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NEW YORK (AP) — High oil and gasoline prices and energy supply problems won’t be solved overnight, despite an agreement to end the Iran war and open the Strait of Hormuz announced Sunday.

It will likely take months before energy companies can resume operations to the point of meeting the world’s demand, according to energy experts. The slow pace of the process of shipping and refining crude oil, and doubts about the security of traveling through the strait mean the effect won’t be seen immediately, they said.

Ships loaded with crude oil have been stranded in the Persian Gulf for more than three months, unable to safely travel through the waterway, through which about a fifth of the world’s oil and gasoline supplies typically traveled before the war began.

“It’s going to take time for people to feel comfortable and for insurance to be in place … particularly to get people on the ground to restart some of these assets,” said Daniel Evans, global head of fuels and refining research at S&P Global Energy.

Still, oil prices slipped early Monday after the deal was announced.

Brent crude, the international standard, was down $3.45 at $83.89 per barrel. U.S. benchmark crude oil lost $4.03 to $80.85 per barrel.

Those prices are still well above the roughly $70 per barrel where oil was trading before the war started.

As the higher prices unwind, ships that have been stranded will have to exit the strait, and then new tankers will have to come in to be loaded, Evans said.

“To bring a ship in, you need to be confident that you’ve got a big enough window of safety to bring it in, load it and move it out,” he added.

Oil tankers also move slowly, he explained. It takes months to travel from the strait to distant countries, deliver the crude oil to a refinery for processing and then arrive at its final destination.

In addition, some producers in the Middle East paused extracting oil from the ground, known as a shut-in, when they ran out of storage space. Restarting those operations can be a slow process.

Countries such as Saudi Arabia and United Arab Emirates, where there are alternate pipelines or routes besides the Strait of Hormuz to deliver oil, may be among the quickest to resume production, said Alan Gelder, senior vice president of refining, chemicals and oil markets at Wood Mackenzie, an analytics firm.

“But places like Iraq could be much more challenged because they’ve had a much bigger shut-in, their fields are more difficult … it may well take about a year before they get back,” he said.

Investment in the energy system, which can take years to see the results, ground to a halt after the strait’s closure, Gelder said. So it will take time for this capital to restart.

Countries that shut in oil production won’t want to restart until they know there is a stable, durable strait, and that a ceasefire will last more than 30 or 60 days, said Daniel Sternoff, senior fellow at the Center on Global Energy Policy at Columbia University.

“We don’t know what open means or what the speed of evacuation of trapped material is going to be,” he said.

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By Florence Tan

SINGAPORE, June 15 (Reuters) – Oil prices slipped to their lowest since March on Monday after U.S. President Donald Trump and Iran’s deputy foreign minister said they had reached an initial deal to end the war and to resume traffic through the Strait of Hormuz.

Brent crude futures fell $3.58, or 4.10%, to $83.75 a barrel by 0004 GMT and U.S. West Texas Intermediate was at $80.87, down $4.01, or 4.72%. Both contracts tumbled more than 3% on Friday.

The U.S. and Iran will sign a memorandum of understanding in Switzerland on Friday, said the prime minister of Pakistan, whose country has served as a mediator. Trump said on Sunday that the Strait of Hormuz would be open “toll free” and that a U.S. naval blockade of Iranian ports would also end.

Iran’s semi-official Mehr news agency said the draft deal called for reopening the Strait of Hormuz within 30 days under Iranian arrangements.

“The geopolitical risk premium that had been built into crude is now being unwound quite aggressively as traders price in the prospect of restored oil flows,” said Tim Waterer, chief ⁠market analyst at KCM Trade.

The world has lost millions of barrels of oil and gas supply since the war closed the Strait of Hormuz, a chokepoint for a fifth of the world’s oil and liquefied natural gas supplies, for more than three months.

Investors are also watching cautiously how quickly Middle Eastern producers can resume oil production and exports following damage from the war and whether more ships will enter the region.

“While these uncertainties suggest upside risks to our forecast for Brent oil futures to reach $80/bbl by the end of the year, it’s worth noting that oil flows through the Strait of Hormuz just needs to reach 60-70% of pre-war levels to return oil markets to pre-war oversupply expectations,” Vivek Dhar, a commodities strategist at Commonwealth Bank of Australia, said in a note.

