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Good Morning,

Wall Street is warming to retail traders for IPOs, PE giants are hunting for investor relations talent, LTSE wants to end mandatory quarterly earnings, Bessent once again threatened to beat up a White House official, and the Murdoch family's decades-long succession battle was finally settled.

The Fall 2025 cohort for the AI for Business & Finance Certificate Program from Columbia Business School Exec Ed and Wall Street Prep starts Oct. 6. It's perfect for non-technical business and finance professionals looking for practical, impactful AI use cases. Learn more.

Let's dive in.

Before The Bell

Markets

• US stocks inched higher as investors awaited crucial inflation data later this week

  • Nasdaq hit a new ATH 

• Japan's Nikkei 225 hit a fresh ATH on PM Ishiba's resignation 

• Long-dated yields fell for a fourth-straight day 

• All three Litquidity portfolios turned positive YTD. Learn about them here and also check out the AI Alpha Fund, my latest high-conviction portfolio investing in the full AI value chain.*

Earnings

• What we're watching this week:  

  • Today: Oracle, GameStop

  • Wednesday: Chewy

  • Thursday: Kroger, Adobe

• Full calendar here

Prediction Markets

• Epic NFL Week 1. Depending on your team of course…

• Trade your predictions on a range of events, only on Kalshi. Sign up with code LIT and get a $20 bonus when you trade $100.

Headline Roundup

• PE giants raid Wall Street as fundraising talent wars heat up (CNBC)

• Bid to end quarterly earnings sees renewed interest (WSJ)

• Wall Street courts retail traders to supercharge IPOs (BBG)

• Bessent threatened to punch housing regulator Bill Pulte (WSP)

• US offered some tariff exemptions to countries with trade deals (RT)

• China exports to US slowed to weakest in six months (BBG)

• BofA expects IB fees to rise 15% in Q3 (RT)

• Japan is set for record number of takeover offers by foreign firms (BBG)

• Fund managers turn to private assets amid London's IPO drought (FT)

• Europe defense tech startups attract investment surge (FT)

• Canadian VC investment hit its lowest level since Covid (BK)

• Europe's top rated firms are fans of convertible bonds again (BBG)

• Australia's SWF gained 12.2% in H1 (BBG)

• US bank regulator issued guidelines to avert 'debanking' (RT)

• Alibaba became China's most-traded stock (BBG)

• Apollo's managing partner for Europe PE will depart (BBG)

• Lazard Asset Management named AB's Chris Johbin as CEO (BBG)

• Activist Starboard nominated four directors to BILL's board (RT)

• OpenAI is backing an AI-made animated movie (WSJ)

• Stellantis will scrap its 100% EVs target (RT)

• Franklin Templeton shuffled leadership in private markets push (FT)

• Intel shuffled key leadership in executive shake-up (RT)

• Australia's ANZ will cut 3.5k jobs (RT)

• Murdoch family reaches deal to end real-life 'Succession' fight (NYT)

• Fashion retailers test full-price strategy as rich shoppers keep spending (RT)

• Job-seeker confidence is at a record low (WP)

• France's government collapsed (BBG)

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• Learn directly from leaders driving AI at BlackRock, OpenAI, and Morgan Stanley

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• Get step-by-step guidance from Columbia Business School faculty (no coding experience required)

Gain practical AI skills and a global network of professionals who continue to share insight and support well beyond the program.

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Deal Flow

M&A / Investments

• Mining giant Anglo American is close to acquiring Canada's Teck Resources in a $20B stock deal 

• Italian bank BMPS secured 62% of $18B-listed peer Mediobanca

• Spanish bank BBVA formally launched its $17.4B hostile takeover bid for peer Sabadell 

• Musk's SpaceX agreed to acquire wireless spectrum licenses from EchoStar for $17B in a cash-and-stock deal

• Canada's Strathcona Resources raised its all-stock bid for oil and sands producer MEG Energy to $5.7B

• US bank PNC agreed to acquire regional lender FirstBank for $4.1B

• PE firm Arsenal Capital Partners will acquire packaging company Sonoco's ThermoSafe temperature-assured packaging business in a $725M deal

