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Good morning from the Financial Times. Today is Friday, August 18th,

and this is your FT News Briefing. US mortgages have become even more expensive

and earnings reports from US retailers are sending mixed messages.

Plus, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates are buying

powerful microchips to develop artificial intelligence.

I'm Sonya Hudson in for Mark Filipino, and here's the news you need to start your day.

US mortgage rates are now at a 21-year high. The average 30-year fixed rate mortgage

hits 7.09 percent yesterday. It's being driven up by the Federal Reserve's aggressive

interest rate rises. Plus, the yield on 10-year treasuries continued to rise yesterday.

It's now at its highest level in 16 years.

A bunch of big US retailers reported earnings this week. Walmart said yesterday it beat

forecasts and raised its profit guidance for the second time this year. Target did not have

such a great quarter. It lowered its earnings outlook. Here to talk about the mixed signals is

the FT's Steph Chavez. Hi, Steph. Hi, Sonya. How are you? I'm doing well. Thanks. These are

super different outlooks from Target and Walmart. What's going on?

I think that the differences in their earnings can come down to some differences between the companies

themselves. Target, for example, had a unique issue in that it received a lot of backlash from

customers for its pride merchandise. Customers harassed employees about the pride merchandise.

So much so that Target had to take some of that merchandise off the shelves and that bit into

their sales. Then you can think also about how they have different product mixes, if you will.

...