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Good Morning,
US is playing trade policy like a game of monopoly, China set its growth target at 5%, PE AUM fell for the first time ever, a Twitter lender said Twitter is more profitable than markets believe, and none other than BlackRock acquired two major Panama Canal ports within weeks of Trump's plan to bring them under US control.
Curious about the state of fintech in 2025? Plaid just released their highly insightful 2025 Fintech Predictions Guide, discussing some interesting trends on the horizon. Check it out.
Let's dive in.
Before The Bell

As of 3/4/2025 market close.
Click here to learn more about the Litquidity portfolios and subscribe to the strategies on Autopilot.*
Markets
US stocks swung to close lower as investors digested new tariffs (and potential tariff pacts) on Canada and Mexico
S&P wiped out all post-election gains
Global stocks across Europe, Asia and elsewhere also plummeted
US 10Y yield rebounded from four-month lows
Dollar traded at a three-month low
Euro rose to a four-month high and a YTD versus dollar
Earnings
Target beat Q4 earnings and revenue estimates but forecast a a rough Q1 on concerns about consumer health and the additional effects of tariffs (CNBC)
Best Buy fell 13% despite beating Q4 earnings and revenue estimates as it forecast flat FY sales growth on likely tariff-fueled price hikes which may offset sales growth (CNBC)
CrowdStrike fell 9% despite beating Q4 estimates as it grapples with weak spending on its products despite rapid adoption of cybersecurity AI (CNBC)
Nordstrom beat Q4 sales estimates on strong holiday demand as the firm prepares to go private (MW)
AutoZone missed Q2 revenue estimates amid inflationary pressures and FX fluctuations and warned of near-term impacts from tariffs and cautious consumer spending (RT)
What we're watching this week:
Today: Abercrombie & Fitch, Victoria's Secret, LandBridge
Thursday: Costco, Broadcom, Macy's, Gap
Full calendar here
Headline Roundup
PE AUM fell for the first time in twenty years (FT)
US may relieve yesterday's Canada and Mexico tariffs by today (CNBC)
Global government borrowing is set to hit a record $12.3T (FT)
China set its GDP growth target at 5% (CNBC)
Soros CIO sees investors who shifted to privates in 'world of hurt' (BBG)
Top decile Asian equity fund is most bullish on Chinese stocks ever (BBG)
NYSE president Martin sees 'more normal' IPO market this year (BBG)
Hong Kong targets creation of rival to Euroclear (FT)
CFPB dropped its Zelle case against JPMorgan, BofA and Wells Fargo (RT)
TD Bank set its new CEO's pay at $8M and cut pay for US CEO (RT)
Activist Elliott nominated seven directors to Phillips 66's board (RT)
Twitter-lender Diameter says X was more profitable than first believed (BBG)
Google urged US to reverse course on antitrust breakup (BBG)
A court denied Musk's attempt to block OpenAI from going for-profit (CNBC)
Goldman plans to cut 5% of jobs in review targeting VPs (WSJ)
UK asset manager abrdn rebranded back to aberdeen (FT)
Arab states endorsed an alternative to Trump's Gaza plan (FT)
Ukraine will sign US mineral deal (BBG)
A Message from Plaid
Our 2025 Fintech Predictions?
Two words: Edible Bitcoin.
We kid, we kid (unless…). When it comes to predicting the future of fintech, we defer to the experts: Plaid – and can you blame us? They've got a seriously impressive track record of nailing upcoming trends, which is why we're so excited to check out their latest and greatest:
What's inside this free download? Plaid's co-founder and CEO Zach Perret gives the skinny on (among other topics):
Fraud as the #1 focus for banks
AI: hype or substance?
Renaissance of fintech funding
Surge of interest in stablecoins
If you want to flex your fintech knowledge to your friends/coworkers/competitors, this is one piece of content you can't miss.
Deal Flow
M&A / Investments
A group led by BlackRock agreed to acquire a 90% stake in Hong Kong's CK Hutchison's Panama Canal port operations and dozens of other global ports in a $22.8B deal
Italy's Banco BPM plans to launch an offer for Italian asset manager Anima this month as part of its defense against UniCredit's $10.48B all-share hostile takeover bid
Blackstone dropped out of race for a minority stake in Indian snack maker Haldiram's over valuation concerns; Haldiram's is seeking a $10B valuation
PE firm Francisco Partners agreed to acquire O&G software firm Quorum at a $2.4B valuation, including debt
Engineering conglomerate Honeywell International agreed to acquire industrial pump manufacturer Sundyne from PE firm Warburg Pincus for $2.16B cash ahead of a planned three-way split (RT)
Insurance firm Arthur J. Gallagher agreed to acquire rival Woodruff Sawyer in a $1.2B deal
South Africa's Nedbank and Norwegian investment firm Norfund acquired a substantial minority stake in Pele Energy Group as part of a $165M investment
Swedish lender Swedbank agreed to merge its corporate finance and high-yield bond teams with SpareBank 1 to form a new investment bank SB1 Markets
23andMe rejected a $75M MBO bid by its CEO Anne Wojcicki
VC
Chinese tech giant and TikTok-owner ByteDance plans to buy back employee stock at a $312B valuation
Peregrine Technologies, a tech platform for state and local law enforcement agencies, raised a $190M Series C at a $2.5B valuation led by Sequoia
Assured Insurance Technologies, a startup automating insurance claims with AI, raised a round at a $1B valuation from ICONIQ and Kleiner Perkins
Saudi quick commerce firm Ninja is in talks to raise a round at a $1B valuation led by Riyad Capital
Materials science startup Forge Nano is seeking to raise new funding at a $900M valuation
Odeko, a startup helping local F&B businesses with operations and technology, raised a $126M Series E led by B Capital
Flowdesk, a digital asset trading and liquidity business, raised a $102M round from HV Capital and BlackRock
