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Brent near 5-month high on West Asia supply fears, US inventory drawdowns

Brent crude futures rose $1.32, or 1.2%, to $110.11 per barrel by 0747 GMT while US West Texas Intermediate (WTI) crude gained $1.18, or 1.2%, to $99.00 per barrel

What are the three key issues shaping the 2026 US midterm elections?

Republicans hold narrow majorities in the House of Representatives and Senate while Democrats need a net gain of four seats to take control of each chamber

Musk ordered slowdown of Starlink service used by Ukraine's military

Ukraine uses Starlink ​for battlefield communications and drone ​operations. Restricting the satellite service hampered the country's attack and air defence drone ​missions against Russia

UN experts urge India to cease 'use of excessive force' to curb protests

India has repeatedly dismissed such criticism and cast it as interference ‌in the country's internal affairs

Half of coal plants run critically low on fuel as power demand surges

The number of power plants with critically low coal stocks - which only have enough fuel supply to generate power for less than three days - rose to 96 as of October 19 from 60 plants in mid-September

ByteDance, Alibaba, Tencent place over $35 billion in Nvidia chip orders

ByteDance, Alibaba and Tencent have ordered over 3 million Nvidia RTX PRO 5500 graphics cards, but the chipmaker may struggle to meet demand amid US export restrictions on China

Pete Hegseth meets Benjamin Netanyahu in unannounced visit to Israel

Hegseth said ‌in a social media post ​that he had visited ​US service members in the Central Command area of responsibility, which covers ​the West Asia, northeast Africa and parts of Asia

Qualcomm plans worldwide job cuts in performance-focused layoffs

Qualcomm CEO Cristiano Amon said the company would begin notifying affected employees in November as it seeks to strengthen its performance culture amid slowing smartphone demand

US bans Chinese AI firm DeepSeek from government agency IT systems

The department is also banning acquisition of DeepSeek products and third-party services developed using DeepSeek by US civilian ‌government agencies

Hormuz could be 'redundant' in 5 years, replaced by new routes: HSBC CEO

The conflict has highlighted the world's heavy reliance on the strategic waterway, through which ‌a fifth of global oil and liquefied ​natural gas trade previously passed

Brent crude holds near 5-month high as W Asia tensions stoke supply fears

Brent crude futures rose to $111.05 a barrel, the highest since May, and as of 0810 GMT were trading at $110.80, up $1.25 or 1.1%

Trump approval hits record low of 31% ahead of US midterm elections: Poll

Some 31% of ​Americans approve of Trump's performance in office, down ​a percentage point from two weeks earlier and the lowest level in either of his presidential ​terms

Trump open to idea of joint meeting with Xi Jinping, Putin next month

Trump has tried to thaw frosty relations with Beijing and Moscow as those non-Western powers grow closer

OpenAI seeks to accelerate fundraising ahead of Anthropic's planned IPO

SoftBank Group, Abu Dhabi-based MGX and other existing backers of OpenAI are in talks to join the round of about $30 billion

Amazon launches TorchNeuron to challenge Nvidia's AI chip dominance

TorchNeuron lets developers run code ‌written in a language called PyTorch ​on Amazon's Trainium AI ​chips with a single configuration change and no rewriting needed

US bans Chinese AI DeepSeek from civilian government agency IT systems

The US has ordered federal civilian agencies to remove DeepSeek AI products and related services from IT systems, citing national security risks and concerns over potential data transfers to China.

Putin proposes summit with Trump, Xi Jinping to discuss Ukraine deal

The proposed summit comes ‌amid warming ties between Trump and Putin ​especially after the US President ​announced a deal to buy Russian diesel and signed an order ​waiving key sanctions on Moscow

China's growth accelerates to 4.5% in third quarter, beats expectations

Beijing has leaned heavily on exports for growth this ‌year, but that engine faces growing pressure as ​domestic demand remains weak and trade tensions ​with the European Union escalate

Tax dept probes Pernod, Diageo Scotch imports under UK trade pact

Tax officials are examining whether bulk Scotch imports qualify for lower duties under the India-UK pact, sources said. Pernod and Diageo said they were cooperating with authorities

Banks tap RBI's first cash auction in 3 months as market rates spike

The operation comes after several months of the central bank absorbing surplus liquidity that hit a record high ‌due to hefty inflows from diaspora deposits ​mobilised to defend a ​weak rupee