MINNEAPOLIS – Target Corp. is benefiting from a shift in its food and beverage strategy, the company said. Category sales ticked up to $6 billion during the second quarter ended Aug. 1, up from $5.6 billion during the same period as the previous year.

“Earlier this year, I talked about our ambition to make food a destination, not simply a category a guest shops while they’re in our stores, but a reason they choose to come to Target,” said Cara Sylvester, chief merchandising officer, during an Aug. 19 conference call with securities analysts. “We recently completed our largest food transition in more than a decade, changing the presentation of nearly half of our center store grocery assortment, adding new and unique offerings, and reimagining end caps and in-aisle presentation to make discovery easier.”

As part of the reset, the retailer added space for products perceived as trendy, like snacks, global foods and functional coffee. 

“The response has been really encouraging,” Sylvester said. “Snacks, beverages, and candy were already among our largest categories by sales, and these transitions are building on that strength.”

She said snack sales are 15% ahead of last year, with “outstanding momentum” from protein bars, meat sticks and better-for-you snacks.

“Just as importantly, we’re pairing that innovation with incredible value,” she said. “That’s merchandising authority in action, understanding where the guest is going and moving with speed to get there, bringing together trend, quality, differentiation, and affordability in a way that’s uniquely Target.”

The retailer’s net income for the quarter was $1.9 billion, equal to $4.13 per share on the common stock, and an improvement over the second quarter of 2025 when the company earned $935 million, equal to $2.05 per share. A $994 million tariff refund drove the surge in earnings. Adjusted earnings per share with the refund stripped out were $2.46 per share.

Quarterly sales rose 5% to $26.5 billion from $25.2 billion the year before. 

President Donald Trump said earlier this week that any governor or local government official should want to welcome the construction of AI data centers.

“The construction jobs are enormous. We’re building the biggest plants anywhere in the world. And I can say, if I were the mayor of a town or the governor of a state, and I had a chance to get a big plant in an AI plant or a data center, I would absolutely want it because the jobs are enormous, and the money paid, the taxes paid are just enormous,” Trump said at the White House on Wednesday. 

“And if you don’t take it, you’re going to be left behind because there are plenty of places that want it,” he added during a meeting with technology and cryptocurrency industry leaders in the Roosevelt Room. “But if I were a governor or mayor, I would want that plant in my community. And many of them are designed in a very beautiful way. It’s really very positive.”

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President Donald Trump speaks during a meeting with crypto and prediction market executives in the Roosevelt Room of the White House in Washington, D.C., on Aug. 19, 2026. (Al Drago/The Washington Post/Bloomberg via Getty Images / Getty Images)

BALMORAL, Scotland — Prince William and Catherine, the Princess of Wales, arrived at Balmoral Castle on Thursday to join King Charles III for the royal family’s traditional summer stay in Scotland, days after news broke that Prince Harry and Meghan Markle plan to return to the United Kingdom after six years living in the United States.

The Prince and Princess of Wales began their visit accompanied by their three children, Prince George, 13, Princess Charlotte, 11, and Prince Louis, 8. The family typically travels to the royal residence in Aberdeenshire each summer for a break from official engagements, joining King Charles, who received his formal welcome to the castle on Tuesday, just two days after learning of Harry and Meghan’s plans to relocate back to Britain.

William has previously spoken about the significance the Scottish retreat holds for his family. “George, Charlotte and Louis are already aware of how dear Scotland is to both of us, and they’re beginning to create their own cherished memories there, too,” William has said of the annual visits.

HELLO! royal editor Emily Nash said William and Catherine are likely feeling less than enthusiastic about the timing of Harry and Meghan’s announcement, offering her assessment on the outlet’s “A Right Royal Podcast.” “Well, what is intriguing about this is the complete radio silence coming from that end of the spectrum. And what’s interesting about it is that they’re normally away at this time of year. I imagine they’re not delighted about this,” Nash said.

Nash suggested the damage done to the relationship between the two brothers over recent years would make any public reintroduction of Harry and Meghan into British life a significant challenge for the family to navigate. “It’s going to be a very, very difficult hill to climb, having them suddenly back in the UK, popping up, doing things publicly, if that’s where they go with this. So much has been said and done that has damaged that relationship, almost beyond repair,” she said.