Aescape, a robotics startup creating a massage experience, raised an $83M strategic round led by Valor Equity Partners
Hotel management platform Mews raised a $75M round led by Tiger Global
Tandem PV, a perovskite solar tech company, raised a $50M Series A led by Eclipse
Netforce, a French law enforcement tech startup, raised $48M from GEM Global Yield
Swap, a startup building tools for e-commerce companies to navigate cross-border trading, raised a $40M Series B led by ICONIQ Growth
Quantum computing startup QuantWare raised a $21M Series A led by Invest-NL Deep Tech Fund and InnovationQuarter
LlamaIndex, a startup allowing developers to build custom agents over unstructured data, raised a $19M Series A led by Norwest Venture Partners
Infrared, an Ethereum liquidity staking protocol, raised a $16M Series A led by Framework Ventures
Heidi Health, a healthcare startup developing an AI scribe to ease doctor workloads, raised a $16M Series A follow-on led by Headline
Helios, a an AI-powered workforce management platform, raised a $15.5M seed round
Daisy, a home and small business technology installation and services company, raised a $15M Series C
Stargate Hydrogen, a manufacturer of electrolyzer stacks and systems, raised an $11M Series A led by Giga, UG Investments, and SmartCap Green Fund
myTU, a Lithuanian AI-powered cloud-first digital bank, raised a $10.6M Series A from existing backers
Nitricity, a startup electrifying the production of nitrogen fertilizer, raised $10M in funding led by Elemental Impact and Trellis Climate
Cloud security enforcement platform Aryon Security raised a $9M seed round led by Viola Ventures and Blumberg Capital
GEM HEALTH, a virtual specialty care company, raised a $7M Series A led by HealthTrend Capital and LFE Capital
AI revenue workforce solutions provider Alta raised a $7M seed round led by Entrée Capital and Target Global
Mote, a startup working on carbon negative energy production, raised a $7M Series A led by Nella Next and Preston-Werner Ventures
Digital pass issuance startup PassEntry raised a $6.7M round led by Acurio Ventures and Bonsai Partners
Copley Software, an AI-powered cross-channel experimentation platform, raised $4.8M led by Asymmetric Capital Partners and Underscore VC
Scrunch AI, a startup helping companies prepare for a world in which more AI bots and agents visit their website than humans, raised a $4M seed round led by Mayfield
Uniti AI, an AI agent platform for CRE operators, raised a $4M seed round led by Prudence
Cino, a real-time shared payment app allowing users to split bills, raised a $3.7M seed round led by Balderton Capital
IPO / Direct Listings / Issuances / Block Trades
Reliance Retail, the retail unit of Indian conglomerate Reliance, is restructuring to address investor concerns in hopes to boost its valuation from $50B to $125B for a potential IPO
Indian budget hotel chain Oyo Hotels is fast-tracking its IPO to meet a looming $383B debt repayment deadline, with a potential $5B valuation
KKR is looking to raise $1.5B in mandatory convertible preferred stock offering
UK insurance firm Prudential aims to raise $1B at a $12B valuation in an India IPO of its India JV ICICI Prudential Asset Management
Italian businessman Francesco Gaetano Caltagirone raised his stake in Italian insurer Generali to 8% via a $525M investment
Swedish investment firm Roko is aiming to raise $502M at a $2.9B valuation in a Sweden IPO in what could be the largest Nordic IPO in three years
SPAC
Japanese regenerative medicine firm Instinct Brothers will merge with Relativity Acquisition Corp in $242M deal
Debt
EU proposed borrowing up to $158B as part of a rearmament plan
China plans to issue $69B in special sovereign bonds to boost capital at its largest state-owned banks
Private credit lenders HPS, Ares, Oaktree, Sixth Street. Goldman Sachs Asset Management and JPMorgan Asset Management and banks Citigroup, Goldman, UBS, Wells Fargo, and JPMorgan are in talks to lend $12B to back Sycamore Partners' potential $20B LBO of Walgreens Boots Alliance, with private credit making up $4.5B of the debt package
Consumer lender Ally Financial sold $2.8B of low-yielding investment securities as part of a repositioning
Chinese EV maker Geely raised a $2.5B syndicated loan to refinance debt related to its 2018 acquisition of a stake in Volvo
Harvard University will issue $450M in tax-exempt bonds
Oaktree secured a $215M private credit loan from Ares and Barings to fund its LBO of Australian advisory AZ Next Generation Advisory
Bankruptcy / Restructuring / Distressed
Defaulted Chinese developer Country Garden missed a self-imposed target date to reach a deal on its debt restructuring plan
Fundraising
South Korea is preparing a $34B fund for national strategic industries
BlackRock-owned Global Infrastructure Partners is nearing a $25B close for its fifth fund, making it one of the largest infrastructure funds ever
European PE firm CVC raised $4.8B for its CVC Strategic Opportunities III fund
Crypto Sum Snapshot
IMF put the brakes on El Salvador's Bitcoin frenzy
Check out our Crypto Sum newsletter for the full stories on everything crypto!
Exec’s Picks
Trump mentioned Panama Canal in his inaugural address and within weeks BlackRock CEO Larry Fink was on the line. Check out Bloomberg's article on how Larry Fink used a direct line to Trump for the Panama Canal deal.
Matt Phillips shared some analysis on why retail traders may not buy this times dip.
Joachim Klement shared his thoughts on why short and long-term investors really are different.
Financial Services Recruiting 💼
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We aim to place strong candidates across private equity, hedge funds, venture capital, growth equity, credit, and investment banking.
We're currently seeking talent for some incredible roles. Head over to Litney Partners to drop your resume / create your profile and we'd love to get in touch!
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