Restaurant chain Red Lobster’s “Everyday $20 Ultimate Endless Shrimp” offering was described as a “car crash” as creditors of the chain sued former controlling shareholder Thai Union.

In a suit filed in Orange County, Fla., in May, the creditors said that Thai Union — a seafood producer with shares traded on Thailand’s stock exchange — knew in 2023 that the chain was facing significant financial headwinds and risked insolvency. The suit, filed by a trust on behalf of the Red Lobster creditors, requests a jury trial to determine damages.

Instead of considering the interests of the restaurant chain, “Thai Union doubled down on a campaign to squeeze out every drop of value that it could through uneconomic contracts that benefited Thai Union and made no economic sense for Red Lobster.”

Thai Union and Red Lobster didn’t immediately respond when contacted for comment by CNBC.

Red Lobster filed for bankruptcy in May 2024, shuttering restaurants around the U.S. and filing for Chapter 11 protection as it faced increased competition, expensive leases, a broader pullback in consumer spending, and fallout from the shrimp promotion.

The company had defaulted on a term loan of $275 million from Fortress Investment Group in September 2023.

The company exited Chapter 11 in September 2024 after being acquired by private investor group RL Holdings, reportedly led by Fortress. RL Holdings still owns Red Lobster.

The suit alleged that Thai Union had pressed Red Lobster to purchase increasing amounts of its shrimp at above-market prices and banned a competitor from supplying the restaurant chain.

Thai Union and then-interim CEO Paul Kenny “engineered and implemented” the endless-shrimp promotion over the objections of Red Lobster employees not affiliated with Thai Union, and this led to restaurants around the country being “immobilized” as they ran out of shrimp and were unable to turn over tables, the lawsuit alleged.

“When it was clear that the Everyday $20 Ultimate Endless Shrimp offering was wreaking havoc on Red Lobster and its balance sheet, Kenny doubled down. He responded by continuing the offering—and generating tens of millions of dollars more in overpriced shrimp orders for Thai Union—and ultimately left Red Lobster with a massive oversupply,” the filing read.

Red Lobster brought back the endless-shrimp promotion in April, according to its website, though it said the promotion was for a limited time and didn’t provide the cost.

Thai Union had bought a minority stake in Red Lobster in 2016, then effectively controlled the company after teaming up with another related shareholder in 2020 for a majority stake and three out of five of Red Lobster’s board seats.

It later divested its stake in May 2024, and the suit alleged that it did not contribute any capital in the Chapter 11 process.

“Thai Union treated the company as little more than a distribution arm for its own products, milking whatever value it could from Red Lobster, especially as the company became insolvent,” the lawsuit said.

Shipping traffic is recovering a week after the U.S. and Iran signed a deal to reopen the Strait of Hormuz — but a renewed attack on a cargo ship Thursday threw fresh uncertainty over the fragile passage, halting the United Nations’ evacuation plan and sending some tankers into reverse.

In the week following the ceasefire announcement, 125 transits were recorded between June 15-21, marking the highest weekly total since the war began in late February, as tankers rushed to move stored Gulf crude before the 60-day truce window expires.

On June 24, AXS Marine recorded 62 commercial vessel crossings, the highest single-day count since the war started, but only equivalent to 53% of the traffic on the same day last year.

The Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps on Wednesday declared that all ships must use only its northern route and comply with Iranian routing instructions. Hours later, the Ever Lovely — a Singapore-flagged Evergreen container ship — was struck on its starboard side by a projectile off the Omani coast. A U.S. official said the IRGC had carried out the strike. It was the first attack on a cargo vessel since the ceasefire took effect.

Located in the gulf between Oman and Iran, the Strait of Hormuz is recognized as one of the world’s most critical energy chokepoints. The narrow waterway typically handles around 20% of the world’s oil traffic.

Shipowners are left navigating two competing authorities with no agreed rules, with a northern corridor under Iranian control and a southern passage through Omani waters. The standard pre-war commercial lane remains closed due to mines.

