Russian President Vladimir Putin has conceded that the country is facing fuel shortages following a barrage of long-range Ukrainian drone strikes on key energy infrastructure, although he insisted the Kremlin was dealing with them.

The Russian president’s comments during an interview with a state TV reporter on Sunday mark the first time he has detailed the extent to which Ukraine’s deep-strike success has hampered Russia’s fuel production.

Putin said Russia would import more fuel and expedite repairs of oil facilities to end what he described as the “temporary deficit,” according to The Associated Press.

“All damaged facilities are being restored quite quickly, and the issues that arise are not critical,” Putin said. He also pledged to bolster Russia’s air defense capacity to tackle Ukraine’s mid- to long-range drone capabilities.

Ukraine has stepped up attacks on Russian oil facilities in recent weeks, seeking to cut off Moscow’s energy revenues and try to force Putin into bringing an end to the more than four-year war.

The attacks, including a huge explosion at Gazprom’s Moscow Refinery earlier in the month, have prompted analysts to suggest that the conflict could be shifting in Ukraine’s favor.

Ukraine has also intensified its strikes on Crimea, which Russia seized by force in 2014, as part of a strategy to isolate the peninsula, and has benefited from a series of political tail winds in recent weeks.

Speaking earlier on Sunday, Putin used a speech to the ruling United Russia party congress to reinforce his resolve to achieve the country’s military objectives and project Russia’s strength.

He vaguely referred to the impact of Ukraine’s attacks on Russian energy facilities, saying: “Yes, we see and realise our problems – we also respond to them.”

Putin added: “We will certainly handle all the challenges we are facing today, including terrorist attacks on our territory and our infrastructure.”

The Russian president also acknowledged the impact of Ukraine’s drone strikes during a meeting with government ministers and other officials, noting the queues at petrol stations and saying a full ban on diesel exports was under consideration.

Researchers at the Institute for the Study of War, a Washington-based think tank, said the Russian president’s latest comments acknowledged the effects of Ukraine’s long-range strike campaign but sought to dismiss concerns and “promote a facade of stability.”

“Putin did not explicitly discuss Ukraine’s strike campaign against Russia or the wide-scale gasoline shortages experienced across the entire country, but Putin is likely subtly trying to portray himself as cognizant of the economic and social struggles Russia is facing,” ISW researchers said Sunday.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said on Sunday that the country’s forces struck two more Russian oil refineries, one in the Krasnodar region, which was estimated to be about 186 miles from the front line, and another facility in the Yaroslavl region, about 435 miles from the Ukrainian border.

“Each of our long-range sanctions is a reduction in the resources working for the Russian war machine, and another step towards peace,” Zelenskyy said via Telegram, according to a Google translation.

There were no immediate reports from Russian authorities about the strike. Mikhail Evraev, governor of the Yaroslavl region, said Sunday that a drone danger alert had been issued and traffic had been briefly closed on the road out of Yaroslavl toward Moscow.

Ukraine’s president recently signed off on a 40-day operation designed to influence the Kremlin to bring an end to the war. Zelenskyy, who shared the announcement via Telegram on Thursday, gave no further details about the campaign.

Ukraine’s drone campaign targeting Russian oil facilities appears likely to take its toll on the Russian economy, which is already experiencing a slowdown this year.

“Of course, the situation where the fuel sector operates below full capacity for several months will probably take something out of this year’s GDP results,” Alexey Zabotkin, the deputy governor of Russia’s central bank, told reporters on Monday, according to Reuters.

Russia’s central bank has forecast gross domestic product growth of between 0.5% and 1.5% in 2026.

The U.S. and Iran are poised to hold fresh talks on Tuesday in Qatar’s capital, President Donald Trump said via social media on Monday, following a weekend of hostilities in the Middle East.

“IRAN HAS REQUESTED A MEETING. IT WILL TAKE PLACE TOMORROW IN DOHA!,” Trump said in a post on Truth Social.

There was no immediate reaction from Iran. CNBC has contacted Iran’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs and is awaiting a response.

Trump’s post comes after the U.S. and Iran exchanged a series of strikes over the weekend that threatened to derail negotiations aimed at ending the conflict.

White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt told Fox News on Monday that special envoys Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner would travel for the meeting.

“As far as we’re concerned, we’re holding up our end of the ceasefire. Violence will be met with violence,” she added.

“The United States of America has the best and strongest military in the world. The president retains the right to use it. But again, the memorandum of understanding will continue to be discussed. The ceasefire is in place, and we hope that we can get to a good deal.”

