NEWSLETTER of October 9, 2026

The following content has been added at finexpert:

The Boston Consulting Group
IN SEARCH OF A WIDER RECOVERY – THE 2026 M&A REPORT
Global M&A value rose 15% year-on-year during the first eight months of 2026, but the recovery remains concentrated in large transactions while smaller deals continue to lag. Europe recorded the strongest regional growth, with deal value increasing 43% to USD 541 billion and German activity rising 149%. BCG argues that the principal constraints have shifted from capital availability and buyer appetite to asset readiness, valuation gaps and regulatory execution, with AI creating opportunities while making some business models harder to value. Private equity remains an important source of activity, although longer holding periods and a large inventory of unsold portfolio companies continue to impede capital recycling and exits. >more

KfW Research
KFW-VENTURE-CAPITAL-DASHBOARD Q3 2026
German start-ups raised around EUR 4.5 billion in the third quarter of 2026, one-third more than in the previous quarter and nearly four times the amount recorded a year earlier. Investment reached EUR 9.5 billion in the first nine months, already exceeding each of the full-year totals from 2023 to 2025. The headline strength was highly concentrated: six megadeals accounted for EUR 3.5 billion, while the number of funding rounds above EUR 1 million fell to 89, one of the lowest quarterly readings in recent years. US investors supplied an estimated 43% of the quarter's capital, largely because of one defence gigadeal, illustrating both Germany's ability to attract international growth capital and its continuing dependence on foreign investors for very large rounds. >more

Association for Financial Markets in Europe (AFME)
GOVERNMENT BOND DATA REPORT Q2 2026
EU Member States, the United Kingdom and the European Commission issued EUR 1.22 trillion of bonds and bills in the second quarter of 2026, 10.4% more than a year earlier. European government-bond trading volumes reached their second-highest quarterly average on record, rising 3% year-on-year. Outstanding European ESG sovereign bonds increased to EUR 657.1 billion, supported by new issuance and taps that included EUR 5.1 billion from Germany. The average bid-cover ratio rose slightly quarter-on-quarter to 2.48, while sovereign-rating actions and changes in primary-dealer networks provide additional evidence on financing conditions across Europe. >more

European Banking Authority (EBA)
RISK DASHBOARD Q2 2026
EU and EEA banks maintained strong capital and liquidity positions in the second quarter of 2026, with a CET1 ratio of 16.1%, a liquidity coverage ratio of 158.5% and a net stable funding ratio of 125.7%. Lending to households and non-financial companies grew 5.2% and 6.3% year-on-year respectively, while the non-performing-loan ratio remained low at 1.8%. Profitability strengthened, with return on equity reaching 11.3% and the cost-to-income ratio declining to 51.5%. The EBA nevertheless highlights geopolitical tensions, rising interest rates and elevated asset valuations, particularly around increasingly concentrated AI-related financing, as risks requiring continued monitoring. >more

WHY THE CAPM APPEARS TO WORK AT TIMES: DISTINGUISHING MECHANICAL AND ECONOMIC EXPLANATIONS
Narasimhan Jegadeesh, and Avanidhar Subrahmanyam
2026
Tests of the CAPM over long sample periods generally find that the Fama-MacBeth slope on market beta is statistically indistinguishable from zero. Recent studies, however, find significantly positive slopes in selected event samples and interpret them as support for the CAPM. We show that realized market returns contribute mechanically to the Fama-MacBeth slope in selected samples, even when market beta risk is not priced. We derive tests that remove this mechanical component and isolate the economic effect. Applying these tests to the settings studied by Savor and Wilson (2014) and Chan and Marsh (2022), we find no evidence in support of the CAPM. >more