TheChek News Flow

-The S&P 500’s apparent resilience conceals an extraordinary internal divide: the cap-weighted index lost only 0.5% in September and remains less than 1% below its August record, while the equal-weighted index fell 5% and was headed for a seventh consecutive weekly decline, something seen only twice since 2000. Technology and communications were the only sectors to rise; Meta Platforms alone, up 27% in September, added about 0.6 percentage point to the S&P 500. Yet Barron’s argues this narrowness is less ominous than it looks. Nvidia and Meta valuations have fallen despite their gains, unlike the valuation explosion of the dot-com era. Investors appear to be discriminating among AI winners and losers rather than blindly chasing technology. With S&P 500 third-quarter earnings expected to rise 29%, valuations lower, investor sentiment deeply negative and the midterms approaching, easing bond and oil pressure could produce a powerful year-end rally. One bullish scenario puts the S&P 500 at 8,000, about 4.4% above Thursday’s close.

-No update

-Micron Technology serves as a test of whether the memory business has genuinely changed or investors are simply watching another spectacular cycle approach its peak. Fiscal fourth-quarter sales jumped 379% and gross margin reached an extraordinary 87%, while the stock trades at only 6.4 times projected earnings despite Wall Street expecting fiscal 2027 earnings to rise 126%. The skepticism is historical: memory prices and inventories have repeatedly produced brutal boom-bust cycles, and Micron recorded negative gross margins throughout calendar 2023. This time, however, data centers generate 63% of sales, versus roughly 25% during the previous upcycle, giving Micron much better visibility into demand. It has also signed 26 long-term contracts with pricing protections and take-or-pay provisions covering more than a third of expected sales through 2030. CEO Sanjay Mehrotra expects memory supply to become even tighter in 2027 and 2028. Barron’s argues that investors may need to see Micron survive the eventual downturn without another collapse in prices, revenue and margins before rewarding it with a higher valuation

-The stock market has absorbed a remarkable collection of headwinds, from surging Treasury yields and expensive oil to geopolitical tension, yet investors are already looking toward third-quarter earnings for the next catalyst. Micron Technology offered an early taste with its blockbuster Sept. 30 report, while analysts expect another unusually strong quarter once the major banks begin reporting Oct. 13. The economic backdrop also became slightly friendlier Friday: September payrolls increased only 29,000, well below expectations, reducing concern that the Federal Reserve will raise rates again this month. The S&P 500 rose 0.7% Friday and the Nasdaq 1.2%, although both the S&P and Dow still finished lower for the week. Barron’s central argument is that earnings may again shift attention from macro anxiety toward corporate profitability, particularly if AI-related spending continues producing outsized growth.

-Quantum computing is beginning to cross from laboratory promise into an investable commercial industry, with Quantinuum’s IPO and a wave of new listings providing the clearest evidence yet. Barron’s points to competing approaches from IBM, IonQ, Microsoft, Nvidia and others, while emphasizing that no dominant architecture has emerged and error correction remains the central technical obstacle. The likely near-term model is hybrid computing, where quantum processors work alongside conventional CPUs and GPUs rather than replacing them. That helps explain IonQ’s push into networking, sensing, security and manufacturing, and the broader effort to integrate quantum hardware with Nvidia-style computing infrastructure. The investment opportunity is potentially enormous, particularly in drug discovery, materials science, optimization and cryptography, but Barron’s cautions that commercialization remains early and many pure-play valuations already assume substantial technological progress.

-President Trump’s continuing investigation of former Federal Reserve chair Jerome Powell may complicate his effort to reshape the central bank. Powell’s chairmanship ended in May, but his term as a governor runs until January 2028, and Barron’s argues the pressure gives him an incentive to remain rather than vacate a seat Trump could fill. Powell had previously indicated he would stay at least until the Fed inspector general completed its investigation of the $2.4B headquarters renovation. That report criticized serious management and cost-control failures but found no evidence of criminal or administrative misconduct; a separate criminal investigation had already been closed in April. With Kevin Warsh now chair, Powell’s continued presence could therefore matter for the balance of the seven-member board and the administration’s ability to alter the Fed’s direction

-uniQure suffered a devastating clinical setback after its experimental Huntington’s disease gene therapy AMT-130 failed to show a statistically significant benefit in a pivotal study, undermining what had been one of Europe’s most closely watched biotechnology stories. The result sharply reversed earlier enthusiasm around the one-time treatment and raised questions over both the program’s regulatory path and the reliability of comparisons with external control groups in rare-disease trials. The failure is particularly painful because Huntington’s has no therapy capable of altering the underlying course of the disease, and AMT-130 had generated considerable hopes that gene therapy could finally change that. For investors, the trial removes much of the value previously attached to uniQure’s principal pipeline asset and leaves the company facing a far more uncertain future.

