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Good Morning,

We hope you all enjoyed the long weekend and took some time off for yourselves. Market news was mostly slow, except for an appeals court ruling against US tariffs and another Spirit Airlines bankruptcy.

On the brighter side, college football, tennis, and Formula 1 came back in full-force to mark a rather entertaining Labor Day weekend.

Let's dive in.

Before The Bell

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Markets

• US stock and bond markets were closed yesterday for Labor Day

• US stocks fell on Friday as investors digested fresh economic data and Q2 earnings

  • S&P 500 stocks are now more expensive than in the dot-com era

  • S&P gained for a fourth-straight month

• China's CSI 300 index gained 10% in August to be one of the world's best-performing equity indexes

• MSCI EM stocks index gained 0.6% in its best day in a week on Alibaba's earnings

• US 10Y breakeven rate hit a six-month high

• Gold hit a record high

• Silver hit a record high

  • Spot silver rallied 1.4% to trade above $40 for the first time since 2011 

• Dollar hit a five-week low ahead jobs data this week

• Indian rupee slumped to a new low

Earnings

• Alibaba shares surged 19% after reporting booming cloud sales with AI-related revenue maintaining triple-digit growth for an eighth-straight quarter; the firm emphasized cloud in AI monetization and unveiled plans for a new AI chip while prioritizing growth over margins (BBG)

• What we're watching this week:  

  • Wednesday: Dollar Tree, Salesforce, Macy’s, American Eagle, Figma

  • Thursday: Broadcom, lululemon, DocuSign

• Full calendar here

Prediction Markets

• Bama lol.

• 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

• North Korea GDP grew 3.7% YoY at the fastest pace in eight years (RT)

• An appeals court ruled most US tariffs as illegal (CNBC)

• India offered to cut US tariffs to 'nothing' (BBG)

• US is weighing declaring a national housing emergency (BBG)

• Fed-favorite PCE index rose 2.6% YoY (CNBC)

• US consumer sentiment declined on dimmer economic outlook (BBG)

• Eurozone factory activity rose for the first time since mid-2022 (RT)

• New Zealand's central bank chair resigned (RT)

• Yale's 'Endowment Model' with PE is getting harder to pull off (WSJ)

• US firms are poised to boost debt to help fund $1T M&A wave (BBG)

• Swaps pioneered by Credit Suisse take on new life in defense push (BBG) 

• Mizuho plans more dealmaking to become top Asia investment bank (BBG)

• Norway seeks to defuse clash with US over Caterpillar stake exit (RT)

• Individual investors piled a record $48B into private credit in H1 (FT)

• ESG bonds made up smallest share of corporate debt since 2020 (FT)

• US shareholders didn't pass any green proposals for first time in 6 years (FT)

• Hedge funds slashed bullish oil bets to the lowest since 2007 (BBG)

• China stock ETFs broke a nine-week streak of outflows (BBG)

• $23T cash pile holds key for China bull market (BBG)

• Australia's No. 2 pension cut Treasuries exposure on rising risks (BBG)

• California tries again to combat PE healthcare takeovers (WSJ)

• Tokyo bourse faces pressure to protect minority shareholders in MBOs (BBG) 

• Apollo bust-up heads to New York trial (FT)

• Japanese corporate bond sales to retail investors are booming (BBG)

• Margin regime change arrives for $4T options market (BBG)

• Meta created flirty chatbots of celebrities without permission (RT)

• Nestlé fired new CEO over office affair (FT)

• Study finds VCs responded to George Floyd's death with tokenism (SFE)

• America is in a sexcession (WSJ)

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Deal Flow

M&A / Investments

• Italian bank BMPS is considering raising its $18B bid for rival Mediobanca

• UK PE firm CapVest Partners is nearing a deal to acquire German drugmaker Stada for $11.7B including debt

• Goldman Sachs-backed engineering firm Boyd is weighing a sale of its thermal business, which could be worth over $5B

• Mideast SWFs Mumtalakat and CYVN Holdings agreed to buy out the 30% stake in McLaren F1 Team held by MSP Sports Capital and other minority shareholders at a $4.1B valuation to take full control

• UK-listed fund solutions firm JTC rejected UK PE firm Permira's $2.7B take-private bid

