Good Morning! Trump said "I love the inflation" after CPI hit a three-year high. He also baffled Wall Street by crowning Citi the top M&A shop, news to Goldman, JPMorgan, Morgan Stanley, and BofA, who all sit ahead of Citi in the actual rankings. And Ares raised $8.5B for a new esoteric credit fund despite the broader private markets slump.

Wedding inflation has desperate brides paying witches for perfect $100K days. Travis Kelce and Taylor Swift are reportedly dropping $3M to rent out MSG for their wedding. And SpaceX's IPO is pulling billions in orders from Middle Eastern sovereign wealth funds.

Plus: Magnetar is planning a hedge fund that swaps human analysts for AI bots, and how people actually make it to the C-suite at S&P 500 companies.

“Buy, borrow, die". It’s the strategy the wealthy use to access capital. You can now do it with Stelrix. Join the waitlist today. 

SQUEEZ OF THE DAY

The 1% Fee Meets AI

Wealth management has long been one of finance’s cushier gigs. Win clients, keep them happy, charge around 1% on assets, and let comp compound as their portfolios grow. Once advisers survive the early cold-call grind, the job can pay $500k+ a year, with top partners making far more. But now AI is coming for the model.

At the Future Proof wealth conference in Miami Beach, thousands of advisers gathered around an “AI Playground” to figure out whether chatbots are tools, threats, or both. The threat is obvious. More people are already using AI to budget, screen investments, manage portfolios, and make financial decisions. Banks and fintechs are rolling out “always-on” advice tools without the awkward quarterly call or the 1% fee. One startup’s pitch was basically: “Make Claude manage your money.” That is a little terrifying if your job is convincing clients not to panic-sell during drawdowns.

For now, advisers say AI is helping, not replacing them. It can summarize research, draft client emails, analyze portfolios, handle back-office work, and make junior advisers more productive. Anthropic’s head of asset and wealth management told advisers: “We’re not trying to replace you. We’re trying to work for you.”

The human adviser still has a strong case at the high end. Rich people do not just need asset allocation. They need tax planning, estate work, trust structures, liquidity planning, emotional hand-holding, and someone to call when life gets messy. AI can explain a donor-advised fund. It probably cannot manage your divorce, your $30 million estate plan, your panicked heirs, and your art collection in the same week.

But the lower and middle parts of the wealth market look more vulnerable. If you have $200k, $500k, or even $1 million, a chatbot that helps with budgeting, tax-loss harvesting, portfolio allocation, and basic planning may be good enough, especially for younger investors who already trust apps more than brokers. Roughly 80% of Gen Z respondents in one survey said they use AI for personal finances.

That is why wealth stocks have already been rattled by AI fears. When Altruist announced an AI-powered tax-planning tool, shares of Raymond James, LPL, and Schwab fell. The market’s question is simple: if AI can replicate more of the planning stack, how much of the traditional adviser fee is still defensible?

Takeaway: AI probably will not kill wealth management overnight. Rich people still want trust, judgment, and a human to call when things get complicated. But the cushy economics of the business are officially under review. The adviser of the future may still make great money, but only if they use AI to become faster, smarter, and more valuable. Everyone else may find out that “relationship-driven business” is a lot less safe when the next generation is perfectly comfortable asking ChatGPT what to do with their money.

PRESENTED BY STELRIX

How the Rich Don’t Pay Capital Gains Tax

The wealthy don’t just make money differently, they access it differently. Instead of selling appreciating assets and triggering capital gains taxes, many borrow against their portfolios to unlock liquidity while their investments continue compounding in the background. This strategy, often called “buy, borrow, die,” allows investors to use stocks, ETFs, or other assets as collateral for low interest credit without creating a taxable sale event. The advantage is not only tax deferral, but also maintaining ownership, preserving long term market exposure, and keeping compounding intact while still accessing cash when needed. What was once a strategy reserved for ultra high net worth private banking clients is now becoming increasingly accessible through modern investment backed credit platforms, like Stelrix.

Explore Stelrix’s Instagram for luxury and finance news and sign-up for their waitlist today.

HEADLINES

Top Reads

• Trump says ‘I love the inflation’ after consumer price index hits 3-year high (CNBC)

• Trump baffles Wall Street with top dealmaker praise for Citi (CNBC)

• Ares Management secures $8.5 billion for new esoteric credit fund (GuruFocus)

• Brides are turning to Etsy witches for wedding weather spells (BB)

• The staggering cost for Travis Kelce and Taylor Swift to rent MSG for their wedding (NY Post)

• SpaceX IPO draws billions in orders from Middle Eastern funds (BB)

• Magnetar plans fund that replaces human analysts with AI bots (BB)

• AI will help young workers 'mature' faster by automating grunt work, Thoma Bravo says, amid youth job crisis (CNBC)

• Apollo's Kleinman says private equity has lost its way (BB)

• Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei is a manager to only one direct report (BB)

• Marc Lore's robots make 500 burrito bowls an hour — a human can make 45 (Fortune)

• Amazon inks $17.5 billion loan in financing led by Citigroup (BB)

• Supermicro Computer stock sinks on $7 billion equity raise (Yahoo Finance)

• Oracle Q4 earnings beat on revenue but miss on cloud sales (Yahoo Finance)

CAPITAL PULSE

Markets Rundown

Market Update

• Markets lower: The S&P 500 fell 1.6% and the Nasdaq declined 2.0% as geopolitical tensions resurfaced.

