The financial news that actually matters
If Brent crude futures were to surge to $126 a barrel during a single session and then reverse by roughly $12 before the close, it would rank among the most violent intraday swings in oil markets since the early weeks of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in 2022. The following analysis explores what such a scenario…
Roughly 57 million American workers have no access to a 401(k) or any employer-sponsored retirement plan, according to estimates from the Bureau of Labor Statistics. For decades, most of them have been left out of the tax breaks that make saving for retirement easier. That is set to change in 2027, when the federal government…
Canada’s federal government has proposed banning every cryptocurrency ATM in the country, a move that would make it one of the first major economies to eliminate the machines entirely. The proposal, which emerged during a government consultation in early 2026, targets the kiosks that scammers have used to extract hundreds of millions of dollars from…
A gallon of regular gasoline now costs the average American driver $4.30, the most expensive fill-up the country has seen since the summer of 2022, according to the latest weekly survey from the U.S. Energy Information Administration. The price has climbed roughly 60 cents since early March 2026, driven largely by a military confrontation between…
Social Security’s three-Wednesday payment cycle rolls through May 2026 starting on May 13, delivering retirement checks to roughly 70 million Americans, including retirees, survivors, and disability beneficiaries. For a small slice of retirees who earned at or above the taxable maximum for 35-plus years and waited until age 70 to file, those deposits can reach…
Not long ago, buying a home in Austin meant racing against a dozen other offers and waiving inspections just to stay competitive. That frenzy has faded. The median home value across the Austin-Round Rock metro area settled to roughly $530,000 as of the first quarter of 2026, according to closed-sale data tracked by Redfin and…
Millions of Americans who paid premiums to a Blue Cross Blue Shield health plan between February 2008 and October 2020 are about to see something rare: actual money from a class action lawsuit. The first checks from a $2.67 billion antitrust settlement, the largest in U.S. health insurance history, are scheduled to go out in…
Trading floors across Asia opened to a wall of red on Wednesday as two forces collided: a spike in oil prices driven by the U.S.-Iran standoff near the Strait of Hormuz and a Federal Reserve that made clear overnight it has no plans to lower interest rates anytime soon. Japan’s Nikkei 225 fell more than…
Australia’s government wants to hit Meta, Google, and TikTok with a 2.25% charge on their Australian revenue if they refuse to pay local news publishers for content. Draft legislation for what Canberra calls the News Bargaining Incentive was released for public consultation in late April 2026, presenting the platforms with a stark choice: negotiate commercial…
For years, for-profit developers in North Carolina have avoided property taxes on affordable housing projects by partnering, sometimes in name only, with nonprofit organizations. A state House committee now wants to shut that door. The House Select Committee on Property Tax Reduction and Reform advanced “Legislative Proposal #4: Affordable Housing Exemption Modifications” at its April…