Higher interest rates and tighter financial conditions can kill the AI boom, but those forces are already at work in the bond market.
The post Breitbart Business Digest: The Bond Market Is Already Doing Warsh’s Work appeared first on Breitbart.
Eric Schmidt, the former Google chief executive and Democrat mega-donor, holds a one percent stake in Anthropic that traces back to an early investment of millions in the AI startup. This stake could add up to $10 billion to Schmidt's net worth when the company notable for its AI doomer messages goes public.
The post Democrat Mega-Donor Eric Schmidt’s Anthropic Stake Could Add $10 Billion to His Fortune appeared first on Breitbart.
A fire that began with a single luxury vehicle at a Cadillac dealership in Fort Worth, Texas, spread to destroy six electric SUVs and damage two others before firefighters brought it under control nearly 18 hours later.
The post Green Inferno: Fire Destroys 6 Luxury Cadillac EVs at Texas Dealership, Takes 18 Hours to Extinguish appeared first on Breitbart.
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The Wall Street Journal has been ramping up its push into video and had plans for an ambitious slate of streaming TV shows.
Internal documents viewed by Business Insider described an initial six-series offering that would include a flagship live morning program and an interview show hosted by the Journal's editor in chief, Emma Tucker. The docs are from the summer, and a person familiar with the Journal's strategy said that its plans, including dates and partners, are in flux.
The docs said the Journal had been "in negotiations" with creators such as Feed Me Substacker Emily Sundberg, as well as with the restaurant discovery platform The Infatuation. Sundberg dropped out of the talks a few weeks ago, Business Insider has learned.
The plans called for the shows to launch on the Journal's own channels, YouTube, and social media.
Journal parent company Dow Jones is also hiring a head of programming and content, who would be tasked with building "something ambitious in video." The live job description says the role will pay up to $330,000 in base salary, and involve developing talent that includes employees and external creators, translating the company's journalism into streaming formats, and creating live and on-demand shows.
The Journal and Dow Jones's effort shows how news outlets traditionally known for the written word — including The New York Times — are racing to beef up their video offerings in a media landscape that's seeing both the rise of social video and the decline of cable TV news. It also demonstrates that Tucker is taking a flexible approach to the market by looking to both build shows around in-house talent, including herself, and partner with creators and other media companies.
"Expanding our video presence across Dow Jones and The Wall Street Journal is a major strategic priority, as we have widely communicated," a Dow Jones spokesperson said. "We are actively hiring leadership to shape and execute our go-to-market strategy for video across Dow Jones, and we look forward to sharing our updated plans when ready."
Aurore Marechal/Getty Images for The Business of Fashion
The internal docs viewed by Business Insider described the live morning show as a 60-minute-long anchor of the initial slate. The docs said the Journal enlisted some familiar names in morning news and video to help execute the show. They said the Journal has been working with the production company EverWonder, which was cofounded by the former Time Studios executive Ian Orefice with backing from Jeff Zucker's RedBird IMI.
Another show in the proposed slate in the docs was "The Exchange with Emma Tucker," which was billed as a "prestige interview franchise" that would put viewers "in the room with the people running the global economy." The documents name-checked top CEOs, including Microsoft's Satya Nadella, JPMorgan Chase's Jamie Dimon, and BlackRock's Larry Fink, as potential guests.
The person familiar with the Journal's strategy said the documents represented one of a number of different avenues the outlet was exploring and didn't reflect the current status and form of its efforts. The person said the company is in active conversations with a number of external people for potential partnerships.
The documents said the Journal had been "in negotiations" with Sundberg — which have since ended — for a show called "Feed Me, On Camera" that would introduce her "highly engaged, younger creator audience to WSJ while bringing WSJ's scale, authority, and affluent professional audience to her world." The docs envisioned each episode beginning with a "tip, obsession, or question from the Feed Me universe," and following Sundberg to its conclusion while integrating business context and reporting from the Journal.
Other shows the docs said the Journal had explored included one called "Market Price with The Infatuation" that would tackle the "business behind taste, literally." It would combine the cultural authority and young audience of The Infatuation, now owned by JPMorgan Chase, with the Journal's business reporting chops.
Another was "Inside Sports" ("title to change"), a "next generation reboot of 'Real Sports' for the sports-as-an-asset class era," potentially helmed by Emmy-winning TV journalist Armen Keteyian.
The documents said the Journal had been "in negotiations" with The Infatuation and "in discussions" with Keteyian. Business Insider could not confirm the status of those discussions.
The last series listed in the docs was an AI show that aimed to get a big-name host.
Patrick McMullan/Patrick McMullan via Getty Images
In the docs, the Journal expressed big ambitions for a live morning news show, and said there had been "nothing new" in the category for a professional audience "in a decade." The last entry on a timeline included in the planning docs was The New York Times' "The Daily" in 2017, which has become a reliable top show on the podcast charts and one of the paper's most successful launches.
