Author: NCIJ NETWNCIJ NETWORK

Bitcoin (BTC) shook off volatility on Thursday as US stocks rebounded on the back of inflation-data relief.Key points:Bitcoin avoids a snap reaction to US personal consumption expenditures (PCE) inflation data, which reverses a local uptrend.Analysis remains wary of inflationary tendencies despite PCE conforming to expectations.Bitwise predicts that going forward, Bitcoin will become less sensitive to Fed interest-rate changes.PCE ends uptrend while staying above Fed inflation targetData from TradingView showed BTC price action focusing on $64,500, broadly unchanged from the day prior. BTC/USD one-hour chart. Source: Cointelegraph/TradingViewThe major risk-asset headwind from earlier in the week in the form of a mass sell-off…

NASA astronaut Deniz Burnham will embark on her first mission to the International Space Station, serving as an Expedition 76 flight engineer. Burnham will launch aboard the Roscosmos Soyuz MS-30 spacecraft with cosmonauts Dmitri Petelin and Konstantin Borisov. Launch is targeted for March 2027, from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan, and the trio will spend about seven months aboard the orbiting laboratory. During her expedition, Burnham will conduct scientific investigations and technology demonstrations to help prepare humans for future exploration missions to the Moon and Mars and to benefit people on Earth. Selected as a NASA astronaut in 2021, Burnham…

Golden lion tamarins, an endangered species of monkey endemic to Brazil’s Atlantic Forest, are susceptible to yellow fever: An outbreak in 2017-2019 wiped out roughly 30% of the population.A new study finds that certain environmental factors, including habitat connectivity and human population, were linked to higher numbers of deaths during the outbreak.Scientists have identified areas where tamarins could be at high risk for yellow fever transmission, which could help guide vaccination efforts and help protect the monkeys in the event of another deadly outbreak.See All Key Ideas After a two-hour drive from the airport in Rio de Janeiro,…

Construction has started in China on the floating production, storage and offloading (FPSO) topside destined for an ultra-deepwater development in Angola being developed by Azule Energy, a joint venture between Italy’s Eni and the UK’s BP.Source: Azule Energy via LinkedIn The Greater PAJ project is described as Angola’s first integrated cross-block development, with first oil expected in less than three years, in the first half of 2029. The development brings together five offshore fields across two blocks, Palas, Astraea and Juno in Block 31 and Urano and Dione in Block 31/21. The first steel cutting ceremony for the Greater PAJ…

Cristiano Ronaldo during Portugal’s losing game against Spain earlier this month. Source: Imagn Images via Reuters Connect Football fans wagered more than US $14 billion on the FIFA World Cup through prediction markets Polymarket and Kalshi, a Bellingcat analysis has found. On the crypto-based Polymarket, which provides more information about individual trading accounts than its rival American site Kalshi, we also found that just 1% of users collected the vast majority of winnings during the tournament. Users traded on almost 60,000 outcomes across both sites during the competition, betting on everything from the sponsor of the Golden Boot winner to…

I’m just back from my home country, the United States. I always enjoy visiting, but every time I go between the US and my adopted home of Europe, I’m keenly aware of disparity in health: Americans live much shorter lives and spend more of their lifetime in poor health. This is despite Americans earning some of the highest salaries per capita in the world and spending twice as much as comparable countries on healthcare.A recent study in the New England Journal of Medicine of 74,000 adults found that even the wealthiest Americans had higher mortality rates than the wealthiest Europeans…

Folk, Zachary. “Trump Indicates Morocco Is Naming A Highway After Him.” Forbes, Jul 26, 2026, https://www.forbes.com/sites/zacharyfolk/2026/07/26/trump-indicates-morocco-is-naming-a-highway-after-him/.Hespress EN. “Southern Morocco’s Major Highway Project Fully Opened.” Hespress English, 10 Jan. 2025, https://en.hespress.com/100553-southern-moroccos-major-highway-project-fully-opened.html.———. “Trump Announces Tiznit–Dakhla Highway Will Be Named in His Honor, Thanks King Mohammed VI.” Hespress English, 26 July 2026, https://en.hespress.com/142637-trump-announces-tiznit-dakhla-highway-will-be-named-in-his-honor-thanks-king-mohammed-vi.html.’Israeli Recognition of Moroccan Sovereignty in Western Sahara’. INSS, https://www.inss.org.il/publication/western-sahara/. Accessed 29 July 2026.Karam, Souhail. “Trump Says 660-Mile Highway in Disputed Sahara to Bear His Name.” Bloomberg, 27 July 2026, https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2026-07-27/trump-says-660-mile-highway-in-disputed-sahara-to-bear-his-name.Lewis, Nell. “‘We’Re Constructing an Ecosystem’: How a Small, Windy City Could Become a Gateway for Trade.” CNN, 28 May 2024,…

European football’s governing body UEFA said Thursday it would boycott the World Cup should FIFA press ahead with its private investor plan. “No UEFA national teams will participate in any FIFA competition for so long as these proposals remain alive, unless this proposal has been abandoned in its entirety and binding assurances have been given that FIFA will never again open its governance or competitions to private ownership,” UEFA said in a statement.   “The World Cup cannot be treated as an investment product … No part of it should ever be surrendered to private investors. The World Cup is…

The Trump administration’s plan to stop funding the Pan American Health Organization, which coordinates public health efforts across dozens of countries including the United States, will leave Americans more vulnerable to infectious disease threats, more than 100 U.S. leaders in health and national security warned in an open letter to be released on Thursday.They include former health secretaries, directors of health agencies, Pentagon and White House officials and surgeons general who have served in Democratic and Republican administrations.Founded in 1902, the organization is supported by contributions from its 35 member countries. The United States, a founding member, owes nearly $135…

After work one day last week, Kim Sajet sat down at her computer with a cup of coffee to watch a former Smithsonian colleague, Anthea M. Hartig, director of the National Museum of American History, testify before a congressional panel.The White House had just released a scathing report that accused Ms. Hartig and the museum she leads of downplaying the role of the nation’s founders while promoting “extreme political activism.”Now Ms. Hartig was under fire from Republican lawmakers who embraced the White House’s findings.“Who gave you the authority to turn the National Museum of American History into a vehicle for…