Today's Headlines

Bloomberg:  

• Russian Strikes in Syria Draw Ire From Anti-Assad Opposition. (video) Russia pledged to strike targets in Syria as long as Bashar al-Assad’s government continues advancing against rebels, drawing criticism from Syria’s main opposition group, which accused President Vladimir Putin of propping up his embattled ally. Russia carried out four air strikes on Islamic State targets overnight, the Defense Ministry said on Twitter on Thursday. At the same time, Syria’s envoy to Moscow, Riad Haddad, said the air campaign is also targeting the al-Qaeda-affiliated al-Nusra front and Ahrar ash-Sham. With the latter group supported by Qatar and Turkey, according to Hassan Hassan, an associate fellow at Chatham House, that will add to doubts among the U.S. and its allies who were caught by surprise when the bombing campaign kicked off on Wednesday. They say Russia may be targeting other groups in a bid to prop up Assad.
• China to Lose Earliest Manufacturing Gauge as Flash PMI Ends. China watchers, beset by limited data compared with other major economies, will have even fewer tea leaves to analyze, starting this month. The earliest estimate of China’s manufacturing sector, the flash gauge of a purchasing managers index compiled by Markit Economics and sponsored by Caixin Media, is being discontinued. Markit will still publish flash PMI readings for other countries.
• China woes battering Glencore claim Japan victim as risk surges. Sparking a jump in the default risk for other competitors and trading companies reliant on the commodities and energy business. The Chinese economic slowdown that’s caused a rout in mining giant Glencore PLC’s stock price claimed a victim in Japan’s shipping industry, sparking a jump in the default risk for other competitors and trading companies reliant on the commodities and energy business. Daiichi Chuo KK filed for bankruptcy protection in Tokyo on Tuesday with 120 billion yen (Dh3.67 billion, $1 billion) in liabilities, in the biggest failure by a publicly-traded Japanese company this year. The cost to insure shipper Mitsui OSK Lines Ltd’s debt against non-payment surged 43 basis points last month and touched 156, the highest since October 2013, while trading house Mitsui & Co’s credit-default swaps climbed to the most since August 2012, CMA data show. The Markit iTraxx Japan CDS index rose 19 basis points in September.
• Only Bravest Borrowers Need Apply After Emerging-Market Rout. Only the bravest and strongest of borrowers are likely to keep emerging-market bonds from extending the slowest quarter in four years. While the volume of sales is forecast to recover through year-end, the market will remain off limits to all but those issuers ready to tolerate increased costs as investors remain wary of rising U.S. interest rates and a global economic slowdown, according to Union Investment Privatfonds GmbH and PineBridge Investments. Sales in dollars and euros by governments and companies dropped 34 percent on the year to $62.3 billion in the third quarter, the lowest amount since 2011, as China’s surprise devaluation of the yuan in August roiled global markets, spurring demand for haven assets. 
• Glencore's Wild Ride Has Investors Asking: Can It Happen Again? (video) From London to New York to Hong Kong, the frantic question kept coming: could this be another Lehman?
• HCL Technologies Tumbles on Second Sales Warning in 6 Months. Shares of HCL Technologies Ltd. slumped to the biggest loss in more than six years after the fourth-largest Indian software exporter said currency and certain client issues are likely to hurt revenue growth in the quarter ended September. The stock plunged 13 percent to 857.05 rupees in Mumbai, after diving as much as 15 percent earlier. Besides facing an adverse impact from the sharp depreciation of multiple currencies against the dollar, HCL is considering setting aside as much as $20 million for the quarter “as a matter of prudence” because of differences with a client over the objectives of a contract, the New Delhi-based codewriter said in a filing after market hours on Wednesday. 
• Worst Seen Coming for Currencies Ensnared in Commodities Fallout. To foreign-exchange traders, the currencies of commodity exporters are all in the same boat -- and it’s going down. The long suffering exchange rates for Australia, Canada and Brazil have become increasingly correlated with each other during the past month, and banks including BNP Paribas SA, citing an indicator of momentum, and Barclays Plc, noting economic headwinds, say there are more losses to come. “It’s bearish across the board -- we’re negative on all commodity currencies,” said Atul Lele, chief investment officer of Nassau, Bahamas-based Deltec International Group, describing the declines as a once-in-a-generation move. “The selloff will become more persistent” when the U.S. Federal Reserve raises interest rates, said Lele, who manages $2 billion. 
• Yen Gains on Report That Central Bank Will Refrain From Stimulus.
• Heads Dollar Wins, Tails It Rises: It's All Good for Greenback. U.S. economic strength is a boon for the dollar, and evidence of weakness may not prove much of an obstacle. The rally in the greenback is set to stay on course in either scenario, say strategists at Credit Suisse Group AG. The dollar has gained against major peers since Sept. 17, when the Federal Reserve kept its target rate near zero. For a hint at the currency’s path forward, traders are fixated on Friday’s release of September U.S. jobs figures.