Iran warned it would take action against ships not using its northern route or coordinating with Iranian authorities. The U.S. and Oman backed a separate southern corridor, with Oman issuing navigational guidance and American Navy providing naval oversight.

Companies are confronted with a difficult choice: take the risk to transit, or hold back and potentially cede ground to rivals willing to take that risk.

Bruce Tan, a Singapore-based electronics manufacturer who held back deliveries to Middle East clients for four months, said he had begun moving goods through the corridor again, but only in small batches, in case the Strait closes again. Tan is also routing some orders through alternative corridors as a hedge against another closure.

Aristidis Alafouzos, CEO of Okeanis Eco Tankers Corp, a crude oil shipping company headquartered in Greece, said he doesn’t expect Thursday’s attack on a ship in the Gulf of Oman to “significantly change” the trend of transits through the waterway.

“We’ve seen a large increase, especially on the crude oil passages, and I think this is set to continue and maybe this one-off event isn’t enough to really disrupt the recent events of the large exports of Kuwaiti and Emirati crude oil from the Gulf,” Alafouzos told CNBC’s “Squawk Box Europe” on Friday.

“The one big missing factor is the Saudis. For now, we haven’t seen them export almost anything from inside the Arabian Gulf and everything is coming from Yanbu in the Red Sea.”

Analysts have warned that passage through the waterway remains risky, and shipping companies are pushing for clarity on safe navigation, as well as the likelihood of tolls and how sanctions could interplay with whatever passages are open in the future.

“We don’t know how much of the straits is mined — it can be very dangerous going through that,” said Tim Huxley, CEO of Singapore-based Mandarin Shipping, which manages 50 vessels globally and has kept all of them out of the strait.

“You’ve got this debate about who is authorizing ships to go through, what level of control the Iranians have on one side, the Americans have on the other. A lot of ship owners are just saying: I’m going to wait and see how these talks progress before I commit to sending a ship, its cargo, and most importantly, its crew,” Huxley said.

“Insurance premiums are still very high on ships and cargoes going through the straits,” Huxley said. “Until there is a more concrete set of guidelines on safe navigation, people are going to be very reticent to go through.”

Han Shen Lin, China country director of The Asia Group, was more blunt about the predicament facing corporate executives.

“Boardrooms aren’t asking about cargo safety — they’re asking if it is insurable. War-risk premiums have shot up from 0.05% to over 0.7% of hull value per transit. That’s not a risk premium, that’s a serious business model stress test,” Han said.

“One vessel seizure doesn’t just cost you the cargo — it costs you the client relationship, the insurance renewal, and your board’s confidence. Speed is worthless without survivability,” Han said.

The U.S. and Iran’s interim peace agreement gives inspectors from the U.N. nuclear watchdog access to the Islamic Republic’s nuclear sites, according to the head of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA).

His comments come shortly after U.S. President Donald Trump said Iran had agreed to allow nuclear inspections, despite Iran insisting that there were no new plans for U.N. inspectors to visit sites damaged in U.S. and Israeli strikes.

“There is a bit of a war of statements here,” IAEA chief Rafael Grossi said at a news conference in Japan on Friday.

“What is undeniable is that we have an MOU. This MOU specifically indicates that the nuclear part of the memorandum will be supervised. This is the word, will be supervised by the IAEA. In order to supervise, we need to inspect. There is no other way,” Grossi said.

“The technical work has started, and we hope to be there soon,” he added.

The U.S. and Iran signed an interim peace deal last week to bring the Middle East conflict to an end, although Washington and Tehran have continued to clash over some of the details of the 14-point memorandum of understanding.

Under the memorandum, both sides agreed to reopen the strategically vital Strait of Hormuz toll-free for at least 60 days and to end all hostilities, including in Lebanon, where fighting has persisted between Israel and Iran-backed Hezbollah.

A separate U.N. agency, the International Maritime Organization, paused its efforts to evacuate ships and seafarers stranded inside the Middle East Gulf after a vessel was attacked in the Gulf of Oman on Thursday.

