CNBC Daily Open: Trump touts "next conquest"

Hello, this is Leonie Kidd writing to you from London. Welcome to another edition of CNBC's Daily Open.

A running joke has suggested that "Trump can't have his Iran, he hasn't finished his Venezuela yet."

It seems Greenland is also very much back on the menu.

An increasingly fragile-looking ceasefire in Iran has not deterred President Donald Trump from signaling that he is still focused on what he calls "that big, poorly run, piece of ice."

Early market moves suggest investors are cautious and have little conviction in the agreement, amid accusations the truce with Tehran has already been violated.

President Donald Trump said Wednesday U.S. military forces will remain deployed in and around Iran until Tehran fully complies with the "real agreement," warning that any breach would trigger a military response larger than anything seen before.

"All US ships, aircraft, and military personnel...will remain in place in, and around, Iran, until such time as the REAL AGREEMENT reached is fully complied with," Trump wrote on Truth Social.

"If for any reason it is not...the 'Shootin' Starts,′ bigger, and better, and stronger than anyone has ever seen before."

He continued the post with the message, "...our great Military is Loading Up and Resting, looking forward, actually, to its next Conquest."

That could be Greenland. Trump appears to have re-focused on the Danish autonomous territory while venting frustration at NATO, as the diplomatic fallout from the Iran war exposes rifts in Washington's ties with the security alliance.

In another Truth Social post Wednesday evening stateside, Trump said that "NATO WASN'T THERE WHEN WE NEEDED THEM, AND THEY WON'T BE THERE IF WE NEED THEM AGAIN. REMEMBER GREENLAND, THAT BIG, POORLY RUN, PIECE OF ICE!!!"

Trump's comments followed a meeting with NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte at the White House earlier on Wednesday, with White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt reportedly saying that NATO had "turned their backs on the American people."

All this comes as the ceasefire agreement between the U.S and Iran looks increasingly fragile.

Iran's parliamentary speaker, Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf, accused the U.S. on Wednesday of violating the two-week agreement.

"The deep historical distrust we hold toward the United States stems from its repeated violations of all forms of commitments — a pattern that has regrettably been repeated once again," Ghalibaf said in a statement posted on social media.

Three parts of Iran's 10-point ceasefire proposal have been violated, Ghalibaf said. The violations are Israel's continued attacks on Lebanon, the entry of a drone into Iranian airspace, and the denial of the Islamic Republic's right to enrich uranium, he said.

Meanwhile, the White House reinforced that the agreement requires the Strait of Hormuz to reopen  "without limitation, including tolls." 

The first ships have sailed through the strait since the ceasefire, but traffic remained low amid confusion over the toll payment structure.

Oil prices have resumed their gains, amid concerns that tensions could escalate again and disrupt energy supplies. The moves come a day after U.S. crude oil posted its biggest single-day drop since 2020.

Meanwhile in equities, Asia-Pacific markets traded lower Thursday, led down by South Korea's Kospi. Futures for Europe and the U.S. major markets indicate a mixed session ahead.

— Leonie Kidd

Anthropic loses appeals court bid to temporarily block Pentagon blacklisting

A federal appeals court in Washington, D.C. on Wednesday denied Anthropic's request to temporarily block the Department of Defense's blacklisting of the artificial intelligence company as a lawsuit challenging that sanction plays out.

The ruling comes after a judge in San Francisco federal court late last month, in a separate but related case, granted Anthropic a preliminary injunction that bars the Trump administration from enforcing a ban on the use of its Claude model.

"In our view, the equitable balance here cuts in favor of the government," the appeals court said in its decision. "On one side is a relatively contained risk of financial harm to a single private company. On the other side is judicial management of how, and through whom, the Department of War secures vital AI technology during an active military conflict. For that reason, we deny Anthropic's motion for a stay pending review on the merits."

— Ashley Capoot