Iran’s deputy foreign minister, Kazem Gharibabadi, said a more expansive agreement would be negotiated during a 60-day ceasefire period.

E4 nations, which include the UK, France, Germany and Italy, said on Sunday the countries were prepared to lift sanctions on Iran in response to steps on its nuclear programme.

“Given the uncertainties around the next round of negotiations over the next 60 days, particularly around the nuclear aspect, it’s hard to see crude oil prices falling too much further from here immediately,” IG market analyst Tony Sycamore said.

(Reporting by Florence Tan; Editing by Jamie Freed)

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LOS ANGELES (AP) — Tyra Banks has filed a defamation lawsuit against Netflix and the directors of its docuseries “Reality Check: Inside America’s Next Top Model,” alleging that the producers stripped down hours of interview footage to construct a false narrative.

In the lawsuit filed Saturday in Los Angeles federal court, the model who created and hosted “America’s Next Top Model” said she was interviewed for 3 ½ hours, during which she took responsibility for some of the show’s controversial decisions. Those interviews were edited down to 16 minutes and manipulated “to support a false and defamatory narrative unrelated to what she actually expressed,” the lawsuit said.

“The accountability Ms. Banks took ended up on the cutting room floor. It was there, but viewers were never given the opportunity to see it,” her lawyers wrote.

Banks is seeking damages in her lawsuit against Netflix, the directors Daniel Sivan and Mor Loushy and EverWonder Studio. She’s also seeking an injunction barring the use of her image in connection with the docuseries’ soundtrack, released as an album.

Emails seeking comments were sent Sunday to the defendants’ representatives.

“America’s Next Top Model” launched in 2003 and ran for 24 seasons. In recent years, the reality competition series has undergone a critical reevaluation over accusations of body shaming, manipulation of contestants and problematic photoshoots. Banks has previously addressed those criticisms, acknowledging “the insensitivity of past ANTM moments” and “some really off choices.”

The lawsuit contends that the producers of the Netflix docuseries used “selective editing, deliberate omission, and surgical manipulation of continuous footage” to formulate a narrative that Banks allowed a contestant to be sexually assaulted on the show, used the contestant’s trauma to drum up ratings and then couldn’t remember it when asked during the interviews.

“Defendants edited the Netflix Series to make it appear that Ms. Banks knew she was being asked about a sexual assault and was intentionally trying to evade the topic,” the lawsuit stated, contending that Banks hadn’t been told — or asked — about the assault during the interview.

Banks’ lawyers wrote that she wasn’t permitted to review the docuseries until a day before its Feb. 16 release. According to the lawsuit, she had not been contacted for fact-checking after her interviews, and was not given an opportunity to respond to accusations from other participants. Other judges from the show, including one her lawyers contend holds a grudge against Banks, consulted on the docuseries.

“Had Ms. Banks known these individuals were so deeply involved in the formulation of the Netflix Series, also serving as consultants shaping the editorial direction, and that she had been excluded from such a role, it would have raised a red flag,” the lawsuit read. “She would have known she was being set up. She would not have participated.”

Banks’ lawyers reached out to Netflix in March to request access to the full footage of her interviews. Netflix and EverWonder denied that request, according to the lawsuit. Since the docuseries’ release, public reaction has been “swift, harsh, and directed squarely at Ms. Banks” — even SMiZE & DREAM, her ice cream shop in Sydney, Australia, has been subject to review bombing on Google, the lawsuit read.

The Associated Press sent an email seeking further detail from Banks’ lawyers and representatives on Sunday.

“Every other conversation about ANTM’s legacy — including the candid reflection Ms. Banks came prepared to have — is now drowned out by an accusation she was never given the chance to answer,” her lawyers wrote. “This lawsuit is that answer — particularly after her efforts to resolve the matter directly with Netflix and the producers were refused.”

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TRACY, Calif. (AP) — Officials in a Northern California city urged people sensitive to smoke to keep indoors as firefighters spent a third day Saturday battling a fire in a huge medical equipment warehouse.

