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As expected, President Trump took the opportunity to chastise NATO for its lack of participation in the Iran war while hosting the alliance's Secretary General Mark Rutte at the White House.

"We didn’t need help on this at all. We demolished them in literally the first week," Trump said of Iran before reporters, while seated across from Rutte. That's when the president said, "But it would have been nice if they would have said, ‘We’d like to help.’ We didn’t even need it, but it would have been nice if they said that."

Throughout the conflict Trump has openly mused about pulling the United States out of the military alliance - or also at least withholding significant defense funding, and suggested in the Wednesday meeting that he'd be discussing the issue with Rutte behind closed doors.

"We’re going to be discussing what took place, and we’ll see what happens," he said.

Despite general negativity heaped on NATO's lax response to the Hormuz crisis and Iran campaign, Trump still offered a little praise of Rutte - who has long been generally supportive of the Trump White House.

Rutte in turn hailed Trump as "the leader of the free world" and stressed "I really want to make clear how important it is what you are doing on Iran."

"This is, first of all, about the nuclear capability Iran was basically getting its hands on - and it would have been a threat to the region. It would’ve been a threat to the whole world. This is a country that is exporting chaos, is exporting terrorism," Rutte described, without providing evidence of these series of claims.

Rutte tried a bit of flattery, which didn't exactly calm Trump's verbal attacks on NATO:

"I know there have been isolated cases about which you are really disappointed, but generally speaking your European allies have been there," Rutte said.

Trump appeared unconvinced, at times interrupting Rutte ?to disagree with him, though he praised his leadership.

"You really have done a good job, and I think if anybody else were in that position, we wouldn't even be meeting today, to be honest with you, because we were let down," Trump said.

Trump looks like he's barely able to stay awake while Rutte tries to butter him up pic.twitter.com/pjEOjBgvWr

— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) June 24, 2026

Trump wasn't willing to let Rutte dodge:

“I know there have been debates about whether your allies in Europe were with you enough. I just want to say one thing,” Rutte said.

“They weren’t,” Trump interjected with a two-word comeback.

“Let me say one thing,” Rutte pleaded. “I know you think that [and] your irritation about that, but when you look at the numbers, 4,000- 5,000 US planes [took] off from bases in Europe in the six weeks this war took place.”

With props in hand, Rutte unveiled what he's calling the "Trump trillion"...

WATCH: NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte unveils what he calls the "Trump trillion" as he credits President Trump with helping push European allies to boost defense spending.

Rutte said Europe and Canada have added roughly $1.2 trillion in defense spending since Trump first… pic.twitter.com/IpS5RhNgEs

— Fox News (@FoxNews) June 24, 2026

In a couple weeks, July 7, is when the big annual NATO summit is slated to begin in Ankara, Turkey. The timing of Turkey hosting the gathering is interesting, given the country has been opposed to the US attacks on Iran, and has become a top regional enemy of Israel, with the two sides having issued heated and threated rhetoric for months.

Turkey is another US ally which is not going to lift a finger to assist the US in the Gulf area, but in terms of the pending peace deal with Tehran, and the prior signing of the Memorandum of Understanding (MoU), there is broad support.

By Brian Martucci of UtilityDive

The United States added 3.3 GW/8.4 GWh of energy storage in the first quarter of 2026, according to the latest figures from Wood Mackenzie and the American Clean Power Association. All three segments — utility-scale, residential and commercial/community/industrial — notched records for the seasonally slow first quarter.

The London-based energy consultancy and U.S. clean energy trade association see cumulative installed U.S. energy storage capacity reaching 200 GW/655 GWh by 2031, a four-fold increase from today. The forecast is consistent with a separate outlook from the U.S. Energy Information Administration that sees U.S. energy storage capacity doubling by the end of 2027.

The quarterly update to Wood Mackenzie/ACP’s U.S. Energy Storage Monitor expects favorable tax policy and large-load demand for colocated and behind-the-meter storage to lift installation volumes over the next several years, as U.S. battery manufacturing capacity grows.

Both Wood Mackenzie/ACP’s Q1 2026 U.S. Energy Storage Monitor and the EIA’s June 2026 Short-Term Energy Outlook hint at strong near- and medium-term fundamentals for the U.S. battery energy storage industry.

