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00:00:01BBC News, the latest from New
00:00:04York and around the world. Business
00:00:07Business Today. MUSIC
00:00:19Live from the opening bell. This is Business Today. Markets in
00:00:23in the green on hopes of a deal.
00:00:26deal. Straight talking Iran says says it has made a deal with Oman
00:00:30Oman over shipping in the Gulf, but
00:00:32but its neighbours and the US may
00:00:34may not like the terms payback time.
00:00:38time. The Trump administration refunds refunds $100 billion in illegal tariffs.
00:00:42tariffs. Now it faces a new legal legal battle over its latest import
00:00:46import taxes that a top lawyer tells
00:00:48tells us are also unfair and fighting
00:00:52fighting fire with tech. We speak speak to a company that's using AI
00:00:56AI to detect and track wildfires
00:00:58wildfires in Greece. Welcome to Business
00:01:04Business Today live from New York.
00:01:05York. I'm Samira Hussain. US markets
00:01:08markets have just opened as investors investors await details on a Middle
00:01:11Middle East peace deal. Strong forecasts forecasts from data storage company
00:01:15company Western Digital and memory memory chip maker SanDisk failed
00:01:17failed to impress the markets, and and shares of both are falling rapidly,
00:01:21rapidly, but many eyes will be on
00:01:23on SpaceX today as a first wave of
00:01:26of IPO investors will be permitted permitted to sell shares under the
00:01:29the so-called lock up agreements. agreements. Around 900 million shares
00:01:33shares are eligible to be sold from
00:01:35from today. I'm joined by Richard
00:01:38Richard Riley, chief investment officer
00:01:39officer at Quaestor Capital Partners. Partners. 9 million SpaceX shares
00:01:43shares are about to be unlocked, unlocked, more than doubling the
00:01:46the available stock. What are you you expecting? I expect there will
00:01:50will be lots of selling pressure pressure on the stock. As you mentioned,
00:01:53mentioned, there's 900 million shares shares coming out which is double double the size of the IPO and even
00:01:57even more so than that, there's even even another set of lock ups that
00:02:01that happen later in August and in
00:02:03in September and October, so that that another 900 million shares are
00:02:06are going to be coming available available for sale. So there's going
00:02:10going to be a lot of selling pressure pressure on the stock. And of course, course, I think it goes lower from
00:02:14from here based upon that, those
00:02:16those numbers alone. You know, I
00:02:19I was speaking to one person who
00:02:23who has 200, 200,200 million shares. shares. Sorry. And just talking about
00:02:26about what he was going to be doing doing with them that he was going going to be selling, but also holding
00:02:30holding some. I wonder if a lot of of people are going to be doing that
00:02:33that too. Well, of course there's there's going to be people that are
00:02:35are naturally think that the future future for SpaceX is very bright,
00:02:39bright, and I'm one of those people people too. I think it is too. But
00:02:42But it's just the nature of people. people. This company's been private private for, you know, two decades.
00:02:46decades. And so there's just people people that you've put your money money in and of course you want to
00:02:49to get rewarded for all that patience patience and time that you've had had your money locked away. So I
00:02:53I think on balance, there'll be lots lots of selling. And of course, people people lost. Lots of people will
00:02:56will continue to hold. Well, you
00:02:59you know, I want to stick with sort sort of the AI theme. There's been
00:03:03been a lot of AI news. There's that that big shake-up happening at Google
00:03:07Google and now Meta saying its AI
00:03:09AI also went rogue. I'm wondering
00:03:11wondering if we might see investors investors pulling back from AI again.
00:03:15again. Well, we're seeing that this this morning just with some of these
00:03:18these stocks that got so puffed up,
00:03:20up, Western Digital and SanDisk, SanDisk, for instance, you know, know, posting great numbers and yet
00:03:24yet still those stocks are down, down, you know, heavily this morning.
00:03:27morning. And so I think we're going going to continue to see that. And And of course then there's these
00:03:31these concerns about these AI models models playing outside their sandbox.
