TheChek News Flow

Family offices invest a substantial amount of capital in startups each year. In the first half of 2023, 27% of overall startup deal value came from deals that included a family office investor, according to a recent report from PwC.

Despite their prevalence in startup deals, family offices can be a mysterious class of investors for founders to navigate, as they are not nearly as public or as easy to find as VCs. Multiple family office investors said during a TechCrunch Disrupt panel that the easiest way to approach investors like themselves is to seek out family offices that have alignment with what a startup is building.

Bruce Lee, the founder and CEO of Keebeck Wealth Management, said that when founders are looking to get connected with family offices, they should seek out families that made their wealth in the sector the startup is building in.

“[Family offices] have to kind of look for areas where you feel you have edge, or that the family has edge in a particular technology, so they can add strategic value to not only the conversation, but to the investment itself,” Lee said.

Eti Lazarian, a principal at Elle Family Office, agreed and added that families want to find businesses that are complementary to their own.

“When a family invests in something that has to do with the business that they are in, they can bring a lot of value to your business, as well as a collaboration,” Lazarian said. “So usually we’re looking for something that can complement each other.”

Both Lazarian and Lee added that this alignment is not only related to finding family offices, but is also one of the things that makes family offices good investors to have. Lazarian said that family offices tend to make investments into companies that they care about on an emotional level compared to traditional VCs. She added that when family offices invest, they do so to see a company succeed no matter what, which can make them more flexible and patient investors.

“When you work with venture capital, you feel like always you have a gun to your head that you have to … perform to their goals,” Lazarian said. “When you work with a family office, it feels like the runway is more extended. You have more time. It feels like you know you have more air to breathe as you’re working towards your goals.”

Both Lazarian and Lee added that for founders looking to meet family offices in their respective industries, industry or regional conferences are a great place to start because family offices frequent these events.

Once a founder gets connected with a family office, Lazarian and Lee said they should expect to pitch them differently. While startups can pitch VCs on dreams and aspirations, that doesn’t work on family offices. Companies should pitch their projections and metrics, not that they will be a future unicorn.

The finding of a tight race, by a top-rated pollster, surprised both parties in a state that hasn’t been on anyone’s radar in the presidential election

Democrats got a gift over the weekend, albeit one that could prove to be a mirage. The Iowa Poll, the gold standard of political surveys in the Hawkeye State, showed Vice President Kamala Harris ahead of former President Donald Trump by 3 percentage points.

It was a shocking finding for a state nobody considered competitive and raised Democratic hopes of a last-minute shift that might benefit Harris in traditional battleground states such as Michigan and Wisconsin. Overall, the final polls taken just before Election Day found a neck-and-neck race in the battlegrounds. But Democrats are hoping that the apparent shift toward Harris recorded by the Iowa Poll, particularly among older women and independents, indicated a broader trend, possibly in reaction to Trump’s recent rally at New York City’s Madison Square Garden, where some warm-up speakers made racist, sexist or otherwise demeaning comments.

Republicans immediately threw cold water on the poll, casting it as an outlier. The former president won Iowa by 8 percentage points in 2020, and there has been no general election presidential campaigning in the state or significant advertising. Iowa’s entire congressional delegation is Republican, and it has been trending red for years. And in other polls released over the weekend, there was limited evidence of a drastically reordered race.

In early 2023, the Democratic National Committee yanked Iowa’s first-in-the-nation presidential caucuses and instead made South Carolina, a state that saved President Biden’s 2020 primary campaign, the party’s leadoff nominating state. That led even some Democrats to suggest that the party had essentially given up on competing for rural voters.

Republicans kept their first nominating contest in Iowa, where Trump in January won more than half the vote in what was the largest margin in the history of the first GOP presidential nominating contest.

Iowa GOP Chairman Jeff Kaufmann said on X that the poll’s main sponsor, the Des Moines Register newspaper, and its pollster, Ann Selzer, had “lost any shred of credibility they had left.” He added that the poll should be considered “propaganda” and that Trump would win the state.

