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[ad_1] Unlock the Editor’s Digest for freeRoula Khalaf, Editor of the FT, selects her favourite stories in this weekly newsletter.Oil markets have shrugged off Israel’s threat to topple the Iranian regime, with crude exports from the Middle East so far unaffected by the escalating conflict.Financial Times analysis of ship-tracking data shows there has been no significant impact on the movement of vessels through the critical Strait of Hormuz. Homayoun Falakshahi, head of crude oil at energy analytics firm Kpler, said their systems also showed no drop in the number of oil tankers transiting the strait.About 21mn barrels of oil from…

[ad_1] Unlock the Editor’s Digest for freeRoula Khalaf, Editor of the FT, selects her favourite stories in this weekly newsletter.Warner Bros Discovery bondholders approved a debt structuring that underpins a break-up of the media group, handing a rare win to the company’s chief executive, David Zaslav.The complex deal, announced last week, called for compromise between WBD and its creditors in which the company agreed to buy back more than $14bn of the group’s $36bn of bonds at a slight premium to current market prices, but below 100 cents on the dollar in some instances.In exchange, participating bondholders consented to relax…

[ad_1] Throughout her years working in technology, Jenny Wang, 28, always found herself stumbling back to one idea — a personal styling agent to help users decide what to wear and buy based on their budget, lifestyle, weather, and calendar.  She has tried to build such a product numerous times in the past, “but the AI technology was not yet mature enough,” she told TechCrunch. That’s changed, so a few months ago she announced the launch of her dream company, Alta, followed by the announcement today of an $11 million seed round led by Menlo Ventures.  The product, which feels…

[ad_1] Unlock the Editor’s Digest for freeRoula Khalaf, Editor of the FT, selects her favourite stories in this weekly newsletter.A consortium led by Abu Dhabi’s national oil company has made a $19bn bid to take over one of Australia’s largest energy groups.Santos said XRG, an investment arm of the Abu Dhabi National Oil Company, had made an indicative cash offer of $5.76 a share, valuing the Adelaide-based company at $18.7bn. It represents a 28 per cent premium to Santos’s closing share price last week.Abu Dhabi Developmental Holding Company and US private equity fund Carlyle are also in the bidding group.…

[ad_1] This article is an on-site version of our Unhedged newsletter. Premium subscribers can sign up here to get the newsletter delivered every weekday. Standard subscribers can upgrade to Premium here, or explore all FT newslettersIsrael’s attack on Iranian nuclear facilities has escalated to back-and-forth missile volleys that continue as we write. Much is at stake. Markets, as always, are focusing on what they can most easily quantify — the oil price. The consensus, which seems sensible to us, is that while prices might go higher from here, the chance of a big spiralling increase is quite low. “What I’m…

[ad_1] Unlock the Editor’s Digest for freeRoula Khalaf, Editor of the FT, selects her favourite stories in this weekly newsletter.The writer is author of ‘Blood and Treasure, the Economics of Conflict from the Vikings to Ukraine’Worries over geopolitical risks have regularly featured towards the top of polls of investor concerns over the past year. In recent months, “geopolitical risk” has often been a polite euphemism for unpredictable American tariff policies, preferred by US institutions which do not want to annoy the White House too much. But now the geopolitical risk which is materialising is a more traditional one, the threat…

[ad_1] ChatGPT seems to have pushed some users toward delusional or conspiratorial thinking, or at least reinforced that kind of thinking, according to a recent feature in The New York Times. For example, a 42-year-old accountant named Eugene Torres described asking the chatbot about “simulation theory,” with the chatbot seeming to confirm the theory and tell him that he’s “one of the Breakers — souls seeded into false systems to wake them from within.” ChatGPT reportedly encouraged Torres to give up sleeping pills and anti-anxiety medication, increase his intake of ketamine, and cut off his family and friends, which he…

[ad_1] Unlock the White House Watch newsletter for freeYour guide to what Trump’s second term means for Washington, business and the worldIsrael’s sudden attack on Iran has threatened to disrupt oil supplies in the Middle East, placing the Opec+ cartel’s recent decision to increase crude production into the spotlight.The Saudi Arabia-led producer group has surprised the oil market this year by fast-tracking the return of idled production even as crude prices fell. It has prompted speculation that the cartel was responding to White House pressure to boost output ahead of a confrontation with Iran. The US had held several rounds…

[ad_1] It’s no surprise that wunderkinds want their children to be wunderkinds, too.As Alexandr Wang, the 28-year-old founder of Scale AI, prepares to take on a new role at Meta leading its superintelligence initiatives, he’s also thinking about how to integrate superintelligence into the next generation.And that means he’s not having kids anytime soon.On the Shawn Ryan Show on Thursday, Wang said he wants to wait to have kids until Neuralink or other brain-computer interfaces are available.Neuralink, one of Elon Musk’s most futuristic endeavors, is developing coin-sized microchips that can be embedded into human brains. These chips will not only…

[ad_1] Overtourism is rattling cities across Europe, where some activists blame short-term rental companies like Airbnb for swelling the cost of living and limiting housing options for locals.Airbnb CEO Brian Chesky disagrees.Chesky addressed the criticisms during an interview with Dagmar Von Taube of WELT, a German newspaper that is part of the Axel Springer Global Reporters Network, saying, “I’ve heard the criticisms — and I have responses.”The tech billionaire mentioned Barcelona, where activists protested overtourism in 2024 and are planning further protests on Sunday.”In Barcelona, housing prices rose 60% over the past decade, but Airbnb listings actually decreased. So we…