-Uranium Energy initially jumped nearly 8% after highlighting rising US government demand for domestically produced uranium, but the enthusiasm faded after it reported a fiscal fourth-quarter loss of $0.12 a share, versus $0.06 a year earlier and the $0.04 loss analysts expected. The operational picture was stronger: uranium production rose more than 150% sequentially to 82,744 pounds while total cost per pound fell 33%. The larger story is strategic. The US government is seeking roughly 4M pounds annually of domestically mined, refined and converted “unobligated” uranium for defense purposes beginning as early as 2030. Uranium Energy has opened a second US mine in Texas, is developing a third in Wyoming and is pursuing refining and conversion facilities that could eventually make it the country’s only vertically integrated uranium producer. The shares remain down about 22% this year.

-Argentina’s economy is losing momentum after Javier Milei’s initial stabilization successes. Inflation remains around 30%, poverty is rising again, real wages are stagnant and unemployment is increasing, while this year’s 2%-3% growth is concentrated in oil, mining and agriculture, sectors that generate relatively few jobs. Political difficulties have also delayed tax and pension reforms, and Argentina missed an earlier opportunity to return to international bond markets at roughly 9% yields; borrowing would now cost closer to 11%. Benchmark 2038 bonds have fallen from 83 cents to 74 cents on the dollar in two months. Barron’s nevertheless finds the debt potentially attractive because Argentina’s fiscal position is unusually strong relative to similarly rated sovereigns and yields exceed Ecuador’s by about one percentage point while approaching Gabon’s.

-Persistent AI agents could become the next major platform shift, moving beyond chatbots by working continuously in the background, learning users’ preferences and actually completing tasks such as shopping, booking appointments, moving money and canceling subscriptions. Meta Platforms’ Muse has already rattled exposed businesses: Planet Fitness and Sirius XM are down 19% and 13% since its launch, while Airbnb, Booking Holdings and Charles Schwab have also fallen as investors contemplate automated comparison-shopping and account switching. The potential prize is enormous, with Barclays estimating as much as $10T of stock-market value at stake. The contest will revolve around trust, access to personal-data “connectors,” payments and cost: Meta has the early-mover advantage, while Apple, despite lagging badly with Siri, possesses enormous advantages in consumer trust, Apple Pay and 2.5B installed devices. Barclays estimates persistent agents cost about $4 per user monthly to operate, roughly 10 times a chatbot, making monetization crucial.

Related: IBM IONQ NVDA QNT SCHW META MU PLNT UEC MSFT QURE RAGSX SIRI DMYI.OLD

President Vladimir V. Putin brought up a sale of Russian energy assets with President Trump’s envoys, Jared Kushner and Steve Witkoff, pushing a deal that raises new questions about conflicts of interest.

The Trump administration’s talks with Russia about ending the war in Ukraine have expanded to include a multibillion-dollar oil deal that would benefit Middle Eastern business executives with ties to the two main U.S. negotiators, Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner.

The deal, which is contingent on approval from the U.S. government and the Kremlin, is for a sprawling set of oil fields, refineries and gas stations around the world owned by Lukoil, one of Russia’s biggest energy companies.

The leading group seeking the deal includes an American investor, Todd Boehly, who has donated $2 million to President Trump’s political causes; two Middle Eastern groups that have done business with Mr. Kushner or Mr. Witkoff’s family; and an arm of the U.S. government itself.

The monthslong negotiations, which were described by eight people familiar with them, shed new light on Mr. Trump’s latest approach to settling a four-year war that has killed hundreds of thousands. The people spoke on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the negotiations.

There is no indication that Mr. Kushner or Mr. Witkoff themselves stand to profit. But the pending deal represents a striking intermingling of personal business ties with geopolitics, even for an administration that has regularly dismissed concerns about potential conflicts of interest.

President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia brought up the deal when he met with Mr. Witkoff and Mr. Kushner at the Kremlin on Sept. 5, according to three people familiar with the meeting. Mr. Putin proposed it get done as a way of showing Russians that they can do business with the United States, according to one of the people.

The Americans responded that they would work on it, the person said, seeing it as a way to build good will with the Kremlin while also lowering global energy prices. But the deal is also a lucrative one for the buyers: U.S. approval for the sale would release the assets from American sanctions, instantly increasing their value.

