| June 23, 2025 | "Irreverent, but never irrelevant" | | | | John Lothian
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Hits & Takes
John Lothian & JLN Staff
I am happy to be safely back in Elmhurst, which is experiencing a heatwave nearly matching the historic one I left in London. I am glad not to be schlepping my video equipment around London, as Bloomberg reports that a severe heat wave in the UK could lead to nearly 600 deaths this week, with scientists warning that elderly people, infants, pregnant individuals, and those with pre-existing health conditions are particularly at risk. A study by researchers from the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine and Imperial College London estimates 570 fatalities from Thursday to Sunday, with Saturday expected to be the deadliest day, possibly accounting for 266 deaths, half in London. Heat warnings are also in effect across Germany and France, where temperatures are expected to reach up to 39 degrees Celsius. Experts attribute the increased frequency and severity of such events to global warming, which has made early heat waves five times more likely than in pre-industrial times.
The UK has experienced record-breaking temperatures exceeding 40°C (104°F) for the first time, and this event is being described as a "national emergency." The Met Office issued its first-ever "red extreme" heat warning.
Heat is not the only threat the U.K., the world, and the U.S. faced this weekend after the U.S. joined the Israeli war against Iran's nuclear facilities. That prompted the U.S. State Department to issue a rare "Worldwide Caution" alert, advising American citizens to exercise increased vigilance due to potential travel disruptions and demonstrations following U.S. strikes on Iranian nuclear facilities. British military bases in the Middle East are on the highest level of red alert amid fears of Iranian reprisal attacks.
Politicians, especially presidents, are known for breaking campaign promises. But keeping the nation out of war is an especially big and important one. Republican U.S. Rep. Thomas Massie of Kentucky criticized President Trump's airstrikes on Iran as unconstitutional and a violation of Trump's campaign promises, arguing there was no imminent threat to the United States and that Congress should have been consulted beforehand. While Massie and some Democrats condemned the action and pushed for a war powers resolution, other Kentucky Republicans, including Sen. Mitch McConnell and Rep. Andy Barr, defended Trump's authority and praised the strikes as necessary for national security.
As President Trump has flip-flopped on the issue of regime change in Iran, his message of "give peace a chance" following the attacks is falling on deaf ears as "Iran Says US Caused Irreparable Harm to Treaty on Nuclear Arms," Bloomberg reported. Trump even has a Trumpian acronym for this regime change, "MIGA," which stands for Make Iran Great Again.
Looking back at London for some perspective on the attack, here is what The Financial Times (FT) and The Times had to say. The Financial Times Editorial Board wrote that Donald Trump's decision to join Israel in striking Iranian nuclear sites has drawn the US into a major Middle East conflict, risking further escalation and instability in the region. While the strikes may damage Iran's nuclear capabilities, they also risk provoking Iran to accelerate its nuclear ambitions or cause regional fragmentation, with uncertain consequences for global oil markets and geopolitical stability.
The Times editorial argues that the United States and Israel deserve gratitude for striking Iranian nuclear facilities, asserting that these actions were necessary to check Iran's nuclear ambitions and protect global security. The piece warns Iran against further escalation, emphasizing that the US resolve is firm and that the regime risks severe consequences if it retaliates.
Acting Chairman Caroline D. Pham of the Commodity Futures Trading Commission will receive an award and deliver remarks at the "100 Impact Leaders" Dinner and Award at the UK House of Lords on Monday, June 23, 2025, at 7:30 p.m. BST. The event, held in the Cholmondeley Room at the Palace of Westminster, recognizes leaders making a difference in areas such as sustainable finance, digital assets, and policy during London Climate Action Week.
Maggie Sklar has joined the U.S. Chamber of Commerce as a Senior Director, Policy and Advocacy, she announced on LinkedIn. She was most recently at the FDIC and has previously served at the Chicago Federal Reserve Bank and the CFTC.
Gary Hunt is starting a new position as senior director at Cboe Global Markets, he shared on LinkedIn. He was previously at BAML for 26 years.
Here are the headlines from in front of FOW's paywall from some recent stories: Equity futures and options dominate in light week for launches, LME moves to limit stockpiling amid 'low stock environment,' ANALYSIS: Eurex sees stronger demand for broader European index future, Market 'well-prepared' for active account requirement on June 24 - Eurex, Europe publishes technical standards for active account requirements and Crypto firms warn Europe risks falling behind US.
Bloomberg today has an article for those of you who want to learn to invest in fine wines. The story is simply titled "How to Invest in Fine Wines: A Step-by-Step Beginner's Guide" with the subheadline "Strategies to build a wine portfolio that could make you money and give you something delicious to drink."
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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Occasionally, I make use of online inflation calculators. Over the weekend, I tried using my go-to, which is (was) the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics inflation calculator. For some reason, it now only allows you to calculate figures for less than $10 million. The question is, why? I have my suspicions. There is certainly no reason it cannot calculate larger numbers, and it definitely used to. ~JB
Our most-read stories from our previous edition of JLN Options were:
- Morgan Stanley to Shutter Electronic Equity Market-Making Unit from Bloomberg.
- Currency Traders Are Ditching Dollar for Euro on Option Bets from Bloomberg.
- From Paper to Python: A History of Options Trading Processes from Cboe (and a former employee of JLN ... good job Spencer!). ~JB
Subscribe to the JLN Options Newsletter HERE (it's free).
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Russell Robertson: From the CME to Dubai and Singapore JohnLothianNews.com After working at ICE for a number of years, Russell Robertson was looking for his next step. He got a job at the CME, even though "we didn't really know what the CME was at that time," he said. "We all knew what Nymex and Comex were, and the CBOT, but [the CME] was something that in the UK you really didn't know." He did know it was a competitor of ICE. Watch the Russell Robertson Video » Max Armstrong - Broadcaster Watch the Max Armstrong Video » Max Armstrong - Broadcaster Watch the Max Armstrong Video »
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Here's where the U.S. will see record-breaking heat; Extreme humidity and heat will affect about 265 million people across the country this week. Maps show where and when to expect the worst.
Ben Noll - The Washington Post
A wave of record-breaking humidity and heat is surging across the United States, with about 265 million people forecast to experience 90- or 100-degree temperatures during the week ahead, including humidity levels that rival those in the Middle East. The combination of extreme heat and humidity can be dangerous - and there will be little relief at night, with low temperatures hovering in the mid-70s to near 80 in many central and eastern states.
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****** The hot weather is targeting me.~JJL
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Was It Scrap Metal or an Alien Spacecraft? The Army Asked an Elite Defense Lab to Investigate; Pentagon true believers explored the fringes of science, from psychic spies to teleportation to antigravity material
Joel Schectman and Aruna Viswanatha - The Wall Street Journal
The Pentagon man gathered top technology executives from the six largest defense contractors in 2022 to ask an unusual question: Have any of your companies ever gained access to alien technology? "It would just make my job easier if one of you would 'fess up, give me the UFO, or help me find them," said Sean Kirkpatrick, who had been tapped by the Defense Department to investigate whether Washington had ever had a secret alien program. The comment was made half jokingly, but for one company, Lockheed Martin, the answer was ... complicated.
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****** As if we don't have enough to worry about, now aliens?~JJL
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Disney Files Landmark Case Against AI Image Generator
LegalEagle - YouTube (Video)
The AI War begins (in Court).
/jlne.ws/4lkZdqt
***** The LegalEagle breaks down the case against a firm that lets you make images of Disney characters doing all kinds of fun things. ~JJL
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AI's Biggest Threat: Young People Who Can't Think; Smart computers require even smarter humans, but they tempt us to engage in 'cognitive offloading.'
Allysia Finley - The Wall Street Journal
Amazon CEO Andy Jassy caused a stir last week with a memo to his employees warning that artificial intelligence could displace them. "We will need fewer people doing some of the jobs that are being done today, and more people doing other types of jobs," he wrote. Nothing in his memo was shocking. Technological advances as far back as the printing press have eliminated some jobs while creating many others. The real danger is that excessive reliance on AI could spawn a generation of brainless young people unequipped for the jobs of the future because they have never learned to think creatively or critically.
/jlne.ws/45A6FJH
***** This ties in well with the story we posted on Friday, MIT brain scans suggest that using GenAI tools reduces cognitive activity. ~JB
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Friday's Top Three
Our most clicked story on Friday was Summer books 2025: the best titles of the year so far, from the Financial Times. Second was Trump SEC chair scraps proposed market rules as he charts new path, also from the Financial Times. Third was ICE to clear Euro rates futures in Europe to mitigate regulatory impact, from FOW.
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| Lead Stories | How a Cornered Iran Could Wreak Havoc on Global Oil Trade
Verity Ratcliffe, Grant Smith, Alex Longley and Julian Lee - Bloomberg
US airstrikes on Iranian nuclear facilities are sharpening the focus on one option Iran has yet to really deploy in the conflict: disrupting regional oil trade, especially through the critical Strait of Hormuz. Iran has over the years threatened multiple times to shut the strait - a narrow stretch of water through which a fifth of the world's oil supply flows each day. But in practice, Tehran has numerous less-drastic options at its disposal to calibrate a response that hurts its enemies while limiting the impact on allies like China, its biggest oil buyer. A full closure of Hormuz for more than a few hours or days is a nightmare scenario that many observers think improbable. It would choke off flows and spike crude prices - JPMorgan & Co. analysts said by almost 70% - fueling global inflation and weighing heavily on growth.
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World awaits Iranian response after US hits nuclear sites
Parisa Hafezi, Phil Stewart and Maayan Lubell - Reuters
The world braced on Sunday for Iran's response after the U.S. attacked key Iranian nuclear sites, joining Israel in the biggest Western military action against the Islamic Republic since its 1979 revolution. Iran vowed to defend itself a day after the U.S. dropped 30,000-pound bunker-buster bombs onto the mountain above Iran's Fordow nuclear site while American leaders urged Tehran to stand down and pockets of anti-war protesters emerged in U.S. cities.
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What Israel's Soaring Markets Are Saying About the Iran War; Israel's stocks and currency are signaling confidence in the country's position
David Wainer - The Wall Street Journal
Iranian ballistic missiles are raining down on Tel Aviv and Haifa. Israel's main airport is shut. Much of the workforce is moving in and out of bomb shelters. For most countries, such a wartime scenario would send investors fleeing and markets tanking. Yet the opposite is happening. Israeli markets are buoyant, outperforming the world. Israeli stocks, which trade Sunday through Thursday, have been posting solid gains. The TA-125 Index, also known as the Tel Aviv 125 Index, rose for five straight sessions as of the end of last week, even as global markets tread cautiously amid the specter of a prolonged Middle East war. It rallied again on Sunday after the U.S. strikes on Iran's nuclear facilities. What is going on?
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The 6 Miles of Water Keeping Global Markets On Edge; Oil prices climb after Iran threatens to close the Strait of Hormuz
David Uberti and Costas Paris - The Wall Street Journal
Oil traders see it as a worst-case scenario. Pentagon officials have long warned against it. Vice President JD Vance believes it would be suicidal. Yet Iranian lawmakers on Sunday reportedly threatened a closure of the Strait of Hormuz, a strip of water connecting the energy-rich Persian Gulf to global markets, after the U.S. joined Israeli strikes on Tehran's nuclear facilities. That's put oil markets on edge. Roughly 20% of the world's petroleum passes through the 20-mile-wide strait, where dozens of skyscraper-size tankers each day funnel into a pair of 2-mile-wide traffic lanes separated by a 2-mile-wide buffer. The transit through that 6-mile strip within the strait includes a similarly huge share of the world's liquefied natural gas.