Trump’s campaign, in a memo Sunday, dubbed it “an absurd outlier poll.”

Selzer said in an email that her “method for the current poll is the same as I used for the 2020 and 2016 Iowa Polls that showed Donald Trump winning Iowa.”

Even Democrats suggested the findings should be treated with caution, though state party officials tried to leverage it to motivate activists in the state for a final wave of door-knocking and calls.

“This is just a poll, and what really matters is that Iowans show up and make their voices heard,” Iowa Democratic Party Chair Rita Hart told reporters.

Iowa House Democratic Leader Jennifer Konfrst told reporters she was “pleasantly surprised, but not shocked” by the poll’s findings. She called Iowa a “purple” state and said abortion restrictions are motivating women in particular. “They are sick and tired of politicians interfering in their doctors’ offices,” she said. The state bans abortions after six weeks of pregnancy.

The Iowa Poll found swings toward Harris among some voter groups that were larger than commonly seen in surveys. After trailing among independent likely voters in prior surveys, those voters favored Harris by 7 points in the new poll. The change was driven by independent women, who backed Harris in the new survey by 28 points, compared with a 5-point tilt toward Harris in September.

Another pollster, Emerson College Polling, on Saturday reported Trump ahead in Iowa by 10 points. It found Harris ahead among women by 5 points, whereas she led by 20 points among women in the Iowa Poll.

A New York Times/Siena College poll of battleground states released Sunday, which didn’t include Iowa, offered mixed evidence. The survey reported that Harris leads by 11 points, 55% to 44%, among the 8% of voters who only recently settled on a choice of candidate. The survey also showed she had made gains in North Carolina, where her 2-point lead contrasted with the survey’s finding in late September of a 3-point Trump advantage; and in Georgia, where Harris had trailed by 4 points in late September and now led by 1 point. Trump’s pathways to 270 Electoral College votes are greatly diminished without those two states, and the former president has several North Carolina stops in the closing stretch.

But the same survey also found that the race in Pennsylvania—which is particularly critical to Harris’s chances—had settled into a tie after Harris led by 4 points in September. And it showed no movement in Wisconsin, which like Iowa has an overwhelmingly white voter pool. The survey found Harris leading there by 2 points, unchanged from its prior poll.

Overall, the Times/Siena poll found the race within the polls’ margin of error in all seven battleground states.

A separate survey released Sunday, by NBC News, found the two candidates tied at 49% each in a head-to-head matchup among voters nationally, with essentially no movement from a month earlier. In October, the survey found the candidates tied at 48% each.

Far-right organization that played central role in Jan. 6 Capitol riot has reorganized into chapters that are echoing claims of ballot fraud—and discussing a response

Members of the Proud Boys, key instigators in the Jan. 6, 2021 Capitol riot, are mobilizing in support of Donald Trump—and in some cases, making threats about the presidential election.

While it isn’t clear what the far-right group is planning or how coordinated its plans are, many chapters are amplifying election-cheating claims made by Trump or his allies and discussing potential responses, according to a review by The Wall Street Journal of dozens of accounts on Telegram, the messaging app, and Trump’s Truth Social platform. Chapters have gathered across state lines, talked about watching polls and have been boasting about attending Trump rallies to protect the former president.

The online chatter comes as law-enforcement officials confront an unprecedented array of aggressors this election season: foreign operatives, homegrown extremists and lone wolves such as those accused of trying to assassinate Trump.

The digital activity appears to show the Proud Boys regrouping after the imprisonment of many members and top leaders—individuals that a bipartisan House panel called central orchestrators of the riot. Former national chairman Enrique Tarrio is serving 22 years for seditious conspiracy and other charges for trying to thwart the transfer of power from Trump to Joe Biden.