00:03:34sandbox. And of course I think that's that's causing some security concerns
00:03:37concerns and things like that that
00:03:43that perhaps the future is AI, but but it's going to take a lot longer longer for the winners and losers
00:03:46losers to get sorted and the spending spending may get pulled back a little little bit just because of those
00:03:50those concerns. And just very briefly, briefly, I do want to look ahead
00:03:52ahead to tomorrow and the jobs report.
00:03:55report. What are you expecting? I
00:03:57I expect we'll see. Probably a slightly slightly better print than we saw
00:04:00saw for the June numbers we saw, saw, you know, actually very good
00:04:04good numbers from the jobless claims
00:04:06claims this morning below 200,000
00:04:09200,000 or which was the first time
00:04:10time we saw a print below that in
00:04:13in some time. So it's back to that that same narrative of, you know,
00:04:15know, slow to fire, slow to hire. hire. And that's going to continue
00:04:19continue to trend through. I think think the employment markets and and you know, the Fed's going to
00:04:22to be looking closely at those numbers numbers as they you know, the threat threat of higher interest rates continues
00:04:26continues to kind of haunt the markets
00:04:29markets a bit. Richard Riley of Quest Quest Capital Partners, thanks very
00:04:33very much for joining us. Thank you.
00:04:37you. To the Iran conflict now in in hopes of an agreement to end the
00:04:40the deadlock over the Strait of Hormuz, Hormuz, which has choked off vital
00:04:44vital supplies of oil, gas and chemicals. chemicals. Iran says it has reached
00:04:47reached a deal with Oman on shipping shipping through the strait, and
00:04:50and a joint announcement is being being finalised. This follows promises
00:04:54promises from President Trump and and other senior US officials that that a deal is imminent. For now,
00:04:58now, oil traders are taking a wait wait and see approach. The international
00:05:02international benchmark Brent crude crude has been trading around $80
00:05:04$80 a barrel since reports of an an agreement first emerged earlier
00:05:08earlier this week. Major questions questions remain, though regional
00:05:11regional sources have been telling telling the Reuters news news agency
00:05:14agency the agreement would give Iran Iran control of ships entering the
00:05:18the Gulf, a situation the US may
00:05:20may be unlikely to accept. But what what about the other? What about
00:05:23about other countries in the Gulf?
00:05:25Gulf? Here's Doctor Yousef Al Shammari,
00:05:28Shammari, president of the London
00:05:30London College of Energy Economics. Economics. Well, I certainly don't
00:05:33don't think that a deal of this form form will be acceptable for Gulf
00:05:37Gulf countries. I see it as a major
00:05:40major win for Iran from this conflict.
00:05:44conflict. Literally the aim of this this deal, although it's kind of
00:05:47of it could bring some sort of some some sort of a relief to the markets
00:05:51markets possibly it could allow the the shipping movement to rise a little
00:05:54little bit. But it also gives Iran
00:05:57Iran more leverage. And moreover,
00:06:00moreover, they like an administrative
00:06:02administrative role over the strait strait because it's if Iran is going
00:06:05going to control the inbound that
00:06:09that is going to some somehow have
00:06:10have control on all the imports from
00:06:14from the GCC countries in the region.
00:06:17region. Also on the other hand, also
00:06:19also the deal also kind of provides
00:06:23provides Iran with oversight on all
00:06:25all ships that is going to exit the
00:06:27the Strait of Hormuz. That again, again, that's pretty crude oil, oil
00:06:31oil and gas exports. So, I don't
00:06:34don't think any deal of this form form will be acceptable for Gulf
00:06:37Gulf countries because we've heard heard from, for example, Sultan Al
00:06:41Al Jaber, many weeks ago that, it's
00:06:44it's an international waterway and
00:06:45and an unrestricted movement is deeply
00:06:49deeply being sought by, by the Gulf
00:06:52Gulf countries. Now the Trump administration
00:06:55administration has refunded $100 $100 billion of its so-called Liberation
00:06:58Liberation Day tariffs to businesses businesses after they were ruled
00:07:01ruled to have been illegal. That's That's around 60% of all the tariff
00:07:04tariff revenue collected by the government government under the policy, according
00:07:07according to a recent court filing
00:07:09filing from US customs. Meanwhile,
00:07:11Meanwhile, 25 Democrat led states states are suing the Trump administration
00:07:15administration over the new wave wave of tariffs on imports from dozens
00:07:18dozens of countries who are accused accused of failing to tackle forced
00:07:22forced labour. The states say the
00:07:23the new tariffs are, quote, arbitrary,
00:07:26arbitrary, capricious and contrary contrary to law. We've been speaking
00:07:29speaking to Professor Barry Appleton,
00:07:31Appleton, who testified to the government government over the issue about the
00:07:34the legality of the new tariffs.
