Good Morning and Happy Friday! Amazon popped 13% after hours on strong earnings and surging AWS growth. Netflix jumped 3% after announcing a 10-for-1 split, it was one of the last few S&P 500 names still trading above $1,000. Chipotle and Shake Shack warned of weaker Gen Z demand amid job woes and slower wage growth.

Santander hit record U.S. profits, growth equity firm General Atlantic led a $2B Shutterfly private credit deal, and Palantir sued two AI engineers for allegedly building a “copycat” startup.

Plus: ex-McKinsey consultants are now training AI models to replace them, the best U.S. cities for single people, and are night owls or early birds better?

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SQUEEZ OF THE DAY

JPM 🤝 Private Equity 🤝 Blockchain

JPMorgan just became the first major bank to tokenize a private-equity fund on its own blockchain with the launch of its new Kinexys Fund Flow platform. The move marks a major step in bringing private-market infrastructure onto distributed ledgers.

The idea is to convert fund ownership into digital tokens that represent each investor’s stake. These tokens live on a private, permissioned blockchain, allowing all approved parties (the bank, fund manager, and administrators) to view the same real-time record of who owns what.

Instead of passing PDFs and wiring funds manually, transactions can be executed and settled almost instantly through smart contracts, which automate processes like capital calls and redemptions.

For now, access is limited to JPMorgan Private Bank clients, meaning the same ultra-wealthy investors who already invest in private equity. For them, Kinexys isn’t about democratizing finance; it’s about efficiency: less paperwork, faster settlements, and tighter control over fund flows.

Wall Street is watching closely ahead of a broader rollout next year. Since President Trump’s Genius Act legalized tokenized dollars this summer, every major bank has been experimenting.

Goldman Sachs and BNY Mellon are piloting tokenized money-market funds with BlackRock and Fidelity, while JPMorgan wants to extend tokenization deeper into alternatives like private credit, real estate, and hedge funds.

The firm says this is structural, not speculative, part of a long-term push to modernize how private markets handle ownership and liquidity. Tokenization could eventually enable fractional fund interests, automated capital deployment, and even secondary trading of private fund stakes within regulated networks.

Skeptics point out that the market for tokenized funds remains small and regulatory constraints will likely limit adoption to private ecosystems for now.

Takeaway: For now, Kinexys is a sandbox for the ultra-rich, not a revolution for retail investors. But if JPMorgan can make tokenized private equity actually work, this might be the quietest revolution in finance since Excel.

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HEADLINES

Top Reads

• Amazon soars 13% as earnings beat estimates, company posts strong cloud growth (CNBC)

• Netflix announces a 10-for-1 stock split (CNBC)

• Chipotle and Shake Shack warn of weaker demand among younger consumers (BB)

• Chipotle stock craters as company says young people without jobs “can’t afford their food anymore” (YF)

• Santander’s U.S. bet starts to pay off amid record profit (WSJ)

• General Atlantic leads $2 billion Shutterfly private credit deal (BB)

• Palantir accuses ex-AI engineers of stealing secrets for copycat startup (BB)

• Ex-McKinsey consultants now training AI models to replace themselves (BB)

• Trump leaves China meeting promising tariff reductions and “near-term stability” in relations (YF)

• Powell comments on Dimon’s cockroach warning, says there’s no broader problem (YF)

• Deutsche Bank’s U.S. distressed-debt desk books $200 million profit (BB)

• Blackstone, Apollo, Blue Owl, and Carlyle ramp up marketing amid private capital boom (BB)

• JPMorgan leads 20-bank syndicate on $20 billion EA buyout debt deal (BB)

• Palantir’s Joe Lonsdale says AI firms are downplaying energy and capital demands (CNBC)

• OpenAI’s “Project Mercury” aims to automate Wall Street investment banking (QZ)

• Private credit moves into the equity business as stressed borrowers seek cash (BB)

• Goldman CEO warns U.S. faces a “debt reckoning” if growth slows (BB)

CAPITAL PULSE

Markets Rundown

Market Update

• Markets declined after record highs, led by weakness in the Nasdaq as investors reacted to mixed tech earnings and cautious Fed commentary.

• Sectors such as consumer discretionary, communication services, and technology underperformed, while value and cyclical names fared better.

• Meta fell more than 10% following its earnings, while Alphabet gained 2.5% on strong results.

