The macroeconomics version of a gender reveal is kicking off at 2pm ET today, when the Fed will announce the first interest rate cut in over four years.

Financial watchers are split between two predictions: a standard 0.25% cut or a more aggressive one of 0.5% (investors are betting on the latter, while many analysts think the former). Regardless of its size, today’s rate cut and subsequent ones are expected to make borrowing cheaper for consumers and businesses, with ripple effects throughout the economy.

Celebration for your wallet

While a single rate reduction won’t fatten your checking account, the Fed is expected to keep slashing rates, which is good news for homebuyers in particular:

• Mortgage rates have already come down slightly in anticipation of rate cuts.
• There might be more open houses to go to. Many homeowners have held off on selling their property since buying a replacement dwelling would involve taking out a mortgage at a sky-high rate.

Taking out a car loan could get cheaper and credit card APRs might go down, too. Expensive debt has been taking a toll on Americans, with the share of consumers behind on credit card balances and auto loans at its highest level since the 2008 financial crisis as of July.

On the flip side, sliding interest rates herald the end of the high-yield savings accounts with returns of up to 5% per year.

Business boom?

Cheaper loans could lead to more mergers and acquisitions, benefiting investment banks like Goldman Sachs that facilitate these transactions. Meanwhile, banking giants warned that lower rates could hurt their consumer lending units since they’ll make a smaller profit on auto loans and mortgages.

Lower borrowing costs could also spur business activity and a stock market rally as companies would pay less to get cash for new undertakings and expanded hiring.

But…a business boom can only happen if the overall economy is healthy. Last month’s strong retail spending is an optimistic sign, though only time will tell whether the Fed timed its rate cuts right to avoid a downturn.—SK

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Thousands of Hezbollah operatives injured by exploding pagers. Lebanese officials said more than 2,700 people were hurt and nine killed when wireless pagers blew up simultaneously across the country yesterday afternoon. Hezbollah blamed Israel, which signaled this week that it intends to ramp up its military campaign against the Lebanese paramilitary group. The Wall Street Journal reported that the affected pagers were from a “new shipment that the group received in recent days.” Hezbollah fighters reportedly began using pagers after the Oct. 7 attacks out of fear that Israel had compromised its cellphone networks. It’s unclear how the devices were made to explode at the same time. Israel declined to comment.

Diddy indicted on sex trafficking charges. Per an unsealed federal indictment, Sean “Diddy” Combs is accused of running a criminal enterprise that engaged in racketeering, sex trafficking, sexual violence, kidnapping, bribery, and other charges. The music mogul was arrested Monday in Manhattan, about six months after Homeland Security agents raided his Miami and Los Angeles homes as part of a human trafficking investigation. The indictment alleges Diddy violently coerced women to engage in sex acts called “Freak Offs” that were then recorded and used as “collateral.” Combs’s lawyer said he is innocent and will plead not guilty.

FanDuel’s parent company made a $2.6b play for Italy. Flutter, the company behind FanDuel, bought Italian gambling service Snaitech for $2.6 billion, CNBC reported, as the US gambling giant pushes further into international markets. The move comes a few days after Flutter purchased a majority stake in NSX Group, one of Brazil’s biggest gambling operators. The global expansion differs from the strategy of Flutter’s main rival, DraftKings, which is focused on the US market, per CNBC. Also yesterday: FanDuel and DraftKings were sued by the Major League Baseball Players Association for allegedly using players’ names and likenesses without permission.

Instagram just made it harder to become a 16-year-old GRWM influencer. Yesterday, the social media app introduced its biggest suite of features to protect minors amid growing pressure from politicians and the public.

The changes will designate all new and existing Instagram accounts set up by users under 18 as “Teen Accounts” and automatically make them private:

• Anyone under 16 will need approval through the app’s parental supervision tool to change their privacy settings.
• Parents will also be able to see whom their kids DM (but not the content of messages) and what topics they manually chose to see more of on their Explore pages.
• Teen Accounts will also feature “Sleep Mode,” which pauses notifications from 10pm to 7am.

Luckily, no one ever lies on the internet. But the company says it’s using a few methods, some involving AI, to verify users’ ages—like requiring them to upload images of their IDs or submit a video selfie.

Big picture: Instagram and other social media platforms have received more pressure than their underage users’ chin zits. The Senate passed a controversial child internet safety bill in July, but it has since stalled in the House. Parent company Meta is also facing a lawsuit from several states accusing it of designing apps so kids get hooked.—MM

General Motors bets big on this lithium stock. 414,469 tons. That’s how much lithium GM will need per year to meet their 2035 EV target, which is why they led a $50m investment round in EnergyX. Their patented tech extracts lithium 300% better than conventional methods. Plus, where those methods take 12+ months, EnergyX needs just two days. Now they aim to produce 65k tons of lithium per year between North America and South America. Invest in EnergyX before their raise closes Oct. 3.

A decade after former Meta exec Sheryl Sandberg encouraged women to be assertive in corporate America with her book Lean In, women still hold less power at work than men. A new study from Sandberg’s advocacy group, LeanIn.org, and consulting firm McKinsey reveals that, despite some progress, women have not been able to girlboss their way to the corner office.

The study found:

• 10% of Fortune 500 CEOs are women, compared to 5% in 2015.
• Women now hold 29% of C-suite positions, up from 17% in 2015.
• The share of women in manager roles is 39%, an increase of only two percentage points from a decade ago.

But here’s the kicker: Most women in C-suite positions were promoted to “staff” roles—mostly chief HR officers—rather than “line” roles, which manage core business operations and are seen as a pipeline to the CEO position. The setback starts early, too: The report found that for every 100 men who get their first opportunity to be a manager, only 81 women get the same.

Zoom out: Unless more companies lean in to programs aimed at advancing diversity, the study’s authors estimate that white women will reach gender parity with men by 2046, while women of color won’t achieve it until 2074.—CC

This is the biggest win for Larrys since the 1984 NBA Finals. Oracle chairman and yacht enthusiast Larry Ellison (briefly) became the second-richest person in the world this week, according to Forbes estimates, surpassing Jeff Bezos, when Oracle’s soaring stock took his net worth along for the ride. As of this writing, Ellison, who founded Oracle in 1977 and still owns 40% of it, fell back down to a pathetic third place with a $203b net worth. But that could change again soon as the AI boom powers the cloud computing giant to new heights. Perhaps Ellison can now afford to buy the 2% of the Hawaiian island of Lanai that he doesn’t already own.