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   DealBook: “Canary in the coal mine”
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             February 20, 2026
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         <span style="font-weight:700;font-family:arial,sans-serif;color:#000">
          Good morning. Andrew here.
         </span>
         <span>
          Anxiety about private credit is growing following a strategic flip-flop from Blue Owl Capital, which lent aggressively to software companies now being disrupted by artificial intelligence. A major source of concern is the broad push to sell “semi-liquid” instruments to U.S. retail investors. Billed as the future of private equity, these vehicles have a big flaw: They can “gate” investor withdrawals. It’s a mechanism meant to protect the fund during market upheaval — but it can also
         </span>
         <span style="font-style:italic">
          further
         </span>
         <span>
          undermine investor confidence.
         </span>
        </p>
        <p style="font:normal 17px/25px georgia,serif;color:#333;margin:0 0 15px">
         <span>
          If the industry is dead-set on attracting retail investors, it may be time to change how these vehicles work. Here’s an idea: Why not move these assets into so-called
         </span>
         <a class="css-sdwaa1" style="color:#286ed0;-webkit-text-decoration:underline;text-decoration:underline">
          target-date funds
         </a>
         <span>
          with longer time horizons? It could ensure that only those who won’t need their money for decades are invested.
         </span>
        </p>
        <p style="font:normal 17px/25px georgia,serif;color:#333;margin:0 0 15px">
         <span>
          In other words, it may reduce the risk of a “run on the bank” while giving savers the yield they crave. (Was this newsletter forwarded to you?
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         <a class="css-sdwaa1" style="color:#286ed0;-webkit-text-decoration:underline;text-decoration:underline">
          Sign up here.
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          )
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            <span style="color:#666;font:normal 14px georgia,serif">
             A big sell-off in the shares of private credit firms has the market on edge.
            </span>
            <span style="margin:0;font:11px/11px georgia,serif;color:#888;letter-spacing:.01em">
             Brendan McDermid/Reuters
            </span>
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        <h2 class="css-10nzuqq" style="color:#000;font:700 25px/32px arial,sans-serif;margin:0 0 10px">
         <span>
          Has the reckoning started for private credit?
         </span>
        </h2>
        <p style="font:normal 17px/25px georgia,serif;color:#333;margin:0 0 15px">
         <span>
          Shares in private credit giants — especially Blue Owl Capital, the particularly hard-hit lender — remain under pressure this morning after a blood bath yesterday.
         </span>
        </p>
        <p style="font:normal 17px/25px georgia,serif;color:#333;margin:0 0 15px">
         <span>
          Yet while some on Wall Street remain confident about the sector, others warn that a potential reckoning may have only just begun.
         </span>
        </p>
        <p style="font:normal 17px/25px georgia,serif;color:#333;margin:0 0 15px">
         <span style="font-weight:700;font-family:arial,sans-serif;color:#000">
          The latest:
         </span>
         <span>
          The stocks of lenders including Apollo, Ares and Blackstone
         </span>
         <a class="css-sdwaa1" style="color:#286ed0;-webkit-text-decoration:underline;text-decoration:underline">
          were shellacked
         </a>
         <span>
          yesterday after
         </span>
         <a class="css-sdwaa1" style="color:#286ed0;-webkit-text-decoration:underline;text-decoration:underline">
          Blue Owl altered
         </a>
         <span>
          how investors in one of its most prominent funds can withdraw (or “redeem”) their money.
         </span>
        </p>
        <p style="font:normal 17px/25px georgia,serif;color:#333;margin:0 0 15px">
         <span>
          Blue Owl said it would decide how much investors can take back every quarter, rather than letting them redeem a set amount.
         </span>
        </p>
        <p style="font:normal 17px/25px georgia,serif;color:#333;margin:0 0 15px">
         <span style="font-weight:700;font-family:arial,sans-serif;color:#000">
          Investors have worried about private credit for months now,
         </span>
         <span>
          after it soared in popularity in recent years
         </span>
         <span style="font-weight:700;font-family:arial,sans-serif;color:#000">
          .
