Morgan Stanley said the market had been too optimistic on Meituan's food-delivery unit economics recovery and the normalization of competition in its in-store business, but recent share-price weakness has made expectations more reasonable and created an entry point, according to ETNet. The broker kept its forecast that food-delivery unit economics will recover to RMB1 per order next year and said the market has largely priced out concerns. It also said Meituan's long-term growth potential in other in-store businesses has not been fully reflected, leaving room for upside. Morgan Stanley maintained its Overweight rating and HK$110 target price. On competition, the broker said Douyin expanded aggressively in in-store dining in the first half of this year, narrowing the gap in gross merchandise value with Meituan, and expects competition to remain intense in the near term. It nevertheless expects Meituan's core competitiveness in other physical-store businesses to remain intact, with a 60% restaurant market share and continued share in other in-store businesses. Morgan Stanley said it remains confident in Meituan's long-term potential, but competition will pressure near-term profits. It forecast Meituan's core local commerce operating profit at RMB14 billion, RMB50 billion and RMB60 billion for 2026 to 2028. In e-commerce, it ranked Alibaba, Meituan, PDD and JD.com in that order.

Hong Kong stocks fell for a fifth straight session and hit a near two-month low as U.S. Treasury yields rose again and markets priced in a 70% chance of a rate hike next week, according to Ming Pao. Overnight U.S. equities declined, while U.S. futures were mixed this morning. Asian markets also weakened, with Japan's market down more than 3%, South Korea's market down more than 2%, Shenzhen's market down 2.7%, Shanghai's market down 1.8% and Taiwan's market down more than 1.5%. Hong Kong's decline was less than 1%.

According to Jin10, Xingyun Technology said the profit margins of its orders on hand are affected by upstream supplier purchase prices. The company said its core long-term contracts use a monthly delivery, monthly payment, and monthly revenue recognition model, and that if upstream supplier purchase prices rise or fall, signed but undelivered orders may still be subject to negotiated adjustments to service contracts based on market conditions. It also said it is constrained by multiple factors, including upstream hardware supply, procurement cycles, financing, production capacity, and delivery and operations capabilities, and that adverse changes in these conditions or weaker-than-expected resource access could affect revenue and profit realization in related businesses.

According to Sina Finance, the Central News Agency and the Hong Kong Economic Times, Asian equities broadly retreated at midday Friday after a hotter-than-expected U.S. August producer price index, a jump in oil prices to a near five-month high and 10-year Treasury yields approaching 5% lifted bets on a Federal Reserve rate hike next week to about 70%, pressuring rate-sensitive and metals sectors. Tokyo's Nikkei 225 sank to 63,630.11 as of 04:33 UTC, down 1,640.84 or 2.51%, with chip-related names among the heaviest losers; Advantest fell 7.40% and Tokyo Electron dropped 4.01%. Seoul's KOSPI, which opened down 3.29%, was at 6,853.07 as of 04:33 UTC, off 180.85 or 2.57%. Chip heavyweights weighed on the index, with Samsung Electronics down 4.18% and SK Hynix off 3.78%. Hong Kong stocks closed the morning session lower, with the Hang Seng Index down 0.85% at 24,742.51 and the Hang Seng Tech Index off 0.79% at the half-day break. Non-ferrous metal names slid, with Jiangxi Copper down 10.65% after LME copper tumbled on stalled U.S. tariff plans; property developers and storage-chip stocks also weakened, while Tencent bucked the trend, up 1.03% at HK$430.00, and Xiaomi added 1.23%. Taiwan's TAIEX was at 46,326.10 as of 04:32 UTC, down 1.31%, having fallen more than 900 points intraday to a low of 45,964 and breaching the 46,000 level; TSMC eased 1.22% to NT$2,420 and MediaTek fell 2.44%. In mainland China, the Shanghai Composite ended the morning down 1.82% at 3,862.73, the Shenzhen Component off 2.34% at 13,298.77 and the ChiNext Index down 2.04% at 3,270.35, with precious- and industrial-metal shares leading declines while defense and power names traded higher.

