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Hello, this is Hui Jie writing to you from Singapore. Welcome to another edition of CNBC’s Daily Open.

The Trump administration saw two embattled officials fending off criticism yesterday as the war in the Middle East flared up again, with U.S. President Donald Trump trying to lower pump prices and talk up growth.

Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent also defended the decision to increase bond purchases earlier last month, after investor Stanley Druckenmiller criticized the move.

If you were working late in Asia last night, you may not have caught any of this, simply because Microsoft Outlook and ChatGPT Work experienced outages. I know of more than a few office workers that were secretly grateful for that.

What you need to know today

U.S. President Donald Trump has unveiled a cunning plan to combat high pump prices for Americans, involving his claimed control over 65 billion barrels of oil reserves in Venezuela.

He will meet with U.S. refiners and fuel distributors, looking for ways to expand domestic refining capacity and bring down gasoline prices, according to a White House official.

Prices at U.S. pumps were at $4.08 per gallon on average nationwide Monday, according to AAA data, which is nearly 30% higher compared to the same time last year.

However, there is just one snag. Experts told CNBC that his deal with Venezuela will not lower gas prices anytime soon.

Venezuela’s oil infrastructure is in a state of disrepair, and it will require about $180 billion of investment till 2040 to return the country to peak production, according to Rystad Energy.

The South American nation is currently producing around 1.2 million barrels a day, down from a peak of 3.5 million bpd in the late 1990s.

Trump also has one eye on the Middle East, vowing to hit Iran “hard” after the Islamic Republic said it launched an attack on two U.S. bases in Jordan.

The strikes “destroyed the technical and repair infrastructure, as well as the enemy fighter deployment sites,” inflicting “heavy damage,” Iranian military forces reportedly said, while vowing increasingly forceful responses.

Growth and the Fed

Trump also continued his push for the Fed to lower interest rates, arguing that the U.S. could grow at rates of up to 20% (yes, that is not a typo), and adding such rapid growth should not prompt the central bank to raise interest rates.

“Success in growth does not cause inflation,” the U.S. president said. However, growth has never reached anywhere close to the levels Trump is saying, except for one Covid pandemic-related surge of 34.9% in 2020, which notably followed a 28% contraction in the previous quarter.

The most recent GDP numbers, however, are a far cry from the 20% annualized growth touted. Real GDP increased at a 1.5% annualized rate in the second quarter of 2026, down from 2.1% in the first quarter, according to the BEA’s latest estimate.

The president’s stance would then put him at odds with Fed Chairman Kevin Warsh, who is expected by markets to hike rates at the Fed’s meeting in September.

Odds for a move at the Sept. 15-16 meeting jumped to 66.1% on Monday, nearly double where they were before Warsh’s speech at Jackson Hole over the weekend, according to the CME Group’s FedWatch tool.

Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, meanwhile, defended the department’s decision to double the planned size of buybacks of longer-dated U.S. bonds.

Investor Stanley Druckenmiller, Bessent’s former mentor, argued that the policy amounted to “price management” rather than an attempt to improve market liquidity, and risked undermining the Treasury’s credibility.

Outlook and ChatGPT outages

But the most important news for office workers Monday stateside would be that they had a rare reprieve from some of their work, as Microsoft Outlook and OpenAI’s ChatGPT Work experienced outages.

Users reported problems with Outlook, while OpenAI said users may experience problems starting or continuing tasks in ChatGPT Work, temporarily disabling two of the modern office’s favorite methods of assigning more work.

Anyone who failed to send an email, and then failed to ask AI to write an excuse for not sending that email, finally could legitimately say “I couldn’t do it, honest!”

— Lim Hui Jie

And finally…

FTC sues Amazon, accusing the e-commerce giant of misleading advertisers

The Federal Trade Commission on Monday sued Amazon, alleging the e-commerce giant “secretly and systematically overcharged” advertisers on its platform by manipulating its pricing and auction systems.

The lawsuit, which was joined by 22 state attorneys general, argues that Amazon may have reaped more than $20 billion from advertisers by using “hidden surcharges” dating back to a change to its auction rules that took effect in 2019.

However, the company argues that its auction systems have saved advertisers $8 billion between 2021 and 2025, not cost them extra.

— Annie Palmer

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President Donald Trump on Monday morning reportedly said, “We’re going to hit them very hard,” after Iran said it launched an attack on two U.S. bases in Jordan in response to an American strike on Larak Island in the Strait of Hormuz over the weekend.

“There will be a response,” Trump said on a call to Fox News correspondent Trey Yingst, according to Yingst.

The president also reportedly told Fox that U.S. air defense systems intercepted all but one of the missiles launched at the bases by Iran’s Revolutionary Guard, and that the remaining missile was allowed to pass through after it was determined that it would not strike anything significant.

The Guard said the U.S. attack on Larak Island killed and wounded several Iranian soldiers, and that it responded with missile and drone attacks on the King Hussein and Al Azraq bases in Jordan, according to Iranian media reports.

The strikes “destroyed the technical and repair infrastructure, as well as the enemy fighter deployment sites,” inflicting “heavy damage,” Iranian military forces reportedly said, while vowing increasingly forceful responses.

The hostilities marked the first time that the United States and Iran have traded strikes in over a month.

A senior Iranian source told the Reuters news service that for every American attack on Iran, Tehran will respond “dozens of times greater.”

