2025-06-27 10:56

PESHAWAR, Pakistan, June 27 (Reuters) - At least nine people died when floodwaters swept away children in a river in northern Pakistan and relatives jumped into the water to try to save them on Friday, officials said. The family was having a picnic breakfast by the Swat River and the children were in the water taking photos when the sudden flood hit, district administrator Shehzad Mahboob said. Sign up here. Relatives rushed in but were also caught up in the deluge which had been swollen by monsoon rains, he added. It was still too early to say how many children and how many adults had died, Mahboob told Reuters. Nine bodies have been recovered so far, he said. Four members of the family were rescued alive and another four are still missing. The family group were tourists from Pakistan visiting the Swat Valley, local mayor Shahid Ali Khan said. Locals and more than 80 rescue workers were searching for survivors, rescue official Shah Fahad said. The Provincial Disaster Management Authority later issued an alert saying there were high flood levels and warning people to take precautions. Tens of thousands of tourists, mostly from other parts of Pakistan, visit the north's peaks and glaciers every year during the summer travel season. Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif "expressed his grief over the tourists' deaths," his office said in a statement. https://www.reuters.com/business/environment/nine-dead-floodwaters-sweep-away-children-relatives-pakistan-2025-06-27/

2025-06-27 10:53

LONDON, June 27 (Reuters) - What matters in U.S. and global markets today By Mike Dolan , opens new tab, Editor-At-Large, Finance and Markets Sign up here. The glass appears half full once again. With midyear approaching, the main Wall Street stock indexes are back within a hair's breadth of new records, helped along by a weakening dollar, the prospect of lower borrowing rates, increasing trade optimism and a renewed focus on the artificial intelligence theme. Throw in some positive tax and regulatory twists, and now we’re likely to see new highs for the S&P 500 and Nasdaq later today. It's Friday, so today I'll provide a quick overview of what's happening in global markets and then offer you some weekend reading suggestions away from the headlines. Today's Market Minute * The United States has reached an agreement with China on how to expedite rare earth shipments to the U.S., a White House official said on Thursday, amid efforts to end a trade war between the world's biggest economies. * European Union leaders discussed new proposals from the United States on a trade deal at a summit in Brussels on Thursday, with Commission President Ursula von der Leyen not ruling out tariff talks could fail and saying "all options remain on the table". * Iran would respond to any future U.S. attack by striking American military bases in the Middle East, Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said on Thursday, in his first televised remarks since a ceasefire was reached between Iran and Israel. * U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent on Thursday asked Republicans in Congress to remove a "retaliatory tax" proposal that targets foreign investors from their sweeping budget legislation, as lawmakers struggled to find a path forward on the bill. * What will be the biggest pain trades in the second half of 2025? ROI columnist Jamie McGeever discusses the most vulnerable positions. Wall St flirts with new record While still underperforming the MSCI's all-country index for the year so far, and lagging euro zone stocks by some 20% in dollar terms in 2025, the S&P500 has all but completed a remarkable 20% round trip from the peak of February to the troughs of April and back. The VIX 'fear index' (.VIX) , opens new tab ebbed to its lowest in four months, while gold prices slipped to their lowest in almost a month. With more than 40% of S&P500 revenues coming from overseas, the dollar's (.DXY) , opens new tab slide to 3-year lows this week spotlights a 10%-plus currency tailwind in 2025. The greenback remained near the year's lows on Friday. And even though President Donald Trump's harrying of Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell unnerves many about the long-term inflation impact of threatening Fed independence, it has stepped up bets about a resumption of interest rate cuts - and most clearly after Powell's term ends next year. While markets awaited the latest U.S. May inflation update later on Friday - with oil prices brushing off the latest Middle East conflict to resume a near 20% year-on-year drop - two and 10-year Treasury yields , fell to their lowest since early May on Thursday. The bond market has been soothed in part by this week's Fed proposal on overhauling how much capital large global banks must hold against relatively low-risk assets, part of a bid to boost banks' participation in Treasury markets. But markets got a further lift overnight from signs of some movement on bilateral trade negotiations ahead of July 9's expiry of the 90-day pause on Trump's sweeping tariff hikes. The White House said the United States reached an agreement with China on how to expedite rare earth shipments to the U.S. European Union leaders discussed new proposals from the United States on a trade deal at a summit in Brussels late on Thursday, with Commission President Ursula von der Leyen saying "all options remain on the table". German Chancellor Friedrich Merz urged the EU to do a "quick and simple" trade deal rather than a "slow and complicated" one, even as French President Emmanuel Macron struck a cautious note. And while the U.S. fiscal bill is still struggling through the Senate, there was an important development on tax provisions that may ease foreign investor concerns. