Category: 3. Business

WASHINGTON, Dec. 4, 2025 /PRNewswire/ — Vanda Pharmaceuticals Inc. (Nasdaq: VNDA) today announced that the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has lifted the partial clinical hold on protocol VP-VLY-686-3403, which until today limited the protocol to a maximum of 90 doses of tradipitant.

The lift followed Vanda’s formal dispute resolution request and an expedited re-review conducted by CDER leadership under the collaborative framework established between Vanda and the FDA in October 2025.

The FDA agreed with Vanda’s position that motion sickness is an acute, self-limiting physiologic response rather than a chronic or chronic-intermittent condition. The Agency therefore concluded that the use of tradipitant in motion sickness represents an acute, event-driven therapy, eliminating the need for an additional six-month dog toxicity study and rendering the partial clinical hold unnecessary.

This decision allows Vanda to extend clinical studies of tradipitant in motion sickness. Separately, the ongoing review of the pending, fully completed New Drug Application for tradipitant for the prevention of vomiting induced by motion remains on track, with a PDUFA target action date of December 30, 2025, positioning tradipitant as potentially the first new pharmacologic treatment for motion sickness in over 40 years.

“The swift and favorable resolution of this issue highlights the effectiveness of our collaborative framework with the FDA,” said Mihael H. Polymeropoulos, M.D., President and CEO of Vanda. “We thank the Agency for its thorough and expedited scientific review and look forward to continued constructive dialogue.”

About Vanda Pharmaceuticals Inc.

Vanda is a leading global biopharmaceutical company focused on the development and commercialization of innovative therapies to address high unmet medical needs and improve the lives of patients. For more on Vanda Pharmaceuticals Inc., please visit www.vandapharma.com and follow us on X @vandapharma.

About Tradipitant

Tradipitant is a neurokinin-1 receptor antagonist licensed by Vanda from Eli Lilly and Company. Tradipitant is currently in clinical development for a variety of indications, including gastroparesis, motion sickness, and the prevention of nausea and vomiting induced by GLP-1 receptor agonists. 

CAUTIONARY NOTE REGARDING FORWARD-LOOKING STATEMENTS

Various statements in this press release, including, but not limited to statements regarding Vanda’s further clinical development plans for tradipitant, Vanda’s pursuit of FDA approval of tradipitant for the prevention of vomiting induced by motion, the potential commercialization of tradipitant for such indication, and Vanda’s future interactions with the FDA are “forward-looking statements” under the securities laws. All statements other than statements of historical fact are statements that could be deemed forward-looking statements. Forward-looking statements are based upon current expectations and assumptions that involve risks, changes in circumstances and uncertainties. Important factors that could cause actual results to differ materially from those reflected in Vanda’s forward-looking statements include, among others, the FDA’s ability to complete its review of the NDA for tradipitant for the prevention of vomiting induced by motion by December 30, 2025, the FDA’s assessment of the evidence supporting the safety and efficacy of tradipitant for the prevention of vomiting induced by motion, and the ability of the FDA and Vanda to continue to work together collaboratively. Therefore, no assurance can be given that the results or developments anticipated by Vanda will be realized, or even if substantially realized, that they will have the expected consequences to, or effects on, Vanda. Forward-looking statements in this press release should be evaluated together with the various risks and uncertainties that affect Vanda’s business and market, particularly those identified in the “Cautionary Note Regarding Forward-Looking Statements”, “Risk Factors” and “Management’s Discussion and Analysis of Financial Condition and Results of Operations” sections of Vanda’s most recent Annual Report on Form 10-K, as updated by Vanda’s subsequent Quarterly Reports on Form 10-Q, Current Reports on Form 8-K and other filings with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, which are available at www.sec.gov.

All written and verbal forward-looking statements attributable to Vanda or any person acting on its behalf are expressly qualified in their entirety by the cautionary statements contained or referred to herein. Vanda cautions investors not to rely too heavily on the forward-looking statements Vanda makes or that are made on its behalf. The information in this press release is provided only as of the date of this press release, and Vanda undertakes no obligation, and specifically declines any obligation, to update or revise publicly any forward-looking statements, whether as a result of new information, future events or otherwise, except as required by law.

Corporate Contact:
Kevin Moran
Senior Vice President, Chief Financial Officer and Treasurer
Vanda Pharmaceuticals Inc.
202-734-3400
[email protected]

Jim Golden / Jack Kelleher / Dan Moore
Collected Strategies
[email protected]

SOURCE Vanda Pharmaceuticals Inc.

This fuel will be used for the Project Pele microreactor being developed through a collaboration among the three parties (alongside the Department of Energy) and represents a major milestone for the project. As Jeff Waksman, Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary of the Army for Installations, Energy and Environment, put it, “This is real nuclear microreactor fuel delivered at its final destination, rather than some letter or memorandum promising to make fuel at a later date.”

More details: According to INL—and despite announcements coming out this week—the 40,000 fuel compacts that made up the shipment were delivered on November 5 (a video of the delivery is available here). BWXT manufactured and shipped the fuel from its facilities in Lynchburg, Va., where the company is also constructing the prototype reactor.

