Trump Threatens Tariffs For Nations With Digital Taxes On US Tech

Authored by Aldgra Fredly via The Epoch Times,

President Donald Trump on Aug. 25 threatened to restrict the export of U.S. advanced technologies like chips and impose additional tariffs on countries that refuse to eliminate digital regulations discriminating against U.S. tech companies.

In a Truth Social post, Trump opposed other nation’s digital taxes and regulations imposed on American companies that he said were intended “to harm, or discriminate against, American Technology.”

“They also, outrageously, give a complete pass to China’s largest Tech Companies. This must end, and end NOW,” Trump said of the lopsided treatment of the United States.

Trump warned that his administration would impose “substantial additional tariffs” on imports from those countries and restrict U.S. protected technology and chip exports, unless they withdraw their “discriminatory” digital taxes and regulations.

“America, and American Technology Companies, are neither the ‘piggy bank’ nor the ‘doormat’ of the World any longer,” Trump said.

“Show respect to America and our amazing Tech Companies or, consider the consequences.”

The president did not specify what the tariff rates might be.

Many countries, particularly in Europe, have levied taxes on the sales revenue of digital service providers, including Alphabet’s Google, Meta’s Facebook, Apple, and Amazon. The issue has been a longstanding trade irritant for multiple U.S. administrations.

The United States and the European Union issued a joint statement on Aug. 21 outlining a framework for a “reciprocal, fair and balanced trade” agreement as part of efforts to resolve their trade imbalances.

In the statement, both sides pledged to address “unjustified digital trade barriers” and agreed not to levy customs duties on electronic transmissions. The EU also agreed not to adopt network usage fees.

Washington and the 27-member bloc also pledged to “continue to support the multilateral moratorium on customs duties on electronic transmissions at the World Trade Organization and seek the adoption of a permanent multilateral commitment,” according to the statement.

Trump in June vowed to terminate trade negotiations with Canada due to the nation’s Digital Services Tax (DST) affecting U.S. tech companies such as Amazon, Google, and Netflix. The Canadian government later responded by saying it would rescind its DST legislation.

The U.S. Trade Representative’s office stated in its latest report that most of Canada’s DSTs “have been designed in ways that discriminate against U.S. companies, as they single out U.S. firms for taxation while effectively excluding national firms engaged in similar lines of business.”

Canada’s DST also imposes “significant retroactive tax liabilities” with immediate effects on U.S. companies, according to the report published in March.

“Through bilateral and multilateral engagement, the United States continued to raise serious concerns regarding Canada’s DST and to encourage Canada to withdraw or repeal the DST,” the report stated.

Earlier this year, Trump issued a memo directing his administration to look at which countries are imposing taxes that “may discriminate against” U.S. companies. Among the fines and fees that Trump’s memorandum looked to address were digital taxes.

A fact sheet provided by the White House states that foreign governments have used these digital taxes against U.S. businesses when they shouldn’t otherwise be subject to foreign jurisdiction.

Tyler Durden Tue, 08/26/2025 - 08:50

LA Police Bust Burglary Crew Suspected In 92 Residential Heists

Authored by Jill McLaughlin via The Epoch Times,

Police have arrested the last of 10 suspects involved in the “Rich Rollin Burglary Crew” linked to at least 92 residential burglaries in the city since 2022, the Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD) announced Aug. 25.

Detectives wrapped up a months-long investigation into the burglary ring on Aug. 20, arresting seven alleged members.

The 92 burglaries were carried out mostly in 2024 and 2025, according to the LAPD.

Other burglaries that occurred outside city limits might also be linked to the crew, but those are still under investigation, according to LAPD Chief Jim McDonnell.

Those arrested on Aug. 20 were Devon Collier, 37; Tyrone Tisby, 47; Frank Tisby, 38; Jeremy Shepard, 38; Jermaine Kimbrough, 22; Michael Lewis, 20; and Marquell Lewis, 26.

The men were booked on charges that included burglary and possession of controlled substances while armed.

“What made this takedown possible was the outstanding work of our officers and detectives—communicating across divisions and bureaus, sharing intelligence, and connecting the dots that revealed these burglaries were tied to the same crew,” McDonnell said in a statement.

Another suspect, Eric Cannon, 40, surrendered to police on Aug. 22 in response to an active arrest warrant.

Police had already arrested Anthony Leslie, 36, and Shawn Quinney, 36, who both face attempted murder charges.

All of the men arrested are repeat offenders and confirmed gang members, the LAPD reported.

Los Angeles County District Attorney Nathan Hochman told reporters at a press conference Aug. 25 that his office had filed charges against eight of the suspects.

Many of the suspects have one or two strikes against them for previous offenses. In California, some serious or violent felony convictions qualify as a “strike” under the state’s criminal laws, which can lead to tougher sentences.

L.A. County District Attorney Nathan Hochman on Aug. 11. 2025. John Fredricks/The Epoch Times

Those with two strikes “are looking at a maximum of life sentences,” Hochman said. “These are very serious consequences. We will be seeking to have these people serve maximum sentences.”

Hochman said authorities were also going after the shops that purchased the stolen items for resale or to turn them into cash. He called the burglaries “crimes of greed.”

According to police, the investigation gained momentum in February after three suspects were arrested following a pursuit involving a van connected to two burglaries.

Detectives used information from that arrest to identify additional suspects, the LAPD reported.

In April, detectives served a search warrant at a Los Angeles residence and recovered rifles, handguns, ammunition, body armor, large-capacity magazines, jewelry, watches, stolen credit cards, fake identification, and multiple license plates.

The evidence collected was directly tied to organized burglary, according to police.

Starting at 5 a.m. on Aug. 20, officers from West Los Angeles, North Hollywood, West Valley, Olympic, Hollywood, Wilshire, and downtown served search warrants at eight homes in Los Angeles, Hawthorne, Inglewood, and Carson.

During the searches, investigators recovered 15 firearms, including several reported stolen during the burglaries. They also found large amounts of ammunition and high-capacity magazines, including a 50-round handgun drum.

Investigators also found burglary tools, including handheld radios, face masks, headlamps, window punch devices, and cans of bear spray.

The stolen property included luxury watches, bracelets, high-end purses and luggage, credit cards, wallets, and U.S. and foreign currency. Narcotics, a money counter, and several cellphones were also recovered.

The seized evidence gave investigators a direct link between the burglary crew and their crimes, strengthening the criminal cases against them, the LAPD said.

Police don’t believe the burglary crew was tied to a rash of recent heists in Encino, a wealthy suburb of Los Angeles.

The case is also not related to South American “burglary tourists” who have struck homes recently using surveillance as part of their schemes. Crimes by burglary tourists who fly into the city to break into mansions, then fly back to their countries have decreased lately, police reported.

L.A. Mayor Karen Bass applauded the LAPD's arrests of burglary suspects. Above, Bass at  a news conference on Jan. 17, 2025. Apu Gomes/Getty Images

Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass praised the LAPD’s work.

“In the early hours of last Wednesday, LAPD led a coordinated operation across multiple jurisdictions that successfully took down a burglary crew responsible for nearly 100 break-ins across our city and our County,” Bass said in a statement. “Thanks to the tireless work of our officers and detectives, this crew, which has victimized families and businesses, is no longer a threat to our neighborhoods.”

Tyler Durden Tue, 08/26/2025 - 08:48

Core Durable Goods Orders Rise At Fastest Annual Rate in 3 Years

Amid chaotic swings MoM driven by the variability of Boeing plane orders, analysts expected preliminary July data to show a 3.8% MoM decline (following June's big plunge, following May's big surge). The good news is that the actualk print was better than expected (-2.8% MoM) but still in the red for headline orders. This dragged down the YoY headline growth to 3.5% as the front-running of tariffs fades and earlier this month, Boeing Co. reported a fewer orders in July than in June.

Source: Bloomberg

Under the hood, ex-Transports, durable goods orders rose over 1.0% MoM (the fourth straight month of gains), lifting core orders 3.8% YoY - its strrongest growth since Nov 2022...

Source: Bloomberg

Once again, non-defense aircraft orders plunged (while defense aircraft orders rose)...

Source: Bloomberg

Capital Goods Orders, non-defense ex-aircraft rose 1.1% MoM (better than expected).

Non-defense capital goods shipments including aircraft, which feed directly into the equipment investment portion of the gross domestic product report, rose 0.7% after an upwardly revised gain a month earlier. Rather than orders, which can be canceled, the government uses data on shipments as an input to GDP.

The import/export tariffs - and the frontrunning of such - has clearly sparked chaos in the data.

Tyler Durden Tue, 08/26/2025 - 08:41

Futures Slide, Curve Steepens After Trump Fires Fed's Cook

US equity futures are a tad lower as the yield curve twists steeper with 5Y yields flat, after Trump moves to fire the Fed’s Cook, sending the USD is weaker. A showdown looms with Cook saying that Trump has no authority to oust her and that she will not quit (previously the SCOTUS indicated that the Fed Governors could not be fired at-will but if it does decide that Trump fired her for cause, Powell would be responsible if he keeps her on after Trump has sacked her). As of 8:15am, S&P and Nasdaq futures are down 0.2% even with Nvidia rising 0.5% ahead of its results on Wednesday. In premarket trading, semis are higher with Defensive sectors outperforming Cyclicals; large-cap Industrials are in the green. In Europe, major markets are all lower with France the biggest laggard on fears of gov’t stability; Germany and UK the relative areas of safety. Commodities are weaker, dragged by Energy. Key events today include the August Philadelphia Fed non-manufacturing index and July preliminary durable goods orders (8:30 a.m.), June FHFA house price index and S&P CoreLogic home price indexes (9 a.m.), August Richmond Fed manufacturing and business conditions indexes and Conference Board consumer confidence (10 a.m.). All eyes on Nvidia earnings tomorrow.

In premarket trading, Mag 7 stocks are mostly lower (Nvidia +0.4%, Microsoft -0.1%, Apple -0.1%, Amazon -0.2%, Meta Platforms -0.08%, Alphabet -0.2%, Tesla -0.4%). AMD (AMD) gains 2% after the company and IBM announced a quantum-centric supercomputing partnership. Here are some other notable movers:

• EchoStar (SATS) soars 58% after AT&T announced an agreement to buy spectrum licenses from the satellite broadband communication company for about $23 billion, adding an average of about 50 MHz of low-band and mid-band spectrum to AT&T’s holdings. AT&T (T) shares are up 0.6%.
• Eli Lilly & Co. (LLY) rises 1.8% after its experimental obesity pill helped patients lose 9.6% of their body weight in a trial that moves the company one step closer to a potential approval.
• Interactive Brokers (IBKR) climbs 3% after the S&P Dow Jones Indices announced that the automated-electronic broker will join the S&P 500 Index before trading opens Aug. 28, replacing Walgreens Boots Alliance Inc.
• Olaplex Holdings (OLPX) rises 6% after announcing the acquisition of Purvala Bioscience, a Boston-based biotech company.
• Semtech (SMTC) gains 3% after the semiconductor device company reported second-quarter results that beat expectations and gave an outlook that’s in-line with expectations.

Key corporate news:

• Eli Lilly & Co.’s experimental obesity pill helped patients lose 9.6% of their body weight in a trial that moves the company one step closer to a potential approval.
• EssilorLuxottica SA, the maker of Ray-Ban sunglasses, is exploring a potential deal to increase its stake in Japanese optical equipment manufacturer Nikon Corp., people with knowledge of the matter said.
• Interactive Brokers Group Inc. shares climb as much as 4.7% in premarket trading on Tuesday after the S&P Dow Jones Indices announced that the automated electronic broker will join the S&P 500 Index
• Brevan Howard Asset Management is set to hand a minority stake to Abu Dhabi’s Lunate in a milestone agreement for the macro-trading firm that turned the emirate into its biggest risk center in just a year after setting up a local office.
• Orsted A/S executives are working to reassure shareholders Tuesday after the Trump administration’s decision to halt one of the company’s two wind-power projects in the US raised questions about the viability of its proposed $9.4 billion stock sale.
• Indonesia’s newly established sovereign wealth fund has sounded out investors on a plan to raise $3.1 billion by selling so-called patriot bonds at below-market yields, people familiar with the matter said.

