| October 03, 2022 | "Irreverent, but never irrelevant" | | |  | John Lothian
Publisher
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Hits & Takes
John Lothian & JLN Staff
Louis Bournakis, the owner of Ceres Cafe in the CBOT Building, has passed away at the age of 96. Bournakis continued to work into his 90s and could be regularly seen at the popular restaurant and watering hole. Condolences to the Bournakis family and the friends of Lou on his passing.
Condolences also go to CFTC Commissioner Summer K. Mersinger, who lost her grandmother, Margaret Marone, recently. She shared on LinkedIn the passing of her grandma and another significant person in her life, John "Matt" Sutton, a rancher on whose ranch Mersinger grew up.
The SEC Historical Society posted on Friday that on this day in 1977, "Roberta Karmel, a securities lawyer and former staffer in the New York Regional Office, became the first woman Commissioner, serving just over two years." The SEC Historical Society has an oral history from Karmel in written form that shows her deep understanding of the limits of securities laws, it said on LinkedIn.
I don't know if Hurricane Ian has changed Citadel's Ken Griffin's mind about South Florida as a safe financial center for his home and enterprises, but in Dubai's Palm Jumeirah island a new record price ($82 million) has been set for a home sold in the Persian Gulf emirate. The buyer was not disclosed for the mansion built on Frond G of the "tree-shaped artificial island Palm Jumeirah" that stands on a stretch of land known as Billionaires' Row, Bloomberg reported. Frond G? Record price? I am sure it is just a coincidence.
The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission today announced a settlement with influencer Kim Kardashian, who promoted crypto without disclosing she was being paid for it. Bloomberg has the story with the headline "Kim Kardashian to Pay $1.3 Million to SEC Over Crypto Touting", and SEC Chairman Gary Gensler gets in on the action with one of his popular "Office Hours with Gary Gensler" videos, this one titled "Use Caution with Celebrity Endorsements of Investment Products."
The Financial Times has a Special Report on Exchange Traded Funds today. The stories include:
- Thematic funds pause for breath after market setbacks; Product launches are becoming more esoteric but inflows have slowed for many special categories
- Bond funds recover appeal after painful falls; Institutions have shifted positions after repricing of fixed-income assets
- Can 'K-pop' deliver a global ETF hit? Growing overseas interest in Korean music supports launch of entertainment fund
- Crypto inflows defy crash in fund values; Investor interest in bitcoin and other alternatives remains strong despite a torrid market performance
- Tech stock shocks test concentration risk for ETF investors;l Even deliberately diffuse funds can still be caught by overexposure to once-fashionable companies
- Russia crisis challenges ETF sector's 'cockroach' status; ETFs have built a reputation for being able to operate through any emergency — until now
The European Energy Exchange AG is looking for a Group Sustainability Communications Manager. This position can be filled in Leipzig, Berlin, London or Paris.
The lead story today about the CME filing for an FCM license is an interesting one. Some of CME's competitors have brokerage arms, but it is the CME Group's dominant position in the U.S. futures market that makes this different. The CME seemingly is responding to the potential challenge from FTX. Who knows how they might use a potential FCM license? I remember being in Globex improvement meetings back in the early 2000s and having some brokers present express very strong feelings about how the CME was disenfranchising them. I don't believe those fears or feelings have subsided over the years as the CME has only become more powerful and dominant in U.S. futures trading.
Have a great day and stay safe and treat people the same way you want to be treated: with respect, equality and justice.~JJL
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The Natural Resources Forum's third annual ESG Energy and Mining Forum 2022 kicks off today. Running from October 3 through October 7, ESG Week is a series of in-person events and on-line webinars, many of them free, feature panelist discussions of major ESG trends. Corporate leaders, sustainability experts, government representatives, investors and NGOs are expected to attend ESG Week 2022. You can learn more and register here.~SAED
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MWE SHORT: Joe Gits - What Opportunities Does Unstructured Data Present?
JohnLothianNews.com
In this video from MarketsWiki Education's World of Opportunity event in New York, Joe Gits, CEO of Social Market Analytics, breaks down how unstructured data can benefit your trading. Social media posts, news articles and blogs are all sources of potential market moving information. The trick is parsing all of the data and using it to your advantage. Gits reveals how market participants can stay ahead of the curve using unstructured data to generate ideas, stay informed of breaking news, and identify early warning signs. The information is out there. You just have to know where and how to look.
Watch the video »
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CHICAGO CALLING: Shout-out for Charlie Carey and the Southside Irish
Mike Houlihan - The Irish Echo
"You can take the kid out of the Southside, but you'll never get the Southside out of that kid!" That's an ancient Chicago epigram that celebrates the rugged individualism, tenacity, and heroic chutzpah of the Southside in this "city of big shoulders". And that goes double for Southside Irish. In 2006-2007 two Irish American guys with Southside of Chicago roots put together the "deal of the century" when the Chicago Board of Trade, (CBOT) merged with The Chicago Mercantile Exchange, (CME), for a public offering that continues to break all records for volume trading by any exchange. Those guys were CME's Terry Duffy and CBOT Chairman Charles P. (Charlie) Carey. They had a history in the hog pits of the Mid America Exchange as well as shared roots in old Chicago.
/jlne.ws/3SumMip
***** A nice profile of a man who has seen it all. Charlie, it is time to do that interview with JLN.~JJL
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The Fight to Save Coffee From the Climate Crisis; Global warming is methodically destroying the ability of growers to feed demand. Science may come to the rescue.
Abigail Morgan - Bloomberg
Humanity consumes a half-trillion cups of coffee annually, yet its method of production is about as far from modern agriculture as one can get. There hasn't been a major effort to develop a new varietal in 50 years—and that's made coffee vulnerable. The two main species grown today are robusta and arabica, the latter being the more flavorful and coveted of the two. Most modern strains of arabica were developed in the late 1960s. Decades later, this aging crop is succumbing to modern scourges like coffee rust fungus and borer beetles, along with oscillating heat and moisture levels.
/jlne.ws/3Ss2Ug2
****** We need to find a solution for this fast.~JJL
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For a Woman on Wall Street, Crude Jokes Weren't the Worst of It; In "Bully Market," Jamie Fiore Higgins describes being seduced, and ultimately repelled, by nearly two high-flying decades at Goldman Sachs.
Alexandra Jacobs - The New York Times
"Do What You Love, the Money Will Follow" is the title of a popular, rainbow-covered self-help book published in 1988. "Bully Market," the new memoir by Jamie Fiore Higgins, a former Goldman Sachs managing director, is clad in unambiguous blood red, suggesting rather that if you do what you hate, the money will chase you down a dark alleyway and throttle you. Maybe eventually it will release you to self-awareness, but not without first inducing temporary blindness.
/jlne.ws/3EbAl21
****** One hopes that the world has changed since those days. Hopes are not always met.~JJL
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Greenwood Project: A Summer That Changed Everything
Greenwood Project - LinkedIn
My name is Emmanuel Enriquez and I am a finance major at the University of Illinois Chicago (UIC). I am very passionate about the financial markets and am eager to start my hands-on learning process as soon as possible. The Greenwood Project College Scholar program has given me the opportunity to enhance my skills in finance, which has helped me form a clearer vision of my career path.
/jlne.ws/3RAsa2m
****** Here is an example where we as an industry are making a difference, one young person at a time.~JJL
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Kim Kardashian settles with SEC over crypto promotion
Michelle Chapman - AP News
Kim Kardashian has agreed to pay $1.26 million to settle Securities and Exchange Commission charges that she promoted a cryptocurrency on Instagram without disclosing she'd been paid $250,000 to do so. The SEC said Monday that the reality TV star and entrepreneur has agreed to cooperate with its ongoing investigation.
/jlne.ws/3M3zYs8
****** Anyone who believes anything that comes out of Kim Kardashian's mouth should be fined $1.3 million. ~JJL
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Friday's Top Three
Our top story Friday was Photos: This is what Florida looks like after Hurricane Ian, from NPR. Second was 'No reason to come ... there's nothing here.' Florida residents in shock at devastation left in Hurricane Ian's wake, from the South Florida Sun Sentinel. Third was a tie between Nasdaq reorganises corporate structure into three divisions, from The Trade, and 40 Years Later: A LIFFE Story, a post from Patrick Young on LinkedIn.
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MarketsWiki Stats
27,023 pages; 240,995 edits
MarketsWiki Statistics
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| All MarketsWiki Sponsors» | | | | | | | John Lothian News (JLN) is the news division of John J. Lothian & Company, Inc. (JJLCO). The online media and financial services firm is staffed by derivatives industry, journalism and technology professionals. | | | | | | | John Lothian News Editorial Staff: | | | John Lothian
Publisher | | | Sarah Rudolph
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| Lead Stories | Futures Giant CME Considers Brokerage, Taking Cue From Crypto Rival FTX; CME files paperwork to create a futures commission merchant
Alexander Osipovich - The Wall Street Journal
CME Group Inc. criticized crypto exchange FTX's plan to cut out the middlemen in the futures markets. Now, the Chicago exchange giant is taking a step in the same direction. In August, CME submitted paperwork to register a futures commission merchant, or FCM—essentially, a brokerage that would allow investors to buy and sell futures on CME's marketplace. If the application is approved and CME gets into the brokerage business, investors could bypass existing brokers and connect to the exchange operator directly for futures trades. The move could save money for investors, who pay fees to trade futures. But it is likely to prompt complaints from other FCMs that could lose revenue if CME undercuts them on fees. Clearing futures trades is big business for Wall Street banks—where FCM units are a key part of their prime-brokerage arms—as well as for specialized firms such as Advantage Futures and R.J. O'Brien & Associates LLC.
/jlne.ws/3e3ygL6
Britain's Financial Disaster Is a Warning to the World; The crisis in the U.K. offers a preview of dangers other economies could face in an era of high inflation and rising interest rates
James Mackintosh - The Wall Street Journal
A toxic mix of politics, inflation and higher interest rates is threatening the financial system in the U.K., sending a shock wave through global markets and providing a warning to governments everywhere of the dangers of the new economic era we are entering. A surprise tax cut by the new British government just over a week ago sparked investor concern about the country's fiscal credibility and crashed both the pound and the market for U.K. government bonds, known as gilts.
/jlne.ws/3y9NTay
Millions in Cryptocurrency Vanished as Agents Watched Helplessly; Feds locked up a storage device full of ill-gotten tokens. Then someone started stealing the loot.
David Voreacos - Bloomberg
Gary Harmon grinned as he lounged in a bathtub full of dollar bills surrounded by scantily clad women. The moment, captured in a photo on his cellphone, could be part of his undoing. To US prosecutors, it's evidence that he suddenly came into a lot of money. The prosecutors accuse Harmon of a very unusual crime: remotely swiping Bitcoin stored on a computer device the government had already seized in another case, brought against his older brother, Larry. As authorities watched helplessly, 713 digital tokens—then worth almost $5 million—were somehow spirited away from the "hardware wallet" they were holding in an evidence locker.
/jlne.ws/3STAxav
Hong Kong's Yuan-Denominated Stock Trading Plan Gets Support; New World, Bank of China, Tencent said they support the plan; City plans yuan-denominated shares under Stock-Connect scheme
Shawna Kwan, Chester Yung, and Tania Chen - Bloomberg
The Hong Kong government's plan to trade yuan-denominated shares for companies listed in the city has attracted support from major businesses, despite concerns about the weakening Chinese currency. The Hong Kong government is preparing to create yuan shares in the stock-connect program by setting up a market-maker system in the first half of next year, Christopher Hui, secretary for financial services and the treasury said on Monday. The government will submit a bill to lawmakers by the end of this year to exempt market-makers from paying stamp duty when they are providing liquidity for yuan shares.
/jlne.ws/3SDUHWk
Retail investors warned on piling into risky alternative products; Asset managers cite pitfalls at FT conference as 'alts' look beyond institutions for growth
Madison Darbyshire, Brooke Masters and Harriet Agnew - Financial Times
Retail investors must be wary as a wave of alternative investment products comes to market because many carry high fees, lack diversification and offer poor quality investments, asset managers have warned. Big institutional investors have racked up enviable returns in recent years with investments in alternatives, the catch all term for investments that are not publicly traded, such as private equity, private credit and real estate.
/jlne.ws/3Sv6DcT
'Fear Is Contagious' as UK Crisis Boils Over Into Other Markets; Global market risk surged to highest level since March 2020; UK troubles show how quickly tensions over policy can erupt
Denitsa Tsekova - Bloomberg
The UK's rapid descent from stability to crisis is threatening to expose the fragility of global efforts to crush inflation, raising the specter of chaos spreading across financial markets. Volatility has surged to the highest level since March 2020 across currency and bond markets. Bank of America's global cross-asset market risk indicator also jumped to a level not seen since the start of the pandemic. Current and former government officials in the US warned about potential spillover.
/jlne.ws/3SBCxUX
Pro-Russian Paramilitary Groups Raise $400,000 in Bitcoin, Crypto to Avoid Sanctions: TRM Labs; An in-depth investigation found that pro-Russian groups are using cryptocurrencies to fundraise hundreds of thousands of dollars to prop up paramilitary operations in Ukraine.
Andrew Asmakov - Decrypt
Pro-Russian groups are conducting crowdfunding campaigns, raising a significant amount in Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies to evade U.S. sanctions and support paramilitary operations in war-torn Ukraine, according to research by blockchain intelligence firm TRM Labs. "As of last week, we identified about $400,000 that have been raised since the beginning of the invasion in February," Chris Janczewski, head of global investigations at TRM Labs, said in an interview with CNBC.
/jlne.ws/3LZ71xM
The City of London punishes the political rogue traders; These days, the banks sound far more sober about financial risk than the government
John Gapper - Financial Times
I detected a tone of relief when I rang round some old hands in the City of London this week to ask about the financial turmoil unleashed by Kwasi Kwarteng and Liz Truss. For once, the reckless gambler causing chaos was not one of them. The chancellor addressed them in September to explain that he backed the City, believed it was crucial to increasing UK growth and wanted to unleash a second "Big Bang". He was referring to financial deregulation, but it turned out to be the government's approach to markets.