         </span>
         <span>
          Skeptics of private credit have warned that the lightly regulated sector could face big losses if an economic downturn reveals that lenders had overextended themselves with bad loans. (Jamie Dimon of JPMorgan Chase memorably warned last fall of
         </span>
         <a class="css-sdwaa1" style="color:#286ed0;-webkit-text-decoration:underline;text-decoration:underline">
          potential “cockroaches”
         </a>
         <span>
          coming to light.)
         </span>
        </p>
        <p style="font:normal 17px/25px georgia,serif;color:#333;margin:0 0 15px">
         <span>
          More recently, private credit investors have worried about
         </span>
         <a class="css-sdwaa1" style="color:#286ed0;-webkit-text-decoration:underline;text-decoration:underline">
          stock swoons for enterprise software companies
         </a>
         <span>
          , to which private lenders are heavily exposed.
         </span>
        </p>
        <p style="font:normal 17px/25px georgia,serif;color:#333;margin:0 0 15px">
         <span style="font-weight:700;font-family:arial,sans-serif;color:#000">
          Was the Blue Owl fund a “canary in the coal mine?”
         </span>
         <span>
          That metaphor was used by observers including
         </span>
         <a class="css-sdwaa1" style="color:#286ed0;-webkit-text-decoration:underline;text-decoration:underline">
          Mohamed El-Erian
         </a>
         <span>
          , the former C.E.O. of Pimco.
         </span>
         <a class="css-sdwaa1" style="color:#286ed0;-webkit-text-decoration:underline;text-decoration:underline">
          Dan Rasmussen
         </a>
         <span>
          , the founder of the investment firm Verdad, predicted to CNBC, “The private markets bubble is finally starting to burst.”
         </span>
        </p>
        <p style="font:normal 17px/25px georgia,serif;color:#333;margin:0 0 15px">
         <span style="font-weight:700;font-family:arial,sans-serif;color:#000">
          Defenders say that’s not necessarily the case.
         </span>
         <span>
          Blue Owl disclosed yesterday that it had sold $1.4 billion worth of loans from three funds, taking virtually no loss. Nearly half of the proceeds went to redeem investors in one of the funds.
         </span>
        </p>
        <p style="font:normal 17px/25px georgia,serif;color:#333;margin:0 0 15px">
         <span>
          “I’m getting congratulations from everyone in our industry,” Craig Packer, a Blue Owl co-president, told The Times about the loan sale. Bill Katz, an analyst at TD Cowen, wrote in a research note yesterday that the transaction suggested “there are no ‘cockroaches’ lurking in the portfolio.”
         </span>
        </p>
        <p style="font:normal 17px/25px georgia,serif;color:#333;margin:0 0 15px">
         <span>
          That said, shares in Blue Owl are down in premarket trading today.
         </span>
        </p>
        <p style="font:normal 17px/25px georgia,serif;color:#333;margin:0 0 15px">
         <span style="font-weight:700;font-family:arial,sans-serif;color:#000">
          Keep an eye on Washington.
         </span>
         <span>
          While the Trump administration has introduced rules making it easier for individual investors to put money in private equity, including private credit,
         </span>
         <a class="css-sdwaa1" style="color:#286ed0;-webkit-text-decoration:underline;text-decoration:underline">
          Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent
         </a>
         <span>
          has also pushed to deregulate banks to
         </span>
         <a class="css-sdwaa1" style="color:#286ed0;-webkit-text-decoration:underline;text-decoration:underline">
          help them better compete
         </a>
         <span>
          .
         </span>
        </p>
        <p style="font:normal 17px/25px georgia,serif;color:#333;margin:0 0 15px">
         <a class="css-sdwaa1" style="color:#286ed0;-webkit-text-decoration:underline;text-decoration:underline">
          Senator Elizabeth Warren
         </a>
         <span>
          , Democrat of Massachusetts, urged the Trump administration yesterday to “wake up” and demand more disclosures and stress tests for private lenders — especially with
         </span>
         <a class="css-sdwaa1" style="color:#286ed0;-webkit-text-decoration:underline;text-decoration:underline">
          retail investors’ money
         </a>
         <span>
          on the line in funds like the Blue Owl vehicle. If Democrats make gains in the midterm elections, expect potentially more heat on the sector.