BWXT plans to begin formal system testing as early as 2027 and begin producing electricity at INL as soon as 2028.

While the SCO is leading Project Pele, INL director John Wagner highlighted how instrumental the DOE network has been in facilitating this project, saying, “This milestone reflects years of dedicated effort by the Office of Nuclear Energy’s Advanced Gas Reactor TRISO Fuel Qualification Program to fabricate and qualify TRISO fuel using world-class capabilities at INL’s Advanced Test Reactor and Materials and Fuels Complex, and Oak Ridge National Laboratory—capabilities that exist nowhere else in the world.”

Pele background: In May 2019, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, DOE, and SCO signed a preliminary MOU on microreactor research laying the groundwork for Project Pele. The original goal of the project was to develop a transportable 1–5 MWe advanced microreactor.

In March 2020, the DOD awarded contracts for three projects under Pele: one to BWXT, one to Westinghouse, and one to X-energy. BWXT emerged as the frontrunner in the project with its 1.5-MWe high-temperature, gas-cooled reactor.

In August 2023 (in a webinar organized by the American Nuclear Society), Waksman said that if all went according to plan, the reactor would be turned on at INL before the end of calendar year 2025. The new operational date of 2028 represents a three-year delay in prior plans but still aims to meet a September 30, 2028, deadline set by President Trump’s Executive Order 14299.

In September 2024, the DOD announced that it had broken ground at INL’s Critical Infrastructure Test Range Complex, where the reactor is set to be tested. In July 2025, BWXT announced that it had started fabrication on the Pele reactor core.

Janus tie-in: Project Pele—of course— is not the only nuclear power–related undertaking of the DOD or the broader federal government. Most directly related is the recently announced Janus Program, which seeks to deploy an operational demonstration microreactor power plant on a U.S. military installation by 2030. The DOD has stated that Janus will build on lessons learned from Pele and that the “laboratory teams which partnered on the technical, legal, and policy aspects of Project Pele will also be working closely on the Janus Program.”

Waksman reiterated this most recently in BWXT’s announcement, saying, “the army’s Janus Program will follow on to deliver affordable, reliable, commercial nuclear power to ensure that our critical infrastructure has power, even if the electric grid is disrupted.” In November, nine sites were selected for possible deployment as part of the program.

Don’t forget ANPI: Project Pele and the Janus Program are running parallel to the DOD’s separate Advanced Nuclear Power for Installations (ANPI) program, which was launched in 2024 to deploy microreactor systems at military sites. At the launch of the program, the DOD aimed to have two microreactors operational on military bases by 2030. In April of this year, the DOD announced eight companies that are eligible to receive Other Transaction Awards for the project.

At this year’s annual conference of the Association of the U.S. Army, Waksman reportedly said that Janus will differ from ANPI by virtue of having different technical requirements, reflecting recent changes in the nuclear power market, including new companies that have emerged since last year.

Russian authorities blocked access to Snapchat and imposed restrictions on Apple’s video calling service FaceTime, the latest step in an effort to tighten control over the internet and communications online, according to state-run news agencies and the country’s communications regulator.

State internet regulator Roskomnadzor alleged in a statement that both apps were being “used to organize and conduct terrorist activities on the territory of the country, to recruit perpetrators (and) commit fraud and other crimes against our citizens.” Apple did not respond to an emailed request for comment, nor did Snap Inc.

The Russian regulator said it took action against Snapchat 10 October, even though it only reported the move on Thursday. The moves follow restrictions against Google’s YouTube, Meta’s WhatsApp and Instagram, and the Telegram messaging service, itself founded by a Russian-born man, that came in the wake of Vladimir Putin’s invasion of Ukraine in 2022.

Under Vladimir Putin, authorities have engaged in deliberate and multi-pronged efforts to rein in the internet. They have adopted restrictive laws and banned websites and platforms that don’t comply. Technology also has been perfected to monitor and manipulate online traffic.

Access to YouTube was disrupted last year in what experts called deliberate throttling of the widely popular site by the authorities. The Kremlin blamed YouTube owner Google for not properly maintaining its hardware in Russia.

While it’s still possible to circumvent some of the restrictions by using virtual private network services, those are routinely blocked, too.

Authorities further restricted internet access this summer with widespread shutdowns of cellphone internet connections. Officials have insisted the measure was needed to thwart Ukrainian drone attacks, but experts argued it was another step to tighten internet control. In dozens of regions, “white lists” of government-approved sites and services that are supposed to function despite a shutdown have been introduced.

The government also has acted against popular messaging platforms. Encrypted messenger Signal and another popular app, Viber, were blocked in 2024. This year, authorities banned calls via WhatsApp, the most popular messaging app in Russia, and Telegram, a close second. Roskomnadzor justified the measure by saying the two apps were being used for criminal activities.