/jlne.ws/3CrDXLY
Why Interest Rates Are Rising Everywhere—Except Your Savings Account; Many banks continue to offer meager yields on savings accounts, but it can pay off to shop around
Joe Pinsker - The Wall Street Journal
The Federal Reserve's campaign to fight inflation by raising interest rates seems to have reached nearly every corner of the economy except one: Americans' savings accounts. Mortgage rates doubled this year to nearly 7%, and it has become more expensive to get a car loan or carry a credit-card balance. Yet the interest on savings accounts barely budged. In March 2020, the average annual yield on a standard savings account was 0.1%, according to Bankrate.com. It fell to a pandemic low of 0.06% after Americans' personal saving rate peaked, and is now up to a wan 0.14%.
/jlne.ws/3Rx2nbx
Credit Suisse Market Turmoil Deepens After CEO Memo Backfires; New CEO Koerner sought to reassure employees in Friday memo; Shares fall to a fresh record low, gauge of credit risk rises
Marion Halftermeyer and Myriam Balezou - Bloomberg
Credit Suisse Group AG was plunged into fresh market turmoil after Chief Executive Officer Ulrich Koerner's attempts to reassure employees and investors backfired, adding to uncertainty surrounding the bank. The stock, which had already more than halved this year before Monday's sell-off, fell as much as 12% in Zurich trading to a record low that values the firm at less than $10 billion. That was accompanied by a spike in the cost to insure the bank's debt against default, which jumped to its highest ever.
/jlne.ws/3CCcd7P
JPMorgan Is Worried About Who's Going to Buy All the Bonds; "We remain concerned about the (lack of) structural demand for Treasuries."
Tracy Alloway - Bloomberg
"Who Will Buy?" is the exuberant ensemble number from the 1962 musical hit Oliver! It is also the rallying cry of a number of investors and analysts who are worried about who exactly will be purchasing trillions of dollars worth of bonds as inflation bites and public deficits balloon. Such concerns were on full show last week, when gilt yields soared after the UK government unveiled a mini-budget full of tax cuts that were expected to expand the UK's debt burden. Prime Minister Liz Truss has since reversed the plan, but worries over the future attractiveness of a wide variety of bonds remains.
/jlne.ws/3rqv8fh
Failure to learn lessons of 2008 caused LDI pension blow-up; There are clear parallels with many of the issues that led to the financial crisis
Patrick Jenkins - Financial Times
The crisis in Britain's defined benefit pensions market last week was like a replay of the 2008 banking crisis — just with different acronyms. It was caused by a blow-up of LDIs — or liability-driven investment strategies, a vast £1.5tn corner of the financial markets that most people had never even heard of. Half a dozen lessons from 2008 have not been learnt.
/jlne.ws/3fFN4jz
Truss's growth plan is nothing but a magic potion; Hoping that reality will adapt to your desires is folly: Britain needs stable and credible policies, not zealotry
Martin Wolf - Financial Times
Liz Truss has been weighed in the balance and found wanting. So, too, has Kwasi Kwarteng. A week of unnecessary and damaging turmoil has proved this. But behind it is an even bigger danger. The only sort of leader more dangerous than the rogue the UK used to have is the zealot it has now. The dominant characteristic of zealots is their conviction that reality must adapt to their desires, rather than the other way around. If this attitude to life is adopted by an individual, it can do great damage to those close to them. In political leaders, the result may be a disaster for the country.
/jlne.ws/3ycVjtL
Liz Truss Is a Human Sacrifice to the Inflation Fires; Trace it back to the silence of the economists on the inflationary effects of Covid lockdowns.
Holman W. Jenkins, Jr. - The Wall Street Journal
Needed is a post-Freudian theory of hysteria in which hysteria is not an ailment of women but an ailment women provoke in the bond market. Hysteria still functions by displacement, though. It wasn't the "insane," "stupid" and "moronic" inflationary effects of Prime Minister Liz Truss's pro-growth proposals for the British economy that tanked the U.K. bond market and threatened (in some accounts) to set off a global contagion.
/jlne.ws/3SGmZ1U
London Gold Dealer Runs Out of Bullion as Truss Budget Shocks; Bullion priced in sterling came close to a record last week; Brokerages see surge in demand from British retail investors
Eddie Spence - Bloomberg
When the pound slumped as Kwasi Kwarteng presented his mini-budget, some Britons rushed to the safety of a haven that's recently lost its luster: gold. As the UK currency slid to an all-time low early Monday, bullion priced in pounds climbed close to a record. That would typically encourage selling and deter buyers, but this time round the turmoil in British bond and currency markets increased the allure of the precious metal.
/jlne.ws/3UYikKq
Sterling Credit Has Worst Ever Month as UK Chaos Shakes Market; Investors want out of sterling debt and see more uncertainty; Some pandemic-era bonds are at levels associated with distress
Tasos Vossos - Bloomberg
A meltdown in UK assets during Liz Truss's first month as prime minister has left the sterling corporate bond market notching up its worst monthly return ever. A Bloomberg index of sterling-denominated high-grade corporate bonds fell 9.6% in September, the most since the index began. The measure comprises a majority of British companies, as well as others with sterling debt. It's also the biggest monthly underperformance for pound-denominated debt compared to similar euro and US dollar credit since 2009, according to Bloomberg indexes.
/jlne.ws/3fwr4Y9
This 100% solar community endured Hurricane Ian with no loss of power and minimal damage
Rachel Ramirez - CNN
Anthony Grande moved away from Fort Myers three years ago in large part because of the hurricane risk. He has lived in southwest Florida for nearly 19 years, had experienced Hurricanes Charley in 2004 and Irma in 2017 and saw what stronger storms could do to the coast. Grande told CNN he wanted to find a new home where developers prioritized climate resiliency in a state that is increasingly vulnerable to record-breaking storm surge, catastrophic wind and historic rainfall. What he found was Babcock Ranch — only 12 miles northeast of Fort Myers, yet seemingly light years away.
/jlne.ws/3SRBxf2
Crypto Slump Leaves 12,100 Coins Trapped in Zombie Trading Limbo; A huge amount of digital tokens are languishing as "even good projects" strive to stay afloat in market doldrums that may last for months to come.
Olga Kharif - Bloomberg
When it comes to putting a number on this year's crypto swoon, the one cited most often is $2 trillion, the amount of digital-asset market value that evaporated in the downdraft. But here's a figure that captures the breadth of the bear market: 12,100. That's the number of crypto tokens that have effectively ceased trading this year, according to data provider Nomics — not dead technically, but like zombies, not quite alive either.
/jlne.ws/3dZeVuj
Robinhood Is Closing More Offices With Its Growth Plans Thwarted
Annie Massa - Bloomberg
Robinhood Markets Inc. will partially or completely shutter five more offices, the latest move in a sweeping overhaul to rein in expenses as it adjusts to a sharp downturn in trading activity. The brokerage, which dismissed more than 1,000 employees and shut two offices earlier this year, will close the additional outposts without further job cuts, the Menlo Park, California-based company said Friday in a filing.
/jlne.ws/3Sytkwv
Kim Kardashian pays $1.3mn to settle crypto charges; Celebrity failed to disclose payment for EthereumMax post on Instagram
Stefania Palma - Financial Times
Kim Kardashian has agreed to pay $1.26mn to settle charges with the US securities regulator for promoting a cryptocurrency without revealing that she was paid to do so. The US Securities and Exchange Commission said on Monday the reality TV star did not disclose a $250,000 payment she received to post about crypto security tokens sold by EthereumMax on her Instagram account, which has 331mn followers.
/jlne.ws/3CsnG9A
SEC collars Kim Kardashian, crypto-shill; SEO search terms: Kardashian, crypto, Instagram, DJ Khaled, Elon Musk, disgorgement, Gary Gensler
Bryce Elder - Financial Times
Are you guys into crypto??? This is not financial advice but sharing what my friends at the SEC just told me about payola social media endorsements of shitcoins:
/jlne.ws/3Eg8kq6
FX market weighs viability of spot clearing; Supporters believe it could remove credit risks, but others say it would be unnecessary and add costs
Laura Matthews - Risk.net
Over-the-counter foreign exchange is one of the few markets not to have fully embraced central clearing. Even though the overwhelming proportion of trades are carried out electronically, market participants have largely felt that the current bilateral model does not need to change.
/jlne.ws/3CsgVEU
Americans Abroad Renounce Citizenship to Escape Tax Law's Clutches; FATCA, aimed at cracking down on offshore tax evasion, is hurting accidental US citizens who can't open bank accounts.
Alice Kantor - Bloomberg
A growing number of Americans are renouncing their citizenship to escape a law that was designed to crack down on offshore tax evasion. The Foreign Account Tax Compliance Act, or FATCA, requires foreign banks to report the assets of US account holders to the Internal Revenue Service. It was designed to go after wealthy Americans keeping money overseas to avoid taxes, but is also ensnaring regular people living abroad. Rather than risk steep penalties for failing to provide the information, some banks refuse to open accounts for US citizens at all.
/jlne.ws/3CxcPeV
Celsius Network founder withdrew $10mn ahead of bankruptcy; Scrutiny of Alex Mashinsky grows after crypto lender was left with hole in balance sheet
Kadhim Shubber - Financial Times
Celsius Network founder Alex Mashinsky withdrew $10mn from the crypto lender just weeks before the company froze customer accounts as it spiralled towards bankruptcy, according to people familiar with the matter.
/jlne.ws/3M3F7jW
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| Ukraine Invasion | | News about the invasion of Ukraine by Russia and its military, economic, political and humanitarian impact | Putin Says Annexation Is Forever, Defends Ukraine Land Grab; Russian leader signs accession 'treaties' at Kremlin ceremony; Ukraine battlefield advances may challenge Putin's claim
Bloomberg
Vladimir Putin vowed his annexation of four occupied regions in Ukraine is irreversible, as the Russian president formalized Europe's biggest land grab since World War II and accused the West of trying to subjugate his country. "They will become our citizens forever," he told officials in a Kremlin ceremony Friday before he and Moscow-installed leaders signed annexation documents. He demanded Ukraine stop fighting and begin talks, but refused to negotiate about the territories he's absorbing. "We will use all means available to us to defend our lands," he said.
/jlne.ws/3C1iF6A
Russian central bank governor Elvira Nabiullina hit with US sanctions; Co-ordinated reaction from western allies aims to punish Moscow for moves to annex parts of Ukraine
James Politi, Felicia Schwartz and Sam Fleming - Financial Times
The US has imposed sanctions on Elvira Nabiullina, the governor of Russia's central bank, as part of a new package of measures intended to stiffen its financial punishment of Moscow in the wake of its annexation of vast chunks of territory in eastern Ukraine. The move against Nabiullina came as the Treasury department widened its sanctions against Russia to include several of the country's top economic officials, in addition to individuals and legislators associated with the invasion of Ukraine.
/jlne.ws/3E74ek9
Ukraine War Creates Worst Global Food Crisis Since 2008, IMF Says; Rising costs caused by war and other disruptions imperil 345 million people, report says
Yuka Hayashi - The Wall Street Journal
Sharp rises in food and fertilizer prices caused by the war in Ukraine are creating the worst global food crisis since at least 2008, putting the lives and livelihood of 345 million people in immediate danger, the International Monetary Fund said Friday. While the food shock is touching nations in various parts of the world, the worst impact is felt by 48 mostly low-income countries, many of which depend on imports from Ukraine and Russia. About half of these countries, such as Somalia, South Sudan and Yemen, are especially vulnerable due to existing severe economic challenges and weak institutions, IMF economists said in a new report.
/jlne.ws/3RvtTG4
Gazprom Halts Gas Supplies to Italy in Latest Energy Battle; Company cites regulatory issue in Austria for gas cutoff; Austria says Gazprom hasn't approved changes known for months
Chiara Remondini, Alberto Brambilla, and Marton Eder - Bloomberg
Russia's state-controlled Gazprom PJSC suspended natural gas deliveries to Italy in an apparent scuffle over regulation in Austria, escalating the energy crisis in Europe. The cutoff appeared to target just Italy, which gets Gazprom's supplies from a pipeline that passes through Austria. Higher volumes of Russian gas were allocated to Vienna-based OMV AG than recently, said Andreas Rinofner, a spokesman for OMV, which imports Russian gas to Austria.
/jlne.ws/3SNSGX5
Europe Steps Up Defense of Energy Assets With Show of Force; Oslo accepts offers of help from UK, France and Germany; NATO is also monitoring Baltic and North Seas, chief says
Kari Lundgren, Stephen Treloar, and Ott Ummelas - Bloomberg
Norway's armed forces stepped up patrols of the country's energy facilities and NATO allies rushed to offer help, as the sabotage of key gas pipelines raised the stakes in Europe's energy conflict with Russia. Prime Minister Jonas Gahr Store said Norway has accepted offers of assistance from Germany, France and the UK as it increases its presence around oil and gas installations in the North Sea. NATO is also using its naval and air capabilities to monitor the Baltic and North Seas.
/jlne.ws/3UXjdD1
Germany says it will supply Ukraine with air defence system in days
Reuters
Germany will deliver the first of four advanced IRIS-T air defence systems to Ukraine in the coming days to help ward off drone attacks, its defence minister Christine Lambrecht said during an unannounced visit to Odessa on Saturday. As air raid sirens sounded in the port city above, Lambrecht held talks with her Ukrainian counterpart Oleksii Reznikov in an underground bunker. Lambrecht had extended a visit to nearby Moldova for the meeting. "In a few days, we will deliver the very modern IRIS-T air defence system," she told ARD television. "It is very important for drone defence in particular."
/jlne.ws/3SwzoWu
Nord Stream 2 Pipeline Has Stopped Leaking Gas: Spokesman
Agence France Presse - Barron's
The Nord Stream 2 pipeline is no longer leaking under the Baltic Sea because an equilibrium has been reached between the gas and water pressure, a spokesman told AFP. "The water pressure has more or less closed the pipeline so that the gas which is inside can't go out," Nord Stream 2 spokesman Ulrich Lissek said. "The conclusion is that there is still gas in the pipeline," he added. Asked how much gas was believed to be in the pipeline, Lissek said: "That is the one-million-dollar question." Information on the status of the Nord Stream 1 pipeline leak, which was significantly larger, was not immediately available.