Overnight risk appetite was jolted after Trump said he had fired Federal Reserve Governor Lisa Cook for alleged criminal cause, stoking fears over the long-term outlook for inflation. The president also renewed his trade brinkmanship, threatening fresh tariffs and export restrictions on advanced technology and semiconductors in retaliation against digital services taxes abroad. Stocks and bonds were already under pressure after the optimism that followed Fed Chair Jerome Powell’s address at Jackson Hole faded on Monday. Doubts about the pace of easing are lingering ahead of an inflation report later this week, expected to highlight sticky price pressures.

“If the Fed is perceived as caving to pressure from the administration and lower rates prematurely to placate the White House, it risks inflation becoming more entrenched,” said Tom Essaye at The Sevens Report. “Since longer-dated yields trade primarily off inflation expectations, this pressure is boosting the 30-year Treasury yield.”

For the Fed, swaps imply about an 80% chance of a Fed quarter-point rate cut next month, with at least one more expected by year-end. Forcing out Cook would give Trump an opportunity to secure a four-person majority on the Fed’s seven-member Board of Governors. Her term wasn’t set to expire until 2038.  Trump said he had “sufficient cause” to fire Cook, the first Black woman to serve on the Fed Board in Washington, based on allegations that she made false statements on one or more mortgage loans.

In Europe, the Stoxx 600 fell 0.7% led by French assets which extended losses for a second day as investors fretted that Prime Minister Bayrou’s proposed confidence vote risks toppling his government. The CAC 40 slid 1.7%, leading declines across European bourses. Construction and banks sectors are among the worst performers, while mining and health care shares are leading gains. Here are the biggest movers Tuesday:

• Bunzl shares rise as much as 6.3% after the value-added distributor delivered first-half results broadly in line with expectations, reaffirmed its outlook and resumed its share buyback
• DiaSorin climbs as much as 4%, the most since mid April after Morgan Stanley upgrades to overweight as the bank continues to see strong prospects for the European diagnostics sector
• Huber+Suhner shares gain as much as 3.3% after Baader raised the recommendation to add from sell, citing strong growth ahead thanks to the firm’s optical circuit switch, which allows data centers to operate more efficiently
• Zurich Airport shares gain 3.1%, the most since May. Vontobel says first-half results topped expectations with strong travel demand, especially among local passengers
• Filtronic shares jump as much as 11% after SpaceX agreed to buy £47.3 million worth of the gallium nitride E-band product from the communication
• French stocks are the worst-performers in Europe on Tuesday after Prime Minister Francois Bayrou unexpectedly announced a confidence vote for next month, prompting a selloff in local assets
• British retail stocks drop after a raft of downgrades at Deutsche Bank. Analysts expect a squeeze in discretionary spending power as UK consumer confidence weakens amid concerns over expected tax increases and rising inflation
• Commerzbank shares fall as much as 6.3% after BofA downgrades the German lender to underperform from neutral, saying that its valuation appears stretched
• British American Tobacco shares slide as much as 2.9% as the maker of Dunhill, Rothmans and Camel cigarettes says CFO Soraya Benchikh is stepping down with immediate effect, after a little more than a year in the job

Earlier in the session, Asian stocks fell as a rally in Chinese equities paused amid signs of overheating, while earlier advances in the Japanese yen weighed on export-focused stocks. The MSCI Asia Pacific Index dropped as much as 1.1%, with tech firms Alibaba and Samsung Electronics among the biggest drags. Benchmarks in the Philippines, Japan and Hong Kong were among the biggest decliners in the region. Chinese gauges ended the day lower, after recording a few strong sessions on optimism that more retail money will flow into the market. Red flags are emerging following the surprise rally in onshore shares that’s mostly driven by liquidity rather than improved economic fundamentals. Japanese stocks underperformed in the region, as gains in the yen pressured exporters. Uncertainty around the Federal Reserve’s rate policy was exacerbated by US President Donald Trump’s move to oust Governor Lisa Cook, which weighed on investor sentiment. Elsewhere, South Korean stocks fell as investors grow impatient for concrete corporate reform measures and clearer insight into US tariffs’ impact on earnings.

“The threat to the independence of the Federal Reserve has exacerbated its difficulties in responding to a challenging economic and political environment,” according to a note from the UBS chief investment office. “The next move of the Federal Reserve remains the focus of attention, as investors are closely monitoring signs of further policy shifts.”

In FX, the Bloomberg Dollar Spot Index pared an earlier 0.3% drop to trade little changed, while the euro swung between gains and losses as the common currency got caught between Fed noise and French political risk.

In rates, treasuries are mixed with 30-year yields up 4 bps to 4.94% while two-year yields slip after Trump ousted Fed governor Lisa Cook for mortgage fraud, setting up a legal fight with the central bank, which he’s aiming to remake in pursuit of interest-rate cuts. With shorter-maturity yields little changed to lower, curve spreads widened, pushing 5s30s over 115bp for the first time since 2021 even as Treasury auctions of 2-, 5- and 7-year notes is set to begin. The 30-year is about 2bp higher on the day near 4.95%. Short-maturity yields reflected higher probability of Fed rate cuts, with the 2-year lower by about 1.5bp; swap contracts linked to future Fed rate decisions continue to fully price in one quarter-point rate cut this year in October and a second one by year-end. Month’s final coupon auction cycle begins with $69 billion 2-year note sale at 1pm New York time; WI yield near 3.68% is lower than 2-year auction results since last September. French 10-year yields slip 1 bp to 3.51% as the spread over Germany widens by another 2 bps to the widest since April.

In commodities, WTI crude drops 1.3% to near $64 a barrel. Spot gold rises $10. Bitcoin rises 0.7%.

Looking at today's US economic data calendar we get the August Philadelphia Fed non-manufacturing activity gauge and July preliminary durable goods orders (8:30 a.m.), June FHFA house price index and S&P CoreLogic home price indexes (9 a.m.), August Richmond Fed manufacturing and business conditions indexes and Conference Board consumer confidence (10 a.m.) Fed speaker slate includes Richmond Fed President Barkin repeating his Aug. 12 remarks on the economy (time TBD). We also get Nvidia’s results out after the US close tomorrow (with a +33.9% gain, Nvidia has again been the best performer in the Mag-7 year-to-date, but the past couple of quarters saw it deliver smaller earnings surprises after its euphoric growth during 2023-24). Rounding out US events, in tariffs, the "de minimis" exemption will end this Friday, while additional 25% tariffs on India (taking the total levy to 50%) are due to come into effect on Wednesday

Market Snapshot

• S&P 500 mini -0.1%
• Nasdaq 100 mini -0.1%
• Russell 2000 mini -0.2%
• Stoxx Europe 600 -0.8%
• DAX -0.6%, CAC 40 -1.8%
• 10-year Treasury yield +3 basis points at 4.3%
• VIX +0.6 points at 15.37
• Bloomberg Dollar Index -0.1% at 1206.27
• euro +0.1% at $1.1634
• WTI crude -1.2% at $64/barrel

Top Overnight News

• Donald Trump escalated his battle to exert more control over the Fed by moving to fire Lisa Cook over allegations she falsified mortgage documents. Cook said the president has no authority to oust her, and she won’t quit, setting the scene for a legal battle. Trump’s move may become a test of the Supreme Court’s intentions when it signaled earlier this year it would shield the Fed from at-will removal of board members. BBG
• The U.S. will increase tariffs and impose export restrictions on countries that tax or regulate U.S. tech firms, President Trump said on Monday evening, in his most direct threat to retaliate against nations that he views as discriminating against companies such as Google and Meta Platforms. WSJ
• Trump said on US stakes in companies, that he wants to get as much as he can and hopes to have many more cases like Intel, while he added there will be other cases.
• A senior Chinese trade negotiator is heading to Washington this week for what is expected to be the first dialogue in the U.S. capital, according to people familiar with the matter, as both sides seek to establish regular communication during an extended tariff truce. WSJ
• An announcement regarding the US-Japan trade deal involving a $550 billion investment vehicle is due this week, Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick told Fox. BBG
• The US outlined plans to implement a 50% tariff on products from India. A draft notice said the levies would apply from 12:01 a.m. ET tomorrow. BBG
• Refiners in India, among the largest buyers of Russian crude, are planning to trim their purchases in the coming weeks, a modest concession to Washington’s hawks less than a day ahead of a hike in US tariffs, but also a signal that the country has no plans to sever ties with Moscow. BBG
• France's minority government looked increasingly likely to be ousted next month after three main opposition parties said they would not back a confidence vote which Prime Minister Francois Bayrou announced for September 8 over his plans for sweeping budget cuts. RTRS
• The intensifying Ukrainian drone campaign against Russian refineries has taken some 13% of Russia’s fuel production offline, according to analysts. Sanctions imposed by the West after the 2022 invasion, meanwhile, have limited Moscow’s ability to repair infrastructure and service remaining installations, and forcing them to ration. WSJ
• The Fed’s John Williams said the neutral interest rate may not be much different than before the pandemic. He didn’t elaborate but the latest median estimate of the neutral rate among Fed officials was 3%, up from 2.5% prior to Covid-19. BBG

Trade/Tariffs

• US President Trump threatened on Truth Social to impose substantial additional tariffs on countries that do not remove discriminatory actions such as digital taxes, legislation, and rules against US tech companies, while he also threatened export restrictions on tech and chips.
• According to Politico, citing Top Trade MEP Lange, the European Commission is expected to reveal its proposals to lift tariffs on US industrial goods and cars.
• South Korean President Lee's office said Lee and US President Trump talked about shipbuilding and that Trump stressed his support for Lee, while it added that the mood from the meeting was good enough that a written joint statement was unnecessary and the meeting was an opportunity for the leaders to get close to each other, rather than discussing the specifics on trade.
• South Korean adviser Wi said details on trade talks still need to be determined and progress has been made on modernising the alliance, while Wi added that Trump and Lee had meaningful talks about nuclear energy.
• Chinese top trade negotiator Li Chenggang is set to head to the US as talks resume and will meet with US Trade Representative Greer and senior Treasury Department officials later this week, according to WSJ. It was later reported that a US government spokesperson said Washington welcomes Chinese efforts to reduce its persistent and massive trade surplus with the US.
• US President Trump’s administration reportedly weighs visa sanctions for EU and EU member state officials over the bloc's digital services act, according to Reuters citing sources.
• Canadian and US officials are to meet after Canada removes some tariffs, according to Bloomberg News.
• Brazil's Foreign Minister Vieira said Canada and the South American bloc Mercosur are to resume negotiations for a free trade agreement, while he added a joint decision was made to resume the negotiations and there will be an important meeting in October regarding Canada-Mercosur talks.
• Indonesia's chief tariff negotiator says the US agrees in principle to exempt palm oil, cocoa and rubber from 19% tariffs.
• Morgan Stanley expects Fed to cut rates by 25bps in September and December (prev. saw no rate cuts in 2025); now expects 25bps cut in March, June, Sept and Dec in 2026, taking terminal target range to 2.75-3.00%

A more detailed look at global markets courtesy of Newsquawk

APAC stocks traded mostly lower after global markets faded last Friday's post-Powell dovish reaction, while Trump also moved to fire Fed Governor Cook and threatened to impose substantial additional tariffs on countries that do not remove digital taxes and regulations against US tech companies. ASX 200 retreated amid a continued deluge of earnings releases including from the likes of Coles and Fortescue. Nikkei 225 underperformed with notable weakness seen in power names including TEPCO, and with Nissan pressured as Mercedes-Benz is to offload its 3.8% stake in the Japanese automaker, while participants also digested Services PPI data and Japan's top tariff negotiator is set to travel to the US as early as this week. Hang Seng and Shanghai Comp pared early losses and returned to flat territory with some resilience seen after another firm liquidity operation by the PBoC, while it was also reported that China's top trade negotiator Li Chenggang is set to head to the US and will meet with US Trade Representative Greer and senior officials at the Department of the Treasury later this week. US equity futures (ES -0.1%, NQ -0.1%) lacked demand amid Fed independence concerns and after Trump's latest tariff warning, while participants also await earnings from NVIDIA on Wednesday. European equity futures indicate a lower cash market open with Euro Stoxx 50 futures down 0.5% after the cash market closed with gains of 0.8% on Monday.

