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Kate Moody is here with us in studio. Good to have you with us tonight, Kate. Hi, Sharon. You're starting off with trade ministers from the group of seven. They've been meeting here in Paris amid a backdrop of geopolitical tension and renewed tariff uncertainty. Yeah, really trying to find some common ground there. And they do seem to have found it in their efforts to secure critical mineral supply chains and break China's hold in their production. European ministers said though they were concerned about US President Donald Trump's latest threat to raise tariffs on EU cars from 15 to 25% and they urged him to comply with a long delayed trade deal that was reached last year.
Yukaroyer has more. Gathering under the enormous shadow of the Iran war, G7 trade ministers sought ways to protect and bolster supply chains. Every day the straight of Hormuz is closed costs us money. High energy costs, broken supply chains, and rising costs for our production are the result. Members of the elite club of industrialized nations, Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, the UK, and the US are navigating through weak growth, rising inflation, and competition from China. While never mentioning it by
name, the ministers clearly took aim at Beijing's trade practices. Their joint communicate peppered with terms like non-market policies and practices, pervasive, opaque, and harmful industrial subsidies, unfair competition, and economic coercion, notably when it comes to critical minerals. China has a near monopoly on the rare earth's industry and last year sent shock waves across supply chains by imposing export curves on the commodity that's crucial for modern manufacturing. Postnation France placed efforts to reduce dependence on China for critical minerals as a central topic. It's about the need to secure our supply chains and not be held hostage by certain countries that overwhelmingly dominate the extraction, refining, and
market for rare earths and critical minerals. However, it's becoming increasingly difficult for the G7 to speak with one voice as Washington's trade policies have driven the rift among its members. Last week, Donald Trump threatened to slap a 25% tariff on EU car exports just as the block's member states were preparing to ratify a bilateral trade deal agreed last year. New data from the aviation analytics firm Citriium shows that globally airlines have canled 13,000 flights scheduled for May and cut 2 million seats, mostly from switching to smaller aircraft over a period of just 2 weeks.
It's a warning sign ahead of the summer season, which analysts warn is likely to be disrupted, especially if the Iran conflict drags on. The price of jet fuel has jumped even more than crude oil since the start of that war, over $180 per barrel. That's more than double the price this time a year ago. Middle East refineries provide around 3/4 of Europe's jet fuel. And the International Energy Agency has warned that supplies in Europe could run out within weeks. Here in France, the government has been meeting with representatives of the aviation industry to discuss supplies and prices. Finance Minister Roland Leuro downplayed those concerns, saying that French carriers do have enough supplies for May and June.
Is there a risk beyond that? Probably very little, because there's no reason why the versatility we've been implementing for the past 3 months should come to an end. If that were the case, of course, what we've said is that we have strategic reserves. As you know, at this point, we've used very little of the strategic reserves for diesel, 2 million out of the 90 million barrels we have in total, and none at all for jet fuel. Let's check in on the day trading action now. Oil prices have fallen around 7% on reports that the US and Iran are examining a 14point deal to end the war.
It's a US WTI just over $95 at the close. The international benchmark Brent crude still above 100. That has given a boost to European stock markets. We saw gains of between two and nearly 3% in each London, Paris and Frankfurt earlier. Wall Street has also closed higher, gains of 1 to 2% across the board there. The S&P 500 with a record close. Shares of the chipmaker AMD soared 18% as it raised its forecast for the second quarter. Earlier on Wednesday, shares of Samsung also jumped 14% as it officially passed the threshold to become a trillion dollar company. That did push South Korea's Cosby index to a new high.
The US Food and Drug Administration has made a major U-turn on vaping, saying it will authorize fruit flavored ecigarettes for adults. The decision applies to a small manufacturer that's based in California, but it could open the door for others to make and market flavored vapes. The FDA had previously only approved tobacco and menthol flavors. The campaign for tobaccof free kids was among the activist groups expressing dismay, saying the FDA decision puts at risk the progress our nation has made in reducing youth ecigarette use. it conflicts with overwhelming scientific evidence and the FDA's own repeated conclusions that flavors pose a substantial risk to young people." End quote. Uh now, according to
the Wall Street Journal, President Trump himself had personally been lobbying the FDA about this. In the past, he had vowed to save vaping if he was elected. That led Sharon to some endorsements from ecigarette companies. Uh it is known that a lot of young MAGA supporters do in fact use these flavored vapes. But the fear about this particular move uh is that they'll start to appeal to people who are certainly uh below voting age. Uh 1.4 million middle and high schoolers in the United States say that they do vape. Kate, thanks so much for that. That's our senior business editor, Kit
