The Information : Robinhood Now Makes More Revenue From Predictions Than From St

Robinhood Now Makes More Revenue From Predictions Than From Stock Trades

The Takeaway
  • Robinhood entered prediction markets business in late 2024
  • Traders moved into prediction markets as crypto interest waned
  • World Cup boosted second-quarter revenue


Brokerage app Robinhood has quickly become a force in prediction markets, challenging the hold of Kalshi and Polymarket on the popular betting market.

Robinhood’s prediction markets revenue surged more than tenfold year over year in the second quarter to $156 million, the company reported last week, as part of its second-quarter earnings update. Prediction markets accounted for 20% of Robinhood’s trading revenue in the quarter, eclipsing both stock and crypto revenue for the first time and becoming its second-largest trading business after options.

That’s a significant change in the company’s revenue mix driven by Robinhood’s less than two-year-old prediction business. It also highlights how speculators have shifted their attention, and their trading activity, from financial markets to real-world events via prediction markets.

Prediction contracts allow traders to bet on outcomes of real-world events like World Cup matches, elections and the weather, offering real-time wagers with a simple yes-no format. That has meshed well with Robinhood’s existing customer base of individual investors, giving them something new to trade as enthusiasm for crypto in particular has cooled.

“The people on Robinhood love gambling, and [the] prediction market is right up their alley,” said Dan Dolev, equity research analyst at Mizuho Securities. “It’s the perfect replacement for crypto because it produces a faster reward system in your brain. You don’t have to wait.”

Kalshi remains the dominant U.S. app for prediction markets and is growing fast, topping $2 billion in annualized revenue in June, up about three times from November. Smaller rival Polymarket has seen much slower growth recently. Based on Robinhood’s second-quarter figures, prediction markets could generate over $600 million in annualized revenue.


Robinhood’s success demonstrates its ability to reinvent its business as markets evolve. The 13-year-old brokerage firm initially gained traction in stock trading thanks to its zero-commission stock and options trades as well as its slick app, which made trading quick and simple. It added crypto trading in 2018, and its mix of trading revenue has tended to shift depending on which assets are hot.

Its equities and options revenue boomed during the meme stock frenzy of 2021, while crypto trading jumped too on meme coins such as dogecoin. As recently as late 2024, crypto represented Robinhood’s largest source of trading revenue.

Prediction markets soared in popularity in the lead-up to the 2024 U.S. election, with traders pouring billions into bets on election outcomes. Kalshi that year gained approval to operate in the U.S., paving the way for other apps to follow. Late that year, Robinhood launched its first event contract, allowing users to bet on the winner of the U.S. presidential election. It soon added other events including sports, which has become one of its biggest categories, positioning it to capture more revenue as crypto interest waned.

Robinhood didn’t start out with its own exchange for prediction contracts, instead sending most of its user bets to Kalshi, with the two companies evenly splitting a fee of 2 cents per contract.

But in June, a joint venture between Robinhood and Susquehanna International Group launched a prediction markets exchange called Rothera. Robinhood has been sending some bets, including World Cup wagers, to that new exchange.

Robinhood lowered its fees of prediction markets for its users, the company has said. Now it is charging up to 1 cent per contract fee, in addition to a fee that differs depending on which exchange executes the order. If it sends the orders to Kalshi, Kalshi still charges a 1-cent fee per contract.

The shift means Robinhood and Kalshi have become less interdependent. Robinhood orders made up only 17.5% of Kalshi’s trading volume in the second quarter this year, down from nearly 50% the same period last year, according to data from Artemis.

By using Rothera rather than Kalshi to execute the orders, Robinhood will “have more control over” its prediction markets business, said Dolev. But he doesn’t think there will be a big margin difference between the two models for Robinhood because it will have to provide incentives to users.


Overall, Kalshi still leads in prediction markets activity by a wide margin, with about $33 billion in monthly notional volume in June. Polymarket had $14 billion, while Rothera, which executes trades for Robinhood as well as some market makers, had $2.1 billion, according to data from Artemis.

And Robinhood isn’t the only popular financial app pushing into prediction markets. Coinbase launched in the sector this year, though it’s still a smaller player. In the second quarter, prediction markets surpassed $100 million in annualized revenue, Coinbase said, without disclosing an exact quarterly figure.

The boom in prediction market activity also comes with regulatory uncertainty. Sports betting faces legal risks because multiple states have sued prediction markets platforms, saying they operate as unregistered gambling apps. But a federal regulator, the Commodity Futures Trading Commission, argues it has jurisdiction to regulate prediction markets.

And the betting activity can come and go based on what’s going on in the real world. For instance, Robinhood’s second-quarter surge came during the World Cup, an event that takes place once every four years.

