Baltic
Dry Index. 1980 -154 Brent Crude 65.68
Spot Gold 3868 US 2 Year Yield 3.55 -0.13
US Federal Debt. 37.552 trillion
US GDP 30.303 trillion.
It is the highest impertinence and presumption… in kings and ministers, to pretend to watch over the economy of private people, and to restrain their expense... They are themselves always, and without any exception, the greatest spendthrifts in the society. Let them look well after their own expense, and they may safely trust private people with theirs. If their own extravagance does not ruin the state, that of their subjects never will.
Adam Smith. The Wealth Of Nations, 1776.
In the stock casinos, it’s still AI mania party time. What could possibly go wrong?
Well the US, EU and UK economies are showing serious signs of rolling over, while the end of US EV subsidies likely brings in a serious down turn in US EV sales.
A surge in furloughed US federal workers won’t do much for the US economy either.
From David Stockman’s latest update on casino madness:
You can go up and down the table below, but here’s the thing: The top 10 tech companies have a combined market cap of $19.53 trillion against LTM net income of $469.5 billion. That computes to a combined PE multiple of 41.6X for the entire group.
Of course, the reciprocal of the PE multiple is the earnings yield, which for these super high flyers would amount to 2.4%. And that’s barely half the yield on a super-safe long-term Treasury bond. In a word, the crowd down in the canyons of Wall Street has truly gone mad.
South Korea's Kospi hits record high as Samsung
and SK Hynix soar on OpenAI partnership
Published Wed, Oct 1 2025 7:56 PM EDT
South Korea’s Kospi index jumped more than
3% Thursday to hit an all-time high, lifted
by gains in heavyweight Samsung Electronics and SK Hynix.
Shares in Samsung Electronics and SK
Hynix, which announced a
partnership with OpenAI late
Wednesday to supply memory chips, rose over 4% and 11%, respectively.
Meanwhile, the Kosdaq rose 0.95%.
South Korea’s consumer price index climbed
2.1% year on year in September, more than the 2% rise expected by economists in
a Reuters poll. The latest reading compares with the 1.7% growth in August.
Japan’s benchmark Nikkei 225 index advanced
0.6%, while the Topix fell 0.54%.
Australia’s ASX/S&P 200 surged 1.14%.
Hong Kong’s Hang Seng Index advanced
1.30%. Shares of Zijin
Gold skyrocketed nearly 12%, building on gains for two consecutive
days since its Hong Kong trading debut Tuesday. The Hang Seng Tech index
climbed 2.08%.
Chinese and Indian markets were closed for
holidays.
U.S. equity futures were little changed in
early Asian hours after the S&P 500 recorded a fresh high Wednesday
stateside, as traders bet that the U.S. government shutdown would be
short-lived.
The shutdown is expected
to last at least three days, with the Senate set to be out of session
Thursday stateside due to Yom Kippur, but traders are betting
that the shutdown could drag on for nearly two weeks.
Overnight, the broad market index gained
0.34% to close at 6,711.20. Earlier, it had hit a new all-time intraday high.
The Nasdaq Composite rose 0.42% to settle at 22,755.16, while the Dow Jones
Industrial Average traded up 43.21 points, or 0.09%, to finish at 46,441.10.
South
Korea's Kospi hits record high as Samsung and SK Hynix soar on OpenAI
partnership
Stock futures are little changed as investors look
past government shutdown: Live updates
Updated Thu, Oct 2 2025 7:24 PM EDT
Stock futures are little changed Wednesday
night after the S&P 500 logged
a fresh high and investors appeared to shrug off concerns tied to the latest
U.S. government shutdown.
Futures tied to the Dow Jones
Industrial Average fell 30 points, or 0.06%. S&P futures slipped
0.04%, while Nasdaq 100
futures were flat.
The major U.S. stock indexes closed in the
green on Wednesday on hopes that the funding stoppage would be brief and
therefore limit any serious effects on the economy. The S&P 500 gained
roughly 0.3% to end the session at a record high, while the Nasdaq Composite closed 0.4%
higher. The Dow Jones
Industrial Average jumped 43 points, or 0.1%.
The government shutdown began after top
Democrats and Republicans failed Tuesday to meet the deadline to agree on a
deal that would keep the government funded. Lawmakers blamed each other for the
stoppage as Democrats stayed firm on their demands to use the measure to extend
health care tax credits for millions of Americans.
