WSJ : Hermes Sales Growth Slows Against Tough Luxury Backdrop The timing of a Ch

Hermes Sales Growth Slows Against Tough Luxury Backdrop
The timing of a Chinese recovery has been a major question for the industry

Hermes RMS -7.48%decrease; red down pointing triangle said sales growth lost pace in the third quarter, as hopes of a recovery in luxury demand dwindle.

The French luxury house booked revenue of 4.1 billion euros ($4.61 billion) for the quarter through September, 4.3% higher than in the same period a year earlier at constant currencies. In the second quarter, the Parisian maker of high-end handbags and silk scarves logged a 6.7% increase in revenue.

The stock traded 6.7% lower at 1,264.50 euros, after what Deutsche Bank analysts described as disappointing quarterly results.

Luxury names have been navigating a tough market in recent years, mainly due to sliding demand for high-end goods, especially in China, where European brands also face rising competition from local labels. The war in Iran represents another blow, as the Middle East is a key travel hub for Asian tourist flows to Europe.

The timing of a recovery in China has been a major question for the industry, which had come to rely on spending by the country’s wealthy shoppers at home and abroad.

However, China’s economy remains choppy, prompting consumers to keep to a tight budget. “The macroeconomic context isn’t favorable,” Hermes’ executive vice-president of finance, Eric du Halgouet, said during an earnings call.

Last week, Louis Vuitton owner LVMH warned that weak demand in the country weighed on the performance of its crucial fashion and leather goods division.

“We remain confident in the potential of China,” du Halgouet said, noting that, for now, consumer trust in China is still low and consumption remains unchanged. Lower footfall in Chinese stores has hurt sales of fashion accessories, watches and shoes, he said.

The company said it had stepped up security at stores in its home market following recent protests. Although it is still too early to assess the impact of the demonstrations in France, its Marseille store won’t reopen anytime soon due to damage, du Halgouet said.

Despite economic, geopolitical and monetary uncertainties, the company continues to expect revenue growth at constant exchange rates in the medium term.

FT : London credit hedge fund Arini’s losses mount Master fund sheds estimated 7

London credit hedge fund Arini’s losses mount
Master fund sheds estimated 7% in October, taking decline for the year to more than 21%

Arini Capital Management’s under-pressure hedge fund has shed another 7 per cent this month, exacerbating losses in the fast-growing London credit specialist’s marquee strategy. 

Arini, which has grown to a $22bn-in-assets firm in just five years, has told investors it estimated it had lost 6.91 per cent in its master fund between the start of October and end of last week, according to people familiar with the matter.

The continued run of losses meant that Arini’s roughly $7bn fund is now down more than 21 per cent for the year, the people added. Arini previously communicated that its main hedge fund strategy had lost 15.7 per cent between the start of the year and the end of September.

The losses are some of the biggest at a major credit hedge fund this year and mark a reversal for a firm that rapidly drew in money from sovereign wealth funds and large endowments for its market-beating returns in previous years.

Arini, which was founded by former Credit Suisse star trader Hamza Lemssouguer in 2021, has built large positions in several troubled companies whose bonds and loans have crashed in value as lenders prepare for bruising restructuring negotiations.

Bonds that it owns at companies including struggling telecommunications companies Altice International and Brightspeed, as well as British luxury-car maker Aston Martin, have continued to trade lower in the secondary market this month. 

Arini also holds a smaller position in bonds at German property group Adler that have crashed from face value to less than 60 cents on the euro over the past month, according to people familiar with the matter. Proposals from politicians in Berlin to nationalise the assets of large landlords have driven the slump in the long-troubled company’s bonds.

Arini’s master fund accounts for about $7bn of its assets, with performance in other funds specialising in asset-backed lending and private credit faring better.

On Wednesday, Arini announced it had closed its inaugural direct lending fund, which has a “strategic sourcing alliance” with financial advisory firm Lazard, targeting a “deployment of over $4bn”. It also recently raised $1.5bn for its flagship fund, with $425mn coming in early October. The remainder is to be allocated by early 2027, according to people familiar with the matter.

Arini has sought to reassure investors over its performance in recent weeks, telling them that it had previously bounced back from significant mark-to-market losses to achieve market-beating returns. 

“We do not believe it is an indicator of soured investments, but rather part of the process — being contrarian is a necessary condition for this opportunity set,” Arini wrote in a letter to clients earlier this month, adding that press reports describing its lossmaking positions as “soured bets” were a “miscategorisation”. 

The FT reported earlier this month that Arini’s flagship fund had suffered losses after enduring a string of soured bets.

Arini also provided investors with a summary of its “valuation process, fund liquidity profile, and internal controls”. 

Arini did not respond to a request for comment.

