Sweden’s Northvolt on Wednesday said the head of its main plant, Europe’s first homegrown gigafactory for lithium-ion battery cells, will step down with immediate effect.

It comes shortly after the cash-strapped company announced plans to reduce its workforce by about 25% in Sweden as part of a major cost-cutting drive.

Mark Duchesne, CEO of Northvolt Ett, will be replaced on an interim basis by Angéline J. Bilodeau, the firm’s vice president of operations in North America, the company said in a statement.

The position will be held until the end of the year as the company seeks to secure a permanent replacement for CEO of Northvolt Ett, it added.

Based in Stockholm, Sweden, Northvolt is one of Europe’s most valuable privately held tech firms that builds lithium-ion batteries for the electric vehicle industry. It has partnerships with a number of major European automakers, including Volkswagen and Volvo.

In an update published Sept. 23, Northvolt said that following initial steps taken as part of a strategic review, the company had revised its scope of operations in Sweden “to ensure that its resources are focused on accelerating production in large-scale cell manufacturing at Northvolt Ett.”

The strategic action required the company to cut a total of 1,600 jobs in Sweden, Northvolt said.

Alongside plans to lay off staff, Northvolt said at the time that it would suspend plans for a sizable expansion of Northvolt Ett, noting the project had been intended to provide an additional 30 gigawatt hours of annual cell manufacturing capacity.

On Tuesday, a Northvolt Ett subsidiary filed for bankruptcy following the decision to suspend the expansion project — an update that underscores the group’s deepening financial struggles.

Separately, Swedish automaker Volvo Cars on Wednesday announced deputy CEO Björn Annwall will step down from his current role as part of a management reshuffle.

The reorganization at Volvo Cars comes shortly after the firm scrapped its near-term goal of selling only electric vehicles, citing a need to be “pragmatic and flexible” amid changing market conditions and cooling demand.

Crude oil futures drifted lower Wednesday after sliding more than 4% the previous day.

The rally spurred by the risk of a wider Middle East war has stalled out amid uncertainty over how Israel will retaliate against Iran for last week’s ballistic missile strike. Chinese policymakers’ failure to deliver new economic stimulus measures at a press briefing this week also held energy prices in check.

Though prices are falling, Goldman Sachs sees global benchmark Brent jumping by $10 to $20 per barrel if an Israeli strike disrupts Iranian crude oil production, according to a Tuesday research note.

Here are Wednesday’s energy prices at around 8:02 a.m. ET:

• West Texas Intermediate November contract: $73.38 per barrel, down 19 cents, or 0.26%. Year to date, U.S. crude oil has gained more than 2%.
• Brent December contract: $77.02 per barrel, down 16 cents, or 0.21%. Year to date, the global benchmark is little changed.
• RBOB Gasoline November contract:  $2.0607 per gallon, down 0.36%. Year to date, gasoline has fallen nearly 2%.
• Natural Gas November contract: $2.695 per thousand cubic feet, down 1.39%. Year to date, gas is ahead about 7%.

This report is from today’s CNBC Daily Open, our international markets newsletter. CNBC Daily Open brings investors up to speed on everything they need to know, no matter where they are. Like what you see? You can subscribe here.

Rebound rally
U.S. stocks rebounded on Tuesday, with all major indexes rising. Technology stocks, in particular, rallied to lift the Nasdaq Composite. APAC

Google, it’s not me, it’s you
Breaking up Google is one recommendation the U.S. Department of Justice made to remedy the tech giant’s monopoly in the search market – a ruling the courts reached in August after the U.S. government filed a case against Google in 2020. Legal experts, however, think a break-up isn’t very likely and that the courts will order Google to pursue other remedies.

Cooling oil prices
Crude oil prices fell on Tuesday amid reports by The New York Times and The Jerusalem Post that Israel might focus on striking Iran’s military sites in retaliation for its missile attacks. Both West Texas Intermediate and Brent futures retreated 4.63% during U.S. trading hours Tuesday, halting the red-hot rally oil prices have experienced the past week. 

New Zealand cuts rates
The Reserve Bank of New Zealand slashed interest rates by half a percentage point on Wednesday. It’s the second consecutive cut after the RBNZ unexpectedly lowered rates by a quarter point in August. The central bank’s likely to make another half-point cut in November, Paul Bloxham, HSBC’s chief economist for Australia and New Zealand, told CNBC.

[PRO] Time to invest in China?
China’s blue-chip CSI 300 index popped 5.93% on Tuesday after markets returned from their seven-day Golden Week holiday. However, there are signs the sizzling rally is cooling. The CSI 300 is currently down around 5.6% as of Wednesday morning. On the back of such turbulence, CNBC Pro asks two strategists whether now’s the time to invest in China.