"We see an opportunity to reinvent the category," the documents said. The Journal also has its own daily news podcast, called "The Journal."
Like the Times, the Journal is in a rare position in a challenged media environment to make a transformative investment. The Journal, part of Rupert Murdoch's News Corp., is profitable, helped by an early move to paywall its journalism.
The documents said that in its video push, the Journal aimed to produce 20 hours of video a week, expand to a free, ad-supported streaming (FAST) channel, and add subscription options and other formats as demand warranted. Between WSJ TV, existing video shows, licensed shows, and co-productions with creators, the Journal aspired to be an "always-on streaming channel." The person familiar with the Journal's strategy said those goals didn't represent its current plans.
Roy Rochlin/Getty Images for Tribeca Festival
Tucker took the helm at the Journal in 2023, moving from the Murdoch-owned UK Sunday Times with a plan to increase engagement with the Journal's digital products. Digital subscriptions rose 8% to 4.5 million in the three months ended June 30 versus the year-ago period. She has called for more lively writing and enterprise reporting. The Journal had already begun to reorient its video strategy under its former head of video Maral Usefi. Under Usefi, the video team had grown by a third, to 65 people, as of April. She was succeeded by Samantha Henig, who was hired in July to lead a new multimedia team.
The docs said that with the Journal's new effort, it aimed to combine its authority and scale with the personality of creator-led media and modern distribution. In terms of audience, it intended to reach a younger viewership than the traditional business TV audience and more decision-makers than creator-led media.
It projected reaching about 75 million viewers through Dow Jones' social reach, upward of 5.6 million monthly watch hours by its 2028 fiscal year, and ad rates that were three to five times what business content on YouTube commands. The person familiar with the Journal's strategy didn't say if those figures represented its current ambitions.
The Journal made a big push into original video more than a decade ago, including the launch of video app WSJ Live in 2011 and expanding to episodic video doc series. Publishers overall have newly reprioritized video amid the rise of short-form content, YouTube's increasing popularity on TV screens, and the success of new live shows like TBPN.
While embracing creator talent — and getting its own staff involved in video content — could help the Journal reach a younger audience, it comes with risks. Journalists who become on-camera talent can often command higher paydays, or defect to start their own ventures, like The New York Times' "Hard Fork" hosts Kevin Roose and Casey Newton did recently. Creators often have their own audiences, which give them leverage over a news organization that staff reporters might not have.
Flagship video shows are also expensive to produce, which makes high ad rates crucial to the Journal's success with this slate. The internal docs explored pitching a variety of ways for advertisers to get involved, including as launch partners, with category-exclusive partnerships, and as "moment partners" tied to major news events like elections, earnings, and WSJ specials.
Bloomberg/Getty Images
A new food delivery service is taking aim at menu mark-ups — and some entrenched rivals
Restaurant ordering software company Olo is launching its own customer-focused app, it said on Tuesday. The app puts it in competition with more established delivery companies, such as DoorDash and Uber Eats.
On Olo's app, customers will see the same prices that restaurants charge in-person patrons, the company said. By contrast, third-party delivery services often charge customers higher menu prices than diners would get at a restaurant.
Offering in-store prices can save customers between 15% and 30%, Olo said.
"It's a better experience for consumers and a more sustainable model for restaurants, with no menu price inflation and no barriers standing between great brands and the people and communities they serve," Olo CEO and founder Noah Glass said.
Food delivery is one area where consumers continue to spend money, even as they cut back their budgets elsewhere. How much customers pay for delivery — and whether apps charge individuals different prices or the same order — can affect how often they order.
Olo is stepping into a competitive space. DoorDash and Uber Eats continue to grow, including by rearching into club deliveries and catering. And Walmart, which spent years building its own grocery-focused delivery service, started delivering restaurant orders earlier this year.
Olo got its start in 2005 with a service that let users text their orders to restaurants in the pre-smartphone era. Now, the company fields about 3.5 million orders daily through around 800 restaurant brands.
The company doesn't have its own team of delivery drivers. Instead, the company uses its own dispatch service to compare delivery options at other third-party services, such as Grubhub, and pick one based on factors like cost and speed.
Olo's delivery app will allow customers to order from about 250 restaurants, including Five Guys and Dave's Hot Chicken.
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Donald Trump’s first bailout for farmers came in 2018, at which point the president approved payments totaling $12 billion. A year later, the Republican administration kept going, announcing a bailout for farmers worth $16 billion.
