Israel Government Approves Gaza Hostage Deal

Political

Palestinian-Israeli conflict

Summary:

Israel's government approved a deal that will see Hamas release any remaining hostages held in Gaza in exchange for more than 2,000 prisoners.

Israel's government approved a deal that will see Hamas release any remaining hostages held in Gaza in exchange for more than 2,000 prisoners, another major step toward fulfilling the terms of a peace agreement and ending the two sides' bloody conflict.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's office said in a post on X that the government had approved the framework that would see all hostages released, including the remains of the deceased.

President Donald Trump's son-in-law Jared Kushner attended the meeting along with Trump's Middle East envoy Steve Witkoff, a move that partly appeared meant to ensure that any holdouts wouldn't upend Netanyahu's plan to get signoff for the deal. The move clears the way for the hostages to be freed in the next three days.

In video remarks from the meeting, Netanyahu said he wanted to “personally thank” both of them.

“We're at a momentous development in the last two years,” Netanyahu said. “We fought during these two years to achieve our war aims and a central one of our war aims was to achieve our hostages, all of the hostages, the living and the dead. And we're about to achieve that.”

The move was largely expected but served a capstone on the first phase of the deal after Hamas's chief negotiator announced earlier in the day that the Iran-backed group had agreed to end the war, which has devastated Gaza, left tens of thousands dead and destabilized the Middle East.

Trump, whose 20-point plan formed the basis for the agreement, said Thursday he'll travel to Israel to be on hand for the release of hostages. Hamas is set to return all of the remaining 48 hostages held in Gaza — 20 of whom are believed to be alive. In return, Israel is due to release almost 2,000 jailed Palestinians and allow a ramp up of aid to Gaza through United Nations agencies and other international bodies.

Challenges remain. Two senior US officials, speaking to reporters on condition of anonymity on Thursday night, said there were two phases to the deal — the hostage release and then what they called “almost a permanent ceasefire” where other issues would be worked out such as decommissioning weapons, standing up Gaza's new government and the redeployment of Israeli forces.

The officials acknowledged that there are a lot of ways the deal could go wrong but that Trump hoped to restore momentum for the expansion of the Abraham Accords, signed in his first term, that saw some countries normalize ties with Israel.

They said the hostages would be released in 72 hours after Israel withdraws, and that the US Central Command would help set up a joint task force while an international stabilization force is established.

Source: Bloomberg Europe

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Central Bank

Economic

Australia's economy is in a "pretty good spot" with inflation inside the central bank's 2-3% target band and the labor market still tight, Governor Michele Bullock said Friday.

“We've got a good unemployment rate so far. We've got inflation back in the band. We are in a pretty good spot,” Bullock told a parliamentary committee. She added that household consumption is picking up and filling the gap from waning public demand, a much-needed handover to ensure the economy keeps growing.

The RBA left interest rates unchanged at 3.6% last month — having eased three times since February — as it awaits further evidence that inflation is headed toward the midpoint of its 2-3% target. A stronger-than-expected pick-up in household consumption driven by real income growth, renewed strength in the housing market and a tight labor market are other reasons to keep rates steady.

Economists expect the RBA to ease policy following its Nov. 3-4 meeting, though many say the third-quarter inflation report on Oct. 29 will be a key factor in the decision. Ahead of the board gathering, officials will also review September jobs data, which is expected to show the unemployment rate ticking up to 4.3%.

The RBA's on-hold decision has come as central banks across the region have diverged in recent weeks, with Indonesia and New Zealand extending their easing cycles to support growth amid rising trade protectionism, while Thailand, Malaysia and Australia have held steady to assess the impact of earlier cuts.

Bullock welcomed recent data showing inflation is inside the the RBA's target though pointed to services inflation which remains “sticky.”

“At the moment we're in a situation where we've got inflation back in the band at the moment,” she said. “The key now is to make sure it stays there sustainably.”

On the international front, uncertainty is elevated with the outlook clouded by the Trump administration's protectionist policies, heightened geopolitical tension and a slowdown in Chinese demand. RBA officials have reiterated that their worst-case scenario on tariffs hasn't come to pass after Australia received the global baseline rate of 10% and with many nations refraining from retaliating against the US.

Source: Bloomberg Europe

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Manuel

Economic

Political

Since the shutdown standoff commenced, it was Republicans who were confident that Democrats would crack in the face of a GOP plan to vote again and again on the same bill while offering zero concessions.

But after six failed votes in the past two weeks — and with poll results showing the GOP is taking slightly more of the blame while plans for "permanent" cuts from President Trump have yet to materialize — it's Republican resolve that is increasingly in question.

High-profile GOP defectors are now openly pushing their leaders to reverse course and come to the negotiating table over the thorny issue of reviving expiring Affordable Care Act subsidies.

