Saturday, July 25, 2026

The US air war against Iran has become a nightly ritual. American strikes pounded Iranian targets for a 13th consecutive night, and Tehran hit back by launching drones at US military bases in Bahrain and Jordan, while the Navy disabled a tanker trying to slip past its blockade of Iranian ports. Saudi Arabia piled in too, striking Iran-backed Houthi rebels in Yemen after another of its vessels was attacked in the Red Sea (via NPR).

The question now is how much bigger this gets. Trump said he is close to deciding whether to launch the largest offensive of the war, insisting Iran "needs more of the same," even as he claimed the two sides are still talking and that Tehran is "getting more serious." Oil vaulted past $100 a barrel during the week on the escalation before easing back (via NPR).

American Express delivered the profit and still got dumped. The card giant posted revenue of $19.6 billion, up 10%, and earnings of $4.53 a share, up 11%, but its stock fell as expenses jumped 12% to $14.5 billion on a pricey Platinum card refresh and heavier marketing to lock in big spenders (via Bloomberg).

The economy is not rolling over, at least not yet. S&P Global's flash US manufacturing PMI came in at 53.8 for July, comfortably in expansion territory, a sign factory activity is holding up even as new tariffs reshuffle supply chains and Wall Street frets about an AI-spending hangover (via CNBC).

Wall Street limped to the finish of an ugly week. Friday ended mixed as the Dow rose 0.46% to about 51,947 and the S&P 500 was essentially flat, up 0.05% to roughly 7,412, while the Nasdaq slid another 0.64% to around 24,976. All three indexes booked weekly losses, with the tech-heavy Nasdaq down about 2% as an AI-spending scare kept hammering megacaps (via CNBC).

Intel could not catch a break, and neither could oil bulls. The chipmaker's shares dropped nearly 8% even after strong earnings, extending the tech rout, while crude retreated about 4% on Friday, pulling Brent back below $96 a barrel after the week's Iran-driven spike toward triple digits (via CNBC).

Silicon Valley just drew a line in the sand over open-source AI. Nvidia, Microsoft, Meta and more than 20 other companies, including Palantir, IBM, Hugging Face and Andreessen Horowitz, signed a letter urging the Trump administration to resist "premature restrictions" on open-weight AI models and to expand compute access for startups and researchers (via CNBC).

The letter was really about China, and about who did not sign it. The campaign follows Moonshot AI's Kimi K3, a Chinese open model that recently topped benchmarks and that the White House claims "distilled" Anthropic's technology. Notably absent from the letter: OpenAI and Anthropic themselves, both reportedly preparing IPOs, leaving two of the industry's biggest names on the other side of the open-versus-closed fight (via Bloomberg).

The WNBA's two biggest young stars finally share a stage tonight. Caitlin Clark and Paige Bueckers headline the All-Star Game at Chicago's United Center, drafted onto rival squads by Hall of Famers Teresa Weatherspoon and Cynthia Cooper, capping a weekend that opened Friday with a 3-point contest featuring Azzi Fudd and Marina Mabrey (via ESPN).

The Dodgers keep humming toward October. Roki Sasaki spun seven strong innings and Kyle Tucker launched a two-run homer as Los Angeles beat the Mets 4-2, another tidy win in a summer that has the defending champions looking every bit the class of the National League (via ESPN).

Comic-Con turned into Marvel's comeback party. The studio returned to a packed Hall H with "Avengers: Doomsday," the Russo brothers' December tentpole, teasing the shocking return of Chris Evans as Steve Rogers and the MCU debut of the original X-Men alongside Florence Pugh's New Avengers (via Variety).

And then Johnny Depp crashed the party. The actor made a surprise San Diego appearance in full Ebenezer Scrooge garb to promote his latest project, one of the odder viral moments of a convention already stuffed with "Star Trek" anniversaries and DC's "Lanterns" (via Variety).