undo.

The psychological warfare of the sea mine

Sea mines are so powerful, in part, because they have “disproportionate psychological effects,” designed to prey on the fear of the unknown. The mines are nearly invisible at every stage and are incredibly difficult to detect—unlike missiles, where sailors can use heat signatures or trails picked up by radars. But for a mine, all that needs to happen is a vessel pulls up, shoves one overboard, and moves on. “There’s a splash in the water,” Savitz said. “Ships are dropping things in the water all the time.” 

There’s even more psychological warfare at play. Some mines are programmed to ignore the first ship that passes, detonating only on the fifth, just so that the mine-clearing team goes through safely and the tanker behind it takes the hit. 

Ship operators often fall into one of two traps: they either say, “’Well, I can’t see it, so I’m just going to ignore it’ and blindly find themselves in trouble,” Savitz explained, “Or they say, ‘Well, the waters might be mined,’ and they overreact and are unwilling to assume any risk from mines, even as they’re assuming other types of risk.” 

Some of the worst incidents have been due to the latter mistake. During the tanker war of the ’80s, Iran and Iraq attacked 450 ships in the Persian gulf, and their most devastating weapon was the mine. In 1988, ten Navy sailors were severely injured on the USS Samuel Roberts after hitting an Iranian M-08 mine designed exactly 80 years earlier. “All three of the US warships that were damaged by mines in 1988 and 1991 did not know they were in a minefield when it happened,” Savitz said. The U.S. responded with Operation Praying Mantis, the largest American naval surface battle since World War II, sinking half of Iran’s operational navy in a single afternoon. The repairs cost $90 million, all for a weapon approximated to be worth $1,500. 

The U.S. has had decades to prepare since the disaster. Yet, “The U.S. has been underinvesting in mine warfare for many decades,” Savitz said. The Navy decommissioned its last dedicated minesweepers in the Persian Gulf last September. Their replacements were supposed to be the littoral combat ship—a program Savitz called “a disaster,” because they built tiny metal ships that could set off the mines as opposed to the traditional wood and fiberglass minesweepers.

More so, mines are too boring to compete for budget. “A hypersonic missile is exciting and gets attention. Mines don’t.” The last time a U.S. warship was damaged by a mine was in 1991.

Hormuz escalation 

The question is if the conflict in the strait will escalate that far. Savitz is cautiously optimistic. “Yes, we will be able to get it open,” he said. The U.S. has divers, unmanned systems, allied minesweepers from Europe—even Navy dolphins trained to detect mines, he said. But the timeline depends entirely on what else is happening around them. Mine countermeasures forces move slowly, in predictable patterns, through waters that may also be covered by Iranian missiles, explosive boats, and drones. “Can we suppress those threats well enough that mine countermeasures forces can operate without undue hindrance?” Savitz said. “That’s the challenge.”

And even under ideal conditions, clearing mines is agonizingly slow. Savitz estimated the cost ratio between laying and clearing at “between one and three orders of magnitude”—essentially, up to a thousand times more expensive to remove a mine than to deploy one. 

“A hasty clearance”—opening just one single narrow lane for tankers to push through—could happen in days, Savitz said. Getting the strait to a safety level where tanker operators are willing to accept the risk could take weeks. But to fully remove and sweep the entire waterway, where tankers feel fully confident nothing is left, could take far longer; or could never come. There are still World War II mines in the Baltic Sea and the Pacific because they aren’t fully cleaned up.

Eventually, the calculus will shift. During the Tanker War, ships ran through minefields anyway. About 1% took a hit, Savitz said, “but the risk was deemed to be justified by the reward.”

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Soaring oil prices won’t just cause you trouble at the tank. 

Energy is one of the most critical inputs for the food supply chain, which means the impacts of the war could show up on your grocery receipt. “There’s a very strong correlation between the movement of energy prices and the movement of food prices,” Dr. Ricky Volpe, an agricultural economist and professor of agribusiness at Cal Poly, told Fortune. “We’ve seen oil top $100 a gallon before and that happened to coincide with significant food price inflation.”

The war in Iran is adding another layer of volatility to an already shaky U.S. economy. Goldman Sachs has increased the chance of a recession occurring within 12 months to 25%, up five percentage points. And food affordability has been a top concern for many Americans, with food prices still on the rise despite efforts to cool inflation. Food prices have risen nearly 24% above pre-COVID levels and consumer sentiment remains near historic lows.

An energy-rich supply chain

The longer the war extends, the more drastic the impact on food prices. But if the war does end by the end of the month, as Trump has stated he’s hoping to be the outcome, it’s unlikely you’ll see a spike in grocery prices, according to experts. “If we’re talking just a few weeks, very likely you’re not going to see this show up in your grocery receipts,” Dr. David Ortega, an agricultural economist and professor at Michigan State University, told Fortune. “But if we’re talking a month or more, a few months, then it’s a different story.”

It’s not exactly clear when the war will relent. Trump has offered conflicting messages as to when it could end, telling Axios Wednesday there is “practically nothing left” to target. But Iran has said it’s ready to fight a “long-term war of attrition,” signaling the war could extend beyond the framework Trump has suggested.

However, prices aren’t expected to increase just yet. Ortega said it could take time to see any impact in the short-term. “There’s a lag between when the shock happens and when you see the full effect on your food prices,” he said. “It could be the better part of a full year before we’re seeing the full impact show up at the grocery store.”

Still, the food supply chain is incredibly energy-intensive, with high sums of energy required at each stage of the process. “Energy is required to grow and harvest food, and then to manufacture it, to transport it, and to store it, and then to sell it,” Volpe said. “It compounds down the supply chain, and it’s problematic.”

Shipping—just one stage of the food supply chain requiring a massive amount of energy—includes rates that are largely determined by diesel prices. FedEx Ground and home deliveries, for example, add a fuel surcharge of 24.25% when diesel prices reach $4.54 a gallon. Diesel was above $4.80 as of Sunday.

A blog post Thursday from the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis finds high correlation between crude oil prices and the global price of food index. While the post cautions against implying a direct causal relationship, it notes changes in oil prices could signal broader price changes. “Taken together, these two graphs suggest that large and sustained oil price movements have historically coincided with changes in both food prices and broader consumer inflation,” the report reads.

“We’ve seen oil top $100 a gallon before and that happened to coincide with significant food price inflation,” Volpe said. “Most [food companies] operate on very thin margins, so that means that when important sources of costs increase, they have no choice but to pass those along downstream, to consumers.”

The war is also impacting another critical supply chain that feeds into your grocery bill: fertilizers. More than one-third of the global seaborne fertilizer travels through the Strait of Hormuz. Since the start of the war, the price of urea, the nitrogen-rich compound present in most fertilizers, has spiked 35%. That’s made inputs pricier for American farmers. And the price spike is untimely. Farmers are just starting to plant crops for the season, meaning fertilizer is in high demand, including for America’s favorite crop: corn.

“Corn is king in the US,” Volpe said. “If fertilizer disruptions or inflation drives higher corn prices, that is going to be felt everywhere throughout the food supply.”

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A massive AI breakthrough is coming in the first half of 2026—and Morgan Stanley says most of the world isn’t ready for it.

In a sweeping new report, the investment bank warns that a transformative leap in artificial intelligence is imminent, driven by an unprecedented accumulation of compute at America’s top AI labs. Researchers specifically highlighted a recent interview with Elon Musk, citing his belief that applying 10x the compute to LLM training will effectively double a model’s “intelligence”—and say the scaling laws backing that claim are holding firm.

Executives at major U.S. AI labs are telling investors to brace for progress that will “shock” them. The gains are already outpacing expectations: OpenAI’s recently released GPT-5.4 “Thinking” model scored 83.0% on the GDPVal benchmark, placing it at or above the level of human experts on economically valuable tasks. And Morgan Stanley says the curve only gets steeper from here.

A Power Crisis Is Choking the Buildout

The intelligence explosion comes with a brutal infrastructure constraint. Morgan Stanley’s “Intelligence Factory” model projects a net U.S. power shortfall of 9 to 18 gigawatts through 2028—a 12% to 25% deficit in the power needed to run it all.

Developers aren’t waiting for the grid to catch up. They’re converting Bitcoin mining operations into high-performance computing centers, firing up natural gas turbines, and deploying fuel cells to stay ahead. The economics are staggering: an emerging “15-15-15” dynamic is taking hold—15-year data center leases at 15% yields, generating $15 per watt in net value creation.

Jobs Are Already Disappearing

The economic shockwaves won’t stop at infrastructure. Morgan Stanley predicts “Transformative AI” will become a powerful deflationary force, as AI tools replicate human work at a fraction of the cost. The bank says executives are already executing large-scale workforce reductions because of AI efficiencies.

OpenAI CEO Sam Altman has gone further, envisioning entirely new companies built by just one to five people that can outcompete large incumbents. The report also cites xAI co-founder Jimmy Ba, who suggests recursive self-improvement loops—where AI autonomously upgrades its own capabilities—could emerge as early as the first half of 2027.

Morgan Stanley’s conclusion is stark: the “coin of the realm” is becoming pure intelligence, forged by compute and power. The explosion is arriving faster than almost anyone is prepared for.

For this story, Fortune journalists used generative AI as a research tool. An editor verified the accuracy of the information before publishing.

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It began with a simple magazine cover, and then involved into one of the most valuable companies on the planet with technology that is used in virtually every part of daily life. 

In January 1975, Bill Gates and Paul Allen spotted the Altair 8800 personal computer on the front of Popular Electronics and saw something most people didn’t: a machine desperately in need of software. That realization became Microsoft, a portmanteau of “microprocessors” and “software,” sometimes hyphenated in its earliest days as “Micro-Soft.” What started as a two-person operation in Albuquerque, New Mexico would, over the next five decades, reshape how the entire world not only works, but communicates, plays, and builds.

Now, 40 years to the day since the company went public in 1986, many investors are riding on a high never-before-envisioned for a simple concept that came from that magazine cover decades earlier. 

How Microsoft took the world by storm

Microsoft’s foundational years were built on a single insight: Personal computers were coming for everyone, and they would all need software. In 1981, IBM introduced its landmark personal computer bundled with a suite of Microsoft products. That deal didn’t just put Microsoft on the map—it made the company the invisible infrastructure of the entire PC industry. While IBM made the hardware that sat on your desk, Microsoft quietly owned the language that made it run.

In November 1985, the company launched Windows, a graphical operating environment layered on top of its operating system MS-DOS, which is primitive by modern standards, but radical for its time. The same year, Microsoft debuted its first retail version of the Excel that would eventually become the backbone of financial work across the globe.

The (5.5) million dollar investment

Exactly 40 years ago today, Microsoft made its debut on March 13, 1989, on the Nasdaq stock exchange at $21 per share. By the end of that first trading day, shares had surged to $35.50. The offering raised growth capital, rewarded early employees, and gave everyday investors the chance to buy into the future of computing. But most of them had no idea what they were actually holding.

A $1,000 investment at the IPO price of $21 per share would have purchased approximately 47 shares. That number seems modest, but what happened next was anything but.

If you held for all four decades, that simple $1,000 investment would have turned into $5.5 million today, all thanks to a few splits that kept the share price accessible to investors and increased the number of shares people owned. 

Over the following four decades, Microsoft executed nine stock splits, which would have turned those 47 shares into approximately 13,700 shares. And with Microsoft trading around $400 per share by today, a $1,000 investment made on IPO day would be worth approximately $5.5 million.

In addition to the splits, the return is almost double the market average. That represents an annualized total return of roughly 21.8% compounded over the life of the stock—compared to the S&P 500’s historical annualized return of approximately 10.8% over the same period. It is one of the greatest long-term wealth creation stories in stock market history.

And the appreciation alone doesn’t capture the full picture. Microsoft initiated a quarterly dividend in 2003, meaning a buy-and-hold investor would have collected an additional $341,513 in dividends on top of their principal gains by 2022. Today, that same investor would be collecting roughly $36,000 per year in dividend income—36 times their original investment, simply in annual cash payments.

The ride did require some nerve. After the dot-com bubble burst and Microsoft’s final stock split in 2003, shares entered a long holding pattern that lasted nearly a decade. An investor who sold during those flat years would have walked away with around $288,000—less than 7% of what never-sell investors would come to hold. The lesson was brutal and simple: The people who won biggest were the ones who never touched the sell button.

A $3 trillion company

Microsoft’s modern-day scale is almost incomprehensible when measured against the $197 million annual revenue the company generated around the time of its IPO. In its second quarter of the fiscal year 2026, which ended on Dec. 31, 2025, Microsoft reported revenue of $81.3 billion—a 17% year-over-year increase. Operating income reached $38.3 billion, up 21%, and net income hit $38.5 billion .

Microsoft returned $12.7 billion to shareholders in Q2 FY2026 through dividends and share buybacks, up 32% from the same period a year earlier. Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella, reflecting on the company’s AI momentum, said: “We are only at the beginning phases of AI diffusion and already Microsoft has built an AI business that is larger than some of our biggest franchises.”

Forty years ago, a $1,000 check written for a scrappy software company would be worth roughly $5.5 million today. 

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Legendary venture capitalist Vinod Khosla believes if you follow your passion, you’ll never work a day in your life.

On a recent episode of Fortune’s Titans and Disruptors of Industry podcast, he opened up about his work-life philosophy: even at age 71—and with $12 billion to his name—he has no intention of slowing down.

“At age 71—health permitting—next 25 years, I’ll be doing exactly the same thing because I like working 80 hours a week learning,” he told Fortune Editor-in-Chief Alyson Shontell. “And nobody can take that away from me.”

But while Khosla has spent his career following his interests, he admits that the classic advice to “follow your passion” isn’t always practical today—especially for younger generations navigating a rapidly changing job market.

For many people, the expected path is still traditional: study hard, get into college, and land a stable job that can support a family.

Khosla believes artificial intelligence could soon upend that formula.

Khosla predicted that artificial intelligence will eventually be able to handle about 80% of today’s jobs, ranging from physicians and radiologists to accountants and sales professionals. As AI takes over much of this work, he said labor costs could effectively fall to near zero, dramatically lowering the prices of goods and services. In that scenario, Khosla suggested that the youngest generation may not need a college degree to build a livelihood—or even need traditional employment at all.

“Fifteen years from now, you will say—what is bad advice today or used to be … ‘Follow your passion,’” Khosla said. “‘Follow your passion’ comes second to surviving. I think that surviving part will go away, and you’ll tell every 5-year-old kid, ‘Follow your passion.’”

Khosla’s career, from software to AI 

For Khosla, the freedom to pursue what interests him is something he admits he’s been unusually fortunate to have throughout his career—especially since he’s never written a resume, applied for a job, or even worked for a boss.

After earning his undergraduate degree from the Indian Institute of Technology, a master’s in biomedical engineering from Carnegie Mellon, and an MBA from Stanford, he jumped straight into following his fascination with tech. Khosla made his first fortune cofounding computer hardware firm Sun Microsystems, which helped shape the early internet era and gave him enough financial security to “never need money again.”

Today, Khosla’s long work weeks are dedicated to his passion—Khosla Ventures, the venture capital firm he founded in 2004. It has backed hundreds of companies in their early stages, including Square and DoorDash.

His interest in AI has also shaped his investment priorities. Khosla Ventures placed early bets on Radical Health, a company using AI to help patients navigate the cancer treatment process, and Replit, an AI-powered software development firm. It was also notably one of OpenAI’s first institutional investors in 2019.

For Khosla, prolonging his career is now less about finances—it’s about curiosity and the freedom his success has afforded him. 

“I care about my freedom,” he told Fortune. “…I decided I would do what I want and say what I want, and I want to feel good about where I stand. I would say most people don’t have that luxury. It’s almost an indulgence to be able to do what I do.”

How AI is upending career advice 

The existential question hovering over every college campus right now isn’t which major to choose — it’s whether the old rules of higher education still apply at all. Some of the most influential names in business have been sounding off on exactly that, and their answers might make younger generations reconsider a traditional path. 

LinkedIn CEO Ryan Roslansky has told students point-blank that having a five-year career plan is “outdated” and “a little bit foolish” given how quickly AI is reshaping the workplace. 

Not everyone is sounding the alarm. Sam Altman, the billionaire CEO of OpenAI, has said that if he were 22 and graduating today, he would “feel like the luckiest kid in all of history.” 

Altman told video journalist Cleo Abram that by 2035, today’s college graduates “could very well be leaving on a mission to explore the solar system — in some completely new, exciting, super well-paid, super interesting job.” The caveat, of course, is that Altman added: “if they still go to college at all.”

Alexandr Wang—the 29-year-old Scale AI founder-turned-Meta chief AI officer—has perhaps the most specific and urgent advice for young people.

Speaking on the TBPN podcast and covered by Fortune, Wang told teens that “vibe coding” is today’s equivalent of 1980s teens spending their nights in a computer lab: “If you are 13 years old, you should spend all of your time vibe coding. That’s how you should live your life.”

Wang argued that 10,000 hours of deep, hands-on experimentation with AI tools now can become a “huge advantage.”

Khosla’s advice to Gen Z isn’t to panic, but to embrace the single skill that cannot be automated: the ability to learn rapidly and continuously.

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The U.S. national debt is nearly $39 trillion. One of the country’s top fiscal economists says the real number is closer to $100 trillion — and that Washington’s own accounting rules are designed to hide it. (As this went to press, the national debt clock stood at $38.92 trillion, per Treasury data.)

According to Kent Smetters, faculty director of the Penn Wharton Budget Model and one of the country’s most respected fiscal economists, that $39 trillion number is a polite fiction. The real tab, he argues, is closer to $100 trillion.

It has to do with the accounting distinction between explicit obligations — legally binding debts the government must repay — and implicit “pay-as-you-go” obligations — expected future spending commitments that carry moral or political, but not legal, force. “What we call implicit obligations are twice the size of explicit obligations,” Smetters told Fortune in a recent interview, referring to the unfunded liabilities buried inside programs like Social Security and Medicare.

If the U.S. government were required to report its finances under the same accounting rules as a publicly traded corporation, Smetters pointed out, the debt-to-GDP ratio wouldn’t be the current level of 100%, which is bad enough. “We’d be reporting a debt-to-GDP ratio closer to 300%.” The gap between those two numbers, he warned, is not a rounding error — it is the deliberate product of federal accounting standards designed to keep the full picture hidden from the public.

‘A shell game, not a Ponzi scheme’

Smetters is careful about the language he uses. Critics of Social Security have long compared the pay-as-you-go structure to a Ponzi scheme, in which early investors are paid with money from later ones. Smetters rejects that framing.

“It’s not a Ponzi scheme,” Smetters said, “it’s a shell game,” insisting that this distinction matters. A Ponzi scheme implies fraud, but Social Security never promised a higher return than market returns. It’s more of a shell game because Social Security and entitlement reforms can be moved obligations “off book”, from explicit Treasury obligations to implicit pay-as-you-go liabilities, because federal budget rules do not account for implicit liabilities. In 2001, Treasury Secretary Paul O’Neill attempted to explicitly book the value of pay-as-you-go liabilities but several events later that year – including the 9/11 attacks and the Enron meltdown – shifted the focus toward more immediate challenges. The newer accounting framework was outlined in a 2003 book published by the American Enterprise Institute.

In Washington’s case, Smetters said, that misdirection is written directly into federal law. His Beltway credentials include a stint as an economist at the Congressional Budget Office and as Deputy Assistant Secretary for Economic Policy at the U.S. Treasury, and PWBM is widely used in Washington DC to analyze the fiscal and macroeconomic effects of federal policy proposals. So he knows what he’s talking about when he rattles off, from memory, accounting legislation from 1985 as the origin of this shell game.

By statute, Smetters pointed out, the Congressional Budget Office is required to analyze Social Security on what’s known as a “scheduled benefits basis” — meaning its models assume the program will pay out full promised benefits indefinitely, even after the trust fund is completely exhausted. The problem, of course, is that current law also requires benefits to be automatically slashed the moment the fund runs dry, while the CBO is legally barred from modeling that reality.

This accounting quirk has enormous political consequences. It allows lawmakers to craft Social Security “reform” bills that appear, on paper, to close the program’s long-term funding gap — while actually doing nothing of the sort. Smetters points to the Social Security 2100 Act as a prime example. The bill was widely celebrated for eliminating the program’s 75-year actuarial shortfall. In reality, he argued, it actually worsened the long-term picture by increasing implicit debt by more than $1 for every $1 of reduction in explicit debt. Smetters said he believes this was an unintentional effect; it can just happen when working with an incomplete accounting framework that focuses on explicit federal debt.

This bill simply shifted costs from the explicit ledger — where they show up in official debt projections — to the implicit ledger, where they vanish from public view entirely. “They reduced these explicit liabilities, but it actually increased implicit liabilities by even more. And so instead of helping future generations, instead of incentivizing saving and labor, it ultimately, in the end, did the opposite.”

Handcuffed accounting

As a longtime budget watcher, Smetters attributed the issue to something almost mystical in the gears of government, “remnants” of legislation that remain even as Congress keeps writing new bills to supposedly correct the errors from previous regimes. In particular, he pointed to powerful “remnants” rooted in the 1985 Gramm-Rudman-Hollings Balanced Budget Act, which effectively prevent the agency from projecting discretionary spending to grow faster than inflation over the budget window. During his own three-year tenure at CBO, Smetters claimed, staff recognized this constraint as unrealistic and effectively required CBO to consistently produce debt projections that were too optimistic

“One of the things that’s left over from Gramm-Rudman-Hollings,” Smetters explained, “is that CBO by law is not allowed to grow discretionary spending faster than inflation over the next decade, over the budget window. And if you were to ask them, does this modeling make sense? They’ll be the first to say, ‘No, this absolutely makes no sense.’” In practice, this means the CBO’s long-range models have a structural problem built into them. “They constantly underestimate the growth in the debt,” Smetters said.

Congress passed the 1985 law in a moment of genuine fiscal panic: deficits had exploded during the early Reagan years, and lawmakers desperate for a mechanism to enforce discipline created a statutory framework that required automatic spending cuts — “sequestration” — whenever the deficit exceeded preset targets. To make that system work, the law needed a standardized, apples-to-apples definition of what counted as a “deficit,” so Section 257 codified the rules governing CBO’s official budget baseline. The political logic was straightforward: by locking in assumptions about what programs were “supposed” to spend, Congress could measure any new legislation against a fixed ruler.

The agency also faces restrictions on dynamic scoring — the practice of modeling how a policy change ripples through the broader economy — for any measure that affects fewer than 1 million people. “This is a pretty nutty one, too,” Smetters said. This blinds budget analysts to hundreds of billions of dollars in potential tax revenue generated by high-skilled immigrants over their lifetimes, he explained. Even high-skilled STEM workers who pay much more in taxes than they receive in benefits are scored as losing the government money on average, he explained, pointing to a 2024 analysis of this published by PWBM from former CBO director Douglas Elmendorf and MacArthur “genius grant” awardee Heidi Williams.

Setting aside the politics, Smetters argued, the economics suffer. “Suppose that we were to shift immigration away from low-skilled to high-skilled workers … even though we know those high-skilled STEM workers, for example, they’re going to pay a lot more taxes, CBO is not allowed to account for that.” The result is a federal budgeting apparatus that, through an accumulation of outdated rules and political compromises, consistently produces rosier projections than reality warrants.

Six years to a Social Security reckoning

For Social Security specifically, the law directed CBO to assume that scheduled benefits would be paid in full, indefinitely. It was a conservative modeling choice at the time because the trust fund was healthy following the 1983 reforms. What nobody fully reckoned with was that this assumption would become permanently embedded in law, transforming what was meant as a neutral accounting convention into a tool that could make structurally insolvent legislation appear fiscally responsible on paper.

At one time, according to Smetters, there simply wasn’t a “budget problem” in the United States, because there wasn’t an “automatic stabilizer” like in the Gramm-Rudman-Hollings legislation to keep benefits from growing at the same rate. If you just look at the data, he added, “discretionary spending clearly grows with the size of the economy. I mean, it grows clearly faster than inflation,” but it can’t do that by law. Gramm-Rudman-Hollings was never explicitly overturned, just parts of it bit by bit, “and so CBO just is not allowed to grow discretionary spending faster than inflation.”

The stakes of these accounting games are about to become very real. The Social Security trust fund — which covers Old-Age and Survivors Insurance — is now projected to be depleted by 2032, one year earlier than the CBO estimated just months ago, a revision driven in part by recent tax legislation. When that happens, the program is legally required to cut benefits to whatever level incoming payroll taxes can support — a figure currently estimated at roughly 84% of scheduled payments. Tens of millions of retirees would face automatic cuts with no congressional action required to trigger them.

That looming deadline should be forcing urgent reform debates in Washington. Instead, Smetters said, turning inwardly critical, although he said he doesn’t believe PWBM is a bad offender in this regard, years of alarmist rhetoric about crisis from think tanks and budget hawks have left lawmakers cynical and disengaged. “They’re kind of tired of the boy who cries wolf,” he says. They’ve been “saying the sky is falling for the longest time,” but the sky hasn’t exactly fallen yet, he said, likening it to predictions that the world was supposed to be underwater by now. “That’s a dangerous approach,” he said, adding that “what really needs to be done is really serious, thoughtful discussions of modeling and explaining to people.”

That fatigue is dangerous, because time is the one resource that fiscal reformers are rapidly running out of. The longer Congress waits, Smetters warned, the narrower the range of available solutions becomes. A structural fix implemented today could be spread gradually across generations — modest adjustments to the retirement age, phased benefit recalibrations, incremental revenue increases. A fix implemented in 2031, under pressure of imminent insolvency, will look very different: steep, sudden, and politically brutal. Think a steep tax hike, rather than a gradual, structural adjustment.

The deeper problem

Underlying all of it, Smetters argued, is an epistemic failure in how Washington evaluates fiscal policy. The simplified models and politically convenient scoring rules that dominate budget debates don’t just misrepresent the debt — they actively mislead the policymakers who are supposed to fix it.

The Treasury’s own Financial Report of the United States Government puts the 75-year unfunded shortfall at $73.2 trillion, driven entirely by Social Security and Medicare. The reason the distinction matters is compounding urgency: the longer these implicit liabilities remain off the official ledger, the less pressure lawmakers feel to address them, while the actual cost of closing the gap grows larger each year. 

The CBO already projects that deficits will hit $1.9 trillion in fiscal year 2026 and balloon to $3.1 trillion by 2036 under current law — and that projection still assumes Social Security pays full benefits even after the trust fund is projected to run dry around 2032, obscuring just how much worse the trajectory actually is.

Without transparent, micro-founded economic models that capture the true generational transfer of costs, he warns, lawmakers will keep falling for proposals that shuffle liabilities from one column to another without changing anything fundamental. “They’re just going to get duped into simplistic solutions that really don’t do much,” he said.

The United States is not, Smetters insisted, on the verge of imminent collapse. The debt is manageable — in theory. But the window for a managed solution is closing. And the accounting rules that were supposed to help Washington navigate a path forward are, by design, pointing in the wrong direction.

This story was originally featured on Fortune.com

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This Sunday will be the biggest night of the year for Los Angeles: Tinseltown’s stars will turn out en masse for the Academy Awards at the Dolby Theatre on Hollywood Boulevard, to celebrate the magic that only this storied city can create.

But a look into the field for the Best Picture Oscar reveals an uncomfortable surprise: Not a single one of the 10 nominated movies was produced on the famous soundstages or studio lots of Hollywood. While some post-production was done in L.A.-based facilities, all were entirely or largely filmed elsewhere, from Marty Supreme (New York) to Sinners (Louisiana) to Hamnet (U.K.).

Hollywood, the name for the entertainment industry headquartered and operating in Los Angeles County, is disintegrating. Production measured in Los Angeles shoot days is plunging, down from 36,792 in 2022 to just 19,694 in 2025, according to FilmLA research. Some 41,000 of the workers who make the industry function left from 2022 to 2024, the most recent data available—some by choice, some by necessity. The industry’s most powerful person is not a traditional studio boss but Ted Sarandos, co-CEO of streaming giant Netflix, which is headquartered in Silicon Valley.

And yes, that remains true even after Paramount Skydance’s David Ellison outbid Netflix to purchase the legendary studio Warner Bros. Discovery. Indeed, the outcome of that intensely watched deal negotiation looks likely to be another nail in the coffin for the film industry as a dominant economic force in Los Angeles—with Ellison, Hollywood’s newest mogul, promising to find $6 billion–plus in “synergies” following the acquisition. He has promised that the majority of these cost cuts will affect “nonlabor sources”—but the Town (as the film industry based in Los Angeles is often called) is bracing for large-scale layoffs.

Meanwhile, the threat of AI reshaping the business of making films looms, and the specter of industry collapse, of American cities hollowed out by manufacturing jobs going overseas and workers made obsolete by new technologies, hangs heavy over the boulevards and palm trees of Los Angeles. “The sunny version of Detroit,” was the assessment of Michael Lynton, former CEO of Sony Pictures Entertainment, on a recent visit to his previous stomping ground. “It was crickets,” he told The Hollywood Reporter. “There’s nothing going on.”

The collapse of an entire industry is a sad story no matter how you slice it. The collapse of Hollywood is also something more. For years, movies were a major American export, sending not just celluloid film but also an American worldview around the globe. Now, measured strictly in dollars, the $20 billion–plus the U.S. earns from exporting films and television shows each year is dwarfed by other exports—oil, cars, and industrial machinery among them. But still, these quintessentially American products—action movies, bingeable streaming shows, and a bevy of dashing superheroes and impossibly glam movie stars—punch far above their weight in establishing the nation’s “soft power” internationally, seeding American language, culture, fashion, and societal mores into living rooms from Seoul to São Paulo in a way no container ship full of LNG can match. When we say, “an offer he can’t refuse” or “I don’t think we’re in Kansas anymore,” everyone knows what it means, and where it came from.

The cluster effect

For 100 years Hollywood was among the world’s most successful and famous examples of what is called an “industry cluster.” The Harvard Business School’s Michael Porter, who coined the term in 1998, described such clusters as “critical masses—in one place—of unusual competitive success in particular fields.” Other examples are high-performance car companies in southern Germany; pharmaceutical companies near Philadelphia; and high-fashion shoe companies in northern Italy. But in his writings, Porter singled out the two starriest examples: “Silicon Valley and Hollywood may be the world’s best-known clusters.” 

Such clusters foster success because they create virtuous circles: When an industry’s best people and companies become concentrated in an area, the industry’s other people and companies want to be there. Those who join the cluster gain knowledge, relationships, and motivation “that distant rivals cannot match,” Porter said. The result is an upward cycle that draws in more industry players and further strengthens the industry.

Hollywood emerged as an industry cluster when early 20th‑century filmmakers fled New York and New Jersey to escape Thomas Edison’s aggressive enforcement of his patents on motion‑picture cameras, projectors, and other technologies, and to take advantage of Southern California’s cheap land and year‑round sunshine. Between roughly 1910 and the early 1920s, dozens of independent producers consolidated into vertically integrated studios—Paramount, MGM, Warner Bros., Fox, Universal—concentrating production in and around Los Angeles and locking in a dense ecosystem of stages, back lots, labs, equipment houses, and skilled labor. Worldwide distribution and exhibition were likewise managed from L.A. By the late 1920s and 1930s, this agglomeration had become a self‑reinforcing cluster: The “Golden Age” studio system produced hundreds of films a year; recruited and developed “bankable” stars beloved around the world; and drew in talent and suppliers from everywhere, elevating Hollywood from geographic neighborhood to dream factory.

Pictured circa 2024, the original Hollywoodland sign advertised a housing development of that name in the hills near Mulholland Drive.
Underwood Archives/Getty Images

Today, Hollywood’s upward cycle seems to be reversing. It didn’t happen all at once or from one single cause. It’s partly a story of technology barriers coming down, enabling more consumers to choose from and stream more sources of entertainment than ever—much of it not from Hollywood.

From the consumer’s perspective, an economist might applaud the abundance of choice and competition in the streaming era. More options at lower cost? What’s not to like? But in the real world rather than the theoretical one, today’s transition is miserable for thousands of talented middle-class people who are living in the downward cycle—and for anyone who loves films and TV. The loss of the industry’s talent pipeline may well result in a decline in the quality of the product the industry produces and unleash an abundance of AI slop. And in an era where politicians on both sides of the aisle pay lip service to the goal of Americans getting back into the business of making things, it’s worth noting that the nation’s most culturally significant export industry is in a state of spiraling crisis.

What’s left of the Hollywood dream job?

Consider Jason Lazarcheck, a writer who came to Hollywood from New York City in 2008, right after college. He got a job on a Lifetime show called Army Wives—“the last show on earth I would have picked,” he says, but it offered a sustainable writing life. In those pre-streaming years, most shows produced 22 or 23 episodes per season, “so that meant a lot of jobs for writers,” he says. Even more important, his writing job continued through the production of all the episodes, including the filming, in case changes had to be made on the fly. Through it all, the showrunner mentored him on all aspects of getting those episodes done. The result, he recalls, was “I learned more about writing and producing TV than a lot of writers ever do.”

An eager young writer arriving in Los Angeles today would be unlikely to find such a career springboard. “One of the darkest things that changed about TV for writers is that now most shows have fewer episodes,” Lazarcheck says. In the streaming world there is no requirement of a given number of episodes, so virtually no shows produce 22 episodes anymore; some make as few as four or five episodes at a time. “The last show I was staffed on was a limited series at Apple,” he says. The producers told the writers to write all the scripts, and then Apple would decide whether to make the show, called Lure. Apple passed, though the project could still be produced elsewhere. Even if the show gets a green light, the writers won’t be hired through production.

The streaming era just doesn’t offer the steady flow of work many directors, cinematographers, writers, gaffers, sound mixers, and other workers have relied upon. “There’s no need to fill eight o’clock on Wednesday night,” says Mark Goffman, a producer and writer, so today, “[producers]will order one script, then six months later they’ll approve a second script. A very precious few are on the timeline where they get green-lit and move at light speed. Everything else kind of lumbers along with no real urgency.”

The 2025 Apple TV+ comedyThe Studio skewered the Hollywood of today.
©Apple TV+/Courtesy Everett Collection

The upshot is that landing a writers’ room job today is no longer such a golden opportunity. With “fewer episodes, fewer writers in the room,” and no role in production, Lazarcheck says, it’s a meager version of the screenwriter’s previous job. For those trying to eke out a living in Hollywood, he says, “I feel like it’s never been harder.” That reality became even more starkly obvious after 2023, when the writers’ and actors’ labor unions went on strike—going without salaries for almost five months to ensure better pay, minimum staffing requirements, better health insurance, and protections against AI.

Like many others in Hollywood’s once mighty workforce, Lazarcheck has had to find work outside the industry. He recently took a job as an expert writing consultant for AI companies—the industry that threatens to take over his previous job function. “If you had asked me on the picket line at the Disney lot if I’d be comfortable doing that with an AI company, I would have said, ‘Hell no!’” he says. “But a few years go by, and I just need to earn money.”

Lazarcheck still lives in the Los Angeles area, but many other industry workers are leaving, some giving up on the industry, others working remotely from places less expensive than L.A. Lazarcheck offers this advice to his peers: “Don’t define yourself by Hollywood.”

Hollywood’s broken business model

Veteran Hollywood denizens, when asked about the decline of the Hollywood industry cluster,  often say the same thing: “Netflix changed everything.”

But the shift away from traditional filmmaking started before the streaming giant began to eat the grand old studios’ lunch by producing its own films and shows in the 2010s. Hollywood’s primary business ceased to be movies long ago, says Jeff Bewkes, former CEO of Time Warner, where he oversaw HBO, Warner Bros., Turner Broadcasting, and New Line Cinema. “For the last 30 years, the biggest business for most legacy media companies, in terms of the number of people employed and profit and return on money invested, has been television series production, not movie production,” he explains. “The exception may be Disney, with its huge franchise films and revenues not just from exhibition, but also from consumer products and onsite parks and cruise line experiences.”

Hollywood’s large studios had been making TV shows for years before, but for most of that time there were only three TV networks—not a huge market. Then, starting in the 1970s and accelerating in the 1980s, cables and set-top boxes were installed in millions of homes, enabling dozens of new channels to reach large audiences. All those channels needed programming, and Hollywood stood ready to help.

In the mid-1990s, the government rescinded an old rule that prohibited distributors (the TV networks) from owning the programs they showed. The goal had been to get more producers with more perspectives and ideas on TV’s “big three” channels, but cable had solved that problem. Since cable channel owners could now own the programs they showed, they started producing more—ramping up in‑house and affiliated production; increasing vertically integrated ownership of primetime and cable programming; and opening the door to more business for Hollywood, and more consolidation.

As consumer technology advanced, still more revenue for Hollywood, in the form of royalties, rolled in from Blockbuster and similar companies renting VHS tapes and DVDs to consumers in those same years.

Little noticed in 1997 was the founding of Netflix, which at the time seemed just an evolution of Blockbuster’s sector, renting DVDs by mail. The revolution—what changed everything—was Netflix’s introduction of streaming media over the internet in 2010. At the time, the preeminent cable channel for high-quality proprietary entertainment was HBO, with The Sopranos, Sex and the City, The Wire, Band of Brothers, and more.

But when Netflix started reaching consumers over the internet, HBO faced a major competitive disadvantage. It reached its subscribers through local cable companies, which charged HBO a fee. If subscribers paid the cable company $15 a month for HBO, the cable company kept $5. Netflix, reaching subscribers directly online, received all the money its subscribers paid. It wasn’t much help that HBO’s parent company, Time Warner, was a major supplier of home internet—one of the “pipes” streamers relied upon to deliver content to consumers. The Obama administration’s “net neutrality” rule prevented the internet providers favoring their own products or “throttling” their competitors’.

Even more important, as it turned out: Netflix could collect vast amounts of data on every subscriber—what genres, actors, and directors they like, what scenes they replay or skip, and countless other data points. It used all that data to design a powerful algorithm, presenting popular shows such as Orange Is the New Black and Arrested Development to users based on the tastes their viewing habits revealed. That data also guided the streamer’s original content spend, including the famous $100 million bet it made to green-light two seasons of David Fincher’s House of Cards in 2013, sight unseen. And many have speculated that Netflix’s vast trove of data informs certain narrative habits on its shows (cliff-hangers to encourage bingeing, for example, and frequent restating of plot points to engage viewers distracted by their phones). Until they had their own streaming platforms, HBO and other channels reaching subscribers through a cable company had none of that data.

Netflix co-CEO Ted Sarandos is widely seen as the most powerful man in Hollywood today.
Blanca CRUZ—AFP/Getty Images

Competition intensified—with Hulu, Amazon Prime, and Apple TV+, among others, entering the fray—and the 2010s’ Streaming Wars led to a golden age of TV as premium cable channels and streaming upstarts feverishly outspent one another for top talent.          

That fire hose of money has slowed considerably since, and so far the original streamer has come out on top: Netflix is by far the world’s largest streaming company, with 325 million subscribers. In the U.S. last year it attracted 59% of all streaming viewing time; 10 other streamers shared the rest, says Luminate’s 2025 Year-End Film & TV Report. And it is now competing on a larger scale: Its recent market value of $358 billion makes it more valuable than the next two most valuable companies in Hollywood, Disney and Sony, combined. In a December 2025 ranking of Hollywood’s most powerful people, assembled by industry journal Variety, No. 1 is Netflix co-CEO Ted Sarandos. No one seems to dispute it—even with the inroads David Ellison has lately made.

