CNBC Daily Open: U.S. takes aim at friends and foes alike

Hello, this is Hui Jie writing to you from Singapore. Welcome to another edition of CNBC’s Daily Open.

President Donald Trump has accused Canada of wanting the benefits of a U.S. state, as the two countries failed to reach a trade deal. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, meanwhile, is threatening the “single greatest financial offensive ever marshalled” against Iran.

As the U.S. goes after friends and foes alike, focus is also on Treasury yields that have resumed their upward path after a brief hiatus.

The relationship between the U.S. and Canada took a turn for the worse over the weekend.

The U.S. on Saturday levied 50% tariffs on some Canadian goods, after trade talks between the neighboring countries collapsed, with both governments blaming the other for not reaching a deal.

Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney said Ottawa would respond dollar for dollar, with retaliatory duties on U.S. goods taking effect Sept. 8, prompting Trump to accuse Canada of seeking advantages of an American state. “Canada wants the benefits of being a State, without being one.”

Washington is also using access to the American economy as leverage against Iran.

Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent is expected to announce a sweeping package of sanctions against Iran Monday, describing the measures as “the single greatest financial offensive ever marshalled against an adversary.”

Last week, Bessent told CNBC that the Trump administration’s plan to crush Iran’s economy will likely negate the need for major U.S. military operations against the country.

The Trump administration has demanded that U.S. allies and the rest of the world stop doing business with Iran, with Bessent adding “we are going to them and saying you are either with us or against us.”

Iran, on its part, has slammed the moves, with its foreign ministry spokesperson Esmaeil Baqaei describing the measures as an assertion of “extraterritorial sovereignty” over other members of the United Nations.

As Bessent prepares to exert pressure abroad, the bond market continues to apply pressure at home.

U.S. stock futures slipped Sunday stateside as longer-dated Treasury yields resumed their climb Friday, erasing much of the rally after the Treasury Department’s decision to expand its repurchases of government debt.

The 30-year yield rose to 5.273%, while the benchmark 10-year yield climbed to around 4.734%.

While U.S. futures were lower, Asia markets were mixed. Japan’s Nikkei 225 rose in early trading, while South Korea’s Kospi declined.

In tech, Anthropic is poised to hit the public market at a time when an increasing number of Americans are worried about artificial intelligence and are opposing new data centers that would power the AI build out.

That backlash is expected to be a key risk factor in Anthropic’s IPO prospectus, according to people familiar with matter.

The Claude creator has been holding preliminary “test-the-water” meetings with bankers and investors, and CFO Krishna Rao is being asked about competition, margin pressure from open-source models, and what happens if there’s a slowdown in the building of data centers, the sources said.

— Lim Hui Jie

No more doom scrolling or Instagram Stories? A Meta trial loss could end the social media we know

Meta says it faces a trillion-dollar penalty and damage to its advertising model. But the trial could go well beyond one company. It could make social media unrecognizable. 

The states want the court to force Meta to remove “certain addictive design features” from its platforms, Instagram and Facebook. These include infinite scrolling, autoplaying videos, disappearing content such as Instagram Stories, beauty filters, and algorithm-dominated feeds.

“This trial is potentially the end of social media as we know it,” Kate Winick, a principal analyst at Forrester, said.

— Sawdah Bhaimiya