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| Financial companies around the globe sold $2 trillion of bonds in record time this year as European lenders raised money to repay cheap central bank loans and Chinese companies bolstered balance sheets against mounting economic stress. The collapse of several US regional banks, China’s real estate woes and central bank rate hikes weren’t enough to slow the surge. Issuance by financial firms (excluding real estate companies) has climbed about 6% this year, according to data compiled by Bloomberg, the fastest pace to $2 trillion in the almost quarter century we’ve tracked the data. But the party may not last: Hurdles are getting higher as Treasury yields spike and investors reassess the threat slowing growth may pose for borrowers.  Speaking of regional banks—we’re five months past the first implosions and the fallout hasn’t subsided. Late Monday, S&P followed Moody’s lead and downgraded some banks while lowering its outlook for others in the aftermath of that spring bloodletting. S&P slapped down KeyCorp, Comerica, Valley National Bancorp, UMB Financial and Associated Banc-Corp. The ratings agency also lowered its outlook for River City Bank and S&T Bank to negative. S&P wrote in its note that many depositors have “shifted their funds into higher-interest-bearing accounts, increasing banks’ funding costs” and that “the decline in deposits has squeezed liquidity for many banks while the value of their securities—which make up a large part of their liquidity—has fallen.” Pauline Chrystal, a fund manager at Kapstream Capital, says the regional banks “have a lot of exposure to commercial real estate,” and that “it’s really hard to justify buying them after what happened to SVB.”
Charles Schwab said Monday that it plans to terminate an unspecified number of its employees and close down or shrink its offices. On Tuesday, the financial services firm says it wants more money: Schwab announced it’s looking to raise fresh debt in the US investment-grade bond market. JPMorgan’s former chief gold trader, Gregg Smith, was ordered to serve two years in prison for spoofing, fraud and attempted market manipulation, the stiffest sentence handed down yet in a recent government crackdown on questionable trading practices.  Gregg Smith Photographer: Cheney Orr/Bloomberg Chinese leader Xi Jinping and Brazil’s Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva both proclaimed before a summit with other BRICS leaders that the “Global South” should wield more influence. Speaking separately, their comments emphasized points of unity among Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa ahead of a gathering in which they will debate topics on which they don’t agree—including how membership of the bloc should be expanded. President Joe Biden’s security deal with Japan and South Korea—bringing together two US allies with a long and bitter history—seems to have suddenly bolstered US military power in Asia. The US pivot to Asia, a phrase popularized during the Obama administration, has suddenly begun to take shape. In the process, it’s made an economically wavering China look increasingly isolated in its own geopolitical backyard. With those new military agreements has come White House pressure on both Japan and South Korea to support its tech curbs on China. Meanwhile, Beijing’s own attempts at regional diplomatic outreach (or to throw its weight around) has had limited success, and in some cases triggered blowback.  US President Joe Biden, center, with South Korea President Yoon Suk Yeol, left, and Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida, right, at Camp David in Maryland on Aug. 18. Photographer: Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images The future is here. Computer-generated children’s voices so realistic they fool their own parents. Masks created with photos from social media that can hoodwink facial recognition. Far from sci-fi, these techniques are already available to criminals preying on everyday consumers. Artificial intelligence in particular is being used to “turbocharge” fraud, US Federal Trade Commission Chair Lina Khan warned in June, calling for increased vigilance from law enforcement. The biggest social media platforms all have their niches. Instagram is for showing off the best of your 500 selfies. Facebook is for learning too much about an acquaintance from college. And LinkedIn is for updating the obligatory professional profile when you’re looking for a job, then receiving constant emails prompting you to congratulate someone on their “work anniversary.” Or at least that’s how it used to be. As other networks stagnate, shift their algorithms or in one particular case burn themselves to the ground, LinkedIn is becoming a site where regular people actually want to hang out and post their thoughts. It might even be cool. Pharmacy benefit managers arose in the 1960s to help health insurance plans control spending on prescription drugs. They were lauded early on as a counterweight to Big Pharma, able to bundle the purchasing power of thousands of employers and insurers to negotiate lower prices. Well these days, they’re being accused of helping cause the higher drug prices they were supposed to ameliorate. Side deals made by these negotiators with drug companies are allowing them to snatch up extra cash for themselves from their supposed adversaries. 
The Alps are under a heat wave that’s pushing temperatures above freezing at altitudes higher than the tops of the mountain range’s glaciers. Large swaths of normally balmy Switzerland have seen near-tropical evening temperatures in recent days. Searing heat has recently raised the freezing point above 5,000 meters (16,400 feet). Glacial peaks in the Alps are lower than that.  Visitors hike on a trail in the Aiguilles Rouges nature reserve in Chamonix, Haute-Savoie. Photographer: Emmanuel Dunand/AFP/Getty Images
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