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Iran Has an Oil Card to Play. So Does the U.S.; America's fracking revolution blunts dreaded oil chaos that could come from Iranian closure of Strait of Hormuz
Spencer Jakab - The Wall Street Journal
This is an online version of Spencer's Markets A.M. newsletter. Get investing insights in your inbox each weekday by signing up here-it's free. With oil prices rising after the U.S. decision to bomb Iran, investors are quickly analyzing the nightmare scenario: an Iranian closure of the Strait of Hormuz, the world's main energy shipping artery. Oil prices could hit triple digits in that event. But it would be a Pyrrhic victory for Iran, itself a major exporter, and would likely draw the U.S. further into the conflict in more than just military ways.
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US Issues 'Worldwide Caution' for Americans After Attack on Iran
Bill Faries - Bloomberg
The US State Department issued a "Worldwide Caution" alert for American citizens, flagging the potential of travel disruptions and demonstrations following the US strikes on Iranian nuclear facilities. "The conflict between Israel and Iran has resulted in disruptions to travel and periodic closure of airspace across the Middle East," the State Department said in a statement. "There is the potential for demonstrations against US citizens and interests abroad. The Department of State advises US citizens worldwide to exercise increased caution."
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Iran Makes Direct Plea to Putin After US, Israel Strikes
Brendan Cole and Barney Henderson - Newsweek
Iran's supreme leader has written to Vladimir Putin directly asking for help, as the country's foreign minister, who is holding in-person talks with the Russian leader, urged Moscow to "confront shared challenges and threats" after U.S. and Israeli air strikes. Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araqchi will hand the letter from Ayatollah Ali Khamenei to Putin in Moscow on Monday, Reuters reported citing an unnamed senior source, after U.S. and Israel's strikes on Tehran's nuclear sites. The full contents of the letter have not been reported.
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The perils of war with Iran; Tehran's grand strategy has failed, but that is no guarantee Israel and America can succeed
Gideon Rachman - Financial Times
Going to war is always a gamble. Iran, Israel and now the US have all rolled the dice. In the short term, it looks as if Israel's gamble has succeeded. The government of Benjamin Netanyahu has managed to kill much of the military leadership of Iran and to inflict serious damage on the country's nuclear and military infrastructure. Israel has also succeeded in its clear aim of drawing the US into the fight. Donald Trump's decision to join the conflict was, in part, a reaction to the early Israeli successes. The US president is always keen to look like a winner and, in the aftermath of the US bombing raids on Iran, has claimed a "spectacular military success".
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Chinese Stocks and American Exchanges Head for a Breakup; A delisting push adds to the unraveling of Wall Street's love affair with China Inc.
James T. Areddy - The Wall Street Journal
Wall Street's welcome mat for Chinese stock listings long transcended rocky U.S.-China relations. Increasingly, the stock market relationship is succumbing to distrust between the world's two largest economies. More than 80 Chinese companies have delisted their shares from U.S. exchanges since 2019, according to data provider Wind. Around 275 China-based companies now represent less than 2% of the capitalization of shares traded on the New York Stock Exchange and Nasdaq. Chinese initial public offerings still pour in-in fact, 2024 saw the highest number in years-but most are tiny, highly speculative stocks, not the megabillion-dollar "red chips" of yesteryear. The 62 Chinese offerings last year raised an average of under $7 million. Some struggle to maintain the minimum 300 public shareholders, a red flag for investors that they could be risky or outright scams.
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Bank of New York Mellon Approached Northern Trust to Discuss Potential Merger; The firms' chief executives had at least one conversation
Lauren Thomas and Justin Baer - The New York Times
Bank of New York Mellon approached Northern Trust last week to express interest in merging with its smaller rival, people familiar with the matter said, in what would be a monster deal for the financial-services industry. The chief executives of BNY and Northern Trust had at least one conversation, the people said, though the firms didn't discuss a specific offer. BNY is considering its next steps, which might include returning to Northern Trust with a formal bid. It is possible the talks won't result in a transaction, the people cautioned.
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Stablecoin World Opens Up to Main Street Banks; Regional and community banks will be able to get in on the stablecoin market through Fiserv ventures with crypto firms and PayPal
Gina Heeb - The Wall Street Journal
Thousands of Main Street banks struggling to keep up with crypto's push into mainstream finance will soon get an opening to the rapidly evolving world of stablecoins. Financial-technology giant Fiserv plans to launch a stablecoin and platform that could be used by its clients, which include roughly 3,000 regional and community banks, executives told The Wall Street Journal. The platform is expected to be compatible with other stablecoins and allow for easy connection with the other 10,000 financial institutions and millions of merchant locations that Fiserv works with.
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Why it's time to unshackle London and let it boom again
Jonathan Prynn - Evening Standard
It is close to 40 years since the Big Bang reforms of London's financial markets transformed the City forever. A relatively technical programme of Thatcherite deregulation - the abolition of fixed commissions and the end of the separation of brokers and jobbers on the London Stock Exchange - opened the floodgates to a deluge of foreign capital and talent that lifted the tired old city affectionately known as The Smoke. Much of what we now associate with modern London, for good and for ill - the sky-high property prices, the gleaming towers of Docklands and the Square Mile, the unrecognisably improved restaurant scene, the world leadership position in exciting industries such as fintech - can be traced back to that bold Big Bang moment in October 1986.
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Spac revival puts spring in step of investors in New York; Blank cheque companies are enjoying a fresh moment in the sun as the traditional IPO market struggles
George Steer - Financial Times
The Spac market was shrivelling when the industry's annual conference rolled around in mid-2022, with a hastily arranged guest appearance by porn star Stormy Daniels failing to brighten the gloomy mood. This year's event at a golf club in an upscale suburb of New York was markedly more upbeat, attended by some of Wall Street's most illustrious money managers, delegates from several of America's largest law firms and dozens of banks, consultants and private investors.
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The King of Spacs is back; And he has some hot IPO takes for us
Craig Coben - Financial Times
Chamath Palihapitiya is back! The self-styled "Spac King", whose blank-cheque deals incinerated billions of investor dollars, has announced he's "probably" launching another one. That's despite an abysmal record and the overwhelming thumbs-down verdict of a 58,000-person X (formerly Twitter) poll. "The last time wasn't a success by any means," he magnanimously admitted. That's one way to put it.
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A New Meatpacking Plant's Novel Pitch to Attract American Workers; A Nebraska slaughterhouse offers ergonomic work stations and no night shift to lure employees as the immigration crackdown threatens its traditional labor force
Scott Calvert, Arian Campo-Flores and Patrick Thomas - The Wall Street Journal
Angela Jones feels fortunate to have landed a job at the new meatpacking plant in this stagnant prairie town she's long called home. She earns $24.50 an hour-far more than she made as a convenience-store clerk, custodian or construction flagger-and has health insurance for the first time in over 20 years. But she's also felt stress learning her quality-control duties, such as scrutinizing meat cuts moving down the line and ensuring workers properly sanitize their tools. Days before the May opening, she confided her concerns to the human resources and safety manager, who tried to buck her up with a pep talk.
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Industry bids 'good riddance' to SEC rules; Plus, Scottish Widows cuts UK exposure, emerging markets outperform, and Jenny Saville at the National Portrait Gallery
Harriet Agnew - Financial Times
A pair of scoops to start: Chancellor Rachel Reeves is exploring reversing a decision to charge UK inheritance tax on the global assets of non-doms, following a spate of departures and lobbying by the City of London. Hedge fund Millennium Management is working with Goldman Sachs' Petershill division to sell a 10-15 per cent stake to external investors at a $14bn valuation, as it presses ahead with plans to open up its ownership for the first time.
/jlne.ws/4aZnJc2
US banks' FX notionals hit record $66trn on forwards frenzy; JP Morgan leads record derivatives surge amid Q1 market volatility
Lorenzo Migliorato - Risk.net
US banks' notional amounts of foreign exchange derivatives surged 19.2% to a record $65.76 trillion in the first quarter, as volatility-wary market participants sought refuge in forwards. More than a quarter of the $10.61 trillion aggregate increase accrued to JP Morgan, which reported a $2.7 trillion rise in FX notionals - or 21%. Morgan Stanley followed with a $2.42 trillion increase - the
/jlne.ws/46aShrB
UK's Efforts to Create Municipal Bond Market Fall Flat
Greg Ritchie - Bloomberg
A UK agency set up to kick-start the country's municipal bond scene has closed to new business, abandoning a decade-long push to emulate vibrant markets in the US and Europe. The UK Municipal Bonds Agency will now focus on servicing one outstanding note rather than seeking fresh deals, according to corporate filings seen by Bloomberg News. The change in strategy comes after the agency failed to convince enough local authorities of the merits of raising funds on capital markets rather than borrowing from central government.
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| Trade War and Tariffs | | A roundup of today's trade war and tariff news and the global economic ripple effects shaping markets, industries, and investment strategies. | EU Frets Over US Demands in Trade Talks It Sees as Unbalanced
Alberto Nardelli and Jorge Valero - Bloomberg
The US is demanding the European Union make what the bloc's officials see as unbalanced, unilateral concessions as part of ongoing trade talks, setting up a tough decision over whether to move ahead with countermeasures if the terms of any deal don't improve. The best-case scenario remains an agreement on principles that would allow the negotiations to continue beyond an early July deadline, according to people familiar with the matter.
/jlne.ws/3I7ij4Y
Top economist who previously sounded the alarm on tariffs sees a possible scenario where Trump 'outsmarted all of us'
Jason Ma - Fortune
Torsten Slok, chief economist at Apollo Global Management, laid out a potential scenario where President Donald Trump's tariffs are extended long enough to ease economic uncertainty while also providing a significant bump to federal revenue. That comes as the 90-day pause on Trump's "reciprocal tariffs" is nearing an end. Businesses and consumers remain in limbo over what will happen next with President Donald Trump's tariffs, but a top economist sees a way to leave them in place and still deliver a "victory for the world."
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Project 2025 Coauthor: Trump Tariffs Could Endanger Health Care - Opinion
Karen Kerrigan, President and CEO, Small Business and Entrepreneurship Council - Newsweek
President Donald Trump is right to play hardball on trade with Europe. The European Union targets leading American companies with rules, fines, and other punitive actions that undermine their ability to do business in EU countries and deliver technologies to their citizens and small businesses. However, there are some lines that we should not cross in response to trade tensions-like the tariffs President Trump is expected to impose on imported medicines any day now.
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| World Conflicts | | News about various conflicts and their military, economic, political and humanitarian impact. | Ukraine Invasion
Ukraine Says Russia Not Winding Down and Now Eyeing Europe
Olesia Safronova - Bloomberg
Russia shows no signs it plans to wind down its war in Ukraine, with an estimated 695,000 troops deployed across an expanded front line and another 121,000 in strategic reserve, according to Ukraine's commander-in-chief Oleksandr Syrskyi. Separately, President Volodymyr Zelenskiy, posting on X and Telegram, said Kyiv "has evidence" that Russia is "preparing new military operations on European territory," citing a report by Ukraine's defense intelligence chief but providing no additional detail. "We will keep our partners informed."
