Henry Kravis and George Roberts are stepping down as co-CEOs of KKR, the private equity firm they founded nearly half a century ago. The cousins are pioneers of the buyout industry, taking it from a niche market in the 1970s into one of the biggest pieces of Wall Street. The $25B purchase of Nabisco in 1989 held the record for the largest-ever LBO until 2007, when KKR topped its own record buying Texas utility TXU Corp. for $31.8B. At the time, the Nabisco acquisition was so revolutionary that it became the subject of the bestselling book Barbarians at the Gate.

The IMF’s executive board has opted to retain Kristalina Georgieva as managing director, saying they have “full confidence” in her ability, despite allegations she pressured World Bank staff when she was its chief executive to manipulate data to China’s benefit.

The extended climb in oil prices is leaving some other industrial commodities behind, a divergence that reflects bets that energy supply shortages will offset any slowdown in the global economy.  Oil is now on track to outpace copper this year by the largest amount since 2002 and is topping an index of raw materials by the biggest margin in more than a decade, according to Dow Jones Market Data. Like oil, natural gas is also far outpacing other commodities.