And Trump has said multiple times this week he is open to healthcare talks — albeit with a shifting message on timing — saying Thursday at a Cabinet meeting, "We are the ones that are saving healthcare." He also responded to the sense in Washington that Democrats are gaining ground by saying it's the Democrats who are divided.

For now, Senate Majority Leader John Thune and House Speaker Mike Johnson say nothing has changed but with an acknowledgment that things are at least stuck.

Their stance is under ever-increasing pressure after the Senate gathered Thursday afternoon and once again failed to reach the 60-vote threshold to advance either a Republican or Democratic plan to end the shutdown.

The votes around the GOP plan have also seen zero movement — with the same three members of the Democratic caucus and one Republican crossing party lines each time — even amid a GOP pressure campaign that is fully focused on moving moderate Senate Democrats.

Thune recently suggested to reporters that additional weekend votes may be tabled, as "I don’t know if that does any good."

The Democratic tone has meanwhile become one of increasing ebullience that the party has the political momentum.

"The Republicans are just falling apart, they cannot justify their position," said House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries on MSNBC on Wednesday, with Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer adding to Punchbowl News, "Every day gets better for us."

But the question for economic observers and markets tracking the mounting costs of the shutdown is whether any possible GOP opening for talks will be enough to pry open the government relatively quickly — or whether it could simply be the start of drawn-out healthcare talks as both issues are negotiated in parallel.

Sen. Schumer has said that both healthcare and the shutdown need to be on the table simultaneously but has also promised that talks on enhanced Affordable Care Act healthcare tax credits could be done within days.

Plenty are skeptical that those healthcare policy specifics — not to mention how plenty of Republicans are opposed to offering any sort of lifeline to Obamacare — can be ironed out quickly.

Meanwhile, the economic costs of the shutdown are gradually beginning to mount, from delayed economic data to a farm bailout on ice to air traffic controller staffing shortages to about half of the IRS on furlough.

Overall, the estimates are that the lapse in government funding will offer a drag on annualized GDP growth by 0.1 to 0.2 percentage points each week it lasts, though at least some of the shortfall is made up when the government reopens.

'Everyone's just getting destroyed'

At the core of the standoff is the issue of enhanced Affordable Care Act healthcare tax credits that are set to expire at the end of this year. No action would mean increased premiums for Americans covered by these plans offered outside of employer-run programs.

Extending these credits, which were first introduced during the COVID-19 pandemic, is just one of three Democratic requests but the only one where detailed negotiations appear likely.

Others are reversing Medicaid cuts enacted by Republicans this summer, as well as limiting the president's ability to unilaterally cancel previously approved government spending.

Meanwhile, as Obamacare marketplace enrollees are set to get notices about increased rates within weeks, a number of Republican lawmakers have suggested an openness to talks on the issue, with Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia offering the starkest break from her leadership.

The stalwart Trump ally sat for a CNN interview and said of the healthcare issue, "Everyone's just getting destroyed," calling on the House to come back into session in part to open the healthcare talks.

"This cliff is coming for millions and millions of Americans where their health insurance premiums are about to skyrocket, so put your money where your mouth is," she said.

Another question — especially if the calls for talks increase but GOP leaders remain intransigent — is what shape the eventual talks take, with signs that some senators are beginning to look toward taking matters into their own hands.

"In terms of concrete offramps, our current thinking is that some kind of 'Gang of X' process in the Senate is the likeliest path out of the shutdown," wrote Tobin Marcus of Wolfe Research in a note to clients this week.

"Some kind of bipartisan process mediated by Senate moderates, with the implicit blessing of leadership on both sides, strikes us as a face-saving way for everyone to get some of what they want," he added.

And a recent Axios report found that process apparently underway, with retiring Sen. Jeanne Shaheen, a New Hampshire Democrat, emerging as a potential organizer.

The timing question revolves around whether Shaheen and other Democrats are willing to accept a promise of future talks to end a shutdown — or whether healthcare concessions need to be passed at the same time as any deal that opens the government.

Shaheen herself offered few clues when she spoke to reporters at the Capitol on Wednesday.

"I think we need to open the government back up, and I think people need to sit down and talk to each other," she said.

Editor's note: This article has been updated to clarify that six votes have failed since the shutdown commenced. Including an initial vote on Sept. 19, before the shutdown began, a total of seven votes have failed to pass.

Source: Yahoo Finance

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Cryptocurrency

Political

Luxembourg has become the first country in the Eurozone to invest in Bitcoin through its sovereign wealth fund, allocating 1% of its $730 million Intergenerational Sovereign Wealth Fund (FSIL) to Bitcoin exchange-traded funds (ETFs), Finance Minister Gilles Roth announced on Oct. 9 during the 2026 national budget presentation.