At the same time, authorities actively promoted a “national” messenger app called Max, which critics see as a surveillance tool. The platform, touted by developers and officials as a one-stop shop for messaging, online government services, making payments and more, openly declares it will share user data with authorities upon request. Experts also say it does not use end-to-end encryption.

Earlier this week, the government also said it was blocking Roblox, a popular online game platform, saying the step aimed at protecting children from illicit content and “pedophiles who meet minors directly in the game’s chats and then move on to real life.” Roblox in October was the second most popular game platform in Russia, with nearly 8 million monthly users, according to media monitoring group Mediascope.

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Stanislav Seleznev, cyber security expert and lawyer with the Net Freedom rights group, said that Russian law views any platform where users can message each other as “organizers of dissemination of information”.

This label mandates that platforms have an account with Roskomnadzor so that it could communicate its demands, and give Russia’s security service, the FSB, access to accounts of their users for monitoring; those failing to comply are in violation and can get blocked, Seleznev said.

Seleznev estimated that possibly tens of millions of Russians have been using FaceTime, especially after calls were banned on WhatsApp and Telegram. He called the restrictions against the service “predictable” and warned that other sites failing to cooperate with Roskomnadzor “will be blocked – that’s obvious”.

Executive Summary

On Dec. 3, 2025, researchers publicly disclosed critical remote code execution (RCE) vulnerabilities in the Flight protocol used by React Server Components (RSC). These vulnerabilities are tracked as CVE-2025-55182 (React) and CVE-2025-66478 (Next.js), which have been assigned a maximum severity rating of CVSS 10.0.

The flaw allows unauthenticated attackers to execute arbitrary code on the server via insecure deserialization of malicious HTTP requests. Testing indicates the exploit has near-100% reliability and requires no code changes to be effective against default configurations. There have been no reports of exploitation in the wild as of Dec. 3, 2025.

React is heavily implemented in enterprise environments, used by roughly 40% of all developers, while Next.js is used by approximately 18%-20%. This makes it the leading server-side framework for the React ecosystem.

Palo Alto Networks Cortex Xpanse has identified the presence of over 968,000 React and Next.js instances in our telemetry.

These vulnerabilities impact the React 19 ecosystem and frameworks that implement it. Specifically, they affect the following versions:

• React: Versions 19.0, 19.1, and 19.2
• Next.js: Versions 15.x and 16.x (App Router), as well as Canary builds starting from 14.3.0
• Other frameworks: Any library bundling the react-server implementation, including React Router, Waku, RedwoodSDK, Parcel and Vite RSC plugins

Palo Alto Networks customers receive protections from and mitigations for CVE-2025-55182 and CVE-2025-66478 in the following ways:

• Cortex XDR and XSIAM agents help protect against post-exploitation activities using the multi-layer protection approach.

Palo Alto Networks also recommends upgrading to the following hardened versions immediately:

• React: Upgrade to 19.0.1, 19.1.2, or 19.2.1
• Next.js: Upgrade to the latest stable patched versions, including 16.0.7, 15.5.7, 15.4.8, 15.3.6, 15.2.6, 15.1.9 or 15.0.5

The Unit 42 Incident Response team can be engaged to help with a compromise or to provide a proactive assessment to lower your risk.

Details of the Vulnerabilities: CVE-2025-55182 (React) and CVE-2025-66478 (Next.js)

CVE-2025-55182 (React) and CVE-2025-66478 (Next.js) are classified as Critical (CVSS 10.0) and are caused by insecure deserialization within the RSC architecture, specifically involving the Flight protocol.

The vulnerabilities reside in the react-server package and its implementation of the RSC Flight protocol. It is a logical deserialization flaw where the server processes RSC payloads safely.

When a server receives a specially crafted, malformed HTTP payload (typically through data delivered in a POST request), it fails to correctly validate the structure of the data. Because of this insecure deserialization, the server allows attacker-controlled data to influence server-side execution logic.

This results in RCE, allowing an attacker to execute arbitrary privileged JavaScript code on the server.

Attack Vector and Exploitability

• Attack complexity: The attack complexity is low. It requires no user interaction and no privileges (unauthenticated).
• Target endpoints: The attack targets React Server Function endpoints.
  • Critical nuance: Even if an application does not strictly implement or use React Server Functions, it remains vulnerable if the application supports React Server Components generally.
• Reliability: Testing has shown the exploit has near-100% reliability.
• Default configuration: The vulnerabilities are present in default configurations. For example, a standard Next.js application created with create-next-app and built for production is exploitable without any code changes by the developer.

Specific Affected Components

While generally described as affecting React and Next.js, the vulnerabilities technically exist within specific underlying packages that handle server-side rendering and module loading.

Affected Packages

The vulnerabilities are present in versions 19.0.0, 19.1.0, 19.1.1 and 19.2.0 of the following packages:

• react-server-dom-webpack
• react-server-dom-parcel
• react-server-dom-turbopack

Affected Framework Implementations

Any framework bundling these packages is affected:

• Next.js: Versions 15.x and 16.x (App Router), as well as Canary builds starting from 14.3.0-canary.77
• Other ecosystems: React Router, Waku, RedwoodSDK, Parcel and the Vite RSC plugin are all affected if they use the vulnerable React packages

Interim Guidance

Required actions: Immediate patching is the only definitive mitigation.