/jlne.ws/3HTxHln
Russia hits Kyiv with huge attack while condemning US strikes on Iran; Just a day before Moscow's attack on Ukraine's capital, the Kremlin "strongly condemned" the airstrikes that Washington launched against Iranian nuclear facilities.
Veronika Melkozerova - Politico
Moscow launched another massive attack against Ukraine overnight, targeting primarily the capital's residential districts, even as the Kremlin condemned American military strikes on Iran over the weekend. Russia attacked Ukraine with 352 drones and 16 missiles in the early hours of Monday, the Ukrainian Air Force said in a statement, claiming it managed to shoot down most but not all of them.
/jlne.ws/4k0jMra
Middle East Conflict
Iran stands alone against Trump and Israel, stripped of allies
Bloomberg
Iran's leaders are discovering they're on their own against the US and Israel, without the network of proxies and allies that allowed them to project power in the Middle East and beyond. As the Islamic Republic confronts its most perilous moment in decades following the bombing of its nuclear facilities ordered by US President Donald Trump, Russia and China are sitting on the sidelines and offering only rhetorical support. Militia groups Iran has armed and funded for years are refusing or unable to enter the fight in support of their patron.
/jlne.ws/43SE3u2
Iran votes to shut Strait of Hormuz
Matt Oliver - The Telegraph
Iran is poised to shut a major oil "choke point" in the Middle East as retaliation for US strikes on its nuclear facilities, in a move that risks triggering a fresh energy crisis and global recession. Following Donald Trump's decision to join the Iran-Israel conflict, lawmakers in Tehran have voted to respond by cutting off vital shipping lanes through the Strait of Hormuz. The parliament's decision is not binding, and state television said a final decision would rest with top Iranian security officials, Reuters reported.
/jlne.ws/4k5IbeW
Iran could be more dangerous than ever; Dissenting hardliners within the IRGC could seize power through a coup d'etat
Samuel Ramani - The Telegraph
After days of sending mixed signals, president Donald Trump authorised large-scale military strikes on Iran's Natanz, Fordow and Isfahan nuclear facilities. The strikes have potentially dealt crippling damage to Iran's nuclear program and leave the Middle East in a position of grave uncertainty. Trump has framed the attacks as an isolated military action aimed at compelling Iran to the bargaining table, but a harsh response from Tehran could instigate a broader regional war.
/jlne.ws/45vb6FH
Satellite Images Question Trump's Claim Iran's Atomic Sites Destroyed; The task of ensuring Iran doesn't build a weapon might just have got tougher.
Jonathan Tirone and Rachel Lavin - Bloomberg
President Donald Trump's decision to order US forces to attack three key Iranian nuclear installations may have sabotaged the Islamic Republic's known atomic capabilities, but it's also created a monumental new challenge to work out what's left and where. Trump said heavily fortified sites were "totally obliterated" late Saturday, but independent analysis has yet to verify that claim. Rather than yielding a quick win, the strikes have complicated the task of tracking uranium and ensuring Iran doesn't build a weapon, according to three people who follow the country's nuclear program.
/jlne.ws/3SZtCyy
China Issues Warning Over US Bombing of Iran
Micah McCartney and Shane Croucher - Newsweek
China accused the U.S. of violating the United Nations charter with its strikes on Iranian nuclear facilities and warned all parties involved in the conflict to prevent any further escalation. "The U.S. attacks on Iran's nuclear facilities seriously violate the purposes and principles of the UN charter and has exacerbated tensions in the Middle East. The UN Security Council cannot sit idly by," said Lin Jian, spokesman for the Chinese foreign ministry, at a press briefing on Monday, June 23.
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China Says the U.S. Damaged Its Own Credibility by Striking Iran; The rhetoric belies a more complicated reality, as Beijing has been one of Tehran's biggest backers.
David Pierson and Berry Wang - The New York Times
China said the United States has hurt its reputation as a global power and its diplomatic standing by attacking Iran's nuclear facilities while it was engaged in talks with Tehran. "Iran is harmed, but also harmed is U.S. credibility - as a country and as a party to any international negotiations," Fu Cong, China's ambassador to the United Nations, told China's state broadcaster on Sunday. In the battle for global narratives, China has long cast the United States as a warmonger and a destabilizing power while presenting itself as a responsible global leader championing peace and fairness.
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Middle Eastern military bases on 'highest level' red alert amid fears of Iranian reprisal attacks; The UK has been placed on 'highest level' red alert after the US bombing of Iran and after the arrest of a British national of Azerbaijani descent of 'spying' on a key British military base in Cyprus
Michael D. Carroll and John O'sullivan - Irish Star
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Israel hits Iran's Evin prison, says strikes on Tehran are biggest yet
Parisa Hafezi and Alexander Cornwell - Reuters
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Iran Says US Caused Irreparable Harm to Treaty on Nuclear Arms
Jonathan Tirone and Golnar Motevalli - Bloomberg
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What Israel's Soaring Markets Are Saying About the Iran War; Israel's stocks and currency are signaling confidence in the country's position
David Wainer - The Wall Street Journal
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| Exchanges, OTC & Clearing | | Top news from exchanges, clearing, settlement and trade execution facilities | BME Extends Trading Hours for IBEX 35 Futures Contracts as of Today
BME-X
IBEX 35 Futures, Mini IBEX Futures, and Micro IBEX Futures will now be available for trading until 10:00 p.m. MEFF, BME's derivatives market, has implemented an extension of trading hours effective today. The trading session for IBEX 35 Futures, Mini IBEX Futures, and Micro IBEX Futures on the electronic order book system will now run until 10:00 p.m.
/jlne.ws/44jwo71
JPX and STAC to Hold STAC Summit in Tokyo
JPX
Japan Exchange Group (JPX) is pleased to announce a collaboration with the Strategic Technology Analysis Center (STAC®) to jointly host the STAC Summit in Tokyo on September 18, 2025. STAC Summits are premier global events that bring together capital markets technologists and cutting-edge technology vendors to explore high-performance solutions in trading, data management, AI/ML, and market infrastructure. This Tokyo summit represents a major step in expanding STAC's global footprint and highlights the growing significance of advanced financial technology in the Asia-Pacific region.
/jlne.ws/45BwHfF
Regular Constituents Change in KRX Post IPO Index
KRX
There will be regular consituents change in KRX Post IPO Index. Effective date : June 27th, 2025
/jlne.ws/40er4jY
Amendment to Lending Rules Introduction of Front Month Lending Rules
LME
In recent months the LME has been closely monitoring large positions across multiple Contracts. With immediate effect, the LME, acting through the Special Committee, has determined that it is appropriate in the current circumstances, to amend the existing Lending Rules to introduce "Front Month Lending Rules". These changes to the Lending Rules are temporary and will be reviewed as appropriate by the Special Committee.
/jlne.ws/4efrJHy
NSE Indices launches two new constant maturity indices
NSE
NSE's index services subsidiary, NSE Indices Limited today launched two new constant maturity indices namely - Nifty Financial Services 3 to 6 Months Debt Index and Nifty Financial Services 9 to 12 Months Debt Index. Nifty Financial Services 3 to 6 Months Debt Index seeks to measure the performance of portfolio of Commercial Papers (CPs) & Certificates of Deposit (CDs) with long term credit rating of AAA, issued by entities from the financial services sector with residual maturity of 3 to 6 months. Nifty Financial Services 9 to 12 Months Debt Index seeks to measure the performance of portfolio of Commercial Papers (CPs), Certificates of Deposit (CDs) & corporate bond securities with long term credit rating of AAA, issued by entities from the financial services sector with residual maturity of 9 to 12 months.
/jlne.ws/4jYvz9n
Set Announces Temporary Measures On Ceiling & Floor Limits And Dynamic Price Band To Address Volatility
Mondovisione
Due to the unrest in the Middle East region, concerns have arisen regarding regional stability and global economic trends. Such uncertainty may affect investors' decision-making because of the lack of clear information about the current situation, and it may potentially impact the securities trading on Monday, June 23, 2025. In response to that, the Board of Governors (BoG) of The Stock Exchange of Thailand (SET), at its meeting on Sunday, June 22, 2025, has approved the following temporary measures:
/jlne.ws/4lhHosh
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| Fintech | | A roundup of today's market tech news and a look at tomorrow's disruptors | Artificial Intelligence
Trading Technologies' TT Trade Surveillance Captures 2025 Risk Technology Award for Trade Surveillance Product of the Year
Trading Technologies
Trading Technologies International, Inc. (TT), a global capital markets technology platform services provider, announced today that its TT Trade Surveillance offering has been recognized by Risk.net as Trade Surveillance Product of the Year in the 2025 Risk Technology Awards. Winners of the awards program were selected by a panel of 10 industry experts chosen by the publication's editors. The panel includes technology users, risk management practitioners, analysts and members of the editorial team.
/jlne.ws/44uoZ60
Nvidia: How the chipmaker evolved from a gaming startup to an AI giant
Nina Moothedath - Yahoo Finance
Over the past two decades, Nvidia (NVDA) has skyrocketed into global conversation. The semiconductor company is considered an international leader in the design and manufacturing of computer chips and helped revolutionize the rise of artificial intelligence (AI). Beyond its strengths in the gaming, data, and AI fields, Nvidia announced plans this March for a quantum research center in Boston, where CEO Jensen Huang said researchers could tackle problems from drug discovery to materials development.
/jlne.ws/4lbhaYk
AI is transforming Indian call centers. What does it mean for workers? To understand how AI will reshape the future of work, there are few better places to start than India's $280 billion business process outsourcing sector.
Karishma Mehrotra - The Washington Post
For three years, Kartikeya Kumar hesitated before picking up the phone, anticipating another difficult conversation with another frustrated customer. The call center agent, now 29, had tried everything to eliminate what a colleague called the "Indian-ism" in his accent. He mimicked the dialogue from Marvel movies and belted out songs by Metallica and Pink Floyd. Relief finally arrived in the form of artificial intelligence.
/jlne.ws/43Xx0Al
Apple Executives Have Held Internal Talks About Buying AI Startup Perplexity
Mark Gurman - Bloomberg
Apple Inc. executives have held internal discussions about potentially bidding for artificial intelligence startup Perplexity AI, seeking to address the need for more AI talent and technology. Adrian Perica, the company's head of mergers and acquisitions, has weighed the idea with services chief Eddy Cue and top AI decision-makers, according to people with knowledge of the matter. The discussions are at an early stage and may not lead to an offer, said the people, who asked not to be identified because the matter is private.
/jlne.ws/4lht96T
Meta Discussed Buying Perplexity Before Investing in Scale
Mark Gurman, Katie Roof, and Riley Griffin - Bloomberg
Meta Platforms Inc. held discussions with artificial intelligence search startup Perplexity AI Inc. about a possible takeover before moving ahead with a multibillion-dollar investment in Scale AI, according to people familiar with the matter. The two companies couldn't come to an agreement and decided not to pursue the deal, said the people, who asked not to be named as the details of the talks aren't public. The financial terms under discussion could not be learned. Perplexity recently closed a new round of funding at a $14 billion valuation.
