Cranberry Journal — Independent Business, Technology & Culture

The profit is real, but more than a third of it did not come from operations. The more consequential numbers are $19.6 billion of capital spending in one quarter and a merger idea that would need a majority of all Tesla shares.

An aerial view of a coastal launch site with a tall stainless-steel rocket standing beside tank farms and buildings, with tidal flats and the sea beyond.

SpaceX's launch site at Starbase, on the Texas coast, photographed in an earlier year with a Starship prototype on the pad. File photograph.

By Alison Acosta 3 hours ago5 min read

SpaceX reported third-quarter net income of $4.404 billion on Tuesday 20 October, of which $2.791 billion came from operations, and Elon Musk said on the earnings call that SpaceX and Tesla have formed special committees to discuss combining.

Revenue was $14.575 billion, up 161 per cent from $5.576 billion a year earlier, according to the results release SpaceX furnished to the SEC. That beat the $12.7 billion Bloomberg consensus cited by Yahoo Finance. The profit headline needs a footnote. The merger remark needs a bigger one.

About 63 per cent. Income from operations was $2.791 billion. The remaining $1.613 billion of net income came from interest income of $873 million, other income of $1.025 billion and a $390 million income tax benefit, less $675 million of interest expense. By this publication's arithmetic, that is 36.6 per cent of the quarter's net income. A year earlier the company posted a net loss of $1.054 billion, after a $562 million tax charge.

Timber wall framing and roof trusses of a new house under construction against a clear blue sky.

Money

Housing Starts Fell 5.2 Per Cent to 1.221 Million, Inside the Census Margin of Error. Signed Contracts Fell 7.3 Per Cent, and in Every Region.

Census puts a margin of error of 11.8 per cent on the monthly starts change, so the drop in starts alone proves little.

By Daniel Okafor 52 minutes ago

A B-2 stealth bomber in flight against a blue sky, its fuselage lit by the sun.

Business

Northrop Grumman's Backlog Hit a Record $109.6 Billion. Its Cash Forecast Needs at Least $2.1 Billion in the Fourth Quarter, Less Than Last Year's $3.2 Billion.

Nine months of adjusted free cash flow total $965 million, so the full-year range needs $2.1 billion to $2.5 billion in the fourth quarter.

By Margaret Holloway 1 hour ago

Markets

The Chip Index Has Fallen Eight Sessions in a Row, a Run Last Seen in October 2008. The Semiconductor ETF Is Down 16 Per Cent Since 6 October and Still Up 64 Per Cent for the Year.

By Daniel Okafor October 18, 2026

Money

Moody's Zandi Puts the Iran War's Cost at Almost $2,000 a Household. Only $1,100 Is Energy, and Diesel Is Still 74 Per Cent Above Last Year.

By Daniel Okafor October 18, 2026

World

France's Assembly Votes on Its Revenue Budget on Tuesday. The Finance Committee Rejected It 31 to 3, and Paris Pays About 137 Basis Points Over Berlin.

By Thomas Gutierrez October 18, 2026

Technology

China Has Proposed Export Curbs on 40 Technologies, 23 of Them in AI. Fourteen Would Be Banned Outright.

By Alison Acosta October 18, 2026

Markets

Schwab Reported Record Revenue of $7.17 Billion and Its Stock Fell Anyway. Margin Loans Have Nearly Doubled in a Year to $187.9 Billion.

By Daniel Okafor October 17, 2026

Markets

Warsh Would Not Say Whether the Fed Will Hike Again on 28 October. His Last Words Before the Quiet Period Were About AI.

By Daniel Okafor October 17, 2026

Business

Truist Is Selling $7.7 Billion of LightStream Loans to Carlyle, Weeks After Shedding $5.5 Billion of Auto Loans. It Also Took a $1.45 Billion Securities Loss.

By Margaret Holloway October 17, 2026

Opinion

Margaret Holloway

Technology

3M Gave Amazon a Warrant for 3.16 Million Shares at $164.89. Most of It Vests Only After Amazon Pays 3M $6 Billion for Data Center Gear.

The $6 billion is the spending that earns Amazon its option, not an order.

2 hours ago

Business

EQT Agreed to Buy Cleanaway for A$3.095 a Share, a A$9.3 Billion Deal. Three Days Earlier, the Stock Fell 7.6 Per Cent and the ASX Asked Why.

The price is 3.5 cents below the August proposal because a dividend has since been paid, and the premium the company quotes is measured against the old figure.

18 hours ago

Markets

Tradeweb Will Pay $1.97 Billion for Trumid, and $220 Million of That Is for Tax Assets. It Has Not Said What Trumid Earns.

