US stocks rallied yesterday as investors looked past the government shutdown and trade tensions to prepare for the start of Q3 earnings 

Japan's Nikkei 225 surged 3.4% to a new ATH on political optimism

MSCI EM index surged 1.6%

What we're watching this week:  

Full calendar here

The Rock is getting some Oscar buzz for the first time ever.

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Shutdown stalemate brings US IPO holdouts off the sidelines (BBG)

US bank rout prompts M&A speculation as credit worries loom (RT)

JPMorgan warns First Brands fallout is driving up banks' funding costs (FT)

CLO ETFs saw the biggest outflows since April (BBG) 

SCOTUS will hear case on tariffs in two weeks (BBG)

US signed a rare earths agreement with Australia (BBG)

Cboe is seeking to extend options hours into overnight (BBG)

China ETFs see outflows as US-China tensions trigger volatility (BBG)

Canada tells Maple 8 to invest at home in age of 'economic nationalism' (FT)

Hedge funds have returned to Hong Kong listings (FT)

US tariffs hand surprise win to London Metal Exchange over Comex (FT)

Startup M&A hit a record high in Japan ahead of listing curbs (BBG)

Twelve-hour stock trading explodes activity in $2.4T Korea market (BBG)

Brazil hedge funds outperform benchmark as bullish bets pay off (BBG)

KKR launched a maritime leasing platform (BBG)

Glass Lewis also urged shareholders to reject Musk's $1T pay (RT)

Amazon Web Services took down major websites in global outage (CNBC)

SEC banned three Mexican financial firms for helping cartels launder (BBG)

Paramount Skydance will cut 2k jobs (RT)

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UK PE firm Permira is weighing a sale of financial data group Octus at an over $4B valuation

Swiss building materials supplier Holcim agreed to acquire German walling company Xella for $2.2B

Investment company Plantro withdrew its $500M offer to acquire Canadian legal software form Dye & Durham

European PE firm EQT is in talks with secondaries investors Coller Capital, HarbourVest Partners, and Pantheon over a potential acquisition 

Ari Emanuel's events company MARI acquired TodayTix Group 

House of Doge, the commercial arm of Dogecoin Foundation, acquired a controlling stake in Italian soccer club US Triestina Calcio 1918

UK neobank fintech Revolut is raising a $3B round at a $75B valuation

OpenEvidence, a 'ChatGPT for doctors', raised a $200M round at a $6B valuation led by GV

CoMind, a UK brain monitoring startup, raised a $60M Series A led by Plural

Hyperlayer, UK embedded fintech products company, raised $40m led by CDAM

Safe Pro Group, an AI-based defense and security technology startup, raised a $14M round led by Ondas Holdings

Magic, a startup building AI for real-world experiences, raised a $10M seed round led by Lerer Hippeau

1001 AI, a startup creating AI infrastructure for critical industries in MENA, raised a $9M seed round led by CIV, General Catalyst, and Lux Capital

Provision, a startup building an AI assistant for construction estimators, raised a $7M seed round led by Cercano Management

Milvus Advanced, a startup creating rare metal alternatives, raised a $6.9M seed round led by Hoxton Ventures

Logic, a decision automation platform, raised a $4.3M seed round from Founders' Co-op, Audacious, Neo, and others

Activist hedge fund Jana Partners built a stake in $15B-listed medtech Cooper and is pushing for a merger of its contact lens unit with rival Bausch + Lomb

Activist hedge fund Starboard Value took a 5% stake in $8B-listed engineering and construction firm Fluor

Activist HoldCo Asset Management took a 3.8% stake in $3.3B-listed regional lender First Interstate Bank

Philippine's Maynilad Water Services raised $428M in an IPO priced at the top of a range in the counry's largest listing since 2021

Penta Investments-backed Polish music and books retailer Empik is seeking to raise $235M in a Poland IPO next year 

CVC-backed Japanese personal-care business FineToday canceled Japan IPO plans for a second time 

Evernorth, a crypto treasury firm backed by Ripple, will merge with Armada Acquisition Corp II in a $1B deal to acquire XRP

Ethiopia is in talks to convert some of the $5.4B it owes to China into yuan-denominated loans

Truist Financial raised $2.5B in investment grade debt despite regional bank worries

Costa Rica plans to raise $1.5B in its first global bond sale since 2023

Italian lender UniCredit is planning a SRT to $1.4B of loans originated by its Austrian unit

A unit of Indian conglomerate Godrej is set to raise $230M in its third debt sale in three months

NYC's MTA is seeking to raise $230M in short-term debt

Auto parts supplier First Brands tried to refinance $6B of debt with Banco Santander and Jefferies months before its collapse

Gambling firm Bally's Corp. shelved plans to amend part of a $1.9B debt package after creditor pushback

Blood glucose monitor maker LifeScan is set to receive bankruptcy court approval for its Chapter 11 deal to cut over $1B of debt

Banc of California, Enterprise Bank, and Nano Banc are exposed to $270M of troubled debt, which includes the fraud-linked debt that Zions and Western Alliance revealed

UK growth investor BGF plans to raise $675M in its first external fundraise

EA Private Debt raised a $500M private credit continuation vehicle led by Carlyle's FOF arm AlpInvest

Africa-focused hedge fund Enko Capital raised $100M for a targeted $200M private credit strategy 

Robinhood filed to launch Robinhood Ventures Fund I, a closed-end fund to buy stakes in private companies and hold them through IPO and beyond

August co-CEO says crypto exchanges need more coordination

British Columbia will limit AI power use and ban crypto mining

xAI, DeepSeek, and Anthropic are rattling Wall Street with serious gains in AI crypto trading test

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San Francisco has resurrected from the dust. Thanks to AI.

Gold is on a three-year bender. But while gold is rallying today, there's been periods where it did nothing. Read Ben Carlson's analysis here.