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The Trump administration has declined to renew the U.S.-Mexico-Canada Agreement (USMCA) in its current form following its mandatory six-year review, leaving the trade pact in force for up to another 10 years with annual reviews while negotiations continue over proposed changes. The move starts the countdown towards the agreement's expiry unless all three countries agree to a revised version. The U.S. is seeking tougher North American rules of origin for automobiles and other industrial goods, aiming to reshore manufacturing, reduce trade deficits and limit China's access to the regional trading bloc. Talks with Mexico are due to resume later this month, and Canada has also pledged to continue negotiations while seeking relief from U.S. tariffs on steel, aluminum, vehicles and lumber. The USMCA underpins around $1.6tn of annual trade between the three countries, and industry groups, including automakers and agricultural exporters, have urged governments to preserve the agreement.

 

Bloomberg

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Federal Reserve Chairman Kevin Warsh has insisted there would be “no changes” to U.S. central bank independence as he pledged that the Fed would take a strident approach to tackling inflation. He said he will stick firmly to a 2% inflation target and "disappoint" anyone who expects loose monetary policy despite ​President Donald Trump's call for interest rate cuts. "If people thought this central bank was going to be comfortable with an inflation objective above 2%, they would be disappointed," Warsh said at the European Central Bank’s annual gathering of international policymakers and economists in Sintra, Portugal. He added that "we have been an independent central bank for a long time. We are going to be an independent central bank at this moment and you will see no changes on that." 

 

The Hill

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Reuters

CNBC reports on companies that have walked back their hiring plans after rapidly changing their minds that artificial intelligence can “do it all,” to focus more on human capital. Ford has rehired hundreds of experienced human engineers to work on quality issues that automated systems couldn’t fix, and Commonwealth Bank of Australia and IBM are also said to be refocusing on human capital after making layoffs while investing in AI. IBM replaced its HR functions with AI that handled around 94% of routine requests but was unable to meet the other 6%, which included ethical dilemmas. “Budgeting on ‘tech to replace humans’ without investing in training or upskilling left teams unprepared to leverage AI,” a report from Intuition Labs observed. “Notably, among companies pushing automation, many later ‘regretted’ layoffs, having cut the very people needed to oversee AI,” it added.

 

CNBC

Five companies including Eli Lilly and Regeneron have been selected by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration for the PreCheck pilot program to accelerate ‌reviews of new domestic pharmaceutical manufacturing facilities. The program will allow regulators to start reviewing new manufacturing facilities while they are being built to identify and correct any ​issues. The other companies in the pilot program are Cellares, Fujifilm Biotechnologies, Kriya Therapeutics and Kyowa Kirin. “We’re pleased to see programs like the FDA’s PreCheck Pilot Program that encourage collaboration between innovators and regulators to build next generation manufacturing capabilities and strengthen America’s biopharmaceutical industry,” Regeneron CEO Leonard Schleifer said.

 

CNBC

Microsoft plans to cut under 2.5% of its workforce in the latest round ​of layoffs that could be announced as early as ‌next week. The ​layoffs will impact thousands of roles, including sales and consulting, as ​well as jobs at the company's Xbox gaming division. Some affected employees will be offered new roles immediately, according to people familiar with the situation.

 

Business Insider

The Trump administration's moves to roll back Temporary Protected Status and other humanitarian programs for immigrants are pushing hundreds of thousands of previously legal foreigners into a shadow workforce, Bloomberg reports. The shift has been accelerated by last week's ruling by the Supreme Court that the White House can strip protected status from hundreds of thousands of Haitian and Syrian migrants whose home countries remain unsafe. Pia Orrenius, a labor economist at the Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas, said: “In most cases, these people [who lose their legal status] are not going to leave the country . . . They’ll likely stay and swell the ranks of the undocumented immigrant population.”

 

Bloomberg

Two former Clifford Chance lawyers have sued the firm, claiming it is improperly trying to claw back nearly $5.8m in pay under a partnership agreement before the pair left this year for Sidley Austin. Clifford Cone and Michael Sabin said in their lawsuit filed in Manhattan district court that ​U.K.-based Clifford Chance was trying to claw back pay as a “punitive” and “anti-competitive” response to their January departure to ​a rival. Sabin and Cone asked the court to rule that New York law and not the laws of the U.K. should govern the resolution of the dispute. New York prohibits law firm partnership provisions that impose financial penalties requiring departing partners to return earned compensation when they join a competitor.