The release gives a price, a protocol list and an accretion promise.

19 hours ago

Technology

Salesforce Will Pay $47.50 a Share in Cash for Braze, an Enterprise Value of About $5.66 Billion. It Has Agreed to a $300 Million Reverse Termination Fee.

Salesforce would owe Braze $300 million if regulators or a court block the deal, more than Braze would owe it.

19 hours ago

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Two machined metal flanges resting on engineering drawings. — Machined metal parts on technical drawings. New orders at New York State manufacturers rose 21 points in October. File photograph.

Rows of blood sample tubes with coloured caps in a laboratory rack.

Health

Labcorp Will Pay $722 Million in Cash for the Core of BioReference Health, About 2.9 Times the Revenue It Expects. OPKO Gets Up to $150 Million More if One Prostate Test Sells.

By Thomas Gutierrez October 15, 2026

Two patterned silicon wafers on display, catching coloured light.

Technology

Japan Will Pay Up to $21 Billion for Two New Fabs in Upstate New York. GlobalFoundries Will Run Them, and Washington Will Own About 4 Per Cent of the Company.

By Alison Acosta October 15, 2026

Rows of industrial machinery under overhead pipework on a factory floor.

Business

Philadelphia Factories Fell to 20.9 in October From 37.8, but Prices Received Hit a 17-Month High. 52.2 Per Cent of Firms Plan to Spend More Next Year and None Plan to Spend Less.

By Daniel Okafor October 15, 2026

A three-storey glass and stone office building at 101 Albright Way, part of Netflix's headquarters campus in Los Gatos, California, with a red Netflix sign by the road and a traffic signal in the foreground.

Media

Netflix Is Cutting About 1,000 Jobs, 6 Per Cent of Its Staff. Most Fall in Product, Technology, Legal and HR, Six Days Before It Reports.

By Thomas Gutierrez October 15, 2026

Editor's Choice

White fuel storage tanks at a riverside terminal under a blue sky, seen from the water.

Business

Agility Bought Tristar for About $7 Million in 2003. It Is Selling It at a $1.5 Billion Enterprise Value, and Says the Bet Returned More Than $1 Billion.

By Thomas Gutierrez

The headline value is for the whole company.

Latest News

Everything we have published, newest first

Markets

Warsh Would Not Say Whether the Fed Will Hike Again on 28 October. His Last Words Before the Quiet Period Were About AI.

Fed Chair Kevin Warsh told the IMF and World Bank meetings in Bangkok on Friday 16 October that he does not prejudge meetings, and called AI probably the most consequential economic change of his lifetime. The Fed decides on 28 October after raising rates to 3.75 to 4 per cent in September.

By Daniel Okafor October 17, 2026

High-rise towers and a lit Ferris wheel along the Chao Phraya river in Bangkok at night.

Business

Truist Is Selling $7.7 Billion of LightStream Loans to Carlyle, Weeks After Shedding $5.5 Billion of Auto Loans. It Also Took a $1.45 Billion Securities Loss.

Truist agreed on 14 October to sell $7.7 billion of unsecured consumer loans, substantially all of LightStream's assets, to Carlyle. Its third-quarter results on Friday 16 October showed reported earnings of $0.56 a share and adjusted earnings of $1.16, after a $1.447 billion pre-tax loss on the sale of securities.

By Margaret Holloway October 17, 2026

The Charlotte, North Carolina, skyline seen from the west above trees in spring.

Business

McKesson Is Paying $1.4 Billion for Half of Option Care. The Deal Sets Up a Framework for It to Buy the Rest.

Clayton Dubilier & Rice and McKesson agreed on Monday to take Option Care Health, the largest independent home infusion company in the United States, private for $32.05 a share. McKesson is putting in about $1.4 billion for 49 per cent, and the agreement sets out a framework for it to buy the private equity firm's majority later. Lenders have committed more money to the deal than the two buyers have.

By Margaret Holloway October 7, 2026

A bag of blood with a drip chamber and tubing hanging from a stand in a clinical setting.

Anthropic Told Investors Quarterly Revenue Hit $16.8 Billion, Reuters and the FT Report. The Dollar Gain Was Smaller Than the Quarter Before.

The number is large, and the pitch to investors was about profit and cash. The slowdown in dollar growth, what "adjusted" leaves out, and how much of the business runs through two cloud partners are what buyers will price.

Alison Acosta

EU Leaders Pressed Brussels for Quotas on Chinese Chemicals and Machinery. The Hybrid-Car Deal Covers €15 Billion of a €360 Billion Deficit.

Six days after the hybrid-car deal, governments are already arguing about the next sector. The gap between what has been settled and what is at stake is the story.

