Yen intervention = US self-preservation

Horizons Middle East & Africa 8/4/2026 (Video)

SoftBank's AI funding plans to face reckoning at earnings

SoftBank's AI funding plans to face reckoning at earnings TOKYO, Aug 4 : Technology investor SoftBank Group reports first-quarter earnings on Thursday, with analysts focused on how it will fund its ongoing investment in OpenAI and the impact of rising leverage on its balance sheet. SoftBank has become one of the biggest backers of OpenAI and its ability to keep funding its ambitions in artificial intelligence has become a key test for the broader AI investment boom. The finances of AI firms...

Oil rebounds as markets trade mixed following Wall Street rally

Asian shares were mixed on Tuesday morning, while European pre-market data pointed to a slightly higher open following a Wall Street rally supported by easing oil prices. In addition to earnings reports this week, investors were also still weighing the impact from last week's joint US-Japan currency intervention, analysts said. Japan's benchmark Nikkei 225 slipped 0.3% to 63,585.58, as the US dollar inched up to 157.51 Japanese yen from 157.18 yen.

BP profit more than doubles as Trump blasts Big Oil for ‘making too much money’

Britain's BP on Tuesday reported a sharp upswing in second-quarter profit, as energy supermajors reap massive profits from higher fossil fuel prices amid hostilities between the U.S. and Iran. The oil giant posted underlying replacement cost profit, used as a proxy for net profit, of $5.7 billion for the April to June period. That beat analyst expectations of $5 billion, according to an LSEG-compiled consensus.