The good news: You’re seeing fewer “We did a thing!” posts from high-school acquaintances holding shiny new house keys. The bad news: You’re probably not getting your hands on shiny new house keys, either. The average 30-year fixed-rate mortgage reached 7.8% this week, their highest level since 2000.

Why is this happening?

It’s due partly to a change in Treasury yields. Mortgage rates usually rise alongside the 10-year Treasury yield, which can signify investor optimism in the economy. And the 10-year Treasury yield hit 4.8% on Tuesday, a height it hadn't reached since 2007.

So, investors thinking the economy looks good means you can’t buy a house? Yeah, kinda.

It’s also the Fed. Over the last 40 years, the Federal Reserve has been slowly undoing a hike-a-palooza from the ’80s that bumped interest rates close to 19%. Mortgage rates drop when the Fed loosens its grip on the country’s monetary policy. But last year, Fed Chair Jerome Powell decided the party was over and started hiking rates again—and much more quickly than first-time home buyers are used to—to combat inflation. Meaning: Mortgage rates spiked, too.

What this means for you: If you were one of the lucky ones who purchased a quiet bungalow at a mortgage rate of 3% during the pandemic, well, congrats. Now the housing market is basically at a standstill as high mortgage rates refuse to budge. Housing demand dropped to its lowest level since 1996 last week, according to the Mortgage Bankers Association, since owners don’t want to sell and lose their lower mortgage rate. So there isn’t much inventory even for those looking to buy.

Looking ahead…the Fed has signaled that interest rates will stay elevated, so we’re likely to see mortgage rates hit 8% (for some borrowers, they already have). If and when the job market weakens, the Fed could finally relax rates, which would make mortgages drop. Yay?—MM

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Biden’s building (some of) the wall. His administration is waiving 26 federal laws to allow for the construction of a border wall in South Texas. Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas said there is “an acute and immediate need” to build physical barriers in Starr County, where 245,000 illegal entries have been recorded so far this year, according to government data. President Biden maintained his position that a wall is ineffective but said he was left with no choice but to allow up to 20 miles to be built because Congress allocated funding specifically for it in 2019. “They have to use the money for what it was appropriated,” Biden told reporters. “I can’t stop that.”

Amazon’s and Microsoft’s cloud services are under investigation. UK regulators announced a probe yesterday into the tech companies’ cloud computing market dominance. Combined, the two owned 70%–80% of the UK’s public cloud infrastructure in 2022, which Britain’s media regulator, Ofcom, argued makes it hard for businesses to switch providers. Both Amazon and Microsoft said they would work “constructively” with regulators. The probe could foreshadow more inquiries into the companies’ stranglehold on global cloud computing—the US Federal Trade Commission sought public comment on the industry earlier this year.

Belgian intelligence is monitoring Alibaba for spying. The country’s security service told the FT that it’s looking into “possible espionage” performed by Chinese entities at Alibaba’s logistics hub in Liège. Of particular concern is Alibaba’s use of software that can access data about merchants and pass along insights into any vulnerabilities to China. Alibaba denied the allegations, which come as several other European countries increase scrutiny of the possible security risks posed by Chinese companies.

You’ve heard of Michelin stars for restaurants, if not from The Bear, then from your friend who ate at Eleven Madison Park once and reminds you of it every chance they get.

Now, say hello to Michelin keys: Yesterday, the French tire company announced that in 2024, it will start awarding “keys” to hotels around the world that meet its high standards, relying on its own judges checking into hotels anonymously to determine top-tier stays.

The key program is Michelin’s latest move to grab a bigger piece of the rapidly growing travel and hospitality industry.

• In 2018, Michelin acquired the hotel booking platform Tablet, enabling consumers to book their stays through the Michelin website.
• Awarding keys will help the company compete with rivals World’s 50 Best and La Liste, both of which began ranking hotels for the first time this year.

Zoom out: The company has come a long way since it started making the Michelin Guide, a series of physical books, in 1900 to convince people to drive long distances to restaurants (so Michelin would sell more tires). A Michelin star can change the career of a chef, and a Michelin Guide can transform a local economy—so much so that tourism boards have paid the company hundreds of thousands of dollars to publish one for their cities.—CC

Sometimes, it pays to live in the tundra. Starting this week, Alaska residents will receive their annual dividend from the state’s oil earnings fund—this year, it’s a check for $1,312.

Dwellers of the wintry land—which is home to the biggest oil field in North America—have received a share of Alaska’s oil revenue every year since 1982. This year’s payments will amount to more than $881 million, according to the state’s Department of Revenue.

How will Alaskans spend it? Caught between collapsing fisheries and a rising cost of living, many people will spend their dividends on bills, groceries, and other necessities. But retailers also try to encourage a splurge: Sale signs like “101 Dividend Deals!” are all over Anchorage.

But…as Alaska’s oil production declines (it hit its lowest level since 1976 last year), lawmakers have tapped the unique fund to help cover the state budget, stoking concerns that the nest egg will crack. That’s why some are in favor of reinstating an income tax, which Alaska repealed decades ago…when oil production was booming.—ML

Stat: Score one for universal basic income proponents. The Denver Basic Income Project, funded partly by the city, has been giving vulnerable people up to $1,000 a month as part of an experiment to reduce homelessness. At the start of the trial, only 10% of the group had their own housing. Now, halfway through the yearlong study, more than a third have a house or apartment. Rates of sleeping outdoors also dropped dramatically. The results are similar to those of an experiment in San Francisco, in which two-thirds of participants who were experiencing homelessness at the start had found permanent housing by the end.

Quote: “This month was, in my professional opinion as a climate scientist—absolutely gobsmackingly bananas.”

There are times when describing something as “gobsmackingly bananas” is a good thing, like landing a cool skateboard trick. You don’t, however, want to hear it used in reference to the global temperature, as climate scientist Zeke Hausfather did this week. Last month was a whopping 1.7 degrees Fahrenheit hotter than the historical average for September, making it the most anomalously hot month ever by a large margin. Researchers don’t understand all of the contributing factors, but they know greenhouse gases are making the situation worse.

Read: America’s factory boom brings billion-dollar projects to tiny towns. (Bloomberg)

The feeling of getting a 5/5 on the Brew’s Weekly News Quiz has been compared to getting Final Jeopardy right.

It’s that satisfying. Ace the quiz.

Learn: The unexpected names of the asteroids in the asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter, which include “Mother Teresa,” “James Bond,” “Ocasio-Cortez,” and “Lancearmstrong.”

Watch: English musician Jacob Collier turns the thousands of random strangers in his audience into the most epic choir you’ve ever heard.

Laugh: A fox smoking a cigar, a kangaroo playing air guitar, and an owl looking even more miserable than usual are all among the finalists for the Comedy Wildlife Photography Awards.

Shop: You may not be able to live inside of Dungeons & Dragons, but you can enhance your home with these fantasy-themed lifestyle products, like parchment-scented candles.

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