🤡 All-In, No Bluff
Megaphone threats don’t come with a rewind button.
Also available:🇫🇷 Édition française
Good morning!
Brent trades in the low 90s, about a quarter above where it sat before the war began at the end of February, and the market now files that as calm. Some 6,000 mariners are still aboard roughly 500 vessels behind a strait that four or five ships cross on a good day, against 130 before. 17 seafarers have been killed since February. Iran’s supreme leader was assassinated on the first morning of the war and replaced eight days later by his son, which now ranks below the shipping ledger in the running order. The official explanation is the Madman Theory, a doctrine attributed to Richard Nixon in which extreme threats extract concessions because the adversary cannot rule out genuine derangement. The footnote nobody cites is that Nixon ran the experiment for four years and the North Vietnamese took Saigon in 1975.
The original ploy at least had the decency to operate in private. In October 1969 Nixon sent 18 nuclear-armed B-52s on a three-day loop toward Soviet airspace, on the theory that Moscow would notice and Hanoi would hear about it. Voters found out more than 30 years later, from declassified files. Trump’s threats reach Tehran through a public feed, which means walking them back costs a kind of face Nixon never had to spend. A bluff delivered by megaphone ratchets in one direction only, and the ratchet is priced into every barrel.
$580M of bets against oil went through in a single minute on March 23, 15 minutes before the president posted that strikes on Iranian energy infrastructure were postponed. On April 7, $950M went short hours before a two-week ceasefire that took 15% off crude overnight. On April 17, $760M went short 20 minutes before Iran’s foreign minister announced the Strait would open to commercial shipping. It did not. On April 21, $430M went short 15 minutes before the ceasefire was extended. That is roughly $2.6B in a month, always the same direction, mostly in post-settlement windows too thin to hide in. The CFTC is looking at two of the four. The official line is that alleging otherwise without evidence is baseless and irresponsible.
The defenders have one serious card. Russia took Georgia in 2008, Crimea in 2014 and the rest of Ukraine in 2022, under three consecutive American presidents, and has taken nothing during either of Trump’s. The sample will not survive peer review, but the point is made in good faith and deserves an answer rather than a sneer. Harder to defend is the cottage industry of strategists explaining that markets, allies and historians simply lack the imagination to follow the logic. Vietnam ended with 58,220 American dead, some 21,000 of them killed during the tenure that supposedly perfected the art. The doctrine has a back catalogue. The 6,000 men at anchor behind Hormuz are in the current edition.
Publicité
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🗞️ Top Story
- 🇫🇷 Fake It Till You Make It. BlackCore, a non-existent Israeli company, is exposed as the mastermind behind a digital smear campaign targeting French left-wing candidates. (Le Temps)
- 🇬🇷 Cloud Nine. A rare summer fog blanketed Cyclades hotspots like Kimolos and Paros, turning beach holidays into a scene straight out of winter. (Le Figaro)
- 🇫🇮 Flight Risk. Finland accuses a Russian aircraft of violating its airspace over the Gulf of Finland, launching an investigation as tensions with Moscow remain sky-high. (Le Figaro)
- 🇷🇴 Drone Alone. Romanian F-16s destroyed a naval drone heading for the Neptun Deep gas project in the Black Sea, with Ukraine denying ownership and tensions staying on the surface. (Boursier)
- 🇪🇺 Heat Accounted. Europe sees record excess deaths from summer heatwaves in 2026, with 14,500 in Germany and 7,300 in France alone as temperatures shatter historic highs. (Ouest-France)
- 🇲🇨 Enemy Unknown. Vadim Ermolaev, the Ukrainian oligarch targeted in a Monaco bombing, insists he has no enemies and cannot explain the attack that left his family wounded. (Le Figaro)
- 🇦🇷 Default Line. With 5.8M Argentines now behind on payments, demonstrators call the debt crisis a “new pandemic” and urge the government to act. (Le Temps)