The U.S. struck Iranian military targets over the weekend in response to Tehran’s latest attacks on shipping in the strategically important waterway.

Iran’s attacks prompted Trump on Sunday to again threaten Iran with annihilation.

“There may come a point when we are no longer able to be reasonable, and will be forced to militarily complete the job that we very successfully started. If that happens, the Islamic Republic of Iran will no longer exist!” he wrote on Truth Social.

U.S. officials said both sides would pause hostilities and allow commercial vessels to transit the strategically vital Strait of Hormuz.

“Technical talks are slated to continue on all areas of the MOU,” a U.S. official told CNBC on Sunday. “Both sides will stand down for now and vessels can move freely.”

Located in the gulf between Oman and Iran, the Strait of Hormuz is recognized as one of the world’s most critical energy chokepoints. The narrow waterway typically handles around 20% of the world’s oil traffic.

In separate Truth Social posts earlier on Monday, Trump welcomed the recent decline in oil and gas prices, noting that U.S. crude oil prices had fallen to levels last seen before the start of the Iran war on Feb. 28.

Restaurant chain Red Lobster‘s “Everyday $20 Ultimate Endless Shrimp” offering was described as a “car crash” as creditors of the chain sued former controlling shareholder Thai Union.

In a suit filed in Orange County, Fla., in May, the creditors said that Thai Union — a seafood producer with shares traded on Thailand’s stock exchange — knew in 2023 that the chain was facing significant financial headwinds and risked insolvency. The suit, filed by a trust on behalf of the Red Lobster creditors, requests a jury trial to determine damages.

Instead of considering the interests of the restaurant chain, “Thai Union doubled down on a campaign to squeeze out every drop of value that it could through uneconomic contracts that benefited Thai Union and made no economic sense for Red Lobster.”

Thai Union and Red Lobster didn’t immediately respond when contacted for comment by CNBC.

Red Lobster filed for bankruptcy in May 2024, shuttering restaurants around the U.S. and filing for Chapter 11 protection as it faced increased competition, expensive leases, a broader pullback in consumer spending, and fallout from the shrimp promotion.

The company had defaulted on a term loan of $275 million from Fortress Investment Group in September 2023.

The company exited Chapter 11 in September 2024 after being acquired by private investor group RL Holdings, reportedly led by Fortress. RL Holdings still owns Red Lobster.

The suit alleged that Thai Union had pressed Red Lobster to purchase increasing amounts of its shrimp at above-market prices and banned a competitor from supplying the restaurant chain.

Thai Union and then-interim CEO Paul Kenny “engineered and implemented” the endless-shrimp promotion over the objections of Red Lobster employees not affiliated with Thai Union, and this led to restaurants around the country being “immobilized” as they ran out of shrimp and were unable to turn over tables, the lawsuit alleged.

“When it was clear that the Everyday $20 Ultimate Endless Shrimp offering was wreaking havoc on Red Lobster and its balance sheet, Kenny doubled down. He responded by continuing the offering—and generating tens of millions of dollars more in overpriced shrimp orders for Thai Union—and ultimately left Red Lobster with a massive oversupply,” the filing read.

Red Lobster brought back the endless-shrimp promotion in April, according to its website, though it said the promotion was for a limited time and didn’t provide the cost.

Thai Union had bought a minority stake in Red Lobster in 2016, then effectively controlled the company after teaming up with another related shareholder in 2020 for a majority stake and three out of five of Red Lobster’s board seats.

It later divested its stake in May 2024, and the suit alleged that it did not contribute any capital in the Chapter 11 process.

“Thai Union treated the company as little more than a distribution arm for its own products, milking whatever value it could from Red Lobster, especially as the company became insolvent,” the lawsuit said.

Auto giant Volkswagen is planning to cut 100,000 jobs and end production at four German plants over the coming years, according to a report from Manager Magazin, in a move that would represent the most radical overhaul in the firm’s 89-year history.

The plan, reported on Friday, would see Europe’s largest automobile manufacturer shed roughly 15% of its workforce as it seeks to counter intensifying competition from Chinese car brands.

It would also see the Wolfsburg-headquartered company reduce planned investment in the company by about 15% to just over 130 billion euros ($148.2 billion) over the next five years and cease production at plants in Hanover, Zwickau, Emden, alongside Audi’s Neckarsulm site.

