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Major U.S. indexes climbed to fresh highs Friday as a reading on wholesale inflation came in lower than expected, and banks kicked off earnings season with strong results. The Dow and S&P 500 hit all-time highs, while the Nasdaq also gained.

JPMorgan Chase (JPM) shares surged after the financial giant reported a jump in net interest income (NII). Shares of Wells Fargo (WFC) also climbed as the bank posted better-than-expected profit on higher fees.

Fastenal (FAST) shares were higher after the maker of fasteners and other industrial supplies reported growing revenue even as disruptions caused by Hurricane Helene cut into sales.

Tesla (TSLA) shares sank after the electric vehicle (EV) maker’s Cybercab and Robovan unveiling Thursday failed to impress investors. However, the news lifted shares of Uber Technologies (UBER) and Lyft (LYFT), which are working on their own autonomous vehicles. 

Shares of Stellantis (STLA) slumped after the automaker announced it was shaking up its management team, including the ouster of its CFO.

A.O. Smith (AOS) shares tumbled as the maker of water heaters and boilers cut its forecast on lower demand in North America and China.

Oil futures fell and gold prices rose. The yield on the 10-year Treasury note edged lower. The U.S. dollar rose versus the yen, but lost ground to the euro and pound. Most major cryptocurrencies traded in the green.

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Delta State PRO, Bright Edafe, has shared how he intervened to assist someone who was stopped by a police officer over a minor vehicle particulars issue.

He said someone called him that he was taking his children to school and he’s being delayed by the police over a minor vehicle particulars issue, Hmmmm. Well he said, give the policeman the phone and he asked him, do you have children, he said yes, how old, he said 12. He then asked him a deep question, “so do you think your child will be proud to say outside that his father is a policeman, he said no. He asked why? He said it’s because of the way the people see us. He then told him, start changing that narrative by being a little nicer to the people”. He said oga thank you sir. He will allow him to go.

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Peter Obi has tackl£d the federal government.

As Nigerians continue to groan under extremely difficult economic conditions, largely caused by the Federal Government’s wrong policy choices, the NNPCL has once again raised the price of fuel (PMS) without providing any explanation.

This is both unfortunate and insensitive, considering the wide-ranging negative consequences for our economic survival and well-being.

This is neither how an economy’s resources should be managed nor how a nation should be governed. In this new measure, there is neither sound economics nor necessary compassion. We are told that the NNPCL is now a limited liability company, regulated by agencies such as the NUPRC and NMDPRA, yet there seems to be growing confusion about the roles and responsibilities of the NPCL and these regulating bodies.

Interestingly, both the NPCL and the regulatory agencies are supposed to be under the supervision of the Federal Ministry of Petroleum Resources, with the President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria serving as the substantive Minister. Who, in arrangement, is regulating who?

With the unprecedented but avoidable hardship that Nigerians are enduring, the responsibility for providing a full explanation, offering alternative options, and most importantly, reversing the sudden price hike falls squarely on the Honorable Minister of Petroleum Resources/President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria.

We hope and pray that he acts in the best interest of the majority of Nigerians, who are living under unnecessarily precarious conditions, and that he does so before his return from his working vacation.

To casually inflict such a draconian measure on the populace from the comfort of an annual vacation amounts to taking the people’s welfare lightly and for granted.

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The Government of Namibia has approached the Independent Corrupt Practices and Other Related Offences Commission (ICPC) to explore training opportunities, as well as sharing of expertise with personnel of the Namibian Anti-corruption Commission in the f¥ght against corruption.

The position of the Namibian government was made known on Friday when its Ambassador to Nigeria, Mr. Humphrey Geiseb paid a courtesy call to the ICPC’s headquarters. According to him, Nigeria as a country occupies an exalted position in the fight against corruption in Africa and such expertise that it possessed needed to be shared with other countries in the continent.

The Ambassador revealed further that Namibia also had an anti-corruption agency known as the Anti-Corruption Commission of Namibia (ACC) just as he proposed that the Commission would love to learn about the success story coming from Nigeria, especially in the recovery of stolen assets by the ICPC and its sister agency, the EFCC.

“The f¥ght against corruption is taking a new dimension in the continent and we believe Nigeria should lead in sharing its expertise in the f¥ght against corruption and we hope it will open its doors to other African countries like Namibia to learn. We feel ICPC and the EFCC should be able to go the extra mile to share their remarkable achievements. It’s not good for Namibia to go outside the continent to learn this,” he said.

While responding, the ICPC Chairman, Dr. Musa Adamu Aliyu, SAN, appreciated the presence of the Namibian Ambassador to Nigeria during the launch of ICPC’s Strategic Action Plan 2024-2028, just as he reiterated that the fight against corruption on the continent cannot be fought in isolation.

He maintained that the Commission was ever ready and willing to partner with other anti-corruption bodies on the continent to stem the scourge of corruption in Africa noting that the Anti-Corruption Academy of Nigeria, (ACAN) the training arm of ICPC would come handy to see to the training request for personnel of the Namibian Anti-Corruption Commission.

“Those who indulge in corruption have their networks. So, we too on the continent need to come together so that we can distort the illegal methods. By doing so, we’ll have good governance and a vibrant foreign-direct investment on the continent.

We are aware of the MoU signed by my predecessor, Prof Bolaji Owasanoye, I wish to reiterate that our doors remain open for any assistance that the Namibian Anti-corruption Commission may require from us. We have our own Anti-corruption Academy where we train people, I believe when your people come, we can also learn from them as well,” the Chairman said.

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Wholesale prices stayed flat in September, suggesting inflation is on a downward path despite some bumps in the road.The Producer Price Index (PPI) for final demand, a measure of wholesale prices, was unchanged in September from August, the Bureau of Labor Statistics said Friday. That was less than the 0.2% increase in August, and below the 0.1% increase forecasters had expected, according to a survey of economists by and . Over the year, prices were up 1.8%, less than the 1.9% annual change in August.

The PPI is an indicator of where inflation is headed because business costs are ultimately passed on to consumers.

Economists use it, together with other economic data such as the Consumer Price Index, to forecast inflation as measured by Personal Consumption Expenditures, which is due to be released Oct. 31. Based on the data so far, PCE inflation is likely to have risen only moderately in September, economists said.That could have implications for financial markets and borrowing costs for all kinds of loans. PCE inflation is the measure Federal Reserve policy makers prefer to use when considering price increases.

Fed officials cut the central bank's benchmark interest rate in September by half a percentage point, and plan to cut it further in the coming months as long as inflation continues falling toward the Fed's goal of a 2% annual rate.

Higher-than-expected consumer price inflation in September cast some doubt on those plans, but the PPI report suggests they may stay on track after all.

"The latest data won’t throw off the Fed’s plan to recalibrate policy from a position of economic strength," Oren Klachkin, financial markets economist at Nationwide, wrote in a commentary.

The tame increase in wholesale prices in September was largely due to a 2.7% decrease in energy prices. That's unlikely to be repeated in October because conflict in the Middle East has driven up oil prices this month, Samuel Tombs, chief U.S. economist at Pantheon Macroeconomics, said in a commentary. Additionally, Hurricanes Helene and Milton could cause "a brief period of price gouging," temporarily pushing up prices, he said.However, Tombs said that inflation is likely to stay on its recent downward trajectory, partly because businesses now have little ability to raise prices without losing customers.

"Disinflation trends remain well-embedded," he wrote.

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