Flagship

Australia vote follows anti-Trump trend

Australia’s ruling party decisively won the country’s national election Saturday, beating back a conservative opposition that had borrowed from US President Donald Trump’s playbook. The Labor Party’s comeback mirrored Canada’s vote last week, where the once-unpopular incumbents rode an anti-Trump wave to victory. Most Australians believe the US can’t be trusted as a security ally, according to recent polling, reflecting a “fundamental change of worldview,” one analyst said. The elections signal a “revival of social democratic politics,” a Sydney Morning Herald journalist wrote, breathing life into center-left coalitions that at the start of the year had seemed under threat from rising right-wing populism and anti-establishment sentiment.

Stability wins in Singapore election

US President Donald Trump’s shakeup of global trade also bolstered the incumbent party in Singapore’s election on Saturday. The People’s Action Party’s victory was a foregone conclusion — it has held power since 1959 — but voters were particularly enthused by Prime Minister Lawrence Wong’s pitch that he is best suited to shepherd the trade-dependent nation through economic uncertainty, analysts said. “Singaporeans opted for the familiar party they felt they could repose their trust in,” a columnist for The Straits Times wrote. As a global trade hub, Singapore is especially vulnerable in the US-China trade war; the island state has maintained a strong relationship with both governments for years, but Beijing is hoping to use the conflict to forge closer bonds with Southeast Asia.

Trump ramps up pressure on Fed

US President Donald Trump renewed his pressure campaign on the Federal Reserve Sunday, urging the central bank to cut interest rates at its meeting this week. Economists expect the Fed to keep the cost of borrowing steady until at least the second half of the year: Despite worries of a tariff-induced economic slowdown, the Fed’s wait-and-see approach to rate cuts is likely unchanged, especially after Friday’s strong jobs data reinforced policymakers’ sense that the economy seems on solid footing. Officials are watching closely to see whether rising consumer prices causes persistent inflation. A decision to hold rates steady could draw Trump’s ire again, although the president recently insisted he won’t try to fire Fed Chair Jerome Powell.

Warren Buffett stepping down

Berkshire Hathaway CEO Warren Buffett announced Saturday he will retire this year, shocking the conglomerate’s other executives and marking the end of a legendary career in investing. Buffett, 94, has led the firm for six decades, using a wide range of investments and acquisitions to build a trillion-dollar enterprise. Through his “unparalleled exposure to financial information, combined with his prodigious memory,” Buffett became a “human form of artificial intelligence,” The Wall Street Journal wrote. His successor, Berkshire vice chairman Greg Abel, faces the challenge of managing the $348 billion in cash that Buffett has amassed: The company now owns more cash than stock, a position that “reflects a tough environment for the sort of investing” that made Buffett famous, The Economist wrote.

Israel plans expansion of Gaza offensive

Israel is calling up tens of thousands of reservists to expand its military operations in Gaza. Ceasefire talks with Hamas have languished, and Israel said mounting military pressure on the Iran-backed group is key to its goal of “total victory,” though the families of remaining hostages in Gaza have pushed for a deal. Israeli reservists had flocked to bolster military ranks after Hamas’ Oct. 7, 2023 attack on Israel, but enthusiasm has waned in recent months, in part because of a growing sense that the government’s decisions are “motivated more by political calculations than strategic ones,” The Jerusalem Post wrote. Israel is also weighing a possible escalation on another front: Officials on Sunday vowed retaliation after a Houthi missile struck near Israel’s main airport.

Ukraine, Russia spar on ceasefire terms

Russian President Vladimir Putin said his country has the “strength and means” to finish the war in Ukraine, as Moscow and Kyiv push for competing ceasefire proposals. Putin has proposed a three-day truce starting Thursday to mark World War II’s Victory Day, but Ukraine is deeply skeptical and has called to extend the cessation in fighting. Even as Washington pushes for a quick peace deal — although that effort may be waning — the precise terms of any eventual agreement “matter greatly,” the historian Mary Elise Sarotte wrote: If the US were to formally recognize Russia’s claims to Ukrainian territory, it would undermine the notion of a safe European border and create a “more permissive environment for transgressions.”