Volkswagen had already laid out plans to implement sweeping job cuts and launched a major product offensive as it seeks to boost profitability.

The figures cited by Manager Magazin, however, represent a stark acceleration of those planned job cuts, given that around 50,000 jobs had been expected across the company in Germany by 2030.

Volkswagen agreed a deal with unions in late 2024 to avoid factory closures in Germany and rule out compulsory redundancies until the end of 2030.

A spokesperson for the company declined to comment on “internal, confidential documents” when contacted by CNBC, saying decisions would be taken and approved by the relevant governing bodies, according to a Google translation.

“The entire Group—including its brands and subsidiaries—must undergo profound change,” the spokesperson said.

Shares of Volkswagen were last seen trading 0.2% lower on Friday. The stock price has fallen more than 25% year-to-date.

Volkswagen’s General Works Council and German industrial union IG Metall pledged to push back against the reported job cuts and plant closures.

“If such plans were to be pushed forward, we would prevent them with all our might,” they said in a joint statement, according to a translation.

Volkswagen had a workforce of about 657,400 employees at the end of the first quarter of 2026, according to the company.

Shipping traffic is recovering a week after the U.S. and Iran signed a deal to reopen the Strait of Hormuz — but a renewed attack on a cargo ship Thursday threw fresh uncertainty over the fragile passage, halting the United Nations’ evacuation plan and sending some tankers into reverse.

In the week following the ceasefire announcement, 125 transits were recorded between June 15-21, marking the highest weekly total since the war began in late February, as tankers rushed to move stored Gulf crude before the 60-day truce window expires.

On June 24, AXS Marine recorded 62 commercial vessel crossings, the highest single-day count since the war started, but only equivalent to 53% of the traffic on the same day last year.

The Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps on Wednesday declared that all ships must use only its northern route and comply with Iranian routing instructions. Hours later, the Ever Lovely — a Singapore-flagged Evergreen container ship — was struck on its starboard side by a projectile off the Omani coast. A U.S. official said the IRGC had carried out the strike. It was the first attack on a cargo vessel since the ceasefire took effect.

Located in the gulf between Oman and Iran, the Strait of Hormuz is recognized as one of the world’s most critical energy chokepoints. The narrow waterway typically handles around 20% of the world’s oil traffic.

Shipowners are left navigating two competing authorities with no agreed rules, with a northern corridor under Iranian control and a southern passage through Omani waters. The standard pre-war commercial lane remains closed due to mines.

Iran warned it would take action against ships not using its northern route or coordinating with Iranian authorities. The U.S. and Oman backed a separate southern corridor, with Oman issuing navigational guidance and American Navy providing naval oversight.

Companies are confronted with a difficult choice: take the risk to transit, or hold back and potentially cede ground to rivals willing to take that risk.

Bruce Tan, a Singapore-based electronics manufacturer who held back deliveries to Middle East clients for four months, said he had begun moving goods through the corridor again, but only in small batches, in case the Strait closes again. Tan is also routing some orders through alternative corridors as a hedge against another closure.

Aristidis Alafouzos, CEO of Okeanis Eco Tankers Corp, a crude oil shipping company headquartered in Greece, said he doesn’t expect Thursday’s attack on a ship in the Gulf of Oman to “significantly change” the trend of transits through the waterway.

“We’ve seen a large increase, especially on the crude oil passages, and I think this is set to continue and maybe this one-off event isn’t enough to really disrupt the recent events of the large exports of Kuwaiti and Emirati crude oil from the Gulf,” Alafouzos told CNBC’s “Squawk Box Europe” on Friday.

“The one big missing factor is the Saudis. For now, we haven’t seen them export almost anything from inside the Arabian Gulf and everything is coming from Yanbu in the Red Sea.”

Analysts have warned that passage through the waterway remains risky, and shipping companies are pushing for clarity on safe navigation, as well as the likelihood of tolls and how sanctions could interplay with whatever passages are open in the future.

“We don’t know how much of the straits is mined — it can be very dangerous going through that,” said Tim Huxley, CEO of Singapore-based Mandarin Shipping, which manages 50 vessels globally and has kept all of them out of the strait.

“You’ve got this debate about who is authorizing ships to go through, what level of control the Iranians have on one side, the Americans have on the other. A lot of ship owners are just saying: I’m going to wait and see how these talks progress before I commit to sending a ship, its cargo, and most importantly, its crew,” Huxley said.

“Insurance premiums are still very high on ships and cargoes going through the straits,” Huxley said. “Until there is a more concrete set of guidelines on safe navigation, people are going to be very reticent to go through.”

