Evening Brief, Wednesday 28 October

Spain began examining why two trains were allowed back into normal circulation before they collided at Urda, on the Madrid to Seville high-speed line. Emergency services said a Renfe AVE and an Iryo train crashed at the station, and Castilla-La Mancha raised the toll to 68 dead with dozens injured. The region activated its emergency plan, and the government declared three days of mourning after Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez visited the scene.

Transport Minister Óscar Puente said the LZB safety system had failed and left a 63 km stretch without normal control. Trains had first stopped automatically, but Adif operators at the Atocha control centre then authorised service to resume despite a 40 km/h speed limit and a red warning showing the Iryo train still occupied the track. The Renfe train covered about 25 km before the impact, likely at more than 100 km/h, and Puente declined to discuss resignation while investigators piece together the chain of decisions.

Sánchez promised a thorough investigation and framed the crash as a national disaster. The Spanish football federation postponed 24 Copa del Rey fixtures scheduled for Wednesday night, while European officials offered help and condolences.

Israel's polling-station ballots have all been counted, and the result gives neither main camp a route to government. Benjamin Netanyahu's bloc holds 53 seats in the 120-seat Knesset, Gadi Eisenkot's Change bloc has 48 and parties led by Arab representatives hold 19. That leaves both Netanyahu and Eisenkot short of the 61 seats needed to govern, before about 650,000 double-envelope ballots are added to the total.

Those envelopes come from soldiers, hospitalised voters, diplomats abroad, detainees and other groups whose ballots need a second check. Asaf Shapira of the Israel Democracy Institute told N12 that religious right-wing parties usually gain from that count, but he expects no basic change because neither main bloc is near a majority. Michael Milshtein, a former Israeli intelligence colonel, told Adnkronos that new elections look the most likely outcome, though he also described unity talks between Eisenkot and Netanyahu as one possible path.

The first tactical fight may be over the Knesset speaker. Channel 12 reported that Eisenkot's bloc wants to combine its votes with Arab parties to replace Amir Ohana of Likud, though no shared candidate has been agreed. Under the Basic Law, the president starts consultations within seven days of final results being published and then gives one lawmaker 28 days to try to assemble a majority.

The Dutch TTF gas benchmark rose above €100 per megawatt-hour in Amsterdam, its first trip to that level since 2022. ANSA put the contract at €100.04, up 4.1%, while other outlets recorded similar prices and a session high of €100.30. Brent crude also traded above $115 a barrel, keeping pressure on governments that are already trying to shield households from high energy bills.

The move follows the war between the United States, Israel and Iran, which has almost halted LNG deliveries from the Persian Gulf. Qatar has cancelled shipments under force majeure, and traders see little progress on reopening the Strait of Hormuz before winter. European prices have more than tripled from €31.70 on the last trading day before the conflict began, while Asian buyers have paid up for cargoes and pulled supply away from Europe.

Storage makes the price shock harder to absorb. Gas Infrastructure Europe put EU sites at 74.9% full on 27 October, compared with 82.9% at a similar point last year, and Germany's reserves stood at 61.6%. ICIS expects Hormuz to stay closed until March 2027 and forecasts prices around €100 in November, with a severe winter pushing them near €130 early next year.

John Healey used his first Budget to raise the bank surcharge from 3% to 6%, lifting lenders' effective corporation tax rate to 31% for 15 months from January 2027. The increase is smaller than markets had feared, and shares in Lloyds, NatWest and Barclays rose in London. The Financial Times said the levy should raise £305m this financial year and almost £1bn next year.

The money funds a £100 household energy payment for about 20m homes in council tax bands A to D in England, at a cost of £2.6bn. Healey also extended a VAT cut on electricity until July, moved green levies from household bills into general taxation and said standing charges on gas bills will be scrapped from 2027. Savers and landlords face a further 2 percentage-point tax rise on income from savings and property from next April.

Healey cut fiscal headroom to £15bn in 2029-30, down from the £22bn set by Rachel Reeves last year, after the Office for Budget Responsibility lowered its growth forecast. Fuel duty stays frozen for a 16th year, gambling taxes rise and public investment vehicles receive another £20.4bn over coming years.

Washington has told several Gulf countries to prepare for a short but intense military campaign against Iran after the US midterm elections on 3 November, according to the Wall Street Journal. The warnings passed through diplomatic and military channels, while the White House said Donald Trump is keeping all options open to stop Iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon. The Defense Department said its job is to give the president such options.

US forces are also shifting. A Patriot air-defence system is moving from Texas to Israel, exposed American units have left some Middle East bases, and munitions stocks are being replenished. Bombers, fighters, a carrier strike group and a Marine expeditionary unit are being readied for possible use, though Trump has not made a final decision and regional mediators still push a deal to reopen the Strait of Hormuz.

The cost of the existing war has already reached $47.1bn through 16 October, according to Pentagon figures shared with Congress and reported by The New York Times. That is more than 25% above Pete Hegseth's July estimate of $37.5bn. More than 60% of spending goes on munitions, and replacing bombs, missiles and other weapons used in the conflict costs more than $29bn.

Argentina's migration agency confirmed that Flávio Bolsonaro and his family entered the country late on Tuesday through Misiones province, crossing the Tancredo Neves bridge from Foz do Iguaçu to Puerto Iguazú at 22:50. Forty minutes later, they boarded a private Baires Fly aircraft whose flight plan listed Guayaquil, Ecuador, as the destination. Brazilian outlet Metrópoles reported instead that Bolsonaro reached Florida and met his brother Eduardo Bolsonaro there.

Donald Trump said on Wednesday that he would agree to a visa for Bolsonaro and would be fine with it. A State Department spokesperson told Europa Press that Marco Rubio's department will issue visas to the senator and his family. The comments followed Lula's runoff victory, after which Justice Alexandre de Moraes ordered the seizure of Bolsonaro's Brazilian and Italian passports, according to ANSA.

Brazilian police have annulled the passports, and the Supreme Court ordered an investigation into alleged foreign financing of Bolsonaro's campaign and manipulation of social media algorithms. ANSA also reported that he is being investigated on suspicion of money laundering with his lawyer, Willer Tomaz. Lula called the departure shameful and said Bolsonaro should have stayed in Brazil to prove the accusations false.