That made June and July volumes “abnormally strong,” according to a research note on Robinhood by Ed Engel, an equity research analyst at Compass Point. Still, U.S. football season is coming up this fall, he noted, which should provide a fresh boost.

FT : Italy’s Giorgia Meloni bets big on nuclear power revival Rural backlash aga

Italy’s Giorgia Meloni bets big on nuclear power revival
Rural backlash against renewables that ‘spoil the landscape’ fuels support for atomic energy decades after reactor shutdowns

From her grandmother’s beautifully restored home in a medieval Italian village, Monica Tommasi, president of Friends of the Earth Italy, is battling wind turbines — literally.

German renewable energy group RWE has secured permission to erect seven 200-metre wind turbines in the countryside around Tommasi’s home not far from the picturesque Umbrian town of Orvieto. Along with other local property owners, Tommasi, a transportation engineer, is now fighting to stop a project she says will scar a precious landscape while delivering little reliable power.

Though she says she once believed in “the energy fairy tale” of renewables cutting dependence on imported fossil fuels, Tommasi is now convinced the answer to Italy’s energy woes lies in nuclear power, which the country once generated — until Rome shut down all its reactors decades ago amid a fierce public backlash.

“We realised achieving these renewable energy targets meant filling the country with wind turbines and solar panels, distorting the landscape and our identity,” said Tommasi. “If we need to decarbonise, we need to use the best technology, and one of the best technologies is nuclear. It’s no longer the world of the ‘70s and ‘80s — the world has changed. This technology — nuclear power — has changed.” 

She is not alone in her belief. As Italian businesses and households face power bills around 30 per cent higher than the European average — due partly to the country’s heavy reliance on gas imports, Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni’s rightwing coalition government is betting big on a nuclear power revival to offer long-term relief.


Italian physicist Stefano Buono, chief executive of Newcleo, a Franco-Italian nuclear start-up, says he has already received enquiries from Italian industrialists eager for nuclear reactors to power their own energy-intensive businesses such as steelmaking and cement. 

Some Italian businesses have invested in Newcleo, contributing to the $780mn it has raised so far to develop and commercialise its lead-cooled, small reactors fuelled by recycled nuclear waste.

“As soon as we have the regulation, we can file the request for a nuclear power plant,” Buono told the FT.

Not all are convinced. Many climate change activists and renewables companies see Rome’s nuclear obsession as a tool to distract Italians from the severity of the climate and energy crisis — and the simplest, quickest solutions for decarbonisation. For all the hype around the SMRs and their potential, many designs are still unproven commercially, while the International Energy Agency has called solar power, in the right locations, “the cheapest source of electricity in history”.

Italy’s powerful industry association, Confindustria, has argued businesses cannot afford to wait another decade for a nuclear revival. It has pleaded with Meloni’s government to authorise an emergency increase in renewables production to bring quick relief to industries struggling with high electricity costs.

About 130 gigawatts of proposed photovoltaic and wind projects are pending, awaiting official clearance, as policymakers debate over suitable locations. 

RWE argues that its Orvieto-area wind farm — whose 42MW capacity could power 40,000 homes — “balances” cultural heritage preservation with renewables development, as the turbines will not be visible from the town’s historic centre but will make a “tangible contribution” to Italy’s energy security.

But Gilberto Pichetto Fratin, the minister of environment and energy security, says Italy’s topography makes a large rollout of renewables tough. The country’s installed capacity of solar and wind was about 60 gigawatts at the start of 2026, far less than Germany or Spain.

“Italy is a country that is two-thirds hilly and mountainous, largely cultivated and has a world-class tourist value,” Pichetto Fratin, a longtime atomic energy advocate, told a recent nuclear conference. “We can’t plaster it with solar panels and wind turbines.”  


That’s a sentiment shared by other Italian nuclear advocates — many of whom were themselves once fiercely opposed to the technology but now consider wind turbines or solar panels a bigger blight.

“Nuclear power is for sure something that has much less impact on the environment,” said campaigner Francesco Pratesi, president of the Tuscany branch of the environmental group Italia Nostra (Our Italy). “It doesn’t spoil the landscape . . . [or] agriculture . . . and you can produce the same energy in a small area as acres and acres of solar and wind.” 

Italy has had a fraught relationship with nuclear energy. In the 1960s and 1970s, it was an early adopter of civil nuclear power — with four large reactors in operation and ambitious plans for capacity expansion. 

But as capacity expanded, so too did anti-nuclear sentiment. In 1987, after the Soviet Union’s Chernobyl disaster, Italians voted overwhelmingly against nuclear energy in a national referendum, leading to the shutdown of all atomic power stations by 1990.