Late last year, the president launched another $12 billion bailout for farmers, many of whom were harmed by the White House’s misguided and ill-fated trade tariffs policy, though the money proved insufficient. As my MS NOW colleague Hayes Brown summarized, the policy was little more than “duct tape on a broken pipe,” which did “little to fix the underlying problem.”
In June, Trump made it clear that he was eyeing a possible fourth bailout for the industry. And this week he followed through, announcing an $8 billion bailout during a campaign rally in Kansas, specifically aimed at helping farmers address higher diesel costs. The New York Times reported:
Under the plan, known as the Harvest Fuel Relief Program, the Agriculture Department will use a formula based on how many acres and which crops farmers planted to reimburse them for a “portion” of their losses. The money will come from the Commodity Credit Corporation, a financing institution that the Agriculture Department uses to fund crop insurance and natural disaster payment programs.
Payment rates will be announced next month, and farmers will receive money at a later date.
There’s ample reason to believe the $8 billion will be insufficient. But just as notably, at no point during Trump’s event did he mention that farmers were struggling with higher diesel costs because of the war with Iran that the president launched eight months ago.
Indeed, the one thing that all four of the bailouts have in common is that they’re effectively admissions of guilt: Trump’s agenda continues to hurt his own country’s agriculture industry, which in turn has necessitated a series of payouts.
As for the timing of the president’s latest announcement, it comes just two weeks before Election Day, with early voting underway in many states. It’s a safe bet that the bailout was intended to address intensifying discontent among voters in farming communities, who have long backed Republicans but don’t appear to have much to show for it. As MS NOW reported this week:
After two decades of defeats in rural America, Democrats are suddenly putting up a fight in farm country. The party is running competitive Senate races in Iowa, Kansas and other farm states, as well as House races in heavily rural districts that could help it regain control of Congress in January.
Credit (or blame, depending on your party) for this reversal of fortune lies with President Donald Trump’s tariffs and his war with Iran, which have battered farmers and pushed the rural economy into crisis. The Department of Agriculture’s analysts expect farmers’ net incomes to decline by 5.5% this year, as costs rise and receipts fall. The National Agricultural Law Center’s tally of farm bankruptcies jumped 45% last year, and is on pace to rise another 11% in 2026.
Will Trump’s latest bailout affect voters’ attitudes, enough to stem the tide? We’ll find out in two weeks.
The post White House approves yet another bailout for farmers hurt by Trump’s agenda appeared first on MS NOW.
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Student-loan borrowers are legally entitled to debt relief — but they're still waiting for it to arrive, an advocacy group contends in a new court filing.
The Project on Predatory Student Lending — a borrower advocacy group — filed a new motion in its years-long lawsuit to get relief for thousands of defrauded borrowers.
In July, a federal court denied the Trump administration's request to delay relief under the Sweet v. McMahon settlement, which has provided $23 billion in relief to over 500,000 borrowers. Now, PPSL says that over 1,000 members of the settlement class are still waiting for loan discharges or refunds that the Education Department "was legally required to provide by deadlines that have long since passed."
The group filed a motion asking the court to enforce the settlement and hold the department in contempt, in order to compel compliance with the settlement terms and process relief within the set deadlines. Specifically, the motion asks the department to resume weekly meetings with the plaintiffs' counsel for status updates on the processing of the relief, and asks the court to enforce penalties if the department does not comply.
The Education Department said in its response that the motions are "baseless."
Additionally, a declaration from the department's ombudsman said that borrowers still awaiting refunds are not due to department failure, but rather, that those borrowers' accounts "warranted further review."
"Although it has taken staff some time to understand all of the complexities, the current staff have been reviewing and resolving Sweet complaints since approximately April 2024 with some staff added in 2025," the ombudsman said. "They are all incredibly well-versed in Sweet complaint resolution."
A public hearing in the case is scheduled for November 5.
Student-loan borrowers first filed a lawsuit against the department in 2019, accusing it of failing to process their borrower defense to repayment applications — claims borrowers can file if they believe they were defrauded. If approved, their student debt from the school would be wiped out.
A settlement in the case was reached under the Biden administration in 2022, and while batches of borrowers have received relief, PPSL said that others who qualify are still waiting.
Have a story to share about student loans? Contact this reporter at asheffey@businessinsider.com.
The American housing market deteriorated sharply in September as rising mortgage rates drove pending home sales to a record low and sent home construction tumbling, according to reports released Tuesday. The National Association of Realtors said its index of pending
The post Housing Slump Worsens Amid Higher Rates appeared first on Breitbart.
Farmers across the United States will soon get relief from the cost of diesel, President Donald Trump said during his rally near Wichita, Kansas, on Monday evening, CBS News reported.
The post WATCH: President Trump Announces $8 Billion in Relief to Help Farmers with Diesel Costs appeared first on Breitbart.