WSJ : Meta Will Split Stock, Create New Class to Fund AI Spending The company, w

Meta Will Split Stock, Create New Class to Fund AI Spending
The company, which reported record revenue of $64.6 billion for the third quarter, says the 2-for-1 split won’t affect Mark Zuckerberg’s voting control

  • Meta Platforms will create a new class of nonvoting stock to raise capital for artificial intelligence development.
  • The company reported record third-quarter revenue of $64.6 billion, but net income fell below analyst forecasts due to a $9.9 billion legal charge.
  • An effective 2-for-1 stock split won’t affect Chief Executive Mark Zuckerberg’s voting control.

Meta Platforms META 0.47%increase; up pointing triangle is getting creative to fund its massive investments in artificial intelligence.

The company reported record revenue for the third quarter and said it would create a new class of nonvoting stock to raise the capital it needs for developing and serving AI models. The new shares will be issued as a dividend to holders of common and supervoting shares, with an effective date of Jan. 19, 2027. The effective 2-for-1 stock split won’t affect Chief Executive Mark Zuckerberg’s voting control or the voting power of other shareholders, the company said.

In a filing, Meta said Zuckerberg would be able to immediately sell 20% of his new nonvoting shares, potentially helping him pay a new wealth tax on California’s upcoming ballot. The company said Zuckerberg faced a possible diminishment of his voting interest if the tax forced him to sell shares, and that he had discussed the possibility of relocating. Zuckerberg has committed to living in the same state as Meta’s headquarters for at least eight years barring unforeseen circumstances, the filing said.

The company said it brought in $64.6 billion in revenue, a 26% year-over-year increase, and net income of $9.8 billion. The revenue figure exceeded the expectations of analysts surveyed by FactSet. The net income total was considerably below analysts’ forecast of $17.2 billion, dragged down by a $9.9 billion legal charge related to the company’s settlement of social-media harm lawsuits.

In the current quarter, Meta expects revenue to be in the range of $73 billion to $76 billion, the high end of which is above analyst expectations. It also revised its range of expected capital expenditures for the year, raising the low end to $135 billion, from $130 billion. The high end of the range remained unchanged at $145 billion.

Meta finance chief Susan Li didn’t provide a capex estimate for 2027 but said company leaders “expect to continue investing aggressively” to support both its core business and AI bets.

Meta’s free cash flow went into negative territory for the first time since it became a public company, although analysts had expected a stronger downturn. The company reported negative free cash flow of $2.1 billion versus analyst projections of negative $9.4 billion.

Meta’s shares rose 4% in after-hours trading.

Investors have at times been hesitant to support the spending spree Zuckerberg has undertaken to transform Meta into an AI company, repeatedly pushing him to see near-term returns.

They responded warmly when Meta launched Muse, its new personal-assistant AI agent, in September. The app, which offers subscriptions at $20 and $100 a month, has been downloaded more than 10 million times, according to SensorTower, a market intelligence firm. Meta’s stock gained nearly 20% in the month after its debut.

Investors pointed to Meta’s potential ability to monetize the app, with one estimate from Truist Securities projecting Muse could add $28.5 billion of incremental revenue by 2030. On a call with investors and analysts, Zuckerberg said about 25% of people who have set up Muse use it “on any given day” and that shopping was the most popular use case.

But to become Meta’s next large business, Muse will have to clear a number of hurdles, beginning with widespread unpopularity of AI as expressed in polls. Muse has also been blocked by dozens of websites, including Amazon.com, limiting its utility in carrying out shopping and other tasks.

Still, Meta sees Muse as the centerpiece of its whole operation and has restructured the company around the division that houses it, called Meta Superintelligence Labs. It also announced a new business line focused on selling AI tools to enterprise customers.

The goal, Zuckerberg said, is to create “a large-scale Muse network” where billions of Muse agents work together to get more done for people and businesses.

Another weight on the company’s bottom line has been legal costs related to the many social media lawsuits it is facing. In August, Meta settled with 48 states for up to $18 billion and agreed to make a number of changes to the way its platforms operate accounts for teens.

On Wednesday, ahead of its earnings report, a judge in New Mexico ordered Meta to pay $25 billion after a jury found the social-media company misled users about its data-privacy practices. Meta didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment about the judgment.

WSJ : AI Just Found a Bug That Puts up to 70% of the World’s Websites at Risk Ar

AI Just Found a Bug That Puts up to 70% of the World’s Websites at Risk
Artificial-intelligence tools helped find one of the most severe online bugs ever. Cyber experts are racing to patch it before hackers use AI to exploit it.

  • PHP creators disclosed a critical security issue called PHP2Shell that could allow hackers to take control of systems running its software.
  • Security researchers at Calif discovered the vulnerability, which affects technology powering up to 70% of websites, using OpenAI’s GPT-5.6 Sol.
  • Web administrators rushed to patch the issue amid concerns that hackers could use AI tools to quickly exploit the vulnerability.

First, artificial intelligence heralded the Bugmageddon. Now it is triggering an all-hands-on-deck cyber emergency.

The creators of PHP, a technology that powers as much as 70% of the world’s websites, disclosed a critical security issue Wednesday that could be leveraged by hackers to take control of any system running its software. That would allow an attacker to steal information or launch a cyberattack on anyone visiting a hacked website.