Former Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi later tried to revive the industry, passing new laws and developing new contracts. But in a second referendum months after Japan’s 2011 Fukushima nuclear accident, some 90 per cent of voters rejected Berlusconi’s plan.

Alessandra Fenizzi, Pratesi’s wife, who is also active in the fight against wind turbines, admits she once voted against nuclear power but now says: “We were wrong.”

British-born artist James P Graham, who has campaigned fiercely against the proposed RWE project, which threatens to tower over his villa, says it is “hypocritical and wrong” that Italians happily import nuclear-generated electricity from France while opposing production at home.

"Nuclear is the only constant source of energy we have right now,” Graham said.

Polls suggest Italians are far more open to domestic nuclear power production than in the past. A June YouTrend poll found that 57 per cent of respondents were positive about Meloni’s attempted nuclear revival, while 31 per cent viewed it negatively.

For all the current enthusiasm, Newcleo’s Buono says public support could waver when it comes to finding future sites for a new generation of small reactors. Members of Meloni’s coalition admit that another referendum cannot be ruled out either.

“Italians don’t like any power installation — wind turbines, solar power plants or nuclear reactors,” Buono said. When it comes to it, “we will be having the same problems as everyone else”.

>>> Week End Press Summary

THE FINANCIAL TIMES
-FIFA has abandoned plans to sell a $20B stake in the commercial rights to the World Cup after fierce opposition from football associations, leagues and UEFA. The reversal represents a major setback for Gianni Infantino's effort to reshape football's financial model and underscores the limits of commercializing the sport without broad institutional support.
-Nearly 60,000 migrants crossed into Spain's North African enclave of Ceuta in one of Europe's largest migration surges in decades, exposing the fragility of the EU's external borders and intensifying pressure on Madrid. The FT examines the crisis through the lenses of migration, diplomacy with Morocco and the broader challenge facing European asylum policy.
-The U.S. Treasury intervened directly in currency markets to support the Japanese yen, marking a rare move aimed at stabilizing financial markets after sharp volatility. The intervention reflects growing concern that rapid currency swings could undermine global financial stability and complicate monetary policy coordination.
-A senior Federal Reserve official says the recent bond market sell-off reflected investor concerns over the central bank's inflation credibility rather than broader financial stress. The comments suggest policymakers view restoring confidence in their inflation-fighting commitment as increasingly important to maintaining orderly markets.
-Citadel helped stabilize the AI market rout by purchasing positions liquidated by hedge fund Situational Awareness after its leveraged bets collapsed. The episode highlights Citadel's role as a buyer during periods of market stress.
-The European Union's new AI transparency rules requiring labels for AI-generated content have entered into force, creating what the FT describes as artificial intelligence's equivalent of the cookie banner. The regulations represent Europe's latest attempt to set global standards for AI governance without directly restricting innovation.
-The UK's Financial Conduct Authority has launched another initiative to revive London's equity markets, seeking to boost trading activity and improve the City's competitiveness after years of declining listings and liquidity.
-Eurozone inflation accelerated to 2.9% in July, complicating the European Central Bank's efforts to balance easing price pressures with a weakening economic outlook. The data reinforce expectations that policymakers will remain cautious about further interest-rate cuts.
-Amazon has completed a further $50B investment in OpenAI, deepening one of the technology industry's most significant strategic partnerships. The commitment underscores how hyperscale cloud providers continue to spend aggressively to secure leadership in artificial intelligence despite growing investor scrutiny of capital expenditures.
-Mexico has quietly become a key hub for America's AI expansion as technology companies increasingly build data centers and manufacturing capacity south of the border. The FT argues that proximity to the U.S., competitive energy costs and integration under USMCA are making Mexico an unexpected beneficiary of the global AI boom.
-Greece's devastating island wildfires are exposing the growing economic risks of climate change for one of Europe's most tourism-dependent countries. The FT argues that increasingly frequent heatwaves and fires are beginning to threaten the sustainability of tourism-driven growth across the Mediterranean.

