News & Insight • Weekly Newsletters

26 September 2025 | William Buckhurst | Charlie Todd

That Was The Week That Was

MACRO NEWS

European economic data released was mostly better than expected as Services offset Manufacturing taking the Composite PMI to 51.2, slightly higher than forecast. French data was below expectations while German data was mixed. In a separate release German business confidence dropped. The IFO Business Climate reading declined in September to 87.7 vs 89.4 expected.

US housing data released yesterday was largely better than expected. Data showed that August new single family home sales were 800k vs 650k expected and up 20.5% on the revised higher prior month, which saw a decline of 1.8%. This good news offset US economic data which was mostly below expectations with both Services and Manufacturing slightly below consensus.

US Q2 GDP growth was revised higher to 3.8% vs 3.3% expected with Personal Consumption revised higher from 1.6% to 2.5%. The data showed that business investment increased 7.3%, driven by the largest increase in spending on IP since 1999.

Members of the Fed Committee made public comments following the FOMC meeting last week. Fed Chair Jerome Powell reiterated his comments that there was no risk-free path and that near term risks to inflation were tilted to the upside and risks to employment to the downside, creating a challenging situation. Fed Governor Michelle Bowman stated that officials were in danger of falling behind the curve and in his first public comments since joining, Stephen Miran stated that rates were too high and laid out his case for why the neutral rate of interest has fallen, and that it had been lowered by tariffs, immigration restrictions and tax policy and that rates should be much lower.

COMPANY NEWS

Tariff man is back. The Trump administration announced that it had launched investigations into the imports of robotics, industrial machinery and medical devices. Siemens Healthineers and Smith & Nephew closed down 3.5% and 1.2% respectively and Japanese healthcare stocks Chugai Pharmaceutical and Sumitomo Pharma fell 4.8% and 3.5% respectively. 

Nvidia announced that it would invest $100bn in OpenAI. The money would help the building of data centre capacity whilst using Nvidia chips.

Oracle shares rose following reports that it was set to sign a new $20bn agreement with Meta to provide computing power for training and deploying AI models.

The FT reported that activist hedge fund Irenic Capital Management, which owns about 3% of SSP Group, was encouraging private equity groups to launch a takeover.

Accenture was flat after reporting in line earnings with revenue rising 7.3% to $17.6bn. GenAI bookings increased to $1.8bn but guidance was slightly weak.

In more MAGA news, Boeing shares took off after US Ambassador to China David Perdue stated that in final stages of trade negotiations involved a “huge” 500 craft Boeing order. Lithium Americas stock price rose 95.77% following reports that the US Government is taking a 10% stake in the company. Shares in Intel finished materially higher on the week after it was reported that Intel had approached Apple about securing investment and that both firms had discussed how to collaborate.

Porsche fell 7.2% earlier in the week after cutting guidance again around operating returns. CarMax closed down over 20% after missing on every metric.

Electronic Arts, the videogame publisher, is in advanced talks to go private for $50bn with a rumored bid from Silver Lake, Saudi Arabia's Public Investment Fund and Jared Kushner's Affinity Partners.

Spanish bank BBVA finished 2.7% lower yesterday after increasing its offer for Sabadell by 10% to €17bn.

FREEPORT SLIDE

Shares in Freeport-McMoRan fell 21% over the week after they reported they have suffered a mudslide at Grasberg in Indonesia – which they own 49% of – killing two workers and closing the mine for what could be a significant period with reduction to production through the rest of 2025 and a substantial portion of 2026.

The other element here is that it provides substantial exposure to gold which massively reduces their costs and should have led to enormous cash flow over the next year.

Grasberg is the second largest copper mine in the world adds further to the supply side problems of the industry which sent the copper price up over 5%.

TIKTOK’S AMERICAN REMIX

President Trump has signed an executive order allowing TikTok to operate in the US under American ownership. Details have not been confirmed by Chinese owner ByteDance.

A list of the investors would soon be released but involved: Tech giant Oracle and chairman Larry Ellison, Fox Corporation's Rupert Murdoch, and Michael Dell of Dell.

According to Bloomberg reporters, ByteDance will get half of the profit from the platform’s US operation after it sells majority ownership to American investors. ByteDance is expected to receive a licensing fee on all revenue generated from making its algorithm available as well as a share of the profit in proportion to its equity stake.

THE WEEK IN HISTORY

2008: Washington Mutual with assets of around $300bn and deposits of around $188bn but an extremely troubled mortgage book, is seized by US regulators and sold to JP Morgan Chase for around $1.9bn.

2019: Thomas Cook collapses. The 178-year-old UK tour operator entered compulsory liquidation due to massive debt, a failure to adapt to digital trends and intense competition from online booking sites. 

THE WEEK AHEAD

• All eyes on the US employment numbers as the Non-Farm Payrolls are released on Friday.
• Manufacturing and Services PMIs will be released in the Eurozone.
• Quarterly earnings reports from Nike and Tesco.