u/jackandjillonthehill

NEW YORK, Oct 6 (Reuters) - Google has contracted for 3,590 megawatts of power from Constellation Energy in the largest US power grid, with new nuclear energy accounting ‌for about a quarter of that supply, the companies said on Tuesday.

Constellation will make more than $4.3 billion of new investments in its fleet as part of the agreement, which involves adding capacity at several of the power company's nuclear reactors in the Midwest and Mid-Atlantic regions, the companies said.

In the latest arrangement, Google entered into a 20-year power purchase agreement for 890 megawatts of electricity from multiple Constellation-owned nuclear power plants, which would be upgraded to produce more electricity from existing reactors.

Electricity from the first of the upgraded plants is expected to be delivered in 2028, the companies said.

Google also entered into a 15-year supply agreement for an additional 2,700 megawatts of power from Constellation in the PJM power grid. That power is not tied to a specific generation source and serves as long-term revenue certainty for Constellation's operating plants, Google said.

The head of the French central bank has warned that the country risks being “strangled by interest rates” if it does not act to clean up its public finances. 

Emmanuel Moulin, the governor of the Banque de France, told the FT that the Eurozone’s second-largest economy could win back investor confidence despite the “serious and worrying” moves on sovereign debt markets in recent days.

“France is not Greece during the Eurozone crisis,” Moulin said. “If it can pass a budget this year to reduce spending and narrow the deficit as the government has proposed, then markets will be reassured by this concrete step of fiscal consolidation.”

“If we don’t act, there is indeed a risk of being gradually strangled by rising interest rates,” he added. “We have to remain masters of our own destiny.”

Heidelberg material is a German company that makes cement, aggregates, and concrete.

Cement is 45% of revenues, aggregates are 21%, and concrete and asphalt are 23% of revenues.

Geographic mix is heavily European, with about 45% of sales coming from Europe, about 10% from Germany, and then 21% from U.S., and the rest from rest of world.

It has a market cap of 25.5 billion euros or $29 billion.

Net debt of 8 billion euros or $9 billion. Debt to EBITDA of 1.8X.

EV of $38 billion.

$3.6 billion TTM operating profit.

EV/EBIT of 10.5

This is much lower than other similar businesses which make cement, concrete, and aggregates.

The aggregates business is attractive because gravel is very heavy and expensive to transport. So the owner of a local gravel pit or quarry has good bargaining power and they have high margins and ROE. Moreover in Europe, there are regulatory barriers to anyone starting a new gravel pit, so no new competitors can enter the market.

Despite this, Heidelberg trades at a discount to US or global businesses with gravel pits.

Martin Marietta trades at a 29.5X EV/EBIT

Vulcan Materials trades at a 22.3X EV/EBIT

Holcim, which is also Europe and emerging market, trades at 21.8X EV/EBIT.

Cemex trades at 14.9X EV/EBIT despite making 30% of revenues in Mexico and 29% from EMEA.

Amrize is cheaper at 14.3X EV/EBIT, with, curiously, 100% US exposure.

Just rising to Amrize multiple would mean over 60% upside to the stock. But Amrize itself seems undervalued given it is a 100% North American company.

Heidelberg Seems cheap to me. And maybe Amrize too.

US utilities are investing record sums in power plants and transmission lines to meet rising demand from data centres and upgrade an ageing grid battered by extreme weather. At the same time, electricity bills have risen 15 per cent since the start of 2025, according to the Energy Information Administration — while Americans also contend with higher housing, food and transport costs.

Most US utilities are monopolies, meaning customers cannot choose which company supplies their electricity or gas. Regulators decide which investments — such as power plants, wires and poles — customers should pay for, creating a pool of assets called the “rate base”. They then decide how much profit the utility can make on those investments, the return on equity.

Regulators cut $3.6bn from utility requests in 2025, more than five times the amount they cut in 2021, data from Halcyon, a market intelligence firm, shows.

During these so-called rate cases, consumer advocates and politicians can argue that infrastructure spending was unnecessary or that the return on equity should be lower.