British and Gulf officials have called on businesses and investors to begin turning a landmark free trade agreement into concrete partnerships without waiting for its formal ratification, as both sides seek to deepen economic ties and expand cooperation beyond traditional trade.
The calls came during the UK-GCC Strategic Dialogue Forum, organised by The Business Year in central London on Tuesday, bringing together senior officials, representatives of Gulf sovereign wealth funds and private sector companies to explore investment opportunities arising from the agreement.
The UK became the first G7 economy to conclude negotiations on a free trade deal with the six-member Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) on 20 May 2026, when the British government announced that talks had been completed following nearly four years of negotiations that began in June 2022.
However, the agreement has yet to be formally signed and ratified, with both sides still working to finalise and legally verify its text before completing the necessary government and parliamentary procedures.
While the deal is not yet legally in force, officials at the forum stressed that businesses could already begin identifying investment opportunities, building partnerships and preparing projects that could benefit from improved market access once it takes effect.
GCC Secretary-General Jasem Mohamed Albudaiwi described the agreement as a "significant achievement" in relations between Britain and the Gulf states, stressing that its importance extended well beyond the immediate benefits of trade.
Speaking at the forum, Albudaiwi said the agreement would strengthen economic partnerships, support diversification efforts and improve competitiveness across the Gulf economies, which have increasingly sought to reduce their dependence on oil revenues.
"GCC estimates put total investment between the two sides at $643 billion, while bilateral trade reached approximately $70 billion in 2025," he said.
The agreement is expected to eliminate tariffs on more than 90% of GCC exports to the UK, opening new opportunities for businesses and strengthening the Gulf's position as a major economic partner for Britain.
"The deal would support the GCC's wider economic objectives, including greater economic integration, diversification of production, improving the business environment and empowering the private sector," Albudaiwi said.
He highlighted opportunities in developing smart cities, sustainable living and attracting leading international technology companies, alongside cooperation in healthcare, financial technology, artificial intelligence, advanced manufacturing and clean energy.
These sectors have become increasingly important to Gulf economic transformation plans, as governments seek to attract international expertise, develop new industries and create sources of growth beyond oil and gas.
The GCC chief stressed that the success of the agreement would ultimately be measured not simply by its signing, but by the joint ventures, business partnerships and economic opportunities it generated.
He urged business leaders and investors from both sides to seize the opportunities offered by the agreement and begin translating its provisions into practical projects.
British Trade Minister Lord Anas Sarwar echoed those calls, urging businesses not to wait until the agreement had been formally signed and ratified before exploring new partnerships.
Addressing the forum, Sarwar acknowledged that the Gulf was experiencing a "nervous time" and a "time of challenge", offering assurances of Britain's continued support for its regional partners.
"It is in difficult times that you know where your friends are," he said, explaining that his first overseas visit as trade minister had been to the Gulf.
Sarwar stressed that the partnership was important to the British government and could contribute to economic growth and improved living standards across the UK.
He described the relationship as being about more than signing an agreement, calling for immediate cooperation across sectors including aviation, security systems, financial services and legal services.
He also highlighted opportunities in artificial intelligence and digital infrastructure, pointing to Britain's research capabilities and the Gulf's access to energy and resources needed to support the expansion of data centres and cloud computing infrastructure.
Such cooperation could allow British companies to contribute technical expertise and specialist services to major Gulf development projects, while creating opportunities for Gulf investors to expand their involvement in Britain's technology and infrastructure sectors.
Sarwar said economic cooperation needed to work in both directions, with Britain seeking not only greater Gulf investment in the UK but also increased British investment and exports into Gulf markets.
He also encouraged businesses to explore joint investments in third countries, arguing that UK-Gulf cooperation should extend beyond bilateral projects.
Lord Mayor of London Alderman Sir Alastair King similarly highlighted the potential for British and Gulf investors to combine their resources and expertise to pursue opportunities in other international markets.
The UK hopes the agreement will encourage larger and more sustained flows of Gulf capital into British infrastructure, property and other strategic sectors, while opening one of the world's most important markets to British exporters.
The emphasis on joint investment also reflects a broader ambition to move beyond conventional trade in goods and services towards longer-term partnerships involving technology, infrastructure development and international projects.
GCC chief negotiator Raja Almarzoqi expressed optimism about the agreement's long-term economic benefits, revealing that negotiators from both sides had held approximately 900 meetings before reaching an agreement.
He said one of the most challenging aspects of the negotiations had been securing a unified position among the GCC's six member states, which have different economic priorities and domestic interests.
Almarzoqi cited studies by the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund suggesting that free trade agreements could increase trade between participating countries by 60% to 100% over five to ten years after implementation.
He expressed confidence that the UK-GCC agreement could deliver similar results, although the scale of any increase would depend on how businesses used the opportunities created by the deal.
