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A rally in several big techs spurred a rebound in stocks, with Nvidia Corp. briefly hitting $4 trillion. Treasuries climbed after a solid $39 billion sale, with minutes from the Federal Reserve’s latest meeting showing officials remained split around how tariffs would impact inflation.

Equity traders brushed off trade angst to send the S&P 500 closer to its all-time highs. While the equity benchmark came off session highs, a gauge of megacaps added about 1% as the giant chipmaker extended this year’s surge to over 20%.

Nvidia plans to launch a new artificial-intelligence chip designed specifically for China as soon as September, with chief Jensen Huang planning a visit to the Asian nation, according to the Financial Times.

US Federal Reserve officials diverged at their June meeting about how aggressively they would be willing to cut interest rates, split between concerns over tariff-fueled inflation and signs of labour market weakness and economic strength.

Minutes from the June 17-18 meeting released Wednesday showed that policymakers largely held to a wait-and-see position on future rate moves. The meeting ended with Federal Open Market Committee members voting unanimously to hold the central bank’s key borrowing rate in a range between 4.25%-4.5%, where it has been since December 2024.

However, the summary also showed a growing divide over how policy should proceed from here.

“Most participants assessed that some reduction in the target range for the federal funds rate this year would likely be appropriate,” the minutes stated, as officials saw tariff-induced inflation pressures as potentially “temporary and modest” while economic growth and hiring could weaken. How far the cuts could go, though, was a matter of debate.

AES Corp., which provides renewable power to tech giants such as Microsoft Corp., is exploring options including a potential sale amid takeover interest, people with knowledge of the matter said.

Infrastructure investors, including Brookfield Asset Management Ltd. and BlackRock Inc.’s Global Infrastructure Partners unit have been studying AES after the company’s shares lost about half their value over the past two years, the people said. With an enterprise value of about $40 billion, a leveraged buyout of Arlington, Virginia-based AES would still rank among the biggest of all time.

Shares of AES jumped as much as 18% on Wednesday for their biggest intraday gain since 2009. The shares were up 17% to $12.96 at 1:25 p.m. in New York, giving AES a market value of about $9.2 billion after a 38% drop in the stock over the past 12 months as of Tuesday.

Egypt’s inflation rate fell in June, ending three months of rises, as officials contend with an interest-rate decision on Thursday.

Consumer prices in urban areas rose 14.9% in annual terms, a slowdown from 16.8% in May, Egypt’s main statistics body said Wednesday. The decline seemed mainly linked to an easing in the acceleration of food and beverage prices. Those items, which account for the largest single component in the inflation basket, rose by 6.9% annually compared with 11.2% the previous month.

On a monthly basis, there was deflation of 0.1%, versus inflation of 1.9% in May.

Microsoft Corp. is keen to show employees how much AI is transforming its own workplace, even as the company terminates thousands of personnel.

During a presentation this week, Chief Commercial Officer Judson Althoff said artificial intelligence tools are boosting productivity in everything from sales and customer service to software engineering, according to a person familiar with his remarks.

Althoff said AI saved Microsoft more than $500 million last year in its call centers alone and increased both employee and customer satisfaction, according to the person, who requested anonymity to discuss an internal matter.

The company is also starting to use AI to handle interactions with smaller customers, Althoff said. This effort is nascent, but already generating tens of millions of dollars, he said.

President Donald Trump welcomed leaders of five African nations, hailing the continent’s economic potential as his administration seeks to expand US access to critical minerals and other natural resources.

“My administration is committed to strengthening our friendships in Africa through economic development efforts that benefit both the United States and our partners,” Trump said at a White House event with leaders from Gabon, Guinea-Bissau, Liberia, Mauritania and Senegal, kicking off a three-day summit.

Trump said there was “tremendous wealth there and potential” in those nations and highlighted his efforts to drum up more deals with other economies in lieu of US foreign assistance.

“We’re shifting from aid to trade,” Trump added. “In the long run this will be far more effective and sustainable and beneficial than anything else that we could be doing together.”

The clash between Elon Musk’s xAI empire and European officials is intensifying with leaders in Poland and Germany calling for more aggressive action against the company.

German lawmaker Ralf Stegner, responding to antisemitic comments that xAI’s chatbot Grok made Tuesday on X, said the posts “must not be tolerated under any circumstances” and called for sanctions in an interview with the German newspaper Handelsblatt.

Poland’s government separately urged the European Union to investigate and possibly fine xAI following lewd comments made by Grok about the country’s politicians.