Engineering and security teams should upgrade to the following hardened versions immediately:

• React: Upgrade to 19.0.1, 19.1.2, or 19.2.1
• Next.js: Upgrade to the latest stable patched versions, including 16.0.7, 15.5.7, 15.4.8, 15.3.6, 15.2.6, 15.1.9 or 15.0.5

For the latest updates on these vulnerabilities, please see the documentation provided by each respective vendor:

Unit 42 Managed Threat Hunting Queries

The Unit 42 Managed Threat Hunting team continues to track any attempts to exploit this CVE across our customers, using Cortex XDR and the XQL queries below. Cortex XDR customers can also use these XQL queries to search for signs of exploitation.

The following hunting queries are not high-fidelity detections and should be investigated to determine whether the web server operates vulnerable React Server Components.

Conclusion

The critical distinction of these vulnerabilities is their nature as a deterministic logic flaw in the Flight protocol, rather than a probabilistic error. Unlike memory corruption bugs that may fail, this flaw guarantees execution, transforming it into a reliable system-wide bypass for attackers. Amplified by the massive footprint of Next.js in enterprise environments, this creates a direct conduit to sensitive internal data.

Ultimately, this incident underscores the inherent friction between performance and security in modern architecture. While React Server Components optimize data fetching and search engine optimization (SEO) by moving logic closer to the source, they simultaneously move the attack surface closer to organizations’ most sensitive and valuable data.

Palo Alto Networks customers are better protected by our products, as listed below. We will update this threat brief as more relevant information becomes available.

Palo Alto Networks Product Protections for CVE-2025-55182 and CVE-2025-66478

Palo Alto Networks customers can leverage a variety of product protections and updates to identify and defend against this threat.

If you think you might have been compromised or have an urgent matter, get in touch with the Unit 42 Incident Response team or call:

• North America: Toll Free: +1 (866) 486-4842 (866.4.UNIT42)
• UK: +44.20.3743.3660
• Europe and Middle East: +31.20.299.3130
• Asia: +65.6983.8730
• Japan: +81.50.1790.0200
• Australia: +61.2.4062.7950
• India: 000 800 050 45107

Cortex XDR and XSIAM

Cortex XDR and XSIAM agents help protect against post-exploitation activities using the multi-layer protection approach.

Story Continues

Time to Act

The modelling makes clear that the cost savings from nuclear energy emerge primarily in the final phase of decarbonization (after 2040 in most modelled countries). But construction timelines mean that planning and building must begin decades earlier, well before market signals alone would trigger investment.

Countries don’t need to choose between economic growth and climate action, or between energy access and environmental protection. With the right technology mix, supportive policies, and strategic investment, emerging economies can achieve energy abundance while building cleaner, more resilient power systems.

The window for action is now. Every year of delay makes the final phase of decarbonization more expensive and more difficult. For countries serious about universal energy access and climate commitments, nuclear power deserves a prominent place in the conversation.

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This analysis is based on research by Bayesian Energy in collaboration with Radiant Energy Group, commissioned by The Rockefeller Foundation. The study used detailed power system modeling to evaluate cost-optimal pathways for eight emerging market and developing economies through 2050.

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Nvidia would be blocked from selling advanced chips to China under a bipartisan bill that US senators introduced on Thursday as part of an effort to make it harder for Beijing to obtain critical American AI-related technology.

The Secure and Feasible Exports Chips Act would require the commerce secretary to deny export licences for advanced chips to China for 30 months. The bill would prevent Nvidia from selling the H200 and Blackwell, its most advanced chip, to China.

It comes as the White House weighs whether to allow Nvidia to export the H200 to China — a possibility that has alarmed some officials.

Pete Ricketts, the Republican chair of the Senate foreign relations east Asia sub-committee, who co-sponsored the legislation with Chris Coons, the top Democrat on the panel, said the US was leading in the artificial intelligence race with China largely because of its “dominance of global compute power”.

“Denying Beijing access to these chips is therefore essential,” Ricketts said. “Codifying President Trump’s current AI chip limitations on Communist China as US chip companies continue to rapidly innovate will allow us to widen our compute lead exponentially.”

Coons said: “The rest of the 21st century will be determined by who wins the AI race, and whether this technology is built on American values of free thought and free markets or the values of the Chinese Communist party.”

Other senators sponsoring the bill are Republicans Tom Cotton and Dave McCormick and Democrats Jeanne Shaheen and Andy Kim.

The bill comes as China hawks in Washington fear Donald Trump is ignoring security issues to preserve the trade deal he agreed with Chinese President Xi Jinping in October.

The FT reported on Wednesday that the US Treasury had halted plans to impose sanctions on China’s Ministry of State Security spy agency over “Salt Typhoon”, a massive cyber penetration of American telecom groups.

