TSX futures rise on trade optimism and U.S. economic data
Futures on the S&P/TSX index (.SXFcv1), opens new tab rose 0.2% at 1,636.40 points by 06:20 a.m. ET (1020 GMT).
Canada's International Trade Minister pointed to interest in advancing trade talks with the South American bloc Mercosur, comprising Brazil, Argentina, Paraguay, and Uruguay, as Ottawa seeks to diversify its trade relations beyond the U.S.
Prime Minister Mark Carney and his team are in talks with U.S. President Donald Trump to reach a trade agreement before the August 1 deadline, when 35% tariffs are set to take effect.
In other trade-related news, Canada and New Zealand reached a "mutually satisfactory" resolution to a long-term dispute over dairy product access, which will allow for better access to the Canadian market, Ottawa said on Thursday.
Trump has previously criticised high Canadian tariffs on dairy products.
Earlier this week, Carney introduced a steel tariff rate quota in a bid to protect the domestic steel industry. China's Commerce Ministry urged Ottawa on Friday to drop the restrictions while threatening countermeasures.
Thursday's positive retail sales and U.S. weekly jobless claims data showed that the economy has continued to show resilience despite tariff-related uncertainty.
Gold prices edged higher, while platinum rose to a near 11-year high and copper climbed to an over one-week high. Oil , rose after EU's new sanctions on Russia.
TSX hit a record high on Thursday, helped by financial and technology shares, as Alimentation Couche-Tard abandoned a major takeover bid and U.S. data pointed to economic resilience.
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The Guardian
21 minutes ago
- The Guardian
Trump fossil-fuel push setting back green progress decades, critics warn
Ever since Donald Trump began his second presidency, he has used an 'invented' national energy emergency to help justify expanding oil, gas and coal while slashing green energy – despite years of scientific evidence that burning fossil fuels has contributed significantly to climate change, say scholars and watchdogs. It's an agenda that in only its first six months, has put back environmental progress by decades, they say. Trump's skewed and unscientific energy priorities have come even as climate-change related weather disasters from huge floods in Texas to giant California fires have increased, and as Trump regulators are clamping down on spending for alternative fuels and weather research. As the death toll from the Texas floods rose to over 100 on 7 July, Trump signed an executive order that added new treasury department restrictions on tax subsidies for wind and solar projects. That order came days after Trump signed his One Big Beautiful Bill Act, which included provisions to gut big tax credits for green energy contained in the 2022 Inflation Reduction Act legislation Congress passed during Joe Biden's presidency In another oddly timed move, underscoring the administration's war on science, its proposed budget for the coming fiscal year would shutter 10 labs that the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration runs – specifically ones that conduct key research on ways weather changes are affected by a warming earth. Trump also signed four executive orders in April to help revive the beleaguered and polluting coal industry, which he and key cabinet members touted more at Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh as they promoted plans by private companies to spend $92bn on AI projects and expand coal and natural gas in Pennsylvania. The blinkered focus that Trump and his key regulators place on their energy policies reflect the administration's denigration of science, while posing dangers to public health and scientific progress. And, critics say, this is all happening as university research and government labs face big cutbacks in funding and staff. Trump has pushed for more fossil-fuel production, rhapsodized about 'beautiful coal', dubbed climate change a 'hoax' and invoked his 'drill, baby, drill' mantra to promote more oil and gas projects after receiving $75m in campaign donations in 2024 from fossil-fuel interests. Scholars have hit out at the administration for firing hundreds of scientists and experts working on a major federal report detailing how climate change is impacting the country. The administration has also systematically deleted mentions of climate change from federal websites while cutting back funds for global warming research. 'Trump's actions are a patent attempt to roll back decades of environmental progress, not because it makes any sense, economically, but because it does two things that Trump wants,' Naomi Oreskes, a Harvard historian of science, told the Guardian 'First, it helps his cronies in the oil, gas and coal industries, who we know he met with a Mar-a-Lago before the election, and who gave substantial sums to his election campaign.' Oreskes said it's also 'part of a larger attempt to deny the credibility of environmental protection, tout court'. 