Asia-Pacific markets began the first full trading week of 2026 on a stronger note after the U.S. said it had attacked Venezuela and captured President Nicolas Maduro over the weekend. Oil prices edged lower as markets weighed the potential impact of geopolitical tensions. U.S. authorities said Maduro and his wife, Cilia Flores, were flown to New York following the operation and charged with narco-terrorism conspiracy and other crimes. An indictment said drug trafficking had “enriched and entrenched Venezuela’s political and military elite.” Japan’s benchmark Nikkei 225 index jumped 2.97% to close at 51,832.8 in its first trading session of the year, while the Topix index added 2.01% to 3,477.52, after hitting a record high.
Stocks rose on Monday even after the U.S.′ attack on Venezuela and capture of leader Nicolas Maduro as crude oil prices saw gains and investors bet the action would not lead to bigger geopolitical conflicts that upset markets. The Dow Jones Industrial Average gained 594.79 points, or 1.23%, to close at 48,977.18. The 30-stock index also hit a new all-time high in the session. The S&P 500 advanced 0.64% and ended at 6,902.05. The Nasdaq Composite added 0.69%, settling at 23,395.82. Shares of defence giants General Dynamics and Lockheed Martin received a bit of a boost, moving higher by 3.5% and 2.9%, respectively, with Trump’s latest action showing quick military strikes would be a key part of his policy for dealing with geopolitical issues that arise.
Gold prices rose above $4,450 per ounce on Tuesday, marking a third consecutive session of gains, driven by increased demand for safe-haven assets amid political turmoil in Venezuela. Bullion surged 2.7% on Monday following the US military operation in Venezuela over the weekend that led to the removal of President Nicolas Maduro. President Donald Trump said on Sunday that Washington would temporarily “run” Venezuela and warned of a second strike if the interim government fails to comply with US demands. Investors are also closely monitoring upcoming US labor market data, particularly the December jobs report due on Friday, for further clues on the Federal Reserve’s policy outlook.
WTI crude oil futures hovered around $58.2 per barrel on Tuesday, after a volatile session on Monday that ended 1.7% higher amid heightened geopolitical tensions involving Venezuela. Investors continued to assess the impact of US actions toward Venezuela on global oil supply. While Venezuela holds the world’s largest proven crude oil reserves, analysts noted that any disruption to its exports is unlikely to have a meaningful impact on prices, as the country accounts for only a small fraction of global supply. Years of underinvestment have left Venezuelan production at less than 1% of global output, limiting its influence on the broader market. At the same time, oil prices remain under pressure from abundant global supply.
Even as China eyes new opportunities to build global influence in the wake of the U.S. attack on Venezuela, Beijing’s immediate priority is protecting its economic interests, analysts said. China reacted swiftly to the military strike on Saturday night, expressing shock and condemnation. Beijing subsequently called on the U.S. to release the ousted Venezuelan president Nicolás Maduro and his wife, and urged Washington to resolve the crisis through dialogue. China’s Foreign Ministry spokesperson Lin Jian said at a press briefing Monday that China maintains “positive communication and cooperation” with the Venezuelan government and that its willingness to deepen cooperation, including on oil exports, would not change regardless of how the situation evolves.
Denmark is in “full crisis mode” after U.S. President Donald Trump once again set his sights on Greenland, following the strike on Venezuela. “We need Greenland from the standpoint of national security and Denmark is not going to be able to do it, I can tell you,” Trump said Sunday on Air Force One, echoing similar remarks made separately to The Atlantic magazine. His comments come a day after the U.S. conducted a major military operation in Venezuela, capturing Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro and his wife, Cilia Flores, in a surprise intervention that sent shock waves across the globe. It has raised alarm in Denmark, which is responsible for the defense of Greenland, a self-governing Danish territory. “I have to say this very directly to the United States: It makes absolutely no sense to talk about the need for the United States to take over Greenland,” Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen said Sunday in a Facebook post.
Deposed Venezuelan leader Nicolas Maduro appeared in a New York court on Monday afternoon, saying that he had been “kidnapped” with his wife by U.S. forces from their home in Caracas, and that he was a “prisoner of war,” as he pleaded not guilty to drug trafficking charges Maduro and his wife, Cilia Flores, who is also charged in the case, have been held since they were taken from Venezuela on Saturday after a U.S. strike on the country at the orders of U.S. President Donald Trump. Flores also pleaded not guilty. “I’m innocent. I am not guilty of anything,” Maduro repeatedly said through a translator to Judge Alvin Hellerstein during his appearance in U.S. District Court in Manhattan.