US officials said the administration did not plan to issue any big new export controls on China for the time being.

China would benefit greatly from access to Nvidia’s H200 chips, said Saif Khan, a chips expert at the Institute for Progress think-tank.

“Unfettered access to the H200 would allow China to build frontier-scale AI supercomputers to develop the most powerful AI systems, just at a moderately higher cost relative to cutting-edge Blackwell chips,” said Khan, a former White House and commerce department official.

“It would also arm Chinese cloud providers to compete globally with US hyperscalers.”

Nvidia chief Jensen Huang was in Washington on Wednesday and met Trump and Republican senators on the banking committee. Ahead of the meeting with the committee, he said Beijing would not accept degraded chips and that US companies should be able to export their most competitive chips to China.

John Kennedy, a Republican senator on the committee, told reporters Huang was not a “credible source” on what the US should export to China.

“He’s got more money than the Father, the Son and the Holy Ghost, and he wants even more,” Kennedy said, according to the Associated Press.

“If I’m looking for someone to give me objective advice about whether we should make our technology available to China, he’s not it,” he added.

Steve Bannon, the former White House strategist in the first Trump administration who is influential in the Maga movement, said the US should not be exporting advanced chips to China, particularly as Chinese companies such as DeepSeek have made such advances in AI.

“If this is in fact a ‘Sputnik Moment’ because of DeepSeek then we should ban all chip sales, especially high-end, but also stop all financial support — no access to debt or equity capital markets, no training, no Chinese students — just like in the cold war about nuclear weapons,” Bannon said.

He also took aim at Huang and David Sacks, the White House AI adviser who backs selling high-end chips to China as part of an AI “action plan” to make countries reliant on the American “technology stack”.

“David Sacks has acted as the agent for the Chinese Communist party and Jensen Huang is the arms merchant,” Bannon said.

Asked about the bill, Nvidia said the AI action plan “wisely recognises non-military businesses everywhere should be able to choose the American technology stack, promoting US jobs and promoting national security”.

In response to Bannon’s comment, the company said: “AI is not an atomic bomb. No one should have an atomic bomb. Everyone should have AI.”

The White House did not respond to a request for comment.

(Bloomberg) — A rally that put the stock market within a striking distance of its all-time highs struggled to gain a whole lot of traction ahead of next week’s Federal Reserve decision. Bitcoin halted its rebound. Bonds fell.

The S&P 500 barely budged. Bets on a Fed reduction remained intact despite a slide in jobless claims — a noisy reading that captured the Thanksgiving period. Meta Platforms Inc. jumped about 3.5% as Bloomberg News reported executives are considering budget cuts for the metaverse group. A gauge of small caps climbed almost 1%.

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Worries that the frenzy around artificial-intelligence has gone too far caused a recent wobble in equities. But the strong outlook for the sector and wagers that policy easing will fuel corporate profits bolstered hopes on further gains.

“The key question hanging over markets is whether a potential Federal Reserve rate cut next week can trigger a so-called Santa rally,” said Fawad Razaqzada at Forex.com. “For now, the S&P 500 forecast remains cautiously constructive, albeit with more hesitancy creeping in.”

The pattern for the first couple of weeks of December could prove far “choppier” than the last part of the month, noted Mark Newton at Fundstrat Global Advisors. With bets on a December rate cut rising to near certainty, he said we’re gradually seeing sectors like industrials, financials and small caps climbing.

The S&P 500 closed near 6,860. The yield on 10-year Treasuries rose four basis points to 4.1%. The dollar fluctuated. Bitcoin dropped below $93,000.

Given the equity market’s snapback from late November, technicals have improved to match some of the bullish seasonality thought possible for this month, Newton added. While trends are bullish, he says technicals support further choppiness until after the Fed decision.

“The market’s ‘risk-on’ light is on, led by expectations for a Fed rate cut next week and a broadening rotation down-cap,” said Craig Johnson at Piper Sandler. “But we still anticipate more ‘backing and filling’ as the major indices approach their year-to-date highs.”

While the S&P 500 has made limited progress so far this week, several previously broken levels have now been reclaimed, reinforcing the impression that the bulls maintain a degree of control, noted Razaqzada.

To Matt Maley at Miller Tabak, while the market has spent the past few days consolidating gains, the set-up is a good one.

“So unless we get a big reversal over the next few trading days, the advantage will definitely be with the bulls,” he said.

Maley notes that one area that could do well if we get a strong year-end rally is the small-cap space.

“A push to a new significant all-time high might finally attract the kind of momentum money that could help this part of the stock market outperform,” he said. “Of course, if the mega-cap tech stocks start to roll over in a big way, all bets will be off.”

At Interactive Brokers, Jose Torres noted that the cyclically oriented Russell 2000 is sustaining its recent momentum and is poised to rally in an environment of looser financial conditions alongside a still solid economy.

While the US tech sector is likely to remain a key driver for the market’s next leg up, its recent underperformance also points to other compelling opportunities across the market, according to Ulrike Hoffmann-Burchardi at UBS Global Wealth Management.