A Texas Proud Boys chapter’s Telegram account recently shared a post alleging a Democratic conspiracy to install Vice President Kamala Harris as president through “millions of fake ballots.”

Replied a commenter pictured with a Proud Boys flag in the background: “So we can shoot them then, right?”

A North Carolina Proud Boys chapter, which has formally endorsed Trump on Telegram, thanked its members who volunteered to “work the polls” in the primaries, calling it an “excellent trial run for the general election in November.” The chapter also talked about providing “security” for Trump at a September rally in Wilmington, N.C., and declared that Harris “will not win without a steal, which is exactly what they are planning to do.”

The North Phoenix Proud Boys posted a picture of a gun arsenal on Truth Social last month, declaring, “Proud Boys stocking up getting ready for Nov…It’s going to be biggley!!” An Ohio chapter warned on Telegram that “once Trump wins,” antifa will riot, adding, “Prepare accordingly.”

The Global Project Against Hate and Extremism, a nonprofit tracking hate speech and extremism, documented in a new report a 317% surge in “violent rhetoric related to election denialism” by various groups on Telegram during October. The organization cited posts that used alleged rigged elections to justify an “inevitable civil war” and a call to “Shoot to kill any illegal voters.”

Heidi Beirich, the organization’s co-founder, said groups like the Proud Boys are planning to do poll watching and have signaled they are prepared for violence.

In one discussion—viewed by the Journal—Proud Boys members suggested “keeping your rifle by your side.”

The federal government is planning dramatically increased security for this Jan. 6 when Congress meets to certify election results. Law-enforcement officials say they don’t expect an attack of similar scale, in part because more than 1,500 rioters were charged.

Yet the Federal Bureau of Investigation and Department of Homeland Security warned state and local officials in October that solo extremists or small groups, similarly galvanized by “election-related grievances,” could mobilize for violence between Election Day and at least the Jan. 20 inauguration.

In the Jan. 6, 2021 riot, the Proud Boys were “leading the on-the-ground efforts to storm the seat of government,” the U.S. Attorney for the District of Columbia said in a written statement after Tarrio’s 2023 sentencing. “No organization put more boots on the ground.”

With their national leadership ranks thinned, the Proud Boys appear to have pivoted to localized operations.

On Telegram, a North Carolina chapter said “a hard lesson was learned about having a national PB leadership structure after J6,” referring to the riot, and said that now, there are more than “100 individual chapters conducting local events yet still feeding their lessons learned to the club as a whole.”

The local chapters list “tenets,” such as “declare ‘the West is the best’” and “venerate the housewife.”

The Proud Boys recently joined demonstrations in Springfield, Ohio, as top Republicans in September floated a debunked claim that Haitian migrants were eating pets.

“The red hat army is coming back. From now til the election,” an Indiana Proud Boy chapter posted on Telegram in July with a photo of a MAGA cap.

A Telegram page for a chapter in Long Island, N.Y., boasted about members who it said attended a Trump rally in Michigan last month. “If they only knew we were backstage and all over,” the post states.

Another Proud Boy Telegram post said members from a half-dozen states converged on Trump’s Oct. 5 rally in Butler, Pa., the site of the July assassination attempt. Their post, accompanied by a photo slideshow, said members were there “to watch Trump’s back and to experience the momentous occasion with the good people of the MAGA movement.”

Julie Farnam, a former U.S. Capitol Police assistant director over intelligence, who is now a private investigator, cautions that decentralized chapters make the Proud Boys harder to track.

Farnam said potential presidential pardons for Jan. 6 defendants is a factor driving their support for Trump. Trump has floated the idea of pardoning Jan. 6 rioters. On Telegram, some Proud boys post photos of themselves, claiming to be outside Trump rallies, with signs like, “free the J6 prisoners.”

“They will expect that Trump will pardon,” Farnam said.

