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Putin orders army expansion as Zelenskyy warns Russia preparing to deploy 10,000 North Korean troops
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Warning more homes will be uninsurable due to flood risk
Aviva boss Amanda Blanc said England was "for sure" building homes that might be uninsurable at some point in the future.
Oil prices flat as Middle East supply concerns persist
The U.S. and Iran are reportedly talking separately to mediators as part of renewed efforts to end the conflict, with regional mediators seeking negotiations.

New UK homes in flood-risk areas could become uninsurable, says Aviva boss
Amanda Blanc says flooding threat is ‘absolutely increasing’, as she also warns ministers over ‘kite flying’ before budget Business live – latest updates The boss of Britain’s biggest insurer has warned that homes being built now could become uninsurable in the future because they are sited in flood-risk areas. Amanda Blanc, the chief executive of Aviva, said the flooding threat was “absolutely increasing”. Assuming current construction patterns continue, 115,000 homes will be built in flood zones in the next decade. Continue reading...

UK mortgage approvals lowest since December 2023 as borrowing costs rise – business live
Rolling coverage of the latest economic and financial news Newsflash: the number of mortgages approved by UK lenders has fallen to its lowest level since the end of 2023. Just 54,918 new home loans were approved in August on a seasonally-adjusted basis, new Bank of England data shows, as rising borrowing costs deterred potential home buyers. The average 2-year fixed residential mortgage rate today is 5.93%. This is up from 5.91% the previous working day. The average 5-year fixed residential mortgage rate today is 5.94%. This is up from 5.93% the previous working day. Continue reading...

On the rocks? Scotch distilleries pause production as unsold ‘whisky loch’ grows
Demand for Scotland’s most famous export has slumped, with industry facing job cuts and closures Obscured by the Scottish countryside on the outskirts of Kirkcaldy, Cluny bond is, in effect, a small town built to store whisky. By the time the latest set of warehouses are finished on the former opencast coal mine, Diageo’s 220-hectare (544-acre) maturation campus will be able to store almost 3m casks of Scotch. The drinks multinational needs the space. After a 15-year boom turbocharged by the Covid-19 pandemic, demand for Scotch whisky has slumped around the world. Distilleries have paused production across Scotland to avoid adding to the glut of supply, known as a “whisky loch” – the equivalent of a “wine lake”. Continue reading...
Anthropic warns investors of AI’s 'existential risk to humanity' in IPO prospectus, reports say
Anthropic's IPO filing dedicates 80 pages to the risks of AI, nearly double the 48 pages it spends discussing its business plans, according to Reuters.