Another disorienting element in Netflix world is the company’s approach to paying actors, writers, and others. Studios traditionally have offered upfront fees and residuals based upon a film’s or TV show’s earnings—sustaining payments that sometimes continue for years, based on its success. But Netflix, which hoards its user data like gold in Fort Knox, offers a larger lump sum upfront, with no residuals and no performance data released. This is perhaps understandable given how precious that data is, Jason Blum, founder and CEO of Blumhouse Productions, wrote in the New York Times in 2022. “But the system leaves creators with precious little visibility into whether their works succeed in drawing viewers,” Blum explained. “By typically paying an upfront flat fee, Netflix buys out the usual success-based incentive compensation (known as the back end in Hollywood).”

A well-known agent, who prefers to stay anonymous because he still negotiates with Netflix and other companies, seems almost traumatized by the new order: “The big hits of the past that paid off, don’t pay off anymore,” the agent explains. “Therefore, all these people in the business are not working at the rate that they used to and for the money they used to get.”

“I didn’t want to go live in Bulgaria”

The Los Angeles area is an expensive place in which to live and to produce movies and TV shows, so it makes sense that productions and workers are looking elsewhere. The Atlanta area has been a major production locale for many years, offering producers lower costs and even subsidies in some cases. Disney has produced many of its Marvel films there, including Black Panther and Captain America: Civil War. Movies in the Hunger Games and Fast & Furious franchises have been made there, along with hundreds more projects. Vancouver is another attractive and growing alternative to Hollywood, especially when the Canadian dollar is low.

Many projects go to other countries offering subsidies and low costs while absorbing Hollywood know-how. “In the last couple of years I’ve been to Taiwan several times,” says Goffman. “I’ve been to parts of Asia and the Middle East where they’re ramping up production. A lot of Eastern European countries have built up productions.”

The globalization of filmmaking may be healthy for the industry in the long run—expanding markets, lowering costs, and spreading know‑how to new filmmaking hubs—but for Los Angeles–based crews, uprooting to live on far‑flung sets for months at a time can be profoundly disruptive and deeply undesirable. “Often you’ll be asked if you want to do a series,” Goffman says, “but you’ll need to move to another country that’s on another continent for six to nine months, away from your family.” Marjorie David, a producer and writer with 40 years in the business, says: “There’s a whole show I didn’t do, because I didn’t want to go live in Bulgaria.”

Silicon Valley devours Hollywood

Why does it matter if movies are made in Hollywood or in Atlanta or Dublin? Perhaps, in the age of online collaboration and Zoom meetings, it doesn’t. But with the disintegration of Hollywood, one of the world’s greatest industry clusters, something more than jobs and income is lost.

For a century, Hollywood’s geographic specificity meant writers, directors, cinematographers, editors, actors, and executives were all working in close proximity, moving from project to project and swapping ideas, techniques, and contacts on sets, over martinis at Musso & Frank’s or at coffee shops in Silver Lake. That self-propelling upward spiral built a small patch of Southern California into the center of an industry and, culturally, the world.

If that cluster scatters to cheaper locations, the city will lose those everyday collisions—shared stages, repeat partnerships, in‑person mentorship—that helped knit individual talents into an ecosystem of innovation. The knowledge built over decades won’t be handed down as it once was, nor improved in the process of close cooperation and competition.

What replaces it is likely to be more fragmented: Great work can still happen, but it becomes harder to sustain the same level of collective craft and experimentation. And unfortunately, a downward spiral is also self-propelling.

For now, Netflix and the other streamers are clearly ascendant—and continuing to pay professionals to make films and TV shows around the world—but the picture could change dramatically, and soon. Teenagers spend more time watching user-generated videos on TikTok, YouTube, Facebook, Instagram, X, and other social media than they do any other type of video, according to research by eMarketer, the Pew Research Center, and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. YouTube reports that users are uploading 500 hours of video every minute; that’s more product in a day than all the movies and TV shows that Hollywood produces in a year. As AI roars ahead, billions of people worldwide will have the tools to make increasingly high-quality videos all by themselves.

This Sunday’s telecast on Disney’s ABC TV network will be a celebration of everything that is Tinseltown—fabulous gowns on the red carpet, heartfelt speeches by celebrated creatives, and wall-to-wall coverage of the after-parties. But come 2029, the 100th anniversary of the Oscars, the gala will leave the television network that has carried the Oscars every year since 1976. It will then be shown exclusively by YouTube, owned by Alphabet, parent of Google. And it might well be consumed largely via next-day clips of viral moments.  

As Michael Porter said, the world’s two most famous industry clusters are Hollywood and Silicon Valley. With one of them fading, it seems the other may be devouring it.

Bewkes—once a Hollywood mogul himself—describes it as the end of an era. “The most powerful people controlling the media now, and determining its future, are the tech oligarchs,” he says. “That’s not a prediction, it’s a description of what’s happening now.”

This article appears in the April/May 2026 issue of Fortune.

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Strategy Inc. (NASDAQ:MSTR) Chair Michael Saylor said on Thursday that Bitcoin (CRYPTO: BTC) purchases don’t lead to immediate price increases and there’s always a “delay.”

Another Call To HODL?

In what looked like a cheeky reminder on X, Saylor pointed out the lag between big companies buying Bitcoin and the moment it finally “goes to the moon.”

It appeared to be yet another call from Saylor encouraging HODLers to stay firm despite the market situation.

Responses poured in, with some sharing memes about Saylor’s odd past advocacies, while others praised his conviction.

Full story available on Benzinga.com

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“Typically,” Morgan Stanley observed in a big research note earlier this week, “headcount growth has been required for revenue growth but AI is changing that relationship.” It’s the latest puzzle piece in the paradox of productivity under AI: it seems to be making work more intense, not less, and despite all the doomsday predictions of massive job loss and an impending white-collar recession, many CEOs insist they are still planning to hire more people.

The investment bank, drawing on takeaways from its annual Technology, Media & Telecom Conference in San Francisco, identified three distinct areas where AI is actually creating demand for workers—even as it threatens to hollow out others.​

The findings arrive at a pivotal moment. Corporate America is increasingly signaling a “decoupling” between revenue growth and headcount growth, Morgan Stanley noted, with executives from companies like Snowflake and Shopify describing how AI tools are allowing them to do more with smaller teams. But Morgan Stanley’s analysts argue the picture is more nuanced than a straightforward displacement story—and that three areas of the labor market in particular are experiencing a surge in demand driven directly by AI.​

“While some companies have reduced headcount, the majority of discussions [at the TMT conference] around AI’s impact on white collar work centered on productivity transformation and growing results without growing headcount,” they said.

In a related thought exercise last month, the Deutsche Bank Research Institute decided to ask AI how many human jobs it was going to displace, and the robot answered back that it saw 92 million jobs on the chopping block. On the other hand, it said AI would create 170 million new roles, more than offsetting the losses. “However, this transition will be disruptive,” Deutsche Bank’s Jim Reid and Adrian Cox predicted. But for Morgan Stanley, analysts said the disruption is happening right now.

Skilled Trades: The Hidden Bottleneck

The most urgent and underappreciated jobs sector, according to Morgan Stanley, is in skilled trades. The unprecedented scale of the AI infrastructure buildout—spanning data centers, power delivery systems, and networking equipment—is driving demand for electricians, electrical engineers, and construction workers that “far exceeds supply,” the bank said.​

Executives from CoreWeave described a shortage of “thousands of skilled-trade workers” needed for data center construction, warning that because relevant skills take years to acquire, the supply-demand gap will persist. Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang echoed the concern, noting electrician shortages in key markets like Texas as a constraint on expansion. The bottleneck, CoreWeave noted, isn’t just about available power—it’s about having the human capital to physically deliver that power into racks and servers.​

AI Training and Reskilling: A Market Exploding in Real Time

The second area of surging demand is workforce education and reskilling. As companies restructure roles around AI tools, enterprises are racing to upskill employees—and the numbers are striking. Coursera reported that AI-content enrollments reached 15 enrollments per minute in 2025, up from 8 per minute in 2024, a near-doubling in just one year.​

The buyers are increasingly corporate rather than individual, with CTOs and Chief Data Officers turning to platforms like Coursera to equip their workforces with skills in generative AI, data science, and software development. Docebo, a learning management software provider, described AI as “fundamentally causing every organization to re-skill their workforce,” calling learning management systems a critical tool for delivering that training at scale.​

AI Supervisors and Orchestrators: The New White-Collar Role

The third category isn’t a traditional trade or training job—it’s a newly emerging class of knowledge worker. As AI agents take over routine tasks, companies are redefining white-collar roles around supervising, orchestrating, and providing context for those systems.​

C.H. Robinson told conference attendees it is being transparent with employees that “future jobs will involve managing standard operating procedures and context for AI agents rather than running operations directly.” Salesforce introduced a new productivity metric—”Agentic Work Units”—to capture the value that AI agents and the humans who manage them are delivering, as the company moves beyond measuring simple token consumption. Across industries, the message from Morgan Stanley’s conference was consistent: the workers who thrive will be those who can direct AI, not just use it.​

A Tale of Two Labor Markets

The three growth areas exist alongside a more sobering dynamic for traditional white-collar employment. Snowflake cut roughly 200 positions in Q4 tied to AI-driven efficiencies, adding only a net 37 workers despite revenue reaccelerating to 30% growth. Shopify has seen headcount decline for eight to ten consecutive quarters.​

Morgan Stanley frames this as a “diverging trends” story—one in which AI is simultaneously eliminating certain jobs, elevating others, and creating entirely new categories of demand that didn’t exist a few years ago. The companies and workers best positioned for what comes next, the bank suggests, are those already adapting to all three.

“Companies are increasingly allowing natural attrition to reduce staffing needs, reallocating resources toward technical talent, or shifting spending from labor to technology while maintaining headcount,” Morgan Stanley concluded. At the same time, it noted that this transition is reshaping job definitions, moving workers toward roles that supervise, orchestrate, and contextualize AI systems.

The new economy is arriving—and soon.

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Moving up the career ladder at Accenture comes with a requirement: You must be using the company’s AI tools.

In a recent episode of the “Rapid Response” podcast, Accenture CEO Julie Sweet said AI proficiency is a mandatory part of working at the consultancy and moving up its ranks. The company announced in September it has invested more than $865 million in a “six-month business optimization program,” including reskilling thousands of employees—and showing the door to those who refused to adapt to using evolving workplace technology.

“If you want to get promoted, you’ve got to do the things that we do in order to operate Accenture,” Sweet said.

“These are the new tools to operate a company,” she added. “We didn’t go from zero to ‘you won’t get promoted’ in a month. It’s over a three-year period of getting used to the technology, making sure it’s user-friendly, making sure we have the right workbench for people to use, and then saying, ‘Hey, this is Accenture and how we operate.’” 

The mass reskilling effort is part of Accenture’s three-year, $3 billion push to integrate AI first announced in 2023. One goal of the effort was to double the company’s AI talent to 80,000 professionals through hiring, acquisitions, and training. Accenture has more than 770,000 employees.

But Accenture’s embrace of AI has been an exception rather than the rule. As of the fourth quarter of 2025, 38% of companies reported integrating AI to improve workplace productivity, efficiency, and quality, according to a Gallup poll, a 1% increase from the quarter before. To be sure, AI adoption is still on the rise, with 69% of workplace leaders using AI as of 2025’s fourth quarter, up from less than 40% as of 2023’s second quarter.

CEOs and other executives have approached AI adoption and impact with skepticism. A study published in February by the National Bureau of Economic Research found that among 6,000 C-suite executives, two-thirds used AI, but that usage amounted to only about 1.5 hours per week. About 90% of those respondents reported over the past three years, AI had no impact on employment or productivity. 

That could all soon change. Those same executives also forecasted a 1.4% increase in productivity and 0.8% increase in output over the next three years. The education company Pearson estimated that augmenting jobs with AI and reskilling employees could add between $4.8 trillion and $6.6 trillion to the U.S. economy within the next decade, per a report published in January.

Why Accenture went all in on AI

According to Sweet, integrating AI into the workplace is a natural extension of when computers become ubiquitous. The typewriter classes of yesterday are analogous to the AI reskilling of today, she suggested.

“No one would have said that requiring someone to use a computer is coercion,” Sweet said. “It’s how the companies were going to get work done. Today, AI at Accenture is how we do work.”

Still, Sweet has empathy toward companies resistant to making the sweeping changes Accenture has made to accommodate an AI future. She previously told Fortune Editor in Chief Alyson Shontell that companies’ failed attempts to integrate the technology in the office were a result of using AI as a tool in a previously established workflow, when it was really most effective when workplace systems were built with the technology in mind.

“First of all, I think we’re a good lesson in something that I’m advising CEOs all about: In order to capture the opportunity with AI, you really have to be willing to rewire your company,” Sweet said. 

Accenture’s own employees hit snags in embracing AI, she noted. Welcoming change associated with the new slate of tools was challenging, for both employees and old business.

“For our people and our clients, it was hard,” Sweet said. “How do you have the courage to do that? That’s where you have the humility, but also this idea of embracing change and innovation.”

This story was originally featured on Fortune.com

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The team behind Official Trump (CRYPTO: TRUMP) memecoin announced on Thursday a “crypto and business conference” in Mar-a-Lago next month, which will include a gala luncheon with President Donald Trump

Another Gala Event For TRUMP Holders

TrumpMeme took to X, promoting the “exclusive” event scheduled for April 25 at Trump’s Florida resort.

Only the top 297 TRUMP holders will receive an invitation. To participate, users must register by connecting their cryptocurrency wallet or their TRUMP holdings on Robinhood. A leaderboard, tracking participants’ time-weighted average holdings between March 12 and April 10, will update every hour.

The top 29 holders will be invited to a VIP reception with Trump, although private meetings with the president will not be permitted.

Full story available on Benzinga.com

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The team behind Official Trump (CRYPTO: TRUMP) memecoin announced on Thursday a “crypto and business conference” in Mar-a-Lago next month, which will include a gala luncheon with President Donald Trump

Another Gala Event For TRUMP Holders

TrumpMeme took to X, promoting the “exclusive” event scheduled for April 25 at Trump’s Florida resort.

Only the top 297 TRUMP holders will receive an invitation. To participate, users must register by connecting their cryptocurrency wallet or their TRUMP holdings on Robinhood. A leaderboard, tracking participants’ time-weighted average holdings between March 12 and April 10, will update every hour.

The top 29 holders will be invited to a VIP reception with Trump, although private meetings with the president will not be permitted.

Full story available on Benzinga.com

This post was originally published here

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Mojtaba Khamenei may have been appointed Iran’s Supreme Leader only days ago, but cryptocurrency bettors are already wagering on how soon he might exit.

Bets On New Supreme Leader

Prediction market Polymarket, based on Polygon (CRYPTO: POL), shows a 64% probability that Mojtaba Khamenei is removed, detained, or blocked from acting as Iran’s Supreme Leader before year‑end, with 38% odds of this happening by April 30.

Over $2 million has been wagered on the outcome and an official announcement of his resignation or removal would suffice for a “Yes” resolution.

Notably, a similar bet regarding his …

Full story available on Benzinga.com

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Leading cryptocurrencies rallied on Thursday, but stocks plunged as the Iran war continued to pressure global energy prices.

Cryptocurrency 24-Hour Gains +/- Price (Recorded at 9:35 p.m. ET)
Bitcoin (CRYPTO: BTC) +2.32% $71,465.11
Ethereum (CRYPTO: ETH)
               		 +3.57% $2,119.63
XRP (CRYPTO: XRP)                          +2.20% $1.40
Solana (CRYPTO: SOL)                          +4.65% $90.30
Dogecoin (CRYPTO: DOGE)              +4.65% $0.09671

Evening Spike For Crypto

Bitcoin hovered sideways most of the day before nearly hitting $72,000 late evening. Trading activity remained tepid.

Likewise, Ethereum spiked to $2,147, while XRP and Dogecoin also recorded notable jumps late in the day.

The global cryptocurrency market capitalization stood at $2.38 trillion, following a modest gain of 0.06% from the previous day.

Despite this, shares of Strategy Inc. (NASDAQ:MSTR) and Coinbase Global Inc. (NASDAQ:COIN) closed down 0.72% and 2.71%, respectively.

Over $250 million was liquidated from the cryptocurrency market over the past 24 hours, with short liquidations accounting for the majority, according to Coinglass data.

Open interest in Bitcoin futures spiked 3.84% in the last 24 hours, and over 10% this week. Meanwhile, sentiment among retail and whale traders holding open BTC positions on Binance remained “Neutral.”

“Extreme Fear” sentiment …

Full story available on Benzinga.com

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The U.S. Mint unveiled new designs for the country’s 250th anniversary and it left out one key detail: the olive branch from the newly designed dime. The new reverse shows a bald eagle mid-flight, arrows clutched in its left talon and nothing—where an olive branch once lived—in its right, with beneath, the inscription “Liberty over Tyranny.”

For a nation whose founding symbols were carefully engineered around the balance of peace and war, that omission is hard to read as accidental.

Unchanged since 1946, the Roosevelt dime is now replaced by a modern Liberty figure on the front, solely for one year as the country celebrates its 250th anniversary this year. The U.S. Mint is marking the Semiquincentennial with a sweeping redesign of the coinage, something not undertaken since the 1976 Bicentennial. Authorized by Congress, the change touches the dime, quarter, half dollar, penny, and dollar coin, all bearing 1776–2026 dates.

The olive branch has anchored American iconography for 250 years—its absence from the very coin marking that anniversary is a curious choice, if not a telling one.

What does the olive branch mean?

When the Great Seal of the United States was finalized in 1782, it contained what the Founding Father’s held as the country’s most esteemed values. The eagle holds 13 arrows in its left talon and an olive branch in its right, its head turned toward the branch—the side which the eagle preferred to err on.

The arrows—not for lack of symbolism, take a wild guess why there are 13 of them—are in the eagle’s left talon, the traditionally thought-of weaker and subordinate side. Meant to represent the power of war and military preparedness, the arrows clutched in the left talon signal that although the U.S. is always armed and ready, force is not its first instinct.

Charles Thomson, who shepherded the final design, was explicit: the arrows represented the power of war, the olive branch the power of peace, and together they carried a single message: the United States had a strong desire for peace, but would always be ready for war.

The eagle’s head facing the olive branch was not incidental. It was a statement of national preference, drawn directly from the Olive Branch Petition of 1775, Congress’s last diplomatic appeal to King George III before the war escalated beyond return.

Dropping the olive branch from the dime isn’t just a design choice: it’s a cultural signal. The Founders spent six years perfecting the balance between peace and war on the Great Seal. Erasing half of that equation, on a coin meant to celebrate their legacy, and especially 250 years after they fought for “Liberty over Tyranny,” says something about which half the country currently feels like.

What was the coin design process?

The U.S. Mint is also redesigning other currency. Five new one-year-only quarter designs trace American history from the Mayflower Compact to the Gettysburg Address. Acting Mint Director Kristie McNally said the goal was for every American to hold 250 years of history in their hands.

“The designs on these historic coins depict the story of America’s journey toward a ‘more perfect union,’ and celebrate America’s defining ideals of liberty. We hope to offer each American the opportunity to hold our nation’s storied 250 years of history in the palms of their hands as we Connect America through Coins.”

In 2025, the U.S. Mint brought the coin designs to the public, with the top rated coins reviewed and recommended by the Citizens Coinage Advisory Committee (CCAC) and U.S. Commission of Fine Arts (CFA). The CCAC, established in 2003, advises the Secretary of the Treasury on themes and designs of all U.S. coins and medals, the latter of which are used in commemoration and neither hold face value nor are legal tender. The CCAC, an informed and impartial resource for the Secretary, essentially, is meant to represent the interests of all Americans. The Secretary then approves all final suggestions.

In Sept. 2024, the coin designs were put into review. Each coin design will depict a special Semiquincentennial Liberty Bell with the numeral “250” marked on the coin.

Coins and their symbolism

In Dec. 2025, Secretary of the Treasury Scott Bessent nixxed some of the quarter designs that were approved by then-Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen during the Biden Administration for focusing “on DEI and Critical Race Theory policies.” One of the coins featured a line of people with arms linked, in between the words “We shall overcome.”

At the time, U.S. Treasurer Brandon Beach said the coinage design is supposed to “celebrate American history and the founding of our great nation,” but that imagery was scrapped because “the Biden Administration and Secretary Yellen remained focused on DEI and Critical Race Theory policies.”

“The Trump Administration is dedicated to fostering prosperity and patriotism. We have no doubt these new designs will be wildly popular with the American people.”

Best of the Mint #2: 1916 Standing Liberty Quarter
Best of the Mint #2: 1916 Standing Liberty Quarter
U.S. Mint

It’s interesting to note, however, the 1916 Standing Liberty Quarter, a medal that also will be released this year in commemoration of the 250th anniversary (dubbed by the Mint as the SemiQ), features a standing Liberty holding an olive branch on the front, and on the back, the talons of an eagle gripping an olive branch.

Perhaps the most famous dime is the Mercury dime which was minted between 1916 and 1946. Designer Adolph Weinman chose to use a Roman fasces—an axe bound tightly in a bundle of rods—wrapped in an olive branch, together symbolizing military readiness tempered by a desire for peace, in a nod to the Roman Republic. Three years after the Mercury dime debuted, Benito Mussolini adopted the fasces as the emblem of his Italian fascist movement, even where the name derived from. It was then replaced in 1946 by the Roosevelt dime, in honor of President Franklin D. Roosevelt following his death. The dime remains the one in use today.

The eagle didn’t always err on the side of peace, and instead, faced the arrows between 1877 and 1945, until President Harry S. Truman signed Executive Order 9646 on Oct. 25, 1945, which changed the direction of the eagle from the arrows to the olive branch. Reportedly, according to the Winston Churchill archives, the president was very happy about the change, and told the British prime minister “The eagle used to face the arrows but I have re­designed it so that it now faces the olive branches.”

Churchill’s response? “With the greatest respect, I would prefer the American eagle’s neck to be on a swivel so that it could face the olive branches or the arrows, as the occasion might demand.”

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So let me get this right. After every Democrat in the House and Senate who voted against One, Big, Beautiful Bill — and therefore promoted a roughly $5 trillion tax hike — now a couple of presidential wannabees, like Senators Cory Booker and Chris Van Hollen, are surfacing plans that would end most income taxes for middle-class Americans, this according to a Wall Street Journal news story. The two men have somewhat differing plans, but basically, as I understand it, they would be raising the standard deduction and some other credits, so the first $75,000 of income would not be taxable.

So, are the Democrats possibly rediscovering tax cuts? Is the ghost of John F. Kennedy, who was the last Democratic president to lower tax rates and usher in supply-side economics, is the Kennedy ghost suddenly hovering over their shoulder? Are they admitting that President Trump was right as he walloped them in 2024 with across-the-board tax cuts, no tax on tips, or overtime, big breaks for seniors, et cetera. 

Now I don’t agree with the specifics of the Democratic plan, we’ll talk about it in a minute. But even the merest hint that Democrats believe lower taxes, at least for some people, are better than higher taxes for everybody, might be a good thing. Just maybe.

Now, what Booker and Van Hollen are doing is basically raising the standard deduction on middle-class earners somewhere around $75,000 to $100,000 a year. I’m oversimplifying, but that’s the gist of it. Now here’s the problem, they want to significantly raise taxes on successful earners, upper end earners.

According to the Journal article, Mr. Van Hollen calls for a surtax that climbs as high as 12 percent above existing taxes, which would drive the top rate to nearly 50 percent, or if you live in New York or California, you’d be taxed in the mid 60s percentile. Mr. Booker would raise the top rates from 35 percent and 37 percent into a new 41 percent and 43 percent brackets. 

Confiscatory tax rates like these would squelch work and investment, leading to a depressed economy, higher unemployment, and by the way even larger budget deficits. I don’t care how many people the senators want to shield from income taxes, turning around with punitive tax rates on successful entrepreneurs and wealthy individuals is a nonstarter.

Supply-side economics as Kennedy or Art Laffer would tell you, suggests that when you tax something more you get less of it. Punish success and prosperity, you’ll get less success and prosperity. But if you tax something less, you will encourage work effort and risk taking. And that’s the ticket to prosperity.

As Kennedy said many times, a rising tide will lift all boats. There’s no need to punish some while rewarding others in some kind of bizarre socialist redistribution scheme that has been tried many times before and always failed. But you know what folks? At least there are a couple of Democratic senators who don’t think tax cuts are dirty words. So, is JFK having a comeback?

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A long-stalled plan to redevelop a deteriorating New Jersey shopping center is once again before local officials.

The Raritan Borough Planning Board recently reviewed a new site plan application for Raritan Lofts, which calls for a five-story, mixed-use building that would replace much of the largely vacant Raritan Mall in Somerset County, roughly 45 miles southwest of New York City.

Submitted by Raritan Mall Urban Renewal LLC, the proposal outlines the demolition of the aging strip mall and the construction of a 70-foot-tall building featuring 276 rental apartments and 20,000 square feet of ground-floor retail space, according to planning documents.

The project would include 42 affordable rental units.

MAJOR RETAILERS ARE FLEEING ANOTHER POPULAR MALL

A separate one-story building on the property would remain and be converted into retail space.

The redevelopment marks the latest effort to revive the 10.88-acre site, which has struggled since its anchor tenant, Stop & Shop, closed in 2016, according to NJ.com.

The shopping center is now largely vacant. A 2022 preliminary study described the site as “mostly abandoned” and “dilapidated,” citing vandalism and flood damage, the local outlet reported.

SHOPPING MALLS BETTER ADAPT TO MODERN TIMES TO AVOID TOTAL DEATH, SERIAL ENTREPRENEUR SAYS

The hearing represents the newest push to revive a redevelopment plan that has stalled for years.

After the Raritan Borough Council rejected an earlier redevelopment plan, the mall’s owner filed a lawsuit in August 2024. The $100 million suit alleged the vote involved a conflict of interest but was withdrawn in February 2025, NJ.com reported.

The Raritan Mall’s decline also mirrors broader challenges facing traditional shopping centers nationwide. 

TRUMP SAYS AMAZON ‘DESTROYING’ SHOPPING MALLS, HOLLOWING OUT TOWNS

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Even before the COVID-19 pandemic, malls were losing ground as online retailers such as Amazon drew customers away from brick-and-mortar stores. 

Lockdowns then accelerated the decline by keeping shoppers home. Economic pressures stemming from inflation made matters worse with households tightening their budgets and spending less on discretionary items. 

FOX Business reached out to The Raritan Borough Planning Board and Raritan Mall Urban Renewal LLC for comment.

FOX Business’ Daniella Genovese contributed to this report.

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A new hotspot has emerged for homebuyers looking to leave California, and it’s outdrawing a larger and more well-known metro area within its state in the process.

Reno is the second-largest metropolitan area in the state of Nevada and has surpassed Las Vegas, the Silver State’s largest city, as a more attractive destination for Californians looking to move, a report by Realtor.com found.

The analysis of housing data by Realtor.com found that in 2025, almost 43% of views of online listings in the Reno area came from users in California metropolitan areas, which the outlet said was the highest share in the history of the data series dating back to 2019.

By contrast, about 25% of views of Las Vegas area listings came from California metros, a decrease from a 2023 peak of 27%.

AMERICA’S 10 MOST EXPENSIVE ZIP CODES REVEALED

“The data suggests that Reno has long been popular with California home shoppers, and its popularity is continuing to grow perhaps due to its relative affordability and lower cost of living,” said Realtor.com senior economic research analyst Hannah Jones.

Jones noted that in 2025, Reno brought in more prospective homebuyers from locations throughout the state of California than shoppers from within the local market, who accounted for just over 30% of listing views.

By contrast, homes listed in Las Vegas had 38% of their views came from within the metro area and surpassed those from shoppers in California by more than 12%.

AMERICAN HOMEBUYERS GAIN MOST PURCHASING POWER SINCE 2022

Reno is known as “the Biggest Little City in the World” and is located near Nevada’s border with California, close to Lake Tahoe and the Sierra Nevada mountains as well as metro areas in Northern California. Its climate is relatively mild in comparison to that of Las Vegas, which endures sizzling temperatures in the summer months.

Much like Sin City further south in Nevada, Reno is home to casinos and has a significant gambling industry. However, the region’s economy is diversified and major employers in the Reno metro area include Tesla and Panasonic as well as Caesars Entertainment. 

US HOME PRICES ARE RISING – BUT THESE FAST-GROWING MARKETS REMAIN AFFORDABLE

The median home listing price in Reno was $636,800 in February, an increase of over 11% from a year ago, according to the Realtor.com report. Median prices in Las Vegas were lower at $464,950 and were down 1.1% from the prior year amid a 23% increase in inventory.

Experts told Realtor.com that the pricing disparity was largely due to market size, with Reno being much smaller and having a more limited supply of houses. That can translate to larger increases in prices when demand rises.

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Despite the disparity, Bay Area residents looking at Reno will find much cheaper houses than what they’re used to in places like San Francisco, which had a median price of $907,000, as well as San Jose with its $1.35 million median price.

Nevada also lacks a state income tax, which makes it an appealing destination for homebuyers looking to preserve more of their income. It also has become popular among high-earning Californians who could be affected by a proposed wealth tax.

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In what has become a now-familiar refrain, President Donald Trump on Thursday pressed Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell to cut interest rates immediately, rather than wait for the next policy meeting.

“Where is the Federal Reserve Chairman, Jerome “Too Late” Powell, today? He should be dropping Interest Rates, IMMEDIATELY, not waiting for the next meeting,” Trump wrote in a Truth Social post using a mocking nickname for Powell. 

The comments come ahead of the Federal Open Market Committee’s March 17 meeting, when the Fed’s 12-member rate-setting panel will decide whether to change its key interest rate. That benchmark rate helps determine what consumers and businesses pay to borrow money — including for mortgages, car loans and credit cards.

The meeting also comes as the conflict involving Iran has fueled a run-up in energy prices, adding to inflation pressures the Fed is watching closely — and complicating Trump’s pledge to lower costs for Americans.

GAS PRICES SURGE, PINCHING AMERICANS AND HANDING THE GOP A NEW MIDTERM HEADACHE

This week, oil prices surged past $100 a barrel for the first time since 2022 as fallout from the U.S.-Israeli conflict with Iran continued to roil global markets and investors priced in the risk of tighter supply. 

With oil higher, gasoline and diesel prices are rising fast.

Trump’s demand, however, runs up against how the Fed typically operates.

Rate changes are typically made at scheduled meetings. Still, the Fed has cut rates between meetings during crises, most recently in 2020 during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Trump, who nominated Powell to lead the Fed in 2017, has intensified his public campaign in recent months, calling for rates to fall as low as 1% as part of his push to stimulate growth.

For his part, Powell held off initially on rate cuts as the Fed assessed the economic impact of Trump’s evolving trade agenda. That wait-and-see posture kept the Fed’s benchmark rate at 4.25% to 4.5% for a period. The Fed has since lowered rates, and the target range now stands at 3.50% to 3.75%. But even after rate cuts, Trump has escalated his attacks on Powell and the central bank.

TRUMP VS THE FEDERAL RESERVE: HOW THE CLASH REACHED UNCHARTED TERRITORY

Trump’s renewed demands also sharpen the long-running tension between the White House and an institution designed to operate independently, with Fed officials insisting rate decisions will be driven by economic data, not political pressure.

That tension has now expanded beyond monetary policy. Federal prosecutors have opened a criminal investigation tied to Powell’s prior testimony to Congress about cost overruns on the Fed’s headquarters renovation project.

Powell, in a rare video statement, called the probe “unprecedented” and described it as another salvo in what he described as Trump’s pressure campaign on the central bank to cut rates. 

POWELL’S BEHIND-THE-SCENES MOVE AFTER TRUMP’S DOJ OPENED ITS CRIMINAL PROBE

The unusually public response followed days of private consultations with advisors and stood out for a Fed chair known for a measured approach.

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The political stakes are heightened by the timing: Powell’s term as chair ends May 15. 

Trump has nominated former Fed governor Kevin Warsh to succeed him, putting the Fed’s next moves and Powell’s final months under even brighter scrutiny.

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Costco is facing a proposed nationwide class action lawsuit seeking refunds for customers over higher prices charged by the company due to the Trump administration’s tariffs that were subsequently ruled unconstitutional by the Supreme Court.

The lawsuit was filed by a Costco shopper in federal court in Illinois on Wednesday and seeks a declaration that the company must return to customers any refunds it receives for tariffs Costco paid under the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA).

The suit follows the Supreme Court’s ruling on Feb. 20 which held that President Donald Trump overstepped his authority in imposing tariffs under IEEPA, as the law doesn’t grant tariff authority to the president.

Costco is among the more than 2,000 companies that have filed suits in the U.S. Court of International Trade seeking to recover tariffs they paid for imported goods. If the company receives those funds back through a refund, the lawsuit seeks to ensure those refunds are provided to customers who faced higher prices because of tariffs.

FOX Business reached out to Costco for comment.

FEDEX SAYS IT WILL RETURN ANY TARIFF REFUNDS TO CUSTOMERS, SHIPPERS WHO PAID THEM

“This lawsuit seeks to prevent Costco, the third-largest retailer in the world, from double recovery,” the lawsuit said. “Costco has made no commitment to return any portion of anticipated tariff refunds to the consumers who bore those costs.”

The suit added that the company has only promised “a possible future benefit to an indeterminate group of future shoppers.”

Costco CEO Ron Vachris told analysts last week that it was still unclear if or when businesses will get refunds for the IEEPA tariffs they previously paid.

Vachris indicated that if Costco does receive the funds, the company plans to channel them into lower prices and improved value for shoppers.

FEDEX SUES TRUMP ADMINISTRATION FOR FULL TARIFF REFUNDS AFTER SUPREME COURT RULING ON IEEPA

FedEx, which has also filed suit in the Court of International Trade to recover tariff refunds, is facing a similar class action lawsuit that was filed in late February by shippers who paid higher prices due to the tariffs.

Before the class-action lawsuit was filed, the company said in a statement that, “If refunds are issued to FedEx, we will issue refunds to the shippers and consumers who originally bore those charges. When that will happen and the exact process for requesting and issuing refunds will depend in part on future guidance from the government and the court.”

The class action lawsuit claims that FedEx’s promise wasn’t legally enforceable and seeks to ensure shippers and consumers receive the additional funds they paid due to the tariffs.

HOW SHOULD BUSINESSES APPROACH TARIFF REFUNDS?

The Supreme Court’s ruling sent the case back to lower courts, where it’s possible that the government could reach an agreement with the courts over a format for providing refunds to tariff payers.

Existing avenues to pursue tariff refunds exist through the U.S. Court of International Trade, where thousands of companies have filed suit to recover those funds.

A recent study by the Federal Reserve Bank of New York found that U.S. businesses and consumers bore 86% of the tariff burden, while foreign exporters bore 14% as of November 2025. 

The New York Fed’s researchers found that the share borne by U.S. businesses and consumers declined over the year from 94% in the January through August period to 92% in September and October.

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Those findings are similar to those contained in another analysis by the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office (CBO), which noted in its 10-year budget and economic outlook that foreign exporters were absorbing about 5% of the tariff costs with the remaining 95% falling on U.S. firms and consumers.

Reuters contributed to this report.

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Ripple, the fintech known for its association with the XRP cryptocurrency, will buy back about $750 million of shares from investors and employees, which would put the company’s valuation at about $50 billion. The plans were first reported by Bloomberg, which cited sources familiar with the matter.

Ripple’s valuation has gone up about 25% since November, when it raised $500 million in a funding round backed by affiliates of Citadel Securities and affiliates of Fortress Investment Group, among others. Its growing valuation makes the company a rare recent success story in a crypto industry that has tanked since the tail end of last year. Bitcoin is down about 44% since its all-time high price of $126,000 in October, according to Binance. 

Founded in 2012, the company was an early adopter of crypto. Ripple now aims to help financial institutions send money across the world cheaper and faster than traditional foreign exchange. It does so via the XRP Ledger, a cryptocurrency that it created, which serves as a bridge between currencies. 

In 2025, the company expanded through acquisitions for services like trading and stablecoin infrastructure. It bought the prime brokerage Hidden Road for $1.25 billion, and acquired the treasury management company GTreasury for $1 billion. Ripple said earlier this month that it had processed more than $100 billion in transactions.

Like other major cryptocurrencies, XRP has taken a hit in the last few months. Since its all-time high in July, the cryptocurrency is down about 62% to its current price of roughly $1.38, according to Binance. Ripple has been able to survive this dip in part because it owns large reserves of XRP it periodically sells, and because the firm has been building out other financial services products.

Correction: This article was corrected on March 12. A previous version of the article said that Ripple’s November funding round was backed by Citadel Securities and Fortress Investment Group, but the round was backed by affiliates of Citadel Securities and affiliates of Fortress Investment Group.

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Eastman Kodak Co (NYSE:KODK) shares are soaring in Thursday’s after-hours session on the heels of the company’s fourth-quarter results. Here’s what you need to know.

Kodak Reports Highlights From Q4

Kodak said fourth-quarter revenue increased 9% year-over-year to $290 million. Advanced Materials and Chemicals revenue grew 25% year-over-year to $85 million, and Print revenues came in at $195 million, up 4% year-over-year.

The company posted a fourth-quarter loss of $1.23 per share, down from positive …

Full story available on Benzinga.com

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Lennar Corp. (NYSE:LEN) shares slipped in Thursday’s extended trading after the company released its first-quarter earnings report, missing estimates on the top and bottom lines.

The Details: Lennar reported quarterly earnings of 88 cents per share, which missed the consensus of 96 cents, according to Benzinga Pro data.

Quarterly revenue of $6.62 billion missed the consensus estimate of $6.88 billion by 3.83% and was down from $7.63 billion in the same period last year.

Deliveries and orders also came in below estimates, according to …

Full story available on Benzinga.com

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Ulta Beauty, Inc. (NASDAQ:ULTA) shares fell in Thursday’s extended trading after the company released its fourth-quarter earnings report, despite beating estimates across the board.

Here’s a look at the key figures from the quarter. 

The Details: Ulta Beauty reported quarterly earnings of $8.01 per share, which beat the Street estimate of $7.97, according to Benzinga Pro.  

Quarterly sales of $3.898 billion, which beat the analyst consensus estimate of $3.802 billion by 2.54 percent. This is an 11.75% increase over sales of $3.488 billion in the same period last year.

Ulta shared the following fourth-quarter highlights …

Full story available on Benzinga.com

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SentinelOne Inc (NYSE:S) reported fourth-quarter financial results Thursday after the market close. Here’s a rundown of the report.

SentinelOne Reports Mixed Results In Q4

SentinelOne reported fourth-quarter revenue of $271.15 million, narrowly missing the consensus estimate of approximately $271.16 million, according to Benzinga Pro. The cybersecurity company posted fourth-quarter adjusted earnings of seven cents per share, beating analyst estimates of six cents per share.

Total revenue increased 20% year-over-year. Annualized recurring revenue (ARR) increased 22% year-over-year to $1.12 billion as of Jan. 31, and customers with ARR of …

Full story available on Benzinga.com

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Adobe Inc (NASDAQ:ADBE) reported financial results for the first quarter of fiscal 2026 after the market close on Thursday. Here’s a look at the key details from the print.