The EIA expects U.S. electricity consumption to rise by 76 billion kWh in 2026 and 126 billion kWh in 2027, driven largely by increased sales to commercial, industrial and transportation users. 

In 2026, above-average summer temperatures across much of the U.S. will boost electricity demand to the benefit of renewables, which the EIA expects to “almost entirely” meet the increase in demand. Solar generation could rise 19% and wind generation 10% this year, the EIA said.

Solar and battery deployments, often paired at the same site, continue to dominate new generation deployments in the U.S. Solar and storage accounted for 91% of nameplate generating capacity added in the first quarter of 2026, and nearly 50% of new residential solar systems were paired with batteries during the same period, according to a June 10 report from the U.S. Solar Energy Industries Association.

One key factor behind the U.S. battery boom is the preservation of the federal investment tax credit for qualifying energy storage systems, Wood Mackenzie and ACP said. The Inflation Reduction Act first authorized those credits, which can offset 30% or more of deployment costs, in 2022. Last year, the One Big Beautiful Bill Act preserved the energy storage ITC even as it accelerated the expiration of corresponding investment and production tax credits for wind and solar systems.

WoodMac/ACP expect utility-scale storage to claim 85% of capacity additions through 2031 as large-load customers ink colocation and capacity contracts with energy storage providers. 

The commercial/community/industrial segment will grow 26% through 2031 amid strong behind-the-meter demand in California and at least 215 MW of community-scale storage projects in the works nationally, WoodMac and ACP said. And after a shallow contraction in 2026 following a rush of installations ahead of the expiration of the Section 25D tax credit at the end of last year, the residential storage segment will expand at a 12% average annual pace over the next four years, the organizations said.

Spurred by tax-code changes that benefit energy storage systems with more U.S.-sourced content, domestic battery manufacturing is ramping up to meet expected demand. 

The Energy Storage Coalition, an industry group, said in March that U.S. factories now have enough capacity to supply 100% of domestic demand. Some of that capacity is coming from manufacturers that previously planned to make electric vehicle batteries in the United States. Ford and General Motors, for example, both announced significant energy storage investments this year.

Two reports hit on Thursday that could upset gamers ahead of the release of Grand Theft Auto VI. 

First, a major retailer warned that console shortages could emerge as demand for PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X/S hardware collides with a memory chip shortage. Then The Verge reported that Xbox consoles are set for another price hike, adding another pain point for gamers months before one of the most anticipated video game releases in over a decade. 

Video game industry publication The Game Business reported Thursday that the ongoing hardware component shortage, better known as the chip shortage, could spark a supply crunch for popular gaming consoles at major retailers in the coming months.

Here's what the outlet reported:

But a senior games buyer, speaking without the permission of his employer, told us: "We've been informed that because of the on-going issues around hardware component availability, we won't be getting the units we want ahead of GTA."

He added: "Demand will likely outstrip supply during the year end period."

The outlet continued:

We've contacted PlayStation and Xbox about the claim. Sony CEO Hiroki Totoki told investors in May that "for calendar year 2026, the necessary volume has been secured"

However, Xbox Chief Strategy Officer Matthew Ball told The Game Business earlier in the month that there are already supply issues.

"I can tell you definitively demand for our console exceeds the supply," he told us. "We are putting them in as many stores as possible. We are producing them as quickly as possible. There is a severe limitation to how quickly we can do that, but it's not a question of appetite. We need to do more, but there are constraints here. And so there are, unfortunately, a number of different markets in which we do not have supply. There are other markets in which we have inadequate supply. That is a privilege as a company it is a challenge for us to figure out."

When we asked about the potential impact of Grand Theft Auto 6, he said: "It's going to invigorate a lot of players. It's going to move some additional devices."

Separately, The Verge reports that Microsoft is hiking Xbox console prices again, startingAugust 11, with 512GB models increasing by $100 and 1TB models rising by $150. The price hike now means the Xbox Series S starts at around $499.99, while the disc-less Xbox Series X starts at $749.99 and the disc-drive version at $799.99. 

"Last October, we increased XBOX console price by $20-$70 in the U.S.," Microsoft wrote in a blog post.