The biggest question for investors is how
long the current stalemate will last. It is likely
to drag on for at least three days with the Senate set to be out of
session Thursday in observance of Yom Kippur, making Friday the next day
Senators would be expected to vote again, NBC News reported. On prediction
markets, traders are betting
that the shutdown could drag on for nearly two weeks.
“My belief is this shutdown could last
even longer than in 2018 but that other factors will ultimately matter more
such as 1) upcoming Q3 earnings being solid, 2) AI euphoria continuing with the
Mag7 reporting solid qtrs and 3) the next Fed mtg on 10/29 where I expect the
Fed to stay on its course to cut rates three times this year,” Dan Niles, Niles
Investment Management founder and portfolio manager, wrote in a Tuesday post on
X.
“In summary, I believe that despite the
potential for some near-term choppiness, the mkt will ultimately see new highs
as it slowly grinds higher,” Niles added.
The stock market has historically not been
much affected by government shutdowns, but investors are paying closer
attention to this one given the more volatile policy and macroeconomic
backdrop, elevated market valuations and concentration levels amid the AI-led
rally and ongoing inflation concerns. Moreover, President Donald Trump has
threatened permanent mass firings of federal workers under a shutdown,
exacerbating existing worries about a slowing labor market.
An economic data blackout during the
shutdown this week is also top of mind, as the
September nonfarm payrolls report will not be released on Friday given
the Labor Department’s pause on virtually all activity. The Federal Reserve is
expected announce an interest rate cut at its upcoming October meeting after
Wednesday morning’s ADP data reflected a drop in private payrolls last month,
and as further ramifications of the ongoing shutdown remain to be seen.
U.S. stocks are coming off of a strong
third quarter and September, which saw the S&P 500 boast a gain more than
3% in a trading month that has averaged
a 4.2% loss over the last five years.
Stock
market today: Live updates
New Private Data Points to Softening Jobs
Market
October 1, 2025 at 11:12 PM GMT+1
Payrolls at US companies unexpectedly
dropped in September, according to ADP Research data released Wednesday. While
part of that was due to an adjustment related to government numbers it relies
on, the company said the data continues to support an
underlying softening trend. Other recent sources generally point to
anemic job growth, less appetite for hiring, few firings and modest wage
gains.
“This month’s release further validates
what we’ve been seeing in the labor market, that US employers have been
cautious with hiring,” said Nela Richardson, chief economist at
ADP. The report, published in collaboration with the Stanford Digital
Economy Lab, showed wage growth continued to gradually soften. Workers who
changed jobs saw a 6.6% increase in pay, the lowest in a year. Those
who stayed put saw a 4.5% gain, little changed from the prior month.
The ADP data stand to be the highest
profile report on the labor market this week as the Trump administration said
it would delay
its September employment numbers, scheduled for Friday, because of the
government shutdown. Some on Wall Street have cast doubt on ADP’s data,
favoring instead that of the US Bureau of Labor Statistics. But President
Donald Trump’s August firing of BLS commissioner Erika McEntarfer after a grim
jobs report has planted
seeds of doubt as to the reliability of BLS numbers and whether they
will be insulated from politics.
More
More
Private Data Points to Softening Jobs Market: Evening Briefing Americas -
Bloomberg
U.S. Lost 32,000 Jobs in September, Says
Payroll Processor
ADP report shows a labor force that
continues to deteriorate
Updated Oct. 1, 2025 10:07 am ET
The U.S. shed 32,000 private-sector jobs
in September, payroll-processing giant ADP said on Wednesday.
That is down from a revised loss of 3,000
in August. Economists polled by The Wall Street Journal had expected an
increase of 45,000.
ADP’s report doesn’t include government
workers, but economists are giving it a closer look this month. That is because
the Bureau of Labor Statistics’ monthly jobs report, which was scheduled to
come out this Friday, will be delayed if the government is still shut down.
The surprise job loss in September is the
latest sign that the labor market is weakening. Job growth has slowed to a
trickle this year even as the unemployment rate has held mostly steady. The
Federal Reserve last month lowered short-term interest rates by a quarter percentage point and signaled more cuts are
likely, citing weak hiring. The labor market “is a little bit tenuous right
now,” said Aditya Bhave, an economist at Bank of America.