Han Shen Lin, China country director of The Asia Group, was more blunt about the predicament facing corporate executives.

“Boardrooms aren’t asking about cargo safety — they’re asking if it is insurable. War-risk premiums have shot up from 0.05% to over 0.7% of hull value per transit. That’s not a risk premium, that’s a serious business model stress test,” Han said.

“One vessel seizure doesn’t just cost you the cargo — it costs you the client relationship, the insurance renewal, and your board’s confidence. Speed is worthless without survivability,” Han said.

The U.S. and Iran’s interim peace agreement gives inspectors from the U.N. nuclear watchdog access to the Islamic Republic’s nuclear sites, according to the head of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA).

His comments come shortly after U.S. President Donald Trump said Iran had agreed to allow nuclear inspections, despite Iran insisting that there were no new plans for U.N. inspectors to visit sites damaged in U.S. and Israeli strikes.

“There is a bit of a war of statements here,” IAEA chief Rafael Grossi said at a news conference in Japan on Friday.

“What is undeniable is that we have an MOU. This MOU specifically indicates that the nuclear part of the memorandum will be supervised. This is the word, will be supervised by the IAEA. In order to supervise, we need to inspect. There is no other way,” Grossi said.

“The technical work has started, and we hope to be there soon,” he added.

The U.S. and Iran signed an interim peace deal last week to bring the Middle East conflict to an end, although Washington and Tehran have continued to clash over some of the details of the 14-point memorandum of understanding.

Under the memorandum, both sides agreed to reopen the strategically vital Strait of Hormuz toll-free for at least 60 days and to end all hostilities, including in Lebanon, where fighting has persisted between Israel and Iran-backed Hezbollah.

A separate U.N. agency, the International Maritime Organization, paused its efforts to evacuate ships and seafarers stranded inside the Middle East Gulf after a vessel was attacked in the Gulf of Oman on Thursday.

Critics of Trump’s interim peace deal and the contents of the MOU have questioned whether this outcome was worth nearly four months of war. It has also invited comparisons to former U.S. President Barack Obama’s nuclear deal with Tehran.

Trump scrapped the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, which was agreed to in 2015 under the Obama administration during his first term in office, calling it “an embarrassment” to him as a U.S. citizen.

Speaking to ABC News in an interview earlier in the month, ahead of the interim deal being announced, Obama said he was “doubtful” any agreement with Iran put forward by the Trump administration would be “significantly different” from the JCPOA.

Trump has since lashed out at critics of the MOU, saying those who think he hasn’t been tough enough on Tehran were either “jealous, bad people or stupid.”

A little over a week after the New York Knicks paraded through lower Manhattan celebrating their historic 2026 Championship win over the San Antonio Spurs, the NBA has set its sights on an ambitious target: Southeast Asia. 

The decision to stage both a Rising Stars Invitational tournament – at which high school teams from across Asia showcase their skills, with top performers invited to future NBA development camps – and an accompanying investor conference in Singapore is no coincidence. 

Southeast Asia has emerged as one of the NBA’s fastest-growing markets for fan engagement, making the region a focal point for both player development and business expansion. 

According to the league, basketball is the most-played sport in the Philippines with participation growing in numerous other countries, while fans in the region have increased by 15% in the span of three years through Q1 2026.

Digital consumption is also on the rise. Video views across NBA Asia’s social media platforms increased 88% year-on-year, according to data supplied by the league to CNBC. The number of followers across the league’s regional social media platforms has almost doubled during the 2025-26 season.

In an interview with CNBC’s JP Ong, the NBA’s vice president for Southeast Asia, Sheila Rasu, underscored the loyalty of the region’s fan base. “Basketball is probably the fastest growing sport in Southeast Asia,” said Rasu. “In Singapore, it’s probably the most played team sport in the country. In Indonesia, there is a huge growing population of kids that are taking up basketball. So we do feel that basketball is truly having a moment, not just with the boys, but also the girls.” 

The league is also renewing its focus on the region through its NBA Launchpad program, which announced a strategic expansion in Asia this week. The program, which was originally launched in 2021, is designed to source and pilot emerging technologies that impact the sport. 

Since the program launched, the NBA has championed everything from a sleep tech start-up to a data analytics company that places a sensor in a basketball’s valve to track speed and acceleration.

Launchpad, said Rasu, “is our way to be involved in shaping the game, and how to improve the fan experience. We identify like-minded young companies that can actually help us improve the game.”

