Sen. Tim Scott, R-S.C., warned that Democratic opposition to cryptocurrency market structure legislation risks standing in the way of America’s ability to lead the next evolution of financial markets.

Scott, chairman of the Senate Banking Committee and one of the bill’s lead sponsors, joined FOX Business’ Taylor Riggs on “Mornings with FOX Business” to discuss the CLARITY Act and a key procedural vote that would allow negotiations to continue.

The Senate is scheduled to hold a procedural cloture vote on the CLARITY Act today, Sept. 15, at approximately 2:15 p.m. ET. The vote is not a final-passage vote; it would allow consideration of the legislation and negotiations over digital-asset market structure to continue.

Republican Sen. Tim Scott weighs in on the fight over the Clarity Act and U.S. financial leadership. (Daniel Heuer/Bloomberg / Getty Images)

“If you want everyday, hardworking Americans to have more access to their resources, more options on the table, and you want America to be the leading financial country on the planet, you vote yes,” Scott said.

The South Carolina Republican argued that establishing a federal market structure would provide clearer rules for consumers and developers while encouraging financial innovation to remain in the United States.

“The truth is that without market structure actually being embedded in the laws of our country, you have the wild, wild West,” Scott said. “Rules of the road matter.”

Scott said some Democrats have already made clear they will not support the legislation, framing the debate as one that could determine whether the U.S. benefits from changes taking place across financial markets.

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“They’re never going to vote for clarity. They don’t want market structure to pass,” he said.

Scott also addressed political tensions surrounding the legislation, including Sen. Elizabeth Warren’s opposition to the CLARITY Act and her differences with President Donald Trump.

“He [President Donald Trump] and Elizabeth will probably never be on the same page on this issue or frankly, almost any issue,” Scott said. “And so politics continues, unfortunately. But that’s not in the best interest of our country.”

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Scott maintained that the debate should ultimately focus on whether Americans benefit from the changing financial system rather than partisan politics.

“This should be about whether or not America and Americans will benefit from the evolution of financial markets,” he said.

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The Federal Reserve is holding a closely watched monetary policy meeting this week as the market expects the central bank to hike interest rates amid concerns about stubborn inflation.

Policymakers have held interest rates steady at all five meetings held by the Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC) this year, with the benchmark federal funds rate sitting at a target range of 3.5% to 3.75%.

Persistent inflation above the Fed’s 2% long-run target has prompted concern among policymakers and has shifted the market’s outlook to anticipating a rate increase this week, with the CME FedWatch tool showing a 92.5% chance of a 25-basis-point hike versus a 7.5% probability of rates staying at their current level.

The Fed’s preferred inflation gauge, the personal consumption expenditures (PCE) index, was up 3.7% on an annual basis in July while core PCE, which excludes volatile food and energy prices, was up 3.3%. Another closely watched inflation measure, the consumer price index (CPI), was up 3.4% annually in August while core CPI was up 2.4%.

WHAT WARSH’S JACKSON HOLE SPEECH SIGNALS ABOUT WHERE INTEREST RATES ARE HEADED

Federal Reserve Chair Kevin Warsh and FOMC policymakers will announce an interest rate decision on Wednesday. (Li Yuanqing/Xinhua via Getty Images)

The anticipated rate hike comes as yields on U.S. Treasurys are rising, reaching the highest level in years amid competition in the fixed income market from foreign sovereign debt and corporate debt issuance.

The yield on the benchmark 10-year Treasury note is hovering around 5%, the highest level it’s been at since 2007. Higher interest rates on Treasurys increase the federal government’s cost to service its debt, which is a key driver of growing budget deficits.

Josh Hirt, senior economist at Vanguard, told FOX Business in an interview on Friday that the “developments over the last week, including the inflation report today, I think almost make the case that you could have a somewhat more adverse reaction if the Fed does not go [on Wednesday] unless the communication around the rationale behind that was extremely strong relative to them actually moving at this meeting.”

WARSH SAYS FED’S MAIN FOCUS SHOULD BE ON PRICES WITH CENTRAL BANK’S RATE POLICY IN FOCUS

Hirt said that he “wouldn’t see the immediate case for that to really extend any pricing if they were to move,” adding that “In fact, it could relieve some of the pressure in some extent, that the Fed did act, that the market is comfortable that they would be willing to do so.”