The leisure and hospitality sector shed
19,000 jobs last month, the largest decline among major sectors, according to
ADP. Education and health services were bright spots, with a collective gain of
33,000 jobs.
More
ADP Report: U.S. Lost 32,000 Private-Sector Jobs in September - WSJ
1 big thing: A new electric vehicle era is
here
October 01, 2025
Welcome to the next — and
probably slower — phase of U.S. EV adoption after yesterday's demise of federal
purchase and lease subsidies.
Why it matters: The future
of EV sales affects automakers' strategies, battery and mining companies, and
planet-warming emissions from transportation.
🗞️ Driving the
news: Credits
up to $7,500 for many new EVs — initially put in place until 2032 under the
Biden climate law — are gone under the quick phaseout in the GOP budget law.
- So
are credits up to $4,000 for used models.
- Analysts
expect sales to decline, or at least plateau, after consumers rushed to
tap vanishing incentives.
The big picture: Like
that earworm
of a '70s PSA, automakers are in "be prepared" mode.
- Many
have revised EV production targets downward but are still investing in
battery development, ING analyst Coco Zhang notes.
- They're
"betting on the ability to produce more efficient, affordable
models," Zhang, the bank's VP of ESG research, said in an email.
- For
instance, Ford
is pushing ahead with development of lower-cost models, starting
with a midsize four-door electric pickup with a $30,000 base price in
2027.
More
In other news.
China’s DeepSeek launches next-gen AI
model. Here’s what makes it different
Published Tue, Sep 30 2025 4:43 AM EDT Updated
Tue, Sep 30 2025 5:16 AM EDT
Chinese startup DeepSeek’s latest
experimental model promises to increase efficiency and improve AI’s ability to
handle a lot of information at a fraction of the cost, but questions remain
over how effective and safe the architecture is.
DeepSeek sent Silicon Valley into a frenzy
when it launched its first model R1 out of nowhere last year, showing that it’s
possible to train large language models (LLMs) quickly, on less powerful chips,
using fewer resources.
The company released DeepSeek-V3.2-Exp on
Monday, an experimental version of its current model DeepSeek-V3.1-Terminus,
which builds further on its mission to increase efficiency in AI systems, according to a
post on the AI forum Hugging Face.
“DeepSeek V3.2 continues the focus on
efficiency, cost reduction, and open-source sharing,” Adina Yakefu, Chinese
community lead at Hugging Face, told CNBC. “The big improvement is a new
feature called DSA (DeepSeek Sparse Attention), which makes the AI better at
handling long documents and conversations. It also cuts the cost of running the
AI in half compared to the previous version.”
“It’s significant because it should make
the model faster and more cost-effective to use without a noticeable drop in
performance,” said Nick Patience, vice president and practice lead for AI at
The Futurum Group. “This makes powerful AI more accessible to developers,
researchers, and smaller companies, potentially leading to a wave of new and
innovative applications.”
The pros and cons of sparse
attention
An AI model makes decisions based on its
training data and new information, such as a prompt. Say an airline wants to
find the best route from A to B, while there are many options, not all are
feasible. By filtering out the less viable routes, you dramatically reduce the
amount of time, fuel and, ultimately, money, needed to make the journey. That
is exactly sparse attention does, it only factors in data that it thinks is
important given the task at hand, as opposed to other models thus far which
have crunched all data in the model.
“So basically, you cut out things that you
think are not important,” said Ekaterina Almasque, the cofounder and managing
partner of new venture capital fund BlankPage Capital.
Sparse attention is a boon for efficiency
and the ability to scale AI given fewer resources are needed, but one concern
is that it could lead to a drop in how reliable models are due to the lack of
oversight in how and why it discounts information.
“The reality is, they [sparse attention
models] have lost a lot of nuances,” said Almasque, who was an early supporter
of Dataiku and Darktrace, and an investor in Graphcore. “And then the real
question is, did they have the right mechanism to exclude not important data,
or is there a mechanism excluding really important data, and then the outcome
will be much less relevant?”
More
What's new in
DeepSeek's latest model: DeepSeek-V3.2-Exp
Global Inflation/Stagflation/Recession
Watch.
Given
our Magic Money Tree central banksters and our spendthrift politicians,
inflation now needs an entire section of its own.
How
will the great AI bubble fix any of this?
