Friday 6 November

1. The AI trade cracks: Wall Street gives back its election rally, and more

Wall Street’s election party lasted a day. On Thursday the Nasdaq closed down 5.5%, its worst day since the April 2025 tariff crash, confirming a correction; the S&P 500 lost 4.4% and the Dow more than 1,800 points, more than its whole Wednesday rally. The vote that bought gridlock now threatens the AI build-out: Democrats will hold Congress, and new governors in Texas, Ohio and Georgia, such as Texas’s Gina Hinojosa, campaigned partly on data-centre moratoriums. Chipmakers took the blow. The Philadelphia semiconductor index fell 12%, AMD about 17% and Nvidia more than 9%, while Qualcomm lost 9.5% after a weak forecast, clouded by a shortage of memory components for smartphones. Money ran to safety: the ten-year Treasury yield slipped to about 4.83% in the afternoon, and the VIX, the market’s fear gauge, closed up about 70%. Wednesday priced a Congress that cannot pass laws; Thursday priced one that can hold hearings, alongside governors who sign the permits data centres need.

2. Israel: 67 nominations for Eisenkot, and a coalition still to find

Benjamin Netanyahu has lost the first count that matters after Israel’s election. By the close of President Isaac Herzog’s consultations on Thursday, parties holding 67 of the Knesset’s 120 seats had recommended Gadi Eisenkot, the former army chief who leads Yashar!, against 46 for Netanyahu. Two moves tipped it. Ra’am and the Joint List, the two Arab parties with 19 seats between them, backed Eisenkot, and United Torah Judaism, Netanyahu’s ultra-Orthodox ally with seven seats, recommended no one, frustrated that he never passed a law exempting yeshiva students from military service. Herzog is expected to hand Eisenkot the mandate on Sunday. Nominations are not a coalition, though. Without the Arab parties, Eisenkot’s camp holds 48 seats, and Avigdor Liberman, whose Yisrael Beytenu backs him, has ruled out a minority government that relies on them. The shortest road to 61 runs through the ultra-Orthodox, though Eisenkot campaigned on drafting their young men.

3. The Bank of England raises rates to 4%, and sees inflation near 5%

The Bank of England raised Bank Rate on Thursday for the first time since 2023, to 4% from 3.75%, and the surprise was how few wanted more. Eight of the nine voted for a quarter point; only Catherine Mann backed half a point, seven weeks after three members had voted for a rise. The forecasts did the hawkish work instead. Inflation, 3.5% in September, is now projected to peak at 4.8% in the second quarter of 2027 and to return to the 2% target only in the third quarter of 2028; if oil nears $130 a barrel, it reaches 6.2%. Governor Andrew Bailey said the rise should not be read as the first in an inevitable long sequence, but added that, unless the Middle East conflict is resolved, it is unlikely to be the last. Two-year gilt yields rose 5 basis points. At 4%, Bank Rate sits below the inflation the Bank itself expects next year: in real terms, policy is still loose.

4. Washington's third strike at the Prince Group goes after the plumbing

Washington’s third round against Cambodia’s Prince Group targets the plumbing rather than the bosses. The Treasury’s sanctions office designated four people and 41 companies tied to the group on Thursday, plus a Malaysian, Chui Kok Wa, accused of running a network of scammers in Madagascar that defrauded Americans of more than $400,000: 46 targets in all. The list reads like a guide to hiding scam money. Fourteen companies in the British Virgin Islands and Hong Kong, from shelf companies to money lenders, answer to Qiu Yong, a senior Prince Group official who holds Cambodian, St Lucian and Turkish passports. A Tokyo mansion passed from Chen Bo, sanctioned in June, to his wife, He Yujing, after the first round in October 2025. Twenty-two more companies, from an airline and a lottery to a hotel and a duty-free business, belong to the networks of Chen Bo and an associate, Visal Pang. Each round pushes assets towards relatives and nominees; the next one has to follow them.