“As we expect US equities to rally into 2026, we think under-allocated investors should add exposure,” she said. “Beyond the tech sector, we expect a good performance from the health care, utilities, and banking sectors to broaden the foundation for further gains.”

Hoffmann-Burchardi says the Fed’s easing path is supportive to equities and also creates a positive backdrop for quality bonds.

On the macro front, applications for US unemployment benefits fell last week to the lowest in more than three years, indicating that employers are still largely holding onto workers despite a wave of recent layoffs.

Separate data from Challenger, Gray & Christmas showed announced layoffs at US companies fell last month after surging in October, but were still the highest for any November in three years.

“Overall, the net takeaway from the data served to confirm the crosscurrents evident in the labor landscape,” said Ian Lyngen at BMO Capital Markets.

Policymakers will not yet have the government’s November jobs report in hand for their meeting next week. The report, originally due Dec. 5, was delayed until Dec. 16 as a result of the record-long government shutdown. That release will also include October payrolls figures.

“There remain some negative payroll employment readings. But the US labor market is not collapsing based on timely data and reports that have leading indicator properties,” said Don Rissmiller at Strategas. “We continue to believe the Fed will cut the fed funds rate again by 25 basis points in December.”

While investors are largely betting policymakers will cut rates again, officials have rarely been so divided as many still prefer leaving rates elevated to keep inflation in check.

Before their final policy meeting of the year, Fed officials will get a dated reading on their preferred inflation gauge. On Friday, the September income and spending report — long delayed because of the government shutdown — is due to be released.

The figures will include the personal consumption expenditures price index and a core measure that excludes food and energy. Economists project a third-straight 0.2% increase in the core index. That would keep the year-over-year figure hovering just below 3%, a sign that inflationary pressures are stable, yet sticky.

“We continue to expect two rate cuts by the end of the first quarter of 2026, with Friday’s personal consumption expenditure index likely to show price pressures under control,” said Hoffmann-Burchardi at UBS Global Wealth Management.

Corporate Highlights:

Meta Platforms Inc.’s Mark Zuckerberg is expected to meaningfully cut resources for building the so-called metaverse, an effort that he once framed as the future of the company and the reason for changing its name from Facebook Inc. Meta Platforms risks a temporary European Union ban on the rollout of new policies over how its AI features in WhatsApp, after being hit by the latest probe into Big Tech’s alleged dominance on the continent. Salesforce Inc. gave an outlook for revenue in the current period that topped analysts’ estimates, suggesting the software company is persuading customers to buy its AI tools. Snowflake Inc.’s forecast for sales and profit margin in the current quarter raised concerns the company isn’t yet making enough money from its AI-based tools. Dollar General Corp. raised its full-year outlook, showing how value-focused retailers are winning over consumers hunting for deals. Kroger Co. lowered the top end of its full-year sales forecast, sounding a note of caution that competition is intensifying among food sellers for increasingly discerning consumers. PepsiCo Inc. is nearing a settlement agreement with activist investor Elliott Investment Management, the Wall Street Journal reported Thursday, without providing details. Paramount Skydance Corp. accused Warner Bros. Discovery Inc. of failing to conduct a fair auction, saying the film and TV company isn’t acting in its shareholders’ best interests. Versant Media Group Inc., the company being spun off from Comcast Corp., is making acquisitions to diversify beyond its core business of cable-TV networks. Toronto-Dominion Bank, Bank of Montreal and Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce all beat estimates on results that included strong performance in their capital-markets businesses, continuing a trend seen across other Canadian lenders and wrapping up a year marked by buoyant markets and more advisory work. Novo Nordisk A/S left open the door for additional work on its pill version of Ozempic for Alzheimer’s disease after a pair of failed trials, saying that patients showed a biological response in a handful of areas despite getting no cognitive improvement. Stellantis NV touted promising signs of a turnaround at its Ram and Jeep brands after adding powerful engines and more options for vehicles without a plug. Volkswagen AG plans to convert its small-scale assembly plant in Dresden into an innovation hub after stopping car output, following through on a pledge to avoid factory closures in Germany. Rio Tinto Group’s new chief executive will focus on cutting costs and selling assets in a bid to turn the world’s second largest miner into a slimmed-down operation centered primarily on iron ore and copper. Some of the main moves in markets:

Stocks

The S&P 500 rose 0.1% as of 4 p.m. New York time The Nasdaq 100 was little changed The Dow Jones Industrial Average was little changed The MSCI World Index rose 0.3% Bloomberg Magnificent 7 Total Return Index rose 0.5% The Russell 2000 Index rose 0.8% Meta rose 3.4% Currencies

The Bloomberg Dollar Spot Index was little changed The euro fell 0.2% to $1.1644 The British pound fell 0.2% to $1.3329 The Japanese yen was little changed at 155.10 per dollar Cryptocurrencies

Bitcoin fell 1.3% to $92,459.23 Ether fell 0.8% to $3,139.48 Bonds

The yield on 10-year Treasuries advanced four basis points to 4.10% Germany’s 10-year yield advanced two basis points to 2.77% Britain’s 10-year yield declined one basis point to 4.43% Commodities

West Texas Intermediate crude rose 1.3% to $59.71 a barrel Spot gold rose 0.2% to $4,210.02 an ounce ©2025 Bloomberg L.P.

