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Good Morning,

Andreessen is helping recruit staff for DOGE, Trump named David Sacks as 'AI and Crypto Czar,' TD suspended guidance, Porsche is building luxury condos in Thailand, and a judge rejected Boeing's guilty plea over a discriminatory DEI requirement.

Tired of manual finance ops and outdated tech stacks? Automate your portfolio companies' financial busywork, maximize productivity, and cut wasteful spending with Ramp's all-in-one financial operations platform.

Let's dive in.

Before The Bell

Markets

• US stocks fell yesterday as investors braced for today's crucial jobs report

  • VIX slid to its lowest since July

• Europe's Stoxx 600 rose to a one-month high

• Germany's DAX index crossed 20,000 for a new ATH

• France-Germany 10Y spread fell to 77 bps to a two-week low

Earnings

• TD Bank Group fell 7% after missing Q4 EPS estimates and suspending guidance due to its $3B+ anti-money laundering settlement with US (BBG) 

• Kroger beat Q3 adjusted EPS and same-store revenue estimates on a surge in customers shopping for lower priced groceries in store and online (RT)

• Lululemon rose 9% after beating Q3 EPS and revenue estimates as strong international growth offset slowing US sales (CNBC) 

• Dollar General missed on Q3 earnings but beat sales estimates despite protracted restraint in consumer spending (MW) 

• Full calendar here

Headline Roundup

• SWFs and pensions plan to pour into private markets and India next year (FT)

• Hedge funds are betting big on PE's aging energy assets (BBG)

• PE retook fundraising crown from private credit in Q3 (BBG)

• Private credit looks to scale ahead of expected M&A wave (BBG)

• JPMorgan prefers real estate and PE to private credit (BBG)

• Apollo starts trading blue-chip debt to build private credit ETF (BBG)

• Wall Street banks predict the biggest China rate cuts in a decade (BBG)

• China stock fund beating 97% of peers bet on cheap state firms (BBG)

• Judge rejected Boeing-DOJ plea deal due to DEI (CNBC)

• Global billionaire wealth leaped 17% this year on US gains (RT)

• Citigroup promoted 344 execs to MDs (RT)

• Mutual fund pioneer MFS launched its first ETFs (RT)

• HSBC named Lisa McGeough as US CEO amid leadership changes (RT)

• Marc Andreessen is helping recruit staff for DOGE (FT)

• Intel named two chip industry veterans to board amid CEO search (RT)

• Insurance losses from natural disasters are set to top $135B this year (FT)

• Regulators signed off on new global rules for insurers (FT)

• Eldridge Industries will launch a $74B asset and insurance manager (BBG)

• Cohere will prioritize customized over larger AI models in enterprise push (RT)

• Healthcare industry rethinks risk after murder of UnitedHealth CEO (RT)

• UK pensions lifeboat wiped $360B off funding estimates (FT)

• McKinsey payed $122M to resolve a South Africa corruption scandal (FT)

• Number of 401(k) millionaires rose to a fresh record (BBG)

• EV reliability concerns eased but still lag gas-powered peers (RT)

• Mali issued an arrest warrant for Barrick Gold's CEO (RT)

• NASA delayed the Artemis moon missions (WSJ)

• Porsche is building $40M condos in Bangkok (BBG)

A Message from Ramp

Your portfolio companies are done wasting time and money on manual expenses, out-of-policy spending, and outdated tech stacks.

It's time to introduce them to Ramp. 

A modern finance platform that saves teams time and money through:

• Corporate Cards

• Expense Management

• Accounts Payable

• Travel

• Procurement

All powered by automation. All under one roof.

Offer your portfolio finance leaders 20x higher lines of credit, customizable spend controls, and streamlined workflows to make their lives, and your lives easier.