In Moscow, the decision on the deal is widely seen as Mr. Putin’s to make, even though Lukoil is technically a private company. The upshot is that the giant transaction, involving assets as varied as oil fields in Cameroon, refineries in Europe and gas stations in New Jersey, comes down to Mr. Putin and Mr. Trump.

Mr. Trump has been promoting the promise of business deals with Russia since early last year, describing the country as a “tremendous opportunity.” The deal again brings Mr. Trump’s World Liberty Financial cryptocurrency company — co-founded by Mr. Witkoff — into focus. One of the investors in the Lukoil deal is a part owner of World Liberty.

Mr. Witkoff and Mr. Kushner, who have traveled repeatedly to Russia for meetings with Mr. Putin, have argued that the potential to rebuild economic ties with the West could convince the Russian president to compromise in Ukraine. The administration has recently signaled it is open to deals with Russia even before the war ends, as a way of showing it is serious about resetting the United States’ relationship with Moscow.

The Lukoil sale, people familiar with the matter say, is one of those deals.

In a statement, a senior administration official confirmed that Mr. Witkoff and Mr. Kushner played a direct role in helping negotiate the financial terms of the investment by the federal government in the deal to ensure that it included “a substantial upfront payment and profits interest for the United States.”

A spokeswoman for Mr. Witkoff said that he “takes no salary and travels the world on his own plane, at his own expense, working on behalf of President Trump to negotiate peace and bring hostages home to their families.” She added that Mr. Witkoff “has no conflict of interest and no financial stake in this matter.”

A Stalled Bid, and a New Contender

Numerous potential bidders expressed interest in at least part of Lukoil’s international holdings when the assets went on the market last fall, including U.S. energy giants like Chevron.

The Washington private equity firm Carlyle reached a tentative agreement in January to buy a large share of the assets, after making the pitch that bringing Lukoil’s international portfolio under U.S. ownership would further the Trump administration’s goal of “energy dominance.”

But in recent months, as U.S. approval for Carlyle’s bid stalled, a different group emerged as the leading bidder: one led by Mr. Boehly, a billionaire supporter of Mr. Trump’s, alongside well-connected figures in the Middle East and the U.S. government itself. The members of the partnership were reported last week by The Financial Times.

Mr. Boehly is a co-owner of the Los Angeles Dodgers and donated $1 million to MAGA Inc., the Trump-aligned political committee, in December 2025. He gave another $1 million through his investment firm, Eldridge Industries, to Mr. Trump’s inauguration.

The U.S. government is taking a stake in the deal through the U.S. International Development Finance Corporation, an agency that invests in and lends to projects overseas. A D.F.C. official said in a statement that the potential Lukoil deal “would advance the Trump administration’s commitment to strengthen U.S. economic security, advance U.S. foreign policy and lower energy prices for everyday Americans.”

But it would not be an all-American purchase.

A major equity holder would be the Qatar-based conglomerate controlled by Moutaz Al-Khayyat and his brother Ramez Al-Khayyat, both of whom attended Mr. Trump’s inauguration in 2025 and have since formed a partnership with Mr. Kushner and his wife, Ivanka Trump, one of Mr. Trump’s daughters, to help finance a multibillion-dollar luxury hotel resort project in southern Albania.

Another major stakeholder would be an Abu Dhabi-based investment fund controlled by Sheikh Tahnoon bin Zayed Al Nahyan, the United Arab Emirates’s top national security adviser, who controls another fund that purchased a large stake in the Trump family’s cryptocurrency company, World Liberty, run in part by Mr. Witkoff’s son.

Steve Witkoff was a co-founder of World Liberty, and Mr. Trump’s sons are also involved in the company, which generated $799 million for Mr. Trump last year, in part because of an additional cryptocurrency purchase worth $2 billion that Sheikh Tahnoon’s affiliate made in 2025. Mr. Witkoff himself has sold off his stake in World Liberty, a person close to him said.

Sheikh Tahnoon also helps oversee an Abu Dhabi investment fund called Lunate, which is among the largest stakeholders in the private equity firm Mr. Kushner set up after he left the White House at the end of Mr. Trump’s first term. This means Sheikh Tahnoon is effectively a business partner of Mr. Kushner’s as well.

An ‘Alarming’ Set of Entanglements

Hui Chen, a former Justice Department prosecutor and a white collar crime and ethics adviser who served until the start of Mr. Trump’s first term, said the connections between Mr. Witkoff and Mr. Kushner to players in the Lukoil deal illustrated why friends and family members of Mr. Trump’s should not be top foreign policy advisers.

