Stephen Carroll

Money manager Danny Moses featured in The Big Short says that the private market's push into retail products is reminiscent of the years before the global financial crisis.

Meanwhile, strategists at UBS have upped their forecast for defaults in the sector to 15%.

That's two percentage points higher than they forecast less than a month ago.

The bank's head of public and private credit strategy, Matthew Misch, says technological progress could also present a challenge for the industry.

UBS Matthew Mish speaking there to Bloomberg yesterday.

His remarks come as activist investor Boaz Weinstein also warned of deeper cracks in private credit funds.

Fears surrounding the sector have been building in recent days after the asset manager Blue Owl Capital blocked investors from making withdrawals from one of its private credit funds, which raised anxiety about the loans issued by direct lenders.

European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen says that the EU will deliver on its €90 billion aid for Ukraine one way or another.

The EU has been repeatedly blocked by Hungary from passing an aid package and further sanctions against Russia.

Speaking in Kiev, marking four years of the war, von der Leyen stressed Ukraine would receive the funding.

The European Commission president's words come as Ukraine is set to run out of funds in a matter of weeks.

This is U.S.

brokered peace talks with Russia have stalled.

So those are a few of our top stories for you today.

Let's just take you through the markets this hour with European stocks heading high up by four tenths of one percent.

We are further away from the worries around artificial intelligence that we saw at the start of the week.

There was pushback from the White House against Ukraine.

That Citrine research paper on AI, FTSE 100 is up by seven tenths of one percent this morning.

Just in terms of Diageo's share price taking a significant hit this morning, down 6.6 percent.

HSBC shares, though, jumping five percent after their blowout results.