Gold extended gains to a third straight session on Thursday, supported by rising expectations of an interest rate cut by the US Federal Reserve in September following tame inflation data, which also weighed on the dollar.

Spot gold rose 0.4 per cent to $3,367.53 per ounce as of 0156 GMT. US gold futures for December delivery added 0.3 per cent to $3,416.70.

Read-UAE Central Bank boosts gold reserves by over 19% in Q1

“Markets are pricing in the chance that the Fed cuts 50 basis points in September. So the dollar’s weakening, gold’s going up as a result, yields are also down,” said Kyle Rodda, Capital.com’s financial market analyst.

“The technical setup of gold looks really constructive. The trend still looks higher. We just basically need to see the market break through $3,400 level on a sustained basis.”

The dollar languished near multi-week lows against its rivals, making gold less expensive for holders of other currencies. Benchmark US 10-year Treasury yields held near a one-week low.

US consumer prices rose only marginally in July, strengthening expectations of a Fed rate cut next month, with Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent noting there is a good chance the central bank will opt for a 50 bps reduction.

Traders now see a cut on September 17 as a near certainty, according to data compiled by LSEG, and even lay around 6 per cent odds on a super-sized half-point trim.

Non-yielding gold thrives in a low-interest-rate environment.

Investors are awaiting the US economic data due later this week, including the US Producer Price Index, weekly jobless claims and retail sales data for clues into the Fed’s rate path.

Dubai International Airport (DXB) expects to handle more than 3.6 million passengers between August 13 and August 25 as families return from summer holidays and students travel ahead of the new school year, says operator Dubai Airports.

Daily passenger traffic is expected to average 280,000 during the period, with the busiest day forecast for Friday, August 15, when numbers are set to exceed 290,000.

The travel surge comes after a record-breaking H1 2025, when Dubai welcomed 9.88 million international overnight visitors, a 6 per cent rise from a year earlier, and DXB processed more than 46 million passengers, maintaining its position as the world’s busiest airport for international traffic.

Read: DXB welcomes 46 million passengers in H1 2025

DXB prepares itself for the rush

Dubai Airports said it is working with its “oneDXB” community, which includes airlines, control authorities, and commercial and service partners, to ensure smooth passenger flows during the peak.

The airport issued travel tips for arrivals, including the use of Smart Gates for passengers over 12 years old to speed up passport control, keeping documents ready, and using the Dubai Metro, taxis, or ride-hailing services for onward journeys.

DXB also highlighted amenities including lounges, shopping, dining, and duty-free options, as well as enhanced accessibility support such as marked routes, discreet assistance for travellers with Sunflower Lanyards, and an Assisted Travel Lounge in Terminal 2.

Drake & Scull International (DSI) has reported a sharp drop in profitability for the first half of 2025, posting a net profit of Dhs6.5m compared to Dhs3.8bn in the same period last year. The prior-year result was heavily boosted by a one-time gain linked to the company’s agreed restructuring plan.

The MEP, oil and gas, and water and wastewater treatment contractor saw revenue climb 57 per cent year-on-year to Dhs77.9m, supported by project momentum in India, Tunisia, Romania, and Jordan. Gross profit rose to Dhs5.9m, up from Dhs3.7m a year earlier, on the back of improved cost management and execution.

Despite the top-line growth, general and administrative expenses increased to Dhs24.5m from Dhs21.2m, driven by higher legal, professional, and business development costs. Total assets declined 2.7 per cent to Dhs629.5m as of 30 June 2025, while total equity rose 4.4 per cent to Dhs158.4m. Cash and bank balances stood at Dhs309.2m.

Read: Drake & Scull enters real estate development with first Dubai project

Muin El Saleh, group CEO of Drake & Scull International, said: “Our performance in the first half of 2025 reflects the successful execution of our strategic priorities. The 57 per cent revenue growth demonstrates our ability to capitalize on opportunities in our core markets while maintaining disciplined cost management. We are particularly proud of our recent project awards, which include a landmark Dhs1bn contract in the UAE, the North Balqa Wastewater Treatment Plant in Jordan (Dhs215m), and a water treatment plant in Maharashtra, India (Dhs169m). These achievements showcase our diversified capabilities and strong market position across multiple sectors and geographies.”

He added: “The strong momentum from these significant wins provides a solid foundation for the second half of the year. We remain focused on delivering quality projects, optimizing our operations, and creating sustainable value for our shareholders.”