Former NBA champion Jeremy Lin, the first Asian American to win basketball’s top prize, was also watching the action in Singapore. Lin, who played nine seasons for the league, propelled viewership of the sport across Asia as what was dubbed “Linsanity” exploded in 2012. 

Lin, who was part of the 2019 NBA championship-winning Toronto Raptors, told CNBC’s Emily Tan he was enthused by the opportunities for the game in Asia.

“The NBA is an amazing brand, it is very value-aligned. I want to continue to give back to the game, give back to the NBA and build basketball, especially in Asia, where I have roots,” he said.

Asia is hardly a new territory for the NBA. The league’s ties to China, for example, date back to the 1970s, but that relationship was tested in 2019 after then-Houston Rockets general manager Daryl Morey voiced support for pro-democracy protesters in Hong Kong.

The comments triggered a backlash on the mainland, with state broadcasters suspending NBA coverage and many Chinese sponsors severing ties with the league. 

The NBA began rebuilding its presence in Greater China last year, returning to the region for the first time in six years. With support from Alibaba co-founder and Brooklyn Nets owner Joe Tsai, the Nets and Phoenix Suns played a pair of preseason games at The Venetian Arena in Macao in 2025, marking a significant step in the league’s efforts to re-engage with Chinese fans. The NBA will return to Macao this October for preseason games between the Dallas Mavericks and the Rockets.

Airwallex has raised $320 million in a Series H funding round, valuing the global payments company at $11 billion, a 38% leap from just six months ago, as the fintech firm doubles down on artificial intelligence-powered financial software.

The latest funding round was led by New York venture capital firm Addition, with investment from funds including Baillie Gifford, Hummingbird, QED Investors, T. Rowe Price, Washington University in St. Louis and Amex Ventures.

Airwallex also reported its annualized revenue surged 74% from a year ago to $1.3 billion in March, while annualized transaction volume more than doubled from a year earlier. More than 90% of its revenue came from customers using more than one Airwallex product, the company said.

The company plans to use the funds to accelerate product development in autonomous finance and agentic commerce, expand its regulatory footprint into new markets, and grow the teams building its next-generation AI-native financial software.

Airwallex provides multi-currency payment services to global businesses, including McLaren, Qantas, Canva and Shein. The company was last valued at $8 billion after raising $330 million in a December funding round also led by Addition.

Alongside the raise, the company also announced two new AI-focused products.

One, called T:0, is an AI-native platform designed to automate corporate finance functions, including bookkeeping, tax, compliance and reporting. The product is currently in private beta and could be made more widely available in the coming weeks.

The second product, Airi, is an agentic consumer wallet that Airwallex said will eventually support delegated agent payments, spending limits, permission controls and multi-currency balances.

Airwallex has obtained more than 85 licenses across North America, Europe, the Middle East, and Asia-Pacific, which it said positions it to support the emerging agentic economy.

“The licenses, local network integrations, and settlement rails we spent ten years constructing are precisely the kind of infrastructure it needs,” co-founder and CEO Jack Zhang said in a statement. “This new capital lets us move faster into Airwallex’s next chapter.”

Zhang told the Australian Financial Review in a recent interview that the new financing could allow the company to delay a public listing, as investment in AI development has made its margins “too volatile to go public.”

Founded in Australia in 2015, Airwallex has faced growing scrutiny over its ties to China. The company, headquartered in San Francisco and Singapore, has 27 offices globally, including in Shanghai, Beijing and Shenzhen, and is backed by Australian venture capital firms and Chinese investors, including Tencent and HongShan Capital, formerly known as Sequoia China.

In December, prominent Silicon Valley investor Keith Rabois, who is also a board member of rival U.S. fintech Ramp, accused Airwallex of being a “Chinese backdoor into sensitive American data.”

The company has rejected those allegations. Zhang, in a recent statement, described them as “wild and totally unfounded conspiracy theories,” saying American customers’ data is stored in the U.S. and inaccessible to staff based in China or Hong Kong.

The International Maritime Organization has paused its efforts aimed at evacuating ships and seafarers stranded inside the Middle East Gulf after a vessel was attacked in the Gulf of Oman.

The pause follows a container ship being struck by an unknown projectile near the coast of Oman on Thursday, with a U.S. official telling MS Now that Iran was behind the attack.