 

Bloomberg Law

Reuters

Apple has accused the Competition Commission of India (CCI) of "copy-pasting" its rivals' claims and failing to properly conduct its own investigation in concluding the U.S. tech firm breached competition laws. In a submission, Apple argued that Indian antitrust investigators had not done their own analysis and instead indulged in "copy-pasting" many submissions from the company's opponents in the CCI case such ​as Tinder-owner Match, Walmart's Indian payments app, PhonePe, and Indian rival Paytm. Apple denies claims made by CCI investigators in a privately issued report in 2024 which said the company engaged in "abusive conduct" on the apps platform of its iOS operating system, and wrongly mandated the use of its payment system.

 

Reuters

Cal-Maine Foods, Versova, and Hickman's Egg Ranch have reached settlement agreements with the U.S. Department of Justice and 17 states to resolve allegations that they colluded to inflate egg prices between June 2022 and March 2025 by coordinating pricing submissions to a key industry index. While the companies denied wrongdoing, they agreed to pay a combined $3.3m to the states, donate 53m eggs to food banks and non-profit organizations, and implement antitrust compliance measures, including restrictions on communications with competitors over pricing and bidding. The investigation followed a period in which U.S. egg prices surged to a record average of $6.23 per dozen in March 2025 before falling below $2.20 per dozen by May 2026 as poultry flocks recovered from the bird flu outbreak.

 

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Wall Street Journal

Taiwan’s Keelung District Prosecutors Office has raided server maker Supermicro’s local office in a probe of alleged smuggling of Nvidia’s AI chips to China. Super Micro said in a statement that it is working closely with the Taiwanese authorities. “Super Micro is committed to protecting our advanced technologies and intellectual property,” the firm said. “Super Micro products continued to be targeted in these matters, and we continue to cooperate with law enforcement and government officials in Taiwan and other jurisdictions in which we operate to ensure our technology is distributed as lawfully intended.” Supermicro said earlier this year that it was co-operating with U.S. and Taiwanese authorities to “prevent illicit diversion of server technology.” 

 

Financial Times

Straits Times

Taiwan News

The Supreme Court has agreed to hear Apple's appeal regarding a contempt ruling in its ongoing legal battle with Epic Games, the maker of "Fortnite." The case stems from a 2020 lawsuit where Epic challenged Apple's control over app transactions and distribution on its iOS platform. In 2021, U.S. District Judge Yvonne Gonzalez Rogers mandated that Apple allow developers to include links to alternative payment methods, but Apple imposed a 27% commission on these transactions. In 2025, Apple was found in civil contempt for violating the injunction. Apple has denied violating the judge's order and argued to the Supreme Court that the injunction should not be applied to millions of developers beyond Epic Games. "Regulators around the world are watching this case to determine what commission rate Apple may charge on covered purchases ​in huge markets outside the United States," Apple told the Supreme Court in a filing.

 

U.S. News

A clinical trial for Amgen's pill Tavneos was retracted from the New England Journal of Medicine following a U.S. Food and Drug Administration investigation that found results of nine patients were changed after the study's database was finalized, and and some researchers were unblinded. Tavneos was studied for the treatment of ANCA-associated vasculitis, a rare autoimmune condition that causes inflammation of small blood vessels. Bloomberg says the retraction puts the drug's continued sales at risk, at a time when health regulators in the U.S. and Europe have proposed pulling the drug from the market, alleging it was approved based on incorrect or manipulated data.

 

Bloomberg

Australia's competition regulator has launched legal action against Amazon Australia, alleging the company used unfair contract terms to introduce advertising on Prime Video without adequately protecting annual Prime subscribers. The Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) claims that, between November 2023 and August 2025, Amazon relied on these terms to require more than 1m subscribers either to accept adverts or pay an additional A$2.99 a month for an ad-free experience when advertising was introduced in July 2024, without offering refunds to customers who cancelled. The ACCC is seeking consumer compensation, financial penalties and other court orders, arguing that the contract changes disadvantaged subscribers. Amazon said it had cooperated with the regulator's investigation and is reviewing the case while remaining focused on serving Australian customers.

 

CNBC

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Wall Street Journal

Americans are expected to pay more for their Fourth of July celebrations this year as higher production, labor and transportation costs continue to drive up the prices of food and fuel. The American Farm Bureau Federation estimates the cost of a cookout for 10 people has risen 4% year-on-year, broadly in line with inflation, while Wells Fargo's Agri-Food Institute estimates barbecue costs have increased 2.4%. Beef prices remain at record highs, with ground beef and steak up 14% from a year ago due to tighter cattle supplies, higher feed and labor costs, drought conditions and supply chain disruptions. Other notable increases include pork and beans, up 13.8% as aluminum can costs rise, strawberries, and hamburger buns, up 7.7% because of increased production and distribution costs. The National Retail Federation expects consumers to spend a record average of $94.41 per person on Independence Day food this year.

 

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