Category: Semafor

Iceland voted against resuming talks to join the European Union, officials announced Sunday, as concerns over sovereignty trumped arguments for European integration. Icelandic voters rejected the measure amid widespread concern over maintaining control over fishing rights, a backbone of the country’s economy. The vote, which showed domestic concerns overriding geopolitical ...

Rogue OpenAI agents’ unprecedented coordination during the Hugging Face attack significantly increases the risk of AI escaping human control, analysts said, days after investigators released a bombshell report into the incident. Totaling 1,200 agents, the swarms justified the self-described “sacrifice” of individual agents to further the aims of the “collective” ...

Nepal’s catastrophic landslides — which have killed hundreds with thousands more unaccounted for — underlined the plight of developing nations in climate disasters: They are not large emitters but are disproportionately affected. Accelerating snow and glacier melt likely caused a glacier to break off and slam into a valley more ...

US President Donald Trump announced Friday that the US had secured majority control over more than 65 billion barrels of Venezuela’s oil reserves, expanding Washington’s influence over the country’s energy industry. Under the agreement, a joint company comprising the US government and a Venezuelan private operator will receive a 100-year ...

US Federal Reserve Chair Kevin Warsh’s hawkish Jackson Hole speech on Friday eased fears that the central banker wouldn’t raise interest rates to tackle inflation, as the odds of a September hike jumped. Though Warsh “was keen not to provide forward guidance… his words smacked of forward guidance,” ING analysts ...

The Scoop Three Saudi companies have scrapped plans for initial public offerings that were scheduled over the next month because of expectations of weak investor demand as the Iran war weighs on sentiment, according to people familiar with the matter. The decision suggests the companies believe that foreign investors remain ...

The News JACKSON HOLE, Wyo. — The Federal Reserve has so far “been a little too quiet” about the Treasury Department’s campaign to bring down yields by buying back more long-term debt, former Kansas City Fed President Tom Hoenig told Semafor. “What they’re trying to do is not identify with ...

The News Consumer sentiment among Republicans and independents is “starting to fade” ahead of the midterm elections, The Conference Board Chief Economist Dana Peterson told Semafor. The Conference Board said last week that its overall consumer confidence index had dropped to its lowest level since January. Economists had predicted it ...

The News “It doesn’t feel great to constantly be berated like this,” said Hasan Piker. By Friday morning, when he caught up with Semafor, the socialist influencer had spent the past week watching Democrats condemn him or distance themselves from his commentary. Michigan Democratic Senate nominee Abdul El-Sayed, who he’d ...

The US government said this week it seized digital infrastructure behind a Chinese hacking operation that targeted NASA, the Federal Reserve, and the Senate beginning in 2018, evidence, experts say, that illustrates the growing scale and persistence of Beijing’s cyber operations. The court documents show China is “doubling down” on ...