Starwood

“I think this interest rate hike is too late. This economy is closer to falling over than it is to going up. I think there’s a high probability that we’re looking at a recession in the next twelve months."

• Anti-Trump Effort Launches Super PAC (WSJ)
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• Chinese Companies Are Trapped in IPO Logjam (WSJ)
• Republican Ted Cruz vaults into first place in new Iowa poll (Reuters)

• France, Russia strike Islamic State in Syria, EU aid invoked (Reuters)
• Pressure Grows for Global Response Against Islamic State After Paris Attacks (WSJ)
• Weakened Hollande Faces Election Backlash in Wake of Attacks (BBG)
• French Official Calls for Metal Detectors at Train Stations (NYT)
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• Foreign Companies Scrap Paris Events After Terror Attacks (BBG)

The most interesting aspect of the deal is that instead of the traditional transaction premium, Marriott will buy Starwood in a deal where shareholders will receive 0.92 Marriott Class A shares and $2 in cash for each Starwood share, the companies said on Monday. This works out to $72.08 per share for Starwood, a discount of about 4 percent to the stock's Friday close. In other words, an aggressive take under for a company that was trading as high as $86/share, suggesting the purchase price is about 16% below the 52 week highs.

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• Japan's economy falls back into recession again (BBC)

Washington’s capacity to foster crony capitalist larceny and corruption never ceases to amaze. But as we recently noted, Wall Street’s shameless thievery from US taxpayers is about to get a whole new definition.

Just days after the potential for more capital injections for Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac (GSEs) are admitted to, we discover another 'scheme' to enrich the 'have-yachts' on the backs of the 'have-nots'.

"... we have more single short names than long positions in our book today. We have reduced our net exposure by nearly a third through sales and new shorts over the past few months."

• Fed puts December rate hike firmly on the agenda (Reuters)
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• Deutsche Bank to Cut 35,000 Jobs in Overhaul (WSJ)
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• Barclays profits drop as it abandons cost-cutting targets (FT)

We would say today's main event is the culmination of the Fed's two-day meeting and the announcement slated for 2 pm this afternoon, however with the 90 economists polled by Bloomberg all expecting no rate hike, today's Fed decision also happens to be the least anticipated in years (which may be just the time for the Fed to prove it is not driven by market considerations and shock everybody, alas that will not happen). And considering how bad the economic data has gone in recent months, not to mention the recent easing, hints of easing, and outright return to currency war by other banks, the Fed is once again trapped and may not be able to hike in December or perhaps ever, now that the USD is again surging not due to its actions but due to what other central banks are doing.

News That Matters

Why is the deal particularly notable? Because Zell has traditionally had a very keen nose about such things as "market peaks": the 74 years old is credited with calling the top of the real-estate market in 2007, when he sold another of his companies, Equity Office Properties Trust, to Blackstone for $23 billion. Soon after, the commercial-property market crashed as prices fell and debt defaults surged when it became apparent that subprime was not contained.

In our Chinese stock market wrap following Friday's unexpected rate cut, which saw the Shanghai Composite storm out of the gate, we said that "we would not be surprised to see China's stocks sliding back into the red very shortly as "sell the news" concerns return, and as the increasingly more addicted "markets" demand even more liquidity from central banks just to stay unchanged, let alone rise to new all time highs." Sure enough, with just minutes to go before the close, the SHCOMP wiped out all its daily gains and was set for a red close had it not been for the "national team" miraculous last minute intervention which was inevitable after Friday's PBOC rate cut, and which lifted the composite 0.5% into the green as the euphoria was rapidly evaporating.

• Fed is out so...BOJ brainstorms stimulus overhaul as options dwindle (Reuters)
• And... Yellen Pause Ups Pressure on Draghi as Global Pessimism Mounts (BBG)
• But... Eurozone Nears Limits of What Monetary Policy Can Do (WSJ)
• Global shares struggle on global growth concerns (Reuters)
• VW's Emissions Cheating Found by Curious Clean-Air Group (BBG)
• David Cameron allegedly fucked a dead pig's head (Mirror)

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• Win or Lose, U.S. Stocks Get Biggest Earnings Bang Since ’12 (BBG)
• Weaker China factories argue for more policy support as stocks swoon (Reuters)