Evelyn Reynolds

Shanghai-listed Wingtech Technology saw its shares jump as much as 6.2% on Monday.
Beijing has taken steps to allow the export of certain chips from Nexperia’s China facility.
The Dutch government will send representatives to Beijing for further talks.

This photograph shows a general view of Nexperia headquarters in Nijmegen on November 6, 2025.
John Thys | Afp | Getty Images

Shares of Wingtech Technology, parent company of chipmaker Nexperia, extended gains on Monday after Beijing agreed to further talks with a Dutch delegation, easing concerns about a global auto supply crunch.
Shanghai-listed Wingtech Technology saw its shares jump as much as 6.4% on Monday, according to LSEG data, after surging 9.7% in the final minutes of trading last Friday on signs of de-escalation in a battle over control of the Dutch-based Nexperia.

The Chinese Commerce Ministry said in a statement Sunday that it had taken steps to allow exports of certain chips from Nexperia’s China facility, while urging the European Union to press the Dutch government to lift restrictions on the firm.
In a separate statement on Saturday, Beijing said that it has agreed to the Dutch government’s request to send representatives to Beijing for talks, and that it hoped the Netherlands would propose “constructive solutions” and take “concrete actions” to resolve the dispute over Nexperia soon.
The move followed a statement from Dutch Economic Affairs Minister Vincent Karremans last Thursday, which suggested Nexperia chips would reach customers in Europe and beyond in the coming days, citing “the constructive nature of our talks with the Chinese authorities.”
China and the U.S. had informed the Netherlands that the trade deal they struck last month would result in the resumption of supplies from Nexperia’s facilities in China, Karremans said. “This is also consistent with information provided by the European Commission by the Chinese Ministry of Commerce,” he added.
The Dutch government seized control of Nexperia on Sept. 30, citing security concerns that the company would shift its operations to China, where its parent company Wingtech is based, prompting Beijing to retaliate by blocking exports of components from Nexperia’s Chinese facility.

Automakers ‘war room’

The dispute over the ownership and control of the Dutch-based Nexperia led to worries of a global shortage of the chips widely used in industrial, computing, mobile and consumer products.
Carmakers like Volkswagen warned of possible production risks, while Honda slashed its annual profit forecast after halting production at several plants.
Other major automakers, including Stellantis, said they were monitoring the situation around the clock, setting up “war rooms” to explore alternative purchasing methods to mitigate disruptions.
The recent escalation of the dispute over Nexperia was the “direct result” of Beijing’s simmering tensions with the U.S., said Neo Wang, China strategist at Evercore ISI.

Washington in late September expanded its entity list — a U.S. trade blacklist for companies seen as security or foreign policy risks — to include subsidiaries that are 50% or more owned by firms already on the list.
Nexperia is one such subsidiary of Zhejiang-based communications equipment manufacturer Wingtech Technology Co., which was added to the list in December last year, Wang said.
Following a trade truce struck between Beijing and Washington on Oct. 30, which led both sides to scale back some restrictions, China said earlier this month that it would allow Nexperia’s China unit to resume shipments to global customers.
“Beijing appeared unwilling to gamble with bilateral relations [with the Netherlands],” Evercore’s Neo said, as the stakes are high given that the Dutch government controls ASML Holding, the world’s top supplier of advanced chipmaking equipment.
Because of its unique technology, ASML has been a key focus of U.S.-China tensions, with Washington pressuring The Hague to restrict exports to China.
Suppliers have begun receiving chip shipments from China, according to a note on Saturday from a team of auto and mobility analysts led by Dan Levy at Barclays. However, the analysts warned that low chip inventories could still cause disruptions in the near term.
They added that the relief appeared “temporary,” as the core dispute between Nexperia’s Dutch headquarters and its China-based operation remains unresolved. More

Worries over the government shutdown surged in the early part of November, pushing consumer sentiment In to its lowest in more than three years and just off its worst level ever, according to a University of Michigan survey Friday.
The current conditions index slid to 52.3, a drop of nearly 11% from last month, while the future expectations measure fell to 49.0, down 2.6%. On a year-ago basis, the two measures respectively slumped 18.2% and 36.3%.