Top Asian News

• RBA Minutes from the August meeting stated the board saw a strong case for a 25bps cut in the Cash Rate and judged some further reduction in the Cash Rate is likely needed over the coming year, while the stance of policy was still judged somewhat restrictive and it noted the pace of rate cuts would be determined by incoming data and the balance of global risks. RBA Minutes also stated that the board saw arguments for both a gradual pace of easing and for a faster pace, as well as noted the labour market was still a little tight, inflation remained above the midpoint, and domestic demand was recovering. Furthermore, it said uncertainty about spare capacity and the neutral rate also argued for gradual easing, but faster easing might be needed if the labour market was already in balance, risking inflation undershooting the midpoint.
• Japan will invest USD 68bln in India over 10 years including in AI and chips, while India and Japan's PMs intend to revise their countries' joint declaration on security cooperation for the first time in 17 years, according to Nikkei.

European bourses (STOXX 600 -0.7%) began the session on the backfoot and continue to languish around these levels, driven lower by notable underperformance in Paris; France's Government is at risk of collapse after PM Bayrou called for a confidence vote. European sectors opened almost entirely in the red and continued their bearish bias throughout the morning. The underperformers are led lower by French heavyweights, hurting the likes of Banks, Construction and Insurance. French listed Socgen, BNP Paribas, Vinci, AXA and Alstom are the underperformers in the CAC, with losses ranging between -8% to -4%.

Top European News

• UK think tank Resolution Foundation's analysis highlighted a rapid weakening of the jobs market and warned the UK unemployment rate could hit 5% in the three months to August which would be the highest level since the start of 2021, according to FT.
• French Finance Minister Lombard says certainly not resigned to Government falling on September 8; needs to find path to prepare the 2026 budget which will be a recovery budget.

FX

• DXY is steady after Monday's paring of the post-Powell downside. The DXY took a brief leg lower overnight after US President Trump posted a letter removing Fed Governor Cook from her position. If successful, this would put Trump on course for a majority on the Fed board. That being said, Cook has been defiant in stating that she will not resign and that President Trump has no authority to fire her. For today's docket, US durable goods orders and consumer confidence are both due on deck. DXY held above support via its 50DMA at 98.06.
• EUR is resilient despite an unfavourable Eurozone risk backdrop over the past 24 hours. French politics is back in the headlines after French PM Bayrou called for a vote of no confidence on his government's fiscal plans on September 8th. Whilst the EUR is unfazed today, French assets are showing greater concern with the CAC 40 down over 2% and the FR/GE spread at its widest level since April. EUR/USD is back below its 50DMA 1.1651 and towards the bottom end of Monday's 1.1603-1.1723 range.
• JPY is slightly firmer vs. the USD but unable to hold onto the bulk of its APAC gains that were seen as the risk mood soured post-Trump/Cook. A decline in services PPI had little follow-through to the JPY. USD/JPY delved as low as 147.00 overnight, with the pair unable to test its 50DMA to the downside at 146.91.
• GBP is slightly firmer vs. the USD as UK participants return to market after the long weekend. UK traders return to little in the way of positivity however, with the latest BRC shop price data showing that UK food inflation in August rose to its highest level since February 2024. That being said, ING writes that EUR/GBP looks to stay offered this week as French politics prompts some reassessment of long euro exposure. Cable ran out of steam ahead of its 50DMA at 1.3492.
• Antipodeans are both are marginally weaker vs. the USD alongside the downbeat risk tone. There was little follow-through into AUD from the RBA minutes release, which showed that the board saw a strong case for a 25bps cut in the Cash Rate and judged some further reduction in the Cash Rate is likely needed over the coming year.
• PBoC set USD/CNY mid-point at 7.1188 vs exp. 7.1670 (Prev. 7.1161)

Fixed Income

• USTs are trading on the back foot today and lower by a handful of ticks, to currently trade in a 111-25+ to 112-03+ range. A tinderbox of catalysts for markets to digest on Monday and overnight, including trade developments and US President Trump’s decision to fire Cook. On the latter, ING highlights that “the US 2-30 year yield curve broke to a new cyclical high overnight at 122bp”, levels not seen since the start of the Russia-Ukraine war. Ahead, some Tier 2 US data, and with more focus on 2yr supply.
• Bunds are outperforming across global paper today, seemingly catching a “safety” bid, following on from the increasing risks of a French government collapse (discussed in OAT section). Currently trading in a 129.15 to 129.45 range, with price action fairly muted throughout the morning.
• OATs are lower today to the tune of around 10 ticks, extending on the prior day’s losses where French paper reacted to PM Bayrou’s calls for a confidence vote – it doesn’t seem likely he will get that (discussed below). In terms of price action today, OATs have traded in a 121.54 to 121.98 range. As it stands, the 10y German-French spread sits at 78.06bps, heading back towards levels seen on Liberation Day. As a reminder, in the prior session the spread widened roughly 4.3bps, a move which has continued slightly to make a total widening of 12.8bps at most (from Monday's open to current).
• Gilts are the clear underperformer today as UK paper returns from holiday, and plays catch-up to the broader losses seen in the prior session. Of course, French/US political uncertainty is factoring, but also as UK fiscal woes gradually come into the forefront of traders’ minds. As it stands, political commentary has been exceptionally downbeat on how Chancellor Reeves will enact her high growth/no tax increase budget this autumn.

Commodities

• Crude futures trade with losses near USD 0.90/bbl amid a downbeat mood across global markets, and a broad reversal of geopolitical gains made on Monday as Ukrainian Strikes on a Russian oil terminal did not have a great impact to any barrels.
• Spot gold is boasting gains, and is the clear outperformer in the metals space, with Silver flat and Palladium and Platinum continuing losses. The yellow metal benefits after US President Trump ordered the removal of Fed Governor Lisa Cook, alleging false mortgage statements. XAU/USD is currently trading around 3,375/oz.
• Copper outperforms in the base metals space, as it catches up to Chinese optimism after LME trade was closed on Monday. The industrial metal trades within USD 9,792.35-9,867.38/t parameters.
• Chile's mining regulator added requirements to restart sectors of Codelco's El Teniente copper mine affected by the collapse.
• Shanghai Futures Exchange lowers price limits and trading margins for aluminium alloy futures effective from close of settlement on 28 August

Geopolitics: Middle East

• US President Trump said Gaza has to be settled soon, while he thinks they will have a good and conclusive ending within the next 2-3 weeks.
• Australian PM Albanese said the Iranian government directed at least two antisemitic attacks in Australia and the Iranian ambassador will be expelled, while he added that operations at Australia’s embassy in Tehran have been suspended and Australian diplomats are now safe in a third country. Furthermore, the government will legislate to list Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps as a terrorist organisation.

Geopolitics: Ukraine

• US and Russian government officials have discussed several energy deals on the sidelines of negotiations in August that sought to achieve a peace deal in Ukraine, according to multiple sources, via Reuters; talks included Russia purchases of US equipment
• Ukrainian President Zelensky said he had a good meeting with US Envoy Kellogg and that Ukraine values US readiness to be part of Ukraine's security architecture, while he discussed with Kellogg how to exert pressure on Russia to hold "real talks" to end the war and said military cooperation is important with the US, particularly on purchases of weapons and accord on drones. It was separately reported that US and Ukrainian officials are expected to meet later this week.
• US President Trump said regarding talks with Russian President Putin that they are also talking about nuclear missiles and stated "we" would like to denuclearise, while he added that Putin is reluctant to meet Ukrainian President Zelensky because he does not like him. Furthermore, Trump later commented that he discussed denuclearisation with Putin, and thinks that Russia and China would be willing to do it.
• US President Trump said Russian President Putin and Ukrainian President Zelensky should meet, while Trump said he may be there for the Putin-Zelensky meeting or may not and there could be consequences if they do not meet, but we will see what happens over a week or two and at that point, he will step in.

Geopolitics: Other

• US President Trump thinks they can do something on North and South Korea and he looks forward to meeting with North Korean leader Kim, while South Korean President Lee said Trump is the only person who can solve the North Korean issue and that he would like to meet Kim this year.
• South Korean President Lee said he agreed to work closely with US President Trump for peace in the Korean peninsula and noted that North Korea keeps developing its weapons programme as a result of sanctions. Furthermore, Lee said problems cannot be solved solely by pressuring North Korea and that North Korea reached a stage with capabilities of making 10-20 nuclear weapons per year, while it was separately reported that South Korean President Lee invited US President Trump to APEC to pursue a meeting with North Korean leader Kim, according to Newsis.
• North Korea's military said US-South Korea drills prove a US intention to occupy the Korean peninsula, according to KCNA.

US Event Calendar

• 8:30 am: Jul P Durable Goods Orders, est. -3.8%, prior -9.4%
• 8:30 am: Jul P Durables Ex Transportation, est. 0.2%, prior 0.2%
• 8:30 am: Jul P Cap Goods Orders Nondef Ex Air, est. 0.2%, prior -0.8%
• 8:30 am: Jul P Cap Goods Ship Nondef Ex Air, est. 0.17%, prior 0.3%
• 9:00 am: Jun FHFA House Price Index MoM, est. -0.1%, prior -0.2%
• 9:00 am: Jun S&P CoreLogic CS 20-City YoY NSA, est. 2.08%, prior 2.79%
• 9:00 am: Jun S&P CoreLogic CS U.S. HPI YoY NSA, prior 2.25%
• 10:00 am: Aug Richmond Fed Manufact. Index, est. -11, prior -20
• 10:00 am: Aug Conf. Board Consumer Confidence, est. 96.5, prior 97.2

DB's Jim Reid concludes the overnight wrap

Readers rejoining us after the bank holiday weekend in the UK will have plenty to catch up on since Powell’s dovish tilt in Jackson Hole drove a buoyant market mood just in time for the European close on Friday. That strong cross-asset rally lost momentum on Monday, while President Trump's move last night to dismiss Fed Governor Lisa Cook has led long-end Treasuries to sell off amid renewed concerns over Fed independence. Meanwhile in Europe, political risks resurfaced in France yesterday, where the minority government is at risk of collapse in a confidence vote expected on September 8. French assets struggled in response, with the 10yr BTP-OAT spread falling its lowest level since the start of the century.

Starting with the overnight Fed news, in a letter posted last night Trump claimed he had "sufficient cause" to dismiss Governor Cook and was removing her effectively immediately. This follows allegations that Governor Cook had applied for “primary residence” mortgages on two separate properties within two weeks of each other in 2021 before she became Fed Governor. In a statement reported overnight, Cook challenged the move, saying she will not resign as "President Trump purported to fire me ‘for cause’ when no cause exists under the law, and he has no authority to do so". So this could turn into the most market-relevant test so far of Trump's ability to fire officials of independent government agencies. Were Cook's dismissal to hold, it would open up another seat for Trump to fill on the seven-person Federal Reserve Board. With Stephen Miran nominated for the seat recently vacated by Governor Kugler and with Governors Waller and Bowman dissenting in favour of a rate cut at the July meeting, this would increase the prospects of a dovish majority on the Board.

With Trump’s move seen as further escalating the US administration’s attempts to exert influence over the Fed, the dollar saw a kneejerk drop of nearly -0.4% on the news though it has largely reversed this decline as I type. Gold spiked by +1% and is holding on to most of this overnight gain, while futures on the S&P 500 (-0.14%) and the Nasdaq (-0.18%) are modestly lower. Meanwhile, the Treasury curve has seen a sizeable steepening, with the 2yr yield trading -0.7bps lower but the 10yr up +2.9bps and the 30yr +4.5bps to 4.93%. This has brought the 2s30s slope to 122bps, its steepest since January 2022 when the Fed had not yet started its post-Covid hiking cycle.

Earlier on Monday Treasuries had reversed some of Friday’s rally, with 2yr yields up +3.2bps (-9.7bps Friday) and 10yr up +2.5bps (-7.4bps Friday) even as markets still priced an 83% likelihood of a Fed rate cut in September (up from 71% before Powell spoke on Friday). The S&P 500 (-0.43%) lost ground after having its best day since May on Friday (+1.52%). The headline decline was mitigated by continued gains for the Mag-7 (+0.38%) as Nvidia rose +1.03% ahead of its results after market close tomorrow. However, there were broad declines otherwise with 80% of the S&P 500 constituents declining, which was the most in nearly six weeks.

As a brief recap, Powell’s speech at Jackson Hole showed a couple of notable dovish shifts. First, as the Fed Chair suggested that “downside risks to employment” were rising and second, as he noted that the “shifting balance of risks may warrant adjusting our policy stance”. This left a sense that in Powell’s view further labour market weakening was no longer needed to ease policy. Our US economists updated their near-term Fed view in response, now expecting a 25bps cut next month, with further 25bps cuts in December and March (see their reaction on Friday for more).

