5 Things to Know Ahead of the Opening Bell 2/23/26

0:00Introducing the Total Solutions Advantage only from Comcast Business. It's the largest, fastest fiber-powered network for small business. Gig speeds with equipment and security included, and a five-year price lock. No one does business like Comcast Business. Switch today. Get started for$60 a month for 12 months when you add an advanced solution to a qualifying internet package. Limited time offer. Restrictions apply. New customers only. Requires 300 megabits per second internet, security edge, and additional qualifying service. One-year agreement, paperless billing, and auto pay with bank account required.

0:29Taxes and fees extra. Hey, Fidelity. How can I remember to invest every month? With the Fidelity app, you can choose a schedule and set up recurring investments in stocks and ETFs. Oh, that sounds easier than I thought. You got this. Yeah, I do. Now, where did I put my keys? You will find them where you left them. Investing involves risk, including risk of loss. Fidelity Brokerage Services, LLC. Member NYSE SIPC.

1:01Hi, I'm Andrew Osorkin, co-host of Squawk Box. Today, I'm with Joe Kernan, and this is five things to know before today's opening bell. U.S. Customs says it's going to stop collecting President Trump's reciprocal tariffs early this morning, and the Supreme Court ruled that those tariffs are illegal. In response, the president now says he's going to impose a 15 percent global tax, and he can do that for the next 150 days before having to look for other ways to implement tariffs. Meantime, the TSA says that pre-check airport screening lanes are operational in the United States. That's a change after the Department of Homeland Security had said early yesterday that faster security checkpoints were paused amid the ongoing partial government shutdown.

1:44And Axios is reporting that Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth will meet with Anthropics CEO Dario Amodei at the Pentagon tomorrow. Sources telling Axios that meeting likely to focus on the terms for the military's use of Anthropics clawed AI, saying it will likely not be a friendly sit down. And Goldman Sachs raising its end of year projections for the price of Brent crude and WTI by six dollars a barrel in the fourth quarter of this year. The bank sees Brent at 60 dollars and WTI at 56 dollars. But the forecast assumes no supply disruptions related to Iran and dark comedy one battle after another, taking high honors at Britain's Great Britain's top movie awards.

2:29It won for best film and best director. The BAFTAs are seen as a good indicator of what could happen at the Academy Awards next month. I want to say this meeting with Dario and Pete Hegseth is a super important meeting because the Pentagon is currently using Claude AI. And one of of things that's so interesting about um anthropic which is different than open ai and some of the other uh models joe is is just this idea that they wanted to preserve uh certain rights over how their models are used that that even though they have a contract with the pentagon they can't be used in certain ways if in fact they continue down the path of just of trying to either create a board or some kind of model which i assume pete hegseth is going to say hey if it's legal if you're contracting us, we can do whatever we want.

3:19It'd be very interesting to see whether the Pentagon's going to threaten to either break that deal with Claude. Interestingly, Claude is the best model currently out there. So if you wanted the government to have access to the best model, that's the one. Across the board, not just for certain things. I think for what the Pentagon is trying to do right now. For the Pentagon. And probably even more broadly in this moment. I'm looking for a new AI. I'm looking for a new chatbot. Again. It may be that Gemini or OpenAI becomes better in the next month or two, and they are going to keep going back and forth, back and forth.

3:51But it also means that maybe they'd be able to break their contracts. Also, interestingly, Claude is used in Microsoft. So, for example, Microsoft is now using it in a certain way. I mean, it could break the whole sort of ecosystem. By the way, Microsoft has a contract with the Pentagon, too. Other tech companies. So the sort of the role that Anthropic plays in this is going to be super important in terms of how this technology ultimately gets used. It's going to be very interesting to see what happens after all this. We're going to be back later today with an all-new Squawk Pod, our daily podcast featuring the best of Squawk Box.

4:24Check it out wherever you get your podcasts and listen anytime.

4:34Introducing Fidelity Trader Plus. With customizable tools and charts you can access across all your devices. Try our most powerful trading platform yet at fidelity.com slash trader plus. Investing involves risk, including risk of loss. Fidelity Brokerage Services, LLC. Member NYSE SIPC.