Air quality on the south side of Tracy, a city of 100,000 people where the Medline warehouse fire has been burning since Thursday, was in the “unhealthy” range, according to air monitors.

Firefighters expected the next few days to remain smoky amid a lengthy effort to put out the fire inside the building, South San Joaquin County Fire Authority Fire Chief Randall Bradley said in a statement.

The local fire marshal was investigating, and officials are meeting with company representatives, structural engineers and others to assess the building, Bradley said.

Plans were being made for employees to retrieve their vehicles from the site. Meanwhile, firefighters urged people to avoid the area and not touch or move debris from the fire.

Medline is a major provider of medical-surgical products such as latex gloves, masks and surgical instruments.

The blaze at the 1 million-square-foot (93,000-square-meter) warehouse about 55 miles (88.5 kilometers) east of San Francisco sent embers flying for miles.

Poorly functioning sprinklers and hydrants with little to no flow hindered firefighter efforts. The problem appeared to be with the facility’s fire-suppression system and not city water supplies, they said.

No issues were found when an outside company tested the sprinkler system in January, firefighters said.

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TOKYO, June 14 (Reuters) – Japan is preparing to send a delegation to Greenland this summer to evaluate possible rare earth extraction, the Nikkei newswire reported on Sunday.

The visit would include officials from the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry, trading companies and the Japan Organization for Metals and Energy Security, which would hold talks with local government officials, Nikkei added.

The Arctic island of Greenland, an autonomous territory of the Danish kingdom, has been in the spotlight lately. The White House in January said U.S. President Donald Trump was considering how to acquire the island, ‌setting off alarm bells among NATO allies in Europe. Talks have since been moved to a diplomatic track.

Greenland is of interest because of its strategic location and potentially rich rare earth reserves.

(Reporting by Jekaterīna Golubkova in Tokyo; Editing by Thomas Derpinghaus)

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Global consumers want more protein in every bite, but the dairy industry is struggling to give it to them.

Athletes and older adults have long used smoothies and shakes blended with whey protein concentrate – a powdered byproduct of cheese-making – to build or maintain muscle. More recently, food companies have sprinkled it into everything from breakfast cereals, Pop-Tarts and potato chips to bagels, tortillas and Starbucks drinks to meet growing consumer demand.

The average U.S. supermarket now has 38,708 products advertising their protein content, according to NielsenIQ, a market research company. But the eagerness to appeal to ingredient-focused shoppers is causing shortages of food-grade whey protein and pushing prices to new records.

“Demand is very firm and seemingly outpacing supply for right now,” said Kathleen Wolfley, vice president of Ever.Ag Insights, a data provider and consulting company for the agriculture industry.

Wholesale prices for whey protein began rising in 2024, and the pace accelerated last year and so far this year, Wolfley said.

Whey protein concentrate with 80% protein – the type often used by food makers and supplement companies as a booster – is trading on the dairy commodities market at more than $13 per pound in the U.S., up 250% from a year ago, according to Ever.Ag. Whey protein isolate, a more refined vesion that contains at least 90% protein, is 150% more expensive than last year, the company said.

That’s raising prices for consumers. U.S. prices for whey protein concentrate powder have increased by around 15% over the past year, while more premium whey isolate powder has seen steeper gains, according to Datasembly, a price-tracking company.

It’s a similar story in Europe. In late May, 80% whey protein concentrate hit a new record average of 26,450 euros ($30,518) per metric ton, a price more than double from less than a year earlier, according to DCA Market Intelligence, a Netherlands-based commodity pricing firm.

Here’s what’s happening with whey protein and when strained supplies might be alleviated.

Milk contains two proteins: casein and whey. During the cheese-making process, the casein – which forms solid curds – is separated from the liquid whey, which is dried to form a powder. Every pound of cheese yields nine pounds of whey, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture.

U.S. milk consumption has fallen for decades as Americans shifted to beverages like sodas. But the appetite for cheese remained strong, Wolfley said. A nation of cheese-eaters generated a lot of whey protein, and some of the excess used to be exported to China and other countries.

