1. Economic offense
U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent speaks during a press conference at the Cash Room of the Treasury Department in Washington, D.C., on Aug. 24, 2026.
Mehmet Eser | Anadolu | Getty Images
The Trump administration went on economic offense yesterday, threatening higher tariffs on Canada and launching a global sanctions plan targeting Iran. “Operation Economic Outcast,” detailed in a press conference by Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, aims at isolating Tehran through threats of secondary sanctions on its “enablers.”
Here’s what to know:
2. Foot the bill
Dicks Sporting Goods Inc. signage on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) in New York, US, on Monday, Aug. 24, 2026.
Michael Nagle | Bloomberg | Getty Images
Shares of Dick’s Sporting Goods are 15% lower before the bell after the retailer missed Wall Street’s expectations for the second quarter and lowered its full-year outlook for its Foot Locker business, citing a challenging footwear market.
Comparable sales at Foot Locker, which Dick’s acquired last year, fell 3.6% in the period. Sales at Dick’s stores meanwhile rose 4.9%, helped in part by this summer’s World Cup.
Elsewhere in retail: Lego reported record revenue for the first half of 2026 with a year-over-year increase of 21%. CEO Niels Christiansen told CNBC that the toy brickmaker has both recruited new consumers and retained its current fans.
3. Sale rack
Nvidia CEO Jensen Hwang gives the keynote address at the company’s annual GTC developers conference at the SAP Center in San Jose, California, on March 16, 2026.
Josh Edelson | AFP | Getty Images
Nvidia’s Groq 3 LPX rack is in full production and will be online later this year, the chipmaker announced yesterday. It marks the technological commercialization of Nvidia’s $20 billion purchase of Groq assets — Nvidia’s largest acquisition on record.
As CNBC’s Kif Leswing writes, the race to get Groq’s chip out there underscores the role of low-latency inference in making artificial intelligence agents more responsive. The Groq 3 LPX rack can provide 3,400 tokens per second, according to Nvidia.
All eyes are on the “Magnificent 7” chipmaker ahead of its earnings report tomorrow after the bell. Nvidia shares have fallen for seven straight days, marking its longest losing streak since 2022.
4. Trump trades
President-elect Donald Trump rings the opening bell on the trading floor of the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) on December 12, 2024 in New York City.
Spencer Platt | Getty Images News | Getty Images
A new report from Democrats on Congress’ Joint Economic Committee alleges that Trump’s oil and gas stock positions gained as much as $15.5 million this year, as the oil supply crunch sent energy sector names surging.
According to his 2025 financial disclosure, the president owned between $12.5 million and $45.6 million in oil and gas stocks last year. Estimating an average gain of around 39% as of Aug. 17, the committee said the value of those holdings rose to between $17.2 million and $61.1 million.
The Trump Organization has told CNBC that Trump does not direct individual trades, and that his investments are held in discretionary accounts managed by independent financial institutions. Over the weekend, the president disclosed more than 1,000 financial transactions for the month June.
5. Off the beaten path
Kevin Carter | Getty Images News | Getty Images
United Airlines is adding several international routes next year, as the carrier continues to bet on premium overseas travel. The new destinations announced this morning range from Ljubljana, Slovenia, to Okinawa, Japan to Catania, Sicily.
Patrick Quayle, United’s senior vice president, said the company is seeing its clientele “want to get away from the overcrowded, large European cities.” United CEO Scott Kirby told CNBC’s Phil LeBeau this morning that the new destinations aren’t just for summer travel, either: “These go all the way through October,” he said. “October has become one of our best months of the year.”
The Daily Dividend
There’s a huge danger here that in the era of AI, we outsource our reasoning to these models, and we have cognitive atrophy that stops us being able to reason from first principles ourselves.
Chris Churchman
Goldman Sachs partner
— CNBC’s Kevin Breuninger, Michael Wayland, Anniek Bao, Luke Fountain, Sean Conlon, Tanaya Macheel, Sarah Whitten, Kif Leswing, Michelle Fox, Leslie Josephs and Hugh Son contributed to this report.
Luke Fountain assisted in the production of this newsletter. Josephine Rozzelle edited this edition.