War Financial News

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories.How should you invest now that Kevin Warsh is almost certain to be the next Federal Reserve chair? The short answer: Stay the course.Warsh is headed for Senate confirmation and is likely to take over from Jerome Powell in mid-May. His first meeting leading the Federal Open Market Committee will be in June.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories.Most of us move through our days submerged in routines, juggling everyday responsibilities. Every now and then, we come up for air, a brief pause to disconnect and reset. But that’s getting harder.Even these moments are now crowded with conversations about war, fragile markets and the growing impact of artificial intelligence on jobs.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories.India’s top companies are estimated to have spent anywhere between ₹69,000 crore and ₹72,000 crore on legal matters in the fiscal year ended March. The spending has risen from ₹60,000 crore in FY25 due to shifting regulations, geopolitical risks and rising compliance demands.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories.When Yeats wrote his celebrated poem The Second Coming in 1919, the lines “Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold;/Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world” caught the world’s attention, recovering as it was from the wanton violence of World War I. What inspired the poet is contested, but his words are as relevant today as they were a century ago. The senseless Iran war is taking the core of global certainties apart, with much of the globally accepted compact coming unstuck.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories.WASHINGTON—Just weeks after President Trump declared the Strait of Hormuz “COMPLETELY OPEN AND READY FOR BUSINESS” only to see ship traffic stall, the administration is now asking other countries to join a new international coalition that would enable ships to navigate the waterway.The effort, called the “Maritime Freedom Construct,” was spelled out in an internal State Department cable sent to U.S. embassies on Tuesday that called on U.S.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories.Jerome Powell held his last press conference as Federal Reserve chair on Wednesday afternoon, but said he would stay on as a Fed governor pending the conclusion of an investigation into the renovation of the Fed’s Washington, D.C., headquarters.Powell, whose term as a governor runs through early 2028, said he would keep a low profile and has no interest in acting as a shadow chair under his presumptive successor, Kevin Warsh. That may be welcome news to Warsh, given the other challenges he is likely to face, including the most fractious Federal Open Market Committee in more than 30 years.The Fed held its federal-funds rate target steady after its April 28-29 policy meeting in a range of 3.5% to 3.75%, as expected.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories.India’s outsourcing industry, its largest white-collar employer, is a juggernaut that has all but stopped moving. The dollar revenue at the top five software-services exporters has grown slower than 3% for 10 straight quarters—a shadow of the double-digit expansion in the previous two decades. As these companies squeeze hiring to survive the existential challenge posed by artificial intelligence (AI), the aftershocks are starting to upend everything from real-estate demand to mortgage-underwriting norms.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories.Investors will be keenly watching how the US-Iran war-induced volatility in raw materials in March impacted Hindustan Unilever Ltd's (HUL) margins when the packaged consumer goods giant announces its fourth-quarter results on Thursday.HUL is expected to post a profit after tax of ₹2,612 crore and revenue of ₹16,270 crore in the three months ended 31 March, according to Bloomberg's 21-analyst estimate. In the third quarter, it reported a net profit before exceptional items of ₹2,562 crore and revenue of ₹16,235 crore.The company, often considered a proxy for consumption in India, has had a tough March quarter, with several key inputs used across its product portfolio directly exposed to disruptions triggered by the US-Iran war.For example, the price of palm oil, a key ingredient for HUL, which makes soaps under brands such as Lux, Lifebuoy, Dove, Pears, Rexona and Hamam, has been rising as the war has pushed major producers such as Malaysia and Indonesia to increase their biodiesel capacity.Similarly, prices of liquid paraffin, used in creams, have edged up slightly.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories.China emerged largely unscathed at a time when the West Asia war battered nearly every major emerging market economy through higher energy prices and their ripple effects. The dragon retained its top rank on Mint’s Emerging Markets Tracker (EMT) for March 2026.India, by contrast, slipped three places to sixth as the conflict intensified rupee depreciation, foreign outflows and export weakness.The divergence underscores a widening gap in external-sector stability.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories.WHEN THE Organisation of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) meets on April 29th, the club will be contemplating the departure of one of its longest-standing members. The United Arab Emirates (UAE), which has been part of the cartel since Abu Dhabi joined in 1967, has announced it will leave on May 1st. The war in Iran and its blockade of the Strait of Hormuz have choked off the region’s energy exports, hammering the UAE and its neighbours in the Gulf.