Kuwait's Trade Minister Abdulaziz Naser Almarzouq also emphasised the importance of economic diversification, saying Gulf countries were seeking high-quality investments capable of supporting sustainable long-term growth.
He described Britain as a strong economic partner and called for existing relations to be expanded through new investment opportunities.
Discussions at the forum also focused on financial markets, investment and the Gulf states' economic transformation strategies, including Oman's efforts to diversify away from an energy-dependent economy.
The free trade agreement is expected to provide British companies with greater long-term access to Gulf markets while giving GCC businesses improved opportunities to expand their activities in the UK.
For businesses, the potential benefits extend beyond tariff reductions to opportunities for new commercial relationships, investment planning and greater participation in sectors targeted for growth by both sides.
However, the agreement's practical benefits will depend on its final provisions, implementation and the extent to which companies are able to take advantage of the new arrangements.
Although the main terms were agreed in May, the final legal text must still be completed and verified before the agreement can be signed. It will then need to undergo the necessary approval procedures in Britain and the GCC states, including parliamentary scrutiny in the UK.
Gabrijelagal/Getty Images
There's an income premium for job switchers — and for retirees.
The Social Security Administration recently released the cost-of-living adjustment for next year. About 72 million recipients will experience a 3.6% increase in their benefits in January, higher than the September three-month moving average year-over-year median wage growth for job stayers at 3.4%.
Independent economist Aaron Terrazas said cost-of-living increases for Social Security beneficiaries were higher than job-stayers' increases in three of the past six years, the most recent being the 8.7% 2023 increase announced in 2022 amid the post-pandemic inflation spike.
"Retiree income is adjusted with the cost of living, whereas people who are working are mostly compensated according to the cost of labor," Terrazas said. "For most of the past decades, we've been in a low inflation labor shortage world, so that's worked out in workers' favor, but it feels like that's shifting underneath the surface."
The headline consumer price index increased 3.7% from a year ago in September, moving away from the Fed's 2% inflation target but down from the high rates back in 2022. The Social Security Administration bases the annual cost-of-living adjustment on the average of a related inflation rate during the third quarter of each year.
"Indexing incomes to the cost of living rather than cost of labor is a big part of what fueled inflation, the wage-price spiral in the 1970s," Terrazas said. "We moved away from that practice for most of the workforce, but not for retirees. With the growing share of Americans in their retiring years, more and more consumers are, whether we want it or not, having their incomes indexed to inflation rather than the cost of labor."
This, Terrazas thinks, could continue to drive the K-shaped economy of the haves and the have-nots, as he said older consumers are driving an outsize share of spending, although that could change as boomers start to age out of the peak retirement spending years.
"Baby boomers are in their core retirement spending years," he said. "When we think about consumer trends and what's holding up the economy, that is something we can't forget — that once people reach their 80s, we should expect that spending to start to contract as people become homebound."
Meanwhile, the three-month moving average for job switchers was higher than for job stayers and higher than the announced COLA, so job-hopping could be better than job-staying if you prioritize earning more. The problem is that it may be hard to find a new opportunity, depending on where you're looking. White-collar fields have been experiencing job loss, and employment levels in the leisure and hospitality sector have been pretty volatile.
The US has spent the last couple of years in a low-hire, low-fire period: Layoffs are low, so if you have a job, you're likely doing OK, but job openings and hiring have also been anemic, making an ominous situation for job seekers.
While that means employees may be more secure if they have a job, it also means employers don't have to do a lot to convince people to stay. Some workers have turned to "loud working" to try to make sure their accomplishments are being heard internally at their company or externally via LinkedIn or other platforms, whether that be because of fear of job cuts, to make the case for a raise, or some other reason.
"It's tough, I think, for job seekers to see headlines when we get the jobs report that unemployment is low, we're continuing to create jobs, but it's something very different from what they're feeling," Terrazas said. "And so I think it is important for them to understand that message that they're not alone. Many people, especially in white-collar work, are struggling to find new jobs or struggling to stay afloat in their workplaces."
L’era dei voli low cost potrebbe essere finita. Nel 2027 le tariffe aeree in Europa potrebbero registrare rincari record fino al 20%, mettendo a segno uno degli aumenti più marcati della loro storia recente.
A lanciare l’allarme è Michael O’Leary, ceo di Ryanair, secondo cui le tensioni geopolitiche in Medio Oriente e il conseguente caro-petrolio rischiano di travolgere i margini operativi di tutto il comparto.