The domestic hunger for high-protein snacks and meals is now keeping more whey protein in the U.S. for use as a food additive or a nutritional supplement. U.S. exports of 80% whey protein concentrate and whey protein isolate to China fell 47% from January through April compared to the same four-month period a year ago, according to Vesper, an Amsterdam-based company that tracks commodity prices.

“There simply isn’t enough product for the U.S. customer, and exports have therefore been paused as much as possible,” said Jasper Endlich, a Vesper dairy analyst.

China is seeking more whey protein from Europe, which also is seeing shortages thanks to reduced U.S. exports, Endlich said.

Use of GLP-1 weight-loss drugs is one of the factors that has supercharged demand for whey protein concentrate, Wolfley said.

Obesity drugs like Wegovy and Zepbound are designed to suppress the appetites of people taking them. The foods they do eat need to be nutritionally dense, experts say. GLP-1 users often are advised to consume enough protein to help them feel full for longer and to retain muscle mass as they lose weight.

Around 6% of obese and diabetic patients in the U.S. and 2% of obese and diabetic patients worldwide were using GLP-1 drugs last year, according to an estimate by the investment bank Morgan Stanley. Some estimates have put GLP-1 use as high as 12% of the U.S. adult population, since not everyone on GLP-1 drugs is obese or diabetic.

Food and nutrition companies are creating added-protein products to attract those consumers as well as people who think drinking protein shakes to replace meals will help them lose weight.

Tight supplies and higher costs have caused some manufacturers to increase the prices consumers pay for protein powder or protein-enriched products.

Now Foods, an Illinois-based maker of health foods and nutritional supplements, said tubs of whey protein powder are consistently the biggest seller in its sports nutrition category. But after two years of paying more for raw ingredients, the company raised the price of its own whey protein products earlier this year.

Bryan Morin, the sports brand manager at Now, said the company doesn’t anticipate further price increases on whey protein powder this year. It’s trying to absorb some of its increased costs by cutting back on discounts. It’s also considering expanding its portfolio to include products made with milk protein concentrate, a powder that contains less whey and is cheaper.

“From our perspective, broader market dynamics continue to indicate a tight and evolving protein landscape,” Morin said.

Wolfley, at Ever.Ag, said manufacturers are investing in whey protein production, which should eventually improve supplies. But the relief won’t be immediate.

Glanbia, an Irish nutrition company, said in November that it planned to increase its whey protein isolate production in New Mexico, but the additional capacity won’t be in place until 2027. In February, Canadian dairy company Agropur said it intended to increase whey protein manufacturing at plants in Quebec, Nova Scotia, South Dakota and Wisconsin.

In the meantime, higher prices could cause some consumers to stop buying whey protein powders, especially at a time when groceries are getting more expensive overall, Wolfley said. Reduced retail demand might reduce shortages at the wholesale level.

“The supply-demand dynamics could start to improve, but I don’t know if that’s a tomorrow dynamic or within a year. Some of these things are going to take time,” Wolfley said.

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BRUSSELS, June 14 (Reuters) – The European Commission said on Sunday that it is assessing the practical implications of a U.S. export control directive impacting artificial intelligence company Anthropic and that measures should not be discriminatory against partners.

Anthropic said on Friday it would “abruptly disable” its most advanced AI models for all users after the U.S. government ordered it to suspend access to the models for foreign nationals, citing national security concerns.

“We are seeing a new generation of highly capable AI models reach the market. These models offer significant benefits, including for cyber-defence, but they also raise serious cybersecurity concerns that need to be addressed,” European Commission spokesperson Thomas Regnier said in a statement.

“We believe that contingency measures taken in this light should not be discriminatory against partners,” he said.

“This development is a further illustration of why Europe needs to strengthen its technological sovereignty,” Regnier said. “We are looking closely at the practical consequences of this for European users of these services.”

(Reporting by Foo Yun Chee; Writing by Lili Bayer)

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GENEVA (AP) — Scores of shops and businesses in downtown Geneva boarded up their storefronts with wooden panels ahead of planned anti-G7 protests on Sunday.

