U.S. President Donald Trump on Thursday signed an executive order directing the Department of the Interior to rename Lake Ontario "Lake America," while Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney criticized the move, noting that the lake is called Lake Ontario "today and forever."
"We're gonna to be changing the name of Lake Ontario, effective immediately, to Lake America," Trump said in the Oval Office before signing the order.
The move came just two days after Trump said on social media that the United States is giving "serious consideration" to changing the name of Lake Ontario to "Lake America," citing that "we don't expect to be doing much business with Ontario any longer."
In response, Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney said Thursday that the name "Lake Ontario" carries a long history and that Canadians will always use this name regardless of external changes.
Carney wrote in a post on X that the name came from the Wendat word Ontari'io, which means "the lake is beautiful, the lake is big."
The name is more than 400 years old, "predating both the Confederation of Canada and the Declaration of Independence of the United States of America," added the prime minister.
"We know that America is changing. Their trading relationships, their foreign policies, their national monuments, their hydronyms," Carney said.
"Canadians also know that naming reality means calling it Lake Ontario -- then, now and always," he wrote.
Trump's attempt to rename the lake came as a recent breakdown in trade talks between the two countries led to new retaliatory tariffs.
The United States and Canada failed to reach a trade deal on Aug. 21, and the United States imposed a 50-percent tariff on about 20 billion U.S. dollars' worth of Canadian goods on Aug. 22.
Canada responded by announcing "dollar-for-dollar" retaliatory tariffs on imports from the United States, set to take effect on Sept. 8.
Lake Ontario, one of the five Great Lakes of North America, straddles the U.S.-Canada border, with the Canadian province of Ontario to the north and the U.S. state of New York to the south.
Canadian PM defends "Lake Ontario" name after Trump renaming order
Canadian PM defends "Lake Ontario" name after Trump renaming order
U.S. stocks ended higher on Thursday, propelled by a strong rally in technology shares after Nvidia delivered robust quarterly results that supported broader market optimism.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 105.56 points, or 0.2 percent, to 53,569.44. The Standard and Poor's 500 added 55.29 points, or 0.72 percent, to 7,730.99. The Nasdaq Composite Index increased by 411.16 points, or 1.57 percent, to 26,541.35.
However, 10 of the 11 primary Standard and Poor's 500 sectors actually ended in the red, with consumer staples and health leading the laggards by losing 1.5 percent and 1.1 percent, respectively. Technology bucked the trend, adding 3.4 percent.
Semiconductor and technology shares led the day's gains following earnings reports from Nvidia, Salesforce, and cybersecurity firm CrowdStrike. Nvidia surged 8.74 percent after the chipmaker reported a bottom-line beat and forecasted strong AI hardware demand extending into next year, reassuring investors about the sustainability of the AI infrastructure boom. The company's earnings momentum also lifted peers across the semiconductor ecosystem and provided a tailwind for utility and power producers supporting data center expansion.
Adding to investor focus, media reports indicated that Nvidia agreed to acquire open-source AI model hub Hugging Face for 12.9 billion U.S. dollars, following recent remarks from Nvidia Chief Executive Officer Jensen Huang emphasizing the company's aggressive expansion in AI software and infrastructure.
On the macroeconomic front, the U.S. Department of Labor reported that initial filings for state unemployment benefits dropped to a seasonally adjusted 203,000 for the week ending August 22. The reading came in lower than consensus forecasts of 208,000, underscoring continued strength in the domestic labor market.
Meanwhile, U.S. Treasury yields stabilized after spiking last week, as market participants evaluated recent federal intervention in the bond market and the outlook for Federal Reserve interest rate policy. All eyes are now turning to the central bank's annual economic symposium in Jackson Hole, Wyoming, where Fed Chairman Kevin Warsh is scheduled to deliver a keynote address on Friday.
In the retail sector, discount chains Dollar General and Dollar Tree both reported better-than-expected quarterly earnings, bolstered by an influx of middle and higher income shoppers seeking value, though their stock performances diverged based on differing forward guidance.
U.S. stocks climb after strong Nvidia earnings