Thomas Gutierrez

Yellow fibre-optic patch cables plugged into rows of green connectors in a network cabinet.

Technology

Thoma Bravo's Proofpoint Will Pay $6.3 Billion in Cash for Varonis at $49.75 a Share. The Premium Is 52 Per Cent Against June and 17 Per Cent Against September.

Proofpoint, a Thoma Bravo portfolio company, agreed on Thursday 15 October to buy Varonis Systems for $49.75 a share in cash, a deal valued at about $6.3 billion. Varonis would owe a $211.7 million termination fee in some cases; Proofpoint would owe $423.3 million in others. Closing is expected in the first half of 2027 and needs a Varonis shareholder vote and regulatory approvals.

By Alison Acosta October 16, 2026

World

AT&T Will Sell Its Mexican Wireless Business for $2 Billion, About 0.4 Times Its 2025 Revenue. The Buyers Plan to Borrow Up to $1.4 Billion of the Price.

AT&T said on Tuesday 13 October that it will sell AT&T Mexico to a consortium owned equally by Grupo Televisa and Fintech Holdings for $2 billion in cash at closing, subject to adjustments. A Televisa filing shows the buyers plan to borrow up to $1.4 billion and that Televisa will put in $400 million. Closing is expected in the first quarter of 2027, subject to Mexican regulatory approvals.

By Thomas Gutierrez October 16, 2026

The Mexico City skyline seen over the rooftops of Colonia Condesa, with towers on Paseo de la Reforma under a cloudy sky.

A second software take-private in one day, this one for the company insurers and body shops use to estimate and settle auto claims.

Business

A GTCR-Led Group With Elliott Will Take CCC Private at $7.75 a Share, a $6.1 Billion Enterprise Value. Its Chief Executive and President Are Rolling Over Part of Their Stakes.

By Margaret Holloway October 16, 2026

The Numbers

Industrial Production Rose 0.7 Per Cent in September, and Utilities Supplied More of It Than Factories. Manufacturing Rose 0.3 Per Cent and Is Up 1.1 Per Cent in a Year.

The Federal Reserve said on Friday 16 October that industrial production rose 0.7 per cent in September after a 0.1 per cent gain in August. Utilities output rose 3.5 per cent, manufacturing 0.3 per cent and mining 0.2 per cent. Capacity utilization rose to 76.9 per cent, 2.5 points below its long-run average.

By Daniel Okafor October 16, 2026

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A largely empty shopping mall corridor lined with storefronts, in black and white.

Retail Sales Rose 0.8 Per Cent in September and Are Up 6.3 Per Cent in a Year. Leave Out Cars and Gasoline and the Gain Was 0.2 Per Cent.

Silhouette of an oil refinery and cooling towers across an estuary at sunset, with tidal flats in the foreground.

Wholesale Prices Rose 1.3 Per Cent in One Month, the Most Since 2022, and Are Up 6.3 Per Cent in a Year. Retail Gasoline Margins Fell 30.3 Per Cent.

The glass facade and stone-framed lower floors of 50 Hudson Yards in Manhattan, seen from the street, with neighbouring towers reflected in the windows.

BlackRock Took In $205 Billion in the Quarter and Ended at $15.5 Trillion. GAAP Earnings Were $10.57 a Share, and the Adjusted Figure Was $15.93.

A large office building on ASML's campus in Veldhoven, the Netherlands, clad in angular white aluminium panels, under a partly cloudy sky.

ASML Reported a Record €11.7 Billion Quarter and Guided the Next One to Between €14.2 Billion and €15.2 Billion. It Still Does Not Publish Orders.

Health

One Research Firm Puts Regenerative Medicine at $41 Billion, Heading for $162 Billion. Dr. David Borenstein on Why the FDA Keeps Cracking Down on Unproven Clinics.

DelveInsight, a market-research firm, estimates the global regenerative medicine market at about $41 billion in 2025 and projects roughly $162 billion by 2034. The FDA has spent years pursuing clinics selling unapproved stem cell products, most recently in a January 2025 warning letter to a Pompano Beach, Florida manufacturer. Dr. David Borenstein, a physician who offers regenerative treatments, says patients should ask what a product is before they book.

By Thomas Gutierrez October 15, 2026

A culture growing on agar in a petri dish, lit from below in a laboratory.

Penske Automotive Agreed to Be Taken Private at $212 a Share, a $16.3 Billion Enterprise Value. The Premium Is 8.8 Per Cent, and Its Two Buyers Are Also Its Two Largest Holders.

When the buyers are the controlling holders, the question is not whether the price is high but who gets to decide it is high enough. The deal's structure shows how the company answered that.

Margaret Holloway