Hello, this is Katie Foley writing to you from London. Welcome to today’s edition of the Daily Open newsletter.

It genuinely feels like we could be on the cusp of some big shifts.

It’s now confirmed — next week we will see the biggest IPO of all time in SpaceX.

The Israel-Lebanon ceasefire announced overnight has seen oil ease off, and although we’ve heard it before, U.S. President Donald Trump says a deal with Iran could come “over the weekend”.

Investors are hoping that several of the year’s biggest unanswered questions are nearing a resolution.

Global stocks are sliding, with Asia-Pacific markets tracking Wall Street losses overnight. European and U.S. futures point to continued pressure in today’s session.

But oil has eased off slightly as Israel and Lebanon agreed to implement a ceasefire, after talks brokered by the U.S., boosting hopes for a broader deal to end the U.S.-Israeli war with Iran.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said in a wide-ranging interview with CNBC’s Sara Eisen in Jerusalem on Wednesday that President Trump had warned Iran of “a full-scale return to military action,” if necessary, emphasizing that it would ultimately be the U.S. president’s decision. Netanyahu, however, noted that there had been tactical disagreements between the U.S. and Israel, though they were largely on the same page on their Middle East strategy.

Meanwhile the U.S. House of Representatives delivered a largely-symbolic rebuke to Trump’s authority on Iran, with four Republicans joining Democrats to vote for a resolution that would block the U.S. President from continuing the war without Congressional approval.

In corporate news, SpaceX finally made it official, setting a fixed price of $135 per share for its IPO next Friday, with a valuation of $1.77 trillion. That move is set to make CEO Elon Musk the world’s first trillionaire. But don’t assume it will all be plain sailing, a CNBC review of 30 major initial public offerings over the past 15 years shows stocks tend to fall and suffer sharp drawdowns in the first year.

Elsewhere, the EU unveiled its long-delayed “tech sovereignty” package, which aims to wean the bloc off dependence on U.S.and Chinese tech giants. The measure has unsurprisingly faced criticism that it does not go far enough. Former U.K. Deputy Prime Minister and Meta’s former President of Global Affairs Nick Clegg told CNBC that European AI laws are a “dog’s dinner.”

On the diplomatic front, Trump confirmed in a post on Truth Social he will travel to Evian, France later this month for the G7, where he might run into OpenAI chief Sam Altman who was personally invited by President Emmanuel Macron, as exclusively reported by CNBC.

— Katie Foley

SoftBank’s OpenAI bet and rising debt are raising liquidity…

Hello, this is Katie Foley writing to you from London. Welcome to today’s edition of the Daily Open newsletter.

Geopolitics generates noise, but AI keeps producing signal.

We spent the last 12 hours parsing Iran headlines, trying to determine whether President Donald Trump’s latest comments and Iranian state media reporting indicate anything concrete, or just another turn in a negotiation that seems perpetually ‘close’.

At the same time, Anthropic moved closer to a public listing and Sam Altman, the CEO of bitter rival OpenAI, discussed the “race” to go public with CNBC, while SoftBank’s Masayoshi Son told us we’re still in the early innings of a technological revolution measured in trillions of dollars.

Investors may not know where oil will trade next. But they seem increasingly convinced they know where capital spending, infrastructure investment and corporate attention will be directed for the next decades.

Anthropic said it confidentially filed its IPO prospectus with the Securities and Exchange Commission, setting up a potentially historic share sale for investors ready to jump into artificial intelligence. “This gives us the option to go public after the SEC completes its review,” Anthropic said in a statement on Monday. “The proposed initial public offering will depend on market conditions and other factors.”

Meanwhile, CNBC’s David Faber sat down with OpenAI CEO Sam Altman for a wide-ranging interview. When asked if there is a race to be the first to go public, Altman said no, that the true race was to deliver the best technology and “we’ll do it when we think it makes sense.”