Security researchers found the vulnerability using AI. Now web administrators are scrambling to protect themselves from the vulnerability, which cutting-edge AI systems could quickly exploit.

Some government and commercial site operators say they pre-emptively took their sites offline, and reports of attempted cyberattacks began circulating on Wednesday.

The issue, dubbed PHP2Shell, represents a class of problems in the way PHP manages a computer’s memory. It can be exploited in many ways, some requiring just a few seconds, by hackers who could use it to run unauthorized software on any unpatched web server.

It is the most severe security issue that PHP has faced in more than a decade, according to Volker Dusch, a security engineer with the nonprofit foundation that manages the PHP project. He likened it to Heartbleed, a similarly widespread vulnerability that forced a global race to protect hundreds of thousands of servers more than a decade ago.


When security patches are released, it marks the starting shot in a race between defenders and hackers. Defenders have to test and install the software patches, while hackers study the patches as a guide to find new vulnerabilities, looking to see what has changed and then devising ways of attacking those areas.

But today’s AI tools can do this work much quicker than any human, potentially making the process more risky, security experts say.

“Some dude on Twitter could take the patches and run AI against it and post some exploit script,” said Thai Duong, the chief executive of Calif, the security company that first discovered the issue. “All hell will break loose.”

The big bug
Ryan Austin, a researcher at Calif, uncovered the flaws with help from GPT-5.6 Sol, one of OpenAI’s most advanced models, during an audit of PHP’s source code in August. OpenAI funded that and other audits, part of an effort by AI companies to help open-source projects address software vulnerabilities now being uncovered by artificial intelligence systems.

The class of bugs had been hiding in PHP’s source code for years. A security researcher had flagged it as a problem area decades earlier, but the flaw had been considered too difficult to exploit and was largely forgotten, Duong said.

AI found a way. Austin figured out how to control the code that was running in the computer’s memory with as few as a few dozen requests to a server running PHP. On smaller systems, the hack takes just seconds. On more complex ones, it can take hours.

On Aug. 11, Duong called PHP’s Dusch. “There’s a serious issue here,” he said.

“I had a moment of, ‘Oh God, what are we doing now?’ ” Dusch said. “ ‘How do I communicate this?’ ”

“And then you calm down, you let the adrenaline flow through, and you get to fixing,” he said.

Soon an informal working group had formed among security researchers and software engineers. They collaborated with software distributors and security companies, figuring out ways to patch PHP2Shell and prevent it from being exploited.

Researchers from Google’s Wiz cybersecurity team soon reached out with new exploits, which they had discovered independent of Calif. There were findings from OpenAI’s research team, too.

AI is enabling well-meaning security researchers to find thousands of software bugs, overwhelming projects like PHP with a flood of issues that need patching. But PHP2Shell was viewed as a priority and AI’s proficiency at hacking prompted worries that criminals could exploit PHP2Shell on many websites before they can be patched.

Keeping the secret
PHP2Shell is “the most severe AI vulnerability that was ever found,” and one that was likely too complex to have been discovered without AI, said Ami Luttwak, Wiz’s co-founder.

Duong and the other researchers kept its existence a closely guarded secret while they worked on fixes, for fear that an AI-aided hacker might find and exploit it before they were done.

The patching effort was massive. There are close to 200 files being fixed and developers wrote over 10,000 lines of code during the process.

Eventually, a patch date was set: October 22. Then, the inevitable happened. News of the patch leaked out Tuesday, in a post to Hacker News, just under two days before the patch release.

Dusch’s team decided to rush out the patch. On Tuesday, they warned the world to stand by and expect a critical security update on Wednesday.

It was “a good balance to inform defenders,” Dusch said, “and not give attackers too much time to develop exploits.”