/jlne.ws/4nsH4Jk
Financial services are pushing up the revenues of the Southeast Asia 500's most prominent tech startups
Lionel Lim - Fortune
Tech has a tiny presence on the Southeast Asia 500, generating just under 3% of the list's total revenue. Just one internet company, Sea, sits in the top 20, whereas four such companies sit in the Fortune 500's top 20. Yet the region's most prominent internet platforms all climbed up this year's rankings. Sea, No. 15, rose five places on this year's Southeast Asia 500 after growing its revenue by almost 30% year-on-year to reach $16.8 billion. Singapore's Grab also rose 24 places, reaching No. 128 on this year's list, with revenue of $2.8 billion. And fellow ride-hailing platform GoTo, based in Indonesia, jumped 13 spots with sales of $1 billion. All three platforms can cite one particular business for helping drive recent success: financial services.
/jlne.ws/43SVU3Z
The copyright war between the AI industry and creatives; We have surely gone beyond being able to give the tech sector the benefit of the doubt
Martin Wolf - Financial Times
/jlne.ws/4lomEzj
Customer service AI startup Decagon raises $131 million
Anna Tong - Reuters
/jlne.ws/3G09mtN
AI is the answer, whatever the question; A behind-the-scenes look at the work of Rutherford Hall, critical communications strategist
Rutherford Hall - Financial Times
/jlne.ws/44rjcxX
Connectivity/Data Centers
The A.I. Race Is Splitting the World Into Haves and Have-Nots; The Global A.I. Divide; Where A.I. Data Centers Are Located; Only 32 nations, mostly in the Northern Hemisphere, have A.I.-specialized data centers.
Adam Satariano and Paul Mozur - The New York Times
Last month, Sam Altman, the chief executive of the artificial intelligence company OpenAI, donned a helmet, work boots and a luminescent high-visibility vest to visit the construction site of the company's new data center project in Texas. Bigger than New York's Central Park, the estimated $60 billion project, which has its own natural gas plant, will be one of the most powerful computing hubs ever created when completed as soon as next year.
/jlne.ws/4kNR6Tv
Payments
Revolut chief in line for Musk-style payday at $150bn valuation; Nik Storonsky struck deal before SoftBank funding round that awards him more shares if valuation clears set hurdles
Ivan Levingston and Akila Quinio - Financial Times
Revolut's chief executive Nik Storonsky is in line for a multibillion-dollar windfall if he steers the fintech's valuation to about $150bn, under a long-standing Elon Musk-style pay package. Storonsky, who founded the $45bn start-up in 2015, has an outsized incentive deal that would increase his stake in Revolut by several percentage points if the valuation more than triples from its current level, according to people familiar with the matter.
/jlne.ws/3FSamQF
Technology Firms
ION unveils partnership with GFO-X; The integration follows the launch of GFO-X in May 2025, and follows growing institutional demand for centrally cleared cryptocurrency trading and digital asset trading.
Natasha Cocksedge - The Trade
ION has partnered with GFO-X, the UK's first regulated and centrally cleared trading venue for digital asset derivatives. The collaboration will see ION powering market access, clearing and margin processing for GFO-X's ecosystem, through the provision of software and infrastructure. The firm has said that the move is set to meet the increasing institutional demand for secure and compliant crypto futures and options. GFO-X will also be supported by ION's front-to-back cleared derivatives technology, such as XTP Execution, XTP Clearing, and the firm's trade-processing platform, XTP.
/jlne.ws/4kNEUCd
JP Morgan derivatives expert joins Broadridge as global head of futures and options trading
Incoming individual has also previously worked at Barclays Capital and Lehman Brothers.
Natasha Cocksedge - The Trade
Broadridge has named Kenneth MacHarg as its new managing director, global head of futures and options trading, effective 23 June. The move will see MacHarg leading Broadridge's futures and options (F&O) platform as part of a push to enhance the solution's leadership. He will also be based out of New York in the role and report to Frank Troise, president of Broadridge Trading and Connectivity Solutions.
/jlne.ws/3G82Np0
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| Cybersecurity | | Top stories for cybersecurity | This LinkedIn Message Could Cost You Your Life Savings-How To Avoid The Crypto Scam The FBI Says is Targeting Professionals
Nick Thomas - Benzinga
Federal authorities have filed to seize nearly $680,000 in cryptocurrency connected to a sophisticated romance scam that devastated two victims, highlighting the growing threat of crypto-enabled fraud targeting everyday investors. The Perfect Storm: Romance, Trust, and Cryptocurrency. The case, filed by the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Northern District of Ohio, reveals how scammers are weaponizing both human psychology and cryptocurrency's complexity to steal life savings. The seizure involves 679,981.22 Tether, a stablecoin pegged to the U.S. dollar, representing the traceable portion of funds stolen from victims in Ohio and Arizona.
/jlne.ws/3TA0wG9
Can We Unlock Mom's Phone After She's Buried?' The Crypto Inheritance Crisis No One's Talking About
Hina Nainani - Benzinga
With the rise in cryptocurrency investments, a new challenge is quietly surfacing: what happens to digital assets after the owner passes away? According to Barron's, many investors fail to properly plan for the inheritance of their Bitcoin or crypto holdings, leaving families in the dark or locked out entirely. Estate and business attorney Laura Cowen told Barron's that even financially savvy clients often overlook crypto in their estate plans. "The biggest risk with crypto isn't so much someone stealing it or going to the wrong family member," she said. "It's more just that families don't know that their loved ones owned it."
/jlne.ws/4egzOfo
US Braces for 'Low-Level' Cyberattacks by Iran After Airstrikes
Patrick Howell O'Neill - Bloomberg
US officials are warning businesses to brace for potential Iranian cyberattacks following American airstrikes on the country's nuclear sites, an event that experts say could draw a relatively small response from hackers. A bulletin from the Department of Homeland Security warned that Iranian hackers routinely target American technology, and that such activity is poised to occur after the US military operation. The message said that DHS hadn't identified any specific imminent threat.
/jlne.ws/4ezwmNb
Thailand Targets Cambodian Scam Centers as Border Dispute Rages
Patpicha Tanakasempipat - Bloomberg
Thailand announced a raft of security and trade measures to cripple transnational crime syndicates in Cambodia, as Prime Minister Paetongtarn Shinawatra seeks an upper hand in a simmering border dispute with its neighbor. Bangkok will restrict border crossings to Cambodia across seven provinces, and halt exports of goods including fuel that abet transnational criminal activities, Paetongtarn told reporters on Monday after chairing a meeting of officials and security agencies.
/jlne.ws/4k6DfGx
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| Cryptocurrencies | | Top stories for cryptocurrencies | Bullish Crypto Bets Liquidated for $595M as U.S. Bombs Iran Nuclear Sites
Shaurya Malwa - CoinDesk
Crypto bulls were blindsided Friday after the U.S. military launched airstrikes on Iran's key nuclear sites, triggering a sharp selloff and $595 million in long-position liquidations. The move, announced by former President Donald Trump, saw bombers hit Fordow, Natanz, and Isfahan - three of Iran's main uranium enrichment facilities. The geopolitical jolt rattled global markets and sent crypto into a tailspin on Sunday.
/jlne.ws/3ZHDIry
This Crypto Trader Put His Life Savings on the Line-And His $170K Bitcoin Prediction Could Change Everything
Nick Thomas - Benzinga
Jesse Eckel thought he had crypto figured out. The trader, who admits his "entire life savings is in crypto," started 2024 with bold predictions: a Bitcoin strategic reserve, major market dips, and explosive altcoin seasons. Some calls hit-others missed spectacularly. Now, after what he calls being "completely wrong" about market timing, Eckel has thrown out his old playbook entirely. His new analysis suggests we're not even close to the real crypto boom yet-and when it arrives, it could be unlike anything we've seen before.
/jlne.ws/4kZysIy
Bitcoin
AQR's Cliff Asness Sides With Jim Chanos in Critique of Michael Saylor's Strategy
Yiqin Shen - Bloomberg
AQR Capital Management's Cliff Asness says he's in agreement with famed short seller Jim Chanos when it comes to his criticism of Strategy founder Michael Saylor's claim that the use of convertible debt affords the leveraged Bitcoin proxy downside protection while continuing to accumulate the cryptocurrency. The critique is centered around whether there is "recourse" for the company formally known as MicroStrategy Inc. to pay back holders of its convertible bonds, through which Strategy raised roughly $10 billion to fund Bitcoin purchases. While Saylor said this type of debt "is not going to get called" and can be paid off with stock if the price of Bitcoin tumbles, both Asness and Chanos disagreed. In a Friday post on social media platform X, Asness said Chanos "is of course right."
/jlne.ws/3ToTjJb
Man whose parents were kidnapped after $245M Bitcoin theft has pleaded guilty to federal charges
Dave Collins - Associated Press
A Connecticut man whose parents were kidnapped after he took part in a $245 million Bitcoin theft has pleaded guilty to fraud and money laundering conspiracy charges and has agreed to testify against his co-defendants, according to court documents that were unsealed this week. Veer Chetal, 19, from Danbury, Connecticut, was one of three men charged with stealing 4,100 Bitcoins from a victim in Washington, D.C., in an elaborate online scam last August. The trio lived large after the heist, spending millions of dollars on cars, jewelry, rental mansions and nightclub parties, prosecutors say.
/jlne.ws/3HRs8nG
Anthony Pompliano's crypto venture ProCap Financial to go public via SPAC deal
Reuters
Anthony Pompliano's crypto venture ProCap Financial will go public in the U.S. through a merger with blank-check vehicle Columbus Circle Capital Corp, the American entrepreneur said on Monday. The combined company will have bitcoin worth up to $1 billion on its balance sheet. The transaction is expected to close before the end of 2025.
/jlne.ws/3FQ62RZ
Stablecoins
The stablecoin evangelist: Katie Haun's fight for digital dollars
Connie Loizos - TechCrunch
In 2018, when Bitcoin was trading around $4,000 and most Americans, at least, thought cryptocurrency was a fad, Katie Haun found herself on a debate stage in Mexico City opposite Paul Krugman, the Nobel Prize-winning economist who had dismissed digital assets as near worthless. As Krugman focused on Bitcoin's wild price swings, Haun steered the conversation toward something else - stablecoins. "Stablecoins are really interesting and really important to this ecosystem to hedge against that volatility," she argued on stage, explaining how digital tokens pegged to the U.S. dollar could offer the benefits of blockchain technology without the ups and downs of traditional cryptocurrencies.
/jlne.ws/4neXi8z
Canadian Crypto Firms Struggle to Create First Local Stablecoin
Monique Mulima - Bloomberg
While the US Senate advanced far-reaching stablecoin legislation, Canadian companies are pushing to get even the most basic stablecoin products available for users in the country. A Toronto-based startup backed by Coinbase Global Inc. made a filing with regulators this month asking for approval to create the first publicly-available stablecoin backed by the Canadian dollar. The company, Stablecorp Digital Currencies Inc., asked the Ontario Securities Commission to approve its QCAD product a month after announcing backing from Coinbase Ventures.