Adobe Beats Estimates On Top and Bottom Lines

Adobe reported first-quarter revenue of $6.40 billion, beating analyst estimates of $6.28 billion, according to Benzinga Pro. The company reported adjusted earnings of $6.06 per share for the quarter, beating estimates of $5.87 per share.

Total revenue was up 12% year-over-year as total customer group subscription revenue increased 13% year-over-year to $6.17 billion.

Adobe reported $26.06 billion in total annualized recurring revenue (ARR) and said AI-first ARR more …

Full story available on Benzinga.com

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Rubrik, Inc. (NYSE:RBRK) shares climbed in Thursday’s extended trading after the company released its fourth-quarter earnings report, beating estimates on the top and bottom lines.

Here’s a look at the key figures from the quarter. 

The Details: Rubrik reported quarterly earnings of four cents per share, which beat the consensus estimate for a loss of 11 cents, according to Benzinga Pro data.

Quarterly revenue came in at $377.68 million, which beat the Street estimate of $342.34 million and was up from $258.1 million in the same period last year.

Rubrik reported the following fourth quarter highlights:

  • Subscription Annual Recurring Revenue (ARR): Subscription ARR was up 34% year-over-year, growing to $1.46 billion as of …

Full story available on Benzinga.com

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A new report from Ark Invest and Unchained says advances in quantum computing could eventually challenge Bitcoin’s (CRYPTO: BTC), cryptography, though the threat remains distant for now.

Quantum Computing Could Challenge Bitcoin’s Security

A report titled “Bitcoin and Quantum Computing” by ARK Invest and Unchained said current quantum machines remain far from powerful enough to break Bitcoin’s security.

Today’s systems operate in the Noisy Intermediate-Scale Quantum (NISQ) era, meaning they have limited computational power and high error rates, preventing them from compromising Bitcoin’s cryptographic protections.

Bitcoin’s security mainly relies on cryptographic hash functions and elliptic curve cryptography (ECC). …

Full story available on Benzinga.com

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President Donald Trump has reportedly been gifting Florsheim dress shoes to top administration officials, turning the 134-year-old brand into an unexpected status symbol inside the White House.

Trump has surprised some Cabinet members, White House advisors and members of Congress with the shoes – sometimes even guessing their sizes and instructing staff to place the orders. The president personally pays for the footwear, The Wall Street Journal reported.

At Cabinet meetings, Trump has reportedly even asked recipients, “Did you get the shoes?”

Vice President JD Vance, Secretary of State Marco Rubio, Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy, War Secretary Pete Hegseth and Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick are among those who have received pairs, according to the Journal.

‘HAPPY TRUMP’ PINS AVAILABLE, AMONG OTHER COLLECTIBLES, AFTER PRESIDENT DONS NEW ACCESSORY

“All the boys have them,” one White House official said.

Trump recently began looking for footwear for long workdays and chose Florsheim, whose shoes typically sell for about $145.

Some officials now wear the shoes when they are around the president, and in some cases reluctantly, the Journal reported.

TRUMP STORE SPARKS BUZZ AND DEBATE WITH NEW TRUMP 2028 MERCHANDISE

During a December Oval Office meeting, Trump reportedly noticed Vance and Rubio’s footwear, suggested they needed an upgrade and asked for their sizes, the Journal reported.

“You know, you can tell a lot about a man by his shoe size,” Vance later recalled Trump saying.

A photo of Rubio’s shoes has since gone viral, with some online critics speculating that his pair appeared too large.

Founded in Chicago in 1892, Florsheim supplied U.S. troops during both World Wars and was once worn by President Harry Truman. The company is now part of Wisconsin-based Weyco Group.

TRUMP SAYS HIS TARIFFS AIM TO PROMOTE US PRODUCTION OF TANKS, NOT T-SHIRTS: ‘WE WANT TO MAKE BIG THINGS’

Thomas Florsheim Jr., CEO of Weyco Group and a fifth-generation family member, told the Journal he was unaware of the president’s purchases.

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The White House and Florsheim did not respond to FOX Business’ request for comment.

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The escalating conflict in Iran may no longer be contained to the Middle East, as it threatens to deliver a direct hit to the American pocketbook.

As oil prices surge and global flight paths are redrawn, international carriers are already raising fares. While U.S. airlines have not yet raised prices, a new analysis warns a double-digit fare increase could be imminent for domestic flyers.

With jet fuel one of the largest expenses for airlines, domestic flight prices would need to increase by at least 11% to offset current fuel costs, according to Skift Research. Higher fuel costs could translate into higher fares for U.S. travelers.

Global benchmark Brent crude topped $100 per barrel late Thursday morning, marking a more than 60% increase since the start of the year. The market continues to react to halted oil shipments in the Strait of Hormuz and multiple strikes on Middle Eastern oil facilities and tankers as U.S. military forces continue Operation Epic Fury.

AMERICAN AIRLINES BECOMES FIRST U.S. CARRIER TO RESTORE VENEZUELA FLIGHTS SINCE 2019 SHUTDOWN

Qantas and Scandinavian Airlines announced earlier this week that they would raise fares in direct response to rising fuel prices, Reuters reported.

Air New Zealand said it plans to cancel 1,100 flights, impacting more than 44,000 passengers, between now and early May.

“It’s an unprecedented issue as far as fuel price is concerned, but managing fuel spikes is a well-trodden path if you’re running an airline,” CEO Nikhil Ravishankar said on Radio New Zealand.

Multiple outlets reported Wednesday that Thai Airways plans to raise ticket prices by 10% to 15% due to demand and rising fuel costs, with CFO Cherdchom Therdthirasak saying during an investor meeting this week that “passengers planning to travel should secure their tickets as soon as possible before fares rise further.”

The CEO of Hong Kong’s primary carrier, Cathay Pacific, said at a press conference that with fuel prices as high as they are, price surges are being considered.

“In March, like ever since the Middle East episode began, the costs of our fuel already doubled,” CEO Ronald Lam said, the AFP reported. “So we are going to announce [a surcharge] very soon.”

United Airlines CEO Scott Kirby spoke at a Harvard University event Thursday and said high oil prices will have a “meaningful” effect and could extend into the second quarter if the war continues, adding that the impact on fares will “probably start quick,” according to Forbes.

Most U.S. carriers, including United, Delta, Southwest and American, stopped hedging fuel decades ago, Forbes said, and there is no protection contract with the U.S. government that fixes fuel prices for commercial companies.

Delta, however, is partially insulated due to its ownership of the Trainer refinery in Pennsylvania, allowing them to avoid refining margins, though they still pay market rates for raw crude oil.

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Popular travel guide The Points Guy recommends not waiting to book flights amid the conflict — or risk paying more.

“If you’re planning to fly this summer, go ahead and lock in your airfare now. As experts noted, prices could surge any day now,” The Points Guy wrote. “That’s especially true if you’re hoping to fly in June or July, which in recent years have been the busiest and most expensive months of the summer to travel.”

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Bitcoin trades around $70,000, with geopolitical uncertainty weighing on risk assets.

Cryptocurrency Ticker Price
Bitcoin (CRYPTO: BTC) $69,910.13
Ethereum (CRYPTO: ETH) $2,051.13
Solana (CRYPTO: SOL) $85.98
XRP (CRYPTO: XRP) $1.37
Dogecoin (CRYPTO: DOGE) $0.09394
Shiba Inu (CRYPTO: SHIB) $0.055868

Notable Statistics:

  • Coinglass data shows 67,667 traders were liquidated in the past 24 hours for $154.45 million.
  • SoSoValue data shows net inflows of $115.2 million from spot Bitcoin ETFs on Wednesday. Spot Ethereum ETFs saw net inflows of $57.01 million.
  • In the past 24 hours, top gainers include River, Pi and Bittensor.

Notable Developments:

Full story available on Benzinga.com

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FOX Business is celebrating small businesses that have been the backbone of American excellence with a campaign in honor of America’s 250th anniversary that will award three winners $25,000 each, the network announced Thursday. 

FOX Business’ “Made in America” contest participants can apply online with a video or written entry at SmallBusinessAwards2026.com. Submissions and nominations will be taken on the website until March 30. 

The three winners will also be featured in a Fox Nation special. 

Fans will participate in their first round of voting for their favorite small businesses beginning on April 13, after the initial submissions are narrowed down to 10 finalists.

MILLIONS OF JOBS VULNERABLE AS ‘SILVER TSUNAMI’ LOOMS OVER US SMALL BUSINESSES, EXPERTS WARN

A panel of judges, which will include FOX Business hosts and executives, will determine the three winners of the “Made in America” contest.

The winners of the campaign will be announced on air and receive an award for their businesses, as well as an oversized check.

The contest victors will be announced during Small Business Week starting on Monday, May 4.

RARE AND ORIGINAL AMERICAN FOUNDING DOCUMENTS TO FLY ON FREEDOM PLANE ACROSS NATION

A plethora of FOX Business hosts and anchors appeared in a promo announcing the campaign. 

“For 250 years, small businesses have been the backbone of America,” “Mornings with Maria” and “Sunday Morning Futures” host Maria Bartiromo said. 

“Built by people who took a chance on themselves and their communities,” “Kudlow” namesake Larry Kudlow added. 

“These are the places where the American story is written,” “Making Money” host Charles Payne said. 

“The Bottom Line” and “The Big Money Show” co-host Brian Brenberg said, “FOX Business is shining a light on the independent hops that keep our country moving,” and his co-host and founding FOX Business anchor Dagen McDowell provided details on the campaign. 

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The FOX Business “Made in America” campaign is sponsored by Comcast Business and JP Morgan Chase.

America is celebrating its 250th anniversary on July 4, 2026.

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President Donald Trump previewed his “Freedom 250” campaign in December, announcing a series of celebrations to mark the milestone anniversary of the country’s independence. 

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Washington state lawmakers on Wednesday passed a so-called “millionaires tax,” a move criticism said could lead to an exodus of high-income earners.

The State Senate passed the measure with a day left in the 2026 legislative session, following a hotly contested 24-hour marathon in the State House. 

The bill would impose a 9.9% tax on income over $1 million for individuals or couples in a household.

The funds generated from the tax would address the state budget, which is currently dealing with a multi-billion dollar deficit, Fox Seattle reported. 

KEN GRIFFIN’S FLORIDA TAKEOVER: CITADEL FOUNDER SHELLS OUT $180M FOR LATEST PIECE OF MIAMI EMPIRE

Funds would also go toward programs to improve affordability for working families and small business owners. The legislation would go into effect on Jan. 1, 2028, with tax payments starting in 2029.

It is expected to impact 21,000 residents across the state. The bill now heads to the desk of Gov. Bob Ferguson, who has backed the measure. 

On Tuesday, he said the bill “represents historic progress in rebalancing our unfair system. It sends significant dollars back to Washington families and small businesses.”

FLORIDA DOMINATES NATION’S LUXURY REAL ESTATE MARKET WITH LARRY PAGE’S MIAMI ESTATE TOPPING DECEMBER SALES

“It saves working parents money and ensures our kids are prepared to learn by funding free breakfast and lunch for all Washington K-12 students, which has been a priority of mine since I ran for governor,” he wrote on X. “The Millionaires’ Tax will apply to less than one half of one percent of Washingtonians, but make life more affordable for millions. I look forward to signing it.”

A Tax Foundation analysis found that the proposed tax would yield a top rate of more than 18% on wage income and restricted stock units (RSU) vesting in Seattle, making it the highest rate in the U.S.

Washington state has 695,695 small businesses and nearly 360,000 employees in technology-related jobs, according to the Small Business Administration and Washington State Department of Commerce, respectively.

“A tax this aggressive would do real damage to Washington’s economy, sending jobs and economic opportunity elsewhere,” wrote Jared Walczak, a senior fellow at the Tax Foundation. “In particular, for significant swaths of the state’s tech sector, already the target of anomalously high business taxes, a 9.9 percent income tax could prove the last straw, driving any subsequent expansion to other states, and quite possibly taking existing jobs with them.”

The bill has raised concerns from critics who said it could force Washington’s highest earners to leave for more tax-friendly states. 

“If a Starbucks or a Boeing or other people start to diminish their presence in Washington State, guess what happens?” said Republican lawmaker Andrew Barkisduring the State House’s debate this week, according to the New York Times. “Those high-paying jobs? They are going to leave. It is happening.”

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Former Starbucks CEO Howard Schultz said in a LinkedIn post this week that he and his wife are moving from Seattle to Florida after more than four decades in the city. He didn’t mention the tax in his post but said he hopes Washington “will remain a place for business and entrepreneurship to thrive.”

Fox Business’ Daniella Genovese contributed to this report. 

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Amazon repurposed its regular weekly retail technology meeting Tuesday to figure out why its retail website keeps breaking. The answer, buried in internal documents and then quickly deleted, according to the Financial Times: its own AI initiatives.

Four high-severity incidents hit its retail website in a single week, including a six-hour meltdown last Thursday that locked shoppers out of checkout, account information and product pricing. The meeting, run by the senior vice president who oversees Amazon’s ecommerce infrastructure, was framed as a “deep dive” into what went wrong. What went wrong, it turns out, involves the very AI tools Amazon has been pushing its own engineers to adopt, according to the FT.

An internal document prepared for the meeting initially identified “GenAI-assisted changes” as a factor in a pattern of incidents stretching back to Q3. That reference was deleted before the meeting took place, according to the Financial Times, which viewed both versions of the document. 

Amazon has pushed back on the reporting. In a blog post, the company said only one incident involved AI tools, that “none of the incidents involved AI-written code,” and that the cause was “an engineer following inaccurate advice that an agent inferred from an outdated internal wiki.” Amazon also told Fortune the meeting was a routine weekly operations review, not an emergency gathering. The company also said it is not accurate that it introduced new approval requirements for engineers working with AI tools, and that AWS was not involved in any of the incidents.

“As part of normal business, the meeting will include a review of the availability of our website and app as we focus on continual improvement,” an Amazon spokesperson told Fortune.

The internal documents, obtained and reported by CNBC, tell another story. Dave Treadwell, SVP of eCommerce Foundation, laid it out for staff:. Site availability had not been good recently, he wrote, and the string of Sev 1s—the most severe classification for incidents that take down important systems—demanded immediate attention.

But the internal documents, as initially written, according to CNBC, tell a more complicated story. Treadwell acknowledged in his note that “best practices and safeguards” around generative AI usage haven’t been fully established, and wrote that the company would introduce “controlled friction” into deployments involving the most critical parts of the retail experience, according to CNBC. Either way Amazon calls it, the message to engineers was that AI-assisted changes now get more scrutiny.

The timing for that kind of admission is brutal for Amazon. The company, which just surpassed Walmart to top the Fortune 500, is spending more on AI infrastructure than any company on Earth—$200 billion in projected capital expenditures this year. 

Amazon is also aggressively thinning out its workforce. The company laid off roughly 14,000 corporate workers in October — mostly middle managers — followed by another 16,000 in January. That’s on top of more than 27,000 employees cut between 2022 and 2023. In June, Jassy wrote in an internal memo that Amazon would need fewer employees thanks to AI-driven “efficiency gains,” repeating his drumbeat emphasizing the AI future of less workers needed at the giant retail platform. When the October cuts came, Jassy reframed the rationale on an earnings call to be about “culture,” saying that the company had grown too fast during the pandemic, and Amazon needed to be “lean” and “move fast.”

But a separate Amazon memo announcing the same layoffs cited the need to adapt to “transformative technology,” the kind of language that maps a lot more cleanly onto an AI-driven workforce reduction than a spring cleaning. But it seems that either way, Amazon has found itself in need of more humans in the process.

It’s an interesting narrative violation in a world of AI-related layoffs. Jack Dorsey’s Block cut nearly half its workforce last month — 4,000 employees — and tied the decision explicitly to AI-driven productivity gains. Dorsey said most companies would reach the same conclusion within a year. Salesforce’s Marc Benioff said he needed fewer heads after cutting 4,000 support roles. The C-suite consensus is that increasing AI investment will pay for itself with smaller workforces.

But the promise that AI would lighten the load isn’t playing out— at least, not for the workers who remain, and not for the systems they manage. A new analysis reported by the Wall Street Journal of 164,000 workers by ActivTrak found that AI is increasing the speed, density, and complexity of work rather than reducing it. Time spent on email, messaging, and chat apps more than doubled after workers adopted AI tools. Time devoted to focused, uninterrupted work—the kind required for solving complex problems—fell 9%. Meanwhile, new research from Anthropic suggests the gap between what AI can theoretically automate and what it’s actually automating is enormous. Even in software and math — where 94% of tasks could theoretically be handled by AI, only about 33% are being automated today. Legal constraints and institutional troubles are all slowing deployment, Anthropic said. Amazon’s outages could be a live demonstration of why.

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AI chatbots and search engines are sometimes negative about brands, and the end result—while arguably good for the end consumer—is a wake-up call for companies.

A study of hundreds of millions of prompts across three industries (apparel, electronics, and education) conducted by search engine optimization company BrightEdge found Google’s AI Overviews was 44% more likely to display negative information about a brand than OpenAI’s ChatGPT. Still, when consumers prompted ChatGPT to decide between the two products, the roles flipped, with ChatGPT being more negative.

While the overwhelming majority of responses analyzed in the study were either positive or neutral, a small percentage of responses were negative for both Google AI Overviews and ChatGPT, 2.3% and 1.6%, respectively.

BrightEdge CEO Jim Yu told Fortune while these percentages may seem small, multiplied across hundreds of millions of results, they can still equate to loads of negative queries, which can affect a company’s image in the eyes of potential consumers. For every million queries, an estimated 23,000 would yield a negative response by AI Overviews, based on the data from the study.

Google, in particular, Yu said, is pulling out negative information associated with products that can sometimes be years old because of the way it pulls information from the internet. These searches, though, depend heavily on what people search for and what is publicly available about a company.

“Instead of it being on the back pages that’s way further down, now it’s pulling it into the front page, as people are looking for things about your brand,” he said. “That’s a huge change for businesses.” 

A spokesperson for Google told Fortune the report used a flawed methodology to make sensational claims and found a negligible difference of 1% between AI Overviews and ChatGPT in terms of negative responses.

“It also misunderstands how AI Overviews work: They’re based on what sources on the web say about a topic and change depending on what someone is searching for,” said the spokesperson in a statement.

OpenAI did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Courtesy of BrightEdge

To mitigate the negative information being brought to the forefront of AI, companies need to make it a priority to respond to nearly every negative review published by people online, Matt Blumberg, the CEO of Markup.AI, a tech company that uses AI to review marketing content, told Fortune. 

“I do think it’s more important than ever, because those things are getting picked up more, and they’re getting picked up in different ways by different AI applications,” Blumberg said.

The study shows a clear shift in how AI presents information to people. Consumers are using AI to become better researchers and to get a clearer and arguably more objective picture of the positives and negatives of any product, Yu said.

For companies, this new reality of search means companies need to be pushing out fresh content to cater to AI’s preference for newer content, while also being strategic about where they place it. 

“It’s a new dynamic that they do have to really think about,” Yu added.

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President Donald Trump said that America benefits when oil prices increase because the nation is the world’s biggest oil producer, but added that he considers blocking Iran from obtaining nuclear weapons to be more important.

“The United States is the largest Oil Producer in the World, by far, so when oil prices go up, we make a lot of money,” the president said in a Thursday Truth Social post. 

“BUT, of far greater interest and importance to me, as President, is stoping an evil Empire, Iran, from having Nuclear Weapons, and destroying the Middle East and, indeed, the World. I won’t ever let that happen! Thank you for your attention to this matter,” he added.

TRUMP TOUTS ‘HISTORIC’ $300B TEXAS REFINERY AS FIRST NEW US PLANT IN NEARLY 50 YEARS

Gas prices have been surging amid the war, with AAA’s national average price for regular gas currently at $3.598.

The U.S. plans to release millions of barrels of oil from its Strategic Petroleum Reserve next week. 

“Earlier today, 32 member nations of the International Energy Agency unanimously agreed to President Trump’s request to lower energy prices with a coordinated release of 400 million barrels of oil and refined products from their respective reserves,” Energy Secretary Chris Wright said in a Wednesday statement.

“As part of this effort, President Trump authorized the Department of Energy to release 172 million barrels from the Strategic Petroleum Reserve, beginning next week. This will take approximately 120 days to deliver based on planned discharge rates,” Wright noted.

“Unlike the previous administration, which left America’s oil reserves drained and damaged, the United States has arranged to more than replace these strategic reserves with approximately 200 million barrels within the next year — 20% more barrels than will be drawn down — and at no cost to the taxpayer,” he said in the statement.

IRAN THREATENS $200 OIL BARRELS AS US PREPARES MASSIVE RELEASE OF EMERGENCY PETROLEUM RESERVES

White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt told Fox News on Thursday that the administration “is considering waiving the Jones Act for a limited period of time to ensure vital energy products and agricultural necessities are flowing freely to U.S. ports.”

The Iranian regime has threatened increased oil prices as the regime targets commercial shipping in the Strait of Hormuz. 

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“Get ready for oil to be $200 a barrel, because the oil price depends on regional security, which you have destabilised,” Iranian military command spokesperson Ebrahim Zolfaqari warned in comments directed toward Washington, Reuters reported.

Fox News’ Patrick Ward contributed to this report.

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Mortgage rates climbed this week, mortgage buyer Freddie Mac said Thursday.

Freddie Mac’s latest Primary Mortgage Market Survey, released Thursday, showed the average rate on the benchmark 30-year fixed mortgage rose to 6.11% from last week’s reading of 6%. 

The average rate on a 30-year loan was 6.65% a year ago.

TEXAS CAPITAL’S HOUSEHOLD GROWTH SURGES, FAR OUTPACING NATIONAL RATE

“Despite the modest uptick, buyers are responding to rates in this range, with existing-home sales increasing 1.7% in February,” said Sam Khater, Freddie Mac’s chief economist. “Purchase applications also increased this week, a welcome sign as buyers enter spring homebuying season with rates down more than half a percentage point compared to the same time last year.”

RENT BECOMING MORE AFFORDABLE FOR MANY AMERICANS AS MARKET STABILIZES

The average rate on a 15-year fixed mortgage increased to 5.5% from last week’s reading of 5.43%.

Mortgage rates are affected by several factors, including the Federal Reserve and geopolitics. Though mortgage rates are not directly affected by the Fed’s interest rate decisions, they closely track the 10-year Treasury yield. The 10-year yield hovered around 4.23% as of Thursday afternoon as oil prices moved higher due to the war in Iran.

“The ongoing conflict in Iran has stoked fears of wartime inflation, sending yields on the 10-year Treasury climbing and driving mortgage rates higher,” said Hannah Jones, Realtor.com senior economic research analyst. “This shift comes despite last week’s jobs data being weaker than expected, with unemployment ticking up to 4.4% and nonfarm payroll employment falling by 92,000 jobs. Inflation also drifted lower in February, with headline inflation holding steady at 2.4% and core inflation at 2.5%. Under normal circumstances, these soft economic readings would put downward pressure on mortgage rates. However, the news out of the Middle East is overriding those signals.”

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The biggest new restaurant trend is small.

Special menus with petite, less expensive portions are popping up all over, from large chains like Olive Garden and The Cheesecake Factory to trendy urban eateries and farm-to-fork dining rooms.

Restaurants hope that offering smaller servings beyond the children’s menu will meet many different diners’ needs. Some people want to spend less when they go out. Others are looking for healthier options or trying to lose weight. Younger consumers tend to snack more throughout the day and eat smaller meals, said Maeve Webster, the president of culinary consulting firm Menu Matters.

“These are really driven by, I think, changes in the way people are thinking about their relationship with food, the way they spend money on food, what is a good value and what’s not,” Webster said.

Looking for value

Beth Tipton, the co-owner of Daniel Girls Farmhouse Restaurant in Connersville, Indiana, introduced an eight-item Mini Meals menu last fall after several customers requested smaller portions. The menu, which includes daily specials like a half piece of meatloaf with green beans, mashed potatoes and gravy for $8, now accounts for about 20% of the restaurant’s orders, she said.

Older adults make up about half of the restaurant’s clientele, Tipston said, and some customers told her the regular menu was a stretch for their budgets. As someone who underwent weight-loss surgery, she also knew from experience that many restaurants won’t allow adults to order from their children’s menus.

“We wanted it to be available to all without the word ‘kids meals’ attached,” Tipton said. “With the rising costs all around us we wanted to help in any way we can, and this is a great option.”

Eating out and GLP-1s

Some restaurants are adding menus to court users of GLP-1 weight-loss and diabetes drugs like Zepbound, Wegovy, Ozempic and Mounjaro.

Last fall, restaurateur Barry Gutin ran into two different friends who told him they were taking GLP-1s and struggling to find restaurant meals that met their dietary needs and smaller appetites. GLP-1 users tend to eat less, so they need nutritionally dense foods that are low in fat and high in protein and fiber.

Gutin, the co-owner of Cuba Libre Restaurant and Rum Bar in Philadelphia, Washington, Atlantic City, New Jersey, and Orlando, Florida, reached out to a doctor who specializes in weight loss and to Cuba Libre’s culinary director, Angel Roque. Over the next month, they developed the chain’s GLP-Wonderful menu, which is available during dinner.

The menu has five classic Cuban options. Roque said the pollo asado on Cuba Libre’s regular menu has nearly 1,000 calories; on the GLP-1 menu, that’s slimmed down to 400 calories, but heavy on protein and fiber. He said it was also important to keep the GLP-1 meals flavorful and colorful, to stimulate appetites.

“Many times when people are on those kind of regimes, they feel that they can’t do the same as everybody else. So we wanted to show them, yes, at Cuba Libre, you can,” Roque said.

Gutin said the menu has increased business. He estimated that 10 to 20 groups at each location every week have at least one person who requests the GLP-Wonderful menu.

“People say, ‘Thank you for serving us’,” Gutin said.

Big chains go small

Olive Garden, whose seven-item “Lighter Portions” menu rolled out nationwide in January, said GLP-1 users were one consideration. The Italian-style restaurant chain also wanted to appeal to patrons pursuing healthier diets or more affordable meals, said Rick Cardenas, the president and CEO of Olive Garden’s parent company, Darden Restaurants.

“There is a consumer group out there that believes in abundance, but abundance is different for everybody,” Cardenas said in September during a conference call with investors. “So consumers can choose. We’re not changing our entire menu to make it a smaller portion.”

The Asian fusion chain P.F. Chang’s began offering medium-sized portions last fall. The Cheesecake Factory added smaller, lower-priced Bites and Bowls to its menu last summer, while TGI Fridays recently began testing an “Eat Like A Kid” menu with smaller portions.

A long-term change

Smaller portions aren’t a new concept. Twenty years ago, small-plate tapas restaurants were all the rage, for instance.

But to Webster, the menu consultant, the scaled-down dishes appearing now feel like a longer-term shift. For one thing, the trend is not tied to any particular cuisine. Webster also thinks consumers are thinking more about food waste than they used to, and smaller portions can alleviate some of their concerns.

“I think it is a core need that consumers have, and a demand that has been lingering under the surface for a long time because restaurant meals, particularly at chains, have become so large,” she said. “Sure, it sounds great to take leftovers home, but they never taste as good.”

During a recent visit to Shelburne, Vermont, from his home in North Carolina, Jack Pless was delighted to see the Teeny Tuesday menu at Barkeaters Restaurant, which specializes in locally sourced food. Pless, who’s in his 60s and used to own a restaurant, said he can’t eat as much as he used to at meals.

“So many times you go out to restaurants, especially me or my wife, and we’ll take home a box and it’ll sit in the refrigerator for two, three days and start to grow a beard,” he said.

Julie Finestone, the co-owner of Barkeaters, said she introduced the Teeny Tuesday menu last month to bring in more weekday business during the winter. She was concerned about the cost of offering lower-priced food options, like $12 reuben sliders, but said the decision has brought in more business than she expected.

Finestone said she’s pretty confident Teeny Tuesday will become a year-round fixture.

“Some people, it’s dietary. Some have smaller appetites. Some people don’t like to overindulge in the middle of the week,” Finestone said. “I think that it just spoke to people.”

___

AP Video Journalists Mingson Lau in Philadelphia and Amanda Swinhart in Shelburne, Vermont, contributed.

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Iran’s secretive new supreme leader on Thursday vowed to keep up attacks on Gulf Arab countries and use the effective closure of the strategic Strait of Hormuz as leverage against the United States and Israel. It was his first public statement since being chosen to succeed his father, who was killed in an Israeli strike.

Supreme Leader Ayatollah Mojtaba Khamenei, 56, who Israel suspects was wounded in the opening salvo of the war, has not appeared in public since then. In the statement read by a state TV news anchor, he vowed to avenge those killed in the war, including in a strike on a school that killed over 165 people.

The statement signaled a willingness to continue the war that has disrupted global energy supplies, international travel and the relative safety enjoyed by the Gulf Arab states. Iran’s unrelenting attacks on shipping traffic and energy infrastructure in the Persian Gulf had earlier pushed oil back above $100 a barrel.

Both sides dig in as fighting escalates

U.S. and Israeli strikes have exacted a heavy toll on Iran’s leadership, military and ballistic missile program but have failed to topple the government, which U.S. President Donald Trump has at times suggested is his goal.

Iran is trying to inflict enough global economic pain to pressure the United States and Israel to halt their bombardment, which began on Feb. 28. Those strikes killed Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei — Mojtaba’s father — and the younger Khamenei’s wife.

Trump has meanwhile promised to “finish the job,” even though he claimed Iran is “virtually destroyed.” He said in a social media post Thursday that ensuring Iran does not develop a nuclear weapon was a higher priority than soaring oil prices.

Iran-backed Hezbollah militants meanwhile launched some 200 rockets from Lebanon at northern Israel while sirens rang out and loud booms from the interception of Iranian missiles could be heard in other areas. Israel launched another wave of attacks on Tehran and in Lebanon, where 11 people were killed.

The U.N. refugee agency said up to 3.2 million people in Iran have been displaced by the ongoing war. It said most have fled from Tehran and other major cities toward the north of the country or rural areas. Around 800,000 people have been internally displaced in Lebanon, prompting fears of a humanitarian crisis.

Khamenei warns of ‘opening other fronts’ if war continues

Khamenei’s first statement signaled a continuation of his late father’s strategy in confronting the United States and Israel. He called on Gulf Arabs to “shut down” U.S. bases in the region, saying protection promised by Washington was “nothing more than a lie.”

He also said Iran has studied “opening other fronts in which the enemy has little experience and would be highly vulnerable” if the war continues. He did not elaborate, but Iran has been linked to previous attacks on U.S., Israeli and Jewish targets around the world.

Khamenei is close to Iran’s paramilitary Revolutionary Guard and is widely seen as even less compromising than his father. His location is unknown, and he is likely a prime target for the U.S. and Israel.

In addition to attacking energy infrastructure across the region, Iran has also effectively closed the Strait of Hormuz, the waterway leading from the Persian Gulf toward the Indian Ocean through which a fifth of the world’s traded oil flows.

The price of Brent crude oil, the international standard, rose another 9% to more than $100 a barrel, up some 38% over what it cost when the war started. Prices have swung back and forth in recent days, at one point surging to around $120 a barrel.

Israel and Hezbollah trade heavy fire

It was a sleepless night for many in Israel and Lebanon as Hezbollah launched some 200 rockets into Israel, according to the Israeli military. Israeli warplanes carried out simultaneous airstrikes on areas in Beirut’s southern suburbs and struck a car near the capital.

“The noise was extraordinary, it was really scary,” said Naama Porat, a resident of the rural Israeli community of Klil, some 15 kilometers (9 miles) from the Lebanese border. As the sound of explosions and interceptions rang out, she dashed with her son to a shelter and spent the night there.

Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz warned Lebanon that if its government does not prevent Hezbollah from attacking, Israel “will take the territory and do it ourselves.”

Lebanon’s government has ramped up calls for Hezbollah to disarm since the group’s last war with Israel was halted by a 2024 ceasefire, and earlier this month declared Hezbollah’s military activities illegal. But it has been reluctant to confront the militants directly.

More than 20 killed in strikes on Lebanon and Iran

The Israeli military struck a building in a busy residential and commercial district in central Beirut after issuing a warning for residents to evacuate. The strike hit in a neighborhood that is close to Lebanon’s parliament, United Nations offices and international embassies.

Israeli military spokesperson Avichay Adraee said they were targeting a “facility affiliated with Hezbollah.”

Israel earlier hit a car in a seaside area of Lebanon’s capital, killing eight and wounding 31, the Lebanese Health Ministry said. The Israeli military said it was “not aware” of a strike at that location.

Israel’s military on Thursday warned residents of an even larger area of southern Lebanon to leave their homes. It said they should move north of the Zahrani River, which at its midpoint is about 35 miles (56 kilometers) away from the border with Israel.

Separately, Israel said it struck a nuclear facility in Iran in recent days that it had destroyed with an airstrike in October 2024. Earlier this year, satellite photos raised concerns that Iran was working to restore the facility.

The U.S. and Israel say that destroying whatever remains of Iran’s nuclear program is one of the central aims of the war. They have long suspected Iran seeks nuclear weapons, while the Islamic Republic says its nuclear program is peaceful.

Iran fires at Gulf Arab countries and hits ship in Persian Gulf

British officials said several U.S. personnel were injured in drone strikes in northern Iraq on Wednesday night.

Brig. Guy Foden said a number of drones hit a base in Erbil that houses both British and American troops. Another officer, Lt. Gen. Nick Perry, said there were no British casualties, while the U.S. sustained some casualties but “nothing too serious.”

Early Thursday, a container ship was hit with a projectile off the coast of Dubai, sparking a small fire, according to British military’s United Kingdom Maritime Trade Operations Center. It said the crew were safe.

An Iranian attack sparked a major fire on Muharraq Island, home to Bahrain’s international airport. Kuwait authorities said an Iranian drone smashed into a residential building, wounding two people, and that a drone damaged Kuwait International Airport but caused no casualties.

The UAE said it had activated air defenses twice to protect the futuristic city of Dubai from attacks, and firefighters extinguished a blaze at a tower after a drone hit.

Saudi Arabia, meanwhile, said it shot down a drone targeting the diplomatic quarter in its capital, Riyadh, and other drones in the east, including at least one trying to target its Shaybah oil field.

Iran’s latest attacks on its Gulf neighbors flouted a U.N. Security Council resolution approved Wednesday.

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Melzer reported from Mitzpe Hila, Israel, Rising from Bangkok and Corder from The Hague, Netherlands. Associated Press writers Sally Abou AlJoud and Kareem Chehayeb in Beirut, and Jill Lawless in London, contributed to this report.

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Energy Secretary Chris Wright on Thursday said that while the U.S. Navy may soon be in a position to escort oil tankers through the Strait of Hormuz to protect them from attacks by Iran, the Navy isn’t yet ready to do so.

Wright said in an interview on CNBC’s “Squawk Box” that tanker escorts through the Strait of Hormuz – a vital chokepoint in the shipping lanes through the Persian Gulf – will be on the table in the near future as the air campaign against Iran’s military capabilities continues. Shipping traffic in the strait has largely ground to a halt due to the risk of Iranian attacks.

“It’ll happen relatively soon, but it can’t happen now,” Wright said in the interview. “We’re simply not ready. All of our military assets right now are focused on destroying Iran’s offensive capabilities and the manufacturing industry that supplies their offensive capabilities.”

The energy secretary was asked in the interview whether the Navy would be in a position to begin escorting tankers through the strait by the end of this month and Wright responded, “Yes, I think that is quite likely the case.”

CARGO SHIP STRUCK IN STRAIT OF HORMUZ AMID IRAN WAR

“Again, I’ll be over at the Pentagon later today. But that is what the military is working on and, yes, a lot of critical materials come out of the Strait of Hormuz,” Wright told CNBC.

“We have a large global economy. Fortunately, with President Trump’s policies, we’re a net exporter of oil, we’re a net exporter of natural gas, and in fact we’re growing our net exports of natural gas this spring, this summer. You’ll see massively more capacity online by the end of this year,” he added.

OIL SPIKE FADES AS MARKETS REASSESS IRAN WAR SUPPLY RISKS

Wright said in the interview that the Trump administration doesn’t want the Iran campaign to be a “brush off for a year or two” and wants to “permanently destroy their ability to build missiles, to build drones, to have a nuclear program.”

“It is short-term pain for the long-term gain, but it’s simply a must-achieve thing. Otherwise, you’ve got decades into the future of an Iran that can hold the world hostage whenever it wants,” he added.

HOW THE IRAN WAR COULD HIT AMERICANS’ GROCERY BILLS

The energy secretary’s comments come after a subsequently deleted social media post on his X account indicated that the “U.S. Navy successfully escorted an oil tanker through the Strait of Hormuz to ensure oil remains flowing to global markets.”

However, the post was taken down and White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt confirmed during a briefing that the “U.S. Navy has not escorted a tanker or vessel at this time. Though, of course, that is an option the president has said he will absolutely utilize if and when necessary at the appropriate time.”

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Oil prices have surged amid the conflict with Iran, with prices briefly rising near $115 a barrel before declining and trading between about $80 and $95 a barrel this week.

Gasoline prices have also spiked, with AAA reporting the national average price for a gallon of gas rose to $3.598 a gallon as of Thursday – up from $2.944 a gallon a month ago.

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When Kevin Ketels bought an electric 2026 Chevrolet Blazer last year, he wasn’t thinking about the cost of gas. He just thought EVs were better and “wanted to be part of the future.” Now that the Iran war is spiking prices at the pump, the Detroit man is happy he is no longer filling up his 11-year-old gas-powered SUV.

“Electricity can go up, but it won’t go up nearly as much as gas will and it won’t go up nearly as fast, either,” said Ketels, 55, an assistant professor of global supply chain management at Wayne State University.

Experts say prolonged high gas prices may drive some EV interest and sales, especially if drivers assume their electricity prices won’t be affected by the crises.

But many factors influence consumer EV purchases — and electricity rates.

Are EV owners truly insulated from price hikes?

Drivers of gas-powered vehicles are much more vulnerable to fluctuating prices that result from global conflict than those who charge their cars. The national average for a gallon of regular gas this week was $3.57, up from $2.94 a month ago, according to AAA.

Meanwhile, “residential electricity prices are regulated and are much less volatile than gasoline prices,” said University of California, Davis economics professor Erich Muehlegger. “As a result, EV owners are largely unaffected by oil price shocks.”

But experts say electricity prices have been increasing nationally for a variety of reasons, including surging power demand from new data centers.

“This is an inflationary event,” Holt Edwards, principal in Bracewell’s Policy Resolution Group, said of the war. “Is this the driver in electricity prices? I think probably not. But it’s certainly a contributing factor.”

To what extent oil and gas conflicts could translate to the electricity sector is yet to be seen.

What about how different grids are powered?

When it comes to the electricity an EV owner is tapping, much of the cost depends on which sources of electricity are in a local grid’s power mix, experts say.

Because regulators set residential electricity prices annually, most households are sheltered from month-to-month changes in natural gas costs. Though experts say higher natural gas prices can increase the cost of generating electricity, natural gas prices haven’t risen as quickly or as much as oil prices have recently.

Those are just two of many energy sources — including coal, nuclear and renewables — that power the electric grid.

“The energy component varies depending on the energy you’re using and the price of the energy that you’re using to generate electricity,” said Pierpaolo Cazzola, an energy expert at Columbia University’s Center on Global Energy Policy. “What happens is that in the U.S., the variation of the price of the energy component is smaller than it is elsewhere.”

