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Good Morning,

Firms are favoring employee share sales over IPOs, small private credit loans are weakening the fastest, Coinbase will join the S&P 500, Apple may raise iPhone prices, and US and China had a major breakthrough in trade talks.

The annual Lit Cup is back for 2025! Litquidity's annual padel tournament featuring Wall Street's best is all set for ​June 28-29 at Reserve Padel in Hudson Yards, NYC. Join us for a weekend of padel, music, food, and fun as Wall Street folks compete for a shot at glory! RSVP here.

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Let's dive in.

Before The Bell

As of 5/12/2025 market close.

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Markets

  • US stocks ripped yesterday after US and China agreed to temporarily slash tariffs

    • S&P hit a two-month high

    • Nasdaq 100 re-entered a bull market from its April low

    • VIX index fell to its lowest since March

    • Traders now see just two 25 bps Fed rate cuts this year

  • Asian stocks hit their highest level since October

    • China's CSI 300 turned positive YTD

    • Japan's Nikkei 225 soared to its highest level since late-February

  • Emerging stocks also rallied to hit their highest since October

  • US 2Y yield surged over 10 bps to 4% 

  • Japan 30Y yield climbed to 2.9% to its highest in 25 years

  • Dollar jumped to its highest since mid-April

  • One-month forward points on Hong Kong dollar (cost of shorting HK dollar) fell to a record low 

Earnings

  • Hertz missed Q1 earnings and revenue estimates amid intentional lower supply due to cooling demand among businesses, government agencies and international travelers in US, though leisure bookings and its turnaround efforts are bearing fruit (WSJ)

  • Chegg beat Q1 revenue estimates but missed on earnings as subscribers fell 31% amid increasing competition from AI tools; the firm will layoff 22% of staff and slash investments amid growing AI disruption (CNBC)

  • What we're watching this week:  

    • Today: JD.com, Honda

    • Wednesday: Cisco, Sony, CoreWeave, Tencent

    • Thursday: Alibaba, Applied Materials, Cava, Walmart, John Deere, Take-Two Interactive

  • Full calendar here

Prediction Markets

  • Obviously, Bitcoin should have strong correlations with tariffs, right?

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Headline Roundup

  • US and China temporarily slashed tariffs to begin talks (CNBC)

  • US budget surplus hit $258B in April but YTD deficit topped $1T (RT)

  • Firms are favoring employee share sales over IPOs (BBG)

  • Surge in Chinese listings drives boom for US small-cap IPOs (FT)

  • Moody's says small private credit loans are weakening the fastest (BBG)

  • Private credit's mass appeal creates new risks (RT)

  • Hedge funds re-enter Chinese stocks on trade talk optimism (RT)

  • Australia's $2.7T pension funds start questioning US strategies (RT)

  • Japanese foreign equity purchases hit a 20-year high in April (BBG)

  • Markets are bracing for $14B in munis sale wave this week (BBG)

  • Proxy firm ISS also endorsed activist Elliott in Phillips 66 proxy fight (RT)

  • JPMorgan head of tech IB will join General Catalyst (BBG)

  • Evercore poached Citigroup's top Europe dealmaker (FT)

  • Global banking regulators agree to prioritize climate risk work (RT)

  • Apple is weighing raising iPhone prices (WSJ)

  • CrowdStrike CEO cut his voting power by 92% with $1B stock gifts (BBG)

  • Coinbase will join the S&P 500 (CNBC)

  • Nissan will cut another 10k jobs (RT)

  • Trump faces $2T hurdle to win money from Saudi Arabia (BBG)

  • Founders of PE ponzi GPB Capital were sentenced to prison (WSJ)

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Deal Flow

M&A / Investments

  • NRG Energy agreed to acquire a fleet of natural gas-fired power plants from LS Power Equity Advisors for ~$12B, including debt

  • Swiss industrial giant ABB is weighing a sale or spinoff of its robotics division at an over $3.5B valuation

  • Miner Pan American Silver will acquire smaller peer MAG Silver in a $2.1B cash and stock deal at a 21% premium

  • Australia's Macquarie agreed to acquire Spanish renewable energy firm Iberdrola's UK smart meter rental business for $1.2B

  • T. Rowe Price, Alpha Wave Global, Temasek, and others made a $1.6B minority investment at a at $29B valuation in Hellman & Friedman-backed insurance broker Hub International

  • PE firm TSG Consumer Partners agreed to acquire budget gym chain EoS Fitness from PE firm BRS & Co at a $1.5B valuation, including debt

  • PE firm TA Associates is considering selling its majority stake in software firm Accion Labs at a ~$1B valuation

  • Bain Capital will take Japanese logistics firm Nissin private in a $756M deal

  • Towerbrook Capital Partners is seeking buyers for Austrian bio-refinery Austrocel Hallein, which could fetch $570M

  • Brazilian agri firms Ferrari Agroindustria and Agromen Sementes will acquire a sugar-cane processing plant from Raizen, the fuel distributor JV between Cosan and Shell, for $75M as part of efforts to slash debt

  • Czech investment conglomerate PPF launched an offer to increase its stake in German mass media firm ProSiebenSat.1 Media to up to 29.99%, a 21% premium over MediaForEurope's recent $1.8B takeover bid

  • Sports-focused PE firm Arctos Partners is in talks to acquire a stake in NFL's Los Angeles Chargers

  • Blackstone Infrastructure Partners is in talks to acquire New Mexico and Texas-focused utility TXNM Energy

  • Spanish lender Banco Sabadell informally approached peer Unicaja Banco's shareholders about a potential deal, aiming to avoid a hostile takeover by BBVA