/jlne.ws/4kSaTRE
Fiserv to Offer Own Stablecoin, Partners With PayPal and Circle
Emily Mason - Bloomberg
Fiserv Inc. is lauching its own stablecoin and joining with both traditional and crypto payments firms PayPal Holdings Inc. and Circle Internet Group Inc. to develop products for financial institutions and merchants within the banking technology provider's ecosystem. Fiserv aims to have its FIUSD stablecoin available for customers by the end of the year, the firm said in a statement Monday. Financial terms of the other agreements weren't disclosed. Shares of Milwaukee-based Fiserv jumped more than 6% before the start of regular trading in New York.
/jlne.ws/3G7fG2B
Other Crypto
Hedge Fund Executives Eye $100 Million to Accumulate BNB Token
Ryan Weeks - Bloomberg
A team of crypto hedge fund executives are in advanced talks to raise $100 million for investing in a token linked to Binance Holdings Ltd. through a publicly listed company they control, in the latest spin on the Bitcoin treasury blueprint pioneered by Michael Saylor's Strategy. Former Coral Capital Holdings executives Patrick Horsman, Joshua Kruger and Johnathan Pasch are behind the pitch, according to an investor document reviewed by Bloomberg News. They aim to complete the fundraising this month and then rename the unidentified Nasdaq-listed company Build & Build Corporation and start accumulating the BNB token, the materials show.
/jlne.ws/43XNE2E
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| Politics | | An overview of politics as it relates to the financial markets | U.S. Administration
To a President With a Midnight Hammer, Everything Is a Nail; The prowess on display in America's strike on Iran inspired shock and awe. So did the start of America's forever wars.
Andreas Kluth - Bloomberg
No other military in the world could have done this. That was one of the Truths, as they're called, which President Donald Trump banged out during the early hours (Iranian time) of Sunday, and which his defense secretary, Pete Hegseth, and highest-ranking military officer, Dan Caine, repeated in their own presentation. And it really is true. Operation Midnight Hammer, the code name for the American "strike package" (as Caine kept calling it) on Iran, was an awe-inspiring display of martial prowess. It involved 125 aircraft and 75 types of precision weapons in total, plus submarines and support from land, space and cyberspace, all seamlessly coordinated. It began, and continued, with a masterful deception, as some B-2 bombers allowed themselves to be tracked flying west from the United States, while the real hunters were going east in stealth.
/jlne.ws/4lkcIGZ
Trump's impulsive Iran strike casts doubt over US commitment to Asia; Attack may define his legacy as the president who reignited the Middle East
Jennifer Kavanagh - Nikkei Asia
"Now is the time for peace," U.S. President Donald Trump declared after authorizing U.S. strikes on Iran's nuclear facilities at Fordo, Natanz, and Isfahan. Unfortunately, what happens next is something even he cannot predict or control. Instead, by opting to use military force against Iran, Trump has sacrificed his own diplomatic leverage, made Americans less safe, and put his second-term foreign policy priorities -- including peace in Ukraine and a renewed U.S. focus on Asia -- at risk.
/jlne.ws/45vTsla
Pakistan condemns Trump's bombing of Iran - a day after nominating him for Peace Prize
Saeed Shah - Reuters
Pakistan condemned on Sunday the strikes ordered on its neighbour Iran by Donald Trump, a day after Islamabad had said it would nominate the U.S. President for the Nobel Peace Prize. Pakistan on Sunday said Trump's decision to bomb Iranian nuclear facilities violated international law and that diplomacy was the only way to resolve the Iran crisis.
/jlne.ws/43TPCkE
Trump's Golden-Share Mistake; He would effectively nationalize U.S. Steel and make America a little less great.
Andy Kessler - the Wall Street Journal
Last week brought us the Golden Share. No, that isn't a James Bond movie, or a detail from the Steele dossier, although the plot is as sinister. It's the Trump administration's first step to nationalize the steel industry. In exchange for approval of Nippon Steel's merger with U.S. Steel, the government receives a single preferred share, which includes voting rights and all sorts of control over U.S. Steel's ability to close factories, invest capital and relocate jobs outside the U.S. This "Golden Share" is a bad idea. Nationalization is a fool's errand, a slippery slope to fascism's "government controlling the means of production." Don't do it.
/jlne.ws/4lmDvT6
U.S. Congress
Moratorium on state AI regulation clears Senate hurdle
Anthony Ha - TechCrunch
A Republican effort to prevent states from enforcing their own AI regulations cleared a key procedural hurdle on Saturday. The rule, as reportedly rewritten by Senate Commerce Chair Ted Cruz in an attempt to comply with budgetary rules, would withhold federal broadband funding from states if they try to enforce AI regulations in the next 10 years.
/jlne.ws/4eeB4j9
Republican Thomas Massie of Kentucky says Iran attack violates Constitution, Trump campaign promises
Lantern Staff - Kentucky Lantern
Kentucky Republicans in Congress are split on both the necessity and constitutionality of the U.S. attack on Iran. U.S. Rep. Thomas Massie called President Donald Trump's action unconstitutional while Rep. Andy Barr said Trump had acted within his constitutional authority to protect "the safety and security of the American people." Massie also criticized Republican House Speaker Mike Johnson for not calling the House back from vacation last week to consider a bipartisan war powers resolution filed by Massie and Democratic Rep. Ro Khanna of California.
/jlne.ws/45G3mRr
Other U.S. Politics
Voice of America parent terminates over 600 more staff in likely death knell
Reuters
The parent agency of Voice of America said on Friday it had issued termination notices to over 639 more staff, completing an 85% decrease in personnel since March and effectively spelling the end of a broadcasting network founded to counter Nazi propaganda. Kari Lake, senior advisor to the U.S. Agency for Global Media, said the staff reduction meant 1,400 positions had been eliminated as part of U.S. President Donald Trump's agenda to cut staffing at the agency to a statutory minimum.
/jlne.ws/44tAJpl
Musk Says Grok Will Be Fixed After It Tells the Truth About Right-wing Terrorism; The billionaire has previously pledged to adjust his AI chatbot in order to make it agree with his extremist politics
Miles Klee - Rolling Stone
What good is being the wealthiest man alive if your chatbot won't lie in support of your rancid politics? That's the question far-right billionaire Elon Musk appears to be asking once again of Grok, the AI model developed by his company xAI and integrated into X, his social media platform. Following the assassination on Saturday of Minnesota Democratic Rep. Melissa Hortman and her husband Mark Hortman in their home, and the shooting of Minnesota Sen. John Hoffman and his wife Yvette Hoffman, allegedly by the same suspect, much of the online right mobilized to paint the horrific attack as the work of a radical leftist. Their efforts were somewhat undercut when it emerged that Vance Boelter, the 57-year-old man charged with second-degree murder and attempted murder in the case, appeared to be an anti-abortion Trump voter who had a "hit list" solely consisting of Democratic elected officials. (He has not yet entered a plea.)
/jlne.ws/44cdazV
Why Wall Street fears a 33-year-old political outsider; Progressive candidate Zohran Mamdani has shaken up New York's mayoral race and the city's elite wants to stop him
James Fontanella-Khan, Sujeet Indap, Amelia Pollard and Sam Learner - Financial Times
Wall Street has a new enemy: a little-known 33-year-old democratic socialist who is standing for mayor in New York City. Zohran Mamdani, who represents part of the borough of Queens in the state legislature, has pledged to raise taxes on the rich to fund free buses and childcare, as well as city-owned grocery stores. His surge of popularity against former New York governor Andrew Cuomo, a longtime fixture of the political scene who resigned in 2021 after facing accusations of sexual harassment (which he denies) has alarmed the city's business elite, who have joined forces to prevent the newcomer from winning the vote.
/jlne.ws/44s4Hdj
United Kingdom
Thames Water bonds plunge to record low as nationalisation threat grows
Luke Barr - The Telegraph
Thames Water's bonds have crashed to a record low after the Environment Secretary said it was stepping up contingency plans for the struggling utility giant. The price of Thames Water's debt fell to as low as 67p on Friday, down from 70p at the start of the month, as investors took flight amid fears the Government could nationalise the business. The market reaction was prompted largely by comments from Steve Reed last Thursday, who said that ministers were preparing to put Thames Water into a taxpayer-backed special administration regime.
/jlne.ws/3HQScPG
Farage: 'I will charge non-doms £250k and give it to the poor'
Charles Hymas - The Telegraph
Nigel Farage will vow to reinstate non-dom status for wealthy entrepreneurs if they pay a £250,000 fee which will be handed to Britain's poorest workers. On Monday, the Reform UK leader will use a press conference to unveil plans to impose a Robin Hood-style levy on new or returning "high net worth" individuals. The revenue generated would then be redistributed to pay cash bonuses of £600 a year to low-paid workers.
/jlne.ws/4ee5xxH
UK to Scrap Green Levies for Heavy Industry in Push for Growth
Philip Aldrick - Bloomberg
Energy costs will be cut for as many as 7,000 UK businesses as the government scraps green levies to level the playing field with foreign rivals and boost growth under its new ten-year Industrial Strategy. Big users of electricity like aerospace, automotive and chemicals firms will be exempted from several climate schemes from 2027 to reduce their bills by as much as 25% and protect 300,000 skilled jobs, the government said.
/jlne.ws/3T5uKkb
UK government to invest more than £500mn in quantum computing; Cash boost for technology with potential to transform areas ranging from industrial materials to communications security
Michael Peel - Financial Times
The UK is to invest more than £500mn in emerging computing based on quantum physics that experts say has the potential to transform economic and national security. The government's support will be welcomed following questions about what would replace an ambitious Conservative pledge in 2023 to invest £2.5bn over 10 years in broader quantum technology and project Britain as a world leader.
/jlne.ws/4kY649y
European Union
Russian Threat Looms Over Denmark's Democracy Festival; At this year's Folkemødet, festival-goers voted in "wargame" scenarios and learned about survival skills and stockpiling.
Sanne Wass - Bloomberg
The warm scent of smoked fish and tangy rye bread drifted through the crowd as Denmark's crisis minister, Torsten Schack Pedersen, tied on a long apron and stepped behind a pop-up kitchen counter in Allinge on the Danish island of Bornholm. With his sleeves rolled up, he reached for tins of peppered kippers - his personal favorite, he eagerly admitted - and began crafting his take on a smørrebrød, Denmark's beloved open-faced sandwich. But the point wasn't just to showcase his culinary skills. Pedersen was demonstrating how to make a tasty meal using the shelf-stable ingredients every Dane is now advised to stockpile in case of a national emergency such as a power blackout or military engagement.
/jlne.ws/3HT9JqD
Spain Wins Exemption from NATO's 5% Defense Spending Goal
Andrea Palasciano and Daniel Basteiro - Bloomberg
Spain obtained an exemption from NATO's ambitious defense spending target of 5% of GDP after several days of diplomatic wrangling that drew scorn from Donald Trump, right before leaders of the military alliance gather on Tuesday. "We fully respect the legitimate desire of other countries of increasing their defense investment but we won't do it," Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez said on Sunday afternoon. The country can get defense expenditure up to 2.1%, "nothing more, nothing less."