Alphabet said it plans to sell $80 billion in stock, including through a $10 billion investment by Berkshire Hathaway. The Google parent company said in a statement that the capital will “fund investments in its world-class AI compute infrastructure to meet its unprecedented customer demand.” For Berkshire, the transaction adds to a position it has been rapidly building over the past three quarters, marking one of the conglomerate’s largest recent equity investments.

Softbank CEO Masayoshi Son has identified physical AI and robotics as the next trillion-dollar opportunities. Asked by CNBC’s Arjun Kharpal what sectors excite him most, Son said “both” humanoid and industrial robotics, “with physical AI as a core.”

In geopolitics, President Donald Trump shrugged off the possible collapse of peace negotiations with Iran, telling CNBC, “I don’t care if they’re over, honestly.” Trump told CNBC’s Eamon Javers in a phone interview he thought the protracted discussions had “started to get very boring.” Oil jumped more than 4 percent on the news, after Iranian state news outlet Tasnim reported that Tehran was halting…

Hello, this is Leonie Kidd writing to you from London. Welcome to today’s edition of the Daily Open newsletter.

Chatting to my colleagues in the London newsroom this Monday morning, we remarked how there appears to be two parallel markets at play.

There is an AI-fueled bull market driving stocks from Wall Street to Japan to record highs, as every inch of the AI stack is scrutinized for investment opportunities.

Conversely, there is the geopolitically driven world of risk, which remains volatile as developments taking place far from Silicon Valley keep assets like oil swinging from session to session.

Each day, these market forces jostle for the top spot in investors’ minds – which do you think it is today?

Investment juggernaut Softbank has become Japan’s most valuable firm. Shares rallied through the Asian trading session on Monday, propelling the Nikkei 225 above 67,000 for the first time.

The group, led by CEO Masayoshi Son, has made a €75 billion AI infrastructure commitment to France, its largest investment in Europe. He described the country as “a leading AI infrastructure hub in Europe.”

CNBC will speak exclusively to Masayoshi Son from Paris later this morning. Watch here on CNBC Pro.

Staying within the AI stack, Nvidia is pushing into PCs with a new ARM-based chip for Microsoft, Dell and HP laptops. During a keynote address at Taiwan’s Computex conference on Monday, Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang unveiled a new N1X processor made alongside Microsoft.

“Microsoft and Nvidia are going to reinvent the PC,” Huang said. “This is the first completely re-engineered, reinvented line of PCs that has happened in 40 years.”

Across broader markets, an escalation in hostilities in Iran is driving oil prices higher. U.S. Central Command announced that it had conducted “self-defense” strikes on Iranian targets throughout the weekend, while Israel ordered troops to push deeper into Lebanon.

U.S. President Donald Trump said Saturday that he is in “no hurry” to make a deal with Iran, as the war dragged into its fourth month.

Over the weekend, U.S. Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth addressed the Shangri-La Dialogue in Singapore and gave a stark warning to his international peers: “Allies who refuse to step up and carry their own weight for our collective defense will face a clear shift in how we do business.” Read more of the key quotes from that meeting here.

Stocks have started the month of June on a broadly positive note. In the Asia-Pacific session, South…

Hello, this is Leonie Kidd writing to you from London. Welcome to today’s edition of the Daily Open newsletter.

In some ways, we end the week where we started, with conflicting accounts of how close the U.S. and Iran actually are to reaching a peace agreement.

A slew of corporate news has continued to support major markets, while oil prices have retreated further from their recent highs.

But it remains to be seen who will “outwait” whom to get the perceived upper hand in these peace negotiations.

U.S. President Donald Trump has yet to issue final approval for a 60-day memorandum of understanding, which Tehran has reportedly signed off on. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said Trump has “several red lines” for any agreement, while the President himself told a cabinet meeting he would not be pressured.

“They thought they were going to outwait me, you know. ‘We’ll outwait him, he’s got the midterms.’ I don’t care about the midterms,” Trump told cabinet colleagues.

Defense Ministers from across the globe are meeting at the Shangri-La Dialogue in Singapore, with U.S. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth due to make an address to the group early on Saturday.