- 🇰🇷 Ice Breaker. South Korea is sending a container ship to Europe via the Arctic with Russian approval, testing a shortcut that leaves Western diplomats cold. (Boursier)
- 🇮🇷 Protest Penalty. Iran hanged Ghaem Hosseini, an Afghan citizen, for his alleged involvement in a fatal January protest incident, with executions now at 56 for 2026. (Ouest-France)
- 🇨🇩 Shot in the Dark. The WHO is sending 70,000 doses of the Ervebo vaccine to the DRC, hoping it might slow the deadliest Ebola outbreak the country has ever seen. (France Info)
- 🌍 Pirate Bay. Somali pirates hijacked two ships in four days, including an Iranian-linked oil tanker, marking the region’s sharpest piracy surge in over a decade. (New York Times)
🇬🇧 United Kingdom
- 🇬🇧 Private Security. UK Prime Minister Andy Burnham calls Harry and Meghan’s security funding a « private matter » as the couple prepares to return from the US this month. (The Guardian)
- 🇬🇧 Silent Witness. UK counter-terror police charged Hakim, 49, with withholding information linked to the deadly Manchester synagogue attack, making him the first to face direct charges. (Bbc)
- 🇬🇧 Closed Door Policy. Reform UK deputy leader Richard Tice justifies suspending a senior activist for criticizing Nigel Farage, insisting party disputes stay private. (The Guardian)
🇺🇸 United States
- 🇺🇸 Disclosure Optional. Trump boasts about transparency while refusing to release the key intelligence report on 2024 election meddling, leaving Congress and voters in the dark. (New York Times)
- 🇨🇳 Wrong Number. The State Department now classifies U Min Zin’s arrest in China as a wrongful detention, putting extra pressure on Beijing ahead of Xi’s US visit. (New York Times)
🏛️ Economy
- 🇩🇪 Price Hike Club. German producer prices jumped 3% in July, marking their sharpest rise in over three years as metals, chemicals, and fertilizers lead the surge. (Die Zeit)
- 🇪🇺 Crude Awakening. Despite the energy crisis and war-driven price shocks, European oil refineries are still set to shrink by 20% over the next decade. (Financial Times)
- 🇺🇸 Yield of Dreams. Big Tech’s $200B bond spree to fund A.I. has pushed Treasury yields to near 20-year highs, making Wall Street’s optimism expensive for everyone else. (New York Times)
- 🇺🇸 Bond Voyage. With US gross debt topping $40T, Scott Bessent takes the helm as Treasury’s top trader, steering through a sea of rising yields and fiscal drama. (Wall Street Journal)
- 🇺🇸 Web of Deceit. According to Pew, over one-third of new web pages are likely written or edited by AI, so humans are now the minority online. (TechCrunch)
- 🇵🇦 Dry Run. El Niño’s drought slashes rainfall in Panama, prompting the canal authority to cut daily crossings from 36 to 32 ships and warn of further limits. (Le Monde)
- 🇨🇳 No-Fly Zone. Beijing denounces the US decision to impose tariffs on Chinese drones, accusing the Trump administration of hiding trade barriers behind security concerns. (Boursier)
- 🇯🇵 Buyback to the Future. Scott Bessent signals a larger debt buyback plan as Japan’s inflation shows signs of picking up, giving markets something new to price in. (Bloomberg)
- 🇸🇬 Ore Dealings. Singapore police are investigating Radiant World, a major iron ore trader, after banks and rivals raised concerns over alleged fake documents and cut ties. (Financial Times)
- 🇮🇳 Factory Fade. India’s economy fails to pick up speed with manufacturing output weakening, making the growth narrative harder to sell. (Bloomberg)
🇬🇧 United Kingdom
- 🇬🇧 Sunny Side Up. UK consumer confidence hit a two-year high in August, defying forecasts as sunny weather and a new PM fueled a rare burst of optimism. (Financial Times)
- 🇬🇧 Cab Wars. London’s iconic black cab drivers and private-hire operators are bracing for a new threat as Waymo and Wayve prepare to launch robotaxis, raising fears of job losses and a new round of turf battles on the capital’s streets. (Financial Times)
- 🇬🇧 Screen Test. Meta’s AI glasses face a possible ban in UK cinemas as operators worry about films leaking before the credits even roll. (The Guardian)
- 🇬🇧 Track and Field. Network Rail aims to reopen the Lewes line in September after a derailment, racing to clear carriages before school holidays end. (The Guardian)
🇺🇸 United States