“This is an alarming and very concerning set of entanglements,” said Ms. Chen, who has also worked as a corporate compliance lawyer. “And it means you have to question how the Trump administration is evaluating the different bidders involved here. Are the personal interests involved going to wrongly influence the outcome?”

Lukoil’s international division, which is based in Austria, hired its own Washington-based consultant who is close to Mr. Trump, Bryan Lanza, who served as a senior adviser to Mr. Trump’s 2024 election campaign and now works at Mercury Public Affairs. He is no longer working for Lukoil, a person familiar with the matter said.

The deal is not yet final, and would need to be approved by the Treasury Department, which oversees sanctions enforcement.

But in the case of Lukoil, people involved said, the key decisions are being made at the White House. Asked about its approach to the Lukoil decision, a Treasury Department spokeswoman said that the agency’s Office of Foreign Assets Control “implements foreign policy as determined by the White House.”

The Sept. 5 meeting with Mr. Putin was the first time that Lukoil came up in the Russian president’s conversations with Mr. Witkoff and Mr. Kushner, one person familiar with the matter said.

But Kirill Dmitriev, Mr. Putin’s economic envoy, has been closely involved, people familiar with the sale process said. He traveled to New York and Washington for meetings last month, and told reporters that “dialogue” with the United States was “continuing across many areas, including energy.”

Lukoil’s refineries in the Netherlands, Bulgaria and Romania play an important role. They produce diesel and jet fuel, which have been in short supply since the start of the Iran war, which has driven up prices and given Mr. Trump an incentive to support a deal that could provide more access to energy.

Lukoil valued its international assets at $20 billion earlier this year, but the price and structure of the proposed deal are not clear.

An official with the D.F.C., the U.S. agency investing in the deal, described participation in the purchase as a way to strengthen the energy security of U.S. allies. The official also said the deal would produce significant profits for the American taxpayer and keep strategic infrastructure away from adversaries.

Scramble for Assets

The Trump administration imposed sanctions on Lukoil a year ago, describing the move as new pressure on Mr. Putin to “stop the killing.” It also created a lucrative opportunity: Lukoil was forced to sell off its sprawling portfolio of international holdings.

Investors around the world scrambled to bid on the assets, but the U.S. government held veto power because it controlled how to enforce its sanctions. Because of Russia’s autocratic system, Mr. Putin was seen as the final decision maker in Moscow.

The bidding frenzy accelerated last November, when the Treasury Department rejected an initial offer by Gunvor, a Swiss-based energy trading company with past ties to Russia, which had moved to buy Lukoil’s foreign assets. The Treasury Department said in a statement that “as long as Putin continues the senseless killings, the Kremlin’s puppet, Gunvor, will never get a license to operation and profit.”

Carlyle secured a “nonexclusive” agreement in January with Lukoil to sell its international assets. It was up to the Treasury Department to then sign off on the deal. As months passed with no final deal, other bidders intensified their efforts to step in.

Mr. Boehly has little experience in the oil and gas industry. He has made most of his money through investment firms such as Guggenheim Partners and Eldridge Industries, as well as sports team and entertainment industry investments, including Bruce Springsteen’s music catalog.

But over the last several years, the billionaire Khayyat brothers, who were born in Syria before moving to Qatar during the Syrian civil war, have begun to amass a collection of oil industry assets and planned projects in Syria, Libya and Iraq.

Even while the Lukoil negotiations were underway, the Khayyats were continuing to work with Mr. Kushner and Ivanka Trump over plans to build the luxury resort in Albania, an effort that included a meeting involving Ramez Al-Khayyat and Ms. Trump earlier this year in Albania, The Times reported.

The decision over Lukoil’s fate has taken so long that the Treasury Department has had to repeatedly issue extensions to its sanctions action, so that Lukoil gas stations in the United States and other businesses around the world could continue to engage with other financial partners. The most recent extension lasts until Oct. 29.

Thomas Lind previously led AI policy at the White House’s Office of the National Cyber Director

OpenAI is continuing to fill out its leadership bench with former Trump administration officials.

Thomas Lind, who previously led AI policy at the Office of the National Cyber Director, joined OpenAI this week, an OpenAI spokesperson confirmed. ONCD is a key office within the White House that played a leading role in putting together a June executive order on AI.

Lind will lead cyber and strategic risk on OpenAI’s national security policy team, which is led by Sasha Baker, the former deputy Under Secretary of Defense for Policy in the Biden administration.

OpenAI and its executives have been stepping up efforts to strengthen the company’s ties to the Trump administration. In July, it hired Dean Ball, who previously worked in the White House’s Office of Science and Technology Policy and helped draft the administration’s July 2025 AI Action Plan. Last year, OpenAI President Greg Brockman and his wife Anna donated $25 million to Donald Trump’s super PAC.