THE NEW YORK TIMES
-More than 50,000 Moroccans surged into the Spanish enclave of Ceuta in one of Europe's largest migration crises in recent years, but many quickly returned after finding little work, food or shelter. The Times portrays the episode as both a humanitarian emergency and a geopolitical warning, illustrating how migration can be rapidly weaponized to pressure European governments.
-President Trump's proposed Gaza agreement faces fresh uncertainty despite his insistence that Hamas has accepted a framework for disarmament. The Times reports growing tension between Washington and Jerusalem, arguing that Trump is increasingly attempting to impose his own timetable on Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu while simultaneously tempering expectations about the plan's implementation.
-President Trump has backed away from an earlier proposal allowing Ukraine to manufacture Patriot missiles domestically, despite Kiev's warning that it is rapidly depleting interceptor stocks. The reversal highlights continuing uncertainty over U.S. military support as Russian missile attacks on Ukrainian cities intensify.
-FIFA has abandoned plans to sell a stake in the commercial rights to the World Cup after widespread opposition from football federations and stakeholders. The retreat marks a significant setback for Gianni Infantino's effort to reshape the tournament's financing and governance.
-The collapse of AI-focused hedge fund Situational Awareness offers an early warning about the risks of excessive leverage in one of the market's hottest sectors. The Times chronicles how the 24-year-old founder's spectacular rise and equally rapid downfall underscore the volatility surrounding artificial intelligence investing even as enthusiasm for the technology remains strong.
-A U.S. citizen has been charged with obstructing customs officers after remotely wiping his encrypted smartphone during an airport inspection. The case could become an important legal test of the limits of digital privacy and government authority over encrypted devices at U.S. borders.
-The Trump administration plans to weaken federal standards governing the Head Start preschool program after failing to eliminate its funding. Rather than cutting the program outright, officials are seeking to reduce requirements covering health, literacy and other services, a move likely to ignite another debate over the federal role in early childhood education.
-Sen. Mitch McConnell has rejected growing calls to resign despite persistent health concerns, insisting he will serve out his Senate term. The Times examines how changing political expectations are making long-serving lawmakers face greater pressure to step aside than in previous generations.
-Scientists estimate that roughly one ton of space debris now re-enters Earth's atmosphere every week as satellite launches accelerate. The growing volume of uncontrolled re-entry is exposing regulatory gaps over liability and public safety while highlighting one of the less visible consequences of the expanding commercial space industry.

NY POST
-Apple shares fell after CEO Tim Cook warned that soaring memory prices and supply constraints, which he likened to a "100-year flood," are likely to weigh on growth despite another quarter of solid financial results. The Post highlights growing concern that shortages of key AI-related components are becoming a constraint even for the world's largest technology companies.
-Amazon said it received roughly $600M in tariff refunds from the U.S. government during the second quarter and plans to pass the savings on to customers. The Post argues the refunds could help cushion consumers from higher import costs while highlighting how large retailers are increasingly benefiting from government trade policies designed to offset the impact of tariffs.

WWD : Luxury Looks to Bring Its Newfound Resilience Into the Second Half Results

Luxury Looks to Bring Its Newfound Resilience Into the Second Half
Results across Europe’s leading luxury groups pointed to the power of VICs and newness, while a fragile China still complicates the rebound story for much of the sector.

LONDON — The luxury verdict is in — the pool of aspirational buyers is shrinking and brands need to entertain their wealthiest and most loyal clients with genuine creativity.

“Selling more to existing consumers will require sustained relevance and a higher innovation tempo,” Bernstein analyst Luca Solca said in a note on the luxury sector, arguing that brands must lean more heavily on those who already own the iconic essentials and will only part with additional money for genuinely new and compelling products.

That thread — confirming that the post‑pandemic luxe boom has fractured into a K‑shaped market — ran through a week or so of results from many of the sectors top players, including LVMH Moët Hennessy Louis Vuitton, Kering, Hermès, Prada Group, Zegna and Brunello Cucinelli.

The luxury bigwigs also signaled continued strength in the U.S., while there is still a good deal of work to still do in China. For Europe, Prada’s statement that its Mui Mui business there was “subdued albeit improving” could apply to many. Big brands like Dior and Gucci also cosigned the belief that high-profile creative changes would gin up business changes with better results.

“Broadly, the recovery continued in the second quarter, with some acceleration, although results remain mixed across brands,” said Jelena Sokolova, senior equity analyst at Morningstar.

Now the trick is going to be to keep the momentum going.

Sokolova remains “cautiously optimistic.”

“We expect several positive trends to continue, including the stabilization of real estate prices in China and accelerating creative momentum driven by a higher share of new designer collections at brands such as Dior and Gucci,” she said. “However, comparisons become more challenging as the recovery began in [third quarter] 2025. U.S. demand momentum is showing signs of acceleration rather than abating, although volatility in equity markets could weigh on performance.”

The Market Reacts, Unevenly
On a brand level, Hermès is still delivering growth at the very top. But it wasn’t quite enough to keep the investors happy, and prompted an 11 percent stock sell off on Wednesday. And there was little sign of recovery as of Friday, when the stock closed down 1.2 percent for the day to 1,531 euros.

Shares of LVMH and Kering are stabilizing or slowly healing. Outside of the mega groups, strong contenders like Prada are growing sales but seeing margin and leverage move the wrong way, and mid‑scale groups like Zegna and Brunello Cucinelli are outpacing larger rivals by leaning hard into direct‑to‑consumer and parts of the Asia‑Pacific region.