The investment marks a milestone for the nation’s financial strategy, reflecting a gradual shift toward diversified, innovation-driven asset management.

Roth said the move aligns with the FSIL’s revised framework approved in July 2025, which now permits up to 15% of its portfolio to be allocated to alternative assets, including private equity, real estate, and digital assets such as cryptocurrencies.

A eurozone first

Jonathan Westhead, head of communications at the Luxembourg Finance Agency, said the 1% allocation demonstrates the country’s confidence in the growing maturity of digital assets and sends a clear message about Bitcoin’s role in the future of finance.”

He noted that the decision to invest through Bitcoin ETFs was designed to mitigate risk while maintaining regulatory compliance under Luxembourg’s investment law, especially considering the FSIL’s standards.

The FSIL, established in 2014 to preserve national wealth for future generations, was traditionally limited to high-quality bonds and conservative assets. The July policy amendment marked a turning point, expanding the fund’s scope to include higher-yield, risk-adjusted investments that reflect global financial innovation.

Luxembourg’s allocation makes it the first EU nation to make a deliberate, policy-backed investment in Bitcoin. While other European countries, such as Finland and the UK, hold Bitcoin seized through law enforcement, Luxembourg’s approach is strategic and planned.

Globally, only a handful of countries have taken similar steps. El Salvador remains the most prominent example of a sovereign nation directly holding Bitcoin as part of its reserves. Other countries, including Bhutan, Georgia, and Norway, have also gained exposure to Bitcoin through sovereign or institutional funds.

Institutional momentum

The Luxembourg move comes amid a broader wave of institutional adoption of Bitcoin ETFs worldwide. US spot Bitcoin ETFs currently manage roughly $168 billion in net assets, representing nearly 7% of Bitcoin’s total market capitalization.

Sovereign entities have followed suit. The Wisconsin Investment Board in the U.S. disclosed $321 million in holdings of BlackRock’s iShares Bitcoin Trust (IBIT) earlier this year, while Abu Dhabi’s Mubadala Investment Company revealed a $436.9 million position.

Luxembourg’s regulatory environment has also played a critical role. In July, the country’s financial regulator, the Commission de Surveillance du Secteur Financier (CSSF), issued updated guidelines allowing virtual assets in alternative investment funds, bolstering the groundwork for the FSIL’s new investment mandate.

Source: Cryptoslate

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Stocks

Nvidia (NVDA) stock rose to a record high Thursday, up around 1.8%, after Bloomberg reported that the US government has approved for export several billion dollars' worth of the tech giant's chips to the United Arab Emirates.

The Commerce Department issued Nvidia its export license to the UAE after the federation solidified earlier commitments to making reciprocal investments in the US, Bloomberg reported, citing an unnamed US official. This marks the first time Nvidia has been allowed to ship its AI chips to the country since Trump became president.

The move follows the announcement of a massive AI infrastructure project called Stargate UAE during President Trump's visit to the country earlier this year. The project, unveiled in May, included a proposed 5 gigawatt data center hub in Abu Dhabi managed in part by OpenAI (OPAI.PVT) and Oracle (ORCL), with infrastructure supplied by Cisco (CSCO) and Nvidia.

Trump's AI deals with the UAE and Saudi Arabia have opened up new potential international markets for Nvidia as geopolitical tensions cloud its prospects in the Chinese AI market. Although the US government lifted a short-lived surprise export ban on sales of Nvidia's chips to China in exchange for a cut of its revenue from the region — a highly unusual arrangement that has yet to be finalized — China has now reportedly banned tech companies from buying Nvidia's chips.

In another boost to Nvidia stock on Thursday, Cantor Fitzgerald analyst C.J. Muse published a note raising his price target on the company to a Wall Street high of $300 from $240, dismissing the recent growing fears of an AI bubble.

"We are still in the early innings of a multi-trillion AI Infrastructure build-out with just the Hyperscalers providing significant line-of-sight into hundreds of billions of dollars worth of demand for the next handful of years," Muse wrote. Hyperscalers are Big Tech cloud providers, such as Microsoft (MSFT) and Alphabet-owned Google (GOOGL, GOOG).

Muse's view highlights the bull side of the AI bubble debate, which sees Big Tech as justifiably rushing to build data centers to meet unprecedented AI demand.

"Thus, this is not a bubble, and we are still in the early innings of this investment cycle," Muse wrote.

Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang also added to optimism over the company in comments to CNBC on Wednesday, saying that demand for the company's technology is showing no signs of slowing down.

"Demand for Blackwell is really, really high," Huang said on CNBC. "I think we're at the beginning of a new buildout, beginning of a new industrial revolution."

