Authored by Jack Hunter via Libertarian Institute 

Piers Morgan recently said on his program of Russian President Vladimir Putin, “I do think he’s the nearest thing to a modern day Hitler…” Libertarian Institute Director Scott Horton had something to say about that. “You know what?” Horton said. “Noriega’s Hitler and Saddam’s Hitler and Milosevic’s Hitler and Putin’s Hitler. It sounds to me like Adolf was just another Hitler.”

“And apparently, any country that America doesn’t like, we can just start an aggressive war against them because they’re all the same as that one guy that one time,” he exclaimed.

Morgan: I actually do think [Putin is] the nearest thing to a modern-day Hitler. Scott Horton: Noriega's Hitler, and Saddam is Hitler, and Milosevic is Hitler, and Putin is Hitler. It sounds to me like Adolf was just another Hitler! https://t.co/1G3sDIxm5a

— Furkan Gözükara (@FurkanGozukara) October 15, 2026

Horton is right: There is a broad consensus that the supremely evil, mid-twentieth century German National Socialist dictator, responsible for the Holocaust and other horrors, deserved death and defeat for his crimes. Which is why so many war advocates ever since have tried to cast whoever they want to go to war against as being on par with Hitler. But just like Satan, there can only be one—unless you crave war.

I could not possibly list every would-be Hitler that American leaders have wanted to take out. Scott listed off a few examples of enemies, real and imagined, going back to Panamanian dictator Manuel Noriega of the Reagan-era ‘80s and Slobadan Milosevic in the Bill Clinton ‘90s, and then Iraq’s Saddam Hussein in this century.

In the post 9/11 era alone, the late Senator Lindsey Graham (R-SC) warned that if Muammar Gaddafi wasn’t taken out in 2011, the Libyan dictator would strike European cities.

Like Hitler, of course.

“He actually means it,” Graham said of Gaddafi fifteen years ago. “Hitler meant it. He means it.” Graham would also later compare Syria’s head Bashar al Assad to Hitler. Graham also assured us over a decade ago that the Iranian regime were Nazis, and of course that Putin was also Hitler.

Everybody’s Hitler!

Graham had plenty of company. For starters, he certainly wasn’t the only person to do this with Gaddafi.

The same goes for Assad. Secretary of State John Kerry said in 2013 that “Bashar al-Assad now joins the list of Adolf Hitler and Saddam Hussein who have used these weapons in time of war,” referring to certain claims about the use of chemical weapons. Two decades ago, it was all the rage for some leaders to claim Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad was Hitler. Trump even said this year at the beginning of his war with Iran that its leaders are the worst people since Hitler.

Senator Ted Cruz (R-TX) declared over a decade ago that “appeasing” Iran was another “Munich moment” like when England negotiated with Germany in 1938. The late Senator John McCain (R-AZ) did the same in 2013 when he said of President Barack Obama shaking hands with Cuban President Raul Castro, “Neville Chamberlain shook hands with Hitler.”

How did all this let’s-get-the-next-Hitler war drooling turn out?

America’s role in deposing Libya’s Gaddafi created an instability in the region that created a vacuum for ISIS, a foreign policy decision Obama would eventually call the “worst mistake” of his presidency.

The United States would end up arming al-Qaeda members against Syria’s Assad, and now a former member of the terrorist group that carried out the 9/11 attacks is that country’s president.

“Never Forget.”

How has going after the allegedly Hitlerian Iranian government gone so far? That disaster is still in progress. But its authors have also teased regime change against Cuban Nazis too.

Surely Cuban regime change would be an unparalleled success!

It’s probably worth noting that the Ukrainian forces U.S. war advocates support have within their ranks actual neo-Nazis (something Horton also noted to Piers Morgan).

Also, doesn’t equating everything with Hitler undermine the unique severity of the Holocaust tragedy and ultimately disrespect its victims?

Also, for Republicans who constantly invoke this, how many times have political opponents of Donald Trump compared the president to Germany’s Fuhrer? Many things can be said about Trump, including exhibiting authoritarian behavior. But Hitler?’That’s not remotely serious. About as serious as Republicans comparing Barack Obama to Hitler.

Just stop.

It’s not that so many of these foreign actors aren’t horrific. Of course they are. But the United States can’t go to war with every country on earth to solve every wrong or ill. That’s not America’s mission, or shouldn’t be.

But the reason to compare every potential war to World War II and every foreign foe to Hitler is because most people find it impossible to argue against a war with Hitler.

That’s key. Whether it’s true, not so much.

Everyone we don’t like is not Hitler. It’s dumb and dishonest to say so.

So expect people to keep doing just that.

The video game industry is collapsing in 2026 under the weight of their own arrogance and stupidity, and the "chuds" are cheering.  Why?  Because this is what needs to happen before better companies and better games can be made.  The people who ruined the hobby with their politics need to lose their jobs and be exiled from the business.  

Around 13,000 games developers are slated to be fired this year alone.  Since 2022, the industry has cut over 57,000 workers due to imploding revenues and lack of consumer interest.  Microsoft, Sony, Ubisoft, EA and a dozen other studios are cleaning house and booting out the rubbish. 

The most recent example is the large Xbox cuts to ultra-woke Bethesda Softworks.  Their layoffs (reportedly close to 440 workers) triggered socialist protests and accusations of discrimination against LGBT and minority employees.

The vast majority of these layoffs are being blamed on "restructuring", but the restructuring was caused by a plunge in gamer interest.  And the decline in gamer interest is part of an ongoing boycott of woke propaganda in games.  This is something the political left will never admit to, but the fact remains that the majority of developers who get woke, ultimately go broke.  In other words, the majority of woke products fail. 

Gaming studio Bioware, a veteran company in the industry, did not learn this lesson soon enough.  Bioware officially announced this week that after 30 years, they will be shutting down.  

https://t.co/TicSujMWps

— BioWare (@bioware) October 21, 2026

The company dove headfirst into woke virtue signaling around 2016-2017 and it was all downhill from there.  Critics say the final nail in the coffin was the game Dragon Age: Veilguard, which is widely considered one of the most ridiculously homosexual games ever produced.  The game was so notorious, it is still the subject of internet mockery to this day.  

For anyone with common sense, it's easy to see why the company is being scrapped by parent company Electronic Arts (EA).  Veilguard was the last game they published before they hit rock bottom.  Industry shill and activists initially claimed that Veilgaurd sales were doing well, despite evidence to the contrary.  The estimated cost of development and marketing was around $250 million, and it took around 9 years to make. 

After release, most estimates suggest the game pulled in less than $50 million in total sales.  An utter disaster.   

At its historical peak, BioWare employed around 500 people. By the time of the October 2026 closure announcement the remaining staff was around 50 people, all of them are now being laid off.  The lesson here is clear:  The progressive invasion of gaming media was a disaster for these companies. 

Those who want to survive past 2026 need to accept an undeniable reality - The consumers own you, you do not own them.  You cannot force gamers to buy your products. You cannot shame them into opening their wallets. Games are not a platform for your degenerate fanfiction.  They are not a platform for your personal politics. The "modern audience" you are trying to appeal to does not exist. You cannot win. 

Either make games that the people you call "chuds" enjoy, or go broke and get replaced.  It's that simple. 

Authored by Andrew Korybko via Substack,

Although Putin might agree to some trade-offs in Ukraine as the quid pro quo for these deals, it's not guaranteed, but they can still be clinched so long as Trump has the will to waive more sanctions without a ceasefire first.

Putin's top aide Yury Ushakov confirmed after Steve Witkoff's latest meeting with Putin that "Other large-scale joint economic projects, which offer significant prospects for bilateral cooperation, were also discussed in detail; some of them are now nearing the implementation stage." This followed Putin courting the return of US investment to Russia's resource sector in early 2025 and Kirill Dmitriev recently confirming talks on nuclear-powered data centers.

Here are the five most promising joint opportunities:

* Oil & Gas

US stakes in Russia's energy infrastructure and companies can incentivize it to get the EU to return Russia's frozen assets through the sequence proposed here. They'd also serve as security guarantees against Ukrainian attacks on pain of the US cutting Ukraine off if it attacks assets in which Trump personally obtained stakes for the US. A separate injection of US capital into Russia's energy industry as the new "deal of the century" can reshape the global industry by reducing dependence on the Gulf.

* Critical Minerals

Russia's globally significant critical mineral deposits remain woefully underexploited, but with US stakes in this industry through the abovementioned sequence and separate capital injections, it can be brought online relatively quickly for accelerating the US' diversification from dependence on China. Russia's sparsely populated Siberia and Far East regions can also host pollution-heavy processing facilities far away from populated and agricultural areas. This makes joint investments extremely attractive.

* Data Centers

Per Dmitriev's recent disclosure, talks on nuclear-powered data centers represent another promising opportunity for both countries. Russia's globally significant critical mineral deposits could be processed in the country as proposed above and then immediately put to use within these facilities. That can greatly lower the cost of constructing them, while maintaining them would be similarly cost-effective through nuclear-powered means. This could lay the basis for global nuclear and tech partnerships too.

* Power Plants

Critical mineral processing facilities and data centers can also be powered by hydroelectric dams, not just nuclear power plants, and the US can obtain stakes in all four - the facilities, centers, dams, and plants - through the return of Russia's frozen EU assets as proposed. Separate capital injections can help fund the costs of construction in exchange for greater stakes, and any excess electricity produced through new dams and nuclear power plants can be exported to Russia's neighbors, both in Asia and Europe.

