Highlights for this morning: Trump's duties, OpenAI growth, Wealthfront going public

Donald Trump announced new duties on wood, furniture, pharmaceuticals and movies. OpenAI is booming revenue growth - $4.3 billion for the first half of 2025 - but is spending billions on AI development. In the U.S., Wealthfront, one of the pioneers of the robo-advisory market, is preparing for an IPO, and was never sold to UBS in 2022. These and other topics - in our review of key events for the morning of September 30.

US President Donald Trump has announced new duties - 10% on lumber and 25% on certain wood furniture products - that will take effect on October 14, Yahoo Finance writes. This is in addition to the already announced tariffs on kitchen cabinets and upholstered furniture, effective Oct. 1. In total, the duties will cover a wide range of goods - from furniture to pharmaceuticals and movie products with a range of rates from 30% to 100%.

Trump said the purpose of these measures is to bring furniture production back to North Carolina and to protect the U.S. movie industry. There are exceptions for pharmaceutical companies: the duties will not affect those manufacturers that build plants in the United States or work within the framework of trade agreements.

At the same time, the White House is considering using revenue from the fees to support farmers affected by the new measures, although the mechanism for such assistance remains uncertain, the agency noted.

Wealthfront, one of the pioneers of the robo-advisory market, has filed for an IPO in the U.S. and plans to list on the Nasdaq exchange under the ticker WLTH, CNBC reports. The company manages $88.2 billion in assets and serves 1.3 million customers. In fiscal 2025, it earned $194.4 million in net income on revenue of $308.9 million.

Founded in 2007 in Palo Alto, Wealthfront calls its main clients "digital natives" - young affluent investors focused on long-term capital accumulation. Together with Betterment, the company set the trend of algorithmic investments, which was later joined by major banks, the channel notes.

UBS tried to buy Wealthfront for $1.4 billion in 2022, but the deal fell through due to cooling interest in fintech.

Australia's central bank on Tuesday left its key rate unchanged at 3.6%, which matched analysts' forecasts, CNBC reported. The decision came after inflation reached 3% in August - the maximum since July 2024, with housing, food and alcohol being the main drivers of price growth. The rate has been cut by 75 bps since the beginning of the year, after a period of tight policy, when it remained at 4.35%.

The head of the Central Bank of Australia Michelle Bullock earlier warned the Parliament that the economic outlook remains "clouded by uncertainty". She noted that the global backdrop is unstable, but the regulator is ready to react promptly if external events have a significant impact on the country's economy.

For all the risks, Australia's GDP grew at an annualized rate of 1.8% in the second quarter, beating forecasts (1.6%) and the previous quarter's results (1.3%).

OpenAI generated about $4.3 billion in revenue in the first half of 2025 - up 16% from the full year last year, The Information writes, citing a report to shareholders.

That said, the AI company's spending remains colossal: it has spent $2.5 billion, mostly on developing new artificial intelligence models and keeping ChatGPT running.

Reuters notes that it has not yet been able to independently confirm this data.

Video game developer Electronic Arts will go private: its shares will be bought by a consortium of investors with a valuation of the entire business at $55 billion. The consortium includes Silver Lake Fund, the investment company of former Donald Trump adviser Jared Kushner Affinity Partners and the Saudi Arabian sovereign fund (PIF). This is the largest leveraged buyout of a company in history, the Financial Times notes.

The deal represents a major bet that artificial intelligence technology could significantly reduce EA's operating costs, allowing the consortium to deal with the company's heavy debt load, the FT wrote.

At the same time, S&P Global Ratings said it is considering downgrading Electronic Arts' credit rating to junk after the buyout deal is finalized, Bloomberg reports . The agency attributed this to the expected increase in debt by about $20 billion as a result of the deal. This financing will be provided by JPMorgan.

Shares of online broker Robinhood Markets jumped more than 12% after CEO Vladimir Tenev said the company has made significant gains in the market for betting on the outcome of elections, sports matches and other widely discussed events.

Tenev said Robinhood customers have already transacted more than 4 billion such contracts. The company sees this area as a source of growth, but its proliferation is blurring the lines between financial markets and gambling, Bloomberg notes . The broker offers the ability to trade contracts in the prediction market through a partnership with Kalshi, regulated by the U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission. In August, Robinhood expanded its lineup by adding contracts on professional and college soccer.

A rise in stock prices on Monday lifted Robinhood shares to a record high. The company's value has increased nearly 270% since the beginning of the year. Earlier in September, it entered the S&P 500 index.

- Japan's broad Topix index rose 0.3 percent, while the Nikkei 225 was little changed.

- In South Korea, the Kospi index also barely moved from its previous close, with the Kosdaq small-company index down 0.4%.

- Australia's S&P/ASX 200 was little changed.

- Futures on the Nasdaq 100, S&P 500 and Dow Jones Industrial Average were little changed.

This article was AI-translated and verified by a human editor