Asian markets look set to end the week on a positive note, while U.S. and European futures are on course for a more muted open on Friday.

The biggest moves have been in oil markets. Today, crude prices are trading lower, with Brent now down over 17% through May, while WTI has fallen by over 15% on the month.

Energy major Exxon has issued a stark warning that oil inventories will fall to record lows in the coming weeks. Senior Vice President Neil Chapman told an event in New York: “I mean really, really low levels… You can debate whether [it’s] going to hit those really low levels in two weeks or three weeks. Once you get to that point, then you’ll see [the] price shoot up.”

In other corporate news, Dell shares surged almost 40% in extended trading after the technology group blew past Wall Street’s earnings forecasts and raised its guidance. Some analysts are citing the solid performance to Michael Dell’s early moves to establish good relations with the Trump Administration.

Also overnight, Blue Origin’s New Glenn rocket has exploded during a ground test in Cape Canaveral, Florida. The space group is led by Amazon founder Jeff Bezos, who took to X to confirm that all personnel are safe, adding, “Very rough day, but we’ll rebuild whatever needs rebuilding and get back to flying. It’s worth it.”

— Leonie Kidd

I was at the exclusive launch of Ferrari’s new EV that sent the stock tumbling. But there may be light at the end of the…

Hello, this is Leonie Kidd writing to you from London. Welcome to today’s edition of the Daily Open newsletter.

The war in Iran is once again the dominant market force today, with whipsaw trade in Asia across stocks and oil prices.

Officials insist the ceasefire still holds, but how long can that last as the frequency of attacks from both sides increases?

A significant escalation in tension between the U.S. and Iran has sparked a risk-on reaction in early trading across Asia and European futures.

Oil prices are driving higher after American forces launched fresh strikes in Iran against a military site believed to threaten U.S. troops and commercial shipping through the Strait of Hormuz, a U.S. official told MS NOW. They also reportedly intercepted and downed several Iranian drones.

Following that, Iran’s Revolutionary Guards said on Thursday that they had targeted a U.S. airbase at around 4:50 a.m. local time, according to the Islamic Republic’s semi-official Tasnim news agency. 

Meanwhile, Kuwait activated its own air defenses in response to what it described as “hostile missile and drone threats.”

In a set of exclusive interviews, CNBC spoke with Federal Reserve governors Neel Kashkari and Austin Goolsbee about the inflationary impact of the conflict in the Middle East. Kashkari said the fight against price pressures is taking priority as the labor market is “in decent shape,” while Goolsbee said the energy inflation tied to the war was creating a “stagflationary shock” in Asia.

The EU is reportedly preparing a new plan to reduce its dependence on U.S. technology by backing European alternatives in several critical sectors. That’s according to the Financial Times, which cited a draft document. It says the bloc is looking to increase incentives to help with the construction of data centres, whilst also favouring homegrown cloud and AI tech firms.

CNBC spoke with Europe’s AI giant, Mistral AI, with the CEO Arthur Mensch saying: “Europe is starting to look at AI as a strategic asset and there is a realization by policymakers that something needs to be done.”

In other corporate news, the CEO of supercar group Lamborghini has told CNBC the company was right to cancel its own EV. His comments come amid the backlash to Ferrari‘s new EV, the Luce, which has wiped billions off the Italian car group’s market capitalization.

Staying in the EV space, Chinese group Nio has seen shares pop over 10% on the unveiling of its latest EV model, the first release in over two years. The company is pricing the car competitively despite Beijing’s efforts to curb excessive…

Hello, this is Leonie Kidd writing to you from London. Welcome to today’s edition of the Daily Open newsletter.

The $1 trillion club just got bigger, as the AI-fueled rally propelled more companies into the mega-market-cap space.

The race to scale continues at breakneck speed, and is keeping tech-heavy indices across the world at record levels.

It’s one of the first days when developments in Iran have not dominated international markets, but it is not far from investors’ minds as the fragile truce continues to be tested.