* International Logistics

The mineral deposits in which the US recently invested in Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan can reach jointly owned processing facilities in Russia through the Trans-Siberian Railway and then onward to the global market. The same goes for the US' related investments in similarly landlocked Mongolia. As the gatekeepers of the Northern Sea Route and Northwest Passage through their control of the Bering Strait, separate Arctic logistical cooperation is possible too, as is cooperation on nuclear-powered icebreakers.

"Trump Is More Serious Than Ever About Cutting Deals With Putin" in order for their long-negotiated resource-centric strategic partnership, the essence of which is described in the preceding hyperlinked analyses, to irreversibly shift the balance of the Sino-US systemic rivalry in the US' favor. Although Putin might agree to some trade-offs in Ukraine as the quid pro quo for these deals, it's not guaranteed, but they can still be clinched so long as Trump has the will to waive more sanctions without a ceasefire first.

Multiple gunmen brutally attacked a church in Jordan on Friday in the middle of a funeral, killing at least seven people and wounding 34 others - in what is one of the worst terror attacks on Christians in the country's modern history.

The Jordanian government quickly condemned the act as terrorism, and authorities are reportedly seeking the attackers amid an investigation.

It happened in Jordan’s Karak region, south of the capital of Amman, at St. George Orthodox Church - in a region which has been home to a sizeable ancient Christian community for some 2,000 years.

According to a Reuters description of the terror assault:

Interior Minister Mazin Al Farrayeh said the attack had been carried out by "extremists", but that ⁠it was too early to tell whether they had any links to known groups either inside or outside Jordan. There was ​no immediate claim of responsibility.

A video aired on Jordan's state-owned Al-Mamlaka television station that appeared to be from a security camera ​mounted on the church showed three people firing at it from a sidewalk and hiding behind trees and a low wall. The video showed the attackers then running towards the church's entrance. Reuters was able to verify the video from the entry path and wall surrounding the church, as ​well as other details.

Some reports have been suggesting an ISIS or other takfiri or jihadist association of the attackers, but there's been nothing official yet as to their identities.

The attack happened for several minutes, with people at the entrance of the church seen scattering, and with some immediately collapsing to the ground after being hit amid a hail of bullets. The attackers appeared to go inside the church, where the massacre continued. Around 150 to 200 people were at the church at the time.

مشاهد من كاميرا مراقبة لتنفيذ الهجوم الذي استهدف كنيسة في الكرك https://t.co/3F2DUewLsH

— العربية عاجل (@AlArabiya_Brk) October 23, 2026

Jordan's King Abdullah soon after said the killers would be apprehended and punished "with an iron fist".

"The terrorist attack against Karak will be met with the harshest retaliation. Those who delude themselves into thinking that they can divide Jordanians with their bullets have no chance in the face of our unity," he said in a statement.

St. George Church is under the ecclesiastical jurisdiction of the Greek Orthodox Patriarchate of Jerusalem. Orthodox Christianity in Jordan is so old and rooted that it predates the birth of Islam by centuries, going back to Biblical times. Indigenous Christians there have over the centuries spoken and worshipped in ancient languages including Arabic, Greek, and Aramaic.

The US ambassador ⁠to the ​United Nations Mike Waltz called the attack on Jordanian Christians a "depraved and brutal attack on a house of worship."

7 dead, 10 injured in attack on Orthodox funeral in Jordan (+VIDEO) https://t.co/ucnQn83pLb Gunmen opened fire on mourners inside a church during a funeral in central Jordan, killing at least seven people and wounding ten more. https://t.co/5bGB0FJsSz

— Orthodox Christianity (@Orthodoxy2019) October 23, 2026

In neighboring Syria, Iraq, the West Bank, and Gaza - ancient Christian communities have also suffered attacks, along with being squeezed by fast-moving geopolitical events.

US policy in the region has not been friendly to Middle East Christians, and Washington continues to barely acknowledge their presence. For example, throughout the Syria proxy war to oust Assad, the US covertly armed and funded groups which openly declared they seek to exterminate Christians, Alawites, Shiites, and other non-Sunni religious minorities.

*  *  *

For more on Levantine Christians and Geopolitics:

"We are a church of martyrs and we will stay."

This book is the result of years of Syrian Christians warning what's coming. We collected the interviews from 2015-2020. Last words to me of a priest in Damascus while we sat on Straight Street: "We are a church of martyrs & we will stay." #Syria is home. https://t.co/JsjacQwNJO

— Brad Hoff (@BradRHoff) March 9, 2025

Authored by Jeffrey A. Tucker via The Brownstone Institute,

“Out, damned spot! Out, I say!” said Lady Macbeth as she paced in a hallucinatory state, reliving in her subconscious the murders she helped plan. She rubbed her hands as if washing them, to wash away the sin, following up the promise to her son that “a little water clears us of this deed.”

The line comes to mind from the latest dump of entries from the diaries of Anthony Fauci that cover the months December 2021 to May 2022. These were the darkest months of the Covid era.

Confidence that the virus was a lab creation was growing. That points directly to Fauci. The lockdowns had given rise to growing population-wide fury. And the shot was not working, not stopping infection or spread while groups reporting deep injury from injection could not be censored fast enough to make them vanish completely, though tech companies certainly tried.

Fauci still held his position at NIAID with certainty that he would keep it under President Biden, whose confidence he enjoyed. He was daily in touch with the people who were actually running the government – aides Ron Klain and Jeff Zients – and coordinated his decisions with them. They trusted him to continue the Covid operation, which they all knew to be a national security issue beyond the control of any political player. Fauci was the front man but an effective one, until he became a liability.

We know from previous entries that Fauci at first hoped the new virus would get lost in the mix of a bad flu season. This was mid-January 2020. The CDC called him out on that. His first scheme failed because a savvy businessman in China spilled the beans by posting the sequence on a pay-to-play website in mid-January.

After pressing a friend and former colleague to use his personal credit card to download the sequence, Fauci launched plan B, which was to deny the lab leak and prepare a nationwide inoculation to make it all go away.

The audacious scheme was to keep population immunity at the lowest levels possible through lockdowns while the shot went through clinical trials and was ready for distribution. Fauci knew for certain that this was the type of virus that would mutate rapidly. His hope was to take the energy out of the pace of mutation by reducing the infection rate as low as possible.

Sadly for him, the new and most powerful variant had appeared just as his shots hit general distribution. Delta disabled their protection that had been formulated for wild type and Alpha. The race was on, as mutations appeared faster than repeated boosters could catch.

The spot would not go away no matter what he did.

The darkest hours open with the appearance of Omicron in December of 2021, the fastest spreading but least virulent strain. He now had a new problem. With Omicron operating as a form of inoculation itself, there was less reason for vaccination than ever, especially given the risk of injury. And yet his goal of 90 percent coverage was nowhere in view, while population opposition to the entire Covidian regime was rising.

Fauci might as well have thrown up his hands, admitted defeat, apologized for putting the country through the biggest trauma of our lifetimes, and ruining the lives of students everywhere, in addition to crushing the dreams of millions of small business owners.

But that is not who he is. He would not and could not accept responsibility for doing this. He ended up demonizing the opposition, scrambling for cover, wrapping himself in ever more layers of fame for protection, and clinging to the lies he told himself as self-justification as his career and legacy were permanently tarnished beyond repair, even as he developed a severe and strange case of germaphobia in a Macbeth-like way.

Two weeks before this tranche begins, Biden had gone on TV to declare the following: “We are looking at a winter of severe illness and death for the unvaccinated – for themselves, their families and the hospitals they’ll soon overwhelm. But there’s good news: If you’re vaccinated and you have your booster shot, you’re protected from severe illness and death.”

It was an intense claim even as the weakest of all variants had just appeared, even as evidence poured in that these injections provided no protection whatsoever. Regardless, the Biden administration was dedicated to ruining a second holiday season with terrifying warnings all in the hope of maximum shot coverage.

Fauci begins his diary close to Christmas in a dispute with the CDC, which was starting to open up a bit and lighten up on its diktats. It wanted to permit people to choose whether to get tested yet again after recovering from Covid. Fauci smelled a rat – that dread thing called freedom – and tried to strangle the baby in the crib.

Meanwhile the opposition campaign gained new steam from the release of Robert F. Kennedy, Jr.’s masterpiece, The Real Anthony Fauci, and he had headlined a rally on Capitol Hill that galvanized a movement. Fauci was aware of the growing opposition but was mostly dismissive.

By February 2022, pressure was rising to open up the economy and society and Fauci was on the backfoot. He was still defending China-style lockdowns before he later claimed never to support them at all.

Fauci began collecting international endorsements to assure himself of the good job he had done.

The White House, meanwhile, was increasingly concerned about the sheer number of military men and women who had quit rather than submit to vaccination. What kind of militia might they form if it came to that? Fauci claimed not to be worried about that at all, observing that they must not have liked their jobs very much. This is a man entering into deep denial.

Meanwhile, he was being more honest with himself about the lack of efficacy of the shots themselves.

His fame and stardom became his only solace, the warm blanket in which he wrapped himself for comfort from the storms outside.

Another strange feature of this period is how Fauci became absolutely obsessed with avoiding any possibility of catching Covid. He started panicking in crowds, taking his own advice ever more seriously. He started cancelling dinners and meetings.

Thinking through why, consider that he knew that this virus was created in a lab and he knew that the shots would not protect against it. He now had fully two years to turn over these facts in his brain. They began to eat at him more and more. No matter how many times he boosted himself, his paranoia only grew worse.

By the spring, even Fauci started admitting that both he and the CDC were completely making things up. There was no science to anything they were saying and he knew it. Even he had lost faith in the system he created, playing a scientist only on TV.