“ROE is the skeleton key in terms of utility regulation,” said Mark Ellis, senior fellow for Utilities at the American Economic Liberties Project. “It’s a big chunk of your bill, and high returns create an incentive to build more than is necessary.”

Pressure to keep bills down is trickling down to state regulators. In August Maryland’s commission cut Pepco’s return on equity by 10 basis points — after the Washington, DC, utility asked for a 1 per cent rise. Governor Wes Moore praised the move, saying “utilities should not earn unreasonable profits while everyday Marylanders can’t afford to pay their power bills”.

Maryland’s regulators said Exelon, which owns Pepco, Peco and Delmarva, could not pass on to ratepayers $164.9mn for its White Flint Substation in Rockville, saying the project’s costs were “not prudent”. Chief executive Calvin Butler said this makes it harder for utilities to plan confidently.

“You can’t tell me to invest and then second-guess after the fact,” he told the FT.

Utilities say they are asking for higher returns because the cost of capital is high. As yields on safe investments such as 10-year US Treasuries rise, shareholders ask for higher returns to justify investing in utility stocks. According to Morningstar, the spread between Treasuries and average allowed ROE is the tightest since 2007, narrowing 43 per cent since 2020.

“There’s a virtuous cycle: If you want a grid that survives a hurricane or wildfire, and if you want clean energy, you have to have investment,” said Tim Winter, a portfolio manager at Gabelli.

China’s urban youth unemployment rose last month, as a record influx of university graduates struggles to find work in a job market weighed down by weak domestic demand and the growing adoption of artificial intelligence.

The jobless rate for those aged 16 to 24, excluding students, rose to 18.9 per cent in August from 17.9 per cent in July, according to data released by the National Bureau of Statistics on Thursday.

This figure, as well as the identical number from August last year, represents the highest reading since Beijing revised its calculation methodology to exclude students in 2023, following a peak of 21.3 per cent under the old rubric reported in June of that year.

A record 12.7 million university students were estimated to have graduated this summer, entering a labour market already weakened by slowing economic momentum. While the rise in youth unemployment is partly seasonal, anxiety is growing over the threat that the emerging adoption of AI poses to entry-level roles.

I’ve been trading futures for about 5 years now, more seriously since 2024 or so. I’ve generally stuck to these higher time scale trades (weeks to months) just because I can’t sit in front of the screen all day to watch entries.

Late 2024-2025 seemed like a relatively easy time, there were big multi month trends in products with lots of liquidity. I caught the big bull market in European stocks in early 2025, a bit of the bullish Nasdaq move post liberation day, and lots of good chunks of the big bull market in gold. Despite a lot of crappy trades that hit my stop loss, and some bad trading in the last 3 months or so of the year, my positive trades overwhelmed everything and I made a lot of money.

2026 has been much harder for me. I went long the Kospi futures in early 2026 as well as Nikkei but then we entered the Iran war and everything gapped down pretty far below my stops so I got blown out with a large loss.

I tried to go long oil several times and eventually threw in the towel - it was super choppy and never set up a great trend.

I took a long time off from futures trading after that. When I came back I thought things had calmed down on geopolitics, and I saw a good setup, again in Japan, this time with the yen futures. And again blown out on geopolitics after this latest escalation.

I’m trying to decide if it is a problem of strategy or a problem of environment. The strategy I am using benefits from long smooth trends with occasional consolidations that allow me to adjust stops and potentially size up.

The only “smooth trend” I can see has been shorting ZN or ZB all year, or perhaps shorting SOFR futures in anticipation of rate hikes. Other than that everything has been quite choppy this year.

This year the major issues I had in futures trading have all revolved around geopolitics or sudden, unanticipated news announcements. In 2024-2025, there were very few such events and the strategy worked well.

It’s also tough with longer time frame trading to get the number of observations that you need to understand if your system is working across different environments.