Business
confidence ‘plumbs new depths’ ahead of Budget
Wednesday
01 October 2025 12:00 am | Updated: Tuesday 30
September 2025 5:13 pm
Business
confidence fell to a fresh record low in September, as fears of another cost
squeeze stoked an already dire operating environment that was found to have
“worsened across the board”.
According
to an Institute of Directors (IoD) poll, private sector optimism
plunged to the lowest level since the industry body started collecting data a
decade ago, piling fresh pressure on new business secretary Peter Kyle and the
Chancellor as she prepares her second Budget.
Optimism
among business leaders fell to a score of -74 last month, the survey found,
meaning nearly 80 per cent of bosses felt either ‘quite pessimistic’ or ‘very
pessimistic’ about the outlook for the UK economy over the next year. This was
dow from a score of -61 in August and eclipsed the previous record – set this
July – of -72.
Execs
overwhelmingly attributed their dour predictions to fears that
the batch of tax hikes expected at next month’s Budget will set off
another round of heightened price pressures that will drive up the cost of
wages and firms’ other inputs.
Business
confidence falls as they brace for tax hikes
Chancellor
Rachel Reeves is widely expected to unveil up to £30bn of tax rises when she
publishes her second major fiscal event on 26 November. Bosses fear the more
constrictive fiscal landscape will drive up staff’s wage demands and supply
costs, in a manner redolent of the months following the government’s fateful
£25bn raid on payroll tax last year.
“Business
confidence has plumbed new depths in September, following a fleeting
improvement at the tag-end of summer,” said IoD boss Anna Leach. “Conditions
worsened across the board, with cost expectations hitting a record high, driven
notably by employment costs.”
Respondents’
outlook for staff headcount and investment were also found to have fallen
sharply. Headcount expectations fell to -13 from -4 in August, while investment
intentions plunged as much as 12 points to -20.
The
bleak poll adds to a string of similar updates that have laid bare the battle
the Chancellor is locked in to revive the UK’s economic fortunes. On Tuesday,
the Office for National Statistics confirmed the economy grew by just 0.3
per cent in the second quarter, while the UK’s fiscal watchdog is widely
expected to downgrade its all-important productivity
forecast, in
what would amount to a major blow to the government’s tax-and-spend plans.
Leach
added: “The Chancellor’s conference speech rightly reiterated the role that
fiscal credibility has in providing the platform for growth. But we urgently
need a genuinely growth-focused Budget that has business at its heart, that
delivers genuine policy coherence and stability and reduces regulatory and tax
burdens on business.”
The
IoD data was reflected in a similar
poll released on Tuesday, which also found confidence had slumped as firms
braced for the chilling effect of higher taxes.
Lloyds’
monthly Business Barometer – whose more optimistic findings mean it has
been regularly cited by both the Prime Minister and Chancellor – dropped from
54 to 42 per cent.
More
Business
confidence 'plumbs new depths' ahead of Budget
Stellantis
will temporarily halt production at French plant in Mulhouse
September
30, 2025
MEUDON,
France (Reuters) -Stellantis will temporarily halt production at its plant in
Mulhouse, in northeastern France, from October 27 to November 2, a union and
the carmaker said on Tuesday.
The
move will affect about 2,000 of the 4,700 employees who work at the plant,
which makes two Peugeot models, the 308 and the 408, and one DS model, the DS7
The
company said the step was being taken to adjust the production rate to a
"difficult" European market and to manage inventories as efficiently
as possible before the end of the year.
Stellantis
had previously said it would temporarily halt production at its plants in
Poissy, near Paris, and in Pomigliano, close to the Italian town of Naples,
from end-September for up to three weeks due to weak market demand in Europe.
Stellantis will
temporarily halt production at French plant in Mulhouse
Eurozone
inflation hits 5-month high: ECB expected to stay cautious
1
October 2025
Price
pressures across the eurozone picked up pace in September, reaching their
highest level since April, but the rise is unlikely to alter the European
Central Bank's (ECB's) wait-and-see approach.
Annual
inflation in the eurozone rose to 2.2% in September, up from 2.0% in August,
according to Eurostat’s flash estimate. The reading was in line with economist
expectations. On a month-on-month basis, prices edged up 0.1%, mirroring
August's figure.
Core
inflation, which excludes volatile food and energy prices, held steady at 2.3%
for the fifth month running, offering reassurance that underlying price
pressures are not gaining momentum, even as headline figures rise.