A Kentucky Proud Boys chapter said on Truth Social last month it was “standing back and standing by,” which it called a throwback to Trump’s use of that phrase to the Proud Boys during a 2020 presidential debate. The chapter promoted a Sunday Traveling Trump Train event in Lexington that it said was organized by Christian conservatives.

A Kentucky chapter member told the Journal his group doesn’t have plans to gather for the election, but said there is a possibility members will attend the inauguration if Trump wins—to celebrate and raise awareness of the Proud Boys imprisoned over the Capitol riot.

Some Proud Boys also express support for Trump’s proposals, particularly immigration.

A recent Telegram post by an Ohio Proud Boys group said: “1/20/25: Trump is sworn in as President. 1/21/25: Me and the Proud Boys begin the deportations.”

Cartel to leave output curbs in place an extra month in effort to boost anaemic crude prices

Saudi Arabia and other members of Opec+ have delayed a plan to begin raising oil production until the end of the year, as the group tries to revive crude prices that have continued to flag despite turmoil in the Middle East.

The world’s largest oil exporter and seven others, including Russia, Iraq, the UAE and Algeria, would leave all output cuts in place until the end of December, Opec said in a statement.

The eight countries had been due to start unwinding voluntary cuts, but have postponed the plan for at least another month amid persistent weakness in the oil price.

The planned increases would have lifted the group’s production by 180,000 barrels a day by December, as part of a gradual unwinding of 2.2mn of cuts over 12 months.

Brent crude has fallen by almost 14 per cent over the past 12 months, in part because of concern over demand from China. It closed at $73 on Friday, having briefly dropped below $70 in September, to its lowest since December 2021.

“The Opec Secretariat noted that the eight Opec+ countries Saudi Arabia, Russia, Iraq, the United Arab Emirates, Kuwait, Kazakhstan, Algeria, and Oman […] have agreed to extend the voluntary production adjustments,” the group’s statement said.

The statement also reaffirmed a commitment to the cuts by Iraq, Russia and Kazakhstan, which had previously frustrated other members, particularly Saudi Arabia, by pumping more than their quotas.

Postponing the unwinding of the cuts for another month also enables the group to delay a decision on production levels for 2025 until after the US election, analysts said. Opec+ members are due to meet in person on December 1 in Vienna, when a final decision is expected.

US voters are set to head to the polls on Tuesday. Republican candidate Donald Trump has said he wants to halve energy prices within a year of taking office.

Oil prices have reacted to escalating conflict in the Middle East over the past year, but have tended to pare short-term gains as macroeconomic factors come back to the fore.

Prices fell more than 6 per cent last Monday after Israeli strikes on Iran stopped short of targeting oil and nuclear facilities, which calmed the market and put the focus back on China’s economic outlook.

They climbed only slightly on Friday after Major General Hossein Salami, head of Iran’s elite Revolutionary Guard Corps, vowed that Tehran would deliver an “unimaginable” response to the strikes.

On Saturday Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, the Islamic republic’s supreme leader, threatened Israel with a “crushing response”.

Executives said they were pleased with the third-quarter results overall, that they're seeing younger generations hanging out at the mall again, but the SPARC joint venture was a drag on the business.

Simon Property Group, a real estate investment trust and the nation’s largest developer of malls, mixed-used and outlet centers, continues to see plenty of opportunity in the mall.

“I’m pleased with our financial and operational performance in the third quarter,” said chairman and chief executive officer David Simon, during a conference call going over third-quarter results on Friday. “We saw increased leasing volumes, occupancy gains, and total retail sales volumes. Demand for our space from a broad spectrum of tenants is strong and steady, and we continue to strengthen our unique retail real estate platform through our growing development and redevelopment pipeline. This combined with our A-rated balance sheet, really sets us apart and allows us to focus on the future. We raised our dividend again to $2.10. We’re now at our historical high overcoming the arbitrary, capricious closing of our real estate during COVID[-19].