The Justice Department said it is indicting longtime sports and entertainment executive Tim Leiweke over allegations of bid-rigging related to the development of an arena in Texas.

Leiweke’s company, Oak View Group LLC, is entering into a non-prosecution agreement with the department and will pay a fine of $15 million. Oak View rival Legends also entered into a non-prosecution agreement with the US and will pay a $1.5 million fine over the matter, according to Justice Department antitrust chief Gail Slater.

The cases relate to allegations that Oak View illegally coordinated with Legends on the bidding to develop and operate the Moody Center, a $338 million arena at the University of Texas in Austin. Oak View ultimately won the contract in 2018 and the venue opened in 2022.

Ever since operetta composer Victor Herbert sued Shanley’s restaurant in New York in 1917 to force it to pay for playing his song on a player-piano, songwriters and music publishers have depended on Performing Rights Organizations to make sure they get compensated.

For much of the last century, three organisations dominated the industry, a relatively staid and unglamorous corner of the music scene that remained largely unchanged throughout the eras of radio, records and CDs. But the rise of streaming has led to a surge in revenue and spawned a handful of new organisations looking to cash in.

Now there are at least half a dozen PROs in the US, representing different songwriters and publishers, each demanding that bars, restaurants, hotels and other venues pay a fee or risk being sued.

Crews in central Texas are digging through massive piles of debris, overturned vehicles and shattered homes for a sixth day as the search continues for victims of flash floods that killed more than 100 people over the Fourth of July weekend.

At least 160 people are still missing in Kerr Country, the hardest-hit area of the Texas Hill Country. Officials say no one has been found alive since July 4, when the deluge arrived in the pre-dawn hours, tearing through a 100-kilometer stretch of the Guadalupe River packed with vacationers.

The waters inundated storied summer camps, including Camp Mystic, where at least 27 children and counselors perished. Sheriff Larry Leitha said 2,100 people are involved in the response and the death toll in Kerry County alone has reached 95.

Spain wants to charge more for certain drugs facing supply shortages due to patients taking them for “off-label” uses.

A two-tier pricing system would preserve the availability of certain drugs for uses financed by the country’s national health service, Spain’s Health Ministry said in a statement on its website. The ministry said it started a public consultation on the plan.

While the government didn’t name any specific drug, Spanish state-owned news agency Efe said Novo Nordisk A/S’s Ozempic is an example of such a drug as it’s increasingly been used for weight loss rather than to treat illnesses like diabetes.

Private equity firms, including Blackstone Inc. and Permir,a are considering bids for fund services business IQ-EQ, people familiar with the matter said, paving the way for one of the most competitive auctions in Europe this year.

Carlyle Group Inc., EQT AB and TPG Inc. are also among those studying the asset, the people said. Luxembourg-based IQ-EQ could be valued at about €5 billion ($5.9 billion) in a sale, the people said, asking not to be identified as the information is private.

Astorg, which took control of IQ-EQ in 2016, has reached out to potential buyers and could start the formal sale process after the summer, the people said.

Deliberations are ongoing and the private equity firms could decide against any deal, the people said. Astorg could also choose to keep the company for longer, said the people. Representatives for the private equity firms declined to comment.

A crypto token backed by the Trump family is moving closer to trading openly on exchanges, potentially unlocking substantial gains for early insiders, while raising fresh questions about governance and investor protection in the booming digital-asset market.

World Liberty Financial Inc., a project co-founded by President Donald Trump, his sons and business allies, has initiated a process to allow its flagship token, WLFI, to be listed on crypto exchanges. The July 4 announcement, shared by both Eric and Donald Jr., marked the first formal step toward public trading after months of anticipation.

On the forum seeking feedback on World Liberty’s website, a majority of the more than 400 replies endorsed the proposal. No date has been set for the conclusion of the process.

A spokesperson for World Liberty declined to comment on the proposal.

The South African Reserve Bank could lower its inflation target as soon as its policy meeting at the end of this month, according to Citigroup Inc.

“We recently wrote that the SARB would likely drop the inflation target in the third quarter” to 3% — with a possible 1% plus-or-minus tolerance band — from its current 4.5% goal, said Gina Schoeman, the bank’s economist for South Africa. “We believe there is a reasonable chance” of this happening at the upcoming meeting.

SARB Governor Lesetja Kganyago said on July 1 that a long-running review of the 3% to 6% inflation goal would be finalised “very soon,” with the country’s current tame price pressures presenting an opportunity to move.