Critics of Trump’s interim peace deal and the contents of the MOU have questioned whether this outcome was worth nearly four months of war. It has also invited comparisons to former U.S. President Barack Obama’s nuclear deal with Tehran.

Trump scrapped the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, which was agreed to in 2015 under the Obama administration during his first term in office, calling it “an embarrassment” to him as a U.S. citizen.

Speaking to ABC News in an interview earlier in the month, ahead of the interim deal being announced, Obama said he was “doubtful” any agreement with Iran put forward by the Trump administration would be “significantly different” from the JCPOA.

Trump has since lashed out at critics of the MOU, saying those who think he hasn’t been tough enough on Tehran were either “jealous, bad people or stupid.”

A little over a week after the New York Knicks paraded through lower Manhattan celebrating their historic 2026 Championship win over the San Antonio Spurs, the NBA has set its sights on an ambitious target: Southeast Asia. 

The decision to stage both a Rising Stars Invitational tournament – at which high school teams from across Asia showcase their skills, with top performers invited to future NBA development camps – and an accompanying investor conference in Singapore is no coincidence. 

Southeast Asia has emerged as one of the NBA’s fastest-growing markets for fan engagement, making the region a focal point for both player development and business expansion. 

According to the league, basketball is the most-played sport in the Philippines with participation growing in numerous other countries, while fans in the region have increased by 15% in the span of three years through Q1 2026.

Digital consumption is also on the rise. Video views across NBA Asia’s social media platforms increased 88% year-on-year, according to data supplied by the league to CNBC. The number of followers across the league’s regional social media platforms has almost doubled during the 2025-26 season.

In an interview with CNBC’s JP Ong, the NBA’s vice president for Southeast Asia, Sheila Rasu, underscored the loyalty of the region’s fan base. “Basketball is probably the fastest growing sport in Southeast Asia,” said Rasu. “In Singapore, it’s probably the most played team sport in the country. In Indonesia, there is a huge growing population of kids that are taking up basketball. So we do feel that basketball is truly having a moment, not just with the boys, but also the girls.” 

The league is also renewing its focus on the region through its NBA Launchpad program, which announced a strategic expansion in Asia this week. The program, which was originally launched in 2021, is designed to source and pilot emerging technologies that impact the sport. 

Since the program launched, the NBA has championed everything from a sleep tech start-up to a data analytics company that places a sensor in a basketball’s valve to track speed and acceleration.

Launchpad, said Rasu, “is our way to be involved in shaping the game, and how to improve the fan experience. We identify like-minded young companies that can actually help us improve the game.”

Former NBA champion Jeremy Lin, the first Asian American to win basketball’s top prize, was also watching the action in Singapore. Lin, who played nine seasons for the league, propelled viewership of the sport across Asia as what was dubbed “Linsanity” exploded in 2012. 

Lin, who was part of the 2019 NBA championship-winning Toronto Raptors, told CNBC’s Emily Tan he was enthused by the opportunities for the game in Asia.

“The NBA is an amazing brand, it is very value-aligned. I want to continue to give back to the game, give back to the NBA and build basketball, especially in Asia, where I have roots,” he said.

Asia is hardly a new territory for the NBA. The league’s ties to China, for example, date back to the 1970s, but that relationship was tested in 2019 after then-Houston Rockets general manager Daryl Morey voiced support for pro-democracy protesters in Hong Kong.

The comments triggered a backlash on the mainland, with state broadcasters suspending NBA coverage and many Chinese sponsors severing ties with the league. 

The NBA began rebuilding its presence in Greater China last year, returning to the region for the first time in six years. With support from Alibaba co-founder and Brooklyn Nets owner Joe Tsai, the Nets and Phoenix Suns played a pair of preseason games at The Venetian Arena in Macao in 2025, marking a significant step in the league’s efforts to re-engage with Chinese fans. The NBA will return to Macao this October for preseason games between the Dallas Mavericks and the Rockets.

Airwallex has raised $320 million in a Series H funding round, valuing the global payments company at $11 billion, a 38% leap from just six months ago, as the fintech firm doubles down on artificial intelligence-powered financial software.

