Some Tuesdays you wake up to one story. Today you wake up to a bond market at 2007 levels, an AI lab pressing the brakes, and eleven cricketers in Japan who don't care about either.

While everyone watched the headlines, the number that matters moved. The US 10-year Treasury yield climbed to roughly 5.2% on Monday, its highest since mid-2007, and the 30-year sits near 5.5%, levels not seen since 2004.

Why now? Two forces, pulling the same way:

Why you should care: the 10-year yield is the price tag on almost every long-term loan. US mortgage rates have followed it up (roughly 7.4% for a 30-year fixed). When the world's benchmark borrowing cost rises, it tightens things everywhere, including for countries that borrow, export to, or send workers to the US and Gulf.

The Nepal angle: Nepal Oil Corporation is the sole importer and buys refined fuel through Indian Oil, revising retail prices roughly every two weeks. It doesn't set the world price, but it feels it. Keep an eye on the next NOC revision as Dashain travel season approaches.

This week's scoreboard: inflation and jobs data all week, with September payrolls on Friday.

Nepal plays Sri Lanka in the Asian Games cricket quarterfinal today at 5:45 a.m. Nepal time in Nisshin, Japan. The winner moves into the semifinals, one step from the medal round.

How Nepal got here:

The honest caveat: Sri Lanka come in as the higher-ranked side with far more experience against top teams, and the two have never met in a T20I. Rain has already shortened games in this tournament, so keep a backup plan for your morning.

Watch: Kushal Bhurtel (488 runs in his last 10 T20Is), and Sandeep Lamichhane with the ball (12 wickets in his last 9).

If the result is in by the time you read this, tell us where you watched it.

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*The data presented below are from the official sites of NEPSE, NASDAQ and London Bullion Market Association respectively.

🇺🇸 Nasdaq (Wall Street, intraday): down about 1.1% to roughly 26,761 as yields climbed and chip stocks sold off.

🥇 Gold: spot fell about 3% to roughly $4,149 an ounce, its lowest since August 5, as higher oil and rate-hike bets weighed.

🥈 Silver: spot dropped about 4.3% to roughly $61.5 an ounce. The gold-silver ratio widened to around 67.8.

OpenAI has paused training of its most capable models, along with evaluation and inference with tool use, after a security incident. Details vary by report: one account says an internal research model found a way to reach an outside chatbot from an environment meant to limit internet access; others describe agents acting beyond their instructions during testing on US government platforms. OpenAI says it will resume once it's confident new safeguards are in place, and has given no restart date. It is reportedly the second pause since July.

ChatGPT itself has not been shut down, and there's no confirmed change in chip orders. But markets read "slower training" as "less demand for memory and compute," and sold accordingly.

Why it matters: the AI trade has been priced for relentless acceleration. Safety brakes are now a line item.

Nvidia raised its buyback authorization by $150 billion, which LSEG data shows is larger than the market value of about 84% of S&P 500 companies. It lands as overall buybacks have slowed by roughly half between July and September, and the stock is up more than 20% this year.

Why it matters: when the biggest chip company chooses to shrink its share count instead of spending everything on expansion, investors read it as either supreme confidence or a sign that cash is piling up faster than good places to put it. Both readings are live today.

Chinese President Xi Jinping made his second state visit to Washington, with a rare airport greeting from President Trump and a state dinner for 100-plus guests. The substance was thinner than the spectacle. The two sides mostly agreed to keep talking: the trade truce was extended by only two months, shorter than expected, and both leaders signaled two more meetings this year, at APEC in China and at the G20 in Miami in December.

Trump said Iran was discussed. CSIS analysts note how little moved on the hardest files, including AI, cyber, export controls and digital sovereignty.

Why it matters: a short truce keeps tariffs and rare-earth export controls hanging over supply chains, which is exactly the kind of uncertainty that shows up later in prices and factory orders across Asia.

Which worries you most over the next three months? Reply with A, B or C:

(We'll share the split in a coming edition.)

Answers are just below. No peeking. 👇

Term premium (say it: TERM PREE-mee-um)

Meaning: the extra return investors want for locking money into a long-term bond instead of rolling short-term ones.

Example: "The Fed didn't touch rates, yet mortgage rates jumped, because the term premium on long bonds shot up."

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