WSJ What’s News - Hamas’s Leader Is Dead. What Does That Mean for the War in Gaza?

Episode Date: October 17, 2024

P.M. Edition for Oct. 17. WSJ reporter Rory Jones discusses how the death of Hamas’s leader Yayha Sinwar’s changes the calculus of the conflict. And Wall Street investment firms want to sell securities made by bundling junk-rated loans to individual investors. Journal markets reporter Vicky Ge Huang explains why. Plus, there’s been an executive shakeup in Google’s core moneymaking business unit. Tracie Hunte hosts. Sign up for the WSJ's free What's News newsletter. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

How do airplanes fly? What's in this box? What does this thing do? Kids are curious about everything, including guns. Learn how to store your guns securely and make your home safer at nfamilyfire.org. Brought to you by N Family Fire, Brady and the Ad Council. Israel says it's killed Hamas's leader, who also orchestrated the October 7th attacks. This is a big win for Benjamin Netanyahu. But what it's also likely to do is put pressure on the Israeli leader to now bring the war in Gaza to a close and try to bring back roughly about 100 hostages that are still believed to be held

in Gaza. And Wall Street wants to sell CLOs to ordinary investors. But what are they? Plus, there's been an executive shakeup in Google's core money-making business. It's Thursday, October 17th. I'm Tracy Hunt for The Wall Street Journal. This is the PM edition of What's News, the top headlines and business stories that move the world today.

Let's begin with the top story. Israel today said it killed the leader of Hamas, Yahiwa Sinwar, in southern Gaza. His death was confirmed following forensic identification tests. Sinwar, a US designated terrorist, was widely viewed as the architect of the October 7 attacks that killed 1200 people in southern Israel and led to the kidnapping of around 250 others. The attack triggered a war with Israel and Gaza that has killed more than 42,000 people and has since expanded to a multi-front conflict

in the Middle East. In a short video statement, the Israeli Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, announced the death of Senwar and said that Hamas, quote, "'Will no longer rule Gaza,' adding that militants holding hostages who give themselves up and lay down their arms would be pardoned, while those who hurt hostages

would be hunted down by Israel. The war isn't over, he said. Hamas didn't respond to a request for comment. Speaking from the campaign trail in Wisconsin, Vice President Kamala Harris said that now Sinwar was dead, the war should end. Hamas is decimated and its leadership is eliminated. This moment gives us an opportunity to finally end the war in Gaza.

And it must end such that Israel is secure, the hostages are released, the suffering in Gaza ends, and the Palestinian people can realize their right to dignity, security, freedom, and self-determination. Joining us now is Rory Jones, a reporter with the Wall Street Journal based in the Middle East. So Rory, where does this latest development leave the war in Gaza? This is probably the most significant event to have happened in the year-long war. Sinwar is widely considered as the architect of the attacks that sparked the war and he has been leader of Hamas since August, but he's been de facto

leader of Hamas since October 7 and been directing all their reparations on the ground. This takes out their leader and it comes after Israel has already been taking out many of their other senior commanders. So Israel has killed the head of their armed wing earlier this year and his deputy. And then Hamas' political leadership, Israel killed its leader earlier this year and its deputy in January. So now that Sinwar has also died, this marks a real hollowing out of Hamas's leadership

and is likely to change the dynamics of what we see on the ground. So there are about a hundred hostages still in Gaza. How does this development change the negotiations for their release? It's really really difficult to know right at this moment in time. I think there will be greater pressure on Netanyahu to try to re-engage in ceasefire talks that lead to some kind of hostage deal. Those talks largely fell apart earlier this year, probably because Sinwar was entrenching in positions, but also Netanyahu wanted to implement certain policies that were very

difficult for Hamas to agree to and would largely have led to their demise. And so it's not even really clear who Israel now engages with to try to push for a ceasefire. The people who have been trying to pull the two sides together are Arab mediators. And so what I think will happen is those mediators will now try to come back to the table and get in touch with the people they think in Hamas that still hold sway and try to hash out some kind of deal. And what about Hamas as a group? What's next for them?

Hamas in Gaza is very much a weakened and wounded animal. Israel has systematically moved through the Gaza Strip, taking out Hamas' military structures and its ability to fire rockets on Israel. And so militarily, it's very much weakened Hamas. Israel also says that it's killed about 15,000 Hamas fighters, and that's about half of the number that they thought existed before the war. But that does leave a lot of fighters still out there and there's lots of people that are still sympathetic with Hamas.