By late April, Fauci was starting to clamor for other ways to understand all that had unfolded. Maybe the Great Barrington Declaration had been correct all along? He could never admit it to himself. But his egregious failures to control the virus through any means finally led him there through a side door.

That said, Fauci’s own personal germaphobia only intensified to the point that it was debilitating.

This tranche ends with Fauci’s paranoias growing, his fears of the opposition intensifying, and finally mollifying his psychological breakdown by reflecting on his own global fame, which he regarded as his only real hope to avoid the consequences of all that he had done.

Fauci was finally pushed out of his job later in the year, mostly because of growing concerns that the more he talked, the more the resistance to vaccination grew. There are even indications in this drop that it was industry itself that pushed him out for doing such a bad job in selling their product. He found safe haven at Georgetown University in a high-paid post.

And where are we today? Fauci will talk with no one, no reporters, not even on background. His last public appearance consisted of 110 invocations of his right to remain silent under the 5th Amendment.

The spot never went away, no matter how much sanitizer he rubbed on his hands. “Life’s but a walking shadow, a poor player,” he might be saying to himself, “that struts and frets his hour upon the stage, And then is heard no more. It is a tale, Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing.”

America's reindustrialization depends on securing reliable, conflict-free supplies of critical materials, including rare earths and other critical metals, most of which are produced and processed overseas.

The Trump administration has made rebuilding and strengthening domestic critical material supply chains a national security priority. Its designation of helium as a critical material on Friday morning extends that effort to now include the industrial gas used for semiconductor manufacturing and many other applications. 

The Energy Department's decision earlier today makes the 20th critical material designated by the agency and brings the industrial gas within the Energy Act of 2020's critical materials framework, including closer government monitoring.

Energy Secretary Chris Wright wrote in a statement, "President Trump is bringing back America's manufacturing industry, and that means making sure we have the materials needed to build things in America again."

Wright continued, "Helium is essential to producing the semiconductors and advanced technologies that power our economy. By designating helium as a critical material, we are taking another step toward securing our supply chains, creating American jobs, and ensuring the United States leads the world in energy and technological innovation."

Helium is recovered as a byproduct of natural gas processing and faces growing geopolitical risks in the Gulf area. Qatar's exports have been severely curtailed by Iran's closure of the Strait of Hormuz and attacks on Qatari infrastructure, while Russia imposed temporary export controls in April. 

The good news is that the US remains one of the top helium producers in the world, supplying 81 million cubic meters in 2025, or about 43% of global output. It exported 38 million cubic meters that year.

Helium is critical to applications ranging from chipmaking to medical imaging to quantum computing to magnets to space rockets. 

Assistant Energy Secretary Audrey Robertson warned that shortages could become a "single point of failure" for strategically important industries. The Canadian Press quoted her in an interview.

"We need to make sure that we can build those here. And helium is one of those components that could be a single point of failure, where we cannot let that happen. That's why we're designating it within our statutory authority, but I think why it's important is not necessarily for our birthday parties," Robertson said in an interview. "It's really towards the future of American competitiveness and energy security, which we believe is national security."

Designating helium as a critical material under the Energy Act of 2020 brings it within DOE's framework for developing, demonstrating, and commercializing critical material technologies to support America's reindustrialization efforts. 

The new designation could help qualifying helium projects access government financing, technical assistance, and partnerships, similar to support provided to rare earth miners.

Authored by Aldgra Fredly via The Epoch Times,

The Department of Justice (DOJ) filed a notice of appeal on Oct. 22 in its bid to block California from counting mail-in ballots from voters whom the federal government suspected of being noncitizens.

The DOJ asked the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals to intervene after U.S. District Judge David Carter failed to rule on its emergency application for injunctive relief by noon Thursday, the deadline set by the department.

The department said the judge's silence amounted to what it called a "constructive denial" of its emergency application for preliminary injunctive relief, citing the "critical and exigent nature" of the case.

The DOJ sued California on Oct. 15 to prevent the counting of mail-in ballots from more than 20,000 people identified by the federal government as likely noncitizens.

The federal government asked that if California was not able to independently confirm the citizenship of the voters registered, the state should set aside ballots received until citizenship could be confirmed.

Los Angeles County said on Oct. 15 that it could not comply with the DOJ's demand because the department has not provided evidence, sources, or methodology to establish that the individuals identified in its records were ineligible to vote.

"We cannot withhold or refuse to count ballots based solely on unverified allegations, nor can we disregard the legal requirements governing our election - and we certainly have no authority to act on records that are outside of our jurisdiction," the county said in an Oct. 15 statement.

In its Oct. 21 emergency filing for a temporary restraining order, the DOJ said state and county officials contended they lacked the mechanisms and authority to prevent noncitizens from voting in the midterm elections.

The department argued that this showed an immediate threat to the integrity of lawful votes.

"As defendants continue processing ballots that cannot later be segregated or verified for eligibility, the dilution of lawful votes accelerates in real time," the DOJ said in its filing.

"This is an emergency. Every minute of processing that occurs without segregating the ballots of suspected non-eligible voters causes untraceable disenfranchisement and dilution of the votes of United States citizens."

Los Angeles County filed a motion on Oct. 21 asking the judge to dismiss the DOJ's lawsuit, arguing the department lacked legal standing to bring the case.

"The executive, like any other plaintiff, must identify a concrete injury, actual or imminent, fairly traceable to the county's conduct and likely to be redressed by the requested relief. The complaint identifies none," it said.

Acting U.S. Deputy Attorney General Trent McCotter sent a letter to the Los Angeles County Counsel's office on Oct. 16, saying the DOJ did not expect county officials to adjudicate anyone's immigration status, but asked the county to temporarily set aside ballots when there are credible concerns about the voters' eligibility.

McCotter warned that county officials could risk "becoming aiders and abettors to a federal crime" if they knowingly count ballots from individuals whom federal agencies have identified as noncitizens.

In response to the letter, Los Angeles County Registrar-Recorder Dean Logan said his office is focused on conducting a fair and secure election.

Authored by Michael Snyder via End Of The American Dream,

Authorities assure us that we are perfectly safe and that no giant space rocks are heading our way. If that is true, why is a scenario that has been developed for the 2027 Planetary Defense Conference "based around a hypothetical impact threat" from a very large asteroid? And why are scientists at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory studying how to destroy a giant asteroid that is heading toward Earth using nuclear weapons? If there is no threat anywhere on the horizon, wouldn't you think that those scientists would have something better to do with their time? On top of everything else, NASA recently concluded a secretive operation known as "OSIRIS-REx" in which a spacecraft visited an asteroid, plucked a piece off of it, and returned it to Earth. While the general public is being told that we are safe for decades to come, a tremendous amount of time, money and energy is being poured into preparing for a potential asteroid threat.

Do they know something that the rest of us do not?

I am convinced that there is far more going on behind the scenes than we are being told.

They never say anything that will alarm the general public, but at the same time they are pumping vast resources into "sophisticated planetary defense efforts" that are intended to protect our planet "from potentially hazardous asteroids"...

Would we be prepared if a potentially life-threatening object from space were on a collision course with Earth? And how much damage could an incoming asteroid actually cause?

Such questions remain at the forefront of increasingly sophisticated planetary defense efforts aimed at protecting our planet from potentially hazardous asteroids. Yet even if astronomers are able to identify a space object that might pose a threat, a significant number of uncertainties remain: the object's size, composition, structure, and potential impact locations all must be considered, as these factors can dramatically influence what happens once an asteroid enters Earth's atmosphere.

If there are no near-Earth objects that are a threat, why spend so much money on this?

We certainly have a lot of other very pressing matters that do require funding right now.

NASA is either wasting our money, or something else is going on.

Interestingly, NASA is a participant in the 2027 Planetary Defense Conference. An exercise is underway that simulates how authorities would respond to a "Tunguska-sized object" that is headed toward Earth...

Additionally, NASA's Center for Near-Earth Object Studies (CNEOS) regularly participates in planetary defense exercises designed to test these assessment methods, with current scenarios under development for the 2027 Planetary Defense Conference that take a cue from one of history's most concerning airburst events.

"The current exercise that is underway for the 2027 Planetary Defense Conference is based around a hypothetical impact threat from a roughly Tunguska-sized object," Wheeler told The Debrief.

For those of you that are not familiar, in 1908 the Tunguska event flattened approximately 2,000 square kilometers in Siberia...

Tunguska event, enormous explosion that is estimated to have occurred at 7:14 AM plus or minus one minute on June 30, 1908, at an altitude of 5-10 km (15,000-30,000 feet), flattening some 2,000 square km (500,000 acres) and charring more than 100 square km of pine forest near the Podkamennaya Tunguska River in central Siberia (60°55′ N 101°57′ E), Russia. The energy of the explosion is estimated to have been equivalent to the explosive force of as much as 15 megatons of TNT - a thousand times more powerful than the atomic bomb dropped on Hiroshima, Japan, on August 6, 1945.

Why hold an exercise of this nature if there is absolutely no threat of this sort of event occurring for decades to come?

And why did NASA just send a small spacecraft to grab a piece of an asteroid known as Bennu and bring it back to Earth?...

On Sept. 30, NASA formally concluded OSIRIS-REx, the historic first U.S. mission to pluck a pristine piece of an asteroid and deliver it safely back to Earth.

The van-sized OSIRIS-REx spacecraft - whose name is short for Origins, Spectral Interpretation, Resource Identification, Security-Regolith Explorer - visited and sampled Bennu, an ancient space rock holding pristine remnants from the dawn of our solar system more than 4.5 billion years ago. Among those cosmic relics are raw organic building blocks, the kind that may have seeded life on Earth.

