Related articles
National News
CNBC blindsided as Musk abruptly bails on live interview while SpaceX shares freefall
CNBC was left holding the bag on Friday when Elon Musk abruptly backed out of a live, heavily promoted interview moments before it was set to air, as SpaceX shares slid below the price of their first public trade.
The network had spent the morning teasing the sit-down, billed as Musk's first television interview since SpaceX went public. Anchor Scott Wapner threw to correspondent Julia Boorstin at the Allen & Co. gathering in Sun Valley, Idaho, to explain why it suddenly wasn't happening.
"We've been promoting this exclusive interview that Elon Musk was expected to give to our Julia Boorstin, which is now apparently no longer happening. I want to bring in Julia Boorstin, who's been in Sun Valley. Julia, do you want to explain to us exactly what happened here, as this was imminent?" said Wapner.
"Yeah, we were expecting to start an interview with Elon Musk right now at noon Eastern. We just got word that he has to postpone," Boorstin replied, adding that the network hopes Musk will offer a new time.
Boorstin noted that SpaceX shares were trading below the level of their very first trade and well off the highs the stock reached after its record June debut. As she spoke, shares were off nearly 3% at around $148. SpaceX priced its IPO at $135 and opened at $150 on June 12 before surging in its opening sessions, then slipping back below that opening level as it was pulled into major market indexes.
She said there was plenty she had hoped to raise, including Grok 4.5, the AI model Musk's company launched Wednesday, and how SpaceX is holding down customer prices as component costs climb. That thread would have followed a CNBC interview a day earlier with OpenAI's Sam Altman about efficiency gains in his company's newest models.
Wapner called it an unfortunate development and said the network would report any update.
National News
Trump insults Zelensky to his face during NATO meeting
At the NATO summit in Turkey Wednesday, President Donald Trump called Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy a "difficult character" directly to his face, then laughed awkwardly at his own comment.
During brief remarks before media questions, as he pointed to Zelenskyy, Trump said, "We've settled a lot of wars, and this one is the one that I thought maybe would be the easiest, but Putin's a difficult character, and this guy's a difficult character!"
Unlike Trump's apparent amusement at the jab, Zelenskyy remained stone-faced and stoic, glaring at the President without reciprocating the laughter.
“It's not the easiest thing,” Trump acknowledged.
He continued, "There's a lot of commitment and there's a lot of love of the countries and everything else," and claimed progress had been made in recent weeks.
The tense exchange highlighted the strained dynamics between the two leaders during peace negotiations.
Watch the video below.