“The mall continues to be a unique gathering place,” Simon said. “If you talk to really new and exciting companies like Shein or Skims…they all believe in our product. And so we’re seeing a rejuvenation of the younger consumers wanting to hang out at the mall.”

Simon cited some interesting growth possibilities including putting up micro or mini distribution facilities within certain centers or in retailers, and investing more in lower-tier malls, which up to now have generally provided cash flow for improving top-tier malls. “I do think there’s a real potential to improve them because in many cases, we’re the only game in town. And given the lack of supply and our ability to reinvest, I do think we can make real strides in the bottom tier,” Simon said. “Not with every asset,” he added, “but the majority of them. So that’s a big focus going into 2025, without question.”

The company’s net income for the three months ended Sept. 30 was $475.2 million, or $1.46 per diluted share, down from $594.1 million, or $1.82, a year earlier.

The quarter included a non-cash net loss of $49.3 million due to the mark-to-market accounting for a fair market adjustment of the Klépierre exchangeable bonds issued in November 2023. Additionally, income in the year-ago period included non-cash after-tax gains of $118.1 million primarily due to the partial sale of the company’s interest in its SPARC joint venture with Authentic Brands Group.

Real estate funds from operations grew 4.8 percent to $3.05 per share in the third quarter compared with $2.91 a year earlier. Domestic and international operations had “a very good quarter” and contributed 15 cents of growth driven by a 3 percent increase in lease income.

Domestic property net operating income increased 5.4 percent and portfolio net operating income increased 5 percent compared to the prior year period.

In other third-quarter results, occupancy as of Sept. 30 was 96.2 percent, a 1 percent increase from 95.2 percent a year ago. Base minimum rent per square foot totaled $57.71 as of Sept. 30, compared with $56.41 a year ago, an increase of 2.3 percent. “We still have room to grow our occupancy, but more important than that is bringing in the right tenants in the right center in the right location. That’s a huge focus for us,” Simon said.

Reported retailer sales per square foot was $737 for the trailing 12 months ended Sept. 30.

The board declared a quarterly common stock dividend of $2.10 for the fourth quarter, an increase of 20 cents, or 10.5 percent, year-over-year. The dividend is payable Dec. 30.

On Sept. 12, the 184,000-square-foot, phase two expansion of Busan Premium Outlets in Busan, South Korea, opened with new fashion and sports brands, “in vogue” food and beverage brands, and ample gathering and green spaces, the company said. Simon owns 50 percent of this center.

On Aug. 15, Tulsa Premium Outlets in Jenks, Okla., opened with 338,000 square feet. Simon also owns 100 percent of this center.

Last quarter, Simon’s digital marketplace was rebranded Shop Simon, from Shop Premium Outlets, to include sale and discounted merchandise from Simon’s regular-priced retailers while continuing to offer outlet products. Additionally, a nationwide marketing campaign, Meet Me at the Mall, designed to depict malls as a go-to destination across generations, was launched.

On the SPARC joint venture, Brian J. McDade, executive vice president and chief financial officer, said: “SPARC underperformed as the lower income consumer continues to be more cautious in their spending. We first highlighted the inflationary impact in the second half of 2022 relative to this consumer. Performance was below expectations at Forever 21 and Reebok. SPARC and JCPenney did, however, record sequential improvements in comp sales during the third quarter, which sets these brands up well for the important upcoming holiday season. We are not sitting still, and we expect to have some positive announcements by year-end with respect to these businesses.”

There is growing industry chatter that high-end puffer jacket maker Moncler could be considering making a bid for London-listed Burberry to create an outdoor specialist giant. Several industry sources say Bernard Arnault, CEO and controlling shareholder of industry leader LVMH which recently invested in Moncler, is keen to see such a deal happen.

Moncler and Arnault believe Burberry can be turned around and more value extracted from the brand with the right strategy and management and away from the market’s scrutiny.