- 🇺🇸 Claim to Calm. weekly jobless claims fell by 6,000 to 206,000 last week, keeping layoffs near historic lows and signaling a steady labor market. (Bloomberg)
🏢 Real Estate
- 🇺🇸 Server Dissent. high school students are organizing protests against new A.I. data centers, warning of environmental and health risks from their construction in local communities. (New York Times)
- 🇺🇸 Cloud Cover-Up. From satirical commercials to gubernatorial primaries, outrage over AI data centers’ water and energy use is now a headline issue in politics. (Cnbc)
- 🇨🇳 Great Wall of Debt. Evergrande creditors are staring down a $45B repayment maze after the Chinese developer’s restructuring plan hits new legal hurdles in Hong Kong. (Bloomberg)
🇬🇧 United Kingdom
- 🇬🇧 Ladder Half Full. Millennials in the UK still face tougher odds buying a first home than previous generations, but falling house prices and friendlier mortgages are finally offering a glimmer of hope. (Bbc)
🇺🇸 United States
- 🇺🇸 Chip Happens. Micron’s $50B expansion has turned Boise into a tech boomtown with new millionaires, surging prices, and a city struggling to keep its balance. (Cnbc)
- 🇺🇸 Hot Property. South Carolina claims the highest score in a new NAR index forecasting commercial real estate demand, while pandemic-era favorites cool off. (Cnbc)
- 🇺🇸 Frozen Assets. Hovnanian Enterprises 🇺🇸 reports a quarterly loss as high mortgage rates and anxious buyers leave the housing market stuck in deep freeze. (Wall Street Journal)
🔗 On-chain
- 🇺🇸 Trump Card. Bitcoin surged 12% after Donald Trump and crypto executives urged Congress to pass the Clarity Act, sparking a market-wide rebound. (Cnbc)
- 🇨🇳 Bot and Paid. Binance unveils Agent OS, letting AI agents trade crypto for users while shifting most oversight and risk management to the account holder. Users set the limits, not the exchange. (TechCrunch)
- 🇦🇪 Coincidence? Two Binance 🇨🇳 employees were detained in the UAE as police investigate possible financial crimes on the platform, rattling the crypto giant’s workforce. (New York Times)
🇺🇸 United States
- 🇺🇸 Market Makers. At its inaugural Innovation Advisory Committee, the CFTC grilled Kalshi 🇺🇸 and Polymarket 🇺🇸 on the dangers of self-certified prediction markets, as concerns over insider trading and regulatory blind spots took center stage. (Cnbc)
💱 Listed Markets
- 🇬🇧 Run for Cover. JD Sports 🇬🇧 lowers profit outlook by £50M after inflation and the Iran conflict keep young shoppers from splurging on trainers. (The Guardian)
- 🇺🇸 Brand New Day. Coty 🇺🇸 announces plans to exit its Gucci Beauty partnership by 2028, with 2027 marked as a year of strategic transformation. (Les Echos)
- 🇺🇸 Chip and Charge. Nvidia 🇺🇸 is turbocharging the next AI wave by guaranteeing billions in loans for customers and data centers, betting its chips are now an asset class lenders cannot resist. (Financial Times)
- 🇺🇸 Vice City Limits. Cyberleek releases supposed GTA VI footage online, forcing Rockstar Games into radio silence as fans debate the authenticity and the leaks disrupt the studio’s carefully crafted launch hype. (Libé)
- 🇺🇸 Tumor Service. Moderna 🇺🇸 rebounded from a 90% stock plunge as its mRNA cancer vaccine success sent shares up 177%, giving investors a new reason to believe. (New York Times)
- 🇨🇳 Fad to Black. Pop Mart 🇨🇳 signals a revenue miss after Labubu doll sales slow sharply, giving skeptics of the craze plenty to smile about. (Wall Street Journal)
🇬🇧 United Kingdom
- 🇬🇧 Cherry Picking. Chinese automaker Chery will open a research and development center in England this autumn, cementing its rapid UK market gains with over 100,000 cars sold. (Boursier)
- 🇬🇧 Eye for Profit. Specsavers’ founders collect a £12M dividend as the chain’s pre-tax earnings soar and sales reach £4.3B, making hindsight lucrative. (The Guardian)
🇺🇸 United States
- 🇺🇸 Milk Money. Abbott 🇺🇸 agrees to a $670M payout after being found liable for failing to warn that its infant formula posed serious health risks to premature babies. (Wall Street Journal)
🛎️ Big Deals (M&A)
- Spie 🇫🇷 acquires Worley Power Services 🇦🇺, finalising the deal and rebranding it as Spie Power Services; ~300 employees across 30+ sites, managing 27 power assets totalling >5,800 MW and 1,100+ km of gas pipelines, now part of a new Australia division led by Dean Paton.