Remarkably, the moves over the past couple of sessions have been a near-carbon copy of those seen after Powell signaled impending rate cuts at Jackson Hole last year (see our EMR at the time). Both in terms of a strong cross-asset rally on Friday partially reversing on Monday, and in terms of the S&P 500 being within 1% of its all-time highs. Last year this was followed by 100bps of rate cuts over the next three FOMC meetings. This time round – with the fed funds rate now 100bps lower, unemployment stable at 4.2% over the past 12 months and core PCE inflation at 2.8% a smidgen higher than it was a year ago – it’s hard to see economic fundamentals justifying swift policy easing.

In Europe, the big news yesterday came in France where Prime Minister Bayrou called for a confidence vote as he seeks to force support for his budget plan that foresees EUR 44bn of fiscal tightening. The vote is due on September 8 and comments from opposition parties suggest that Bayrou’s minority government is likely to lose it. The government would need to achieve a simple majority in the National Assembly to survive, but officials from both the far-left and the right-wing populist RN said yesterday that they would vote against it. It would then require many of the centre-left Socialist MPs to support the government, but the Socialists’ leadership have suggested overnight that the Party will also vote against it. Should the government lose the confidence vote, President Macron may seek to nominate a different Prime Minister to form a government, who would then face the immediate challenge of passing a 2026 budget.

Alternatively, Macron could call snap elections. Current polls point to another fragmented outcome as happened after the summer 2024 snap vote, though with the far-right RN leading in polls, investors would be watchful whether it could translate this lead into an outright majority this time round.

Following the news, the 10yr OAT-Bund spread widened by +5.3bps to 75bps, its highest level since April, while the spread on Italian BTPs over OATs fell to just 9.8bps, its lowest since the start of our Bloomberg series in 1999. France’s CAC index (-1.59%) posted its biggest decline in three weeks, while the euro had its worst day against the dollar so far this month (-0.85%), closing at 1.1618.

Elsewhere in Europe, bonds and equities saw milder declines on Monday. 10yr bunds yield rose +3.6bps to 2.76%, helped by a decent August Ifo survey that saw its expectations series rise from 90.8 to 91.6, its highest level since February 2022. However, stocks still lost ground across the continent, with the Stoxx 600 down -0.44% as both the DAX (-0.37%) and FTSE MIB (-0.19%) posted modest declines.

Recapping yesterday’s other data releases, US new home sales totaled 652k in July, exceeding expectations (630k) as June data was revised higher from 627k to 656k, while median new sales prices edged lower. Meanwhile, we saw underwhelming regional readings in the Chicago Fed’s activity index (-0.19 vs -0.11 exp) and the Dallas Fed’s manufacturing index (-1.8 bs -0.9 exp).

Overnight in Asia, equity markets are reflecting Monday's losses from Wall Street as well as President Trump’s intensified rhetoric on tariffs yesterday evening. Trump’s comments included a threat of '200% tariffs or something' on China if it does not export rare-earth magnets. He also warned of fresh tariffs and export restrictions on countries that do not remove digital taxes and associated regulations that hit American technology companies. Both the Nikkei (-0.88%) and the KOSPI (-0.94%) are seeing notable declines.

Chinese stocks are mixed this morning, with Hang Seng down -0.22% but the CSI (+0.14%) and the Shanghai Composite (-0.11%) edging higher after rising for the previous four sessions. Indeed, the Shanghai Composite has surged by over +9% since August 1, reaching a new 10-year high on Monday on news of potential additional property market assistance. In a note yesterday (see here ), our China economists dissect what has driven the sudden risk-on performance of China’s on-shore market despite lacklustre economic data and discuss what to expect moving forward.
Looking forward to the rest of the week ahead, Friday will see key inflation data out on both sides of the Atlantic. In the US, our economists expect the July core PCE deflator to come in at +0.29% MoM (vs. +0.26% previous), bringing the YoY rate a tenth higher to 2.9%, with risks of this even rounding up to 3.0%. A 3% reading would be the highest since March 2024. In Europe, we expect the flash August CPI prints for Germany, France and Italy to show a slight uptick in annual inflation (see more from our European economists here).

Before that, we have Nvidia’s results out after the US close tomorrow. With a +33.9% gain, Nvidia has again been the best performer in the Mag-7 year-to-date, but the past couple of quarters saw it deliver smaller earnings surprises after its euphoric growth during 2023-24. Rounding out US events, in tariffs, the "de minimis" exemption will end this Friday, while additional 25% tariffs on India (taking the total levy to 50%) are due to come into effect on Wednesday.

Tyler Durden Tue, 08/26/2025 - 08:29

The Gauntlet Of Fed Chair Powell

Authored by Tuomas Malinen via Substack,

Chairman of the Federal Reserve Jerome Powell signaled a September rate cut in his speech in Jackson Hole on Friday. During the past decade or so, the annual meeting of the most powerful central bankers in Jackson Hole has turned from something we (macro)economists looked forward to into a ‘snake pit’ of central bank policy.

Back in the day, we looked for signals considering monetary policy, but in recent years we have started to worry about messages on world domination.

This year, it is likely that Central Bank Digital Currencies (CBDCs) and the independence of central banks, particularly the Fed, have been prominent topics of discussion, and they can only be described as tools for financial enslavement. The former is nothing more than a plan to take over the global financial system, while the latter is whether the central banks are in government control or not. The implications of the combination of these topics could not be more worrying for us regular citizens.

My friend, who works in a high position at the Bank of Finland, told me in the spring that there’s almost zero understanding towards the Central Bank Digital Currency, or CBDC, pushed by the leadership of the European Central Bank, ECB, among the economists at the BoF. The central bankers within the euro area I’ve spoken with in recent years tend to agree.

My friend summarized all this by noting that “Why on earth should a central bank start to compete with commercial banks?”

This does not make any sense, unless you add a conspiracy into it by noting that the attitude of central bankers towards CBDCs tends to change only at the very top (the leadership of the ECB).

I detailed the likely dark aims of CBDCs in my first entry into the Apocalypse Scenario. It was actually rather worrying, and intriguing, how squarely CBDCs fit into my (absolute) worst-case scenario for the world. It was like they were created for the domination of the financial world, and they probably are, summarized by this part of my piece:

They [commercial banks] would lose most of their freedoms as independent actors. While central bankers would not, at least in the very beginning, enact tough guidelines towards their newly acquired ‘commercial branches’ this would almost certainly change, when the economy falls into recession or if there was some major crisis. In such a case, the central bank would most likely issue strict guidelines on all transactions of banks, dictating what you could buy and from where (consider for example the sanctions against Russia). Moreover, in such situations, central bank and government policies would, most likely, also be strictly enforced on all lending activities. 

This means that lending to both corporations and consumers would be monitored, and only those projects and investments would get financed, which would follow the agenda and policies of the government (and the ‘elite’). 

Think, for example, of the enforcement of the ‘European Green Deal’ in all investment activities.

The striking fact is that there’s even academic research providing a very conspiratorial conclusion on the role of CBDCs in the financial system. Jesús Fernández-Villaverde, Daniel Sanches, Linda Schilling, and Harald Uhlig note in their 2021 paper, published in the Review of Economic Dynamics, that a central bank could be forced to use its profits and its ability to divert lending towards politically desirable ends, such as green initiatives, social, gender, or racial equality, universal basic income, or even towards supporters of politically acceptable political parties, if the independence of the central bank were to be broken. Such outspoken criticism against central banks and speculation on massive political corruption of central banks are utterly unheard of in a respected macroeconomic journal.

In the worst-case scenario, central bank digital currencies could be used to control what you can buy and what investments get financed. For example the European Central Bank (ECB) is already controlling the latter with loans to “dirty” industries (like coal) treated in the balance sheets of banks in such a way that banks get punished for issuing them. This is being done, I hear, despite the major energy issues faced by Europe, which naturally raises questions about the motives and aims of our leaders.

Now let's move back to the standard signals. Chair Powell noted on Friday that, “With policy in restrictive territory, the baseline outlook and the shifting balance of risks may warrant adjusting our policy stance.” This central bank jargon implies that the Federal Reserve (the Federal Open Market Committee) is getting ready to lower rates. This is happening despite the increasing inflation pressures and the U.S. Producer Price Index, or PPI, reaching its highest monthly growth in July since March 2022. Illogical, yes, but our quest for the probable solution doesn't require extensive exploration.

Federal government current expenditures: Interest payments in billions of U.S. dollars. Source: St. Louis Fed, U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis.

The administration of President Trump has gone on a mad spending spree, a possibility we at GnS Economics warned about in January. In just July alone, the U.S. federal government posted a $291 billion deficit, the 2nd largest July deficit on record. President Trump wants to bring down the interest rates so that it would bring some relief for massive interest rate costs (remember that the U.S. 2024 federal budget was $6.8 trillion), and he has been putting a lot of heat on Chairman Powell and FOMC to accomplish this. Yet, are (semi-high) interest rates really the root of the problem? They are not.

From the Bipartisan Policy Center.

Cutting interest rates would solve nothing, because this is a spending and not an interest cost issue, but it would bring temporary relief with a (massive) downside. Per the Kobeissi letter (and Wolf Street):

President Trump is pushing the Federal Reserve to cut interest rates into a darkening inflation picture just so that he would be able to finance an unsustainable borrowing spree from an unsustainable starting point. President Trump has always been good at playing with debt, but now he is likely to be over his head, like we saw in April.

In our (consensus) forecast for 2025 we noted that

The economic policy of President Trump will be first concentrated on helping the economy with tax cuts and shielding U.S. interests with tariffs. However, the deteriorating economic picture in the U.S., and globally, and growing issues in the bond markets will eventually force him to enact drastic spending cuts, which will cause a recession.

• President Trump will float the idea of U.S. defaulting on its federal debt at some point, but will eventually walk back from it, when the implications of such a move to the U.S. and global banking sectors is made clear to him.

Therefore, my dear President, do play freely with the bond market, but please remember that it delivers a nasty bite. And, to Fed Chair J. Powell, I leave this immortal quote by the (great) Paul Volcker:

It is a sobering fact that the prominence of central banks in this century has coincided with a general tendency towards more inflation, not less.

[I]f the overriding objective is price stability, we did better with the nineteenth-century gold standard and passive central banks, with currency boards, or even with 'free banking.'

The truly unique power of a central bank, after all, is the power to create money, and ultimately the power to create is the power to destroy.

Tyler Durden Tue, 08/26/2025 - 08:05

Why The IEA Reinstated Its "Business As Usual" Scenario

Authored by Haley Zaremba via OilPrice.com,

• The IEA has reversed course by reintroducing the “Current Policies Scenario” in its flagship World Energy Outlook, marking a significant policy shift.

• The debate highlights the inherent subjectivity of data in energy modeling and the political stakes tied to forecasting fossil fuel demand.

• U.S. political leaders and fossil fuel advocates pressured the IEA, arguing that its previous modeling discouraged oil and gas investment and threatened energy security.

A great debate is unfolding about the subjectivity of data in producing the energy outlooks that guide public policy and private spending, shaping the future of the global energy sector. The International Energy Agency has been caught in the crossfire of a partisan debate in which environmental and energy industry leaders vehemently disagree about what constitutes accuracy, truth, and good science in data, and particularly in the agency’s flagship World Energy Outlook report. And this year, the fossil fuels industry is getting its way.

It’s easy to forget that data is not objective, nor is it purely subjective. This false dichotomy, according to data expert Melanie Feinberg, “distorts the empirical realities of data collection, the challenging work of forcing unruly phenomena to speak in clean, distinct, ideally quantitative phrases.” Instead, good science is about recognizing the responsibility of being an active decision-maker to produce methods and outputs that most accurately represent complex realities. 

Human-led decisions and difficult choices are being made at every step of developing a report like the International Energy Agency (IEA)’s annual World Energy Outlook – from how to collect and clean the data to how to analyze and report on it.

One of those critical choices is how the agency chooses to construct its projected scenarios for the clean energy transition and the phaseout of fossil fuels. 

The choice that has recently come under scrutiny is whether to include a “Current Policies Scenario” along with the typical scenarios that the agency uses to make its forecasts.

The IEA based its “business as usual” outlooks on current policies until 2019, when the agency decided to switch to a “Stated Policies Scenario,” which it believed to be more accurate.

The difference is that the Stated Policies Scenario assumes certain future policy actions, such as the extension and renewal of policies with end dates.