>>> What to look at today - 22nd of Oct. 2026

Contracts for the Nasdaq 100 Index slipped 1.1% and those for the S&P 500 dropped 0.5%, following a split set of results from Tesla Inc. and Meta Platforms Inc. In Asia, the Kospi Index — a barometer for the AI trade — declined 2.2% as chip heavyweights Samsung Electronics Co. and SK Hynix Inc. retreated. China’s CSI 300 Index fell 1.7% and was set for a bear market. Alibaba Group Holding Ltd. led Chinese e-commerce shares lower after the government called for quality control. The broader MSCI Asia Pacific Index lost 1%.
Tesla dropped 3.3% in post-market trading after cutting its capital-spending forecast. Meta Platforms, however, rose 2.2% after hours as the company boosted its bet on AI with spending outlook. Shares of the semiconductor capital equipment company Lam Research Corp. fell 7.4% in extended trading after a weaker-than-expected earnings forecast. Also weighing on the mood, crude oil advanced after deadly attacks in Saudi Arabia heightened concerns that escalating Middle East hostilities could hit supply. Brent climbed 1.5% to trade above $110 a barrel. The latest corporate results will test whether earnings can keep the AI trade on track as investors weigh strong growth against the mounting cost of funding the industry’s expansion. Concerns have grown that heavy spending on data centers and computing capacity may take longer to generate returns, while this year’s blistering stock rally has raised questions about stretched valuations and the risk of an AI bubble. Doubts over the economics of the AI boom have rattled markets recently, with shareholders demanding clearer evidence that enormous outlays on infrastructure will eventually pay off. The repricing has been sharp. The Nasdaq 100 lost 5.5% last week, its steepest weekly decline since President Donald Trump unveiled global tariffs in April 2025. The Philadelphia Semiconductor Index slid for eight consecutive sessions, marking its longest run of losses since October 2008. Prominent investors have added to the skepticism. Billionaire Ken Griffin said markets are “almost certainly” experiencing an AI bubble as businesses wrestle with investment decisions and the technology’s economic impact. Ray Dalio earlier this month warned that AI is a “classic bubble” that is nearing a bursting point thanks to rising interest rates and the need to turn wealth into cash. Elsewhere, the Bank of Korea kept its benchmark interest rate unchanged, pausing after a rare back-to-back increase aimed at containing inflation fueled by an unprecedented semiconductor-led economic boom. Attention is also on the rising tensions in the Middle East and the oil market. Oil rose following a deadly attack on a Saudi oil field, raising concerns that escalating hostilities in the Middle East could hit supply even as exports through the Strait of Hormuz have accelerated in recent months.  The US State Department issued an ordered departure for non-emergency personnel and their families from Saudi Arabia because of the growing threat from Houthi militants in neighboring Yemen. The US and Israeli militaries have developed specific plans for renewed strikes against Iran after the American midterm elections, the New York Times reported, citing US officials and other people briefed on the deliberations.
Investors aren’t “comfortable with oil rising above 110,” said Rajeev De Mello, a global macro portfolio manager at Gama Asset Management. “We are regularly making new highs in oil and energy products, which is stagflationary. Implied volatility on oil options is rising once again reflecting uncertainty about the future path of energy as we approach the Northern Hemisphere winter.” US After Hours After Hours Summary: QS +10.3%, LBRT +8.6%, SEIC +4.5%, ESI +4.4%, CSX +4.1%, SAP +4.0%, EPRT +3.7% higher on earnings; SON -10.2%, HXL -10.1%, GGG -8.7%, ROL -7.4%, KALU -6.2%, LRCX -5.4%, OII -4.7% lower on earnings

Nikkei -2.56% Hang Seng -3.13% CSI -1.81% Kospi -3.78% Shanghai -1.44% Shenzen -2.56%

Eur$ CNH CNY JPY GBP CHF RUB TRY WTI$ Gold BTC ETH

S&P -0.88% Nasdaq -1.66% EuroStoxx -1.07% FTSE -0.45% Dax -0.78% SMI +0.35%

Macro :
- EU September Car Registrations Rise 9.3% Y/y to 0.971m Units
- Einhorn’s Greenlight Lost 3.3% in 3Q, Stung by Long Positions
- Ex-Brevan Howard Trader Sued by Quant Who Joined New Fund
- Balyasny Macro Trader Stanley Sheriff Leaves After Losses
- US Orders Some Diplomats Out of Saudi Arabia Amid Houthi Attacks

