Good evening and welcome to Markets Desk, your close-of-day read on what moved the needle today.
Russia launched what its defense ministry described as a massive strike on Ukraine using long-range precision weapons and attack drones, prompting Poland to scramble jets and Finland to restrict its airspace. The scale of the assault marks a significant escalation and is already weighing on European risk sentiment heading into tomorrow's open.
On the ground, Ukraine's defense minister says disrupted Russian supply routes are now forcing Kremlin troops to walk eighteen miles to reach the front lines — a march of six to eight hours under full combat gear. That kind of logistical breakdown points to meaningful degradation of Russian operational capacity in the south, and it suggests Ukraine's interdiction campaign is finding real traction.
Shifting to health care, Vertex Pharmaceuticals picked up an expanded FDA approval for its gene-editing therapy CASGEVY, now cleared for patients as young as two years old with sickle cell disease and transfusion-dependent beta thalassemia. This broadens the addressable patient population considerably and strengthens Vertex's position at the leading edge of genetic medicine, a space investors have watched closely for durable growth.
That's the tape. Markets Desk, signing off the floor.