“I think that actually could very much be the case, in fact, rather than the alternative – which would be not going and the market potentially thinking about credibility issues and extending even further.”

“The base case would be if they were to move [on Wednesday], I wouldn’t see any necessary conditions that the market has to move higher based on that. In fact, it could potentially retrench a bit from where we are today,” Hirt added.

FED’S HAMMACK SAYS MULTIPLE RATE HIKES MAY BE NEEDED TO TAME INFLATION

Fed Chair Kevin Warsh was confirmed to the role in May and September marks the third FOMC meeting he has led. (Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images)

Wednesday’s FOMC announcement will also include the so-called “dot plot” that outlines how Fed policymakers view the future path of interest rates. Fed Chair Kevin Warsh declined to submit his own projection due to his opposition to providing forward guidance,

“If they were to move [on Wednesday] and you were to get, say, a level shift up in the dots at least by those participants that submit them, then that would really be an indication that I think the market could move on,” Hirt said.

“It wouldn’t be my base that you are going to see such a level shift,” he added. “At least based on the June numbers, the highest or most hawkish participant had about three rate hikes. It’s not clear to me that you would need to see a lot of members move much higher than that, if at all, but maybe just more a move up from those that didn’t have any or only had one rate hike.”

The market sees a higher likelihood of further interest rate hikes on the horizon after this week’s FOMC meeting, as policymakers will meet again in October and December to close out this year before kicking off their 2027 meetings in late January.

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The CME FedWatch tool shows a 49.7% chance of two 25-basis-point rate hikes before the end of the year to a range of 4% to 4.25%, with a 28.9% probability of three hikes of that size to a target of 4.25% to 4.5%. It also shows just a 20% chance of a single rate hike through year’s end.

Ford is recalling more than 223,472 pickup trucks due to an improperly secured fuel tank, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration said.

“In some instances, front fuel tank strap T-slots were not properly inserted into the vehicle’s frame rail at the time of vehicle assembly,” the recall report said.

The recall affects certain model year 2023-2027 F-150 pickups, according to NHTSA.

NEARLY 150,000 FORD VEHICLES RECALLED AFTER DEFECT RAISES RISK OF SUDDEN POWER LOSS WHILE DRIVING

A model year 2027 Ford F-150. (Ford Motor Co.)

An improperly secured fuel tank could increase the risk of a fire or stalling of the engine due to fuel loss, the recall report said. If the tank detaches, it poses a road hazard to other vehicles.

Ford estimates that 1% of vehicles involved in the recall are affected.

SOME OLDER FORD VEHICLES POSE ‘UNREASONABLE’ SAFETY RISKS, REGULATORS WARN

Ford estimates that 1% of vehicles involved in the recall are affected. (Jeff Kowalsky/Bloomberg via Getty Images )

FORD TO INVEST $1B IN KENTUCKY TRUCK PLANT

Owners will be notified by mail and should take their vehicle to a Ford or Lincoln dealer to have the fuel tanks inspected and replaced, if necessary, the recall report said. The service will be free of charge, Ford told FOX Business.

Notification letters are expected to be mailed to owners beginning Sept. 21.

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WELLINGTON, New Zealand — Shares in Infratil Ltd. rose 5.49% to $11.53 on the ASX Wednesday, adding 60 cents, as the New Zealand-based infrastructure investor rode a broader rebound in AI-linked data centre stocks following a rough stretch for the sector earlier in the week.

The gain adds to what has already been a strong run for Infratil shares over the past year, with the stock up roughly 23% over the trailing twelve months as of recent trading, comfortably outperforming the broader S&P/ASX 200 Index, which has posted far more modest gains over the same period. Much of that outperformance has been driven by the surging value of Infratil’s stake in CDC Data Centres, the hyperscale data centre operator in which Infratil holds an approximately 49.8% ownership interest.

CDC has emerged as the dominant driver of Infratil’s investment case in recent months. The data centre business now represents roughly 41% of Infratil’s total portfolio value, according to recent company disclosures, reflecting the scale of demand CDC has captured amid the broader boom in artificial intelligence infrastructure spending across Australia. In May, CDC signed what was described as Australia’s largest-ever data centre contract, a 555-megawatt, 30-year deal with an investment-grade United States hyperscaler customer, a deal that pushed CDC’s total contracted capacity above one gigawatt for the first time. Infratil shares jumped more than 12% on the day that contract was announced, and the stock has continued to trade with elevated sensitivity to CDC-related news ever since.