The potential deal has emerged as demand for Moncler’s shiny puffer jackets is cooling. The brand appears to have hit a peak in sales growth, industry analysts say. Last week, Moncler reported a 3 percent drop in like-for-like revenue in the third quarter, slightly worse than analysts expected.

If Burberry’s turnaround were successful, it would give Moncler a significant boost. Also there would be great synergies between the two companies. One obvious one is in the supply chain. Moncler is the best-in-class manufacturer of puffer jackets and Stone Island, which belongs to Moncler, also makes high-quality outdoor jackets. It would be “plug and play” for Burberry as the two outerwear specialists could make the British brand benefit from their supply chains and improve its own range of high-quality jackets of all kinds.

Burberry declined to comment. Moncler did not reply to requests for comment.

There could also be synergies in terms of boutiques. Burberry needs to downsize its portfolio, analysts believe, particularly if it is going to focus on outerwear and reduce its fashion offering. Many of its stores are too big. Hence, it could potentially hand over some locations to Moncler. Pruning Burberry’s portfolio would also lower costs and improve the company’s profitability.

In September, LVMH took a 10-percent stake in the investment company Ruffini Partecipazioni Holding, controlled by CEO Remo Ruffini which has a 15.8 percent stake in Moncler. Last month, the two companies said they had agreed not to increase their stake in Moncler to more than 20 percent in the next three years.

“I have been told by bankers close to Burberry that the company was feeling vulnerable, which means that a bid could be in the works,” one industry source told Miss Tweed on condition of anonymity. Another industry source said he had dinner with Remo Ruffini’s two sons Pietro and Romeo last summer and “they were discussing Burberry at length and what needed to be done to turn around the company.”

Moncler has been looking at Burberry for many years, financial sources say. But the company’s market valuation was too high to consider making a bid. Now that its market capitalisation is £2.9 billion, down from close to £7 billion in 2023, its pricetag looks much more attractive.

Burberry’s share price has been going up steadily in recent weeks on speculation that a bid could be afoot. On Friday, Burberry shares closed at 818 pence, or 43-percent higher than its September low point of 517 pence reached on Sept. 10.

MASTER OF THE TAKEOVER

If Moncler was to make an offer for Burberry, it would probably be either in shares or a mix of cash and shares, bankers believe. At the end of 2023, Moncler had net cash of €1.033 billion, excluding liabilities for store leases. Hence, the company does not have enough cash on its own to make a full-cash takeover bid. However, LVMH could provide financing if needed, bankers say.

Arnault is a master of the takeover. The luxury tycoon created the world’s biggest luxury goods group, thanks to an aggressive acquisition strategy that earned him the moniker “the wolf in cashmere.” Burberry has long been seen as a takeover target from bigger groups, including Arnault’s arch rival Francois-Henri Pinault, who controls Gucci parent Kering.

Kering is weak at present because Gucci is struggling to turn itself around. So, it looks unlikely that Kering would be in a position to mount a rival bid, particularly since it may have debt issues of its own if its cash flow does not markedly improve in the near future.

Arnault has already snapped up a stake in Moncler from under Pinault’s nose. Ruffini spoke as recently as last spring about his ongoing talks with Pinault about the Frenchman taking a stake.

That said, Arnault may have bid competition from across the pond. Some investors have been saying that Tapestry could make an offer for Burberry after the U.S. group’s deal to acquire its close rival Capri was blocked by the U.S. Federal Trade Commission on Oct. 25.

“We calculate that buying Burberry at a 30% premium to the current share price (748p) would cost around €4 billion and could generate a 10% pretax return on investment, assuming that the EBIT margin can return to the 11.0% level,” Bernstein wrote last month about the potential tie-up between the two companies.

Tapestry owns accessible luxury brands Coach, Kate Spade and Stuart Weitzman which trade in a much lower price category than Moncler and Burberry. Therefore, from a strategic point of view and market positioning, Burberry and Moncler have more in common.

