What to watch for today
Xi Jinping’s royal treatment begins. The Chinese president will receive an official royal welcome, address parliament, meet with Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn, and attend a state banquet, on invitation of the Queen. The UK is set to take in $150 billion in Chinese investment over the next 10 years.
A tense Pakistani visit to DC. Prime minister Nawaz Sharif will be in the US all week. He’ll talk to US president Barack Obama about Pakistan’s edgy relations with its neighbors—India and Afghanistan—and how militants based in his country have carried out attacks throughout the region.
A busy earnings week continues. Defense contractors Lockheed Martin and United Technologies are expected to report little to no growth in their quarterly earnings, as the Pentagon spent slightly less on weapons in fiscal 2015. Verizon, Harley-Davidson, Yahoo, and Chipotle are also due to post third-quarter results.
While you were sleeping
Stephen Harper announced his resignation. The current Canadian prime minister said he will not continue to lead the Conservative Party after the Liberal Party surged ahead in the general election, according to CTV. The Liberal Party is projected to win the vote; you can follow the live results here.
IBM’s earnings missed even pessimistic expectations. The IT giant’s third-quarter net income from continuing operations was just $3 billion, from $3.5 billion a year earlier. IBM also reported a 14th consecutive quarterly revenue drop as it transitions from a hardware company to offering cloud computing; its share price fell by as much as 4.8%.
América Móvil swung to a loss. The Mexican telecom company owned by Carlos Slim reported a net loss of 2.9 billion pesos ($170 million), from a profit of 10.4 billion pesos a year earlier. A weak peso and Brazilian real had pushed América Móvil’s costs up significantly; most of the company’s earnings were below expectations (paywall).
Balkan countries reopened their borders. Slovenia says it has allowed in most of the 5,000 migrants it had shut out at its border with Croatia yesterday, while Croatia announced it has reopened its border to Serbia. Those decisions will ease the movement of migrants toward countries like Germany and Sweden.
China’s capital outflows topped $500 billion. A US Treasury report estimated that cash leaving the country surpassed $250 billion in the first six months of the year—up massively from $26 billion a year earlier. Including July and August, that figure reached half a trillion dollars, as its central bank spent heavily to prop up its currency.
Quartz obsession interlude
Mike Murphy on how Google has been logging your voice records—and how to delete them. “In recent months, I’ve apparently asked Google where I can eat nearby, how to take a screenshot on the OnePlus Two, what a Trap Queen is, what the Perseids are, and to play a Linkin Park song. It’s all there—my dumb voice asking dumb questions that I thought were lost into the ephemerality of Google’s search servers.” Read more here.
Matters of debate
Yahoo is losing executives, but that’s not the big problem. CEO Marissa Mayer’s turnaround effort is not driving much growth.
Breastfeeding is overrated. Advocates are crossing the line given that the benefits are modest (paywall).
Cultural appropriation is not racist. The exchange of ideas and styles is a tenet of a modern society.
Donald Trump is great at quitting. Despite his promise to stay in the White House race, he has a knack for anticipating a decline.
Jeremy Corbyn needs to better understand British people. The Labour leader’s failure to do so, not his political ideas, is his biggest shortcoming.
Surprising discoveries
Our brains think corporations are people. The same neural systems are used to understand corporate and human behavior (paywall).
Chicago police “disappeared” 7,000 people, most of them black. They were subjected to brutal off-the-books interrogations.
The first earthlings in space had six legs. The heroic fruit flies were launched 68 miles into the sky on a captured Nazi rocket.
Deutsche Bank sent $6 billion to a US hedge fund by mistake. The “fat finger” error happened when the boss was on vacation.
WestJet will have a “Frozen”-themed plane. “Let it go, let it go, I am one with the wind and sky.”
Our best wishes for a productive day. Please send any news, comments, spare billions, and fruit fly astronauts to hi@qz.com. You can follow us on Twitter for updates throughout the day.