Volunteers load boxes of food into cars during an event held by the Community FoodBank of New Jersey in partnership with Bergen County to deliver emergency food relief to Federal workers and SNAP recipients amid the U.S. government shutdown in Leonia, New Jersey, U.S., November 6, 2025.
Mike Segar | Reuters

Worries over the government shutdown surged in the early part of November, pushing consumer sentiment to its lowest in more than three years and just off its worst level ever, according to a University of Michigan survey released Friday.
The university’s monthly Index of Consumer Sentiment posted a reading of 50.3 for the month, indicating a decline of 6.2% on the month and about 30% from a year ago. Economists surveyed by Dow Jones had been looking for 53.0 after October’s 53.6. Sentiment was last this low in June 2022 as inflation hovered around its highest level in 40 years. November’s reading was the second lowest going back to at least 1978.

Concerns about the ongoing impasse in Washington topped consumers’ fears, outweighing a boost in sentiment from fresh record highs in stock prices, said Joanne Hsu, survey director .
“With the federal government shutdown dragging on for over a month, consumers are now expressing worries about potential negative consequences for the economy,” Hsu said. “This month’s decline in sentiment was widespread throughout the population, seen across age, income, and political affiliation.”
Other measures in the survey painted a similar picture.
The current conditions index slid to 52.3, a drop of nearly 11% from last month and the lowest in its history going back to 1951, while the future expectations measure fell to 49.0, down 2.6%. On a year-earlier basis, the two measures respectively slumped 18.2% and 36.3%.
“Across the economy, segments of the population are increasingly dealing with tighter financial conditions,” said Elizabeth Renter, senior economist at consumer finance site NerdWallet. “That’s certainly true for federal workers and people dependent on food assistance from the federal government. But it’s also likely increasingly true for middle income Americans.”

Measures of inflation held relatively in check, with a drop in the longer-term outlook.
The outlook for one year from now nudged higher to 4.7%, while the five-year measure was at 3.6%, down 0.3 percentage point.
With government economic data collection and releases suspended during the shutdown, measures like the Michigan sentiment survey loom larger as alternative measures of economic progress.
As has been the case with other measures, the survey found some disparity in income levels and particularly by asset holdings. Hsu said sentiment among those with the largest stock holdings actually improved 11%. More

Chicago Federal Reserve President Austan Goolsbee expressed hesitation about lowering interest rates further because the government shutdown has resulted in a blackout on key inflation data.
Goolsbee spoke to CNBC as the Chicago Fed updated its own dashboard of labor market indicators. The data set indicated a stable unemployment rate in October.

Chicago Federal Reserve President Austan Goolsbee on Thursday expressed hesitation about lowering interest rates further because the government shutdown has resulted in a blackout on key inflation data.
While Goolsbee has otherwise been an advocate for gradually lowering rates, the central bank official said during a CNBC interview that he has concerns over the lack of important price reports, particularly with general inflation recently trending higher.

“If there are problems developing on the inflation side, it’s going to be a fair amount bit of time before we see that, where if it starts to deteriorate on the job market side, we’re going to see that pretty much right away,” Goolsbee said. “So that makes me even more uneasy … with front-loading rate cuts and counting on the inflation that we have seen in the last three months to just be transitory and assume that they’re going to go away.”
Goolsbee spoke as the Chicago Fed updated its own dashboard of labor market indicators. The data set indicated a stable unemployment rate in October and a steady pace of hirings and layoffs. The Chicago Fed’s unemployment rate indicator was at 4.36% for the month, up just one one-hundredth of a percentage point from September.
However, the Bureau of Labor Statistics won’t release its consumer price index report for October, which had been scheduled for next week.
The BLS did put out a report for September despite the shutdown, as that particular count is used for Social Security cost-of-living adjustments. That report showed inflation running at a 3% annual rate, compared with the Fed’s goal of 2%. Whether the Commerce Department releases its personal consumption expenditures price index, the Fed’s preferred gauge, depends on getting the shutdown resolved.
Goolsbee said the lack of inflation reports concerns him, as three-month trends before the shutdown showed core inflation, which excludes food and energy prices, running at a 3.6% annualized pace.

