U.S. Treasury sanctions 17 vessels transporting Iranian crude, petroleum products and petrochemicals.

The Ministry of Finance released its 2026 1H fiscal policy execution report. National general public budget spending was 14.33 tln yuan, up 1.5% YoY. Central-government general public budget outlays totaled 2.12 tln yuan, up 6.5% YoY, maintaining high intensity. Local general public budget spending was 12.21 tln yuan, up 0.6% YoY, reversing prior negative cumulative growth. Major allocations: health 1.22 tln yuan, +10.8% YoY (driven by higher childcare subsidies and increased transfers/subsidies to the basic medical insurance fund); social security and employment 2.64 tln yuan, +7.6% YoY; housing security 430.9 bln yuan, +6.1% YoY.

US stocks closed Thursday: Dow Jones up ~0.1%, S&P 500 down 0.47%, Nasdaq down 1.25%. Tech names slumped after reports that OpenAI’s annualized revenue is roughly $20bn below earlier figures. NVIDIA fell nearly 3%; SpaceX, Micron and SK Hynix dropped over 4%; ORACLE and Intel slid more than 5%. The Nasdaq Golden Dragon Index lost 0.62%; NIO fell 3.8%.