• BOE Says Market May Be Underpricing Risks of Falling Liquidity. Financial markets may not be alert to the potential damage caused by drops in liquidity, according to stability officials at the Bank of England. “Market prices might not yet sufficiently be factoring in the potential for a deterioration in liquidity conditions given changes in market functioning and elevated tail risks” related to emerging markets, the officials said, according to the record of the Financial Policy Committee meeting held on Sept. 23 in London. Concern about liquidity is intensifying since a global bond rout in the second quarter erased more than a half a trillion dollars in the value of sovereign debt. Exacerbating matters, the world’s biggest banks are scaling back their bond-trading activities to comply with higher capital requirements imposed in the wake of the financial crisis.
• Europe Banks' Profit Outlook Dims on Commodities, Berenberg Says. European banking profitability is set to worsen as falling commodity values weaken loan books and central bank actions from China to the U.S. cause economic uncertainty, according to analysts at Berenberg Bank. "Developments in commodity markets matter for banks, given what they tell us about economic growth and the implications for asset quality,” Berenberg analysts Nick Anderson and James Chappell said in an note dated Sept. 29. “The financialization of commodities (their widespread use as collateral) underpins asset-quality concerns.”  
• European Stocks Fall as U.S. Manufacturing Report Deflates Rally. An early advance in European stocks proved fragile, turning to losses after a report showed U.S. manufacturing deteriorated in September. Signs of stabilization in China’s factory data had boosted investor optimism earlier today, with rallies in miners and energy shares sending the Stoxx Europe 600 Index up as much as 1.5 percent. The gains evaporated after the Institute for Supply Management’s manufacturing index missed estimates, falling for a third month. Europe’s benchmark gauge lost 0.4 percent to 346.23 at the close of trading. Germany’s DAX Index reversed gains of as much as 1.3 percent to tumble 1.6 percent. Volkswagen dropped 1.3 percent after earlier climbing 5.6 percent. A Markit Economics report showed the a gauge of the country’s manufacturing fell last month to the lowest level since July. 
• Iran Aims to Boost Oil Output by 2 Million Barrels From Projects. Iran plans to increase crude output by 2 million barrels a day from about 50 energy projects slated for investors at a conference in Tehran next month, National Iranian Oil Co. Managing Director Roknoddin Javadi said.
• Alaska’s Money Blizzard May End With Plunge in Price of Oil. With crude prices less than half what they were a year ago, the state is losing millions daily and Alexie’s big payout may shrink dramatically. The dividends come from a fund fed by oil revenue, and lawmakers are considering applying a portion of that money to services. The legislature is readying for a fierce debate over capping payments and levying taxes.
• Goldman Sachs(GS) Says Markets Ready for December Fed Rate Liftoff. After the Federal Reserve’s decision to hold interest rates did little to quell volatility last month, Goldman Sachs Group Inc. says markets are now ready for a 2015 hike. The Fed can be expected to act to stabilize financial markets, said Francesco Garzarelli, co-head of macro markets and market research at Goldman Sachs in London. The central bank’s September decision confused investors and stoked concern about global growth prospects amid a slowdown in China, helping erase almost $11 trillion from the value of shares worldwide in the third quarter.
• Bonds See Fed Rate Move in 2016 as Yellen Sticks With This Year. There’s a 43 percent probability the Fed will move by its Dec. 15-16 meeting, according to futures data compiled by Bloomberg. The odds are just below 50 percent for the January meeting and 64 percent for the March session. The calculation is based on the assumption that the effective fed funds rate will average 0.375 percent after liftoff, versus the current target of zero to 0.25 percent. “Markets see that the international conditions and volatility remain so challenging that the Fed is simply unable to hike rates,” said Martin Whetton, a rates strategist in Sydney at Australia & New Zealand Banking Group Ltd. “The markets are just saying: ‘You say hike, we say not yet.”’
• Young Americans Are Giving Up on Getting Rich. Young Americans’ incomes are depressed, their retirement nest eggs are microscopic, and their rate of employment is weak. The trend lines aren’t promising, either, which likely explains why there’s no shortage of pessimism out there. In a Bloomberg poll of Americans age 18 to 35—the millennial generation—47 percent said they do not expect their cohort to live better than their parents. For one thing, it’s hard to imagine outdoing your parents if you’re still sleeping under their roof. According to U.S. Census Bureau data, 15 percent of people age 25 to 34 were living with their parents last year, up from 10 percent 30 years earlier. High home prices and strict mortgage lending standards are prime reasons for many millennials’ failure to launch. “They are priced out of the kind of housing that they grew up in,” says Richard Portes, an economist at London Business School.
• ConAgra(CAG) Will Cut 1,500 Jobs and Move Headquarters to Chicago.

