MARKET WRAPS

STOCKS: U.S. stocks ended the week on an upswing after slowing jobs growth tempered expectations that the Federal Reserve will hike rates again later this month.

TREASURYS: Treasury yields hovered near multidecade highs as investors looked past slower-than-expected job creation in the U.S. amid lingering concerns about the long-term economic outlook.

FOREX: The dollar declined after weaker-than-expected U.S. jobs data.

COMMODITIES: Oil trimmed losses late in the session, initially falling after the Group of Seven agreed to release 100 million barrels of crude oil and other fuels from emergency stocks.

HEADLINES

September Hiring Trudged Along but Labor Market Still on Steady Track

The U.S. added just 29,000 jobs in September, a sign that the labor

market may not be able to deliver the sizable gains that it did in the

past-but doesn't need to in order to keep the unemployment rate low.

The jobs number, reported Friday by the Labor Department, fell far

short of analysts' expectations for 84,000 jobs. The unemployment rate

edged up to 4.2%. That was higher than 4.1% the previous month but still

at a historically low level that indicates that the labor market remains

generally healthy.

G-7 Agrees to Release 100 Million Barrels of Diesel and Crude

PARIS-The Group of Seven major economies agreed to release 100 million

barrels of crude oil and fuel from their emergency stocks and not to

restrict exports, aiming to bring down the soaring price of diesel and

other fuels.On his Truth Social platform, President Trump said European

nations agreed "to release a massive amount of their heavily stocked

Diesel Oil. The process will begin immediately."

The G-7 statement said the reserve release would happen over four

months.

The announcement would seem to end the threat of a U.S. ban on diesel

exports, at least for now. The G-7 countries agreed to "take no measures

to restrict the exchange of energy and petroleum products between partner

countries," French President Emmanuel Macron said.

David Ellison Changes Name of Combined Paramount-Warner to Skydance

Paramount Chief Executive David Ellison said he would rename his

combined company Skydance after acquiring Warner Bros. Discovery.

"Paramount and Warner Bros. shaped over a century of culture," Ellison

said Friday on social media. "By combining them, we aren't rewriting

history-we're equipping these iconic studios with a more powerful engine.

Ellison said Skydance will focus on "bold, quality storytelling."

FAA Says 737 MAX Software Glitch Doesn't Pose Safety Issue

A software glitch that some industry officials worried could overwork

Boeing 737 MAX pilots during a certain landing scenario doesn't pose a

safety risk, U.S. regulators said Friday, easing a potential obstacle to

certification of the MAX 10.

U.S. air-safety regulators had convened an internal panel known as a

corrective action review board on Friday to decide whether the problem

amounted to an unsafe condition that needed to be addressed.

The FAA panel, composed of various internal experts, arrived at the

determination that "because pilots retain full control of the aircraft,

the indications to the flight crew are clear and unambiguous," the agency

said Friday. "As with any situation, the FAA will consider appropriate

action if it receives new information about this issue."

Amazon's New Push to Get Buy-In for Data Center Build-Out

Amazon.com is touting its good-neighbor bona fides in an attempt to

shore up support for artificial-intelligence data centers.

The cloud-computing giant published a memorandum Friday calling the

fight for AI dominance "the race our nation can't afford to lose" and

laying out initiatives to support the communities where it is building

data centers.

The missive from Amazon Web Services Chief Executive Matt Garman,

which runs more than 3,100 words, said Amazon would invest more than $1

billion over the next five years into the communities, beyond what it has

already committed. That money will go toward education, job training,

water preservation and other local priorities.

Tesla Sales Slump in Third Quarter

Tesla's global sales fell in the third quarter, reversing gains from

the first half of the year.

The electric-vehicle maker sold 486,532 electric vehicles globally in

the period from July to September, down 2% from the same time last year,

the company said Friday.

Tesla also reported 9.6% growth in its energy business, a figure that

measures how much battery energy the company deployed in the quarter.

Two Blue Owl Private Credit Funds See Redemption Requests Well Above 5%

Redemption requests for two of Blue Owl Capital's private-credit funds

remained well above the typical 5% cap, even as requests on one of the

funds fell for the second quarter in a row.

Blue Owl Credit Income Corp. said it saw estimated third-quarter

redemption requests representing 16.8% of shares, or $3.1 billion. That

compares with 18.8% in the second quarter and 21.9% in the first quarter.

The tech-focused fund, Blue Owl Technology Income Corp., saw estimated

redemption requests represent 39% of shares, or $1.1 billion, up from

38.1% in the second quarter but down from 40.4% in the first quarter.

Bayer to Invest $2.2 Billion in U.S. Pharma Manufacturing Expansion

Bayer said it plans to spend $2.2 billion to build a new manufacturing

site in Ohio for its pharmaceutical business, becoming the latest

European drugmaker to invest in the U.S.

The German agricultural and pharmaceutical group said Friday that its

new site in New Albany will create around 600 jobs, with plans to open a

first module dedicated to drug substance manufacturing in 2031, followed

by a second module for finished products in 2034.

Bayer's pharma business has been looking to expand in the U.S.,

betting that an enlarged presence in the world's largest drug market can

help it revive sales growth after two key products went off patent.

TALKING POINT SEC Proposes Framework for Advisor Custody of Cryptocurrencies Many investment advisors have been reluctant to engage with clients looking to invest in cryptocurrencies in part due to the nebulous regulatory framework surrounding digital assets. The Securities and Exchange Commission is looking to change that.

On Thursday, the SEC released a proposal that would set rules of the road for advisors to hold custody of clients' crypto holdings, filling in a regulatory gap to further legitimize an asset class the administration has been aggressively promoting.

"Since the advent of Bitcoin in 2008, the crypto-asset market has grown from a niche curiosity into a multi-trillion-dollar asset class to which investors actively seek exposure," says SEC Chairman Paul Atkins. "Unfortunately, our rules and regulations have not kept pace."

Atkins, who co-chaired a crypto lobbying group before rejoining the SEC in 2025, has embraced the Trump administration's stated goal of making the United States "the crypto capital of the world."

The SEC says that the absence of a regulatory framework has made it challenging for investors to find registered investment advisors who would hold custody of crypto assets the way they do with traditional investments. The SEC's proposal "would provide a clear regulatory framework for the custody of crypto assets, giving investment advisors and funds a compliant pathway where none existed before," Atkins says.

The change would allow advisors to self-custody crypto holdings on behalf of individual clients or funds if they determine that another custodian isn't available and they can demonstrate that they have expertise in safely handling digital assets. The proposal stipulates that advisors must store clients' crypto assets siloed from one another and mitigate cybersecurity risks associated with those holdings.

Government efforts. The move comes amid ongoing efforts across various precincts of government to forge a coherent approach to crypto regulation. The SEC has formed its own crypto task force and has been working with another federal agency, the Commodity Futures Trading Commission, to harmonize oversight of the industry. In Congress, the digital-asset industry has aligned behind the Clarity Act, another effort to establish a regulatory framework, though that measure failed a key Senate vote last month, torpedoed in part by Democrats' contention that it didn't do enough to rein in the Trump family's crypto business dealings.

--Kenneth Corbin, Barron's