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent asked Republicans in Congress to remove a "retaliatory tax" proposal - the controversial Section 899 that targets foreign investors with higher tax in retaliation for any overseas disputes. Justifying the removal, Bessent said that under a G7 agreement, a 15% global corporate minimum tax will not apply to U.S. companies under "Pillar 2" of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development tax deal. The latest economic numbers, meantime, were a mixed bag but show few signs of a sharp downturn yet. Durable goods orders boomed in May well above forecasts, while the labor market remained resilient with a drop in weekly jobless claims. May trade data, on the other hand, showed a sharp drop in exports. As the second-quarter earnings season comes into view next month, the longer-term AI investment theme was given a fresh spur from an above-forecast revenue readout from Micron Technology (MU.O) , opens new tab - even though its stock ended lower on Thursday. AI darling Nvidia (NVDA.O) , opens new tab hit a new record high, however, up more than 80% from the lows of April. In other corporate news, Nike's (NKE.N) , opens new tab shares jumped 10% overnight as its first-quarter revenue outlook exceeded market expectations. Elsewhere, stocks in Europe were sharply higher on Friday - chiming with Wall Street. They have been boosted by the defense spending push at this week's NATO summit and as details of Germany's big fiscal stimulus unfolded. German lawmakers on Thursday passed a multi-billion-euro package of fiscal relief measures to support companies and boost investment, involving corporate tax breaks amounting to almost 46 billion euros ($54 billion) from this year through to 2029. Despite the positive noises on a U.S. trade deal, Chinese stocks (.CSI300) , opens new tab bucked the global trend and were in the red on Friday. China's industrial profits swung back into sharp decline, falling 9.1% in May from a year earlier, as factory activity slowed in the face of broader economic stress. There was better news in Japan as core consumer inflation in Tokyo slowed sharply in June. Tech stocks led the Nikkei (.N225) , opens new tab up more than 1%. Weekend reads: * TARIFF DAMAGE: Even though President Donald Trump appears to have retreated from his more extreme trade tariff plans due to market, industry and political pushback, trade barriers will damage the economy over the next decade. So claims a Peterson Institute paper by Warwick McKibbin, Marcus Noland and Geoffrey Shuetrim, who estimate the impact under five different scenarios , opens new tab - which get worse the bigger the retaliation overseas and the higher the country risk premium demanded by global investors. "Contrary to Trump's promises to revive U.S. industry, America's manufacturing and agriculture sectors see disproportionate losses in production and employment due to his tariffs." * OPAQUE DEBT: Global sovereign debt vulnerability is rising and 54% of low-income countries are already in or at high risk of debt distress, with many spending more on debt repayments than on education, healthcare and infrastructure combined. With frequent global shocks adding to the risk, the World Bank's Axel van Trotsenburg argues on Project Syndicate that debt obligations are now more complex, with a wider range of creditors and some borrowing occurring behind closed doors , opens new tab and outside the scrutiny of oversight mechanisms. "Without urgent action to improve transparency, unsustainable debt-service burdens in the developing world will become common." * UKRAINE VS RUSSIA IN AFRICA: On Africa's dry western tip, Mauritania has become an unlikely staging post for Ukraine's increasingly global struggle with its adversary Russia. Reuters' Jessica Donati and Olena Harmash detail Kyiv's Africa Strategy in seeking allies with aide and embassies - countering Russia's much more entrenched presence in the continent. * SIU SIMPLE: With much attention on the European Union's ability to attract or unlock much-needed investment capital, accelerating its capital markets integration - or Savings and Investments Union - is seen as critical. Nicholas Veron at Bruegel proposes catalyzing this by hardening a central supervisory system to replace the current complex hybrid of a central agency - the European Securities and Markets Authority - alongside national supervisory bodies. "The way to reform it is by pooling all capital market supervisory authority into a transformed multicentric ESMA , opens new tab that would operate mostly through its own offices in EU countries, ensuring supervisory consistency and no preferential treatment for any single financial centre." * WEGOVY TEEN IMPACT: A fast-growing cohort of American teens who have chosen to take Novo Nordisk's weight-loss drug Wegovy, placing them at the forefront of a monumental shift in the treatment of childhood obesity. A Reuters special report by Chad Terhune and Robin Respaut found children who had taken Wegovy or a similar weight-loss drug, to speak with them about their experiences. The reporters spent more than a year closely following four teens and their families to examine in detail the impact of treatment. Chart of the day: U.S. stock markets have completed a remarkable 20% round trip since February to stand back at the brink of new records - with the S&P500 up more than 10% on this time last year. Today's events to watch * U.S. May personal consumption expenditures inflation gauge (0830EDT) University of Michigan's final June consumer survey (10:00 AM EDT) * New York Federal Reserve President John Williams and Cleveland Fed President Beth Hammack speak Opinions expressed are those of the author. They do not reflect the views of Reuters News, which, under the Trust Principles , opens new tab, is committed to integrity, independence, and freedom from bias. https://www.reuters.com/business/finance/global-markets-view-usa-2025-06-27/