"I have known this day was coming for a long time, but it is still difficult to see it arrive," OSIRIS-REx Principal Investigator Dante Lauretta, who's based at the University of Arizona, said in a post on LinkedIn. "I feel enormous pride in what we accomplished together, and real sadness that this journey has come to an end."

That was certainly an impressive scientific achievement.

But it also cost a lot of money to do that.

Why not spend all that money in more productive ways if asteroids are no threat to us?

And why study how to destroy asteroids using nuclear weapons if there won't be any asteroids to destroy for the rest of this century?

A shocking study that was recently conducted by scientists at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory is raising a lot of eyebrows...

A new study from Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) has used advanced 3D simulations to assess how effective a nuclear weapon would be for destroying a dangerous space object such as a large asteroid on a collision course with Earth.

Yeah, that definitely sounds a lot like a Bruce Willis movie that I once watched.

But in that case, a civilization-killing space rock was actually headed toward us.

Why are our scientists running so many simulations if we are facing absolutely no threat?...

For their new work, the team ran simulations to explore how an asteroid might be affected by a nuclear blast somewhere near its surface, with the aim of rapidly heating and vaporizing material within it.

They began with more than 1,500 one-dimensional simulations to test the approach before running three fully three-dimensional simulations modelling the effects of a nuclear blast on a roughly 160-meter (525-foot) asteroid, altering factors such as the distance to the asteroid when detonation occurred and assumptions about how easily it would be damaged by such an explosion.

"These simulations give us a much more detailed picture of how an asteroid may respond to a nuclear mitigation attempt," Isaiah Santistevan, who led the study, said in a statement. "Being able to model damage, fracture and material motion in three dimensions is an important step toward improving our ability to evaluate planetary defense options."

More resources are being devoted to "planetary defense" than ever before in our history.

Is this being done for a reason, or is this just a colossal misallocation of public funds?

Those of you that have been following my work for an extended period of time already know what I think.

I believe that there are very serious threats out there that are not being discussed publicly.

It is always policy to keep the general public as calm as possible when we are facing a very serious threat.

That means not telling the general public the truth.

Of course everyone should be able to see that our particular neighborhood of the cosmos has been unusually busy lately.

I asked Google about this, and this is the response that I got...

Yes, data from the American Meteor Society and USA Today confirms an unusual and significant surge in large fireball events during the first quarter of 2026, especially through March

This week, we are witnessing the peak of the Orionid meteor shower...

The Orionid meteor shower reaches its peak tonight, Wednesday, Oct. 21, and continues into early Thursday morning. The shower is made up of debris left behind by Halley's Comet, which burns up as it enters Earth's atmosphere.

Under dark, ideal conditions, the Orionids can produce about 10 to 20 meteors per hour. But a bright waxing gibbous moon will hide some of the fainter streaks. NASA says the moon is expected to set around 3 a.m. local time, giving skywatchers a darker window before sunrise.

The fireballs in the sky that people are marveling at right now are no threat.

But there are giant space rocks that are looming in the distance.

One of these days, our luck will run out and one of them will hit us.

When that day arrives, everything will change and millions will suddenly die.

Seven months ago, Qatar was the world's biggest LNG seller. Now it's a buyer. 

According to a Reuters scoop late Thursday, QatarEnergy is in advanced talks with Venture Global (VG) on a long-term supply deal for at least 3 million tons of LNG a year, sourced from VG's CP2 plant, which is still under construction in Louisiana. The report landed just hours after QatarEnergy signed a separate deal with Cheniere (LNG) for up to 4 million tons a year through 2054. VG shares jumped more than 6% on Friday, and they have now roughly doubled this year. Then again, they're still trading about 45% below their $25 IPO price.

Venture Global's other headline this month is that it wants to get into AI data centers... in a very big way. Goldman thinks both stories come back to the same molecule. Below we summarize what Goldman's LNG team has been telling clients about each (available to pro subs), and why we think the Qatar trade is the one that pays first.

The Customer Who Used To Be The Competition

Regular readers know how Qatar got here. In March, Iranian missiles hit Ras Laffan, the world's largest LNG complex. We wrote at the time that the attack itself was "bad" and the math behind the global LNG fleet "far worse", and a day later we concluded that Qatar had been dethroned as "LNG King", with the US taking the crown. The strikes damaged two of Qatar's 14 trains, taking out 12.8 million tons a year, or about 17% of export capacity. QatarEnergy CEO Saad al-Kaabi said repairs would take three to five years and cost roughly $20 billion a year in lost revenue.

The bill has been coming due. Last week we reported that Qatar's government revenue plunged 42% in the first half: LNG exports were just 1.6 million tons in September, less than a quarter of the prewar average, and Kpler sees October falling to 0.6 million tons. QatarEnergy has also been renewing its force majeure notices every month, most recently through November.

Meanwhile, Doha still has customers to serve. So it has been buying spot cargoes, many of them from Venture Global, and is now trying to lock in long-term supply. As one source told Reuters back in September, "They will have to buy whatever they can get their hands on." We flagged where this was headed the moment Bloomberg first reported the talks:

Qatar buying LNG?

— zerohedge (@zerohedge) September 10, 2026

Goldman's Americas Pipelines & MLPs analyst John Mackay ran the numbers that same day in "Outlining Contractable Capacity for Our LNG Coverage Following Media Reports of QatarEnergy Interest". Mackay notes that Qatar is "the largest single LNG exporter in the world," sits behind the Strait of Hormuz, and "is planning the largest LNG capacity additions through the medium-term." Goldman says it takes no view on whether a deal happens, but it points out who would be on the other side if one does:

We note that Venture Global (VG, Buy) management stated during our mid-August virtual NDR that such deals could be a sign of significantly tighter global LNG balances than the market currently expects. To illustrate the scale of available capacity, we outline below the uncontracted capacity within our coverage universe, which totals ~69 mtpa potentially available by YE32. Specifically, we project up to 40 mtpa / 9 mtpa / 7 mtpa / 12 mtpa of contractable capacity at VG / LNG / NEXT / GLNG, respectively... In our view, VG and Golar LNG (GLNG, Buy, on CL) are well-positioned due to their ability to offer meaningful capacity with flexibility around timing.

Put differently, VG alone has about three times as much uncontracted capacity as Qatar lost at Ras Laffan. Rapidan's count of capacity under construction is more modest, but VG still leads it at 10 mtpa, ahead of Cheniere and Woodside (6 mtpa each) and Sempra's Port Arthur (3 mtpa). So when Qatar goes shopping in the US, Venture Global probably can't be avoided.

Mackay brought Qatar up again in his 3Q26 preview on Oct 8. He trimmed his 3Q EBITDA estimate to $2.52 billion, below the $2.61 billion consensus, but kept FY26 at $9.03 billion, "still at the top-end of guidance." He also wrote that "any Qatar contracting, on top of their ongoing spot deals, would be meaningful." That was two weeks before the Reuters scoop. Goldman also counts recent additions such as ConocoPhillips' 20-year deal (Oct 1) and China Gas as "high-quality," while dismissing the adverse Galp arbitration ruling on CP1, where damages are capped at $170 million, as "manageable." Goldman's price target stays at $18, about 32% above Friday's price.

Two caveats. Nothing has been signed yet: Reuters "could not immediately learn the timeline of any agreement... or how long a contract could run," and neither company commented. And Cheniere's deal doesn't start until 2031, which says a lot about how long Doha expects to be without those trains.

Plan B: Burn It For AI

The Qatar news is relatively straightforward. The data center plan is a far bigger swing.

On Oct 15, VG signed frame agreements with GE Vernova (GEV) and Baker Hughes (BKR) for up to 16 combined-cycle "power island" units of 720 MW each, plus transformers and switchgear. VG says the units could support up to 10 GW of compute by the end of 2034. The plants would run behind the meter, without drawing on the grid or local water utilities, around VG's existing Louisiana LNG sites. VG plans to place its first power island order by year-end and was set to file its first permit applications that week. It already runs 4.5 GW of gas-fired generation in island mode to power its LNG plants.

Goldman's first take, called it "on its face, a major diversification away from VG's core LNG export focus," but listed five ways it could fit with the LNG business. The fifth is the most interesting:

...an admittedly amorphous but potentially meaningful ability, over time, to "switch" between liquefying gas for export and burning it for compute.

In other words, VG would own an option on which use pays more for a molecule of Louisiana gas: a Qatari utility or a hyperscaler. That's the "sell gas twice" pitch.

The market wasn't convinced. VG was up 1.5% in the premarket, according to Goldman's Industrials & Natural Resources desk, which called it a "big diversification for VG." The stock then closed down 5.8%. Investors seem to be asking the same thing as Mackay: whether VG can fund the rest of its LNG buildout to ~85-100 mtpa before taking on a second capital-intensive business. Goldman also notes that "strip pricing would add ~$20b to our EBITDA estimates, all else equal, by YE30." That's a good reminder that the LNG business is the one generating the cash.

"A Relatively Low-Cost Call Option"

Goldman hosted CEO Mike Sabel and CFO Jack Thayer for a virtual roadshow the next day. The Oct 19 takeaways note, "Significant Potential Power Scope, but Limited Spend Ahead of Customer Deals" is where the numbers got big:

...their plans are potentially massive, specifically >10 GW by 2034 and ~$160b of deployed capital, with typical scope effectively being a powered shell solution (~teens million of capex per MW) vs. smaller-scale behind-the-meter (BTM) solutions (generally ~$1-2m/MW)... potential scope aside, VG's current commitments are relatively small - specifically ~2 power plant commitments and a few hundred million dollars in capex, with firm off-ramps before meaningful capital is spent, and could be redeployed for their LNG expansions and/or resold if commercial wins do not materialize.