/jlne.ws/448qdCv
Germany and Italy pressed to bring $245bn of gold home from US; Trump's attacks on the Fed and growing geopolitical risks reignite public debate about repatriating bullion
Olaf Storbeck and Amy Kazmin - Financial Times
Germany and Italy are facing calls to move their gold out of New York following President Donald Trump's repeated attacks on the US Federal Reserve and increasing geopolitical turbulence. Fabio De Masi, a former Die Linke MEP who joined the leftwing populist BSW party, told the Financial Times that there were "strong arguments" for relocating more gold to Europe or Germany "in turbulent times".
/jlne.ws/4k0BI4U
Trump has handed Europe a chance to shape its own future; American retreat should be the catalyst for deeper integration and with it a stronger EU
Enrico Letta - Financial Times
Donald Trump's actions in his second term make clear that we are dealing with a long-term strategic vision that aims to reshape America's global role, weaken multilateralism and increase pressure on allies, especially Europe. The US president is pursuing an agenda that forces the EU to face an urgent reality: it must strengthen its autonomy and capacity to act. Paradoxically, Trump's challenge offers an unprecedented opportunity for Europe to do just that. It could be the catalyst that drives deeper integration and a stronger, more decisive EU. This EU must begin by fully leveraging its two most powerful assets: the single market and the euro.
/jlne.ws/3ZEDcL2
Ireland's Donohoe Sees Energy, Trade Risk From Mideast Tensions
Olivia Fletcher - Bloomberg
Tensions in the Middle East are adding risk in the energy and trade sectors, according to the Eurogroup President. "I do have to acknowledge the economic risks that are there," Paschal Donohoe, who is also Ireland's Finance Minister, said on a panel at Bloomberg's Future of Finance in Ireland event. " there is what could happen from an energy and trade perspective, the price of energy, ability of access for goods to move around the world."
/jlne.ws/44cNdjX
China
China Tightens Fentanyl Controls in Goodwill Gesture to Trump
Josh Xiao - Bloomberg
China moved to tighten controls over two chemicals that can be used to make fentanyl, in an apparent olive branch to the US that may help maintain their fragile trade truce. Authorities added two previously unclassified precursors to a list of Class Two chemicals, according to a joint statement by six government departments on Monday. The label will subject the substances, 4-piperidone and 1-boc-4-piperidone, to tougher supervision starting July 20. The announcement followed a meeting between China's Minister of Public Security Wang Xiaohong and US Ambassador David Perdue in Beijing last week. Wang said China was ready to collaborate on law enforcement areas such as counter-narcotics, which has been a source of friction between the world's largest economies.
/jlne.ws/45uPc5s
Japan
Japan's LDP Suffers Bruising Loss in Tokyo Before National Vote
Sakura Murakami - Bloomberg
Japan's ruling Liberal Democratic Party suffered its worst-ever result in a Tokyo metropolitan election, losing its spot as the biggest political force on the assembly less than a month before voters deliver a verdict on Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba's premiership in a national vote. The LDP lost 9 seats in the 127-seat assembly to end up with 21 representatives after Sunday's election, leaving it well behind Tokyo Governor Yuriko Koike's Tomin First no Kai, a locally focused party that maintained its grip on 31 seats. Among national opposition parties, the Constitutional Democratic Party expanded its representation on the assembly to 17 from 12, while the Democratic Party for the People won its first nine seats in the metropolitan government.
/jlne.ws/4ntmEzU
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| Regulation & Enforcement | | Stories about regulation and the law. | Venezuela arrests dozens in crackdown on black market dollars; Former finance minister and economists detained, sowing fears of return to economic ruin
Joe Daniels and Ana Rodriguez Brazon - Financial Times
Venezuela's authoritarian government has arrested dozens of people, including a former finance minister, in a crackdown on black market dollars and independent economists that analysts fear could return the country to economic ruin. The country's bolívar currency has lost about two-thirds of its official value since President Nicolás Maduro abandoned a fixed exchange rate in October as dollar reserves needed to prop up the currency dwindled.
/jlne.ws/44dOUNQ
Republican plan to scrap US audit watchdog ruled in violation of Senate rules; Decision protects funding for some government agencies and is blow to Donald Trump's deregulatory agenda
Stephen Foley and Kate Duguid and Stefania Palma - Financial Times
The US audit regulator created after the Enron scandal has been granted a reprieve after the Senate parliamentarian ruled that Republicans' plan to close the agency as part of their giant tax and spending bill would violate Senate rules. Republicans had planned to scrap the Public Company Accounting Oversight Board and hand its powers to inspect and fine audit firms to the Securities and Exchange Commission, a measure they said would save money for taxpayers and the listed companies that pay fees to fund the agency.
/jlne.ws/3HUlooV
Report From FINRA Board of Governors Meeting - June 2025; Board Approves Two Rule Proposals, Appoints New Advisory Committee Members and Approves the 2024 Annual Financial Report
FINRA
FINRA's Board of Governors met June 4-5. The Board approved two rule proposals, approved the appointments of new Advisory Committee members, met with Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) Commissioner Mark Uyeda, and received updates on FINRA's long-term financial planning and FINRA's enterprise risk management and cybersecurity program.
/jlne.ws/3T7dif8
SEC Obtains Final Judgments Against Participants in Illegal Microcap Fraud Schemes
SEC
On May 27, 2025, the Securities and Exchange Commission obtained a final judgment from the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of California against defendant Brehnen Knight, who had previously been charged for his role in several fraudulent stock manipulation schemes.
/jlne.ws/3T3Fhwc
SEC Obtains Final Judgments in Penny-Stock Fraud Scheme
SEC
On June 11, 2025, the Securities and Exchange Commission obtained final judgments against defendants Benjamin Ballout and Mohamed Zayed for their roles in a fraudulent scheme to pump and dump the publicly traded stock of Enerkon Solar International, Inc.
/jlne.ws/3I7Y4nK
Federal Court dismisses application by former auditor of LM Managed Performance Fund
ASIC
The Federal Court has dismissed an application by Reginald Lance Williams to overturn the decision of the Companies Auditors Disciplinary Board (CADB) to cancel his registration as a company auditor and requiring him to pay ASIC's costs of the CADB proceedings. Following an application by ASIC, in December 2018 the CADB cancelled Mr Williams' registration as an auditor for failing to carry out or perform adequately and properly the duties of an auditor in relation to his audit of the financial report of LM Managed Performance Fund for the year ended 30 June 2012 (see 19-084MR).
/jlne.ws/4nm2DLB
Streamlining financial transaction reporting: ESMA calls for input
ESMA
/jlne.ws/4nfBrxY
FSA Weekly Review No.642
FSA
/jlne.ws/44eoNqa
Consumer Price Developments in May 2025
MSA
This May 2025 report contains an update of the latest consumer price developments in Singapore, prepared by MAS and the Ministry of Trade and Industry.
/jlne.ws/4ejbb1B
New speech by Kelvin Wong: Keynote speech at Annual Conference of Hong Kong Investment Funds Association
SFC
A speech titled "Regulator-Industry Partnership in Bolstering Hong Kong's Status as Asset Management Hub" delivered by Dr Kelvin Wong today at the 18th Annual Conference of Hong Kong Investment Funds Association is now posted on the SFC website.
/jlne.ws/447TNbj
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| Investing & Trading | | Today's top stories from equities, indices and FICC (fixed income, currencies and commodities) | Value Investing Is Getting a MAGA Bump; Donald Trump's economic agenda is turning international value traps into gold mines.
Shuli Ren - Bloomberg
Value investing has been out of style for over a decade. Even Warren Buffett, who began his career as a deep-value investor, flipped the formula and favored quality businesses. But cheap, unloved companies outside of the US are starting to outperform. Year-to-date, international value stocks beat the S&P 500 by more than 10 percentage points.
/jlne.ws/3G6xH0Z
Investors are shaken, but not yet stirred; Amid global turmoil, markets are focused on the hit to economic fundamentals
The editorial board - Financial Times
Observers might be forgiven for thinking that financial markets don't care much about geopolitical shocks. The world's largest economy is threatening to put itself behind a tariff wall. War rages on in Europe. And since June 13 a fresh Middle East conflict has broken out. Yet, the S&P 500 remains near record highs. It has been resilient this week even as the US considered joining Israel's war on Iran. Brent crude prices are up, but only to a tame $77 per barrel. Have investors lost touch with reality? A look at historical market reactions to global events suggests not.
/jlne.ws/4ndUl8r
Any tidal shift of investors away from the US will take time; Despite a stock rally, it is still unwise to assume the view of investors of America is not changing
Katie Martin - Financial Times
It is starting to look as if investors are all talk and no action when it comes to the anything-but-America trade. At the start of this year, and especially around the time of President Donald Trump's full-fat "reciprocal" tariffs announcement in early April, it was all anyone could talk about - a disturbance in the force that has led every serious investor to rethink their reliance on the US.
/jlne.ws/4ek9z7M
Assault on proxy advisers is an attack on the rights of asset owners; Pressure seeks to censor independent analysis and neuter shareholder oversight
Sarah Wilson - Financial Times
The firms that advise big shareholders on corporate governance matters and help them vote are under siege. A simmering backlash over the activities of proxy advisory firms has mutated into an all-out assault in the US from multiple directions. The attacks have included congressional hearings, legal actions, regulatory pressure and recent comments by JPMorgan chief executive Jamie Dimon who reportedly called them a "cancer". The proxy advisory firms are accused of cartel-like behaviour and ideological over-reach in their corporate governance advice with critics treating the fiduciaries who manage money with disdain, painting them as manipulated victims.
/jlne.ws/45BMT0q
Investors Rush to Pour Cash Into $7.4 Trillion US Money-Market Fund Industry
Alexandra Harris - Bloomberg
The rush of cash into the US money-market funds is showing few signs of slowing as it secured a record $7.4 trillion in assets. Investors have poured more than $320 billion into the funds so far this year, according to Crane Data LLC, making it one of the biggest benefactors of the Federal Reserve's current monetary policy. That's something of a surprise for those on Wall Street who'd gone into 2025 assuming officials would lower interest rates and sap the attractive returns offered by the industry.
/jlne.ws/4k6x4SR
Young Investor Demand for Alternative Assets Is Reshaping Wall Street's Playbook
Lu Wang - Bloomberg
Wall Street has a new favorite investor. They're young, they're affluent and they're skeptical that traditional markets can deliver wealth over the long haul. Shaped by financial crises and fueled by tech optimism, this well-heeled class of Millennials and Gen Z are moving their money into the buzzy world of alternative assets. Think pre-IPO unicorns, real estate, crypto, collectibles, and more. From private banks to fintech platforms, the financial industry is rushing to keep up. Firms like Forge Global Holdings Inc. have lowered their minimum investment thresholds, pitching private-market access as aspirational - and attainable.