India is likely to retain the existing inflation target for its central bank with the setup viewed as effective in managing prices, Bloomberg News reported on Monday, citing finance ministry officials familiar with the matter. The flexible inflation targeting in India mandates a 4% headline inflation target within a tolerance band of 2% to 6%. The RBI’s target is set every five years and is due in March. The Ministry of Finance did not immediately respond to a Reuters request for comment. In September, Reuters reported that the RBI was expected to recommend retaining the existing inflation target for third consecutive time following feedback from stakeholders who backed the framework. India adopted the inflation-targeting framework and formally tasked the central bank with it in 2016. It was last renewed in 2021.
Elon Musk’s X is being investigated by authorities in Europe, India and Malaysia after its Grok chatbot let users create and share AI-generated sexualized images of children and women. British media watchdog Ofcom also said it’s requested information from X, which is owned by xAI, concerning the Grok issues. And on Sunday, a member of Brazil’s parliament said on social media that she’s asked the country’s federal public prosecutor and data protection authority to suspend use of Grok until an investigation is completed. The probes follow a global surge over the past few weeks in the use of Grok to create and share nonconsensual, intimate images, or NCII, derived from photos or videos of real people in response to user’s prompts. The concerning images have been widely shared on X.
Advanced Micro Devices CEO Lisa Su showed off a number of the company’s AI chips on Monday at the CES trade show in Las Vegas, including its advanced MI455 AI processors, which are components in the data center server racks that the company is selling to firms like ChatGPT maker OpenAI. Su also unveiled the MI440X, a version of the MI400 series chip designed for on-premise use at businesses. The so-called enterprise version is designed to fit into infrastructure that is not specifically designed for AI clusters. The MI440X is a version of an earlier chip that the U.S. plans to use in a supercomputer. At the Monday event, OpenAI President Greg Brockman joined Su on stage and said chip advancements were critical to OpenAI’s vast computing needs. Looking to the future needs of companies like OpenAI, Su previewed the MI500 and said it offered 1,000 times the performance of an older version of the processor. The company said the chips would launch in 2027.
Intel launched Panther Lake, its new AI chip for laptops, on Monday at the CES trade show in Las Vegas, as the company seeks to reassure investors about the first product made using its next-generation manufacturing process called 18A. Jim Johnson, senior vice president and general manager of Intel’s PC group, offered technical details about the company’s first line of Panther Lake chips known as Intel Core Ultra Series 3. The chips feature a new transistor design and a way to deliver power to the chip due to the company’s 18A manufacturing process. At the event, Intel CEO Lip-Bu Tan said the company made good on its promise to ship its first products with the 18A manufacturing process in 2025, referring to the Panther Lake chips.
Dell has brought back its popular XPS laptop lineup a year after retiring the premium brand, as it looks to drum up demand in a sagging personal computer market. The company on Monday unveiled its thinnest laptops yet, XPS 14 and XPS 16, with plans to launch an even lighter XPS 13 later this year. The announcement at the annual Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas marks a U-turn for Dell following "very broad" feedback from its partners. "I owe you an apology today. We didn’t listen to you. You were right on branding," Dell Chief Operating Officer Jeff Clarke said in a media briefing. Launched in the 1990s, XPS helped Dell carve a share of the consumer market after years of targeting businesses. But the company shifted its strategy last year to sell models under "Dell," "Dell Pro," and "Dell Pro Max" names.
Lucid Group, Nuro and Uber on Monday unveiled a production-intent robotaxi, marking a key step toward commercial deployment for the autonomous vehicle partnership. The unveiling at the CES technology conference in Las Vegas places the trio among a growing group of companies pursuing large-scale robotaxi deployment in the U.S., alongside Alphabet’s Waymo and Elon Musk’s Tesla among others. The companies said on-road testing began in December, led by Nuro using engineering prototypes supervised by safety operators, a move toward a planned robotaxi launch in the San Francisco Bay Area later this year. The testing program combines real-world driving, closed-course testing and simulation to validate safety before commercial deployment. Production of the robotaxi is expected to begin later this year at Lucid’s Arizona factory, pending final validation.