2025-12-03 20:45
BAGHDAD, Dec 3 (Reuters) - Iraq's armed forces said on Wednesday that the attack last week on Khor Mor gas field, one of the largest in the Kurdistan region, was carried out using two drones, one which hit the field and another which fell outside it. Iraqi armed forces said the perpetrators behind the attack had been identified, and described them as "outlawed elements." Sign up here. https://www.reuters.com/world/middle-east/iraq-says-khor-mor-gas-field-attack-carried-out-with-two-drones-perpetrators-2025-12-03/
2025-12-03 20:44
Dec 3 (Reuters) - Reuters is hosting the two-day Reuters NEXT conference in New York on Wednesday and Thursday, bringing together more than 700 international business leaders and policymakers to examine the biggest issues facing society, business and the world. The following are some notable quotes from speakers in the finance and markets sessions of the conference. Sign up here. MICHAL KATZ, MIZUHO AMERICAS HEAD OF INVESTMENT AND CORPORATE BANKING "AI is still in the early innings of its evolution, and obviously valuations have been stretched, just given the dollars going into capex and companies wanting a stake in the game. We have seen risks arise over potential overbuild, concentration among certain off-takers, and questions about whether returns will materialize. But it’s early days—the story of AI is still being written. Winners have yet to be defined." UMESH SUBRAMANIAN, CITADEL CHIEF TECHNOLOGY OFFICER "We try to make sure that AI doesn't go into the land of prediction. It goes into the land of seeing today clearly." BRENDAN COUGHLIN, PRESIDENT OF CITIZENS FINANCIAL GROUP "The industry is ripe for further consolidation and a lot of this tech discussion we've had is going to favor folks with more scale. There's been some M&A in 2025. There's a lot of discussion around that heating up. I think you know (by) December 31, 2026, there will be less deals than people imagine." JOHN STECHER, BLACKSTONE CHIEF TECHNOLOGY OFFICER "We are really looking at these tools as augmenting all of our great people," Stecher said, in response to a question about applications of artificial intelligence. Stecher said large language models were good at extracting information from documents and putting it together so that "somebody can actually read it and decide, 'is this a deal I actually want to take a look at or not?'" Those models are currently equivalent to "high-school-level people" in their ability to make decisions, Stecher said, but they augment people's work. "It's like the Iron Man suit around everybody, every man and woman that works inside the firm, it just makes them more effective." RICK WURSTER, CHARLES SCHWAB CEO "Our clients' wealth is at an all-time high. A lot of our clients are asking us about how to protect that wealth. Many have grown their balances beyond what they might have hoped for given what the markets have done." "M&A will be something we're going to keep our eyes out for. If we can add a capability that appeals to our clients, it's going to add enormous value to the company with the size of our asset base and client base. If we acquire a capability that appeals to them, the value in that is huge." SINEAD COLTON GRANT, CHIEF INVESTMENT OFFICER AT BNY WEALTH MANAGEMENT “The circularity of investment is something that we are watching very closely because that does appear that almost the sprinkling of a little bit of AI stardust in other names has been, in the short term, very helpful to valuations or very helpful to the stock price, but you need to see the fundamentals come through." MARK HAEFELE, CHIEF INVESTMENT OFFICER, UBS GLOBAL WEALTH MANAGEMENT "I don't think you could say AI is the determinant on what the U.S. growth is. But was AI very important to the growth that we did have? Yes, of course it was. And everybody is an AI investor whether they know it or not. It's like 37% of the MSCI World is tied to AI. So you've got to get that trade right for ‘26.” ANNE DINNEEN, CHIEF INVESTMENT OFFICER AT NEW YORK-PRESBYTERIAN HOSPITAL “When you're allocating capital, you have to think about the return expectation of each asset class or sub-asset class, but also the (volatility) expectation. Venture has a very high-vol expectation and you're seeing an innovation cycle play on the public market. So yeah, you should expect higher vol,” Dinneen said, when asked about a possible AI bubble. SHOAIB KHAN, CHIEF INVESTMENT OFFICER AT THE NEW JERSEY DIVISION OF INVESTMENT Speaking about private credit, he said he is not concerned about the growth, but the arrival of retail to the asset class was a red flag. “When you have a large pool of capital or a lot of capital chasing deals and chasing opportunities, you tend to see a compression in returns.” View the live broadcast of the World Stage here and read full coverage here. https://www.reuters.com/business/finance/notable-quotes-finance-markets-speakers-reuters-next-conference-2025-12-03/
2025-12-03 20:39