Some math: $160 billion for 10 GW works out to about $16 million per MW, roughly ten times the cost of a typical behind-the-meter project, because VG would supply the land and buildings as well as the power (everything except the chips). About two-thirds of that capex isn't power-related, and VG says it won't commit to that part without signed tenants. For the power portion, management is targeting ~75% investment-grade debt financing. If the power piece is the remaining third, or about $53 billion, that's somewhere around $40 billion of new debt on top of a balance sheet that already carries a debt-to-equity ratio of about 3.5x.

Goldman, which rates VG Buy, ends up more constructive than the tape:

Overall, we expect the broader power trade could remain choppy in the near-term and believe investors will look for more confidence in commercial execution before giving more credit to VG (as we have recently seen for others in the data center power market, including WMB, KGS, and LB in our coverage). That said, we come away from the conversation increasingly viewing the strategic rationale of the BKR/GEV agreement as effectively a relatively low-cost call option for VG, with a mostly limited impact on the story if the broader power macro story doesn't re-inflect - and with significant potential upside over time if it does.

Wells Fargo, which had been sitting at Equal Weight, apparently agrees: it upgraded VG to Overweight on Tuesday and raised its target from $15 to $21. The "choppy" part is easy to see: as Goldman's desk showed a couple of weeks ago, IPPs and GE Vernova were trading near their "Liberation Day" lows on a P/E basis.

Cheap Power, Slow Power

We've been pounding the table on on-site generation for almost a year. Since last November, we have argued that every data center should have its own "behind the meter" power so that households don't pay for the AI buildout through their electric bills. A month later we put it more simply:

Make "behind the meter" mandatory https://t.co/bCBnwx2E5g

— zerohedge (@zerohedge) December 24, 2025

Wall Street has since come around. Goldman now expects behind-the-meter generation to power a quarter of all US data centers by 2030. So VG's idea is sound. The problem is timing, and it comes down to which technology VG picked. Combined-cycle gas turbines (CCGTs) are the cheapest behind-the-meter option and also the slowest. Bernstein's machinery team spelled out that trade-off last month in "Powering AI: The modular advantage" (also available to pro subs): CCGT power costs about $48/MWh, but it takes 4-5 years to deliver, versus months for fuel cells at almost twice the price.

That lines up with Goldman's timeline: first deployments in late 2028 at the earliest, and only about half of the capacity ramped by 2031. By then, VG will be competing for tenants with everyone who signed up two years earlier. Goldman flags this too, asking about "their go-to-market strategy for signing customers as a relatively later entrant vs. other competitors in the space."

Equipment is the other constraint. Back in September we noted that the gas turbine shortage was sending AI developers back to boilers and steam. VG's GE Vernova and Baker Hughes order secures a big block of a very scarce resource, and as Goldman notes, VG is already one of those suppliers' largest customers. There's a twist here, too. As Bloomberg's Stephen Stapczynski pointed out in March, Qatar's two damaged trains need new gas turbines for their refrigeration compressors, with delivery expected to take 2-4 years. So the same turbine backlog that keeps Qatar's capacity offline is the one VG has just reserved a large chunk of.

One Molecule, Two Bidders

VG now has two possible new markets for its gas. One is a state-backed buyer that has lost a sixth of its capacity for years and needs cargoes now. The other is a data center business that doesn't yet have a single tenant and can't deliver power before 2028. Goldman's view is that the power plan is a cheap option and the LNG business keeps generating the cash in the meantime:

...the size of their agreement and their track record of disruption in LNG should argue for VG upside over time as well as a potentially meaningful shift in competition for the BTM power and EPC sectors.

We agree with the first half. The Qatar deal is close to signing, the counterparty is about as motivated as a buyer can be, and every month Ras Laffan stays damaged makes 20-year American LNG look more valuable. The $160 billion data center plan is a different matter: until VG names a tenant, it is mostly equipment reservations and press releases. To its credit, VG knows this, which is why it built in "firm off-ramps." The bigger risk may be the timing. If Hormuz reopens properly and Qatar's trains come back sooner than expected, the spot cargoes, and maybe the urgency to sign long-term deals, could fade just as the power build starts requiring real money.

For now, the market is rewarding the Qatar story and punishing the AI one: shares jumped over 6% on a Reuters report of talks and fell 5.8% on 10 GW of compute. We'll know more on Nov 10, when VG reports third-quarter results.

Much more in the full Goldman notes (here, here and here) all available to pro subs.

Authored by Jack Phillips via The Epoch Times,

President Donald Trump told reporters on Friday that he plans to use his veto power on bills or resolutions Democrats want to pass if they win in either the House or the Senate, with days to go before the November midterm elections.

"I think the Republicans are going to win - but if there was gridlock, what happens is I veto everything, and then the Democrats come and want to make a deal," he said.

When pressed further on congressional gridlock if Democrats win Congress, he responded by saying that historically, a president would then "veto, veto, veto, and they come and they say, 'How do we get it done.' And we make a deal."

Trump has issued two vetoes during his second administration, while his predecessor, former President Joe Biden, used his veto power 13 times. In his first term, Trump vetoed 10 measures.

In recent weeks, Trump has held campaign-style rallies in numerous states to boost Republican voter turnout ahead of the Nov. 3 election.

On Thursday, the president traveled to Iowa to support Ashley Hinson, Iowa's Republican nominee for the U.S. Senate, for a rally in Sioux City. The visit to safe territory is geared toward boosting GOP turnout as Trump is expected to visit the state again on Nov. 1.

"Let's go out and do what we do best, which is to win," Trump said in the rally, thanking Iowans for their support.

Throughout the campaign cycle, Trump has often said he would back certain provisions, including sending payments to Americans, if Republicans retain control of the House of Representatives and the Senate. The GOP currently holds small majorities in each chamber.

Last month, Trump said at a Dallas rally that he would send $5,000 payments to Americans in what he called a dividend derived from tariff revenues and investment into the United States.

He also sent out $500 health insurance rebate checks, which he said are meant to offset costs incurred under the Biden administration, as well as a $90 one-time payment to people receiving Medicare.

Trump also announced at a Kansas rally to back Sen. Roger Marshall's (R-Kan.) reelection bid that he would back a measure to support the year-round availability of E-15 gasoline, which is blended with a higher amount of ethanol than regular gasoline, but said he would only back the provision if Marshal wins his reelection bid next month.

According to the University of Florida's Election Lab, as of Friday, more than 22 million people have voted early in the midterms, including more than 10 million early in-person voters and more than 12 million mail-in ballots returned. Overall, more than 59 million mail ballots have been requested.

Only New Hampshire, Missouri, Alabama, and New York have not reported any data to the Election Lab, according to a map the school provided.

As for Trump, he told reporters on Friday as he was going to depart for Fort Myers, Florida, that he might be "voting tomorrow."

Saturday marks the first day of early voting in Florida, and it runs through Oct. 31. At another point in the gaggle with journalists, Trump was asked about this year's early voting figures and which party has benefited.

"Nobody knows," he responded.

Authored by RFE/RL staff via OilPrice.com,

US officials publicly accused Russia of threatening a Finnish-operated commercial satellite that provides imagery and intelligence to Ukraine and other nations, calling the move "deliberately reckless."

In response to the accusations, made during a United Nations debate on October 21, Russia broadly described US claims as "absurd" and accused Washington of its own "aggressive military space ambitions."

The back-and-forth came days after a Russian military satellite known as Kosmos-2612 moved "dangerously" near to ICEYE-X36, a satellite registered in the United States and operated by a Finnish company called ICEYE.

The Russian satellite came "exceptionally close" - within 200 meters, by some estimates - something that space officials and amateur satellite watchers said was extremely unusual.

"This was not a routine conjunction or 'fly by,'" LeoLabs, an aerospace intelligence company, told RFE/RL. "The behavior is consistent with sophisticated rendezvous and proximity operations."

ICEYE-X36 carries a radar technology that can gather detailed terrestrial images, even through cloud cover. The Finnish company in January signed a contract with the Ukrainian Defense Ministry to provide intelligence.

Kosmos-2612 "exhibited threatening behavior by intentionally maneuvering dangerously close to a commercial satellite," Brian Hardesty, an adviser to the US Delegation to the Conference on Disarmament, said during a meeting in New York of the UN First Committee, a body that debates arms control and disarmament issues. "These behaviors appear consistent with an on-orbit weapons operation."

"The decision to conduct these activities was deliberately reckless," he said.

Russia's representative who could not be immediately identified, did not directly address the assertion.

"We call on member states to give the proper response to the aggressive military space ambitions of the United States," he said.

He also referenced comments made last month by the secretary of the US Air Force, the top civilian official for that military branch.

As just announced in the @UN First Committee, Russia's COSMOS 2612 military satellite has been exhibiting threatening behavior by intentionally maneuvering dangerously close to a commercial satellite, behaviors consistent with on-orbit weapons operations. This violates long-established safety thresholds in low Earth orbit. The United States will continue to secure and defend American vital national security interests in, from, and to space.

— Under Secretary of State Thomas G. DiNanno (@UnderSecT) October 21, 2026

Speaking to a conference outside of Washington, Troy Meink's comments that Washington has in fact deployed actual weapons in space - "on-orbit space control weapons capable of defending the Joint Force against hostile adversary action" - caused a jolt among policy experts.