“Medium-run, I’m not hawkish on rates. I believe that the settling point for rates is going to be a fair bit below where it is today,” he said. “When it’s foggy, let’s just be a little careful and slow down.”
Goolsbee will get a vote when the Federal Open Market Committee meets in December to decide whether to cut rates again following reductions at the prior two meetings. However, he will rotate to being an alternate in 2026 before returning to a voting role in 2027. More

Job cuts for October totaled 153,074, a 183% surge from September and 175% higher than the same month a year ago. It was the highest level for any October since 2003 and has been the worst year for layoffs since 2009.
Companies in the technology sector announced 33,281 cuts, nearly six times the level in September.
“Like in 2003, a disruptive technology is changing the landscape,” said Andy Challenger, workplace expert and chief revenue officer at outplacement firm Challenger, Gray % Christmas

Jobseekers during a NYS Department Of Labor job fair at the Downtown Central Library in Buffalo, New York, US, on Wednesday, Aug. 27, 2025.
Lauren Petracca | Bloomberg | Getty Images

Layoff announcements soared in October as companies recalibrated staffing levels during the artificial intelligence boom, a sign of potential trouble ahead for the labor market, according to outplacement firm Challenger, Gray & Christmas.
Job cuts for the month totaled 153,074, a 183% surge from September and 175% higher than the same month a year ago. It was the highest level for any October since 2003. This has been the worst year for announced layoffs since 2009.

“Like in 2003, a disruptive technology is changing the landscape,” said Andy Challenger, workplace expert and chief revenue officer at the firm. “At a time when job creation is at its lowest point in years, the optics of announcing layoffs in the fourth quarter are particularly unfavorable.”
The report provides a glimpse into the labor market at a time when the government has suspended data gathering and releases during the shutdown in Washington, D.C.
To be sure, the Challenger monthly numbers can be highly volatile, and an accelerated pace of layoffs has yet to show up in state-level weekly jobless claim filings that continue to come in despite the shutdown. Payrolls processing firm ADP reported that October saw net job growth of 42,000 in October, reversing two consecutive months of losses in the private sector.
However, the report comes at a time when Federal Reserve officials have expressed concern about a softening labor market. The central bank has lowered its benchmark interest rate twice since September and is expected to approve another quarter percentage point reduction in December as policymakers look to get ahead of any more serious problems.
The Challenger reports the highest level of layoffs coming from the technology sector amid a time of restructuring due to AI integration. Companies in the sector announced 33,281 cuts, nearly six times the level in September.

Consumer products also saw a sharp gain to 3,409, while nonprofits, an area hit hard by the shutdown, listed 27,651 cuts year to date, up 419% from the same point in 2024.
In total, companies have announced 1.1 million cuts this year, a 65% increase from a year ago and the highest level since the Covid pandemic year of 2020. October saw the highest total for any month in the fourth quarter since 2008.
“Some industries are correcting after the hiring boom of the pandemic, but this comes as AI adoption, softening consumer and corporate spending, and rising costs drive belt-tightening and hiring freezes. Those laid off now are finding it harder to quickly secure new roles, which could further loosen the labor market,” Challenger said. More

Economists widely predicted that the BOE would vote to keep key interest rates unchanged.
A cut could come in February, or maybe as soon as December.
The BOE’s meeting comes ahead of the Autumn Budget on Nov. 26.

LONDON — The Bank of England on Thursday voted narrowly to hold interest rates steady, exercising caution ahead of the government’s Autumn Budget in November.
Out of the BOE’s nine-member monetary policy committee, five members voted to hold the key interest rate, known as Bank Rate, at 4%, while four opted for a 25 basis point cut.