Shares in SK Hynix jumped on Wednesday, taking the South Korean chipmaker’s market capitalization above $1 trillion for the first time. The move follows a blistering rally for the stock, which has skyrocketed around 250% since the start of the year. The gains have been fueled by surging demand for AI chips, which has driven South Korea’s KOPSI to record highs.

And it’s not the only one to join the $1 trillion club over the last 24 hours. U.S. tech group Micron is also riding the AI wave. On Tuesday, UBS tripled its price target for the stock, sending shares 19% higher on the day. You can get Jim Cramer’s take on the top nine U.S.-based trillion-dollar companies here.

Staying with technology, industrial profits in China have surged by 24.7% in April, marking the fastest growth since November 2023. Computing and electronics equipment manufacturing saw earnings almost double from a year ago.

European companies are committed to their supply chains in China, according to a survey released by the European Union Chamber of Commerce, which said one-third of respondents are onshoring further in the country.

Meanwhile, top ECB policymaker Francois Villeroy de Galhau has told CNBC that the central bank “will do what is necessary” to keep inflation on target.

“If I speak on behalf of the ECB, this means do what is necessary to bring inflation back to 2% in the medium term. Markets can be assured of that,” he told CNBC.

In corporate news, shares in Italian luxury car giant Ferrari closed deep in the red after investors took a cynical view of the group’s highly anticipated electric vehicle launch. The Luce was met with widespread disappointment over its appearance and skepticism over the $640,000 price tag.

BP also ended Tuesday in the red after the board removed chairman Albert Manifold over “serious” conduct concerns. He told the Financial Times he “will not allow a false narrative to go unchallenged.”

Across broader equity markets, Japan and South Korea have hit fresh record highs as markets weigh the progress of U.S.-Iran ceasefire talks against fresh tensions in the region. U.S. stock futures are little changed after the S&P 500 closed at another record on Tuesday. In Europe, stocks are heading for a…

Estée Lauder’s shares surged after talks over a potential merger with Spanish beauty group Puig were “terminated.”

The British beauty giant, which owns the Clinique and Tom Ford Beauty brands and is listed on the New York Stock Exchange, said in March that it was in discussions with Puig, the owner of Charlotte Tilbury and Jean Paul Gaultier, to combine the companies.

But Estée Lauder said in a statement on Thursday that both parties had terminated discussions and that it remained focused on its “Beauty Reimagined” turnaround strategy, which involves focusing on premium launches and streamlining the company’s supply chain.

“We are grateful for the conversations we have had with Puig,” Estée’s president and CEO, Stéphane de La Faverie, said in the statement. “We are reiterating our confidence in the power of our incredible brands, our talented teams, and our strength as a standalone company.

“We are more optimistic than ever about our ability to unlock significant long-term value through Beauty Reimagined, and we remain focused on accelerating that progress.”

Estée Lauder’s shares were up 11.2% shortly after the opening bell. Puig plunged nearly 14% by 3:46 p.m. CEST (9:46 a.m. E.T.). Estée Lauder has a market cap of $28 billion. Puig’s is 2.7 billion euros (roughly $3 billion).

Puig did not immediately respond to CNBC’s request for comment.

Estée said in February that it expects a $100 million hit to its full-year profitability due to tariffs. Its “Beauty Reimagined” strategy, which is intended to boost growth, is expected to cost between $1.2 billion and $1.6 billion.

The company laid out plans to slash 3,000 jobs as part of a restructuring and is looking to cut up to 10,000 positions, which, it said, could save $1.2 billion.

Analysts were concerned about the merger due to a mismatch and potential power struggle between the brands, with investors cheering the termination of the deal as a near “lucky escape,” AJ Bell’s head of markets, Dan Coatsworth, said in a note on Friday.

“Handbags at dawn appear to have kiboshed a near-$40 billion fashion and beauty merger deal,” Coatsworth said.

“Estée Lauder and Puig weren’t the most obvious companies to park together. One is focused on skincare, makeup, and haircare, while the other specialises in designer clothing. They meet in the middle on fragrances and perfumes.

“Putting everything under one roof felt a bit like a jumble sale rather than a match made in heaven.”