The latest funding round was led by New York venture capital firm Addition, with investment from funds including Baillie Gifford, Hummingbird, QED Investors, T. Rowe Price, Washington University in St. Louis and Amex Ventures.

Airwallex also reported its annualized revenue surged 74% from a year ago to $1.3 billion in March, while annualized transaction volume more than doubled from a year earlier. More than 90% of its revenue came from customers using more than one Airwallex product, the company said.

The company plans to use the funds to accelerate product development in autonomous finance and agentic commerce, expand its regulatory footprint into new markets, and grow the teams building its next-generation AI-native financial software.

Airwallex provides multi-currency payment services to global businesses, including McLaren, Qantas, Canva and Shein. The company was last valued at $8 billion after raising $330 million in a December funding round also led by Addition.

Alongside the raise, the company also announced two new AI-focused products.

One, called T:0, is an AI-native platform designed to automate corporate finance functions, including bookkeeping, tax, compliance and reporting. The product is currently in private beta and could be made more widely available in the coming weeks.

The second product, Airi, is an agentic consumer wallet that Airwallex said will eventually support delegated agent payments, spending limits, permission controls and multi-currency balances.

Airwallex has obtained more than 85 licenses across North America, Europe, the Middle East, and Asia-Pacific, which it said positions it to support the emerging agentic economy.

“The licenses, local network integrations, and settlement rails we spent ten years constructing are precisely the kind of infrastructure it needs,” co-founder and CEO Jack Zhang said in a statement. “This new capital lets us move faster into Airwallex’s next chapter.”

Zhang told the Australian Financial Review in a recent interview that the new financing could allow the company to delay a public listing, as investment in AI development has made its margins “too volatile to go public.”

Founded in Australia in 2015, Airwallex has faced growing scrutiny over its ties to China. The company, headquartered in San Francisco and Singapore, has 27 offices globally, including in Shanghai, Beijing and Shenzhen, and is backed by Australian venture capital firms and Chinese investors, including Tencent and HongShan Capital, formerly known as Sequoia China.

In December, prominent Silicon Valley investor Keith Rabois, who is also a board member of rival U.S. fintech Ramp, accused Airwallex of being a “Chinese backdoor into sensitive American data.”

The company has rejected those allegations. Zhang, in a recent statement, described them as “wild and totally unfounded conspiracy theories,” saying American customers’ data is stored in the U.S. and inaccessible to staff based in China or Hong Kong.

Amazon plans to invest an additional $13 billion to expand artificial intelligence and cloud infrastructure in India, taking its total investment in the country to $48 billion between 2026 and 2030.

These funds will be used to expand AWS data center capacity in Mumbai and Hyderabad, the company said in a statement on Thursday. In December last year, Amazon had pledged to invest $35 billion, as hyperscalers raced to get a foothold in the Indian market.

Amazon CEO Andy Jassy said the company is committed to being “a long-term partner in India’s growth story” and wants to align with the country’s “priorities of democratizing access to AI, digitizing small businesses, creating jobs, and enabling exports.”

Jassy met Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Thursday and highlighted the importance to Amazon of India, where the company operates several businesses spanning e-commerce, AI, cloud, and entertainment.

The company said its total investment in India between 2010 and 2030 stands at $88 billion.

Through its data centers, Amazon hopes to provide Indian startups, enterprises, and government organizations with access to custom AI chips, managed AI services, and secure and reliable cloud technologies.

Last December, India secured investment to the tune of $50 billion within 24 hours from U.S. big tech companies such as Amazon and Microsoft. Google, another major hyperscaler, is also investing $15 billion to build data center capacity for a new artificial intelligence hub in southern India.

India does not yet produce cutting-edge chips domestically, nor does it have a frontier-scale foundation model on a par with leading U.S. or Chinese models. However, the data center space in the country is growing rapidly.

To encourage the development of data centers in India, the Indian government has offered long‑term tax breaks to major global hyperscalers.

“India’s DC industry is emerging as one of the fastest growing globally,” global brokerage Nomura said in a report earlier this month. India’s data center capacity has risen to around 1.6GW in 2025 from 350MW in 2019, implying a 29% compounded annual growth versus 20% globally.