         </span>
        </p>
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           <h3 style="color:#000;font:700 17px/25px arial,sans-serif;margin:5px 0 30px 0;letter-spacing:.2px">
            <span>
             HERE’S WHAT’S HAPPENING
            </span>
           </h3>
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        <p style="font:normal 17px/25px georgia,serif;color:#333;margin:0 0 15px">
         <span style="font-weight:700;font-family:arial,sans-serif;color:#000">
          The fallout from the Epstein files spreads.
         </span>
         <a class="css-sdwaa1" style="color:#286ed0;-webkit-text-decoration:underline;text-decoration:underline">
          Bill Gates canceled a speech
         </a>
         <span>
          for an artificial intelligence event in India amid renewed scrutiny over his ties to Jeffrey Epstein. Emails have emerged showing
         </span>
         <a class="css-sdwaa1" style="color:#286ed0;-webkit-text-decoration:underline;text-decoration:underline">
          Ben Goertzel
         </a>
         <span>
          , a prominent A.I. researcher, congratulating Epstein on his release from jail after being convicted of sex crimes. An advisory firm founded by Peter Mandelson, the veteran British politician and longtime Epstein friend,
         </span>
         <a class="css-sdwaa1" style="color:#286ed0;-webkit-text-decoration:underline;text-decoration:underline">
          collapsed
         </a>
         <span>
          . And Bard College has
         </span>
         <a class="css-sdwaa1" style="color:#286ed0;-webkit-text-decoration:underline;text-decoration:underline">
          begun an “independent review”
         </a>
         <span>
          into its president over his ties to Epstein.
         </span>
        </p>
        <p style="font:normal 17px/25px georgia,serif;color:#333;margin:0 0 15px">
         <span style="font-weight:700;font-family:arial,sans-serif;color:#000">
          U.S. imports hit a record in 2025, in spite of President Trump’s tariffs.
         </span>
         <span>
          Imports rose 5 percent last year to
         </span>
         <a class="css-sdwaa1" style="color:#286ed0;-webkit-text-decoration:underline;text-decoration:underline">
          $4.3 trillion
         </a>
         <span>
          , even as the trade deficit fell slightly to $901.5 billion. That meant America continued to be a
         </span>
         <a class="css-sdwaa1" style="color:#286ed0;-webkit-text-decoration:underline;text-decoration:underline">
          net importer
         </a>
         <span>
          , despite Trump arguing that the levies would make the U.S. a major exporter. Of note: Imports of goods from China dropped nearly 30 percent, to their lowest level since 2009 — but U.S. exports to China fell by nearly as much.
         </span>
        </p>
        <p style="font:normal 17px/25px georgia,serif;color:#333;margin:0 0 15px">
         <span style="font-weight:700;font-family:arial,sans-serif;color:#000">
          New York drops a plan to allow robotaxis.
         </span>
         <span>
          Gov. Kathy Hochul pulled a proposal that would have
         </span>
         <a class="css-sdwaa1" style="color:#286ed0;-webkit-text-decoration:underline;text-decoration:underline">
          allowed commercial autonomous vehicles
         </a>
         <span>
          to operate outside of New York City, which labor groups and taxi drivers had opposed. The decision is a blow to Alphabet’s Waymo (which planned to provide more than one million paid weekly robotaxi rides in the U.S. by the end of 2026), Tesla and other service providers.
         </span>
        </p>
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           </td>
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         </tbody>
        </table>
        <table border="0" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="width:100%">
         <tbody>
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           <td height="10">
           </td>
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        <h2 class="css-10nzuqq" style="color:#000;font:700 25px/32px arial,sans-serif;margin:0 0 10px">
         <span>
          A different inflation problem
         </span>
        </h2>
        <p style="font:normal 17px/25px georgia,serif;color:#333;margin:0 0 15px">
         <span>
          President Trump and Fed policymakers largely agree that the economy is doing fine. But when it comes to America’s affordability crunch, an issue of huge importance to voters, the president and central bankers are growing further apart.
         </span>
        </p>
        <p style="font:normal 17px/25px georgia,serif;color:#333;margin:0 0 15px">
         <span>
          That widening gap may cause problems for Kevin Warsh, the president’s pick to succeed Jay Powell as Fed chair after his term expires in May. The situation that awaits Warsh could come into sharper focus later this morning with the release of the Consumer Price Expenditures report, the Fed’s preferred measure on inflation.