/jlne.ws/3SwGZEx
Probe Into Nord Stream Pipeline Damage Faces Hurdles at Sea, Ashore; Denmark and Sweden lead multinational investigation, with both the West and Russia saying sabotage caused the leaks
Benjamin Katz - The Wall Street Journal
When Bjorn Lund's team at the Swedish National Seismic Network first recorded tremors in the Baltic Sea, it didn't initially notice anything unusual. The area, off the coasts of Denmark and Sweden, is used for naval exercises by both countries. The institute, part of Uppsala University, regularly records the impact of explosive blasts there. But after Swedish and Danish authorities later reported leaks in the same area, along the undersea Nord Stream natural-gas pipelines, Mr. Lund's team took a deeper look. It was the beginning of what has now grown into a high-stakes, multinational investigation into what happened to those pipes.
/jlne.ws/3E76Mid
As Russian Troops Flee Lyman, Ukrainians Rejoice—and Help Themselves to Russian Supplies; Ambushed during the hasty retreat, Moscow's forces leave behind burning vehicles and bodies of soldiers along the roadsides
Yaroslav Trofimov - The Wall Street Journal
Residents of the war-wrecked town of Lyman ventured onto the streets Sunday morning, enjoying an unusual quiet after months of fighting, and unsure about who was now in charge. The last Russian forces drove out of the city the previous night, trying to avoid getting encircled by the advancing Ukrainian troops. Not all the Russians made it out. Burning Russian vehicles and sprawled bodies of dead Russian soldiers remain on the roadsides outside the city.
/jlne.ws/3T7L0iL
Pro-Russian Paramilitary Groups Raised $400,000 in Bitcoin, Crypto to Avoid Sanctions: TRM Labs; An in-depth investigation found that pro-Russian groups are using cryptocurrencies to fundraise hundreds of thousands of dollars to prop up paramilitary operations in Ukraine.
Andrew Asmakov - Decrypt
Pro-Russian groups are conducting crowdfunding campaigns, raising a significant amount in Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies to evade U.S. sanctions and support paramilitary operations in war-torn Ukraine, according to research by blockchain intelligence firm TRM Labs.
/jlne.ws/3LZ71xM
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| Exchanges, OTC & Clearing | | Top news from exchanges, clearing, settlement and trade execution facilities | ICE Names Caterina Caramaschi as Head of Combined Global Interest Rates and Equity Derivatives Product Portfolio
ICE.
Intercontinental Exchange, Inc. (NYSE: ICE), a leading global provider of data, technology, and market infrastructure, and home to the most liquid markets for trading FTSE®, MSCI® and multi-currency European interest rate derivatives, today named Caterina Caramaschi as head of a combined portfolio covering ICE's global interest rates and equity derivatives futures and options. Caramaschi, who becomes Vice President, Financial Derivatives, has worked at ICE and formerly LIFFE, for 21 years. She has held the role of ICE's Global Head of Equity Derivatives since December 2020. "Caterina demonstrates many of the qualities which differentiates leaders at ICE across teamwork, collaboration, and being focused on solving our customers' problems, no matter how complex, every single day," said Trabue Bland, SVP, Futures Exchanges at ICE.
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Clearing house of the year: LCH; Asia Risk Awards 2022
Risk.net
Rohit Verma, who joined LCH in July last year as head of Asia-Pacific, doesn't believe salespeople alone can carry the clearing house's regional aspirations. It is all about product capabilities and technical expertise, he insists - and it is this strategic focus that has continued to win accolades with clients this year.
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The Spanish stock market trades 24.2 billion euros in September
BME-X
The volume traded in Equities so far this year is 4.6% higher year on year; Fixed-income trading in September amounted to 10 billion euros, up 52,4% from the preceding month; Trading in Futures contracts on the IBEX 35 ® index increased by 6.2% in the first nine months of the year
The Spanish stock market traded 24.2 billion euros in Equities in September, down 25.1% year on year and up 27.1% from the preceding month. The trading volume for the first nine months of the year increased 4,6%.The number of trades in September was 2.8 million, down 24.3% from September 2021 and up 23.8% from August 2022.
/jlne.ws/3Ry6pQC
EEX sets new record for trading in Futures on dairy products in Europe
EEX
EEX has registered a new annual record in the current calendar year in trading EEX Dairy Futures. As of 21 September 2022, the cumulative trading volume in 2022 (27,678 contracts = 138,390 tonnes of commodity equivalent) exceeded the total volume of the record year 2017 (27,564 contracts = 137,820 tonnes of commodity equivalent). Within the product range that includes also Liquid Milk, Butter and Whey Powder Futures, growth in the EEX European Skimmed Milk Powder Futures was especially striking.
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EEX Group Press Release - Successful start of pan-European spot market for Guarantees of Origin; First auction completed by EPEX SPOT with clearing and delivery through ECC and EEX
EEX
The European Power Exchange (EPEX SPOT), European Energy Exchange (EEX) and European Commodity Clearing (ECC) jointly launched a pan-European market for Guarantees of Origin (GOs). It is the first secondary market for GOs, involving no primary allocation by states but only trading of previously emitted certificates. The first spot auction took place on 28 September 2022 with 26 market participants registered and 19,171 MWh of certified green energy were sold. The orderbook of this new spot auction reflected a strong market interest on the buy-side, with over 4.5 TWh of buy orders registered. This is a promising outset for the upcoming auction, which will furthermore cover all completed production months of 2022. The next GOs spot auction is scheduled for 26.10.2022.
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Review on Guarantee Fund
HKEX
HKSCC has performed a review of the size of the Guarantee Fund and the contributions required from each Clearing Participant. The required size of the Guarantee Fund excluding the Dynamic Contribution Credit for all Clearing Participants after the re-calculation is HK$3,054 million. The amounts of Basic Contribution and Dynamic Contribution required from a Clearing Participant are re-calculated based on its share of the average Expected Uncollateralised Loss (EUL) of all Clearing Participants, for the period from 8 July 2022 to 30 September 2022 pursuant to Section 18.2.1 of the CCASS Operational Procedures.
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HKCC Participant Additional Deposit
HKEX
Please be advised that HKFE Clearing Corporation Limited (HKCC) has recalculated the HKCC Participant Additional Deposits (HPAD) pursuant to the HKCC Rule 705A and the Clearing House Procedures. The new total HPAD requirement of HK$1,013 million after the recalculation will be shared by all the Participants based on their daily average net margin liabilities during the period from 11 July 2022 to 30 September 2022 in accordance with Chapter 4 of the Clearing House Procedures for Futures/Options Contracts Traded on the Automated Trading System of the Exchange ("HKATS").
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Trading Overview in September 2022 & First Half of FY2022 (April to September)Japan Exchange Group released Trading Overview in September 2022 & First Half of FY2022 (April to September).
JPX
Cash Equity Market; In the first half of FY2022, the daily average trading value for the Prime Market (domestic common stocks) was JPY 3.2350 trillion. In the first half of FY2022, the daily average trading value for ETFs was JPY 283 billion. In September 2022, the daily average trading value for the Prime Market (domestic common stocks) was JPY 3.2848 trillion. The daily average trading value for the ETF market was JPY 297.7 billion.
/jlne.ws/3EcooZR
DBS Accelerates Market Integrity Efforts Leveraging Nasdaq Surveillance Technology; Cloud-based surveillance technology from Nasdaq to underpin DBS' market abuse detection efforts
Nasdaq
Nasdaq (Nasdaq: NDAQ) and DBS, a leading financial services group in Asia and Southeast Asia's largest bank, announced today that DBS will leverage Nasdaq Trade Surveillance technology to advance its surveillance and market integrity efforts. Nasdaq's Trade Surveillance solutions will enable DBS to enhance its abilities to analyze comprehensive market abuse surveillance scenarios and patterns and detect trading anomalies across equities and derivatives markets as well as OTC FX markets.
/jlne.ws/3Rs1GQy
NSE Indices launches Nifty AAA PSU Bond Plus SDL Apr 2026 50:50 Index
NSE
NSE's index services subsidiary, NSE Indices Limited today launched a new index - Nifty AAA PSU Bond Plus SDL Apr 2026 50:50 Index
/jlne.ws/3FOrfHc
Updated NYSE Group Equities Clearly Erroneous Execution Rules - Effective October 1, 2022
NYSE
Effective October 1, 2022, NYSE Group Equities Exchanges, in coordination with all U.S. equities exchanges, will update the existing clearly erroneous execution ("CEE") rules and procedures as outlined in the previous NYSE Regulation memo. CEE Review requests will continue to be submitted via the Customer Submission CEE Review page or by email to cee @ nyse.com.
/jlne.ws/3UVguKy
Notice Of Disciplinary Action
CME
Non-Member Qun Chen; Comex Rule: COMEX 539. Prearranged, Pre-Negotiated And Noncompetitive Trades Prohibited (In Part) 539.A. General Prohibition. No person shall prearrange or pre-negotiate any purchase or sale or noncompetitively execute any transaction.
/jlne.ws/3Cq1cpW
MIAX Options and Pearl Options Exchanges - October 1, 2022 Fee Changes
MIAX
Effective October 1, 2022, MIAX Options and MIAX Pearl Options will amend certain transaction fees. Attached is a highlighted summary of the October 1, 2022 fee changes for each exchange along with a combined summary of the fee changes. For full details, please review the October 1, 2022 Fee Schedules and Summaries on the MIAX website at MIAX Options Fee Schedule and MIAX Pearl Options Fee Schedule.
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Proposed Rule Change To Change References in the Codes of Arbitration Procedure From the Neutral List Selection System to the List Selection Algorithm
MIAX
FINRA is proposing to change references in the Codes of Arbitration Procedure (''Codes'') from the Neutral List Selection System to the list selection algorithm.
/jlne.ws/3C5XUXm
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| Fintech | | A roundup of today's market tech news and a look at tomorrow's disruptors | Why Emotional Intelligence and Inclusion Matter in the Fintech Workplace
PEAK 6
Emotional intelligence (E.I.), also referred to as emotional quotient (E.Q.), is the ability to understand and manage emotions. Practicing E.I. at work can improve interpersonal relationships, understanding, nonverbal communication, and decision-making. Some say E.I. is more important now than ever, particularly as we are still carving out our new normals after emerging from a global pandemic. Creating a safe environment for employees to be seen and heard is vital. Remember, everyone has feelings, regardless of whether they choose to display them or not.
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Exclusive: JPMorgan to hire about 2,000 engineers even as economy softens
Lananh Nguyen - Reuters
JPMorgan Chase & Co plans to hire about 2,000 engineers worldwide through the end of the year despite a worsening economy, its global chief information officer, Lori Beer, said on Wednesday. The biggest U.S. lender added a net more than 5,000 software developers and data scientists last year and aims to attract a couple thousand more at a time when technology giants have stopped hiring or are cutting jobs. Tech workers comprise about 20% of the bank's roughly 278,000-strong global workforce.
/jlne.ws/3ybcg7Q
Swiss Dropout Worth $14 Billion Moves Startup Away From Porn; Guillaume Pousaz built Checkout.com into a force in electronic payments and is now poised to become a tech rainmaker.
Ivan Levingston - Bloomberg
A college dropout from Switzerland has amassed a $14 billion fortune to become one of the country's richest people by creating a rising star in electronic payments.
/jlne.ws/3SPI1uX
Prosus scraps $4.7bn deal for Indian payments group BillDesk; Investment arm of South Africa's Naspers says certain conditions for purchase had not been met
Joseph Cotterill and Chloe Cornish - Financial Times
India's biggest payments deal has collapsed after South Africa's Naspers scrapped a $4.7bn agreement to buy BillDesk, the country's oldest payment gateway Prosus, the international investment arm of Naspers, said on Monday that it was terminating a year-old agreement to merge Mumbai-based BillDesk with its own PayU payment business after "certain conditions" had not been met before the end of September.
/jlne.ws/3SxuHf7
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| Cybersecurity | | Top stories for cybersecurity | Schumer urges FTC and DOJ to increase protections against cybersecurity hacks
Aaron Pellish - CNN Politics
Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer on Sunday urged federal officials to increase their efforts to protect consumers from cybersecurity breaches and investigate those responsible for such hacks. "I am calling on the Federal Trade Commission, first, to ensure that companies do everything they can to protect consumer data, and on the Department of Justice to fully investigate and go after the hackers that aim to harm Americans," Schumer, a New York Democrat, said at a news conference.
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New IBM Study Finds Cybersecurity Incident Responders Have Strong Sense of Service as Threats Cross Over to Physical World
Press Release
IBM Security (NYSE: IBM) today announced the results of a global survey that examines the critical role of cybersecurity incident responders at a time when the physical and digital worlds are increasingly converging. The study, released during National Cybersecurity Awareness Month, found that incident responders surveyed - the frontline responders to cyberattacks - are primarily driven by a strong sense of duty to protect others; a responsibility that's increasingly challenged by the surge of disruptive attacks, from the proliferation of ransomware attacks to the recent rise of wiper malware.
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The 13 Most Promising Cybersecurity Startups of 2022
Aaron Mok - Business Insider
The market to catch cyber attackers is hot. And it will only continue to heat up, Allie Mellen, a cybersecurity analyst at Forrester, told Insider. The global cybersecurity market was worth an estimated total of $173.5 billion in 2022, according to a report from data firm Research and Markets. It's expected to grow to $366.2 billion by 2022, the report said.
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Australian government slams Optus for cybersecurity breach
Sonali Paul - Reuters
The Australian government on Sunday levelled its harshest criticism yet against Optus, the second-biggest telecoms company, for a cybersecurity breach that affected the equivalent of 40% of the country's population. The government blamed Optus, owned by Singapore Telecommunications (STEL.SI), for the breach, which affected 10 million accounts, urging the company to speed up its notification to 10,200 customers whose personal information was released in one of the country's biggest cybersecurity breaches.
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| Cryptocurrencies | | Top stories for cryptocurrencies | Crypto ETP Trading Volume Falls to Two-Year Low
Shanny Basar - Markets Media
Average daily trading volumes of cryptocurrency exchange-traded products fell below $100m for the first time in two years in September according to CryptoCompare, an FCA-authorised benchmark administrator and digital asset data provider. CryptoCompare said in its Digital Asset Management Review that average daily aggregate product volumes across all digital asset investment products fell 24.1% to $939m in September, continuing an almost continuous fall in volumes since November 2021. The report said: "It also recorded the first month since September 2020 where average daily volumes have fallen under $100m."