Nel corso di una conferenza stampa tenutasi a Bruxelles nella giornata di oggi, il numero uno del primo vettore low cost europeo ha tracciato uno scenario di forte rincaro per i prossimi dodici mesi:
vedremo, a mio avviso, il più grande aumento delle tariffe aeree mai registrato in Europa
ha dichiarato O’Leary, sottolineando come neanche un incremento così marcato dei prezzi dei biglietti e degli eventuali supplementi carburante possa bastare a compensare la violenta impennata dei costi energetici.
Il fattore di maggiore vulnerabilità per le compagnie risiede nella gestione delle coperture finanziarie contro le oscillazioni del carburante. Ryanair e tutti gli altri vettori europei che finora hanno permesso a una generazione intera di volare a prezzi contenuti si trovano ad affrontare questo periodo ampiamente scoperti rispetto al rincaro del greggio.
O’Leary ha spiegato che Ryanair è coperta soltanto per il 15% del fabbisogno del prossimo anno. Questo significa che l‘85% del carburante necessario per garantire il servizio resta esposto alle oscillazioni del mercato.
A complicare il quadro c’è anche il cambio delle abitudini dei viaggiatori, che tendono a posticipare sempre di più l’acquisto dei biglietti, rendendo complessa e imprevedibile la pianificazione operativa dei voli.
La combinazione tra caro-carburante e pressione fiscale porterà il vettore a ridurre la propria presenza in Francia e Belgio in risposta all’aumento delle imposte locali, mentre sul fronte industriale si attende per gennaio la consegna del primo Boeing 737 Max 10 (con altri 16 aeromobili previsti entro aprile) per cercare di efficientare i consumi.
I titoli del settore riflettono già la gravità della crisi: Ryanair ha ceduto fino al 2,1% in borsa, con una flessione del 25% da inizio anno che rischia di rendere il 2026 l’anno peggiore per il titolo dal 2018.
Secondo O’Leary, questa morsa tra caro-petrolio, fisco e vincoli operativi ridisegnerà il mercato, spingendo fuori le compagnie più fragili.
Il settore mostra già i primi segnali di riassestamento. Vettori come Air Baltic e la spagnola Volotea sono impegnati in complessi processi di ristrutturazione aziendale. Lufthansa ha superato Air France-Klm nell’acquisizione di una quota della portoghese Tap, mentre il fondo Apollo Global Management valuta il rilevamento di EasyJet.
Michael Macor/The San Francisco Chronicle via Getty Images
Uber is offering ride-hailing drivers something that many haven't seen in years: Big bonuses.
The ride-hailing service is coaxing some drivers to take more rides, offering up to several hundred dollars in "incentive" pay if they complete a set number of rides within a set time period, according to several screenshots of the offers seen by Business Insider.
In one example, a driver was offered $525 if the driver completed 45 trips within a few days. Similar offers involved smaller payouts and fewer trips, but paid out proportional amounts of $10 to $12 per trip.
That's a huge pay bump for many drivers, who make as little as a few dollars per trip, said Sergio Avedian, an Uber driver and senior contributor to the gig-driver-advocacy blog and YouTube channel The Rideshare Guy.
The bonuses might also be Uber's attempt to get more drivers on the road to meet rider demand during busy periods like Halloween and the holiday travel season, Avedian said.
"This may tell the story that they need supply," he said. "They're saying that we need to get everybody out there."
Some drivers have also gotten messages from Uber encouraging them to refer friends to sign up as drivers or get those who haven't driven in a couple of years back on the app, according to screenshots seen by Business Insider. Payment for those referrals can reach up to $1,225.
The payments are a potential boon to Uber drivers, whose pay can vary significantly between cities.
Uber drivers have to cover their own costs, such as car maintenance, since they are independent contractors, not full-time employees. Rising gas prices have eaten into drivers' pay after the US and Israel started a war with Iran earlier this year.
An Uber spokesperson did not provide details on why the company is offering the payments.
Uber has used targeted incentive payments before.
In 2021, demand for rides began to outpace the number of available drivers after many had stopped driving during the pandemic.
In response, the company decided "to invest fast and to invest aggressively in attracting drivers back to Uber" and increased the number of active drivers on the app by 65% between January and November that year, CEO Dara Khosrowshahi said on an earnings call at the time. Uber later pulled back on the extra pay.
"When we were coming out of the pandemic, they were short tons of drivers," said Avedian, who was driving for Uber at the time. "It was crazy bonuses out there."
More recently, riders have been paying more per mile and waiting longer for their rides to show up, according to a study published last month.
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The EU “will not drill and will not buy” Arctic oil and gas, EU officials said on Tuesday (20 October), as the European Commission presented its new Arctic strategy.
“Our position on Arctic oil, gas and coal has not changed,” a senior EU official told reporters. “It’s fairly simple. We will not drill in the Arctic, and we will not buy hydrocarbons from the Arctic.”
The strategy follows months of heavy lobbying by Norway’s prime minister Jonas Gahr Støre and his cabinet.