         </span>
        </p>
        <p style="font:normal 17px/25px georgia,serif;color:#333;margin:0 0 15px">
         <span>
          It’s
         </span>
         <a class="css-sdwaa1" style="color:#286ed0;-webkit-text-decoration:underline;text-decoration:underline">
          expected to show
         </a>
         <span>
          that inflation in December remained well above the Fed’s 2 percent target and was showing little sign of easing.
         </span>
        </p>
        <p style="font:normal 17px/25px georgia,serif;color:#333;margin:0 0 15px">
         <span style="font-weight:700;font-family:arial,sans-serif;color:#000">
          The White House and Wall Street will also be watching the Supreme Court.
         </span>
         <span>
          The court is slated to
         </span>
         <a class="css-sdwaa1" style="color:#286ed0;-webkit-text-decoration:underline;text-decoration:underline">
          release its latest opinions
         </a>
         <span>
          today, and next Tuesday and Wednesday. Businesses have been anxiously awaiting the justices’ ruling on the legality of Trump’s most bruising tariffs, those justified under the International Emergency Economic Powers Act of 1977.
         </span>
        </p>
        <p style="font:normal 17px/25px georgia,serif;color:#333;margin:0 0 15px">
         <span style="font-weight:700;font-family:arial,sans-serif;color:#000">
          Trump took on inflation and tariffs yesterday.
         </span>
         <span>
          If the court were to invalidate the tariffs, most importers would rejoice. (New research by the JPMorganChase Institute shows that tariffs are especially
         </span>
         <a class="css-sdwaa1" style="color:#286ed0;-webkit-text-decoration:underline;text-decoration:underline">
          walloping midsize U.S. businesses
         </a>
         <span>
          .) But that would also wipe out a
         </span>
         <a class="css-sdwaa1" style="color:#286ed0;-webkit-text-decoration:underline;text-decoration:underline">
          potential windfall
         </a>
         <span style="font-weight:700;font-family:arial,sans-serif;color:#000">
         </span>
         <span>
          that the administration hoped to use to plug the country’s giant debt hole.
         </span>
        </p>
        <p style="font:normal 17px/25px georgia,serif;color:#333;margin:0 0 15px">
         <span>
          “Without tariffs, this country would be in so much trouble right now,” Trump told supporters at a steel plant in northwestern Georgia.
         </span>
        </p>
        <p style="font:normal 17px/25px georgia,serif;color:#333;margin:0 0 15px">
         <span style="font-weight:700;font-family:arial,sans-serif;color:#000">
          The president continued to play down inflation.
         </span>
         <span>
          He called the affordability crisis “
         </span>
         <a class="css-sdwaa1" style="color:#286ed0;-webkit-text-decoration:underline;text-decoration:underline">
          fake news
         </a>
         <span>
          ” yesterday, arguing, without evidence, that he had vanquished the problem.
         </span>
        </p>
        <p style="font:normal 17px/25px georgia,serif;color:#333;margin:0 0 15px">
         <span>
          But economists and business leaders continue to worry that a two-tiered —
         </span>
         <a class="css-sdwaa1" style="color:#286ed0;-webkit-text-decoration:underline;text-decoration:underline">
          or K-shaped
         </a>
         <span>
          — economy is emerging in which high-wage earners are weathering high inflation while poorer households struggle.
         </span>
        </p>
        <p style="font:normal 17px/25px georgia,serif;color:#333;margin:0 0 15px">
         <span style="font-weight:700;font-family:arial,sans-serif;color:#000">
          And a new inflation risk has emerged.
         </span>
         <span>
          The price of Brent crude has soared this week — it stabilized this morning around $71 a barrel — as the The Times has reported that the president is weighing
         </span>
         <a class="css-sdwaa1" style="color:#286ed0;-webkit-text-decoration:underline;text-decoration:underline">
          strikes against Iran
         </a>
         <span>
          . Military action could disrupt a key oil exporting trade route.
