Daily News
Dow Posts Worst Week Since March as Treasury Yields Top 5%; Gold Holds Above $4,350; Oil Falls to $98 on Iran Diplomacy Hopes; Trump Threatens Iran Ahead of UN Summit
21 September 2026
Today in Brief
In Asia, the Kospi added 1.66% and the Kosdaq gained 0.82%, Hong Kong’s Hang Seng rose 0.57% and the CSI 300 added 0.42%, while Japan’s markets were closed for a holiday. The Dow fell 95.40 points (0.18%) to 51,682.64 on Friday, capping its worst week since March, while the S&P 500 edged up 0.17% to 7,650.50 and the Nasdaq rose 0.39% to 26,522.55 as the 10-year Treasury yield hovered near 5.006%, its highest since July 2007. Gold held above $4,350 an ounce for a second straight session, while crude oil dropped to around $98 a barrel for a fourth straight session on hopes that diplomacy could ease the Middle East conflict.
In other news: President Trump threatened to destroy Iran’s economy or eliminate its leadership absent a deal, and said he’d “probably” meet Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian at the UN General Assembly, while Iran’s military warned of “painful” retaliation; Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent called talks with China’s Vice Premier He Lifeng “successful” ahead of the Trump-Xi summit; Trump announced a security deal giving the U.S. a larger military presence in Greenland; Chinese biopharma stocks jumped in Hong Kong on reports the U.S. may ease rules on licensing Chinese drugs; Meta’s Facebook and Instagram suffered a U.S. outage; Anthropic confirmed it has quietly built a biology wet lab for its AI drug research; roughly $18 billion in loans tied to an Oracle-leased New Mexico data center came under pressure; and Kylian Mbappe left Nike to sign with On.
In Asia, the Kospi added 1.66%, while the small-cap Kosdaq gained 0.82%
In Asia, the Kospi added 1.66%, while the small-cap Kosdaq gained 0.82%. Australia’s benchmark S&P/ASX 200 was flat. Japan’s markets are closed for a holiday. Hong Kong’s Hang Seng index was 0.57% higher, while mainland China’s CSI 300 added 0.42% The Federal Reserve hiked interest rates last week for the first time in three years, as the U.S. struggles with taming sticky inflation and elevated bond yields. Oil prices remain near $100 a barrel. The 10-year Treasury yield is also hovering close to 5%.
Dow falls Friday and posts worst week since March as Treasury yields rise
The Dow Jones Industrial Average slid on Friday as traders wrapped up a volatile week and navigated rising Treasury yields and elevated oil prices along with the Federal Reserve’s first rate hike in three years. The 30-stock Dow shed 95.40 points, or 0.18%, to close at 51,682.64. The S&P 500 rose 0.17% to end at 7,650.50, while the Nasdaq Composite advanced 0.39% to settle at 26,522.55. Treasury yields increased, weighing on equities. The 10-year yield, which climbed above 5% to hit its highest level since July 2007 earlier in the week, briefly rose back above that threshold after sliding Thursday. It was last up almost 6 basis points at 5.006%.
Gold held above $4,350 an ounce on Monday after advancing for two consecutive sessions
Gold held above $4,350 an ounce on Monday after advancing for two consecutive sessions, supported by falling oil prices that eased concerns over rising inflation and the prospect of further interest rate hikes. Oil prices fell for a fourth straight session amid signs of increased diplomatic efforts to resolve the Middle East conflict and restore energy flows from the region. President Donald Trump said he would “probably” be open to meeting Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian on the sidelines of the United Nations General Assembly this week, where he could also hold talks with other Persian Gulf leaders. Meanwhile, investors are awaiting several appearances by Federal Reserve officials this week after the central bank raised rates last week for the first time in three years.
Crude oil dropped to around $98 per barrel on Monday, declining for the fourth straight session
Crude oil dropped to around $98 per barrel on Monday, declining for the fourth straight session, pressured by hopes that increased diplomatic efforts could help end the Middle East conflict and restore energy flows from the region. President Donald Trump said he would “probably” be open to meeting Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian on the sidelines of the United Nations General Assembly in New York this week. Trump may also meet with other Persian Gulf leaders, while he is scheduled to hold a summit with Chinese President Xi Jinping. Qatari Prime Minister Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al-Thani urged Gulf states to cooperate in restoring stability across the region, noting that messages were being exchanged between the US and Iran.
Iran vows ‘painful’ retaliation as Trump piles on pressure ahead of UN General Assembly meeting
President Donald Trump threatened to destroy Iran’s economy or eliminate its leadership if Tehran doesn’t strike a deal, raising the stakes as Iranian officials head to New York for this week’s gathering of world leaders at the UN. Trump told Fox News on Sunday that the only options on the table were “wiping Iran out,” or letting its economy “rot,” unless both sides reach a deal. Separately, Iran’s military said that its intelligence suggested a new, large-scale strike being prepared by the U.S. and its allies, warning of “painful” retaliation across the Middle East. Regional countries backing such a strike would be treated as parties to the conflict, it said.
