NEW YORK (AP) — NASCAR Hall of Famer Kurt Busch wiped tears from his eyes in recalling the final day he spent at his younger brother’s hospital bedside in his first public comments about Kyle Busch’s death.
“I was at the hospital. I was there all day, hoping, praying, hoping for a turnaround,” Busch said in an interview on NBC’s “Today” show on Friday.
“I said, ‘I got you man. Come on, I got you. I got you. Come on, be strong,’” an emotional Busch added, before a brief pause. “It just wasn’t fair.”
The interview marked Busch’s first comments since Kyle Busch died on May 21 after severe pneumonia progressed into sepsis, resulting in rapid and overwhelming complications. Busch’s death at the age of 41 devastated the racing community and one of NASCAR’s most accomplished families. The borthers were born in Las Vegas.
Kyle Busch won Cup Series championships in 2015 and 2019 for Joe Gibbs Racing, and holds the record in winning 234 combined races across NASCAR’s top three national series. His older brother was a Cup champion in 2004 and inducted this year into the Hall of Fame.
In the interview, Busch outlined how his brother became increasingly ill while practicing in a simulator on May 20. Asked by his crew chief whether he was OK, Busch responded no and he was taken to a hospital by ambulance.
Kyle Busch initially believed he was dealing with a sinus cold while racing at Watkins Glen, New York, on May 10. He continued competing, including winning a Truck Series race at Dover, Delaware, less than a week before he died. Kurt Busch said their father, Tom Busch, chose not to be at the hospital in order to “remember him the way he wanted to remember him.”
“There is no book, there is no outline on what we’re supposed to do right now,” Kurt Busch said, before recalling the on-track chemistry he had with his brother.
“Him and I were carbon copies of each other. We could speak on track without saying a word,” he said. “I miss the words we never spoke to each other, and the vibe that we had on track.”
Busch said he’s now mentoring his nephew, Kyle’s 11-year-old son Brexton, who has taken up racing.
“He’s a prodigy,” Busch said. “He can be a big start in the world of motorsports. He’s 11, but he’s already racing like an 18-year-old.”
As for his brother’s legacy, Busch said the achievements speak for themselves.
“It’s already there. Winningest driver in NASCAR history in all the series,” Busch said.
“The tenacity that he had. It was every day, 24-7, to help people in the latter part of his career, to be a great father like he was,” he added. “It will all shine as time puts different things in spotlights.”
See AP’s full auto racing coverage here
FILE - Kyle Busch, left, and Kurt Busch, right, greet fans as they are introduced before the NASCAR Daytona 500 auto race at Daytona International Speedway in Daytona Beach, Fla., Feb. 18, 2018. (AP Photo/John Raoux, File)
FILE - Kurt Busch, front, gets a hug from his brother, Kyle Busch, after announcing his retirement before a NASCAR Cup Series auto race at Daytona International Speedway, Aug. 26, 2023, in Daytona Beach, Fla. (AP Photo/Phelan M. Ebenhack, File)
NEW YORK (AP) — U.S. stocks are rising Friday and trimming their losses from what’s been a shaky week. The bond market, which has been the center of Wall Street’s action, remains jumpy, but yields are not moving as much as earlier in the week and are helping to keep financial markets relatively calm.
The S&P 500 rose 0.5% and was on track for just its second gain in the six days since setting its all-time high last week. The Dow Jones Industrial Average was up 424 points, or 0.8%, as of 12:37 p.m. Eastern time, and the Nasdaq composite was 0.5% higher.
Ross Stores helped lead the way and climbed 5.2% after reporting stronger profit and revenue for the latest quarter than analysts expected. CEO Jim Conroy said it saw both an increase in new customers and more interest from existing customers, while the off-price retailer at the same time benefited from refunds on tariffs.
Most U.S. companies have reported bigger profits for the spring than analysts expected, which has helped drive the stock market’s run to records recently. Stock prices tend to follow the path of corporate profits over the long term.
The other big lever that helps set stock prices is interest rates, which have been much shakier.
After soaring through the summer and then hesitating earlier this week following a surprise announcement that the U.S. Treasury Department will repurchase more longer-term bonds, yields remained unsettled in the bond market on Friday.
The yield on the 10-year Treasury rose to 4.73% from 4.69% late Thursday after yo-yoing repeatedly between that level and 4.68% in the overnight and early-morning hours. The moves, though, were less sharp than earlier in the week, like when the 10-year yield lost 0.06 percentage points and the 30-year yield dropped nearly 0.10 percentage points on Wednesday.
Contributing to Friday's moves was continued uncertainty about when the war with Iran will allow oil tankers to freely exit the Persian Gulf again. That caused oil prices to flip between gains and losses, which directly affected Treasury yields because higher prices raise worries about inflation.
The price for a barrel of Brent crude oil was most recently up 0.2% at $93.96.
One of the biggest beneficiaries of U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent’s move to increase the planned repurchases of Treasurys is bitcoin. Cryptocurrencies often rise when interest rates are lower and more money is flowing through the financial system.
Bitcoin has climbed above $77,000 from less than $63,000 a week ago. That helped stocks in the crypto industry lead Wall Street. Robinhood Markets jumped 11.9%, and Coinbase Global gained 9.2%.
The price of gold also climbed and topped $4,660 per ounce from less than $4,440 a week earlier. When Treasurys are no longer paying much more in yield, they get less of an advantage in investors’ eyes over gold, which pays its holders nothing.
That helped drive stocks of miners higher. Newmont climbed 3.4%, and Freeport-McMoRan jumped 6.6%.
They helped offset drop of 8.6% for OSI Systems, which sells security screening equipment to airports and other specialized electronic systems. It reported weaker revenue for the latest quarter than analysts expected, and CEO Ajay Mehra said it was hurt by “the Middle East conflicts which shifted the timing of certain planned deliveries.”
Boston Beer sank 4% after the seller of Samuel Adams and Dogfish Head said its chief financial officer is leaving the company and announced an interim replacement.
In stock markets abroad, indexes rose in much of Asia and Europe. Hong Kong’s Hang Seng rose 1.2%, and South Korea’s Kospi climbed 0.9% for two of the world’s bigger moves.
AP Business Writers Chan Ho-him and Michelle Chapman contributed to this report.
Options traders Chris Dattolo, Scott Frinzi, Justin Kanda, and Ravi Bhandari, left to right, work on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange, Monday, Aug. 17, 2026, in New York. (AP Photo/Yuki Iwamura)
Options trader Anthony Spina works on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange, Monday, Aug. 17, 2026, in New York. (AP Photo/Yuki Iwamura)
Currency traders watch monitors near a screen showing the Korea Composite Stock Price Index (KOSPI) and the foreign exchange rate between U.S. dollar and South Korean won at the foreign exchange dealing room of the Hana Bank headquarters in Seoul, South Korea, Friday, Aug. 21, 2026. (AP Photo/Ahn Young-joon)
A currency trader watches monitors near a screen showing the Korea Composite Stock Price Index (KOSPI) and the foreign exchange rate between U.S. dollar and South Korean won at the foreign exchange dealing room of the Hana Bank headquarters in Seoul, South Korea, Friday, Aug. 21, 2026. (AP Photo/Ahn Young-joon)
Currency traders work at the foreign exchange dealing room of the Hana Bank headquarters in Seoul, South Korea, Friday, Aug. 21, 2026. (AP Photo/Ahn Young-joon)
