Inkhabar webdesk

By David Lawder WASHINGTON (Reuters) -The U.S. again purchased Argentine pesos in the open market on Wednesday, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent told reporters, adding that the department was working with banks and investment funds to create a $20 billion facility to invest in the South American country's sovereign debt. Bessent said during a press conference that the facility would sit alongside a new $20 billion U.S. currency swap line for Argentina, providing a total of $40 billion in support for Latin America's third-largest economy. Bessent did not provide details of the peso operation, which follows an initial U.S. purchase on October 9. He also clarified that the U.S. would continue to support Argentina financially as long as President Javier Milei's government pursues "good policies," regardless of the outcome of a parliamentary election on October 26. President Donald Trump said on Tuesday that the U.S. would not "waste our time" with Argentina if Milei's party loses the elections. Bessent said the Trump administration's support for Argentina "is not election-specific," but a win for Milei's La Libertad Avanza party would ensure that the right-wing Argentine president has a sufficient majority to be able to veto policies aimed at ending his libertarian fiscal austerity agenda and free-market overhauls of the country's crisis-prone economy. "It is policy-specific. So as long as Argentina continues enacting good policy, they will have U.S. support," Bessent said. BESSENT SAYS 'WE COULD' BUY DEBT Asked if the peso operation would be accompanied by U.S. purchases of Argentine debt, Bessent said, "We could," without elaborating. Work on the private-sector debt investment facility has been underway for weeks, but Bessent did not provide a timeline for any debt purchases. "So it is a private-sector solution to Argentina's upcoming debt payments," Bessent said. "Many banks are interested in it, and many sovereign funds have expressed interest in being part of it." The Trump administration has disclosed few details about the $20 billion swap line that it has pledged to Argentina. Bessent confirmed it would be backed by International Monetary Fund Special Drawing Rights assets that are held in the Treasury's Exchange Stabilization Fund and would be converted to dollars. Asked whether the U.S. would assume a preferred creditor status ahead of the IMF or private-sector lenders, Bessent said: "No, that's what China does, we don't do that." (Reporting by David Lawder; editing by Paul Simao)

(The article has been published through a syndicated feed. Except for the headline, the content has been published verbatim. Liability lies with original publisher.)

(Reuters) -PNC Financial reported a more than 21% rise in third-quarter profit on Wednesday, driven by higher interest income and across-the-board jump in fees. The results underscored borrower resilience across the U.S. and a rebound in dealmaking from April's tariff-driven slump, mirroring trends observed across the biggest U.S. banks this week. JPMorgan Chase raised its full-year forecast for net interest income on Tuesday, while Wells Fargo and Citigroup also reported higher income from interest payments. NII – the difference between what a bank earns as interest on loans and pays out on deposits – jumped to $3.65 billion in the quarter for PNC, compared with $3.41 billion a year earlier, reflecting lower funding costs and loan growth. Provisions for credit losses fell to $167 million in the period, compared with $243 million a year earlier. "Credit performed well and we continued to build on our strong capital levels," said CEO Bill Demchak. PNC agreed to buy privately held FirstBank Holding in a $4.1 billion cash-and-stock deal last month, providing momentum to a long-predicted wave of regional banking consolidation. Analysts say the deal provides the bank access to low-cost deposits and cross-selling opportunities. They continue to view the bank as a potential buyer as banking M&A picks up pace under lighter regulation. Total non-interest income for Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania-based PNC rose 12% to $2.23 billion, led by a 16% jump in capital markets and advisory fees. The lender's profit rose to $1.82 billion, or $4.35 per share, from $1.51 billion, or $3.49 per share, a year earlier. (Reporting by Ateev Bhandari in Bengaluru; Editing by Sriraj Kalluvila)

(The article has been published through a syndicated feed. Except for the headline, the content has been published verbatim. Liability lies with original publisher.)

By David Lawder and Andrea Shalal WASHINGTON (Reuters) -The U.S. is close to finalizing a trade deal with South Korea, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said on Wednesday, telling reporters that he expected an announcement in the next 10 days. "We are about to finish up with Korea," Bessent told CNBC. "The devil's in the details, but we are ironing out the details." Bessent said U.S. and South Korean officials were meeting this week on the sidelines of the annual meetings of the International Monetary Fund and World Bank in Washington. Speaking to reporters later on Wednesday, Bessent said he believed disagreements with South Korea over promised investments could be resolved. "I'm sure the differences can be resolved. We are in discussions now, and I would expect something in the next 10 days," Bessent said. Asked if Treasury would support setting up a currency swap facility for South Korea, Bessent said that would be up to the Federal Reserve, but he was surprised it didn't already exist. "If I were Federal Reserve chair, and I'm not, Korea would already have a currency swap facility, as would Singapore." BOTH SIDES KEEN TO GET A DEAL U.S. and South Korean officials are keen to finalize a trade agreement before the end of October, when Seoul will host an Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation summit. U.S. President Donald Trump is expected to attend the APEC summit and meet with Chinese President Xi Jinping on the sidelines. Seoul's top policy adviser Kim Yong-beom on Wednesday said the two countries had made "meaningful progress" in negotiations over $350 billion of investments that Seoul had pledged to make in the U.S. in exchange for reduced U.S. trade tariffs. The promise was made in a preliminary trade deal announced in July. In an interview with a YouTube channel, Kim said U.S. negotiators made a new proposal about how South Korea could implement the investment package, but gave no details. President Lee Jae Myung told Reuters last month that South Korea's economy could plunge into crisis rivaling its 1997 meltdown if the government accepted current U.S. demands in the trade talks without safeguards. (Reporting by David Lawder; Writing by Andrea Shalal; Editing by Paul Simao and Andrea Ricci)

