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The World
Nasdaq Falls Into Bear Market After Volatile Day: Stocks fell after Bank of England governor warned that bond-buying program will end this week as scheduled. The S&P 500 and the Nasdaq Composite fell in volatile trading, upended by Bank of England Gov. Andrew Bailey’s remark that the U.K. central bank’s plan to rescue pension funds hit by interest-rate increases will end as scheduled Friday. The Nasdaq Composite slipped into a bear market, its second of the year. The S&P 500 and the Dow are already in bear markets. (Wall Street Journal)
The International Monetary Fund said the world economy was headed for “stormy waters” as it downgraded its global growth projections for next year and warned of a harsh worldwide recession if policymakers mishandled the fight against inflation. (New York Times)
If there is a recession, it will be "very slight," Biden says. (Reuters)
Saudi Arabia Defied U.S. Warnings Ahead of OPEC+ Production Cut: Days before a major oil-production cut by OPEC and its Russia-led allies, U.S. officials called their counterparts in Saudi Arabia and other big Gulf producers with an urgent appeal—delay the decision for another month, according to people familiar with the talks. The answer: a resounding no. U.S. officials warned Saudi leaders that a cut would be viewed as a clear choice by Riyadh to side with Russia in the Ukraine war and that the move would weaken already-waning support in Washington for the kingdom, the people said. Saudi officials dismissed the requests, which they viewed as a political gambit by the Biden administration to avoid bad news ahead of the U.S. midterm elections, on which control of Congress hangs. (Wall Street Journal)
Kyiv braces for prolonged hardship as Russia threatens more strikes: Residents stocked up on supplies as authorities warned of rolling blackouts and scrambled to repair damage from Russia’s missile attack. (Washington Post)
Russian President Vladimir Putin has accepted Thailand's invitation to attend the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (Apec) summit in Bangkok next month. (Bangkok Post)
Defense ministers from NATO member states and aspiring members Sweden and Finland will reportedly attempt to implement a system to coordinate weapon production and delivery to Ukraine to streamline the ad hoc systems rushed into action over the past several months. The consolidation effort is no easy feat given the defense industry's demand for highly specialized inputs and technical knowledge. (Wall Street Journal)
Hungary and Serbia have agreed to build a pipeline to supply Serbia with Russian Urals crude via the Druzhba oil pipeline as Belgrade's shipments via Croatia fall under EU sanctions. (Reuters)
British Official Stresses Threat From China Even Amid Russian Aggression: A top British intelligence official warns that while Russia's aggression has created an urgent threat, China's expanding use of technology to control dissent and its growing ability to attack satellite systems, control digital currencies and track individuals pose far deeper challenges for the West. (New York Times)
“Fortress Beijing” is ready. More than 1mn alleged criminals have been arrested; travellers on the Chinese capital’s trains are being forced to prove their water bottles do not carry dangerous substances by taking sips; and airports across China are redoubling surveillance of ethnic minorities. With just days until the Chinese Communist party’s most important political meeting in a decade, President Xi Jinping’s security lieutenants are intensifying a months-long crackdown. Under the Ministry of Public Security’s “100-day operation”, which started in June, more than 1.4mn people have been arrested across the country. (Financial Times)
California doesn’t know how many died in the record heat wave: It was the state’s worst heat wave ever recorded in September. For 10 grueling days, meteorologists tracked record-setting temperatures as they boiled across the state — 116 degrees in Sacramento, 114 in Napa, 109 in Long Beach. But for all the data on soaring temperatures, there was little information on the heat wave’s human toll — how many people had been sickened or even killed. (Los Angeles Times)
American Universities Continue to Falter in World Rankings as China Rises: This year’s World University Rankings, released Tuesday by Times Higher Education, a British publication that tracks education, also named University of Oxford in England the world’s leading research university for the seventh straight year. The U.S. and Britain continue to dominate the upper echelon of the rankings, with the U.S. taking seven of the top 10 slots and Britain three. Oxford is followed by Harvard University, University of Cambridge, Stanford University, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, California Institute of Technology, Princeton University, University of California, Berkeley, Yale University and Imperial College London. But among the top 100 universities, the number of those in the U.S. fell to 34 from 43 between 2018 and this year. The number of Chinese universities in the top 100 increased from two to seven. (Wall Street Journal)
Economy
