Published on April 5th 2026
The Weekly Market Brief
It has been another highly eventful week across markets, with geopolitical tensions continuing to drive energy prices and inflation expectations, central banks shifting their tone, and dealmaking activity accelerating despite ongoing uncertainty. In this edition of The Weekly Market Brief, I have once again focused on highlighting the most relevant and interesting developments across M&A, markets, and macro. Given the exceptionally strong start to the year for large transactions, I have also added a new section – Deals So Far This Year – to put the current deal momentum into perspective and revisit some of the biggest transactions shaping 2026 so far.
Feel free to skip to the sections you find most relevant
M&A activity – Deal of the Week
M&A activity remained highly relevant this week, not only because of the individual transactions announced, but also because of what the broader backdrop is now telling us about corporate confidence. Despite continued geopolitical tensions, elevated oil prices, and more uncertainty around growth and rates, large strategic and financial buyers are still willing to pursue sizeable transactions where the long-term rationale is compelling. In that sense, this week’s deal activity was not just busy, it was another sign that the upper end of the market remains very much open for business.
Deals So Far This Year
Before turning to this week’s specific developments, it is worth briefly stepping back to look at the bigger picture. 2026 has gotten off to an exceptionally strong start for large-scale M&A, with 22 transactions worth $10 billion or more announced globally so far this year, marking the strongest quarterly start on record. That is particularly notable given that this momentum has emerged against a backdrop of war-driven commodity volatility, weaker equity markets, and renewed uncertainty around rates and financing conditions.
What stands out is that the current deal environment appears increasingly selective rather than broad-based. Total deal value has risen sharply year-on-year, while the number of smaller transactions has declined, suggesting that buyers remain cautious overall but are still willing to move decisively when a transaction offers meaningful strategic value. This year’s megadeal activity has also been broad in nature, spanning consumer staples, food distribution, AI infrastructure, and industrial consolidation. Transactions such as Unilever’s proposed combination of its food business with McCormick, Sysco’s acquisition of Jetro Restaurant Depot, and Amazon’s major investment as part of OpenAI’s fundraising all point to the same conclusion: in the current environment, scale, strategic positioning, and long-term relevance are being prioritized over short-term noise.
At the same time, the record pace of large deals is also being helped by a more permissive antitrust backdrop in the U.S., where buyers appear more willing to pursue combinations that may have faced a more difficult regulatory path in previous years. That does not mean execution has become easy, advisers continue to note that valuation gaps, financing costs, and macro volatility are still slowing many processes, but it does suggest that high-conviction dealmaking is very much alive in 2026.
Key M&A Developments
One of the most strategically interesting developments this week came from the airline sector, where Air France-KLM and Lufthansa both submitted nonbinding offers for a minority stake in Portugal’s national carrier, TAP Air Portugal. The process reflects the broader consolidation logic that has increasingly shaped European aviation, where scale, route optimization, and hub strategy remain critical competitive advantages. TAP is particularly attractive because of its strong positioning between Europe, Brazil, Africa, and the Americas, making it a highly valuable network asset in a sector where geographic connectivity matters enormously. Air France-KLM has already made clear that Lisbon would become its Southern European hub if successful, underlining the strategic importance of the deal. While the process is still at an early stage, the situation is being closely watched by major financial institutions, with UBS and Bank of America reportedly linked to the sell side and firms such as Goldman Sachs, Morgan Stanley, Lazard, Deutsche Bank, and Société Générale connected to various buy-side discussions.
In healthcare, Biogen agreed to acquire Apellis Pharmaceuticals for approximately $5.6 billion, adding another important transaction to what continues to be a very active pharmaceutical M&A environment. Strategically, the acquisition gives Biogen immediate access to two commercialized therapies in immunology and rare diseases, helping strengthen both its near-term revenue base and longer-term growth profile. That is particularly important for large-cap biopharma companies, which are increasingly using acquisitions not just to access pipeline optionality, but to secure already commercialized assets that can support earnings visibility more quickly. The inclusion of a contingent value right tied to Syfovre sales also reflects a familiar biotech deal structure, balancing valuation certainty with upside participation. Lazard advised Biogen, while Evercore served as financial advisor to Apellis.
