Flagship

Signal leak raises US security questions

Top US officials unintentionally leaked military plans to a journalist through a commercial messaging app, raising questions over the Trump administration’s handling of national security information. The Atlantic’s Jeffrey Goldberg revealed that days before the US struck Houthi forces in Yemen earlier this month, he was added to a group text on Signal alongside Vice President JD Vance, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, and other White House officials in which they discussed the timing and strategy of the offensive, including classified details just before the attack. “I have never seen a breach quite like this,” Goldberg wrote, noting that the officials may have violated federal policy and law by texting each other on an app that is not authorized for classified discussions.

US markets rally on tariff optimism

US markets rallied Monday on the belief that President Donald Trump might scale back some planned tariffs, even as he vowed to target countries that buy oil from Venezuela. Trump’s statement that he “may give a lot of countries breaks” on so-called reciprocal tariffs slated for April 2 was enough to encourage investors worried about the economic impact of an escalating trade war. But his threat of a 25% tariff hike on buyers of Venezuelan crude risks roiling the oil market, which the White House has so far tried to avoid, the Financial Times wrote. As top buyers of Venezuelan oil, China and India would be the most impacted by the levies.

Economic impact of US migration agenda

Economists are warning that US President Donald Trump’s immigration crackdown poses a risk to the country’s growth. The sharp decline in people crossing the border is likely to result in lower US job figures over the coming months, an Apollo analyst said Monday. And Morgan Stanley’s chief economist called immigration “an underappreciated drag on the economy.” The topic is top of mind in US boardrooms: Mentions of “immigration” on earnings calls this year reached a record high, Bloomberg reported, a sign of “broader anxiety about the labor supply.” Legal fights will determine the extent of Trump’s efforts to curb migration. Judges heard arguments Monday on the legality of recent flights deporting Venezuelan immigrants.

Turkey tries to ease investor concerns

Turkish authorities are racing to stem the market volatility that resulted from the arrest of President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s chief rival. Erdoğan on Monday voiced his commitment to investor-friendly policies, while finance and bank officials stepped in to help stabilize markets and defend the lira, which weakened to record lows. Top Wall Street figures visited Istanbul last week to hear about the country’s improved stability — but they left shaken by the market turmoil resulting from the government’s detainment of Istanbul Mayor Ekrem İmamoğlu. Erdoğan’s anti-democratic crackdown is jeopardizing Ankara’s yearslong efforts to attract foreign investment through orthodox economic policies, The Economist wrote, and escalating anti-government protests will further shake investor confidence in the country’s economy.

Leaders invoke Trump to justify crackdowns

US President Donald Trump’s upending of political norms has emboldened several autocratic leaders around the world to pursue anti-democratic crackdowns, analysts say. Some governments, including Hungary and Serbia, have explicitly invoked Trump’s return to power as justification for actions such as banning a Pride rally and raiding civil society groups, The Washington Post wrote. Others have not openly cited Trump, but experts see clear links: Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, for example, is betting that Trump won’t challenge the jailing of a top rival. These leaders are acting increasingly in sync, “sniffing the change in the geopolitical air, and reckoning they’re on the cusp of a new era,” Politico Europe’s opinion editor wrote.

Russia downplays ceasefire progress

Russia downplayed the possibility of swift progress in Ukraine ceasefire talks with US officials Monday. A Kremlin spokesperson spoke of “difficult negotiations” during the 12-hour meeting in Saudi Arabia, the specifics of which will be released Tuesday. Moscow has “turned the discussion into a lingering one” to blunt momentum on a ceasefire while it gains on the battlefield, a prominent pro-Kremlin analyst said. While the talks may result in some normalization of US-Russia relations, a successful peace negotiation is unlikely, Eurasia Group’s Ian Bremmer argued, drawing a comparison with the US involvement in talks for a Gaza ceasefire — which ultimately fell apart, allowing Israel to restart fighting over its “more maximalist” demands.

BYD sales surpass $100B

Chinese electric vehicle giant BYD surpassed $100 billion in sales for the first time last year, cementing its dominance in the world’s largest car market, and beating US rival Tesla. While Tesla is still far ahead of BYD in terms of market valuation, and sells in more countries — BYD is effectively blocked from selling in the US, for example, because of tariffs and other regulatory hurdles — the Elon Musk-run company has seen diminishing returns in China in recent years. BYD, analysts say, has benefited from its focus on advanced technology, like its “God’s Eye” driver assistance system. Last week, the automaker unveiled a system that purportedly charges EVs in five minutes, sending shares to a record high.

China unveils deep-sea cable cutter

China reportedly unveiled a deep-sea cable-cutting device, raising concerns about Beijing’s ability to disrupt global communications. No other nation has so far officially acknowledged the existence of such an asset. The tool can cut armored cables up to 13,123 feet underwater, the South China Morning Post reported, citing a Chinese academic paper. More than 97% of global internet traffic passes through subsea cables, and the tool — described as being created for salvage work — “could send alarm bells ringing for other nations,” SCMP wrote, because cutting cables at certain choke points could “destabilise global communications during a geopolitical crisis.” Taiwan is investigating China’s involvement in the cutting of an undersea internet cable last month.

Bonobo famed for communication dies

Kanzi, a bonobo who learned to communicate with humans via symbolic language, has died, aged 44. He was not the first ape to do so: Famously, Koko the gorilla and Washoe the chimpanzee learned American Sign Language. But they were deliberately trained while Kanzi independently showed interest in using pictorial symbols, and was the subject of many scientific studies aiming to reveal truths about the development of human language. He learned hundreds of symbols, both concrete and more abstract, and sometimes combined them to create new meaning. One primatologist told Scientific American that Kanzi “combined the symbols for ‘water’ and ‘gorilla’” to describe a beaver, “and I always think of beavers ... as water gorillas now.”

US women are staying single

A growing number of American women are giving up looking for a life partner. Only 34% of single women are looking for romance, compared to 54% of single men, down from 38% and 61% respectively in 2019, and the number of single women aged 18-40 has also jumped since 2000. One of the reasons, The Wall Street Journal reported, is that women are now unwilling to settle. They are increasingly financially self-sufficient and there is less social stigma around being single, so they can afford to be choosier. Many are intentionally heading into motherhood solo: “Parenthood and romantic love don’t have to be intrinsically linked,” a 34-year-old single woman who has started saving up for a baby told the Journal.

March 25:

• Taiwan holds “whole of society” civil defense drills.
• The Boao Forum for Asia begins its four-day annual conference in China.
• David Sheff’s biography of Yoko Ono, Yoko, is published.

An exhibition in Paris is proof that artists are forever fascinated with the end of the world. Apocalypse: Yesterday and Tomorrow at the Bibliothèque Nationale de France showcases around 300 works ranging from the 9th century to the present day — including iconic pieces like Henri Rousseau’s La Guerre — which have been inspired by the apocalyptic themes of The Book of Revelation. At the heart of the exhibition is a paradox, Le Monde wrote: The artists worked with great zeal to create masterpieces that they believed would be “doomed to disappear in the final cataclysm.” But they strove to depict the apocalypse “in such a seductive way as to distract the mind from the horror of this terrible outcome.”

Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent’s play for more control over US banking regulators, including the Federal Reserve, is about to enter a contentious new phase, reported Semafor’s Eleanor Mueller and Rachel Witkowski.

“There are two ways to consolidate federal bank regulation. First, you can change the law,” wrote one financial analyst. “The other way is for one federal entity to assert all the power it has under law.”

“Secretary Bessent has now made it clear that the Trump Administration will open Door Number Two.”