Deal Flow

M&A / Investments

• UK's regulator watchdog approved Vodafone's $19.1B merger with CK Hutchison's Three, which will create UK's largest mobile phone company 

• UK insurer Aviva increased its offer for Direct Line Insurance to ~$4.4B

• EQT is seeking to sell payments fintech Banking Circle for $3B-$4B

• Germany's largest power producer RWE is seeking to sell its 25% stake in grid operator Amprion for $2.1B

• Singapore's Aelios offered to acquire the remaining 68.5% stake it doesn't already own in Suntec Real Estate Investment Trust for $1.7B

• Asian real estate group Hongkong Land is considering a sale of its developer arm MCL Land for over $820M

• Real estate investor HMC Capital will acquire some of French renewable energy firm Neon's Australian generation and storage assets for $616M

• Food maker Conagra is seeking to sell its canned pasta brand Chef Boyardee for over $500M

• Malaysia's Mawar Setia will acquire a majority stake in Singapore Technologies Telemedia's Malaysian mobile service provider U Mobile

• An American consortium agreed to acquire English football team Sheffield United from Saudi prince Abdullah bin Abdul Aziz Al Saud

VC

• Tractian, a manufacturing AI startup, raised a $120M Series C led by Sapphire Ventures

• Waste sorting facilities robotics startup Amp Robotics raised a $91M Series D led by Congruent Ventures

• Legal tech startup Lawhive raised a $40M Series A led by GV and TQ Ventures

• Senior living operations platform Sage raised a $35M Series B led by IVP

• Concierge medicine provider Sollis Health raised a $33M Series B led by Foresite Capital

• Space materials startup FibreCoat raised a $20M Series B led by NewSpace Capital, Goose Capital, and more

• BRM, a vendor management and procurement platform, raised a $15M Series A led by Caffeinated Capital

• Social gamification startup Lucra raised a $10M round led by 7GC

• Data privacy engineering startup Ethyca raised a $10M round led by Aspenwood Ventures and AVP

• Pixeltable, an open-source AI data infrastructure, raised a $5.5M seed round led by The General Partnership

• Sightglass, an AI investor relations platform for private markets, raised a $3M seed round led by Base10 Partners

IPO / Direct Listings / Issuances / Block Trades

• PE firm Hg is studying an IPO of $20B Norwegian software firm Visma

• $16B China-listed energy drink maker Eastroc Beverage is considering a $1B Hong Kong listing

• France's Praemia REIM is considering listing a healthcare REIT in Singapore that may be worth $2B-$3B

• Indonesian coal miner Adaro Andalan rose 20% in its trading debut after its $272M IPO, the country's biggest this year

Debt

• Blackstone is in talks with ~10 global banks for a $2.6B multi-currency loan for Australian data center operator AirTrunk

• Family office The Friedkin Group is in talks with JPMorgan to raise debt to restructure Everton's $840M debt pile after completing its acquisition of the Premier League club

Bankruptcy / Restructuring / Distressed

• Infrastructure investor Covalis Capital submitted a $6.4B bid to take over struggling UK water company Thames Water

• UK asset manager Arrow Global will take over French debt collector iQera as part of a debt restructuring 

Fundraising

• Sixth Street Partners is seeking to raise $4B for its sixth opportunities fund

• H.I.G. Capital's special situations credit arm Bayside Capital closed its seventh European opportunity fund at $1B

• MM PE firm Valeas closed its debut institutional fund at over $600M

• Early stage biotech VC Atlas Venture closed its fourteenth fund at $450M

Crypto Corner

• Trump named VC David Sacks as 'White House AI and Crypto Czar' (BBG)

• Crypto is celebrating Trump's SEC pick (WSJ)

Exec’s Picks

• Has anyone figured what the Enron revival is about? The countdown clock is down to three days but I'm still in the dark. Check out their website, maybe you can figure!

• Wayne Marlton published a great thread on Paul Graham's one advice that helped two Irish brothers launch Stripe, one of the most successful fintech startups today.

• Check out Bloomberg's Big Take on the Quant Olympics: a global competition hosted by a Millennium-linked quant fund to find the next generation of finance geniuses.

Financial Services Recruiting 💼

If you're a junior banker looking for your next career move, check out Litney Partners, a recruiting firm established by Litquidity and Whitney Partners (the oldest purely financial services executive search and consulting firm).

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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