Another notable transaction came from the energy transition space, where TotalEnergies and Masdar formed a $2.2 billion joint venture to combine their onshore renewable activities across nine Asian markets. While not a traditional full acquisition, the transaction is highly relevant from an M&A perspective because it reflects how strategic partnerships and portfolio combinations are increasingly being used as alternatives to outright takeovers in capital-intensive sectors. The rationale here is clear: Asia is expected to be a major driver of global electricity demand growth over the coming decade, and combining operational assets, local market presence, and development pipelines gives both firms a stronger platform than they would likely have on a standalone basis. The deal also highlights how energy transition M&A is increasingly moving beyond Europe and North America into large-scale cross-border infrastructure partnerships in faster-growing markets. Latham & Watkins advised TotalEnergies on the transaction.
This Weeks Deal of The Week: Intel’s $14.2 Billion Buyback of Apollo’s Stake in Fab 34
This week’s standout transaction is Intel’s decision to repurchase Apollo Global Management’s 49% stake in the companies’ Fab 34 joint venture manufacturing facility in Ireland for $14.2 billion. At first glance, the transaction may appear more technical than transformational. But strategically, it is one of the more important corporate moves of the week because it speaks directly to three major themes currently shaping markets: the return of semiconductor capital discipline, the growing importance of AI-linked infrastructure, and the reassertion of strategic control over critical manufacturing assets.
At its core, this is a capital structure and control transaction. Intel originally sold the stake to Apollo in 2024 as part of a broader effort to raise cash while funding its extremely expensive manufacturing expansion across Europe and the U.S. At the time, the deal made sense because Intel needed financial flexibility. Today, the logic has shifted. With a stronger balance sheet, improved investor sentiment, and renewed demand for its processors as AI inference workloads expand, Intel is now in a position to reclaim full ownership of one of its most strategically important fabrication facilities.
That matters because Fab 34 is not just any production site. It is one of Intel’s most advanced manufacturing assets, producing chips using Intel 4 and Intel 3 process technologies and playing an important role in products such as Core Ultra processors and Xeon server chips. It was also Intel’s first high-volume manufacturing site using extreme ultraviolet lithography for Intel 4, making it a central part of the company’s broader foundry and advanced manufacturing ambitions. In other words, by buying back Apollo’s stake, Intel is not simply cleaning up a prior financing arrangement, it is re-consolidating ownership over infrastructure that could become increasingly important in the next phase of semiconductor demand.
From a strategic perspective, the timing is especially interesting. Intel has spent the past several years trying to recover from a period in which it was widely viewed as having fallen behind in both manufacturing execution and AI positioning. Under new leadership and a more aggressive restructuring agenda, the company is now trying to re-establish itself not only as a chip designer, but as a serious advanced manufacturing platform at a time when semiconductor sovereignty, AI compute demand, and geopolitical supply-chain resilience have all become much more important. Full ownership of Fab 34 gives Intel greater strategic and operational flexibility as it continues to reposition itself.
There is also a clear financial logic behind the transaction. Intel expects the deal to be accretive to earnings per share and supportive of its credit profile beginning in 2027, suggesting management sees this as a longer-term value-enhancing move rather than simply a symbolic one. The fact that the transaction is being funded with a combination of cash on hand and roughly $6.5 billion in new debt also reflects a degree of confidence that Intel’s current capital position can support more assertive strategic decisions again. That, in itself, is notable given where the company stood just a year or two ago.
From an opportunity perspective, the deal gives Intel more direct exposure to the upside if demand for AI-related compute and server infrastructure continues to improve. If the company can execute on its manufacturing roadmap and benefit from rising demand for data-center processors and advanced chips, then full control of a high-value facility like Fab 34 becomes significantly more valuable over time. It also strengthens Intel’s strategic optionality should it choose to expand foundry relationships or reallocate manufacturing capacity in line with future demand.
At the same time, the deal is not without risk. The semiconductor industry remains highly capital-intensive, cyclical, and execution-sensitive. Intel is effectively doubling down on the idea that it can restore stronger profitability and relevance through internal manufacturing strength, something the market is still not fully convinced on. Taking on additional debt also introduces some balance-sheet sensitivity, particularly if macro conditions deteriorate or if demand in PCs, servers, or foundry services proves less durable than hoped. More broadly, the success of the transaction still depends on Intel’s ability to execute operationally, not just financially.
