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Becker Business
15 Headlines: The Good, the Bad, & the Ugly 9-30-25
00:03:47
In this episode, Scott Becker shares insights into 15 headlines shaping business and the economy today.
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This is Scott Becker with the Becker Business Podcast. The Becker Private Equity Podcast. We cover business startups, private equity and a lot more. Today's discussion is 15 headlines. The good, the bad and the ugly. So, so here's the good. The good is M and A deals hit a really high number this summer. It was very busy summer. $1 trillion in deals. That is weighted towards a lot of mega deals. So still lots of trouble on the small and mid sized deal market. But that's good news for the deal market. Second, emerging stocks are set for their longest monthly rally since 2004. As tech continues to perform well. That's also good news. A third good piece of good news is the markets and the Magnificent Seven continue to have overall a really good year with Microsoft, Google Meta platforms and Nvidia having a great year. The NASDAQ's up about 17% year to date. So, so that's the good. Those are three headlines. Here is the bad and I've got eight headlines here. All right, first, the markets are stalling and starting to struggle a little bit. Is there is we're moving towards potentially a government shutdown. We'll see how long that lasts. That seems to be challenging. Second, Fed Vice Chair Jefferson says that the U.S. job market is really weakening in lots of trouble. Third, budget hotels are filling the squeeze. And what we're seeing out there is luxury hotels, high end spenders are still doing okay. Lower income spenders are struggling between wages stagnating and inflation rising. And so budget hotels, budget airlines are really starting to struggle. Fourth and fifth are two related headlines. Japan's economy is slowing as factory output slows itself there. And fifth, very similar in China. China's factory activity has improved, but it's been slumping now for six months. So not doing very well. Finally, sixth of our eight stories that are bad. Oracle initiated at Cell by Rothschild. Oracle still is up 70% year to date, but there's some sense that maybe Oracle has been overpriced a little bit overbought. Seventh, GM is slamming the brakes completely on E the EV business government Governor Gavin Newsom criticizes GM Mary Barra. In any event, they're slimming the brakes in the EV business, but they're up still about 14.74% year to date. Eighth, finally, another bad story. Nvidia predicts cooler growth after sales records. They see themselves slowing some. They're still up 35% year to date. So that's the bad. The ugly is as follows. Is as follows. The US debt is now at 37.5 trillion. That is quickly becoming an unsustainable number on a million different levels. Ugly. Second, unemployment has risen to 4.3%. I keep on seeing signs of layoffs and layoffs, so that's also challenging and we're looking to see more of that and more challenges there in terms of layoffs. Finally. Third, in addition to saying that the job market is slowing, Vice Chairman of the Fed Philip Jefferson says that economic growth is also slowing down to about one and a half percent. So that's also bad news. Finally. Fourth, my golf, my tennis, and my fitness are all just absolutely mediocre right now. It is what it is. Life goes on. But that's also ugly. My golf, tennis and fitness. Not horrible, but mediocre. Probably should put it in the bad category versus the ugly category, but we'll see how it goes. In any event, thank you for listening to the Becker Business Podcast, the Becker Private Equity podcast. That's 15 quick headlines for you. The good, the bad, and the Ugly. Thank you for listening.