French and Swiss authorities have imposed extensive security measures as U.S. President Donald Trump and other leaders attend a G7 summit of leading industrialized nations starting on Monday. There are concerns the gathering could trigger violent unrest.

The June 15-17 summit of some of the world’s richest nations being held in the French town of Evian-les-Bains, on Lake Geneva, is meant to discuss the Middle East, Ukraine and global economic imbalances. Activist groups including environmentalists, feminists and foes of capitalism have called for a big demonstration later Sunday.

A flotilla of around 20 boats appeared on Lake Geneva off the coast of Evian on Saturday, displaying anti-G7 and pro-Palestinian banners. Some 20 protesters were detained on Friday evening, according to Swiss media reports.

Earlier, between 100 and 150 people had gathered in Geneva for a protest bicycle ride, slowing down traffic and chanting anti-G7 and pro-Palestinian slogans, public broadcaster RTS reported.

Business owners and local leaders are worried of a repeat of violent protests that smashed storefronts on the sidelines of the G8 summit in 2003, when Russia was in the club of nations.

Local resident Robin Hedz lamented the “mess” and expressed bafflement about the “wood-wall everywhere,” while acknowledging the memories of the trail of damaged property at the summit over a generation ago.

The Swiss government said the army will deploy some 4,000 personnel to support police during the summit. Operations will include airspace and road restrictions as well as patrols on Lake Geneva. Seven of the 35 roadway border crossings will remain open. Geneva also is closing a major park where activists wanted to congregate.

France will deploy more than 13,000 police and gendarmerie officers to ensure security in the summit area just across the border. Over 800 French border control officers will be active, up from about 60 normally.

French gendarmes buzzed around in motorboats off the coast of Evian on Saturday, and one officer hoisted up a bulky drone-interception device in a display of the security measures being rolled out for the summit.

Protests are nothing new around such elite gatherings. This time, activists want to demonstrate frustration with Trump’s leadership on issues as diverse as tariffs, the war in Iran and the climate, or even highlight his past ties to convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein.

“We are very afraid of the policy and the politics of Mr. Trump and also of the other leaders of the G7, because they are fighting, making war all over the place,” said Francoise Nyffeler, spokesperson for the NoG7 coalition, which has organized the demonstration and march on Sunday.

“The planet is in danger and we are very scared about it and we want to protest and say that the people of the world are against their policies,” she added.

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PARIS (AP) — From the outset, China wasn’t included when major powers gathered in 1975 at a chateau outside Paris to fix the slumping global economy, the first of what have become annual summits by the G7 club of wealthy nations to forward their interests.

No surprise there. Imagining Chinese revolutionary leader Mao Zedong brainstorming with U.S. President Gerald Ford and other leaders would have been unthinkable.

China was in turmoil, nowhere close to becoming the economic giant it is now. Mao had also helped defeat France and U.S. forces in Vietnam, by militarily supporting Ho Chi Minh’s communists that took power. So Mao would have been the odd man out had he been at the inaugural Rambouillet summit of six nations, growing into the G7 when Canada joined the following year.

But as U.S. President Donald Trump and his G7 counterparts gather again in France from Monday, China’s exclusion from the informal club’s summits also looks odd, given its now immense sway over the world’s economic well-being and affairs.

Put simply: Without China, does the G7 make sense?

Here’s a closer look:

If determined only by economic success, China would already be in the club.

Its economy, swollen by decades of growth since Mao’s death in 1976, now dwarfs those of G7 nations Germany, Japan, the United Kingdom, France, Italy and Canada — leaving only the United States to catch. By this measure, a G7 summit without China is arguably like a soccer World Cup without 5-time winner Brazil.

From being “only a tiny, benign, panda bear” in 1975, ”China has become a great global dragon,” says John Kirton, a University of Toronto specialist on the G7.

“So many understandably ask: Would the G7 and the global community be better off if China became a member of the G7 club? A plausible answer is ‘Yes.’”

A year ago, Trump mused about possibly expanding the club to include China, saying “ it’s not a bad idea ” when a journalist asked him.

But an unwritten G7 rule has always been that it’s only for democracies.