Overall, this is why the deal stands out. Intel’s repurchase of Apollo’s stake is not just a buyback of a prior JV interest, it is a statement about where the company believes its future competitive advantage lies. By reclaiming full ownership of a strategically important semiconductor manufacturing asset, Intel is signaling that advanced production capacity, AI-linked demand, and tighter control over core infrastructure are now central to its next phase of recovery. In that sense, this week’s deal is less about financial engineering and more about strategic reassertion in one of the world’s most important industries.
Goldman Sachs acted as exclusive financial advisor to Intel, while Morgan Stanley advised Apollo on the transaction.
Market Movements
This week’s market action suggested that investors are beginning to move beyond simply reacting to the Iran war as a geopolitical shock and are instead trying to assess what a more prolonged period of elevated energy prices, higher yields, and uneven sector performance could mean for the broader market. While oil remained the dominant variable once again, the tone across asset classes was somewhat more constructive than in prior weeks, helped by a rebound in equities and signs that investors are still willing to lean into selected growth stories where the underlying fundamentals remain strong. At the same time, the market continues to reward resilience, pricing power, and structural growth more than broad cyclical exposure, a theme that remained visible across commodities, technology, transport, healthcare, and financials.
Key Market Movements This Week
One of the clearest themes this week was the divergence between commodity–related winners and losers as the energy shock continued to work its way through the market. In the energy sector, estimated earnings expectations improved sharply, with FactSet noting that energy recorded the largest percentage increase in projected earnings among all S&P 500 sectors. Rising oil prices tied to the conflict with Iran have materially improved the profit outlook for major producers, with Exxon Mobil standing out as a particularly important contributor. That reinforces the now familiar point that, in the current environment, energy remains one of the most direct beneficiaries of geopolitical disruption.
At the same time, the effect of higher input costs across basic materials remained far more uneven. Companies that are able to preserve liquidity, improve operations, or benefit from stronger distribution networks were rewarded by the market, as seen in names such as Sigma Lithium and APL Apollo Tubes. But elsewhere, weak steel demand and higher raw-material costs continued to pressure earnings expectations, as illustrated by the more difficult outlook for Posco. In other words, the materials space is still not moving as a single trade. The market is increasingly differentiating between firms that can navigate cost pressure and those whose margins remain exposed.
Transport and logistics-related names painted a similarly selective picture. J&T Global Express continued to benefit from strong customer expansion and validation of its operating model in newer markets, while China Merchants Port was seen as relatively insulated from direct Middle East disruption because of its limited exposure to the Persian Gulf. At the same time, the broader transport and shipping environment remains heavily influenced by the war through fuel costs and trade-route uncertainty. Even where fundamentals remain solid, investors are having to judge whether operational execution can continue to outweigh macro pressure.
In autos and consumer hardware, the picture was mixed but instructive. Geely’s profit outlook improved on the back of better product mix and stronger high-margin overseas sales, showing that select automotive names can still generate upside through execution and mix improvement even in a difficult environment. Xiaomi, by contrast, is expected to post losses in its EV business due to elevated R&D spending and temporary buyer incentives, which is a reminder that not every growth story benefits equally from scale if profitability remains deferred. The broader lesson is that investors are still willing to support expansion stories, but increasingly only where margin visibility is improving rather than deteriorating.
Technology remained one of the most interesting sectors this week because it continued to show both structural strength and rising competitive tension. Microsoft’s reported ambition to develop its own frontier AI model by 2027 was interpreted as a major strategic shift, one that could strengthen its long-term control over the AI stack while simultaneously limiting near-term upside for Azure as compute capacity is redirected inward. Elsewhere in tech, companies such as Meituan and LG Electronics benefited from improving earnings narratives, while others such as Naver faced pressure from heavy AI investment weighing on margins. Memory markets also remained strong, though analysts increasingly expect pricing power to become less one-directional after the near term. Taken together, these developments reinforced a broader point: AI is still a structural tailwind for markets, but it is also forcing companies to make increasingly expensive strategic choices that may not pay off evenly or immediately.