- Danone 🇫🇷 acquires Huel 🇬🇧 for $1.2B after the competition watchdog cleared the transaction.
- Freenet 🇩🇪 nears deal to buy out minority investors in Waipu.TV 🇩🇪 at a $1.7B valuation after abandoning IPO plans.
- Munich Re 🇩🇪 acquires At-Bay 🇮🇱 for $575M, a deal in the cyber insurtech sector.
- BMPS 🇮🇹, the $43B-listed lender, reviews strategic alternatives to Intesa Sanpaolo 🇮🇹’s takeover bid and may make offers for Banco BPM 🇮🇹 and Banca Generali 🇮🇹.
- EQT 🇸🇪 acquires Kakaku.com 🇯🇵 (activist Oasis Management, which owns 19% of the target, asked the firm to withdraw support for the $3.7B buyout bid).
- EQT 🇸🇪 considers sale of ILA Vietnam 🇻🇳 and Vietnam-USA Society English Centers 🇻🇳 for $500M, English language education businesses.
- EQT 🇸🇪 acquires a majority stake in Melbourne Storm 🇦🇺, taking control of Australia’s leading rugby league club.
- Holcim 🇨🇭 acquires James Hardie’s European Fermacell business 🇦🇺 for $980M (EUR840M). Building-materials deal expected to close in H1 next year.
- Strategic Value Partners 🇺🇸 is considering a $3B sale of APCOA Parking Holdings 🇩🇪.
- Charlesbank Capital Partners 🇺🇸 acquires a stake in law firm WSHB 🇺🇸 in a $700M deal.
- KKR 🇺🇸 emerges as the preferred bidder to buy a minority stake in Avisena Healthcare 🇲🇾 at a $370M valuation.
- KKR 🇺🇸 will buy a 6% stake in BookMyShow 🇮🇳 for $40M-$50M, in the ticketing and entertainment sector.
- SpaceX 🇺🇸 attempts to acquire Cognition 🇺🇸. CEO Scott Wu denies the report, saying the company “is not for sale.”
- JBS 🇧🇷 offers to buy the remaining 18% of shares of Pilgrim’s Pride 🇺🇸, the $7.5B-listed US chicken producer, at market price.
- Proterial 🇯🇵 considers sale of Proterial Cable Solutions 🇯🇵 for up to $1.3B
- SJ Holding 🇰🇷 attempts to take Golfzon Holdings 🇰🇷 private at $210M, facing renewed resistance from minority shareholder Terton Capital.
- Evolution Mining 🇦🇺 may buy assets from Northern Star Resources 🇦🇺, Aussie gold miner considering further acquisitions.
🇺🇸 United States
- Arctos 🇺🇸 acquires Atlanta Falcons 🇺🇸 in a 10% stake at a $10.6B valuation, to be purchased in two tranches over 18 months.
- SEVA 🇺🇸 acquires a minority stake in Serif Health 🇺🇸, significant growth investment in healthcare price transparency data and intelligence. Shalin Mehta to join Serif’s board.