As Australia rides the AI boom with dozens of new investments in datacentres in Sydney and Melbourne, experts are warning about the impact these massive projects will have on already strained water resources.

Water demand to service datacentres in Sydney alone is forecast to be larger than the volume of Canberra’s total drinking water within the next decade.

In Melbourne the Victorian government has announced a “$5.5m investment to become Australia’s datacentre capital”, but the hyperscale datacentre applications on hand already exceed the water demands of nearly all of the state’s top 30 business customers combined.

Technology companies, including Open AI and Atlassian, are pushing for Australia to become a hub for data processing and storage. But with 260 datacentres operating and dozens more in the offing, experts are flagging concerns about the impact on the supply of drinking water.

Sydney Water has estimated up to 250 megalitres a day would be needed to service the industry by 2035 (a larger volume than Canberra’s total drinking water).

Cooling requires ‘huge amount of water’

Prof Priya Rajagopalan, director of the Post Carbon Research Centre at RMIT, says water and electricity demands of datacentres depend on the cooling technology used.

“If you’re just using evaporative cooling, there is a lot of water loss from the evaporation, but if you are using sealers, there is no water loss but it requires a huge amount of water to cool,” she says.

While older datacentres tend to rely on air cooling, demand for more computing power means higher server rack density so the output is warmer, meaning centres have turned to water for cooling .

The amount of water used in a datacentre can vary greatly. Some centres, such as NextDC, are moving towards liquid-to-chip cooling, which cools the processor or GPU directly instead of using air or water to cool the whole room.

NextDC says it has completed an initial smaller deployment of the cooling technology but it has the capacity to scale up for ultra-high-density environments to allow for greater processing power without an associated rise in power consumption because liquid cooling is more efficient. The company says its modelling suggests power usage effectiveness (PUE, a measure of energy efficiency) could go as low as 1.15.

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The datacentre industry accounts for its sustainability with two metrics: water usage effectiveness (WUE) and power usage effectiveness (PUE). These measure the amount of water or power used relative to computing work.

WUE is measured by annual water use divided by annual IT energy use (kWh). For example, a 100MW datacentre using 3ML a day would have a WUE of 1.25. The closer the number is to 1, the more efficient it is. Several countries mandate minimum standards. Malaysia has recommended a WUE of 1.8, for example.

But even efficient facilities can still use large quantities of water and energy, at scale.

NextDC’s PUE in the last financial year was 1.44, up from 1.42 the previous year, which the company says “reflects the dynamic nature of customer activity across our fleet and the scaling up of new facilities”.

Calls for ban on use of drinking water

Sydney Water says its estimates of datacentre water use are being reviewed regularly. The utility is exploring climate-resilient and alternative water sources such as recycled water and stormwater harvesting to prepare for future demand.

“All proposed datacentre connections are individually assessed to confirm there is sufficient local network capacity and operators may be required to fund upgrades if additional servicing is needed,” a Sydney Water spokesperson says.

In its submission to the Victorian pricing review for 2026 to 2031, Melbourne Water noted that hyperscale datacentre operators that have put in applications for connections have “projected instantaneous or annual demands exceeding nearly all top 30 non-residential customers in Melbourne”.

“We have not accounted for this in our demand forecasts or expenditure planning,” Melbourne Water said.

It has sought upfront capital contributions from the companies so the financial burden of works required “does not fall on the broader customer base”.

Greater Western Water in Victoria had 19 datacentre applications on hand, according to documents obtained by the ABC, and provided to the Guardian.

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The Concerned Waterways Alliance, a network of Victorian community and environment groups, has flagged its concerns about the diversion of large volumes of drinking water to cool servers, when many of the state’s water resources are already stretched.

Cameron Steele, a spokesperson for the alliance, says datacentre growth could increase Melbourne’s reliance on desalinated water and reduce water available for environmental flows, with the associated costs borne by the community. The groups have called for a ban on the use of drinking water for cooling, and mandatory public reporting of water use for all centres.

“We would strongly advocate for the use of recycled water for datacentres rather than potable drinking water.”

Closed-loop cooling

In hotter climates, such as large parts of Australia during the summer months, centres require more energy or water to keep cool.

Danielle Francis, manager of customer and policy at the Water Services Association of Australia, says there isn’t a one-size-fits-all approach for how much energy and water datacentres use because it will depend on the local constraints such as land, noise restrictions and availability of water.

“We’re always balancing all the different customers, and that’s the need for residential areas and also non-residential customers, as well as of course environmental needs,” Francis says.

“It is true that there are quite a lot of datacentre applications. And the cumulative impact is what we have to plan for … We have to obviously look at what the community impact of that is going to be.