Healthcare also produced a few important signals. The sector overall saw downward revisions to first–quarterearnings expectations, largely because of Merck, but at the company level there were still important positive catalysts. Eli Lilly’s oral weight-loss pill approval was seen as a potentially significant competitive advantage in the GLP-1 race, while innovative-drug growth continues to support long-term confidence in selected pharma names such as Hansoh. That contrast matters because it shows healthcare is continuing to function as both a defensive sector and a structural-growth sector, depending on where the innovation pipeline sits.
Finally, markets ended the week with a somewhat firmer tone after a stronger-than-expected U.S. jobs report. Treasuryyields moved higher after payrolls came in ahead of expectations, and futures markets continued to reflect the view that the Federal Reserve is unlikely to cut rates any time soon. At the same time, equities posted a meaningful weekly rebound, helped by hopes that the war may eventually wind down and by the absence of immediate signs that the energy shock has yet materially broken the labor market. Still, the report did little to clarify the war’s trueeconomic impact, and investors remain highly focused on oil as the main variable that could ultimately determine whether resilience can continue.
Focus Topic: SpaceX’s IPO filing points to a very different kind of public-market story
One of the most interesting developments this week was SpaceX’s confidential filing for an initial public offering, a move that could lead to one of the largest IPOs ever. Beyond the headline valuation and fundraising figures, what makes this development especially important is that it reflects how capital markets may increasingly be asked to fund not just software or platform growth, but entire industrial-scale ecosystems linked to AI, data infrastructure, and national-security-relevant technology.
The proposed IPO comes at a fascinating moment. SpaceX is no longer simply a rocket company or even just a satellite business. Following its combination with xAI, investors are now looking at an entity that spans satellite broadband, launch infrastructure, government and defense-linked contracts, and a still nascent but highly capital-intensive AI arm. That means the market is not just being asked to value a successful commercial space business, but also to price the strategic potential of an integrated technology and infrastructure platform with ambitions extending into AI data centers and compute capacity in space.
That matters because it represents a very different IPO proposition from the typical technology flotation. In recent years, many growth IPOs have been judged primarily on software margins, recurring revenues, and platform monetization. SpaceX, by contrast, brings together hard infrastructure, industrial capex, government relationships, and frontier technology. The upside is obvious: Starlink has already become a major commercial business, the company has deep ties to NASA and U.S. national-security agencies, and a large IPO would provide significant firepower for expansion into next-generation AI and communications infrastructure.
At the same time, the transaction is not without complexity. Once public, SpaceX will likely face much greater scrutiny over the economics of its combined operations, particularly as the xAI side of the business is still cash-hungry and far less mature than the core space and satellite divisions. Investors will also have to decide how much they are willing to pay not only for current earnings power, but for a highly ambitious longer-term strategic vision that includes major spending on AI and orbital infrastructure. In that sense, the IPO could become a broader test of how much public markets are still willing to fund ultra-large, capital-intensive growth stories in a world of higher rates and more discriminating investor sentiment.
The timing is also important. If SpaceX does come to market by mid-year, it could help reset the tone for the IPO environment more broadly, particularly in technology, where many offerings have been delayed by fears around AI disruption and valuation uncertainty. A successful listing would send a strong signal that capital markets remain open for very large, strategically important growth platforms, especially those positioned at the intersection of AI, infrastructure, and geopolitical relevance. That is what makes this more than just another IPO headline. It may turn into one of the clearest tests this year of what the public market still wants to fund at scale.
Risks and Opportunities for Investors
The main risk for investors remains that the recent rebound in equities proves more fragile than it currently appears. This week’s stronger jobs report helped support the view that the U.S. economy is still pushing forward, but that resilience sits alongside elevated oil prices, higher Treasury yields, and continued uncertainty around the broader impact of the war. If energy costs remain high or move higher still, the pressure on consumer spending, transport costs, corporate margins, and inflation expectations would become much harder to ignore. In that environment, markets could quickly shift from rewarding near-term resilience to punishing any signs of earnings vulnerability.
Another important risk is that investors begin to underestimate how selective this environment has become. Across sectors, the gap between operational winners and losers is widening. Some companies are benefiting from structural demand, strong distribution, or favorable product mix, while others are being squeezed by input costs, margin pressure, or heavy capital spending. The current environment still offers upside, but it is much less forgiving of weak execution, unclear profitability, or balance-sheet vulnerability than the broad rally phases of recent years.
