World
President Donald Trump rejected an Iranian proposal that Tehran said could have reopened the Strait of Hormuz within a week if the United States met conditions attached to it. Trump told reporters outside the White House that Iran wanted a deal because it was losing badly under the American naval blockade, and that the offer was not acceptable. Iran's president left New York after the United Nations General Assembly meetings, which included indirect contacts with Washington. Saudi Arabia said it intercepted another missile it blamed on Iran-backed Houthi forces in Yemen. Oil has traded near $100 a barrel during the standoff, and ship traffic through the waterway stays restricted.
AP / Al Jazeera
Politics
The White House said late on Friday that it would cancel $810 million in spending that Congress had already approved, using a rarely used budget device known as a pocket rescission. The largest item was $567 million in Health and Human Services funding for programmes that serve noncitizens. Other cuts targeted health and education services and support for immigrants, refugees and minority-owned businesses. Senate Appropriations Committee Chair Susan Collins said lawmakers were told without warning or consultation, and that the Office of Management and Budget appeared to have withheld the money for months. The Government Accountability Office has called pocket rescissions illegal. The fiscal year ends on September 30.
NBC News / CBS News
Business
The yield on the 10-year US Treasury note is back above 5 percent, a level it had not reached since late 2023 and had touched only once before that since 2007. The benchmark yield has risen about 80 basis points since January, when it traded near 4.15 percent, and the 30-year bond is near 5.3 percent. Two forces are driving the move: oil near $100 a barrel because of the Iran war and the Hormuz blockade, and a Federal Reserve that raised rates this month for the first time since 2023. The government paid about $1.27 trillion in interest this fiscal year.
CNN / Reuters / The Hill
Technology
Chip suppliers are giving sharply different accounts of the memory market. Industry trackers reported on September 26 that Acer and Phison Electronics disagree about where DRAM prices are heading, as supply improves for mainstream PC memory while AI server demand keeps the wider market constrained. Foundry capacity remains the bottleneck: Broadcom has warned that advanced-node capacity will stay tight through 2026 as AI accelerators take priority. SK hynix has committed about $38 billion to new memory output but says relief is roughly three years away. Samsung's foundry recovery is gaining pace, though 2-nanometre yields and the ramp of its Taylor fab in Texas remain hurdles.
DigiTimes / Broadcom
Science
Engineers at CERN have begun removing some of the Large Hadron Collider's most important magnets, the start of the hardest phase of the machine's High-Luminosity upgrade. The 27-kilometre ring is offline for the work. The replacement superconducting magnets produce fields about 40 percent stronger, which lets operators squeeze the particle beams into a tighter focus and raise the number of collisions per second. The upgrade is meant to multiply the total data the collider collects over its lifetime, making rare processes measurable. The new magnets are manufactured in series and tested individually before installation, along with upgraded cryogenics and vacuum systems.
CERN / ScienceDaily
Sports
The United States goes into the weekend at Medinah Country Club trailing the International Team 7-3 after Geoff Ogilvy's side swept all five Friday foursomes matches. The Americans had led 3-2 after Thursday's fourballs. Saturday carries eight points, with four fourball matches in the morning and four foursomes in the afternoon, before 12 singles matches on Sunday. The International Team needs eight more points to reach 15 and win the cup for only the second time. The US has won ten straight Presidents Cups and leads the series 13-1-1.
PGA Tour / AP
Health
Pennsylvania's measles outbreak is now the largest in the United States this year. The state Department of Health reported 792 confirmed cases across 39 counties as of September 21, and local reports said about 55 more cases were confirmed in the three days to September 26. Lancaster County, home to one of the country's largest plain communities, accounts for 185 cases. Officials have linked at least two deaths to the outbreak, Pennsylvania's first measles deaths in 35 years and the first US measles fatalities of 2026. Demand for the MMR vaccine has jumped sharply, with more than 46,000 doses given in August against a typical 25,000.
Pennsylvania Dept of Health / CIDRAP
Environment
Arctic sea ice reached its smallest extent of the year on September 12, NASA and the National Snow and Ice Data Center reported. The ice covered about 4.6 million square kilometres, or 1.78 million square miles, tying with 2008, 2010 and 2025 for the tenth-lowest minimum since satellite records began in 1978. The past 20 years have produced the 20 lowest minimums in the record. At the other pole, Antarctic sea ice probably reached its yearly maximum on September 14 at 17.59 million square kilometres, which would be the third-lowest Antarctic maximum on record.
NASA / NSIDC