Keep an eye on :
- AMBA US : Ambarella Shares Jump on Betaville Report of Nvidia Interest
- Anthropic IPO : Stripe and Anthropic Form Claude Duet Payments Framework
- Anthropic IPO : Anthropic Opens Research Preview of Claude Duet
- ATEA NO : Atea 3Q Ebitda Misses Estimates
- ARGX BB : Argenx 3Q Vyvgart Sales Beat Estimates
- AZN LN : Astra’s Ultomiris Gets FDA Approval for Rare Kidney Disease
- AZE BB : Azelis 3Q Revenue Beats Estimates
- BKT SM : Bankinter 3Q Net Income Meets Estimates
- BARC LN : Barclays ‘Big Believer’ In Mideast Opportunities, Khanna Says
- BESI NA : BE Semiconductor 3Q Orders Beats Estimates
- BONAVA SS : Bonava 3Q Net Sales SEK1.51B Vs. SEK1.20B Y/y
- CA FP : *CARREFOUR STUDIES BUYING CONDIS TO GROW IN CATALONIA: CINCO
- CO FP : Plesio Repays €15.3m of Quatrim Secured Debt
- COOR SS : Coor 3Q Net Sales Meet Estimates
- COV FP : Covivio 9M Occupancy 96.4%
- ACA FP : Credit Agricole CIB Names Bajaj as Head of Energy & Infra. Asia
- CVC NA : CVC Explores Bid to Take Verisure Private: FT
- DOM SS : Dometic 3Q Net Sales Beat Estimates
- EMSN SW : EMS-Chemie 9M Net Sales CHF1.51B Vs. CHF1.49B Y/y
- ENEA SS : Enea 3Q Revenue Misses Estimates
- FDJU FP : FDJ United Sees FY Recurring Ebitda Margin 23%, Saw 23% to 24%
- FGR FP : Eiffage Signs MOU With LOSC to Sell Decathlon Arena Operators
- FTK GY : FlatexDEGIRO 3Q Revenue Misses Estimates
- FNAC FP : Fnac Darty 3Q Revenue EU2.51B Vs. EU2.49B Y/y
- GALD SW : Galderma Sees FY Sales at Constant FX +22.5% to +23.5%
- GET FP : Getlink 3Q Revenue Beats Estimates
- GRNG SS : Granges 3Q Adjusted Operating Profit Beats Estimates
- RMS FP : Hermes 3Q Asia Pacific Rev. at Constant FX Misses Estimates
- HTRO SS : Hexatronic 3Q Operating Income SEK328M
- HOLN SW : Inversiones ASPI Launches Tender Offer for Cementos Pacasmayo
- HOLMB SS : Holmen 3Q Operating Profit Misses Estimates
- IBM US : IBM Maintains FY Revenue at Constant Currency Forecast: Snapshot
- IHG LN : InterContinental Hotels Remains Confident of Meeting Consensus
- IPN FP : Ipsen FY Sales at Constant FX Forecast Beats Estimates
- KIN BB : Kinepolis 'Firmly on Track' for Record Year
- LDO IM : *LEONARDO-RHEINMETALL JV TO GET €3.7B ORDER FOR ITALY TANKS: MF
- LINDEX FH : Lindex 3Q Net Sales EU241.5M
- LSEG LN : LSEG Near $3.5b Deal to Buy Octus as Soon as Thursday: FT
- META US : Meta Sees 4Q Revenue $73B to $76B, Est. $73.57B: Snapshot
- META US : Zuckerberg Mulls California Move If Prop 40 Passes, Meta Says
- MONC IM : Moncler ADRs Advance as 3Q Revenue Tops Consensus Estimates
- NESN SW : Nestle 9M Real Internal Growth +1.9%
- NEX FP : Nexans 3Q Organic Revenue Beats Estimates
- NOKIA FH : Nokia 3Q Adjusted Operating Profit Beats Estimates
- NDX1 GY : Nordex Gets 192 MW Order From Mercury in New Zealand
- NXT AU : Hedge funds feast on NextDC, but brokers say it’s still a ‘buy’
- NOD NO : Nordic Semiconductor Sees 4Q Rev. $215M to $235M, Est. $217.1M
- PNDXB SS : Pandox 3Q Income From Property Management SEK1.49B
- PHARM NA : Pharming Prelim 3Q Revenue About $117.6M
- PCELL SS : PowerCell 3Q Sales SEK33.1M Vs. SEK85.8M Y/y
- PUIG SM : Puig 3Q Net Revenue Beats Estimates
- QGEN US : Qiagen Prelim 3Q Net Sales Beat Estimates
- QIA GY : EQT Is Said to Near €9.6 Billion Deal for Testing Firm Qiagen
- QGEN US : EQT to Buy Qiagen for EU46.50/Share in Cash
- R3NK GY : Renk to Sell Slide Bearings Business to Miba AG
- RTO LN : Rentokil Sees Earnings in Line With Market Expectations
- RHM GY : *LEONARDO-RHEINMETALL JV TO GET €3.7B ORDER FOR ITALY TANKS: MF
- ROP SW : Roche 3Q Sales Beat Estimates
- SAP GY : SAP 3Q Non-IFRS Cloud Revenue Beats Estimates, SAP Gains With Cloud a Highlight of Results: Street Wrap
- SAND SS : Sandvik 3Q Adjusted Operating Profit Beats Estimates
- DIM FP : Sartorius Stedim 3Q Underlying Ebitda Meets Estimates
- SRT GY : Sartorius 3Q Sales Beat Estimates
- SCATC NO : Scatec Cuts Full-Year 2026 Power Production EBITDA Forecast
- SCHP SW : Schindler Raises Ebit Margin Forecast, 3Q Ebit Beats Estimates (1)
- SMCP FP : SMCP 3Q Organic Sales -2%
- 4XO GY : Steyr Motors Maintains FY Revenue Forecast
- TELIA SS : Telia 3Q Adjusted Ebitda Beats Estimates; Upgrades FY Outlook
- TSLA US : Tesla 3Q Adjusted EPS Beats Estimates: Snapshot
- HO FP : Thales Lifts Guidance on Growing Defense, Aerospace Demand
- THULE SS : Thule 3Q Net Sales Meet Estimates
- TXN US : TI Gains as Forecast Points to Ongoing Momentum: Street Wrap
- TOBII SS : Tobii 3Q Operating Loss SEK217M
- UCB BB : UCB Raises 2026 Revenue, Adj. Ebitda Growth Guidance
- VPLAYB SS : Viaplay 3Q Sales SEK5.25B
- VSURE SS : CVC Explores Bid to Take Verisure Private: FT
- VOS GY : Vossloh 9M Ebit EU56.6M Vs. EU76.2M Y/y
- MF FP : Wendel Net Asset Value per Share EU167.00 Vs. EU158.90 Q/Q

