Welcome to Markets Desk, your midday read on what's moving markets and the broader economy.
Greg Jensen, co-chief investment officer at Bridgewater Associates, made waves this week by openly agreeing that artificial intelligence poses an existential risk to humanity. When the investment chief of one of the world's most influential hedge funds speaks in those terms, markets and policymakers alike are forced to take notice.
Shifting to equities, Warren Buffett's retirement on December thirty-first has formally handed the reins of Berkshire Hathaway's three hundred sixty billion dollar portfolio to Greg Abel. What's striking is the concentration at the top — eighty-two percent of that massive book sits in just ten positions, meaning Abel inherits both enormous conviction and considerable single-name risk.
And on the structural side of the economy, New York City's push to convert vacant office towers into residential units is running into serious headwinds. Retrofitting plumbing, floor plans, and windows for residential use is proving costly and technically complex, slowing a strategy that city planners had counted on to meaningfully dent the housing supply shortage.
That's the tape. Markets Desk, signing off the floor.
