- U.S. President Donald Trump called on Congress to add tariffs on Iran to a sanctions bill against Russia and Tehran that has bipartisan support.
- Signs of a recovery in crude flows through the Strait of Hormuz are easing supply concerns, with oil prices extended declines on Friday.
- Canadian convenience and mobility retailer Alimentation Couche-Tard announced plans on Friday to acquire Poland’s largest convenience store operator Zabka Group.
- China’s factory activity contracted unexpectedly in July for the first time since February.
- The Bank of Japan kept its policy rate steady on Friday.
- AI rally comes roaring back in Asia with South Korea’s chip heavyweights SK Hynix and Samsung Electronics surging over 20%.
Vessels transit the Bab el-Mandeb Strait off the coast of southern Yemen on July 25, 2026.
Khaled Ziad | Afp | Getty Images
Hello, this is Justina Lee writing to you from Singapore, filling in for Leonie
U.S. President Donald Trumphas called on Congress to add tariffson Iran to a sanctions bill against Russia and Tehran that has bipartisan support, but those duties are likely to have little effect to Iran’s economy
Signs of a recovery in crude flows through the Strait of Hormuz areeasingsupply concerns, with oil prices extending declines on Friday
In Asia, China’s factory activitycontracted unexpectedlyin July for the first time since February, the Bank of Japankeptits policy rate steady, while shares South Korea’s chip heavyweights SK Hynix and Samsung Electronics come roaring back to life
What you need to know today
Hostilities between the U.S. and Iran continue to intensify, after U.S. President Donald Trump called on Congress to add tariffs on Iran to a sanctions bill against Russia and Tehran that has bipartisan support
“I’d like to see tariffs on Iran. It would make it much stronger,” Trump said of the bill
However, those duties would have little effect, given that the U.S. imports nearly nothing from Iran. Data from the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative showed the U.S. imported just $1.4 million in goods from Iran in 2025. Works of art, collectors’ pieces and antiques were the largest category of those imports, making up 55% of the value, according to the firm Trading Economics
Meanwhile, signs of a recovery in crude flows through the Strait of Hormuz are easing supply concerns. Oil prices extended declines on Friday, with West Texas Intermediate futures for September delivery dropping 1.6%. Brent crude futures, the international benchmark, fell by nearly 1%
Moving over to mergers and acquisitions, Canadian convenience and mobility retailer Alimentation Couche-Tardannounced plans on Friday to acquire Poland’s largest convenience store operator Zabka Group
The deal, which values Zabka at approximately 32.62 billion zloty ($8.6 billion), would expand Couche-Tard’s presence in central and eastern Europe
Over in Asia, a slew of economic and market news dominated the headlines on Friday
China’s factory activity contracted unexpectedly in July for the first time since February, weighed by a slump in domestic orders and production disrupted by typhoons
The latest survey of businesses by China Beige Book also found that one of the Chinese economy’s few growth drivers lost steam in July, with “U.S.-bound shipments fell outright for the first time in several months.”
Meanwhile, the Bank of Japan kept its policy rate steady on Friday, while warning that the country’s core inflation could exceed its 2% target
In Asian markets, the AI rally comes roaring back with South Korea’s chip heavyweights SK Hynix and Samsung Electronics surging over 20% on Friday, tracking huge gains in U.S. technology stocks. Blockbuster earnings from Amazon and Microsoft helped renew optimism around AI spending
And finally
Anthropic says its Claude models ‘gained unauthorized access’ to other organizations’ systems
Anthropic on Thursday said it discovered three instances where its Claude artificial intelligence models accessed the internet during an evaluation and “gained unauthorized access to the real systems of three different organizations.”
The company said it found these incidents after carrying out a “a large-scale retrospective review” of its cybersecurity evaluations. Anthropic said the review was prompted by a separate but similar security incident that OpenAI disclosed last week
OpenAI said a combination of its models escaped an isolated testing environment that had very limited internet access. The models chained together a series of vulnerabilities to reach the open web and eventually gain access to Hugging Face, which operates an open-
—Ashley Capoot