5. Washington's Cuba squeeze reaches the tankers and their Chinese suppliers

Washington’s squeeze on Cuba has moved down the supply chain, from the island’s oil company to the ships that carry its fuel and the Chinese firms that equip its army. On Thursday the State Department designated eight companies and two people and identified five tankers as blocked property, under Donald Trump’s Cuba order of 1 May. The ships, among them the Gloria C and the Emilia, are managed by CAROIL, registered in Cyprus, and by Cuba’s Petromarca. Two Chinese state-linked suppliers, CEIEC and Beijing H&C Technologies, are accused of exporting military equipment to Cuba’s armed forces through a Cuban firm, Duna. The list also names the daughter of the president of GAESA, the military conglomerate, a former commercial director of the Mariel container terminal. The bigger step came from the Treasury: a determination that exposes any foreign firm operating in Cuba’s manufacturing, technology, electronics and marine sectors. That reaches shipowners and suppliers anywhere. Food and medicine remain authorised.

6. South Africa's ANC slumps to a third of the vote, and trails in the big cities

South Africa’s ANC is losing its grip on the country’s cities faster than analysts expected. With about half of the votes from Wednesday’s municipal elections counted on Thursday, the party had 32% (count continuing, as of Thursday evening), down from 45.6% in 2021, against 26.3% for the Democratic Alliance; the CSIR’s projection, which has tracked the count closely, puts the ANC at 31.7%. The damage is sharpest in Gauteng, the economic heartland. In early counts the DA led Johannesburg, Tshwane and Ekurhuleni with 34% to 37%, while the ANC was below 21% in all three; in eThekwini, which includes Durban, the MK party led a very early count. “The ANC is performing worse than expected, and expectations were already low,” said Louw Nel of Oxford Economics. Final results are expected on Sunday, and parties then have two weeks to build coalitions. In Johannesburg, where the DA’s candidate is Helen Zille, no party is expected to win outright: coalitions, not majorities, will run the country’s economic heart.

Friday and the week ahead

Chart 7

Friday 6 November

Key events. Times are Paris time (CET); New York is six hours behind

Hover or tap an event for details

Paris timeEventWhy it matters

OvernightAsian markets open after Wall Street’s chip routSeoul’s Kospi already fell 5.3% on Thursday (story 1)Friday 6 November, Asian tradingAfter this edition was verifiedKospi -5.3% and Nikkei -1.8% on Thursday (AP)

14:30US jobs report for OctoberForecasts from 55,000 to 63,000 jobs, after 29,000 in September (story 1)14:30 Paris: US payrollsFriday 6 November, 08:30 in New York (financecalendar.com)Consensus 63,000 (financecalendar.com); 55,000 and 4.2% unemployment (Newsquawk)

14:30Canada’s labour force surveyConsensus +14,500 jobs, unemployment steady at 6.5%14:30 Paris: Canada jobsFriday 6 November, 08:30 in Toronto (financecalendar.com)September: 68,300 jobs lost

All daySouth Africa’s count goes onResults are due on Sunday; coalitions follow (story 6)Friday 6 NovemberCount continuing (BusinessTech; Reuters)Declaration expected on Sunday 8 November

All dayIsrael: coalition contacts before Sunday’s mandateUnited Torah Judaism’s seven seats are in play (story 2)Friday 6 NovemberBefore the mandate expected on Sunday (Israel Hayom)Eisenkot has 67 recommendations, Netanyahu 46

Chart 8

The rest of the week and beyond

Dates to watch after Friday

Hover or tap a day for details

Sunday

8 Nov

Israel

Herzog is expected to give Gadi Eisenkot the mandate to form a government

Sunday 8 NovemberExpected handover of the mandate (Israel Hayom; Times of Israel)Eisenkot has 67 recommendations

Sunday

8 Nov

South Africa

Final municipal results; two weeks of coalition talks follow

Sunday 8 NovemberExpected declaration (Reuters via Club of Mozambique)Johannesburg is not expected to have a clear winner

Next week

10 and 11 Nov

Abu Dhabi

Three-way talks on Ukraine

10 and 11 NovemberTrilateral talks in Abu Dhabi (The Hill and Reuters, via Just Security, 5 November 2026)Zelensky spoke for 90 minutes with Witkoff and Kushner beforehand

Herzog said he would “leave no stone unturned” in forming a stable government (Israel Hayom).