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Billionaire Stan Druckenmiller Discusses Cryptocurrency Having 'Big Role in a Renaissance' — 'People Aren't Going to Trust Central Banks'
Kevin Helms - Bitcoin.com
Billionaire investor Stanley Druckenmiller discussed the U.S. economy and cryptocurrency in an interview at the CNBC Delivering Alpha conference Wednesday. Druckenmiller is the chairman and CEO of Duquesne Family Office LLC. He was previously a managing director at Soros Fund Management where he had overall responsibility for funds with a peak asset value of $22 billion. According to Forbes' list of billionaires, his personal net worth is currently $6.4 billion.
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Do Kwon's Terra Says Crypto Case Unfair and 'Highly Politicized'; Terra disputes accusation of breaches of capital-markets law; South Korea has asked Interpol for help in arresting Kwon
Joanna Ossinger and Sangmi Cha - Bloomberg
Terraform Labs, the digital-asset firm of hunted entrepreneur Do Kwon, rejected South Korean charges over a $60 billion cryptocurrency collapse and said the case against him had become "highly politicized." A spokesperson for the firm said in a statement that prosecutors had demonstrated "unfairness and a failure to uphold basic rights guaranteed under Korean law," adding that there's "no reasonable basis" for their accusation of breaches of capital-markets law.
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Crypto's Hold on Formula 1 Sponsoring Gets Tested in Singapore; Market rout has prompted regulators to tighten rules; McLaren to debut special crypto-themed car for Singapore race
Emily Nicolle - Bloomberg
At Formula One's Miami Grand Prix in May, the dizzying displays of crypto companies sponsoring the sport were inescapable, with Crypto.com's blue branding covering every imaginable surface along the race track. When Singapore hosts the most popular motor sport this weekend, the visibility of digital assets will be far more subdued. The Monetary Authority of Singapore will let teams show their crypto sponsors' logos only on cars and uniforms at the Singapore Grand Prix, but no advertising will be permitted around the track or in the local area.
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Crypto Volatility Creates Opportunity for Wall Street Traders; Institutions are leaning on tactics used in traditional markets, including short selling
Justin Baer - The Wall Street Journal
Wall Street is preparing for the next round of crypto volatility with tried and true tactics, according to brokers and analysts. Leverage is building again among crypto investors. The market for bitcoin and other digital assets has swung wildly in 2022, pushing prominent crypto firms into bankruptcy. It has also made for the kind of conditions in which savvy, deep-pocketed traders can thrive. Bitcoin is down nearly 60% so far this year. Many people expect the already-turbulent market to grow even choppier, perhaps even before the end of 2022.
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Coinbase users were unable to withdraw funds to US bank accounts for six hours
Kris Holt - Engadget
Coinbase users were unable to carry out US bank account transactions for around six hours on Sunday. An issue with the Automated Clearing House Network, which is used for electronic transfers between bank accounts in the country, emerged just before 7AM ET. The company said on its status page that it identified the problem, described as a "major outage," by 8:23AM and resolved it by 12:41PM. During the outage, users were still able to buy cryptocurrency with a debit card or PayPal account, as Decrypt noted. However, they weren't able to make withdrawals to a US bank account.
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Indian Crypto Exchange WazirX Lays Off 40% of Its Employees: Sources
Amitoj Singh - CoinDesk
Indian exchange WazirX has laid off several employees, the company said in a statement shared with CoinDesk on Saturday. 50 to as many as 70 employees or 40% of the exchange's workforce of 150, were laid off, three sources familiar with the matter told CoinDesk. The laid off workers were told on Friday they would be paid for 45 days, they would not be required to report for work henceforth and their accesses were withdrawn simultaneously. "The crypto market has been in the grip of a bear market because of the current global economic slowdown," WazirX said in a statement on Saturday. "The Indian crypto industry has had its unique problems with respect to taxes, regulations and banking access. This has lead to a dramatic fall in volumes in all Indian crypto exchanges."
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Web3 security companies emerge in China amid mounting crypto thefts and few legal protections; Web3 security firms are offering tools like browser extensions and blockchain blacklists to help users in China protect themselves when the law does not
Yaling Jiang - South China Morning Post
When Wu Caizeng lost a 20,000-yuan (US$2,800) non-fungible token (NFT) to a phishing scam in September, he sought help on Twitter, where he publicised his thief's public blockchain address. However, the anonymous nature that characterises much of the crypto world left him with no practical way to recoup his losses.
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Is Web3 Really Going That Great? The software engineer's Twitter account, dubbed 'web3 is going just great,' is a clue into her world view on digital assets.
Victoria Vergolina and Stacy-Marie Ishmael - Bloomberg
Perhaps you've heard of Molly White. The software engineer and crypto skeptic has been profiled in the Washington Post, Fast Company, and the Boston Globe. She has more than 80,000 followers on her personal Twitter account, and more than 100,000 on an account called "web3 is going just great." It is, as you might guess, a chronicle of all the ways that web3 is not going so well. Molly White joins this episode to talk through her skepticism of digital assets.
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Robinhood Crypto Unit General Counsel Departs to Join Firm Behind Videogame 'Axie Infinity'; James Nguyen, who served as Robinhood's lead lawyer and compliance chief since last year, has joined Sky Mavis as its general counsel
Mengqi Sun - The Wall Street Journal
The lead lawyer and compliance chief for Robinhood Markets Inc.'s cryptocurrency trading unit has left the online brokerage to join crypto startup Sky Mavis Pte. Ltd., the publisher of the popular online game "Axie Infinity." James Nguyen, who also previously worked at Wells Fargo & Co. and at law firm Morrison & Foerster LLP, now serves as Sky Mavis's general counsel, the company said on Twitter Thursday. A spokeswoman for Robinhood confirmed Mr. Nguyen's departure but declined to comment further.
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Kim Kardashian to Pay $1.26 Million to Settle S.E.C. Charges Over Crypto Promotion; The S.E.C. said Ms. Kardashian did not disclose she had been paid to promote a crypto token sold by EthereumMax.
Matthew Goldstein - The New York Times
Kim Kardashian has found there is a price to be paid when influencers hawk investment opportunities like crypto to their adoring fans without disclosing they are getting paid to do so.
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Kim Kardashian charged by SEC over alleged 'pump and dump' crypto scheme, will pay $1.26M
Ariel Zilber - NY Post
Kim Kardashian has landed in hot water with the feds over an Instagram post promoting a cryptocurrency asset that has been blasted by critics as an alleged "pump and dump" scheme. The Securities and Exchange Commission announced on Monday that it has charged the reality television star and social media influencer "for touting on social media a crypto asset security...without disclosing the payment she received for the promotion."
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Big Banks Haven't Warmed to Crypto. Here's Why.
Joe Light - Barron's
Crypto might have captured the imaginations of retail investors, venture capitalists, and start-up founders, but for now, the largest financial institutions are giving it a pass. A report released Friday by the Basel Committee on Banking Supervision found that the largest banks' crypto exposure was worth only about 9.4 billion euros ($9.2 billion) or about 0.01% of the total exposures that banks must account for when determining capital requirements. Just two banks, which the report didn't identify, made up 40% of the total.
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Coinbase Resolves Problem That Halted Payments From US Banks
Patrick Sykes - Bloomberg
Crypto exchange Coinbase Global Inc. said it fixed an issue that prevented the company from processing transactions with US bank accounts for more than five hours. "We've fully resolved this issue and ACH transfers are now processing. We apologize for the inconvenience," the company said on Twitter. Earlier, it said it was unable to take payments or make withdrawals involving US bank accounts.
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CEO Tim Cook says Apple avoids the word 'metaverse' because the average person doesn't know what it means — a stark contrast to rival Facebook
Hannah Towey - Insider
Apple CEO Tim Cook revealed in an exclusive interview with Dutch media outlet Bright that the tech giant's hesitancy toward joining the metaverse hype is intentional. "I always think it's important that people understand what something is. And I'm really not sure the average person can tell you what the metaverse is," Cook told the outlet. The metaverse is a term derived from science-fiction and refers to a hypothetical version of a three-dimensional internet accessed via immersive technologies rather than 2D screens.
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| Politics | | An overview of politics as it relates to the financial markets | Former President Donald Trump stands on stage; Trump Media has appeared to grow anxious. | Mario Tama/Getty Images
Declan Harty - Politico
Big investors are starting to eye the exits on the $1.3 billion bid to take former President Donald Trump's new social media startup public. The hedge funds, trading firms and other major backers are questioning whether the financial riches that first attracted them to the transaction are still strong enough to hold their interest in a deal fraught with troubles, according to four investors who asked not to be named. Negotiations have been ongoing as some investors seek bigger potential profits in exchange for following through on commitments to put hundreds of millions of dollars into the venture, which planned a public stock exchange listing through a special purpose acquisition company, or SPAC.
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House Republicans Ask GAO to Probe Foreign Ownership of U.S. Farmland; Lawmakers flag acquisitions by China as possible security threat
Kristina Peterson - The Wall Street Journal
The top Republicans on the House Agriculture and Oversight committees have asked the Government Accountability Office to investigate foreign investment in U.S. farmland, questioning whether Chinese acquisitions in particular could pose a national-security threat. In a letter released Monday, Reps. Glenn Thompson (R., Pa.) and James Comer (R., Ky.), as well as more than 100 other House Republicans, asked GAO to conduct a study examining foreign countries' acquisition of U.S. farmland and its impact on national security, trade and food security.
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Pelosi Ripped by Fellow Democrat for Delaying Stock-Trade Bill; Spanberger calls lack of action 'failure of House leadership'; Pelosi says ideas from other lawmakers will be addressed
Billy House - Bloomberg
Democratic Representative Abigail Spanberger lashed out at House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and other party leaders who she accused of dragging their feet on legislation to ban stock trading by lawmakers. Spanberger, who introduced a bill with Republican Representative Chip Roy to require that lawmakers place investment assets into a blind trust while in office, questioned Pelosi's commitment to a stock-trading ban and called the delay in acting on any reform bill before the House leaves for a break "a failure of House leadership."
/jlne.ws/3LYLB3C
Newsom Calls for Profit Tax on Oil as California Gasoline Surges
Gerson Freitas Jr - Bloomberg
California Governor Gavin Newsom called for a windfall tax on oil companies and allowed for production of a cheaper blend of gasoline as the state faces a surge in fuel prices. The Democrat said in a video that refiners have failed to provide an explanation on why rising pump prices in California have diverged from the rest of the country, where prices have fallen or are holding steady, and he accused companies of extortion. California gasoline prices surged to $6.29 a gallon as of Friday, up from $5.58 a gallon a week earlier, according to data from auto club AAA.
/jlne.ws/3UVabXi
House Puts Off Vote to Limit Lawmakers' Stock Trades, Casting Doubt on Prospects; The majority leader's announcement that the House would not vote this week on a bill to curb trading by members of Congress punted the issue until after the midterm elections and reflected a rough road ahead.
Stephanie Lai and Kate Kelly - The New York Times
Legislation to limit stock trading by members of Congress has stalled amid resistance from members of both parties to more tightly regulating their financial activities, raising doubt about the prospects of a bid to ensure that public officials are not profiting off their positions. Speaker Nancy Pelosi, Democrat of California and initially a skeptic of such a measure, embraced the effort in recent months after pressure from rank-and-file lawmakers. She said that the House would take up the issue this month, before adjourning for the midterm elections. But on Thursday, Representative Steny H. Hoyer, Democrat of Maryland and the majority leader, told reporters that the legislation was on hold, at least until after the balloting in November.
/jlne.ws/3ybS5Xc
Texas anti-ESG law endangers financial stability, says Sarah Bloom Raskin; Ex-Fed official says blacklisting of companies over climate policies encourages risky investment
Brooke Masters, Colby Smith and Aime Williams - Financial Times
New laws in Texas and other US states that punish financial firms for "boycotting" oil and gas endanger global financial stability by encouraging risky loans to energy firms, former deputy Treasury secretary Sarah Bloom Raskin has said. Large banks including JPMorgan Chase, Wells Fargo, NatWest and Goldman Sachs will feel obliged to continue lending to energy companies at current levels even if there are good risk management reasons to cut back, said Raskin, who has also served as a US Federal Reserve governor. Her nomination to return to the Fed to head banking supervision was blocked by Republicans earlier this year.
/jlne.ws/3UXlSwv
A broken insurance market threatens Florida and its star governor; Devastation from Hurricane Ian presents a critical test for the ambitious Ron DeSantis
Joshua Chaffin - Financial Times
What may be Florida's most destructive hurricane is threatening to swamp the state's property insurance market, posing a stiff challenge to a star governor with national political aspirations. Even before Hurricane Ian made landfall on Wednesday, the state's property insurance market was buckling. Six companies had already fallen into insolvency this year as underwriting losses exceeded $1bn for the second consecutive year. Insurers, in turn, have been exiting the state and curtailing renewals, leaving homeowners with dwindling options for coverage and soaring prices.
/jlne.ws/3ybUEIO
Florida Senators Request More Federal Aid Despite Not Voting For Hurricane Relief
Sanjana Karanth - HuffPost
Florida's Republican senators have asked for federal funding to help with relief after Hurricane Ian ripped through the state - despite neither lawmaker voting on Thursday for billions in disaster relief, some of which would go toward hurricane recovery efforts. On Friday, Sens. Marco Rubio and Rick Scott sent a joint letter to the Senate Appropriations Committee chairs asking for funding to "provide much needed assistance to Florida." The letter was first reported by the Tallahassee Democrat.
/jlne.ws/3dVIXzj
Truss Tries to Soothe Angry Britons Citing 'Clear Plan'
Anurag Kotoky - Bloomberg
Beleaguered UK Prime Minister Liz Truss said her government has a "clear plan" to fix the root cause of an energy crisis that has fueled skyrocketing inflation, in an effort to win public support for policies that prompted more than half of Britons to call for her resignation. "I am going to do things differently. It involves difficult decisions and does involve disruption in the short term," Truss wrote in The Sun newspaper. "Not everyone will like what we are doing, but I want to reassure the public that the Government has a clear plan that I believe is right for the country."
/jlne.ws/3CroEmw
Truss Should Resign as UK Prime Minister, More Than Half of Britons Say
Alex Morales - Bloomberg
More than half of Britons think Liz Truss should quit as UK premier, according to a YouGov poll that adds to her woes less than a month into the job. The survey on Friday underscores the damage done to Truss's standing and that of her Conservative Party by the huge package of unfunded tax cuts her government unveiled a week ago, triggering a selloff in the pound and government bonds and leaving her party trailing the opposition Labour by a record distance.