• Trade headlines helped limit losses, as the U.S. and China agreed to a one-year truce: Washington will halve fentanyl-related tariffs to 10%, cutting total tariffs to 47%, while Beijing will pause rare-earth export curbs and resume soybean purchases.

• Bonds weakened, with yields rising on reduced Fed cut expectations, while the U.S. dollar advanced.

Economic Data Highlights

• Fed reaffirmed a gradual approach to policy easing after delivering a 25-bp rate cut earlier this week, lowering its target range to 3.75%–4.00%.

• Powell cautioned that a December rate cut is “not guaranteed,” sending market-implied odds down to roughly 70%.

• Committee members were divided—some favored a larger cut, others no change—reflecting uncertainty amid limited data from the ongoing shutdown.

• Outlook remains for gradual easing through 2026, though the Fed is balancing slower growth with lingering inflation pressures.

Earnings Today

• Chevron (CVX) – Focus on energy prices, production guidance, and shareholder returns.

• ExxonMobil (XOM) – Watch for refining margins, upstream performance, and capex outlook.

• AbbVie (ABBV) – Key focus on Humira erosion, new product uptake, and R&D pipeline strength.

Movers & Shakers

• (+) S&P Global ($SPGI) +4% after the financial data company announced strong earnings.

• (–) Meta ($META) -11% after earnings, a $16B tax hit, $25B bond sale.

• (–) Chipotle Mexican Grill ($CMG) -18% after the fast casual chain cut its outlook for the third time this year.

Prediction Markets

• ~52% think the S&P 500 will close above 7,000.

• Trade on real-world events with Kalshi. Use code OWS to get a $10 bonus when you trade $10.

Private Dealmaking

• Bending Spoons, a holding company that revitalizes legacy tech brands, raised $710 million

• Fruitist, a healthy snackmaker, raised $150 million

• EnduroSat, a satellite constellations-as-a-service provider, raised $100 million

• Starship Technologies, an autonomous delivery startup, raised $50 million

• Scorability, a college sports recruiting and evaluation platform, raised $40 million

• Recall.ai, a platform for developer access to meeting recordings, raised $38 million

For more PE, VC & M&A deals, subscribe to our Buysiders newsletter.

BOOK OF THE DAY

The Last Economy

Description:
This is a provocative roadmap for the “Intelligence Age”—a time when human intellect becomes abundant, thanks to AI, and traditional economic systems geared for scarcity break down. Mostaque argues we’re entering a phase transition, where value shifts from labor and capital to creativity, judgment, and care. Drawing on systems thinking, complexity science, and computer science, he offers a blueprint for an economy built around abundance, human agency, and symbiosis with technology.

Book Length: 180 pages
Release Date: August 22, 2025

Ideal For:
Futurists, economists, tech strategists, policy makers, and anyone curious about how the next wave of economic change might be structured—and how individuals and institutions should prepare.

“Our dashboards show record profits, while daily life shows a loss of purpose. The gap signals a paradigm collapse.”

DAILY VISUAL

Harvard Careers by Family Income

What Harvard grads pursued a career in based on their parents income

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Unlike traditional crypto projects or gold ETFs, each NatGold token represents a claim on independently verified gold deposits, without exposure to fiat or the need for physical extraction. The model removes intermediaries and carbon-intensive mining, using digital issuance to create a more streamlined structure.

So far, NatGold has drawn $170 million in reservations ahead of its official launch, with more than 75,000 tokens already reserved. The first 25,000 tokens will be issued at a 10% discount to Baseline Intrinsic Value.

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DAILY ACUMEN

Strategic Laziness

Not every hill is worth climbing.

Strategic laziness is knowing which battles to skip.

You don’t need to have an opinion on everything or fix every problem.

Most successful people are selectively obsessed.

They conserve energy for asymmetric opportunities and ignore the noise.

Laziness isn’t apathy; it’s capital allocation.

Spend your focus like it’s currency. Hoard it for the work that matters.

ENLIGHTENMENT

Short Squeez Picks

• Are night owls or early birds better?

• The best U.S. cities for single people

• How to fit workouts into your schedule

• Why Gen-Z wants to build credit

• The traffic revolution that’s making cities healthier 

MEME-A-PALOOZA

Memes of the Day

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