The experts said persistent war could affect electricity bills in the future. And that is all the more reason for countries to transition to clean power, they said.

“Clean power and electrification combined is what provides the most security,” said Euan Graham, an analyst at energy think tank Ember.

Michael B. Klein, a 56-year-old software developer in Evanston, Illinois, has driven EVs for the past eight years to save on fuel costs and because of environmental concerns.

Every time electrical grid efficiency improves — especially as renewables are added — “I get that benefit no matter what,” said Klein, who drives a Chevy Bolt. “They can improve the efficiency of gas engines, but you have to get a new car in order to reap the benefit of that.”

So will EV demand rise?

Several experts say high gasoline prices are a strong driver of EV sales, particularly if high prices persist. Drivers also consider more gasoline-efficient hybrid vehicles during these times.

Car-shopping resource Edmunds analyzed consumer shopping data for the week starting March 2, after the Iran war had begun. They found that interest in hybrids, plug-in hybrids and battery EVs accounted for 22.4% of all vehicle research activity on their site that week, up from 20.7% the previous week. Analysts also looked back at the last major nationwide fuel price surges in 2022, and they saw that consideration of electrified vehicles consideration rose sharply then, too.

But whether this means more EV purchases depends on whether buyers expect to save not just now but in the future, experts say.

Adding to the complexity: A sudden increase in EV demand could drive up prices, Graham said.

“I think the real step change would be in whether this causes governments to shift tax, tariff policies around EVs,” Graham said. Doing so would help reduce fossil fuel dependence, he said.

Does driving electric really save money?

Pretty much.

People who buy EVs have a “really substantial” gas savings over the life of their vehicles even without government tax credits, said Peter Zalzal, an attorney with Environmental Defense Fund.

“We’re talking about thousands and thousands of dollars” in savings, Zalzal said. “And as gas prices increase, those savings are only greater. Fuel costs are a big piece of overall vehicle costs, and increases in fuel prices have significant impacts on people.”

However, the upfront cost of a new EV is still more than that of a gasoline-powered vehicle; new EVs sold for an average of $55,300 last month, while new vehicles overall sold for an average $49,353, according to auto-buying resource Kelley Blue Book. Some experts also expressed national security concerns with EVs because China dominates significant parts of the EV supply chain.

Ketels, the EV owner and professor, said he believes EVs and renewable energy should be a strategic priority for individuals and the U.S. because they could be produced domestically “and we don’t have those fluctuations and those worries.”

But because the federal government has withdrawn many incentives for both, “it puts us at a disadvantage globally,” Ketels said. “I think it’s been a terrible mistake to withdraw these incentives and to attack the sustainable energy industry,” and the war “is just making it that much more obvious.”

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Read more of AP’s climate coverage.

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The Associated Press’ climate and environmental coverage receives financial support from multiple private foundations. AP is solely responsible for all content. Find AP’s standards for working with philanthropies, a list of supporters and funded coverage areas at AP.org.

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With no clear end in sight, the war with Iran is sending oil prices back to $100 per barrel, and stocks are sinking worldwide on Thursday.

The S&P 500 fell 1.1% and is returning to sharp swings following a couple days of relative calm. The Dow Jones Industrial Average was down 575 points, or 1.2%, as of 12:15 p.m. Eastern time, and the Nasdaq composite was 1.4% lower.

The center of action was again the oil market, where the price of a barrel of Brent crude, the international standard, climbed 7.9% to $99.25 after briefly touching $101.59. Worries are worsening that the war could block the production of oil in the Persian Gulf for a long time and cause a debilitating surge of inflation for the global economy.

Iran’s new supreme leader released his first statement Thursday since succeeding his late father, saying his country would keep up attacks on Gulf Arab neighbors and use the effective closure of the Strait of Hormuz as leverage against the United States and Israel. A fifth of the world’s oil typically sails through the strait, and oil producers in the region are cutting production because their crude has nowhere to go.

Countries around the world are trying to make up for that, and the International Energy Agency said Wednesday that its members would release a record amount of oil, 400 million barrels, from stockpiles built for such emergencies.

But such moves are short-term fixes, and they do not clear the long-term risks. Analysts have said that if the Strait of Hormuz remains closed, oil prices could jump to $150.

To be sure, the U.S. stock market has a history of bouncing back relatively quickly from military conflicts in the Middle East and elsewhere, as long as oil prices don’t stay too high for too long. Even with all the up- and- down swings of the last couple weeks, many rocking markets hour to hour, the S&P 500 is still just roughly 4% below its all-time high set in January.

What’s made this jump for oil prices frightening is not only the degree — prices jumped near $120 earlier this week to their highest level since 2022 — but that they’re also occurring during an uncertain time for the economy.

Last month’s report on hiring by U.S. employers was surprisingly weak, which raised worries about a possible worst-case scenario for the economy called “stagflation.” That’s where economic growth stagnates while inflation remains high, and it’s a miserable mix that the Federal Reserve has no good tools to fix.

A more encouraging signal arrived Thursday. A report said that the number of U.S. workers applying for unemployment benefits inched lower last week. That’s a sign that layoffs are potentially remaining low around the country.

Dollar General, meanwhile, reported better profit and revenue for the latest quarter than analysts expected. But the retailer with relatively low prices, whose customers often have the least cushion to absorb higher gasoline prices, gave forecasts for revenue this upcoming year that indicated a potential slowdown in growth. Its stock fell 4.4%.

Some of Wall Street’s worst losses again hit companies with big fuel bills. Cruise-ship operator Carnival fell 6.2%, and United Airlines sank 3.8%.

Worries about the private-credit industry continued to hurt the market. Investors have been rushing to pull money out of some funds and companies that have lent to businesses whose profits are potentially under threat. Many of the worries are focused on business that could be made obsolete by new AI-powered rivals and may not pay back their loans.

Morgan Stanley fell 3.9% after its North Haven Private Income Fund said it allowed investors to redeem only 5% of its total shares instead of the nearly 11% they had requested. That 5% cap is the advertised limit.

In stock markets abroad, indexes fell across Europe and Asia.

Japan’s Nikkei 225 dropped 1%, and France’s CAC 40 sank 0.9% for two of the world’s bigger moves.

In the bond market, Treasury yields continued to climb because of upward pressure from rising oil prices. The yield on the 10-year Treasury rose to 4.24% from 4.21% late Wednesday and from just 3.97% before the war started.

Higher yields make all kinds of borrowing more expensive, such as mortgages for potential U.S. homebuyers and bond offerings for companies looking to expand. They also push down on prices for all kinds of investments, from stocks to crypto.

Because of the spike for oil prices, traders have pushed back forecasts for when the Fed could resume its cuts to interest rates. President Donald Trump has been angrily calling for such cuts, which would give the economy and job market a boost but also potentially worsen inflation.

A barrel of benchmark U.S. crude rose 9.3% to $95.34.

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AP Business Writers Matt Ott and Elaine Kurtenbach contributed.

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BlackRock (NYSE:BLK) on Thursday launched the iShares Staked Ethereum Trust ETF (NASDAQ:ETHB) on Nasdaq, combining spot Ethereum (CRYPTO: ETH) exposure with staking rewards as institutional demand for crypto yield accelerates.

The Staking Feature Gap

ETHB marks BlackRock’s third crypto ETF and the first to incorporate staking, Coindesk reported on Thursday.

The fund holds spot Ethereum and stakes a portion of holdings on the Ethereum network, allowing investors to earn rewards while benefiting from price movements.

The launch addresses a gap that discouraged crypto-native investors from moving into ETFs. 

Jay Jacobs, BlackRock’s U.S. head of equity ETFs, explained that investors who already held ether directly and were staking it weren’t ready to move into exchange-traded products because they …

Full story available on Benzinga.com

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American officials are on heightened alert after federal authorities warned that Iran could attempt to launch drones toward the California coast, raising concerns about how easily low-cost unmanned aircraft could threaten U.S. cities.

Red Cat CEO Jeff Thompson joined FOX Business’ Maria Bartiromo on “Mornings with Maria” to discuss how emerging drone threats could be detected and destroyed if adversaries attempted to launch them toward the U.S. coastline.

CARGO SHIP STRUCK IN STRAIT OF HORMUZ AMID IRAN WAR

The warning comes as Iran has increasingly relied on drone technology in modern warfare, deploying both large strike drones and smaller, inexpensive models that can be launched quickly and in large numbers. Defense officials have seen similar tactics used in conflicts overseas, particularly in the Middle East and Eastern Europe, where swarms of relatively inexpensive drones have been used to overwhelm traditional defense systems.

Thompson said a potential offshore launch targeting California would likely be identifiable and could be intercepted quickly by U.S. defenses.

“We don’t have any details currently, but if they’re trying to launch vertical-launch mechanisms off of small boats off the coast of California, it’s going to be very easy to find and very easy to kill,” Thompson said.

IRAN THREATENS $200 OIL BARRELS AS US PREPARES MASSIVE RELEASE OF EMERGENCY PETROLEUM RESERVES

Still, he cautioned that the smallest drones present a different challenge. Because many are built using widely available commercial technology, they can move quickly and operate at low altitudes, making them harder to detect with traditional systems.

“The really small ones like FPV drones… are going to be very hard to battle because they’re just so quick,” Thompson said.

As drone warfare evolves, Thompson said future defense strategies will likely rely on large numbers of inexpensive counter-systems designed to intercept incoming aircraft before they reach their targets.

“It’s not humans anymore. It’s drone against drone,” Thompson said.

California Gov. Gavin Newsom said Wednesday that he is “not aware of any imminent threats at this time” while the state remains “prepared for any emergency.”

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Prominent crypto analyst Trader Mayne predicts Bitcoin (CRYPTO: BTC) and Ethereum (CRYPTO: ETH) may face another leg lower before long-term buying opportunities emerge.

Bitcoin Could See Another 20% Drop

Speaking on his podcast, Maybe said Bitcoin remains in a broken higher-timeframe structure, suggesting further downside may occur before a meaningful bottom form.

He pointed to a similar breakdown during the previous cycle, when Bitcoin lost its monthly structure and continued falling for months, eventually dropping more than 20%.

Based on historical drawdowns and a key yearly order block, Mayne believes Bitcoin could decline toward the $48,000 zone, which would represent roughly a 60% correction from its all-time high.

While many …

Full story available on Benzinga.com

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Welcome to Eye on AI, with AI reporter Sharon Goldman. In this edition: a preview of Nvidia GTC…the end of computer programming as we know it…Atlassian cuts 10% of its workforce in AI drive…AI money floods into the U.S. midterms...McKinsey rushes to fix AI system after hacker exposes flaws. 

As basketball fans gear up for March Madness next week, AI industry watchers turn to their own late-winter frenzy: Nvidia GTC, the annual developer conference of what is now the world’s most valuable company.

For the past two years, I’ve headed to San Jose for what has become far more than a gathering of the Nvidia faithful. It has evolved into a highly-anticipated moment for CEO Jensen Huang to step on stage before nearly 20,000 attendees at the packed SAP Center and hit the equivalent of dozens of three-pointers in his keynote—with loud cheers at every “swish” of Nvidia news. There’s even a three-hour “pre-game” show, which this year features the CEOs of several Nvidia partners. 

And that’s just the first day. The event has grown so popular that last year I struggled to find space to meet people, or even to sit down for a minute.

While I won’t be able to attend in person this year, I’ll be watching the announcements—as well as playing what has become a game of “Which black leather jacket will Jensen wear?”

There has already been a stream of previews, strong hints and rumors about what will be shared at GTC. Here’s a sampling: 

  • AI as a “5 layer cake.” On Tuesday, Nvidia released a blog post by Huang called “AI is a 5 Layer Cake.” In the blog, Huang argues that AI depends on five layers—energy, chips, infrastructure, models, and applications—and that all five need to scale together to enable the massive buildout of AI across the economy. Nvidia, not coincidentally, sits squarely in the middle of that stack, and connects most of the layers together. 
  • More investments and partnerships. Nvidia has invested in dozens of AI companies since last year, deploying billions of dollars across the ecosystem. This week, in advance of GTC, the company announced it has invested $2 billion in AI cloud firm Nebius and is also backing former OpenAI CTO Mira Murati’s new startup, Thinking Machines with over 1 GW in Nvidia chips.
  • Open-source models—with a strategic goal. In the wake of an announcement this week of a new open source model, Nvidia is reportedly investing up to $26 billion in open-source models and it is rumored that the company will unveil something called NemoClaw, an open-source AI agent platform for enterprises, at GTC. The strategy is less about competing with frontier AI labs and more about keeping developers building inside Nvidia’s software ecosystem—and ultimately driving demand for more chips.
  • Autonomous driving ambitions. Nvidia is also continuing to expand its push into autonomous vehicles, where its chips and software platforms are increasingly being used by carmakers building self-driving systems. Yesterday, the company released a video showing Huang taking a 2.5-hour ride across San Francisco in a Mercedes using its Alpamayo autonomous driving system.

With that, here’s more AI news.

Sharon Goldman
sharon.goldman@fortune.com
@sharongoldman

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The bill for President Trump’s war in Iran is huge—and mounting. According to reports, Pentagon officials told members of Congress in a closed door meeting on Tuesday that they estimated the cost of the war exceeded $11.3 billion in the first 6 days of the conflict. And those figures do not include costs such as the hardware and personnel that were put in place in advance of the first strikes.

Kent Smetters, faculty director of the Penn Wharton Budget Model, forecasts that the meter is now running at roughly $800 million a day. Other estimates, including that advanced by John Phillips, a British safety, security, and risk advisor, put the daily tab at $1 billion. Smetters told Fortune that if the conflict rages for a total of two months, or seven more weeks, that it will inflict net new expenses on U.S. taxpayers of $65 billion.

The numbers come amidst a backdrop of a worsening U.S. financial picture thanks to the spiraling national debt, and the mounting interest payments that are due. In its Feb. 11 report, the CBO projected a gap between expenditures and revenue for FY 2026 of $1.853 billion. The U.S. gets there by spending 33% more than the Treasury collects in taxes. An Iran war that lasts 60 days would hike the deficit by that $65 billion plus $1.4 billion in interest, or around $66.4 billion. That’s an increase of 3.6% that would raise the shortfall’s share of GDP from the forecasted 5.8% to 6.0%. The $66.4 billion would get tacked onto the deficit, and raises the amount we need to borrow, plus interest, year after year.

But it’s best not to look at the war impact in isolation. Just days before the first attack, the SCOTUS also dealt a blow to the budget by nixing the Trump tariffs. The Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget estimates that if Trump replaces the former border duties with a 10% blanket rate, the U.S would collect $74 billion less this year than under the previous regime. Add that $74 billion to the $65 billion in spending, and the budget hammering almost doubles to $139 billion, raising the CBO-projected deficit by 7.5%. Keep in mind that tariff losses aren’t mainly a one-time hit like the war spending. If permanent, the loss of a large part of the Trump import duties would represent a year-after-year, recurring, structural increase in deficits.

In the absence of a plan to reopen the Strait of Hormuz, KPMG chief economist Diane Swonk worries that the conflict will drag on for up to six more months, sending oil prices north of $130 per barrel. Some analysts think it could hit $200. But should the campaign drag on for even several more weeks, the damage to America’s fragile finances will prove substantial. 

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Tax season is stressful enough, but avoidable mistakes can turn a routine filing into an expensive headache. 

With Tax Day approaching, here are five common filing missteps that could mean a smaller refund, a bigger bill or delays getting your return processed.

Your filing status is one of the most important choices on your tax return because it helps determine your tax rate, your standard deduction and which credits you may be eligible to claim. Pick the wrong one, and you could end up paying more than you owe, getting a smaller refund or triggering delays if the IRS flags the return for review.

For many taxpayers, the confusion comes from life changes that happened during the year, like getting married or divorced, having a child, moving in with a partner, supporting an aging parent or sharing custody. Even if your situation feels straightforward, the IRS rules can be less intuitive, especially for taxpayers who aren’t sure whether they qualify as “head of household” or whether they can still file as “qualifying surviving spouse” after a spouse has died.

Head of household, in particular, can be costly to get wrong. It typically comes with a larger standard deduction and more favorable tax brackets than filing as single – but it has strict requirements tied to paying more than half the cost of keeping up a home and having a qualifying dependent. If you don’t meet the rules and claim it anyway, you may have to pay back tax benefits later, plus penalties and interest.

When in doubt, the IRS has an online filing-status tool, and many tax software programs will walk you through the questions to help you choose the right category.

One of the biggest and most expensive tax-season mistakes is failing to claim every credit or deduction you qualify for. That can mean a smaller refund or a higher bill.

“I think the top mistake people make is not fully understanding or taking the time to really research what are all the different deductions and the ways that you can put a little bit of extra money in your pocket that are available to you,” said Bill Sweeney, senior vice president of government affairs at AARP.

AVERAGE TAX REFUND TOPS $3,700 MIDWAY THROUGH FILING SEASON, TREASURY SAYS

Sweeney also warned taxpayers not to rely on last year’s return as a blueprint for filing because of recent changes to the tax code from the One Big Beautiful Bill Act. 

“This would be a good year given that there are these changes to the tax code, to make sure not to assume that what you did last year will convey over to this year. Really take a fresh look at your tax situation and see if there’s money that you’re leaving on the table,” he said.

An extension can buy you time to file your paperwork, but it doesn’t give you extra time to pay. For most taxpayers, the IRS deadline to pay what you owe is April 15, 2026 – even if you request an extension to file later.

“Remember that even if you claim an extension, the money is owed on April 15,” said Mike Faulkender, co-chair of American Prosperity at the America First Policy Institute.

WHAT TRUMP’S NEXT PICK TO LEAD THE FEDERAL RESERVE MEANS FOR YOUR WALLET

Faulkender, a former Treasury official and IRS commissioner, said taxpayers who need more time should still estimate their bill and pay by the filing deadline to help avoid added costs.

“You have to actually send in a check or have the payment deducted from your account by the filing deadline,” he said.

If you can’t pay in full by April 15, pay what you can to help limit penalties and interest on top of your tax bill.

If you choose direct deposit for your refund, the IRS relies on the routing and account numbers you provide. One wrong digit can lead to delays. 

If you pay what you owe by direct debit, incorrect banking details can also lead to a rejected payment and potentially result in penalties and interest.

Timing matters when it comes to filing your taxes. Submitting your return before you’ve received all your key paperwork, like W-2s or 1099s, can lead to errors, missing income or a return you have to amend later.

Faulkender said there’s a simple way to double-check what’s been reported under your name before you file. 

“One of the things that I learned last year when I was IRS commissioner, was that if you create an account on irs.gov, you can see everything that’s been filed under your tax ID,” he said. 

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“We’re supposed to receive all of our W-2s and our 1099 forms in the mail in January and February. But if you’re missing one, or you misplaced it rather than requesting it again, you can actually go and see what was filed under your taxpayer identification number if you create an account on IRS.gov.” 

Filing late can also cost you extra money, especially if you owe. The goal is to wait until you have what you need, then file as soon as you’re ready.

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Forty-four years ago, Howard Schultz packed up his life, loaded his golden retriever, Jonas, into his 1979 Audi, and drove cross-country from New York City to Seattle with his wife, Sheri. He was headed toward a city he barely knew, but would eventually become where he built his massive coffee empire and a brand we all know today: Starbucks. 

At the time, Sheri was the “breadwinner,” with a design career, Shultz said in a LinkedIn post on Wednesday. But Sept. 7, 1982, changed the course of the couple’s lives: It was the day Schultz started a new job “at a place called Starbucks.”

“Back then, the Pike Place Starbucks only sold whole bean coffee,” Schultz said. “Today, it’s the most visited Starbucks in the world. The history of the company is bound up in the very foundation, walls, and floorboards of our first store in the city’s historic market.”

And that company would make Schultz a billionaire (he’s worth about $6.6 billion today). 

Building the Starbucks empire

Schultz joined Starbucks in 1982 as director of retail operations and marketing, when the company was still a small Seattle roaster selling whole-bean coffee. 

The turning point in Schultz’s career came a year later when he took a trip to Milan. He was struck by the culture of Italian espresso bars—the ritual, the community, the craft. He came back to Seattle convinced that the model could also work in America. This was also the inception of the idea of “third places,” which Starbucks continues to pursue today.

But Starbucks wasn’t originally convinced the idea would work, so Schultz left the company.

“’You’re out of your mind. This is insane. You should just go get a job,’” Schultz was told, according to his own book, Pour Your Heart Into It. “In the course of the year I spent trying to raise money, I spoke to 242 people, and 217 of them said ‘no.’”

But after Schultz raised the money, he opened his own coffeehouse, Il Giornale, in 1986, and acquired Starbucks itself for $3.8 million in 1987. The company went public in 1992.

What followed was one of the great American business expansions of the 20th century: Starbucks went from just a handful of Seattle stores to more than 35,000 locations in 80 countries. 

Schultz served as CEO three times: from 1987 to 2000; from 2008 to 2017; and again briefly in 2022-2023, returning each time to steady the company. 

“I came back this past year because the company really did lose its way, and it lost its way culturally,” Schultz said in an interview with CNN in February 2023. Schultz’s third stint as CEO from 2022 to 2023 was largely defined by an aggressive, legally contentious battle against worker unionization. 

He left Starbucks for the last time in 2023, handing the reins to Laxman Narasimhan, who only served as CEO from April 2023 to August 2024. Brian Niccol (Chipotle’s former CEO) became chief executive in September 2024. 

Still, Schultz’s legacy is hard to beat. He took a regional bean roaster and turned it into a global cultural institution. Today, Starbucks has more than 32,000 stores in 80 countries, dwarfing other chains like Dunkin’ Donuts, which has about 14,000 stores globally. 

He also popularized the “third place” concept, an idea Niccol is attempting to revive by bringing back handwritten notes on coffee cups, more seating in coffee shops, and more options to enjoy a coffee at an actual Starbucks location rather than only taking it to go. 

Schultz took a regional bean roaster and turned it into a global cultural institution, popularizing the “third place” concept — the idea that people needed somewhere between home and work to gather, linger, and connect. He also championed employee benefits that were unusual for the service industry at the time, including health insurance for part-time workers and a free college tuition program.

And while union drama was an undercurrent of Schultz’s third tenure, in particular, Starbucks was still one of the first companies to provide comprehensive health care to part-time employees, starting in 1988.

“I knew I wanted to build the kind of company my father never got to work for,” Schultz wrote in a 2022 Instagram post. “That year, I decided we would offer full health benefits to eligible full- and part-time Starbucks employees.”

Closing the Seattle chapter

More than a year after his retirement from Starbucks, Schultz decided it was time to leave Seattle. He announced in his LinkedIn post this week that he and Sheri were leaving Seattle.

“Last year we traveled to dozens of places around the world—places we were too busy to see when building Starbucks and raising kids,” Schultz wrote. “And we have moved to Miami for our next adventure together. We are enjoying the sunshine of South Florida and its allure to our kids on the East Coast as they raise families of their own.”

The timing of Schultz’s announcement drew attention because it coincided with Washington state lawmakers advancing legislation targeting high-income earners, including a proposed wealth tax that would apply to residents with significant investment assets. Schultz’s move is reminiscent of California billionaires who have also fled the West Coast for Florida due to a proposed one-time 5% tax on billionaires. 

The former Starbucks CEO hinted at the proposed tax in his LinkedIn post, although never directly denied it.

“It is our hope that Washington will remain a place for business and entrepreneurship to thrive, creating essential opportunity for those in Seattle and the surrounding areas,” he wrote. 

Like others, Schultz’s destination is Miami, where he reportedly paid $44 million for a penthouse. It’s a state that has no income tax and a booming luxury real-estate market that’s also attracted Amazon founder Jeff Bezos, Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg, Google cofounders Larry Page and Sergey Brin, and Oracle cofounder Larry Ellison.

Schultz leaves behind a massive legacy for a penthouse on the water. 

“We will be forever grateful for the memories made in Seattle and the relationships built along the way,” he wrote. “To the family, friends, and partners who made Seattle our home for so many years, thank you.”

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President Donald Trump’s decision to bomb Iran is rattling global oil markets, threatening to reignite inflation—and according to Morgan Stanley’s Global Investment Office, it could cost Republicans their Senate majority and send the national debt into overdrive.​

The firm’s investment strategist and head of U.S. policy, Monica Guerra, published a detailed analysis Thursday warning about the obvious: The incumbent’s party tends to lose seats in midterm elections, and this particular conflict has triggered one of the most consequential energy-supply shocks in recent memory. The implications stretch from the Federal Reserve’s interest rate path all the way to November’s midterm ballot box.​

The Strait of Hormuz is closed—and oil just hit $100

On Feb. 28, U.S. and Israeli forces launched coordinated missile strikes on Iran’s nuclear facilities, military infrastructure, and senior leadership. Iran retaliated against Israel, U.S. bases, and regional allies—and the Strait of Hormuz, through which roughly 20% of global oil supply flows, or approximately 21 million barrels per day, effectively shut down.​

Crude prices surged above $100 a barrel almost immediately. Oil is now up over 51% for the year to date. The 10-year U.S. Treasury yield has jumped 27 basis points since the conflict began, reflecting renewed inflation fears and growing concern about deficit spending.​

This is now an inflation problem—and a Fed problem

Guerra’s team warned oil shocks of this magnitude have historically delivered a 70-basis-point boost to headline CPI within three months. Core inflation, by contrast, would see only a modest impact—but that calculus changes fast if elevated prices persist.​

“If higher oil prices persist,” the report warned, “the Fed’s reaction function could be complicated, supporting a higher fed funds rate for longer.” That’s bad news for an economy already navigating tariff pressures and a ballooning deficit.​

Why Republicans should be worried about the Senate

Here’s the political math Morgan Stanley lays out: Since 1922, the sitting president’s party has lost an average of 30 House seats and four Senate seats in midterm elections. Republicans currently hold a 53–47 Senate majority—a margin Morgan Stanley says could narrow significantly with a prolonged energy shock.​

The firm’s base case is that the GOP loses the House and keeps the Senate. But a sustained oil shock could tighten the Senate race in ways that scramble that forecast.​

The reason is simple and visceral: gas prices. The bottom 20% of consumers spend four times more of their budget on energy than the top 20%. Rising prices at the pump, Morgan Stanley notes, are “one of the most visible signs of daily affordability for most voters”—and affordability is the top voter concern heading into the midterms.​

On a related note, UBS chief economist Paul Donovan warned on Thursday not to underestimate one key indicator of inflation: the price of a Snickers candy bar.

“The lived reality is somewhat different from the headlines,” he wrote on Thursday. It’s true that owners’ equivalent rent helped lower inflation, but he called that “a fantasy price no one pays.” Used car prices fell, too, but people don’t buy a used car every month.

“Grocery price inflation has accelerated recently, with big increases for beef, coffee, and chocolate,” he wrote. “A Snickers bar’s price is important in shaping inflation perceptions.”

The war could turbocharge the debt

Guerra also noted the fiscal dimension in voters’ concerns. The conflict has injected fresh momentum into Trump’s $1.5 trillion defense spending request for fiscal year 2027—a proposal that would push military outlays to 4.6% of GDP, the largest annual increase in at least 60 years. The U.S. reportedly spent $5.6 billion on munitions in just the opening 48 hours of the war, accelerating bipartisan pressure for $50 billion in supplemental defense spending.​

Morgan Stanley warns that elevated war-driven government spending will “modestly weigh on debt and deficits” and push up U.S. Treasury term premiums—the additional yield investors demand to hold longer-term government bonds. In plain terms: Borrowing gets more expensive just as Washington needs to borrow more.​

Markets are holding—for now

Despite the turbulence, U.S. equities have remained largely flat since the conflict began, buoyed by strong energy sector performance and a global rotation into dollar-denominated assets. International stocks, as measured by the MSCI World ex-U.S. Index, are down 6%—reflecting Europe and Asia’s greater exposure to the energy shock.​

History offers some comfort: The S&P 500 has gained an average of 8.4% in the 12 months following major geopolitical risk events over the past 75 years. But Morgan Stanley was explicit that duration is the key variable. The longer the Strait stays closed and the bombs keep falling, the harder those historical averages are to count on.

For this story, Fortune journalists used generative AI as a research tool. An editor verified the accuracy of the information before publishing.

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Daymond John didn’t become a $350 million Shark Tank mogul by playing it safe—or by cutting corners. The FUBU founder went from flipping used cars and waiting tables at Red Lobster to backing hits like Bombas, one of the show’s most successful bets ever—and he says one Ice‑T mantra about shortcuts has quietly guided every step.

“Here’s the truth: If you keep cutting corners…all you end up doing is going in circles,” John wrote on X last week. “Every corner you cut creates a problem you’ll eventually have to come back and fix. The time you think you saved today becomes the wall you face tomorrow. Real progress comes from doing the full lap.”

“Since Ice-T shared it with me, I’m sharing it with you: ‘Cutting corners doesn’t move you forward. It just keeps you going in circles.’”

Leaning in on his own team is one way John said he’s put that lesson into practice. 

You can only operate a business in one of two ways: reduce costs or increase sales,” he said in 2024. “Cutting corners on team training isn’t the place to do it and investing in your team is one of the greatest ROIs you can make.”

The stakes for people who try to rush the process can be high: Only one-third of small businesses survive for more than a decade, according to data from the U.S. Department of Labor. 

Work-life balance does not exist, according to Daymond John—and Mark Cuban and Barack Obama agree

John has also been blunt about the level of commitment required to beat those odds, arguing that the traditional notions of work-life balance don’t always align with the demands of building a successful company—or career.

“There’s no such thing as work-life balance,” John said.

Instead, he advises a focus on carefully structured time and finding what he calls “work-life harmony.”

“My biggest piece of advice to all of you on achieving work-life harmony is to schedule out your entire day,” he added. “Ask yourself what you are going to dedicate your time to and how you are going to steal away moments.”

For John, that can mean blending personal time with productivity. For example, when he walks for exercise, he’s taking calls on the phone, and instead of eating out at restaurants, he often eats at home so he can get back to work quicker.

He’s not the only business leader who has warned that getting ahead often requires a level of focus that stretches beyond the traditional 9-to-5.

His former Shark Tank co-star Mark Cuban has said that ambitious people can’t afford to lose sight of their goals.

“If you want to work nine-to-five, you can have work-life balance,” Cuban told Sports Illustrated last year. “If you want to crush the game, whatever game you’re in, there’s somebody working 24 hours a day to kick your ass.”

Even former President Barack Obama has acknowledged that intense focus is often part of exceptional achievement.

“If you want to be excellent at anything—sports, music, business, politics—there’s going to be times of your life when you’re out of balance, where you’re just working and you’re single-minded,” he said on The Pivot Podcast.

Shark Tank’s Daymond John 3-step path to wealth 

Ultimately, building wealth doesn’t have to start with a big windfall—those who come from little means just need to make small, disciplined financial decisions, according to John. 

His rule of thumb starts with breaking every dollar into three buckets.

“If you have $3, $3 million, or $3 trillion, the first dollar goes for what you have to pay for,” John previously told Fortune in an interview. This includes necessary living expenses like rent, medical bills, heat and electricity, and any debts or loan repayments.  

The second dollar—or the second million or trillion—should be invested, but that doesn’t mean it has to be made in the stock market alone.

“Investment can be into a book, into a business, or into the public market,” John added.

The third dollar, or whatever is left over, can go toward enjoyment.

“Buy what you would like to have, but don’t have to have,” John said. “And if you don’t want it, put it back in number two. And over the years, number two will start flowing into bucket number three and number one. And that’s how you really simply look at things.”

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McDonald’s is doubling down on its “McValue” menu as the fast-food giant acknowledges that years of post-pandemic price hikes have left many Americans feeling priced out of a basic burger and fries.

In an internal message to franchisees, the world’s largest burger chain announced a sweeping “McValue 2.0” initiative set to launch in April, featuring $3 and $4 meal deals designed to lure back lower-income consumers who have pulled back on spending because of persistently high living costs.

“We have achieved incredible progress together and remain committed to meeting ever-changing customer needs,” McDonald’s wrote in a message to chain franchisees obtained by The Wall Street Journal.

McDONALD’S C.E.O. ROASTED AFTER HIS TINY FIRST BITE OF NEW BIG ARCH BURGER GOES VIRAL

The new menu items will replace the previous buy-one-add-one promotions. Customers can soon pay $3 or less for items including 4-piece Chicken McNuggets or a Sausage Biscuit, and $4 for breakfast meal deals with a McMuffin sandwich, hash brown and coffee.

Internal memos reportedly showed a “unanimous alignment” between the corporation and franchisees, who set their own prices, to address the affordability gap at McDonald’s. Stores are expected to begin training employees on the new deals in the coming weeks.

“We absolutely are going to make sure that we are protecting our leadership position in value,” CEO Chris Kempczinski during a February investor call.

Fox News previously reported that McDonald’s prices have risen sharply post-pandemic, with millennials especially vocal on social media about how much menu costs have increased since their childhoods.

A social media user shared a viral graphic claiming a McDonald’s feast once cost about $12 total — with medium fries at 99 cents, a cheeseburger at 79 cents and a Big Mac at $1.85. The post also said a Filet-O-Fish sold for $1.29 in 1991 and a medium drink for 89 cents.

Last year, the company capitalized on its $5 meal deal, various holiday promotions and the revival of its Monopoly sweepstakes. The strategy appeared to work as U.S. sales rose 6.8% in the fourth quarter, the biggest jump in about two years, as lower-priced offers and aggressive promotions drove traffic back into restaurants. Analysts had expected a 4.9% gain.

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Kempczinski also said there is growing evidence the company’s value push is working, particularly among lower-income consumers who have been most affected by inflation.

McDonald’s recently ranked No. 10 on Entrepreneur’s Franchise 500 annual list, which evaluates costs, fees, size, growth, support, brand strength and financial stability. The 2026 report marks McDonald’s first Top 10 appearance since 2020, when it placed No. 3. The chain ranked No. 22 in 2025 rankings.

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Fox News’ Andrea Margolis and FOX Business’ Bradford Betz contributed to this report.

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On Wednesday, some of the most prominent names in American education and workforce policy gathered in Washington to deliver a blunt message: the United States is failing its workers, its students, and its economy — and the window to fix it is closing fast.

The Bipartisan Policy Center, a group of bipartisan national and state policymakers, business leaders, and education experts, released a sweeping report produced by a 24-member commission that spent more than a year examining the country’s broken education and workforce pipeline. The report, entitled “A Nation at Risk to a Nation at Work: The Case for a National Talent Strategy,” told a sombering story of a nation headed towards severe economic instability as an unready workforce becomes all the more unprepared in the midst of rising AI technologies in the workplace.

The Numbers Are Alarming

By late 2025, estimates showed that 57% of current U.S. work hours could be automated with technology that already exists—nearly double McKinsey’s projection from just two years prior. Half of college graduates from the last decade were underemployed a year after graduation, and nearly three-quarters stayed that way for a decade. Some 37.6 million American adults under 65 have some college credits and no credential to show for it. 

“The World’s Changed”

Former Tennessee Gov. Bill Haslam and former Massachusetts Gov. Deval Patrick, who co-chaired the effort and were joined on Wednesday by former U.S. Secretary of Education and BPC President Margaret Spellings and former Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo. The two governors spoke to Fortune about the need to update our laws for the current dire situation. 

The key laws governing how Americans pay for college and access job training—the Higher Education Act and the Workforce Innovation and Opportunity Act—were last updated in 2008 and 2014, respectively, predating the rise of generative AI, the gig economy, and widespread remote work.​

“This is not just about AI,” Haslam told Fortune. “This is about making certain that we have a workforce training system that was designed 100 years ago for a very different economy than we have now. It’s about having a system that lets people know, hey, the world’s changed — here’s the skill sets that you are probably going to need going forward, and here’s how to get them.”​

According to the Bipartisan Policy Center, the trend reveals that “the U.S. workforce system is not fully aligned with the demands of an AI-driven economy,” with a growing skills mismatch leaving many employers unable to find qualified workers even as unemployment fluctuates. Education systems, the report notes, “remain largely built around traditional college-only pathways, while the modern labor market increasingly requires a wider range of options such as apprenticeships, technical credentials, short-term training programs, and opportunities for lifelong learning.” What makes the current moment different from past technological disruptions, the BPC argues, is its pace: “Previous tech waves automated routine tasks, while this disruption is different—changing in real time.”

Who Gets Left Behind

Patrick, who served two terms as Massachusetts’ governor before leading Bain Capital Double Impact and later joining the Harvard Kennedy School faculty, was clear that the report’s ambitions stretch well beyond the AI debate. “We’re at a period of rapid change in the workforce, in our economy that comes from a lot of different places, but it affects all of us—workers, learners, employers.”

Central to the commission’s diagnosis is the question of who gets left behind. Patrick invoked the research of Stanford economist Raj Chetty to illustrate the stakes. “Raj Chetty’s work on ‘lost Einsteins’ shows us that genius, creativity, and innovation exist equally across zip codes and income levels,” Patrick said. “Yet too many talented young people from low-income and working-class communities never get the chance to develop their gifts because they lack access to great schools, mentorship, and career pathways,” he said. 

“We’re leaving untapped talent on the sidelines. If we’re serious about strengthening America’s competitiveness and expanding opportunity for everyone, we have to be equally serious about ensuring that every child can discover and develop their talents. That’s not charity — that’s smart policy and moral imperative.”

A Model From Tennessee

Haslam brought his own track record to the table. As governor of Tennessee, he launched Tennessee Promise, making community college and technical school free for all high school graduates—a program the report holds up as a model for what aligned state-level policy can achieve. “When Tennessee made community college and technical school free for all high school graduates, we weren’t just opening doors—we were transforming the entire state’s economic trajectory,” Haslam said. 

“Employers had a deeper talent pipeline. Communities saw young people stay and build careers at home instead of leaving for opportunity elsewhere,” he continued. “Combined with our investments in K-12 and our commitment to employer partnerships, free community college became a linchpin of a statewide talent ecosystem. That’s what happens when you align education policy with workforce and economic development.”

The Fix: A National Talent Strategy

The report’s central structural fix is the creation of a Talent Advisory Council within the Executive Office of the President—modeled on the National Security Council — that would coordinate education and workforce policy across more than a dozen federal agencies that currently spend over $230 billion annually across 150+ programs with no cohesive strategy. “What we have experienced is a system that is very fragmented, that is hard to access—that you kind of have to know about in your little corner of the economy to take advantage of,” Patrick said. “We need a strategy, and that strategy needs to be national in scope. Because the challenge is national in scope.”

“This feels like—different parts of the country, different political parties—but this feels like an issue that has some increasing national urgency, and it needs some leadership to address it,” said Haslam.

The report arrives at a fraught political moment, with the current administration cutting federal education spending and Congress showing little appetite for sweeping reform. But Patrick rejected the idea that funding battles would doom the effort. “Washington will act on this if the people are mobilized,” he said. “Funding always matters. I don’t want to downplay that. But this is not solely an issue about funding. This is about how you allocate the resources and assets to properly train the next generation workforce. If we get stuck in a funding conversation, that does evolve into the old battle. This is about how do we think differently.”​

That cross-partisan determination is the summit’s animating spirit. “There are a lot of things that are just immediately polarized in today’s world,” Patrick said. “This is one of those that everybody, I think, understands: the future is going to look a lot different. And I don’t know if we’re ready for it.”​

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Speaking at the BlackRock Infrastructure Summit, OpenAI CEO Sam Altman tackled the growing public skepticism surrounding artificial intelligence, acknowledging the warning from President Donald Trump that AI is facing a major public relations problem. Moreover, the tech executive validated widespread anxieties about the future of employment, admitting that the traditional balance between labor and capital is shifting drastically.