>>> Europe : Brokers Upgrades & Downgrades - 22nd of Oct. 2026

>>> Up
* Ageas Raised to Overweight at JPMorgan; PT 90 euros
* Asmodee Raised to Buy at Trigon Dom Maklerski; PT 196 kronor
* ASR Nederland Raised to Overweight at JPMorgan; PT 90 euros
* Erste Raised to Buy at Trigon Dom Maklerski; PT 128.60 euros
* Georgia Capital Raised to Buy at Wood & Company; PT 5,110 pence
* Handelsbanken Raised to Neutral at SB1 Markets; PT 140 kronor
* Multiconsult Raised to Buy at SB1 Markets; PT 160 kroner
* RS Group Raised to Buy at Berenberg; PT 900 pence
* Salix Group Raised to Buy at SB1 Markets; PT 78 kronor
* XP Power Raised to Buy at Deutsche Bank; PT 2,285 pence

>>> Down
* Aegon Cut to Neutral at JPMorgan; PT 8.15 euros
* Carrefour Cut to Neutral at UBS; PT 15 euros
* Commerzbank Cut to Equal-Weight at Barclays; PT 41 euros
* DFS Cut to Hold at Jefferies; PT 156 pence
* Erste Cut to Market Perform at KBW; PT 126 euros
* HMS Networks Cut to Hold at ABG; PT 535 kronor
* Kesko Cut to Hold at ABG; PT 26 euros
* Lapwall Cut to Reduce at Inderes; PT 5.50 euros
* Maersk Cut to Sell at Goldman; PT 18,000 kroner
* OPmobility Cut to Neutral at JPMorgan; PT 12 euros
* Qiagen Cut to Neutral at JPMorgan; PT $52
* Sobi Cut to Hold at Nordea
* Ubisoft Cut to Underperform at BNP Paribas; PT 3.50 euros
* Vincit Cut to Reduce at Inderes; PT 90 euro cents

>>> Initiation


>>> Call
* *HSBC STRATEGISTS RAISE EUROPEAN ENERGY STOCKS TO NEUTRAL

FT : A dangerous threat to UK company rules must be scrapped Proposal to ditch t

A dangerous threat to UK company rules must be scrapped
Proposal to ditch the regime on capital distributions such as dividends risks lower growth and weaker businesses

It pays to read the small print. Buried deep within a 70-page UK government consultation on “Modernising corporate reporting” is a proposal to take a wrecking ball to a foundational investor protection. 

The proposal is to abandon the UK’s longstanding regime for ensuring companies do not pay out excessive amounts of capital to shareholders. This capital maintenance regime would be replaced by vague attestation similar to that required of management to state their companies are a going concern.

Couched in soothing rhetoric of supporting growth and tackling wasteful complexity, it is sold as a win-win. But investors and the public should reject this framing. This is not a narrow technical tweak; it would strip away a core investor protection that has existed since the 19th century and codified in the 1980s. If it proceeds, the public will lose.

The current regime aims to ensure that capital is invested in productive activities, and not channelled straight back out of a company. Distributions must only be paid out of accumulated, realised profits. Two features of this regime stand out. First, prudence: companies must provide for foreseeable losses and liabilities, even where timing or value is uncertain. To ignore expected obligations could lead to excessive distributions, jeopardising the company’s ability to pay its debts as they fall due.

Second, companies must not distribute “unrealised” profits — those booked (or accrued) in the financial statements but not yet received in cash or near cash. The early recognition of income from long-term contracts before it has been paid is one example of “unrealised” earnings. Mark-to-market gains on a portfolio of assets are another. Paying cash dividends out before cash profits have been received risks an entity coming up short.

The capital maintenance regime underpins corporate resilience and its healthy functioning sustains investment, job creation and economic growth. The government suggests capital maintenance could be replaced with a solvency regime. However, what is being proposed looks more like a going concern-style approach, not rooted in the hard reality of a balance sheet test.

The UK already requires a going concern attestation and, according to the Audit Reform Lab think-tank, this has failed to provide early warning of impending failure in three out of four large corporate liquidations between 2010 and 2022. The problem is not onerous capital protection rules; it is that the rules we have are not being enforced.

Consider what has unfolded in the water industry. Water companies have paid tens of billions in dividends since privatisation in 1989, while infrastructure investment has fallen short. In November 2025, Ofwat announced that nine of 16 companies were under enhanced monitoring or in “action required” status over their financial strength.

The reasons for the proposal are hard to know but it is a matter of public record that the accountancy profession has long sought to remove the capital maintenance rules, arguing their failure to line up with International Financial Reporting Standards causes confusion. This may be simpler, but simplicity is no reason to remove essential safeguards.

The proposals are all the harder to fathom given the government’s recent calls for stronger enforcement. In 2019, a cross-party select committee was unequivocal in rejecting any weakening of the regime in its Future of Audit report, written after collapse of Carillion, a construction company.

Proposals to strengthen capital maintenance enforcement were duly drawn up as part of a review in 2022. They were due to be enacted until, in January, the government scrapped its Audit Reform Bill, citing costs to large companies. Now it wants to scrap capital maintenance rules altogether.