The vote was slimmer than expected with economists polled by Reuters expecting a 6-3 split in favor of a hold.
The BOE said in a statement that the inflation rate, at 3.8% in September, had likely peaked and that a disinflationary trend was underway. This was “supported by the still restrictive stance of monetary policy,” it said.
“This is reflected in an easing of pay growth and services price inflation. Underlying disinflation is being underpinned by subdued economic growth and building slack in the labour market,” the bank added.
The BOE cautioned that future rate cuts “will therefore depend on the evolution of the outlook for inflation. If progress on disinflation continues, Bank Rate is likely to continue on a gradual downward path.”
“I think this is the doves winning the argument,” Victoria Clarke, U.K. chief economist at Santander CIB, told CNBC Thursday.

“[BOE Governor Andrew] Bailey has made it clear he wants a bit more data and that was certainly my judgement, that there is a lot of value in waiting for December. You’ve got two more CPI [inflation] prints coming and two more labor market prints and, of course, this massive budget,” she told CNBC’s Decision Time.
Yields on U.K. government bonds fell across the board, with the yield on the benchmark 10-year gilt shedding almost 3 basis points. Meanwhile the British pound trimmed earlier gains to trade 0.18% higher against the U.S. dollar.

A Union flag flutters from a pole atop the Bank of England, in the City of London on August 7, 2025.
Niklas Halle’n | Afp | Getty Images

The meeting on Thursday was the last one before the Autumn Budget later this month. Economists had said that while they believed the central bank was more likely to hold rates steady, it was not a given.
“We can never know for sure which way any meeting will go, but this one is … one of the hardest to call for some time,” Dean Turner, chief euro zone and U.K. Economist at UBS Global Wealth Management’s Chief Investment Office, had said Tuesday.
“It’s not a case of whether they will cut interest rates at some point — the answer to that is yes, we believe they will … if policy is tight, inflation is falling, and growth is lacklustre, then interest rates are going to come down. The hard part is anticipating when,” he added.
Economists had forecast, for the most part, that a majority of the BOE’s policymakers would vote to keep its key interest rate, known as Bank Rate, unchanged at 4% at its November meeting.
There were some dissenters, however, with the likes of Barclays, Nomura, Mizuho and Unicredit believing there could be a surprise cut today, to 3.75%. Julien Lafargue, chief market strategist at Barclays Private Bank, conceded Wednesday that while there was a case for a rate cut, it was “a very finely balanced decision.”

Cuts coming

In any case, there is a general consensus that rate-setters could trim rates as soon as December, and will cut again over the coming year in response to expected cooling inflation — the rate of which remained unchanged for the third consecutive month in September, at 3.8% — and a softening of labor market data.

Most MPC members are more concerned about the implications of cutting rates too quickly rather than too slowly, Oxford Economics noted in analysis, and the BOE will want to see evidence of sustained downside surprises in the data and pay growth slowing to a target-consistent pace before voting to cut again.
“If we are right and the BOE pauses [this] week, the question will then turn to when the next cut will come,” Allan Monks, chief U.K. economist at JP Morgan, said in a note.
“We have argued that further downside surprises in the inflation and labour market data will determine that. For example, a move up in the unemployment rate to 4.9% in September could be significant, as well as further soft sequential gains in core CPI services and private pay.”
Assuming the BOE does hold rates on Thursday, UBS’ Turner said that he expects the central bank to then “signal that a cut is coming no later than February — maybe as soon as December.”
“Policymakers will not be armed with fresh forecasts in December, but they will have the budget and the impact analysis in their pockets,” he said.

Autumn Budget

The fact the central bank’s meeting this month comes ahead of the upcoming Autumn Budget on Nov. 26 is another reason for the BOE’s policy makers to pause for thought.
It’s widely expected that Chancellor Rachel Reeves will announce tax rises as she looks to fill a fiscal black hole estimated to be anywhere between £20-50 billion ($20-$65.2 billion), based on assumed forecasts of lower productivity, servicing debt and the cost of U-turns on welfare spending cuts, among other things.
Earlier this week Reeves gave a clearer indication that tax rises are coming and is she is expected to consider increasing income tax as one way to raise revenues, but she has not given any further detail. Tax rises would likely act as another damper on inflation by reducing consumer demand.