Addressing the current backlash, Altman noted that AI has become a widespread scapegoat for corporate downsizing and rising utility costs. “Data centers are getting blamed for electricity prices hikes. Almost every company that does layoffs is blaming AI, whether or not it really is about AI,” Altman explained, recalling his recent warning that some companies were engaging in what’s called “AI washing,” in blaming layoffs on new tech regardless if that was the reason for those layoffs in the first place. However, while some of the immediate blame might be misplaced, Altman confirmed that the underlying threat to traditional employment is grounded in reality.

He said he saw a quote online that’s been sticking in his head, around how for centuries, maybe millennia, humans have learned how to structure society to manage scarcity, and now we have to quickly learn the opposite, managing “abundance.” “So that’s, like, a real change to how capitalism has worked,” he said, noting that capitalism has also depended on at least something of a power balance between labor and capital. “But if it’s hard in many of our current jobs to outwork a GPU, then that changes.” He said it, frankly, stumps him. “If there was an easy consensus answer, we’d have done it by now, so I don’t think anyone knows what to do.”

The AI landscape has crossed a threshold into “major economic utility” over the last few months, Altman claimed, rapidly evolving from simple coding assistance to executing complex tasks across various fields of knowledge work. Altman warned that the pace of this evolution is disorienting, and very soon, AI agents will be trusted to handle multi-day and multi-week tasks, operating proactively much like a senior human employee.

This shift is already altering corporate behavior. A new generation of startups is deliberately avoiding large head counts, preferring instead to invest their capital heavily into computing power. In places like India, Altman observed entrepreneurs attempting to build “zero person” startups, relying entirely on AI prompts to write software, handle legal work, and manage customer support.

Even the C-suite won’t be immune to this transformation, Altman warned. He predicted a future where the cognitive capacity inside data centers will eclipse human capacity outside of them, potentially by late 2028, implicitly recalling his rival Anthropic’s warning that each AI cluster would have the brainpower of 50 million Nobel prize winners. Ultimately, Altman said he foresees a threshold where the leaders of major organizations—including CEOs, presidents, and top scientists—will be entirely unable to perform their duties without heavy reliance on AI supervision and assistance.

To fuel this intelligence revolution, Altman said OpenAI is pursuing massive infrastructure buildouts, including gigawatt data center campuses, with the ultimate goal of making artificial intelligence “too cheap to meter.” He said, “We want to flood the world with intelligence, we want people to just use it for everything.”

To address the physical bottlenecks of this expansion, OpenAI has partnered with North American building trades unions to expand pathways for skilled construction workers, highlighting that massive physical infrastructure is necessary to support AI’s digital growth. Altman envisions a future where intelligence is sold as a basic utility, like water or electricity, flooding the global market and fundamentally rewriting the rules of the economy.

However, achieving this era of abundance will not be easy. Altman predicted that traditional economic metrics like GDP might plummet in a “forever deflationary world,” forcing society to rethink how it measures quality of life. Spookily, Altman was echoing the viral doomsday AI essay from Citrini Research that warned of spiralling deflation and “ghost GDP,” leading to economic chaos within 18 months.

While Altman insisted, back in December, he is “not a long-term jobs doomer” and believes humanity will eventually invent new roles, he did not sugarcoat the immediate future. He warned that “the next few years are going to be a painful adjustment,” heavily marked by “very intense and uncomfortable debates” over how to reshape society. Several weeks ago, one of Altman’s AI counterparts, Sir Demis Hassabis of Google DeepMind, a Nobel prize winner himself, told Fortune Editor-in-Chief Alyson Shontell that AI abundance will lead to a “kind of new renaissance,” but there will be a shakeout over the next 10 years en route to it.

For this story, Fortune journalists used generative AI as a research tool. An editor verified the accuracy of the information before publishing.

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Bitcoin (CRYPTO: BTC) has been trading in a range for months, with observers searching for short-term price patterns that could signal where the market may head in the longer run.

Bitcoin Often Rises Before Sharp Bear Market Drops

Prominent analyst Benjamin Cowen said in a March 11 podcast that bear markets in Bitcoin often behave counterintuitively, with prices spending more time drifting upward than falling.

These rallies can last weeks or months, creating optimism that a new bull market has begun before a rapid capitulation pushes prices to a lower low.

According to Cowen, this structure makes bear markets difficult to identify in real time because temporary rebounds often convince investors that …

Full story available on Benzinga.com

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JPMorgan Chase (NYSE:JPM) faces a proposed class action lawsuit accusing the bank of enabling a $328 million crypto Ponzi scheme run by Goliath Ventures by ignoring suspicious transactions and allowing fraudulent wire transfers to Coinbase (NASDAQ:COIN) wallets.

The $328 Million Scheme

Investors filed the lawsuit Tuesday in U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California, alleging JPMorgan was the sole banking institution for Goliath from January 2023 to May or June 2025. 

“Goliath obtained at least $328 million from what are believed to be over 2,000 investors,” the complaint states.

Investors deposited about $253 million into JPMorgan’s 0305 account from January 2023 through June 2025, representing nearly two-thirds of the $328 million total.

Investors transferred roughly $123 million of that amount to Goliath’s wallets maintained by Coinbase.

CEO Christopher Delgado ran the scheme through Goliath Ventures from January 2023 to January 2026 before authorities arrested him on February …

Full story available on Benzinga.com

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At 9 a.m. Eastern Time on March 12, 2026, oil reached $98.76 per barrel, measured using the Brent benchmark. That’s $7.80 more than it cost yesterday morning around the same time—and more than $27 above its price a year earlier.

Oil price per ounce % Change
Price of oil yesterday $90.96 +8.57%
Price of oil 1 month ago $70.03 +40.98%
Price of oil 1 year ago $71.15 +38.80%

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Will oil prices go up?

Oil prices are inherently unpredictable. While many variables come into play, the basic push and pull of supply and demand is what ultimately matters. In times of heightened concern about recession, war, or other major disruptions, oil can swing suddenly.

How oil prices translate to gas pump prices

Each gallon you pay for at the pump bundles together several costs. Crude oil is one piece, but you also pay for refineries, wholesalers, government taxes, and the price markup set by gas stations.

Because crude oil usually accounts for more than half of the price per gallon, it tends to move the needle the most. Sharp increases in oil almost always show up quickly at the pump. Declines in the price of oil, on the other hand, often translate into slower, more delayed drops in gas prices—the “rockets and feathers” effect.

The role of the U.S. Strategic Petroleum Reserve

When an emergency arises, the U.S. has a reserve of crude oil called the Strategic Petroleum Reserve. Its chief function is to secure energy during disasters like sanctions, severe storm damage, or war. It can also help take the edge off brutal price spikes when supply gets hit.

It’s not a solution for the long haul. It’s more of an immediate safety net to support consumers and keep crucial sectors of the economy running (think key industries, emergency services, public transportation, and the like).

How oil and natural gas prices are linked

Oil and natural gas are two of the main fuels that keep the world running. A big change in oil prices can end up affecting natural gas. As an example, if oil prices increase, some industries may sub natural gas for certain areas of their operations wherever possible. This can increase demand for natural gas.

Historical performance of oil

The oil market typically tracks two benchmarks:

  • Brent crude oil (the main global oil benchmark)
  • West Texas Intermediate (WTI) (the main benchmark of North America)

Between the two, Brent offers a clearer view of global oil performance because it prices much of the world’s traded crude. It’s also often the preferred gauge for tracking historical oil trends. In fact, the U.S. Energy Information Administration now uses Brent as its primary reference in its Annual Energy Outlook.

Looking at the Brent benchmark over multiple decades, you’ll find oil has been anything but stable. It’s seen sharp rises due to factors like wars and supply cuts, along with steep declines tied to global recessions and oversupply (called a “glut”). For example:

  • The early 1970s saw the first major oil shock when the Middle East slashed exports and placed an embargo on the U.S. and others during the Yom Kippur War.
  • Prices fell in the mid-1980s for reasons including lower demand and the entry of more non-OPEC oil producers.
  • Prices jumped again in 2008 with increased global demand, but then plunged alongside the global financial crisis.
  • During the 2020 COVID lockdown, oil demand collapsed like never before—bringing prices below $20 per barrel.

Bottom line, oil’s historical performance has been anything but smooth. It’s hugely affected by wars, recessions, OPEC whims, evolving energy initiatives and policies, and much more.

Energy coverage from Fortune

Looking to stay abreast of the latest energy developments? Check out our recent coverage:

Frequently asked questions

How is the current price of oil per barrel actually determined?

The current price of oil per barrel depends largely on supply and demand, including news about potential future supply and demand (geopolitics, decisions made by OPEC+, etc.). In the U.S., prices also move based on how friendly an administration is to drilling, as it can affect future supply. For example, 2025 saw the Trump administration move to reopen more than 1.5 million acres in the Coastal Plain of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge for oil and gas leasing, reversing the Biden administration’s policy of limiting oil drilling in the Arctic.

How often does the price of oil change during the day?

The price of oil updates constantly when the “futures” markets are open. A futures market is effectively an auction where people agree to buy or sell oil in the future. As long as people and companies are trading contracts, the oil price is changing.

How does U.S. shale oil production affect the current price of oil?

In short, shale is rock that contains oil and natural gas. Think of shale as energy yet to be tapped. The more shale the U.S. accesses, the more energy we’ll have—and the more easily oil prices can keep from spiking as much thanks to a greater supply.

How does the current price of oil impact inflation and the broader economy?

When oil is expensive, it tends to make everyday items cost more. This can be related to energy (your heating, gas utilities, etc.), but it’s also due to the logistics involved with making those items accessible to you. Shipping, for example, can affect the price of things at the grocery store, as it’s more expensive to get those products from warehouses and farms onto the shelf.

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The U.S.-Iran war has delivered what Goldman Sachs now sees as the largest oil supply shock on record.

Persian Gulf exports, as tracked by vessel count data, have fallen to roughly 3% of normal levels at the Strait of Hormuz — a disruption that dwarfs even the 1973 OPEC embargo and the 1990 Gulf War in terms of the immediate hit to flows.

Goldman’s commodity research team, led by analyst Daan Struyven, upgraded its Brent crude price forecast on Wednesday, citing a longer assumed disruption and a more complex global policy response than their initial models projected.

“Our commodity strategists now expect Brent to average $98 in March and April—up 40% from the 2025 average— before falling back to $71 by 2026 Q4,” Goldman Sachs said.

On Thursday morning, front-month futures on the West Texas Intermediate light crude – as tracked by the United States Oil Fund (NYSE:USO) – traded 6% higher near $95 a barrel. That’s after the International Energy Agency (IEA) announced an emergency release of 400 million barrels from crude reserves – the largest in history.

The Largest Oil Supply Shock on Record

Goldman’s analysis shows the current hit to Persian Gulf exports at 16.2 mb/d on a four-day moving average basis, a figure the bank describes as the largest supply shock on record, exceeding the production losses seen during the 1973 …

Full story available on Benzinga.com

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XRP (CRYPTO: XRP) and Solana (CRYPTO: SOL) ETF holders are “even better diamond hands than the Bitcoin and Ethereum ETF holders,” Bloomberg senior ETF analyst James Seyffart said Wednesday, as both products held $1.4 billion in inflows despite assets falling over 60%.

The Diamond Hands Data

Seyffart said on the Milk Road podcast there hasn’t been a ton of outflows despite massive pullbacks, demonstrating stronger holder conviction than Bitcoin (CRYPTO: BTC) and Ethereum (CRYPTO: ETH) ETFs.

Bitcoin ETFs saw roughly $9 billion in outflows from October 10, 2025 through February 23, representing about 12-15% of flows reversing after Bitcoin fell more than 50%. 

Meanwhile, Ethereum ETFs experienced worse performance with 25% of flows reversing after the asset dropped over 60%.

In contrast, XRP and Solana ETF holders barely sold despite similar or …

Full story available on Benzinga.com

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SoFi Technologies Inc. (NASDAQ:SOFI) is capturing significant market attention this week as its momentum score surged from 39.06 to 63.72.

Momentum Spikes, Growth Remains Elite For SOFI

This rapid week-on-week improvement in its percentile ranking follows a flurry of high-impact news, including a landmark stablecoin settlement partnership with Mastercard Inc. (NYSE:MA) and a massive show of confidence from the company’s top leadership.

While SOFI‘s price trend is currently flagged as downward in the short and medium term, according to Benzinga Edge’s Stock Ranking, its growth ranking remains elite at 95.27, reflecting a robust expansion in earnings and revenue.

Benzinga Edge's Stock Ranking for ...</a></figure></p><p><a href=https://www.benzinga.com/news/26/03/51209174/sofi-stock-sees-massive-rise-in-momentum-as-mastercard-stablecoin-deal-goes-live?utm_source=benzinga_taxonomy&utm_medium=rss_feed_free&utm_content=taxonomy_rss&utm_campaign=channel alt=SOFi Stock Sees Massive Rise In Momentum As Mastercard Stablecoin Deal Goes Live>Full story available on Benzinga.com</a></p></div></body></html>

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Bitcoin is hovering around $70,000, following $115.2 million in net inflows into Bitcoin ETFs on Wednesday, while Ethereum ETFs reported $57 million in net inflows.  


Cryptocurrency		 Ticke Price
Bitcoin (CRYPTO: BTC) $70,555.61
Ethereum (CRYPTO: ETH) $2,071.21
Solana (CRYPTO: SOL) $86.87
XRP (CRYPTO: XRP) $1.39
Dogecoin (CRYPTO: DOGE) $0.09442
Shiba Inu (CRYPTO: SHIB) $0.055945

Meme coin market capitalization is up 4.1% to $33 billion over the past 24 hours.

Trader Commentary:

Crypto trader Jelle said Bitcoin continues to mirror its mid-2022 bear market …

Full story available on Benzinga.com

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Steven Sinofsky isn’t a household name outside tech circles, but he once ran the operating system on more than 90% of the world’s PCs, and now quietly sits as a board partner at one of Silicon Valley’s most powerful venture firms, Andreessen Horowitz. He’s also, as Fortune’s new investigation digs into, a former Microsoft insider who turned to Jeffrey Epstein as a seven‑figure fixer on his way out of the company.

Sinofsky joined Microsoft straight out of grad school in 1989 and climbed from software engineer to president of the Windows division, overseeing Windows 7 and Windows 8. He was once even seen as a possible successor to Steve Ballmer. When he abruptly left in 2012, his departure temporarily knocked billions off Microsoft’s market cap.

Today, he’s a board partner at Andreessen Horowitz, representing the firm on select portfolio company boards and advising founders on product, strategy, and scaling.

What that résumé doesn’t show, however, is Sinofsky’s entanglement in the murkier corners of the business world. Department of Justice documents detail how, after leaving Microsoft, Sinofsky brought on Jeffrey Epstein—an already convicted sex offender—as a paid negotiator on his exit deal. Emails, reviewed by Fortune, show Epstein critiquing drafts of Sinofsky’s resignation agreement, especially non‑disparagement language in the draft, and ultimately collecting a $1 million fee when Sinofsky secured a $14 million package.

Those same records place Sinofsky in the tight orbit through which Epstein sought influence over Bill Gates, aided by Sinofsky’s longtime partner Melanie Walker, a Gates Foundation alum who fed Epstein internal Microsoft gossip years before Sinofsky’s exit, files published by the DOJ reveal. Through a series of other interactions (Epstein document search tool JMail cites over 1,400 emails and mentions of Sinofsky in the communications), Sinofsky remained in contact with Epstein in a personal capacity until at least late 2017, and appeared to help Epstein keep tabs on various other tech figures and startups, including details on WeWork as its business model came into question, and feedback on various startup investment opportunities. Sinofsky also appeared to use Epstein as a professional sounding board, keeping him informed on the Andreessen Horowitz opportunity and an exploratory conversation he apparently had with another tech bigwig.

Sinofsky hasn’t been charged with any crime, nor accused of any wrongdoing. Sinofsky did not provide a comment to Fortune, and a16z did not immediately respond to Fortune’s request for comment. Microsoft declined to comment. Venture capitalists are known for doing their due diligence. But the question this episode raises is how much do founders know about the investors, their LPs, and the sometimes murky dealings swirling in the corridors of money and power? You can read the full story in Fortune here.

See you tomorrow,

Lily Mae Lazarus
X: @LilyMaeLazarus
Email: lily.lazarus@fortune.com
Submit a deal for the Term Sheet newsletter here.

Joey Abrams curated the deals section of today’s newsletter. Subscribe here.

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As large enterprises invest in blockchain technology, they quickly discover the need for accounting software that can help them track a growing hoard of digital assets. Cryptio, a crypto accounting startup, has benefited from that wave of institutional interest and announced Thursday that it’s raised $45 million in a Series B funding round. 

The company provides software to help customers track what digital assets they own and where they’re stored. Cryptio also helps clients manage their crypto loans and monitor other blockchain-related assets. The venture firms BlackFin Capital Partners and Sentinel Global led the startup’s fundraise, which closed three weeks ago. Other participants included 1kx, BlueYard Capital and Ledger Cathay Capital. Antoine Scalia, founder and CEO of Cryptio, declined to specify at what valuation his startup raised its most recent round of capital.

“We wanted to make a bet on corporate adoption of crypto,” said Scalia, who founded Cryptio eight years ago. His gamble now seems to have paid off. “We’ve been seeing more and more activity and more and more clients on the traditional side,” he said.  

Corporate adoption

Especially after President Donald Trump took office in 2025, large financial institutions have grown more comfortable experimenting with digital assets in a more permissive regulatory environment for crypto than the one under former President Joe Biden. 

In July, the investment bank Goldman Sachs, a relative crypto latecomer, announced that it and the financial institution BNY Mellon planned to tokenize, or put into blockchain wrappers, money-market funds. And in September, the banking giant Morgan Stanley, long a blockchain skeptic, decided to partner with a crypto infrastructure provider to let its brokerage customers trade cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin and Ethereum in the first half of 2026. 

When Scalia first founded Cryptio, his customers weren’t large enterprises. Fresh out of business school in Paris, the entrepreneur was courting startups and other smaller companies. Now, Cryptio has 110 employees and more than 450 clients, including digital asset titans like the stablecoin issuer Circle as well as the blockchain subsidiary of the French bank Société Générale.

Cryptio isn’t the only crypto accounting platform on the market. There are other competitors, including TRES Finance, which the crypto infrastructure company Fireblocks acquired for $130 million in January.

Still, Cryptio’s backers believe the startup has an edge. “They’ve invested the time to explain things, show how it works, and instill trust with very high-end institutions,” said Jeremy Kranz, the founder and managing partner of Sentinel Global.

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In an uneven economic climate where myriad factors have made change the only constant, one message to employees seems universal across business leaders: Do better. 

Leaders expect employees to produce more, increase efficiency and maximize impact — particularly on the front lines. Many leaders, though, forget or fail to build the necessary cultural engagement to motivate employees and unlock that discretionary effort.

But performance missives without culture, collective purpose and the tools to get the job done fall flat with the workers that former United Airlines CEO Oscar Munoz says are critical to operational excellence: the front line. 

“Essential workers are the first to detect bullshit a mile away. Excellence is the outcome of the belief they have in you as a leader, and you earn their belief with action,” Munoz said in a recent interview. 

The Frontline Is Where Performance Lives or Dies

I had the opportunity to work alongside Munoz as he transformed United Airlines from the inside out, aligning a largely disgruntled 85,000-person workforce whose discontent was hemorrhaging into the customer experience. 

In doing so, Munoz had a composite audience in mind – the guy with the wrench. 

“When mechanical issues delay a flight, it’s not the middle managers with the desk jobs who fix it. It’s the guy with the wrench,” Munoz told me as we traveled from O’Hare to Newark in October 2015, part of a multi-hub charm offensive tour. 

How fast he moves, how motivated he is to apply his very best work at that exact moment with purposeful precision can be the difference as to whether the flight gets out on time, Munoz said. 

The domino effect of the mechanic’s discretionary effort can determine whether the plane connects to the next one to take off, whether the crew reaches its next assignment, whether the airline reaches its on-time departure goals, whether the customers choose United for their next flight and whether the company’s revenue trajectory meets investor expectations. 

With a great deal of reverence for blue collar and frontline workers, Munoz said he knew that unlocking operational excellence began with listening to essential workers and understanding what they needed to feel connected to corporate mission with the tools to perform their jobs. 

This was the first of many trips I would take with him over the next several years, which always included an impromptu stop to the inner canal of airport operations, the place where Munoz said the real work was done, where he would pull up a folding chair for an unscripted listening session

Culture Is Infrastructure, Not a Perk

In those days of traveling with Munoz, making our way from the gate to curbside pickup often took nearly an hour. Aviation’s new Elvis had entered the building. Gate agents cheered. Wheelchair assistants stopped for selfies. 

This kinetic energy was about more than high-fives and fist bumps; it was part of long, intentional campaign to build operational excellence through a unified, purpose-driven culture campaign.

“Culture,” Munoz said, “can either be quicksand or the scaffolding of an operating system.”

Most Frontline Workers Don’t Feel Like They Belong to the Company

Nowhere is that truer than for frontline workers, who often feel far removed from corporate headquarters. A 2025 survey by Workvivo by Zoom said 87% of frontline workers are unsure whether company culture applies to them. Forty-two percent said company leadership wasn’t good at communicating with them, while 69% said they wanted to better understand company strategy and what it means for their roles. 

Culture is a critical piece of the operations framework that ultimately delivers the financial and efficiency metrics investors prioritize. Leaders who ignore culture, particularly in its power to cultivate discretionary effort from the frontline, are leaving a critical tool untouched in the management toolbox.

Why This Moment Is Different

Frontline workers are disproportionately affected by myriad societal dynamics – economic uncertainty, inflation, decreased social services and an education system that is only just beginning to build pipelines for vocational skills, particularly those being fueled from rather than threatened by AI. 

A recent study from The How Institute said 94% of employees believe the need for moral leadership is more important than ever, but that only 6% of CEOs and 9% of managers deliver the kind of purpose-driven leadership that helps scale human contribution to create value. 

Companies that bring people together around shared purpose, Munoz echoed, particularly succeed together. Critical to that environment is transparent, authentic and consistent leadership to neutralize the agita felt from external forces at play and cultivate internal unity. 

“People are worried about their money, worried about their future, worried about technology,” Munoz said. “In today’s polarized times, the concept of consistency is the real courage.”

Beyond the culture scaffolding’s impact on singular company’s success, the U.S. economy would broadly benefit from greater engagement with and celebration of essential workers. 

The GDP Cost of Ignoring Essential Workers

A June 2025 Aspen Institute study found that that U.S. GDP would be 10% higher if the essential economy had kept pace. 

The essential economy – which includes sectors like agriculture, construction, energy, manufacturing, transportation, logistics and repair – contributes $7.5 trillion dollars in output per year, 27% of the U.S. GDP, according to the institute. However, from 2015 to 2023, productivity in the white-collar economy rose 28% while productivity in the essential economy decreased.

Among the many solutions the Aspen Institute recommends for boosting essential economy productivity is bolstering human capital by investing in employees through ongoing learning and development, salary increases and rewards. 

The fear of unemployment due to obsolescence is just one factor that could be driving potential hires away from essential roles. A January 2026 University of Michigan study found 62% of consumers expect unemployment levels to worsen this year. 

Meantime, Republican political strategist Bruce Mehlman noted in his Age of Disruption Substack that consumer sentiment among blue collar workers, which the Michigan study placed at 51 percent, is at a record low – below the Regan Recession of 1982, the Global Financial Crisis in 2008, peak COVID-19 pandemic in 2020 and 2022’s inflation spike. 

The anxious essential worker is also a student unlikely to upskill, and a consumer unlikely to spend. 

Engaging your frontline as part of an operational system doesn’t just unlock discretionary effort; it spurs a domino effect to bolster talent pipeline and consumer confidence that will build a more sustainable business. 

Today’s CEOs must connect all employees to the business mission and strategy through authentic, consistent, value-driven communications to earn the performance that will deliver the results investors want to see. 

The opinions expressed in Fortune.com commentary pieces are solely the views of their authors and do not necessarily reflect the opinions and beliefs of Fortune.

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Is it luck when an entrepreneur hits big? It is not the lottery, but the returns can feel like it.

I learned this early. At 31, I exited one of the most successful real estate deals in Metropolitan New York history: the redevelopment of the Harborside Financial Center in Jersey City. At the time, it was the country’s largest commercial renovation. For me, it was my first substantial wealth moment and I had no idea what to do next: What to do with the new capital I acquired and how would I make it matter? 

The more wealth one accumulates, the more fragile one can feel. What begins as a quest for freedom can morph into a fortress mentality. I have seen peers—brilliant, driven individuals—become distracted by the fear of losing what they have built. Instead of leaning into the adaptability that made them successful, they retreat behind walls, both literal and figurative. 

Today we are in a similar societal position: We are on the precipice of the largest societal wealth transfer in history, where an estimated $84 trillion is set to pass down to younger generations over the next two decades. What will we do next? What happens now will define the future of American innovation and entrepreneurship, and that’s why we all should be paying attention. 

For the last 26 years, I have been studying some of the world’s most successful entrepreneurs through my founding of TIGER 21, and I’ve learned a lot about how entrepreneurs find success and how investors create impressive returns. 

Two points are poignant today as we think about our future: One, being a successful founder and entrepreneur rarely ever translates into being an equally successful investor, and two, once wealth is accumulated, the fear of losing wealth can cause loss and inaction. Combined, these two learnings have the potential to shift our entire wealth and societal landscape: It turns out that managing capital is just as important as figuring out how to create it. 

During my teens I tried a dozen different ways to hit the entrepreneurial lottery, from shoveling snow to slinging milk at the local Dairy Barn. Some of my endeavors paid off; others did not. In many ways, that experience reflects something uniquely American: a country structured, culturally and economically, to encourage people to take risks, start businesses, accept failure and accumulate learning as the byproduct of each venture to maximize success the next time around. 

So why do so few entrepreneurs hit it big? The answer lies in how success is spread out. Entrepreneurs often start with very little and build something valuable from scratch. Investors, on the other hand, spread their money across many existing opportunities. Most entrepreneurs don’t make much money, but a tiny number hit it big—so big that they re-shape the entire wealth landscape.

Investor returns, on the other hand, typically preserve wealth with safer investments yielding 8-10% returns, and generally a point or two less for family offices that, unlike most institutional investors, have to maintain cash and liquidity. But even at 10% return over the same 30 years, $1 only grows to $18.  Eighteen times very little is very little, but if you inherit $10 million, that can turn into $180 million at 10% for 30 years, and that’s a horse of another color. 

The key difference is to set expectations based on the shape of likely outcomes, not hopeful pipedreams.  Investor returns tend to follow a bell curve—most people earn around the average. Entrepreneurial outcomes, however, follow a power law distribution. That means a lucky few (Zuckerberg, Gates, Musk etc) earn massive amounts—so much so that they skew the average. It’s like city populations: most cities are small, but a handful are enormous because people flock to them–drawn by opportunity, talent, capital and more—making them even bigger. 

Our country was built on the resilience and creativity of entrepreneurs, people who are willing to take risks, adapt and innovate. Success, in its truest form, is something to celebrate. But there is a troubling shift that occurs when success hardens into excess and gives way to fear, a paradox that emerges all too often. 

Defensive wealth behaviors, however, create ripple effects that weaken social fabric. Communities fracture as inequality deepens. Public trust erodes when resources concentrate at the top. Ironically, the very effort to secure one’s position can destabilize the society that enabled success in the first place.

Why does this happen? Partly because wealth magnifies risk perception. The stakes feel higher, and the margin for error smaller. But the mindset that built success—adaptability, openness and a willingness to embrace uncertainty—remains the antidote. When we lose that, we trade creativity for control and generosity for guardedness. And in doing so, we diminish not only our own sense of purpose but the collective resilience of our communities.

There is another way. Ultimate security does not come from building taller walls or deeper moats. A society can become stronger, more successful and more resilient by strengthening the networks of trust and opportunity that bind us together. That means investing in shared systems—education, healthcare, energy, infrastructure, entrepreneurship—that allow all of us to thrive. We must resist the temptation to see privilege as a prize to defend and instead view success as a platform for meaningful contribution and mentorship. True leadership in this era is not simply about accumulation; it is about stewardship.

As someone who understands the allure of control, I know that the entrepreneurial spirit prizes independence, and wealth amplifies that instinct. But independence without interdependence is an illusion. If we allow fear to dictate our choices, we risk creating a society defined by walls that separate, harden and ultimately collapse under their own weight.

As we look back at the first 250 years of American entrepreneurship and look ahead to our shared future, fear cannot win. We must better understand how we can make an impact, as both investors and entrepreneurs. America’s extraordinary wealth must become focused on creating an entrepreneurial prism refracts into a broader spectrum of responsibility, opportunity and stewardship. This is not a left wing fantasy but centrist reality. When the United States has invested in finding societal solutions, we have all benefitted(social security, education, and even fixing the ozone layer in the 1990s). 

The challenge before us is cultural as much as economic. We must redefine what it means to be secure—not as just owning more, but as belonging to a society that works for all. That requires the same courage that sparked our first ventures to let go of the illusion that more is always better. In the end, resilience is not measured by what we keep, but by what we are willing to invest in others. And the future of our country depends on that choice.

The opinions expressed in Fortune.com commentary pieces are solely the views of their authors and do not necessarily reflect the opinions and beliefs of Fortune.

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  • In today’s CEO Daily: Fortune‘s executive editorial director for Europe Kamal Ahmed reports on why U.S. CEOs are backing King Charles III’s Sustainable Markets Initiative.
  • The big leadership story: BlackRock pours $100 million into solving the tradespeople shortage.
  • The markets: In the red globally as oil prices jump again
  • Plus: All the news and watercooler chat from Fortune.

Good morning. Earlier this week, I journeyed to the 16th century Great Hall of Henry VIII’s home—Hampton Court Palace near London. But the talk filling these halls wasn’t of the past, it was about the future. Brian Moynihan, the chief executive of Bank of America, Ron O’Hanley, the chief executive of State Street, and Janet Truncale, the chief executive of EY, were here to promote private sector efforts to drive the energy transition and climate sustainability. Donald Trump might want to look away. 

Moynihan, O’Hanley and Truncale came together following an initiative by King Charles III when he was still the Prince of Wales. He set up the Sustainable Markets Initiative to explore how businesses and investors could accelerate the energy transition, away from a reliance on fossil fuels and towards renewables and nuclear. 

“His majesty set this up in 2020 with a goal of driving the private sector to do more, faster for sustainability, a future that’s sustainable for all,” Moynihan said. “We’re a CEO-led organization, a volunteer army coalition of willing people who believe that we’ve got to make this happen the right way in the current context and in the future context.” 

The U.S. president has changed the political weather on the energy transition, pulling America out of the Paris climate agreement and calling much of the sustainability agenda a “green scam”. He directly accused Bank of America of “de-banking” U.S. conservative groups, a claim denied by the bank. 

BofA is sticking to the path, despite the noises from the White House. It did pull out of the United Nation’s Net Zero Banking Alliance in 2025 along with JP Morgan and Citi but said it still remained committed to its customers on the energy transition. 

“The private sector is critical to this,” Moynihan said. “As we said from the beginning: ‘If you need to get this done, private sectors have to drive it—they have the money, innovation, the techniques, the know-how.’ The private sector is important and we’re now moving to drive forward.” 

Moynihan is moderating across the two-day conference at Hampton Court. The King will arrive today, providing the royal stamp of approval to continuing progress on sustainability. 

“I get asked all the time, is this falling off the agenda?” said Truncale. “And my answer is always that the best companies are focusing on sustainability as core to resilience, value protection, value creation and growth. “There are two real reasons for that. One is about risk and one is about opportunity,” Truncale adds. On the risk side, climate and weather are impacting supply chains, operations, people, assets. But, says Truncale, when it comes to the green economy there’s opportunity—one worth $7 trillion by 2030. 

Economic momentum is even greater than a post on Truth Social. The thirst for energy supply chains not linked to the spikes and falls of fossil fuel pricing is driving change. And the recent war in the Gulf has only increased demand for more resilient, in-country renewable and nuclear systems that support the growing demand for electricity. 

The U.S. administration’s shift on climate sustainability does not have zero effect, but it is not the only signal. “I think that’s probably where there’s most of the recent confusion in the market, because we haven’t had policy certainty,” said O’Hanley. “Part of it is that some of the early policies were really much more around making commitments, as opposed to really getting at what the fundamental problem is. And I think there’s no place where policy has been more uncertain than in the U.S. 

“[But given] the cost of solar and the cost of wind being the lowest margin of any kind of energy—and innovation is driving down these costs—means the fact that we haven’t had policy certainty really doesn’t matter. The place in the United States where there’s the highest amount of renewables is Texas. You think of Texas as being fossil fuel central, and it is in the United States, but it’s also renewable central, and that has everything to do with economics.”

Contact CEO Daily via Diane Brady at diane.brady@fortune.com

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Costco Wholesale Corp. (NASDAQ:COST) has become the subject of a proposed nationwide class-action lawsuit demanding refunds for customers who were charged higher prices before the Supreme Court nullified tariffs imposed by the Trump administration.

The lawsuit was filed Tuesday in a federal court in Illinois by Costco shopper Matthew Stockov, individually and on behalf of other similarly situated shoppers. The plaintiff is seeking a declaration that the company must return to customers any refunds it receives for tariffs it paid under the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA).

The complaint alleges the lawsuit aims to stop Costco from receiving a double recovery and notes the retailer has not committed to returning any tariff refunds to consumers who ultimately paid those costs.

Costco CEO Ron Vachris said in an analyst call last week that it is still unclear whether or when businesses will be refunded the …

Full story available on Benzinga.com

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LOS ANGELES, March 12, 2026 /PRNewswire/ — The Schall Law Firm, a national shareholder rights litigation firm, reminds investors of a class action lawsuit against Richtech Robotics Inc. (“Richtech” or “the Company”) (NASDAQ: RR) for violations of §§10(b) and 20(a) of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934 and Rule 10b-5 promulgated thereunder by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission.

…

Full story available on Benzinga.com

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Actelis Networks Inc. (NASDAQ:ASNS) shares are trending on Thursday.

Pre-Market Announcement Fueled Wednesday’s Rally

Shares of the California-based technology company declined 9.91% to $0.50 in pre-market trading on Thursday, after surging 47.57% during the regular session following a pre-market announcement of a new order from a Japanese governmental entity for its MetaLight networking solutions.

ASNS claims its MetaLight technology can deliver fiber-grade Ethernet connectivity through existing copper infrastructure.

According to Actelis, the order was placed through its established Japanese channel partner and distributor and will deploy dozens of MetaLight units across critical infrastructure environments, including transportation, utilities and public safety systems, with potential expansion into defense-related installations.

Full story available on Benzinga.com

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The CNN Money Fear and Greed index showed a slight easing in the overall fear level, while the index remained in the “Fear” zone on Wednesday.

U.S. stocks settled mixed on Wednesday, with the Dow Jones index falling by almost 300 points during the session as investors continued to monitor developments in the ongoing war against Iran.

Iran struck three more cargo vessels in the Strait of Hormuz overnight, extending a campaign that has now targeted more than a dozen ships since the conflict began.

The IEA authorized an unprecedented 400-million-barrel release of emergency reserves from its 32 member nations — the body’s largest emergency action on record — but crude markets shrugged off the announcement.

In earnings, Commercial Vehicle Group Inc. (NASDAQ:CVGI) shares jumped over 25% on Wednesday after the company reported better-than-expected fourth-quarter sales results. Shares of Campbell’s …

Full story available on Benzinga.com

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Billionaire investor Bill Ackman strongly rejected claims that he exploits a controversial tax loophole, engaging in a fiery exchange on X after wealth manager Ross Gerber accused him of paying a lower tax rate than a public school teacher.

The ‘Scam’ Accusation

The public dispute began on March 11 when Gerber targeted Ackman’s compensation, specifically a reported $140 million in earnings.

Gerber, the Co-Founder, President, and CEO of Gerber Kawasaki Wealth & Investment Management, alleged that Ackman benefits from the “carried interest” provision, which allows investment managers to treat performance-based pay as long-term capital gains rather than ordinary income.

“One thing that is absurd is Bill Ackman made $140 mil in income last year and paid a lower tax rate than a school teacher in LA due to the hedge fund tax scam called carried interest,” Gerber wrote on X. He demanded that the loophole be stopped and argued Ackman should receive standard W-2 income.

Ackman Fires Back

Ackman quickly dismantled …

Full story available on Benzinga.com

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Every morning starts the same way: A 6 a.m. alarm and an hour to prepare for the day before her kids get up. By 7 a.m., it’s time to get the kids ready for school and her turn to carpool to school. Then, a full day at the office. 

By 5 p.m., it’s time to pick up the kids from after-school childcare and to soccer practice and make time to run to the grocery store before it’s time to pick them up again. When they all finally get back home, it’s time for dinner, homework, and answering emails, before bath time. If she’s lucky, the kids will be down by 9 p.m.—just enough time for a little more work before knocking out at 10 p.m. And that’s only Monday. 

Women with children under 6 spend an average of 8.15 hours on weekdays and 10.5 hours on weekends caring for their child, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. The work women do to support their families is almost always unpaid, despite being worth billions of dollars. 

If American women were paid for all their caregiving labor, it would be worth $683 billion, according to an analysis from the National Partnership for Women & Families (NPWF). Nearly two-thirds of caregiving is done by women, and they average nearly 300 hours of unpaid care work worth $4,900 each year. If both men and women were paid for caregiving, they would earn $1.1 trillion.

This is a conservative estimate, says Katherine Gallagher Robbins, a senior fellow at the NPWF. The analysis used the average between childcare workers and home health aides wages, which is $16.38, but this work is typically underpaid, she said. 

One in four Americans is a caregiver, and they are spending more time than ever before caring for their children and older family members as the 65-plus population grows at record rates. 

Caregivers often have to choose between taking unpaid time off or going to work while missing leaving loved ones who are sick or need them, Robbins told Fortune. 

“Often, it means you can’t be in the labor force at all, and we especially see this happen for moms,” she said. 

Women are less likely to get hired after having children, and mothers lose an average of $237,000 in lifetime earnings, 15% of what they would earn if they did not provide any family care, according to a 2025 Urban Institute analysis. Loss of earnings directly impacts benefits from Social Security and employment-based retirement plans.   

“That’s a big deal. That’s a lot of cash,” Robbins said. 

How companies are responding and offering working caregiver support

Some companies are trying to ease the burden of caregiving for employees by expanding childcare and paid leave. 

Levi Strauss & Company offers immediate access to parental leave to both corporate and retail hires, regardless of whether they are hourly or salaried workers, according to the NPWF. Many companies require employees to work for several months to be eligible for parental leave. Their policy earned them a spot on NPWF’s list of companies leading paid-leave policy. 

“As a result, [Levi Strauss & Company] has experienced higher retention rates and greater employee satisfaction as employees feel supported and encouraged to return after taking leave,” according to NPWF. 

