Crypto News: Can UBS and Credit Suisse become the winning team?

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UBS: win
Abortion ban: lose
Bitcoin: win
Job-switching: lose

Picture this: You're in college. The biggest home football game of the season is today — the one against your school's archrival. But when kickoff time rolls around, the visiting team is a mysterious no-show. Word gets around that the rival team ran out of money, and that your coach is planning to merge your team with theirs. Everyone is outraged, but no one is more livid than the parents of the football players. All of a sudden, there are 10 guys who want to be kickers, and your coach is putting the rival's star quarterback on the fourth string. "The FOURTH string???" his mother screams over the phone to the coach. "Just last week, my son was scouted by the head coach of the Buffalo Bills!" His father adds — "THE BUFFALO BILLS!!!!" Despite the vitriol, the coaches of both schools remain stoic, knowing that their unity is the only glue that's holding this godforsaken team together.

But this kind of thing doesn't just happen to college football teams. It can happen with banks, too. A few weeks back, UBS scooped up its long-time rival Credit Suisse before the latter nearly went insolvent. Overnight, UBS became a bank with "over $1.5 trillion in assets and more than 12,000 wealth managers spread across the globe," according to Bloomberg News. Deciding which players should start and which ones should be benched is a very complicated process:

Colm Kelleher — chairman of UBS — knows that his bank is now absolutely stacked thanks to this merger, and yet Paul J. Davies writes that he "sounded like he was presiding over a funeral" during Wednesday's annual shareholder meeting:

Scheming? Photographer: Stefan Wermuth

Kelleher's somber tone mirrored that of Axel Lehmann, Credit Suisse's chairman, who told an angry group of shareholders Tuesday that "ultimately, there were only two options: 'deal' or 'bankruptcy.' " But Kelleher and Lehmann's united front isn't fooling anyone. Paul says "the takeover is hugely unpopular in Switzerland, according to early polls," adding that "Credit Suisse shareholders are getting 1 UBS share for each 22.48 shares they currently own." Before the bank's meltdown, analysts believed Credit Suisse's domestic portfolio was worth at least $11 billion — almost four times what UBS is shelling out for the entire operation. It's a major gut punch:

Naturally, Credit Suisse shareholders have many questions. For starters: How was the deal negotiated? Why did UBS pay such a low price? Can we contest it? Some junior bondholders are even planning to sue. Paul says that while the deal may not be welcomed by all, it gives UBS an opportunity to become the world's premier wealth manager, challenging even Morgan Stanley. If that happens, perhaps everyone will be celebrating — including the people who are angry now. The football players may be upset at first, but once they secure the national championship trophy, all this friction will be forgotten.

In a lot of ways, Wisconsin has played a formidable role in the foundation of US culture. It brought us fried cheese curds. Malted milk. The typewriter. The Ringling Brothers' Circus. The Kringle Capital of America. The prince of darkness. And now, after the win of liberal judge Janet Protasiewicz, it's home to the most significant election victory of 2023.

The state's Supreme Court election flips its 4-3 majority — which is a major deal, considering everything that's resting on Wisconsin. "Protasiewicz made abortion rights a centerpiece of her campaign, and with her victory the court is now expected to overturn Wisconsin's abortion ban rooted in a 19th-century statute," Jonathan Bernstein writes. Her win is further evidence that Democrats will continue to campaign hard on the issue.

The staunch support for reproductive rights is a major puzzle for the Republican Party, which doesn't have an answer for the incredible turnout. For years, conservatives have worked painstakingly hard to redraw Wisconsin's district lines in their favor. As a result, they "hold large majorities in both legislative chambers and control six of eight US House seats, even though the state is evenly divided between Republicans and Democrats," Jonathan notes. But a liberal-leaning state Supreme Court may soon rebalance the power.

In 2016, Trump's victories in Wisconsin, Michigan and Pennsylvania enabled him to win the Electoral College even though he lost the popular vote. Now, all three of those states appear to be trending toward the Democratic Party. Last night, after facing criminal charges in New York, Trump returned to the comforts of his Mar-a-Lago villa. His "speech was a stew of anger, resentment, emotional flotsam and dangerous psychobabble," Tim O'Brien writes.

"Our country is going to hell," Trump lamented. But if Wisconsin is any guide, hell is exactly where we want to be.

This chart is your annual reminder that Bitcoin is actually … not bad! After rising to its highest price in ten months, some naysayers are reconsidering the value of the digital currency. Alexis Leondis points out that financial advisors are comically unaligned when it comes to crypto, with some believing it's a next-gen Enron and others saying "it represents a wealth creation opportunity that we haven't seen in 35 years." Although Alexis says "there's no one-size-fits-all answer," a little bit of Bitcoin might be good for what ails you.

Here's an interesting factoid for those who wonder whether they're missing out on a raise by sticking with the same desk job they've had since 1992: John Authers says "usually, those who switch jobs will obtain higher wage rises than those who stay," but now "the premium for job-switching [is] falling very significantly after hitting an all-time high last year." This is something that really only happens when a recession is near. The tide is turning against workers, which is music to Jerome Powell's ears.