South Korea's Financial Supervisory Service held a financial-situation meeting on the 16th, chaired by FSS chief Lee Chan-jin, to assess market moves after the Bank of Korea MPC raised its policy rate by 25bp. Lee said the BOK hike was in line with market expectations but warned that sharply higher domestic equity volatility, ongoing Middle East geopolitical tensions and the risk of further US rate hikes warrant preparedness and measures to safeguard corporate financing and limit potential wider

NewsNation reported that Trump said if a solution cannot be reached with Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, the United States may seek to eliminate it as was done with ISIS.

At a Pennsylvania Defense and Innovation Summit hosted by Sen. McCormick on Wednesday, Trump told arms makers, "Our products are world-class, but the pace needs to be faster." His appearance highlighted the administration's push to expand defense production as a prolonged Middle East conflict has depleted large numbers of missiles, interceptors and other munitions and exposed limits in U.S. military supply chains and production capacity. Earlier Wednesday the Department of Defense launched the National Security Finance Fund to provide funding and credit to companies addressing critical-minerals supply shortfalls deemed essential to national security.