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Leaked footage of missile damage in Israeli cities has undermined an early government information blackout and highlighted limits in the country’s layered air-defence systems under saturation attack. The strikes inflicted both physical harm and broader civil disruption, forcing Israel to confront fiscal, operational and political trade-offs in defending its population centres.

As spring slowly returns to China’s high frontiers, PLA border units are planting greenhouses, hanging wooden star plaques on an honour tree and cultivating family and civic ties to sustain morale. These initiatives improve living conditions, reinforce unit identity and serve a broader domestic messaging effort about the normality and dedication of frontier service.

China’s stock market finished slightly lower as narrower liquidity and risk aversion weighed on broad indices. Renewables and chemicals led gains in a concentrated rotation, while coal rallied and military and gas-turbine names retreated. The session underscores a market driven by sector-specific narratives rather than broad-based confidence, leaving future direction dependent on liquidity and policy signals.

After a Supreme Court ruling curbed the president’s emergency tariff powers, the U.S. launched new investigations under Section 301 targeting China and a dozen other economies. The probes, focused on subsidies, excess capacity and labour practices, aim to restore a credible tariff threat but risk reigniting trade tensions and disrupting global supply chains.

A US internal probe has preliminarily determined that a Tomahawk missile mistakenly struck an elementary school in Minab, Iran, on February 28 after relying on outdated DIA target data. The school had once been part of an IRGC naval facility but was converted years earlier, complicating targeting assessments and raising legal and political concerns.

At Davos 2026 President Trump and his cabinet staged a high‑profile offensive, pressing claims on Greenland, launching a paid "Board of Peace" and openly chastising European policy choices. The spectacle crystallised widening disagreements within the Western camp and highlighted both opportunities and limits for China and other middle powers amid an evolving global order.

A retinal implant developed by Max Hodak’s company Science has reportedly restored coherent visual percepts in more than 40 blind patients and published results in the New England Journal of Medicine. Hodak frames this clinical success as the start of a BCI "takeoff era," outlining ambitious plans for biohybrid implants, deep AI–neuroscience convergence, and even radical longevity claims that the first 1,000‑year humans may already be alive.

Anker launched the eufyMake E1, a consumer-focused textured UV printer, at AWE 2026 and began pre-sales in China via JD.com at RMB 13,999. Backed by a roughly $46.8m Kickstarter campaign, the device aims to democratise industrial surface-texturing for creators and small businesses but faces adoption, safety, and competitive hurdles.

GE Aerospace will invest $1 billion in 2026 to expand engine production and overhaul capacity in the U.S. and continue funding its Suzhou, China facility. The package includes $200 million for LEAP durability kits and over $100 million to equip suppliers, a response to deep supply‑chain strain that has inflated airline costs and delayed fleet renewal.

A consumer craze around OpenClaw agents has galvanized Chinese companies to adopt desktop AI agents quickly, forcing vendors to deliver demonstrable results within weeks. Fabarta — led by Gao Xuefeng — sells an "out‑of‑the‑box" personal agent that combines local multimodal memory, safety controls, token cost optimisation and cloud‑edge integration, and is co‑creating industry agents with large incumbents to validate and replicate solutions across industrial chains.

A social craze for DIY AI agents in China — nicknamed “raising shrimp” — is cooling as early users uninstall experimental tools, but major tech firms have mobilized in a compressed timeline to deploy cloud‑hosted agent products. Companies are not competing over individual apps but over the long‑term platform advantages: cloud compute and token monetization, first‑touch user entry points, and ecosystem distribution rules. The outcome will determine who captures the economics and control of everyday AI tasking.

Jieyue Xingchen launched StepClaw, a cloud AI assistant platform built on OpenClaw that offers 50,000 one‑click deployment slots with a one‑month free trial including 50 million tokens, compute and storage. The move lowers technical barriers to running assistants, accelerates experimentation, and signals intensified competition over hosted model services in China amid regulatory and moderation challenges.

Honda has cancelled development and planned North American launches of three battery-electric models following a strategic reassessment, and expects a consolidated loss in fiscal 2026. The decision reflects mounting industry pressure over EV profitability, competitive disruption and shifting market conditions, with immediate consequences for suppliers and regional production plans.

The 14th National People’s Congress closed after voting on major economic plans and laws, even as a Middle East‑driven oil shock and an unprecedented 400 million‑barrel IEA release roiled global markets. China signalled continued industrial prioritisation and regulatory attention to AI agents while capital rotated into Hong Kong ETFs and select technology names.

Google has acquired wind and solar developer Intersect from TPG Rise Climate for $4.75 billion, taking on the company’s debt. The deal signals a shift by big tech from relying mainly on power purchase agreements to owning generation assets, aiming to secure long‑term, controllable clean power for energy‑intensive operations such as data centres and AI.

Tencent has launched SkillHub, a China‑focused distribution and community platform for Skills compatible with the OpenClaw AI‑agent framework. The service provides domestic mirrors, curated skill listings, Chinese search and a safety stack, while converting Tencent products into callable Skills to capture the emerging agent application layer.

Yangdian Technology said on March 12 it has no plans to integrate its HanTang Cloud or HanYang Intelligent products with OpenClaw, the viral framework behind China’s recent AI‑agent craze known as “养龙虾.” The response underscores a cautious stance by mid‑tier vendors amid rapid consumer uptake, regulatory scrutiny and unresolved technical and security questions.

Apple is preparing a foldable iPhone whose interior behaves like an iPad, with a wide, tablet‑sized screen and iOS updates enabling side‑by‑side app layouts. The design prioritizes multitasking and could shift expectations for premium foldables, but success hinges on durability, developer adoption and price.

Wayve, Uber and Nissan have signed a memorandum to pilot autonomous taxis in Tokyo by the end of 2026, using Wayve’s AI driving system in Nissan Leaf EVs and rides booked through Uber. The collaboration unites machine-learning autonomy, ride-hailing distribution and OEM manufacturing but faces technical, regulatory and public-acceptance hurdles before it can scale.

Iran’s Revolutionary Guard said it and Hezbollah conducted a five-hour coordinated missile-and-drone campaign striking more than 50 targets across Israel and claiming hits on US bases in Jordan and Saudi Arabia. Tehran framed the action as part of an ongoing campaign to alter battlefield realities, a development that raises the risk of broader regional escalation and complicates US and allied responses.