“We are each responsible for the government of an open, democratic society, dedicated to individual liberty and social advancement,” the founding leaders declared in Rambouillet in 1975.

China wouldn’t have cleared that bar then, during Mao’s rule that claimed many millions of lives through famine and revolutionary upheaval.

Nor, under President Xi Jinping, would China do so now. By multiple measures, including the annual Freedom in the World study the World Press Freedom Index or the Canadian Fraser Institute’s ranking of economic freedom, China lags far behind G7 nations for civil liberties.

China’s clout impacts all G7 countries, in myriad ways. It sells far more goods than it buys, announcing a record trade surplus of almost $1.2 trillion in 2025, which is a source of friction with other industrial powers. It controls supplies of crucial rare minerals. Its technological advances and growing military strength are giving rivals cold sweats. And it is the world’s biggest emitter of climate-warming pollution.

All this means that China will be an elephant in the room at the Monday-to-Wednesday summit in the Alpine spa town of Evian-les-Bains.

As host, French President Emmanuel Macron has carved out time for the leaders to talk about how to rebalance trade with China, amid fears that soaring Chinese exports of cars and other products could wreck G7 industries.

The chemistry between Trump and other G7 leaders has been bad of late — over the Iran war and other bones of contention — but China could be an issue that unites them, said Cédric Dupont, who specializes in international politics at the Geneva Graduate Institute.

“They agree on the same thing, you know: China is a problem,” he said.

China’s Communist Party-led government has in the past criticized the G7’s exclusiveness and painted it as a relic of the Cold War when the world was more divided along ideological lines.

But in a statement to The Associated Press ahead of the Evian gathering, the Chinese Foreign Ministry took a more nuanced view, saying “the G7 should serve as a catalyst for solidarity and cooperation rather than an amplifier of division and confrontation.”

Beijing-based analyst Wang Zichen says that “Beijing is wary of the G7 because it sees the group as structurally aligned with U.S.-led Western power, and increasingly as a venue where China is discussed as a challenge or threat.”

But Chinese leaders cannot ignore it.

“China recognizes that the G7 still represents a very significant concentration of economic, technological, military and financial power,” said Wang.

Analysts say that admitting China into the club could wreck its cohesion, not only because Beijing’s authoritarian system of government, interests and its positions on Russia, Iran and other major issues don’t align with those of G7 democracies but also because its presence could test their long-standing alliances.

“China inside would indeed be a Trojan horse,” said Kirton. With a Chinese leader at the table, “individual members might be tempted to break G7 ranks to secure special favors from him on the economic, critical minerals, digital technology and other issues they address.”

Chris Alden, an international relations expert at the London School of Economics and Political Science, said that adding China “would make it very difficult for it to function.”

The G7’s last expansion — accepting Russia as a member in 1998 — didn’t end well.

The club froze out Russian President Vladimir Putin when he seized Crimea from Ukraine in 2014, foreshadowing the full-scale war now raging since 2022.

Trump said last year that excluding Russia “was a very big mistake.”

But Kirton said the experience convinced other leaders “that they should never take a chance on a less than fully democratic power becoming a full member of their fully democratic club again.”

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Associated Press writers Ken Moritsugu and E. Eduardo Castillo in Beijing and Jamey Keaten in Geneva contributed.

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The economy, inflation and how those forces could impact the lives of Americans were front and center over the past week. Trips to the grocery store or gas station are more painful than they were last year, and rising costs are impacting the decisions of both households and businesses.

Here’s a snapshot of prominent economic data and news that occurred over the past week and what it potentially means for you.

The world’s richest man has become its first trillionaire.

Shares in Elon Musk’s rocket company SpaceX soared 25% after opening for trading Friday, an auspicious start for history’s biggest initial public offering and enough to push the net worth of its founder and CEO over the trillion dollar mark.

That price gave the company a market value of $2.21 trillion. Musk, who also is a major shareholder and CEO of Tesla, is now worth an estimated $1.1 trillion, according to Forbes.

Rising gas prices pushed inflation to its highest level in three years last month, a headache for the Federal Reserve and a potential political challenge for the Trump administration as midterm elections near.