Aside from leave for newborns, management consulting firm PwC offers employees “Just-in-Case” benefits and reimburses up to $50 for emergency care for up to 20 weekdays and unlimited weekend days each year. In fiscal year 2025, PwC employees used more than 8,000 back-up care days and received $5 million in reimbursements, according to HRM America. 

AARP also offers employees up to two weeks of paid time off to care for family members who are older than 50 or have serious health conditions. AARP didn’t respond to Fortune’s request for more information about the program. 

Employees lead the way

These policies often come from employee advocacy. 

While working at Airbnb in Mexico and Brazil, Chio Paniagua and her colleagues in Latin America realized their American counterparts were getting egg-freezing benefits, she told Fortune. Paniagua is now a Big Tech and crypto strategic advisor, having also previously worked in communications for Instagram, Coinbase, and Uber.

“We were able to internally advocate for ourselves so that every woman in the company across the country could get access to the same type of care,” she said.

A representative from Airbnb told Fortune the company offers egg preservation globally for eligible employees. 

In 2019, more than 1,800 moms at Amazon directly lobbied founder Jeff Bezos for emergency day care assistance, after seeing employees quit because they couldn’t find childcare. 

During the COVID-19 pandemic, Amazon began temporarily offering employees up to 10 days of subsidized emergency child or adult care. Employees could pay $25 a day for in-center childcare or $5 per hour for in-home child or adult care.

“We’ve heard from our employees that access to affordable family care, for both children and adults, is particularly challenging during the COVID crisis, and we are committed to support them in this unprecedented time,” Beth Galetti, then-senior vice president of human resources, said in a statement at the time. 

Amazon now gives employees free memberships to Sittercity and Years Ahead, platforms where people can seek both child and elder care and access background checks and references for caregivers. 

Remote work isn’t enough

Common policies, such as remote or hybrid work, may help caregiving by offering more flexibility, but also can exacerbate inequalities for certain workers, Robbins of NPWF said. 

“Flexible work, in general, is a really important complement when possible to other family-supportive policies,” she said, adding it’s no substitute for childcare, support services for disabled people, or paid family leave.

Remote and hybrid work is also not available to many people, from service to health care workers, many of whom tend to have lower-wage jobs and less access to paid leave and childcare, she said. 

“I think it’s an important compliment that we should leverage when we can, but we also should be attentive to the inequities that it can exacerbate,” she added. 

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Trio Petroleum Corp. (NYSE:TPET) and Battalion Oil Corp. (NYSE:BATL) surged in after-hours trading on Wednesday, gaining 13.51% and 10.44%, respectively.

The stocks moved in the extended trading session comes amid an escalating U.S., Israel and Iran conflict, which remains the main catalyst.

The conflict, which is now in its 12th day, has rattled global energy markets.

Geopolitical Fear Trade Fuels Energy Names

The stocks of the two independent energy companies have rallied since the conflict began on Feb. 28, fueled by rising geopolitical tensions in the Middle East.

Traders are pricing in a prolonged disruption …

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Oro Labs, a Silicon Valley startup that uses artificial intelligence to automate companies’  procurement processes, has raised $100 million in new venture capital funding. 

The fundraise, which is the company’s Series C round, is being led by Goldman Sachs Growth Equity and Brighton Park Capital. Existing investors Norwest Venture Partners, B Capital, XYZ Capital, and Felicis are also participating. As part of the deal, Clare Greenan, a vice president at Goldman Sachs Growth Equity, and Mike Gregoire, partner at Brighton Park Capital, will join Oro’s board of directors.

Oro declined to disclose its valuation following the new fundraise. The new capital raise brings the total amount of money the startup has raised to date to $160 million.

The five-year old startup has built what it calls a “procurement orchestration platform”—a layer of AI-powered software that sits on top of a company’s existing enterprise resource planning and procurement systems. Rather than replacing those legacy investments, Oro acts as an intelligent front door, using AI agents to route requests, check compliance, and automate manual processes.

Oro’s customers include a number of Fortune 500 companies, including Coca-Cola, Pfizer, Novartis, Thermo Fisher Scientific, and Booking.com, among others. The company says it now works with 15 of the top 25 life sciences companies, two of the top four diversified U.S. banks, and five of the top 15 food and drink manufacturers.

Oro’s fundraise comes after a year in which the five-year-old company said it achieved 300% revenue growth. The company says it expects to triple revenue again this year and that it is currently seeing a 150% “revenue retention rate,” meaning that existing customers are rapidly expanding their use of the platform.

“Demand for procurement orchestration has skyrocketed because of one fundamental truth: procurement teams simply cannot continue to operate like they always have. The market volatility, disruption and price pressures are too severe,” Sudhir Bhojwani, co-founder and CEO of Oro Labs, said. Companies, he said, “need a layer that brings order and intelligence to the chaos—and that layer is orchestration.”

Bhojwani, a software engineer who spent nine years at Ariba, a procurement software company that was acquired by SAP, told Fortune that the fundamental problem with existing procurement software is that it is “designed as systems of record, rather than systems of action.” What he means is that the software produces data in the form of purchase orders, contracts, and invoices, but is not designed, for example, to produce risk-based assessments of whether a particular invoice should be paid or presents a compliance issue.

He said procurement departments consistently receive the lowest net promoter scores in internal company surveys because they are seen as overly-bureaucratic blockers that slow down the business. And most of that bureaucracy still involves manual processes, according to Bhojwani. He said one Fortune 500 energy company, which he could not name but said had roughly $40 billion in annual revenue, had a procurement process that involved 20 million human touchpoints per year before it began using Oro’s software.

“We built Oro to ensure enterprises can move faster without losing control,” Lalitha Rajagopalan, a cofounder of Oro Labs who currently leads strategy and operations for the company, told Fortune.  

Bhojwani said that Oro’s software helped one global pharmaceutical company with roughly $20 billion in procurement spending bring the time it takes to onboard a new supplier from more than 30 days to under 10 days, and that the company thinks it can reduce this further to less than five days. At the same company, manual compliance checks on purchase orders that previously took 36 hours now take six minutes, with 50% of transactions running completely without human intervention, he said. He said the company has compared the accuracy of Oro’s automated decisions to those made by its purchasing department employees and that the AI system’s accuracy has reached 90%. He said this inevitably meant that “the number of people who are doing this work can be reduced dramatically.”

Gregoire, the Brighton Park partner who is joining Oro’s board, said the company represents a generational shift in how procurement technology works. “Previous generations of procurement software relied on rigid, manual decision trees that easily broke down under enterprise scale and complexity,” he said. But Oro is built on AI systems that understand the language in purchase orders, invoices, and contracts and also builds on a knowledge graph, or complex map, of how a particular company’s processes work and what its purchasing and compliance rules are.

Gregoire added that Brighton Park liked the fact that Oro’s founding team has deep roots in the procurement industry, giving them an intimate understanding of where legacy systems fall short. “Their extraordinary traction with the world’s most complex, highly regulated enterprises like Novartis, Coca-Cola, and Roche proves the platform can handle the most demanding compliance environments,” he said.

Oro plans to use the new capital to accelerate its growth, building out its product capabilities but also adding to its sales and go-to-market teams. Bhojwani said that the company spends about half of its budget on research and development. The company is also expanding what it calls the Oro Partner Enterprise Network, or OPEN, which brings together technology providers, consulting firms, and service partners. Unlike many legacy software-as-a-service companies, Oro does not use a per-seat licensing model. Instead, it charges based on transaction volume—a pricing structure that Bhojwani said better reflects the value the platform delivers. “I never believed in [the per-seat] model fundamentally,” he said of seat-based pricing. “It didn’t make sense before and it definitely does not make sense now.”

He also said that he is not concerned that businesses will use AI coding tools to create their own procurement software with similar capabilities to what Oro has built. He says bringing together all the capabilities that Oro has would not be easy, and, even if a company did do that on their own, the cost of maintaining such a system would not be something most companies would want to take on.

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Gen Z is entering the toughest job market in years, and millions are struggling with unemployment, with a record number classified as NEETs (not in education, employment, or training). So now they’re bringing a parental plus-one to interviews to vouch for their skills and talents.

New research from the career platform Zety shows that 1 in 5 Gen Z candidates have brought a parent to a job interview, and some are even letting mom or dad negotiate their salary.

But the trend is raising eyebrows among employers—and Shark Tank investor Kevin O’Leary says candidates who do it risk seeing their résumé go “right into the garbage.”

Some parents are even negotiating their child’s salary

You might assume these parents are quietly dialling into first-stage Zoom calls to hold their child’s hand through the nerves. But the reality is far more brazen—most are showing up in person, taking time out of their own working day to sit across the table from their child’s potential employer.

And the coddling doesn’t stop there. 

1 in 5 say a parent has contacted a potential employer or recruiter on their behalf. Think cold-calling a hiring manager to put in a good word, or emailing a recruiter to chase up an application their child never followed up on.

A third of respondents said their parents helped them negotiate their salary, with 10% letting mom or dad negotiate directly with the boss themselves.

Even once their adult children have gotten the jobs, the involvement continues: More than half (56%) have had parents visit their workplace outside of formal events.

Employers say it’s a red flag

It comes as Gen Z workers are getting fired just months after being hired—with managers citing a lack of basic workplace readiness, poor communication skills, and an inability to take feedback.

And this new research suggests employers may have a point: if a young person can’t handle a job interview alone, how will they handle a difficult client, a high-stakes presentation, or a performance review? 

It’s a concern that’s already playing out in real hiring rooms. Shark Tank‘s O’Leary recently slammed a young applicant after their parent gatecrashed a Zoom interview uninvited.

In an interview with Fox Business, the multimillionaire businessman called the trend a “horrific signal”—questioning whether someone who needs a parent by their side can be trusted to make a decision on their own.

He’s got a point: Nearly 70% of Gen Zers admit they get regular career advice from their parents, and a third say their parents have the greatest influence over their career choices. 

For this generation, mom and dad aren’t just cheerleaders from the sidelines—they’re the first call, the safety net, and increasingly, the plus one. 

But ultimately, the very involvement they’re hoping will help get them hired can backfire. When advice trickles into action, it stops looking like support—and starts looking like a red flag. A parent editing a résumé is one thing. A parent sitting across from a hiring manager is another thing entirely.

Just ask O’Leary, who has a blunt warning for anyone thinking of bringing a parent to sit in on their interview: Your résumé is going “right into the garbage.”

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Nvidia Corp. (NASDAQ:NVDA) CEO Jensen Huang was seen driving around the city of San Francisco in a car equipped with the company’s Alpamayo self-driving suite.

Nvidia’s Alpamayo In Real Time

In a new video released by the chipmaker, the CEO can be seen in a Mercedes-Benz vehicle equipped with Nvidia’s self-driving stack, driving around in the city, with a mix of highway driving and lane changing on multiple occasions.

Huang said that the “miracle” about the Alpamayo technology was that “it drives like a human,” while also hailing its end-to-end stack. He also talked about the company’s upcoming Robotaxi network set for a 2027 launch.

Huang also suggested that “every Robotaxi network should have an air traffic control center,” adding that Alpamayo could help a Robotaxi navigate its way out of a complex situation by a few “human-inject waypoints,” adding that its safety stack also provides an advantage for operators.

The Alpamayo stack showcased in the video had over ten cameras, five radar sensors and twelve ultrasonic sensors on the car that enabled self-driving, touting its human-like driving …

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A top cryptocurrency analyst on Wednesday flagged imminent volatility for Solana (CRYPTO: SOL), as the seventh-largest cryptocurrency battles a month-long sideways movement.

Upward Breakout Or Downside Breakdown?

Ali Martinez took to X, highlighting a Bollinger Bands squeeze roughly between $81 and $92. They interpreted it as a sign of an incoming “major price move.”

The Bollinger Band Squeeze occurs when the volatility drops, causing the space between the bands to tighten. When the price closes outside of bands, traders consider it a potential new breakout. This strategy is used to identify the start of new trends after periods of consolidation.

Bulls Vs. Bears: Who’s …

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With U.S. stock futures trading lower this morning on Thursday, some of the stocks that may grab investor focus today are as follows:

  • Wall Street expects Dollar General Corp. (NYSE:DG) to report quarterly earnings at $1.64 per share on revenue of $10.81 billion before the opening bell, according to data from Benzinga Pro. Dollar General shares slipped 0.1% to $144.81 in after-hours trading.
  • Northern Oil And Gas Inc. (NYSE:NOG) announced a proposed public offering of common stock. After the market closed on Wednesday, Northern Oil and Gas announced it commenced an underwritten public offering of $200 million of …

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The S&P 500 closed Wednesday’s session down 0.084% at 6,775.80, extending its losses as a historic release of strategic oil reserves failed to cool surging crude prices.

The Polygon-based (CRYPTO: POL) Polymarket crowd is leaning significantly bearish heading into Thursday. The March 12 market currently shows only a 12% chance of traders betting on an “Up” opening. Early trading volume for the March 12 bet has reached $26,319.

Why That Number Matters?

Energy markets continue to dictate the narrative. Despite the IEA authorizing a record 400-million-barrel release of emergency reserves, WTI crude jumped 8.45% to $94.62, at the last check, after Iran reportedly struck three more cargo vessels in the Strait of Hormuz.

Beyond energy, a new turmoil in private credit markets emerged in the financial sector. Reports that JPMorgan Chase & Co.

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Barry Silbert, CEO of cryptocurrency conglomerate Digital Currency Group, hailed the growth of financial privacy on Wednesday after mining giant Foundry announced plans to launch a Zcash (CRYPTO: ZEC) mining pool.

A Mining Pool For ZEC?

Foundry, which operates one of the world’s leading Bitcoin (CRYPTO: BTC) mining pools, Foundry USA pool, said the launch intends to address a critical gap in Zcash’s mining infrastructure.

“With the launch of our Zcash pool, we are bringing to Zcash the same compliance, transparency, and operational excellence that made Foundry USA Pool the trusted standard for Bitcoin miners,” said Mike Colyer, CEO of Foundry.

Silbert, whose conglomerate is the parent company of Foundry, cheered the development, adding, “Financial privacy will become more important as digital assets integrate with …

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President Donald Trump has been quite vocal about what the November midterm will be like and has been pushing the House Republicans to pass the SAVE America Act, arguing that its passage will “guarantee the midterms.”

Trump To Stall Other Legislation

Trump has threatened to stall other legislation until the SAVE America Act is passed. The Safeguard American Voter Eligibility, or SAVE America Act, would require proof of U.S. citizenship to register to vote and identification proof to cast a ballot.

Who Controls The House

The U.S. House of Representatives is currently controlled by the Republicans, who hold the majority of the …

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Codexis Inc. (NASDAQ:CDXS) shares surged 37.8% in after-hours trading on Wednesday to $1.75, following the company’s fourth-quarter and full-year 2025 earnings release.

Q4 Profit Swing and Revenue Beat

Codexis reported fourth-quarter net income of $9.6 million, or 11 cents per share, reversing a $10.4 million loss, or 13 cents per share, in the same period a year earlier.

Total fourth-quarter revenue increased 81% to $38.9 million, up from $21.5 million in the same quarter of 2024. The figure topped the analyst estimate of $36.82 million by 5.69%.

The biotechnology company also reported a product gross margin of 65% for the quarter, up from 63% a year earlier.

Full-Year Results and 2026 Outlook

Codexis’ full-year fiscal 2025 revenues rose 19% …

Full story available on Benzinga.com

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Tesla Inc. (NASDAQ:TSLA) and SpaceX CEO Elon Musk has given an insight into what his proposed trillion-dollar fortune could look like as the commercial space flight giant gears itself up for an IPO this year.

It’s Not Like It’s Sitting In A Bank

In an interview with entrepreneur Peter Diamandis, Musk shared what a trillion-dollar fortune would mean. “It really just represents percentage ownership in companies that I built,” Musk said. He added that net worths are more complex than just money in the bank. “It’s not like it’s sitting in a bank account,” Musk said.

Breaking down what it represented, Musk shared that companies were doing “useful things,” which increases the value of the companies. “I own a percentage of those companies, and it sums up to that number, which seems high,” the billionaire said.

Full story available on Benzinga.com

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General Motors has issued a recall affecting more than 17,000 vehicles over a rear toe link fracture that increases the risk of a crash.

The recall from General Motors applies to about 17,050 Buicks due to a rear toe link fracture that can cause loss of vehicle control, increasing the collision risk, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) said in a recall report.

Certain 2012–2013 Buick Regal Turbo and GS trim-level vehicles that were sold or registered in more than 20 “high corrosion” states are included in the recall. More specifically, about 4,751 2012 Buick Regals and about 12,299 2013 Buick Regals.

GM TAKES $7B HIT AFTER SHIFTING EV STRATEGY DUE TO SLOWING DEMAND

The “high corrosion” states include Connecticut, Delaware, Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Kentucky, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, Missouri, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New York, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, Vermont, Virginia, West Virginia and Wisconsin.

Vehicles in Washington, D.C., were also included.

Only about 1% of the vehicles included in the recall may have a defect, which was caused by a supplier’s failure to properly apply corrosion protection.

General Motors said no injuries have been reported in connection with the issue that triggered the recall, which was submitted on Tuesday.

TOYOTA RECALLS 550,000 VEHICLES OVER SEAT DEFECT

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General Motors dealerships will replace the rear suspension toe links and adjuster fasteners at no cost. Owner notification letters are expected to be mailed on April 13.

The recall expands on multiple others the automaker has filed since late last month about the same issue.

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Renowned author and statistician Nassim Nicholas Taleb found Elon Musk’s widely touted X Money payments service better than Bitcoin (CRYPTO: BTC) on Wednesday.

X Money A ‘Private’ Currency?

Talib responded to Musk‘s announcement that X Money will begin early public access next month, saying, “This is much, much smarter than Bitcoin. Private currencies must compete with one another.”

X users differed on what Taleb meant by “private currencies,” with some concluding that “private” referred to X as a private company rather than privacy features.

Full story available on Benzinga.com

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Tilly’s Inc. (NYSE:TLYS) shares are trending on Wednesday night.

TLYS rocketed 80.9% in after-hours trading on Tuesday to $2.95 after the California-based retailer reported its first profitable fourth quarter since fiscal 2021.

What Does Q4 Results Say

Tilly’s reported fourth-quarter net income of $2.9 million, or 10 cents per diluted share, rebounding from a $13.7 million loss a year earlier. It marks a 55-cent-per-share turnaround.

Total comparable net sales, which measure revenue from established long-term retail locations or channels compared with the same period last year, surged 10.1%, with physical store comps up 10.3% and e-commerce comps rising 9.8%.

The company’s selling, general, and administrative expenses also dropped $3.5 million from last year to …

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Florida is facing its worst drought in 25 years, intensifying pressure on a citrus industry already battered by disease, hurricanes and rising costs.

According to the U.S. Drought Monitor, 100% of the state is experiencing some level of drought, with more than 75% in extreme drought conditions. The dry spell is adding new financial strain for growers who rely heavily on irrigation to sustain crops.

Florida accounts for 17% of the nation’s citrus production, according to the Florida Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services. For many communities, the industry remains a key economic driver.

“There are multiple companies across our county and across our state, and it’s definitely a lifeline to a lot of Floridians here,” said Jennifer Schaal, VP of finance at Dundee Citrus Growers Association. “It’s what they depend on.”

USDA CREDITS TRUMP TRADE DEALS AS AGRICULTURAL DEFICIT SHRINKS, FARM SECTOR GAINS GROUND

However, nature has been anything but dependable for Florida farmers.

Back in 2000, the state’s citrus industry covered over 800,000 acres. Today, that figure has fallen to just over 200,000 acres, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture, reflecting years of disease pressure and storm damage.

“The number one challenge the industry has had over the years is citrus greening disease,” said Steven Callaham, executive vice president and CEO of Dundee Citrus Growers Association. “And then on top of that challenge, we’ve experienced numerous hurricanes.”

RECENT HURRICANES CAUSE FLORIDA CITRUS PRODUCTION TO FALL AS FARMS WORK THROUGH DAMAGE

Recent freezes and now drought conditions have compounded those pressures.

“When you irrigate, it requires a pump that is either powered by diesel or it’s powered by electricity, and it gets very, very expensive,” explained Callaham.

Dundee Citrus Growers Association is one of the largest fresh fruit cooperatives in the state of Florida, harvesting citrus from over 10,000 acres. 

“It’s been challenging over the last year,” added Bill Bohde, director of agronomy at Dundee Citrus. “During the bloom period, water is critical. It determines how well the fruit sizes and ultimately, you know, how large your crop will be.”

As citrus acreage dwindles throughout the state, the company has found a solution to nature’s many obstacles with something called “CUPS,” or Citrus Under Protective Screens. 

Orange groves are planted under 10-acre white tent structures, also known as pods. Originally installed to prevent disease in citrus plants, the structures are also helping growers better manage soil moisture during the historic drought.

CITRUS INDUSTRY HAS BEEN PUT ‘BACK ON ITS HEELS’: MATT JOYNER

“Everything is pumped through a series of pipes into this black tubing, and every tree has a very small emitter that puts, you know, puts out an amount of water,” explained Bhode.

The system allows for precise irrigation, creating a controlled environment that can support fruit production even during prolonged dry spells.

“This ten-acre pod will produce between 8,000 and 10,000 boxes per pod,” said Callaham. “The trees in this environment, they’re happy. They grow faster than trees do in traditional outdoor groves, and they come into production quicker. So it’s one way that we can really get the industry back on track.”

USDA production data show mixed results across citrus categories. Florida lemon production increased 4% from last season, while tangerine and tangelo output was unchanged. Grapefruit production declined 8%, and non-Valencia orange production fell 2%, according to the agency.

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“If I wasn’t optimistic, I would not be in the citrus business,” said Callaham. “So I think we have a lot of positives going for us right now, you know? The challenges we have are temporary. We’re going to make it through.”

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Lightwave Logic Inc. (NASDAQ:LWLG) shares are trending on Wednesday night.

Shares of the technology platform company jumped 29.89% in after-hours trading on Wednesday to $6.52.

LWLG closed the regular session at $5.02, up 15.14%, according to Benzinga Pro data.

What’s Behind the Rally

The surge in extended trading followed Lightwave’s announcement of a development agreement with Israeli integrated circuit manufacturer Tower Semiconductor to integrate its electro-optic polymer-based modulator reference designs into Tower’s PH18 silicon photonics process design kit (PDK).

Tower’s PH18 is a 200mm SiPho foundry platform developed in Newport Beach, California. It is designed to support the growing demand for data center interconnects operating in both the O-band and C-band optical ranges.

According to Lightwave, under …

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Binance (CRYPTO: BNB) co-founder Changpeng “CZ” Zhao disputed on Wednesday Forbes’ estimate that his net worth has exceeded $111 billion, ranking him ahead of Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates.

CZ Says Wealth Can’t Increase In Bear Market

Forbes reported that CZ’s wealth jumped nearly $47 billion from last year. But CZ asked how that was possible, given that cryptocurrency prices have dropped over the same period.

“Binance is the largest crypto exchange. It grows and shrinks with the industry,” CZ said. “Binance’s valuation can’t increase when crypto prices are down.”

He added that Binance’s revenue is tied to trading volumes, which shrink during a “crypto winter.”

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Papa John’s International is reportedly reviewing a new proposal to take the company private in a potential $1.5 billion acquisition, according to Reuters. 

Irth Capital Management, a Qatari-backed investment fund supported by Brookfield Asset Management, reportedly submitted the proposal on Wednesday, offering $47 per share, a 44% premium over the stock’s most recent closing price.

Following the announcement, the stock surged by a significant 15%, closing around $38.86. 

The bid comes after Papa John’s has been pursuing a turnaround strategy following years of weak demand under multiple CEOs.

BAHAMA BREEZE TO CLOSE ALL ITS RESTAURANTS

Irth Capital, a relatively new firm founded in 2024 and backed by a member of the Qatari royal family, reportedly already holds about a 10% stake in Papa John’s. 

Led by co-founders Sheikh Mohamed bin Abdulla Al-Thani and Matthew Bradshaw, the firm is working alongside Brookfield Asset Management on a high-stakes offer that, if successful, would mark one of Irth’s first major transactions, Reuters said.

The potential acquisition would become one of the firm’s first major deals, following a period of financial recovery and previous failed buyout attempts by other investors, including Apollo Global, which had partnered with Irth last year on a joint offer exceeding $60 per share.

RESTAURANT GIANT FILES FOR BANKRUPTCY UNDER MASSIVE DEBT SHORTLY AFTER TOUTING MAJOR EXPANSION

Mounting speculation about the company’s future has also prompted activist investor Irenic Capital Management to build a stake in the pizza chain, according to the outlet. 

While the bid is significant, there is no guarantee of an agreement as the pizza giant remains open to other potential buyers. 

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Papa John’s has previously struggled with weak consumer spending and tough competition in the pizza industry, specifically among North American restaurants.

In the last quarter, the company reported a 5.4% drop in North American same-store sales. To improve profitability, it announced plans to close roughly 300 underperforming restaurants in the region by the end of 2027.

Reuters contributed to this report.

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Leading cryptocurrencies traded flat, while stocks fell further on Wednesday as President Donald Trump authorized tapping the strategic reserve to lower oil prices.

Cryptocurrency 24-Hour Gains +/- Price (Recorded at 9:15 p.m. ET)
Bitcoin (CRYPTO: BTC) -0.22% $69,912.33
Ethereum (CRYPTO: ETH)
               		 +0.48% $2,046.98
XRP (CRYPTO: XRP)                          -0.73% $1.37
Solana (CRYPTO: SOL)                          +0.18% $86.28
Dogecoin (CRYPTO: DOGE)              -1.85% $0.09276

Crypto Market Shifts Sideways

Bitcoin surged past $71,000 but met strong resistance shortly after, dropping back under $70,000 overnight. Trading volume fell 16% in the last 24 hours. Ethereum wobbled in the $2,000 region amid subdued trading volumes 

Nearly $180 million was liquidated from the cryptocurrency market over the past 24 hours, representing a notable decline from the previous day. Bearish short positions worth $102 million were wiped out.

Moreover, about $490 million in Bitcoin shorts risked liquidation if the apex cryptocurrency rises to $73,000.

Open interest in Bitcoin futures spiked 1.51% in the last 24 hours. Rising open interest alongside flat price action signals a consolidation phase where market participants are actively building positions, but there is no clear consensus on direction.

Meanwhile, Binance derivatives traders, including both …

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Iran warned the United States on Wednesday that oil prices could soar to $200 a barrel as escalating U.S. and Israeli strikes against the country continue to rattle global energy markets. 

To prevent what could be one of the worst oil shocks since the 1970s, the U.S. announced that Washington, along with the International Energy Agency (IEA), will soon release a historic volume of oil from its emergency reserves.

If oil prices reach such levels, average gas prices in the United States could surpass $5 a gallon, analysts predict. As of Wednesday, the national average price for regular gasoline stands at $3.57 per gallon, according to the American Automobile Association.

A spokesperson for Iran’s primary military command issued the warning in comments addressed to Washington, Reuters reported. Tehran reportedly emphasized that the instability in global oil markets was the result of what Tehran describes as conditions imposed by the United States and Israel. 

“Get ready for oil to be $200 a barrel, because the oil price depends on regional security, which you have destabilized,” Ebrahim Zolfaqari, spokesperson for Khatam al-Anbiya Central Headquarters, said.

GAS PRICES SURGE, PINCHING AMERICANS AND HANDING THE GOP A NEW MIDTERM HEADACHE

The threat of $200-a-barrel oil comes after crude prices recently surged past $100 for the first time since 2022, peaking at nearly $120 a barrel before settling around $90 on Wednesday due to a brief relief rally. West Texas Intermediate, the crude oil produced in the United States, was trading at just under $86 a barrel.

In response, the IEA, made up of major oil-consuming nations, agreed to release 400 million barrels from its global strategic reserves, though experts warn this would replace only a fraction of the supply normally flowing through the Strait of Hormuz.

The United States will add another 172 million barrels from its own Strategic Petroleum Reserve starting next week, according to U.S. Secretary of Energy Chris Wright. 

“Earlier today, 32 member nations of the International Energy Agency unanimously agreed to President Trump’s request to lower energy prices with a coordinated release of 400 million barrels of oil and refined products from their respective reserves,” Wright said in a statement.

TRAVEL IS ABOUT TO GET MORE EXPENSIVE AS IRAN CONFLICT SPARKS JET FUEL CRUNCH

“As part of this effort, President Trump authorized the Department of Energy to release 172 million barrels from the Strategic Petroleum Reserve, beginning next week. This will take approximately 120 days to deliver based on planned discharge rates.”

The energy secretary added that the Trump administration has arranged to replenish the U.S. Strategic Petroleum Reserves with roughly 200 million barrels over the next year, roughly 20% more than the amount being drawn down, at no cost to taxpayers.

“For 47 years, Iran and its terrorist proxies have been intent on killing Americans,” he said. “They have manipulated and threatened the energy security of America and its allies. Under President Trump, those days are coming to an end. Rest assured, America’s energy security is as strong as ever.”

THE UNLIKELY TOOL TRUMP IS EYEING TO TACKLE RISING OIL PRICES AMID THE IRAN CONFLICT

IEA nations have released emergency oil stocks on only five previous occasions, including the 1990–1991 Gulf War, Hurricane Katrina in 2005, the Libyan civil war in 2011, and twice following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

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Iran further warned on Wednesday that any ships belonging to the United States, Israel or their allies would be targeted if they pass through the Strait of Hormuz, the strategic channel that typically transports about a fifth of the world’s oil supply.

“Any vessel whose oil cargo or the vessel itself belongs to the United States, the Zionist regime or their hostile allies will be considered legitimate targets,” Al-Anbiya said in a statement carried by state TV, according to Arab News.

The comments highlight Iran’s maritime attacks in the past week and reported deployment of naval mines in the region. At least 14 merchant ships have been hit since the conflict began. 

Reuters contributed to this report.

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If you take an Uber or Lyft from Los Angeles International Airport (LAX), your ride could soon cost more.

The Los Angeles Board of Airport Commissioners on Tuesday approved an increase in rideshare fees, raising the charge from $4 to as much as $12 per trip — a move Uber is warning will impact both riders and drivers, FOX 11 reported.

Under the new plan, rideshare vehicles will pay a $6 base fee to enter LAX. An additional $6 fee will apply for pickups or drop-offs at the airport’s Central Terminal Area, according to FOX 11.

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Right now, rideshare companies pay about $4 per pickup or drop-off. Taxi companies pay $4 for pickups, while limousines pay $5. Taxis and limos are not charged for drop-offs, according to FOX 11.

Airport officials say the higher fees are meant to reduce traffic congestion and encourage travelers to use the airport’s new SkyLink automated people mover once it opens, according to ABC7 Los Angeles.

“To be able to be dropped off there will be a $2 increase to the ride-share companies,” Vanessa Rodriguez, deputy executive director of external affairs at Los Angeles World Airports, told ABC7 Los Angeles. “As the new front door to the airport, essentially a traveler will be able to get on the SkyLink train and do the full loop of the horseshoe in 10 minutes.”

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However, Uber says the fee will be passed directly on to all travelers and would be nearly triple the $4.24 average across major U.S. airports.

“The board’s decision significantly increases the cost of getting to and from LAX,” Danielle Lam, head of local California policy at Uber, told FOX Business in an email. “A 140% fee hike will directly impact riders and reduce demand for drivers who rely on airport trips.”

Higher passenger fees usually reduce demand for airport trips, limiting drivers’ earning opportunities. The proposed LAX fee increase could result in approximately $1,000 in lost earnings per driver each quarter, according to Uber.

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“We support investments that improve the airport experience, but they must be transparent and balanced,” Lam added.

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Los Angeles World Airports and Lyft did not immediately respond to FOX Business’ request for comment.

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Michigan-based medical device company Stryker announced on Thursday it is experiencing a “global network disruption” to its Microsoft suite following a cyberattack that may have ties to a pro-Iranian group.

Fox News spoke to a Stryker employee based in Boise, Idaho, who confirmed the attack and said they were unable to access their network. 

The employee said they were advised to avoid connecting to any Stryker VPN networks or software on any device, and coworkers’ work phones were wiped Wednesday morning. 

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In a message to customers, Stryker confirmed it is experiencing a global network disruption to its Microsoft environment as a result of a cyberattack. 

“We have no indication of ransomware or malware and believe the incident is contained,” Stryker wrote. “Our teams are working rapidly to understand the impact of the attack on our systems.”

A pro-Iranian hacktivist group later took to social media to claim responsibility for the cyberattack. 

The hackers, who alleged Stryker was a “Zionist-rooted corporation,” claimed 200,000 systems were affected and 50 terabytes of data were extracted.

META CEO TO TESTIFY IN HIGH-STAKES TRIAL THAT COULD COST BIG TECH BILLIONS

Stryker has not yet confirmed the group’s involvement.

The same hacking group claimed to have breached New York City-based company Verifone, which provides technology for electronic payment transactions to 75% of the top retailers, according to the company’s website.

A spokesperson for Verifone told FOX Business the claims are false.

“Verifone closely monitors the security and integrity of its systems worldwide,” the spokesperson said. “We have observed recent allegations on March 11 from threat actors claiming an intrusion into our systems in Israel. Verifone has found no evidence of any incident related to this claim and has no service disruption to our clients.” 

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Stryker did not immediately respond to FOX Business’ request for comment.

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We all know that crude oil and gasoline prices have jumped up as a result of the Iran war. And to me, it’s a small price to pay for a small bump up in energy costs in order to defeat the barbaric terrorist regime in Iran, and literally change the course of history. Yet economists are still trying to figure out what, if any, impact there will be on inflation and output.

I’ve seen recession scenarios, inflation scenarios, stagflation, you name it, it’s all out there. And I’ve seen lots of comparisons with the oil shock of the 1970s and the early 1990s. Maybe even the Russia shock of 2022. Let me counsel caution, though, in relying on these past episodes to forecast the future. For one thing, this oil shock looks to be very brief. To quote President Trump “the war will be over very soon, because there’s practically nothing left to target.”

When it’s all said and done, this war might last only four to five weeks, not enough duration to really have any significant impact on the economy. You might see a whiff of energy inflation in the March CPI number, but people are going to look through it. It won’t last. Actually, the exchange value of the dollar has gone up, not down. And unlike the 1970s, there’s no supply shock, because most of our oil is now produced in America and Canada. In fact, the most important thing to remember is how much more oil we produce today than we did way back then. “Drill, baby, drill.” Pure genius from Mr. Trump.

Oil production in the 1970s remained under 10 million barrels a day. Today it’s nearly 14 million. And we don’t have wage and price controls today, or long lines at the pump, because of Trumpian deregulation. So we don’t actually have supply shortages today, we don’t really need Middle Eastern oil, although we are subjected to world oil prices. Gasoline is up about 50 cents a gallon. Big deal. Yes, temporarily that will slightly cut into middle-class wallets and pocketbooks, but it’s also important to remember that as oil producers, the higher price actually benefits parts of the population. It’s not all one-sided lost consumer disposable income anymore.

Now here’s another point, interest rates have not changed significantly. In prior oil shocks, it seemed like rising inflation drove up interest rates, which in turn drove down the economy. The 10-year treasury has hovered just around 4 percent, slightly above. And the 30-year mortgage has stayed around 6 percent. So, we haven’t had a real oil supply shock. We haven’t had a real interest rate shock. And it is likely that energy prices will fall below prewar levels.

Therefore, Mr. Trump’s One, Big, Beautiful Bill with tax cuts, deregulation, and “drill, baby, drill,” will continue to provide tailwinds for the economy once this war is over. And for investors, I say look through the temporary disruption.

Mr. Trump’s Operation Epic Fury is changing the course of the Middle East and the rest of the world toward freedom. And freedom in the Middle East and everywhere else will bring greater prosperity. So for investors, look through the war and see the enormous prosperity that lies on the other side.

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Americans who are planning for their retirement can get bigger Social Security benefit checks by delaying their application for benefits until after they reach full retirement age.

The monthly benefit payments to Social Security beneficiaries are determined based on their full retirement age (FRA), which varies based on the year a worker was born in. 

For workers born in 1960 and after, the FRA is 67, while the FRA is reduced by two months for each year before 1960 until it reaches 66, which is the FRA for those born from 1943 to 1954.

Those who want to continue working beyond their FRA and choose to delay claiming their Social Security benefits can incrementally increase their monthly benefits by continuing to work, with benefits increasing by 8% per year until they reach age 70, when the benefit is maximized.

SOCIAL SECURITY’S MAIN TRUST FUND FACES DEPLETION IN 2032, TRIGGERING BENEFIT CUTS

Workers can claim Social Security benefits as early as age 62, though they have their benefit amount reduced. 

For example, a person whose FRA is 67 and claims early when they turn 62 would see their monthly benefit reduced 30%, lowering every $1,000 in benefits to $700. It would also impact their spouse’s benefit by 35%, reducing $500 in benefits to $325.

Those who are receiving their Social Security benefits and have reached their FRA can choose to suspend their payments temporarily or until they reach age 70, when they will automatically resume. 

RESTORED SOCIAL SECURITY BENEFITS COULD GET TAX BREAK UNDER NEW BILL

Benefit amounts resume their annual growth during the period that the beneficiary has suspended their benefits – which can allow them to receive larger benefit checks than they received before the pause once benefits are resumed.

While a beneficiary has suspended their benefits, their future monthly benefits grow at a rate of about 8% per year, or 0.666% on a monthly basis.

Married couples should be aware that voluntarily suspending Social Security benefits also suspends spousal benefits, which are up to 50% of the spouse’s benefits unless they’re divorced.

SOCIAL SECURITY COLA FOR 2026 REVEALED FOLLOWING SHUTDOWN-RELATED DELAY

Beneficiaries who suspended their benefits may request the resumption of their benefits before they turn 70, when they automatically begin again.

Suspending benefits also means that Medicare premiums cannot be deducted from Social Security benefits, which means the beneficiary would be billed by the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services.

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Toyota is recalling 550,007 vehicles because of a seat-back locking issue, federal regulators said.

The recall affects 420,771 Highlander and 129,236 Highlander Hybrid vehicles, all from model years 2021 through 2024, according to a notice filed with the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration.

The notice said “second-row seat backs may fail to lock into position during seat back adjustment.”

TOYOTA RECALLS 141K VEHICLES OVER DOORS THAT COULD OPEN WHILE DRIVING

FORD RECALLS MORE THAN 83,000 VEHICLES OVER HEADLIGHT, ENGINE VALVE ISSUES

A seat back that has not been secured in a locked position may fail to properly restrain occupants, increasing the risk of injury in the event of a crash at higher speeds, the notice said.

NHTSA said that all owners of the affected vehicles will be notified to return their vehicle to a Toyota dealer. The dealer will replace the return springs in the recliner assemblies with improved ones, free of charge.

Owner notification letters are expected to be mailed in April.

Toyota also recalled around 141,000 Prius and Prius Prime vehicles last month after discovering that rear doors can unexpectedly open while the car is moving.

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FOX Business reached out to Toyota for comment.

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In team sports, athletes get a built-in support system thanks to teammates going through the same journey as them most of the time. 

In golf, it’s you, the ball and the course – no matter what kind of team you have behind the scenes. And for those elite players, like Michelle Wie West, who has been playing LPGA Tour tournaments since she was 12 years old, it can be tough navigating a professional world at the onset. 