Oslo used the energy supply disruption caused by the Iran war to push the EU to drop its 2021 support for a moratorium on oil and gas drilling in the Arctic, insisting that it was crucial for future energy security.
But EU officials made clear on Tuesday they did not buy that argument. “We do not need Arctic resources to keep our energy supply secure,” the official said.
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Ya se ha desatado el caos a la hora de investigar qué está ocurriendo exactamente en relación con los últimos movimientos, sin duda turbios y vinculados a EE. UU., en territorio y aguas pakistaníes. Tras una evaluación inicial en Transition Protocol —que, como se reconoció, no proporcionó todas las respuestas necesarias—, profundizamos en un análisis mucho más exhaustivo respaldado por varias fuentes.
Lo que estamos observando en varios puntos clave de la conexión terrestre entre Irán y Pakistán, de extrema sensibilidad, no es un cierre total de la frontera, sino un delicado equilibrio de doble vía por parte de Islamabad entre la tremenda presión financiera de Washington y el salvavidas estratégico de Teherán.
Así que esta es la situación actual, combinando los datos contrastados con nuestras últimas consultas.
El punto clave: el detonante normativo fue una medida de sanciones bancarias, no solo la seguridad fronteriza.
Aunque los responsables provinciales de Baluchistán justificaron públicamente el sábado el cierre de dos puntos clave —Taftan y Gabd–Rimdan— alegando motivos de seguridad, lucha contra el terrorismo y lucha contra el contrabando, lo que más importa es el mecanismo exacto en torno a un memorándum emitido el viernes pasado por el Ministerio de Comercio pakistaní.
Dicho memorándum revocó de inmediato una prórroga, concedida el 3 de octubre, de la exención del Formulario Electrónico de Importación (EIF, en inglés) para mercancías importadas de Irán, y coincidió con la orden de Islamabad de cerrar el puesto de inmigración de la Agencia Federal de Investigación (FIA, en inglés) en Taftan.
Lo fundamental es que, sin la exención del EIF, los importadores pakistaníes deben tramitar las compras iraníes a través de los canales bancarios oficiales de Pakistán —lo que, por supuesto, las sanciones estadounidenses hacen absolutamente imposible.
Peyman Sanandaji, presidente de la Comisión de Transporte de la Cámara de Comercio de Teherán, confirmó oficialmente que ha sido el cumplimiento de las sanciones bancarias (el abandono del EIF) lo que ha paralizado las exportaciones iraníes a Pakistán.
El impacto inmediato en los pasos fronterizos oficiales fue considerable: están en peligro más de 4.000 toneladas de importaciones diarias de GLP iraní a través de Gabd–Rimdan. El expresidente de la Cámara de Comercio de Quetta, Ayoub Miryani, informó de que solo en Gabd–Rimdan hay más de 2.000 contenedores varados, con cientos de camiones de mercancías más atascados en Taftan.
¿Por qué está ocurriendo esto ahora? Debido a la nefasta coincidencia entre el pago del tramo del FMI del 7 de octubre que Pakistán tenía que abonar y la «Operación Economic Outcast» del Tesoro imperial estadounidense.
En el marco de la «Operación Economic Outcast», Washington dio a terceros países un «plazo definido para cerrar» las vías de suministro comerciales relacionadas con Irán o enfrentarse a la expulsión del sistema financiero estadounidense. A esto le siguieron las designaciones de la OFAC del 1 de octubre contra las redes ferroviarias terrestres e industriales de Irán y las medidas del 8 de octubre contra 17 petroleros de la «flota en la sombra».
Pero entonces, el 7 de octubre —solo nueve días antes de que el Ministerio de Comercio revocara la exención del EIF—, Islamabad llegó a un acuerdo con el FMI sobre la cuarta revisión de su Servicio Ampliado del Fondo para desbloquear 1.210 millones de dólares. Esto aún requiere la aprobación del Consejo Ejecutivo del FMI.
Por supuesto, no existe ningún documento público que demuestre una orden directa de EE. UU. o del FMI para cerrar las fronteras entre Irán y Pakistán. Pero fuentes de Islamabad subrayaron que mantener vigente una exención de instrumentos bancarios de duración indefinida antes de la votación del Consejo del FMI se había convertido en una vulnerabilidad insostenible para Pakistán en materia de sanciones.
Las fuentes de Islamabad insisten en que la medida vino acompañada de auténticas preocupaciones por el contrasabotaje y se coordinó discretamente entre Islamabad y Teherán (cursiva mía) para que la pausa no rompiera las relaciones bilaterales.
El portavoz del Ministerio de Asuntos Exteriores iraní, Esmaeil Baghaei, calificó públicamente la interrupción como una pausa temporal debida a «problemas técnicos» y «medidas de precaución».