'Look at Trump trying to force uneconomic coal fired power plants to stay open,' she continued. 'That makes no economic sense, and defies the principles of free market economics that Republicans claim to support. But like the guys who jack up their trucks to make more pollution, Trump is trying to deny the necessity and credibility of environmental concerns.' Oreskes stressed that much of the science Trump 'is in the process of destroying forms the basis for environmental and public health protection in this country: the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, the US Geological Survey and the EPA, plus all the federally funded science at universities across the country, including my home institution, Harvard. None of this makes economic sense.' Many scientists echo Oreskes's concerns as do Democratic attorneys general, who filed a lawsuit in May challenging the legality of the Trump administration's declaration of a national 'energy emergency' to justify its radical policies. Meanwhile, regulatory and spending shifts at the Environmental Protection Agency, including staff and research cuts, have revealed the administration's disregard for scientific evidence – particularly about climate change and its adverse economic effects. In response to the cuts and policy shifts, a total of 278 EPA employees signed a letter in July denouncing the agency's politicization and decrying policies that 'undermine the EPA mission of protecting human health and the environment'. The EPA then put 144 of the employees who signed their names to the letter on leave for two weeks while an 'administrative investigation' was conducted. 'This isn't quite at the level of the 17th-century church's persecution of Galileo for saying the Earth goes around the Sun, but it's in a similar spirit of ideology trying to squelch science,' Michael Gerrard, who heads the Sabin Center for Climate Change Law at Columbia University, told the Guardian. 'Trump's use of an invented 'energy emergency' to justify more fossil-fuel production defies not only physics but arithmetic. The numbers show that the US is producing more oil and gas than any other country, and that Trump's actions in knifing the wind and solar industries will raise the energy prices paid by US consumers.' Gerrard stressed too that, on the Texas flooding, 'the lack of sufficient warnings highlight how short-sighted are Trump's drastic cuts to the National Weather Service and other federal scientific work'. He added it was 'especially so since climate change is intensifying extreme weather events, and Trump's attacks on green energy and support of fossil fuels will make those worse'. Such criticism has not seemed to faze Trump or top agency appointees like EPA administrator Lee Zeldin. Last month, 1,500 staffers who work in EPA's office of research and development (ORD) were told in a staff meeting that they would have to apply for about 400 new posts in other EPA offices. What will happen to employees who don't land new positions is unclear. 'Gutting the … [ORD] is a loss for health,' warned Laura Kate Bender, assistant vice-president of nationwide healthy air at the American Lung Association. Further experts and watchdogs have stressed that the health of millions of Americans was threatened by Zeldin's May announcement of plans to cut its budget by $300m in fiscal year 2026 – a move that's part of a makeover to reduce spending levels to those of the 1980s under Ronald Reagan. On Friday, the EPA doubled down on the cuts and say it would be reducing its entire workforce by at least 23% through voluntary retirements and layoffs. Gerrard noted that the administration's misguided energy moves and rejection of science are having enormous societal costs: 'Laboratories are being shut down around the country, experiments that might be on the cusp of great discoveries are being halted, and young aspiring scientists are rethinking their career paths. Other countries are recruiting US scientists and offering them friendlier environments.' Looking ahead, Oreskes, too, warns that the Trump administration's denigration of science will do long term damage to public health, the environment and scientific progress 'The scientific agencies that Trump is destroying, such as the National Weather Service, save the American people and American business billions of dollars in avoided property damage and health costs,' she said. 'But if you want to deny the true costs of climate change, then you may be motivated to destroy the agency that documents these costs [Noaa]. And if you want to deny the need for environmental and public health protection, then an effective way to do that is to destroy the scientific agencies and academic research that for decades have proven that need.'