• Middle East tensions: U.S. strikes against Iran and uncertainty around negotiations weighed on investor sentiment.

• Oil higher: WTI crude rose modestly, finishing just above $90 per barrel.

• Rates higher: The 10-year Treasury yield increased to 4.55%, while the 2-year yield rose to 4.13%.

• Inflation in line: May CPI matched expectations, helping limit concerns of a broader inflation surprise.

Economic Data Highlights

• Headline CPI: Inflation rose 4.2% year-over-year, the highest reading since April 2023.

• Core CPI: Core inflation increased 2.9% year-over-year, with monthly growth below expectations.

• Energy impact: Higher energy prices remained the primary driver of headline inflation.

• Fed outlook: Policymakers are expected to remain on hold, though an easing bias may be removed at next week's meeting.

Central Bank Watch

• Bank of Canada: Left interest rates unchanged.

• ECB today: Markets expect a 0.25% rate hike from the European Central Bank.

• Fed next week: Investors will focus on Kevin Warsh's first meeting as Fed Chair and updated economic projections.

• Policy path: Markets continue to expect the Fed to remain on hold despite elevated inflation and geopolitical risks.

Movers & Shakers

• (+) Cracker Barrel ($CBRL) +23% after Q3 results beat badly lowered expectations signaling strong turnaround efforts.

• (+) Cava ($CAVA) +7% because UBS upgraded the fast casual chain to Buy, citing a compelling long-term growth story.

• (–) Super Micro Computer ($SMCI) -28% after announcing a $7B equity raise to fulfill surging AI server orders.

Prediction Markets

• US Producer Price Index comes out today around 8:30am EDT.

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

Private Dealmaking

• Standard Bots, an industrial robots developer, raised $200 million

• Morpho, an open credit network, raised $175 million

• SonoThera, a developer of ultrasound-delivered genetic medicines, raised $125 million

• City Therapeutics, a developer of RNAi medicines, raised $99.5 million

• PointFive, an AI and cloud spend management startup, raised $60 million

• Stepful, a medical worker training platform, raised $55 million

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

BOOK OF THE DAY

How To Get What You Want

Description:
A practical guide from Joshua Bandoch on the principles that drive influence, negotiation, and persuasion. Blending insights from psychology, behavioral science, and real-world examples, the book explores how people make decisions and what motivates them to change their minds. It provides frameworks for communicating more effectively, building credibility, and creating win-win outcomes without relying on manipulation or pressure.

Book Length: 272 pages
Release Date: April 29, 2025

Ideal For:
Professionals, leaders, entrepreneurs, and anyone looking to improve their ability to influence decisions, negotiate effectively, and communicate with greater impact

Persuasion is not about changing people's minds it is about helping them see what already matters to them in a new way.

DAILY VISUAL

Where Is the AI Jobs Crisis?

PRESENTED BY BLUEFLAME AI

10 Tabs, Now 1 Space

Private market work runs on detail, and those details rarely sit in one place. CIMs, transcripts, broker reports, and email threads are scattered across VDRs, CRMs, and shared drives. As the team goes through them, a shared view gets hard to maintain, onboarding new teammates drags, and every conversation tends to restart from scratch.

Blueflame's Spaces gives you a single home for anything you need, from connected files to notes and agent chats. These live together in the Space under existing firm permissions, so the full context stays in one place and persists from one session to the next.

A few ways teams put them to work:

• Deal diligence from one shared information set

• Market and competitor research, tracked over time

• LP fundraising notes, touchpoints, and follow-ups

• Q&A drafting against a live data room

Find out if Blueflame is right for your firm. Book a demo today.

DAILY ACUMEN

Compounding Relationships

The most valuable relationships in your life are the ones you invested in long before you needed anything from them. By the time you need a person, it is usually too late to start building the relationship, and everyone can feel the difference between genuine connection and transactional outreach dressed up to look like it.

This is the part most ambitious people get backwards. They network when they need something, which is exactly when networking works worst. The relationships that actually pay off were planted years earlier, watered consistently, and never once asked to justify themselves.

Reach out to people when you want nothing. That is the only time the gesture means anything, and paradoxically, the only foundation strong enough to hold weight later.

ENLIGHTENMENT

Short Squeez Picks

• How people actually get to the C-suite at S&P 500 companies

• How to develop discipline in your life

• How to read better books

• When the vibe isn’t right at work

• Why you should never want a job you’re qualified to do

MEME-A-PALOOZA

Memes of the Day

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