Mortgage rates fall to lowest level in more than three years
CNN
The average 30-year fixed mortgage rate was 6.06% for the week ending January 15, according to Freddie Mac. The last time home borrowing rates were this low was September 2022.
Dozens of countries have done the unprecedented, releasing an historic amount of crude from emergency reserves to prevent high oil prices from crippling the economy. If that doesn’t work, there’s only one serious option left: ending the war and opening the Strait of Hormuz.
In an era marked by President Donald Trump’s wars and trade turbulence, Chinese leader Xi Jinping is counting on a plan to shield his country from the storm and win its race with the US: driving innovation to transform China into a global tech superpower.
Oil prices surged past $100 per barrel again overnight, three days after it hit a four-year high, as the US and Israel’s war with Iran continues to have a historic impact on global fuel supplies.
Brent crude oil prices shot up as the US and Israeli war against Iran disrupted oil supplies in the Middle East. CNN’s Word of the Week asks: How did the benchmark barrel of oil get the name “Brent”?
Annual inflation was unchanged last month at 2.4%, according to the latest Consumer Price Index, released Wednesday.
Global oil prices have fallen well below their recent peak. But don’t expect to see relief at the pump in the coming days.
Oil prices rebounded Wednesday, as worries about a prolonged supply disruption in the Strait of Hormuz outweighed a report of a potential record release of oil reserves.
President Donald Trump has a sales pitch for Americans worried about high oil and gas prices: Rising fuel prices are a temporary but necessary sacrifice, and they will fall quickly back to earth once the war with Iran is done.
Meta, the company behind some of the world’s most popular social media platforms, just scooped up a new site – for bots.
Oil prices fell sharply Tuesday after US President Donald Trump said the war with Iran would be over “very soon,” though they remain volatile and well above their levels before the conflict started.
Economists warn that the war has increased the risk of a recession. And the longer the crisis lasts, the greater the danger to an economy that already looked vulnerable before the chaos in the Middle East.
Investors rattled by the war in Iran have sent oil prices skyrocketing – and global governments have noticed. The world’s biggest economy are reportedly considering emergency releases of millions of barrels of oil into the market.
Investors have long viewed the closure of the Strait of Hormuz as a “tail risk” event — the kind of thing that was highly unlikely to happen but would be so catastrophic that you can’t afford to be unprepared for it. As black swans go, Hormuz closing for weeks or months could be an economic disaster on par with a global pandemic.