2025-06-27 10:46

BERLIN, June 27 (Reuters) - Plans to build one of Europe's largest green energy hubs on the site of disused coal-fired power plant units in eastern Germany have been postponed indefinitely, energy firm LEAG said on Friday. The announcement comes a week after ArcelorMittal (MT.LU) , opens new tab dropped plans to convert two German steel plants to carbon-neutral production, citing high energy costs. Sign up here. LEAG said H2UB Boxberg was being postponed as political and economic conditions for the plant had not developed as expected. It said the previous coalition government had indefinitely delayed implementation of the federal Power Plant Safety Act, a key regulatory pre-condition. "We are currently postponing plans for hydrogen production in Boxberg and initially shifting our focus to other technologies for the generation, storage, and flexible provision of electricity," a LEAG spokesperson said. LEAG announced the project in April 2024. It called for the construction of a centre for hydrogen production and energy use, along with large-scale green electricity storage, on the grounds of lignite-fired power station units that were decommissioned in the 1990s. In 2023, the company announced its ambition to bring 7 gigawatts (GW) of solar and wind capacity online by 2030 and committed to investing 1 billion euros annually. LEAG is based in eastern Germany's Lusatia region and owned by Czech investor EPH. It said there was no reliable implementation schedule yet for the timely and cost-effective availability of hydrogen infrastructure in the region. "The hydrogen economy is far from its expected increase. Uncertainty regarding availability and prices in a future hydrogen market is high," the spokesperson said. Germany phased out nuclear power in 2023 and aims to end coal-fired power use in 2038. There are still two 500-megawatt lignite-fired units in operation at Boxberg which are expected to operate until 2029. https://www.reuters.com/business/energy/germans-leag-indefinitely-postpones-green-hydrogen-project-2025-06-27/