NASA faces stinging funding cuts

US President Donald Trump’s 2026 budget proposal includes a 24% cut in funding for NASA that would see several of its flagship programs scrapped. Among them are the Space Launch System and Orion spacecraft: Designed to return humans to the Moon, both vehicles have been widely criticized for running over budget and behind schedule. The administration’s proposal notes that the SLS alone is 140% over budget, yet has only ever flown to space once — and each subsequent launch would cost about $4 billion. The cuts also imperil billions of dollars in federal contracts already awarded to America’s aerospace industry: Lockheed Martin is building a fourth Orion spacecraft for a Moon mission that Trump’s budget would eliminate, for example.

As AI continues to evolve at a rapid pace, companies are shifting from experimentation to real-world deployment and practical use within their businesses.

Semafor’s Reed Albergotti will host newsmaking conversations in San Francisco on the breakthroughs driving AI and how they’re changing the way we work, live, and interact with the world. Discussions will dive into how global, national, and regional AI ecosystems are shaping the technology’s future, and why building the policy frameworks governing them is more critical than ever for its potential.

May 21, 2025 | San Francisco, CA | Request Invitation

France eyes weary US scientists

France’s flagship scientific research center launched an initiative to attract US researchers fleeing funding cuts and restrictions on academic freedom under US President Donald Trump. The National Center for Scientific Research’s President Antoine Petit said the “Choose CNRS” program was designed to attract foreign scientists whose work is under threat, as well as French researchers who “don’t want to live and raise their children in Trump’s United States.” Europe is keen to lure American researchers: Both the presidents of France and the European Commission, among others, have declared the continent open to academic migrants. Petit said France’s strong welfare state, as well as the lower cost of education and health care, would make up for any pay gap with the US.

The Orb will see you now

OpenAI CEO Sam Altman’s eye-scanning tech startup has launched its biometric ID service in the US. The founding principle of the company, World, is that advanced artificial intelligence means it’s impossible for someone to know whether they’re interacting online with a human or a bot. World’s proposed solution is scanning a user’s irises using one of its Orbs; that data is then converted into a digital ID. While World has identified a real problem, The New York Times’ Kevin Roose noted on the Hard Fork podcast, it has been blocked or faced regulatory scrutiny in several countries amid privacy concerns. It’s also unclear whether World will attract enough users, Roose noted: “It just feels creepy to upload your biometric data to a private company.”

The cultural spectacle of a conclave

Cardinals gathering at the Vatican this week to select the next pope are hyper-aware of the pop culture mythos surrounding the process — and, so far, they are living up to expectations. Already, conclave preparations have featured the surprise appearance of a cardinal who was convicted of embezzlement and fraud; the discovery of letters from “beyond the grave” written by Pope Francis excluding said cleric from the vote; and “whispering campaigns against the front-runners,” The Wall Street Journal wrote. Meanwhile, local press, as well as viral social media news accounts, are documenting all of the tension. The cardinals apparently know the influence that the 2024 film Conclave has had, “not just on popular culture but also on their own perceptions,” the Journal wrote.

May 5:

• South Korea marks the birth of the Buddha; financial markets close.
• Microsoft ends support for the video chat app Skype.
• The Met Gala takes place in New York City.

A set of jewels linked to the Buddha are going up for auction in Hong Kong. The gems were part of a hoard unearthed in 1898 in Uttar Pradesh, India, near the Buddha’s birthplace. Alongside them were fragments of bone and an urn with an inscription claiming that they had belonged to the Buddha, Siddartha Gautama — a find that remains “among the most extraordinary archaeological discoveries of all time,” Sotheby’s Asia chairman told the BBC. The seller’s decision to auction them off has been met with some criticism and unease from art historians. As one Delhi-based expert mused: “Are the relics of the Buddha a commodity that can be treated like a work of art to be sold on the market?”

Snowflake found success by allowing its clients to scale up their computing power without buying more data storage. But by February last year, its shares had fallen below their 2020 price, as it became clear that artificial intelligence was ushering in a period of disruptive technological change.

Rethinking the company’s product was the top priority for newly installed CEO Sridhar Ramaswamy, as Semafor’s Andrew Edgecliffe-Johnson writes. But just as important was figuring out Snowflake’s future: “How do we take new products to market in a company that has been enormously successful with an old product?”