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Good Morning,

Central bankers are preoccupied with post-inflation challenges, emerging market funding is getting creative as dollar bonds dry up, rising long-term rates loom over autumn on Wall Street, NY’s governor is under fire for NYC’s migrant crisis, China cut its stock trade tax, and India’s moon landing made history.

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Let’s dive in.

Before The Bell

Markets

• US stocks rallied higher on Friday as investors digested Powell’s comments at Jackson Hole that pointed to faster economic growth, snapping a 3 week losing streak

  • The Nasdaq led indices with a 0.9% gain

• Oil prices rallied as US diesel prices soared

• Asian markets slid ahead of Powell’s speech

Earnings

• Meituan stock fell ~5% despite posting strong earnings and revenue, which was up 33% YoY, due to a warning about a food delivery slowdown in Q3 (CNBC)

• China Evergrande reported a net loss of ~$4.5B from January to June, compared to a $9.1B loss a year earlier (RT)

• What we're watching this week:

  • Tuesday: Nio, Best Buy, HP 

  • Wednesday: CrowdStrike, Salesforce, Chewy, Five Below 

  • Thursday: Dollar General, UBS, Broadcom, lululemon, Dell, VMware, Polestar 

• Full calendar here

Headline Roundup

• At Jackson Hole, post-inflation challenges vex central bankers (BBG)

• Emerging market funding gets creative as dollar bonds dry up (BBG)

• Rising long term rates loom over autumn on Wall Street (WSJ)

• Labor unions are pushing hard for double-digit raises and better hours. Many are winning (CNBC)

• The SALT Cap has a $20B hole (WSJ)

• New York governor is under fire for NYC’s migrant crisis (WSJ)

• The bond market bull run that began in the 80s is ending (BBG)

• India further tightens rice shipments in threat to global supply (BBG)

• US commerce chief seeks trade, tourism boost in China talks (RT)

• China cuts stock trade tax, tightens IPOs to boost market (BBG)

• Chanel’s unexpected CEO is reinventing the company (WSJ)

• India’s moon landing made history at a low cost (CNBC)

• Egypt stocks hit record high as investors seek inflation offset (BBG)

• China’s rare earth dominance make US supply chain vulnerable, trade representative says (CNBC)

• Maui officials release list of hundreds missing since deadly wildfire (RT)

• Trump arrest full recap: mugshot, surrender, what’s next in Georgia election case (CNBC)

• Bob Barker, long-time US TV game show host, dies at age 99 (RT)

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Deal Flow

M&A / Investments

• FTC will pause its in-house proceedings to block Amgen’s $27.8B acquisition of Horizon Therapeutics, opening the door for settlement talks (BBG)

• India’s largest steel producer, JSW Steel, intends to bid for a 20%-40% stake in Teck Resources’ Elk Valley Resources; Japanese and South Korean mills also plan to buy a stake, and a combined offer could value the metallurgical coal unit at ~$8B (BBG)

• Realty Income Trust will acquire a 22% stake in Las Vegas’ Bellagio hotel at a $5B valuation from Blackstone’s BREIT (BBG)

• Cloud cybersecurity startup Wiz, which was last valued at $10B, is considering a potential bid for $4.8B market cap cybersecurity firm SentinelOne (BBG)

• Hostess Brands, the $3.6B maker of Twinkies snacks, is exploring a sale after receiving takeover interest from major snack makers (RT)

• Danaher has emerged as the lead bidder for $3.4B market cap biotech supplier Abcam and is in negotiations to reach a deal (BBG)

• PE firm Veritas Capital is considering a potential takeover for cybersecurity software maker BlackBerry, which has a market cap of ~$3.1B (BBG)

• Spanish infrastructure investor Asterion will acquire German utility Steag in a $2.8B deal, outbidding Czech billionaire Daniel Kretinsky (RT)

• PE firm PAG will buy hospitality group Australian Venue from KKR in an $898M deal (RT)

• Gruppo San Donato, Italy’s largest private healthcare group, acquired a majority stake in American Heart of Poland in a deal that values the cardiovascular care company at over $539M (RT)

• Dutch brewer Heineken exited Russia and sold its operations to Russia’s Arnest Group for a symbolic one euro (RT)

VC

• Instant grocery delivery startup Zepto has raised $200M in a Series E funding round led by StepStone Group (TC)

• Dice raises a $65M funding round, led by MUSIC, to focus on their ticketing platform (FN)

• A Sao Paulo, Brazil-based fintech company Nomad raised a $61M Series B led by Tiger Group (FN)

• LemFi, a fintech platform providing financial services for immigrants, raised a $33M Series A led by Left Lane Capital (FN)

• Cypago, an Israel-based SaaS provider, raised $13M in equity funding led by Entree Capital and Axon Ventures (FN)

• Green hydrogen company Advanced Ionics raised a $12.5M Series A led by BP (TC)

• Arkifi, a Palo Alto, CA-based company that provides a finance workflow automation tool, raised over $9M in seed funding led by Khosla Ventures and Nyca Partners (FN)

• A web3 engagement platform, Raleon, raised $3.8M in seed funding led by Blockchange (FN)

• Neurowyzr, a brain health company, raised a $2.1M seed round led by Peak XV and Jungle (TC)

IPO / Direct Listings / Issuances / Block Trades

• Grocery delivery business Instacart plans to IPO on Friday and disclosed that its core business turned profitable (RT)

• Neumora Therapeutics, a biopharma company backed by Amgen and SoftBank, filed for an IPO (RT)

• Marketing and data automation provider Klaviyo filed for an IPO and disclosed that it was profitable in the first half of 2023 (BBG)

Debt

• UBS is exploring its first sale of additional tier 1 bonds since its acquisition of Credit Suisse (BBG)

• PAG Asia Capital prepared $577M worth of senior debt financing for the purchase of bar owner Australian Venue (BBG)

Bankruptcy / Restructuring

• Bankrupt power utility Puerto Rico Electric Power Authority reached a deal with BlackRock and Nuveen Asset Management to reduce its debt load from $10B to $2.5B (BBG)

• Rite Aid is preparing to file for Chapter 11 bankruptcy to resolve its $3.3B debt load and halt pending opioid lawsuits (WSJ)

• Investment manager Blue Torch Capital will buy bankrupt pillow maker Pegasus Home Fashions from H.I.G. Capital (BBG)

Crypto Corner

• Biden administration proposed a new set of crypto tax rules that would require crypto brokerages to report new information on users’ sales and exchange of digital assets to the IRS (RT)

• JPMorgan Chase sees limited downside for crypto in the near term (BBG)

Exec’s Picks

• Ronan Farrow wrote about how the US government came to rely on Elon Musk, and how they’re now struggling to rein him in.

• Ben Wildavsky explained why college degrees are still valuable in this New York Times piece.

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