# Roundup of the week: 21 November 2025 _A weak week for markets, a 30% drop in Bitcoin, and yet more pre-budget chaos in Westminster – but beneath the noise, falling inflation, likely rate cuts and solid corporate news continue to support my positive view on the outlook._ Neil Woodford · 21 November 2025 · 9 min read ![Roundup of the week: 21 November 2025](https://cdn.sanity.io/images/v3acfbvo/production/d3998848a9f9c6d94152de7fad12f9390e5b505c-3024x4032.jpg?w=1600&fit=max&auto=format) --- **If you think we have missed something you would like to discuss or would like to send in a question for next week's podcast episode,** [**send us an email**](mailto:hello@noisecancelling.co)**.** In what has been a generally quiet week for political and economic news, financial markets have been pretty weak, with equity indices falling everywhere. For example, after peaking on the 12th November, the FTSE 100 index is down just over 4%. Hardly earth-shattering, but after such a long ascent this year from the lows in April, it is notable. The most dramatic fall, though, was not in any equity index but in Bitcoin, which, until quite recently, had been defined by its followers as a hedge against conventional financial assets. Bitcoin is, today, down just over 30% from its early October high. ## Politics The most significant political story this week is the ongoing UK pre-budget omnishambles. The political pantomime will thankfully end next Wednesday, but I cannot think of a better advert for bringing this absurd process to an end. It started with ludicrous calculations of the size of the fictional fiscal black hole in the late summer and has become more ridiculous week by week. I said at the time that the Chancellor’s pre-budget, vague and wooden speech was a mistake, and so it proved. My guess is that she decided to get ahead of what she suspected would be dire OBR forecasts with her tough-choices monologue. What followed was a combination of a self-inflicted Starmer political crisis (following the Wes Streeting affair) and an OBR number that was nowhere near as bad as she thought it was going to be. The result was the screeching sound of engines reversing on the manifesto-busting increase in the basic rate of income tax and the corresponding increase in national insurance. What this sorry, long-drawn-out episode proves is that the OBR/Treasury pre-budget process is not fit for purpose. It takes too long (10 weeks) and provides far too much opportunity for fiscal kite-flying and speculation that only cause economic harm by increasing economic uncertainty. It’s wrong, and we should never have to endure this nonsense again. In fact, I would like to think that the postmortem on this wretched process might even lead to the OBR’s omnipotent role being pegged back considerably. One can only hope. My final point on this, based on what I think will happen, is that the budget and its tax-raising measures will not have a discernible impact on the economy, which will quickly shrug off their negative effects and continue on the improving trajectory it is already on. ## Economics ### China Recent economic data in China has been pretty disappointing, and in particular, data released last Friday showed fixed asset investment down 1.7% in the year to the end of October. For an economy that has, in recent history, been so reliant on growth in investment spending and manufacturing, this came as quite a shock. With consumption, exports and now investment spending all lagging, it seems quite extraordinary that the authorities still believe that the 5% growth target will be achieved this year. Having said that, it is becoming increasingly clear that additional stimulus measures will be required to deliver growth over the medium term and interestingly, hot on the heels of these disappointing data, was a story on Bloomberg today which talked about the government planning new stimulus measures explicitly aimed at the struggling property market including the mortgage subsidies for new homebuyers and income tax rebates for mortgage borrowers. It seems that the process of gradually increasing targeted fiscal measures is continuing, as expected, and will remain in place until the desired growth in consumption is visible and sustained. ### UK The most important data released in the UK this week was the monthly inflation data. As expected, CPI was 3.6% in October, down from the September peak of 3.8%. Interestingly, this latest reading matched the forecast in the November Monetary Policy Report, which sees CPI inflation falling further to 3% in the first quarter of 2026 and to 2.5% by Q4 next year. My own expectation is more optimistic than this, but if the Bank of England is right (it often isn’t), this fall in UK inflation will be consistent with at least another three interest rate cuts, with the first due next month. The significance of lower rates should not be underestimated, in my view, because these cuts will, I believe, catalyse lower savings and stronger consumption growth, which will drive growth well above the gloomy consensus expectation for next year. It’s worth reminding you that the outturn for this year looks likely to be substantially above the OBR’s Spring forecast of 1%. Although we won’t know until early in the new year, I expect the outturn to be close to 1.5%, a full 0.5% above the OBR’s “educated guess”, which, as usual, turned out to be way too gloomy. ### USA After such a prolonged shutdown, it came as something of a relief to see official labour market data published today. The data contained a number of slightly mixed messages. On the one hand, payrolls rose by more than expected after declining in August, but on the other hand, unemployment increased to 4.4% because more people joined the labour market (the participation rate rose to a four-month high). I am not sure what sort of signal this sends to the Fed, which meets in early December. The October report will not be published, so the next data point will be the November data, published in December just after the FOMC meets. This timing is not especially helpful, and my guess is that, based on what we know now, a rate cut is unlikely at that December meeting. ## Markets As I said in the introduction to this update, markets have been pretty weak in recent days, with equity indices falling across the board and government bond yields generally rising (though not in the US). The standout faller, though, is Bitcoin, which is now down over 30% from its early October high. I am sure nothing will change in how commentators and “investors” view Bitcoin, but the claim that it is a hedge against conventional financial assets