To that end, West teamed up with Ford to launch “Power Her Drive,” a new mentorship platform designed to support LPGA rookies on and off the course. It’s a program built on Wie West’s own experience as a teenager trying her hardest to make an impact on the course, while dealing with everything else that comes with being a professional athlete. 

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“This is probably the easiest yes I’ve had when it comes in terms of sponsorship,” Wie West said in a recent call with FOX Business ahead of “Power Her Drive” debuting at the Ford Championship, which begins in Phoenix, Arizona, on March 26. “This really, deeply aligns with my passion. Now that I’m retired and in my post-retirement career, hosting my tournament, having juniors involved and mentorship was a big part of it as well. I think what Ford is doing is amazing. Since our early conversations, it was very clear it wasn’t just about logos – it was about empowerment.

“Golf is an individual sport, and this is what I tell the juniors all the time: you have to lean into community. You have to lean into your support group.”

PGA TOUR UNLEASHES AI REVOLUTION WITH AWS TO TRANSFORM GOLF VIEWING EXPERIENCE FOR FANS WORLDWIDE

Wie West said she was lucky to have her parents as a strong support system, but since they didn’t expect their daughter to be as successful as she was at an early age, the 2014 U.S. Women’s Open winner admitted, “It was the blind leading the blind a lot of the times.”

So, with women’s sports in general seeing unprecedented growth, Wie West’s passion was one Ford immediately wanted to help out with in their partnership. 

“I think this all started with the idea that we were very committed to becoming the official vehicle partner for the LPGA Tour. But then we started exploring it more deeply. How can we do this in a very unique way?” Lisa Materazzo, Ford’s global chief marketing officer, said to FOX Business. 

“We don’t want to just sponsor the tournament. It’s very important, so I don’t want to downplay that at all, but we saw an unmet need when we began speaking with the LPGA and an opportunity for deeper connection with the athletes. Really authentically supporting their development, and this to us felt very right for Ford, to demonstrate that we have this unique commitment to the players and the LPGA, and more broadly, this sport and women’s sports in general.”

“Power Her Drive” will begin with a Class of 2026, featuring a bright group of LPGA Tour rookies: Camille Boyd, Briana Chacon, Hailee Cooper, Laney Frye, Melanie Green and Yana Wilson. 

As these rookies look to cement themselves as winners, or even stars, on the LPGA Tour, “Power Her Drive” plans to help them deal with what comes off the course, including brand sponsorships, financial advice and more. 

“The score on the leaderboard is what you see, but there’s so many layers behind that,” Wie West added. “I hope with our partnership, people will kind of see the peeling of the onion and see the support these players are getting. We’re going to go through and talk about personal brand building, talk about leadership skills. Even though it’s an elite individual sport, you’re still a leader of your own team – your caddy, your trainer, etc. I think all of this is going to be so much fun to go through with the rookies.”

Materazzo added: “We are a big business – we’re a 122-year-old big, global brand. We know how to do these things, we know how to operate in a business environment. So, we can help those young golfers build their brands… If we can make other pieces of it an easier lift, that makes us, in theory, proud and very humble to be a part of that journey for them.”

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Taxpayers in several states may face delays in receiving their tax refunds this filing season amid changes in tax policies as well as the processes for filing returns.

Tax refunds are issued to taxpayers when the amount of taxes they paid over the course of the year is greater than the amount of liability based on their return after deductions or credits are applied. Refunds are issued by the IRS at the federal level, while state revenue agencies distribute refunds based on their policies.

This tax season’s refunds have been larger following the enactment of the One Big Beautiful Bill Act (OBBBA) at the federal level, which extended lower tax rates that were set to expire and also created new deductions that required the IRS and Treasury Department to implement new rules for handling them.

Several states have informed taxpayers that their state-level tax refunds may be delayed this tax season for a variety of reasons, including the need to update tax forms and systems to account for OBBBA’s changes at the federal level. Many taxpayers rely on the financial boost of a tax refund check to help shore up household budgets or for special expenses.

HOW TO AVOID TAX SCAMS THIS FILING SEASON

Taxpayers in New York who filed early this tax season may face processing delays due to the timing of software updates that were installed in early February, which could leave some taxpayers in a “processing loop” according to a report by Kiplinger. 

Federal tax policy shifts and the state of New York’s inflation refund checks that were disbursed late last year may not have been accounted for prior to the software update.

Idaho’s budget office announced last month that tax refunds may be delayed up to six weeks this filing season due to several factors. 

The agency noted that Idaho cut the budgets of most state agencies in the last two years, which has left the state government with fewer temporary workers who can assist with processing tax returns. Idaho also enacted a law last month that retroactively added similar tax breaks from OBBBA to the state tax code, including the deductions for tipped income and interest on new car loans.

AMERICANS SEE BIGGER TAX REFUNDS SO FAR THIS YEAR AS FILING SEASON BEGINS AT A SLOWER PACE

Oregon announced that taxpayers who filed paper returns won’t see their refunds until early April because the state Department of Revenue won’t begin processing paper returns until that latter part of this month.

The agency said there was a delay in receiving tax forms from the IRS that pertained to tax law changes under OBBBA, while it also adopted some of the law’s policies at the state level, such as a larger standard deduction and a deduction for overtime pay.

Those changes have prompted changes to tax forms and the agency’s tax return processing systems for paper returns. Oregon’s Department of Revenue is encouraging taxpayers to file electronically this season to avoid delays.

HERE’S WHEN TAXPAYERS WILL GET THEIR REFUNDS

South Carolina taxpayers are facing complications after the legislature didn’t update some of its state-level tax provisions to account for the OBBBA, meaning some federal provisions are accounted for at the state level. 

The discrepancy created issues with tax software programs trying to correctly calculate manual “add backs” of federal tax breaks on returns, which led to delays and may require some filers to submit an amended return.

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Taxpayers in the District of Columbia may face refund delays due to Congress overturning a D.C. tax law that had created a divergence from OBBBA provisions in federal law. Those changes prompted a software update in February, which could require some filers to re-file their returns after forms have been revised.

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Northern Oil And Gas Inc (NYSE:NOG) shares are trading lower in Wednesday’s after-hours session after the company announced a proposed public offering of common stock.

Northern Oil and Gas Proposes Offering

After the market close on Wednesday, Northern Oil and Gas announced it commenced an underwritten public offering of $200 million of its common …

Full story available on Benzinga.com

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Institutional investors invested more than $540 million in U.S. Solana (CRYPTO: SOL) ETFs in Q4 after their launch last October, per Bloomberg data, yet the token’s price has barely moved. This has sparked debate about the true impact of demand on the token’s price, translating into real momentum for the blockchain’s native asset.

Data highlighted by Bloomberg ETF analyst, James Seyffart, indicates that approximately 30 large institutional investors collectively created more than $540 million in exposure to Solana ETFs during the fourth quarter of 2025. Venture firm Electric Capital led the allocations with nearly $138 million, followed by Goldman Sachs with more than $107 million.

However, despite that surge in institutional positioning, the token’s price has been stuck in consolidation, trading around $86 as of March 11 and only slightly higher at $86.80 on March 10, still far from the coveted $100 mark. To be more specific, the price of Solana fell from …

Full story available on Benzinga.com

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Petco Health and Wellness Company, Inc. (NASDAQ:WOOF) shares climbed higher in Wednesday’s extended trading after the company released a mixed fourth-quarter earnings report, squeaking out a revenue beat. 

Here’s a look at the key figures from the report. 

The Details: Petco Health and Wellness reported quarterly losses of 1 cent per share which missed the Street estimate of for earnings of 2 …

Full story available on Benzinga.com

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A growing number of billionaires, CEOs and major corporations are relocating from blue states to red states, pointing to lower taxes, fewer regulations and a friendlier business climate.

The trend has picked up in recent years and shows no clear signs of slowing.

Several well-known companies have recently moved or announced plans to move their headquarters:

The tech firm announced in February that it moved its headquarters from Denver to Miami.

The energy giant said this week it will leave New Jersey and reincorporate in Texas, pointing to the state’s pro-business legal environment after years of legal challenges.

The company announced last month that it is moving its corporate headquarters from Glendale, California, to Frisco, Texas, ending a half-century run in California.

Yamaha is relocating its U.S. headquarters from California to Georgia after nearly 50 years in the Golden State, the company announced in February.

OVER $126M IN 60 DAYS — FLORIDA REAL ESTATE TYCOONS SAY BLUE-STATE WEALTH MIGRATION IS NOW PERMANENT

The space company and social media platform relocated their headquarters from California to Texas, Elon Musk announced in 2024, citing policy concerns.

The Musk-owned electric-vehicle maker officially moved its corporate headquarters from Palo Alto, California, to its Gigafactory in Texas, in December 2021.

The energy company announced plans in 2024 for the relocation of its headquarters from San Ramon, California, to Houston, Texas.

Playboy Enterprises announced last year that it would be moving its Los Angeles headquarters to Miami Beach.

Larry Ellison’s tech firm announced in 2024 it was moving its headquarters to Nashville, Tennessee. The company previously moved its headquarters from California to Texas in 2020, according to Fortune.

PROGRESSIVE LAWMAKERS BERNIE SANDERS, RO KHANNA UNVEIL $4.4T WEALTH TAX TARGETING BILLIONAIRES

Meanwhile, some other companies are expanding instead of fully relocating.

Starbucks recently announced plans to open a new corporate office in Nashville, Tennessee. In-N-Out is also expected to open a 100,000-square-foot eastern office near Nashville later this year.

The shift also includes high-profile individuals:

The former Starbucks CEO recently moved to Florida after decades in Washington state.

Amazon’s founder announced in 2023 that he was leaving Seattle for Miami.

The Citadel CEO moved the hedge fund’s headquarters from Chicago to Miami in 2022, citing crime and failed policies in the city.

The PayPal co-founder recently established a new office for Thiel Capital in Miami, according to Business Insider.

The founder of Related Companies and owner of the Miami Dolphins, relocated from New York to Florida, according to the New York Post.

The Meta CEO and his wife, Priscilla Chan, have reportedly closed on a sprawling Miami-area estate for a bit less than the original $200 million listing price.

The co-founder of Google also reportedly closed recently on a $51 million property in northern Miami Beach.

Musk, the world’s richest person, announced in 2020 that he had moved to Texas, according to The Wall Street Journal.

FLORIDA CHAMBER CEO SAYS HIGH-TAX STATES ARE IN A ‘DEATH SPIRAL’ AS $4M-AN-HOUR WEALTH MIGRATION ACCELERATES

Florida, which has no state income tax, has become a major draw for wealthy individuals. 

California lawmakers are also considering new taxes aimed at the ultra-wealthy. A proposed 2026 ballot measure would impose a one-time 5% tax on individuals worth more than $1 billion.

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Critics argue higher taxes could push more businesses and wealthy residents to leave the state.

FOX Business’ Eric Revell, Kristen Altus, Aislinn Murphy and Michael Dorgan contributed to this report.

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Bumble, Inc. (NASDAQ:BMBL) shares climbed in Wednesday’s extended trading after the company released its fourth-quarter earnings report and an upbeat first-quarter revenue outlook.

Here’s a look at the key figures from the quarter. 

The Details: Bumble reported quarterly losses of $4.06 per share which missed the analyst consensus for earnings of 24 cents.

Quarterly revenue came in at $224.17 million which beat the Street consensus estimate of $221.3 million.

Bumble reported the following Q4 metrics:

  • Total Revenue decreased 14.3% to $224.2 million, …

Full story available on Benzinga.com

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Bloomberg Intelligence senior commodities strategist Mike McGlone predicts Bitcoin (CRYPTO: BTC) will fall to $10,000, calling the crypto asset class “dead” as unlimited token supply and five years of underperformance versus the S&P 500 make it uninvestable for institutional risk managers.

The $10,000 Target Explained

McGlone defines $10,000 as the most widely traded price for Bitcoin since 2019-2020, similar to how crude oil has traded around $57 per barrel for almost 10 years. 

“That’s where Bitcoin set its place,” McGlone said, arguing the asset will return to this level during a broader risk asset correction.

McGlone previously called for Bitcoin to drop to $1,100 in 2018 when it traded at $10,000.

Bitcoin ultimately bottomed at $3,000, making him “30% wrong, 70% right.” He became bullish in 2019 and correctly predicted Bitcoin would exceed $100,000 in 2020 by “just adding a zero.”

Now McGlone argues Bitcoin must “lop off a zero” from $100,000. Currently trading around $68,000, he’s about 32% …

Full story available on Benzinga.com

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Ripple has begun buying back equity shares from investors and employees in a tender offer worth up to $750 million that values the private company at $50 billion.

Ripple’s Biggest Buyback Yet

The repurchase, reported by Bloomberg on Wednesday, comes as crypto markets reel.

Bitcoin (CRYPTO: BTC) has fallen more than 40% from its October peak and XRP (CRYPTO: XRP) has dropped over 50%. Ripple is effectively buying back its own equity at fire-sale crypto prices while signaling a $50 billion self-assessment.

Ripple bought back $285 million at an $11 billion valuation in January 2024, offered $700 million at $175 per share in June 2025, then attempted a $1 billion tender at $40 billion in September 2025 that saw the lowest participation rate of any round, with employees refusing to sell.

The …

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Bitcoin’s (CRYPTO: BTC) macro behaviour is increasingly tied to global liquidity and energy markets, which increases its correlation with the Nasdaq, according to VanEck’s Matthew Sigel.

Bitcoin’s Correlation With Nasdaq Rising

Speaking on Squawk Box on CNBC on March 11, Sigel said oil shocks and geopolitical tensions, including risks around the Strait of Hormuz, can tighten liquidity and put pressure on risk assets such as Bitcoin.

As a result, Bitcoin’s correlation with the Nasdaq Composite has climbed to a five-year high.

Sigel also noted that investors in the Middle East are increasingly turning to Bitcoin during geopolitical stress because it is easier to move across borders than physical assets such as Gold.

Recent data showing increased crypto transfers from Iran …

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Bitcoin is holding $70,000 as oil price continue to remain elevated.

Cryptocurrency Ticker Price
Bitcoin (CRYPTO: BTC) $70,461.60
Ethereum (CRYPTO: ETH) $2,070.06
Solana (CRYPTO: SOL) $87.36
XRP (CRYPTO: XRP) $1.39
Dogecoin (CRYPTO: DOGE) $0.09438
Shiba Inu (CRYPTO: SHIB) $0.055823

Notable Statistics:

  • Coinglass data shows 95,278 traders were liquidated in the past 24 hours for $190.53 million.
  • SoSoValue data shows net inflows of $250.9 million from spot Bitcoin ETFs on Tuesday. Spot Ethereum ETFs saw net inflows of $12.6 million.
  • In the past 24 hours, top gainers include Internet Computer, JUST and Artificial Superintelligence Alliance.

Notable Developments:

Full story available on Benzinga.com

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The latest inflation data from the Labor Department showed that price increases continued at a steady pace in February, though some items saw notable price hikes or declines.

The Bureau of Labor Statistics found that the consumer price index (CPI) rose 2.4% from a year ago in February, a figure that was in line with the expectations of economists polled by LSEG and unchanged from January’s reading.

Core CPI inflation – a figure which excludes volatile measures of food and energy prices – was up 2.5% in February, also in line with expectations and unchanged from a month ago.

The readings for both headline and core CPI were above the Federal Reserve’s long-run target of 2% annual inflation but well below the 9.1% high recorded in June 2022 amid the pandemic-era inflation surge.

INFLATION HELD STEADY IN FEBRUARY AND REMAINED ABOVE THE FED’S TARGET

Here’s a look at some popular items from the February CPI report that saw notable increases or decreases in prices.

Coffee prices were up 18.4% from a year ago in February. The U.S. imports the majority of its coffee and those imports were subject to higher tariffs for most of 2025 before an exemption was put in place to address affordability concerns.

Lettuce prices rose 15.3% on an annual basis through February, including a 12.2% monthly increase. A confluence of factors has impacted lettuce prices, including a disease affecting some lettuce grown in California, agricultural labor shortages due to immigration enforcement, as well as a seasonal transition between growing regions.

BEEF PRICES SOAR AS AMERICAN FAMILIES PAY STEEP PRICES FOR STEAKS AND BURGERS NATIONWIDE

Beef and veal prices increased 14.4% year over year, and within that category, beef steaks were up 16.3% while ground beef was up 15.2% and beef roasts rose 12.4%. Beef prices have risen as the U.S. cattle inventory is at a 70-year low due to drought and wildfires in key ranching regions, as well as higher overhead costs facing ranchers.

Audio equipment prices rose 13.5% on an annual basis through February. A combination of tariffs, rising raw material costs for inputs like copper and gold, as well as increased demand for components such as chips that are also used in artificial intelligence data centers contributed to the rise.

Utility gas service prices were up 10.9% from a year ago in February, including a 3.1% monthly increase. Natural gas prices were volatile amid geopolitical tensions prior to the outbreak of the Iran war at the end of February, as well as due to increased demand for U.S. natural gas exports to Europe and Asia.

HOW THE IRAN WAR COULD HIT AMERICANS’ GROCERY BILLS

Egg prices plunged 42.1% in February compared with last year, including a 3.8% monthly decline. The decline is occurring as the egg supply chain normalizes after an avian flu outbreak impacted inventory levels in recent years, prompting dramatic price increases.

Smartphone prices fell 13.9% from a year ago in February, in part because the BLS index includes older smartphone models that have been discounted and also accounts for the tech improvements. That means a more capable phone at a higher price may be reflected as a price decline due to the relative capability improvement. Additionally, smartphones were generally exempt from tariffs in 2025, unlike some other electronic devices like audio equipment.

Tax return preparation and accounting fees declined 6.4% over the last year. The decline was driven by the integration of AI into tax software as well as the expansion of the IRS’ Direct File and Free File programs and more simplistic tax forms for self-filers.

WILL TAPPING OIL RESERVES CURB SOARING GAS PRICES?

Gasoline prices were down 5.6% year over year in February, inclusive of a 0.8% increase for the month. The BLS’ data was collected prior to the outbreak of the Iran war, which has pushed oil and gasoline prices significantly higher in recent weeks.

Television prices fell 4.1% in the last year through February, continuing a longstanding deflationary trend in TV prices. The BLS uses a similar model for TVs as it does for smartphones, so improved features or larger TVs can result in a reported decline in prices due to tech and capability improvements.

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A projectile hit a Thai-flagged cargo ship off the coast of Oman in the Strait of Hormuz, setting it on fire.

The Iranian regime reportedly claimed responsibility for striking the ship, the Mayuree Naree. The Omani navy was assisting in rescuing crew members amid the blaze, according to Thailand’s Marine Department. Iran has been targeting commercial shipping vessels through the strategic passageway amid tensions surrounding the global energy sector. 

U.S. Central Command later issued a warning to civilians “that the Iranian regime is using civilian ports along the Strait of Hormuz to conduct military operations that threaten international shipping.” CENTCOM stressed that, “This dangerous action risks the lives of innocent people. Civilian ports used for military purposes lose protected status and become legitimate military targets under international law.”

HOW THE IRAN WAR COULD HIT AMERICANS’ GROCERY BILLS

The United Kingdom Maritime Trade Operations (UKMTO) Centre had issued reports earlier Wednesday of ships being struck in the region, including one about a cargo ship reportedly being struck in the Strait of Hormuz.

“UKMTO has received a report of an incident 11NM north of Oman in the Straits of Hormuz. It has been reported that a cargo vessel has been hit by an unknown projectile in the Straits of Hormuz which has resulted in a fire onboard,” the warning stated, with an update noting that the fire was “extinguished.”

PANAMA CANAL CHIEF TOUTS LOGISTICAL CAPABILITIES AS IRAN CRISIS CHOKES OFF STRAIT OF HORMUZ SHIPPING ROUTE

One of the other warnings stated, “UKMTO has received a report of an incident 25NM northwest of Ra’s al Khaymah, UAE. The Master of a container vessel has reported that the vessel has sustained damage from a suspected but unknown projectile.” It also noted that “The Master additionally reports that all crew members are safe and accounted for.”

“UKMTO has received a report of an incident 50NM northwest of Dubai, United Arab Emirates. The Master of a Bulk Carrier has reported their vessel being hit by an unknown projectile,” another warning stated. “The crew are reported safe and well.”

In a Monday Truth Social, President Donald Trump warned of consequences if Iran acts to stop the transport of oil in the Strait of Hormuz.

OIL SPIKE FADES AS MARKETS REASSESS IRAN WAR SUPPLY RISKS

“If Iran does anything that stops the flow of Oil within the Strait of Hormuz, they will be hit by the United States of America TWENTY TIMES HARDER than they have been hit thus far. Additionally, we will take out easily destroyable targets that will make it virtually impossible for Iran to ever be built back, as a Nation, again — Death, Fire, and Fury will reign upon them — But I hope, and pray, that it does not happen!” Trump warned in the post.

Iran’s Revolutionary Guard has said that it “will not allow the export of even a single liter of oil from the region to the hostile side and its partners until further notice,” according to the Associated Press.

Gas prices have been surging in the U.S. as Trump prosecutes the controversial war effort against the Islamic Republic along with the nation of Israel, a close U.S. ally.

The AAA national average price for a gallon of regular gas is currently $3.578.

Fox News’ Rebekah Castor and The Associated Press contributed to this report.

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Strive (NASDAQ:ASST) purchased $50 million of Strategy’s (NASDAQ:MSTR) STRC preferred stock after Michael Saylor claimed STRC achieved a Sharpe ratio above 3, outperforming Nvidia, Tesla and gold on risk-adjusted returns.

The Saylor Sharpe Ratio Claim

Saylor posted on X on Wednesday that STRC achieved a Sharpe ratio of 3.08, comparing it to gold at 2.88, Alphabet at 2.65, Nvidia at 1.66, and Tesla at 1.32. 

The Sharpe ratio measures returns relative to risk taken, with higher numbers indicating better risk-adjusted performance.

“Digital Credit is engineered for superior risk-adjusted returns,” Saylor said. STRC currently yields 11.5% with monthly cash distributions. 

The dividend rate adjusts each month to keep shares trading close to their $100 par value while limiting price volatility.

The claim positions STRC as delivering better returns per unit of risk than major tech stocks and traditional safe havens. …

Full story available on Benzinga.com

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Fundstrat’s Tom Lee says the crypto market has moved past its winter phase, with reduced speculation and leverage creating a healthier foundation for future gains.

Markets Could Move Higher Through March

Markets, including crypto and major tech stocks, appear to have emerged from a recent bear phase, Lee said in a CNBC interview on Tuesday.

He expects markets to move higher in the near term, particularly through March, although he warned that a broader bear market could develop later in the year.

A roughly 20% decline could occur once markets stop reacting positively to good news, a signal Lee views as a typical indicator that a larger downturn may be forming.

For now, much of the speculative excess …

Full story available on Benzinga.com

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Small Business Administrator (SBA) Kelly Loeffler unveiled a sweeping fraud crackdown on Wednesday, announcing an audit of a decades-old $50 billion program she said has “never been looked at” and barring 112,000 borrowers from future aid over COVID-era loan fraud.

“There are dozens of programs across this government that need to be reviewed,” Loeffler told “Mornings with Maria.”

“I found a program that we had in our agency about 50 years old, [that has] never been looked at, $50 billion, so what we’re doing is auditing each participant in the program, and we’re looking back at COVID-era loans.”

GOP SENATORS LAUNCH TASK FORCE TO CRACK DOWN ON FRAUD TIED TO MINNESOTA SCANDAL

The SBA chief said 112,000 borrowers in California are banned from ever getting SBA assistance again for allegedly defrauding COVID-era loan programs and expressed gratitude to Vice President JD Vance for leading the charge in the fight against fraud.

President Trump tapped Vance to spearhead the administration’s “war on fraud” during his State of the Union address last month, a task the vice president accepted with a promise to root out “stolen” taxpayer money on a systematic level.

PHILADELPHIA MEN REPEATEDLY TRAVELED TO MINNEAPOLIS TO CARRY OUT $3.5M HOUSING FRAUD SCHEME: DOJ

“The American people want accountability. They want to make sure their hard-earned tax dollars are not going to fraudsters,” Loeffler said.

“People that have come here and built businesses on defrauding the government… we’re going to see results on that and make sure that we change it for good. These changes need to be durable and sustainable for the American taxpayer.”

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Loeffler has already paused some SBA loans to Minnesota amid a widespread fraud investigation in the state.

She vowed to go “state by state” to weed out offenders, telling the New York Post that the push is part of a greater effort to “contribute meaningfully” to Vance’s fraud task force.

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Mastercard (NYSE:MA) on Wednesday launched a Crypto Partner Program with over 85 companies including Binance (CRYPTO: BNB), Circle (NASDAQ:CRCL), Ripple (CRYPTO: XRP), Gemini, PayPal (NASDAQ:PYPL), and Paxos to connect blockchain technology with its global payments infrastructure.

The 85+ Partner Program

The initiative brings together crypto exchanges, blockchain developers, fintech firms, and banks to explore how blockchain-based systems can connect with traditional payment rails used by banks, merchants, and consumers. 

Participants will work with Mastercard teams to shape products combining on-chain tools with established payment rails.

The program focuses on practical use cases where digital assets are gaining traction, including cross-border transfers, business-to-business payments, and global payouts. 

Companies will collaborate on future product development targeting enterprise applications like remittances, B2B transfers, and settlement.

Mastercard’s network links banks, merchants, …

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As the U.S. enters its fifth year of inflation running above the Federal Reserve’s 2% target, major retailers are responding to softer demand and increased competitive pressure.

With consumer sentiment in 2026 divided and the cost of living remaining a top concern among Americans, Target announced Wednesday that it will reduce prices on more than 3,000 items.

“Busy families are thinking about value as they begin to update their homes and wardrobes for spring,” , Cara Sylvester, Target’s executive vice president and chief merchandising officer, said in a press release.

“We’re delivering by lowering prices on 3,000 spring favorites across apparel, essentials and home,” she continued. “We’re committed to making it easier than ever for guests to have the fresh style and incredible value they love, with lower prices on the items we know they want.”

BELOVED BUC-EE’S CONVENIENCE STORE CHAIN FACES CUSTOMER SERVICE CRISIS AFTER DEVASTATING ‘F’ RATING

The discounted categories include women’s and children’s apparel, footwear such as flats, sandals and sneakers, bedding and blankets, baby products, household essentials and pantry staples.

Most reductions range from 5% to 20% off original prices and will begin rolling out in stores this month through the spring.

However, the price reduction program excludes stores in Alaska and Hawaii.

Inflation remained above the Federal Reserve’s 2% target in February as policymakers continue to weigh affordability concerns. The Bureau of Labor Statistics said Wednesday that the consumer price index (CPI) — a broad measure of the cost of goods and services, including gasoline, groceries and rent — rose 0.3% in February and increased 2.4% from a year earlier. The annual rate was unchanged from January, while the monthly gain was slightly higher than January’s 0.2% increase.

The price cuts appear to be part of a broader strategy aimed at restoring sales growth. Target CEO Michael Fiddelke outlined the company’s plan to return to growth during a financial community meeting last week, citing investments in key categories such as women’s apparel, home and baby.

“This new chapter of growth at Target is defined by clear choices and rooted in a deeper understanding of our unique lane in retail, the guests we serve and the areas where we’re distinctly positioned to win,” Fiddelke said.

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“This work is underway, and by putting style, design and value at the center of every decision,” he continued, “we’re making big changes to lead with a trend-forward assortment, elevate the guest experience, accelerate with technology and equip our teams to deliver the most delightful experience in retail, for today and over the long term.”

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FOX Business’ Eric Revell contributed to this report.

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Former Starbucks CEO Howard Schultz and his wife announced they’ve moved to Florida for their “retirement phase,” leaving Washington state after nearly half a century.

Schultz shared the news in a post on LinkedIn, recounting how he, his wife Sheri, and their golden retriever Jonas, made the move from New York City to Seattle 44 years ago.

“We were starting a new life,” Shultz wrote, recalling how Sheri would be their primary income earner as he started a new job “at a place called Starbucks” in September 1982.

Schultz would later become the coffee company’s CEO, serving in the position from 1986 to 2000, from 2008 to 2017, and as its interim CEO from 2022 to 2023.

STARBUCKS TO OPEN NEW OFFICE IN NASHVILLE, MOVE SOME JOBS FROM SEATTLE

“The spirit of continuing forward has long underpinned our approach to life—in business, in philanthropy and most importantly, as a family,” Schultz wrote. “For those of you who know us well, we have entered the ‘retirement’ phase of our lives. (A term we are both just getting used to.)”

Schultz added that he and Sheri moved to Miami, where they were enjoying the sunshine and being close to their kids on the East Coast as they raised their own families.

“We will be forever grateful for the memories made in Seattle and the relationships built along the way,” Schultz wrote. “To the family, friends and partners who made Seattle our home for so many years, thank you.”

STARBUCKS’ TURNAROUND PLAN SHOWS PROMISE IN US AS SALES GROWTH RETURNS FOR FIRST TIME IN 2 YEARS

Schultz has an estimated net worth of $3.5 billion, according to Forbes.

The news of Schultz’s move to Florida comes a week after Starbucks said it will be opening a new corporate office in Nashville.

Both announcements come as Washington state has been working to pass what has been dubbed the “millionaires tax,” which would impose a 9.9% income tax on households earning more than $1 million annually.

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The Washington State House of Representatives passed the controversial bill in a 51-46 vote. The bill must now be confirmed by the State Senate before Democratic Gov. Bob Ferguson can sign it into law.

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Yamaha Motor Co. is relocating its U.S. headquarters from California to Georgia after nearly a half century of operations in the Golden State.

The company announced late last month that it will move the corporate headquarters of its U.S. entity from Cypress, California, to Kennesaw, Georgia. It added that the relocation will occur incrementally by business function, starting in late 2026, and is expected to conclude in late 2028.

Yamaha said in its announcement the move is “undertaking structural reforms aimed at improving the profitability of its U.S. operations in response to cost increases resulting from U.S. tariffs and changes in the market environment.”

CALIFORNIA TECH LEADERS CHALLENGE PROGRESSIVE POLICIES AS BILLIONAIRES, BUSINESSES FLEE

The company manufactures ATVs, boat engines, personal watercraft and other motorized products. It is also known for its motorcycles, though they are not produced in North America.

PUBLIC STORAGE RELOCATES HEADQUARTERS FROM CALIFORNIA TO TEXAS

Yamaha established its office in Cypress in 1979, a year after acquiring the land. It relocated its marine business to Kennesaw in 1999 and its motorsports business there in 2019. The California office houses mostly corporate functions and the financial services business, Yamaha said.

“After many years of great partnership, we are honored and proud to welcome Yamaha’s American headquarters to the No. 1 state for business,” said Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp. “This is another loud and clear testament to what we offer job creators from around the world. To any other California-based companies looking for a better home, we’ll give you plenty of reasons to keep Georgia on your mind.”

RICH CALIFORNIANS FLOCK TO LAS VEGAS HOUSING MARKET AS LAWMAKERS CONSIDER WEALTH TAX

Yamaha employs more than 2,300 workers in Georgia, according to Kemp’s office.

The move adds to a broader trend of relocations out of California by both corporations and individuals, as the high cost of doing business and a proposed wealth tax on the state’s highest earners weighs.

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Bitcoin (CRYPTO: BTC) is trading sideways, with investors’ weakening conviction conviction pointing to a psychologically difficult phase of the market cycle.

Why Investors Are Getting Jittery

Data from CryptoQuant suggests the market is currently in a highly uncertain phase marked more by hesitation than conviction.

Several on-chain indicators point to weakening investor confidence:

  • Apparent demand briefly improved following the latest sell-off but quickly turned negative again, indicating buyers remain cautious.
  • The CryptoQuant Bull Market Cycle Indicator currently signals a bear-market consolidation phase, typically associated with sideways price action and frustrating …

Full story available on Benzinga.com

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This is a developing story about the February 2026 consumer price index. Please check back for updates.

Inflation remained elevated in February as the pace of consumer price growth stayed above the Federal Reserve’s target rate as policymakers weigh affordability concerns.

The Bureau of Labor Statistics on Wednesday said that the consumer price index (CPI) – a broad measure of how much everyday goods like gasoline, groceries and rent cost – rose 0.3% on a monthly basis in February and held steady at 2.4% on a year-over-year basis. The annual figure was unchanged from January, while the monthly gain was slightly higher than last month’s 0.2% reading.

Both figures were in line with the expectations of economists polled by LSEG.

So-called core prices, which exclude volatile measurements of gasoline and food to better assess price growth trends, were up 0.2% from the prior month and rose 2.5% from a year ago. Those figures were in line with economists’ expectations.

The monthly core CPI figure was slightly cooler than January’s 0.3% reading, while the annual figure was unchanged from last month.

FED OFFICIALS CLOSELY MONITOR IRAN CONFLICT FOR POTENTIAL INFLATION IMPACT

Economists have noted that inflation data from December 2025 through April 2026 will be affected due to data collection interruptions resulting from last fall’s 43-day government shutdown.

During the shutdown, the BLS wasn’t able to gather data and used a carry-forward methodology to make up for the lack of an October CPI report and missing data in November’s report. Economists say that going forward this is likely to impart a downward bias on inflation data until this spring, when fresh data will negate the discrepancy.

High inflation has created severe financial pressures in recent years for most U.S. households, which are forced to pay more for everyday necessities like food and rent. Price hikes are particularly difficult for lower-income Americans, because they tend to spend more of their already-stretched paychecks on necessities and have less flexibility to save.

Food prices increased 0.4% in February and were up 3.1% from a year ago. The food at home index was up 0.4% for the month and 2.4% from last year, while the food away from home index rose 0.3% on a monthly basis and is 3.9% higher than a year ago. Monthly price increases for each category rose from 0.2% in January.

HOW THE IRAN WAR COULD HIT AMERICANS’ GROCERY BILLS

Meats, poultry and fish prices increased 0.2% in February and are up 6.8% from a year ago. Beef and veal prices jumped 1.5% for the month and are up 14.4% on an annual basis. Egg prices continued to decline following an avian flu outbreak that impacted supply, with prices down 3.8% for the month and 42.1% from a year ago. The fruits and vegetables index increased 1.4% in February and is 2.7% higher than a year ago.

Energy prices were up 0.6% in February but are up just 0.5% from last year. Gasoline prices increased 0.8% in February but were down 5.6% compared with the same month a year ago. Utility gas service prices rose 3.1% in February and are up 10.9% from a year ago. Electricity prices declined 0.7% in February and are 4.8% higher than a year ago.

Housing prices rose 0.2% in February and are up 3% from last year, as the BLS noted the shelter index was the largest factor in the overall monthly CPI increase. Tenants’ and household insurance prices were little changed and up just 0.1% in February, but have risen 6.2% in the last year.

OIL SPIKE FADES AS MARKETS REASSESS IRAN WAR SUPPLY RISKS

Transportation services prices were up 0.2% for the month and 2.2% in the last year. Motor vehicle maintenance and repair prices increased 0.9% in February and were up 5.6% from last year. Auto insurance prices declined 0.3% for the month and are up 0.2% over the past year. Airline fares rose 1.4% in February and have increased 7.1% from a year ago.

Medical care services rose 0.6% in February and are up 4.1% over the past 12 months. Prices for personal care services were up 0.3% on a monthly basis and 4.9% on an annual basis.

Household furnishings increased 0.2% for the month and 3.9% in the last year. Furniture and bedding prices were flat for the month but have risen 4.2% from a year ago. Prices for appliances rose 3.1% in February but are up 2.9% from a year ago.

“Before the war in Iran sent gas prices spiking, inflation was starting to look a bit better. February’s inflation reading of 2.4% is one of the lowest in the past five years, but it won’t stay that way with gas prices surging above $3.50 a gallon,” said Heather Long, chief economist at Navy Federal Credit Union.

“A steady inflation reading would probably be a welcome data point on any other day, but against the current backdrop of geopolitical uncertainty and surging oil prices, it may not carry as much weight in the markets – or with the Fed,” said Ellen Zentner, chief economic strategist for Morgan Stanley Wealth Management. 

“Despite the prospect of releasing oil reserves, continued uncertainty translates into continued upside risk for oil prices, and that translates into a Fed that will remain cautious about cutting interest rates,” Zentner added.

The Federal Reserve is set to hold its next monetary policy meeting next week on March 17-18, when it will announce its latest interest rate decision.

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The market’s expectations that the Fed will leave the benchmark federal funds rate unchanged at its current range of 3.5% to 3.75% were reinforced by the February CPI inflation report.

The probability of the Fed holding rates steady rose to 99.3%, up from 98.3% a week ago and 93.6% last month, according to the CME FedWatch tool.

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Scienture Holdings, Inc. (NASDAQ:SCNX) on Wednesday formalized multiple commercial Group Purchasing Organization (GPO) agreements for Rezenopy (naloxone HCl) Nasal Spray 10 mg.

Rezenopy, an opioid antagonist, received FDA approval in April 2024 for the emergency treatment of known or suspected opioid overdose.

Scienture secured exclusive U.S. commercialization rights to Rezenopy from Summit Biosciences Inc. (a Kindeva subsidiary) in March 2025.

Expanded Institutional Footprint For Scienture

The agreement provides access to over 5000 healthcare institutions, including hospitals, clinics, and nursing homes, representing potential penetration into roughly 60% of the U.S. institutional market.

The deal also establishes a broad footprint across first responders, EMS providers, and rehabilitation centers.

“These GPO agreements represent a significant step forward in the commercial expansion of Rezenopy,” commented Narasimhan Mani, President and co-CEO …

Full story available on Benzinga.com

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Envoy Medical Inc. (NASDAQ:COCH) on Wednesday said it has completed enrollment of its pivotal clinical trial for the investigational fully implanted Acclaim cochlear implant for hearing loss.

The company implanted the 56th and final patient.

Differentiated Ear Implant

The investigational Acclaim fully implanted cochlear implant leverages the natural ear, rather than an external microphone, to capture sound using Envoy Medical’s proprietary implanted piezoelectric sensor technology.

Unlike traditional cochlear implants, the Acclaim device does not require an externally worn component on or in the ear, representing a differentiated approach in the cochlear implant market.

Pivotal Trial Concludes Enrollment

Envoy Medical believes it is the first cochlear implant manufacturer to complete enrollment in a U.S. pivotal trial for a fully implanted cochlear implant, positioning the company at the forefront of this next generation of hearing technology.

“Completing enrollment of a pivotal clinical trial that is evaluating …

Full story available on Benzinga.com

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Heavy-duty truck maker Commercial Vehicle Group Inc. (NASDAQ:CVGI) jumped 26.54% in after-hours trading on Tuesday to $2.05.

According to Benzinga Pro data, the stock of the Ohio-based company closed the regular session down 2.99% at $1.62. Year-to-date, shares are up about 7%.

Shares Surge Despite Earnings Miss

The stock surged in extended trading despite missing fourth-quarter earnings expectations.

Commercial Vehicle Group reported a fourth-quarter loss of $0.18 per share, missing analysts’ expectations of a $0.15 per share loss by 20%.

Revenue of the company totaled $154.8 million, down 5.2% from a year earlier due to softer demand in North America. However, the revenue still came in 5.24% above analysts’ estimate of $147.05 million.

Operating loss narrowed sharply to $1.8 million from $5.3 million year-over-year.

Adjusted earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation, and amortization surged 155.6% to $2.3 million.

