Good morning! BlackRock’s Global Infrastructure Partners is in advanced talks to acquire Aligned Data Centers in a $40B deal. The AI boom is thawing the frozen IPO market and giving private equity funds a liquidity boost. PE firms are also pushing to tap 401(k) money faster by adding illiquid assets to target-date funds.

Jeff Bezos says AI may be in an “industrial bubble” but will pay off long-term. Goldman’s David Solomon warned of a stock “drawdown" in the next year or two. Bitcoin hit $125K for the first time, while European AI startups continue to lag U.S. peers.

Plus: Diddy is eyeing AI platform launch after prison, Trump proposed $2,000 tariff-funded stimulus checks, and gold miners are outpacing AI stocks in 2025.

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SQUEEZ OF THE DAY

JPMorgan Cooling on Nuclear Hype

As AI’s energy appetite soars, Wall Street is piling into nuclear as the next megatrend. But inside JPMorgan’s investment bank, some senior dealmakers think the trade is getting overheated.

Rama Variankaval, JPMorgan’s global head of corporate advisory, warned this week that markets may be “over-indexing” on nuclear as a quick fix for AI’s power crunch. The logic fueling the rally is simple: data centers are devouring electricity, and Bloomberg Intelligence projects a $350 billion U.S. nuclear build-out by 2050, with reactor output climbing 63%.

The narrative has sent assets flying: Oklo shares are up more than 500% this year, while the MVIS Global Uranium & Nuclear Energy Index has surged 70%, outpacing the S&P 500’s 14% gain.

But Variankaval is urging restraint. “The demand for new power is real, but the supply of new nuclear will take time,” he said. Large fission plants cost billions, typically take a decade or more to complete, and routinely face delays.

Wall Street’s supposed shortcut, small modular reactors (SMRs), remains “probably still a handful of years away” from cost competitiveness. Fusion, he added, is “two handfuls of years away.” 

He says that his concern grew after sitting through Climate Week panels in New York filled with unrealistic optimism and venture money chasing early-stage nuclear startups.

Even with President Trump’s push to quadruple U.S. nuclear capacity, JPMorgan expects only ~9 GW of new nuclear to come online this decade, with SMR deployment not expected until after 2035.

Meanwhile, just three traditional reactors have been completed in the U.S. this century, and the industry still faces shortages of skilled labor, domestic fuel, and regulatory clarity. Variankaval also flagged rising power prices and policy risk over who pays for the high capex of new energy.

Takeaway: It’s rare for a top investment banker to pump the brakes on a Wall Street mania, but that’s exactly what Variankaval’s doing. His message: nuclear is a long-duration, high-beta trade, not a liquidity event. For now, the real capital will chase fast-build energy, gas, solar, and batteries, while nuclear remains the ultimate “maybe someday” story.

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HEADLINES

Top Reads

• BlackRock’s GIP nears deal to buy Aligned Data Centers for nearly $40B (BB)

• Mega AI deals enable exits for private equity but fuel bubble fears (CNBC)

• Private equity hunts for a quicker path to tap 401(k) money (BB)

• Jeff Bezos: AI may be in an industrial bubble, but society will benefit (CNBC)

• Goldman Sachs CEO David Solomon warns stock market drawdown is coming (CNBC)

• Bitcoin touches record price above $125k (YF)

• OpenAI, Anthropic push European AI startups to keep up (CNBC)

• Convicted moguls Diddy and Miles Guo ponder AI platform after jail (FT)

• Trump's pitching $2,000 stimulus checks from tariff revenue (Axios)

• Gold stocks rally 150% in 2025, trounce AI-driven rally (YF)

• The biggest sign of an AI bubble is starting to appear (Axios)

• Opendoor hype won’t make its business any more viable (WSJ)

• Asia markets shrug off U.S. shutdown concerns, follow Wall Street gains (CNBC)

• Cracker Barrel ends partnership with consulting firm behind logo change backlash (NYP)

• Wealth of the top 1% hits record $52 trillion (CNBC)

• Jefferies downgrades Apple to Sell, sees 20% downside (CNBC)

• Private credit funds eye $1.3 billion take-private deal for JTC (BB)

CAPITAL PULSE

Markets Rundown

Market Update

• Dow Jones hit a record close, outpacing the S&P 500 and Nasdaq

• ISM Services Index for September came in at 50.0, signaling continued expansion