Curious for any thoughts people may have on these topics.

https://preview.redd.it/gsj8nzvvdqph1.png?width=647&format=png&auto=webp&s=1f2487a92121b327dc822d07cc58b648b0b963bb

Source: https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2026-09-15/mbs-and-saudi-arabia-face-crisis-with-key-oil-pipeline-shut-for-weeks

>Egyptian President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi has backed Saudi calls for secure and unhindered navigation in the Red Sea during a meeting with Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman in Cairo, according to a statement by the Egyptian presidency.

>Sisi met the crown prince, known as MBS, on Tuesday as part of a Saudi delegation that included Foreign Minister Prince Faisal bin Farhan and other senior officials.

The statement affirmed that “relations between Egypt and Saudi Arabia can only be exemplary within the Arab framework, and that the security of Saudi Arabia and the Gulf states is an integral part of Egypt’s national security”, while also emphasising efforts to achieve a sustainable political solution to the Yemen conflict. The Saudi-backed Yemeni government has lost key territories including coastal areas vital for oil shipping to the Iran-aligned Houthis in recent days.

>MBS emphasised the importance of secure navigation in both the Bab al-Mandeb Strait and the Red Sea, according to the Saudi Press Agency.

>The visit by Saudi leaders comes as Yemen’s Houthi rebels have captured Mocha port and effectively control the Bab al-Mandeb Strait.

China’s spy agency has warned that AI could pose a risk to the country’s political and social security, signalling growing concern in Beijing that rapid advances in the technology could be exploited against the country.

In its first public statement on AI, the Ministry of State Security on Sunday detailed the threats the technology presented, including to China’s cyber defences, sensitive data and military apparatus.

“Hostile forces and people with ulterior motives are abusing generative AI technologies such as deepfake audio and video, AI-generated text and images, and ‘intelligent troll armies’ to cheaply and on a mass scale fabricate political rumours, disseminate harmful information and incite divisive sentiments,” said state security minister Chen Yixin.

“These activities constitute an attack on public opinion and cognitive warfare against China, directly threatening our political security, institutional security and ideological security,” he added.

In a statement on Friday, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs said the pipeline was targeted in the Riyadh and Medina areas by “several drones originating from Iraq”, resulting in injuries and material damage.

“At the request of the Iraqi Prime Minister to allow the brotherly Iraqi government the opportunity to take the necessary measures to prevent attacks launched from Iraqi territory against the Kingdom and neighbouring countries, the Kingdom has chosen not to respond at this stage and to support the efforts of the Iraqi government,” said the ministry in a statement posted on X.

The pipeline was stopped as a precaution, and the attacks resulted in some injuries,” the official said.
Iraq ⁠welcomed ⁠Saudi Arabia’s decision to hold ⁠off on retaliation and said it “appreciates” Riyadh’s response to its efforts to contain the situation.

Iraq “condemns” the attack and affirms its “rejection of any aggression that threatens the Kingdom’s security and stability or harms the deep-rooted fraternal relations between the two countries”, said the statement issued by Sabah al-Numan, the spokesperson for the commander-in-chief of the Iraqi Armed Forces.

The Iraqi Prime Minister’s Office said early on Saturday that a military commander who led operations in Maysan province was dismissed ⁠after investigations confirmed the latest drone attacks ‌targeting Saudi Arabia “had been launched from a location within” the southern province.

Prime Minister Ali al-Zaidi also ordered the formation of an “investigative council” to probe the Maysan Operations Command, the office said.

Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) Secretary-General Jasem Mohamed Albudaiwi called the attack “a dangerous escalation and an unacceptable threat to the security of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, its territorial integrity, and its vital installations”, as well as “a flagrant violation of the principles of international law”.
He said the GCC “categorically rejects all actions targeting the Kingdom’s security, stability, and national assets”.

Albudaiwi stressed the importance of Iraq “intensifying its efforts and taking the necessary, decisive measures to prevent its territory from being used as a launchpad for such attacks”. He called on Baghdad to “work to halt them and deter their recurrence in order to safeguard regional security and stability”.