LEAD

Options Are Pricing in Muted Moves for US Stocks on Midterm Vote
Christian Dass – Bloomberg
While the upcoming US midterm election is one of the biggest events left on the market’s calendar for this year, derivatives pricing indicates traders aren’t expecting especially big moves in stock benchmarks. Implied volatility appears relatively low heading into November, with the Cboe Volatility Index’s forward curve well below prior midterm election setups.
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An Inversion of the US Yield Curve Becomes New Risk as Fed Hikes
Greg Ritchie and Ye Xie – Bloomberg
The bond market is on the brink of signaling that a series of Federal Reserve interest-rate hikes will start shifting the narrative toward the risk that the US economy stalls out. The extra yield investors demand to hold 10-year Treasuries over two-year notes shrank to as little as 17 basis points last week, the slimmest gap since early 2025. This so-called flattening of the curve increases the possibility that the 10-year will soon yield less than shorter maturities, a closely watched phenomenon known as
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Rising Rates No Problem for US Stock Market’s Shadiest Nook
Joel Leon – Bloomberg
Rising bond yields, a war in Iran and the Federal Reserve’s campaign to tame down inflation were supposed to dim the appeal of America’s most shorted stocks. Instead, the group heads toward one of its best years ever. A Goldman Sachs Group Inc. basket of shares with the highest bearish interest, which includes names like Rackspace Technology Inc. and UiPath Inc., has jumped 31% so far this year, handily beating the S&P 500 Index’s advance. Should the current pace of gains continue, the group will rally 46% in 2026, a feat last seen in 2020 when policymakers cut borrowing rates to near zero.
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Op-ed | Prediction markets can hedge against small business risks
Brian Quintenz – amNewYork
New York is the financial capital of the country. For generations, businesses here have relied on sophisticated financial markets to manage risk, discover prices and plan around uncertainty. The New York Stock Exchange is built on the basic idea that buyers and sellers should be able to meet in a transparent marketplace and collectively determine what something is worth. Prediction markets apply a similar model to a new category of risk.
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World’s worst-performing market slashes minimum price for stocks
William Sandlund and A. Anantha Lakshmi – Financial Times
Indonesia is slashing the minimum price at which shares can trade, a move expected to cause stocks in dozens of companies in south-east Asia’s largest economy to slump to a tiny fraction of a penny. The floor price for a share on the Indonesian stock exchange on Monday fell from Rp50 — less than one-third of a US cent — to Rp1. The step is part of efforts to promote liquidity and price discovery in the world’s worst-performing stock market as Jakarta seeks to avoid a downgrade by global index provider MSCI.
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REGULATION

Prediction markets’ push into US stocks raises regulatory alarm bells
Douglas Gillison – Reuters
Prediction markets are fast becoming alternative venues for traders to wager on US companies like Tesla and Apple (AAPL.O), raising concerns about investor protection and market oversight, according to ​independent data and regulatory experts. The booming industry pioneered by Polymarket and Kalshi rose to prominence by allowing punters to bet on almost anything, including sports events, elections and military operations.
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Appeals court rules against Kalshi, says prediction markets can be regulated like gambling
Miranda Nazzaro – NewsNation
The 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled against the prediction market Kalshi Friday, determining states can regulate prediction market platforms like gambling in the latest blow to the industry. In a unanimous ruling, the three-judge panel sided with Ohio and Tennessee, finding Kalshi did not show its sports-event contracts are “swaps” that typically fall under the jurisdiction of the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC).
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MOVES

Trading Technologies Elevates Maxime Jeanniard du Dot to Lead TT® Margin Business Line
Trading Technologies – Cision PR Newswire
Trading Technologies International, Inc. (TT), a global capital markets technology provider, today announced the promotion of Maxime Jeanniard du Dot to EVP, Margin Analytics. In that role, he leads the TT Margin business, created following TT’s acquisition of OpenGamma in December. Jeanniard du Dot served as Chief Operating Officer of OpenGamma for 10 years prior to the acquisition. Alun Green, EVP, Managing Director, Futures and Options, said: “OpenGamma is the industry-leading solution for margin analytics, helping our clients save billions of dollars in capital every year. Maxime is the ideal choice to assume responsibility for TT Margin to continue OpenGamma’s leading role in providing margin analytics services to the world’s largest hedge funds, asset managers, commodity trading firms and banks. He understands the challenges our customers face along with the efficiencies and insights our products can provide across all asset classes and trade flows. He will be instrumental as we introduce cross-asset margin optimization to meet the growing demand for cross-asset trading from our clients.”
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Strategy

Building liquidity in Europe’s volatility markets
Eurex
European volatility markets are becoming increasingly liquid and offering market participants a growing product suite to pursue volatility trading strategies. To discuss these developments and the market forces that are driving them, we sat down with Matthew Koren, Sales Americas at Eurex, to discuss how Eurex’ volatility ecosystem is evolving, the growth of short-dated trading, and what improved liquidity could mean for institutional and retail participation.
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The history of this market’s bad-breadth signal points to risks ahead
Jamie Chisholm – MarketWatch
For some time now, it has been a feature of the U.S. stock market that a seemingly relatively serene S&P 500, currently sitting less than 1% from record highs, has contained some frantic and disturbing action beneath the surface. These worrying signals keep coming, according to Jonathan Krinsky, technical analyst at BTIG. In a note published over the weekend titled “Something’s gotta give,” he argued that, while equity-market characteristics are “unsustainable,” there are also concerning developments in credit.
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MISCELLANEOUS

From $6 eggs to $50,000 cars, these charts show how inflation has defined the past 5 years
Genna Contino – MarketWatch
Rising prices have been crushing consumer confidence and biting at Americans’ wallets for more than five years now. Whether it’s rent, insurance, gas, groceries, electricity, airfares — you name it — everyday purchases have become too expensive for many Americans, pushing them to cover essentials with their emergency savings accounts, high-interest credit cards or buy-now-pay-later loans. Some have even pushed off major financial milestones, such as buying a house, indefinitely because they simply can’t afford it.
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