If Hermès is a luxury weather vane, it’s pointing to changes that the whole sector is adjusting to.

Second‑quarter sales at Hermès rose 6.7 percent at constant exchange to 4.1 billion euros. But the underlying geographic picture pointed to just where the brand’s top clients are today. U.S. sales climbed 13.7 percent, total Europe advanced 7.4 percent, and Asia overall grew 4.4 percent, with Japan up 12.3 percent.

“We see that our aspirational customers are suffering more than the resistance of our more wealthy customers,” said Axel Dumas, chief executive officer at Hermès, on a call with analysts.

On China, he characterized the situation as still far from a full recovery. “We have a situation that has stabilized in China, but I don’t see a great improvement,” he said, citing the drag from the real estate and stock markets on household confidence and savings patterns in the country.

RBC analyst Piral Dadhania said the numbers reinforced Hermès’ position as the luxury industry’s most resilient player at a time when many brands continue to struggle, posting results that were largely in line with analysts’ expectations, with “no major surprises.”

“In tougher periods of luxury demand, Hermès’ relative defensiveness is more attractive as it is likely to suffer less than peers, given its absolute luxury brand positioning and supply constrained model for its most coveted products,” he added.

Signs of Stabilization
At LVMH, after seven consecutive quarters of declines, its core fashion and leather goods division finally returned to growth in the second quarter, with sales rising 1 percent on an organic basis.

The improvement was driven by Christian Dior, where creative director Jonathan Anderson’s first products have begun landing in stores.

Chief financial officer Cécile Cabanis said Dior outperformed the division in the first half, with “all clienteles” up and double‑digit sales growth among U.S. and Japanese customers. The house is seeing strong uptake in women’s ready‑to‑wear and leather goods.

“We’ve made a lot of progress,” Cabanis said. “What we are offering is getting success, and there will be more to come.” She acknowledged that creative renewal had created some short‑term supply‑chain complexity and occasional shortages on key lines, but insisted that “the trend is positive and accelerating.”

China, however, remained a swing factor. Cabanis said overall Chinese demand was flat, with spending shifting from domestic to overseas shopping and increasingly clustered around big events. That left Asia as the only region not to show sequential improvement in the second quarter, even as the U.S., Japan and the rest of Asia posted solid gains.

Morningstar’s Sokolova said, while performance in fashion and leather goods remains below that of some peers despite the improvement, LVMH is “well positioned to return to industry outperformance” over the long term, supported by creative momentum at Dior, ongoing innovation at Louis Vuitton and the group’s ability to invest behind its brands.

Kickstarting Kering
After a long stretch in the wilderness, Kering is finally turning around under CEO Luca de Meo. The group this week posted its first comparable sales increase in three years, with second‑quarter revenues up 1 percent at reported exchange rates and 2 percent on a comparable basis to 3.65 billion euros.

“All the key levers that are within our control — from brand execution and store optimization to cost discipline and inventory management — are tracking in line with, or ahead of, our expectations,” de Meo told investors. “The return to growth in the second quarter was, I think, an important milestone, but we are still at the beginning of the journey, and we remain realistic about the challenges ahead.”

Gucci showed important signs of stabilization. Organic sales fell 2 percent in the second quarter, versus an 8 percent decline in the first quarter and better than the roughly 4.7 percent drop analysts had expected.

Anne-Laure Bismuth, head of consumer luxury and sporting goods at HSBC, said Kering is moving into the right direction, and upgraded its stock to buy.

“We believe the group is focusing on the right priorities to regain momentum and reengage with the aspirational customers, particularly for the Gucci brand, with a focus on product creativity, quality and competitive pricing,” she said.

The Flavor of Italy
Italian luxury groups Prada, Zegna and Brunello Cucinelli are emerging as some of the sector’s quietly effective operators, delivering above‑market top line growth this year.

Prada reported first‑half revenues up 11 percent to 3.05 billion euros, or 16 percent at constant exchange rates. Excluding Versace, which it acquired and consolidated at the end of last year, organic growth was up 5 percent.

“In a geopolitical and macroeconomic scenario that remained turbulent, we continued to execute with rigor,” chairman Patrizio Bertelli said. “Our commitment to the highest standards of product excellence, nurturing craftsmanship and creativity as non‑negotiable pillars, allowed us to reach 22 quarters of uninterrupted organic growth.”

Group CEO Andrea Guerra believes Prada’s further growth potential depends on whether it can “satisfy an unbelievable demand from top spenders, which Prada has somehow been reluctant to do in its history.”

“The top spenders are there; they drive the market, they are even stronger than before, they’re wealthy, and we need to gain our fair share there. I think that we are ready to pamper and service these consumers in the best possible way,” Guerra added.