US President Trump on Wednesday (July 9) announced a new round of tariffs, imposing a 30% duty on imports from Libya, Iraq, and Algeria, while Moldova and Brunei will face a 25% tariff. The Philippines has been hit with a 20% tariff under the revised trade measures.

The US Treasury is granting a 45-day reprieve to three Mexican financial firms it moved to cut off from the US financial system, citing progress by the country’s government in addressing money laundering by drug trafficking cartels.

The Treasury department’s ban on fund transfers with the designated firms will now take effect on Sept. 4, it said in a statement. The department’s Financial Crimes Enforcement Network slapped orders last month on CIBanco SA, Intercam Banco SA and brokerage Vector Casa de Bolsa SA prohibiting all transfers with them from late July.

“Treasury will continue to take every action necessary to protect the US financial system from abuse by illicit actors and target the financing of transnational criminal organizations and narcotics traffickers,” Andrea Gacki, FinCEN director, said in the statement. Gacki said the US and Mexico had coordinated “for months” to take the unprecedented steps.

Goldman Sachs Group Inc. plans to ask junior bankers to confirm their loyalty on a regular basis in a bid to limit advances from talent-hungry buyout firms.

The investment bank will ask new analysts to certify every three months that they haven’t already lined up jobs elsewhere, according to people familiar with the matter, who asked not to be identified discussing the confidential plan.

A representative for Goldman Sachs declined to comment.

Linda Yaccarino is stepping down as chief executive officer of Elon Musk’s X social-media platform after two years on the job.

“After two incredible years, I’ve decided to step down as CEO of X,” Yaccarino said in a post on X on Wednesday. “I’ll be cheering you all on as you continue to change the world.”

The former NBCUniversal executive was hired by Musk in May 2023 after he’d already fired or lost about 75% of employees at the company known as Twitter.

Over the course of her two-year tenure, Yaccarino was tasked with reversing an advertiser exodus from the platform, triggered in part by Musk’s own erratic content moderation decisions and tweets.

President Donald Trump said his administration is weighing whether to take control of the city of Washington, DC, to help combat crime, in a move that would represent a dramatic upheaval to the capital’s half-century of home rule.

“We could run DC. I mean, we’re looking at DC,” Trump said during a cabinet meeting Tuesday, where he was holding court at length in front of cameras. “We’re thinking about doing it, to be honest with you. We want a capital that’s run flawlessly.”

Trump said that his chief of staff, Susie Wiles, is in touch with the mayor of Washington, Muriel Bowser. He did not specify what he meant by the White House potentially running the city.

To see how the “T-bill-and-chill” mindset is reshaping fixed-income investing, look no further than the diverging fortunes of two BlackRock Inc. exchange-traded funds.

The phrase captures a preference for short-term government debt in the aftermath of the Federal Reserve’s most aggressive rate-hiking cycle in decades — a strategy that delivers steady income without exposure to the monetary-driven whiplash of longer-maturity Treasuries.

One fund has emerged as a haven for cautious cash holders. The other continues to fall out of favour.

The iShares 0-3 Month Treasury Bond ETF — a five-year-old fund with the ticker SGOV — now manages over $50 billion in assets, more than the iShares 20+ Year Treasury Bond ETF, or TLT. Launched in 2002, the TLT fund — still the most traded bond ETF — had been popular among those seeking to bet aggressively on the ups and downs of interest rate moves.

A rally in some of the world’s largest technology companies spurred a rebound in stocks, with Nvidia Corp. hitting $4 trillion – the first company in history to achieve that milestone. Treasuries rose before a $39 billion US bond sale and minutes from last month’s Federal Reserve meeting.

Equity traders brushed off tariff angst to send the S&P 500 closer to its all-time highs. While the equity benchmark came off session highs, megacaps added 1.1% as the giant chipmaker extended this year’s surge to over 20%. Microsoft Corp. climbed on an analyst upgrade. Apple Inc. fell as White House trade counselor Peter Navarro told Fox Business the iPhone maker thinks it is “too big to tariff.”

Oil fell as signs of a large gain in US crude stockpiles undermined comments by the United Arab Emirates and Saudi Arabia about tight market conditions.

West Texas Intermediate futures fell about 0.5% to trade near $68 a barrel, following two days of advances. In the US, crude inventories rose 7.1 million barrels last week, according to the American Petroleum Institute. That would be the largest increase since January if confirmed by government data due later on Wednesday.

Cyberstarts, the Israeli venture capital firm best known for its early investment in the cybersecurity company Wiz, has raised $300 million to buy shares from employees of the firm’s portfolio companies, co-founder Gili Raanan said.