At the same time, this week also showed that opportunities remain available in several areas. Energy continues to benefit most directly from the supply shock, while selected industrial and materials names can still perform well where liquidity, cost structure, or end-market positioning are favorable. Parts of healthcare and AI-linked technology also continue to offer structural support, particularly where companies are translating innovation into clearer commercial outcomes. More broadly, businesses with pricing power, visible earnings improvement, and strong strategic positioning continue to stand out in a market that is increasingly rewarding quality and differentiation.
Looking Ahead
Looking ahead, one of the key questions for markets is whether the recent rebound in equities can hold if oil remains elevated and yields continue to drift higher. The stronger labor-market data offered reassurance that the U.S. economy has not yet meaningfully rolled over, but investors will now need to see whether that resilience is echoed in spending, business activity, and corporate guidance over the coming weeks. If incoming data remains firm, markets may tolerate higher oil prices for longer. If cracks begin to emerge, the current balance between optimism and caution could shift quickly.
The other important takeaway from this week is that leadership continues to narrow around a few themes. Energy remains the obvious geopolitical beneficiary, AI remains the dominant long-term growth narrative, and healthcare still offers pockets of both defensiveness and innovation-driven upside. But outside those areas, the market is becoming more demanding. Investors are increasingly asking not only who can grow, but who can grow profitably, absorb higher costs, and maintain strategic flexibility in a less predictable macro environment. That likely means the next few weeks will continue to reward selectivity, strong fundamentals, and companies that can convert structural tailwinds into real earnings durability.
Economic Policy Shifts & Other Key Developments
This week’s policy backdrop reinforced a theme that has become increasingly central to markets over recent weeks: the Iran war is no longer just an energy and geopolitical story, but one that is steadily reshaping inflation dynamics, central–bank communication, trade expectations, and the relative economic positioning of major regions. What stands out now is not simply that policymakers are becoming more cautious, but that the gap between economies that can better absorb the shock and those that remain more exposed is becoming clearer. As a result, the policy discussion is no longer only about how high inflation might go, but also about which economies can sustain growth and which may begin to weaken more visibly under the strain.
In Switzerland, inflation provided another early reminder that even economies with relatively strong macro foundations are not immune to the energy shock. Consumer prices rose more quickly in March, driven largely by higher heating-oil and fuel costs after the closure of the Strait of Hormuz pushed energy prices upward. Although Switzerland remains better insulated than many of its European peers because of its lower reliance on fossil fuels, imported energy inflation is still beginning to feed through, and that matters for policy. The pickup in prices reduces the likelihood that the Swiss National Bank will need to cut rates below zero, while also easing some of the recent concern around franc strength. In that sense, Switzerland illustrates an important feature of the current environment: even where the inflation shock is smaller than elsewhere, it is still enough to shift the policy debate meaningfully.
The contrast with the eurozone remains striking. While Swiss inflation has only moved modestly higher, eurozoneinflation has accelerated much more forcefully, and policymakers are becoming increasingly sensitive to the risk that energy prices feed into a broader inflation process. That concern was reinforced again this week by comments from Bank of France Governor François Villeroy de Galhau, who said the ECB’s next move is now more likely to be a rate increase than a cut, even if the timing remains uncertain. His remarks underline how much the policy narrative in Europe has shifted in a short space of time. Just a few weeks ago, the discussion was still centered on eventual easing. Now, the emphasis is on vigilance, inflation expectations, and the possibility that a prolonged energy shock could keep eurozone inflation well above target. At the same time, policymakers are clearly aware of the risk of overreacting, since higher energy costs are already acting as a drag on growth. That tension, between containing inflation and avoiding unnecessary damage to activity, is becoming one of the defining macro challenges for Europe.
The United States continues to look relatively more resilient, but not immune. Several of this week’s developments pointed to the same conclusion: the U.S. economy is holding up better than most of the world because it is a major energy producer, yet it is still exposed to the inflationary and supply-chain effects of the conflict. Higher gasoline and diesel prices are already weighing on consumers and transport-intensive sectors, while shortages in products such as fertilizer and helium could begin to affect farming, medical equipment, and semiconductor production if the disruption persists. That means the U.S. retains a significant relative advantage, but not complete insulation. If the war winds down relatively soon, the drag may remain manageable and growth could continue. If the disruption stretches for months, however, the picture changes significantly, and concerns about slower growth or even recession would become much more credible.