/jlne.ws/40jdVGh
Rich young Americans are ditching the stock market
Phil Osagie - Moneywise
/jlne.ws/4nfwe9o
Copper Faces Historic Squeeze With LME Stockpiles Depleting Fast
Mark Burton - Bloomberg
/jlne.ws/3FSev7b
Volatility Has 'Completely Changed' Coffee, Cocoa Trade, Says Top Banker
Mumbi Gitau and Archie Hunter - Bloomberg
/jlne.ws/3HRIjBs
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| Environmental, Social and Corporate Governance | | Stories about environmental, social and governance investing | Eni CEO Claudio Descalzi: 'I hate to be politically correct'; Energy boss has broken ranks with rivals as he faces the challenge of diversifying beyond oil and gas
Malcolm Moore - Financial Times
In the late 1990s, as civil war raged in the Republic of Congo, Claudio Descalzi, then a 41-year-old regional manager for Italian oil major Eni, slept under his bed with his children to avoid being shot in the night. "My wife was pregnant. Fortunately she was able to leave the country. I remained stuck with my two girls," he says. It was two years before he saw Italy again. "I was responsible for the expatriates who remained. Clearly, the last thing you think about is cash flow or operations."
/jlne.ws/3T0Z7bx
Why Fracking Is a Secret Weapon for the U.S.-Heard on the Street
Spencer Jakab - The Wall Street Journal
That's where U.S. petroleum imports per person stood as recently as 2003, during the Iraq war. Due to fracking, the U.S. now has net exports of about 2.5 barrels per head and is also the world's largest seller of liquefied natural gas. Whatever went through President Trump's mind when he decided to bomb Iran's nuclear infrastructure, the economic calculus was made easier by this massive growth in America's energy output. It greatly eases the sting of a broader conflict for consumers and investors.
/jlne.ws/44pgU2t
Senate Weighs Effectively Killing Rule That Drove Rise of Fuel-Efficient Cars; Automakers split over measure to eliminate fines for failing to meet mileage standards that helped launch fuel-efficient mainstays like Toyota's Prius
Ryan Felton and Sharon Terlep - The Wall Street Journal
The Senate is weighing a major change to federal fuel-economy rules that would kneecap the policy that dramatically reduced gas consumption and helped create fuel-efficient cars like the Toyota Prius hybrid. Republican senators are proposing a change to the Corporate Average Fuel Economy, or CAFE, rules as part of President Trump's wide-ranging tax and spending bill. If enacted, the proposal would eliminate fines for violating CAFE, all but nullifying rules that for generations have pushed automakers to churn out ever cleaner and more fuel-efficient vehicles. That technology has saved two trillion gallons of gasoline over the past 50 years, according to the journal Energy Policy.
/jlne.ws/3T4pf5f
High Costs Have Ended America's Love Affair With Cars; You love them, you want them, you can't live without them ... and they're costing you a fortune in repairs, insurance and shockingly expensive replacement parts. Dan Neil on why our national obsession with the automobile has turned dangerously codependent.
Dan Neil - The Wall Street Journal
I think of myself not so much as a car reviewer as an intimacy coordinator. Four out of five American households depend on an automobile to get to work, to get the kids to school, to go wherever. The typical driver spends about an hour a day in the car, says the AAA-more face time than many of us spend with our families. A good relationship starts with a good match. Lately, though, Americans have been losing that car-loving feeling. Actually, they're at the dish-throwing stage. Light-vehicle sales have fallen by about 1.7 million a year since 2016, reflecting the number of younger consumers declining the pleasures of ownership. Millions more remained trapped in toxic relationships with abusive elders. The average age of passenger cars on the road is currently 14.5 years, according to S&P Global's data.
/jlne.ws/40iIhsu
Japan's top investors have a duty to back a clean energy future; Upcoming shareholder meetings a key opportunity to move away from fossil fuels
Sachiko Suzuki - Nikkei Asia (opinion)
Japan faces another scorching summer, but the country's biggest investment companies are stalling the shift to clean energy with the risk of making global warming-fueled disasters worse by pouring billions into new coal, oil and gas development.
/jlne.ws/44eoewy
Largest US Grid Issues Energy Emergency Alert for Monday Heat
Naureen S Malik - Bloomberg
PJM Interconnection, which serves about 20% of Americans in the mid-Atlantic to the Midwest, declared an energy emergency alert with power demand expected to climb to a 14-year high amid intense heat. This alert was issued in anticipation of tight conditions on the 13-state system as electricity demand is set to top 160 gigawatts on the afternoon of June 23, which would be the highest peak since July 2011, according to PJM. The Eastern US grid operator also called a "maximum generation emergency" to shore up supplies.
/jlne.ws/3SZtlM2
The Emirati Oil Boss Banking Billions on U.S. Energy; Sultan Ahmed Al Jaber has turned Adnoc into one of the world's most ambitious-and well-funded-energy companies
Christopher M. Matthews and Benoit Morenne - The Wall Street Journal
/jlne.ws/4jYGArr
Russia says ready to supply LNG to Mexico
Natalia Siniawski - Reuters
/jlne.ws/40k2LkC
Your AI use could have a hidden environmental cost
Kameryn Griesser - CNN
/jlne.ws/44baaE3
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| Banks, Brokers & Managed Funds | | The latest from banks, brokers, hedge funds and managed futures | Commercial Real Estate Distress Is Spreading: Credit Weekly
Neil Callanan - Bloomberg
The pain in US commercial real estate credit continues to bubble to the surface after a surge in borrowing costs and the rise of work from home left lenders vulnerable to losses. Delinquencies continue to increase, though the rate has moderated, researcher Green Street said this past week. Distress is also climbing, rising 23% to more than $116 billion at the end of March from a year earlier, data compiled by MSCI Real Capital Analytics show. That's the highest in more than a decade.
/jlne.ws/3TA4fU9
Vanguard cuts fund fees as competition in Europe heats up; World's second-largest asset manager estimates reduction will save investors $3.5mn a year
Emma Dunkley - Financial Times
Vanguard, the world's second-largest asset manager, is cutting fees on nearly half of its bond exchange traded funds in Europe as part of a push into the fixed income market and as competition among the biggest fund providers heats up. The US-based asset manager, which oversees more than $10.5tn globally, is reducing the charges on seven of its total 15 fixed income ETFs in Europe, in an attempt to attract more customers to its bond funds and win a greater market share.
/jlne.ws/44eknQ6
How Brightwell navigates a world of change; 'One portfolio' approach helped UK pension fund steer a course through trade turmoil, Covid and LDI crisis
Rob Mannix - Risk.net
In early 2020, Brightwell turned its investment process upside down - literally. The £47 billion ($63.3 billion) UK pension fund had previously followed a conventional strategic asset allocation framework, fixing the broad tracks along which its portfolio would run. Following the switch, Brightwell adopted a so-called 'total portfolio', or 'one portfolio' approach. Now the fund determines its
/jlne.ws/4nj4noU
Bank of New York Mellon approached Northern Trust to discuss potential merger, WSJ reports
Reuters
Bank of New York Mellon Corp approached Northern Trust last week to express interest in merging with its smaller rival, the Wall Street Journal reported on Sunday. The chief executives of BNY and Northern Trust had at least one conversation, but no offer was discussed, the newspaper reported citing people familiar with the matter. BNY may approach Northern Trust in the future with a formal bid, however it may not result in a transaction, the report added.
/jlne.ws/3TynZaK
***** Here is the Bloomberg version of this story.~JJL
Lloyds Banking Group moves £6bn pension fund in house; New provider Scottish Widows is overhauling its offering
Mary McDougall and Emma Dunkley - Financial Times
Lloyds Banking Group is planning to move £6bn of workplace retirement savings from Willis Towers Watson to Scottish Widows, as the bank's in-house pension provider carries out a major overhaul of its offerings. The bank has written to more than 100,000 of its pension scheme members to tell them about the changes. The consultation closes in August and the switch is expected to complete in the second quarter of next year.
/jlne.ws/4ec3UR2
Hedge Funds
Giuseppe Paleologo on Quant Investing at Multi-Strat Hedge Funds
How do you actually make money?
Tracy Alloway and Joe Weisenthal - Bloomberg
Quantitative investing is one of those terms that you hear all the time, but there's various explanations of what it actually means, or how quants actually make money. And of course, the term means different things in different contexts. In this live episode, recorded at the Bloomberg Equity Intelligence Summit on June 12, we speak again with Giuseppe Paleologo, the head of quantitative research at Balyasny Asset Management. We talk about his role, what quant investing actually is, and what the future of the space actually entails.
/jlne.ws/3GbFhr9
Third Point, Arb Funds Reap Big Gains as US Steel Bet Pays Out
Yiqin Shen and Joe Deaux - Bloomberg
US hedge funds including Third Point LLC and Pentwater Capital Management are reaping a windfall from bets that political noise wouldn't keep United States Steel Corp. from completing its $14.1 billion deal with its Japanese suitor. Nippon Steel Corp.'s controversial acquisition closed on Wednesday, ending an 18-month saga that divided the US steel industry and became a flash point in American politics. The deal was clinched as US President Donald Trump shifted his views on the foreign transaction after Nippon Steel offered further commitments and investments in the Pittsburgh-based steelmaker.
/jlne.ws/4jZOG2U
Goldman Sachs, Citi Bet on AI in Financial Advice With Investment in Start-up Conquest
Rebecca Ungarino - Barrons.com
Investors at Goldman Sachs and Citigroup are getting behind a Canadian start-up that sells financial-planning software to banks and wealth management firms including Morgan Stanley and Raymond James underlining Wall Street's insatiable appetite for artificial intelligence. Conquest, a Winnipeg-based start-up founded in 2018 and run by a longtime financial-tech executive, said it raised $80 million-or $110 million in Canadian dollars-in a Series B funding round led by a growth-equity investment from Goldman's asset-management business. The start-up's platform for advisors uses proprietary AI tools to make financial-planning suggestions after examining a web of client information, such as income and retirement savings.
/jlne.ws/45vWSEw
Hedge fund leverage reaches five-year high, buying bank stocks, Goldman Sachs says
Nell Mackenzie - Reuters
Hedge fund leverage hit a five-year high last week, with speculators buying banks, trading companies and insurance firms, Goldman Sachs data showed, after U.S. interest rates held steady and just before U.S. attacks on Iran's nuclear sites. The U.S. Federal Reserve held interest rates steady on Wednesday last week and indicated they were in no rush to cut interest rates.
/jlne.ws/4n9lnO5
Pimco bets on long-term Japanese debt in 'dislocated' market; Bond investing group buys as long-term borrowing costs soar to record highs
Ian Smith and Leo Lewis - Financial Times
Bond group Pimco has been buying long-term Japanese government debt to take advantage of what its global fixed income chief Andrew Balls called a "dislocation" in the market. Japanese government bonds have been hit hard in recent months as a resurgence in inflation and a decline in demand from traditional domestic buyers transforms the market. That has taken yields on long-dated debt to record levels and prompted authorities to consider measures to support bond prices.
/jlne.ws/46adJgh
Private Equity
Mark Walter Is Creating a Sports Empire With $10 Billion Lakers
Giles Turner - Bloomberg
For just under $10 billion, private equity firm 3G Capital recently bought Skechers - an ascendant global footwear brand with $9 billion in annual sales and 20,000 employees spread across 5,300 stores. For the same sum, you could now buy the Los Angeles Lakers - a basketball team that generates an estimated $500 million a year, employs 1,000 people, and sells little more than TV rights, tickets, and dreams - plus a century of star-studded mystique.