/jlne.ws/3rrJhIY
EU Aims for Russia Sanctions Deal Today, Including Oil Price Cap; Ambassadors from the 27 member states meet in Brussels Monday; Countries with large shipping industries pushing back
Ewa Krukowska, Alberto Nardelli, and Natalia Drozdiak - Bloomberg
The European Union is aiming for a preliminary deal as soon as Monday on a new sanctions package meant to punish Russia for escalating its war in Ukraine and illegally annexing four occupied territories there. "I am hopeful in a couple of hours we can have a unanimous agreement on the sanctions package," Polish ambassador to the EU, Andrzej Sados, told reporters. "We are very close to it and there is determination to clinch a deal ASAP."
/jlne.ws/3e0RH7b
Putin's War Machine Funding Is Unscathed by Latest Sanctions; Little practical effect seen on Russia's oil and gas revenue; Without cap on energy prices, it's not 'game-changer': analyst
Daniel Flatley - Bloomberg
The US sanctioned hundreds of Russian officials, lawmakers, family members and businesses Friday in what Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen called a "sweeping action," but in reality the measures will have little practical effect on President Vladimir Putin's ability to sustain his country's economy with oil and gas revenue. That raises fundamental questions about the effectiveness of sanctions, despite how big it looks on paper for the Biden administration to go after Russia's central banker, Elvira Nabiullina, and Alexander Novak, the deputy prime minister and a key figure in Russia's energy sector. A raft of sanctions so far haven't materially affected the war on the ground in Ukraine or dented Putin's determination to pursue it despite repeated setbacks.
/jlne.ws/3SMJwdm
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| Regulation & Enforcement | | Stories about regulation and the law. | Justice Department Promises to Crack Down as Corporate Crime Cases Decline; New policies are meant to spur companies to self-report fraud and bribery amid a decline in the number of corporate crime cases. Here's a breakdown of some of the main changes
Dylan Tokar - The Wall Street Journal
The Justice Department is seeking to counter data showing a decline in corporate crime cases by doubling down on a familiar strategy: Getting companies to police their own employees and hand over any evidence of wrongdoing to prosecutors. The bid to get companies to disclose possible criminal violations is part of a sweeping set of policy changes announced by Deputy Attorney General Lisa Monaco last month, which touched upon topics as diverse as compensation clawbacks and how prosecutors should treat companies with long rap sheets.
/jlne.ws/3M36hYd
India's Market Regulator Tightens Disclosure Norms for IPOs; Starts pre-filling of offer document as alternate mechanism; Sebi gets mutual fund transactions under insider trading norms
Dhwani Pandya - Bloomberg
India's capital market regulator approved decisions related to changes in norms for initial public offerings, including additional disclosure norms and optional pre-filling of offer documents. Issuers looking at raising funds from public offers, whether traditional or new age tech startups, will now be mandated to make disclosures on their key performance indicators and pricing based on past transactions and fund raisings in their offer documents, the Securities and Exchange Board of India said in a post board meeting statement.
/jlne.ws/3SRywve
UK Regulators Meet to Prevent New Gilt Selloff, FT Says
Giulia Morpurgo - Bloomberg
UK regulators overseeing the pensions sector are holding daily meetings with asset managers to avoid another crisis in the bond market once the Bank of England's emergency intervention ends, the Financial Times reported. Regulators are worried that once the BOE's £65 billion ($72.6 billion) bond buying stops on Oct. 14, a gilt selloff might resume. The Financial Conduct Authority declined to comment when contacted by Bloomberg News, while the UK's Treasury did not respond to a request for comment.
/jlne.ws/3UW0s32
Dubai hands out $2mn fine for KPMG's Abraaj audits; Financial regulator says auditor and former partner failed to follow international standards
Simeon Kerr and Michael O'Dwyer - Fiancial Times
Dubai's financial regulator has provisionally fined KPMG and one of its former partners $2mn over the firm's auditing of Abraaj, the emerging markets private equity group that collapsed in 2018.
/jlne.ws/3Cv0QhT
OSC alleges fraud in multimillion-dollar crypto asset offering
Ontario Securities Commission
The Ontario Securities Commission (OSC) today filed allegations against Troy Richard James Hogg and affiliated companies in relation to an offering of crypto security tokens that raised US$51 million from investors. The OSC alleges that from May 2017 to June 2019, Hogg, an Ontario resident, and his companies Cryptobontix Inc., Arbitrade Exchange Inc. and Arbitrade Ltd. promoted and sold a crypto asset named Dignity token (formerly Unity Ingot) to investors around the world. According to the allegations, Hogg and his companies defrauded investors with false and misleading statements in promotional materials. These statements included false claims that gold bullion supported the value of Dignity tokens.
/jlne.ws/3SN8fOK
Opec+ plans substantial oil production cut to prop up prices; Group expected to discuss reduction of more than 1mn barrels a day at meeting on Wednesday
David Sheppard and Derek Brower - Financial Times
The Opec+ oil alliance is planning a substantial cut in production to prop up falling prices, according to people close to the discussions, as the group prepares to meet in person for the first time since March 2020. The oil group, which is led by Saudi Arabia and Russia, is expected to discuss a production cut that could total more than 1mn barrels a day at the meeting on Wednesday. This is by far the largest since early in the pandemic and equivalent to more than 1 per cent of global supplies.
/jlne.ws/3SRBYpG
US settlements bare the 'off-channel' world of bankers; Use of WhatsApp and other messaging channels has become widespread during the pandemic
Gary Silverman - Financial Times
For months, US regulators have been investigating leading Wall Street banks and brokerages, searching for evidence that traders and dealmakers have been using unofficial messaging channels like WhatsApp and Signal to evade rules requiring them to preserve work communications. This week, the world learned the price tag to resolve the probe: about $2bn. In addition to a $200mn settlement reached with JPMorgan Chase in December, the Securities and Exchange Commission and Commodity Futures Trading Commission said on Tuesday that Bank of America, Citigroup, Goldman Sachs, Morgan Stanley, Credit Suisse, UBS, Barclays, Deutsche Bank, Nomura, Jefferies and Cantor Fitzgerald — would pay an additional $1.8bn. Those are sizeable sums. But as big settlements go, it left a lot unsettled.
/jlne.ws/3Sw1YaB
OPEC+ to Consider Output Cut of More Than 1 Million Barrels; Reduction would reflect worries on slowing global growth; Brent crude has retreated from February's war-driven spike
Salma El Wardany and Grant Smith - Bloomberg
OPEC+ will consider cutting oil output by more than 1 million barrels a day, according to delegates, when it meets in person on Wednesday for the first time in more than two years. A larger-than-expected reduction would reflect the scale of the producer group's concern that the global economy is slowing fast in the face of rapidly tightening monetary policy. A final decision won't be made until oil ministers meet in OPEC's Vienna headquarters, the delegates said. A cut of 1 million would be the biggest since the start of the pandemic.
/jlne.ws/3e1dZ8I
Statement of Commissioner Christy Goldsmith Romero Regarding Enforcement Action and Settlement with Swap Execution Facility BGC Derivative Markets, L.P.; Systemic Swap Reporting Violations Harm Market Transparency and Integrity
CFTC
Swap reporting is fundamental to post-crisis financial regulation - a critical tool for promoting transparency and market integrity in swap markets that used to be opaque. It has been a decade since the Commodity Futures Trading Commission ("CFTC") implemented Dodd-Frank Act requirements for swap reporting. However, in my six months of serving as a CFTC Commissioner, I have seen multiple enforcement cases involving swap reporting failures, which is troubling.
/jlne.ws/3M4ox3x
CFTC Orders Swap Execution Facility to Pay $1.9 Million for Swap Reporting and Core Principle Violations
CFTC
The Commodity Futures Trading Commission today issued an order simultaneously filing and settling charges against BGC Derivative Markets, L.P. (BGCD), a swap execution facility (SEF), for failing to report or accurately report thousands of swap transactions to the CFTC, a swap data repository (SDR), or the public; failing to timely correct reporting errors; and violating SEF Core Principles.
/jlne.ws/3E7MO73
FINRA Extended Hearing Panel Expels NYPPEX, Bars Former CEO Laurence Allen and Suspends Current CEO and CCO Michael Schunk
Financial Industry Regulatory Authority
FINRA announced today that an extended hearing panel has expelled broker-dealer NYPPEX, LLC and barred its former CEO Laurence Allen for failing to respond in a timely and complete manner to FINRA requests for information and documents. The panel also found that NYPPEX and Allen engaged in securities fraud. In addition, the panel barred NYPPEX's current CEO and Chief Compliance Officer Michael Schunk in any principal or supervisory capacity for his failure to supervise Allen, and suspended him for two years in all capacities for engaging in other misconduct—the maximum suspension under FINRA's sanction guidelines.
/jlne.ws/3M3QqsM
SEC Charges Audit Firm RSM and Three Senior-Level Employees with Failure to Properly Conduct Client Audits
SEC
The Securities and Exchange Commission today charged audit firm RSM US LLP and three senior-level employees with improper professional conduct for failing to properly audit Revolution Lighting Technologies Inc.'s ("Revolution") financial statements over a four-year period when Revolution was violating accounting principles by inflating revenue with bill and hold sales.
/jlne.ws/3E7PTE5
SEC Charges Two Canadian Software Engineers with Insider Trading
SEC
The Securities and Exchange Commission today announced insider trading charges against two Canadian software engineers who made $1.6 million by trading ahead of non-public, market-moving financial information.
/jlne.ws/3SSnmq4
SEC Charges Eight in Scheme to Fraudulently Promote Securities Offerings
SEC
The Securities and Exchange Commission today announced charges against six individuals and two companies for their involvement in a fraudulent scheme to promote the securities of issuers that were conducting (or purporting to conduct) offerings pursuant to Regulation A, which, if certain conditions are met, provides an exemption to the Securities Act's registration provisions. All but two of the parties have agreed to settle the SEC charges.
/jlne.ws/3C0HIXn
SEC Charges Kim Kardashian for Unlawfully Touting Crypto Security
SEC
The Securities and Exchange Commission today announced charges against Kim Kardashian for touting on social media a crypto asset security offered and sold by EthereumMax without disclosing the payment she received for the promotion. Kardashian agreed to settle the charges, pay $1.26 million in penalties, disgorgement, and interest, and cooperate with the Commission's ongoing investigation.
/jlne.ws/3rtexYh
SEC Charges Four Defendants in Connection with Fraudulent Scheme to Sell Public Company Stock
SEC
The SEC today announced charges against Canadian resident David Stephens and California residents Donald Linn Danks, Jonathan Destler, and Robert Lazerus. According to the SEC's complaint, from at least 2014 to at least November 2018, Stephens, Danks, and Destler engaged in a deceptive scheme to sell publicly traded stock of Quebec-based Loop Industries, Inc. while concealing their ownership of Loop stock and connections with the company. The complaint alleges that Lazerus worked with the group to further the scheme by helping to increase demand for Loop stock by promoting it and brokering sales to a number of investors.
/jlne.ws/3fCw0ea
SEC Files Charges in a Crypto Asset Pump-And-Dump Scheme
SEC
The Securities and Exchange Commission today filed charges against Arbitrade Ltd., a Bermudan company, and Cryptobontix Inc., a Canadian company, and their principals, Troy R. J. Hogg, James L. Goldberg, and Stephen L. Braverman, and a so-called international gold trader, Max W. Barber, for perpetrating an alleged pump-and-dump scheme involving a crypto asset called "Dignity" or "DIG."
/jlne.ws/3V9UAn5
SEC Charges Vivera Pharmaceuticals and Its CEO with Offering Fraud
SEC
The Securities and Exchange Commission today announced charges against Orange County, California-based Vivera Pharmaceuticals, Inc., its CEO Paul P. Edalat, and another Edalat-controlled entity, Sentar Pharmaceuticals, for an alleged offering fraud that raised approximately $6.6 million from investors.
/jlne.ws/3e3hLP4
SEC Charges Michigan Resident with Conducting an Unregistered Securities Offering
SEC
The Securities and Exchange Commission announced today that it filed charges against Mark J. McKinley of Kawkawlin, Michigan and his companies Paystr LLC and JumpStart Equity LLC for conducting an unregistered offering of securities that raised approximately $890,000 from 37 investors in violation of the federal securities laws.
/jlne.ws/3fDskJ9
SEC Charges South Florida Man and Others with Real Estate Investment Fraud
SEC
The Securities and Exchange Commission announced today that it filed charges against Paulo Fernando De Bastos, a Florida real estate agent, Joao Pedro Fonseca, a resident of France, and four companies they owned or controlled for their roles in an alleged real estate investment fraud in Detroit, Michigan.
/jlne.ws/3e1Xc5q
SEC Charges Eight in Scheme to Fraudulently Promote Securities Offerings
SEC
The Securities and Exchange Commission today announced charges against six individuals and two companies for their involvement in a fraudulent scheme to promote the securities of issuers that were conducting (or purporting to conduct) offerings pursuant to Regulation A, which, if certain conditions are met, provides an exemption to the Securities Act's registration provisions. All but two of the parties have agreed to settle the SEC charges.
/jlne.ws/3rtfRdH
SEC Charges Infinity Q's Former Senior Officer for Role in Massive Valuation Fraud
SEC
The Securities and Exchange Commission today charged Scott Lindell-the former Chief Risk Officer, head of operations, and Chief Compliance Officer, and a former portfolio manager and Valuation Committee member of SEC-registered investment adviser Infinity Q Capital Management LLC-with misconduct concerning a more than $1 billion overvaluation scheme.
/jlne.ws/3rqPtkt
SEC Charges Former Controller of Network Infrastructure Company with Accounting Fraud
SEC
The Securities and Exchange Commission today charged Daniel Moser, the former controller of FTE Networks, Inc., a network infrastructure company formerly based in Naples, Florida, for his role in a multi-year accounting fraud. This alleged scheme conducted by Moser, along with three senior executives previously charged by the Commission in July 2021 and June 2022, inflated the company's revenues for certain periods by as much as 108 percent.
/jlne.ws/3dYT7z9
SEC Charges California Attorney for Role in $910 Million Ponzi Scheme
SEC
The Securities and Exchange Commission today announced charges against Ari J. Lauer, an attorney for DC Solar Solutions, Inc. and DC Solar Distribution, Inc. (together "DC Solar"), for his role in a multi-year alternative energy tax credit Ponzi scheme run by the two California-based companies.