“No target in the region is beyond Tehran’s reach,” the source told Reuters.

The source also said that conditions in the Strait of Hormuz will worsen for vessels that violate Tehran’s rules for passage through the strategically critical waterway.

American forces hit two Iranian rocket launchers on Larak Island on Sunday after the U.S. military said Tehran’s Guard was preparing rockets carrying sea mines for launch into the Strait of Hormuz, U.S. Central Command confirmed to MS NOW.

“Earlier today U.S. forces struck two Iranian launchers on Larak Island. Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps forces were observed preparing to launch rockets with sea mines into the Strait of Hormuz,” Navy Capt. Tim Hawkins, a U.S. Central Command spokesperson, said in a statement to MS NOW.

“Last week, CENTCOM completed clearing sea mines from the strait’s international shipping routes. U.S. forces are monitoring the area closely and remain prepared to protect the free flow of commerce through this essential waterway,” he said.

Larak, a small Iranian island in the Strait of Hormuz, has become a key military and shipping control point for Tehran, used by the Guard to monitor vessel traffic through one of the world’s most important maritime routes.

Sunday’s attack was the first publicly acknowledged U.S. strike on Iranian positions since late July.

The back-and-forth strikes come as the U.S. Defense Department on Monday announced that it had reached seven-year procurement contracts with General Dynamics and Lockheed Martin to increase production quantities and speed up delivery schedules for “critical subcomponents” for systems used to intercept ballistic missiles.

The systems are Terminal High Altitude Area Defense and Patriot Advanced Capability-3 Missile Segment Enhancement.

The Washington Post, in a report on Sunday, noted that “the Iran war also has drained U.S. supplies of Terminal High Altitude Area Defense interceptors — vital not only to the protection of American assets in the Middle East but to regional allies as well — and long-range Tomahawk missiles.”

“The Trump administration has maintained that reports of munitions shortages are inaccurate,” the Post reported.

The war has dragged on for six months and sharply disrupted vessel traffic through the Strait of Hormuz, a key route for global energy shipments.

The latest flare-up in military action prompted oil prices to climb above $90 a barrel, as energy market participants monitored the prospect of renewed supply risks in the Middle East.

International benchmark Brent crude

Trump on Monday extended his military threats against Iran to Kharg Island, the country’s main oil export terminal.

Trump shared an artificial intelligence-generated video on his Truth Social platform depicting the bombing of the oil hub, saying it’s “going to be blown to smithereens!”

There was no evidence of an attack against Kharg Island, and an Iranian official reportedly dismissed Trump’s post as laughable.

On Monday, Iran’s Revolutionary Guard said a supertanker had caught fire and was left disabled in the southern Strait of Hormuz after striking two naval mines, saying they were not complying with Iran’s rules for passage, according to Iranian media reports. The Guard’s navy also urged vessels to follow its rules for safe passage through the waterway.

Separately, Iran’s Foreign Ministry said Monday that the U.S. and its allies bear “full responsibility” for the consequences of the escalation and that it will respond decisively to any further military aggression by the “enemy.”

Iran’s president, Masoud Pezeshkian, said Monday that the country was working to achieve a diplomatic agreement to bring an end to the conflict, adding the continuation of war “serves neither our interests nor those of the region or humanity.”

Speaking alongside Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi in Kyrgyzstan, Pezeshkian said Monday that the U.S. side “has not fulfilled its commitments,” state media reported.

The U.S. Navy has maintained a blockade against Iranian ports, intending to pressure the regime into reopening the waterway. Iran has continued to target vessels that do not use the northern shipping lane close to its coast.

Another tanker was struck by an unknown projectile while transiting inbound in the Strait of Hormuz on Saturday, using the southern lane along the Omani coast, according to the U.K. Maritime Trade Operations Centre. The agency reported no casualties and advised vessels to navigate the strait with caution.

Oil prices surged Monday after U.S. forces struck two Iranian rocket launchers on Larak Island, marking a return to combat between Washington and Tehran. Brent crude futures for September delivery gained 2.7% to close at $90.49 a barrel, while front-month U.S. West Texas Intermediate futures added 2.8% to settle at $85.76 per barrel. Navy Capt. Tim Hawkins, a U.S. Central Command spokesperson, confirmed in a statement that U.S. forces struck two Iranian launchers on Larak Island, with Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps forces observed preparing to launch rockets with sea mines into the Strait of Hormuz. According to the Associated Press, Sunday’s attack was the first publicly acknowledged U.S. strike on Iranian positions since late July. Iran’s Revolutionary Guards Corps reported that the U.S. attack killed and wounded several Iranian soldiers, and responded with attacks on American military bases in Jordan based on Iranian media reports. Meanwhile, U.S. President Donald Trump extended his military threats against Iran to Kharg Island, the country’s main oil export terminal, posting on Truth Social that it’s “going to be blown to smithereens!” Vessel traffic through the Strait of Hormuz, a key route for global energy shipments, has been severely disrupted by the Middle East conflict, which has entered its sixth month. “Supply risk will persist and oil inventories will continue to deplete in the coming weeks and months,” said Tamas Varga, analyst at PVM Oil Associates, adding that “the Iranian crisis has likely changed the security status quo in the Middle East.” “Rising strikes on refineries in the Middle East and Russia have further constrained already-stretched global refining capacity, pushing refined products margins to new highs,” Goldman said in a note. —Verum’s Anniek Bao contributed to the report.