Free cash …

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Dogecoin (CRYPTO: DOGE) overtook market heavyweights Bitcoin (CRYPTO: BTC) and Ethereum (CRYPTO: ETH) in the latest cryptocurrency market rebound.

What’s Impacting DOGE?

Dogecoin surged over 4% in the past week, ranking among the top large-cap cryptocurrencies in this period. Bitcoin and Ethereum trailed DOGE, as shown below.

Cryptocurrency 7-Day Gains +/- Price (Recorded at 1:15 a.m. ET)
Dogecoin (CRYPTO: DOGE)    +4.18% $0.09287
Ethereum (CRYPTO: ETH)

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GEE Group Inc. (NYSE:JOB) rose 35.14% in after-hours trading on Tuesday to $0.30 following the company’s announcement that it had retained Roth Capital Partners LLC as its financial advisor.

Roth Capital to Evaluate Strategic Alternatives

Roth Capital, a California-based, full-service investment bank that provides strategic and financial advisory services to growth companies and their investors, will assist GEE Group’s Board of Directors and its Mergers and Acquisitions Committee in evaluating unsolicited expressions of interest already received from various parties, as well as other strategic alternatives available to the company, according to the company’s press release.

GEE Group cautioned that no assurance exists that the review …

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SCWorx Corp. (NASDAQ:WORX) rose 36.02% in after-hours trading on Tuesday to $0.17.

According to Benzinga Pro data, the stock closed regular trading at a 1.17% decline to $0.13.

Though no immediate reason has been identified for the stock movement, investors may still be reacting to the company’s announcement last week.

New Customer Agreement Signed

On March 4, SCWorx disclosed a new SaaS and data management agreement with a Southeastern healthcare provider whose integrated delivery network spans over 700 beds across multiple acute care hospitals and outpatient facilities.

Under the agreement, SCWorx will deliver data normalization, master data governance, legacy system migration support …

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Gemini Space Station, Inc. (NASDAQ:GEMI) co-founders Tyler Winklevoss and his twin brother Cameron could dump millions worth of Bitcoin (CRYPTO: BTC) on the market, on-chain analytics firm Arkham said on Tuesday.

Transaction Sparks Intrigue

In an X post, Arkham highlighted that a wallet tied to Winklevoss Capital, the family office of the Winklevoss twins, sent 1,750 BTC, worth $121 million as of this writing, to Gemini hot wallets, “presumably for selling.”

The wallet still holds 8,757 BTC, worth $751.86 million, with unrealized profit of $1.8 billion on the holdings.

Benzinga reached out to Gemini for a comment, but has yet to hear back.

Full story available on Benzinga.com

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Domo Inc. (NASDAQ:DOMO) shares are trending on Tuesday night.

Shares of the software company jumped 39.27% in after-hours trading on Tuesday to $6.10 following the company’s fourth-quarter fiscal 2026 earnings release.

EPS Beat Drives After-Hours Surge

Domo reported fourth-quarter earnings of 3 cents per share, well above the expected loss of 17 cents per share. This represents a beat of 117.65% over the estimate.

Revenue for the Utah-based company rose $855,000 from $78.77 million in the same period last year.

In the third quarter, Domo reported revenue of $79.4 million.

The company also beat earnings per share estimates in the previous two …

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Corning Inc. (NYSE:GLW) shares are trending on Tuesday night.

GLW edged higher in after-hours trading on Tuesday, rising 0.68% to $137.15.

The multinational technology company, which leverages expertise in glass science, ceramics and optical physics, closed the regular session up 5.56% at $136.22.

What’s Driving The Rally?

The stock move came as investor interest spiked as AT&T Inc. (NYSE:T) unveiled a sweeping $250 billion U.S. connectivity investment commitment. Corning is a major supplier to AT&T.

AT&T CEO John Stankey announced the long-term investment commitment, citing a “most conducive” regulatory environment for infrastructure spending.

“Today, we’re committing more than $250 billion to increase U.S. connectivity competitiveness and expand access to AT&T’s leading fiber and wireless networks,” Stankey said.

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Coinbase Global Inc. (NASDAQ:COIN) CEO Brian Armstrong deemed Bitcoin (CRYPTO: BTC) an “inflation-proof” global money on Tuesday, following the network’s milestone of mining its 20 millionth coin.

Over A Century To Go

Armstrong took note of the feat, pointing out that only 1 million BTC remain to be mined, which would take over 100 years.

“Decentralized, inflation-proof, global money,” Coinbase’s top executive heaped praise on the $1 trillion-plus asset.

Armstrong, one of Bitcoin’s most vocal advocates, predicted it would hit $1 million by 2030.

Full story available on Benzinga.com

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A federal appeals court on Monday officially finalized the termination of the Saving on a Valuable Education (SAVE) plan, the Biden program that significantly lowered repayment rates for millions of student loan borrowers.

The judgment, issued by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 8th Circuit, reverses a lower court’s February dismissal of a Republican-led legal challenge against the SAVE plan. That ruling was issued by Judge John Ross of the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Missouri.

Originally introduced in 2023 under former President Joe Biden, the SAVE plan was hailed as the “most affordable repayment plan ever created” for federal student loan borrowers. The program was the first and only plan in history that prevented the balance from ever growing by subsidizing 100% of all unpaid monthly interest.

More than 7 million student loan borrowers reportedly remain enrolled in the SAVE plan as of the fourth quarter.

TRUMP ADMINISTRATION SERVES FINAL BLOW TO END BIDEN’S SAVE STUDENT LOAN PROGRAM

Student loan borrowers enrolled in the SAVE plan have been urged to explore switching to a new repayment program.

Among alternative options, the Income-Based Repayment (IBR) plan sets monthly payments at 10% to 15% of discretionary income over a 20 to 25-year period.

TRUMP ADMINISTRATION AGREES TO SPEED UP STUDENT LOAN FORGIVENESS UNDER NEW COURT DEAL

Under the Big Beautiful Bill Act (OBBBA), passed last year under President Donald Trump, the Repayment Assistance Plan (RAP) will become available starting July 1, 2026. RAP uses a sliding scale of 1% to 10% of a borrower’s total Adjusted Gross Income (AGI) and requires 30 years of payments for all participants.

Borrowers pursuing Public Service Loan Forgiveness (PSLF), a federal program that cancels remaining student debt after 10 years of qualifying public service, should verify their eligibility and file an application to reclaim credit for the months when their SAVE plan progress was effectively frozen.

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Monday’s decision has effectively resolved a years-long legal battle between Republican-led states and the federal government. The ruling comes after nearly 8 million borrowers paused payments under “litigation forbearance” following an earlier injunction, and it follows a brief period of confusion when a lower court attempted to dismiss the case after a settlement with the Trump administration.

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President Donald Trump on Tuesday announced America First Refining (AFR) is opening the first new U.S. oil refinery in nearly half a century in Brownsville, Texas.

Situated in a massive deep-water foreign trade zone, the project will leverage advanced infrastructure and strategic rail and sea connections to transport low-carbon fuels and other energy products.

“America is returning to REAL ENERGY DOMINANCE!” Trump wrote in an announcement on Truth Social. “THIS IS A HISTORIC $300 BILLION DOLLAR DEAL — THE BIGGEST IN U.S. HISTORY, A MASSIVE WIN for American Workers, Energy, and the GREAT People of South Texas!”

AFR said the refinery will generate thousands of construction and permanent jobs, while offering wages that exceed market averages. 

WILL TAPPING OIL RESERVES CURB SOARING GAS PRICES?

Partners in India and their largest privately held energy company, Reliance, made a “tremendous” investment in the project, according to Trump.

AFR also signed a binding 20-year offtake term sheet with the global supermajor.

The company plans to formally break ground on the new refinery in Q2 2026.

“It is because of our America First Agenda, streamlining Permits, and lowering Taxes, that have attracted Billions of Dollars in Deals coming back to our Nation,” Trump said. “A new Refinery at the Port of Brownsville, will fuel U.S. Markets, strengthen our National Security, boost American Energy production, deliver Billions of Dollars in Economic impact, and will be THE CLEANEST REFINERY IN THE WORLD.

“It will power Global Exports, and bring THOUSANDS of long overdue Jobs and Growth to a Region that deserves it,” the president continued. “This is what AMERICAN ENERGY DOMINANCE looks like. AMERICA FIRST, ALWAYS!”

HOW THE IRAN WAR COULD HIT AMERICANS’ GROCERY BILLS

Under the newly signed agreement, 1.2 billion barrels of U.S. light shale oil will be purchased and processed, a value of $125 billion; AFR will produce 50 billion gallons of refined products, a value of $175 billion; and the U.S. trade imbalance will improve by $300 billion, according to AFR.

The refinery is specifically engineered to process American light shale oil (47° API), which is cleaner, more efficient and less costly to process than heavier imported crude. 

Unlike many existing U.S. refineries that depend on foreign oil, the facility will not require imported crude, which strengthens U.S. national and economic security.

Key advantages of the refinery include the capacity to process 60 million barrels per year of 100% U.S. light shale oil, a strategic location at a deep-water U.S. port, enabling distribution to domestic and international markets and the production of some of the cleanest gasoline, diesel and jet fuel refined at scale in the U.S.

AMID IRAN WAR, PRESIDENT TRUMP SUGGESTS SHORT-TERM OIL PRICE SPIKE IS ‘SMALL PRICE TO PAY’ FOR PEACE

From 2014 to 2024, the U.S. exported nearly 10 billion barrels of crude, while still importing roughly 28 billion barrels, costing American consumers and workers more than $1.8 trillion. 

Once operational, the AFR refinery will redirect up to 60 million barrels of U.S. crude annually back into domestic refining, strengthening American industry, energy security and economic growth.

Beyond industrial growth, the company’s website notes it will drive community engagement through educational partnerships and apprenticeships designed to foster long-term social equity and economic stability in the area.

The executive management team collectively has more than a century of experience in the chemical and refining industries, having managed nearly $40 billion in complex capital projects. 

“This project represents a historic step forward for American energy production,” said John V. Calce, chairman and founder of America First Refining. “For the first time in half a century, the United States will build a new refinery designed specifically for American shale oil. Thanks to President Trump’s leadership and the resurgence of an America First energy policy, we are creating thousands of high-quality jobs while ensuring more of our nation’s energy resources are refined here at home in the cleanest, most efficient refinery on the planet.”

CEO Trey Griggs added the U.S. has a surplus of light shale oil but a shortage of refining capacity designed to process it. 

“By building this refinery at the Port of Brownsville, we’re unlocking a major expansion of American energy production while creating thousands of high-paying jobs and strengthening our domestic supply chain,” said Griggs, who previously held top leadership positions at major corporations, including Calpine and Goldman Sachs.

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Other key executives bring decades of experience from managing global operations, midstream logistics and large trading portfolios across industry heavyweights like BP, Shell Oil, ExxonMobil, Vitol and Sunoco Logistics Partners.

The strategic advisory board includes seasoned leaders who have served as CEOs and top executives for companies, including CVR Energy, YCI Methanol One and Royal Dutch Shell.

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Leading cryptocurrencies recovered on Tuesday, while stocks and commodities remained volatile amid the ongoing Middle East war.

Cryptocurrency 24-Hour Gains +/- Price (Recorded at 9:30 p.m. ET)
Bitcoin (CRYPTO: BTC) +1.59% $70,050.52
Ethereum (CRYPTO: ETH)
               		 +1.16% $2,035.55
XRP (CRYPTO: XRP)                          +1.34% $1.38
Solana (CRYPTO: SOL)                          +0.85% $86.04
Dogecoin (CRYPTO: DOGE)              +3.02% $0.09370

Crypto Market’s U-Turn

Bitcoin rebounded as high as $71,700, with trading volume surging 11% in the last 24 hours. 

Ethereum spiked to an intraday high of $2,087.99 before easing to $2,035 in the evening. XRP and Dogecoin were up in the green.

Shares of  Strategy Inc. (NASDAQ:MSTR) and Coinbase Global Inc. (NASDAQ:COIN) closed down 0.35% and 1.64%, respectively.

Nearly $300 million was liquidated from the cryptocurrency market over the past 24 hours, predominantly short positions, according to Coinglass data. Moreover, about $490 million in Bitcoin shorts risked liquidation if the apex cryptocurrency rises to $73,000.

Open interest in Bitcoin futures increased 2.58% in the last 24 hours. Both retail and whale derivatives traders on Binance were long BTC as of this writing.

Top Gainers (24 Hours) 

Full story available on Benzinga.com

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The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) announced Monday that it selected eight proposals for a new pilot program testing new advanced air mobility and electric vertical takeoff and landing (eVTOL) aircraft in 26 states.

Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy and the FAA unveiled the pilot program, known as the Advanced Air Mobility and eVTOL Integration Pilot Program (e-IPP), which will center on eight projects in 26 states.

The futuristic aircraft can run on electric or hybrid engines and may carry people or cargo, taking off and landing in relatively confined spaces. They’re often referred to as “air taxis” or “flying cars” since they represent an alternative to traditional means of transportation.

Under the pilot program, several operational concepts will be tested, including urban air taxi services and regional passenger transportation, including with short takeoff and landing aircraft.

THE FLYING TAXI: A LOOK AT THE FUTURE OF TRAVEL

Additional concepts include cargo and logistics networks, emergency medical response operations, autonomous flight technologies and offshore and energy-sector transportation.

Among the projects selected for participation in the pilot program was one involving the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey, which will have four industry partners participate in testing 12 operational concepts across New England.

The Texas Department of Transportation will be involved with four industry partners in supporting regional flights connecting Dallas, Austin, San Antonio and eventually Houston with air taxi networks expanding from each city.

ARCHER AVIATION TEAMS UP WITH UNITED AIRLINES TO MAKE AIR TAXIS A REALITY

Four states spanning the Pacific Northwest, the Rocky Mountains and the Plains of Oklahoma will test a range of next-generation aircraft and operational concepts under the leadership of the Utah Department of Transportation.

Florida’s Department of Transportation will work with industry partners to test three phases of operations focused on cargo delivery, passenger transportation, automation and medical response with public and private investment.

Louisiana will host operations to test cargo and personnel transportation capabilities to enable flights over the high seas into the Gulf of America and energy industry locations in Louisiana, Texas and Mississippi.

A NEW WAY OF COMMUTING IS CLOSER TO TAKING OFF IN THE US

Other projects detailed in the announcement include those led by the transportation departments of North Carolina and Pennsylvania, as well as the City of Albuquerque.

The program was created under an “Unleashing Drone Dominance” executive order signed by President Donald Trump.

“Thanks to President Trump, the future of aviation is here, and it’s going to dramatically improve how people and products move,” Duffy said. “Congratulations to the great American innovators behind each of these exciting pilot programs.

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“Working together, we will ensure America leads the way in safely leveraging next-gen aircraft to radically redefine personal travel, regional transportation, cargo logistics, emergency medicine and so much more.”

Companies named as participants in the pilot program include Archer, BETA, Electra, Joby, Wisk, Ampaire, Elroy Air, Reliable Robotics and others.

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It wasn’t pixie dust in the air Tuesday when a backstage chemical reaction at Disneyland sent five cast members to hospitals.

The incident happened Tuesday afternoon when materials being used by a contractor produced a reaction in a backstage area of the Anaheim, California, theme park, a Disneyland spokesperson confirmed to Fox News Digital. 

According to the Anaheim Fire Department, firefighters responded to a report of an unknown odor in the backstage area near the Star Tours attraction in Tomorrowland around 12:30 p.m. 

The area was evaluated by first responders in hazmat suites. Aerial video from Sky Fox captured authorities responding to the theme park incident.

DISNEY LOSES $170 MILLION WITH ‘SNOW WHITE’ FLOP: REPORT

Several cast members were treated on site by paramedics and released, according to the park. Five others who experienced dizziness and shortness of breath were taken to nearby hospitals for further evaluation.

Their conditions were not immediately known.

Out of an abundance of caution, adjacent onstage areas were temporarily cleared of guests, the spokesperson said. Those areas were expected to reopen soon.

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Disneyland did not specify what materials were involved or the nature of the reaction. It was also unclear how many employees were in the area at the time.

The park remained open during the response.

Fire and emergency crews responded. The situation was contained to the backstage area, and no guests were reported to be injured, the park said.

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Oil prices briefly spiked to more than $100 a barrel on Monday amid the ongoing war in Iran, before falling sharply, underscoring how initial fears of supply disruptions eased as contingency plans emerged.

Before the outbreak of war with Iran, oil was trading in the range of $60 to $70 a barrel, but prices soared after the conflict began, with crude oil futures reaching upward of $115 a barrel on Monday – the highest level since 2022 when Russia invaded Ukraine.

Early headlines suggested global benchmark Brent crude could hit $150 a barrel due to the supply shock, though trading data showed the spike was short-lived. Crude prices were down 8%, while West Texas Intermediate fell nearly 9% on Tuesday afternoon.

HOW THE IRAN WAR COULD HIT AMERICANS’ GROCERY BILLS

Phil Flynn, senior market analyst at the Price Futures Group and a FOX Business contributor, said in an interview that panic buying ensued after reports of tankers and refineries being hit.

“But I think as the day went on into the overnight, the market realized that maybe things aren’t that bad – the U.S. is having incredible military victories, President Trump is saying, ‘hey, you know what, the war is probably not going to be going on that long.’ And even some signals that the world doesn’t have to just sit and stand and take it,” he said.

Leaders from the G7 nations and the International Energy Association (IEA) discussed potential releases from strategic oil reserves to respond to a potential price shock or shortage in the market on Monday and Tuesday, concluding that they weren’t immediately planning to do so while stating they’re prepared to take “necessary measures” to support the oil market if needed.

WILL TAPPING OIL RESERVES CURB SOARING GAS PRICES?

“We have the possibility of a coordinated release from the G7 and the IEA of oil reserves that could cool prices,” Flynn noted. “There’s many things happening that usually happen when prices go up that can cool prices off very quickly.”

He added that Saudi Arabia built its east-to-west pipeline to avoid threats in the Persian Gulf and Strait of Hormuz and also increased its capacity to 7 million barrels a day, with expectations it will operate at full capacity in days.

FED OFFICIALS CLOSELY MONITOR IRAN CONFLICT FOR POTENTIAL INFLATION IMPACT

Flynn added that the Energy Information Administration (EIA) released a short-term outlook on Tuesday that indicated the higher oil prices are likely to prompt U.S. producers to increase their output of crude oil in 2027. 

The EIA said that while “changes in oil prices take time to affect production – moving from investment decisions to rig deployment to well completion and first oil,” which is why it sees the current price rise having a bigger impact on production in 2027 and 2028.

AMID IRAN WAR, PRESIDENT TRUMP SUGGESTS SHORT-TERM OIL PRICE SPIKE IS ‘SMALL PRICE TO PAY’ FOR PEACE

As the war in Iran continues, Flynn noted that if the conflict is able to remove the longstanding threat of Iran’s regime closing the Strait of Hormuz and fomenting conflict throughout the Middle East via proxies like the Houthis in Yemen, it could result in lower long-term oil prices with that risk mitigated.

“We’ve had an Iranian risk premium in oil since Jimmy Carter… it’s never quite gone away,” Flynn said, noting that insurance costs and the perceived risk have remained embedded in oil prices despite the market’s fluctuations over the years.

The latest price spike bears some similarities to what occurred during the early stages of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in late February 2022, though oil prices had gradually risen above $90 a barrel before the invasion itself prompted a spike above $115 a barrel. They remained around $100 a barrel into the summer before they gradually eased closer to $80 by the end of that year.

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Flynn said that conflict presented a different challenge than the latest oil spike amid the ongoing Iran war, explaining that the “situation there was different because it wasn’t a lack of supply that drove up prices – it was the desire to stop buying Russian oil that the market wasn’t prepared to replace, and a lot of that was bad energy policy, you know the green energy policies of Europe and Joe Biden.”

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When President Trump keeps telling the press that Operation Epic Fury is almost over, and based on the information you’re looking at several more weeks before American war goals have been met, people should listen to him. You don’t have to take my word for it. Here’s what a veteran legacy reporter says: “I’ve covered five presidents, I have never seen one other than Donald Trump who regularly takes phone calls from reporters. I’ve spoken to him over the phone three times since the military operation, the war against Iran started. In each of those cases, I simply called him and he answered.” There you go, Jonathan Karl, I know him well.

Ironically, while so many politicians and media people don’t listen to Mr. Trump, financial markets are listening quite carefully. For example, markets know that our war aims have nearly been met to prevent Iran from ever having nuclear weapons to destroy their long and short-term missiles and the launchers, and to keep the Strait of Hormuz open.

Those are the main goals. So, because of Mr. Trump’s credibility and the credibility of the mighty U.S.-Israel military and intelligence operations, oil prices have come down a lot and stock prices have rallied because they believe what the president is telling them.

I know he’s the rare president who has credibility, but he has credibility. When he posts on Truth Social that America will provide reinsurance for oil tankers and will likely provide assistance from our Navy, we should believe him. When he says there’s not going to be boots on the ground, with a very narrow possible exception of special ops, we should believe that too.

My pal Jason Trennert is probably right to say that it would be a mistake to confuse Mr. Trump for a neo-conservative. He is no George W. Bush, and there is no Donald Rumsfeld to persuade him that it’s in America’s interest to make Iran safe for democracy.

Well, Mr. Trump will get out of Iran as soon as the war aims are met. Now, Mr. Trennert is a little harsh on Mr. Bush and Mr. Rumsfeld, but the point is that Mr. Trump is more pragmatic and does not want forever wars. His goal is to end the forever war waged by Iran on America and on civilized peoples.

Mr. Trump can achieve this with military might in a relatively short period of time. That’s exactly what he’s doing. And the job is nearly complete, as he keeps telling us, but so many political geniuses don’t want to listen. Of course, there’s always a certain fog of war, information can change, unexpected events can certainly occur. Yet if you look carefully at what’s happened, the war is basically over. That’s what I think.

To quote the commander in chief himself: “I think the war is very complete. Iran has navy, no communications, they’ve got no air force. Their missiles are down to a scatter. Their drones are being blown up all over the place.”

I think we’re really entering the mop-up stage. At this point, the way I see it, Mr. Trump is moving to win the peace after having crushed the Iranian enemy during the war. He is bending the arc of terrorism, he is changing the course of history, he is remaking the entire world’s balance of power, and oddly enough a lot of people don’t seem to understand it. They should, though, because he’s been telling it to them straight. He’s the most accessible, truth-talking president.

Listen to President Trump, he is telling the truth.

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/THIS NEWS RELEASE IS NOT FOR DISSEMINATION IN THE UNITED STATES OR FOR DISTRIBUTION TO U.S. NEWSWIRE SERVICES/

VANCOUVER, BC, March 10, 2026 /CNW/ – Century Lithium Corp. (TSXV: LCE) (OTCQX: CYDVF) (Frankfurt: C1Z) (“Century Lithium” or the “Company“) is pleased to announce a brokered private placement for aggregate gross proceeds of up to C$5 million (the “Offering“), consisting of 10,638,297 units of the Company (“Units“) at a price of $0.47 per Unit (the “Offering Price“). The Offering will be conducted on a commercially reasonable “best efforts” basis by A.G.P. Canada Investments ULC, acting as sole agent and bookrunner (the “Agent“) for the Offering and A.G.P./Alliance Global Partners acting as sole U.S. placement agent for the Offering.

Each Unit will consist of one common share in the capital of the Company (a “Share“) and one Share purchase warrant (each whole warrant, a “Warrant“). Each Warrant will entitle the holder to acquire one additional Share (a “Warrant Share“) at a price of $0.65 for a period of five (5) years from the closing of the Offering.

The Units will be offered by way of the listed issuer financing exemption under Part 5A of National Instrument 45-106 – Prospectus Exemptions (“NI 45-106“), as amended by Coordinated Blanket Order 45-935 – Exemptions from Certain Conditions of the Listed Issuer Financing Exemption (the “Order“), ineach of the provinces of Canada (except Québec). Pursuant to NI 45-106 and the Order, the Units issued to Canadian residents under the Offering will not be subject to resale restrictions. The Company is relying on the exemptions …

Full story available on Benzinga.com

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Ford is recalling more than 83,000 vehicles in two separate actions due to issues that could increase the risk of a crash, federal regulators said.

The first recall affects 35,772 model year 2025-2026 Explorer SUVs and the dynamic bending light feature, according to the notice filed with the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration.

The affected vehicles have an incorrect headlamp control module software calibration that results in the right headlight turning in the opposite direction of a vehicle turn.

FORD RECALLS 1.74 MILLION VEHICLES DUE TO REARVIEW CAMERA BLACKOUTS, ISSUES

“When turning the steering wheel on a left curve, the driver’s side (LHS) bending light correctly follows the turn, while the passenger side (RHS) light bends away from the curve,” the recall report said. “Conversely, when turning on a right curve, the left-hand light follows the steering wheel and bends to the right, while the right-hand light bends inward towards the left.”

The report said a headlight that turns incorrectly could result in increased glare to other drivers and increase the risk of a crash.

FORD IN DEEP WATER AFTER SWEEPING RECALLS HIT EVERY MODEL SINCE 2020 – WITH ONE EXCEPTION

Ford said it is not aware of any accidents or injuries related to the issue.

Updates to fix the headline control module software will be available over the air (OTA) or through dealerships, at no charge. Owner notification letters are expected to be mailed on March 23.

In a separate action, Ford is recalling 47,804 vehicles due to issues with the engine gas recirculation (EGR) valve that could lead to a loss of motive power, most likely at low speeds, which Ford said increases the risk of a crash.

FORD BUILDS ONE-OF-A-KIND EXPLORER FOR POPE LEO XIV

The recall affects certain model year 2025 Ranger, Mustang, Maverick, Explorer, Escape, Bronco, Bronco Sport, Lincoln Nautilus and Corsair vehicles with 1.5-liter, 2.0-liter or 2.3-liter engines.

Ford said it is not aware of any accidents, injuries or fires related to the condition.

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The automaker said a fix is still under development. Owners will be notified by mail once a remedy is available, and will need to take their vehicle to a Ford or Lincoln dealer for the repair, free of charge.

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Investors are increasingly focused on not just how they invest their money but also how they can optimize their after-tax investment outcomes. Allspring Global Investments is dedicated to helping investors navigate the evolving tax and estate planning landscapes.

Concentrated stock positions can create unwanted risk in investors’ portfolios. Despite the risk, a combination of factors—including emotional biases and fear of built-in capital gains consequences—can make investors unwilling to diversify. By understanding the many tax-efficient diversification options available to them, investors may be more willing to take some of that concentration risk off the table.

Holly Swan, Allspring’s expert on taxes, recently wrote about 10 techniques for diversifying a concentrated position in a tax-efficient manner. She thinks about tax-management diversification strategies as being in one of these three buckets: avoid, defer, or offset.

Avoid:

Tax strategies may focus on reducing or eliminating capital gains exposure altogether. The first example of this is when investors may choose to hold certain highly appreciated assets so they can pass through a taxable estate and receive a step-up in basis.

Common lifetime strategies include borrowing against their portfolios to generate liquidity without selling and triggering taxes, gifting appreciated assets to lower‑income family members who are unlikely to owe capital gains tax, and using options strategies to manage risk or monetize positions without selling. Less common strategies available to founders and early-stage investors may allow eligible shareholders to exclude substantial capital gains on investments in qualified small businesses.

Defer:

Certain tax strategies may help investors defer when taxes are recognized, often smoothing the impact over time. One example is systematic diversification, where investors, such as public company executives, sell portions of a concentrated position gradually.

Investors may also use tax loss harvesting to capture losses that offset current or future gains. Other deferral tools include exchange funds, which allow investors to contribute concentrated stock in exchange for a diversified portfolio without triggering immediate taxes, and opportunity zones, which—beginning again in 2027—will allow taxpayers to reinvest capital gains in designated areas in exchange for up to five years of capital gains deferral and, in some cases, partial basis step-up (opportunity zone investments made today are only eligible for gain deferral until December 31, 2026).

Offset:

Offset strategies reduce tax liability by pairing gains with deductions or other tax‑favored actions. A primary example of this is charitable giving, where donating appreciated securities held for more than a year can allow investors to avoid capital gains recognition while receiving a deduction for the asset’s fair market value, subject to income limits.

Investors have many options for tax-efficient diversification, each of which can be a powerful step in moving away from a concentrated position that may be adding unnecessary risk to portfolios. Allspring Global Investments can offer insights into this and more as investors prepare for their financial future.

ALL-01282026-ixng4s4a

Allspring Global Investments does not provide accounting, legal, or tax advice or investment recommendations. Any tax or legal information in this brochure is merely a summary of our understanding and interpretations of some of the current income tax regulations and is not exhaustive. Investors should consult their tax advisor or legal counsel for advice and information concerning their particular situation.

Allspring does not offer options. Options involve significant risks and are not suitable for all investors.

Diversification does not ensure or guarantee better performance and cannot eliminate the risk of investment losses.

This material is provided for informational purposes only. This content and the information within do not constitute an offer or solicitation in any jurisdiction where or to any person to whom it would be unauthorized or unlawful to do so and should not be considered investment advice, an investment recommendation, or investment research in any jurisdiction.

INVESTMENT RISKS: All investments contain risk. Your capital may be at risk. The value, price, or income of investments or financial instruments can fall as well as rise and is not guaranteed.

You may not get back the amount originally invested. Past performance is not a guarantee or reliable indicator of future results.

Allspring Global Investments™ (Allspring) is the trade name for the asset management firms of Allspring Global Investments Holdings, LLC, a holding company indirectly owned by certain private funds of GTCR LLC and Reverence Capital Partners, L.P. These firms include but are not limited to Allspring Funds Management, LLC, and Allspring Global Investments, LLC. Unless otherwise stated, Allspring is the source of all data (which is current or as of the date stated). Content is provided for informational purposes only. Views, opinions, assumptions, or estimates are not necessarily those of Allspring or their affiliates and there is no representation regarding their adequacy, accuracy, or completeness. They should not be relied upon and may be subject to change without notice.

© 2026 Allspring Global Investments Holdings, LLC. All rights reserved.

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Groupon, Inc. (NASDAQ:GRPN) shares sold at a discount in Tuesday’s extended trading after the company released its fourth-quarter earnings report, missing estimates on the top and bottom lines.

Here’s a look at the key figures from the report.

The Details: Groupon reported quarterly earnings of 17 cents per share, which was less than the 21 cents per share estimate, according to Benzinga Pro.

Quarterly revenue of $132.71 million missed …

Full story available on Benzinga.com

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Upstart Holdings Inc (NASDAQ:UPST) shares are moving higher in Tuesday’s after-hours session after the company announced plans to apply for a national bank charter.

Upstart To Apply For National Bank Charter

After the market close on Tuesday, Upstart said it plans to submit an application to the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC) and the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC) to establish an insured national bank. The company also plans to apply for Federal Reserve approval, …

Full story available on Benzinga.com

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Evolv Technologies Holdings, Inc. (NASDAQ:EVLV) shares dipped in Tuesday’s extended trading after the company released a mixed fourth-quarter earnings report.

Here’s a look at the details in the report. 

The Details: Evolv Technologies reported quarterly losses of three cents per share, which missed the consensus estimate for a loss of two cents.

Quarterly revenue came in at $38.5 million, which beat the Street estimate of $36.44 …

Full story available on Benzinga.com

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Bitcoin’s (CRYPTO: BTC) rally to around $70,000 over the past two weeks has outperformed traditional assets like gold (+1.6%) and the S&P 500 (-0.2%) as investors rotate capital back into crypto.

BTC Rebound Beats Traditional Markets

Bitcoin has jumped roughly 13% in two weeks, climbing above $71,000 and outperforming both the S&P 500 and gold.

Data from Santiment shows Bitcoin has gained ground since Feb. 24, when all three assets experienced a pullback.

The rebound marks a shift after crypto lagged traditional markets for several months following its Oct. 5, 2025, all-time high.

Analysts say the move partly reflects mean reversion, with capital …

Full story available on Benzinga.com

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AeroVironment Inc. (NASDAQ:AVAV) shares fell in Tuesday’s extended trading after the company released its third-quarter earnings report, missing estimates on the top and bottom lines.

Here’s a look at the key figures from the quarter. 

The Details: AeroVironment reported quarterly earnings of 64 cents per share, which missed the consensus estimate of 69 cents, according to Benzinga Pro data.

Quarterly revenue of $408.05 million missed the Street estimate of $475.63 million by 14.21%.

Bookings reached $2.1 billion and the book-to-bill ratio was 1.6 …

Full story available on Benzinga.com

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Oracle Corp (NYSE:ORCL) reported financial results for the third quarter of fiscal 2026 Tuesday after the market close. Here’s a rundown of the software giant’s report.

Oracle Tops Estimates In Q3

Oracle posted third-quarter revenue of $17.19 billion, beating analyst estimates of $16.91 billion, according to Benzinga Pro. Adjusted earnings grew 21% year-over-year to $1.79 per share, beating analyst estimates of $1.71 per share.

Total revenue was up 22% on a year-over-year basis as cloud revenue climbed 44% and software revenue rose by 3%. Here’s a breakdown of revenue by segment:

  • Cloud: $8.9 billion, up 44%
  • Cloud Infrastructure: $4.9 billion, up 84%
  • Cloud Database: up 35%
  • Cloud Application: $4 billion, up 13%
  • Fusion Cloud ERP: $1.1 billion, up 17%
  • NetSuite Cloud ERP: $1.1 billion, up 14%

Remaining performance obligations …

Full story available on Benzinga.com

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Bitcoin held near $70,000 on Tuesday as sentiment and ETF inflows improved following signals that tensions with Iran could ease.

Cryptocurrency Ticker Price
Bitcoin (CRYPTO: BTC) $70,040.68
Ethereum (CRYPTO: ETH) $2,034.27
Solana (CRYPTO: SOL) $86.14
XRP (CRYPTO: XRP) $1.38
Dogecoin (CRYPTO: DOGE) $0.09486
Shiba Inu (CRYPTO: SHIB) $0.055688

Notable Statistics:

  • Coinglass data shows 99,391 traders were liquidated in the past 24 hours for $386.23 million.
  • SoSoValue data shows net inflows of $167 million from spot Bitcoin ETFs on Monday. Spot Ethereum ETFs saw net outflows of $51.3 million.
  • In the past 24 hours, top gainers include Render, Kaia and Artificial Superintelligence Alliance.

Notable Developments:

Full story available on Benzinga.com

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On Monday, Bitcoin minted its 20 millionth coin, meaning that more than 95% of all coins have now been mined, leaving the total untapped supply at fewer than one million. The last coin is expected to be discovered in approximately 114 years.  

This milestone reinforces how economics of Bitcoin are different from traditional currency systems like the dollar, which allow governments to always print more money. This “hard money” aspect of Bitcoin has been one of its primary appeals since the first batch of 50 coins was first minted 17 years ago.

“Having only one million Bitcoin left to be mined is a powerful reminder of something unique: this is the first monetary system in history with a fully predictable policy written in code,” said Raphael Zagury, CEO of the Bitcoin mining company Elektron Energy. 

By 2035, 99% of Bitcoin’s total supply will be mined, but it will take a little over 100 years to mint what is left. This timeline is due to a concept called halving, which means that about every four years, miners are rewarded with half as much Bitcoin. 

Today, miners receive 3.125 Bitcoin, whereas prior to 2024 they received more than 6 Bitcoin. When Satoshi Nakamoto created the original cryptocurrency in 2009, miners would receive 50 Bitcoin as a reward. The system is intended to make the original cryptocurrency more scarce, at a predictable rate, over time. When Bitcoin runs out in 2140, miners will be compensated solely through transaction fees. 

The original cryptocurrency is currently priced at about $71,000, according to Binance. While this is down about 46% since its all-time high in October, Bitcoin has grown about 16,000% in the past ten years, as its price in March of 2016 was a measly $430. 

Zagury, the CEO of the Bitcoin mining company, shared his short-term and long-term views on the original cryptocurrency. “I don’t think the milestone alone moves price in the short term. Liquidity and macro still dominate,” he said. “But long term, scarcity plus predictable policy is a powerful combination. Over time, markets tend to reward systems people can trust.”

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Bitcoin (CRYPTO: BTC) has been outperforming equities during the Iran conflict as ETF managers declared the “crypto winter” is bottoming.

The Outperformance During Iran Conflict

Bitcoin has risen 10% while equities are down during the Iran conflict, demonstrating diversification benefits. 

“So far in this conflict, actually, if you look at Bitcoin, it’s up a little bit and equities are down,” Hyman said on CNBC’s ‘ETF Edge’. 

“The diversifying piece, I think, still stays intact as an important theme here,” he added.

Hyman challenged the narrative that cryptocurrencies are simply risk assets. 

His research shows Bitcoin, Ethereum (CRYPTO: ETH), Solana (CRYPTO: SOL), and XRP (CRYPTO: XRP) have minimal correlation with equities and equally low correlation with gold and silver. 

This means crypto moves independently from both traditional risk assets and safe havens, supporting the diversification case even …

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Markus Infanger, SVP of RippleX, on Tuesday said XRP (CRYPTO: XRP) is evolving beyond payments as institutional interest grows, with crypto ETFs emerging as a potential bridge between traditional finance and blockchain markets.

RippleX Outlines Three Strategic Priorities

In an interview with The Block, Infanger outlined the company is focusing on three major priorities for 2026.

First, the firm plans to expand institutional decentralized finance (DeFi) on the XRP Ledger.

Tokenized real-world assets on the network have already grown to about $2 billion.

Ripple is developing infrastructure including lending protocols, atomic swaps, privacy features and programmable escrow to support use cases such as collateral mobility, stablecoin payments and institutional finance.

Second, Ripple aims to strengthen the …

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Oscar-nominated actor Terrence Howard declared Bitcoin (CRYPTO: BTC) is “going to die” on the PBD Podcast, while predicting silver will reach “thousands of dollars” as the gold-to-silver ratio collapses from 80:1 toward 13:1.

The ‘Bitcoin Is Going To Die’ Argument

Howard cited Bitcoin’s continued dependence on fiat currency as a fatal flaw. 

“Bitcoin is still based on fiat,” Howard said, arguing that as the U.S. dollar weakens, any asset tethered to its value framework remains exposed.

“Nobody wants their money in something that can be wiped out with a push of a button somewhere,” Howard said. 

He holds less than 1% of his portfolio in Bitcoin and frames that as a ceiling, not a floor.

Howard’s framework positions dollar collapse leading to metals surge and crypto irrelevance. 

This puts him squarely against the Bitcoin-as-digital-gold crowd at a moment when both assets compete for the same …

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Zcash (CRYPTO: ZEC) surged 5% on Tuesday, following Zcash Open Development Lab’s announcement of over $25 million in seed funding from Paradigm, a16z crypto, Winklevoss Capital, and Coinbase Ventures.

The $25M ZODL Funding Round

ZODL was founded by Josh Swihart, former CEO of Electric Coin Company. Under his leadership, ECC launched the flagship Zcash wallet Zodl, setting a new standard for Zcash usability. 

Since its launch in 2024, the app drove growth in the Zcash shielded pool by over 400% and facilitated more than $600 million in ZEC swaps since October 2025.

Earlier this year, the entire ECC team including the product team behind the wallet joined ZODL to continue building the primary user interface for Zcash. 

The work centers on developing Zodl as an open, self-custodial private financial platform designed to expand ecosystem …

Full story available on Benzinga.com

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