00:07:36tariffs. Well, it's kind of complicated.
00:07:39complicated. Look, nobody is in favour favour of the use of forced labour
00:07:43labour in imports where everybody everybody all the countries have
00:07:46have laws that deal with it. The The difference is their laws are
00:07:49are different from the way the US
00:07:51US does it. The US has put in a reverse
00:07:54reverse onus. They've said everything everything is deemed to be use of
00:07:58of forced labour. Unless you can
00:08:00can prove it to the alternative. alternative. And so many countries
00:08:04countries like the UK, Australia, Australia, Canada have forced labour
00:08:07labour laws. But they say you have
00:08:10have to only prosecute those who who have an allegation of use of
00:08:13of force labour. And the Americans Americans have imposed a tax on that.
00:08:17that. So it's not that there's a a proof of any link to forced labour.
00:08:20labour. It's simply that there's there's a difference in the way that
00:08:24that everybody is enforcing it. And
00:08:25And that seems pretty unfair. Africa's
00:08:29Africa's richest man has told the the BBC about his plans to build
00:08:32build a new oil refinery in Kenya, Kenya, which he says will help African
00:08:36African countries become energy self-sufficient. self-sufficient. Nancy Kacungira
00:08:39Kacungira has caught up with him him in Lagos, Lagos. Were really
00:08:43really planning something very big big within the African continent
00:08:47continent and a lot of people say, say, well, does the refinery in East
00:08:50East Africa, does it make sense? sense? But it makes a lot of sense
00:08:54sense because the refinery is not
00:08:56not only for Kenya. That's why we
00:08:58we are calling it East African refinery.
00:09:01refinery. You know, so that can solve
00:09:04solve a lot of countries up to even even Egypt. How much do you expect
00:09:08expect the East African refinery refinery to. I think we thought. thought. It was going to cost 17
00:09:1217 billion. But it's going to cost cost much. It will cost less than
00:09:15than that. We are looking at about
00:09:18about 15 and $16 billion. Why will
00:09:20will it cost less than you originally
00:09:22originally anticipated? Because this
00:09:24this one will be faster. So in terms
00:09:26terms of financing costs will be
00:09:28be less. And then also you know,
00:09:33know, we are wiser as a company then
00:09:35then that when we built this one one because we are just learning.
00:09:39learning. When we built the one here. here. So that is really what is helping
00:09:42helping us. So in terms of timing,
00:09:45timing, we'll be able to build in
00:09:47in less than four years. So the location location is decided. What about the
00:09:51the financing. Are you looking at at cash debt equity. Yeah, we're
00:09:54we're looking at. All that. You know
00:09:57know equity and debt. So 30% is going
00:10:00going to be equity. And then 70%
00:10:0470% will be debt. But we know we we don't have any problem raising
00:10:08raising the money. So what do you
00:10:11you see as the impact that this refinery
00:10:13refinery could have on energy security? security? It's going to have a massive
00:10:17massive impact really. And then also
00:10:19also it guarantees the countries countries getting their own products
00:10:22products that are not going to live live hand-to-mouth. You know, and
00:10:26and then, you know, the refinery
00:10:27refinery is there. It's for them.
00:10:32them. Now this summer's high temperatures temperatures in Europe have seen
00:10:35seen record breaking wildfires in in France and Spain in recent weeks.
