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Good morning.
Investors wiped $52bn off the value of some of the biggest US banks yesterday after worries about the size of their bond portfolios. Scroll down to read more about how it happened.
Elsewhere, we have an exclusive about Australia planning to buy US submarines as part of the so-called Aukus security pact while it waits for new British-designed boats to be built.
Here are some of the important events to keep an eye on:
US jobs: US non-farm payrolls for February will be released today. Economists expect around 200,000 new jobs to have been added. While less than the 500,00 added in January, it will put pressure on the Federal Reserve to increase interest rates later in March.
Von der Leyen meets Biden: European Commission president Ursula von der Leyen is in Washington today meeting US president Joe Biden. The US and EU have also announced they will launch trade talks to dispel tensions over green investment being choked out of Europe by the Inflation Reduction Act.
DeSantis takes the stage: Florida governor Ron DeSantis is in Iowa today, with what many are seeing as his first step towards running for president.
Thank you for reading FirstFT. Have a great weekend.
Today’s top news
1. Investors wiped $52.4bn off the market value of the four largest US banks by assets yesterday in a sell-off that started with difficulties at Silicon Valley Bank. The steep losses at the small, tech-focused lender shifted attention to risks in bond portfolios held by JPMorgan Chase, Bank of America, Citigroup and Wells Fargo.
2. EXCLUSIVE: Australia plans to buy US submarines in preparation for a British-designed fleet of next-generation boats to counter China arriving in the 2040s. New details suggest the deal will also have a secondary focus on developing technology such as hypersonic weapons.
3. EXCLUSIVE: Two Russian billionaires are primed to offload their stakes in Alfa-Bank in a $2.3bn sale of Russia’s largest private lender. Read more on how Mikhail Fridman and Petr Aven seek to free themselves from western sanctions.
4. EXCLUSIVE: UK-based Ferguson has “no regrets” over moving its listing to New York last year, the plumbing equipment supplier’s chief said. As others also shun London for the US, here’s why Kevin Murphy thinks the switch achieved almost all its goals.
5. The Netherlands reviews banning maintenance of chipmaking tools in China after pressure from the US to cut China’s supply of semiconductors. The Netherlands is home to ASML, one of the only companies to produce machines that can make advanced chips. Read more here.
How well did you keep up with the news this week? Take our quiz.
The Big Read
Historian Vincent Scully once said of New York’s Penn Station: “One entered the city like a god. One scuttles in now like a rat.” Fixing it has been an elusive dream since the original was demolished in 1963 in what many regard as the city’s greatest architectural crime. The long-delayed project, trapped in byzantine politics and personal rivalries, has been called by some “too important to fail”.
We’re also reading . . .
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Germany’s Palantir problem: After a recent court ruling, two German states are rethinking how their police forces use data supplied by US company Palantir.
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Fictional Intelligence: Planning for technology dreamed up by science fiction writers is a dangerous game to play argues John Thornhill.
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LA’s homelessness crisis is getting out of control: A chance encounter by the FT’s correspondent in LA with a homeless man during a recent storm illustrates how bad the situation is.
Chart of the day
In the US more and more teenagers are saying that their lives feel meaningless. John Burn-Murdoch illustrates the unhealthy correlation between the increased use of technology and declining mental health in children.
Take a break from the news
In this Weekend Essay for the FT, novelist Petina Gappah reminisces about a group of writers who put a fresh, modern vision of Africa out into the world.
Read more in FT Weekend’s specially curated series celebrating African writers and artists.
Additional contributions by Tee Zhuo and Darren Dodd
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