Zegna’s first‑half revenues rose 6.4 percent to 987.3 million euros, up 9.3 percent on an organic basis.

“I call this the reward of patience,” said Gildo Zegna, executive chairman. “We are reaping the fruits of years of investments in the products, strategies, governance, research and development, and even the ability to sometimes say ‘no.’”

And Brunello Cucinelli’s revenues rose 9.5 percent at current exchange rates to 749.4 million euros in the first half. The Americas were the company’s biggest market by sales and key growth engine, with revenue up 13.6 percent.

Brunello Cucinelli, executive chairman and creative director, was, as usual, upbeat.

“We closed the first half of the year with results that we view as truly, truly outstanding,” he said. “We have the impression that the brand is enjoying an exceptionally favorable momentum across the world, with our boutiques embodying our stylistic identity, our way of working, our way of engaging with others and, ultimately, the lifestyle in which we have always believed.”

Now, Cucinelli and the rest of luxury will have to do it all over again in the second half and prove out that the gains they’ve seen so far this year are for real.

After the summer holiday, of course.

FT : US Treasury undertakes historic intervention in yen market New York Fed sel

US Treasury undertakes historic intervention in yen market
New York Fed sells euros to buy yen following recent speculation that Tokyo intervened to support Japan’s currency

The US Treasury intervened in yen exchange rates on Friday, marking the first time Tokyo and Washington joined forces to support the Japanese currency via outright purchases in nearly 30 years.

The Federal Reserve Bank of New York undertook the unusual move of conducting a sale of euros to buy yen on behalf of the Treasury, according to three people familiar with the matter.

The sales were conducted through Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley, according to two of those people.

The Treasury had earlier told several banks on Wall Street that it was considering an intervention to support the Japanese currency, which on July 23 hit its weakest level against the dollar since 1986.

US authorities were in touch with European Central Bank officials about the move, according to people familiar with the matter.

The New York Fed and Goldman Sachs declined to comment. The Treasury department and Morgan Stanley did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

The yen has strengthened over the past half-dozen sessions, with the dollar weakening about 4 per cent on Thursday as market participants speculated that the Japanese government had also moved to support the currency after a rise in trading volumes. The dollar shed 1.9 per cent on Friday to buy ¥157.57.

Analysts using official data and broker estimates said Thursday’s intervention by Japanese authorities was likely to be about ¥8.45tn ($52.8bn).

The Treasury’s intervention to bolster the yen is the first since 1998, when it bought the currency in order to strengthen Japan’s economy after the yen had dropped to eight-year lows. The US intervened in Japan’s currency in 2011 to weaken it as part of a co-ordinated international effort to prevent a dangerous currency appreciation after the Tohoku earthquake and tsunami.

Earlier on Friday, Treasury secretary Scott Bessent posted on X that he looked forward to “seeing my longtime friend, Bank of Japan governor Kazuo Ueda” at the G20 finance ministers’ meeting in North Carolina in August. He added that the two countries “continue to enjoy a strong relationship and close co-ordination”.

The moves came after the BoJ held interest rates at 1 per cent on Friday, as widely expected by market participants. Ueda said he would ensure the central bank did not “fall behind the curve” and could speed up rate rises, something being closely watched by FX traders.

“Given that underlying inflation is approaching our 2 per cent price stability target, we believe there is a greater need than before to pay attention to upside risks to inflation,” Ueda said. “With that assessment in mind, we intend to discuss these issues carefully at future monetary policy meetings.”

Traders are putting a roughly 40 per cent chance of a quarter-point rise in the BoJ’s policy rate in September, according to derivatives markets, up from 30 per cent earlier in the week.

Ueda has faced criticism from investors over his failure to raise rates more quickly, with some warning that the BoJ risks losing credibility in financial markets if it does not speed up.


On Thursday, the New York Fed conducted a so-called rate check on dollar-yen on behalf of the US Treasury, according to people familiar with the matter. Asking currency-dealing banks for the current exchange rate is typically seen as a precursor to direct foreign-exchange purchases. The New York Fed made a similar move in January.

Investor fears about rising oil prices and how Japan’s Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi can afford her fiscal stimulus plans recently pushed the yen towards 40-year lows near ¥164 to the dollar. Following the end of Ueda’s press conference on Friday, the yen strengthened sharply to less than ¥159 against the US dollar, sparking speculation that the Ministry of Finance had intervened in markets.

“It looks like [another intervention], but smaller in scale,” said one FX banker. “As we have seen in past episodes, they intervene more than once.”

Thursday’s intervention would be the first since a series of moves by the government in April and May that involved ¥11.7tn being spent to prop up the currency. This time, due in part to co-ordination with the US, some analysts said the gains had a better chance of being maintained, at least in the short term.