The evacuation plan would be temporarily paused “in order to reconfirm that the necessary safety guarantees continue to be in place for the ships on our evacuation list and ​all those in the region,” Arsenio Dominguez, Secretary-General of the ​International Maritime Organization, a specialized agency of the United Nations, said in a statement.

When asked about its response to the attack, a U.S. official said “we are aware of these reports and looking into them. President Trump has been clear that Iran cannot subvert the free flow of traffic in the strait.”

The IMO initiative, launched on Tuesday, was aimed at supporting hundreds of stranded ships and thousands of seafarers to sail out of the Gulf, using either a northern route via Iranian waters or a southern route via Omani waters with U.S. oversight, the IMO said earlier this week.

Shipowners had been seeking to transit the Strait of Hormuz after the U.S. and Iran struck an interim peace deal to pause hostilities for 60 days as negotiations for a permanent peace deal proceeded. Traffic through the Strait of Hormuz has partially recovered but remains well below pre-war levels.

In the week following the ceasefire, 125 vessels passed through the strait, according to Lloyd’s List Intelligence, the highest level of weekly transits since the war started in late February.

On Wednesday, Iran’s military warned vessels to not use the southern route approved by the IMO and said any new transit route through the Strait of Hormuz established without its approval is “unacceptable and dangerous,” as Tehran seeks to reinforce its grip over the vital energy waterway.

At least two vessels performed U-turns on their way out of the Middle East Gulf, according to Lloyd’s, after Iran insisted that vessels use the routes approved by Tehran. Both were using the southern route closest to the Omani coastline.

The attacked vessel carried a Singapore flag and was owned by shipping giant Evergreen, according to Lloyd’s. It did not ⁠transit under IMO’s evacuation framework, Dominguez said in the statement.

Evergreen, Singapore’s Ministry of Trade and Industry and Ministry of Foreign Affairs did not respond to CNBC’s requests for comment.

— CNBC’s Akayla Gardner, Lim Hui Jie, Dan Mangan contributed to this report.

Air conditioning and building efficiency stocks extended gains on Thursday as several European countries issued red weather alerts during a fresh bout of extreme heat.

The heat wave marks the second so-called heat dome Europe is experiencing in just two months, with the U.K. notching its all-time temperature record for June on Wednesday and France registering its hottest day ever for the second consecutive day.

The searing heat, alongside unprecedented consumer and commercial demand for air conditioning, appears to have prompted investors to flock to a basket of climate-related stocks.

French construction materials company Saint Gobain, which designs and supplies components used within heating, ventilation and air conditioning (HVAC) systems, rose 2.2% on Thursday, extending gains of more than 3% in the previous session.

Beijer Ref, a world-leading wholesaler of cooling and HVAC equipment, advanced 1.3%, having climbed nearly 5% on Wednesday. The Stockholm-listed company is a supplier of refrigeration and air conditioning equipment to the trade.

Sweden’s NIBE Industrier was another cooling-related stock moving higher on Thursday morning. The company, which produces air and ground source heat pumps, as well as other climate control equipment, was last seen trading 0.7% higher, extending gains of 3.7% in the previous session.

Milan-listed Ariston, which manufactures energy efficient heating and cooling systems, rose 2.3% on Thursday, on track for its third consecutive positive session.

Elsewhere, Danish building materials company Rockwool was last seen up 0.9%, having closed 3.1% higher on Wednesday. The Copenhagen-listed company manufactures insulation products designed to significantly improve building climate resilience by regulating indoor temperatures.

The latest heat wave has underscored the need for efficient technologies and adequate power supply to keep Europe cool. The acceleration of AI adoption, alongside regional decarbonization policies, cultural shifts and income changes, has also supercharged this megatrend.

Matthew Donen, director of equity research at Morningstar, said more than 85% of the European Union’s buildings were constructed before 2001 and many were not designed for today’s climate challenges.

“The current heat wave highlights the growing need for renovations that improve energy efficiency by reducing cooling demand,” Donen said.

He singled out Saint-Gobain as a company that appears to be “well positioned” to benefit from increased investment in upgrading the region’s building stock.

However, Donen said that while the heat wave reinforces the long-term investment case, it is unlikely to have a material impact on near-term earnings expectations or share price performance.

Scientists warn climate change is exacerbating the frequency and intensity of extreme weather events. The burning of fossil fuels such as coal, oil and gas is the chief driver of the climate crisis.

Europe is known to be warming faster than any other continent, at twice the speed of the global average since the 1980s, according to the European Union’s Copernicus Climate Change Service.