• South American agri firms Adecoagro and Asociacion de Cooperativas Argentinas agreed to acquire a 50% stake in Argentine nitrogen producer Profertil from Canada's Nutrien for $600M

• KKR joined the bidding process for $600M-listed UK REIT PRS REIT

• Blackstone agreed to acquire UK industrial property landlord Warehouse REIT for $660M

• French pharma firm Les Laboratoires Servier agreed to acquire a treatment for Fragile X syndrome from UK-based Kaerus Bioscience for $450M

• East Japan Railway acquired a Tokyo office building from Goldman Sachs for over $337M

• Gridiron Capital-owned residential services company Leaf Home acquired Erie Home

VC

• Data analytics software firm Databricks raised a $1B round at a $100B valuation led by Thrive and Insight Partners

• AI coding startup Cognition raised a $400M round at a $10.2B valuation led by Founders Fund

• Kin, a D2C digital home insurance provider, raised a $50M Series E at a $2B pre-money valuation led by QED Investors and Activate Capital

• Unrivaled, a basketball league for women, raised a Series B at $340M valuation led by Bessemer Venture Partners

• Chinese humanoid robot startup X Square Robot raised a $140M Series A+ led by Alibaba Cloud and CAS Investment 

• UK AI startup ElevenLabs sold $100M in secondary shares at a $6.6B valuation to Sequoia and ICONIQ

• Shift5, an operational intelligence platform for defense and transportation systems, raised a $75M Series C led by Hedosophia

• AI calendar and task management app Motion raised a $38M Series C at a $550M post-money valuation led by Scale Venture Partners 

• Leap Holdings, a tech-first managing general agent, raised $37.35M from Community Financial System

• Reggora, an appraisal technology company for residential real estate, raised $18M in funding led by Centana Growth Partners

• Dispatch, an AI-driven data infrastructure platform for financial advisors, raised an $18M Series A led by Brewer Lane Ventures

• AI-based identity and agent verification platform Vouched raised a $17M Series A led by Spring Rock Ventures

• Poke, a startup building an AI assistant to live inside iMessage, raised a $15M seed round at a $100M valuation led by General Catalyst

• Dextall, a startup reimagining how building envelopes are designed, raised $15M in funding from Y Capital 

• Danish travel tech platform Understory raised a $14M Series A led by Smedvig Ventures

• Dazl, an AI creation platform, raised a $10M seed round led by 40RTY Fund

• Cassidy, a context-powered AI automation platform for non-technical teams, raised a $10M Series A led by HOF Capital

• Tetra Digital, a crypto firm developing a regulated stablecoin pegged to the Canadian dollar, raised $10M in funding from NBC, Shopify, and others

• Flybotix, a drone startup helping companies inspect confined spaces, raised a $10M Series A extension led by a family office

• Astrus, a Canadian startup automating analog chip design, raised an $11M seed round led by Khosla Ventures

• Geniez AI, a startup connecting legacy mainframe systems and AI, raised a $6M seed round led by StageOne Ventures and Canapi Ventures

IPO / Direct Listings / Issuances / Block Trades

• PE firms Advent and Cinven are exploring an IPO of German elevator maker TK Elevator in what could be Europe's largest IPOs in years; the firm was valued at $27B earlier this year

• Swedish BNPL fintech Klarna is seeking to raise $1.27B at a $14B valuation in an IPO marketed at the top of its range

• Tickets marketplace StubHub plans to raise $850M at a $9.2B valuation in its IPO

• Abu Dhabi SWF Mubadala plans to raise $920M in a 7.55% stake sale of telecom operator Du 

• Chinese robotics firm Unitree is eyeing a $7B valuation in its China IPO

• Cybersecurity firm Netskope plans to raise $813M at a $6.5B valuation in its IPO

• Chinese LiDAR maker Hesai is seeking to raise $500M in its Hong Kong listing

• Five Point-backed water infrastructure firm WaterBridge is seeking to raise $540M at a $2.3B valuation in its IPO

• Data center builder Fermi filed for a US IPO 

• Financial services firm Hilco Global finalized a spinoff of its property unit HRP Group

• UK beauty device retailer Beauty Tech is planning a London IPO

SPAC / SPV

• Quantum computing startup Infleqtion agreed to merge with Churchill Capital Corp., in a $1.8B deal