NBC News
4 hours ago
- NBC News
Trump's ‘big beautiful bill' includes these key tax changes for 2025 — what they mean for you
It's been about two weeks since President Donald Trump 's 'big beautiful bill' became law, and financial advisors and tax professionals are still digesting what the sweeping legislation means for clients. Meanwhile, several changes are effective for 2025, which will impact tax returns filed in 2026. While the Trump administration has been promoting ' working family tax cuts,' the legislation's impact depends on your unique situation — and some updates are complex, experts say. 'There are just so many moving pieces,' said certified financial planner Jim Guarino, managing director at Baker Newman Noyes in Woburn, Massachusetts. He is also a certified public accountant. Currently, many advisors are running projections — often for multiple years — to see how the new provisions could impact taxes. Without income planning, you could reduce, or even eliminate, various tax benefits for which you are otherwise eligible, experts say. When it comes to tax strategy, 'you never want to do anything in a silo,' Guarino said. Here are some of the key changes from Trump's legislation to know for 2025, and how the updates could affect your taxes. Trump's 2017 tax cut extensions The Republicans' marquee law made permanent Trump's 2017 tax cuts — including lower tax brackets and higher standard deductions, among other provisions — which broadly reduced taxes for Americans. Without the extension, most filers could have seen higher taxes in 2026, according to a 2024 report from the Tax Foundation. However, the new law enhances Trump's 2017 cuts, with a few tax breaks that start in 2025: The standard deduction increases from $15,000 to $15,750 (single filers) and $30,000 to $31,500 (married filing jointly). There is also a bump for the child tax credit, with the maximum benefit going from $2,000 to $2,200 per child. If you itemize tax breaks, there is also a temporary higher cap on the state and local tax deduction, or SALT. For 2025, the SALT deduction limit is $40,000, up from $10,000. The higher SALT benefit phases out, or reduces, for incomesbetween $500,000 to $600,000, which can create an artificially higher tax rate of 45.5% that some experts are calling a 'SALT torpedo.' This creates a 'sweet spot' for the SALT deduction between $200,000 and $500,000 of earnings, based on other provisions in the bill, CPA John McCarthy wrote in a blog post this week. Trump's new tax changes for 2025 Trump's tax and spending bill also introduced some temporary tax breaks, which are effective for 2025. Some of these were floated during his 2024 presidential provisions include a $6,000 'bonus' deduction for certain older Americans ages 65 and over, which phases out over $75,000 for single filers or $150,000 for married couples filing jointly. There are also new deductions for tip income, overtime earnings and car loan interest, with varying eligibility requirements. This chart shows a breakdown of some of the key individual provisions that are effective for 2025 compared to previous law. Premium tax credit 'subsidy cliff' returns During the pandemic, Congress boosted the premium tax credit through 2025, which made Marketplace health insurance more affordable. But Trump's legislation didn't extend the enhanced tax break, which could raise Affordable Care Act premiums for more than 22 million enrollees if no action is taken, according to KFF, a health policy organization. That could impact enrollees when choosing ACA health plans this fall, according to Tommy Lucas, a CFP and enrolled agent at Moisand Fitzgerald Tamayo in Orlando, Florida. Starting in 2026, enrollees need to prepare for the ACA subsidy cliff, where enrollees lose the premium tax credit when income exceeds the earnings thresholds by even $1, he said. Currently, most ACA enrollees receive at least part of the premium tax credit. However, the subsidy cliff means enrollees lose the benefit once earnings exceed 400% of the federal poverty limit. For 2025, that threshold was $103,280 for a family of three, according to The Peterson Center on Healthcare, a nonprofit for healthcare policy, and KFF.
Reuters
5 hours ago
- Reuters
Trump, Xi might meet ahead of or during October APEC summit in South Korea, SCMP reports
July 20 (Reuters) - U.S. President Donald Trump might visit China before going to the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation summit between October 30 and November 1, or he could meet Chinese leader Xi Jinping on the sidelines of the APEC event in South Korea, the South China Morning Post reported on Sunday citing multiple sources. The two countries have been trying to negotiate an end to an escalating tit-for-tat tariff war that has upended global trade and supply chains. Trump has sought to impose tariffs on U.S. importers for virtually all foreign goods, which he says will stimulate domestic manufacturing and which critics say will instead make many consumer goods more expensive for Americans. He has called for a universal base tariff rate of 10% on goods imported from all countries, with higher rates for imports from the most "problematic" ones, including China: imports from there now have the highest tariff rate of 55%. Trump has set a deadline of August 12 for the U.S. and China to reach a durable tariffs agreement. A spokesperson for Trump did not respond to a request for comment about the reported plans for a meeting with Xi in the fall.