Atsushi Mimura, Japan’s vice-minister of finance for international affairs, said: “We understand that we are receiving support from the US authorities that goes beyond mere moral support. We have been in constant contact with them.”

Osamu Takashima, foreign exchange strategist at Citigroup in Tokyo, said it was unlikely that the yen would weaken once more to ¥164 to the dollar “in the very near term” because it seemed the US was willing to help Japan defend its currency.

He added that since the market would be wary of further intervention, “dollar-yen upside is probably limited for now”.

But others have said that any intervention by Japanese authorities will struggle to provide lasting support to the currency without assistance from higher interest rate expectations, especially as the Fed is widely expected by the market to raise rates in the coming months, lifting the dollar.

One banker in Asia said clients were already testing the government’s commitment, putting on yen short positions with targets around ¥162.

FT : Air France-KLM targets easyJet passengers during takeover turmoil Chief exe

Air France-KLM targets easyJet passengers during takeover turmoil
Chief executive of French-Dutch airline group sees opportunity if low-cost carrier is acquired by its suitors

Air France-KLM aims to capitalise on turmoil from an expected £5.7bn takeover of easyJet to seize back passengers who have fled to the budget airline.

EasyJet had poached customers from both Air France and KLM, forcing the Franco-Dutch group to revamp its low-cost offering, its chief executive Ben Smith said.

With an offer for easyJet expected as soon as this weekend — and likely to drag on for months — Smith is confident Air France-KLM can reclaim some passengers who have switched to the British carrier over the years.

“For sure [we will win them back] now that we have a product that can compete and with the lower cost,” Smith told the FT. “These are customers we’ve lost because of the attractiveness of their product.” 

He said easyJet gave Air France-KLM “a headache . . . they are a very well run carrier and they have been able to create a niche for themselves, which is quite impressive”.

US private equity group Apollo and private credit group Castlelake are both weighing final offers for easyJet. Last month the airline said it favoured Apollo’s proposal for a £5.7bn takeover offer at £7.15 a share over Castlelake’s most recent £6.90 a share offer worth £5.5bn. 

Under UK takeover rules, Castlelake has until 5pm on Monday to submit a final offer, while Apollo has until Friday. After Apollo’s surprise entry into the deal last month, Castlelake said it was considering its options. 

If either company is successful, the sales process will stretch into next year. Once acquired, easyJet is likely to be overhauled by its new owners, giving rivals an opportunity to woo its passengers. 

Although it started as a low-cost operator, with the ambition of making flying as cheap as buying “a pair of jeans”, easyJet has moved into higher-cost primary airports in recent years.

While this has meant higher ticket prices, it pits the airline squarely against legacy carriers that have higher cost bases.


Smith said easyJet had “relatively large positions” at key airports such as Paris Charles de Gaulle, compared with rivals such as Ryanair that only use second-tier airports farther from city centres. 

EasyJet also “introduced some very premium business-friendly types of attributes like boarding fast, having [bookable] front-row seats, having free baggage, at Gatwick they have the lounge, so they’ve been quite innovative on this”, he added. 

Transavia, Air France-KLM’s budget airline, had “modelled a lot of the product offering around what easyJet has been able to do”, Smith said.

His company has extended its “Flying Blue” loyalty programme to Transavia, and launched new services from Paris’s lower-cost Orly airport. 

>>> Barron’s Weekend Summary

Cover:
-GLP-1 drugs are evolving from blockbuster obesity treatments into what could become the pharmaceutical industry's equivalent of AI: a platform technology with expanding applications across dozens of diseases. Barron's argues that Eli Lilly has overtaken Novo Nordisk as the market leader and could double annual profits to more than $60B by 2030, placing it alongside Wall Street's biggest earners. The investment case extends well beyond weight loss, with clinical trials targeting heart disease, Alzheimer's, Parkinson's, kidney disease, addiction and cancer prevention, while expanding Medicare coverage and new delivery methods could dramatically enlarge the addressable market.

CEO Interview:
-No update

Tech Trader:
-This week's violent selloff in AI stocks, triggered by the collapse of highly leveraged hedge fund positions, did little to alter the industry's underlying fundamentals. Barron's argues that earnings from Alphabet, Amazon, and Microsoft demonstrate that massive AI infrastructure spending is already translating into accelerating cloud revenue, expanding margins and stronger pricing power, justifying continued investment of roughly $600B in AI data centers this year. The report also highlights improving adoption of AI software such as Microsoft 365 Copilot and Salesforce Agentforce, while identifying Meta as the only major AI spender lacking a cloud business capable of directly monetizing its enormous capital expenditures.

