Oil price tops $100 a barrel as US blockades strait of Hormuz; Goldman Sachs posts rise in profits – as it happened

Time to wrap up…Oil prices have jumped back above $100 a barrel and global stocks fell after weekend talks between the US and Iran ended without an agreement and Donald Trump imposed a blockade of the strait of Hormuz.The US president announced the blockade on Sunday, targeting Iranian vessels and ships that have paid a toll to Iran for passage through the strait, in an attempt to choke off the flow of Iranian oil.US Central Command said it would start blocking all Iranian Gulf ports and coastal areas from 3pm UK time, in effect seizing control of maritime traffic in the strait of Hormuz.Trump said on Monday afternoon that ships coming near the blockade would be “eliminated”, warning Iran not to send its “fast attack ships”:double quotation markWarning: If any of these ships come anywhere close to our BLOCKADE, they will be immediately ELIMINATED, using the same system of kill that we use against the drug dealers on boats at Sea. It is quick and brutal

Rolls-Royce secures nearly £600m in UK government cash to develop small reactors

Rolls-Royce has secured up to £599m from Britain’s national wealth fund as it races to develop the UK’s first small modular nuclear reactors.The fund will help support Rolls-Royce’s design of small modular reactors (SMRs) at Wylfa on the island of Anglesey (called Ynys Môn in Welsh).SMR technology aims to produce nuclear power stations in factories to drive down costs and speed up installation.Wylfa generated nuclear power from 1971 until 2015, when it shut down its last reactor. Hitachi, the Japanese conglomerate, tried to build a new nuclear power station there but ultimately abandoned its plans in 2020 after failing to agree government funding

GSK reports promising early results in ovarian and womb cancer drug trial

GSK has revealed positive results for a treatment for gynaecological cancers as its chief executive, Luke Miels, seeks to speed up drug development at the group.The company said that in an early-stage trial Mocertatug Rezetecan, known as Mo-Rez, shrank or eliminated tumours in 62% of patients with ovarian cancer where chemotherapy had failed, and in 67% of those with endometrial cancer.Based in London, GSK has recently gained plaudits for its work on tackling superbugs, becoming one of just three big pharma companies globally that continue to invest in anti-microbial research.However, commercially GSK has been eclipsed in recent years by its bigger British rival AstraZeneca, which last year outstripped GSK’s near-£33bn turnover by more than £10bn and whose market value is more than twice as high.GSK acquired the Mo-Rez cancer treatment, an antibody-drug conjugate (ADC), from China’s Hansoh Pharma in late 2023, and has trialled it in 224 patients around the world, including the UK, over the past year

Collapse of US-Iran talks heightens fears of prolonged energy shock

The failure of the US and Iran to reach a peace deal after marathon negotiations has put markets on alert for further oil and gas price rises.With large numbers of oil tankers remaining stuck in the Gulf, the US vice-president, JD Vance, blamed the collapse of the talks on Tehran’s refusal to abandon its nuclear weapons programme, while Iranian sources hit back at “excessive” demands from Washington.Vance, who left Islamabad on Sunday morning after 21 hours of talks with Iranian officials in the Pakistani capital, said his team had been very clear on its red lines as hopes faded of a quick end to the war that began on 28 February with US and Israeli airstrikes on Tehran.A weekend market in US crude oil operated by the broker IG indicated that the oil price was going to rise when trading begins on Sunday night, UK time, to about $98 a barrel, from about $96.50 on Friday night before the peace talks in Pakistan

Task for the week: limit the fallout from biggest oil shock in decades | Richard Partington

The world’s finance ministers and central bank governors gather in Washington this week for the half-yearly meetings of the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank, with the global economy in a perilous spot.Not since the foundation of the Bretton Woods institutions late in the second world war have global conflicts triggered this much economic turbulence. The volatile 1970s come close. But the US-Israeli war on Iran, coming so soon after the Covid pandemic and Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, take the prize.Even if a durable peace deal in the Middle East can be reached, there will still be permanent economic scars

Low-tax Texas opens London office to lure jobs and investment

The US state of Texas is putting UK businesses in its crosshairs with the launch this month of a dedicated London office to lure jobs and investment to the low-tax Lone Star State.Texas recently secured approval for the new site, adding to a growing list of international offices from which it can try to draw corporate heavyweights across its borders.It is the latest sign that Texas lobbyists, led by the office of the state’s Republican governor, Greg Abbott, are widening their economic ambitions beyond American borders, having already had success luring jobs and investment from rival US states including California, Delaware and New York.Lobbyists working in the London office are likely to court UK bosses with incentives including new, fast-track business courts and multimillion dollar subsidies. Texas charges neither corporation nor income tax