Arthur Hayes was interviewed on a podcast, where he discussed the global macroeconomic environment and the prospects for the crypto market.

Ripple is adding AI agents to Ripple Treasury, the corporate treasury business it spent $1 billion to enter last year. According to NS3.AI, the tools can monitor cash, risk, and forecasts, and recommend actions. People must approve any action before it is executed.

PPP prediction market tool monitoring shows OpenAI's probability of having the best image editing AI on Polymarket at the end of September is 93%, up 43% over the past week. According to Odaily, the market will settle based on the company behind the model ranked first on arena.ai's "Image Edit Arena" leaderboard at 12:00 p.m. Eastern Time on September 30, 2026. The settlement will use the Image Edit Arena overall leaderboard filtered to "Models." Models marked "AutoEval" will not count, while models marked "Preliminary" may participate. If multiple models share the same rank, the one shown higher on the leaderboard will take priority; if they are still tied, the company names will be ordered alphabetically. If the leaderboard is temporarily unavailable at settlement time, the market will remain open until it can be checked again. If the leaderboard becomes permanently unavailable, the market will settle as "Other."

Asian refiners have bought large volumes of U.S. crude for October shipment, with 18 to 20 very large crude carrier slots already booked by mid-month. According to Sina Finance, the total purchase volume is about 36 million to 40 million barrels. The buyers include refiners in Japan, South Korea, Singapore, and other parts of Southeast Asia. The larger U.S. crude buyers so far include Cosmo Oil, Idemitsu Kosan, and SK Energy. Landed prices for U.S. crude shipped to Asia have continued to rise, and October-shipment cargoes were priced at about $30 a barrel above the Dubai benchmark this week. U.S. crude shipped in October on very large crude carriers typically arrives in Asia around December.

According to Jin10, Dubai Airport CEO Paul Griffiths said the new airport may place some areas underground to guard against possible future drone or missile attacks, and that fuel tanks and other critical infrastructure could be located underground while other areas may need additional reinforcement.

US authorities are moving beyond individual crypto scammers and targeting the financial and communications infrastructure allegedly helping Southeast Asia’s industrial-scale scam centers move and launder their money.

AI capital has become a major driver of growth, but the risk of over-concentration is approaching a systemic tipping point.

Republicans have revised provisions related to decentralized finance (DeFi) and credit unions in the bill, but the prospect of a procedural vote next Tuesday remains uncertain; the White House has not yet stated its position on the ethics clause.

Liquid Network has restarted block production after a $320 million exploit drained about 4,000 BTC from its federation wallet, with 3,400 BTC later returned by the attackers. Transactions and peg operations remain suspended while Liquid fixes the Elements software flaw and works to restore the Bitcoin reserves, with about 598.5 BTC still outstanding.

Artificial Intelligence, LLM, Law, Policy Regulation, Rejecting Binary Opposition: Legal Evaluation and Evidence-Oriented Approach Should Be Adhered to for Large Model Distillation Practices. Golden Finance: Beneath the seemingly neutral appearance of large model distillation technology, where exactly are the legal boundaries?

PumpFun boasts one of the most profitable businesses in the crypto space, but it also suffers from issues such as insufficient transparency and weak token incentives. Whether it can effectively cope with the impact of Pons and StoneFun will be the key to testing whether it can maintain its competitive advantage.

Celebrity-issued cryptocurrencies are bound to go to zero; the MEME cycle will eventually recede. Don't mistake speculation for investment.

As TradeXYZ continues to add new trading markets, its share of trading volume within the exchange continues to rise. Each new trading market brings in a net increase in users, and several macroeconomic drivers throughout the year further accelerated this growth.

The bond market reacted ahead of Friday's CPI release. The 10-year US Treasury yield rose to 4.943%, and the probability of a Fed rate hike next week rose to 71%. The market is worried that the Fed may tighten again, and the real key will be whether the CPI can deliver the final blow.