As an example, before the Inflation Reduction Act, the United States implemented solar and wind power tax credits that expired every few years, at which point they would be reviewed and adjusted as needed. A Current Policies Scenario only includes the policy as written, meaning that the scenario assumes those tax credits would end, since their (likely) renewal wasn’t in writing. A Stated Policy Scenario assumes, on the basis of policy analysis and stated aims, that the tax credits would be renewed. The argument is that while this is not based on concrete policy, it is a more accurate representation of policy – and ultimately a more accurate projection. 

This change in modeling has resulted in projections that foresee a much more rapidly approaching peak fossil fuel demand. This change has yielded some harsh critiques, especially from Republican leadership. Robert McNally, president of research and analysis firm Rapidan Energy and former energy advisor for President George W. Bush, wrote an op-ed earlier this year slamming the IEA for being “neutered” by “climate politics.” McNally wrote for the Wall Street Journal that the EIA’s energy modeling is posing “significant risks” to global energy systems by encouraging underinvestment in oil and gas, thereby undermining “its vital security mission.”

The Trump administration has also been a vocal critic of the IEA, and has recently threatened to withdraw from the agency due to what it sees as "unrealistically green” forecasting.

 “We will do one of two things: we will reform the way the IEA operates or we will withdraw,” said Energy Secretary Chris Wright last month.

“My strong preference is to reform it.”

And now we know that the IEA has yielded to this pushback.

The international agency very quietly confirmed in March calendar notice that this year will mark the much-debated return of the Current Policies Scenario.

The IEA statement noted that this year’s report will include a "wide spectrum of possible outcomes that today's markets and policies imply," encompassing “exploratory scenarios that flow from different assumptions about existing policies, including the Current Policies Scenario, as well as normative pathways that achieve energy and emissions goals in full."

This marks a major policy reversal on the part of the agency, which had previously ardently defended its choice to drop the model.

It also reflects a rapidly changing global policy environment that is more concerned with immediate-term energy security rather than long-term climate realities.

Tyler Durden Tue, 08/26/2025 - 06:30

Trump Family Went Pro-Crypto After Biden 'Weaponized' Banks

Eric Trump, son of US President Donald Trump, said the family became pro-crypto after they were “debanked” in the aftermath of the Capitol attack incident in early 2021.

Several banks shut down hundreds of bank accounts related to the Trump Organization without providing a reason, Trump told The Wall Street Journal, which led to the group having to rely on regional banks before finding a new, unidentified bank, to which they migrated. 

“At that time, I realized how fragile the financial system was and how easily it could be weaponized against you,” said Trump.

CoinTelegraph's Tarang Khaitan reports that the American businessman said that the reason was purely political in nature, which led him to become pro-crypto, as industry insiders told him that the Biden administration was restricting crypto companies from accessing banking services by applying regulatory pressure.

“This whole system was weaponized against them, no different than it had been weaponized against us for different reasons.”

Notably, The Trump Organization sued Capital One in March this year, claiming the bank had closed their accounts due to political reasons, which caused considerable financial harm to the organization.

A month later, Trump said banks must adopt crypto or face extinction in 10 years.

Some claim that banks are sticking to operation chokepoint policies, with banks closing accounts owned by crypto firms.

Eric Trump also spoke in support of the tokenization of real-world assets.

“Why is it that if I wanted to refinance Trump Tower, I couldn’t tokenize this asset and put it on the street for billions of people around the world to otherwise invest in it?” said Trump.

Trump family’s growing ties to crypto

The Trump family has several ties to the crypto industry, which have become the subject of critics who allege that they have used it to enrich themselves. 

This includes Donald Trump’s official memecoin, TRUMP, launched days before getting inaugurated as the 47th US president.

World Liberty Financial was launched on Sept. 16, 2024, and currently offers the USD1 stablecoin. The website lists Donald Trump as co-founder emeritus, while his sons are listed as co-founders.

Trump’s sons Donald Trump Jr. and Eric Trump are the founders of American Bitcoin, a subsidiary of Hut 8, which raised $220 million to purchase Bitcoin and Bitcoin mining equipment.

According to an Aug. 11 report, Donald Trump has amassed a fortune of $2.4 billion from his crypto endeavors. 

Eric Trump denied allegations that the Trump family profited from his father being elected as the 47th president. He has also floated the idea of him or one of his family members potentially running for the presidency in the 2028 election.

Tyler Durden Tue, 08/26/2025 - 05:45

Nuclear War, Volcanos, & Trump's New $500 Note; Martin Armstrong Says Gold Is Going Much Higher

Via Greg Hunter’s USAWatchdog.com,

Five weeks ago, legendary financial and geopolitical cycle analyst Martin Armstrong warned his “Socrates” predictive computer program showed a “100% Chance of Nuclear War.”  After that, Trump was able to get Putin to Alaska to start meaningful peace talks between Russia and Ukraine.  The chance for war is still 100%, but now, that war may not involve America. 

Armstrong explains, “My sources in Ukraine are telling me the losses on the battlefield are approaching 1.8 million, 5 million fled to Russia, 8 million fled to the EU..."

"Ukraine is about ready to fall apart... I spread this to Washington and that is President Zelensky was sending $50 million per month to UAE.  So, Zelensky has been preparing to leave.  There is no way this guy could possibly retire in Ukraine.  They will kill him.”

Does this mean the war may be over?

Zelensky and nearly all of Europe’s leaders came to Washington recently to meet with President Trump, but it really was not to talk peace.  Armstrong says:

“The fact that all those leaders came to Washington - uninvited, they all met with Zelensky before they went to meet with Trump.  Why did they come?  Because they need war.  I have warned Washington.”

So, if Europe starts a wider war with Russia, will Trump stay out of it?  Armstrong says:

“Yes, Trump said no American troops from what I have been told.  Trump refuses to send any American troops to Ukraine as peacekeepers—period.”

Reading between the lines, does this mean Trump is putting the EU on notice we are not going to Article 5 in if you start a war?  Armstrong says, “Article 5 is voluntary..."

"  I have made this very clear to them in Washington.  You don’t have to participate. . .. I can’t stop the war.  The best I can do is reduce the amplitude.  If I can keep America out of this war, that is our best outcome...

Europe knows it’s in trouble financially.  They have $335 billion of Russian assets frozen.  France has about $71 billion...

The rumor going around right now is if there is a peace deal and they have to release those frozen assets, France can’t because they have been dipping into them.  Europe is a complete mess. 

When it comes down to handing back $335 billion in Russian assets, I am not sure Europe is prepared to do that.”

Armstrong says forget all the talk of the elite wanting to get rid of cash and replace it with digital currency.  Armstrong says, “No, no, no..."

"  Why is Trump talking about a $500 note. . .. Trump would not even contemplate doing a $500 bill if he was going to cancel the currency. 

Everybody else is cancelling currency and putting in capital controls, and Trump is going in the opposite direction. . .. 

Gold is still projected to go much higher because it is anticipating war.”

One of the surprising things Armstrong brought up are new signals from “Socrates” on increasing volcanic activity all over the world.  Hawaii’s Kilauea eruption happened for the 31st time since December on Friday.  It spewed lava for 12 hours, and then there was the recent eruption in Northeast Russia that had a huge eruption after 600 years of lying dormant. 

Armstrong says, “We have every data base in there.  Earthquakes, volcanos and temperatures back to 1869 from New York City.  It does not show global warming. . .. "

"The computer says we are heading to global cooling and not global warming...

The computer is showing from 2025 on, we are going to be seeing a lot more volcanic activity. 

I just got off the phone with someone from Italy, and they say the super volcano there is starting to become active.”

In closing, Armstrong says, “I still want to have one of those $500 notes.”

There is more in the 64-minute interview.

Join Greg Hunter of USAWatchdog.com as he goes One-on-One with Martin Armstrong, who will update us on war, the dollar and increased volcanos for 8.23.25

Tyler Durden Tue, 08/26/2025 - 05:00

Roblox Accused Of Enabling Predator Who Exploited 10-Year-Old Girl

A North Carolina mother is suing Roblox, accusing the gaming platform of enabling a predator to sexually exploit her 10-year-old daughter. 

The lawsuit, filed in state court, claims Roblox knowingly fostered a “pedophile hellscape” despite marketing itself as safe for children. The girl, referred to as Jane Doe N.L., allegedly endured “unimaginable harm” after a predator posing as a child groomed her on the app and coerced her into sending explicit photos, according to the NY Post.

According to the filing, the predator rewarded her with Robux, Roblox’s virtual currency, and threatened to revoke it if she didn’t comply. The complaint argues Roblox’s lax safeguards — including reliance on self-reported birthdates and, until late 2023, settings that allowed adults to message minors — directly enabled the abuse.

“Had Defendant disclosed the truth of what was really occurring on its app, Plaintiff’s mother would never have permitted Plaintiff to use this app without her strict supervision,” the lawsuit states.

Roblox denies wrongdoing. “We are deeply troubled by any incident that endangers our users, and safety is a top priority,” a company spokesperson said. The company insists it invests heavily in moderation and technology, adding: “We also partner with law enforcement and leading child safety organizations worldwide to combat the sexual exploitation of children.”

Still, the suit points to contradictions in Roblox’s public messaging. In 2019, Vice President Tami Bhaumik admitted that “digital civility did not exist at Roblox a year and a half ago,” while a former employee told Hindenburg Research: “You can keep your players safe, but then it would be less of them on the platform.”

Attorney Matthew Dolman, representing the family, called the case “a terrifying reminder of the world we live in where capitalist greed far outweighs humanity,” adding: “There have never been sufficient safety measures and protocols in place, and children are suffering unimaginably.”

Recall, days ago, LA Attorney General Liz Murrill sued Roblox Corp. in state court, accusing the California-based company of enabling predators to target children and “facilitate the distribution of child sexual abuse material” on its platform.

These lawsuits come less than a year after high-profile short seller Hindenburg Research published a sweeping investigation into Roblox, alleging the platform is not only a haven for sexual predators but also misleads investors about the size and engagement of its user base.

Hindenburg claimed its research uncovered “digital strip clubs, red light districts, sex parties and child predators lurking on Roblox” despite years of scandals and public promises to clean up the platform. 

According to Hindenburg, Roblox’s open search system allowed a self-identified under-13 account to join groups like “Adult Studios,” which had thousands of members allegedly trading child pornography and soliciting sexual acts from minors.

Tyler Durden Tue, 08/26/2025 - 04:15

Data Center Operators Rush To Secure Gas Connections In The UK

Authored by Irina Slav via OilPrice.com,

Data center developers in the UK are scrambling to get their facilities hooked to gas-fired generation capacity, the Financial Times has reported, citing five such projects planned for southern England.

“The national gas transmission network is ready to play a key role in facilitating this critical investment today while working in partnership with the electricity networks,” the FT quoted the chief commercial officer of National Gas as saying in comments on the news.

The Starmer government has made artificial intelligence one of its top priority areas of future economic growth, alongside its net-zero plans that involve a substantial reduction in the share of oil and gas in the UK’s energy mix—but not just yet.

According to the Financial Times report, the developers of those five data centers in southern England had already submitted formal applications to National Gas to get connected to the gas network.

At the same time, some developers were planning to build their own gas-fired power plants because of the long waits for national gas grid connections.

The proliferation of data centers has turbocharged electricity demand growth, prompting a rush to secure reliable generation capacity.

In the United States, power utilities are set to spend $212.1 billion in capex this year, which would be a 22.3% increase on the year as they race to secure new electricity supply for data centers.

In the UK, data centers are also driving an investment rush in nuclear.

Earlier this year, the Starmer government said it would partner with Big Tech majors to pursue an expansion in nuclear capacity to respond to the power demand of data center operators. 

Natural gas, however, has emerged as the Goldilocks power generation source for the AI industry as it can be built faster than a conventional nuclear power plant and generates lower emissions than a coal plant, while providing baseload supply, unlike wind and solar.

Tyler Durden Tue, 08/26/2025 - 03:30

U.S. Bars China, Russia, Iran From Undersea Cable Supply Chains

The U.S. government is overhauling undersea cable rules for the first time since 2001, tightening restrictions to keep companies linked to adversaries such as China, Russia, and Iran out of the supply chain, according to Nikkei Asia.

The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) approved proposed rules that bar adversary-based firms from working on U.S.-owned undersea cables or supplying related equipment. Approved companies will need cybersecurity plans and must certify their supply chains are free of such entities.

To encourage investment, the FCC will streamline approvals for U.S. firms and partners from Japan and Europe, cutting the typical two-year process. Reapproval will be required every 25 years instead of every three, as originally proposed.