And Hamas has always never been just a military movement. It's a political movement and it has a political leadership that is based outside of Gaza. And so Sinwar's death is definitely a huge setback for the group, but it doesn't eradicate the group or change its goals of trying to push for the establishment of a Palestinian state and destroy Israel at the same time. How will this development affect how the US engages with Israel on Gaza? It's very difficult to say because this news is still bedding in, but I think the US has been very clear that it wants a ceasefire in Gaza, and it has really taken the time to try to corral the sides together towards that,

work with Arab countries to mediate the two sides towards a ceasefire. And so it seems like the US had almost given up on that aim ahead of the elections later this year, but this death might lead the U.S. to try to sort of reengage and revive that effort and try to push for some kind of deal. Rory Jens is a reporter with The Wall Street Journal. Thank you so much, Rory. Thanks so much. Coming up, the hot new product on Wall Street making its way to ordinary investors.

That's after the break. investors. That's after the break. CLOs or collateralized loan obligations are the latest investment product that Wall Street is clamoring to sell to ordinary investors. At least four asset managers, including BlackRock and NewVeen, have recently asked the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission if they could launch new exchange-traded funds of CLOs. About a dozen CLO ETFs have already entered the market in recent years and now have about $16 billion in assets under management. CLO sales have been rising fast. According to pitchbook data, firms like Aries Management and Blackstone have logged around $147 billion in sales this year, compared with $87 billion during the same period last year. Vicki Huang is a reporter for the Wall Street Journal where she covers markets and she joins us now. Vicki, in a few words, what are CLOs? So CLOs are a type of structured product

where you package these things called leverage loans. And leverage loans are loans that are usually taken out by private equity firms, from banks to fund their acquisitions or buyouts of certain companies. So CLOs are a bundle of these leverage loans, and then you slice and dice the bundle into different trenches that are of different credit ratings from the safest to the riskier bond trenches. These loans are typically issued by lower rated or very risky companies from like a credit rating standpoint. So why would you want to buy

them if they're if they're junk status? So there are many reasons for this. Some of these companies even though they are lower rated their fundamentals are still strong, they are generating good earnings and good revenue, they don't have any cash flow problems, but because of certain factors they are lower rated by the credit rating agencies. And the other reason is that because these companies have lower credit ratings, the debt they issue have higher yields, so that's very attractive for investors that are looking to earn higher income on their investments.

Of course there is a risk that some of these companies may default. What happens then? That just means they're not able to pay the money they borrowed from investors. So investors are going to have to wait for a long time for their money to be paid back. The worst scenario is that if the company not only defaults on their debt, but also files for bankruptcy, then they might have to wait for a really, really long time to get their money back or they might not even be able to get their money back. And overall, the biggest threat for this type of assets is that if the economy experiences a downturn or if we stumble into a recession, then it is likely that a lot

of these companies might experience troubles with paying back their debt. Vicky Huang is a reporter for the Wall Street Journal. In U.S. markets, the Dow gained 0.4 percent, or about 161 points. The S&P 500 slipped less than 0.1 percent, while the Nasdaq advanced less than 0.1 percent. Netflix reported earnings after the closing bell. The streaming giant's revenue and operating margins continued to improve in the third quarter as subscriber growth slowed, a sign of the company's success in pivoting towards prioritizing profitability over growth. Netflix added more than 5 million subscribers compared to nearly 9 million net new subscribers during the same period a year earlier. The company

reported revenue of $9.83 billion, up 15% from a year earlier, beating its projections. And Prabhakar Raghavan, the most senior Google executive overseeing its search engine and ad products, is leaving the role after a four-year tenure, leading the company's core money-making business. Raghavan will be succeeded by Nick Fox, a longtime Google executive. Raghavan will have a new role as Google's chief technologist. The shakeup comes as the alphabet unit faces unprecedented pressure on its search business from the courts and artificial intelligence products such as chat GBT. According to the research firm eMarketer, Google's search advertising business is expected

to zip below 50% market share in the U.S. next year for the first time in more than a decade. Raghuvan oversaw a range of products in addition to search and ads, including Google's virtual assistant, maps, commerce, and payment services. And he was once considered a candidate to become the company's next CEO. And finally, when you buy something with your credit card in the US, you're typically asked to sign the receipt. But why? Visa, MasterCard, Discover, and American Express dropped the requirement back in 2018. The US is an outlier here since in Europe and other parts of the world, signatures aren't

generally required for credit card purchases. Personal finance reporter Oyen Adedoyen spoke to our Euromoney Briefing podcast about why this relic from the past is still in our present. It's one of those weird things that's lingered around for years and people are so used to doing it that old habits die hard. Even for some merchants, they don't have to include the signature line. It really depends a lot on technology.

So some businesses have more updated point of sale systems, right? But if you're seeing maybe an older register, that is still going to print out a paper receipt that's going to have that signature line on the bottom. So it really depends on the business and what kind of technology they have when it comes to payments. And you can listen to more on this story at our Your Money Briefing podcast. And that's what's news for this Thursday afternoon. Today's show was produced by Anthony Bansi and PRB Anime with supervising producer Michael Kosmitis. I'm Tracy Hunt for the Wall Street Journal. We'll be back with a new show tomorrow morning.

Thanks for listening.