“And sometimes they do like to cluster near each other and be in a similar location.”

One centre under construction in Sydney’s Marsden Park is a 504MW datacentre spanning 20 hectares, with six four-storey buildings. The CDC centre will become the largest data campus in the southern hemisphere, the company has boasted.

In the last financial year, CDC used 95.8% renewable electricity in its operational datacentres, and the company boasts a PUE of 1.38 and a WUE of 0.01. A spokesperson for the company says it has been able to achieve this through a closed-loop cooling system that eliminates ongoing water draw, rather than relying on the traditional evaporative cooling systems.

“The closed-loop systems at CDC are filled once at the beginning of their life and operate without ongoing water draw, evaporation or waste, ensuring we are preserving water while still maintaining thermal performance,” a spokesperson says.

“It’s a model designed for Australia, a country shaped by drought and water stress, and built for long-term sustainability and sets an industry standard.”

Planning documents for the centre reveal that, despite CDC’s efforts, there remains some community concern over the project.

In a June letter, the acting chief executive of the western health district of New South Wales, Peter Rophail, said the development was too close to vulnerable communities, and the unprecedented scale of the development was untested and represented an unsuitable risk to western Sydney communities.

“The proposal does not provide any assurance that the operation can sufficiently adjust or mitigate environmental exposures during extreme heat weather events so as not to pose an unreasonable risk to human health,” Rophail said.

Blue-collar workers and manufacturers want the Albanese government to stare down the gas giants as it designs a new gas reservation scheme, warning the industry’s preferred approach would fail to quickly contain prices.

The federal government is expected to unveil plans for an east coast gas reserve as soon as next week after a six-month review of the gas market.

After rubbishing Peter Dutton’s election promise to force gas exporters to divert supplies into the east coast market, Labor is preparing to launch its own intervention to avert potential supply shortages and contain prices for households and businesses.

The government is understood to still be weighing up a potential model as it faces competing demands from gas producers, unions and manufacturers.

The government is also sensitive to concerns from customers in Japan and South Korea, which are heavily reliant on Australian gas exports and have resisted past government interventions that they fear threaten supplies.

The gas industry and the federal Coalition insist the reservation policy must only apply to new gas projects. But unions and large energy users maintain any reservation must capture gas from existing projects, except for those already under contract for export.

Paul Farrow, the national secretary of the Australian Workers’ Union, said a policy that only applied to future projects would “achieve virtually nothing for anyone”.

“To shore up Australian industry for the 21st century, we need affordable gas reserved for domestic use right now – not years down the track,” said Farrow, whose union has campaigned for years for Labor to adopt the policy.

Manufacturing Australia, which represents large energy users including BlueScope Steel and Rheem, has argued an “effective” gas reservation scheme is critical to curtail the high gas prices that risk jobs in the sector.

“To be effective, gas reservation needs to put enough gas into the local market to see prices fall. In the short term, that means immediate reservation of uncontracted gas,” said Ben Eade, the chief executive of Manufacturing Australia.

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“In the medium term, we can grandfather existing export contracts, but reservation should apply to all new contracts, variations or renewals, any gas project expansions or variations and any new gas production from this point onward.”

Two models canvassed

The government has canvassed two models for a gas reservation in private consultation sessions with stakeholders over the past six weeks, two sources familiar with the development of the policy confirmed to Guardian Australia.

The first would create a system in which the three Queensland-based LNG exporters supply a prescribed amount of gas into the domestic market in exchange for export permits. The second option would require all gas producers – exporters and domestic-only producers – to supply a certain volume into the local market, the sources said.

The AWU wants the government to adopt the first option to directly target the exporters, which they say “broke the domestic market in the first place”.

East coast gas prices have tripled over the past decade after the major LNG export terminals linked the domestic market to international demand.

“Australian industry has been bleeding for over a decade while we’ve waited for the gas reservation scheme we desperately need,” Farrow said.

“The priority now is getting a simple, workable model in place urgently – not designing some elaborate credit trading system that the gas companies will find ways to exploit.”

The government would not confirm details of options under consideration when contacted by Guardian Australia.

“The government is conducting a review of the gas market. The government is committed to ensuring Australian homes and businesses get access to Australian gas at fair prices,” a spokesperson said.

A gas reservation scheme already exists for the separate Western Australian market, which requires exporters to supply the equivalent of 15% of LNG production to the local market.

The Labor MP and former industry minister Ed Husic wants his government to pursue even more drastic interventions, including cracking down on importers that on-sell Australian gas to third countries.

“It’s a real barbecue-stopper for many Australians that foreign buyers are on-selling our gas while we’re facing forecasts of local gas shortages,” Husic said.

The Greens are advocating a different approach to prevent domestic gas shortages, backing the Australian Council of Trade Union’s push for a 25% levy on LNG exports.

“Taxing gas will be much more effective way of keeping gas in this country and replacing the Petroleum Resources Rent Tax (PRRT) that’s broken and simply not bringing enough money,” said Steph Hodgins-May, the assistant climate spokesperson for the Greens.