/jlne.ws/3RBsCNH
SEC Charges Family Office Executives with Insider Trading
SEC
The Securities and Exchange Commission today filed insider trading charges against Charles Rustin "Rusty" Holzer, a former broker who now manages a New York-based family investment office, and Fernando Moraes, the Chief Operating Officer of that family office. The SEC's complaints allege that Holzer and Moraes traded in options of Dun & Bradstreet Corp. (NYSE: DNB) based on material nonpublic information ahead of the company's August 8, 2018 announcement that it had agreed to be acquired by a private investor group at a price of $145 per share pursuant to an offer made approximately a month earlier. The SEC further alleges that Holzer and Moraes tipped two other traders who also traded ahead of the announcement.
/jlne.ws/3Rq3hq4
ASIC places interim stop order on APIL Essential Retail Income Fund
ASIC
ASIC has made an interim stop order preventing Australasian Property Investments Limited (APIL) from offering or distributing the APIL Essential Retail Income Fund (the Fund) to retail investors because of a non-compliant target market determination (TMD).
/jlne.ws/3dThIoO
ISDA Responds to ESMA on Clearing and Derivative Trading Obligations in View of 2022 Benchmark Transition Status
International Swaps and Derivatives Association, Inc.
ISDA members are overall supportive of ESMA's consultation on adapting the derivatives clearing obligation (CO) in the context of the on-going interest rate benchmark reform. We also welcome that this consultation allows us to feed into the process again. ISDA members acknowledge the benefits of central clearing, as demonstrated by the current clearing rates for risk free reference rate (RFR) swaps. We believe that introducing a CO for these products could be a helpful tool for avoiding liquidity fragmentation.
/jlne.ws/3RwjFpd
AIA to pay $700,000 penalty for false and misleading representations to customers
Financial Markets Authority
The Auckland High Court has ordered life insurer AIA to pay a pecuniary penalty of $700,000 for making false and/or misleading representations to some customers, following proceedings brought by the Financial Markets Authority (FMA) - Te Mana Tatai Hokohoko.
AIA admitted to the conduct last year in court. The FMA and AIA agreed a penalty of $700,000 reflected the seriousness of the breaches.
/jlne.ws/3SpjqNH
Thirteen people charged following SFC and Police joint operation against ramp-and-dump syndicate
Securities & Futures Commission of Hong Kong
Thirteen suspects were charged with various criminal offences following an earlier joint operation of the Securities and Futures Commission (SFC) and the Police against a sophisticated ramp-and-dump syndicate (Note 1). Five of them were charged with the offences of conspiracy to defraud and conspiracy to employ a scheme with intent to defraud or deceive in transactions involving securities under common law, section 300 of the Securities and Futures Ordinance (SFO) and section 159A and 159C of the Crimes Ordinance. Among them, two face additional charges of money laundering together with eight other defendants.
/jlne.ws/3SKj3x7
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| Investing & Trading | | Today's top stories from equities, indices and FICC (fixed income, currencies and commodities) | Generali Explores Deal With US Asset Manager Guggenheim; Italian insurer said to have held talks on various options; Generali explored potential banking unit sale to raise funds
Sonia Sirletti, Tommaso Ebhardt, Sonali Basak, and Dinesh Nair - Bloomberg
Assicurazioni Generali SpA is exploring a deal with US investment firm Guggenheim Partners to bolster its asset management business, according to people familiar with the matter. Italy's biggest insurer has held informal talks on options ranging from a full acquisition of Guggenheim's asset management business to a partnership or strategic investment, the people said, asking not to be identified as the discussions are private.
/jlne.ws/3BUnoqI
The Unstoppable Dollar Is Wreaking Havoc Everywhere But America; The Federal Reserve's focus on taming inflation is inflicting a world of pain on other economies.
Liz McCormick, Michael Mackenzie, and Christopher Condon - Bloomberg
The mighty dollar is steamrolling everything right now, causing issues for economies almost everywhere—except in the US. That means that, for now at least, it's not America's problem and the historic central-bank-fueled surge in the greenback is unlikely to abate anytime soon. By some measures the US currency is already stronger than ever, eclipsing the highs of the Covid-19 pandemic from early 2020. The pain it's inflicting has echoes of the mid-1980s, when foreign exchange chaos forced the world's most important finance officials to join hands and impose a solution on markets. Right now, though, it's every country for itself as the US administration pushes back on the idea of coordinated market action.
/jlne.ws/3rq2ivn
The Crazy Junk-Muni Market Makes More Sense Than Ever; There will always be risky projects looking for money, but today's investors are better equipped to handle losses.
Joe Mysak - Bloomberg
When I hear complaints about some of the riskier municipal bond deals in the market today, I think back to my "map talk" in 1999. I was the lunchtime speaker at the National Federation of Municipal Analysts advanced seminar on high-yield bonds in Santa Monica, Calif. Without any props or projections, I took the roomful of bankers, analysts, and investors on a virtual tour of many of the interesting—even fabulous—transactions I'd written about in Grant's Municipal Bond Observer over the previous few years.
/jlne.ws/3dY3rHI
Corporate Bond Doomsayers Are a Little Premature; Even if a recession is coming, it could be a while until the trouble hits companies' ability to meet their debt obligations.
Jonathan Levin - Bloomberg
The credit-market bears may well be vindicated if the US enters a recession in the next year, but it's too early to go full-scale Armageddon with predictions about corporate bond spreads. For all the economic headwinds, US corporations started the year from a position of extraordinary financial strength thanks to opportunistic refinancing in 2020 and 2021 and strong cash reserves accumulated during the pandemic. While clearly increasing from late 2021 levels, trailing 12-month high-yield default rates are still low for normal times, let alone recessions, and it could take several quarters for the defaults to start materializing in significant numbers.
/jlne.ws/3LZS4eF
Oil Traders Regain Their Swagger With World Desperate for Fuel; Global consumers rush for reliable energy after war in Ukraine; Singapore hosts week of parties, meetings for merchants
Serene Cheong - Bloomberg
As the world's biggest oil and gas traders descended on Singapore this week for one of their industry's top conferences, it wasn't just the maskless crowds and packed late-night cocktail parties reminding them of times past. After years in the shadow of fast-growing clean energy, hydrocarbon merchants returned to the city's brightly lit streets and rooftop bars with a renewed sense of purpose. Amid a global energy crisis and upended trade flows as a result of Russia's invasion of Ukraine, traders are playing a crucial role securing supplies in a world desperate for affordable fuel.
/jlne.ws/3LYMDww
It's Getting More Expensive to Bet Against Cathie Wood — And Investors Are Paying Up; Short interest increased even as cost to bet against ETFs rose; Traders want to get ahead of continued market declines: Bajaj
Vildana Hajric - Bloomberg
Short sellers are homing in on Cathie Wood's pool of exchange-traded funds, undeterred by the rising cost to bet against the Ark Investment Management family. Investors who expect her group of funds to decline have sent short interest to 16.8% of all freely available shares, up from about 13% in mid-August, according to data compiled by Ihor Dusaniwsky at S3 Partners. It's a bet that the Federal Reserve's aggressive tightening will continue to hammer Wood's rate-sensitive picks. Her flagship fund has plunged around 60% so far this year.
/jlne.ws/3rpKalt
As the Fertilizer Crisis Bites, Farmers Take Drastic Steps; Expensive, scarce fertilizers disrupt European farmers' plans; Energy crunch has shut fertilizer plants across Europe
Megan Durisin and Elina Anya Ganatra - Bloomberg
Ditching oilseed crops for peas, preparing to cut herds and splashing out on tractor gadgets. That's what European farmers are doing to try to cope with a worsening fertilizer crisis. The lengths they're going to in order to apply less of the nutrients vital for growing staples like wheat and rapeseed highlights the continued threat the crunch poses to food output. Many of Europe's fertilizer plants have closed as Russia's war in Ukraine squeezes supplies of gas that nitrogen fertilizer is derived from.
/jlne.ws/3C5tF2H
Battered Investors Now Find Thrills in T-Bills; Faltering markets flatter positive returns in the short-term vehicles. 'You don't really have too many other great options.'
Matt Grossman - The Wall Street Journal
James DiCio spent much of the last eight years riding cryptocurrencies' double-digit gains and losses. Lately, the 24-year-old has found a new hot investment: short-term government debt. Weary of big swings in digital currencies, the pilot from Bohemia, N.Y., sold most of his crypto holdings last year, shifting his money from one of the most volatile investments to one of the safest. Now about 20% of his portfolio is in four-week to 13-week Treasury bills, these days yielding as much as 3.3%, the most since he was 9. "I'm here, I've made this much money, and now I kind of want to protect it," Mr. DiCio said. "In this economy, you don't really have too many other great options."
/jlne.ws/3rmPeHl
After Punishing Year for Stocks, Investors Aren't Betting on Post-Midterm Rally; A tough market has investors wondering whether 2022 will dent an 80-year record of notching gains after midterm elections
Hannah Miao - The Wall Street Journal
U.S. stocks have a spotless eight-decade record of rising after midterm elections, but investors and strategists are skeptical over whether November races will spark a rebound in this year's bruised markets. The S&P 500 has moved higher in the one-year period following every midterm election since 1942, according to Dow Jones Market Data. The benchmark on average has gained nearly 15% in post-midterm years since World War II.
/jlne.ws/3Cppct8
UK pension fund crisis shows there is no capitalism without capital or risk; Current turmoil is the culmination of policy mistakes made a generation ago
Michael Tory - Financial Times
It is beyond ironic that an investment strategy that claimed to eliminate risk threatened the unprecedented failure of the UK pension system this week. The main focus of attention so far in probing what went wrong has been on what took place over the few days leading up to the Bank of England's emergency intervention on Wednesday to stem a crisis in pension funds over so-called liability driven investment strategies.
/jlne.ws/3RwHKMy
Corporate Bond Doomsayers Are a Little Premature; Even if a recession is coming, it could be a while until the trouble hits companies' ability to meet their debt obligations.
Jonathan Levin - Bloomberg
The credit-market bears may well be vindicated if the US enters a recession in the next year, but it's too early to go full-scale Armageddon with predictions about corporate bond spreads. For all the economic headwinds, US corporations started the year from a position of extraordinary financial strength thanks to opportunistic refinancing in 2020 and 2021 and strong cash reserves accumulated during the pandemic. While clearly increasing from late 2021 levels, trailing 12-month high-yield default rates are still low for normal times, let alone recessions, and it could take several quarters for the defaults to start materializing in significant numbers.
/jlne.ws/3LZS4eF
Wealthy Use Loophole to Reap Tax Breaks — And Delay Giving Away Money; Foundations shift billions to donor-advised funds, skirting US laws requiring transfers to the needy, a Bloomberg analysis finds.
Noah Buhayar, Sophie Alexander, and Ben Steverman - Bloomberg
For years, New York hedge fund tycoon Robert Mercer itemized in public tax filings the millions of dollars his family foundation gave to conservative causes. Then, in 2018, the foundation made by far its largest gift to an account called a donor-advised fund that effectively keeps his philanthropy secret. At the Allender Family Foundation Inc., based in a house near Las Vegas on Marie Antoinette Street, a millionaire family has used the same sort of fund for another purpose increasingly popular among the wealthy: keeping the tax benefits of philanthropy while delaying for years actually giving to those in need.
/jlne.ws/3EdJrvg
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| Environmental, Social and Corporate Governance | | Stories about environmental, social and governance investing | CFOs will be at the center of climate-risk disclosure reporting, says an author of the SEC's proposed rules
Sheryl Estrada - Fortune
As public companies await the passage of the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission's proposed mandatory climate-risk disclosure rule, internal teams are gearing up to tackle these new requirements. Will a company's finance operation led by the CFO be at the center of the need for enhanced reporting to the SEC? "At the end of the day, yes. That's where the rubber meets the road," Kristina Wyatt, deputy general counsel and SVP of global regulatory climate disclosure at Persefoni, a software company that provides a climate management and accounting platform, told a group of finance chiefs in Dallas last night.
/jlne.ws/3rqe1Kt
Retail investors warned on piling into risky alternative products; Asset managers cite pitfalls at FT conference as 'alts' look beyond institutions for growth
Madison Darbyshire, Brooke Masters and Harriet Agnew - Financial Times
Retail investors must be wary as a wave of alternative investment products comes to market because many carry high fees, lack diversification and offer poor quality investments, asset managers have warned. Big institutional investors have racked up enviable returns in recent years with investments in alternatives, the catch all term for investments that are not publicly traded, such as private equity, private credit and real estate. But the asset class had been largely out of reach of individuals because it requires large minimum investments and long lock up periods.
/jlne.ws/3Cthtun
PEAK6 Spotlight on Hispanic Heritage Authors
PEAK6
As part of the PEAK6 celebration of Hispanic Heritage Month, we are highlighting five well-known American authors of Hispanic heritage. From novelists to poets, each has created outstanding pieces of literature guaranteed to educate and inspire.
/jlne.ws/3C29iDJ
ConEd Agrees to Sell Clean Energy Business for $6.8 Billion to RWE; German energy company says the acquisition will nearly double its U.S. renewable energy position
Katherine Blunt - The Wall Street Journal
Consolidated Edison Inc. has agreed to sell its renewable energy business to German energy company RWE AG for $6.8 billion, the companies said Saturday. The deal nearly doubles RWE's renewable energy portfolio in the U.S. and will make it the second-largest solar operator in the country, the company said in a statement. ConEd's portfolio includes more than 10 gigawatts of renewable projects in operation or under development. "The unique combination of complementary portfolios in onshore wind, solar and batteries creates one of the leading renewable companies in the U.S. market," RWE Chief Executive Markus Krebber said in a statement.
/jlne.ws/3ycSzN0
Half of world's bird species in decline as destruction of avian life intensifies; State of the World's Birds report warns human actions and climate crisis putting 49% in decline, with one in eight bird species under threat of extinction
Phoebe Weston - The Guardian
Nearly half of the planet's bird species are in decline, according to a definitive report that paints the grimmest picture yet of the destruction of avian life. The State of the World's Birds report, which is released every four years by BirdLife International, shows that the expansion and intensification of agriculture is putting pressure on 73% of species.