🧳 Private Markets & VC
- 🇫🇷 Label Me Not. Boohoo 🇬🇧 gets a €2.3M bill from French regulators for inflating discounts and calling synthetics “leather,” showing style sometimes trumps substance. (The Guardian)
- 🇺🇸 Data Rush. Micro1, a startup, has hit a $500M annual run rate by riding the AI data-labeling boom, proving there is gold in annotation. (TechCrunch)
- 🇺🇸 Processing Fee. Stripe 🇺🇸 acquires OpenRouter for $8B, convinced that no matter how smart AI gets, someone still needs to process the transaction. And the invoice. (Financial Times)
- 🇺🇸 Yield Signs. Bond market veteran warns investors not to chase high returns as credit becomes increasingly expensive and riskier in the market. (Bloomberg)
- 🇺🇸 Word Salad Days. xAI’s Grok chatbot has been spitting out streams of gibberish to users, prompting confusion, Reddit complaints, and a brisk apology from the company. (TechCrunch)
- 🇺🇸 Route Awakening. Ramp 🇺🇸 unveils its own AI model router, letting users switch between top language models via API, free until 2026 but with future fees looming. (TechCrunch)
- 🇨🇳 Bid and Prejudice. China blasts the EU for investigating JD.com’s €2.2B takeover of Germany’s Ceconomy, calling it « undue extraterritorial jurisdiction » and threatening retaliation if Brussels persists. (Financial Times)
🇬🇧 United Kingdom
- 🇬🇧 Score and Tell. Experian 🇬🇧 now lets UK users check their personal credit score directly inside ChatGPT, offering instant breakdowns and account comparisons without ever leaving the AI chat. (FinExtra)
Fundraising
- Castelion 🇺🇸 (Defense): $1B (JPMorganChase Strategic Investment Group, Andreessen Horowitz, funds managed by Carlyle, Lightspeed Venture Partners, Lavrock Ventures, Altimeter, General Catalyst, Interlagos, T. Rowe Price Associates, Inc.)
- Fractile (AI): $600M (Lightspeed, Redpoint)
- Muon Space 🇺🇸 (Aerospace): $250M (Eclipse Capital, Galvanize, Google, Salesforce Ventures, Wellington Management, I Squared Capital, Woven Capital, Radical Ventures, Congruent Ventures, Costanoa Ventures, Activate Capital, ACME Capital, ArcTern Ventures, Overlap Holdings)
- ALSO 🇺🇸 (Mobility): $150M (Prysm Capital)
- Rillet 🇺🇸 (Accounting): $100M (ICONIQ)
- Navi Technologies 🇮🇳 (Fintech): $100M (Prosus)
- Callosum 🇬🇧 (AI infrastructure): $100M (Atomico, Plural, UK Sovereign AI Fund)
- Veeda AI 🇺🇸 (AI): $90M (Khosla Ventures, Radical Ventures)
- Math Magic 🇨🇳 (AI 3D): Nearly $50M (BAI Capital, HyT Capital, V Fund, HSG, IDG Capital, Long-Z Investments, Crystal Stream, Jinqiu Capital)
- Network Bio 🇺🇸 (Biotech): $50M (Section 32, Thiel Bio, Founders Fund, Breyer Capital, Blue Venture Fund, JSL Health Capital, other life science and AI funds)
- MaxQ Medical 🇺🇸 (Healthcare): $31.5M (Atlantic Blue Ventures, S3 Ventures, Olympus Innovation Ventures, Hillside Capital)
- Apollo Atomics 🇺🇸 (Nuclear): $31M (FCVC, Y Combinator, Telesoft Partners, Alumni Ventures, Robinhood Ventures, Nucleation Capital, Pelion VC, Duke Capital Partners, Evan Meagher, Paul Graham, Philip Johnston, Matteo Franceschetti, Ray Rothrock)
- Renata Medical 🇺🇸 (Medtech): $25M (ARCHIMED)
- Queen One 🇺🇸 (Commerce): $25M (Mercury Fund, Full In, Connecticut Innovations, CP Overture, Charge Ventures, Inspired Capital, existing investors)
- Relativity Networks (Telecom): $22M (Rhapsody Venture Partners, Bell Ventures, Faster Than Glass, and others)
- Twin1 AI 🇺🇸 (AI): $20M (Bessemer Venture Partners, Tribeca Venture Partners, Aramco Ventures, EJF Ventures, Tin Alley Ventures, AGI House Ventures, Neo, F-Prime, Btech Consortium, Antiportfolio Ventures, Lakestar, Notion Capital, Insiders, Orrick, Haakon Overli, Roy Reznick, Hans Tung, Kevin Buehler, Robert Trezona, Dan Wong)
- Pixelgen Technologies 🇸🇪 (Biotech): $15.5M (Flat Capital, Industrifonden, Navigare Ventures)
- Ours Privacy 🇺🇸 (Healthcare): $15M (Lightbank, Health Velocity Capital, Rock Health, Lakehouse, TMV, Switch Ventures, Starfire Ventures, GreyMatter)
- Thunder Compute 🇺🇸 (Compute): $13M (Matrix Partners, Y Combinator, CEAS Investments)
- RockRose Risk 🇺🇸 (Insurtech): $12.5M (Crosslink Capital, Congruent Ventures, Nuveen Real Estate)
- Quantizr 🇺🇸 (Fintech): $5M (TTV Capital, Jonathan Azu, Chris Kappy, Andy Levine)
Fund Watch
- Ardian 🇫🇷: $5.8B (5th private credit fund)
- Jefferies Credit Partners 🇺🇸: $1.2B (private credit secondaries fund, currently raising)
- Academic Capital Partners 🇸🇬: $300M (debut fund, school assets in Asia & Middle East)
- Makers Fund 🇺🇸: $250M (Fund IV, early-stage interactive entertainment VC)
- Inovo.vc 🇵🇱: €30M (VC fintech fund for early-stage CEE startups, with EIF/BGK, part of Future Tech Poland)
🔔IPO
- KME Group 🇩🇪 (Metals): picked banks for a $1.2B Germany IPO of its Cunova specialty copper unit.