• Crypto asset manager CoinShares International agreed to merge with Vine Hill Capital Investment Corp. in a $1.2B deal

• Hong Kong crypto firm HashKey Group will launch its inaugural Digital Asset Treasury-focused fund with an initial target size of $500M

• South Africa's Altvest Capital plans to raise $210M to buy Bitcoin

• Obscure commerce firm Eightco Holdings surged over 3,000% on after raising $20M from crypto miner BitMine to build a treasury around Worldcoin 

Debt

• Bondholders of chemicals giant DuPont are pushing back against a $5.4B debt-swap plan

• German power utility RWE raised $3.75B from Apollo for future power-grid upgrades

• Hewlett Packard Enterprise sold $2.9B of investment-grade bonds to help refinance debt from its recent acquisition of Juniper Networks

• Uber raised $2.25B in its first investment-grade bond sale this year 

• Gridiron Capital-owned residential services company Leaf Home raised $1.9B in pref equity led by Ares and $2B in private credit from Apollo 

• Canadian Utilities is preparing a $365M subordinated debt sale

• Solar and battery storage-focused REIT SolaREIT raised $200M from SLC Management 

• Colombia will issue euro-denominated bonds for the first time since 2016 and buy back dollar notes

Bankruptcy / Restructuring / Distressed

• Solar firm Pine Gate Renewables tapped advisors amid liquidity struggles

Fundraising / Secondaries

• PE firm One Equity Partners raised $3.25B for its ninth flagship buyout fund

• UK PE firm TDR Capital raised a $2.7B continuation vehicle for European health club chain David Lloyd from CVC and UK hedge fund TCI

• PE firm Platinum Equity raised $2.3B for its second small cap fund

• Morgan Stanley raised $885M for its latest Japan real estate fund

• Startup Inversion Labs plans to raise a $500M fund to acquire firms and outfit them with blockchain 

• Israeli VC JVP raised a $290M continuation vehicle for insurance AI firm Earnix led by TPG GP Solutions

• HRP Group plans raise $250M for its first value-add investment fund focused on revitalizing underperforming properties

• Healthcare VC Winter Street Ventures plans to raise $100M for its first fund since spinning out from insurer CCA

• Wealth manager Westwood Holdings is weighing a second energy secondaries fund

• Ex-Point72 Japan head Tomohiro Yamaguchi raised $200M to debut Invictus Investment Partners, a Hong Kong-based L/S hedge fund focused on Japanese large caps

Crypto Sum Snapshot

• Negotiations are looking tough around the Senate crypto trading bill

• Nasdaq plans to introduce trading of tokenized securities

• Bloomberg also explored how Trump came around to crypto and what crypto wants in return

Check out our Crypto Sum newsletter for the full stories on everything crypto!

Exec’s Picks

• Citadel founder Ken Griffin published a WSJ op-ed blasting Trump's risky games with the Fed. Ken Griffin has been one of Trump's most outspoken critic on Wall Street.

• In another incredible WSJ piece, William Goetzmann explains that financial bubbles have way less often than we think.

• Congressional Democrats released a birthday note that Trump allegedly sent to Jeffrey Epstein.

Finance & Startup Recruiting 💼

Litney Partners

If you're a junior banker looking for your next career move, check out Litney Partners, a recruiting venture between Litquidity and Whitney Partners (the oldest purely financial services executive search and consulting firm), Litney Partners places talent at leading firms in PE, hedge funds, VC, growth, credit, IB, and fintech and is currently recruiting for some incredible roles. Head over to our website to drop your resume and we'd love to get in touch!

Next Play

If you're down bad, realizing finance isn't for you, and want to explore the world of startups (BizOps, chief of staff, strategic finance, etc.), fill out this form. Next Play will reach out to schedule a 1:1 video call if they think they can help as your own, personal startup matchmaker. They've grown their community to over 50k talented professionals and have deep relationships across the tech ecosystem.

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*DISCLAIMER: Investment advice provided by Autopilot Advisers, LLC ("Autopilot"), an SEC-registered investment adviser. Past performance does not guarantee future results. Investing carries risks, including loss of principal. As always, be smart out there. Litquidity is compensated to promote AutoPilot. Compensation details available upon request.