Following that contract, CDC guided for earnings before interest, tax, depreciation, amortization and financing costs to exceed $1 billion by fiscal 2028, up from roughly $400 million in the current financial year, with the company projecting annualized EBITDAF closer to $2 billion once its full contracted capacity is fully deployed. Importantly, the company said the newly contracted capacity would not require additional capital beyond its existing funding plans, meaning existing Infratil shareholders would not face dilution to support the expanded build-out. CDC has maintained its fiscal 2027 EBITDAF guidance of $680 million to $720 million, with the newly contracted capacity from the record deal expected to become operational progressively through fiscal 2028 and 2029.

CDC’s momentum has continued to build in the months since. An independent valuation of Infratil’s stake in CDC climbed 23.6% quarter-on-quarter in a review completed in July, reaching a midpoint valuation of roughly $18.5 billion for the business. Infratil has said it expects CDC’s growth trajectory to continue, with ongoing investment in additional data centre capacity aimed at supporting both existing contracts and future demand out to fiscal 2040. CDC’s broader development pipeline now spans approximately 1.6 gigawatts of capacity through 2034, and the business has strengthened its access to global debt markets after Moody’s Investors Service assigned CDC’s Australian operations a Baa2 stable credit rating, alongside a balance sheet that included roughly $3.9 billion in cash and undrawn facilities as of the end of March.

Trading in Infratil shares has also shown signs of unusual activity in recent weeks beyond the fundamental news flow tied to CDC. Earlier this month, the stock recorded trading volume more than 17 times its 90-day average in a single session, a spike market analysts described as consistent with either large institutional positioning trades, index rebalancing flows, or a discrete portfolio-level announcement occurring between the company’s scheduled reporting dates, without a single confirmed catalyst identified for that particular volume surge.

Wednesday’s gain also coincided with a broader rebound across AI-linked infrastructure and technology stocks globally, following a sharp selloff earlier in the week triggered by a widely discussed essay from a prominent artificial intelligence company executive calling for a slower pace of AI model development. That debate had weighed heavily on chip stocks, data centre operators and other companies tied to the AI infrastructure buildout in prior sessions, before several of those same names began recovering as the week progressed, a pattern that appeared to extend to Infratil’s own trading Wednesday.

Beyond its CDC holding, Infratil’s broader portfolio spans a diverse mix of infrastructure assets, including renewable energy generation platforms such as Trustpower, Longroad Energy and Galileo Green Energy, Wellington International Airport, diagnostic imaging businesses Qscan Group and RHC Holdco, telecommunications provider One NZ, and digital infrastructure investment Kao Data, giving the company exposure across energy transition, healthcare, transport and digital infrastructure sectors in addition to its data centre holdings.

Analyst sentiment toward Infratil has remained broadly positive even amid the stock’s recent volatility. The consensus analyst rating on the stock currently stands at Buy, with consensus price targets in recent months ranging between roughly NZ$17.04 and NZ$17.47, implying continued potential upside from current trading levels. Infratil, which was founded by the late Wellington-based merchant banker Lloyd Morrison and incorporated in 1994, remains dual-listed on both the New Zealand and Australian stock exchanges, giving investors in both markets direct exposure to its data centre-driven growth story.

With CDC’s next scheduled capacity milestones and Infratil’s own upcoming financial results still ahead, investors are likely to continue treating the stock as one of the more direct listed proxies for the broader artificial intelligence infrastructure buildout across Australia and New Zealand, a positioning that has driven much of Wednesday’s gain alongside the broader stabilization in AI-related equities globally.

Players of Riot Games’ tactical shooter “Valorant” began reporting connectivity problems Monday night, with outage-tracking service Downdetector flagging a spike in user complaints starting at 8:24 p.m. Eastern time and the hashtag #ValorantDown trending on social platform X as affected players compared notes on the disruption.

Downdetector’s official account posted an alert shortly after the spike began, asking users how the outage was affecting them and directing them to submit reports through the platform. As of the post, the alert had drawn attention across social media, though the exact scope, cause and expected duration of the disruption had not yet been detailed in any official statement from Riot Games at the time the outage began trending.