Among
inflation’s key drivers, services led the pack with a 3.2% annual increase,
slightly up from 3.1% in August.
Food,
alcohol and tobacco prices rose 3.0%, easing from 3.2%, while non-energy
industrial goods were stable at 0.8%. Energy prices continued to shrink, but at
a slower rate, down 0.4%, compared to 2.0% in August.
Estonia
posted the highest inflation rate at 5.2%, followed by Croatia and Slovakia at
4.6% each. At the other end of the spectrum, Cyprus recorded no annual change,
and France saw a mild increase of 1.1%.
Monthly
trends were more striking in some areas. Italy and Portugal led with price
increases of 1.3% and 1.0% respectively, suggesting some localised
acceleration.
What
does this mean for the ECB?
At
its September meeting, the ECB chose to keep interest rates unchanged,
maintaining the deposit facility at 2.00%. Projections published then showed
inflation expected to average 2.1% in 2025, easing to 1.7% in 2026, before
nudging back up to 1.9% in 2027. Core inflation is seen gradually declining
over the same horizon.
President
Christine Lagarde said the ECB is “in a good place” to hold rates steady, with
no urgency to either tighten or ease policy further.
The
latest inflation figures appear to validate that stance.
More
Eurozone inflation
hits 5-month high: ECB expected to stay cautious
Covid-19
Corner
This
section will continue only occasionally when something of interest occurs.
Technology
Update.
With events happening fast in the
development of solar power and graphene, among other things, I’ve added this
section. Updates as they get reported.
Today, more on a fire danger that’s
only going to get worse with each passing year.
Bike battery
fire in The Hague destroys home, damages seven
September 30, 2025
The emergency services evacuated the
inhabitants of eight apartments in The Hague on Monday evening when the battery
of an electric fatbike caught fire during recharging.
The fire started at 10 pm and was
already so advanced that some of the inhabitants had to be rescued from their
balconies. Three people were taken to hospital to be treated for smoke
inhalation.
The apartment where the fire broke out
is beyond salvaging, the fire service said, and the inhabitants of the other
apartments must also wait until their homes are declared safe.
Batteries used in electric vehicles,
power tools, tablets, phones and games are an increasing source of house fires,
according to figures from the insurers association VvV.
Technical faults or damage to the
battery can cause it to overheat, leading to a phenomenon called “thermal
runaway” and an intense fire that can be difficult to control.
In 2023, batteries were responsible for 5% of all home fires, up from 3% in 2022, the VvV said. No figures are
available yet for 2024 or this year.
Some 48% of all new bikes sold in the
Netherlands in 2024 were electric.
Bike battery fire in The Hague destroys home, damages seven -
DutchNews.nl
Fire displaces 4, hazmat crews remove lithium-ion battery
September 30, 2025
DENVER (KDVR) — Four people are displaced from their home after
a fire involving an electric scooter battery in Arapahoe County on Tuesday.
South Metro Fire Rescue and the Arapahoe
County Sheriff’s Office responded to a fire at a multi-family residence on East
Harvard Avenue, according to a post on X from South Metro Fire Rescue.
Not long after the initial post, South
Metro Fire provided an update that crews were on the scene, had water on the
fire and everything was under control. However, the hazmat team had to respond
to the fire after learning that a lithium-ion battery was possibly in the
blaze.
Four people were displaced due to the
fire and are being assisted by the Red Cross of Colorado and Wyoming. Another
unit in the building sustained water damage, but was unoccupied at the time of
the fire.
The hazmat crew was able to retrieve the
lithium-ion battery, which was attached to an electric scooter. The scooter was
pulled from the fire, and the hazmat team is working with South Metro Logistics
to dispose of the scooter.
More
Fire displaces 4, hazmat crews remove lithium-ion battery
Next, the
world global debt clock. Nations debts to GDP compared.
World Debt Clocks (usdebtclock.org)
The statesman who should attempt to direct private people in
what manner they ought to employ their capitals, would not only load himself
with a most unnecessary attention, but assume an authority which could safely
be trusted, not only to no single person, but to no council or senate whatever,
and which would nowhere be so dangerous as in the hands of a man who had folly
and presumption enough to fancy himself fit to exercise it.
Adam Smith. The Wealth Of Nations, 1776.