/jlne.ws/3yb4zyh
Renewable energy could be the key to hurricane-proofing Puerto Rico's power grid; Stronger hurricanes driven by climate change are pushing Puerto Rico to hunt for better renewable energy options.
Jocelyn Solis-Moreira - Popular Science
Its lights outs for Puerto Rico, again. After dealing with devastation to the electric grid from Hurricane Maria five years ago, the US territory has struggled to create a hurricane-proof way to protect themselves from future blackouts. Now, two weeks after Hurricane Fiona swept over the island, a quarter of Puerto Rico's residents are still without electricity. While efforts are underway to restore power locally, there's been a revival of interest in transitioning to renewable energy—from leaders igniting conversations to locals rallying protests. Experts say diversifying the grid will help to "climatize" the energy system, reducing the chances of another island-wide blackout while simultaneously cutting residents' carbon footprint and energy costs.
/jlne.ws/3EbGds9
Community solar can help revitalize communities. Here's how; The Biden administration wants community solar to reduce energy burdens and build local jobs and economies. Equity-focused solar developers are ready.
Jeff St. John - Canary Media
What does community solar mean for low-income and disadvantaged neighborhoods where residents are struggling to pay their electric bills or are looking to clean energy as a pathway to a good career?
/jlne.ws/3fyEVx8
Renewable energy could be the key to hurricane-proofing Puerto Rico's power grid; Stronger hurricanes driven by climate change are pushing Puerto Rico to hunt for better renewable energy options.
Jocelyn Solis-Moreiira - Popsci.com
Its lights outs for Puerto Rico, again. After dealing with devastation to the electric grid from Hurricane Maria five years ago, the US territory has struggled to create a hurricane-proof way to protect themselves from future blackouts. Now, two weeks after Hurricane Fiona swept over the island, a quarter of Puerto Rico's residents are still without electricity. While efforts are underway to restore power locally, there's been a revival of interest in transitioning to renewable energy—from leaders igniting conversations to locals rallying protests. Experts say diversifying the grid will help to "climatize" the energy system, reducing the chances of another island-wide blackout while simultaneously cutting residents' carbon footprint and energy costs.
/jlne.ws/3EbGds9
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| Banks, Brokers & Managed Funds | | The latest from banks, brokers, hedge funds and managed futures | JPMorgan Chase Is Phasing Out Safe Deposit Boxes; Bank won't rent new boxes or offer substitutes for closed ones; Boxes have long been a place for securing valuables, documents
Jennifer Surane - Bloomberg
JPMorgan Chase & Co. is starting to phase out an offering far more associated with old-fashioned bank branches than today's smartphone apps: safe deposit boxes. The New York-based lender no longer allows customers to rent new boxes. If a Chase bank branch is shut, its safe deposit boxes will be closed as well, and their holders won't be able to open a new box at another location. "We made a business decision to stop offering new safe deposit boxes as of December 2021, but that doesn't affect current customers who have boxes," said JPMorgan spokesman Tom Kelly.
/jlne.ws/3UW0lVb
Credit Suisse Seeks to Calm Market Jitters; In talking points updated Sunday for its bankers and relationship managers, Credit Suisse emphasized its capital buffers
Margot Patrick - The Wall Street Journal
Credit Suisse Group AG tried to assuage fears about its health in a memo to employees and in a round of phone calls to investors and clients over the weekend, according to people familiar with the matter. Credit Suisse shares are down 21% this month and spreads on its credit-default swaps, a type of insurance against default, rose to their highest level of the year on Friday. The deteriorated market condition indicates that Credit Suisse could struggle to raise new shares to pay for a planned restructuring and that its funding costs could rise sharply. There hasn't been a formal approach to any shareholders about issuing new shares, the people familiar with the matter said.
/jlne.ws/3SxYC6W
Credit Suisse reassures investors over bank's financial strength; Executives contacted clients after credit default swaps suggested growing worries over group's health
Owen Walker - Financial Times
Senior Credit Suisse executives spent the weekend reassuring large clients, counterparties and investors about the Swiss bank's liquidity and capital position in response to concerns raised about its financial strength. Executives hit the phones after spreads on the bank's credit default swaps, which offer protection against a company defaulting, rose sharply on Friday, indicating investor worries over its financial health. "The teams are actively engaging with our top clients and counterparties this weekend," said a Credit Suisse executive involved in the discussions. "We are also getting incoming calls from our top investors with messages of support."
/jlne.ws/3rq61sR
Credit Suisse CEO Seeks to Calm Markets as Default Swaps Climb
Myriam Balezou - Bloomberg
Credit Suisse Group AG's new chief has asked investors for less than 100 days to deliver a new turnaround strategy. Turbulent markets are making that feel like a long time. The cost of insuring the firm's bonds against default climbed about 15% last week to levels not seen since 2009 as the shares touched a new record low. On Friday, Chief Executive Officer Ulrich Koerner reassured staff that the bank has a "strong capital base and liquidity position" and told employees that he will be sending them a regular update until the firm announces a new strategic plan on Oct. 27.
/jlne.ws/3E78xvP
Warburg Pincus Is Exploring $1.5 Billion Sale of Wencor
Gillian Tan and Kiel Porter - Bloomberg
Warburg Pincus is exploring a sale of Wencor Group, which designs, repairs and distributes after-market replacement components for airlines, according to people with knowledge of the matter. The private equity firm is working with an adviser to solicit interest in the Peachtree City, Georgia-based company, said the people, who asked to not be identified because the effort is private. Any transaction could value Wencor at about $1.5 billion, one of the people said.
/jlne.ws/3SuQxjb
India falls short of FTSE Russell government bond index inclusion
Reuters
Global index provider FTSE Russell said India will remain on the watch list for inclusion in the FTSE Emerging Markets Government Bond Index (EMGBI), dashing market hopes that FTSE would announce its entrance into the index. India will also remain on the watch list for a potential upgrade to Market Accessibility Level 1, the index provider said on Thursday, which indicates an improved ease of foreign access to local markets. "FTSE Russell continues to engage with its index users and Indian market authorities regarding ongoing market structure reforms, with a focus on securities that are available via the Fully Accessible Route channel," it said in its annual country classification review.
/jlne.ws/3UXVYcg
BlackRock Names Martin Small as Next CFO; Mr. Small succeeds Gary Shedlin, who has been finance chief for nearly a decade
By Sabela Ojea - The Wall Street Journal
Financial giant BlackRock Inc. said Monday that it named Martin Small as its next finance chief, effective next year. Mr. Small succeeds Gary Shedlin, who has been CFO for nearly a decade. Mr. Shedlin will remain with BlackRock as vice chairman, working directly with top clients of the money management firm.
/jlne.ws/3SLA5L6
XTX Markets appoints new chairman following the completion of Beattie's five-year term; New chairman takes on the role in addition to serving as co-CEO of the firm, a position he has held since 2015.
Wesley Bray - The Trade
XTX Markets has appointed Zar Amrolia as chairman, replacing Niki Beattie who held the position over the last five years. Beattie took on the position in 2018, alongside serving as a member of the firm's audit committee. "After five great years on the amazing XTX journey, Friday was my last day as chair of XTX," said Beattie in a social media post.
/jlne.ws/3Rv2swm
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| Wellness Exchange | | An Exchange of Health and Wellness Information | Covid Virus Accelerates With Each New Variant
William A. Haseltine - Forbes
Far from subsiding, SARS-CoV-2 is rapidly mutating worldwide, in multiple directions, with the commonality that each new variant is more fit and spreads through a previously infected and vaccinated population more rapidly. Since late 2021, the Omicron variant has dominated SARS-CoV-2 infections, fueling the massive wave of cases in January and onward. From the parental Omicron BA.2 lineage came BA.5, which currently accounts for most infections. Though while BA.5 was headlining SARS-CoV-2 infections, a cacophony of sibling variants was mutating and emerging behind the scenes, leading to a massive pool of variants being identified around the globe.
/jlne.ws/3rrHpzW
COVID may have pushed a leading seasonal flu strain to extinction; No one has confirmed a case of influenza B/Yamagata since April 2020.
Beth Mole - Ars Technica
The pandemic coronavirus' debut wrought universal havoc—not even seasonal flu viruses were spared. Amid travel restrictions, quarantines, closures, physical distancing, masking, enhanced hand washing, and disinfection, the 2020-2021 flu season was all but canceled. That meant not just an unprecedented global decrease in the number of people sick with the flu but also a dramatic collapse in the genetic diversity of circulating flu strains. Many subtypes of the virus all but vanished. But most notably, one entire lineage—one of only four flu groups targeted by seasonal influenza vaccines—went completely dark, seemingly extinct.
/jlne.ws/3M259UX
UK 'blind' to new immune-evasive Covid variants creating 'perfect storm' for devastating wave; Experts warned that inadequate surveillance of new variants and a decrease in testing could reduce ability to tackle a new wave
Thomas Kingsley - Independent
The UK is heading into a "devastating" Covid wave this autumn exacerbated by a drop in testing and inadequate surveillance of new immune-evasive subvariants, experts have warned. Covid-19 infections in the UK have risen 14 per cent, according to the latest figures. Some 1.1 million people in private households tested positive for coronavirus in the latest survey, which covers the seven days to 17 September in England and the week to 20 September in the other three nations, according to the Office for National Statistics (ONS).
/jlne.ws/3V97RMH
Long Covid Has Become a Parallel Pandemic; There are millions of long-haulers in the US alone, and there will be millions more if we don't develop better vaccines and treatments.
Lisa Jarvis - Bloomberg
The price of "living with Covid" in a free and open society is turning out to be much heftier than public health experts predicted. Even with good vaccines and treatments, this year's US death toll is already many orders of magnitude higher than that of the other virus that circulates each year, the flu. A terrible flu season kills about 50,000 people, but already more than 226,000 have died from Covid in 2022 — and even if another wave is avoided and fatalities remain at their current "low" level, another 150,000 lives could be lost over the next 12 months.
/jlne.ws/3y9Fa8o
Moderna refused China request to reveal vaccine technology; Pharma company still 'eager' to collaborate with Beijing, despite collapse of initial talks
Sun Yu, Eleanor Olcott and Donato Paolo Mancini - Financial Times
Moderna has refused to hand over to China the core intellectual property behind the development of its breakthrough Covid-19 vaccine, leading to a collapse in negotiations on its sale there, according to multiple people familiar with the matter. The Massachusetts-based pharmaceutical company turned down Beijing's request to hand over the recipe for its messenger RNA vaccine because of commercial and safety concerns, said two people involved in negotiations that took place between 2020 and 2021. The vaccine maker says it is still "eager" to sell the product to China.
/jlne.ws/3E6xMOS
Coronavirus: scrap 4-person cap on public gatherings, focus measures instead on preventing severe cases, Hong Kong experts urge as city nears 1,000th day in pandemic fight; Medical experts call for four-person cap on public gatherings to be removed; Study finds taking antiviral oral pills molnupiravir and nirmatrelvir-ritonavir can reduce risk of death among hospitalised patients with Covid-19
Fiona Sun and Sammy Heung - South China Morning Post
Hong Kong should scrap its four-person cap on public gatherings and focus Covid-19 measures on preventing cases with severe conditions, medical experts have said as the city nears the 1,000th day of its battle against the pandemic.
/jlne.ws/3RwfSYI
An Autumn Covid Wave Is Here. Do We Need To Panic About It? As Covid cases soar across the UK, should we be taking action?
Dayna McAlpine - HuffPost
The next wave of coronavirus has begun, according to a leading Covid expert. Professor Tim Spector, co-founder of the Zoe Health Study app, who gave the warning, has urged people to remember that "Covid is not over." Many of us are failing to identify we have coronavirus in among soaring case numbers, due to "using government guidelines which are wrong," the public health expert said.
/jlne.ws/3UZT1Ys
Hong Kong Bids Farewell to Hotel Quarantine
Rachel Chang - Bloomberg
Hello, it's Rachel in Hong Kong. We're breathing a sigh of relief at the long-awaited scrapping of the city's Covid travel quarantine that's done such damage to its reputation. Hong Kong has finally junked its controversial hotel quarantine system for travelers. From 6am last Monday, people could freely walk out of the airport -- albeit subject to multiple Covid tests -- for the first time in nearly three years.
/jlne.ws/3dWrff3
Long COVID Has Forced a Reckoning for One of Medicine's Most Neglected Diseases; Only a couple dozen doctors specialize in chronic fatigue syndrome (ME/CFS). Now their knowledge could be crucial to treating millions more patients.
Ed Yong - The Atlantic
Kira Stoops lives in Bozeman, Montana—a beautiful mountain town where it sometimes feels like everyone regularly goes on 50-mile runs. Stoops, however, can't walk around her own block on most days. To stand for more than a few minutes, she needs a wheeled walker. She reacts so badly to most foods that her diet consists of just 12 ingredients. Her "brain fog" usually lifts for a mere two hours in the morning, during which she can sometimes work or, more rarely, see friends. Stoops has myalgic encephalomyelitis, or chronic fatigue syndrome (ME/CFS). "I'm considered a moderate patient on the mild side," she told me.
/jlne.ws/3rmgy8F
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| Regions | | Stories of local interest from the Americas, EMEA and Asia-Pacific regions | China just boosted bank liquidity by 843%, adding further pressure on the yuan as the currency suffers its weakest year in almost 3 decades
Phil Rosen - Business Insider
The People's Bank of China provided a massive liquidity boost to the financial sector this week ahead of key national events.The central bank injected a net 868 billion yuan ($122 billion) into its banking system, compared to 92 billion yuan the prior week. That's the most since January 2019 and marks an 843% weekly increase. This week's daily injections ranged from 133 billion yuan to 198 billion yuan, up from 12 billion yuan to 24 billion yuan a week ago, according to Bloomberg.
/jlne.ws/3SuO6x3
China Is Rerouting U.S. Liquefied Natural Gas to Europe at a Big Profit; Sluggish economy lets Chinese energy companies benefit from high global prices
Sha Hua - The Wall Street Journal
The economic slowdown in China, a Trump-era trade deal and Europe's desperate hunt for natural gas are creating a windfall for some Chinese energy companies. The unusual alignment is helping Europe stock up for the winter. With demand down, Chinese companies that signed long-term contracts to buy U.S. liquefied natural gas are selling the excess and making hundreds of millions of dollars per cargo. Buyers include Europe, Japan and South Korea. Just 19 LNG vessels from the U.S. docked in China in the first eight months of the year, compared with 133 for the same period last year.
