War in Middle East threatens UK living standards growth, as markets brace for energy shock – business live

Good morning, and welcome to our rolling coverage of business, the financial markets and the world economy.The dust is settling after Rachel Reeves’s spring forecast statement yesterday, which showed that growth will be weaker than hoped this year while unemployment will be higher.While the chancellor claimed the UK could ‘beat the forecasts again’, economists are concerned that the ongoing Middle East crisis will hurt the economy, and household finances, badly.The Resolution Foundation have just released their overnight analysis of the Office for Budget Responsibility’s forecast.The good news? The UK is set for a “decent”, one-off increase in living standards this year, and a bumper rise for lower-income families

Global stock markets tumble as Trump bid to avert oil crisis in strait of Hormuz fails to reassure

Global markets tumbled further on Wednesday despite Donald Trump’s offer to have the US navy escort tankers through the strait of Hormuz and the US military’s claim that there is “not a single Iranian ship underway” in the crucial waterway.The Middle East conflict has crippled the strait, which was in effect closed by Iran after strikes by the US and Israel this weekend, raising fears of a sustained energy supply crisis that reverberated around the world.Oil prices, which have surged in recent days, continued to climb. David Solomon, the chief executive of Goldman Sachs, cautioned it would take “a couple of weeks” for markets to process the impact of the US-led military operation in the region.Trading in Seoul was briefly suspended on Wednesday as South Korea’s benchmark Kospi share index fell as much as 12%, putting it on course for its biggest single-day drop since 2008

What was really behind Jack Dorsey laying off nearly half of Block’s staff?

Jack Dorsey cited AI as the driving force behind cutting 40% of his company’s employees, but other factors such as a weak crypto market, overstaffing and a declining stock price may also have motivated the move.Last week, the financial technology company Block announced that it would lay off 4,000 of its 10,000 workers. Dorsey, Block’s CEO, said in a letter to shareholders that advances in AI “have changed what it means to build and run a company”.“We’re already seeing it internally. A significantly smaller team, using the tools we’re building, can do more and do it better

OpenAI amends Pentagon deal as Sam Altman admits it looks ‘sloppy’

OpenAI is amending its hastily arranged deal to supply artificial intelligence to the US Department of War (DoW) after the ChatGPT owner’s chief executive admitted it looked “opportunistic and sloppy”.The contract prompted fears the San Francisco startup’s AI could be used for domestic mass surveillance but its boss, Sam Altman, said on Monday night the startup would explicitly bar its technology from being used for that purpose or being deployed by defence department intelligence agencies such as the National Security Agency (NSA).OpenAI, which has more than 900 million users of ChatGPT, made the deal almost immediately after the Pentagon’s existing AI contractor, Anthropic, was dropped.Anthropic had insisted “using these systems for mass domestic surveillance is incompatible with democratic values”, leading the US president, Donald Trump, to call Anthropic “leftwing nut jobs” and directing the federal government to stop using its technology.Despite denials from OpenAI that the agreement allowed for surveillance use, commentators raised the spectre of the Snowden scandal, which broke in 2013, when it emerged the NSA was engaged in mass harvesting of phone and internet communications

Borthwick’s Six Nations spring clean makes a fresher-looking mix but raises questions over logic | Robert Kitson

Will it be the players’ fault if a slightly cobbled together England goes down in Roman flames after a selection that suggests the head coach’s patience snapped?The temperatures are rising, the daffodils are out and, within the England camp, the time has come for a major spring clean. Steve Borthwick has certainly snapped on his marigolds with rare vigour in his bid to banish his side’s February blues, with most areas of his team sheet either hosed down or completely flushed away after the less‑than‑fragrant performance against Ireland.A grand total of 12 changes, three of them positional, is almost approaching Thames Water-levels of murky discharge. Not since the infamous tombola days of the 1960s and 70s, when England’s selectors sometimes called up any old Tom, Dick or Harrovian, has a red rose head coach deviated more strikingly from the strong and stable gospel of devil‑you‑know cohesion.The resultant mix is unquestionably fresher-looking if, in places, slightly eclectic

Winter Paralympics 2026: who are Australia’s top medal contenders? | Kieran Pender

Following a Winter Olympics of unprecedented success for team Australia, the nation’s para-athletes will be hoping to emulate that golden form when the Milano Cortina Paralympics begin on Friday. Australia has won a medal at every Winter Paralympics since 1992, with the high-point coming at Salt Lake City in 2002 thanks to a record six gold medals.In Italy, Australia will be represented by 12 para-athletes and two guides across four sports, a slight increase on the team size from Beijing 2022. Who are Australia’s medal hopefuls?Already a two-time Summer Paralympics gold medallist, the remarkable Reid will make history as Australia’s first Indigenous Winter Paralympian in the weeks ahead. The Wemba-Wemba and Guring-gai woman started her career as a para-swimmer, competing at the 2012 Games, before switching to track para-cycling