Lind’s hire comes at a critical juncture for AI regulation. Recent incidents involving rogue AI, including a swarm of OpenAI agents hacking into the open source repository Hugging Face, have led to calls for new laws from policymakers and safety groups. The Trump administration has resisted efforts to establish new regulation, though November’s midterm elections could bring further legislative and oversight efforts if the Democrats take control of either Congressional chamber.

Lind’s former agency, ONCD, was at the center of the Trump administration’s efforts to wrangle AI policy. The office had been working on a cybersecurity-related executive order on AI before Anthropic announced its latest model Mythos last April, which the company did not release to the public because of safety concerns. The planned order evolved to deal with the new threats posed by cyber models, The Information previously reported.

Formally signed by Trump in June after a tumultuous back-and-forth process between AI companies and different factions within the administration, the executive order established a voluntary framework for AI developers to submit their models for government review before releasing them to the public. The framework went into effect in early August, though it has been widely criticized for a lack of transparency after the White House declined to release it publicly, as well as continued uncertainty over whether it will include open-source model providers.

As the White House continues to grapple with how much AI oversight it wants to perform, ONCD remains at the center of key decision-making around the framework’s implementation. That includes the framework’s trusted partner program, which establishes the organizations that get early access to advanced AI models after they go through government review.

Lind left ONCD in June, according to his LinkedIn. He had joined the office in April 2025 as the senior director for intelligence, becoming the head of policy a year later. He previously worked as an intelligence officer in the National Security Agency.

OpenAI continues to invest heavily in cyber efforts. In August, OpenAI’s Brockman released a blog post arguing that the Hugging Face incident was a “watershed moment” for cybersecurity. Later that month, the company led an open letter calling on organizations and governments to bolster their cyber defense efforts. In September, the company committed $1 billion for its “Daybreak for Frontline Defenders” initiative to subsidize access to its frontier models and provide technical assistance.

“Tom is a key addition to our national security team, bringing expertise across AI policy, cybersecurity, and strategic risk,” OpenAI’s Baker said in a statement. “His hire reflects OpenAI’s continued investment in addressing the national security challenges of increasingly capable AI and ensuring this technology is used to benefit and protect the country. His expertise is even more important as AI becomes central to the national security agenda, with the Office of the National Cyber Director playing a growing role in shaping AI policy.”

Hyundai is planning scores of new human-driven cars while Tesla is turning away from the steering wheel

Thursday was supposed to be the long-promised debut of what might well be the last new, human-driven car offered by Tesla TSLA 4.65%increase; up pointing triangle. Yet, the Roadster, first shown almost a decade ago, was delayed. Again. This time due to bad weather in Texas.

More than 1,600 miles to the northeast in New York City, the sun was shining that same day on another automaker. There, Hyundai Motor 005380 -0.72%decrease; down pointing triangle celebrated the reveal of its newest Tucson sport-utility vehicle, one of more than 100 new or refreshed vehicles it has planned globally by 2030.

For Hyundai Motor Chief Executive José Muñoz, it was another stop on a roadshow of sorts. His mission is to sell the South Korean automaker as something more akin to what Elon Musk fans see in Tesla than what its struggling peers have become.

With the auto industry reeling, Muñoz and Musk find themselves in a similar camp: both are betting big on robotics. It’s their timing and approach that reveal a strategic difference.

Musk is turning Tesla’s back on human-driven cars, effectively burning the boats on the shores of a new world full of robots. Muñoz is using the legacy car business to build a bridge to a more-distant robot future.

In 2025, Muñoz rose to CEO as Hyundai’s electric-vehicle offerings, combined with its affiliate Kia, increasingly provided some of the most serious competition in the U.S. to Tesla in the all-EV categories.

The next front between the two companies is shaping up to be over physical AI—humanoid robots and robotaxis.

In the coming weeks, Hyundai begins production of robotaxis for Alphabet’s Waymo, a fierce competitor of Tesla. It’s also working on its own autonomous-vehicle tech with joint venture Motional.

And Muñoz has been touting plans to be able to build 30,000 Boston Dynamics robots annually, including the Atlas humanoid robot, in 2028 at what he has called the “world’s first large-scale commercial robotics manufacturing facility.”

“We are becoming a technology company,” Muñoz told an audience of journalists and influencers Thursday.

That is a familiar line. It has been used not just by Muñoz, but by other automakers over the years trying to portray themselves as tech companies at a time when their ambitions have captured investor enthusiasm.

