The White House says any suggestion that President Donald Trump is considering a 90-day pause in tariffs is “fake news.”
U.S. markets opened sharply lower Monday for a third trading session, as Trump’s tariffs paralyze global trade and investment.
Asian markets plunged overnight, with stock indexes in Singapore, Australia, Japan, South Korea and India all suffering losses.
European Union President Ursula von der Leyen said the EU is willing to negotiate with the U.S. on tariffs but also said the bloc will prepare to retaliate.
Billionaire Trump backer Bill Ackman says America is on the brink of an “economic nuclear winter” due to tariffs.
DOGE chief Elon Musk and top Trump trade advisor Peter Navarro continued a war of words and tweets over free trade.
Analysts at BMO Capital Markets said Centessa’s orexin receptor agonist has “best-in-class” potential for narcolepsy, putting the company in a strong position in the $15 billion market.
Centessa Pharmaceuticals’ investigational orexin receptor agonist ORX750 promotes wakefulness in sleep-deprived healthy volunteers, pointing to its potential as a treatment for narcolepsy and other sleep disorders, according to a Phase I readout on Saturday.
In a note to investors, analysts at Leerink Partners called ORX750’s signals of efficacy “compelling,” pointing to its “significant improvements in mean sleep latency … and subjective alertness” compared to placebo. This readout, according to Leerink, “reinforces ORX750 as a potentially best-in-class OX2R agonist relative to competitors.”
Centessa’s data, presented at the 2025 Annual Meeting of the American Academy of Neurology over the weekend, showed that patients treated with 5 mg of ORX750, taken orally, had mean sleep latency, a measurement of how long it takes a patient to fall asleep, of 37.9 minutes, whereas sleep was delayed by an average of 15.3 minutes in placebo comparators. The treatment difference of 22.6 minutes was highly statistically significant, according to Centessa’s presentation.
Patients on ORX750 were likewise significantly more alert during the day than those on placebo, measured at least three hours after dosing.
ORX750 also had a largely clean safety profile, with treatment-emergent adverse events being mild or moderate in severity. Side effects were transient and resolved without needing medical intervention.
BMO Capital Markets agreed in a Sunday note that these data position ORX750 as a “best-in-class” therapy for narcolepsy, with a “strong/differentiated effect even at 8hrs post-dosing.” BMO analysts also put Centessa’s cash runway at about $480 million, which they said will drive a Phase II readout for ORX750 sometime in 2025 and take the company into 2027.
BMO added that this best-in-class potential “renders [Centessa] an M&A target,” particularly for pharma companies already involved in sleep disorders in the $15 billion market.
Beyond these Phase I data, Centessa is also building toward a Phase II readout for ORX750 this year, which BMO also expects to “demonstrate best-in-class” performance—or the “safest profile, with the lowest dose amount,” —across multiple types of narcolepsy. In turn, ORX750 could drive a 30% to 50% upside for Centessa this year, as per the Sunday note.
Narcolepsy is a neurological disorder involving dysfunctional sleep-wake cycles and most commonly manifests as daytime sleepiness. There are two main types of narcolepsy based on the presence of cataplexy, or sudden muscle weakness: type 1, which involves excessive sleepiness with cataplexy, and type 2, which does not involve cataplexy.
ORX750 works by binding to and activating the orexin receptor 2, a protein in the brain involved in maintaining wakefulness. According to Centessa’s website, its orexin receptor agonists are designed to target the underlying cause of narcolepsy, easing excessive sleepiness, while also demonstrating potential for other symptoms such as inattention, cognitive deficit and fatigue.
GSK is paying to access ABL Bio’s Grabody-B platform, which potentially enables therapies to cross the blood-brain barrier.
GSK is fronting £38.5 million (nearly $50 million), in a partnership with South Korea’s ABL Bio to develop novel drugs for neurodegenerative diseases.
Aside from its upfront payment, GSK will also be on the hook for up to £2.075 billion ($2.66 billion) in research, development, regulatory and commercialization milestones, spread across the deal’s several potential programs. All told, the deal could mean more than a $2.5 billion windfall for ABL Bio.
At the center of Monday’s agreement is the South Korean biotech’s proprietary Grabody-B platform, which makes use of a novel targeting mechanism that allows bulkier therapeutic molecules to pass the blood-brain barrier.