Thursday's climb put Nvidia stock up more than 43% for the year. Shares have been on a record-setting rally since the AI chipmaker announced a $100 billion investment in ChatGPT maker OpenAI — a partnership that has raised eyebrows on Wall Street as analysts and investors question vendor-financing relationships in the AI market.

Also supporting the gain in Nvidia shares Thursday, the chipmaker's contract manufacturer Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company (TSM) posted better-than-expected sales for the third quarter, in a signal of strength for the AI chip supply chain.

Source: Yahoo Finance

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Manuel

Commodity

Silver prices have surged roughly 75% this year, boosted by investors seeking out safe havens, plus strong industrial demand and lingering supply deficits.

Spot silver prices hit a record high $51 a troy ounce on Thursday, breaching the $50 threshold for the first time since 1980.

Traders have turned to hard assets like gold and silver this year as safe investments and tools to hedge against geopolitical instability and economic uncertainty, from concerns about tariffs and inflation to worries about Federal Reserve independence and government debt burdens.

Silver has been on a tear, supported by momentum from gold’s record-breaking rally. The metal is considered a cheaper, alternative safe haven investment to gold, which just hit $4,000 a troy ounce for the first time ever.

“There’s just a lot of concern about the global economy, and when that happens, people turn to hard assets like silver,” Michael DiRienzo, CEO of the Silver Institute, previously told CNN. “Silver tends to follow gold upwards.”

A standout year for precious metals

While investor demand is driving up prices, silver also has widespread industrial uses, including in building data centers, solar panels and smartphones.

“Its dual role as an industrial metal and safe-haven asset has amplified the rally, making 2025 a historic year for silver,” Ewa Manthey, a commodities strategist at ING, said in an email.

There are also supply concerns that could underpin higher prices.

The silver market is in its fifth year of a structural supply deficit because of “stagnant mining output” lagging behind demand, according to Peter Grant, vice president and senior metals strategist at Zaner Metals.

“Strong and growing demand for silver, combined with a persistent supply deficit, is a recipe for higher prices,” Grant said in an email.

Gold prices have soared across the past two years, driven by investors diversifying into safe havens. Central banks decreasing reliance on the dollar and building reserves of gold also boosted prices.

The safe-haven rally has spread out to other precious metals like silver and platinum this year. Silver and platinum, which are up roughly 75% and 80% this year, respectively, are both outpacing gold, which is up roughly 51%.

Precious metals and bitcoin have also become beneficiaries of Wall Street traders and fund managers looking to protect against a weaker dollar.

Investors can get exposure to silver by buying bars or coins or investing in exchange-traded funds backed by silver. The iShares Silver Trust ETF has surged roughly 68% this year.

Inflows into silver ETFs this year are at their highest level since 2020, according to Marina Smirnova, chief investment officer at Sprott Asset Management.

“Silver’s steady climb is turning into a breakout,” Smirnova said. “Supply is thinning, and investors are taking notice.”

Source: CNN

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Central Bank

Economic

The U.S. directly purchased Argentine pesos on Thursday and finalized a $20 billion currency swap framework with Argentina’s central bank, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said in a social media post.

The intent is to provide assistance from the Latin American country’s economic turmoil.

“U.S. Treasury is prepared, immediately, to take whatever exceptional measures are warranted to provide stability to markets,” Bessent said, adding that the Treasury Department conducted four days of meetings with Argentinian Finance Minister Luis Caputo in Washington D.C. to come up with the deal.

Bessent has insisted that the Argentina credit swap is not a bailout. Last month, President Donald Trump stopped short of promising Argentina’s President Javier Milei a financial bailout from the Latin American country’s economic turmoil.

Still, U.S. farmers and Democratic lawmakers have criticized the deal as a bailout of a country that has benefited from sales of soybeans to China, to the detriment of U.S. farmers.

Argentina is one of the biggest Latin American economies and the biggest borrower from the International Monetary Fund — its total outstanding credit as of Aug. 31 is $41.8 billion.

The offer to financially help Argentina comes as Donald Trump has frequently promoted his “America First” agenda. Critics contend that the planned intervention is a way to reward a personal friend of Trump’s who is facing a critical midterm election next month.

Milei celebrated Bessent’s announcement on social media, hailing his economy minister, Luis Caputo, as “far and away, the best Minister of Economy in all of Argentine history…!!!”

Caputo was in Washington last week for talks with Bessent about the swap line.

Argentina’s deregulation minister, Federico Sturzenegger, also congratulated Caputo and the rest of the economic team. “Let’s keep working so that our children want to stay and live in Argentina,” he wrote, adding a pitch to voters to support Milei in the crucial midterm elections later this month.