iPhone 17 Unwrapped

Christmas came early for iPhone nerds as Apple just released details on the iPhone 17 and much more.

September 10, 2025

Silver banana goes to…

Your Daily Dose of Market & Career Clarity

📬 Delivered to 150,000+ ambitious readers


🎯 In this issue:

  • Banana Bits: Finance headlines that actually matter

  • Market Summary: The market clawed its way to a positive gain

  • What’s Ripe / Rotten: The tastiest and most disgusting stocks 

  • Technical Trip: Interview Q&A from PJT

Market Snapshot

📉 Banana Bits

Defining the future of dealmaking is what we do.

Simply put, we make M&A processes smarter and more efficient. That way deal parties and their advisors can focus on doing their best work.

Our team of experts brings unmatched expertise and ingenuity to the most complex transactions—and works at deal speed to deliver standout results while providing the highest levels of service. It’s what we’ve been doing since 2007.

Escape from M&A processes that are stuck in the past. Work with a partner that knows how to define the future. 

Market Recap

Stocks Fight to Stay in the Green

Stocks are starting the early part of the week in the green, despite every logical reason not to. 

Yesterday saw both the Nasdaq and the S&P reach another record high, gaining 0.37% and 0.27% respectively. Reminder, jobs data from the BLS came in revised downward by 911,000. 

Yes, you heard that right. The Bureau of Labor Statistics came out and said we actually overstated annual job numbers by almost 1 million. On top of the shaky job market, CPI and PPI, both of which are expected to drop this week, continue to show stubbornly high inflation. 

And of course, we can’t forget that the billions of dollars in tariff revenue the U.S. government collected over the past few months might in fact be illegal. The Supreme Court is set to take on that case. 

The only bright side to all of this is that as the economy worsens, the market becomes increasingly convinced that Jay Powell is preparing a rate cut. Investors responded quickly, with bond yields dipping and rate cut bets heating up.

Some individual stocks had standout performances. Nvidia did its thing to contribute to the NASDAQ’s record run while Robinhood and AppLovin continued their run after getting added to the S&P 500. Oracle popped 12% after hours on strong guidance despite missing earnings.

For the tech lovers, Apple unveiled the iPhone 17 along with updates to other products, including upgrades to AirPods and smartwatches. Tourmaline Bio and Nebius jumped over 50% on deal news, with Swiss pharma giant Novartis and Microsoft also adding to the broader performance.

Apart from that, investors will be keenly waiting on the PPI report on Thursday and CPI on Wednesday, which will be two of the last major reports prior to the Fed’s interest rate decision on September 17. Odds of a 25 basis point cut are ~90%

What's Ripe

UnitedHealth (UNH) 8.6%

  • UnitedHealth revealed that approximately 78% of its Medicare Advantage members are projected to be enrolled in plans rated four stars or higher, a critical benchmark for earning lucrative federal bonus payments.

  • This strong performance outpaces the 2025 industry average of around 75%, signaling robust profitability and driving share price gains.

Centene Corp (CNC) 7.7%

  • Centene is riding the wave of positive sentiment after its peer, UnitedHealth, provided positive news, which lifted the entire health insurance sector.

  • Barclays noted that Centene’s rally aligns with the strength seen at UnitedHealth, interpreting it as a positive read-through from the company’s investor meetings and Medicare Advantage updates.

What's Rotten

Humana (HUM) 12.0%

  • Humana's shares got hit after analysts reported that the “cut points,” i.e., the thresholds determining Medicare Advantage plan quality, have become more stringent, raising doubts about the insurer’s ability to secure bonus payments.

  • As a major provider of Medicare Advantage plans, Humana is particularly vulnerable to these tougher metrics. Investors reacted negatively amid concerns that the company may struggle to qualify for bonuses under the new Quality Bonus Payment criteria.

Albemarle (ALB) 11.5%

  • The sharp decline in Albemarle shares followed reports that CATL is restarting operations at its Yichun lithium mine, which is responsible for approximately 8% of global lithium supply.

  • The renewed production dampens the speculative rally built on tighter supply. The broader volatility in lithium prices underscores how sensitive Albemarle’s performance is to macro-level supply dynamics.

🧠 Technical Trip

Q&A Interview with PJT

👉 Want 1-on-1 recruiting help from PJT bankers & 2,000+ top mentors? Apply to WSO Academy

🦈Deal News

M&A, IPOs, And Other Notable Transactions

Banana Brain Teaser

Previous

A factory has 500 workers, 15% of whom are women. If 50 additional workers are to be hired and all of the present workers remain, how many of the additional workers must be women in order to raise the percentage of women employees to 20%?

Answer: 35

Today

If money is invested at r% interest, compounded annually, the amount of the investment will double in approximately 70/r years. If Pat’s parents invested $5,000 in a long-term bond that pays 8% interest, compounded annually, what will the approximate total amount of the investment be 18 years later, when Pat is ready for college?

❝

The more certain something becomes, the less likely it is to be profitable.

Jim Rogers (co-founder of Quantum Fund with Soros)

How Would You Rate Today's Peel?


Happy Investing,
Chris, Vyom, Ankit, Mitchell, Colin & Patrick