U.S. consumer confidence falls to lowest level since April
Consumer confidence fell sharply in September on growing...
Consumer confidence fell sharply in September on growing worries about the labor market.
The consumer-confidence index dropped to 94.2 in September from a revised 97.8 in the prior month,the Conference Board said Tuesday. This is the lowest level since April.
Economists polled by the Wall Street Journal had forecast the index to slip to 96.0 in September from the initial estimate of 97.4 in August.
Consumers’ assessment of the availability of jobs fell for the ninth straight month.
Key details: A measure that assesses consumers' current economic sentiment dropped 7 points to 125.4. That’s the most significant drop in a year.
A confidence gauge that looks six months ahead dropped by 1.3 points to 73.4. Since February, the expectations index has been below the threshold of 80, which has traditionally been seen as a signal of recession.
Economists focus on labor-market conditions by measuring the spread between the percentage of consumers who think jobs are plentiful and the percentage who think jobs are hard to get.
That spread, known as the labor-market differential, has narrowed for nine consecutive months and is now at a multi-year low of 7.8.
Canadian Natural Gas Prices Sink Into Record Negative Territory
Canadian natural gas prices took a...
Canadian natural gas prices took a beating in the last week of September, as prices fell into negative territory at record-low levels.
Canada’s natural gas benchmark, AECO, closed in negative territory for seven days in a row from Sept. 11 to Sept. 28. The price remained at about negative CA$0.80/gigajoule (US$0.57) after the market closed Sept. 26.
E&Ps had increased production and rapidly filled the available natural gas storage. Now they are lowering production.
Domestically, warmer-than-usual weather in Canada has led to reduced seasonal demand for natural gas for heating and power generation. At the same time, maintenance projects have restricted the flow of gas out of Alberta, according to a report published by Jefferies analysts on September 25.
Ares Buys Meade’s Central Penn Pipeline in $1.1B Deal with NextEra’s XPLR
Ares Management acquired...
Ares Management acquired Meade Pipeline Co. from affiliates of XPLR Infrastructure for approximately $1.1 billion in cash, the company announced Sept. 29.
Meade owns approximately 40% of the Central Penn Line, a 180-mile Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC)-regulated natural gas pipeline linking northeastern Pennsylvania production to hubs in the Northeast, Mid-Atlantic and Southeast through Williams Cos.’ Transcontinental Gas Pipeline system.
XPLR is an independent power producer formed by NextEra Energy.
The government will probably shut down at midnight
With the shutdown deadline looming, a meeting yesterday between President...
With the shutdown deadline looming, a meeting yesterday between President Trump and congressional leaders from both parties yielded no breakthrough on a deal to keep the government running once its current funding runs out. Democrats are demanding a budget that extends key Obamacare subsidies, and Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer said that “large differences” remained between the parties after the meeting. Both sides are blaming the other for the stalemate: House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries said Democrats would not support a budget that “continues to gut the health care of everyday Americans,” while Vice President JD Vance said, “We’re headed to a shutdown because the Democrats won’t do the right thing.”
Netanyahu agrees to Trump’s plan to end Gaza war. But...
Netanyahu agrees to Trump’s plan to end Gaza war. But it remained unclear yesterday whether Hamas would accept the 20-point plan, which would require major concessions from the group, including disarming and giving up the administration of Gaza, while leaving the possibility of a Palestinian state potentially open—but likely only in a distant future. Trump’s plan calls for the war to end immediately and for Hamas to release all remaining hostages within 72 hours. It would put postwar Gaza’s reconstruction in the hands of an international “Board of Peace” headed by Trump and former British Prime Minister Tony Blair. Trump said that if Hamas did not agree to the plan, Israel’s Benjamin Netanyahu would have the “full backing” of the U.S. to do what you would have to do.”
YouTube has agreed to pay $24.5 million to settle a lawsuit brought by President Trump over his suspension from the Alphabet-owned platform after the Jan. 6, 2021, Capitol riot.
ChatGPT users will be able to use its new Instant Checkout to make purchases from Etsy and Shopify without having to click out of the AI chatbot, OpenAI said yesterday.
President Trump threatened 100% tariffs on movies made outside the US, as well as “substantial Tariffs on any Country that does not make its furniture” in the US, in a pair of Truth Social posts that didn’t detail how these proposed import taxes would work or when they would begin.
Microsoft is hoping to bring the convenience of vibe coding (letting AI write computer code for you) to non-coding work through AI features for the Office suite. In more bring your bot to work news, Anthropic said its new AI model, Claude Sonnet 4.5, is “smarter and more of a colleague.”