According to Nash, it is likely that William and Catherine were informed of Harry and Meghan’s plans before the news became public, given that King Charles was told directly on Sunday. “I can’t see a world in which they would be welcoming them back with open arms. But you would anticipate that the King will have spoken to William about this if he was made aware,” Nash said. “We believe the Waleses were made aware beforehand. They didn’t find out at the same time as the rest of the world. So they’ve had time to process this.”

Harry and Meghan’s return does not involve any resumption of official royal duties. According to HELLO!’s reporting, the couple’s status will remain unchanged, with no partial or “half in, half out” arrangement under consideration. The Duke and Duchess of Sussex are expected to live in a non-royal residence outside London and have already enrolled their children, 7-year-old Archie and 5-year-old Lilibet, in British schools ahead of the upcoming school year.

King Charles learned of the couple’s plans to relocate on Sunday, and is reportedly looking forward to seeing more of the family, who first moved to the United States in 2020 following their departure from official royal duties. The king reunited with Harry, Meghan and their children at Highgrove House in Gloucestershire last month, marking the first time he had seen his grandchildren on the Sussex side of the family in four years.

William and Catherine’s arrival at Balmoral, alongside their children, places the full senior working core of the royal family together in Scotland at a moment of heightened attention on the broader family’s internal dynamics. Other family members have also been photographed arriving at the castle in the days following the initial announcement of Harry and Meghan’s return, including Princess Anne, along with Zara and Mike Tindall, according to subsequent HELLO! coverage describing what was characterized as a show of unity among the wider family gathered at Balmoral.

The renewed focus on Balmoral comes as King Charles has continued settling into his own summer stay at the estate, where he has been photographed meeting members of the public during informal walkabouts, a customary part of the royal family’s presence in the area each year. Those public appearances have continued even as the broader family works through the practical and emotional implications of Harry and Meghan’s imminent return.

The relationship between William and Harry has remained strained for several years, following the 2021 interview the Duke and Duchess of Sussex gave to Oprah Winfrey, in which they raised allegations regarding their treatment within the royal family, as well as the 2023 publication of Harry’s memoir, “Spare,” both of which are widely reported to have deepened the rift between the two brothers. Nash’s characterization of the relationship as damaged “almost beyond repair” reflects a broader assessment shared by several royal commentators in the wake of this week’s announcement, even as attention now turns to how the family will manage Harry and Meghan’s return to British life in the weeks ahead.

Neither Kensington Palace nor Buckingham Palace has issued a detailed public statement addressing William and Catherine’s specific reaction to the news of Harry and Meghan’s return, and much of the current reporting continues to rely on sourced commentary from royal correspondents rather than on-the-record statements from the family members themselves. As Harry and Meghan prepare to relocate to a private residence outside London later this month, attention is likely to remain focused on whether any direct meetings occur between the two branches of the family, and on how the gathering at Balmoral, now including both King Charles and the Prince and Princess of Wales, factors into the broader family’s response to the Sussexes’ return.

The United States has crossed a fiscal threshold few forecasters expected to see this year. The Treasury Department confirmed on August 19 that total gross national debt has surpassed $40 trillion, a milestone that arrived months ahead of schedule and comes wrapped in a set of numbers few Americans, or investors anywhere else, can easily process: roughly $117,000 per person, $297,000 per household, and a figure that now approximates the combined economic output of China, Germany, Japan, the UK, and India put together.

For Thailand, a small open economy with deep trade and capital-market links to the US dollar system, the milestone is not just an American headline. It touches everything from the baht’s exchange rate to the cost of servicing Thailand’s own public debt.

A Fiscal Milestone Years Ahead of Schedule

The US debt load has effectively doubled in under a decade, rising from roughly $19.4 trillion ten years ago to $40 trillion now. It took the country close to two centuries to accumulate its first trillion dollars of debt; it now adds that amount in under five months. Interest payments on the debt have grown large enough to exceed the entire US national defense budget, a threshold that budget hawks in Washington have flagged as a warning sign of fiscal strain.

Part of what pushed the milestone earlier than expected was a shortfall in tariff revenue after several of the White House’s trade levies were invalidated in court, cutting into a funding stream the administration had counted on. Treasury reported a monthly deficit of $432.3 billion in July, the highest since March 2021, with the year-to-date shortfall nearing $1.8 trillion.