Nikkei writes that the rules could benefit trusted suppliers like Japan’s NEC, though they face added screening obligations.

Globally, 90% of undersea cables are made by NEC, U.S.-based SubCom, and France’s Alcatel Submarine Networks. China’s HMN Technologies is expanding, particularly in Africa and the Pacific.

Undersea cables carry more than 95% of international data traffic and facilitate an estimated $10 trillion in daily financial transactions. Tech giants like Google, Meta, and Amazon are among the largest operators. Concerns over Chinese involvement intensified after incidents such as a Chinese-crewed ship damaging a cable in the Taiwan Strait in April.

Tyler Durden Tue, 08/26/2025 - 02:45

Zelensky Wants EU To Provide $1BN Monthly Allowance To Fuel War Against Russia

Via The Cradle

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky stated Monday that Kiev plans to secure at least $1 billion monthly from European nations to purchase US weapons to continue his war against Russia.

Zelensky made the comment while speaking alongside Norwegian Prime Minister Jonas Gahr Store during a press conference in the Ukrainian capital. President Donald Trump is seeking to move away from providing weapons directly to Kiev. He instead wants European nations to purchase US weapons for the Ukrainian military to continue the war.

Office of the Ukrainian Presidency

The Ukrainian president also said Norway could contribute to security guarantees for Ukraine with an emphasis on providing air defense and maritime security.

On Sunday, US Vice President JD Vance claimed Russia has been “flexible” and made “significant concessions” in some core demands as part of negotiations to end the war, including regarding US and European security guarantees.

“They've recognized that they're not going to be able to install a puppet regime in Kiev. That was, of course, a major demand at the beginning. And importantly, they've acknowledged that there is going to be some security guarantee to the territorial integrity of Ukraine,” Vance stated while speaking on NBC News' Meet the Press talk show on Sunday.

Last week, Axios reported that senior officials from the US, Ukraine, and several European countries were discussing a proposal for security guarantees for Ukraine, likely involving US air power.

In an interview with Fox News, President Trump stressed no US troops would be sent to Ukraine, but that he was open to providing air support to European ground forces should they be deployed to the country.

Trump also said he thought Russian President Vladimir Putin would be willing to accept such US and European security guarantees for Ukraine.

A first official look at Ukraine’s other operational land attack cruise missile; the Long Neptune.

The Neptune LACM reportedly has a range of roughly 1000km, and has already seen combat this year. pic.twitter.com/cPHJ5sjZlu

— OSINTtechnical (@Osinttechnical) August 25, 2025

However, the Russian Foreign Ministry has said it “categorically” rejects the possibility of “a military contingent with the participation of NATO countries” inside Ukraine.

Tyler Durden Tue, 08/26/2025 - 02:00

Wild Theories Abound Over Gigantic "Comet" Careening Through Our Solar System In The Fall

Authored by Michael Snyder via TheMostImportantNews.com,

A colossal interstellar space rock that was originally known as “A11pl3Z” but has since been given the designation “3I/ATLAS” will be making a very alarming run through our solar system in September and October.  Based on their initial observations, scientists estimated that 3I/ATLAS has a diameter of approximately 20 kilometers, and that would make it larger than Manhattan.  But now scientists are telling us that it is probably at most 5.6 kilometers wide.  Even if it is only about 5 kilometers wide, we are still talking about an extinction-level event if it were to hit us.

 Over the next couple of months, 3I/ATLAS will be zipping through our solar system at a speed of about 130,000 miles per hour, and scientists assure us that the gravity of the sun cannot significantly alter the trajectory of anything moving that fast.  

But what if they are wrong?

As you will see below, 3I/ATLAS is supposed to fly past Mars at a distance of just 0.19 AU on October 3rd.

That is even closer than astronomers were originally projecting, and that is making some people nervous.

Hopefully the experts are correct and there is no threat of collision, because if this thing actually hit Mars it would be a cataclysm unlike anything that any of us have ever seen.

According to Harvard astrophysicist Avi Loeb, it appears that 3I/ATLAS may actually be emitting its own light…

Interstellar object 3I/ATLAS — which is zooming through our inner solar system — appears to be emitting its own light, according to Harvard astrophysicist Avi Loeb.

The observation by Loeb, if verified, would contradict NASA’s classification of the Manhattan-size object as a comet, the scientist argues in a new blog post.

Obviously, more observations will have to be done in order to confirm this.

But there are essentially two options.

If this theory is not true and 3I/ATLAS is not emitting its own light, Loeb says that this giant space rock is probably about 12 miles long…

If 3I/ATLAS were reflecting light, it would mean the object was 12 miles long, which is improbable, according to the astrophysicist.

I cannot even imagine an object that is 12 miles long and that is traveling at 130,000 miles per hour.

Can you?

The second option is that 3I/ATLAS is emitting its own light, and that would be even more ominous, because Loeb believes that 3I/ATLAS could potentially be “a spacecraft powered by nuclear energy”…

Loeb speculated that the nucleus of the object could in fact be nuclear — and possibly an engine crafted by an alien people.

“A natural nuclear source could be a rare fragment from the core of a nearby supernova that is rich in radioactive material. This possibility is highly unlikely, given the scarce reservoir of radioactive elements in interstellar space,” Loeb wrote.

“Alternatively, 3I/ATLAS could be a spacecraft powered by nuclear energy, and the dust emitted from its frontal surface might be from dirt that accumulated on its surface during its interstellar travel,” Loeb conjectured, adding, “This cannot be ruled out, but requires better evidence to be viable.”

And Loeb has pointed out that the fact that the trajectory of 3I/ATLAS will take it so close to Mars, Venus and Jupiter is more evidence for the theory that it could be an alien spacecraft…

Loeb has also raised questions about its unusual trajectory.

“If you imagine objects entering the solar system from random directions, just one in 500 of them would be aligned so well with the orbits of the planets,” Loeb told Fox News Digital earlier this month.

The interstellar object, which comes from the center of the Milky Way, is also expected to pass near Mars, Venus and Jupiter, another improbable coincidence, he said.

“It also comes close to each of them, with a probability of one in 20,000,” he said.

For the record, I think that Loeb is way out in left field on this.

I do not believe that 3I/ATLAS is an alien spacecraft.

But I do believe that it is a very dangerous space rock.

And it does appear that it will travel alarmingly close to Mars, Venus and Jupiter…

It follows a retrograde orbit aligned within 5 degrees of the ecliptic plane, passing close to Venus at 0.65 astronomical units, Mars at 0.19 AU, and Jupiter at 0.36 AU. Loeb calculates the probability of such alignments at 0.005 percent for random arrivals.

When I originally wrote about this giant space rock, we were being told that it would pass Mars at a distance of approximately 0.4 AU.

But now we are being told that it will pass Mars at a distance of just 0.19 AU on October 3rd.

I know that is still a relatively safe distance, but it is a little too close for comfort in my book.

And could it be possible that our astronomers will modify their projections again as we get closer to October 3rd?

They have already more than halved the projected distance between 3I/ATLAS and Mars.

This is a story that we will want to watch very closely.

Following the close encounter with Mars, 3I/ATLAS is expected to be closest to the Sun on October 30th.

Subsequently, 3I/ATLAS is supposed to come closest to Earth on December 19th at a distance of approximately 1.8 astronomical units.

That is very good news, because as I pointed out in a previous article, it has been estimated that if a giant space rock that is just 11 or 12 kilometers wide hit us it would “wipe out most everything on Earth”…

For an asteroid to wipe out most everything on Earth, it would have to be massive. Scientists estimate it would take an asteroid about 7 to 8 miles (11 to 12 kilometers) wide crashing into the Earth. Once it made impact, it would create a tremendous dust plume that would envelope the entire planet, block out the sun and raise temperatures where the asteroid made impact. Billions would die, and much of life on the planet would be destroyed. But, scientists believe some would survive.

Thankfully, 3I/ATLAS is not going to hit us, but the clock is certainly ticking for humanity.

In fact, even mainstream scientists are now warning that humanity is living on borrowed time…

In a game of Russian roulette with a standard Colt revolver, the chances of instant death are one-in-six.

Terrifyingly, that’s the same as the odds of humanity being wiped out within 75 years – everyone dead in a cataclysmic and total breakdown of civilisation, according to Oxford University futurologist Toby Ord, an expert on the threat of artificial intelligence.

Does it sound impossibly bleak? His colleague Nick Bostrom is more pessimistic still. He rates the possibility of human extinction by the next century as one in four.

Pulitzer prize-winning writer Jared Diamond is even less hopeful, predicting our species’ chances of survival beyond 2050 – just 25 years away – are no better than evens, or 50/50.

Our self-destructive behaviors are slowly but surely killing our civilization in thousands of different ways.

So even if we are extremely fortunate and a giant space rock does not hit our planet in any of our lifetimes, the truth is that our civilization would still be facing one existential crisis after another.

Michael’s new book entitled “10 Prophetic Events That Are Coming Next” is available in paperback and for the Kindle on Amazon.com, and you can subscribe to his Substack newsletter at michaeltsnyder.substack.com.

Tyler Durden Mon, 08/25/2025 - 23:25

Trump Plans To Block Offshore Wind Farm Project Near Biden's Beach House 

President Trump’s war on unreliable green energy is shifting into high gear, with the administration now targeting a massive offshore wind project planned off the coast of Maryland, according to Bloomberg. The move comes just days after the White House halted construction on an offshore wind farm off Rhode Island over unresolved national security concerns - and may also serve as a jab at far-left Maryland Governor Wes Moore, who has tried to out-green neighboring states with disastrous energy policies that have now morphed into a power-bill crisis.

The Interior Department is preparing to revoke a $6 billion permit for U.S. Wind’s planned development of up to 114 turbines, located 10 nautical miles off Ocean City -  or just down the road from Joe Biden’s beach house in the liberal-elite enclave of Rehoboth.

The project was approved under the Biden-Harris regime last year and was slated to begin construction next year. It has been unpopular from the start with many Marylanders, who argue the windmills would pollute the natural surroundings. 

Apollo Global Management and Toto Holding SpA back US Wind. The company told Bloomberg: "We remain confident that the federal permits we secured after a multi-year and rigorous public review process are legally sound." 

Local media reports...

UPDATE: Both Ocean City's Mayor and Town Manager have expressed their approval of the Trump Administration's latest court filing indicating the federal government's plans to revoke US Wind's federal permit approvals. Md. Congressman Andy Harris also applauded the move.

— WBOC TV16 (@wboc) August 25, 2025

Last Friday, the Interior Department ordered construction halted on the 80%-completed Revolution Wind offshore project off Rhode Island, citing unresolved national security concerns under federal review. This sent shares of Orsted A/S, the developer of the offshore wind farm, crashing on Monday in European hours, down around 16%.  

 

Tyler Durden Mon, 08/25/2025 - 21:20

Trump Plans To Block Offshore Wind Farm Project Near Biden's Beach House 

President Trump’s war on unreliable green energy is shifting into high gear, with the administration now targeting a massive offshore wind project planned off the coast of Maryland, according to Bloomberg. The move comes just days after the White House halted construction on an offshore wind farm off Rhode Island over unresolved national security concerns - and may also serve as a jab at far-left Maryland Governor Wes Moore, who has tried to out-green neighboring states with disastrous energy policies that have now morphed into a power-bill crisis.

The Interior Department is preparing to revoke a $6 billion permit for U.S. Wind’s planned development of up to 114 turbines, located 10 nautical miles off Ocean City -  or just down the road from Joe Biden’s beach house in the liberal-elite enclave of Rehoboth.

The project was approved under the Biden-Harris regime last year and was slated to begin construction next year. It has been unpopular from the start with many Marylanders, who argue the windmills would pollute the natural surroundings. 

Apollo Global Management and Toto Holding SpA back US Wind. The company told Bloomberg: "We remain confident that the federal permits we secured after a multi-year and rigorous public review process are legally sound." 

Local media reports...

UPDATE: Both Ocean City's Mayor and Town Manager have expressed their approval of the Trump Administration's latest court filing indicating the federal government's plans to revoke US Wind's federal permit approvals. Md. Congressman Andy Harris also applauded the move.

— WBOC TV16 (@wboc) August 25, 2025

Last Friday, the Interior Department ordered construction halted on the 80%-completed Revolution Wind offshore project off Rhode Island, citing unresolved national security concerns under federal review. This sent shares of Orsted A/S, the developer of the offshore wind farm, crashing on Monday in European hours, down around 16%.  