Weakening investor protections is not a growth strategy. Sheffield university research found that, since the financial crisis, a significant minority of large listed UK companies have distributed more dividends and share buybacks than they declared in group income. The productivity, investment, operating performance and impairment resilience of high distributors were materially worse than companies with lower distribution rates.

The government’s seemingly innocuous proposal is not just wrong-headed; it is dangerous and sets the scene for weaker companies and persistently low growth — the opposite of what the UK needs. The government must rethink.

FT : Highland Spring billionaire’s property empire hit by loan defaults and cred

Highland Spring billionaire’s property empire hit by loan defaults and creditor action
Family of former UAE ambassador Mahdi Al Tajir looks to sell prized UK property assets as lenders seek to recoup unpaid debts

The billionaire owner of bottled water company Highland Spring has been hit by defaults and enforcement actions from creditors across his family’s heavily indebted property empire.

The family of Mahdi Al Tajir, the United Arab Emirates’ first ambassador to the UK who was ranked for years as the richest man in Scotland, is now looking to sell chunks of a real estate portfolio that spans luxury developments in London to sprawling estates in the Perthshire countryside.

Bahrain-born Tajir amassed a fortune in Dubai as one of the most trusted advisers to Sheikh Rashid bin Saeed al-Maktoum, the emirate’s former ruler who in the 1960s and 1970s developed it into a diversified entrepôt by channelling oil revenues into commercial infrastructure. 

Described as Dubai’s “Cardinal Richelieu” by another senior adviser, his influence waned in the early 1980s when Sheikh Rashid’s sons, including current ruler Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid al-Maktoum, consolidated their authority. 

Tajir bought a raft of British trophy properties and country estates in the 1970s, including a Kent stately home featured in early James Bond spoof Casino Royale, at a time when Middle Eastern investors entered the British property market in earnest. He also amassed a collection of historic English silverware, including a record purchase in 1993 of a chandelier designed for King George II.

In 1979 he established Highland Spring in the Scottish village of Blackford after buying nearby Keir House, the ancestral home of SAS founder David Stirling. It became the UK’s largest brand of bottled water, sourced from the surrounding Ochil Hills.

Property companies owned by Tajir’s family have borrowed heavily in recent years, both from Gulf banks and US institutional investors such as Apollo Global Management.

The 94-year-old last month put a more than 620-acre golf resort near Gleneagles up for sale. While the gWest course was completed in 2009, it never opened to the public and an adjoining hotel and residential development were not completed. 

National Bank of Kuwait, which provided a £12.75mn loan against the Perthshire golf course, according to its 2024 annual accounts, filed a breach of contract claim in London’s High Court in August against three members of the Tajir family. 

Full details of the lawsuit are not yet available. Accounts for the company behind gWest, filed in December 2025, noted that NBK’s loan had matured the previous month without being repaid and said the business was in “extension discussions with the lender”. 

NBK did not respond to a request for comment.

The Tajirs embarked on a major reorganisation and restructuring a couple of years ago, according to people aware of the process. One of them insisted it was “business as usual” for the family, adding that their lenders were unfazed by the debts. 

However, in June, one of the family’s lenders repossessed a mews house they owned in London’s affluent Belgravia, according to an official notice seen by the FT. Swiss bank UBS held a mortgage charge on the property, according to the Land Registry. 

UBS declined to comment. The family was dealing with this and other issues, the person with knowledge of their restructuring efforts said. 

The Emirati tycoon has also been trying for more than a year to sell a six-storey townhouse in London’s wealthy St James neighbourhood, according to people familiar with the matter, having mortgaged the property with a high-interest bridging loan in 2023.

Estate agency Aldersley London is handling the sale of the property, according to people familiar with the matter, and is asking for £125mn. One of the people said potential buyers in the Gulf had expressed interest. Aldersley declined to comment.

High-profile London developments owned by the family have also faced serious debt issues. 

The vehicles that own the Park Tower Hotel in Knightsbridge and Arlington House in St James, both of which Tajir purchased in the 1970s and are slated for major refurbishments, have defaulted on separate loans raised against them last year, according to their latest accounts.

CBRE Loan Services, which manages loans on behalf of other property lenders, also filed a claim this month in London’s High Court against Amer and Khalid Al Tajir — two of the former ambassador’s sons. 

While details of the lawsuit are not yet available, CBRE holds a mortgage charge on behalf of another lender over a high-profile property development owned by Tajir’s sons on The Bishops Avenue, a street in north London commonly known as “Billionaires’ Row” for its wealthy residents. 

Tajir’s family bought a plot of land on the street in Hampstead for £18mn in 2018 and has been building 36 luxury apartments with property developer Valouran. The company behind the project had more than £100mn of debt at the end of last year, according to its accounts.

The development is “back on track”, according to one of the people aware of the restructuring process. 

Valouran and CBRE declined to comment. 