Riot Games, the publisher behind “Valorant,” maintains a dedicated Service Status page where the company posts real-time updates on server health, ongoing maintenance and confirmed outages across its game titles, including region-specific status information for players around the world. During past outages, the company has typically used that page, along with its official support accounts on social media, to acknowledge disruptions and provide updates as engineering teams investigate the underlying cause.

Riot’s infrastructure is built to support millions of concurrent players across “Valorant” and the company’s other titles, and outright server outages remain relatively uncommon compared with smaller, localized connectivity issues. Even so, the game has experienced a range of disruptions over the past several years, with causes spanning routine scheduled maintenance tied to major content patches, unexpected server errors during periods of unusually high player traffic, and, in at least two previously documented incidents, broader connectivity problems linked to issues with Cloudflare, the internet infrastructure company whose services Riot’s servers have relied on. In one such earlier incident, outage tracking showed disrupted service lasting roughly three hours before connections began stabilizing, with a brief recurrence of the issue several hours later.

Not every reported connectivity problem traces back to an issue on Riot’s end. The company and third-party guides covering “Valorant’s” server status commonly note that local network configurations, virtual private network or proxy interference, home network congestion and outdated game clients can each produce symptoms that resemble a broader server outage even when Riot’s infrastructure itself remains fully operational. Players experiencing connection issues are typically advised to first check Riot’s official status page and Downdetector’s live outage tracker to determine whether a problem is affecting a broad swath of the player base or appears limited to their own individual setup, before attempting local troubleshooting steps such as restarting the game client and Riot Client launcher, disabling any active VPN or proxy services, and closing unnecessary background applications that may be competing for network bandwidth.

Downdetector, the crowdsourced outage-tracking platform that first flagged Monday night’s disruption, aggregates user-submitted problem reports alongside automated signals to identify spikes in complaints for a given service, generating real-time alerts when reports for a platform exceed typical baseline levels. The service has become a widely used first stop for gamers and other internet users seeking to quickly confirm whether a disruption they are experiencing reflects a broader, service-wide issue rather than a problem isolated to their own device or internet connection.

“Valorant” has built a large and highly engaged competitive player base since its 2020 launch, with the free-to-play tactical shooter regularly ranking among the most-played titles on PC gaming platforms and supporting an active professional esports circuit organized by Riot Games. That scale means even relatively short outages tend to generate significant social media attention and player frustration, particularly when disruptions occur during peak evening play hours in North America, as Monday night’s reported issues appeared to.

As of the most recent available information, Riot Games had not issued a detailed public statement specifying the root cause of Monday night’s reported outage, and it remained unclear whether the disruption was affecting all regions simultaneously or was concentrated in specific areas. Players seeking the most current and authoritative updates on the situation were directed to Riot’s official Valorant Service Status page, which the company updates directly, rather than relying solely on third-party trackers or social media speculation, which can lag behind or occasionally misrepresent the actual scope of an ongoing technical issue.

Riot Games has historically resolved server-side outages affecting “Valorant” within a period ranging from under an hour to several hours, depending on the underlying cause, with the company’s engineering teams typically posting incremental updates as investigations progress and services are gradually restored across affected regions. Whether Monday night’s reported issues would follow that same pattern remained unclear as reports of the outage continued to circulate online.

For players still experiencing connection problems, standard troubleshooting guidance from both Riot Games and independent gaming outlets recommends confirming server status through official channels first, since attempting extensive local fixes during a genuine server-side outage typically has no effect until Riot’s own infrastructure issues are resolved on the company’s end.

REHOVOT, ISRAEL — Amai Proteins, an Israel-based food technology startup that develops sweet proteins for the food, beverage and dietary supplement industries, has named Doug Brown as its new chief executive officer.

Brown succeeds Amir Guttman, PhD, who is transitioning to an executive board member role.

Brown joins the company from Sirio Pharma, where he was most recently vice president, head of global account management and earlier general manager of Americas.

He also was previously chief commercial officer at Best Formulations, a division of Sirio Pharma and earlier was CCO at Clasado Biosciences.

Guttman, who had been CEO since July 2025, joined Amai in 2018 as a board member.