United States Retains Spot As World's Top Oil Producer

Facebook Marketplace Enters The AI Thirst-Trap Era Searching Facebook Marketplace in the AI era has revealed a strange new phenomenon: sellers are running product photos through chatbots or image generators to insert scantily clad women into listings. This marketing ploy seemingly bets that thirst-trap imagery will boost clicks and improve the chances of selling whatever item is listed on the online marketplace. "This dude on FB Marketplace has multiple listings for heavy Caterpillar industrial equipment superimposed with AI-generated female models. Must have industry-leading click-through rates," journalist Trung Phan wrote on X. This...

Oil Up, Stocks Down As War Rhetoric Rises, Deadlines Loom After a long weekend of kinetic and verbal escalation (and a strong payrolls print), and with President Trump reminded Iran that his deadline for a deal looms, it is no surprise that oil prices are higher in early trading... WTI topped $115... Near post-war highs... And despite the recent hope-filled decoupling of oil and stocks... ...S&P futures also weak, down around 0.7% in the early trading... Treasury futures and gold are lower with USD/JPY near 159.70. While the Iran conflict has established an ongoing state of caution...

Ukrainian Expert Dismisses Trump Pledge On Patriot Missile License As Empty PR President Trump's declaration from the NATO summit in Turkey this week saying that he'll give Ukraine a license to produce Patriot defense systems has been met with a lot of skepticism, both among Ukrainians and internationally.  "We’ll give them the right to make Patriots. We’ll show them how to do it," Trump had said. "I think they can produce them pretty quickly." via Associated Press Zelensky seized on the opening, telling reports on Thursday, "America has recognized Ukraine as a country...