One person close to the family said Tajir had been “a genius businessman, a visionary” and that his “amazing” array of assets had been mismanaged. “This is a classic case of the next generation not knowing how to carry on developing the business.” 

The family, approached through third parties, declined to comment. Dubai-based Tyburn Capital, the Tajirs’ family office, did not respond to a request for comment. 

The company through which Tajir’s family owns the Park Tower hotel borrowed £347.5mn from US private capital firm Apollo Global Management, New York hedge fund King Street Capital and London property-lending firm Cohort Capital in October last year.

That company breached a number of its debt covenants and went into default this year, according to its latest annual accounts. Financial statements published last month note that lenders “remain supportive and continue to engage constructively” but warned that they hold the “right to demand repayment”. 

Apollo holds the safer senior tranche of debt that is not in default, according to a person familiar with the matter. King Street and Cohort hold the riskier mezzanine tranche of the loan.

Apollo and King Street declined to comment.

King Street and Cohort also agreed to provide an up to £171mn mezzanine loan against Arlington House last year, alongside a £147mn senior loan from Dubai lender Emirates NBD. 

Both tranches of debt breached covenants and went into default last year, according to the company that owns the property’s accounts. Emirates NBD declined to comment. 

A website outlining redevelopment plans for Arlington House, which is adjacent to Green Park and near the Ritz Hotel, describes it as “no longer fit for purpose” and requiring “sensitive improvement to meet modern expectations”.

The debt against Arlington House and Park Tower carries “personal guarantees” from the directors of the companies that own them — Amer and Khalid Al Tajir — allowing lenders to pursue their wider assets to recover any potential losses.

Cohort Capital, a Mayfair-based bridging loan specialist, has also lent against a wider range of the family’s properties in recent years. The firm did not return requests for comment.

These loans include mortgages against Keir House, Mereworth Castle in Kent, a pub in West Sussex and 18 Carlton House Terrace — the St James townhouse the family is now looking to sell. 

Bridging loans usually carry double-digit annual interest rates and are typically intended as a stopgap solution until a sale takes place or longer-term financing is secured.

Cohort’s co-founder Bal Sohal said in 2023 that its loan against the Carlton House Terrace property had proved the company’s “mettle in completing complex lending deals for the country’s most iconic residential properties”. 

The company that owns the West Sussex pub, which Cohort lent against in January, was subject to a winding-up petition from HM Revenue & Customs last month. These court actions allow creditors to try to push a company into insolvency over outstanding bills and are used by the British tax authority as an enforcement mechanism to collect unpaid tax.

HMRC declined to comment, citing “taxpayer confidentiality law”.

FT : Big private equity backers call for greater scrutiny of sweetheart deals Co

Big private equity backers call for greater scrutiny of sweetheart deals
Concern that investors are insufficiently prepared to challenge buyout firms on deals involving potential conflicts

Big backers of private equity funds have called on their peers to avoid waving through sweetheart deals by buyout firms without properly engaging with or challenging fund managers.

An influential body of some of the world’s biggest private equity investors has set out detailed expectations of investors sitting on fund governance committees when managers propose to sell the vehicle’s holdings to themselves.

Committee members should be “fully prepared for meetings with the requisite experience to engage, and where appropriate, challenge the [buyout firm]”, the Institutional Limited Partners Association said in new guidance on continuation vehicles.

Buyout managers have increasingly turned to continuation vehicles — new funds that they raise to buy companies from their older funds — in a difficult market where they have struggled to sell companies to third parties.

The call by ILPA comes after the FT reported that buyout backers had raised concerns about the effectiveness of small committees of fund investors that traditionally approve or veto actions by managers, after an explosion in popularity of the conflicted deals.

Continuation vehicles, which allow private equity firms to hold on to companies in the hope of selling them for more later, carry inherent conflicts of interest because the same buyout group sits on both sides of the deal. Investors in selling funds worry the manager could influence the price.

A committee was most effective at assessing a buyout firm’s “management and mitigation of its conflicts inherent in a continuation vehicle” when the committee did “not simply ‘rubber stamp’” conflict disclosures, ILPA wrote.

The body spelled out how committee members could have their own conflicts. “Members may also sit on both sides of a continuation vehicle transaction and have a financial interest in the CV acquiring the asset(s) at a low price,” ILPA wrote.

Some large private capital firms invest in traditional buyout funds and have separate strategies that back continuation vehicles. Firms such as Hamilton Lane, HarbourVest and Partners Group run both business lines, but have not been accused of any wrongdoing.

“A [committee] member may be rolling its interests into the CV but it may also be invested in a . . . fund that is investing in the CV”, said ILPA, or “another part of its firm might be acting as lead investor” in the CV.

In April, two of the largest global private equity investors told the FT they were worried about whether some firms rubber-stamped asset sales to CVs when such a deal could benefit their other business lines. Continuation vehicles accounted for about a fifth of buyout exits last year.

One fund investor said there had been concerns for years about fund investors attending committee meetings unprepared or sending only junior analysts, but that continuation vehicles were “shining a spotlight” on the problem.

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