has taken a bit of a hit in recent weeks. Interestingly, despite blowout quarterly results from Nvidia and raised guidance for the January quarter ($3bn above consensus), the siren voices of the AI industrial revolution appear to be getting louder, and today's setback in the NASDAQ index will feed that particular frenzy. As I have said on a number of occasions in recent podcasts and in print, I do not think that markets are in some kind of AI bubble which is about to implode. My guess is that the enthusiasm for AI and what it will do for mankind is only just beginning in many respects. In my view, what we are witnessing are the very normal gyrations in financial markets, which have been an ever-present feature since they were invented. Although many commentators appear to want to explain every down day as an omen of impending doom, they are just a feature of normal market behaviour, nothing more, nothing less. Here is a quick summary of the results this week and notable events which have affected the companies I follow. Once again, I don’t intend to comment at length on each company or event, but will just give a summary of the standout features. ### Nvidia Undoubtedly, the most important set of numbers this week was Nvidia’s Q3 results, which were very good. Not only did they beat an already elevated consensus, but the CEO also guided to a very strong Q4, with revenue targeted at some $3bn above expectations. Against a backdrop of widespread commentary about an AI bubble and concerns about the level of investment in AI infrastructure, the calming voice of Jensen Huang was very welcome. In particular, he commented that demand for Nvidia’s Blackwell and Rubin chips was stronger than expected and would exceed $500bn in the next few quarters. He also addressed another of the bear stories related to Nvidia’s customers’ depreciation policies on chips and their utilisation rates. In summary, the numbers addressed many of the more lurid bear stories of recent weeks, but, on their own, are unlikely to silence the ongoing sceptics who will remain wedded to their bubble-collapse theories. My own perspective is that the number and volume of these stories almost guarantee that their prognostications will not come to pass anytime soon. By definition, market collapses are not predicted by a consensus. ### Biotech This corner of the technology sector has been completely eclipsed by the noise surrounding AI and the Mag7 in recent years. However, after a long period of underperformance, it is beginning to come to life for all the reasons that I have previously highlighted. In particular, the rapidly approaching patent cliff in 2030 is finally driving a significant increase in M&A in the sector, as global pharma companies look to repopulate their pipelines with acquired IP from the biotech sector. This week, Merck announced a $9.2bn acquisition of Cidara Therapeutics. (it doesn’t yet have any marketed products) So far this year, the value of biotech and pharma deals is up 31% on last year to about $187bn, with the highest-profile deals being J&J’s $14bn acquisition of Intra-Cellular Therapies and Novartis’s recently announced takeover of Avidity Biosciences. Yesterday, Abbott Labs also announced a $21bn deal to acquire Exact Sciences, the cancer diagnostic business, which is not included in the above data. ### Land Securities At the end of last week, Land Secs announced a pretty encouraging set of interim results. The UK commercial property sector has been through a very difficult time since the pandemic, but there are now signs that businesses with well-placed, modern portfolios are beginning to experience better trading conditions. In fact, Lands raised both its near-term EPS guidance and its medium-term growth potential, reflected in a 2% increase in the already very healthy interim dividend. ### Breedon Breedon issued a scheduled trading update covering the period to the end of October. Not surprisingly, the statement highlighted the challenging environment the building materials industry has confronted in recent times in both the UK and in Ireland. Nevertheless, during this period, the business has continued to grow via astute acquisitions and is very well placed to benefit from the recovery when it arrives in the US, Ireland and the UK, where I am confident that, as interest rates continue to fall, the trading environment will improve considerably. ### JD Sports JD also released a Q3 trading statement, which, at an underlying level, highlighted a pretty resilient trading performance in a reasonably tough environment. The Asia Pacific region was the standout performer with over 13% organic growth, whilst Europe and N.America were resilient, and the UK was still down, but on an improving trend. This is a business that will benefit from improving consumer confidence in its important home market and from key self-help initiatives designed to improve operating performance, both in-store and online, and to significantly attack the cost base. Nevertheless, a cautious statement guided the full-year results to come in at the lower end of current market expectations, in anticipation of a “pragmatic” view of the key Q4 trading period. ### Babcock Babcock has today released another set of very good results (interims) which beat expectations by a considerable margin, especially at the EPS level. Apparently, timing issues benefited the numbers, so guidance has not been raised, but these are encouraging figures. Predictably, because there is some speculation about a peace deal in Ukraine, the share price is down today, as are all defence stocks across Europe (sometimes markets can be so infantile) Perhaps the standout features of the numbers were margins up from 7 to 7.9% (and guidance for 9% next year) and a 25% increase in the interim dividend. ## What to look out for next week Next week, the US will release more labour market and inflation data, which will, as usual, be pored over by all those concerned about the future path of US interest rates. Given the prolonged shutdown, these data will be particularly closely watched. For me, the most interesting event of the week will be the budget on Wednesday. The absurd, long-drawn-out lead-up, which has been the economic equivalent of water torture, will finally be over. I suspect the bears will be disappointed because it won’t be as bad as they have been saying, but neither will the optimists be pleased because it will, once again, represent a missed opportunity. For the record, I continue to believe that the economy will shrug off the inevitable higher taxes and continue on the accelerating growth trajectory in 2026 and beyond.