The Trader:
-Conventional wisdom holds that stocks always outperform bonds over the long run, but new research challenges that assumption. Citing a study by Santa Clara University's Edward McQuarrie, Barron's argues that long-term government bonds have historically outperformed equities during prolonged periods of deflation and disinflation, while stocks have delivered superior returns in inflationary environments. The findings suggest that the equity risk premium is not constant but depends heavily on the prevailing inflation regime, highlighting the importance of macroeconomic conditions in long-term asset allocation.
-Airbnb is trying to evolve from a home-sharing platform into a broad travel-services marketplace offering hotels, experiences, rentals and other services, but Barron's argues the strategy doesn't yet justify the stock's premium valuation. While the company's core business remains healthy and could receive a temporary boost from World Cup travel, increasing regulatory restrictions on short-term rentals and the uncertainty surrounding its expansion into new business lines make the shares look fully valued relative to rivals Booking Holdings and Expedia.

Features:
-Publicis Groupe has transformed itself from a traditional advertising agency into an AI-driven marketing and data company, positioning it to benefit from the growing complexity of digital advertising. Barron's argues the French group has successfully integrated creative services, consumer data and AI-powered media planning, allowing it to outperform peers and raise guidance again. With AI-related services now generating 87% of revenue and demand driven by increasingly fragmented media consumption, the magazine believes the shares could appreciate as much as 56% over the next year.
-Markets are no longer reacting to bad news so much as questioning the assumptions that have driven the bull market for the past three years. Barron's argues that uncertainty over AI spending, the economic outlook and the direction of interest rates has left investors struggling to price risk, triggering a rotation out of semiconductor stocks and into defensive sectors. Despite the shift in sentiment, corporate earnings remain exceptionally strong, with technology still expected to generate roughly half of S&P 500 profits, meaning the market's fate continues to hinge on whether AI investment can justify its enormous cost.

European Trader:
-The Bank of England kept interest rates unchanged at 3.75%, reinforcing the growing divergence between the U.K. and the United States as investors speculated the Federal Reserve might resume tightening. Barron's argues that easing British inflation has given policymakers room to remain on hold despite higher energy prices linked to Middle East tensions. The decision also buys time for new Prime Minister Andy Burnham, whose economic agenda will be closely scrutinized by bond markets wary of increased government spending.

Emerging Markets:
-Chevron delivered blockbuster second-quarter results as higher oil prices during the Iran war and record refinery output drove earnings well above expectations. Barron's argues the company is using the windfall to strengthen its balance sheet rather than aggressively expanding, reducing net debt, integrating its Hess acquisition ahead of schedule and maintaining capital discipline. Despite a sharp rally in the shares, analysts believe Chevron still trades at an unjustified discount to Exxon Mobil, leaving room for further upside.

Commodities:
-International Paper surged after announcing an $80-per-ton increase in containerboard prices, following a similar move by rival Packaging Corp. of America, reinforcing signs of stronger pricing power across the packaging industry. Barron's says the increase reflects higher input costs, tight supply and resilient demand, while J.P. Morgan upgraded the stock, arguing that improving industry fundamentals and higher prices should support earnings despite the shares' recent rally.

Streetwise:
-No update

>>> SPAIN: THE TRUE REALITY OF THE OUTPERFORMANCE

Sent last week but interesting with what happening

----- Original Message -----
From: LAURENT CHEKROUN
At: 07/27/26 08:33:26 UTC+02:00



From: Laurent Chekroun (MAKOR CAPITAL MARKET) At: 07/26/26 17:11:58 UTC+2:00
Subject: >>> SPAIN: THE TRUE REALITY OF THE OUTPERFORMANCE

GRAHAM ADVISORS | MACRO — EUROPE | 26 JUL 2026

SPAIN: THE TRUE REALITY OF THE OUTPERFORMANCE
(Country deep-dive, 5pp, 4 exhibits. LC.)

- Spain grows 3x the euro area (2.4% vs 0.9% 2026f, EC Spring) and has closed to within 10% of EU average income. Real, not spin.
- But it is quantity-led: foreign-born = ~2/3 of net job creation since the pandemic. Output per employed person +0.3%; GDP per hour still 7% below EU average.
- Absorptive capacity is the binding constraint: 226k new households in 2025 vs ~83.5k homes completed. Prices +12.9% y/y.
- Unemployment 10.83% (Q1) — still the EU's highest after a five-year boom. Structural, not cyclical.
- Debt falling on nominal growth, not adjustment. No budget passed since 2023; spending ceiling voted down twice in late 2025.

The question is not whether Spain is growing. It is what the growth rate does when immigration moderates and the productivity gap is still open.

Full note attached.

LC / Graham Advisors.

Institutional clients only — not for redistribution.