 

Tyler Durden Mon, 08/25/2025 - 21:20

Why More Farmers Are Turning To AI Machines

Authored by Autumn Spredemann via The Epoch Times,

Artificial intelligence-powered harvesters, drones, and precision farming systems are quickly entering the mainstream of American agriculture. At its core, the technology promises efficiency and sustainability and carries a potential solution to a decades-old farming problem: the need for physical labor.

As the capabilities of robotics evolve, many jobs that once required human hands are being delegated to machines. Some artificial intelligence (AI) developers working on integrating this technology into America’s farms say early data support the possibility of a major farm labor force reduction.

The American Farm Bureau Federation estimated 17 percent of all U.S. agricultural labor in fiscal year 2024 comprised temporary migrant workers brought in under the H-2A visa program.

There are also millions of illegal immigrant workers, who, according to the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) made up 42 percent of farm workers from 2020 to 2022.

Roman Rylko, chief technology officer  of Pynest, said his company has worked with vegetable growers in the Midwest to deploy AI systems.

“We built the onboard model that lets an autonomous weeder separate spinach seedlings from pigweed in real time. A single rig now clears a 50-acre block in about eight hours. Before, that job meant a crew of 10 walking the rows for two days,” he told The Epoch Times.

Rylko’s firm works with growers to implement machine-learning models into field-deployable robotics.

“Autonomous tractors won’t kill field labor; they’ll move it up the stack, from stoop work to sensor maintenance and fleet orchestration,” he said.

“Our growers cut seasonal hand-weeding hours by roughly 70 percent, yet hired two techs to keep cameras clean, retrain the model on new cultivars and swap battery packs.”

Migrant farmworkers harvest lettuce in Brawley, Calif., on Dec. 10, 2024. U.S. agriculture has long relied on migrant labor, but advances in robotics and AI could significantly reduce the farm workforce. Sandy Huffaker/AFP via Getty Images

Rylko cited data from a recent AI-powered machine trial.

“Our last trial logged 1.6 million weeds pulled per day—equivalent to 12 workers—at 32 percent lower total cost per acre,” Rylko said.

“The grower’s biggest surprise wasn’t speed, it was consistency. Robots don’t call in sick during peak weed flush.”

Among the producers paving the way for AI in the fields is Wish Farms, a Florida-based berry grower that has been experimenting with robotic harvesters in response to persistent labor shortages.

Wish Farms grows strawberries, one of the most labor-intensive commercial row crops. In collaboration with Harvest CROO Robotics, Wish Farms has test-piloted an all-in-one crop solution with an AI-powered machine.

Joe McGee, the CEO of Harvest CROO Robotics, told The Epoch Times that strawberries are an ideal place for AI to step into the farm labor scene.

“Strawberries need to be picked every three days. It’s one of the most dense labor crops you could pick,” he said.

This is where automated crop management can offer what McGee called a “pick to pack” solution.

“The company completed its first commercial runs of fully autonomous strawberry harvesting earlier this year and in the 2024–2025 Florida season,” McGee said.

“Our harvester, robotics system, and AI have been autonomously harvesting strawberries in production fields, and we’ve shipped revenue-generating berries.”

Roughly the size of a shipping container, the AI-powered, camera-guided machine McGee described crawls between rows of berries, its robotic arms rapidly identifying and yanking the delicate produce for weighing and packing. Normally, this work could take a stooped labor force days to complete, depending on the weather, heat index, and amount of daylight hours available.

It takes about 16 hours for the AI harvester to complete the same work. The machine can perform the equivalent work of 25 human laborers, according to McGee.

An attendee watches the smart farming Doosan Robotics M1013 (L) robot demonstrate its capabilities at CES 2022 at the Las Vegas Convention Center on Jan. 6, 2022. The M1013 can measure the sweetness of fruit and harvest them without bruising. It can also be used for seeding, watering, planting, and pesticide spraying. Ethan Miller/Getty Images

The AI-powered harvester also does more than just pick strawberries. It performs the complete sequence of tasks from transitioning between rows to scanning, identifying, and picking ripe berries. They are then sanitized and chilled to prepare for immediate packaging.

This is a more critical part of the process than most realize. If a strawberry is picked, weighed, and packaged, but not up to grade for retail selling, it will get rejected. This can cost a producer a lot of money. Three percent of a crop can be lost in packaging alone, while retail distribution accounts for another 18 percent of produce losses, according to the USDA.

“Food may be left unharvested in a field or not sold by a distributor for a variety of economic reasons, including price volatility, labor cost, lack of refrigeration infrastructure, consumer preferences, quality-based contracts, and various policies related to produce,” the USDA stated.

According to McGee, seasonal workers have monetary incentives to harvest the largest possible volume, so their judgment on quality isn’t always aligned with retail sale requirements. This is where AI-harvesters can step in and make a no-stakes decision based on programming.

McGee said after the initial cosmetic analysis, the strawberries go to the upper deck of the AI harvester, where it has to pass the weight test. If the product is underweight by retail standards, it won’t be packaged.

“The error rate of human pickers is around 10 percent, but with AI, we can get that down to zero,” McGee said.

Rylko and McGee aren’t the only ones who see a promising partnership between AI and agriculture. University studies and field tests are being conducted with AI robotics in North Carolina, Georgia, and Iowa for yield monitoring, weeding, pest control, and harvesting. All of these jobs currently require a substantial amount of manual labor.

A solar-powered Aigen Element autonomous AI robot demonstrates how it hammers down on targets at Bowles Farm in Los Banos, Calif., on June 26, 2025. The robot eliminates herbicide-resistant weeds with precise ground strikes, reducing chemical use and saving labor. Josh Edelson/AFP via Getty Images

“We’re living in very exciting times for AI and agriculture,” said Baskar Ganapathysubramanian, director of the AI Institute for Resilient Agriculture at Iowa State University.

“We’re going to see significant progress in the next decade.”

Meanwhile, heavy equipment manufacturers such as John Deere have also entered the AI farming race with fully autonomous tractors that can plow and plant without a driver in the cab.

Beyond picking and packing, a 2023 study published in AI & Society supports the position that AI may be able to resolve the long-standing issue of farm labor shortages. Last year, there were an estimated 2.4 million agricultural job openings in the United States, and 56 percent of farmers reported worker shortages.

Changing Seasons

For decades, the U.S. agricultural sector has depended heavily on migrant workers, particularly acquired through the H-2A visa program, which allows foreign workers to take temporary agricultural jobs. As more farms turn to AI for solutions, the long-term role of these seasonal workers is uncertain.

In a Baker Institute for Public Policy report, researchers found that foreign workers—legal and illegal—play a “disproportionate role in ensuring a reliable supply of food for American households.”

A recent Kaiser Family Foundation analysis found that 47 percent of all U.S. agricultural workers are illegal immigrants without proper work authorization, while 18 percent are noncitizens, with legal working status.

Around 400,000 certified H-2A workers arrive in the United States annually, according to the USDA.

Migrant farmworkers harvest spinach near Coachella, Calif., on Feb. 24, 2017. H-2A visa workers constituted about 17 percent of U.S. farm labor in fiscal 2024, according to American Farm Bureau Federation estimates. David McNew/AFP via Getty Images

But McGee has seen how even legal workers can be expensive, complicated, and unreliable for producers.

A farmer pays thousands of dollars to bring the seasonal workers in, transport and house them, then McGee said many simply “abscond” before or near the end of their work contract.

“So the issue is getting the people, the cost of the people, and the reliability of having them for the whole season,” he said.

Rylko said his company’s early testing supports the idea of a reduced need for human labor.

“Relative gains and the shift in labor profile are representative of what we’re seeing across several [AI-machine] deployments,” he said.

Nonetheless, it will take time and a lot of investment to meet the existing demand from American farms. Machine labor or otherwise.

Like all new technologies, AI-driven farm equipment comes with hefty upfront costs into the tens of thousands. This could deter smaller agricultural producers. Base prices for autonomous tractors are around $500,000, without including maintenance and electricity needs.

McGee said his company validated their AI-powered harvester this year, but is currently facing funding hurdles to reach the next stage because this emerging technology is still an “unstructured market.”

“Right now, we have one harvester, but the demand [from other farms] is 1,500. We have a grower in Florida that placed an order for 165 machines,” he said.

Investment in the AI-agriculture market was valued at just under $2 billion in 2023, according to Grand View Research, and it is expected to surge at a compound annual growth rate of more than 25 percent per year through 2030.

Tyler Durden Mon, 08/25/2025 - 20:55

Why More Farmers Are Turning To AI Machines

Authored by Autumn Spredemann via The Epoch Times,

Artificial intelligence-powered harvesters, drones, and precision farming systems are quickly entering the mainstream of American agriculture. At its core, the technology promises efficiency and sustainability and carries a potential solution to a decades-old farming problem: the need for physical labor.

As the capabilities of robotics evolve, many jobs that once required human hands are being delegated to machines. Some artificial intelligence (AI) developers working on integrating this technology into America’s farms say early data support the possibility of a major farm labor force reduction.

The American Farm Bureau Federation estimated 17 percent of all U.S. agricultural labor in fiscal year 2024 comprised temporary migrant workers brought in under the H-2A visa program.

There are also millions of illegal immigrant workers, who, according to the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) made up 42 percent of farm workers from 2020 to 2022.

Roman Rylko, chief technology officer  of Pynest, said his company has worked with vegetable growers in the Midwest to deploy AI systems.

“We built the onboard model that lets an autonomous weeder separate spinach seedlings from pigweed in real time. A single rig now clears a 50-acre block in about eight hours. Before, that job meant a crew of 10 walking the rows for two days,” he told The Epoch Times.

Rylko’s firm works with growers to implement machine-learning models into field-deployable robotics.

“Autonomous tractors won’t kill field labor; they’ll move it up the stack, from stoop work to sensor maintenance and fleet orchestration,” he said.

“Our growers cut seasonal hand-weeding hours by roughly 70 percent, yet hired two techs to keep cameras clean, retrain the model on new cultivars and swap battery packs.”

Migrant farmworkers harvest lettuce in Brawley, Calif., on Dec. 10, 2024. U.S. agriculture has long relied on migrant labor, but advances in robotics and AI could significantly reduce the farm workforce. Sandy Huffaker/AFP via Getty Images

Rylko cited data from a recent AI-powered machine trial.

“Our last trial logged 1.6 million weeds pulled per day—equivalent to 12 workers—at 32 percent lower total cost per acre,” Rylko said.

“The grower’s biggest surprise wasn’t speed, it was consistency. Robots don’t call in sick during peak weed flush.”

Among the producers paving the way for AI in the fields is Wish Farms, a Florida-based berry grower that has been experimenting with robotic harvesters in response to persistent labor shortages.

Wish Farms grows strawberries, one of the most labor-intensive commercial row crops. In collaboration with Harvest CROO Robotics, Wish Farms has test-piloted an all-in-one crop solution with an AI-powered machine.

Joe McGee, the CEO of Harvest CROO Robotics, told The Epoch Times that strawberries are an ideal place for AI to step into the farm labor scene.

“Strawberries need to be picked every three days. It’s one of the most dense labor crops you could pick,” he said.

This is where automated crop management can offer what McGee called a “pick to pack” solution.

“The company completed its first commercial runs of fully autonomous strawberry harvesting earlier this year and in the 2024–2025 Florida season,” McGee said.

“Our harvester, robotics system, and AI have been autonomously harvesting strawberries in production fields, and we’ve shipped revenue-generating berries.”

Roughly the size of a shipping container, the AI-powered, camera-guided machine McGee described crawls between rows of berries, its robotic arms rapidly identifying and yanking the delicate produce for weighing and packing. Normally, this work could take a stooped labor force days to complete, depending on the weather, heat index, and amount of daylight hours available.

It takes about 16 hours for the AI harvester to complete the same work. The machine can perform the equivalent work of 25 human laborers, according to McGee.

An attendee watches the smart farming Doosan Robotics M1013 (L) robot demonstrate its capabilities at CES 2022 at the Las Vegas Convention Center on Jan. 6, 2022. The M1013 can measure the sweetness of fruit and harvest them without bruising. It can also be used for seeding, watering, planting, and pesticide spraying. Ethan Miller/Getty Images

The AI-powered harvester also does more than just pick strawberries. It performs the complete sequence of tasks from transitioning between rows to scanning, identifying, and picking ripe berries. They are then sanitized and chilled to prepare for immediate packaging.

