Good morning. Here’s what happened overnight and what you need to know today.
1.
Chip check: The US has drafted rules that would restrict AI chip exports to anywhere in the world without American approval, giving Washington sweeping control over who can build AI infrastructure globally, Bloomberg reported, citing unnamed sources. The proposed rules would expand curbs currently covering around 40 countries and set up the US Commerce Department as gatekeeper for the global AI industry. The rules would not be framed as an Nvidia export ban, but as a licensing regime governing virtually all sales of AI accelerators from the likes of Nvidia and AMD, according to the report. The framework is not yet finalised and could change substantially or be shelved, it said. According to the news agency, the approval process would scale with computing power. Shipments of up to 1,000 of Nvidia’s latest GB300 GPUs would undergo a fairly simple review, while companies building bigger clusters would need preclearance and could face conditions such as disclosing their business models or allowing US government site visits. For deployments exceeding 200,000 GB300 GPUs owned by one company in a single country, the host government would need to get involved. The US would only approve the latter exports to allies making stringent security commitments and matching investments in American AI, though no investment ratio has been specified. Nvidia shares fell about 2% after the report, AMD was also over 2% lower on the news. The Commerce Department’s Bureau of Industry and Security, Nvidia and AMD have not commented. (Bloomberg)
2.
Hormuz hurt: US markets were pricing in a war with no end in sight, with oil rising above USD80 a barrel and Wall Street experiencing one of its sharpest falls of the year. The Dow Jones Industrial Average was skidding more than 2% in the New York afternoon session, the S&P 500 was down 1.3% and the Nasdaq shedding 1.2%. WTI crude surged more than 7%, breaching USD80 for the first time since January last year. Brent rose above USD85. The Strait of Hormuz’s near-closure has trapped roughly 300 tankers, Reuters reported citing ship tracking data from Vortexa and Kpler that excludes some of the smallest tankers. Iraq cut output by 1.5 million barrels per day for lack of storage and an export route, officials told Reuters, while Qatar declared force majeure on LNG exports on Wednesday. Meanwhile, Saudi Aramco began rerouting crude exports via the Red Sea. With higher energy costs fuelling inflation worries, swaps are now pricing less than 40 basis points of Fed cuts in 2026, down sharply from 60 basis points the prior week. Chipmakers dragged down stocks further after Bloomberg reported the US has written draft regulations that would restrict AI chip shipments to anywhere in the world without American approval, with Nvidia and AMD falling over 2% each. Broadcom bucked the trend, rising 5% after CEO Hock Tan said the company expects AI chip sales to top USD100 billion next year. (Bloomberg)(WSJ)(Reuters)(FT)(AP)
