FirstFT: Republican candidates in race for Texas oil money

Receive free World updates

We’ll send you a myFT Daily Digest email rounding up the latest World news every morning.

Good morning.

Republican presidential hopefuls are courting wealthy US oil donors as they seek to tap a rich seam of campaign funds that remains up for grabs, reflecting what executives say is a shift in support away from former president Donald Trump.

Ron DeSantis is leading the charge with a visit today to the energy hub of Midland, West Texas, to tout his support for American oil and gas, and his intention to unpick President Joe Biden’s green agenda.

Yesterday, the Florida governor moved to capitalise on the recent surge in petrol prices across the country, saying in a Fox Business interview that his administration would be “shooting for $2 a gallon”, or just over half the current average price.

Texas has been fruitful ground for Republicans in recent election cycles, with donors from the state giving more than $85mn to Trump’s campaign in 2020, according to OpenSecrets, or more than 9 per cent of his war chest. The oil and gas industry backed him with $15mn. Here’s more on how Republicans are courting the oil industry.

Here’s what else I’m keeping tabs on today:

• US interest rates: The Federal Reserve is expected to maintain its benchmark interest rate at a 22-year high, but investor attention will be on the comments of chair Jay Powell in the post-decision press conference.

• UNGA: US president Joe Biden will meet separately with Brazilian president Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva and Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu during the UN General Assembly in New York. Ukraine was central to Biden’s appeal to world leaders yesterday.

• SEC: The US Securities and Exchange Commission will vote on whether to crack down on deceptive fund names and adopt a proposed change to its 20-year-old “names rule” that would require many funds to prove that 80 per cent of their holdings match their names.

• Earnings: Investors will look for economic commentary from parcel delivery group FedEx and breakfast cereal producer General Mills.

Join Martin Wolf, FT China watchers and UBS China economist Tao Wang for a subscriber-only webinar on China’s economic slowdown tomorrow at 11am BST. Register for free here.

Five more top stories

1. Exclusive: A top Uber executive has warned that Brussels’ proposals to designate gig workers as de facto employees will force its ride-hailing service to shut down in hundreds of cities across the bloc and raise prices by as much as 40 per cent if enacted. “If Brussels forces Uber to reclassify drivers and couriers across the EU, we could expect to see a 50-70 per cent reduction in the number of work opportunities,” Anabel Díaz, head of Uber’s mobility division in Europe, told the FT. Here’s more of the interview.

2. Justin Trudeau denied trying to provoke Narendra Modi’s government with claims that Indian agents may be linked to the killing of a Sikh leader. Canada’s prime minister yesterday urged New Delhi to take what he has described as “credible allegations” seriously. Read the latest on the growing international row.

3. Shares in grocery delivery group Instacart jumped more than 10 per cent on their first day of trading, in the latest sign of investor appetite for new listings. The stock closed at $33.70 a share, valuing the group at $9.3bn based on shares outstanding, or $11.2bn on a fully diluted basis. The IPO will float just 8 per cent of Instacart stock, raising $660mn.

4. Rishi Sunak is expected to outline a retreat from key commitments tied to Britain’s push for net zero carbon emissions by 2050 in the coming days. Downing Street did not deny reports last night that suggested the prime minister was preparing to push back the ban on the sale of new petrol and diesel cars from 2030 to 2035. Here’s what we know so far about Sunak’s planned speech.

5. FTX has sued the parents of Sam Bankman-Fried, claiming they enriched themselves by siphoning off millions of dollars in “fraudulently transferred and misappropriated funds” from the cryptocurrency exchange their son founded. A court filing accused Joseph Bankman and Barbara Fried, both of whom are tenured professors at Stanford Law School, of using their influence to funnel money from the business to their pet charitable causes. Here’s more on the claims.

Deep dive

The green transition is fuelling increasing demand for rare earths in Europe. Although they are found across the world, no country has exploited these minerals like China, which accounted for 70 per cent of rare-earth mining production last year. With the EU almost entirely dependent on the country for the supply and processing of rare earths, can Europe go green without China? The FT’s visual team investigates.

We’re also reading . . . 

Chart of the day

The launch of the Mate 60 Pro smartphone reveals that Huawei has joined the elite group of Big Tech companies capable of designing their own semiconductors. While it still licenses Arm’s basic chip designs, it has built on them to develop its own processor cores, allowing it to produce high-end smartphones despite the constraints of US sanctions. Qianer Liu in Hong Kong reveals how the company plans to challenge Apple in China.

Take a break from the news

To mark Deaf Awareness Month, HTSI interviews members of the deaf community on how they have embraced and challenged their diagnoses.

Additional contributions from Tee Zhuo and Benjamin Wilhelm