Finance
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Tariffs are generating only 25% of the revenue needed to pay interest on national debt—despite pitch that it would be a silver bullet
When President Trump announced his plans for a new tariff regime, he said the action was “primarily to pay down debt, which will happen in very large quantity.” But fast-forward a little under a year, and the revenues generated by customs duties aren’t enough to make a dent in interest payments on national debt—let alone…
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Vietnam has to find $200 billion to fund its ambitious growth agenda. Techcombank’s CEO thinks that has to come from overseas
When Techcombank CEO Jens Lottner looks at Vietnam’s growth ambitions, he sees a simple mismatch: big plans, not enough money. Vietnam’s economy grew by just over 8% in 2025, the second-highest rate in a decade. Hanoi’s ambitions are even more aggressive: It wants Vietnam to grow by 10% a year by 2030, and reach high-income…
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Filling up your car won’t feel normal until next summer, S&P says
The war in the Middle East might be drawing to a close, but one of the largest energy disruptions in history still needs some time to iron out the kinks. On Sunday, the U.S. and Iran announced a memorandum of understanding to end their conflict that has been waged on and off since February. The…
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Trump turned the dollar into a foreign policy tool, and now risks undermining the currency’s extraordinary status, think tank says
For decades, the U.S. largely held off on approving currency swaps with foreign powers, save for rare circumstances. When it did, the Federal Reserve would trade currencies to shore up international dollar reserves, including at the height of the 2008 financial crisis. The central bank would also sign off on swap lines to restore confidence…
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SpaceX just surpassed Amazon’s market cap, overtaking the 31-year-old company on day three of public trading
SpaceX, the freshly-IPO’d company that barely has been on the public markets for three days, has already surpassed 31-year-old Amazon in market cap. Not only that, it briefly overtook Microsoft too on Tuesday morning. This is a major pull for a company that earned less than a quarter of what Amazon raked in. Last year,…
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Kevin Warsh’s first Fed test is here: He must navigate hawks ‘on the offensive’ and Wall Street’s hunger for details on regime change
Kevin Warsh has, to the best of his abilities, stayed out of the limelight in the run-up to taking over as chairman of the U.S. Federal Reserve. He had no plans to overshadow the final throes of Jerome Powell’s leadership; staying well away from the halls of the central bank and its staff, steering clear…
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Robinhood announces it will reduce headcount by 10%, CEO seeks to avoid ‘heavily-layered’ organization
Robinhood, the app-based brokerage that helped fuel the meme-stock boom, is preparing another round of layoffs as it becomes the latest tech company to slim down its workforce. In a recent Form 8-K filing released on Tuesday, the company announced that it would trim about 290 full-time employees, amounting to 10% of its workforce, and…
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The jet fuel crisis never existed, sources say
The end of the conflict with Iran will be accompanied by a sigh of relief from anyone planning air travel. For months, jet passengers have worried that flights might be cancelled due to a lack of jet fuel, given that 20% of the world’s supply transits through the Strait of Hormuz. At one point, the…
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A ChatGPT prompt almost killed Ryan Serhant’s $50 million NYC penthouse deal. Here’s how he saved it
AI can drudge up untrustworthy sources or just feel kind of “off,” but the technology has also been pretty consequential for some business owners. In fact, celebrity real estate agent Ryan Serhant said at Fortune’s Brainstorm Tech conference last week that ChatGPT nearly blew a $50 million deal for his firm. When asked by Fortune’s…
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UFC fighters at the White House got paid with Trump family stablecoins—but an ethics expert says a gap in the law allows this
Trump’s Ultimate Fighting Championship Freedom 250 spectacle on the White House South Lawn resulted in record bonuses for the winners. The fighters, though, didn’t get paid in U.S. dollars, which would seem to be the obvious currency for such an event. Instead, the prize money came in the form of USD1, a type of synthetic…