/jlne.ws/4lh0xKV
Morgan Stanley Collects $3.2 Billion for Middle Market Deals
Preeti Singh - Bloomberg
Middle-market focused Morgan Stanley Capital Partners has collected $3.2 billion for its latest buyout fund amid a tough fundraising market for private equity firms. The fund, North Haven Capital Partners VIII, will back companies with earnings of between $20 million and $30 million, according to Morgan Stanley Investment Management's Aaron Sack. The latest fund added several new investors from Asia and the Americas and is about 60% bigger than the last vehicle, Sack said.
/jlne.ws/43X6s2a
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| Work & Management | | Stories impacting work and more about management ideas, practices and trends. | NIKKEI Film: Why learn English in the age of AI? Machine translations set to surpass human abilities
Wataru Ito - Nikkei Asia
AI can correctly answer about 90% of the University of Tokyo's English entrance exam questions and is capable of achieving a 900 out of a 990 perfect score on the TOEIC (Test of English for International Communication). The average TOEIC score for Japanese in 2023 was 561. Developments such as these are significant enough that AI translation researcher Eiichiro Sumita asserts, "Practical English for business use should be left to AI."
/jlne.ws/4liQJQI
Millions of Résumés Never Make It Past the Bots. One Man Is Trying to Find Out Why; After more than 100 unsuccessful job applications, Derek Mobley sued software firm Workday for discrimination, claiming its algorithm screened him out
Lauren Weber - The Wall Street Journal
U.S. job hunters submit millions of online applications every year. Often they get an automatic rejection or no response at all, never knowing if they got a fair shake from the algorithms that gatekeep today's job market. One worker, Derek Mobley, is trying to discover why. Mobley, an IT professional in North Carolina, applied for more than 100 jobs during a stretch of unemployment from 2017 to 2019 and for a few years after. He was met with rejection or silence each time. Sometimes the rejection emails arrived in the middle of the night or within an hour of submitting his application.
/jlne.ws/4k7XtQu
2025 Grads Are Entering a Rough Job Market. The Class of 2020 Has Some Advice; Younger and older Gen Zers in a group chat discuss how to get employers' attention, starting a job in the AI era and playing the corporate 'game'
Lindsay Ellis - The Wall Street Journal
Hiring freezes, the threat of AI, a stop-start global trade war-the Class of 2025 is having a tough time getting launched in today's job market. It is an experience hauntingly familiar to the Class of 2020, who collected their diplomas just as a pandemic was turning the global economy upside down. To let them compare notes, trade tips and simply commiserate, The Wall Street Journal recently tapped five members of each class, then got all 10 talking in a weeklong group chat. They discussed everything from getting hired to finding mentors to deciphering the corporate world.
/jlne.ws/4lhlUf1
Meta's CFO describes her mortifying first day on the Morgan Stanley trading floor
Sarah Perkel - Business Insider
Her first day on Morgan Stanley's trading floor, Susan Li was "mortified." Li, who is now Meta's CFO, started at the bank around two decades ago when she was just 19, after graduating from Stanford sooner than most of her peers. "When I showed up at Morgan Stanley for my first day, I was on the trading floor in the big Broadway headquarters at 1585, and the equivalent of an HRBP basically got the attention of everyone on the trading floor," Li told Stripe cofounder John Collison on his podcast Cheeky Pint. "And so she wanted everyone on the floor to stop and look at me and know that no one was to serve me any alcohol at any company gathering."
/jlne.ws/4kWUs6O
A.I. Sludge Has Entered the Job Search; Candidates are frustrated. Employers are overwhelmed. The problem? An untenable pile of applications - many of them generated with the help of A.I. tools.
Sarah Kessler - The New York Times
Katie Tanner, a human resource consultant in Utah, knew the job would be popular: It was fully remote, was at a tech company and required only three years of experience. But she was still shocked by the response on LinkedIn. After 12 hours, 400 applications had been submitted. By 24, there were 600. A few days later, there were more than 1,200, at which point she removed the post. Three months later, she's still whittling down candidates. "It's crazy," she said. "You just get inundated."
/jlne.ws/3HSo9aw
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| Wellness Exchange | | An Exchange of Health and Wellness Information | Your Postcode Is Ageing You: New Report Exposes North-South Longevity Gap; People across England are "ageing unequally" - here's what experts say is behind the growing gap.
Amy Glover - Huffington Post
New research has detailed "alarming" disparities among older people in the North and South of England across multiple factors, including life expectancy, poverty, nutrition, social inclusion, and employment. Anna Dixon, MP for Shipley, is set to launch the Northern Health Science Alliance's new report in Westminster today. She said: "Where you live shouldn't affect your experience of ageing. This report brings into sharp focus the reality of how unequal ageing is across England."
/jlne.ws/4kTocBt
'I Feel Like I've Been Lied To': When a Measles Outbreak Hits Home; From a lone clinic in Texas to an entire school district in North Dakota, the virus is upending daily life and revealing a deeper crisis of belief.
Eli Saslow - The New York Times
He was a chiropractor by training, but in a remote part of West Texas with limited medical care, Kiley Timmons had become a first stop for whatever hurt. Ear infections. Labor pains. Oil workers who arrived with broken ribs and farmers with bulging discs. For more than a decade, Kiley, 48, had seen 20 patients each day at his small clinic located between a church and a gas station in Brownfield, population 8,500. He treated what he could, referred others to physicians and prayed over the rest. It wasn't until early this spring that he started to notice something unfamiliar coming through the door: aches that lingered, fevers that wouldn't break, discolored patches of skin that didn't make sense. At first, he blamed it on a bad flu season, but the symptoms stuck around and then multiplied. By late March, a third of his patients were telling him about relatives who couldn't breathe. And then Kiley started coughing, too.
/jlne.ws/4nfst3M
Stop telling me to lower my cortisol - it's making me stressed!
Ruth Clegg - BBC
It could apparently change the shape of my face, add pounds to my midriff, and even make my hair fall out. I feel like warnings about cortisol - a stress hormone I know very little about - have hijacked my social media accounts. I see posts advising me to drink a cortisol cocktail - a blend of orange juice, coconut water and sea salt, take a range of different supplements, and massage lavender balm into my temples.
/jlne.ws/4kRr5T8
ChatGPT use linked to cognitive decline, research reveals
Katie Hawkinson - The Independent
Relying on the artificial intelligence chatbot ChatGPT to help you write an essay could be linked to cognitive decline, a new study reveals. Researchers at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology Media Lab studied the impact of ChatGPT on the brain by asking three groups of people to write an essay. One group relied on ChatGPT, one group relied on search engines, and one group had no outside resources at all.
/jlne.ws/3G7xqef
Donald Trump's drug plan risks higher medicine prices in Europe; US president's 'most favoured nation' policy could also lead to European patients losing access to new treatments
Hannah Kuchler and Peter Foster and Patrick Temple-West - Financial Times
European healthcare systems face paying more for drugs or losing access to new treatments as a result of Donald Trump's push for the global medicines industry to cut prices in the US, industry experts have warned. Global drugmakers are in talks with the Trump administration as he pressures them to voluntarily reduce their prices for American patients.
/jlne.ws/4ndY7yB
Lilly Drug Saves Muscle When Added to Wegovy Weight-Loss Shot
Madison Muller and Damian Garde - Bloomberg
Patients who took an experimental drug from Eli Lilly & Co. together with Novo Nordisk A/S's Wegovy maintained muscle while losing weight, offering a potential solution to one of the key problems that's emerged with popular obesity shots. The closely-watched study showed that patients on Wegovy combined with bimagrumab lost 22.1% of their body weight in 48 weeks, with 92.8% of that coming from the body's fat stores, according to results shared Monday at the American Diabetes Association conference in Chicago.
/jlne.ws/43WKdcD
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| Regions | | Stories of local interest from the Americas, EMEA and Asia-Pacific regions | Central Banks in Asia Are Becoming Wary of Currency Intervention
Marcus Wong and Malavika Kaur Makol - Bloomberg
Some of emerging Asia's biggest central banks look to be dialing back their interventions in the currency market. The central banks of India and Malaysia have reduced the size of some derivatives positions they use to weaken their currencies. Taiwan has allowed its currency to surge against the dollar in recent weeks and dropped hints it would be comfortable with more if the moves were "orderly." South Korea's giant national pension fund has ended its five-month support of the won.
/jlne.ws/469yMzz
Japan Flags Big Cut to Long-End Bond Issuance Before Risky Sale
Mia Glass and Erica Yokoyama - Bloomberg
Japan's larger-than-expected cut to super-long bond issuance has potential to ease some upward pressure on yields just before an auction this week that risks reigniting turmoil in the debt market. The move by the finance ministry may also prove fortuitous in light of the US attack on Iranian nuclear sites over the weekend. The escalating military action adds to the dangers for super-long yields via higher oil prices and inflation, even if the knee-jerk reaction Monday pulls bonds the other way as investors seek havens.
/jlne.ws/44dC1n2
Surging gold prices sees Ghana launch drones to detect wildcat miners
Reuters
Gold Fields' Tarkwa Mine's Head of Protection Services, Edwin Asare, believes they are a game changer for spotting potential illegal activity across the 81 square mile tract. "The drone is a faster way and it has a faster coverage. So you could use a few minutes to fly a drone over the whole concession. But if you would want to go physically, that would mean the use of fuel and human resources and going around all the mine'.'
/jlne.ws/4k0nKA4
Young people face 'soul-destroying' struggle to buy first homes
Nic Rigby - BBC Politics East
The government wants 1.5 million new homes to be built in England by 2029 but, with the average house in the East costing £332,000, about nine times the average salary, what chance do young people have of getting on the housing ladder? Lauren Finch, 29, told BBC Politics East a mortgage broker advised her to ask for a pay rise, get a new job or find a partner to move in with. Living with her 28-year-old sister at her parents' home in Lowestoft, Suffolk, she often finds herself house-sitting for friends as a way to get some independence.
/jlne.ws/4lkTwJb
Key Trader in Trafigura's Nickel Nightmare Joins Abu Dhabi's IRH
Jack Farchy and Julian Luk - Bloomberg
Abu Dhabi's International Resources Holding has hired Harshdeep Bhatia, a former Trafigura Group trader who led the company's relationship with the man it accuses of perpetrating a massive nickel fraud against it. Bhatia has joined IRH as head of base metals, according to people familiar with the matter, as the company and its parent conglomerate push ahead with an acquisition spree in metals and mining. He left Trafigura in early 2023 after the trading house revealed it had lost more than $500 million following its purchase of nickel cargoes that didn't contain the metal.
/jlne.ws/44fblm2
America's Top Logger Bets It Can Make Money Off Small, Crooked Trees; Weyerhaeuser's $500 million plant in Arkansas will turn small trees once bound for paper mills into lumber
Ryan Dezember - The Wall Street Journal
Weyerhaeuser has broken ground on a $500 million plant in Arkansas to produce engineered lumber from the small trees that have piled up across the pine belt after the closure of many pulp and paper mills. It is a big bet on one of the most depressed commodities in America: pine trees that are too small, crooked or otherwise unfit for making lumber. The decline of pulp and paper mills has left some timberland owners with wood they can't sell.
/jlne.ws/3ZI3OuD
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