Mōrena and welcome to Wednesday’s wrap of the major global business and political headlines you need to know today.
First up, US president Donald Trump has done an about turn and extended a ceasefire with Iran, having overnight said he expected to resume bombing Iran as a deadline for a 14-day ceasefire approached with no deal imminent.
He earlier told CNBC’s Squawk Box the military was ready and raring to go. “I expect to be bombing because I think that’s a better attitude to go in with,” he said.
He also rejected the idea he might extend the ceasefire, which was set to end Wednesday, while claiming the US would end up with a “great deal”, saying Iran had no choice when asked what he expected to come out of the second round of peace talks.
“We’ve taken out their navy, we’ve taken out their air force, we’ve taken out their leaders,” he told CNBC.
Trump had also taken to his Truth Social platform to accuse Tehran of having “Violated the Cease Fire numerous times!” A second round of talks ahead of the deadline, which was expected to go ahead in Pakistan between US vice president JD Vance and Iran’s parliamentary speaker Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf, were up in the air, with an Iranian source telling BBC “everything changed” when the US fired on an Iranian-flagged cargo ship a few days ago.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 0.4% on concerns a peace deal would not be struck ahead of the ceasefire’s expiration on Wednesday (US time). Oil prices also reversed recent drops, with Brent futures up 4% to trade above US$99 a barrel and West Texas Intermediate futures trading 4% higher to above US$93 a barrel.
The S&P 500 was also down 0.5% and the tech-heavy Nasdaq declined 0.6%. Apple shares were down more than 2% after it announced yesterday Tim Cook would step down as chief executive on September 1, while Amazon climbed more than 1% on the back of it agreeing to invest up to US$25 billion in AI startup Anthropic.
But on Wednesday morning NZ time, Trump said the ceasefire would be extended after all. Oil prices dropped back below US$100 a barrel following the news.
"Based on the fact that the Government of Iran is seriously fractured, not unexpectedly so and, upon the request of Field Marshal Asim Munir, and Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif, of Pakistan, we have been asked to hold our Attack on the Country of Iran until such time as their leaders and representatives can come up with a unified proposal," Trump said in a statement. "I have therefore directed our Military to continue the Blockade and, in all other respects, remain ready and able, and will therefore extend the Ceasefire until such time as their proposal is submitted, and discussions are concluded, one way or the other."
Meanwhile, US senators have been questioning Trump’s pick the be the next chair of the US Federal Reserve, Kevin Warsh.
Democrat Elizabeth Warren said Warsh would be a “sock puppet” for Trump but Warsh rejected the claim, saying he would “absolutely not” be a puppet and would act independently, adding that Trump had not pressured him to cut rates and that he would not “make a deal” ahead of his nomination.
“Fed independence means everything to me,” he said.
Senator Tim Scott, the Republican chair of the Senate committee questioning Warsh, said the nominee was “battle-tested” for this job, while Warsh also committed to divesting millions of dollars in investments if he is confirmed chair.
Senator Thom Tillis has indicated he may block Warsh’s confirmation until a federal probe is dropped into incumbent chair Jerome Powell. Powell’s term ends in May.
Finally today, the Guardian reports that Nasa’s Curiosity rover has detected organic molecules on Mars, including chemicals which are widely considered building blocks for the origin of life on Earth.
Five of the seven molecules identified had never previously been observed on the red planet.
“We think we’re looking at organic matter that’s been preserved on Mars for 3.5 billion years,” said University of Florida astrogeologist and Curiosity mission scientist Amy Williams, who led the experiment. “Is it life? We can’t tell, based on this information.”
The car-sized rover has been roaming on Mars since 2012 in often harsh conditions, with temperatures dropping below -100c at night while also being blasted by powerful radiation from the sun because of the planet’s lack of atmosphere.
“For a long time, we thought that all organic matter was going to be seriously degraded by that harsh radiation environment,” Williams said. “It’s really exciting to see [that] large complex material can survive in the subsurface environment.”