What’s different, now, is that other automakers in the U.S. are largely frozen in place after taking a battering. They made huge investments into electric vehicles, trying to catch up to Musk’s lead with their supposed Tesla-killers. Then demand fell when U.S. politics soured on the technology and government incentives evaporated. And they’re watching Chinese rivals, which aren’t in the U.S. yet, become a scarier threat.

Huge losses have resulted as plans for EVs are shelved or delayed. That has led to the industry’s slowest release of new vehicles since at least the 1970s, or a “product drought,” according to research by John Murphy, an independent analyst.

Not Hyundai. Under Muñoz, the company has been bucking that trend with a redesign rate above the industry average. In turn, the company has been picking up market share in the U.S.

Even Musk seems disenchanted with the traditional carmaking business. In Musk’s version of the future, new cars will be mostly driven by computers and humanoid robots will outnumber people.

Earlier this year, he stopped production of Tesla’s full-size sedan and SUV to make room for a humanoid-robot assembly line. The most recent new car to debut from Tesla, the Cybercab, doesn’t have a steering wheel and is part of the company’s nascent robotaxi fleet. It is unclear when the Cybercab might go on sale (Musk has suggested by year’s end) or when it will increase production in a big way.

The Tesla CEO often says human-driven cars will become like horses today—largely ridden for fun. That would make the new Roadster something of a mustang for the new era.

The risk for Tesla is one of timing. Musk is often wrong on such things—the new Roadster was originally expected in 2020. Tesla will be left with little in the pipeline if the robot dream doesn’t play out as expected.

In Muñoz’s future, the profitable car business of today pays for the robot business. “The strategy is simple to say and hard to do: maximize the profit of the car business today through product efficiency and localization, then fund the future,” he told investors at an event in August.

The risk for Hyundai is that the needs of the moneymaking end of the business derail dreams of tomorrow. Several automakers in recent years ditched their robot-car plans when things got tough.

In an interview Thursday, Muñoz told me Hyundai’s plans weren’t marketing hype. “It is very real,” he said. Muñoz emphasized the strength the automaker has from its vertical integration with its umbrella company, Hyundai Motor Group, which includes affiliates in steel, logistics, finance, and robot-maker Boston Dynamics.

The overall strategy is very Musk-esque. The original Roadster, which began production in 2008, was sold to help fund a bigger idea of what Tesla could become. Similarly, Musk aimed to use the satellite-internet service Starlink to provide funds to build larger rockets at SpaceX, where he was CEO before taking over Tesla, too.

That’s another thing Musk and Muñoz share. Both men worked on building space rockets before getting into the car business.

Muñoz, a nuclear engineer by education, was working on European space rockets when a chance encounter with the woman who would later become his wife sent him in a new career direction. She was a car dealer. And the car business suddenly interested him.

While he would go on to work for Toyota, Nissan and eventually Hyundai, the lessons of the space program stayed with him, he told me Thursday. One of the most important revolved around the importance of meeting deadlines tied to the distance of orbit.

“Everything is perfectly calculated, so you cannot just say, ‘You need more time, you’re going to launch it later,’ so you need to finish on time,” Muñoz said.

Or, as he put it, “The timing is the timing.”

An adherence to deadlines is one thing the two men don’t share.

‘Krasner and Pollock: Past Continuous’ Review: Abstract Painting’s Power Couple at the Met

The museum highlights both the independence and interconnectedness of the married artists in a well-focused, often surprising show.

China launches anti-dumping probe into European chemical exports

Latest tit-for-tat move follows three similar investigations launched by the EU last week

Beijing has launched an anti-dumping investigation into European exports of a chemical used for dyes and pharmaceuticals as tensions rise over China’s massive trade surplus with the bloc.

The commerce ministry in Beijing said on Saturday that it had started an investigation into p-nitrotoluene, which is also used in pesticide and pigment production, after a complaint from Chinese industry.

The investigation marks the latest tit-for-tat measure between Brussels and Beijing after trade tensions flared again in recent weeks.

The EU opened three anti-dumping investigations into chemicals from China last week. It also began consulting on a new diversification tool that would seek to reduce imports from China.

It comes just ahead of crunch talks between EU trade commissioner Maroš Šefčovič and his Chinese counterpart, commerce minister Wang Wentao, in Beijing this month. 

The EU in June set an October deadline for progress in reducing its trade deficit with China, which is now running at €1bn a day.

Brussels has warned that without any action it could resort to new trade measures, which are set to be debated at a summit of EU leaders at the end of October.

The European Commission declined to comment.