Long-term borrowing costs have moved with the debt. The 30-year Treasury yield touched its highest level since 2007 this month, at 5.31 percent, while the 10-year sits near 4.7 percent. Those yields are not abstract numbers confined to Washington; they set the benchmark price of global capital, including the capital that flows into and out of Thai bonds and equities.

Rising Yields, Global Ripple Effects

Elevated US yields tend to pull capital toward dollar assets and away from emerging markets, Thailand included. TBN has previously examined the fragility signals building beneath record-high global equity markets, noting that concentration risk in US indices and stretched valuations leave the current wave of capital flowing into Southeast Asia more exposed than headline numbers suggest. A further leg up in US yields, driven by concerns over debt sustainability, would test that inflow directly.

The mechanism is already visible in Thai bond markets. The 10-year Thai government bond yield has climbed toward 2.3 percent this year, its highest level since February 2025, as the spread over comparable US Treasuries, currently around 200 basis points, keeps global funds calibrating their exposure to Thai fixed income against what Washington is paying. Foreign investors pulled over a billion dollars out of Thai bonds in a single month earlier this year during a bout of global risk aversion, a reminder of how quickly sentiment can turn when US rate expectations shift.

The Baht, Capital Flows, and Thai Debt Servicing

The interest-rate gap between the Federal Reserve and the Bank of Thailand has been the dominant force behind the baht’s moves in 2026. With the Fed’s policy range sitting 250 to 275 basis points above the BOT’s 1.00 percent rate, the dollar has retained a structural carry advantage that has periodically pushed USD/THB toward the 34 level. TBN has tracked this dynamic through the year, noting that Thailand’s roughly $279 billion in gross reserves provide a substantial buffer, meaning the current pressure looks more like a repricing than a funding crisis.

A US debt trajectory that keeps Treasury yields elevated, or pushes them higher still as investors demand greater compensation for holding US paper, would work against any near-term narrowing of that rate gap. That matters for the BOT, which has generally leaned toward an accommodative policy stance to support a fragile domestic recovery; a widening differential limits how much room the central bank has to cut further without triggering renewed baht weakness.

For the Thai government’s own borrowing, the read-through is more indirect but still relevant. Thailand’s public debt-to-GDP ratio stood at roughly 64 percent in the most recent fiscal year, low by comparison with many advanced economies, and the government funds the bulk of its needs domestically. But global benchmark yields still act as a floor beneath what Thailand pays to borrow, particularly for the growing share of debt issued to fund stimulus and energy-relief measures. The Public Debt Management Office has already leaned on notes and term loans this year as a liquidity cushion amid rising yields, a sign that Thailand is not entirely insulated from the global repricing of sovereign risk that a $40 trillion US debt load represents.

Thailand’s Relative Position

Set against Washington’s numbers, Thailand’s fiscal position looks comparatively conservative. Thai government debt equal to roughly 64 percent of GDP compares with a US debt load now approaching the full size of American GDP, a threshold economists have long treated as a red flag for fiscal sustainability. Thailand’s debt is also overwhelmingly baht-denominated and domestically held, reducing the currency-mismatch risk that has destabilized other emerging economies during past periods of dollar strength.

That relative discipline has not fully insulated Thai assets from global spillover, as the SET Index’s sharp swings this year illustrate, but it does give Thai policymakers more flexibility than counterparts in more heavily indebted economies. Bangkok’s growing appeal to global wealth, documented in TBN’s recent look at the city’s ultra-high-net-worth population growth, reflects in part a search for stability and institutional credibility at a moment when confidence in the fiscal trajectory of larger economies is being openly questioned.

What to Watch

The US debt path is likely to shape several storylines relevant to Thailand and the wider region over the coming months. The Federal Reserve’s rate decisions will remain the single biggest swing factor for the dollar-baht rate gap, with any hawkish surprise driven by inflation or fiscal concerns adding further pressure on the baht. Washington’s next debt-ceiling fight is also likely to arrive earlier than usual given the accelerated pace of borrowing, a recurring source of volatility for global risk assets. And with foreign holders of US debt watching yields climb to multi-decade highs, any shift in appetite for Treasuries, from China, Japan, or other major holders, would ripple quickly into emerging-market currencies and bond spreads, Thailand’s included.

For now, Thailand’s reserves, current account position, and comparatively modest public debt load offer a cushion. But a US fiscal trajectory adding trillions of dollars in debt every few months is a structural headwind that Thai policymakers, businesses, and investors will need to keep watching closely.