US stocks rallied yesterday on dovish commentary from Fed governor Chris Waller

Some of the $60B of defaulted Venezuela and state oil company bonds rose to 54¢ to a four-month high following a deal to hand over 20% of all oil reserves to US

lululemon missed Q2 earnings and revenue estimates and cut its FY forecast a week before new CEO Heidi ‌O'Neill takes over to tackle softening demand and intense competition (CNBC)

Victoria's Secret beat Q2 revenue estimates and boosted guidance as comps rose 9% on customer growth and success in bras and its pink brand, though shares fell 14% as growth was still slower than expected (BBG)

DocuSign issued a Q2 beat-and-raise amid strong AI-related demand (WSJ)

Full calendar here

OpenAI claims it has overtaken Anthropic with latest AI model

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Fed governor Waller may support holding rates steady (CNBC)

Rising yields seen pushing companies to sell bonds sooner (BBG)

Nodal Exchange will launch AI compute futures (BBG)

JPMorgan curbed lending to Jane Street as it pushed into bond market (FT)

Star Citadel natural gas trader stepped down amid historic volatility (FT)

KPMG warned Guggenheim unit over deficiencies in internal controls (FT)

Korea lawmakers seek M&A reform to protect minority shareholders (BBG)

Sanders introduces bill to ban AI that surpasses human intelligence (WP)

Claude, ChatGPT, and Grok all went down at the same time (TV)

OpenAI's Astra model can hack with minimal human help (WSJ)

OpenAI says it has overtaken Anthropic with latest AI model (FT)

Texas Republicans turn against data centers (RT)

Revolut secured a conditional US banking license (RT)

Volkswagen will slash 50k jobs in historic restructuring (FT)

Founder of startup investment firm Linqto was charged with fraud (WSJ)

US charges ICE agent with lying about shooting of Venezuelan migrant (AP)

Contract manufacturer Flex will acquire power conversion systems maker ​EPC Power in a $4.4B deal 

Diversified Energy agreed to acquire Elliott-backed O&G company Birch Resources in a $1.8B deal

Samsung Fire ​and Marine Insurance and Samsung Life ⁠Insurance will acquire 90% of UK reinsurance ‌company Canopius by buying an additional 50% stake for $1.5B from Centerbridge Partners

Shell and Chevron signed non-binding agreements for the acquisition of production ​rights over Ghana's South Deepwater Tano Cape Three Points block

TSG Consumer made a strategic investment in iconic NYC taco chain Los Tacos No. 1 

US family holding company Friedkin Group is exploring a stake sale in UK soccer club Everton FC just two years after acquiring the club

Thai state-owned O&G firm PTT is considering bringing in strategic partners for for its Taiwan-listed Lotus Pharmaceutical

Robotics startup Figure raised an undisclosed investment from AI cloud firm Nscale as part of a $3.5B compute deal

Enterprise AI platform Wonderful raised a $550M Series C at a $5B valuation led by Insight Partners

Thyme Care, an oncology navigation startup, raised a $125M Series E at a $2B+ valuation led by Morgan Health

Immediate, an earned wage access and financial wellness platform, raised a $13M Series B led by BankTech Ventures

Vietnam's EV taxi firm Green & Smart Mobility is weighing expanding in US ahead of a planned Hong Kong IPO which could fetch a $20B valuation 

UK AI cloud firm Nscale has $103B ​of total contracted revenue ahead of its $3B US IPO

Swedish smart ring maker Oura Health filed for a US IPO to raise $3B at a $16B valuation 

Pet food platform Golden Pet Brands hired banks for an IPO that could fetch a $1B valuation 

Chinese chipmaker Longsys priced its $780M Hong Kong listing below the top end of the marketed range at a 44% discount to its China trading

Olympus-backed data center infrastructure firm Accelevation filed for an IPO

Crypto exchange Kraken delayed its IPO until Q2 next year

Anthropic is set to expand its revolving credit facility to $15B ahead of its IPO

Pakistan raised a record $3B in international high-yield bond markets after securing credit rating upgrades

A unit of Indian conglomerate Aditya Birla Group raised $2.5B in commitments from four banks to finance its acquisition of Shell's Indian renewable energy unit Solenergi Power 

Public Storage is looking to raise $360M in a debut Canadian bond sale

Silver Lake and Related Companies-backed luxury gym chain Equinox is in advanced talks with for a cash infusion and refinancing to reduce debt and fund expansion

EQT-backed French medical diagnostics firm Cerba Healthcare filed for a court-supervised restructuring in France to tackle its $5.8B debt pile 

Air India is close to securing $1.1B in financial aid from owners Tata Sons and Singapore Airlines

CVC raised $10B for its sixth and largest PE secondaries fund

Swish Ventures, the VC firm of Israel's first NBA player Omri Casspi, raised $250M for its third fund

Polymarket launched perps trading with up to 20x leverage

Coinbase files to launch stock perps in US

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In memory of Dolly Parton, WSJ published a piece on her business savvy that led her to build an empire.

Ben Carlson shared 14 random things on his mind about markets. Insightful perspectives as always…