         </span>
        </p>
        <p style="font:normal 17px/25px georgia,serif;color:#333;margin:0 0 15px">
         <span>
          Trump said yesterday that Iran would need to reach a deal with Washington over the next 10 to 15 days, “
         </span>
         <a class="css-sdwaa1" style="color:#286ed0;-webkit-text-decoration:underline;text-decoration:underline">
          otherwise bad things happen
         </a>
         <span>
          ” — a timeline that has left markets on edge.
         </span>
        </p>
        <p style="font:normal 17px/25px georgia,serif;color:#333;margin:0 0 15px">
         <span style="font-weight:700;font-family:arial,sans-serif;color:#000">
          The uncertainty about inflation is becoming harder to ignore.
         </span>
         <span>
          Stephen Miran, the former White House economic adviser who joined the Fed last year, appears to have had a kind of change of heart.
         </span>
        </p>
        <p style="font:normal 17px/25px georgia,serif;color:#333;margin:0 0 15px">
         <span>
          He had been in lock step with Trump in calling for the Fed to slash borrowing costs this year. But now he has
         </span>
         <a class="css-sdwaa1" style="color:#286ed0;-webkit-text-decoration:underline;text-decoration:underline">
          moderated his rates outlook
         </a>
         <span>
          , calling for the equivalent of two fewer cuts than he had supported in December. Why? “Firming” of goods inflation, he says, is becoming an issue.
         </span>
        </p>
        <table width="100%">
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           </td>
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         </tbody>
        </table>
        <h2 class="css-10nzuqq" style="color:#000;font:700 25px/32px arial,sans-serif;margin:0 0 10px">
         <span>
          Picture of the day
         </span>
        </h2>
        <table border="0" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="width:100%">
         <tbody>
          <tr>
           <td style="text-align:center">
            <img alt="Men with raised arms, some with linked hands, stand in front of a purple backdrop that reads AI Impact Summit." class="css-xsf469" height="333" src="https://inboxflows.com/_/image/https%253A%252F%252Fstatic01.nyt.com%252Fimages%252F2026%252F02%252F20%252Fmultimedia%252F20db-AI-summit-wtqv%252F20db-AI-summit-wtqv-jumbo.jpg/?inbox_flows_img_sig=eyJwYXRoIjoiaHR0cHMlM0ElMkYlMkZzdGF0aWMwMS5ueSIsInRpbWUiOjE3NzE1OTM4MzkuMTgxNH0:1vtQUB:cB17KDV-mw_HbHa5RcdgjdSNPDTsjXZOU60BKUVwQbg" style="display:inline-block;width:83%;max-width:500px;height:auto;padding-top:10px;padding-bottom:0;line-height:0" width="500"/>
           </td>
          </tr>
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           <td style="text-align:center;width:100%;padding-top:3px;padding-bottom:20px;line-height:12px">
            <span class="css-1wuwhda" style="width:83%;max-width:500px;display:inline-block;text-align:right">
             <span style="margin:0;font:11px/11px georgia,serif;color:#888;letter-spacing:.01em;padding-left:0">
              Ludovic Marin/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images
             </span>
            </span>
           </td>
          </tr>
         </tbody>
        </table>
        <p style="font:normal 17px/25px georgia,serif;color:#333;margin:0 0 15px">
         <span>
          The tech world is still buzzing over an awkward moment at an A.I. summit in New Delhi yesterday. For a photo op, Prime Minister Narendra Modi of India asked the participants to clasp hands above their heads.
         </span>
        </p>
        <p style="font:normal 17px/25px georgia,serif;color:#333;margin:0 0 15px">
         <span>
          But two major rivals, Sam Altman of OpenAI (above, center) and Dario Amodei of Anthropic,
         </span>
         <a class="css-sdwaa1" style="color:#286ed0;-webkit-text-decoration:underline;text-decoration:underline">
          weren’t having it
         </a>
         <span>
          .
         </span>
        </p>
        <table border="0" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="width:100%">
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           <td height="10">
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           <td>
            <div style="width:100%;text-align:center;line-height:0">
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           </td>
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        </table>
        <table width="100%">
         <tbody>
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           <td class="css-36ugzx" style="padding-bottom:15px">
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        <h2 class="css-10nzuqq" style="color:#000;font:700 25px/32px arial,sans-serif;margin:0 0 10px">
         <span>
          A new kind of global trade alliance
         </span>
        </h2>
        <p style="font:normal 17px/25px georgia,serif;color:#333;margin:0 0 15px">
         <span>
          Prime Minister Mark Carney of Canada
         </span>
         <a class="css-sdwaa1" style="color:#286ed0;-webkit-text-decoration:underline;text-decoration:underline">
          stunned business and political leaders
         </a>
         <span>
          last month at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland — and rankled President Donald Trump — by declaring that the era of U.S.-led free trade was dead, and urging “middle powers” to forge their own deals.