Also, synergies between Tapestry and Burberry would not be as attractive as they would be between Moncler and Burberry, industry analysts say. Thus, a Burberry-Moncler tie-up would make more sense than with Tapestry, investors say. Moncler has established itself as a market leader in outdoor clothing, a category which has grown strongly in the past 15 years, “eating Burberry’s lunch in the process.” Focusing on that segment is one of Burberry’s many missed opportunities, some industry analysts say.

If Moncler is serious about making a bid for Burberry, it may want to hurry up. Legally, Tapestry cannot get out of its deal to acquire Capri before February 2025, also called the “stop date.” Therefore, Moncler’s approach could not be challenged by Tapestry before that time.

SHARE PRICE RISE

The brand’s new ad campaigns released last month have been welcomed by investors and contributed to the rise in the company’s share price. They signal a change in focus from fashion to outerwear, a field in which Burberry has much more legitimacy than in fashion and something investors have been asking for many years, as Miss Tweed wrote on Friday. Burberry is finally doing what it should have been doing for years: focusing on its heritage as a British outerwear company. Initiated by the previous CEO Jonathan Akeroyd, the company’s new CEO Joshua Schulman, in place since July, is getting the credit. It is unfair but little can be done about that.

On the back of the new ad campaigns, many investors, analysts and journalists said they felt that for the first time in years, the brand felt relevant again.

“It is refreshing to see Burberry go back to its core DNA,” Luca Solca, luxury goods analyst at Bernstein, told Miss Tweed. “The new campaign goes back to basics: it is quintessentially British and showcases the most iconic Burberry products.”

Bernstein was the first broker this week to upgrade Burberry’s rating to “outperform.” It called the company “our preferred self-help story.” Bernstein said it was encouraged not only by the new campaign but also by the company’s new strategy with regard to pricing.

“Burberry's plans on pricing are starting to make sense,” Bernstein wrote in a note published on Oct. 30. “Department stores are reporting a pragmatic view on what the brand can do, with a focus on opening price points at a more realistic level, especially in product categories like leather in which the brand’s credibility is low.”

Shortly after Bernstein, HSBC upgraded Burberry to a “buy” rating. “We think management's priority will be rebuilding brand equity and regaining share, with margin expansion coming as a consequence,” the broker said in a note published on Oct. 31.

“Burberry’s heritage is outerwear: the brand was founded in 1856 when Thomas Burberry, a former draper’s apprentice, opened a store in Basingstoke, England, focused on outdoor attire. In 1879, Burberry invented gabardine, a lightweight, breathable, weatherproof and tearproof cloth. We would view it positively if Burberry were to build up its brand equity on its DNA – outdoor and gabardine – as it would make sense for customers to rely on the brand for what it is best known for. Once the Burberry outerwear category becomes an unavoidable purchase destination, then stretching the brand towards other businesses more meaningfully could be successful. Today, the €2,000 handbag category is very crowded and it seems that consumers are not willing to give Burberry credit in a leather category where it has traditionally been a follower.”

Few industries stand to gain — or lose — more on US election day than renewable sources of power

At the mouth of New York’s Hudson River, Norwegian oil and gas producer Equinor is building the largest US port for offshore wind, and a potential monument to America’s energy future — or its past.

As Americans brace for one of the closest presidential elections in the nation’s history, investors and executives alike have been parsing campaign statements for which industries stand to gain or lose the most in the next administration. But as election day nears, one is clearly emerging as the most exposed to the outcome: renewable energy.

“A Harris-Walz win next Tuesday is good news for the offshore wind industry. A Trump-Vance win next Tuesday is terrible,” Sean McGarvey, president of the North America’s Building Trades Unions, which works on offshore wind projects, said at a conference this week. His predictions that Kamala Harris would win the election were met with unanimous applause.

Donald Trump has vowed to stop offshore wind projects on “day one” if re-elected. He has also pledged to “terminate” the Inflation Reduction Act, President Joe Biden’s landmark climate law that included lucrative tax credits to drive down the cost of renewable energy and turbocharge the pace of decarbonisation.