/jlne.ws/3UZaGiW
Amsterdam considers banning 'cannabis tourists' from its coffee shops; Fed up with stoned visitors and worried by hard-drug criminality, the mayor wants to clean up the city. But will it work?
Senay Boztas - The Guardian
Strumming gently at a guitar, outside the "nicest" coffee shop in Amsterdam, French tourists Terry Novel and Manon Fouquet enjoy a quiet joint in the sun. They have no idea of the dark cloud around them and the cannabis sector in Amsterdam. The council has just spent a day debating whether to ban tourists from cafes such as Coffeeshop The Rookies - where the state currently turns a blind eye to foreigners smoking weed and taxes the profits. "We just really love the city," says Fouquet, 26. "We come for the museums and the people and the ambience, not just to smoke. But it's nice that it's legal and well done, there's good-quality weed and a lot of respect from people."
/jlne.ws/3C1l3KA
Cow's Milk Becomes Pricier Than Non-Dairy Alternatives in UK; Price of milk has jumped 36% since January as inflation soars; Thrifty shoppers may seek out plant-based alternatives
Katie Linsell - Bloomberg
The cost-of-living crisis has pushed the price of cow's milk, a staple for households across the UK, above dairy-free alternatives for some shoppers. A two-pint bottle of own-brand milk now costs £1.25 ($1.38) on average across four of the UK's main supermarkets, a 36% jump since January. The nearest comparable own-brand alternatives, which come in one-liter bottles, cost £1.05 for soya milk, £1.07 for almond milk and £1.24 for oat milk, according to retail research company Assosia.
/jlne.ws/3ybSHvY
Europe's energy plan: is it enough to get through winter?; A growing number of member states warn that proposals do not go far enough as they seek to ward off the risk of political unrest
Sam Fleming and Leila Abboud - Financial Times
Emmanuel Macron had a simple message last week for French businesses preparing to sign punishingly costly energy contracts: don't do it. Companies should spurn the "crazy prices" currently on offer, the French president said, insisting that European governments would succeed in making markets work again and bringing costs back down to reasonable levels. Aymeric Le Jemtel, chief executive of Veta France, a small company that manufactures cladding for buildings at a factory in northern France, finds it hard to share Macron's confidence.
/jlne.ws/3fv59jX
Dubai Sets New Record With Sale of Palm Jumeirah Mansion for $82 Million; Villa was sold for 302.5 million dirhams in the emirate; Sales of luxury homes have climbed in Dubai this year
Zainab Fattah - Bloomberg
A mansion built on Dubai's Palm Jumeirah island has become the most expensive home to be sold in the Persian Gulf emirate, the latest real-estate record as the city's luxury property sales surge. The villa, called Casa Del Sole, fetched 302.5 million dirhams ($82.4 million) when it was sold in July, according to its developer Alpago Properties. The firm declined to name the buyer, citing privacy concerns. The mansion was bought without a mortgage, according to partially redacted title deed seen by Bloomberg.
/jlne.ws/3fDUkvZ
UK's New Oil, Gas Permits Probably Won't Boost Supply for Years; UK will soon open leasing round for offshore exploration; New supplies will come too late to alleviate current crisis
Will Mathis - Bloomberg
The UK will soon offer new licenses to explore areas of its seabed for oil and gas, but even if the drilling is successful it probably won't boost supplies for at least a decade.
/jlne.ws/3rqxECf
Copper Industry Has a New Champion in Worst Mining Nation; New Peruvian minister applauded by executives at mining event; Still, Kurt Burneo has tough task ahead amid political turmoil
James Attwood and Maria Cervantes - Bloomberg
Put the cautious optimism on display at Peru's top mining event down to three main factors: easing pandemic restrictions, copper's bright longer term outlook and a diminutive sexagenarian economist. An estimated 50,000 people are doing the rounds at the Perumin show this week in Arequipa, a picturesque yet bustling city surrounded by giant copper deposits.
/jlne.ws/3fr3kEJ
Americas Are Consuming More Oil, Even If They're Not Driving Much; July gasoline demand fell from a year ago, extending declines; Natural gas liquids and diesel boasted strong summer demand
Chunzi Xu - Bloomberg
Oil demand in the US soared during the summer, even as higher pump prices forced many Americans to cut back on driving. Overall petroleum supplied, a proxy for demand, posted its best July since 2019, according to government data released Friday. June was even stronger, with demand for the month at a 16-year high. The boost came despite a marked drop in gasoline consumption, which fell 6% from a year ago and double June's decline.
/jlne.ws/3SKFAtu
Hurricane Ian Hit Florida at Key Time for Vegetable, Fruit Planting; Fall vegetables, livestock, dairy farms were destroyed by Ian; Honey bee colonies that were submerged are now in distress
Kim Chipman, Elizabeth Elkin, Dayanne Martins Sousa, and Deante Washington - Bloomberg
Dan Richey stood outside of Riverfront Packing Co.'s 4,000-acre grove in Vero Beach, Florida, surrounded by fruit that had fallen from trees, destroyed by Hurricane Ian. "This storm kicked us in the teeth," said Richey, 65. Florida's farmers and ranchers are facing widespread destruction from Hurricane Ian that threatens to curb supplies of fruit and vegetables in a region that is critical to America's food supplies. The Sunshine State is a key source of vegetables, livestock, dairy and fruit -- most notably the oranges it's famous for. And they've all been devastated by the storm, the Florida Farm Bureau said by email.
/jlne.ws/3fxUqFA
Inflation Is Hampering Single Americans Looking for Love; People are going on fewer dates with higher prices hitting budgets, but some millennials say they're willing to take on debt to find the one.
Paulina Cachero and Craig Giammona - Bloomberg
Roaring inflation has made it more expensive to find love. With food and alcohol prices jumping, along with the cost of everything else, nearly 20% of single Americans say they're going on fewer dates, according to a survey from LendingTree. "The extra cost of each of these things individually may not be earth-shattering, but added together, they can be a very big deal, especially when you're living on a budget." said Matt Schulz, chief credit analyst at LendingTree.
/jlne.ws/3RqA91P
Profit drove a 30-year boom. Ian smashed it in a day.; Explosive construction on the west coast of Florida has created new communities during a long absence of hurricanes. Ian rammed into those high-value targets as the state is gripped by an insurance crisis.
Thomas Frank and Daniel Cusick - Politico
Hurricane Ian's path of destruction cut through some of the fastest-growing counties in the nation, pulverizing communities whose populations have doubled and tripled in recent decades during a period of deceptive atmospheric calm. Ian made landfall Wednesday afternoon off the coast of Lee County, Fla., where the population has more than doubled since 1990 to nearly 800,000 residents. Counties in Ian's path through west and central Florida include Osceola, whose population has nearly tripled since 1990, and Sumter, where an influx of people has pushed its population to over three times what it was 30 years ago.
/jlne.ws/3SRzZBK
Hurricane Ian Targeted Florida's Retirement Belt; Older people, who are particularly vulnerable to hurricanes, make up a large share of the population in southwest and central Florida.
Linda Poon - Bloomberg
The promise of sandy beaches, mild winters and low living expenses has long attracted retirees to Florida's southwest coast. But that high concentration of older people means more vulnerability for a region that's increasingly at risk of natural disasters — a devastating trade-off that became all too clear when Hurricane Ian slammed into the Fort Myers metro region this week. The Category 4 storm brought catastrophic winds, heavy rains and storm surges that flooded homes and roadways, and that left more than 2.5 million Floridians without electricity by Thursday morning — including 91% of households in Charlotte County. At least 21 people are confirmed dead in Florida as of Friday morning, though officials suggest numbers will continue to rise.
/jlne.ws/3ST0Hdw
Why the Florida Fantasy Withstands Reality; Cape Coral is a microcosm of Florida's worst impulse: selling dream homes in a hurricane-prone flood zone. But people still want them.
Michael Grunwald - The Atlantic
Five years ago, after Hurricane Irma pummeled Florida's Gulf Coast, I rode a boat through the canals of Cape Coral, the "Waterfront Wonderland," America's fastest-growing city at the time. It was a sunny day with a gentle breeze and just a few puffs of clouds, so as I pointed to the blown-out lanais and piles of storm debris, my guide, a snowbird named Brian Tattersall, kept teasing me for missing the point of a magical afternoon. He said I sounded like his northern friends who always told him he was crazy to live in the Florida hurricane zone.
/jlne.ws/3C4i581
The new era of stronger hurricanes: bigger storms, better forecasts; The US is investing in supercomputers to predict how badly storms like Hurricane Ian will strike the east coast
Aime Williams - Financial Times
By the time Lieutenant Colonel Sean Cross realised he was in trouble, it was too late to turn back. Cross's plane slammed into the wall of Hurricane Michael, a violent Category 5 hurricane that in October 2018 was barrelling towards the coast of Florida. As the plane tried desperately to propel itself forward through the chaos, an extreme wind picked up the left wing of the aircraft. It flipped 90 degrees, wrenching the passengers sideways. The nose dived towards the ground. The engine began to stall as the autopilot system shut down. For 15 long seconds, the plane was tossed around and battered by the sheer power of the storm. Alarms wailed warning signals at the crew, and boxes and equipment smashed around the cabin.
/jlne.ws/3C47jyC
'Most expensive crop in decades': Farmers face higher stakes than ever with inflation
Sarah Bowman - USA TODAY
Outside Evansville, near the corner of Indiana where it meets with Kentucky and Illinois, Randy Kron farms about 2,200 acres of corn and soybeans. By now the corn is taller than he is, and the green vigor of the bean leaves are beginning to fade as the crop dries out. He's been farming for nearly 40 years now. That means Kron remembers the farming crisis of the 1980s — a time when high interest rates sent farm debt soaring. Many families lost their farms. Agriculture now finds itself on the verge of crisis yet again, as farmers face growing inflation and even higher stakes. Those that produce much of the nation's corn and soy, as well as raise its livestock, are used to battling the weather. This growing season, however, they are also battling skyrocketing costs.
/jlne.ws/3fwtAxz
A Railroad Megamerger Could Be A Boon To Canada's Dirty Oil Industry; Rail is never oil producers' first choice, but a new transcontinental line could become the most attractive backup option when pipelines fail.
Alexander C. Kaufman - HuffPost
Shortly after 1 a.m. on July 6, 2013, Bernard Théberge stepped outside a bar in eastern Québec for a cigarette. At just that moment, a runaway freight train carrying 2.1 million gallons of oil throttled into Lac-Mégantic, a tiny town near the Maine border. The train derailed and exploded in a giant fireball. When he saw the flames, Théberge started pedaling away on his bike. Soon after, the entire downtown was decimated, killing 47 in Canada's deadliest rail accident since 1894. "Smoking saved my life," Théberge later told The Globe and Mail newspaper.
/jlne.ws/3CmEkGL
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| Miscellaneous | | Stories that don't quite fit under the other sections | Leadenhall Market Wrapped In Giant Purple Tentacles
Will Noble - Londonist
If you walk by Leadenhall Market this October, do not adjust your peepers. Those really are six-metre-long purple tentacles wriggling out of the windows. Well, inflatable ones, anyhow. Not many London buildings have their own Halloween costume, but the City of London's Victorian market (aka Diagon Alley if you're into a certain wizard saga) certainly does. Leadenhall Market first donned its monstrous squid-like outfit last October, and clearly received some compliments, because it's wearing the same outfit again. (Rumours it considered dressing up as Liz Truss this year are unfounded.)
/jlne.ws/3M1GDmH
Ten Things Elon Musk's Texts Reveal About the Twitter Deal; Read billionaire's most revealing communications during talks; One text suggests Musk already knew of Twitter's bot problem
Dana Hull - Bloomberg
A new trove of text messages between Elon Musk and Twitter Inc. executives, close friends, potential investors and Silicon Valley bros sheds light on how a $44 billion deal by the world's richest person to buy the social media company came about -- and ended up in court. The texts show who wanted to be part of the buyout and reveal the inner circle's musings on who should run the company if Musk did come to own it. They were disclosed as part of Twitter's lawsuit to make Musk follow through on his $54.20-per-share offer, which is slated to go to trial in Delaware Chancery Court next month.
/jlne.ws/3Rz4JX8
Comedy And The Economic Crash Of 1929
Robert Smith - NPR
People need comedy during tough economic times, but during the great stock market crash of 1929 there was a problem. Large numbers of entertainers lost their shirts, too, and there didn't seem like much to laugh at. This week is the 80th anniversary of the big market crash.
/jlne.ws/3Suk2lt
How to read a hurricane map; The 'cone of uncertainty' and why it is misunderstood
Steven Bernard - Financial Times
Hurricanes Fiona and Ian have claimed the lives of an unconfirmed number of people, caused hundreds of millions of dollars worth of damage and left millions without power. For all these reasons, weather agencies spend vast amounts of time and resources predicting the possible paths that hurricanes might take — yet how they convey those predictions to the public can still create confusion. The most common way of displaying the predicted path of a hurricane is deployed by the National Hurricane Center (NHC). It is referred to as the "cone of uncertainty".
/jlne.ws/3rq6ADi
Remote work could be the reason you don't have a job in 10 years
Jane Thier - FORTUNE
Workers who have been rejoicing about their ability to log on from anywhere might do well to consider the inverse situation: a worker somewhere else can probably do their job—for cheaper. That might cost them their job in the long run. The fact that many jobs that can be done from home can also be done from anywhere around the globe is often missing in the remote work discussion, says Anna Stansbury, an assistant professor of work and organization studies at MIT Sloan School of Business who teaches a course on the future of work.
/jlne.ws/3CrolYU
Rich Kids' Boot Camps Return as Private Banks Woo Next-Gen Wealth; Bento boxes replace gala dinners in post-pandemic vibe change; Trillions of dollars will shift between Asian generations
David Ramli and Yoojung Lee - Bloomberg
For years Covid froze one of private banking's best tools for keeping customers loyal -- invite-only events for the children of wealthy clients. Now, as global borders finally re-open, they're starting to return. In the bowels of Singapore's Ritz-Carlton hotel 12 young people in gray hoodies sipping bubble tea could be mistaken for a university study group on first glance. That's until you look down and see the Balenciaga sneakers and $4,000 Christian Dior book totes.
/jlne.ws/3M0tdY6
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