That relative strength is increasingly feeding into a broader geopolitical and economic story: the Iran war is, at least for now, making the American economy look even more dominant relative to many of its allies. As a net exporter of energy, the U.S. is benefiting from a position that Europe and parts of Asia simply do not share. This has implications not only for growth differentials, but also for political leverage. The more expensive and strategically important U.S. energy exports become, the more Washington’s economic influence expands. At the same time, this creates new vulnerabilities for allies that have already spent years trying to diversify away from one form of geopolitical energy dependence, only to discover that energy security remains deeply tied to global power politics. In that sense, the current shock is not just cyclical, but structural, exposing again how central energy remains to economic sovereignty.
This also helps explain why some market participants are increasingly skeptical of aggressive monetary tightening in response to the current inflation shock. One of the more important policy debates this week centered on whether higher oil prices should really imply higher interest rates. The argument against such a response is straightforward: this is primarily a supply shock, not a demand boom. Central banks can slow spending, but they cannot produce more oil. History offers several examples, particularly in Europe, where policymakers tightened into energy-driven weakness and were later forced to reverse course as growth deteriorated. That does not mean inflation can be ignored, especially if expectations begin to shift, but it does mean that policymakers face a far narrower and more difficult path than markets may currently be assuming.
Trade developments added another layer of uncertainty. The U.S. trade deficit widened modestly in February, continuing the broader volatility seen in trade flows as tariff rules and policy frameworks continue to change quickly. While the latest numbers were not dramatic in isolation, they reinforce the sense that global trade remains unsettled not only by war and shipping disruption, but also by policy instability. The trade picture is becoming harder to interpret cleanly because geopolitics, tariffs, and supply-chain adaptation are all interacting at once. For businesses, that means less visibility. For policymakers, it means that trade data now tells a more complicated story than simple import-export balances would suggest.
Looking ahead, data will remain critical because it will help markets judge whether the current shock is still primarily an inflation story or increasingly a growth story as well. U.S. inflation figures for March, Fed minutes, jobless claims, eurozone services PMIs, Chinese inflation data, and central-bank decisions across Asia will all be watched closely in the coming week. In particular, investors will look for signs of whether energy-related price increases are beginning to spread more broadly through economies or whether domestic demand is already starting to soften in response. That distinction matters enormously because it will shape how central banks respond from here.
The labor–market data out of the U.S. continues to suggest that the economy has not yet meaningfully cracked under the strain. Jobless claims fell unexpectedly last week, pointing to continued labor-market resilience even as energy prices surged. That should give the Federal Reserve some room to stay patient, but it does not eliminate the risk that employment becomes more vulnerable if the shock persists. Much like elsewhere, the immediate data is holding up better than the more forward-looking concerns.
Taken together, this week’s developments suggest that the macro environment is becoming increasingly defined by asymmetry. Switzerland remains relatively stable but is still seeing energy-driven inflation. Europe faces a more difficult stagflationary balance and a growing likelihood that the ECB may need to tighten rather than ease. The U.S. continues to outperform on a relative basis thanks to energy strength, but still faces meaningful risks through consumers, supply chains, and prices. What ties all of this together is that policymakers are no longer debating a return to normal. They are increasingly trying to determine how to manage an environment in which energy, inflation, trade, and geopolitics are all pulling in different directions at the same time.
A Few Words
All in all, it has been another exciting and highly eventful week across markets, macroeconomics, and corporate activity. From renewed dealmaking momentum and shifting market leadership to evolving inflation risks and a still highly uncertain geopolitical backdrop, there was once again a great deal for investors to digest. At the same time, weeks like this are a reminder that many of the most important developments do not stop with the headlines in front of us today but often continue to shape markets over the weeks and months ahead. That is exactly why it will be worth keeping a close eye on how these themes develop from here.
As always, thank you very much to everyone who has been reading and following The Weekly Market Brief. I truly appreciate the continued support, the feedback, and the growing interest in the project. If you have any thoughts, suggestions, or criticism, feel free to share them, I am always happy to hear feedback. And if you have not subscribed yet, make sure to follow the newsletter so you are notified as soon as next week’s edition goes live. There will certainly be plenty more to watch in the coming weeks, so I hope to see you back here again next week.
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