A second worker has died at the construction site of BYD’s electric vehicle factory in Szeged, Hungary, CNBC has learned.

The fatality — which follows a death at the site in February — comes after BYD executive vice president Stella Li earlier this month denied allegations of labor abuse at the site, and told CNBC the automaker welcomed labor inspectors. Shenzhen-based BYD did not immediately respond to requests for comment on the latest fatality.

This worker died on June 18 after resuscitation attempts by paramedics failed, Hungary’s National Ambulance Service told CNBC on Monday, adding that several emergency units, including a rescue helicopter, had been dispatched to the scene of the incident.

Local media reported that the worker had been struck by a lorry at the construction site of the factory. Authorities are investigating the circumstances of the incident, according to a statement from the Csongrád-Csanád County Government Office on Wednesday.

AIM Construction Hungary Ltd. — a subsidiary of the construction company linked to a 2024 labor scandal at BYD’s EV factory in Brazil — was fined 34,500,000 forints ($110,350) over occupational security issues, the Csongrád-Csanád County Government Office said in response to CNBC’s request for comment on the second worker death.

AIM Construction was also warned over a suite of other violations, including late employee registration, violations of working time framework regulations, and “formal defects” in employment contracts, the county government office added.

Two other firms were also found to be non-compliant. LÉVAI-SECURITY Ltd. was fined for employing workers without proper registration, while Plusz Kéz Ltd. received warnings over labor supervision issues.

Earlier this year, New York-based watchdog China Labor Watch published a report alleging forced labor at BYD’s Szeged factory construction site, including reports of employees who had seven-day work weeks and had wages withheld.

BYD began moving production machinery into the site in January, according to earlier remarks to CNBC by BYD’s Li, with full production expected in the third quarter of 2026.

President Donald Trump said Wednesday that Iran had informed him there would be no tolls, insurance costs, or charges of any kind for ships looking to pass through the strategically vital Strait of Hormuz.

“Additionally, no money has been given to Iran, or released from their money to them, by the U.S. We will be releasing some of their money, that is totally controlled by us, to our Farmers and Ranchers, for the purchase of Corn, Wheat, Soybeans, and more,” Trump said in a post on Truth Social.

“Food is desperately needed in Iran, and we will be purchasing it for them exclusively from the United States,” he added.

Iran has not yet commented on Trump’s post.

The president’s remarks come shortly after the U.S. and Iran signed an interim peace deal to bring an end to the conflict, although Washington and Tehran have continued to clash over some of the details of the 14-point memorandum of understanding.

Under the memorandum, both sides agreed to reopen the Strait of Hormuz toll-free for at least 60 days and to end all hostilities, including in Lebanon, where fighting has persisted between Israel and Iran-backed Hezbollah.

The Trump administration has faced criticism from Republican lawmakers for certain aspects of the deal, some of whom have raised concerns that the memorandum of understanding represents a step in the wrong direction.

Shipping traffic through the Strait of Hormuz, a narrow waterway that typically handles around 20% of the world’s oil traffic, was found to have stalled over the weekend.

Iran and Oman on Tuesday said in a joint statement that they would start working on an agreement over the services relating to navigating the Strait of Hormuz, including “costs associated with them in accordance with international standards.”

Located in the gulf between Oman and Iran, the Strait of Hormuz is recognized as one of the world’s most important oil choke points.

Oil prices traded lower on Wednesday. International benchmark Brent crude futures for August fell 3% to $74.75 per barrel, notching its lowest since the day before the U.S. and Israel launched airstrikes against Iran on Feb. 28.

U.S. West Texas Intermediate futures for August were last seen nearly 3% lower at $71.03 per barrel.

Three progressive candidates endorsed by New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani won Democratic primaries for House seats on Tuesday night, ousting two incumbents in the process.

Brad Lander, who previously was the city’s comptroller, defeated incumbent Rep. Dan Goldman in the 10th congressional district, which includes parts of lower Manhattan and Brooklyn.

