US markets were closed yesterday so some of our readers may have enjoyed sleeping in. Not our readers in Spain though it seems. Spanish regulators are currently investigating the Big Four accounting firms after complaints from employees of long hours and spreadsheets when there should’ve been bedsheets. What happened to the siesta?

The lowdown

• 💬 Microsoft will expand ChatGPT access within its products as it considers upping its stake.

• 🗿 Meme stock investor Ryan Cohen builds Alibaba stake.

• 🏗️ Property developer China Evergrande Group engages with creditors on restructuring proposal.

Featured Stories

Bain prepares Virgin Australia for IPO

PE firm Bain Capital is preparing to list Australia’s second largest airline Virgin Australia ($). This comes two years after Bain bought the business out of administration and as travel rebounds.

United States airline stocks are having an incredible start to the year as the graph below shows. This may have encouraged Bain to accelerate Virgin Australia’s IPO.

Virgin Australia has a market share of more than 30%, up from the 20% it commanded when it collapsed three years ago. Industry leader Qantas has roughly double that market share.

The Australian Financial Review reported that one banker said: “For a while they [Qantas and Virgin] were trying to kill each other. Now they are trying to co-exist.” Even if Virgin Australia is the junior partner, this cosy duopoly is likely to be attractive to investors.

And sometimes second place is the best. Just ask Virgin Australia employees who could enter an internal competition in which the top prize was lunch with the Virgin Australia CEO and second place was an all-expenses paid holiday.

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The content we're consuming today

• Odd Lots podcast: Ex-logger aims to beat Elon Musk in Electric Trucks.

• The Economist Podcasts: Editor’s Picks: January 16th 2023.

Off-balance sheet items

• Keeping with the Australian theme of our featured story and knowing how much finance types tend to like cycling, a reminder that the Tour Down Under – the opening event of the UCI World Tour – has now kicked off. The men’s prologue will have just concluded as this newsletter goes out.

The bottom line