Happy morning, Munchers! 🙏

Hope you had a decent Monday. Rise and grind, as they say.

As always, here is your daily dose of the news that matters, from Wall Street to Dalal Street - in 4 minutes and 57 seconds.

Let’s dive in.

What’s hot, what’s not?

Market Commentary

• Stocks took a sharp nosedive over renewed recession and rate hike fears. Bye-bye to the bulls' partying. 📉

• Gas prices surged 20% - adding to piling concern that Europe will slip into recession. 🔥

• Euro and Dollar hit parity again, over the same problem. Balancing on a knife's edge. 💶

Story Roundup

1 - Gas prices soar and renew European recession fears. 🫢

Europe's going through some economic doom-and-gloom.

Gas prices shot up 20% yesterday - putting more pressure on an energy-starved continent.

At the end of this month, Russia will be shutting down a gas pipeline responsible for supply 40% of Europe's nat-gas energy.

From the Russian end, the pretext is maintenance - if they find anything wrong, there's no more gas for Europe.

Sets a pretty gloomy tone ahead of winter - and it's gonna make it all the more difficult for governments to shield their people from these price shocks.

Fiery. ⛽

2 - Citibank sees UK inflation at 18.6% next year. 🔥

Citibank's not happy with the way the UK is moving.

They forecast inflation to hit 18.6% - driven mainly by volatile energy prices.

Such an increase in the cost-of-living would squeeze household incomes - and push the UK into a deep, deep recession.

Goldman Sachs and EY see inflation at 15%, and the Bank of England sees it at 13% by the end of the year.

The energy squeeze isn't disappearing anytime soon - and political parties have switched up their targets toward supporting households.

Crazy times. 📈

3 - China slashes it's mortgage rates. 🏠

China's trying to fire it's economy back up.

They trimmed their key lending rates from 4.45% to 4.30% in an attempt to revive demand.

The Chinese economy has been hurt by frequent lockdowns, a crumbling real estate sector, and a ton of debt problems.

This move sends a strong message - and it's that policymakers will do what it takes to bring stability back.

Fingers crossed it's all good. 🙏

4 - Vodafone to ditch it's Hungary business for $1.8bn. 🤙

Vodafone has agreed to sell it's Hungarian operations to the government there.

The deal weighs in at $1.8 billion and follows a lot of pushing from activist investors.

Cevian Capital - Europe's largest activist investor - took a stake in Vodafone and started pushing for them to simplify their massive network of businesses.

This meant selling poorly performing segments - and Hungary was the first one to go.

The deal makes 4iG (the acquiring company) the second-largest telco in Hungary.

Electrifying. ⚡

5 - Global tensions crash the bulls' month-long party. 🐂

US, European, and Indian stocks all slid ~2% as outlook for the biggest economies in the world darkens.

The Nasdaq seems to be mirroring all the interest rate uncertainty - with companies like Amazon, Apple and Google all sliding about 3%.

All this economic precariousness comes ahead of the US Fed's field trip - an annual gathering which the Fed often uses to make big announcements.

Most economists expect the Fed to keep their hawkish comments coming - as there's still a long way to go with tackling inflation.

Hawks aboard. ✈️

Thanks for reading this. Have a great day ahead. Peace out. 🙏

Hope you enjoyed this issue of the Market Munch. If you have any feedback, positive or negative, hit my line at [email protected] or +971 50 708 8469.

Cheers.

- A