Thanks for joining me. UBS has made the largest quarterly profit ever recorded by a bank after its $3bn shotgun wedding to Credit Suisse.
The bank announced a $29bn profit in the three months to June as the addition of Credit Suisse’s balance sheet took its assets to around $5trn.
5 things to start your day
1) Biden blocks sale of Nvidia AI chips to Middle East over China fears | Move follows Gulf countries’ closer collaboration with Beijing on the key technology
2) Shapps accused of passing on hydrogen costs to households by stealth | ‘Hydrogen levy’ replaced with a tax on gas shipping companies but consumers may still bear the costs
3) Babylon virtual GP puts two divisions into administration | Company behind NHS’s GP at Hand app had been seeking rescue funding or a buyer for its businesses
4) Pro-Putin rapper takes over Domino’s Pizza in Russia | Pro-Kremlin figures are snapping up assets as Western brands continue to leave Russia
5) Marks & Spencer to make FTSE 100 comeback | High street giant to rejoin Britain’s blue-chip index four years after being relegated
What happened overnight
Asian shares were set for their worst month since February, with sentiment hurt by still-gloomy China factory readings, as investors awaited a barrage of US data that could add to bets that interest rates have peaked.
MSCI’s broadest index of Asia-Pacific shares outside Japan slipped 0.3pc and was headed for a monthly loss of 6.3pc, the largest since February.
Tokyo stocks advanced, however, on the back of Wall Street gains, with the benchmark Nikkei 225 index adding 0.9pc to 32,619.34 and the broader Topix index rising 0.8pc to 2,332.00.
Data on Thursday showed China’s manufacturing activity contracted for a fifth straight month in August, but the pace of declines moderated, while the expansion in services sector lost a little momentum.
Wall Streets finished higher after US economic growth was revised lower for the three months to June.
The S&P 500 ended 0.4pc higher to close at 4,514.87. The Dow Jones Industrial Average climbed 0.1pc to 34,890.24. The Nasdaq Composite rose 0.5pc to 14,019.31.
The yield on the benchmark 10-year Treasury slipped to 4.11pc from around 4.15pc before the latest GDP release. The yield on the 2-year Treasury, which tracks expectations for the Fed, fell to 4.88pc from 4.90pc.