Bessent calls meeting with China Vice Premier He Lifeng ‘successful’ ahead of Trump-Xi summit
Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said on Sunday he had a successful meeting with Chinese Vice Premier He Lifeng ahead of Chinese President Xi Jinping’s visit to the U.S. this week. The talks covered artificial intelligence and trade, among other issues ahead of Trump and Xi’s Sept. 24 summit in Washington, D.C. Bessent, emerging from the meeting alongside U.S. Trade Representative Jamieson Greer, said the two sides had discussed setting up a “U.S.-China AI Dialogue,” with the U.S. proposing the two countries set up a notification mechanism for incidents regarding AI. The notification mechanism would be for incidents rising “up to a national security level from AI,” he said.
Trump says U.S. to build a ‘large Military presence’ in Greenland as part of a security deal with it and Denmark
President Donald Trump on Friday announced an agreement with Greenland and Denmark that gives the U.S. what he described as “permanent control over security, and all other needs” in the Danish island territory. “We will immediately begin the process of developing a large Military presence in the appropriate part of Greenland, of which there are many,” Trump said in a Truth Social post. Greenland already has a U.S. military presence under a decades-old defense agreement with Denmark. The deal as described in Trump’s post appears to stop far short of his prior insistence that Greenland must be made a part of the United States. Greenland has maintained it is not for sale, and the European Union earlier this year united to rebuke Trump over his push to acquire the island.
Chinese biopharma stocks jump as U.S. weighs keeping door open to drug deals
Chinese biopharma stocks jumped in Hong Kong on Monday after a report that the U.S. is considering rules that would allow American pharmaceutical companies to continue licensing most drugs from Chinese firms. Innovent Biologics jumped 6%, while Akeso surged 8% and CSPC Pharmaceutical Group gained more than 6%. HUTCHMED climbed 3%, while Sino Biopharmaceutical added 8%. The Hang Seng Biotech Index was also up more than 5%. The moves followed a Reuters report Friday, citing people briefed on the process, that the U.S. Treasury Department is drafting rules that would likely allow American pharmaceutical companies to invest in promising new drugs being developed by Chinese firms, excluding those related to pathogens or biotechnology that could be weaponized.
Meta’s social networks down for thousands of users in US
Meta’s social networking platforms Facebook and Instagram were down for thousands of users in the U.S. on Sunday, according to Downdetector.com. There were more than 17,000 reports of issues with Facebook, as of 9:11 PM ET, and more than 5,000 outages on Instagram as well, according to Downdetector.com, which tracks outages by collating status reports from a number of sources. Meta did not immediately respond to a Reuters request for comment. Since the numbers on Downdetector are based on user-submitted reports, the actual number of affected users may vary.
Anthropic quietly sets up biology lab as it ramps AI drug program
Anthropic has quietly set up a laboratory to do physical biology work as it pushes its artificial-intelligence ambitions into the world of drug science. At a time when fears of AI are gripping the public, the startup has built a wet lab, or place for physical experiments, in the San Francisco Bay Area, two people familiar with the matter said. Anthropic has said it wants to unlock treatments for rare diseases, and its biology work has gone beyond “in silico” or computer evaluations. In a Reuters interview on Tuesday, Anthropic’s head of life sciences, Eric Kauderer-Abrams, confirmed the startup’s wet lab. “We believe that to do biology, the final test is still and will be for a while in real lab work,” he said.
Oracle’s $18 billion data center debt under pressure
About $18 billion in loans tied to an Oracle-leased data center in New Mexico has come under pressure, with loans quoted at 89 to 91 cents on the dollar by syndicate banks including Santander and Jefferies, the Financial Times reported on Friday. The development comes amid concerns that growing local opposition to the project over fears it would impact water supply and air quality could derail Oracle’s massive AI infrastructure build-out, the FT report said. The 1,400-acre “Project Jupiter” campus in Doña Ana County is part of Oracle’s broader agreement with OpenAI to provide AI computing capacity. The project secured $18 billion in loans from a consortium of banks late last year to kick-start construction, according to media reports. Efforts to sell the debt to a broader pool of investors have stalled amid concerns over Oracle’s rising borrowing and weakening creditworthiness, the Financial Times said.
Mbappe leaves Nike, signs with On as Swiss sportswear maker forays into soccer
French soccer star Kylian Mbappe has ended a two-decade partnership with Nike to join fast-growing Swiss sportswear brand On, giving the Roger Federer-backed company a marquee name for its push into soccer and handing the US giant another high-profile defection. The financial terms of the deal have not been disclosed, though On said that the structure includes both cash and equity components, without providing further details. The move underlines On’s ambitions to expand beyond running and tennis into soccer, where it plans to launch its first boots in 2027 and has brought in former France star Thierry Henry as director of football. It adds to pressure on Nike , which has recently lost other high-profile players to rivals, as newer brands make inroads into the global sportswear market. Mbappe’s move to On ends a relationship between the French national team captain and Nike that dates back to 2006 when he was 9 years old, and comes on the heels of Nike’s loss of recent World Cup winner Spain’s Lamine Yamal to Adidas.