Rep. Adriano Espaillat conceded to Mamdani-endorsed Darializa Avila Chevalier in the primary for the 13th District, which covers upper Manhattan and parts of the Bronx.

And the third Mamdani-endorsed candidate, Claire Valdez, won the primary for an open House seat representing the 7th District, which includes neighborhoods in Brooklyn and Queens. Incumbent Rep. Nydia Velázquez, who currently represents the district, is not seeking reelection.

The Democratic Socialists of America organization backed Chevalier and Valdez.

A year ago, the DSA’s efforts helped Mamdani stun the local and national political world by soundly defeating former New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo in the Democratic mayoral primary, and months later in the general election.

“It’s not just a question of electing more Democrats. It’s a question of electing better Democrats,” Mamdani said Tuesday, according to The Associated Press.

“When I look at these candidacies, I see in them a willingness to also put working people back at the heart of our politics,” Mamdani said.

In another closely watched race, to succeed Rep. Jerry Nadler in the 12th District in Manhattan, Micah Lasher defeated his fellow state assemblyman Alex Bores, and a field of other candidates, including Jake Schlossberg, the grandson of late President John F. Kennedy.

Two political action committees affiliated with major artificial intelligence companies had pumped a stunning combined $20 million into the race to back or oppose Bores’ candidacy.

The winners of the four primaries are seen as all but locks to win the general election in November, given their heavily Democratic voter populations.

Several countries in Europe have issued red weather alerts as a fresh bout of extreme heat pushes temperatures beyond 40 degrees Celsius (104 degrees Fahrenheit), bringing dangerous conditions across large swaths of the world’s fastest warming continent.

The U.K.’s Met Office on Monday put a rare red extreme heat warning in place for Wednesday and Thursday, warning that the country’s highest temperature on record for June is “very likely” to be broken over the coming days.

The red warning caters for an exceptional spell of hot and humid weather, which carries the potential for adverse health effects population wide and means substantial changes in daily routines will be required.

The U.K.’s weather forecaster said the mercury could reach at least 39 degrees Celsius this week, while evening temperatures were unlikely to drop below 20 degrees Celsius through consecutive nights.

“Red warnings are reserved for the most severe events and we’re expecting severe and significant impacts from this heatwave, with health impacts likely for many, even beyond those who are normally more vulnerable to the heat,” said Mark Sidaway, deputy chief forecaster of the Met Office.

Red heat alerts were also issued in France, Spain and Italy, alongside similar warnings by authorities in Germany, Italy and Switzerland.

At least 18 people died in France, Reuters reported on Monday, and hundreds of schools were ordered to close as the country’s weather agency Meteo France warned a “prolonged and intense” heat wave episode was now underway.

Temperatures in Bordeaux in southwestern France hit 42 degrees Celsius on Monday.

In a social media post, Meteo France said 54 regional administrative areas would be under a red heat wave warning on Tuesday, describing this as an “unprecedented number.”

Europe’s heat wave is its second so-called heat dome in just two months and comes as scientists warn climate change is exacerbating the frequency and intensity of extreme weather events. The burning of fossil fuels such as coal, oil and gas is the chief driver of the climate crisis.

Europe is known to be warming faster than any other continent, at twice the speed of the global average since the 1980s, according to the European Union’s Copernicus Climate Change Service.

Richard Allan, professor of climate science at the U.K.’s University of Reading, said that while a heat wave in June is perhaps to be expected, temperatures nudging toward 40 degrees Celsius were unprecedented for the U.K. up until 2022.

“Whilst May brought record dry heat, this week will see a more muggy heatwave that makes it difficult to stay cool and critical for those with underlying health conditions,” Allan said.

“It is blindingly obvious that heatwaves will increase in severity as rising greenhouse gases stifle the planet’s ability to lose heat to space,” he continued.

“A warmer atmosphere’s greater thirst for water also means more rapidly onsetting drought, but also the intensification of extreme rainfall and associated flooding as excess water drained from the soil and oceans is channelled into storms that can often be sparked off by summer heat.”