NHTSA to propose reducing fuel economy requirements for 2022-2031 vehicles Ford CEO supports aligning standards with market realities Environmental group criticizes rollback for increasing costs at the pump WASHINGTON, Dec 3 (Reuters) - President Donald Trump on Wednesday proposed slashing fuel economy standards that former President Joe Biden had finalized last year, in a push to make it easier for automakers to sell gasoline-powered cars. Trump's action aims to undo one of Biden's signature climate moves as he sought to incentivize more electric vehicle purchases. "People want the gasoline car," Trump said. Sign up here. The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration proposed significantly reducing the fuel economy requirements from model years 2022 to 2031, requiring 34.5 miles per gallon on average by 2031, down from 50.4 miles per gallon (21.4 km per liter). NHTSA is proposing to revise down the 2022 fuel economy standards and then proposing to hike them between 0.25% and 0.5% annually through 2031. In 2022, under Biden, NHTSA increased fuel efficiency by 8% annually for model years 2024-2025 and 10% for 2026. Biden's rules sought to prod automakers to build a rising number of EVs to comply, but would not have forced an immediate end to gas-powered vehicles. NHTSA estimates the proposed rule would reduce average up-front vehicle costs by $930, but would increase fuel consumption by around 100 billion gallons through 2050 - and cost Americans up to another $185 billion for fuel and increase carbon dioxide emissions by about 5%. Reducing the rule for past years will make it much easier for automakers to comply for a period still being reviewed by NHTSA. Automakers would save $35 billion through 2031, including $8.7 billion for GM (GM.N) , opens new tab and more than $5 billion for Ford (F.N) , opens new tab and Stellantis (STLAM.MI) , opens new tab, according to a NHTSA document. END TO CREDIT TRADING PROPOSED The proposal will also make drastic changes to the program, including proposing to eliminate credit trading among automakers in 2028, and will end some credits for fuel-saving features. NHTSA said the credit trading was a "windfall for EV-exclusive manufacturers that sell credits to other non-EV manufacturers." California Governor Gavin Newsom said Trump is "proposing to gut fuel economy standards that will force Americans to spend billions more at the pump while poisoning the air in our communities." Transportation accounts for the single largest percentage of U.S. greenhouse gas emissions. NHTSA said the increase in vehicle emissions from its proposal in 2035 would be the equivalent of annual emissions from 7.7 million vehicles over the Biden proposal. Earlier this year, Trump signed legislation that ended fuel economy penalties for automakers, and NHTSA said they faced no fines dating back to the 2022 model year. Ending credit trading could hurt automakers like EV manufacturers Tesla (TSLA.O) , opens new tab and Rivian (RIVN.O) , opens new tab, which have sold credits to rivals making gas-powered models. Trump was joined at the White House by the CEOs of Stellantis (STLAM.MI) , opens new tab and Ford to tout the proposal. Ford CEO Jim Farley said the company would invest more in affordable vehicles. "Today is a victory for common sense and affordability... We believe that people should be able to make a choice." Trump said the price of vehicles was declining, but new vehicle prices are up 0.8% year-over-year as of the latest data for September. In October, Kelley Blue Book said the average price of a new car in the United States topped $50,000 for the first time, up 3.6% year-over-year. GM CEO Mary Barra noted on Tuesday at an event that before Congress blocked California's zero-emission vehicle rules in June, the auto sector was facing requirements in some states that 35% of new vehicles sold in 2026 must be EVs. "We were going to have to start shutting down plants because we weren't going to be able to build and sell those vehicles," Barra said. RULE WOULD HAVE CUT EMISSIONS The agency last year said the passenger car and truck rule would reduce gasoline consumption by 64 billion gallons and cut emissions by 659 million metric tons, reducing fuel costs with net benefits estimated at $35.2 billion for drivers. The 2022 rule was estimated to reduce fuel use by more than 200 billion gallons through 2050. Kathy Harris, director of clean vehicles at environmental nonprofit the Natural Resources Defense Council, said, "The Trump administration is sticking drivers with higher costs at the pump, all to benefit the oil industry ... Drivers will be paying hundreds of dollars more at the pump every year if these rules are put in place." Trump has taken a series of steps to make it easier to sell gas-powered vehicles and disincentivize EV production, including rescinding EV tax credits and barring California from banning the sale of traditional gas-powered vehicles after 2035. https://www.reuters.com/business/autos-transportation/trump-propose-sharp-rollback-us-vehicle-fuel-economy-rules-2025-12-03/
2025-12-03 20:18
LONDON, Dec 3 (Reuters) - The U.S. dollar's status as a global reserve currency could be undermined by the country's reduced support for its friends and military allies, Bank of England policymaker Catherine Mann said on Wednesday. "If you can't depend on a certain country to be your ally, then why are you holding their currency in reserve?" Mann said at an event in New York hosted by the Global Interdependence Center and Bloomberg. Sign up here. Mann, a U.S. citizen, has served on the BoE's Monetary Policy Committee since 2021 and before that was the chief economist at Citi and the Paris-based Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development. The United States could draw lessons from Britain, where the pound's share of global reserves shrank from 80% in 1900 to 5% now, she said. The dollar accounted for 58% of global official currency reserves last year, according to data from the International Monetary Fund, down from 65% in 2016. Part of sterling's decline was caused by the cost of World War One, when Britain shifted from being a creditor nation to a debtor, as well as the growth of the U.S. economy in the 20th century, and the further financial hit from