2025-06-27 10:17

MUMBAI, June 25 (Reuters) - The Indian rupee had its best week since January 2023, as an Iran-Israel ceasefire cooled oil prices and sapped safe-haven dollar demand, while worries over the Federal Reserve's future independence added pressure on the greenback. The rupee gained 1.3% on the week, its best performance in two and a half years, to close at 85.4750 per U.S. dollar on Friday. Sign up here. Crude oil prices retreated by over 11% this week after Iran and Israel reached a ceasefire following a 12-day war, which saw involvement of the U.S. Meanwhile, the dollar index was down 1.5% on the week as investors, unnerved by fresh signs of an erosion in U.S. central bank independence, wasted no time in pushing the greenback back to its lowest levels in over three years. "Part of the sell-off of the dollar is due to the unpredictability of policy from Washington and that is unlikely to change," MUFG Bank said in a note. The rupee rose this week but it continues to lag behind its Asian peers amid persistent dollar weakness seen over 2025. While currencies like the Korean won and offshore Chinese yuan are up between 2% and 9% this year so far, the rupee is little changed. Bankers and analysts reckon that while the rupee's underperformance is likely to persist, a broadly weaker dollar alongside portfolio inflows should support the currency in the near term. Foreign investors have turned buyers on Indian government bonds over the last few sessions, while block trades and initial public offerings have drawn interest from global investors. Later on Friday, the focus will be on U.S. personal consumption expenditure (PCE) inflation data alongside remarks from Fed policymakers as investors try to gauge the future trajectory of the central bank's policy rates. https://www.reuters.com/world/india/rupee-posts-best-week-over-two-years-dollars-struggles-resurface-2025-06-27/

2025-06-27 09:33

LONDON, June 27 (Reuters) - The pound was set for its biggest weekly gain against the dollar in nearly four months on Friday and held close to its near four-year high hit the previous day, though that was more due to dollar weakness than sterling strength. The pound was last up 0.14% on the dollar at $1.13745, just off Thursday's top of $1.37701, the highest since late 2021. Sign up here. It was broadly steady on the euro, at 85.24 pence, underlining the fact that the move in the pound against the dollar - referred to as cable by financial markets - has much more to do with the dollar. "The gains in cable reflect mostly this year’s weakness in the dollar and the strength of the euro, which has dragged the pound higher due to the limited parameters of the EUR/GBP trading range," Rabobank analysts said in a note. The pound has gained 2.2% against the dollar this week, its most since early March, as the greenback's short-lived gains during the Israel-Iran conflict fade. The main domestic support for the pound this year has come from the Bank of England being slower to cut interest rates than peers, particularly the European Central Bank, as inflation remains sticky. "Core inflation in the UK has basically stopped moving for the past year - hard to say why. BoE officials are quite concerned. That makes it difficult to cut rates and also the economic outlook is not improving," Michael Pfister, FX analyst at Commerzbank, said. Analysts also said they were watching this week's political drama given what Rabobank described as "the overhang of a very large debt/GDP ratio and a UK current account deficit." Prime Minister Keir Starmer this week sharply scaled back planned welfare cuts after more than 100 of his Labour Party lawmakers publicly opposed the reforms, which sought to shave 5 billion pounds ($6.9 billion) per year off a rapidly rising welfare bill. https://www.reuters.com/world/uk/sterling-keeps-climbing-struggling-dollar-2025-06-27/

2025-06-27 07:41

TOKYO, June 27 (Reuters) - Japan's private-sector rice imports rocketed higher in May as the country grapples with supply shortages that have become a major headache for both consumers and policymakers. Some 10,600 metric tons of so-called staple rice - which is consumed at meals as opposed to rice used for feed or ingredients in other products - were imported by companies such as trading firms and wholesalers despite high levies. Sign up here. While that's still a small amount compared to the roughly 7 million tons eaten by the Japanese each year, it represents a huge jump from the 3,004 tons imported for the entire last financial year that ended in March. Rice prices in Japan have doubled since last year after an extreme heatwave hit the 2023 harvest which was then exacerbated by stockpiling following an earthquake and additional demand from a boom in tourism. To tackle the problem, Japan's government began releasing stockpiled rice directly to retailers from late May, allowing some consumers to snap up 5 kg of rice for about 2,000 yen ($13.85) - less than half of average supermarket prices. Japanese restaurants and consumers are increasingly turning to U.S. brands in search of cheaper prices. Japan takes a heavily protectionist stance towards its most basic food and traditionally has not had to rely on imports. Private-sector imports are subject to a levy of 341 yen per kilogramme. The government can also import 100,000 tons of staple rice tariff free under World Trade Organization rules. It decided to hold a tender for tariff-free imported rice this month, earlier than the usual auction in September, to help lower soaring prices. https://www.reuters.com/markets/commodities/japan-private-sector-rice-imports-soar-may-2025-06-27/