“If the measures [in the budget] include a hike in income tax, they would add to the drag on households’ real incomes from high inflation and slowing pay growth. As these factors weigh on demand inflation will likely ease,” Andrew Wishart, economist at Berenberg, said in a note Friday.
“If so, this will allow the Bank of England to cut interest rates by 25 basis points at least twice next year to 3.50%. A front-loaded fiscal tightening would open the door to a third cut in 2026, to 3.25%,” he added. More

Sam Altman, chief executive officer of OpenAI Inc., during a media tour of the Stargate AI data center in Abilene, Texas, US, on Tuesday, Sept. 23, 2025.
Kyle Grillot | Bloomberg | Getty Images

With OpenAI’s recent release of its AI browser, the historic level of capital expenditures being made in the current AI arms race may accelerate even further, if that is possible.
From the reciprocal, and some have said circular, nature of hundreds of billions in commitments in investment, tied to future chip purchases, to the extent to which GDP growth is reliant on this boom, some have said this is a bubble. A Harvard economist estimates 92% of US GDP growth in the first half of 2025 was due to investment in AI.

But much more needs to be understood about the connection between the breakneck investment in AI and the business models that underpins the entire economy: the advertising technology (Ad Tech) industrial complex.For the past 25 years the infrastructure of the internet has been engineered to extract advertising revenue. Search Engine Marketing, the advertising business model at the core of Google, is perhaps the greatest business model of all time. Meta’s advertising business, based on engagement and attribution, is a close second. And right behind both of these is Amazon’s advertising business, powered by its position as the largest online retailer. While a smaller portion of Amazon’s topline, its highly profitable advertising business makes up a disproportionate percentage of Amazon’s profits. So much so that nearly every major retailer has spun up their own version of retail media networks, all driving significantly to the bottom lines and market capitalization of massive companies like Walmart, Kroger, Uber (and UberEats), Doordash and many more.In fact, these platforms have been using AI to refine their advertising business models for years, in the form of algorithmic models that powered their search and recommendation engines, and to increase engagement and better predict purchase decision, seeking an ever-greater share of all commerce, not just what is typically thought of as “advertising.” These three multi-trillion-dollar market cap companies eitherwholly, or substantially, derive their profits from advertising. And now they are using some portion of those historically profitable advertising revenues to fuel infrastructure investments at a level the world has not seen outside of War Time spending by governments.
But at the same time, the latest wave of AI has the potential to disrupt the very same trillions in market cap that is fueling it. AI will, without question, change how people search (Google), shop (Amazon) and are entertained (Meta). Answers delivered without clicking around the web. AI-assisted shopping. Infinite personalized content creation.
If AI represents such a potential existential risk, why are Google, Meta and Amazon such a huge part of the current arms race to invest in AI? The “moonshot” outcome of would be that achieving Artificial General Intelligence, or Super Intelligence, AI that can do anything a human can, but better, would unlock so much value that it would dwarf any investment.
But there is more immediate urgency to protect, or disrupt, the advertising business model fueling the trillions in market cap and hundreds of billions of current investment, before someone else does. While the seminal paper that launched this phase of AI, “Attention is All You Need” was written by mostly Google researchers, it was OpenAI and Microsoft, and now Grok as well, that launched the current AI arms race. And they are not remotely as dependent on the current advertising industrial complex. In fact,Sam Altman has called the feeds of the major platforms using AI to maximize advertising dollars, “the first at-scale misaligned AIs.” He is clearly stating which businesses he believes OpenAI is trying to disrupt.

What comes next?

This time is different, but it also comes with different risks. The major difference with the current fever in infrastructure investment vs the dotcom bubble of 2000, is that in large part the companies funding it are among the most profitable companies in the world. And so far, there has not been indications of cracks in the business model of advertising that is both funding their investments, and their market capitalizations (along with so many massive companies people wouldn’t think about being in the advertising business).