• ISM Employment Index remained in contraction at 47.2, reflecting labor-market softening

• Market odds for an October Fed rate cut rose to ~95%, supporting sentiment

Economic Data Highlights

• Labor-market data delayed due to the government shutdown; no September jobs report released

• Prior forecasts called for +50k payrolls, 4.3% unemployment, and 3.7% wage growth y/y

• 7.2M job openings vs. 7.4M unemployed suggest a cooling but stable labor market

• Alternative data sources (ADP, Challenger reports) remain available, but transparency is reduced

• Fed likely to weigh delayed data carefully heading into the October 30 FOMC meeting

Earnings Today

• Constellation Brands (STZ) – Watch for consumer demand trends and pricing resilience

• AEHR Test Systems (AEHR) – Focus on semiconductor test demand and AI-related growth

Movers & Shakers

• (+) USA Rare Earth ($USAR) +14% after the rare-earth company confirmed talks with Trump for the government to invest in the company.

• (+) Red Cat Holdings ($RC) +10% because Needham initiated coverage on the drone company with a buy.

• (–) Palantir ($PLTR) -7% after concerns over the company’s battlefield communications systems and subsequent issues.  

Private Dealmaking

• Supabase, a Postgres database management system, raised $100 million

• DualEntry, an ERP startup, raised $90 million

• Feedzai, a financial fraud and crime prevention platform, raised $75 million

• Nornorm, a furniture-as-a-service company, raised $54 million

• Phaidra, a provider of AI agents for data centers, raised $50 million

• Motion, developer of “Microsoft Office for AI agents,” raised $38 million

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

NEIGHBORHOOD WATCH

Real Estate Digest

Need help with real estate? Our official partner, Nest Seekers International, can help you buy, sell, rent, or invest, anywhere in the world. Get in touch here.

The 30-year fixed-rate mortgage saw a slight increase again this week but remains well below its 52-week average of 6.71%. The recently reported increase in pending home sales shows that homebuyers are feeling more confident coming into the marketplace.

Latest News

• Is NYC a Buyers Market or a Sellers Market?

• Pending US Home Sales Jump to Highest Level in Five Months

• US New Home Sales Unexpectedly Jump 20% in Broad Advance

• Manhattan Home Sales Jump to Two-Year High Led By Cash Buyers 

New Listings

• 130 William St Apt: PH60B New York, NY:  3 Bed / 3.5 Bath - $6.9M

• 522 Kings Road Chelsea London, UK: 4 Bed / 4.5 Bath - $8.1M 

• 200 Caravelle Dr Dillon, CO: 5 Bed / 5.5 Bath -  $3.6M 

• 300 Biscayne Boulevard, 8001, Miami, FL: 4 Bed / 4.5 Bath - $9.7M

• Rte de Morel Apt: 501 Les Allues, France: 5 Bed / 5.5 Bath - $8.9M

BOOK OF THE DAY

The Power to Persist

Description: A resilience roadmap built on eight consistent habits—attitude, work ethic, agility, vulnerability, network, focus, dogged determination, and faith. Drawing from his personal journey through adversity, McMorris offers tools and stories to help readers stay grounded and keep moving forward, even when everything seems against them.

Book Length: 208 pages
Release Date: September 23, 2025

Ideal For: Anyone facing sustained challenges—entrepreneurs, leaders, creators, and individuals striving to build emotional and mental fortitude over time.

“Persistence doesn’t require perfection. It’s about showing up again and again with purpose.”

DAILY VISUAL

US Private Equity as a Percentage of the Total Stock Market

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DAILY ACUMEN

Anchoring

Behavioral finance 101: people overweigh the first number they hear.

The same house feels cheap at $800K if it was listed at $1M, expensive if listed at $600K.

Anchoring quietly shapes salaries, negotiations, even self-worth.

The market does it too—stocks stick near round numbers, valuations cluster by precedent.

The way out isn’t pretending you’re rational.

It’s choosing which anchors you tie to. 

Anchor to fundamentals, not to noise. Anchor to process, not to price.

ENLIGHTENMENT

Short Squeez Picks

• Work bags that keep you organized 

• 4 essential principles to build athletic training workouts

• Why Gen-Z can’t afford to specialize at work

• Is WFH still the new normal for corporate America?

• The 10 best countries to retire abroad

MEME-A-PALOOZA

Memes of the Day

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