Other longtime space watchers, however, said the announcement merely stated publicly what had already been obvious for some time.

"The United States did not suddenly weaponize space by acknowledging that it possesses these capabilities," wrote Mallory Stewart, a former top arms control secretary at the US State Department. "An arms race in space has been under way for years."

Trevor Milton, founder and former CEO of electric truck maker Nikola and now CEO of jet company Syberjet, is suing an FBI agent and a whistleblower who testified against him during his fraud trial, alleging they conspired to intimidate a potential defense witness ahead of his trial. 

Milton filed a complaint on October 13 in federal court in Utah against FBI Special Agent Christopher S. Essick and Nikola whistleblower Paul Lackey. The lawsuit alleges Essick secretly controlled two anonymous X accounts, @CntrlScrut1nizr and @lfxs1212, which posted negative commentary about Milton and Nikola, discussed betting against the company's stock and allegedly harassed former Nikola executive Jason Roycht.

Milton claims the online activity contributed to Roycht's decision not to meet with his defense attorneys before his trial.

But before an answer was filed in his latest lawsuit, a new investigation by Activ8Insights has raised questions about key allegations in Milton's latest lawsuit, including his claim that an FBI agent operated anonymous social media accounts used to target him and a potential witness.

In what appears to be a detailed investigation, Activ8Insights reported that it identified and interviewed the person operating both Twitter accounts, finding evidence that appeared to contradict Milton's allegations. The account holder purportedly showed reporters his government-issued photo ID, vehicle registration and insurance documents, all bearing a name other than Essick's. He also demonstrated control of both X accounts by sending messages from each during a live video call.

The individual denied knowing Essick or having any connection to the FBI and said no one else had ever controlled the accounts.

Milton defended his lawsuit in an interview with Activ8, saying his investigators had gathered evidence connecting Essick to the accounts. He suggested the agent may have transferred control to another person or directed others to post on his behalf.

"He could have traded them off. He could have handed them off," Milton said. “Look, it’ll all come out in the lawsuit… we’re going to come in with depositions. We’re going to come in with discovery."

The report questioned Milton's decision to bring the lawsuit in Utah. The complaint cites interactions with an X account called @life_utah as part of its argument that the alleged conduct was directed at the state. However, the account's operator told Activ8 he does not live in Utah.

According to the complaint, none of the parties named in the lawsuit resides in Utah, raising questions about whether the federal court has jurisdiction.

The lawsuit comes after Milton suffered a separate legal defeat in his case against CNBC and short seller Hindenburg Research, which published a damaging report about Nikola in 2020. In December 2025, a New Jersey appeals court ruled against Milton in a lawsuit stemming from a 2022 episode of CNBC's American Greed that examined Nikola and the fraud allegations surrounding the company.

Milton had accused CNBC of trade libel and Hindenburg of helping spread damaging allegations. The appeals court concluded that his claims concerned alleged harm to his personal reputation rather than his business and were barred by the one-year statute of limitations for defamation.

The court ordered the lawsuit dismissed with prejudice and a New Jersey judge ordered the Nikola founder to reimburse CNBC $286,087 in attorneys' fees and litigation expenses. Hindenburg Research was also ordered to be reimbursed by Milton to the tune of $270,475 in fees.

Milton was indicted in 2021 on securities fraud and wire fraud charges and convicted in 2022 of defrauding investors and later sentenced to four years in prison, though President Donald Trump pardoned him in March 2025. 

Milton has continued to challenge the circumstances surrounding his prosecution, arguing that he was unfairly targeted. He has moved on to become CEO of SyberJet, a company focused "on cutting-edge aerospace technology" that includes, among other things, developing AI assisted flying.

Finishing a data center in America has become a logistical nightmare. Now just starting one is turning into a problem too, even in the one county that was supposed to say yes to everything.

Back in April, when we reported that "Half Of US Data Centers Scheduled To Start In 2026, Will Be Canceled Or Delayed," the blame was spread across the usual suspects: power, transformers, permitting and a vague, growing sense that the locals were getting restless. Two months later, Blackstone sold its stake in three Northern Virginia data centers amid grassroot outrage, cashing out of a bet it made less than three years earlier, in the heart of what is known, with zero irony, as "Data Center Alley."

And now the restless locals have claimed their biggest scalp yet.

According to the Washington Post, Amazon has scrapped a plan to build data centers on the site of George Washington University's former campus in Ashburn, Northern Virginia, after reaching an agreement with local officials amid widespread opposition from residents. Under the deal announced Tuesday by Loudoun County Board of Supervisors Chair Phyllis J. Randall, Amazon will repurpose the majority of the 122-acre campus for mixed-use and residential development, and commit to never building data centers on the land. It will also donate 25 acres to the county for a community arts center and recreational facility, and hand $5 million to the county's housing fund.

"By choosing dialogue over reflexive disagreement, Loudoun County and Amazon created an opportunity for the County," Randall said in a statement. "This agreement provides new places for our Loudoun residents to gather, create, and play. And, most importantly to me, we will provide more attainable homes for working families."

Some context on just how big a reversal this is: Amazon paid GWU $427 million for the campus earlier this year, roughly four times its assessed value, according to Supervisor Juli Briskman, because the zoning made data centers "a reasonable expectation." It filed a site plan in late July for "Bridgefield Tech Center": four two-story data center buildings totaling more than 800,000 square feet. Briskman promptly vowed to fight it "every step of the way," and by September Randall was meeting with Amazon because a "likely disagreement" was emerging over what the land could legally be used for, per Bisnow. Amazon's take was that it read the site's legal potential differently than the county, but chose a "shared vision" over costly litigation. Translation: Amazon also agreed not to sue.

So instead of 800,000 square feet of servers, Loudoun gets an arts center, an indoor sports facility, housing, and roughly $70 million in land and cash (the 25 acres carry a stated fair market value of about $65 million). The rezoning alone is expected to take about a year, even on a fast-track schedule. Amazon, for its part, is left holding a very expensive future apartment complex.

Now for the punchline: according to Fortune, Loudoun's ~233 data center buildings generated about $1.2 billion in property tax revenue in fiscal 2026, roughly 39% of the county's entire budget. Amazon alone says it has invested more than $63 billion in the county since 2011. In other words, the county that arguably needs data centers more than any other in America just accepted a check to make sure one never gets built. If "Data Center Alley" is saying no to data centers, well, who exactly is left to say yes?

The timing was impeccable too. One day later, President Trump took to Truth Social to urge data center developers to "pay the community, and/or individuals within the community, a 'dividend'" to win local support, adding "MAKE DEALS, and get them built!" Amazon did pay a dividend, and it did make a deal. It just forgot the "get them built" part.

Data Center Alley, Unplugged

Amazon's U-turn is the latest in a remarkable string of reversals in what was, until recently, the most data-center-friendly real estate on the planet. Regular readers will recall that the trouble started in Prince William County, next door, where the 2,100-acre "Digital Gateway" (up to 37 buildings, ~5GW of capacity and roughly $100 billion of planned spending) was hit by a court ruling that voided its rezoning. In April, Brookfield-backed Compass pulled out after spending "tens of millions" and years chasing approvals. Then came Blackstone's sale on June 29... and two days later, we flagged the other shoe dropping:

*BLACKSTONE’S QTS ABANDONS MASSIVE DATA CENTER IN VIRGINIA

— zerohedge (@zerohedge) July 2, 2026

Then, last month, Loudoun's board voted 7-1-1 to draft an up-to-12-month pause on new data center applications, which Randall insisted was "not a moratorium" (a 12-month pause being "the maximum allowed by Virginia law"). The final vote was due this week; instead, on the same day as the Amazon deal, it was pushed to November 17. Here is how 2026 has gone in Data Center Alley so far:

Note that none of this involves a sputtering hyperscaler running out of money: Amazon spent $427 million to buy the land and is now spending another $70 million to walk away from what it bought it for. The capital is there. The permission is not.

The 6% Problem

The most striking thing here is how fast "community opposition" went from footnote to deal-breaker. As recently as July, when Data Center Dynamics surveyed 88 industry respondents about their biggest delivery constraints over the next 12 months (a survey Bernstein highlighted in its modular-builds deep dive [MARKETDESK LINK]), "community opposition/political risk" ranked second to last, at just 6%, behind equipment lead times (24%), power and interconnection (23%), permitting (17%) and supply chains (17%).

Three months later, that 6% just killed an 800,000-square-foot Amazon campus in the friendliest zip code in America. Maybe the respondents should get out more: the Heatmap/Embold poll that tracks Americans' views on a data center "being built near where you live" shows the share strongly opposed going from 24% in August 2025 to 61% in August 2026, while total support collapsed from 43% to below 20%.

And the backlash has gone institutional. In September, Wells Fargo flagged a fourfold jump in active local moratoriums, to 374 by the end of summer from 92 in June, with the average one lasting nearly a year. Its utilities analyst Shahriar Pourreza summed it up: "DCs are unpopular across the political spectrum." Just how bipartisan? In Ohio, one of the top data center states, both leading candidates for governor are running on restricting the industry:

Ohio is one of the top data center states: AWS, META, GOOGL, MSFT and SB Energy are all building here. Both leading governor candidates, Democrat Amy Acton and Republican Vivek Ramaswamy, said they want new restrictions on the industry. Acton said she supports what she’s calling a “conditional moratorium” on new data center construction. Developers must cover 100% of their own utility costs, build exclusively with union labor, operate with full transparency and meet Ohio’s existing air and water quality standards Ramaswamy also laid out his data center policy, which he calls his "Ohioans-First Data Center Pledge." His campaign describes the plan as resting on three “non-negotiable” requirements: nearby residents must receive free electricity from data center developers, new facilities must pay their full property taxes with no abatements, with that revenue used to fund property tax rebates for homeowners, and developers must meet strict air and water quality standards while prioritizing brownfield sites over farmland. “If a project fails to meet any one of these three requirements, it will not be built. Period,” Ramaswamy’s campaign states.