The results underline the impact of last year’s restructuring windfall on DSI’s bottom line, with the latest figures reflecting a more normalized earnings profile. The company continues to pursue its recovery strategy, securing new project awards while navigating higher operating costs and the legacy of its restructuring process.

SAP has announced a definitive agreement to acquire SmartRecruiters, a leading provider of talent acquisition (TA) software. Known for its strength in high-volume hiring, recruitment automation, and AI-driven candidate engagement, SmartRecruiters is expected to enhance the capabilities of the SAP SuccessFactors human capital management (HCM) suite.

The acquisition aims to provide customers with a more robust, all-in-one solution for hiring and retaining top talent in today’s fiercely competitive job market.

Read-UAE’s job boom: 56% of companies planning to hire

SmartRecruiters’ user-friendly interface and seamless workflows will complement SAP’s already comprehensive HR tools, offering improvements across decision-making, hiring speed, and candidate experience. The companies will integrate embedded analytics and AI-powered recommendations to unlock insights into talent pools, hiring bottlenecks, and workforce planning.

“Hiring the right people is not just an HR priority – it’s a business priority,” said Muhammad Alam, Executive Board Member, SAP SE, SAP Product & Engineering. “This planned acquisition will help our customers attract and hire top talent quickly and efficiently, while also reducing total cost of ownership.”

Customers will gain the ability to manage the full candidate journey—from sourcing and interviewing to onboarding—within a single, streamlined system.

Smarter, AI-powered hiring

The acquisition will also supercharge SAP’s recruiting and hiring features, introducing enhanced applicant tracking and AI-assisted candidate screening. Recruitment analytics will feed directly into SAP’s existing HCM ecosystem, delivering a unified system of record and harmonised data for efficient, compliant operations.

Importantly, the SmartRecruiters platform will continue to be available as a standalone offering for the foreseeable future, ensuring continuity for its existing customer base.

Global Reach, Shared Mission

With its cloud-based Software-as-a-Service solutions, SmartRecruiters supports over 4,000 organizations globally, enabling end-to-end hiring workflow management for recruiters, managers, and candidates alike.

“SmartRecruiters’ mission has always been to make hiring easy,” said Rebecca Carr, CEO of SmartRecruiters. “Joining forces with SAP is a massive opportunity to scale our impact and bring our best-in-class TA approach to more enterprises worldwide. We’re excited about what’s next.”

The deal is expected to close in Q4 2025, pending regulatory approvals and customary closing conditions. Financial details were not disclosed. JP Morgan acted as exclusive financial advisor to SmartRecruiters.

Core42 has made OpenAI’s latest open-weight AI models, including gpt-oss-20B and gpt-oss-120B, available on its AI Cloud platform, with instant access through the Core42 Compass API.

The deployment allows enterprises, researchers and developers to run the models on a choice of silicon platforms with sovereign, scalable and high-performance capabilities.

Integrated into the Compass API, Core42 said it delivers inference speeds of up to 3,000 tokens per second per user, enabling real-time AI at global scale while matching workloads with optimal infrastructure for price-performance and scalability.

The deployment is aimed at low-latency inference workloads and applications, underscoring the company’s focus on secure and optimised sovereign-enabled AI infrastructure.

“Core42 AI Cloud, powered by silicon-diverse infrastructure, delivers the flexibility and performance needed for today’s AI workloads,” said Kiril Evtimov, CEO of Core42 and group CTO of G42. “Through the Compass API, organisations can access the latest open-weight AI models and choose the optimal platform to scale transformation, optimise performance and cost, and drive progress across global markets.”

Key benefits of the open-weight deployment on Core42’s AI cloud

• Enterprise-scale performance for automation, decision-making and real-time AI at global scale.

• Sovereign-ready scalability for secure, in-country operations in regulated sectors such as healthcare, finance and national security.

• Optimised performance for committed infrastructure agreements, ensuring predictable cost and capacity.

• Cost-efficient agentic AI capabilities for in-country, sovereign-controlled deployments in cost-sensitive use cases.

Available now through the Compass API, the models can be run and adapted locally or in the cloud with options for transparency, fine-tuning and sovereign deployment.

The launch marks a step toward enterprise AI autonomy, giving businesses more control to adapt AI to specific needs and scale innovation.

The announcement follows G42 milestones including plans for a 5GW US-UAE AI campus, the launch of the 1GW Stargate UAE facility as Phase 1 of the project, and Microsoft’s $1.5bn investment in 2024, moves that reinforce the UAE’s position as a growing AI hub.