The post continued, “We hoped another price increase would not be necessary, and we have spent the last several months working with suppliers on options. Unfortunately, console storage and memory prices have increased by more than 2.5x and we expect another doubling by the fall of 2027. The entire consumer electronics industry is struggling with the current components crisis, but the effects are particularly hard on consoles. Unlike phones, computers, speakers, and other consumer devices, consoles are typically not sold at a profit, but instead for less than they cost to make."

Earlier today, Take-Two Interactive's Rockstar Games studio officially launched the long-awaited pre-orders for Grand Theft Auto VI. The action-packed game is priced at $79.99 and is scheNovember 19unch on November 19 for PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X|S.

The last major GTA release was GTA V,September 17hed on September 17, 2013. Gamers have been waiting 13 years for a major GTA installment, which only suggests massive demand for the game, and will likely coincide with demand for gaming consoles at the worst possible time - a memory chip shortage.

Google search trends for "pre-order Grand Theft Auto" are at their highest level since the GTA V release in 2013.

We provided readers with Wall Street commentary - from Raymond James to BTIG to Goldman analysts - discussing what their desks think of TTWO ahead of the fall release. Read the note here.

New development:

• Apple Price Shock: Macs And iPads Jump $200 Or More As Memory Crisis Worsens

It probably makes sense for gamers to front-run potential supply issues that could materialize later this year, especially given that the memory-chip shortage is not expected to ease anytime soon.

After a solid 2Y auction and a subpar 5Y auction earlier this week, moments ago we got the week's final Treasury issuance when the US auctioned off $44BN in 7Y paper in a perfectly average sale.

Starting at the top, the bond priced at a high yield  of 4.260%, down modestly from 4.290% last month and in the middle of a range established in late-2023 after which the 7Y has traded between 3.50% and 5%. The auction also priced on the screws with the When Issued which was also at 4.260. 

The bid to cover was 2.498, just under last month's 2.516 and on top of the 6-auction average of 2.488%.

The internals were a bit weaker: after Indirect bidders took down a record 78.4% in May, today their demand crashed to earth and foreign buyers ended up taking down just 57.55%, the lowest since Sept 26. And with Directs taking down 29.7%, a big jump from 11.2% in May but in line with the recent average, Dealers were left holding 12.75%, up from 10.42% a month ago and the highest since November.

Overall, this was a average-to-weak auction, with sufficiently good metrics even if the internals were a bit on the weak side. Not that the market cared (about this, or anything else); with 10Y yields extending their drop all day today, the meh auction barely registered. 

French President Emmanuel Macron has announced yet another highly provocative naval seizure of a Russian so-called shadow fleet vessel. 

"On Tuesday, the French navy boarded the oil tanker Deliver as it was passing off the coast of Sicily in breach of maritime law," Macron wrote in a post on X, revealing the prior interdiction that took place earlier in the week.

Reports say it flew a Cameroonian flag and was sailing from Russia's Baltic port of Primorsk, whereupon it was boarded by French forces over a falsified registration, according to the French maritime prefecture.

France's navy escorted then the tanker to an anchorage location, where it was subject to deeper inspections my maritime authorities.

It marks no less than the fifth such boarding of a 'shadow fleet' vessel suspected of transiting sanctioned Russian goods or energy off a European coastline since September.

"We will not allow the 'shadow fleet' to circumvent sanctions and finance Russia's war effort," Macron said.

The apparent legal justification France's navy has relied on for such actions is the practice of "flag-hopping" - which involves a crew repeatedly changing displayed flags, along with often invalid registrations to thwart international tracking monitors.

The last several seized tankers were also flying flags of African nations, and these interdictions have stretched back through last year. 

France's military released footage of the boarding of the 'Delivery'...

French President Emmanuel Macron has announced that the French military intercepted the Russian "shadow fleet" tanker 'Deliver' on Tuesday as it transited off the coast of Sicily in violation of maritime law. pic.twitter.com/T3sE95BrT1

— OSINTdefender (@sentdefender) June 25, 2026

In some instances, Russia has been sending military escorts - which of course has seen French and European militaries hold off executing any action.

As a result of this latest intercept, it's likely Russia's navy will increase its military escorts, which has been more common in northern European waters, given the proximity to Russia.