         </span>
        </p>
        <p style="font:normal 17px/25px georgia,serif;color:#333;margin:0 0 15px">
         <span>
          The speech left many questions about the potential fallout on geopolitics and global trade.
         </span>
        </p>
        <p style="font:normal 17px/25px georgia,serif;color:#333;margin:0 0 15px">
         <span>
          But one thing became clearer at the annual ministerial meeting of the International Energy Agency this week in Paris, Vivienne Walt writes. While U.S. officials were threatening to abandon the I.E.A., their counterparts to the north were asserting a new trade vision based squarely on Carney’s speech.
         </span>
        </p>
        <p style="font:normal 17px/25px georgia,serif;color:#333;margin:0 0 15px">
         <span style="font-weight:700;font-family:arial,sans-serif;color:#000">
          A recap:
         </span>
         <span>
          Chris Wright, the U.S. energy secretary, generated arguably the most headlines from the I.E.A. summit. He
         </span>
         <a class="css-sdwaa1" style="color:#286ed0;-webkit-text-decoration:underline;text-decoration:underline">
          threatened to pull
         </a>
         <span>
          the U.S. out of the organization unless the I.E.A. ditched its “ridiculous” net-zero road map — emissions guidelines that many companies and countries are sticking with despite the Trump administration’s opposition to them.
         </span>
        </p>
        <p style="font:normal 17px/25px georgia,serif;color:#333;margin:0 0 15px">
         <span>
          As Wright browbeat the I.E.A., Canada got to work talking deals.
         </span>
        </p>
        <p style="font:normal 17px/25px georgia,serif;color:#333;margin:0 0 15px">
         <span style="font-weight:700;font-family:arial,sans-serif;color:#000">
          Here’s what DealBook heard on the sidelines:
         </span>
         <span>
          Countries beyond Canada are also pursuing the blueprint that Carney spelled out in Davos to “rewire their economies to be less reliant on the hegemons,” Timothy Hodgson, Canada’s energy and natural resources minister, told DealBook.
         </span>
        </p>
        <p style="font:normal 17px/25px georgia,serif;color:#333;margin:0 0 15px">
         <span>
          “Our economic integration is being weaponized against us, and tariffs are being used as leverage against us,” said Hodgson, a former Goldman Sachs banker who worked with Carney at the investment bank and later at the Bank of Canada.
         </span>
        </p>
        <p style="font:normal 17px/25px georgia,serif;color:#333;margin:0 0 15px">
         <span style="font-weight:700;font-family:arial,sans-serif;color:#000">
          Canada plans to double its exports to countries other than the U.S. within a decade.
         </span>
         <span>
          That speaks to how U.S. trading partners are trying to leave Washington’s orbit and create a new trading network, Hodgson said.
         </span>
        </p>
        <p style="font:normal 17px/25px georgia,serif;color:#333;margin:0 0 15px">
         <span>
          Consider:
         </span>
        </p>
        <div style="margin:0 auto;max-width:600px;width:100%">
         <table>
          <tbody>
           <tr>
            <td style="padding:0 0 5px">
             <ul class="css-1dtd48z" style="color:#000;font:20px georgia,serif;text-align:left;padding-left:50px;list-style-type:square;margin-bottom:10px">
              <li style="margin:0 0 10px 0;line-height:27.5px">
               <span style="font:normal 17px/25px georgia,serif;vertical-align:middle">
                Carney is set to visit India
               </span>
               <span style="font:normal 17px/25px georgia,serif;vertical-align:middle;font-weight:700;font-family:arial,sans-serif;color:#000">
               </span>
               <span style="font:normal 17px/25px georgia,serif;vertical-align:middle">
                next month, to
               </span>
               <a class="css-sdwaa1" style="color:#286ed0;-webkit-text-decoration:underline;text-decoration:underline;font:normal 17px/25px georgia,serif;vertical-align:middle">
                discuss new energy deals
               </a>
               <span style="font:normal 17px/25px georgia,serif;vertical-align:middle">
                , while other Canadian trade missions are underway this week in Singapore and Mexico.