• TJC-backed polymer and materials firm Arclin agreed to acquire DuPont's Kevlar and Nomex business for $1.8B

• Czech-based firearms maker Colt agreed to acquire a majority stake (potentially 100%) in Czech gunpowder ingredient maker Synthesia Nitrocellulose at a $1B valuation

VC

• UK fintech Revolut is selling secondary shares at a $75B valuation

• FriendliAI, an AI inference platform startup, raised a $20M seed extension round led by Capstone Partners

• Dutch EV charging startup Deftpower raised a $14.6M round led by Endeit Capital

• Obita, an enterprise level cross-border payment and digital financial network, raised a $10M+ angel round led by Vision Plus Capital and Mirana Ventures

• Matey, a legal AI company focused on criminal defense, raised a $7.5M seed round led by Timespan Ventures

• Battery tech startup Palmer Energy Technology raised a $6.7M Series A led by FirstGroup, Barclays Bank, and University of Oxford

• ALIGNMT AI, a startup building AI compliance and governance products, raised a $6.5M seed round led by AIX Ventures

• Spanish sustainable maritime bunkering startup Green Bunkers raised a $5.8M round from Baghdadi Capital

• Danish cybersecurity startup Moxso raised a $5.5M seed round led by Seed Capital

• NUVIEW, a startup building space-based LiDAR payloads, raised a $5M grant from the DOD's National Security Innovation Capital program

• Estonian voice coaching startup Vocal Image raised a $3.6M seed round led by Educapital

• Allasso, a fintech startup bringing data-backed analytics to financial market professionals, raised a $3M round led by Fuel Ventures

IPO / Direct Listings / Issuances / Block Trades

• Norway's energy giant Equinor pledged to support Danish wind-farm developer Orsted's $9.4B rights issue by subscribing for $940M shares

• Apollo and Vistria-backed for-profit University of Phoenix filed for an IPO which could fetch a $1.5B-$1.7B valuation

• Saudi quick delivery firm Ninja is lining up banks for a 2026 IPO; the firm was last valued at $1.5B this year

• PepsiCo boosted its stake in energy-drink maker Celsius to 11% via a $585M convertible preferred stock deal

• Australian miner Lynas Rare Earths raised $490M in a stock sale to speed up expansion plans

• Angola lender BFA plans to raise $239M in Angola's biggest IPO

• Lululemon-founder Chip Wilson sold $160M of stock in Finnish apparel business Amer Sports

• India's National Commodity & Derivatives Exchange (NCDEX) raised $88M in a share sale to investors including Citadel Securities and Tower Research 

• Indian conglomerate Reliance Industries is aiming to list India's largest wireless carrier Reliance Jio Infocom by H1 next year

• Hellman & Friedman-backed security services firm Verisure may launch a Sweden IPO as soon as this quarter

• Rolls-Royce is reportedly weighing funding options including an IPO for its SMR unit

Debt

• World Bank sold $510M of bonds backed by corporate loans in developing markets

• Tencent-backed Uzbek fintech unicorn Uzum is seeking to raise $300M in international bond markets as it prepares for an IPO

• Flexport, a global supply chain technology startup, raised $250M in supply chain financing from BlackRock

• Chinese developer Seazen plans to issue tokenized private debt this year

Bankruptcy / Restructuring / Distressed

• Activist Elliott emerged as the recommended bidder in the court-ordered auction of Citgo Petroleum's parent in a $5.9B proposal

• Spirit Airlines filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy for the second time in a year

Crypto Sum Snapshot

• Stablecoins could trigger taxpayer bailouts

• Bitcoin boom spurs newly wealthy to splurge on luxury travel

• Trump family masses $5B fortune after crypto launch

• Subscribe to Crypto Sum for the most important stories on everything crypto.

Exec’s Picks

• 💥 You can just do things. Get unlimited access to Brightwave's powerful AI investment research platform for 14 days. Rapid deal screens, instant memos, and real-time market insights - Brightwave does the grunt work for you. Start your free trial today.

• Ben Carlson published some interesting charts on the state of markets.

• In light of a potential US sovereign wealth fund, Bill Alpert reminds us that most sovereign wealth funds are not great investors.

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