Wall Street Journal:

• Richmond Fed’s Lacker Says October Rate Rise Possible. Believes policy makers could be convinced by Oct. 27-28 meeting that U.S. economy is strong enough to tolerate first rate increase in nearly a decade. The Federal Reserve could get enough new information by its late October policy meeting to spur officials to raise short-term interest rates then, Jeffrey Lacker, president of the Federal Reserve Bank of Richmond, said in an interview with The Wall Street Journal on Wednesday.

Fox News:

• Multiple people reportedly dead at Oregon community college.

Zero Hedge:

• This Is The Endgame, According To Deutsche Bank.
• Mid-East Coup: As Russia Pounds Militant Targets, Iran Readies Ground Invasions While Saudis Panic.
• Tech Censors? Apple(AAPL) Bans App Noting Every US Drone Strike; Facebook(FB) Blocks Ad For "Negativity".
• Global Manufacturing PMI Plunges To 26-Month Lows. (graph)
• Copper, Crude, Credit Crumble As Stocks, Bond Yields Tumble. (graph)
• Atlanta Fed Slashes Q3 GDP Estimate By 50% To Just 0.9%. (graph)
• "Hedge Fund Hotels" Blow Up: September Slams Billionaire Stock Pickers.
• DAX Reverses Month-End Ramp, Suffers Worst Start-To-Q4 Since 2009. (graph)
• Consumer Sentiment Plunges On 401K Drop. (graph)
• The Best And Worst Performing Assets In September, Q3 And 2015 YTD. (graph)
• ISM Manufacturing Weakest Since May 2013 Amid Collapse In New Orders. (graph)
• US Manufacturing PMI Stagnates at 2-Year Low With Weakest Employment Since June 2013. (graph)
• Key Global Equity Index Has Fallen Off The Precipice. (graph)
• Bailed Out FX Broker FXCM Says It Was Hacked, Resulting In "Wire Transfers From Customer Accounts".
• Does Not Compute: DOL Continues To Paint Rosy Jobless Claims Picture As Challenger Sees "Surge" In Unemployment. (graph)
• Major Hurricane Bears Down On Bahamas, May Make US Landfall By Sunday. (pic)
• Second Massive Bomb Explosion Rocks Chinese City, Day After 17 Parcel Bomb Attacks Kill Seven.

Telegraph: 

• Fears of a Chinese 'hard landing' trigger mass exodus from emerging markets. Investors are pulling their money out of emerging markets in the biggest net outflow of capital since 1988. 
• Eurozone recovery shows signs of petering out as stimulus fails to breathe life into factories. Manufacturers in the single currency have another unremarkable month, prompting expectation of bumper QE. 

Handelsblatt:

• Russia Economy Faces Toughest Year in 2016. Three reasons why the Russia economy will further stagnate are oil price, sanctions and lagging structural economic reforms, Russia's RSPP industry federation President Alexander Shokhin says in an interview. 2016 to be "toughest year for Russian economy". Companies not able to secure finance, Shokhin said.