US President Donald Trump speaks during a dinner for Republican senators in the State Dining Room of the White House on July 18 in Washington. (AP)

WASHINGTON, July 23, (AP): US President Donald Trump announced a trade framework with Japan on Tuesday, placing a 15% tax on goods imported from that nation.

“This Deal will create Hundreds of Thousands of Jobs — There has never been anything like it,” Trump posted on Truth Social, adding that the United States “will continue to always have a great relationship with the Country of Japan.”

The president said Japan would invest “at my direction” $550 billion into the U.S. and would “open” its economy to American autos and rice. The 15% tax on imported Japanese goods is a meaningful drop from the 25% rate that Trump, in a recent letter to Japanese Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba, said would be levied starting Aug. 1.

Early Wednesday, Ishiba acknowledged the new trade agreement, saying it would benefit both sides and help them work together.

With the announcement, Trump is seeking to tout his ability as a dealmaker — even as his tariffs, when initially announced in early April led to a market panic and fears of slower growth that for the moment appear to have subsided. Key details remained unclear from his post, such as whether Japanese-built autos would face a higher 25% tariff that Trump imposed on the sector.

The wave of tariffs continues to be a source of uncertainty about whether it could lead to higher prices for consumers and businesses if companies simply pass along the costs. The problem was seen sharply Tuesday after General Motors reported a 35% drop in its net income during the second quarter as it warned that tariffs would hit its business in the months ahead, causing its stock to tumble.

OpenAI’s Sam Altman sounds alarm on AI voice fraud at Fed conference.

WASHINGTON, July 23, (AP): OpenAI CEO Sam Altman warned the financial industry of a “significant impending fraud crisis” because of the ability of artificial intelligence tools to impersonate a person’s voice to bypass security checks and move money.

Altman spoke at a Federal Reserve conference Tuesday in Washington.

“A thing that terrifies me is apparently there are still some financial institutions that will accept the voiceprint as authentication,” Altman said. “That is a crazy thing to still be doing. AI has fully defeated that.”

Voiceprinting as an identification for wealthy bank clients grew popular more than a decade ago, with customers typically asked to utter a challenge phrase into the phone to access their accounts.

But now AI voice clones, and eventually video clones, can impersonate people in a way that Altman said is increasingly “indistinguishable from reality” and will require new methods for verification.

“That might be something we can think about partnering on,” said Fed Vice Chair for Supervision Michelle Bowman, the central bank’s top financial regulator, who was hosting the discussion with Altman.

US President Donald Trump meets with Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos Jr, in the Oval Office of the White House, Tuesday on July 22 in Washington. (AP)

WASHINGTON, July 23, (AP): US President Donald Trump said he has reached a trade agreement with Philippine leader Ferdinand Marcos Jr, following a meeting Tuesday at the White House, that will see the US slightly drop its tariff rate for the Philippines without paying import taxes for what it sells there.

Trump revealed the broad terms of the agreement on his social media network and said the US and the Philippines would work together militarily. The announcement of a loose framework of a deal comes as the two countries are seeking closer security and economic ties in the face of shifting geopolitics in the Indo-Pacific region.

Marcos’ government indicated ahead of the meeting that he was prepared to offer zero tariffs on some US goods to strike a deal with Trump. The Philippine Embassy did not immediately respond to a message seeking comment. Marcos’ three-day visit to Washington shows the importance of the alliance between the treaty partners as China is increasingly assertive in the South China Sea, where Manila and Beijing have clashed over the hotly contested Scarborough Shoal.

Trump said on Truth Social that the US would impose a 19% tariff rate on the Philippines, down from a 20% tariff he threatened starting Aug. 1. In return, he said, the Philippines would have an open market and the US would not pay tariffs. Marcos described the lower 19% tariff rate to reporters in Washington as a “significant achievement” in real terms. He said his country was considering options such as having an open market without tariffs for US automobiles, but emphasized details were still left to be worked out. When asked whether the Philippines got the shorter end of the stick, Marcos said, “that’s how negotiations go.”

Without further details on the agreement, it’s unclear how it will impact their countries’ economies. Trump wrote that Marcos’ visit was “beautiful,” and it was a “Great Honor” to host such a “very good, and tough, negotiator.” Appearing before reporters in the Oval Office ahead of their private meeting, Marcos spoke warmly of the ties between the two nations.