Nearly $450bn in private investment has flowed into the US energy sector since the IRA’s passage, according to the Clean Investment Monitor. Consultancy BloombergNEF estimates a repeal of the IRA will result in a 17 per cent drop in new renewable capacity additions from 2025 to 2035, with offshore wind the hardest hit, falling 35 per cent.

A recent Goldman Sachs analysis of market outcomes concluded renewables could be the biggest winner under Harris, and tied for biggest loser under Trump, along with tariff-sensitive sectors.

Unlike solar and onshore wind, offshore wind requires federal permits and is most vulnerable to changes in office. The Biden administration turbocharged offshore wind deployment, setting an ambitious target to deploy 30GW by 2030 and approving 16GW of commercial-scale projects, up from zero at the start of his presidency.

Molly Morris, Equinor’s US president of offshore wind, cited the “certainty of the commitment” for renewable energy as the most important factor to advance offshore wind.

Equinor broke ground in June on its 73-acre project, known as the South Brooklyn Marine Terminal. It will serve as an assembly site for its offshore wind project, Empire Wind 1, which is eligible for IRA tax credits, and accommodate future offshore wind projects in the region.

Whether Trump or Harris wins next week’s election will have ramifications across corporate America. Bloomberg Intelligence predicts a Trump presidency could reduce capital requirements for US banks, undermine subsidies in the Affordable Care Act, and lower the liability shield for Big Tech companies. A Harris presidency would resemble policies set by the Biden administration, increasing scrutiny of banks, Big Tech, and pharmaceutical companies, and continuing the implementation of the IRA and rules to curb emissions.

“I’ve been unapologetic about who we’re supporting,” said Sheldon Kimber, chief executive of renewables developer Intersect Power, who introduced Harris at a fundraiser earlier this year. The company has started construction on nearly all of its projects to safeguard itself from potential changes to tax credit rules.

A full repeal of the IRA would face steep challenges. While the IRA passed with no Republican support in Congress, GOP areas of the country have been the main beneficiaries, with more than three-quarters of all manufacturing projects announced in the first year of the law’s passage headed to the party’s districts, according to an FT analysis.

In August, 18 congressional Republicans wrote a letter to Speaker Mike Johnson urging the party leader to “prioritise business and market certainty” in consideration of efforts to repeal or reform the IRA.

“We see not only steel in the water and people working, but people working in red states and blue states,” said Doreen Harris, president of the New York State Energy Research and Development Authority. “It would be difficult to imagine throwing that all away.”

While Trump rolled back restrictions on fossil fuel production and limits to emissions from power plants and cars, he also renewed tax credits for solar and wind projects and electric vehicles. US renewables deployment continued to grow under his presidency.

Wind capacity grew 45 per cent between 2016 and 2020, while solar capacity more than doubled, according to the Energy Information Administration. In his debate with Harris, Trump said he is a “big fan” of solar.

Analysts say potential Trump policies that pose a high risk to the US transition are tariffs on Chinese goods and changes to the IRA’s tax credit for EVs, which have become a culture war issue since his presidency. China is the dominant producer of clean energy technologies and refines the majority of the mineral inputs.

The Biden administration has set a target to reduce emissions by 50 per cent to 52 per cent from 2005 levels. A May forecast from Wood Mackenzie anticipates a slower energy transition under Trump, resulting in 683mn tonnes of additional carbon emissions in the energy sector and a $322bn reduction in anticipated clean energy investment by 2030.

“[Companies] are going to go to Europe. They’re going to go to other places. They’re not going to come here . . . It’s anti-business,” said Elizabeth Yeampierre, executive director of Uprose, a Brooklyn community organisation that has lent its support to the Equinor project. Next to her office is a barbershop with a flag that reads: Trump 2024 Take America Back.