- Marvell Technology 🇺🇸 (Semiconductors): granted Google rights to buy $12.2B of shares in exchange for chip purchases.
- Lyntris 🇺🇸 (Defense): raised $297M in a downsized IPO at a $1.6B market cap and fell 14% in its trading debut.
- Shein 🇨🇳 (Fashion): delays Hong Kong IPO to Sept 1, targeting a roughly $26–27B valuation.
- Unitree Robotics 🇨🇳 (Robotics): surged 460% in its trading debut after raising $900M in a China IPO.
- YMTC 🇨🇳 (Semiconductors): completed pre-IPO regulatory work as it prepares for a potential listing.
- AiMOGA 🇨🇳 (Robotics): preparing for an IPO as the robotics unit of Chery Automobile.
- SDC Capital Partners 🇸🇬 (Digital infrastructure): plans to raise $1B in a Singapore REIT listing.
- Upstox 🇮🇳 (Fintech): talks for a $400M India IPO.
- SE Fruits and Vegetable 🇵🇰 (Fresh produce): plans to raise $7M in a Pakistan IPO.
🧳 Debt
- Revolut 🇬🇧: will let founder Nik Storonsky borrow up to $250M against his stake.
- Thales 🇫🇷: sold €1B bond to help fund its Exail acquisition.
- Nebius 🇳🇱: plans to raise $4.5B in a private convertible bond offering.
- Alphabet 🇺🇸: raised $3.9B in a debut Aussie bond sale.
- Goldman Sachs 🇺🇸: sounding out interest for a $1.15B junk bond to fund a Blue Owl–backed data center leased to CoreWeave.
- Vylor 🇺🇸: set to raise $1.1B in a pre-spinoff bond sale.
- DayOne 🇭🇰: seeking a loan to fund a Hong Kong data center ahead of a US IPO.
🇺🇸 United States
- Swift Current Energy 🇺🇸: closed a $750M corporate credit facility (expandable to $1B).
❌ Failures
- HSBC 🇬🇧: spent $67.5M last year severing 134 senior bankers in its biggest cull since 2008.
- Azur Drones 🇫🇷: placed in redressement judiciaire and sold at the commercial court for €160,000, with about 15 of 38 jobs kept.
- MBS Group 🇺🇸: HPS and Oaktree took control of the defaulted Hollywood supplier, wiping out $900M of debt.
- Starbucks 🇺🇸: will cut about 224 corporate jobs. Roughly 120 technology roles and 104 in coffeehouse design and development.
- NAB 🇦🇺: National Australia Bank cuts banker jobs in its institutional division.
🎯 For a Few More Minutes…
- 🇬🇧 Snake Eyes Only. Jodie Foster, Chester Zoo’s 23-year-old python, becomes the world’s first snake to receive human-style electrochemotherapy for cancer and makes a full recovery. (The Guardian)
- 🇩🇪 Caught on Camera. Ukrainian diver Vladimir Zhuravlev, suspected in the Nord Stream sabotage, was arrested in Croatia while working on a Hollywood film about the very attack. (Le Figaro)
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