(The article has been published through a syndicated feed. Except for the headline, the content has been published verbatim. Liability lies with original publisher.)

By Deepa Seetharaman (Reuters) -Artificial intelligence startup Anthropic has overhauled its smallest AI model, Haiku, as companies increasingly opt for AI systems that are nearly as capable as the most advanced tools – but come at a fraction of the cost. Anthropic said on Wednesday that the updated model, called Haiku 4.5, is about one-third the cost of Sonnet 4, one of its medium-sized models, and one-fifteenth the cost of its most advanced offering, Opus. The new Haiku model performs as well or better than Sonnet 4 on a range of tasks, including coding.   Traditional companies outside of Silicon Valley are more likely to use AI if they have cheaper, yet still capable models to try, Mike Krieger, the company’s chief product officer, said in an interview. It also makes it easier for firms to add more AI to their internal systems that might be used by hundreds or thousands of employees, he added. “Often, there’s a lot of scale to that,” Krieger said. “Small models really help because they can be a more economical way of deploying into that.”   The vast majority – about 80% – of the company’s revenue comes from companies, an Anthropic spokesperson said, adding that it has more than 300,000 enterprise customers that use Anthropic tools internally, for products or both.  Anthropic's annual revenue run rate – a calculation of annual revenue extrapolated from the current sales pace – is almost $7 billion, the spokesperson said. Anthropic also draws revenue from people who pay to use Anthropic’s chatbot, Claude.   San Francisco-based Anthropic, last valued at $183 billion, was formed in 2021 by a group of former OpenAI employees. Its models go toe-to-toe with those of its more famous counterpart. This is the first time in about a year that Anthropic has updated its smallest model, Krieger said.   In the earliest days of the modern AI boom, executives at companies like Anthropic and OpenAI tended to talk up their most powerful and capable AI systems. Such systems can cost $100 million or more to train and need a lot of computing power to respond to customer queries or requests.  But many customers balk at the computational costs of using the best models. So in response, AI companies have had to think small. It is possible to use the different models in tandem, Krieger said. Some companies rely on the most advanced models to set strategy or make plans, but outsource the grunt work to smaller models that can search the Web and synthesize information.  (Reporting by Deepa Seetharaman in San Francisco; Editing by Matthew Lewis)

(The article has been published through a syndicated feed. Except for the headline, the content has been published verbatim. Liability lies with original publisher.)

By Jody Godoy (Reuters) -A group of U.S. states said they may seek to block Hewlett-Packard Enterprise's $14 billion acquisition of Juniper Networks and have asked a judge for permission to intervene in a case where the U.S. Department of Justice has proposed to settle and let the deal move forward. Colorado Attorney General Phil Weiser and Democratic attorneys general from six other states and Washington, D.C. said in court papers on Tuesday that they want to probe what they called suspicious circumstances around the settlement.  "The public deserves transparency on what happened in this case and to ensure that high-ranking government officials follow the law during merger reviews, make decisions on the merits and are not influenced by politically connected lobbyists," Weiser said. Weiser, who was a DOJ antitrust attorney earlier in his career, is running for governor of Colorado in 2026. If U.S. District Judge Casey Pitts in San Jose, California allows the states to intervene, they could seek an order for the companies to pause integrating their businesses. Shortly after President Donald Trump took office in January, the DOJ sued to block the deal, alleging it would stifle competition and lead to only two companies – Cisco Systems and HPE – controlling more than 70% of the U.S. market for networking equipment. The DOJ agreed to drop its claims in June ahead of a scheduled trial in exchange for HPE agreeing to license some of Juniper's AI technology to competitors and sell off a unit that caters to small and mid-sized businesses. Last month, Colorado was among a group of states that called on Pitts to probe whether the deal addressed the DOJ's initial concerns about the deal and what role lobbyists with ties to the Trump administration played in the settlement. (Reporting by Jody Godoy in New York; Editing by Joe Bavier)

(The article has been published through a syndicated feed. Except for the headline, the content has been published verbatim. Liability lies with original publisher.)