Raanan, a former partner at Sequoia Capital, said the goal is to reward long-tenured employees with reliable and recurring opportunities to cash out vested shares. It’s part of a broader effort by Raanan to rethink the venture capital model as startups stay private longer and face new challenges.

“The venture model is not working well, especially in the early stage,” Raanan said. “We are trying to do whatever we can to really innovate.”

China disputed Germany’s accusation that one if its warships behaved dangerously toward a plane in the Red Sea, further complicating Beijing’s ties with Europe.

“As we have learned from the competent authorities, what Germany said is fully inconsistent with the facts,” Chinese foreign ministry spokeswoman Mao Ning said at a regular press briefing in Beijing on Wednesday.

Mao said her nation “fulfills its responsibility as a major country and contributes to the safety of international shipping lanes,” adding that “the two sides should strengthen communication in a facts-based and timely way to avoid misunderstanding and miscalculation.”

Starbucks Corp. has received proposals from prospective investors in its China business, most of whom are eyeing a controlling stake in the operation, said people familiar with the matter.

The Seattle-based company is now in the process of sifting through proposals and shortlisting a group of potential investors for the next round of bidding, the people said, asking not to be identified because the matter is private.

The company may share financial and operating details with those bidders to help them assess the valuation of its Chinese assets, the people said.

Nvidia shares jumped more than 2% on Wednesday, topping a $4 trillion market cap for the first time as investors scooped up stock in the tech giant building the hardware for the generative artificial intelligence boom. The chipmaker is the first company to ever achieve this market value.

Nvidia is the world’s most valuable company, surpassing Microsoft and Apple, both of which hit the $3 trillion mark before Nvidia. Microsoft is also one of Nvidia’s biggest and most important customers.

Chocolate makers were already grappling with record prices for cocoa butter, which provides that melt-in-your-mouth feel. Now they are also paying up for the powder that lends their product its colour and taste.

Cocoa powder, used in everything from baking mixes to protein shakes, is now in short supply too. Prices for the key ingredient, produced when cocoa beans are ground, surged about 16% in the US over the past year, and are now trading near a record.

It’s the latest twist in a global cocoa crisis that has hurt profits for the world’s largest chocolate makers and left consumers paying more for less. Companies from Mars Inc. to Hershey Co. have turned to tactics including reducing bar sizes, adding things like nuts and even promoting non-chocolate products altogether.

Thaksin Shinawatra, the de facto leader of Thailand’s ruling party, expects a court to ultimately clear allegations of ethical misconduct against his daughter, Prime Minister Paetongtarn Shinawatra, who was suspended from office last month.

“I’m confident in my daughter’s good intentions, and I trust the court will consider the facts with reason,” Thaksin told local broadcaster Nation TV, when asked about the allegations against Paetongtarn. “Everything can be explained.”

Paetongtarn is the youngest of Thaksin’s three children and the third member of the influential Shinawatra clan to become Thailand’s prime minister. She was suspended from office by the country’s Constitutional Court until it ruled on a petition by a group of senators, who alleged she had violated ethical standards by blaming the Thai army for escalating a border dispute in a leaked phone call with former Cambodian leader Hun Sen.

President Donald Trump sowed fresh chaos in metals markets by indicating the US would implement a higher-than-expected 50% tariff on copper imports, spurring a record spike in New York futures and a drop in the global benchmark.

The plan, announced in an apparently off-the-cuff comment to reporters, marks the latest twist in a tumultuous period for industrial commodities, as the US leader aims to encourage more mining and smelting at home. He’s already raised fees on steel and aluminium imports, while probes into flows of multiple other metals are in train.

The European Central Bank must keep all its options open, given elevated economic uncertainty, and should neither promise nor exclude another cut in interest rates, according to Governing Council member Joachim Nagel.

“It seems fair to say we are in a good position to respond to further developments,” the Bundesbank president said Wednesday in Tuebingen, Germany. “Yet it would be unwise to commit to a certain interest-rate path, to envisage a further step or indeed, to rule it out.”

Nagel, one of the Governing Council’s more hawkish members, said, “heightened uncertainty will not quickly disappear.” Therefore, the ECB “would be well advised to act prudently and to make data-dependent decisions on a meeting-by-meeting basis.”NewsLive TVMarketPopular CategoriesCalculatorsTrending NowLet's Connect with CNBCTV 18Network 18 Group :©TV18 Broadcast Limited. All rights reserved.