But if AI does disrupt, or even break, the current advertising model, the shock to the economy and markets would be far greater than most could imagine.
Google, Meta and Amazon are still best positioned to create new business models, and as mentioned, have been using AI for far longer to support their advertising business models with great success.
However, fundamentally changing the way people interface with search, commerce and content online will require just that, entirely new revenue models, maybe, hopefully, some that are aligned, that are not advertising based. But whatever the model, perhaps it is helpful to consider that the justification in AIinfrastructure spending may not be to just unlock new revenue, but to protect the business models that make up a much more significant portion of the market capitalization of public companies than most people are aware. More

Private companies added 42,000 jobs in October, following a decline of 29,000 in September and topping the Dow Jones consensus estimate for a gain of 22,000.
All of the job creation came from companies employing at least 250 workers. That category added 76,000 jobs, while smaller businesses lost 34,000.
The ADP count comes out the first Wednesday of the month and usually takes a back seat to the official nonfarm payrolls report, which won’t be released because of the government shutdown.

A jobseeker speaks with a recruiter during a NYS Department Of Labor job fair at the Downtown Central Library in Buffalo, New York, US, on Wednesday, Aug. 27, 2025.
Lauren Petracca | Bloomberg | Getty Images

Payroll growth at private companies turned slightly stronger than expected in October, providing some hope that the labor market isn’t in danger of sinking, ADP reported Wednesday.
Companies added 42,000 jobs for the month, following a decline of 29,000 in September and topping the Dow Jones consensus estimate for a gain of 22,000. A revision for September showed 3,000 fewer jobs lost, the payrolls processing firm said.

A gain of 47,000 in the trade, transportation and utilities grouping helped offset losses in multiple other categories. Education and health services also showed growth of 26,000 while financial activities added 11,000.
Despite the artificial intelligence-fueled tech boom, information services saw a decline of 17,000 positions. Other sectors posting losses included professional and business services (-15,000), other services (-13,000) and manufacturing (-3,000), a sector that continues to struggle despite President Donald Trump’s tariffs aimed at bringing factory jobs back to the U.S.
All of the job creation came from companies employing at least 250 workers. That category added 76,000 jobs, while smaller businesses lost 34,000.
Despite the meager job growth, salaries continued to rise. Year-over-year pay for those staying in their jobs rose 4.5%, the same as in September, while job switchers saw a 6.7% increase, up slightly from a month ago.
“Private employers added jobs in October for the first time since July, but hiring was modest relative towhat we reported earlier this year,” said ADP chief economist Nela Richardson. “Meanwhile, pay growth has been largely flat for more than a year, indicating that shifts in supply and demand are balanced.”

By ADP’s count, job growth has averaged about 60,000 a month. However, that has tailed off significantly in the second half of the year.
The ADP count comes out the first Wednesday of the month and usually takes a back seat to the Bureau of Labor Statistics’ official nonfarm payrolls report released two days later. However, because of the history-making government shutdown, the BLS, like all other government agencies, has suspended data collection and releases.
Had the BLS report been released, Wall Street was looking for it to show a drop of 60,000 jobs and a rise in the unemployment rate to 4.5%.
Federal Reserve officials have expressed concern over the state of the labor market, saying it has overtaken for now the central bank’s attention toward inflation running above the 2% target. The Fed at its meeting last week approved a quarter percentage point reduction in its key interest rate, which now is targeted between 3.75%-4%.
Though the BLS has gone dark, officials will get a look at other data this week.
Challenger, Gray & Christmas on Thursday releases its monthly look at announced layoffs, while economists will watch state-level jobless claims for a look at whether companies are shrinking payrolls. The University of Michigan on Friday also will release its monthly sentiment index which provides snapshots of how consumers feel about broader economic conditions. Recent data from jobs site indeed show employment postings at their lowest since February 2021. More