Smoke rises after the attack on Tehran on March 4, 2026.
Atta Kenare | AFP | Getty Images
What you need to know today
China on Thursday set its GDP growth target for 2026 at 4.5% to 5%, according to a copy of a government work report obtained by CNBC. This is the lowest goal ever recorded dating back to the early 1990s. Defense spending is expected to rise 7%, the slowest growth since 2021, as Beijing grapples with persistent deflationary pressures and trade tensions with the United States, but analysts believe the official figures are an underestimate.
A vote to force President Donald Trump to withdraw from the Iran war failed to pass in the US Senate on Wednesday. The resolution had many hurdles and was largely symbolic, as it was almost certain that President Trump would veto it. Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez on Wednesday described the Middle East war as a “disaster.” The move comes after President Trump pledged to cut off trade with Madrid after the Spanish government blocked two jointly operated bases on its territory from being used in an attack.
State media Fars news agency reported on Wednesday that Amazon’s Bahrain data center was targeted by Iran for supporting the US military. The company’s cloud computing division announced Monday that one of its facilities in Bahrain was damaged in a nearby drone attack on Sunday. Two data centers in the United Arab Emirates were also damaged by “direct hits” from drones.
U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent told CNBC that tariffs of 15% will begin worldwide this week, up from the current 10%. Bessent also predicted that by August, U.S. tariffs would effectively return to levels where they were before the Supreme Court struck down the often-draconian tariffs that President Trump unilaterally imposed on most countries around the world last year.
Tech industry groups have expressed “concerns” to U.S. Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth after a company was designated as a supply chain risk. The letter, written by the Information Technology Industry Council, did not mention Anthropic by name, but the artificial intelligence company was given that name Friday after failing to reach an agreement with the Department of Defense. Participating companies include Nvidia, Google, Anthropic, Microsoft, Apple, and Amazon.
Broadcom, the chipmaker riding the artificial intelligence boom, reported stronger profits and revenue and issued a strong outlook for the current fiscal year. Shares rose as much as 5% in extended trading Wednesday. “We expect AI revenue from chips alone to exceed $100 billion in 2027,” Broadcom CEO Hock Tan said on a conference call with analysts. “We have also secured the necessary supply chain to achieve this.”
And finally…
Nvidia CEO Huang says $30 billion OpenAI investment ‘may be the last’
Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang said the company’s recent $30 billion investment in OpenAI “may be its last investment” in the artificial intelligence startup before going public towards the end of the year.
He added that the $100 billion investment the companies touted in September was probably “not in the plan.”
“The reason is because we’re going public,” Hwang said Wednesday at the Morgan Stanley Technology, Media and Telecom Conference.