This is a more critical part of the process than most realize. If a strawberry is picked, weighed, and packaged, but not up to grade for retail selling, it will get rejected. This can cost a producer a lot of money. Three percent of a crop can be lost in packaging alone, while retail distribution accounts for another 18 percent of produce losses, according to the USDA.

“Food may be left unharvested in a field or not sold by a distributor for a variety of economic reasons, including price volatility, labor cost, lack of refrigeration infrastructure, consumer preferences, quality-based contracts, and various policies related to produce,” the USDA stated.

According to McGee, seasonal workers have monetary incentives to harvest the largest possible volume, so their judgment on quality isn’t always aligned with retail sale requirements. This is where AI-harvesters can step in and make a no-stakes decision based on programming.

McGee said after the initial cosmetic analysis, the strawberries go to the upper deck of the AI harvester, where it has to pass the weight test. If the product is underweight by retail standards, it won’t be packaged.

“The error rate of human pickers is around 10 percent, but with AI, we can get that down to zero,” McGee said.

Rylko and McGee aren’t the only ones who see a promising partnership between AI and agriculture. University studies and field tests are being conducted with AI robotics in North Carolina, Georgia, and Iowa for yield monitoring, weeding, pest control, and harvesting. All of these jobs currently require a substantial amount of manual labor.

A solar-powered Aigen Element autonomous AI robot demonstrates how it hammers down on targets at Bowles Farm in Los Banos, Calif., on June 26, 2025. The robot eliminates herbicide-resistant weeds with precise ground strikes, reducing chemical use and saving labor. Josh Edelson/AFP via Getty Images

“We’re living in very exciting times for AI and agriculture,” said Baskar Ganapathysubramanian, director of the AI Institute for Resilient Agriculture at Iowa State University.

“We’re going to see significant progress in the next decade.”

Meanwhile, heavy equipment manufacturers such as John Deere have also entered the AI farming race with fully autonomous tractors that can plow and plant without a driver in the cab.

Beyond picking and packing, a 2023 study published in AI & Society supports the position that AI may be able to resolve the long-standing issue of farm labor shortages. Last year, there were an estimated 2.4 million agricultural job openings in the United States, and 56 percent of farmers reported worker shortages.

Changing Seasons

For decades, the U.S. agricultural sector has depended heavily on migrant workers, particularly acquired through the H-2A visa program, which allows foreign workers to take temporary agricultural jobs. As more farms turn to AI for solutions, the long-term role of these seasonal workers is uncertain.

In a Baker Institute for Public Policy report, researchers found that foreign workers—legal and illegal—play a “disproportionate role in ensuring a reliable supply of food for American households.”

A recent Kaiser Family Foundation analysis found that 47 percent of all U.S. agricultural workers are illegal immigrants without proper work authorization, while 18 percent are noncitizens, with legal working status.

Around 400,000 certified H-2A workers arrive in the United States annually, according to the USDA.

Migrant farmworkers harvest spinach near Coachella, Calif., on Feb. 24, 2017. H-2A visa workers constituted about 17 percent of U.S. farm labor in fiscal 2024, according to American Farm Bureau Federation estimates. David McNew/AFP via Getty Images

But McGee has seen how even legal workers can be expensive, complicated, and unreliable for producers.

A farmer pays thousands of dollars to bring the seasonal workers in, transport and house them, then McGee said many simply “abscond” before or near the end of their work contract.

“So the issue is getting the people, the cost of the people, and the reliability of having them for the whole season,” he said.

Rylko said his company’s early testing supports the idea of a reduced need for human labor.

“Relative gains and the shift in labor profile are representative of what we’re seeing across several [AI-machine] deployments,” he said.

Nonetheless, it will take time and a lot of investment to meet the existing demand from American farms. Machine labor or otherwise.

Like all new technologies, AI-driven farm equipment comes with hefty upfront costs into the tens of thousands. This could deter smaller agricultural producers. Base prices for autonomous tractors are around $500,000, without including maintenance and electricity needs.

McGee said his company validated their AI-powered harvester this year, but is currently facing funding hurdles to reach the next stage because this emerging technology is still an “unstructured market.”

“Right now, we have one harvester, but the demand [from other farms] is 1,500. We have a grower in Florida that placed an order for 165 machines,” he said.

Investment in the AI-agriculture market was valued at just under $2 billion in 2023, according to Grand View Research, and it is expected to surge at a compound annual growth rate of more than 25 percent per year through 2030.

Tyler Durden Mon, 08/25/2025 - 20:55

First Human Case Of Flesh-Eating Screwworm Detected In Sanctuary State Of Maryland 

The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) reported the first human case of travel-associated New World screwworm in Maryland after a "patient" returned from El Salvador, according to Reuters, citing HHS spokesman Andrew G. Nixon. Details about the patient's immigration status were not released, though it's worth noting that Maryland is a far-left Democratic Party stronghold and a sanctuary state.

Screwworms have been moving north from Central America through Mexico since 2023, with a new case identified in July about 400 miles south of the U.S. border in Veracruz. The U.S. Department of Agriculture's (USDA) response was to shut down cross-border activity of cattle ports of entry into the U.S. to mitigate the biosecurity threat.  

More details from the Reuters report:

• HHS reported the first human case of travel-associated New World screwworm in the U.S. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) confirmed the parasite on August 4 in a patient returning from El Salvador.

• Industry sources earlier told Reuters the patient had traveled from Guatemala, and Beef Alliance emails circulated this version to livestock stakeholders. HHS did not clarify the discrepancy.

• HHS says the risk to U.S. public health is very low. No U.S. animal cases have been reported this year.

For humans, screwworm infestations are survivable with treatment, but this is the first U.S. case that has sent alarm bells across public health officials and the cattle industry. Left untreated, these parasites can kill hosts, such as cattle, wildlife, and pets. 

Here is USDA's response so far:

• Sterile fly facility: USDA Secretary Brooke Rollins recently announced plans for a new sterile fly facility in Texas (Moore Air Force Base), modeled on past eradication campaigns. The facility will take 2–3 years to build.

• Mexico is also building a $51 million sterile fly plant in the south. Currently, only one plant exists (Panama City), producing 100 million sterile flies weekly - but 500 million are needed to push infestations back to the Darien Gap.

USDA estimates that a Texas screwworm outbreak could devastate the cattle industry, inflicting $1.8 billion in losses from livestock deaths, labor, and treatment costs. The biothreat comes at a time when the nation's cattle herd is the smallest in 70 years, beef prices are at record highs, and feedlot margins remain extremely tight.

A confluence of factors - including shrinking herds, droughts, tariffs - is pushing up beef prices at the supermarket to record levels... 

The good news:

• 12-Year Cattle Cycle Bottoms: Tyson CEO Predicts Rebuild Phase Beginning Next Year

USDA officially classifies screwworms as an "agricultural biosecurity threat," and one has to wonder, given recent cases of Chinese nationals caught smuggling "agroterrorism" fungi into the country, whether these parasites could be weaponized as part of hybrid warfare by foreign adversaries.

 

Tyler Durden Mon, 08/25/2025 - 20:30

First Human Case Of Flesh-Eating Screwworm Detected In Sanctuary State Of Maryland 

The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) reported the first human case of travel-associated New World screwworm in Maryland after a "patient" returned from El Salvador, according to Reuters, citing HHS spokesman Andrew G. Nixon. Details about the patient's immigration status were not released, though it's worth noting that Maryland is a far-left Democratic Party stronghold and a sanctuary state.

Screwworms have been moving north from Central America through Mexico since 2023, with a new case identified in July about 400 miles south of the U.S. border in Veracruz. The U.S. Department of Agriculture's (USDA) response was to shut down cross-border activity of cattle ports of entry into the U.S. to mitigate the biosecurity threat.  

More details from the Reuters report:

• HHS reported the first human case of travel-associated New World screwworm in the U.S. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) confirmed the parasite on August 4 in a patient returning from El Salvador.

• Industry sources earlier told Reuters the patient had traveled from Guatemala, and Beef Alliance emails circulated this version to livestock stakeholders. HHS did not clarify the discrepancy.

• HHS says the risk to U.S. public health is very low. No U.S. animal cases have been reported this year.

For humans, screwworm infestations are survivable with treatment, but this is the first U.S. case that has sent alarm bells across public health officials and the cattle industry. Left untreated, these parasites can kill hosts, such as cattle, wildlife, and pets. 

Here is USDA's response so far:

• Sterile fly facility: USDA Secretary Brooke Rollins recently announced plans for a new sterile fly facility in Texas (Moore Air Force Base), modeled on past eradication campaigns. The facility will take 2–3 years to build.

• Mexico is also building a $51 million sterile fly plant in the south. Currently, only one plant exists (Panama City), producing 100 million sterile flies weekly - but 500 million are needed to push infestations back to the Darien Gap.

USDA estimates that a Texas screwworm outbreak could devastate the cattle industry, inflicting $1.8 billion in losses from livestock deaths, labor, and treatment costs. The biothreat comes at a time when the nation's cattle herd is the smallest in 70 years, beef prices are at record highs, and feedlot margins remain extremely tight.

A confluence of factors - including shrinking herds, droughts, tariffs - is pushing up beef prices at the supermarket to record levels... 

The good news:

• 12-Year Cattle Cycle Bottoms: Tyson CEO Predicts Rebuild Phase Beginning Next Year

USDA officially classifies screwworms as an "agricultural biosecurity threat," and one has to wonder, given recent cases of Chinese nationals caught smuggling "agroterrorism" fungi into the country, whether these parasites could be weaponized as part of hybrid warfare by foreign adversaries.

 

Tyler Durden Mon, 08/25/2025 - 20:30

Lisa Cook'd: Trump Fires Fed Governor For "Potentially Criminal Conduct" Creating Another Opening On Fed Board

Update (2330ET): Former Fed governor Lisa Cook says she will not resign, the Washington Post reports, citing a statement from Cook.

“President Trump purported to fire me ‘for cause’ when no cause exists under the law, and he has no authority to do so,” Cook said through a spokeswoman: WaPo

“I will continue to carry out my duties to help the American economy as I have been doing since 2022,” Cook said

Good luck with that plan when the FBI turns up tomorrow at your place of work.

*  *  *

Promises made... promises kept...

On Friday, President Trump warned that he would fire Federal Reserve Governor Lisa Cook who allegedly "falsified bank documents and property records to acquire more favorable loan terms" if she didn't resign...

.@POTUS on Federal Reserve Governor Lisa Cook: "I'll fire her if she doesn't resign. What she did was bad, so I'll fire her if she doesn't resign." pic.twitter.com/1vEv7k7ar8

— Rapid Response 47 (@RapidResponse47) August 22, 2025

She immediately played the victim card, claiming she "would not be bullied".

But now that is moot as President Trump has fired her, effective immediately:

" I have determined that there is sufficient cause to remove you from your position...

...

The Federal Reserve has tremendous responsibility for setting interest rates and regulating reserve and member banks. The American people must be able to have full confidence in the honesty of the members entrusted with setting policy and overseeing the Federal Reserve.

In light of your deceitful and potentially criminal conduct in a financial matter, they cannot and I do not have such confidence in your integrity.

At a minimum, the conduct at issue exhibits the sort of gross negligence in financial transactions that calls into question your competence and trustworthiness as a financial regulator."

Full letter below: 

Trump will now have a majority on the Fed Board...

If/when Cook leaves/is fired, Trump will have a majority on the Fed board pic.twitter.com/6Hxn8f2PPw

— zerohedge (@zerohedge) August 21, 2025

Trump was quick to make note of her dismissal on Truth Social:

Reminder, The Fed is not political... etc, etc...

Exactly 6 years later, Trump has an answer to Dudley's op-ed https://t.co/sHwvmxAKhp

— zerohedge (@zerohedge) August 26, 2025

There is a silver lining for her...

The good news is Cook will soon be able to refinance at a much lower rate. https://t.co/5Coxyp8iDd

— zerohedge (@zerohedge) August 26, 2025

How long before Democrats decry this racist act and demand it be appealed all the way to SCOTUS?

Or will she skulk away sheepishly admitting she broke the law rather than face the discovery that Bill Pulte has already exposed?

There was a notable market reaction to this move with gold rallying as the dollar dropped and short-end bonds are bid (stocks lower)...

With rate-cut odds rising for Sept and more for December.

Tyler Durden Mon, 08/25/2025 - 20:15