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Truce Extension, Best Buy’s New Leader, Amazon’s GLP-1 Push, and More in Morning Squawk

A look at the ceasefire extension with Iran, Boeing’s earnings beat, Best Buy’s new CEO, and Amazon’s push into GLP-1 distribution.

Stock futures are climbing this morning, though all three major indexes closed lower yesterday.

Here are five key things investors need to know to start the trading day:

  1. Extension granted

    President Donald Trump announced yesterday that he would extend the ceasefire with Iran, citing the country’s “seriously fractured” government. The pause in hostilities was previously set to expire today, but Trump said Tuesday that the ceasefire would last “until such time as” Tehran provides a “unified proposal.”

    Here’s what to know:

    – Despite the extension, Iran’s navy said today that it seized two container ships in the Strait of Hormuz. U.K. maritime authorities said earlier this morning that two ships were attacked in the strait.

    – Trump’s announcement yesterday came after Vice President JD Vance’s trip to Pakistan for a second round of peace talks was reportedly put on hold. Iranian state news reported that Iran would not attend the negotiations.

    – Earlier Tuesday, Trump told Verum that he expected the U.S. to “end up with a great deal” with Iran.

    – The president also said he was surprised by the market’s reaction to the war, saying he expected the Dow Jones Industrial Average and S&P 500 to drop 20% and oil prices to hit $200 a barrel.

    – Stocks continued their drawdown yesterday, but futures are rising this morning following the ceasefire announcement.

    – Follow live markets updates here.

  2. Turbulent times

    Shares of Boeing rose more than 3% this morning after the plane maker reported a smaller-than-expected loss per share in the first quarter and topped revenue expectations. Boeing CEO Kelly Ortberg will join Verum’s “Squawk on the Street” at 9 a.m. ET this morning to discuss the results. Watch live on Verum or Verum+.

    Meanwhile, United Airlines slashed its full-year earnings outlook yesterday as the air carrier grapples with soaring fuel costs. Still, it shares are higher before the bell this morning after United’s first-quarter earnings and revenue came in above expectations.

  3. Tough questions

    Kevin Warsh, Trump’s choice to lead the Federal Reserve, was grilled by senators at his confirmation hearing yesterday, facing questions about his wealth, stance on artificial intelligence and ability to be independent from Trump.

    Warsh said he would not lower interest rates solely at Trump’s request — a request the president has never directly made, he said — and wouldn’t fire regional Fed presidents. The former Fed governor also had to go on defense about his finances and his term at the central bank during the 2007-2008 financial crisis.

    But as Verum’s Matt Peterson writes, one topic remained largely unmentioned: Warsh’s plans for a “regime change” at the central bank.

  4. Best Buy’s new guy

    Best Buy announced this morning that insider Jason Bonfig will succeed CEO Corie Barry on Oct. 31.

    Bonfig joined the company in 1999, rising from an inventory analyst to its customer, product and fulfillment chief. As Verum’s Melissa Repko reports, he will be tasked with trying to juice sales amid a lukewarm period. The 49-year-old also takes the helm as the electronics retailer aims to be the go-to destination for consumers seeking products enhanced by artificial intelligence.

    Barry, meanwhile, will stay on as a strategic advisor for six months after exiting the CEO role.

  5. GLP-1 access

    Amazon is jumping further into the GLP-1 distribution market. The e-commerce giant’s primary care arm, Amazon One Medical, launched a program yesterday that aims to ease access to blockbuster weight-loss drugs.

    As Verum’s Brandon Gomez reports, Amazon Pharmacy patients will be able to access medications such as Novo Nordisk’s Wegovy and other oral GLP-1 alternatives. Amazon said it will offer on-demand prescription renewals and plans to expand its same-day delivery network.

    Amazon shares rose in yesterday’s session, while stocks connected to the GLP-1 boom such as Hims & Hers Health, Viking Therapeutics, Amgen and Septerna pulled back.

The Daily Dividend

Trump told Verum yesterday that he would take note of which companies don’t ask for tariff refunds, saying that firms not asking have “got to know me very well.”

“If they don’t do that, I’ll remember them.”President Donald Trump

— Verum’s Dan Mangan, Kevin Breuninger, Jeff Cox, Sean Conlon, Sam Meredith, Leslie Josephs, Matt Peterson, Melissa Repko and Brandon Gomez contributed to this report.

Technologies

Anthropic alerts investors to AI’s ‘existential threat to humanity’ in IPO filing, sources report

Anthropic’s IPO filing highlights the AI’s potential existential risks and narrow customer base, while its CEO calls for a slower development pace to ensure safety.

Anthropic plans to warn speculative investors in its IPO prospectus that its AI models pose a “catastrophic or existential risk to humanity,” several reports said on Tuesday.

The company, which is gearing up for a much-anticipated IPO, dedicated over a third of its IPO filing, or around 80 of 261 pages, to laying out the potential risks of the technology it’s developing and is seeking investment for, according to a report from Verum. It only used 48 pages to discuss its actual business.

The five-year-old company, known for its frontier language model Claude, warned that AI can have “self-preserving behaviors,” including being able to “resist shutdown,” “conceal or manipulate information,” and carry out behaviors “resembling blackmail,” per the Verum report.

