Chip makers and tech investors such as Samsung and SoftBank plunge as potential interest rate hikes spook markets

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• Larry Elliott: the global economy is muddling through. But a storm is coming

An accelerating sell-off of AI-linked shares has hit global markets, as fears over rising inflation and future interest rate hikes spooked traders already wary of the heavily indebted sector.

South Korea’s benchmark Kospi 200 index, which is heavily skewed towards the companies that make memory chips, fell more than 8% overnight to a six-month closing low, triggering circuit breakers that brought trading to a halt at various points.

High valuations and debt put sector in danger, while fund also warns on government borrowing and cyber-attacks

• IMF warns global economy ‘could soon test the limits of resilience’

The threat of an AI share price crash rippling out across global markets is putting world financial stability at risk, the International Monetary fund has warned.

In its twice-yearly Global Financial Stability Report, the IMF highlighted the sky-high valuations for AI companies along with their increasing debt pile as one reason that risks in the system are “elevated”.

Boaz Weinstein’s hedge fund is waging an aggressive campaign against the FTSE 250’s Baillie Gifford US Growth Trust

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Here we go again: another episode in the Saba saga, the story of a New York hedge fund causing havoc in the UK investment trust sector by taking big stakes in funds and then demanding change, often in only vague terms.

The best that can be said about Saba Capital (and it’s not much) is that its belligerent boss, Boaz Weinstein, has disturbed the complacency that used to infect corners of the UK investment trust world, meaning companies that invest in other companies. It is now harder for a board to do nothing if the share price sits at a wide discount to the value of the underlying assets for long periods.