The FT reported last month that among the initiatives proposed, the EU has asked China to restrict its exports of plug-in hybrid vehicles voluntarily, as well as restrain exports of some chemicals.

According to the commerce ministry, from 2022 to 2025 European exports of p-nitrotoluene were at high levels while prices declined by 60 per cent, meeting the grounds for an investigation under both Chinese and World Trade Organization rules.

The Chinese move also follows a warning from Brussels to UK Prime Minister Andy Burnham that Britain would need to raise tariffs on Chinese cars and align more closely with EU trade policy if it wants to avoid “made in Europe” barriers on exports to the bloc.

EU officials have argued that Chinese controls on rare earth exports, introduced last year as part of China’s retaliation against US President Donald Trump, have unfairly hit European companies. 

Over recent years, the EU has targeted Chinese industrial products with higher tariffs while China has sought to influence EU member governments by hitting agricultural interests, including dairy products, pork and cognac.

FINANCIAL TIMES

-The US economy added only 29,000 jobs in September, far below the 88,000 economists expected and sharply down from August’s downwardly revised 133,000. July and August were revised lower by another 60,000, while unemployment edged from 4.1% to 4.2%. The unexpectedly weak report reduced expectations of another Federal Reserve increase in October, although persistent inflation and renewed Treasury selling leave the broader rate outlook unsettled.

-The US abandoned its threatened fuel-export ban after G7 countries agreed to release 100M barrels of crude and diesel from strategic reserves over four months, including a substantial diesel release within 20 days. About 40M barrels are expected from the US, 50M barrels of diesel from Europe and the balance from Asia. The compromise removes the immediate danger that US export restrictions would intensify the global fuel shortage; European diesel futures fell 8% following the announcement.

-Arctic shipping is expanding as the Middle East war disrupts traditional routes and retreating ice makes northern passages increasingly usable, accelerating the strategic and commercial importance of the High North. The shift could shorten some Europe-Asia voyages while raising the stakes around Russian-controlled routes, ports and infrastructure, adding another layer to the emerging competition over Arctic security and trade.

-The US Justice Department will not reopen its criminal investigation of former Federal Reserve chair Jay Powell, removing one source of pressure surrounding his handling of the central bank’s headquarters renovation. The decision follows the Fed inspector general’s finding of serious management shortcomings but no criminal or administrative misconduct, leaving Powell free to remain a Fed governor until his term expires in January 2028.

-Ukrainian President Zelensky asked Trump to prevent Russia and China from developing a rival to SpaceX’s Starlink, underscoring Ukraine’s concern that competing satellite constellations could erode one of its most important communications advantages. The request also highlights the increasingly strategic character of commercial space infrastructure: satellite connectivity has become embedded in battlefield command, drone operations and communications, while Chinese and Russian alternatives would reduce Western leverage over access to such systems.

-The EU is pressing Ukraine for additional reforms before releasing further financial support, keeping governance and institutional changes tied to Kiev’s access to European funding even as the war intensifies. The pressure illustrates the tension within the accession process between Ukraine’s immediate financing requirements and Brussels’ insistence that wartime urgency should not dilute conditions involving governance, transparency and the rule of law.

-Goldman Sachs bought $220M of Shein shares after the fast-fashion company’s disappointing IPO, a significant institutional bet following the listing’s weak reception. The purchase suggests some large investors see value after the post-IPO decline, even as Shein continues to confront questions surrounding growth, regulation and its supply chain.

-Partners Group has split its flagship private-equity fund as investors demand liquidity, another sign of pressure across private markets after years of weak exits and delayed distributions. Fund managers increasingly face clients unwilling to wait indefinitely for portfolio companies to be sold, forcing firms to find new structures for returning capital while preserving investments they believe should remain privately held.

-Volvo Cars issued a profit warning as sales weakened in China, adding to evidence that foreign automakers are struggling as Chinese manufacturers take an increasing share of their domestic market. The deterioration is particularly consequential because China has been both a major profit center and manufacturing base for global carmakers, while the rapid expansion of local EV competitors is compressing the position of established European brands.

-Investors are seeking shelter in German government debt as US, French and other sovereign bonds suffer a sharp selloff. The 10-year US Treasury yield nevertheless ended Friday around 5.37% after initially falling on the weak payroll report, while German, French and Italian bonds recovered. The divergence reinforces Bunds’ role as the eurozone’s principal safe asset at a moment when inflation and fiscal concerns are increasing risk premiums elsewhere. Financial Times

-Emerging-market bonds are outperforming developed-market debt during the global rout, an unusual reversal of the traditional pattern in periods of financial stress. The relative resilience suggests that years of earlier monetary tightening and, in some cases, stronger fiscal positions have left parts of the emerging world better placed than highly indebted developed economies now confronting renewed inflation and rising long-term borrowing costs.