               </span>
              </li>
              <li style="margin:0 0 10px 0;line-height:27.5px">
               <span style="font:normal 17px/25px georgia,serif;vertical-align:middle">
                Hodgson was in Warsaw on Tuesday to discuss a nuclear-energy deal with Poland.
               </span>
              </li>
             </ul>
            </td>
           </tr>
          </tbody>
         </table>
        </div>
        <p style="font:normal 17px/25px georgia,serif;color:#333;margin:0 0 15px">
         <span>
          Canada plans to eventually ship as much as 100 million tons of liquefied natural gas to other countries, Hodgson said, a huge jump from today’s levels. In addition, critical minerals — of which Canada has large reserves — would also be shipped worldwide, he said, in a move to break China’s stranglehold on global supplies.
         </span>
        </p>
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           <h3 style="color:#000;font:700 17px/25px arial,sans-serif;margin:5px 0 30px 0;letter-spacing:.2px">
            <span>
             THE SPEED READ
            </span>
           </h3>
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          Deals
         </span>
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        <div style="margin:0 auto;max-width:600px;width:100%">
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               <span style="font:normal 17px/25px georgia,serif;vertical-align:middle">
                Big buyout funds are said to be interested in J&amp;J’s
               </span>
               <a class="css-sdwaa1" style="color:#286ed0;-webkit-text-decoration:underline;text-decoration:underline;font:normal 17px/25px georgia,serif;vertical-align:middle">
                possible sale of DePuy Synthes
               </a>
               <span style="font:normal 17px/25px georgia,serif;vertical-align:middle">
                , an orthopedics unit that could be valued at more than $20 billion. (Bloomberg)
               </span>
              </li>
              <li style="margin:0 0 10px 0;line-height:27.5px">
               <span style="font:normal 17px/25px georgia,serif;vertical-align:middle">
                Nvidia is reportedly
               </span>
               <a class="css-sdwaa1" style="color:#286ed0;-webkit-text-decoration:underline;text-decoration:underline;font:normal 17px/25px georgia,serif;vertical-align:middle">
                abandoning a $100 billion funding deal
               </a>
               <span style="font:normal 17px/25px georgia,serif;vertical-align:middle">
                for OpenAI in favor of a $30 billion commitment as part of the start-up’s latest funding round. (FT)
               </span>
              </li>
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          Politics, policy and regulation
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                The E.U. worries that its
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               <a class="css-sdwaa1" style="color:#286ed0;-webkit-text-decoration:underline;text-decoration:underline;font:normal 17px/25px georgia,serif;vertical-align:middle">
                next clash
               </a>
               <span style="font:normal 17px/25px georgia,serif;vertical-align:middle">
                with the White House will be over the bloc’s technology regulations. Meanwhile, the U.S. has reportedly threatened the E.U. over its
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                “Buy European” weapons-procurement push
               </a>
               <span style="font:normal 17px/25px georgia,serif;vertical-align:middle">
                . (NYT, Politico)
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              <li style="margin:0 0 10px 0;line-height:27.5px">
               <span style="font:normal 17px/25px georgia,serif;vertical-align:middle">
                Gov. Josh Shapiro, Democrat of Pennsylvania, told data center owners to
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                “pay for your own power”
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                so as to limit price rises on constituents’ utilities bills; some data projects are already
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                building their own power plants
               </a>
               <span style="font:normal 17px/25px georgia,serif;vertical-align:middle">
                . (Politico, WaPo)
               </span>
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          Best of the rest
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                “OpenAI has a
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                Hollywood problem
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               <span style="font:normal 17px/25px georgia,serif;vertical-align:middle">
                . They just hired a guy to fix it.” (Business Insider)
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              </li>
              <li style="margin:0 0 10px 0;line-height:27.5px">
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                How the Trump administration is using the
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                “equal time” rule
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                to reshape late-night TV. (NYT)
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