— zerohedge (@zerohedge) September 23, 2026

Morgan Stanley's map of the November races that could tighten the screws further (from its "Following AI's $1.6 trillion Money Trail" report shows 50.8GW of capacity, including 10.6GW already under construction, sitting in states where the elections "could lead to more restrictions on data center construction." Texas alone accounts for 24GW, and its governor has already ordered a halt to new data centers pending an audit of 250-300 projects. Midterms are 11 days away.

To be fair, not everyone thinks the pitchforks matter. Last week SemiAnalysis did a project-by-project audit and concluded that of the ~21GW of capacity sitting in moratorium areas, only about 2.3GW (three projects) is likely to be delayed, which The Economist's Archie Hall described as "much more bark than bite."

Perhaps. But here is the thing: the Amazon campus was never under a moratorium. Loudoun's pause hasn't even been enacted. What killed it was a zoning fight, a threat of litigation and a negotiated "dividend," none of which shows up in a moratorium tracker. Which is probably why Hall himself sees the bigger risk in deterrence: the projects that quietly never get proposed, or get "re-envisioned" into townhouses before anyone counts them.

Goldman's Outlook Is "Largely Intact"... Assuming Half Of It Never Shows Up

What does Goldman make of all this? In its latest Power Tracker (available to pro subs) Goldman's commodity team argues that "despite rising political push back against US data centers," its capacity estimates "show the 2027 growth outlook is largely unchanged, with moderate revisions." The bank raised its year-end 2026 US data center capacity forecast by 5GW to 64GW, while cutting its year-end 2027 forecast by 5GW to 90GW, and still sees US data center power demand growing 38% in both 2026 (+12GW) and 2027 (+17GW).

So far so bullish. But read the fine print under the chart:

Our GS data center capacity forecast assumes only 60/50% of currently scheduled additions are realized, which is derived from the historical relationship between scheduled and activated capacity.

In other words, Goldman's "largely intact" outlook already assumes that 40% to 50% of what's on the schedule never gets switched on. Which, if we recall, is precisely the "half" we wrote about in April (when Sightline Climate warned that 30-50% of the ~16GW slated for 2026 would be delayed, with only ~5GW actually under construction), and which SemiAnalysis spent an entire June post telling everyone to "stop saying." Goldman, it turns out, never stopped saying it; it just put it in a footnote. And note which way the revision went: the near term got pulled forward, while 2027, the year the hyperscalers are spending like there is no tomorrow for, got cut.

Goldman also notes that "effective peak spare capacity tightened YoY across nearly every key region" this summer. That matters, because even the projects that do survive the zoning board walk straight into the next wall.

Break Ground, Then Wait For The Grid

Because getting permission is merely step one. Step two is getting power, and that is where the timelines go from awkward to absurd. Per Berkeley Lab data compiled by Bernstein, the median time from interconnection request to commercial operation in the US has stretched to over five years, more than triple the 1.5 years it took in 2005.

Hence the scramble for "speed to power." Goldman's Carbonomics team (in its report on "Behind-the-meter power solutions for data centers," which we covered in detail last month) lays out the mismatch neatly: a data center takes 2-3 years to develop, while a heavy-duty gas turbine takes 5-7 years to show up. GE Vernova, recall, is now taking reservations for 2031 delivery.

Then there are the transformers, switchgear and generators that topped the Bernstein survey: Apollo's Torsten Slok (who took his number from our June report) pegs transformer lead times at up to 26 months in his latest note, while Bloomberg reported earlier this year that delivery times for the large units data centers need had stretched to as much as five years. Throw in a chronic shortage of electricians (there is a reason why we told readers to learn to be one back in January) and you get a pipeline where every link must arrive on time for any of it to matter.... which will never happen. As one TechRadar headline put it, "if one piece of your supply chain is delayed then your whole project can't deliver." Correct.

Add it all up and Morgan Stanley's verdict is grim. Even after counting every "time to power" fix available (spare grid capacity, nuclear, announced turbines and engines, Bloom fuel cells), the bank projects that US data center developers face a 32GW power shortfall through 2028, a result of "intensifying challenges with respect to People, Power and Politics." That is down from the 44GW shortfall MS warned about last November, which says more about how hard everyone is scrambling for turbines and fuel cells than about any improvement in the grid.

And, as a reminder, the "Politics" part of that triad just got a lot worse in Virginia, a lot worse in Ohio, and possibly a lot worse in Texas on November 3. Which is why we keep saying the only real solution is to make "behind the meter" mandatory: if the community won't give you its grid, bring your own power plant... and then hope the zoning board lets you build that too.

Who Wins When Nothing Gets Built

So who benefits from a buildout that keeps getting pushed out? Torsten Slok had a timely answer this week in "Winners and Losers if the Data Center Buildout Is Delayed." The winners are owners of operating data centers ("capacity that is already online can raise rents and fill every megawatt"), holders of powered land and grid access, long-lead equipment makers and on-site power producers. The losers: hyperscalers whose "revenue is capped by supply rather than demand, and committed capex keeps accruing while capacity sits idle," developers and construction-stage investors whose "cash flows start later while interest and carrying costs continue," and equity investors in the AI trade, whose "valuations that assume on-time delivery are exposed to earnings revisions and multiple compression."

Slok draws a crucial distinction between delay and cancellation:

A delay hurts returns by pushing cash flows out, but the asset remains and may become more valuable. The real risk is that scarcity unwinds, for example, if supply catches up in a rush or demand softens, which would erode the premium on existing capacity.

Which, come to think of it, is a pretty good description of what Blackstone did in June: sell fully leased, already operating Virginia capacity to Digital Realty at a scarcity premium, while it lasts. Amazon's Loudoun campus, meanwhile, falls squarely in the "cancellation" bucket, and joins a fast-growing list. Here is the latest update of our AI data center Casualty List, which also includes last week's Nextdc collapse after protesters stalled power to its Melbourne campus:

If Loudoun Says No, Who Says Yes?

The bulls will say this is one 800,000-square-foot campus in a county that already has 233 data center buildings, and that SemiAnalysis still sees 38GW of US capacity coming online in 2027 (good luck with that). Maybe. But the bull case has always rested on the assumption that the binding constraints were physical (chips, power, transformers) and that money could eventually buy its way through all of them. Loudoun just showed that money can't buy permission. Amazon brought $427 million, a $70 million "dividend" and the threat of a lawsuit, and the best it could get was the right to build townhouses.

Despite all this, Goldman says the outlook is "largely intact." We'd note that it is intact precisely because Goldman already assumes that half of it won't happen, and that the one revision it did make cut 2027. Between Loudoun's pause vote on November 17, the midterms two weeks before that, and turbine slots booked into the next decade, we suspect that haircut is the floor... and that the next revision (undoubtedly lower) won't be confined to a footnote.

Then again, Amazon can always try again somewhere else in Loudoun... in 12 months, "the maximum allowed by Virginia law."

Much more in the full Goldman Power Tracker, the Morgan Stanley "Following AI's $1.6 trillion Money Trail" report and Goldman's Carbonomics "Behind-the-meter power solutions for data centers" note, all available to pro subs.

Authored by James Howard Kunstler via Clusterfuck Nation,

"The Left has always preferred the ashes of its own making to the inheritance of better men." - Celina101 on X

By now, everybody and his uncle interested in public matters has probably read that a claque of current-and-former agency officials, ex-USAID busybodies, military officers, activist academics, Democratic Party paladins, and freelance communist jihadis has been exposed plotting the overthrow of the US government. The plot was reported by the diligent "X" blogger Jennica Pounds under her nom-de-plume "Data Republican," who lately received an enormous document-and-recording dump courtesy of careless color revolutionaries who recorded themselves and saved doc files against orders, the dumb bunnies.

Erica Chenoweth of Harvard (They / Them?) Master Color Revolutionary

Ms. Pounds, an experienced software engineer turned political detective, came to public attention early in 2025 when she assisted Elon Musk's DOGE operation in building a database of NGO money trails emanating from the colossal USAID grant matrix - after which her identity was "doxed" by Rolling Stone and she underwent a harassment campaign.

Of course, USAID was abolished early in the Trump 2.0 admin, and a lot of the "activists" defenestrated from it moved into scores of NGOs, with their salaries switched from taxpayer funding to the bank accounts of George Soros-connected orgs and sundry other shady characters like Shanghai-based Neville Roy Singham. These are the NGOs forever puling about "our democracy," meaning their drive to punish, persecute, and push around Americans who demur from a communist future. Data Republican says her reporting so far is "only the beginning" of much more detailed and alarming disclosures.

Coincidentally this week, their cover was also blown by Senator Elissa Slotkin (D-MI and former CIA analyst), who told an audience at the U. of Chicago that the Democrats intend to go after and wreck any young person who might think about working in the current administration. Ms. Slotkin, you might recall, was in that video put out a year ago - with five other US lawmakers - telling military officers they should-and-must refuse "illegal" orders. Sedition-lite, it looked like at the time.