According to the biotech’s website, ABL Bio’s approach leverages a bispecific antibody engineered to bind to the insulin-like growth factor 1 receptors, which are found on the cells that make up the blood-brain barrier, and in which turn allows the molecule to be shuttled across the barrier.
As per Monday’s deal, ABL Bio will transfer Grabody-B-related technologies and expertise to GSK. GSK will then be responsible for preclinical and clinical development, as well as taking charge of manufacturing and commercialization activities. ABL Bio will be entitled to tiered royalties on net sales of any product that results from this partnership.
GSK has not disclosed specific target indications, though Christopher Austin, senior vice president of Research Technologies, said in a prepared statement on Monday that the ABL Bio partnership is part of the pharma’s push to address “neurodegenerative brain diseases,” particularly those that are becoming more common “due to the aging of the population.”
GSK has pushed deeper into the neuro space in recent months. In December 2024, it paid $35 million upfront to partner with Danish biotech Muna Therapeutics to get access to its MiND-MAP platform.
GSK will be able to work on “multiple, high-value, validated” Alzheimer’s disease targets under the Muna partnership, though it hasn’t yet disclosed a specific number. For each target, Muna will be entitled to up to roughly $148 million in milestones.
In November 2024, GSK also partnered with Vesalius Therapeutics to leverage its proprietary platform, which according to Vesalius combines genomics, stem cells and AI, and use that platform to develop novel therapies for Parkinsons’s disease and another neurodegenerative disease. The pharma paid $80 million upfront and also pledged up to $570 in milestones for one preclinical program. Vesalius will also be entitled to undisclosed milestones and tiered royalties for each novel target.
Stocks halted a selling stampede as Wall Street traders sought signs of a bottom after a $9.5 trillion global wipeout that put the S&P 500 on the brink of a bear market.
The S&P 500 rose 3% on Monday, reversing an earlier slide of about 5%. Bonds erased their rally, but markets continued to price around 100 basis points in policy easing by the end of 2025- equivalent to four quarter-point cuts.
Niagen Bioscience, Inc.(NASDAQ: NAGE) (formerly ChromaDex Corp.), the global authority on NAD+ (nicotinamide adenine dinucleotide) with a focus on the science of healthy aging, reaffirms that the manufacturing of its Niagen® ingredient (patented nicotinamide riboside or NR) and Tru Niagen®and pharmaceutical-grade Niagen®products remain resilient amid the recently enacted global tariffs.
Manufactured in the U.S. by the Company’s partner, W.R. Grace, Niagen is rigorously tested, encapsulated, bottled, and packaged domestically as Tru Niagen using premium materials. With only a small percentage of materials sourced internationally, the cost to manufacture final Niagen products remains largely insulated from global price volatility.
"We made the decision to build a U.S.-based supply chain for Niagen to safeguard long-term resilience, trust, and quality," said Rob Fried, CEO of Niagen Bioscience. "That foresight is proving valuable now. We remain confident in our ability to deliver Niagen products to customers and long-term stability to shareholders."
Currently, most vitamins—including nicotinamide riboside (NR)— remain exempt from the recently enacted tariffs. This exemption enables Niagen Bioscience to continue international operations without disruption. In 2024, approximately 24% of the Company’s revenue came from international sales, with over 12% attributed to A.S. Watson in Hong Kong—a duty-free market not subject to tariffs. As a result, this key international revenue stream remains unaffected by recent trade policy changes.
At this time, the Company anticipates no interruption in its ability to deliver Niagen products or maintain costs and pricing.
California did not materially comply with the requirements for seven of the 22 federal programs the state auditor examined, including “pervasive” noncompliance in its unemployment benefits program, which could put essential federal funding at risk.
“This report concludes that the State did not materially comply with certain requirements for seven of the 22 federal programs or clusters of programs (federal programs) MGO audited, including one program for which the noncompliance was pervasive,” wrote Deputy State Auditor Linus Li.
“Additionally, although MGO concluded that the State materially complied with requirements for the remaining federal programs it audited, the State continues to experience certain deficiencies in its accounting and administrative practices that affect its internal controls over compliance with federal requirements.”