World War Two. But recent academic research placed increased emphasis on diplomatic factors as Britain gave up its empire and global military role, rather than purely economic and financial ones, Mann said. "The military alliances, the institutional relationships across countries, the agreements that countries have with each other, these ... have been identified as being much more important than people thought in the past," she said. "I do see a corollary in today's environment, where there's a retreat from these alliances by the United States," she said. U.S. President Donald Trump has been much more insistent than his predecessors in telling European countries to shoulder more of the cost of NATO. Mann said this could lead to greater dominance of the euro as a reserve and trade currency in Europe and nearby areas, much as the dollar took over in Latin America in the 1920s and 1930s. But the stalled growth of the yen as a global currency since the 1980s showed this was not a certainty and relied on countries with potential reserve currencies being willing to give up some control over financial institutions. "It's going to be a long time before we see the renminbi moving in that direction," she said. https://www.reuters.com/business/us-retreat-its-allies-could-hurt-dollars-status-boes-mann-says-2025-12-03/
2025-12-03 20:06
ABUJA, Dec 3 (Reuters) - Nigeria's cabinet has signed off on a medium-term fiscal plan that projects spending of around 54.5 trillion naira ($37.71 billion) in 2026, its minister of budget and planning said on Wednesday. The plan forecasts total federal revenue at 34.33 trillion naira, leaving a 20.1 trillion naira deficit, or 3.61% of GDP, with debt service costs estimated at 15.9 trillion naira, Atiku Bagudu told reporters after a cabinet meeting in Abuja. Sign up here. Nonrecurrent debt expenditure is set at 15.27 trillion, underscoring the fiscal strain on Africa's most populous country. Oil, which accounts for most of the government's foreign exchange, is benchmarked at $64.85 per barrel, with production expected to average 1.84 million barrels per day (bpd), well below a 2.06 million bpd target, Bagudu said. The framework assumes an exchange rate of 1,512 per dollar and GDP growth of 4.68%, he said. ($1 = 1,445.4200 naira) https://www.reuters.com/world/africa/nigeria-approves-fiscal-plan-proposing-377-billion-2026-budget-2025-12-03/
2025-12-03 20:05
FTC aims to prevent Boeing's unfair edge over Airbus and military contractors Boeing expects to finalize Spirit merger by year's end despite FTC order Boeing shares drop 3.1%, Spirit AeroSystems shares up 3.5% Dec 3 (Reuters) - Boeing (BA.N) , opens new tab said on Wednesday it could close its $4.7 billion acquisition of wing and fuselage maker Spirit AeroSystems (SPR.N) , opens new tab by the end of the year after a U.S. regulator said it could proceed, so long as it carried out divestments that have largely been agreed to with rival Airbus (AIR.PA) , opens new tab. Boeing's shares fell 3% and Spirit's rose 3.5% on the move by the Federal Trade Commission, which aims to resolve competition concerns about Boeing's purchase of the world's biggest aerostructures supplier. Sign up here. The deal splits up the financially struggling and problem-plagued Spirit, which was part of Boeing until 2005. Boeing is reacquiring the bulk of Spirit, which makes 737 fuselages, while Airbus will take over facilities in North Carolina and Belfast, Northern Ireland. The total transaction, including Airbus' portion and other pieces, is valued at $8.3 billion. Spirit has been cited as one source of delays on several programs, including Boeing's 737 and Airbus' A350 and A220. The FTC's order requires the divestments to Airbus, as well as the sale of Spirit’s Subang, Malaysia, operations, which supplies components for both Airbus and Boeing. A sale to Composites Technology Research Malaysia was negotiated earlier this year. The order also requires Spirit to continue as a supplier to Boeing's competitors vying for future military aircraft programs. Boeing's defense division won the contract for the U.S. military's first sixth-generation fighter, the F-47, earlier this year, and it is competing for the U.S. Navy's F/A-XX fighter contract. The FTC's proposed order would add further regulatory oversight to the implementation of the merger with appointments of two monitors - one for the FTC and another representing the Pentagon. The divestments would address the FTC's concerns that the merger would allow Boeing to unfairly control Airbus' supply chain and box out competitors in the defense industry. “We welcome the U.S. Federal Trade Commission’s approval of our acquisition of Spirit AeroSystems," a Boeing spokesperson said. "While the transaction has not yet fully closed, we are committed to completing the remaining steps necessary to finalize the acquisition.” A Spirit spokesman confirmed that the deal is expected to close by the end of December. Reducing manufacturing quality problems at Spirit has been a key focus for Boeing in its efforts to stabilize 737 production. The deal gives Airbus direct control of the struggling Belfast plant. The historic former Short Brothers facilities posted a loss of roughly $670 million in 2024. The Belfast operation warned in a July filing that it needed additional funds to remain afloat to meet upcoming liabilities. The deal includes a $439 million cash-out to Airbus to make up for the losses it will have to absorb. https://www.reuters.com/sustainability/boards-policy-regulation/us-ftc-says-boeing-must-divest-spirit-aerosystems-assets-proceed-with-merger-2025-12-03/