-The Eurozone’s inflation rate reached 3.8% in September, its highest in three years, complicating the European Central Bank’s policy choices just as sovereign borrowing costs are under renewed pressure. Higher energy prices have revived inflation while weaker growth and fiscal strains in countries including France limit policymakers’ room for maneuver, leaving the ECB facing the uncomfortable combination of elevated prices, fragile government finances and expensive credit.

NEW YORK TIMES

-The Trump administration diverted $1.4B in science funding that Congress had specifically mandated, another escalation in the struggle over executive control of federal spending. The move raises constitutional and appropriations questions because Congress controls the federal purse, while universities and research institutions face growing uncertainty over whether appropriated money will actually reach the programs lawmakers designated.

-A federal judge blocked construction of a section of Trump’s border wall in Big Bend, Texas, creating another legal obstacle for the administration’s accelerated border-infrastructure program. The dispute adds to a broader series of court battles over executive authority, environmental requirements and the administration’s ability to redirect federal resources toward immigration enforcement.

-The administration ordered taxpayer-funded television advertisements praising Trump, drawing criticism from Democrats and some Republicans who question whether the campaign violates federal restrictions on government-funded publicity. The controversy centers on the boundary between legitimate agency communications and using public money to promote a sitting president personally.

-Iran jailed a hardline lawmaker in a case the Times says exposes widening divisions within the country’s leadership. The episode is significant because the dispute is occurring amid extraordinary external military and economic pressure, bringing normally concealed disagreements within the political establishment into public view.

-Two Iranian men were charged in Britain over a suspected plot targeting Jews, adding to European concern over alleged Iranian-linked operations on British soil. The charges come as UK authorities are already investigating other suspected Iranian activity, increasing diplomatic and security pressure on relations with Tehran.

-The White House asserted in a legal filing that the president has authority to bar news organizations from access, escalating a dispute over whether administrations can selectively exclude media outlets. The case carries broader implications for press access and executive discretion because White House coverage depends heavily on physical access to presidential events and officials.

-September’s extreme heat in Southern California is extending into October, with forecasters warning that dangerous conditions and triple-digit temperatures could persist for at least another week. The prolonged event increases electricity demand and wildfire risk while extending an already punishing warm season for one of the country’s most populous regions. -The FlyDubai Flight 1073 investigation is increasingly focusing on airline security and pilot screening after the cockpit attack. The Times reports that a badly wounded Indian pilot managed to unlock the cockpit while four Israeli passengers subdued the attacker, preventing a potentially catastrophic outcome; investigators are examining the attacker’s background and why four pilots were aboard the aircraft.

-Tennessee’s failed execution of Christa Pike is producing wider scrutiny of the state’s corrections system and its prison chief, Frank Strada, who previously oversaw troubled executions in Arizona. Pike remains unconscious after surviving the execution attempt, creating an unusual legal question over whether Tennessee could try again if she is unable to comprehend what is happening.

-The FDA found Cyclospora during an inspection of a Taylor Farms facility in Mexico, adding a significant food-safety issue to the weekend news agenda. The finding puts renewed attention on contamination controls in cross-border produce supply chains, where outbreaks can rapidly affect large US distribution networks.

NY POST

-North Korea test-fired missiles amid renewed tensions following explosions across the inter-Korean border, adding another military signal from Pyongyang as regional security strains intensify.

-Tesla shares climbed 5% after vehicle sales surprised Wall Street, even as the company increasingly pitches its future around AI and robotaxis rather than conventional carmaking. The reaction suggests the existing automotive business still matters considerably to valuation despite the strategic pivot, particularly as investors assess whether stronger deliveries can support the enormous capital requirements and expectations surrounding autonomous driving and AI.

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• Among the other participants were Secretary of State Marco Rubio, Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth, White House envoy Steve Witkoff, CIA director John Ratcliffe and chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Dan Caine.
• "Things were decided or at least deeply discussed," one of the officials said, referring to the crisis in the Middle East.
• The White House declined to comment.

• "Now I have to make a decision: either Iran signs the deal, or it won't exist any longer," he said on Thursday.
• At the same time, Trump is being asked to join Saudi Arabia's planned offensive against the Houthis in Yemen.
• The Saudis are urging the president to conduct airstrikes against the Houthis. Trump has been leaning against it, but U.S. officials say he could change his mind.

• "If I told you, you would have a major story," he said. "But you will see. It is working out very well. Iran is not doing well."