 He added: “A decision has been made to go it alone, meaning Estée Lauder needs a plan B to drive its recovery efforts.”

Shares listed in Europe look set to move higher at the open on Friday, with the U.S.-Iran war and economic data in focus.

Futures tied to the regional Stoxx 50 were last seen trading 0.9% higher. Those tied to London’s FTSE 100 were up by 0.4%. German DAX futures added 0.9% ahead of the week’s final regular trading session, while French CAC 40 futures gained around 0.8%.

A rally in Europe on Friday would put regional stocks on course for their fourth consecutive day of gains. The pan-European Stoxx 600 is currently on track for a weekly rise of 2.25%.

Investors are continuing to monitor negotiations between the U.S. and Iran. Oil prices surged on Thursday after Tehran reportedly said it would insist on keeping enriched uranium in Iran, renewing concerns about a prolonged conflict that would disrupt the oil market for longer than expected. Oil extended its rally into Friday, with global benchmark Brent crude holding slightly above $104 a barrel.

In Europe, investors are keeping an eye on a series of data prints. The GfK German Consumer Confidence report for June is due later this morning. It is expected to shed some light on how rising energy costs have hit consumer sentiment in Europe’s largest economy. The corresponding report for the U.K. is also due to be released, as well as figures on public sector borrowing and retail sales in Britain. Business confidence data from France is slated for release later.

In corporate news, U.S. cosmetics giant Estée Lauder and Spanish beauty conglomerate Puig said Thursday that they had ended merger talks. New York-listed shares of Estée Lauder rose more than 10% in after-hours trading.

Kevin Warsh’s newly released financial disclosures shed light on the Federal Reserve chair nominee’s vast wealth, but also raise questions about parts of his holdings that aren’t fully revealed in the paperwork. That could be a challenge for Warsh as he seeks to overcome a legacy of ethics scandals under the current chair, Jerome Powell.

Warsh in filings to the Senate Tuesday disclosed owning assets worth roughly $135 million to $226 million. That is in addition to what Forbes estimates as a $1.9 billion fortune held by his wife, Jane Lauder, granddaughter of the cosmetics founder Estée Lauder.

But Warsh’s disclosures don’t reveal everything about his wealth. For one, the forms ask only for reporting values in broad ranges, making precise calculations of his wealth impossible. Two individual assets are each listed as simply being worth over $50 million. Their worth could be just above that threshold, or far higher. 

Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D.-Mass., called attention Thursday to that pair of holdings, both in a a financial vehicle called Juggernaut Fund. Warsh in his filings describes them as connected to Duquesne Family Office, the financial firm run by investor Stanley Druckenmiller. Warsh has worked there since leaving the Fed more than 15 years ago.

But that is the extent of the information Warsh gives about a slice of assets that appears to make up the bulk of his personal wealth. In the filings, Warsh declines to say what is actually in the Juggernaut holdings, as well as a few other, smaller funds, because he is bound by “pre-existing confidentiality agreements.”

“Not telling about $100-million plus of assets means that it’s just not possible to understand about his entanglements,” Warren told reporters Thursday at the Capitol.

Warsh “is the first Fed nominee not to be in compliance with ethics rules, and the first Trump nominee in this term, not to be in compliance with ethics rules,” Warren said. The Congressional Research Service confirmed Warsh’s outlier status, a spokesman for the Banking Committee said.

A note from a government ethics official on his filings says Warsh is at the moment out of compliance with ethics rules for the holdings where he didn’t disclose the funds’ underlying holdings.

Warsh has pledged to divest those assets within 90 days of being confirmed. And once he does, the ethics official notes, Warsh will be back in compliance with ethics rules.

The Office of Government Ethics declined to comment, saying it doesn’t discuss individuals’ filings.

Warsh declined to comment. He met with Warren earlier Thursday. 

“This is an unusual situation,” said Cynthia Brown, senior ethics counsel at Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, a watchdog group.

“The optics of so many items related to investment funds not being disclosed, by someone nominated to…