After falling 0.96% on Monday, the S&P 500 added 0.97% on Tuesday. (Though it should be noted that doesn’t necessarily mean the S&P erased its losses and is up 1 basis point from Monday to Tuesday. Percentages are hard.)

Likewise, the Nasdaq Composite slipped 1.18% Monday but climbed 1.45% yesterday, zapped higher by a rally in tech stocks like Nvidia, Palo Alto Networks and Meta. The Dow Jones Industrial Average didn’t have that dramatic a swing, losing 0.94% Monday but advancing 0.3% Tuesday.

October, then, is truly living up to its reputation as the most volatile month for stocks. But investors should keep in mind the uncomfortable swings in markets aren’t always a good signal for the underlying health of stocks.  

“While our expectation is for October to remain choppy, we don’t view the overall market action to be bearish and encourage investors to maintain perspective on the longer-term trends,” Robert Sluymer, technical strategist at RBC Wealth Management, wrote to clients in a Tuesday note.

Investment bank Piper Sandler has the same opinion on October’s turbulence. “October is historically a ‘backing and filling’ month as investors react to Q3 earnings results,” Craig Johnson, chief market technician, wrote in a Tuesday note.

In fact, when stocks dip because of mild repricing or a correction, that’s a good opportunity for investors to swoop in, according to Johnson.

The see-saw motion of stocks in October isn’t all that bad, then, if investors can seize the right time to enter the market or solidify their positions further. It doesn’t have to be spooky season all the time. 

– CNBC’s Hakyung Kim, Samantha Subin and Alex Harring contributed to this story.   

This report is from today’s CNBC Daily Open, our international markets newsletter. CNBC Daily Open brings investors up to speed on everything they need to know, no matter where they are. Like what you see? You can subscribe here.

Rebound rally
U.S. stocks rebounded on Tuesday, with all major indexes rising. Technology stocks, in particular, rallied to lift the Nasdaq Composite. The pan-European Stoxx 600 index lost 0.55%. European liquor producers like LVMH, Pernod Ricard and Diageo slumped after China announced anti-dumping measures on brandy products imported from the European Union.

Cooling oil prices
Crude oil prices fell on Tuesday amid reports Israel might focus on striking Iran’s military sites in retaliation for its missile attacks, according to reports by The New York Times and The Jerusalem Post.  Both West Texas Intermediate and Brent futures retreated 4.63% yesterday, halting the red-hot rally oil prices have experienced the past week. 

GM’s not slowing down
General Motors aims to bring in between $13 billion and $15 billion in adjusted earnings before interest and taxes for 2024. The Detroit automaker also expects its 2025 adjusted earnings to be in a “similar range,” said CFO Paul Jacobson during the company’s investor day. That’d be an accomplishment, given the slowdown in the industry.

Shorting Roblox
Short seller Hindenburg Research alleged on Tuesday that Roblox conflated daily active users with the number of people visiting its platform. This distorts the true number of people accessing Roblox because DAUs could include bots or alternate accounts, Hindenburg said. Roblox denies all claims in the report. 

[PRO] Slower earnings growth
Third-quarter earnings season ramps up this week, with banking giant JPMorgan Chase slated to announce its financial results on Friday. Investors might want to temper expectations. For companies in the S&P 500, Wall Street projects a slower pace of earnings growth compared with its estimate in June, according to FactSet data. 

After falling 0.96% on Monday, the S&P 500 added 0.97% on Tuesday. (Though it should be noted that doesn’t necessarily mean the S&P erased its losses and is up 1 basis point from Monday to Tuesday. Percentages are hard.)

Likewise, the Nasdaq Composite slipped 1.18% Monday but climbed 1.45% yesterday, zapped higher by a rally in tech stocks like Nvidia, Palo Alto Networks and Meta. The Dow Jones Industrial Average didn’t have that dramatic a swing, losing 0.94% Monday but advancing 0.3% Tuesday.

October, then, is truly living up to its reputation as the most volatile month for stocks. But investors should keep in mind the uncomfortable swings in markets aren’t always a good signal for the underlying health of stocks.  

“While our expectation is for October to remain choppy, we don’t view the overall market action to be bearish and encourage investors to maintain perspective on the longer-term trends,” Robert Sluymer, technical strategist at RBC Wealth Management, wrote to clients in a Tuesday note.

Investment bank Piper Sandler has the same opinion on October’s turbulence. “October is historically a ‘backing and filling’ month as investors react to Q3 earnings results,” Craig Johnson, chief market technician, wrote in a Tuesday note.

In fact, when stocks dip because of mild repricing or a correction, that’s a good opportunity for investors to swoop in, according to Johnson.

The see-saw motion of stocks in October isn’t all that bad, then, if investors can seize the right time to enter the market or solidify their positions further. It doesn’t have to be spooky season all the time. 

– CNBC’s Hakyung Kim, Samantha Subin and Alex Harring contributed to this story.