Oil on track for record monthly surge as Iran war disrupts markets

The Brent crude oil price is on track for its biggest monthly gain on record in March after the Iran war caused mayhem in the markets.Brent crude, the international benchmark, has climbed by 51% since the start of March, LSEG data shows, beating the previous monthly record of 46% in September 1990 after Saddam Hussein invaded Kuwait, leading to the first Gulf war.Brent closed at $112.57 a barrel on Friday, up from $72.48 a barrel on 27 February, the day before the US-Israeli war on Iran began

War in Iran erodes the chancellor’s headroom and exposes our fragility | Heather Stewart

It is with no pleasure that I must report a depressing domestic byproduct of the war in the Middle East: headroom chat is back.Of course, shifts in investors’ appetite for gilts – UK government bonds – are trivial in the context of the bloodshed in Iran and beyond. But as a result of the economic chaos unleashed, gilt yields, which determine the interest rate on government borrowing, have resumed their grip on British politics. And one of Rachel Reeves’s proudest boasts, the £23bn in “headroom” she had built up against her fiscal rules, is in jeopardy.Less than a month ago, the chancellor was able to stand up in the House of Commons and report that her headroom had increased since November’s tax-raising budget

‘Our assumptions are broken’: how fraudulent church data revealed AI’s threat to polling

If you had been keeping tabs on the news about church attendance in Britain lately, you would be forgiven for thinking the country was in the midst of a Christian revival.Stories of swelling congregations, filled with young people returning to the flock, spurred on by everything from social media to a rise in bible sales appeared to be confirmed by a 2024 report from the Bible Society.Based on data collected by a YouGov survey, it claimed church attendance was increasing in England and Wales. The findings drove headlines, and the narrative was established.There was just one problem – the survey turned out to be based on “fraudulent” data and has been withdrawn

‘They feel true’: political deepfakes are growing in influence – even if people know they aren’t real

Online content creators are not just building fake images and videos of prominent public figures, they are also fabricating people and using them in military contexts, which can make them money and even serve as effective propaganda, according to artificial intelligence researchers.Some of these online avatars are sexualized images of women wearing camouflage garb that have generated a significant audience and helped create an idealized image of political figures like Donald Trump, even if the viewer knows the content is not real, according to experts.“We are blending the lines between political cartoons and reality,” said Daniel Schiff, an assistant professor of technology policy at Purdue University and co-director of the Governance and Responsible AI Lab (Grail). “A lot of people feel like these images or videos or the stories they convey, feel true.”The amount of political deepfakes has increased dramatically in recent years, according to a Grail database

Mary Rand obituary

One of the true “golden girls” of the swinging 60s, Mary Rand, who has died aged 86, emerged as the brightest British sporting star of her era when she became her nation’s first female gold medallist in Olympic athletics, taking long jump victory with a world record leap in the Tokyo games of 1964. She also won silver in the pentathlon and bronze in the sprint relay at the event, making her the first British athlete to have claimed three medals in one Olympic Games.Her life was transformed after she broke the previous record on a wet day with a leap of 6.76 metres. On a cinder track, running into a headwind, her performance was spectacular

Alfie Barbeary’s late try earns Bath thrilling comeback victory against Sale

The reservoir of talent at Bath runs deep these days. The champions rested a raft of key players but still had too much class for a Sale side whose season continues to unravel at a rate of knots.An entertaining game played in difficult, windswept conditions could have gone either way, but Johann van Graan’s side conjured up two tries in the final quarter to clinch a bonus-point win.First their precocious 20‑year‑old hooker, Kepu Tuipulotu, broke on the left touchline before sending a delightful kick downfield for his fellow replacement Bernard van der Linde to gather and score.It was a telling reminder of Tuipulotu’s awesome potential on a day when Finn Russell and Ben Spencer were given the afternoon off