NY appeals court throws out $500 million fraud penalty against Trump
President Trump will no longer have to pay the half-billion-dollar judgment...
President Trump will no longer have to pay the half-billion-dollar judgment from his civil business fraud trial after a New York court tossed the massive fine. “While harm certainly occurred, it was not the cataclysmic harm that can justify a nearly half-billion-dollar award to the State,” Justice Peter Moulton wrote in a decision that sharply divided the court. Trump immediately took to social media to declare “TOTAL VICTORY.” Though it threw out the huge financial penalty, the court upheld the fraud ruling, which found last year that the president had inflated his net worth in order to secure better loan terms.
Meta reportedly freezes its AI hiring. According to...
Meta reportedly freezes its AI hiring. According to the Wall Street Journal, the Facebook and Instagram parent company is ending its AI spending spree (for now) and putting a hold on hiring for its artificial intelligence division. Meta has invested untold billions in waging a talent war over the industry’s top AI minds as part of CEO Mark Zuckerberg’s quest to develop “superintelligence,” or smarter-than-human intelligence. Earlier this year, Meta spent $14 billion for a stake in Scale AI to secure the services of its co-founder, Alexandr Wang. But analysts and investors are beginning to worry about the sky-high spending. Meta downplayed the hiring freeze as “basic organizational planning.”
Apple raised the price of an Apple TV+ subscription in the US from $10 a month to $13 yesterday.
Starbucks is expanding its test of coconut water drinks to hundreds more locations, probably because we need something besides pumpkin spice lattes to talk about.
Sony is hiking prices of PlayStation 5 consoles by about $50 due to tariffs, the company announced yesterday.
Elon Musk was ordered to face a lawsuit accusing him of running an illegal $1 million giveaway during the 2024 presidential election.
Netflix is launching an astrology hub that will recommend content based on your zodiac sign, so now Leos and Scorpios can find something to bond over (Love Is Blind).
Oil rises 1% on stalled Russia-Ukraine peace talks, strong US demand
(Reuters) - Oil prices rose by nearly a dollar a barrel...
(Reuters) - Oil prices rose by nearly a dollar a barrel on Thursday as Russia and Ukraine blamed each other for a stalled peace process, and as earlier U.S. data showed signs of strong demand in the top oil-consuming nation.
Brent crude futures rose 83 cents, or 1.2%, to settle at $67.67 a barrel, a two-week high. U.S. West Texas Intermediate crude futures gained 81 cents, or 1.3%, to close at $63.52 a barrel.
Both contracts climbed more than 1% in the prior session.
The path to peace in Ukraine remained uncertain, turning oil traders cautious after a selloff over the past two weeks on hopes that U.S. President Donald Trump would soon negotiate a diplomatic end to Russia's war with its neighbor.
"Some geopolitical risk premium is slowly being pumped back into the market," oil trading advisory firm Ritterbusch and Associates told clients on Thursday.
The uncertainty in the peace talks means that the possibility of tighter sanctions on Russia has resurfaced, said Tamas Varga, an analyst at PVM Oil Associates.
S&P 500 logs 5-day losing streak as investors await Powell's Jackson Hole speech
U.S. stocks closed lower Thursday, with the S&P 500...
U.S. stocks closed lower Thursday, with the S&P 500 index logging a fifth straight daily loss, as technology stocks slumped and investors waited to hear from Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell on Friday.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 152.81 points, or 0.3%, ending at 44,785.50.
The S&P 500 fell 25.61 points, or 0.4%, closing at 6,370.17 and booking a 1.5% decline over five straight days.
The Nasdaq Composite Index shed 72.55 points, or 0.3%, finishing at 21,100.31.
Investors will be listening for any hints about the future path of interest rates during Powell's highly anticipated speech at the annual Jackson Hole economic symposium.
Small-cap stocks and other rate-sensitive assets, like home-builder stocks, have rallied in August in anticipation of the Fed potentially resuming rate cuts in September.
The United States and the European Union on Thursday published much-anticipated...
The United States and the European Union on Thursday published much-anticipated details of the trade agreement they struck verbally last month. Under the deal, Washington will maintain high tariffs on vehicles imported from the 27-nation bloc until the E.U. takes steps to lower its levies on many American industrial and agricultural products. The backbone of the deal remains unchanged, with the U.S. imposing a 15 percent tariff on most goods arriving from E.U. countries, a rate that President Trump enacted in an executive order that took effect earlier this month.
