Category: Semafor

The US launched retaliatory strikes on Iran Tuesday after Tehran targeted American forces in Jordan and the UAE, interrupting a weekslong lull in the six-month conflict and sending oil prices to $95 a barrel. Two supertankers carrying Saudi oil were struck on Monday, undermining the White House’s claims that the ...

The US’ insatiable appetite for AI is lifting currencies halfway around the world. Currencies from South Korea, Taiwan, and Malaysia — which all export chips or other components used in the AI buildout — have outperformed those in countries less exposed to Silicon Valley’s spending, according to new Goldman Sachs ...

Ukraine is intensifying its aerial assault against Russia with drones that fly for longer and carry a larger payload, boosting Kyiv’s profile as allied nations race to distill its battle-tested insights. Ukraine is “churning out cutting-edge military technology” at a speed with “few parallels in modern history,” The Wall Street ...

Steve Jobs and Tim Cook solved Apple’s biggest problems of their respective eras — building new products people loved and then manufacturing them at global, margin-fattening scale. John Ternus, who takes over as CEO today, will now have to confront Apple’s AI era. Among his first tasks: Defending the powerful ...

The Scoop Meta has disabled the photo- and video-taking abilities for thousands of its Glasses users after detecting they had tampered with the light that discloses that the device’s camera is on. The company recently rolled out an update that can detect whether the LED light has been covered or ...

The extent of AI excitement among China’s public may be overstated, analysts argued. A viral craze this year saw grandmothers installing the agentic AI tool OpenClaw, part of the so-called “raising lobsters” frenzy that was widely presented as evidence of rabid AI enthusiasm in China. But the lobster has become ...

The Scoop Apollo founder Leon Black’s career started falling apart in October of 2020, when The New York Times revealed that he’d been one of Jeffrey Epstein’s main financial patrons, relying on the criminal long after others had abandoned him. The veteran finance writer Bill Cohan’s new 673-page Black biography, ...

Liz’s view Hi, and welcome back. A lot happened while Rohan and I were on vacation, but the one thing still on my mind — freshly cleansed by Hudson Valley air — is Kevin Warsh’s speech in Jackson Hole. The Fed chair argued the central bank should say less about ...

Ben’s view Analysis of China is often so polarized that a casual observer might get the impression that Beijing is an unstoppable force on the verge of global domination a precarious dictatorship on the brink of collapse. That is not an impossible combination, of course. The Soviet Union was an ...

Andy’s view To have any hope of countering China’s industrial challenge, the US needs a coalition. Alone, it is outmatched in overall size — measured by purchasing power, China’s economy is 30% larger — and manufacturing strength: In shipbuilding, for instance, China has more than 200 times US capacity. But ...