00:10:38weeks. In Greece, authorities are are still battling fires there with
00:10:42with risks of further outbreaks. outbreaks. Rising temperatures are
00:10:45are making wildfires more frequent, frequent, more intense and harder
00:10:48harder to predict. Now satellite satellite imagery and AI are increasingly
00:10:52increasingly helping emergency services services detect fires earlier and
00:10:56and forecast how they will spread.
00:10:57spread. We've been speaking to Doctor
00:11:00Doctor Axel Roenneke of OroraTech,
00:11:03OroraTech, which helped develop Greece's Greece's first national wildfire wildfire detection system, and he's
00:11:07he's been telling us how it works.
00:11:10works. From space. We can continuously
00:11:13continuously monitor fires with satellites
00:11:16satellites that measure infrared.
00:11:18infrared. So we measure heat rather
00:11:20rather than visible smoke or flames,
00:11:23flames, and we scan the Earth's surface
00:11:25surface surface. Looking for heat
00:11:28heat signatures frequently and globally.
00:11:31globally. So with that information information combined with weather
00:11:34weather vegetation and terrain data,
00:11:37data, our AI turns millions of data
00:11:40data points into a simple alert and
00:11:42and actionable insight like how the
00:11:45the fire evolves, where it goes and
00:11:47and how important it is. Wildfires
00:11:51Wildfires need to be, detected earlier earlier if you want to, if you want
00:11:55want to act, on a manageable size
00:11:57size of the fire. Once fires get
00:11:59get beyond a certain size, there
00:12:02there is no control. So the earlier earlier you can detect a fire and
00:12:05and even predict where fires are
00:12:07are likely to happen, you can put
00:12:10put forces on the ground, be prepared prepared and react when the fire
00:12:13fire is still manageable. And this
00:12:14this is where we need to get to go.
00:12:18go. Now the UK government has not
00:12:20not said it will has said it will
00:12:22will not intervene in the $110 billion billion acquisition of Warner Bros.
00:12:26Bros. Discovery by Paramount Skydance, Skydance, after receiving legally
00:12:29legally binding commitments from from the US company. Britain had
00:12:33had said it was minded to step in
00:12:34in over the deal over the competition
00:12:37competition concerns. Warner posted posted its latest results showing
00:12:40showing with earnings falling short short of expectations despite a jump
00:12:44jump in revenues from its streaming streaming business. Now let's take
00:12:48take a quick look at financial markets.
00:12:50markets. We see that the Dow Jones Jones is in the green and the Nasdaq
00:12:54Nasdaq is feeling a little bit of of pressure. That's it for business
00:12:57business news. Please stay tuned
00:12:58tuned for more coming up here on
00:13:02on BBC News. MUSIC
00:14:19will pay off? Join us on Talking
00:14:21Talking Business Weekly on BBC News.
00:14:29News. Here at BBC Verify we use forensic forensic investigative techniques
00:14:32techniques and tools to fact check
00:14:33check stories, verify information information and counter disinformation
00:14:36disinformation using data analysis analysis and the latest technology, technology, our journalists examine
00:14:40examine the evidence and get to the the facts. Watch our BBC Verify reports
00:14:43reports on the BBC News channel or
00:14:45or go online to find out more.
00:15:10Good to have you with us. As we've been reporting, Ukraine has
00:15:14has hit two oil refineries deep within within Russia as part of a massive
00:15:18massive drone swarm across the country. country. President Zelensky said
00:15:20said the refinery in Yaroslavl and and another in Bashkortostan were
00:15:24were targeted to cut off the oil oil revenues that are funding the
00:15:28the Kremlin. Meanwhile, Russian strikes strikes have also taken place inside
00:15:31inside Ukraine. At least ten deaths deaths have been reported across
00:15:34across the country. So what kind kind of impact are these attacks attacks on oil refineries having
00:15:38having when it comes to the Russian Russian economy? I've been speaking
00:15:40speaking to David Roche, who is from from Quantum Strategy, a financial
00:15:44financial analysis and advisory firm.
00:15:46firm. I looked at the figures this
00:15:48this morning and Russia is now a
00:15:51a net importer of oil and oil products.
00:15:55products. The main change has been
00:15:57been a fall in oil refining,