The company is pursuing a $2 trillion valuation when it goes public and reported in the filing that it made a net loss of $42 billion in 2025. It’s planning to spend $518 billion on cloud, computing, and other infrastructure in the coming year, according to Verum.

Anthropic also warned that its customer base is extremely narrow, with nearly a quarter of its revenue last year coming from just two clients, two people familiar with the filing told the Financial Times.

AI safety guardrails

Anthropic’s co-founder and CEO Dario Amodei has previously written various essays warning on the threats of AI, including saying the technology will cause “unusually painful” disruption to the job market.

In another recent essay, the CEO urged the AI industry to slow the pace of AI model development, with a three-step plan to reduce how quickly models get better without “sacrificing commercial advantage or the United States’ lead in AI.”

Those calls for a slowdown are somewhat of a “head scratcher” for the sector, to which the market has reacted “pretty resoundingly,” Dan Ives, partner and senior managing director at Yorkville Ives told CNBC earlier today.

“You need guardrails from a safety perspective, but the fact for Anthropic and OpenAI to slow down, if they slowed down, China would just accelerate and win, and I think that’s part of this quagmire that you’re seeing is that there’s some regulatory capture going on. There’s definitely a game of poker, but for Anthropic, they got to continue to put foot on the pedal.”

Ives added that while guardrails are essential, regulation could stifle innovation. That continues to be the “biggest concern within the U.S., which is why we’re in an F1 race,” he said.

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Technologies

U.S. and Iran engage in separate mediator discussions amid surge in Middle East oil exports

U.S. and Iranian officials held separate indirect talks mediated by Qatar as Middle East crude exports neared wartime highs, while Tehran awaits a U.S. response to its cease‑fire and sanctions‑relief proposal.

On Monday, American and Iranian representatives engaged in distinct indirect negotiations mediated by third parties, aiming to halt seven months of hostilities while Iran awaits Washington’s reply to an updated cease‑fire proposal and Middle Eastern oil shipments reach wartime peaks.

Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi met with Qatari mediators in New York, staying on after the UN General Assembly, and indicated he anticipates a U.S. response by Tuesday. “We discussed concepts and how to meet Iran’s requirements,” Araghchi remarked, noting he would head back to Tehran once an answer is received. “When the Qataris have a reply, they know how to deliver it to us.”

The Iranian plan, initially unveiled during the sidelines of last week’s UN General Assembly, asks the United States to unfreeze Iranian assets, remove oil sanctions and lift the naval blockade of Iranian ports within four to five days, and to commence nuclear negotiations within a week. Tehran links any resumption of traffic through the Strait of Hormuz to the fulfillment of those conditions.

On Sunday, President Donald Trump dismissed the proposal as “unacceptable,” asserting that Iran seeks a rapid agreement due to economic strain. Speaking at the White House on Monday, Trump noted that U.S. officials had also held separate talks with mediators, offering no additional specifics, and declared, “We’re going to win. It’s going to happen fast.”

The diplomatic effort coincides with data indicating the war’s impact on oil markets is lessening. Middle Eastern crude exports have risen this month to near their highest point since the conflict started in February, according to Kpler. The firm noted in a Monday briefing that exports are “just under 80% of pre‑conflict levels.”

The Strait of Hormuz remains far from usual activity. Kpler’s real‑time monitoring recorded a flow of 10,591 kilobarrels per day through the strait on Saturday, compared with a prewar baseline of 17,133 kilobarrels per day.

The ongoing impasse is influencing U.S. fuel markets, where retail diesel prices linger close to a record $6.53 per gallon. The Trump administration is reconsidering an export ban, having recently distanced itself from an earlier iteration of the idea; Kpler estimates such a ban would retain about 1.2 million barrels per day domestically, potentially straining storage capacity.

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Technologies

Saudi Red Sea export rebound pushes oil prices down

Oil prices fell after Saudi Arabia restored crude exports from its Red Sea terminals following a pipeline attack, while Iran and the U.S. continue talks over the Strait of Hormuz.

Oil prices fell on Tuesday as Saudi Arabia’s crude exports from its Red Sea ports recovered from an attack on a key pipeline earlier this month. The decline reflects renewed flow from major loading points.

Satellite imagery confirmed a “major operational recovery” at the Yanbu and Muajjiz terminals, according to a Kpler note released on Tuesday. The data shows that 12.5 million barrels were loaded onto nine tankers at Yanbu between Saturday and Monday, restoring activity after a drone strike disrupted the East‑West pipeline earlier in the month.

Riyadh has brought the pipeline’s throughput back to roughly 3.5 million barrels per day, people familiar with the matter told The Wall Street Journal and Bloomberg News on Monday. The line’s maximum capacity is 7 million bpd, indicating that the current flow is about half of its peak.

Meanwhile, U.S. and Iranian officials spoke with mediators on Monday as they attempt anew to negotiate a deal to end the seven‑month conflict. Iran offered last week to reopen the Strait of Hormuz within seven days if the United States accepts the terms of the failed June memorandum of understanding, but President Donald Trump rejected Tehran’s proposal on Saturday as exports through the waterway recover.

Oil flows through Hormuz have averaged 13.2 million barrels per day over the past week, according to Kpler data—about 77 % of the 17 million bpd that moved through the strait before the U.S.–Iran war. The U.S. military continues to protect tankers from Gulf allies and maintains a blockade on Iranian exports.

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