Las fuentes oficiales pakistaníes, por su parte, insistieron en que el endurecimiento de los controles es una medida conjunta de lucha contra el terrorismo que refleja un «entendimiento mutuo» con Teherán tras un repunte de los atentados en Sistán-Baluchistán; las emboscadas en autopistas; y un ataque marítimo perpetrado el 11 de octubre contra embarcaciones de la Guardia Costera de Pakistán frente a Jiwani —que las autoridades pakistaníes atribuyeron a «actores extranjeros» que pretendían sabotear la mediación de Pakistán en el acuerdo de paz con Irán—.
Vuelta al mismo patrón de siempre: yihadistas salafistas utilizados como arma y manipulados por los sospechosos habituales.
La única llamada telefónica confirmada públicamente entre el viceprimer ministro Ishaq Dar y el ministro de Asuntos Exteriores Abbas Araghchi tuvo lugar el domingo 18 de octubre —dos días después del memorándum del 16 de octubre— y sus comunicados oficiales solo mencionan la diplomacia regional y la reunión de la OCI en Bagdad.
Por lo tanto, la coordinación previa a nivel de los ministros Dar y Araghchi y las detenciones específicas por sabotaje forman parte de nuestra propia información.
Exportaciones asimétricas de alimentos y rutas informales
En resumen, los productos siguen cruzando las fronteras. Islamabad ha permitido deliberadamente que sigan circulando los productos perecederos y las exportaciones alimentarias pakistaníes hacia Irán. Los productos perecederos esenciales —entre ellos, tomates, patatas y cebollas— siguen circulando, junto con los flujos tradicionales de petróleo y combustible, a través de la porosa frontera de 909 km.
El registro normativo explica el motivo: hace ocho meses, Pakistán promulgó una exención bancaria específica para diez productos alimenticios exportados a Irán por vía terrestre (en la que se enumeraban explícitamente el arroz, las patatas, las cebollas, los tomates, la carne y la fruta), además de productos farmacéuticos.
La Cámara de Comercio de Teherán confirmó el pasado sábado que, si bien las exportaciones iraníes a Pakistán se ven paralizadas por la normativa del EIF, las importaciones de Pakistán a Irán continúan, y el comercio informal de combustible y el comercio fronterizo a través de Baluchistán ya alcanzan un volumen estimado de entre 800 millones y más de 1 000 millones de dólares anuales al margen de los controles aduaneros oficiales.
Debe prestarse especial atención a los puertos de Gwadar y Karachi, así como a la arquitectura general de tránsito entre China e Irán. Según nuestras fuentes, el tránsito de terceros países y el tránsito entre China e Irán a través de Pakistán sigue estando protegido.
A nivel jurídico, un documento que detalla el tránsito de mercancías por Pakistán estableció seis corredores de tránsito terrestre designados que unen Gwadar, Karachi y Port Qasim con Gabd y Taftan para la carga de terceros países con destino a Irán bajo una garantía bancaria.
Además, una notificación de la Junta Federal de Ingresos del pasado mes de junio designó formalmente la estación de ferrocarril de Taftan como puesto aduanero terrestre, y los ministros iraníes y pakistaníes han promovido el corredor ferroviario para conectar China con Irán y Europa.
Sin embargo, siguen existiendo dos limitaciones operativas muy complicadas.
La modernización de la línea ferroviaria Quetta-Taftan sigue figurando oficialmente como una mejora prevista; y la designación por parte de la OFAC, el 1 de octubre, de la Compañía Ferroviaria de la República Islámica de Irán (RAI) tenía como objetivo explícito frenar el cambio de Teherán de las rutas marítimas bloqueadas al ferrocarril.
En resumen: se necesita una habilidad extraordinaria para enfrentarse al Imperio de la Piratería.
Islamabad ha llevado a cabo una maniobra clásica y calculada: revocar de forma visible la exención formal de importación del EIF en Taftan y Gabd-Rimdan para proteger su próximo tramo del FMI, de 1.210 millones de dólares, y a los bancos paquistaníes de las sanciones secundarias del Tesoro de EE. UU.
Y todo ello sin dejar de mantener vivas las exportaciones alimentarias paquistaníes, las vías fronterizas informales y los marcos de tránsito de terceros países con Teherán.
Que esto siga siendo un breve reajuste administrativo o se consolide en un cuello de botella más prolongado lo decidirán tres indicadores durante las próximas quince días:
Movimientos de mercancías documentados a través del enlace ferroviario Taftan-Zahedan.
Que la lección quede grabada en las tierras raras para que todo el Sur Global reflexione: no hay forma de luchar contra el Imperio sin eludir su control del sistema financiero internacional.
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