US property sector braced for job cuts as rate rises crush home sales: “It went from feast to famine, from everybody buying to turtle slow,” said Linda McCoy, board president of the National Association of Mortgage Brokers. Realtors, mortgage brokers, appraisers and construction groups say they have lost as much as 80 per cent of their revenue since the Fed started raising rates in March. Rates for a 30-year fixed mortgage — at 6.66 per cent — have nearly doubled since and are now at their highest level since 2008. (Financial Times)
The United Nations' Development Programme joined the chorus of institutions and charities warning that a serious debt crisis is now taking hold in the poorest parts of the world. (Reuters)
U.K. Crisis Spills Into U.S. Junk Debt: Collateralized loan obligation prices have been hit hard by a slump in the British pound and the unwinding of U.K. pension investments. (Wall Street Journal)
The governor of the Bank of England has warned that its emergency intervention in the UK’s debt markets will come to an end on Friday despite concerns about the nation’s financial stability. The comments by Andrew Bailey last night will lead to fears of further turmoil in the markets in coming days amid warnings that pension funds, which are heavily invested in UK government debt, face a “cliff-edge”. (The Times)
Cybersecurity funding continues slide in Q3: For the fourth straight quarter, funding to VC-backed cybersecurity startups decreased—as even one of the most resilient industries showed it is not immune to the venture capital pullback. The recently ended third quarter saw only $2.6 billion go to startups in cyber, the lowest total since the same quarter in 2020. (Crunchbase)
The amount of computing power dedicated to Bitcoin mining surged to a record as more companies made use of the energy and data center space freed up after the upgrade of the Ethereum network, likely further compressing profit margins. Mining difficulty, a measure of Bitcoin miners’ computing power for the blockchain, has jumped by 13.6% in the two-weeks ended Monday. That was also the largest bi-weekly adjustment since last May. (Bloomberg)
PitchBook: venture capital investment in crypto startups declined 37% YoY in Q3 2022 to $4.44B, the industry's lowest level in more than a year. (Bloomberg)
Google selects Coinbase to take cloud payments with cryptocurrencies and will use its custody tool. (CNBC)
America’s Oldest Bank, BNY Mellon, Will Hold Crypto Now. (Wall Street Journal)
Technology
Intel is planning major job cuts, likely in the thousands, as early as this month; some divisions, including sales and marketing, could see ~20% cuts. (Bloomberg)
The U.S. cripples China’s chips: The new rules are a shift in the government’s approach to stifling China’s access to chips. In the past, the U.S. aimed to keep foreign adversaries about two generations behind in their chip-making abilities. “But now the administration has decided to actively attempt to cripple China's current capabilities of making certain kinds of chips,” Protoco’s Max Cherney states. The U.S. probably isn’t done yet; Max called these restrictions the “opening salvo,” where officials will assess the effects of the rules before possibly applying more pressure. And already China’s commerce ministry is asking the U.S. to stop imposing restrictions, saying it hurts the interests of U.S. exporters. But other countries need to get on board for it to work, at least in the long run. (Protocol)
US struck a blow against China’s chip ambitions, but the war is far from won: Asian rivals far outpace the US in making the advanced chips crucial for fighter jets, drones and cutting-edge military hardware. (South China Morning Post)
Kuo predicts that, in the next three to five years, Apple may be able to supply the US market, or ~25% of global shipments, from assembly sites outside of China. (9to5Mac)
Lufthansa Says Passengers Can’t Use Apple AirTags to Track Checked Bags: It appears to be the sole airline saying that international standards don’t allow passengers to use the Bluetooth devices in the cargo hold. Apple said that regulators allow their use for all baggage. (New York Times)
Shares in the largest gig economy companies in the US tumbled after the Biden administration proposed a new rule that would make it more likely that gig workers will be classified as employees instead of independent contractors. Ride-hailing app Uber fell as much as 16.7 per cent, while shares in rival Lyft and food delivery service DoorDash hit record lows during trading in New York on Tuesday as investors worried the US labour department’s proposal would dramatically raise wage costs. (Financial Times)
SEC is investigating whether Yuga Labs, the creator of Bored Ape Yacht Club NFTs, violated securities laws by selling its NFTs and ApeCoins. (Bloomberg)
Smart Links
Brex, valued at $12.3B earlier this year, lays off 11% of staff as part of restructuring. (TechCrunch)
Syrian Pound Hits Record Low On Black Market. (Barron’s)
Yen falls below 146 for first time since August 1998. (Nikkei Asia Review)
Japan's machinery orders post biggest fall in 6 months in blow to corp spending. (Reuters)
Extreme heat could make parts of Asia, Africa uninhabitable in decades. (Washington Post)
Want to work remotely from Portugal? This new visa makes it possible. (Washington Post)