A chart worth discussing
“Chase credit card data is showing consumer spending accelerating.”
Other charts worth pointing out
Chinese car exports to Europe
Battery EV prices – China vs. Europe
Business research & development spending by country
Year-over-year change in New York restaurant counts
Technology fund flows by year
Private client equity allocations
Days per year of broad 2%+ technology declines
AI-related high yield credit spreads
AI-related investment grade credit spreads
Credit default risk prices for AI-related issuers
U.S. project finance bond issuance
Project finance issuances by industry
High yield project finance bond ownership by investor type
Credit spread percentile rankings by region and credit quality since 2000
Credit spread percentile rankings by region and credit quality since 2010
Cross-asset class correlation
Asset class performance by year
Biotech start-ups turn to reverse mergers to fast-track listings
Twenty-three biotechs have announced they are pursuing reverse mergers this year, according to investment bank William Blair — up from four last year. That surge has come despite a revival in biotech IPOs, which have also risen to 23 this year, from 12 in 2025.
In these deals, a private biotech can go public by merging with a listed company, usually one that has suffered a significant setback such as the failure of a main drug candidate, enabling it to bypass the traditional IPO process.
More biotechs have turned to this type of deal in the past year thanks to a ready supply of listed merger candidates following a pandemic-era jump in biotech IPOs and a growing number of sophisticated investors willing to finance them.
Those investors have helped to boost the sums raised in such deals. In July private biotech Caldera Therapeutics secured $278mn from investors including Bain Capital Life Sciences, Atlas Venture and Janus Henderson to merge with Synlogic. A month later Obsidian Therapeutics raised $350mn from Atlas and Janus Henderson among others to merge with Galera.
Lawyers and biotech executives said some companies were choosing reverse mergers even as the IPO market picked up, attracted by their relative speed and greater certainty over financing. Unlike a listing, where investor demand and pricing can be unpredictable, reverse mergers allow biotechs to agree valuations and secure financing upfront.
The recovery in traditional biotech IPOs has also given promising companies a route to market following a years-long drought, however. Recent listings include Alamar Biosciences, whose shares have risen about 15 per cent since it went public in April.
One life sciences investor stressed that companies would continue to evaluate both reverse mergers and IPOs, cautioning that after a string of such deals, the number of attractive merger candidates — cash-rich companies with clean balance sheets and no ongoing litigation — was dwindling.
This week’s fun finds
Could the answer to happiness be the sounds of the mire? Finland, aka the happiest country in the world, suggests you give it a go.
This month, the Nordic country will host the inaugural Festival of Nature Listening in Valkmusa National Park, a 90-minute drive east of the capital, Helsinki. Hiljaa Fest, which translates to “quietly fest,” will begin on October 10 and, after its opening day, will continue throughout the fall as an unguided experience in the nearly seven-square-mile park, home to 40 different mire (wetland and bog) habitats and diverse wildlife.
According to the organizers, the lineup includes “13 unique nature stars of Valkmusa” from the plant and animal kingdoms, who will make appearances across four “stages.” “Every performer appears on their own terms, in their own habitat, and according to their own schedule,” the cheeky festival announcement reads. Guests can expect to see and hear local “artists” like black grouses, cranes, purple-bordered golds (a type of moth), peat moss, marsh Labrador tea (an evergreen shrub), and other native flora and fauna.
