What we’re reading (10/25)
“The Stock Market Enters The Danger Zone” (Barron’s). “Investors were disappointed by a mixed week for the stock market. They could look back longingly on it if everything goes wrong over the next couple of weeks…Economically sensitive stocks took the worst hit. Retail, banking, and industrial stocks all fell between 2% and 3%, and it appeared that investors were simply taking profits after the S&P 500 entered this past week up 23% in 2024.”
“France’s Financial Morass Produces A Harsh Critique From Moody’s (New York Times). “France has become one of the most financially troubled countries in Europe, with a ballooning debt and deficit. The European Commission has threatened sanctions, including enforced limits on spending, for breaching the bloc’s fiscal discipline rules.”
“NASA Head: Matt Damon’s Potato Farm On Mars Isn’t ‘Too Far Off’” (Semafor). “Elon Musk isn’t the only one with Mars dreams. NASA Administrator Bill Nelson predicted that humans will travel to the planet for the first time in the 2040s. ‘We are getting everything we need to know about how to sustain human life in that very hostile atmosphere,’ Nelson said during Semafor’s World Economy Summit in Washington, DC on Friday, adding that while it takes humans less than a week to travel to the moon, it would take months to travel to Mars. ‘Matt Damon showed us that we can raise potatoes on Mars,’ he joked, referencing the actor’s hit 2015 film The Martian. ‘That’s not too far off, by the way. I have actually seen plants growing in lunar soil that we brought back a half a century ago.’”
“Silicon Valley’s Elite Pour Money Into Blotting Out The Sun” (Bloomberg). “Venture capitalists, startup founders and tech executives are funding studies, experiments and small deployments of controversial technology that could cool the planet.”
“JPMorgan Is Boosting Its Junior-Banker Ranks” (Business Insider). “JPMorgan Chase is amid an off-cycle hiring spree for junior investment bankers, according to people familiar with the bank's recruitment efforts and to its online jobs board. The bank recently rolled out parameters to protect its analysts and associates from burnout and reported a big jump in its dealmaking fees.”