  • BlackRock-backed French food conglomerate Danone acquired a majority stake in plant-based formula maker Kate Farms

  • Spanish telecoms company Telefonica is looking to sell its Chilean business

  • Asia's Frasers Property plans to make a privatization offer for its Singapore-listed Frasers Hospitality Trust REIT

VC

  • AI startup Perplexity is in advanced talks to raise a $500M round at a $14B valuation led by Accel

  • Stash, a next-gen investment platform provider, raised a $146M Series H led by Goodwater Capital

  • Classiq, an Israeli quantum software company, raised a $110M Series C led by Entrée Capital

  • X-Bow Systems, a maker of manufactured solid rocket motors and defense tech, raised a $105M Series B led by Lockheed Martin

  • Content technology startup Sanity raised an $85M Series C led by Bullhound Capital

  • Indian healthy snack brand Farmley raised a $42M Series C led by L Catterton

  • Routematic, an Indian tech-driven employee transportation solutions, raised a $40M Series C led by Fullerton Carbon Action Fund and Shift4Good

  • EV charging network Be.EV raised $26M in funding from Schroders Capital

  • Private markets infrastructure company iAltA Holdings raised a $20M round led by WestCap

  • Theom, an AI-native data operations center platform, raised a $20M Series A led by Wing VC

  • Glass Imaging, a startup using AI to improve digital image quality, raised a $20M Series A led by Insight Partners

  • Exterra Carbon Solutions, a carbon transformation platform, raised a $14M Series A led by Clean Energy Ventures and BDC Capital

  • Zapia, a WhatsApp-based AI executive assistant for LatAm, raised a $7.25M seed round led by Prosus Ventures

  • Turtle Club, a Swiss on-chain liquidity distribution protocol provider, raised a $6.2M seed round led by THEIA

  • TensorStax, a data engineering platform, raised a $5M seed round led by Glasswing Ventures

IPO / Direct Listings / Issuances / Block Trades

  • Design software startup Figma hired Morgan Stanley to lead what could be this year's biggest IPO; Figma's $20B sale to Adobe collapsed in 2023

  • Saudi budget airline Flynas' $1.1B IPO of a 30% stake sold out in minutes

  • Alibaba's fintech affiliate Ant Group will sell a 4% stake in Indian fintech Paytm for $242M, a 6% discount

  • Metals investor Cobalt Holdings plans to raise $230M in London's biggest IPO in two years, with Glencore and Anchorage Structured Commodities Advisor anchoring the deal

  • AI-driven drug firm METiS Pharmaceuticals is considering raising $200M in a Hong Kong IPO by year-end

  • Japanese insurer Dai-ichi Life plans to increase its stake in UK hedge fund Capula to 15% to strengthen its oversight of non-traditional assets

  • American Bitcoin Corp., a Bitcoin mining venture backed by the Trump family, will go public via an all-stock merger with Gryphon Digital Mining

  • Animoca Brands, a Hong Kong crypto investment firm last valued at $6B in 2022, plans to list in US

Debt

  • Themed-entertainment company Herschend launched a $1.1B leveraged loan to fund its acquisition of Palace Entertainment's US assets which includes amusement parks, campgrounds, and hotels

Bankruptcy / Restructuring / Distressed

  • Luxury retail group Saks Global Enterprises tapped PJT and Bank of America to explore new financing options to bolster liquidity amid struggles related to its recent $2.7B buyout of luxury retailer Neiman Marcus

Fundraising / Secondaries

  • Carlyle's FOF arm AlpInvest raised over $10B for its eight flagship fund

  • European private credit firm Pemberton raised $9.3B across two senior loan funds and a strategic credit vehicle

  • Impact investor Ara Partners raised $800M for its debut infrastructure decarbonization fund

  • PE firm Corsair Capital raised ~$600M for a first multi-asset continuation fund and secondaries fund for ZEDRA, Redpin and IDnow led by secondaries investor Coller Capital 

  • Fusion Capital Partners, a PE firm launched by ex-Odyssey execs, is seeking to raise $450M for its debut fund

  • Growth-stage tech investor Renown Capital Partners launched with $250M in anchor capital after spinning out from Moore Capital Management

  • Aligned Climate Capital raised over $200M for its sixth solar fund

  • Google launched its AI Futures Fund to invest in startups using DeepMind's AI tools

Crypto Sum Snapshot

  • Paradigm-backed Exponential launched DeFi platform YO to optimize yield

  • Strategy’s Bitcoin purchases are large enough to move the market

  • Buyers of $TRUMP memecoin spent $148M to win dinner with Trump

  • SEC will likely overhaul crypto broker rules

  • Check out our Crypto Sum newsletter for the full stories on everything crypto!

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  • Bloomberg published a highly insightful piece exploring how AI is draining water from areas that need it the most.

Financial Services Recruiting 💼

If you're a junior banker looking for your next career move, check out Litney Partners, a recruiting firm established by Litquidity and Whitney Partners (the oldest purely financial services executive search and consulting firm).

We aim to place strong candidates across private equity, hedge funds, venture capital, growth equity, credit, and investment banking.

We're currently seeking talent for some incredible roles. Head over to Litney Partners to drop your resume / create your profile and we'd love to get in touch!

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*DISCLAIMER: Investment advice provided by Autopilot Advisers, LLC ("Autopilot"), an SEC-registered investment adviser. Past performance does not guarantee future results. Investing carries risks, including loss of principal. As always, be smart out there. Litquidity is compensated to promote AutoPilot. Compensation details available upon request.