the daily brief

• Iran is awaiting "final approval" on a framework agreement with Oman for the Strait of Hormuz, under which Iranian and Omani routes would stay in temporary use before traffic is redirected through a central course; only 8 to 15 vessels crossed the strait on August 4–6, versus roughly 130 before the conflict — al jazeera
• Iran's foreign ministry responded to Trump's comparison of the talks to a game of chess, saying Iranians "have shown they are professional chess players" — euronews
• Vladimir Putin visited the Kuril Islands on August 13, asserting Russia's presence in a chain whose four southernmost islands are also claimed by Japan — euronews
• Ukrainian drone strikes are causing power outages, fuel shortages and cellphone service cuts in Russian-occupied Crimea — euronews
• Russia gained roughly 180 square miles of Ukrainian territory between late July and late August; Moscow's conditions for any peace deal still include Ukraine ceding the remaining 30% of Donetsk Oblast it holds — globalsecurity.org
• Nigel Farage regained his seat in the UK parliament, though a finance investigation into him resumes and could conclude next month — euronews
• Bangladesh's foreign ministry reported that 16 Bangladeshi nationals died in a fire at a sofa factory in Riyadh — euronews
• Erdoğan said he hopes more countries will join the new Türkiye–Saudi Arabia–Pakistan defense pact as the region confronts the fallout from the US-Iran war — turkish minute

• Anthropic's Q2 2026 revenue reached $10.9 billion, up 130% year-over-year, with a first operating profit of $559 million — arriving roughly two years ahead of the company's own schedule — aitoolsrecap
• GPT-5.6 Luna is now ChatGPT's free default, offering unlimited chats after an 80% price cut (from $1 to $0.20 per million tokens) on July 30 — aitoolsrecap
• OpenAI's public S-1 filing is expected on SEC EDGAR any day, with the company reporting roughly $2 billion in monthly revenue and targeting a September listing — aitoolsrecap
• A new security paper found that encrypted "reasoning blocks" are interchangeable across systems; researchers decoded 315,320 reasoning blocks from Anthropic, OpenAI and Google models, recovering 367 PII artifacts and 182 credentials — aiweekly

• The S&P 500 fell 0.2% Friday as cooling economic data overshadowed bets the Fed will hold rates in September, but still notched a third straight week of gains — its longest winning streak since May — cnbc
• Treasury yields edged lower as July inflation data matched expectations, suggesting price growth continues to cool — cnbc
• Oil rose and bonds fell after the US threatened new economic measures on Iran — cnbc
• Danish shipping giant Maersk hiked its 2026 earnings guidance for the second time this year, as global trade remains snarled by the Strait of Hormuz blockade — cnbc
• Türkiye's first-half foreign direct investment inflows reached $4.2 billion; investment capital fell just 6% even as total FDI dropped 31% year-on-year — türkiye today

• Rising atmospheric CO2 may be leaving a measurable imprint inside the human body: more than two decades of US health data show a detectable effect on blood bicarbonate levels — sciencedaily
• Marine heatwaves are emerging as a threat to human health and wellbeing, not just to coral reefs and fisheries — researchers warn they can fuel stronger storms, trigger harmful algal blooms and reduce seafood supplies — sciencedaily
• Scientists have discovered incredibly tiny plasma whirlpools swirling across the Sun's surface, some just 20 kilometers wide — sciencenews
• A total solar eclipse plunged parts of Europe into darkness on August 12, with Spain offering some of the best views — sciencenews
• Türkiye recorded at least 1,279 worker deaths in the first seven months of 2026, including 214 in July alone — 12 of them children — türkiye today

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