5 Things to Know Before the Opening Bell 6/18/25
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Hi, I'm Becky Quick, co-host of Squawk Box. Today I'm with Joe Kernan, and this is five things you need to know before today's opening bell. Israel and Iran trading airstrikes for the sixth straight day. Current and former Trump administration officials tell NBC News that the president is considering a range of options, including a possible U.S. strike on Iran.

Amazon's chief executive, Andy Jassy, says that the company's corporate workforce will shrink in the coming years as Amazon adopts more generative AI tools and agents. In a memo to employees, Jassy said, we will need fewer people doing some of the jobs that are being done today and more people doing other types of jobs.

New York City Democratic mayoral candidate Brad Lander has been released from custody after he was arrested by federal agents at an immigration court in Manhattan. Lander had linked arms with the person that authorities were trying to detain. Lander's wife posted on X that the New York City controller had been escorting a defendant out of court. He needed a boost. I mean, his campaign needed a boost. That other guy's coming on strong.

Cuomo is like they're buying ads about that young guy that they're calling radical. The guy who's like a communist? Yeah, wants to defund the police. AOC endorsed him. Some other guy endorsed him. But Brad, you know, worked. He was on CNN last night. CNN last night. Got the call immediately from the booker.

- Hmm, yeah. - How many more? How many more times is this gonna happen? It's like a, it's a thing, it's a trend. It's gonna keep happening. You are guaranteed to be on CNN. - He was apparently right next to Governor Kathy Hochul from New York too. - Look, he told me. - All right, the Senate passing a bill to regulate US dollar peg stable coins. It's known as the Genius Act. Attention now turns to the House, which is working on getting its own stable coin bill.

And the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office says that President Trump's package of tax cuts would increase deficits by $2.8 trillion over the next decade after including other economic effects. Congressional Republicans argue that tax cuts would spur economic growth and overcome any revenue that the government stands to lose. Like 68 votes for the stable coin. Oh, right. 68 to 30, I think, was the vote in the... Oh, my God.

Just to say that's shocking. Isn't it? That is backed by bipartisan. Yeah. And that you can actually go ahead and back it up and audit these things. It's a good idea. And there's some people who think the stable point actually boosts the boost the U.S. dollar and because you need these liquid assets to pass it up. If you really are, you know, hopefully it's not like they can audit it under these two. There'd be a way to make sure you can go through an audit of what they actually have.

We'll be back later today with Squawk Pod, our daily podcast featuring the best of Squawk Box. Stay tuned to your feed wherever you get your podcasts and listen anytime.

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