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories.President Trump has instructed aides to prepare for an extended blockade of Iran, U.S. officials said, targeting the regime’s coffers in a high-risk bid to compel a nuclear capitulation Tehran has long refused.In recent meetings, including a Monday discussion in the Situation Room, Trump opted to continue squeezing Iran’s economy and oil exports by preventing shipping to and from its ports.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories.With global energy dependency rapidly shifting from conventional sources to nuclear power, it is natural to fear a Chernobyl or Fukushima-like incident anywhere in the world today. Human exposure to nuclear risks is also rising through genetic research in agriculture, radiation use in healthcare, and the increasing possibility of nuclear conflict.In such circumstances, a natural question arises: do our everyday insurance policies cover nuclear risks?As on date, none of the insurers in India provide coverage for nuclear exposure or related nuclear incidents.Whether personal, institutional, or commercial, almost all insurance policies exclude coverage for risks arising out of nuclear exposure or similar events.Apart from underwriting challenges due to lack of data, the core reason is structural: nuclear exposure is rarely individualistic.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories.After recovering nearly 7.5% between the March and April derivatives series amid the Iran war, options traders are baking in a near 900-point range for Nifty from Tuesday's closing of 23,995.70 over the next one week, per exchange data.Traders expect the Nifty to trade in a 23,558–24,442 range until next Tuesday, based on the volume weighted average price per share (65 shares make one contract) of the 24,000 call and put options expiring on 5 May."The price of the 24,000 straddle (call and put) indicates a rangebound market after the smart rally from the March to April derivatives expiry," said Kruti Shah, quant analyst at Equirus.Shah expects upside pressure to set in around 24,550–24,600, which coincides with the market high of 21 April — 24,601.7 — after which the index corrected 2.5% to Tuesday's close of 23,995.7.A Nifty derivatives series expires on the last Tuesday of every month. During the course of an expiry month, the NSE offers a weekly index options expiry every Tuesday.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories.Dubrovnik, CroatiaEurope’s data center markets need more energy. Demand for energy to power the data centers is projected to grow from 10 gigawatts in 2024 to 35 gigawatts by 2030.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories.TOMBEAU BAY, Mauritius—Over centuries, the people of the remote Chagos Archipelago have been battered by forces beyond their control. Slavery.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories.I can see from your coat, my friend, that you’re from the other side/ Can you tell me, please—who won the war?—Wooden Ships by Crosby, Stills, Nash and YoungIt is now relatively quiet on the West Asian front and there is little doubt that we have moved away from the brinkmanship of 7 April, a critical turning point. On that day, US President Donald Trump threatened a civilizational war against Iran, which responded by mobilizing human shields to protect critical infrastructure and suspending truce talks with the US. In that moment, the price of Brent crude oil for physical delivery briefly surged to $144 per barrel and headlines warned of ‘Armageddon.’ This marked the peak of global panic.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories.WASHINGTON—Hours after gunfire erupted outside the White House Correspondents’ Dinner, Sen. Kevin Cramer called President Trump to check on him.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories.In 2025, renewables surpassed coal in the global power mix for the first time in over a century, according to a new report by energy think tank Ember. India and China played a pivotal role in this transformation, with electricity generated from fossil fuels falling in both countries.However, coal still accounts for more than 70% of India’s electricity.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories.Two months into the West Asia war, a conflict that triggered the world's greatest energy crisis, second- and third-order effects are surfacing everywhere, from falling fertilizer output and shortage of Coke cans to rising condom prices. This is a grim reminder of how deeply economic activity is tethered to crude oil and its derivatives.Beyond its role as a fuel source, crude oil serves as a vital feedstock for manufacturing over 6,000 products.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories.WASHINGTON—King Charles III arrives in Washington on Monday to publicly celebrate 250 years since a nascent U.S. republic ousted his forebears, and privately ensure that a fraying trans-Atlantic relationship can cope with another two-plus years of President Trump.The four day visit—billed as King Charles’s most high-wire diplomatic act since coming to the throne—will include a speech to Congress, the first time a British monarch has spoken there since 1991, a private audience with Trump and state dinner in Washington, as well as trips to New York and Virginia.The attempted attack at the White House Correspondents’ Dinner cast a shadow over the visit.

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories.The jagged path of India’s stock market attests to how shaky the mood of investors is. Although the Sensex is up 6.6% in April (while the Nifty-50 index rose 7%) after its 12% tumble in war-stricken March (the Nifty-50 slid more than 11%), last week ended on a glum note.A tentative truce in West Asia may have mostly silenced the blasts of war, but the lifting smoke revealed a double choke of Hormuz, with even Iran’s oil trapped, like the exports of other Gulf countries. As this US-Iran deadlock is proving harder to break than a level-headed analysis of it would suggest, the war’s impact on India’s economy might still be gaining in intensity.