Consumer prices rose 4.2% in May from a year earlier, the Labor Department said Wednesday, up from 3.8% in April and the third straight increase. On a monthly basis, prices rose 0.5% last month, after big gains of 0.6% in April and 0.9% in March.

Outside energy costs, price increases were not as dramatic, a sign that inflation hasn’t yet spread throughout the economy. Should the Iran war end and oil and gas prices decline, headline inflation could begin to cool. Gas prices have fallen this month.

U.S. producer prices climbed last month at the fastest pace since November 2022, fueled by a surge in energy prices after the start of the Iran war.

The Labor Department reported Thursday that its producer price index — which captures inflation before it reaches consumers — jumped 6.5% from May 2025. It rose 1.1% from April, as it did the previous month. Wholesale gasoline prices surged by more than 23% from April to May, and nearly 70% from a year earlier.

Excluding volatile food and energy prices, so-called core wholesale prices rose 0.4% from April and 4.9% from May 2025.

Social Security’s retirement trust fund is projected to face a funding shortfall in 2032, a year earlier than last year’s projections, according to an annual report released Tuesday, while Medicare’s hospital insurance trust fund will be unable to pay full benefits in 2033, which is unchanged from last year’s estimate.

Rising healthcare costs and government spending have contributed to a projected depletion date that is less than 10 years from now.

The looming challenge for the programs is a partial funding gap, not a collapse. Even after trust fund depletion, the system will continue issuing benefits, albeit at reduced amounts.

Last year, Medicare’s hospital insurance trust fund go-broke date was pushed to 2033 from 2036 the year before that, according to the report from the programs’ trustees.

Meanwhile, Social Security’s combined trust funds — which cover old age and disability recipients — will be unable to pay full benefits beginning in 2034, unchanged from the 2025 report. After that, incoming revenue would cover about 83% of scheduled benefits.

Sales of previously occupied U.S. homes accelerated last month to their fastest pace since December, a sharp turnaround in demand after a lackluster start to the spring homebuying season.

Existing home sales rose 3.2% in May from the previous month to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 4.17 million units, the National Association of Realtors said Tuesday. Sales also rose 3.2% compared with May last year.

Home sales increased from a year earlier in the Midwest, South and West, but fell in the Northeast, NAR said.

The latest sales figure topped the roughly 4.07 million pace economists were expecting, according to FactSet.

Home sales have been mostly hovering close to a 4 million annual pace going back to 2023, far short of the historic norm that is closer to 5.2 million.

The average long-term U.S. mortgage rate ticked up this week to just below its high for the year, the latest sign that borrowing costs on home loans remain elevated relative to where they were before the war with Iran started.

The benchmark 30-year fixed rate mortgage rate rose to 6.52% from 6.48% last week, mortgage buyer Freddie Mac said Thursday. Despite the increase, the average rate remains below 6.84%, where it was a year ago.

Borrowing costs on 15-year fixed-rate mortgages, often sought by borrowers refinancing a home loan, also rose this week. That average rate climbed to 5.84% from 5.79% last week. A year ago, it was at 5.97%, Freddie Mac said.

When mortgage rates rise they can add hundreds of dollars a month in costs for borrowers, reducing their purchasing power.

U.S. applications for jobless aid rose modestly last week, but remain at a historically low level despite economic headwinds brought on by the war in Iran.

The number of Americans filing for unemployment aid for the week ending June 6 rose by 4,000 to 229,000, the Labor Department reported Thursday. That’s the most since early February, before the U.S. and Israel launched attacks on Iran, but still considered a healthy level. It’s also more than the 216,000 new applications forecast by analysts surveyed by the data firm FactSet.

Weekly filings for unemployment benefits are considered a proxy for U.S. layoffs and are close to a real-time indicator of the health of the job market.

U.S. stocks rose this week as oil prices continued to retreat.

The S&P 500 and the Dow Jones Industrial Average both rose. The Nasdaq composite was lower.

Stocks got a lift from a dip for the price of Brent crude oil, deepening its loss for the week. Oil prices have come down since President Donald Trump on Thursday called off his threat to launch strikes on Iran and said a potential deal with Iran may be imminent.

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