News Recap • Week 40 2025

Check the news below and make sure to visit my latest Market Recap as well.

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Macro

• Mon China’s manufacturing activity contracts in September but less than expected, showing the strongest performance since March. (CNBC)
• Mon The United States' gold reserves passed $1 trillion in market value based on the current gold spot price. (New York Post)
• Tue The Conference Board’s latest consumer confidence survey registered a 94.2 reading, below the 96.0 consensus estimate and down from 97.8 in August. It was also the lowest sentiment since April. The “present situation” index even hit a new 1-year low. (CNBC)
• Tue The US government shut down after Congress failed to pass stopgap funding bills. As usual, each side of the aisle blamed the other for being unreasonable and unwilling to compromise. Also as usual, investors didn’t care. (CNBC)
• Wed The Reserve Bank of India held interest rates steady at 5.5% after a unanimous decision by the board members, in line with expectations among economists. (CNBC)
• Wed Private payrolls in the US declined by 32,000 in September, the biggest monthly slide since March 2023. It was also way below the consensus forecast for a 45,000 increase. The data is just the latest in a series of signs pointing to a slowing labor market, albeit heavily distorted by the complete halt of immigration and massive productivity gains from AI in the US. The odds of a rate cut in October went up above 90% while equities rose to new record highs after the report. (CNBC)
• Wed The Supreme Court allowed Lisa Cook to stay on as Federal Reserve Governor despite President Trump’s attempt at firing her. This is arguably a good sign for Fed independence (to the extent it was ever independent) and keeping Trump in place. (CNBC)
• Thu The Swiss National Bank’s quarterly balance sheet update showed it purchased 5.06 billion Swiss francs ($6.36 billion) of foreign currencies in Q2, its largest currency intervention in three years. Interestingly, it seems like the SNB was almost exclusively buying euros. Because while the Swiss franc has been more or less steady against the euro since late April, it has continued to strengthen against the US dollar. (Reuters)

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Other

• Mon FinTech giant Revolut is reportedly considering a dual listing in London and New York for its upcoming IPO. (CoinDesk)
• Mon Electronic Arts said it will be taken private by the Public Investment Fund of Saudi Arabia, Silver Lake, and Affinity Partners in an all-cash deal worth $55 billion. The stock had already jumped 15% on Friday when the story first broke and traded up to $203 on Monday, close to the $210 buyout price. (CNBC)
• Mon Zijin Gold went public on the Hong Kong stock exchange in the second-largest IPO this year. The company operates all overseas gold mining of China’s Zijin Mining. The stock popped 60% in its debut, fueled by the general investor excitement around gold. (CNBC)
• Tue Pfizer announced a deal with the Trump administration to sell its medications at lower prices in the US. Shares surged 6.8% both Tuesday and Wednesday for its best 2-day performance in decades. And yet, the stock is still down more than 50% from its 2021 all-time high. (CNBC)
• Tue Spotify announced that co-founder and CEO Daniel Ek will step down from his role in January and become Executive Chairman instead. Long-time executives Gustav Söderström and Alex Nordström will take over as co-CEOs. Spotify stock fell 4.2% on the news but is still up more than 58% in 2025 and has done a 10x over the past three years. (CNBC)
• Tue Meta said on Tuesday that it intends to acquire chip startup Rivos. (Reuters)
• Tue CoreWeave signed a $14 billion deal with Meta to supply computing power to support the company’s AI ambitions. CoreWeave stock rallied 11.7% on the news. (Reuters)
• Tue OpenAI announced the launch of its new audio and video generator Sora 2, along with a new TikTok-style social media app called Sora. (TechCrunch)
• Tue Emerging-market stocks closed their ninth straight month of gains, their best streak in two decades. (Yahoo Finance)
• Wed Someone found out that there’s an animated series from 2023 featuring a transgender child available on Netflix and called them out for having a hidden woke agenda. Elon Musk joined the mob and encouraged his followers on X to cancel their Netflix subscriptions. NFLX stock had a rough week, falling almost 5%. (X)
• Wed Speaking of Elon, he just became the first person in history to surpass a $500 billion net worth. (Axios)
• Wed Ford reported a 8.3% jump in sales in Q3, let by trucks and electric vehicles. September also became the company’s seventh straight month of sales gains. (Yahoo Finance)
• Thu Tesla reported a 7% increase in Q3 vehicle deliveries. Analysts had expected the company to deliver 447,600 but the number came in well ahead of the forecast at 497,099. (CNBC)
• Thu Berkshire Hathaway is acquiring Occidental Petroleum’s petrochemical unit OxyChem for $9.7 billion in cash. (CNBC)
• Thu OpenAI concluded a $6.6 billion share sale where employees who had held shares for more than two years were given the option to cash out at a $500 billion valuation. The sale fell short of the $10.3 billion authorized in a sign of employee confidence. OpenAI is now once the most valuable startup in the world, right ahead of Elon Musk’s SpaceX. (CNBC)
• Fri AI chipmaker Cerebras withdrew its IPO filing days after announcing a new $1.1 billion funding round at a $8.1 billion valuation. (CNBC)

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Earnings

• Tue Nike reported a solid beat, earning 49 cents per share on $11.72 billion in revenue. Sales grew 1% in its fiscal Q1, easily beating estimates for a single-digit decline. However, the company did warn of a challenging holiday season and a bigger than expected tariff hit. Shares rallied 6.4% after the report. (CNBC)