The audit found that even in 2023 — years after the state made $55 billion in fraudulent COVID lockdown-era benefits payments — the state likely made “potentially ineligible payments” of nearly $200 million. The audit also found that of 138 pandemic unemployment assistance claimants that were tested, 91, or 66%, had verification issues.
“While Gavin Newsom chases the national spotlight, Californians are left with an administration that can’t accomplish the basic functions of government,” said California State Assembly Minority Leader James Gallagher to The Center Square.
“The federal government is right to take a look at this spending and decide if it’s appropriate to keep throwing resources at an administration that treats it like Monopoly money.”
Last year, the state’s Legislative Analyst’s Office said the state’s unemployment fund runs a structural deficit of $2 billion per year, beyond the $20 billion debt and $1 billion in annual interest payments to the federal government. Because the unemployment fund is paid for by payroll taxes on employers and their employees, the LAO said payroll taxes would need to rise from $42 per employee making $46,800 or more per year, to $889.20, or over 21 times higher than the existing base payroll tax.
I always get excited about a market correction when I read the Keynesian consensus predict a disaster. The same people who claimed massive money printing and soaring government spending wouldn’t cause inflation are the ones who know exactly how tariffs will impact aggregate prices. Fascinating.
In June 2016, sixteen Nobel Prize winners expected higher inflation from tariffs, and it never happened. Furthermore, many of those economists recommended enormous government spending and Federal Reserve quantitative easing in 2020, stating there were no concerns about inflation. However, this led to the highest inflationary burst in thirty years. Reality showed that there was no inflation in 2016-2019 and that the insane printing and spending spree of 2021 led to the current inflationary burst. This happens because many economic experts will always justify all government imbalances and tax hikes but raise alarm at any tax cut or supply-side measure. We should never trust experts that work painfully close to social democrat governments.
According to fearmongers, tariffs will create an enormous inflation burst both in the U.S. and abroad. These estimates show that Trump’s tariffs will be paid by US consumers, China tariffs against the US will also be paid by US consumers, and EU countermeasures will be paid only by American consumers. Quite amusing. If we believe this narrative, tariffs would be the best news for businesses all over the world: Americans would swallow the cost entirely, margins will not decline, and the world would be happy. It is so ridiculous that it would be laughable if millions did not take their words seriously. Furthermore, according to the consensus narrative, tariffs will cause a global recession if imposed by the US. However, when tariffs are imposed by China or the EU, then it is all fine.
When Keynesians predict a disaster, it is unlikely to happen. When the Keynesian consensus tells you that there is no risk, as they did in 2008, run away.
We should consider some relevant factors. Markets already discount a recession and a risk of stagflation, but the latest jobs report shows the opposite. 228,000 jobs were created in March despite some federal jobs. The ISM Composite Index points to expansion, and the economically weighted figure is comfortably above the expansion level (50) according to Real Investment Advice. All the investment and production leading indicators are far from a recession signal. Furthermore, many market participants seem to discount a hawkish Federal Reserve and a recession, something that has not happened in two decades.
What I find intriguing is that, for the first time in many years, the S&P 500 is attractively priced. After being hugely expensive in a bull market with constant multiple expansion, we can finally say that the S&P 500 is starting to be attractive, even if you discount a significant downward revision in earnings. The Price-to-Earnings ratio of 15.2x for 2027 provides ample room for a revision and still shows an attractive entry point. Stocks are quite cheap at 10.3x EV to EBITDA 2027 (enterprise value to earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation, and amortisation). Furthermore, with the 10-year yield of Treasuries at 3.99%, it means that stocks look attractive compared to bonds for the first time in months. Margins are strong, guidance is positive, and entry points for long-term investors are starting to be evident, as inflationary pressures are likely to be limited and the so-called trade war will be negotiated, with more than 50 nations calling on the US government to make a deal on trade barriers.
Any long-term investor should look at opportunities in which fear is exaggerated, valuations are attractive, and consensus concerns are unrealistic. It may be a good idea to start building long positions, knowing that quantitative easing and rate cuts will likely follow periods of volatility.
Investors need to protect themselves against inflationism and central bank destruction of the purchasing power of currency and that has not gone away; it is coming back stronger as governments all over the world continue to build debt and fiscal imbalances. Protect yourself against inflation with a balanced strategy, building positions that protect your wealth and help you navigate volatility.