Before we get into the meat of their playbook for us, and what might happen in response, let's just dox a few of the characters involved. You should know who they are (and maybe the DOJ should, too). They are not necessarily the usual suspects you've read about before like the omnipresent lawfare ninjas, Norm Eisen, Marc Elias, Mary McCord, et al., so busy filing frivolous lawsuits in the federal courts.

For instance (as reported by one Eric Schwalm on "X"), there's Erica Chenoweth, the transvestite professor at Harvard's Kennedy School of government who acts as chief strategist and hub for the "color revolution" planned by the United Democracy Alliance cabal she is associated with. Ms. (or Mr.?) Chenoweth's big contribution to Jacobin thought is "the 3.5 rule" which says that if you can get that percentage of people out on the streets making a ruckus, you can successfully overthrow a government.

Then there's Danielle Reiff, former USAID, now co-founder of the Democracy Renewal Group, Renew American Democracy, and Renew to Thrive orgs. . . very verbal on video laying out the exact procedures for the US color revolution. And there's Rear Admiral Michael E. Smith (Ret.) who runs a network of over a thousand retired military officers called National Security Leaders for America. He's in charge of "role-playing" exercises in preparation for post-election hijinks. Then there's Julia Roig, founder of the Horizons Project who is responsible for "building relational infrastructure so that disparate groups can act in concert without a single hierarchical command." Then there's Maria Stephan, co-author, with Erica Chenoweth, of the sedition tract Why Civil Resistance Works. Then there's Brenden Halloran, former USAID, now with the Renew to Thrive org, responsible for "accountability ecosystems, overcoming fragmentation among groups, and long-term sequencing of reforms." Then there's Walt Roberts, also on the Renew to Thrive team, plus the Mediators Foundation and the Inter-Movement Impact Project. Then there's Laura Adams, also former USAID, now in Renew to Thrive and PACT, whose mission is to turn strategy papers into operational plans. Then there's Zoe Marks, also in Harvard's Kennedy School, a "scenario-planner" for Horizons and United Democracy Alliance. Then there's "cohesion" strategist Paul Zeitz, co-founder of UnifyUSA, partner with Danielle Reiff on Renew to Thrive, and active in NGOs Renew to Thrive and National Security Leaders for America. There's the bunch. Now you know.

Top row: Reiff, Smith, Roig; Center row: Roberts, Halloran, Adams; Bottom Row: Stephan, Slotkin, Chenoweth

As to the coup playbook, here goes: The idea is to turn out massive street actions (protests and riots) in the blue cities, based on rumors that President Trump has somehow "interfered" in the election, and create enough chaos so that Mr. Trump would be tempted to invoke the Insurrection Act or some-such national emergency measure. The coupsters mentioned above, and their cohorts and underlings, have been quietly confabbing with blue state attorneys general and governors. These officials would unite to declare that Mr. Trump's actions make him illegitimate, and would set in-motion procedures for said governors to declare the president a tyrant and an outlaw and themselves as the "new governing authority." They would move from that to a new constitutional convention and bring about all the heralded revolutionary changes chattered about for months such as abolishing the electoral college and Senate, changing-up the Supreme Court, etc. Voila! Trump and his government are out! The Democratic Party (and their new DSA commissars) would take over and the punishments would begin. . . .

But. . . what if President Trump doesn't play along? What if he insists that the blue state governors must ask (or beg) for federal troops to be sent in to control the street violence in their cities before he commits to anything? Then the onus would be theirs, wouldn't it? They will have asked for help? Mr. Trump will have obliged. How does that make him a tyrant? (It doesn't, of course.) Or. . . the blue state governors might not ask for federal help and Mr. Trump could just watch their cities burn down. That would kind of be on the blue governors, too, wouldn't it - hey, they didn't ask for federal troops and their own feckless police couldn't get the job done because: previous "de-funding" and all that nonsense.

Then, how about Mr. Trump moves to arrest said blue state governors for sedition and treason (especially if they entertained any collusion with foreign operators, such as CCP-connected Neville Roy Singham's NGO network or any of Soros's overseas outfits)? And how about arresting and likewise charging many of those aforementioned NGO strategists, along with the governors? (And while you're at it, throw in the lawfare ninjas who have assisted in all this mischief.) And how about after accomplishing that, the president then and only then declares the Insurrection Act, sends in federal troops to quell the street chaos, and moves to indict and try said seditionists and traitors in the military tribunal apparatus? There it is! Just some suggestions. . . .

* * *

Submitted by Muckraker, 

Canvassers registering voters for groups backing Arizona Gov. Katie Hobbs's re-election told undercover Muckraker journalists posing as a non-citizen and as a felon on probation that they could go ahead and register to vote, hidden-camera footage shows.

With the midterm elections weeks away, Muckraker visited voter registration drives run by three Democrat-aligned organizations: Stand Indivisible Arizona, Worker Power, and the Democratic National Committee's When We Count program. At each, a Muckraker journalist told the canvasser they were not eligible to vote. Muckraker also attended an AFL-CIO phone bank mobilizing voters for Hobbs, where a journalist volunteering to make calls asked whether voters' citizenship mattered.

Muckraker stopped every exercise before any voter registration form was submitted.

BREAKING: Katie Hobbs-Aligned Canvassers Caught Willing to Allow Non-Citizens and a Felon to Vote Muckraker went undercover in Arizona to investigate the groups working to re-elect Gov. Katie Hobbs @katiehobbs and other Democrats. Here’s what we found: Stand Indivisible Arizona (endorsed Gov. Hobbs in their 2026 ballot guide) — Our journalist posed as a Canadian citizen and asked to register to vote. The canvasser not only agreed to help the alleged non-citizen register, but when asked whether other Canadians could register too, she said, “Tell them to do it online.” Worker Power (working to re-elect Gov. Hobbs) — Our journalist told a canvasser they were not a U.S. citizen. Despite this, at our journalist’s request, the canvasser marked “yes” on the citizenship question of the voter registration form. When We Count (the DNC’s own registration program) — Our journalist posed as a felon on probation and asked to register to vote. The canvassers looked up the law and saw that a felon on probation is ineligible. Even so, they encouraged our journalist to register: “You should just do it.” AFL-CIO (phone bank mobilizing voters for Gov. Hobbs) — Our undercover journalist asked a phone bank trainer whether to ask the people being called if they're citizens. The trainer’s answer: “We don’t care.” Our journalists stopped every exercise before any voter registration form was submitted. We also asked Gov. Katie Hobbs about these findings. Watch this report and share it with the world.

— Muckraker (@realmuckraker) October 22, 2026

Stand Indivisible Arizona: "Take this and tell them to do it online"

Stand Indivisible Arizona, a nonprofit that has endorsed Hobbs and other Democrats running in 2026, was running a voter registration drive at Paradise Valley Community College. A Muckraker journalist, posing as a Canadian student in the U.S. on an F-1 visa, approached a canvasser.

When the canvasser was told that the journalist was a Canadian on a student visa, she first said, "We can't do it." But when the journalist asked, "Can I just fill it out, submit it with you, and then forget it?" she answered: "Yeah, I guess. The other thing you could do is you could go online, but I'd rather do it with you."

Asked whether the journalist's Canadian friends could register to vote too, she said: "Take this [a business card with a QR code linking to an online voter registration form] and tell them to do it online."

When Muckraker's Anthony Rubin returned to ask about the exchange, she said, "I told you, I can't stop you from putting it online," and declined further comment.

Worker Power: "Okay, if you want to"

Worker Power is a Phoenix-based nonprofit that raised nearly $10 million in the 2024 election cycle and says it runs the largest electoral field program in Arizona. This year it is working to re-elect Hobbs and other Democrats. Muckraker found a canvasser registering voters at the Phoenix Public Library and again posed as a non-citizen.

"Are you a USA citizen?" the canvasser asked.

"Not yet," the journalist said.

"You have to be a USA citizen to vote," she replied. The journalist said they were a resident and asked to "just send it." She asked, "Are you sure you want to try it?" then said, "Okay, if you want to," and marked "yes" for U.S. citizenship on the Arizona voter registration form.

"Yes, and then you need to sign there," she said.

Approached afterward, she declined to say how often non-citizens are registered.

When We Count: "You should just do it"

When We Count is the DNC's own voter registration program, the largest in the party's history. It launched in Arizona in 2026 and pays young fellows to register new Democratic voters. Muckraker found its canvassers at Mesa Community College, where journalist Anthony Rubin posed as a felon on probation.

Under Arizona law, a felony conviction suspends the right to vote (A.R.S. § 13-904). The canvassers looked it up. "You're restored to vote when probation has been completed," one said.

Asked whether they cared if the journalist registered anyway, one said, "You should just do it. Just do it."

When Rubin returned to ask how often the group helps ineligible people register, the canvassers declined to comment and left.

AFL-CIO phone bank: "Not our business"

Muckraker also attended an AFL-CIO phone bank at a union hall in central Phoenix, where volunteers were phone banking to mobilize voters to support Katie Hobbs.

A Muckraker journalist asked the phone bank trainer whether to ask the people being called if they were citizens. "No, we don't get into any of that," the trainer said. "We don't care."

"If he's not a U.S. citizen, why should I proceed?" the journalist asked. "Not our business," the trainer said.

Gov. Hobbs: no comment

Katie Hobbs later spoke in the same building as the AFL-CIO phone bank at an event hosted by AFSCME, one of the unions endorsing her re-election. Anthony Rubin asked her about non-citizens being registered to vote and about the groups working for her re-election. She did not respond

What the law says

No Arizona law requires voter registration drives to verify citizenship; county recorders check eligibility after forms are submitted. But Arizona law makes it a class 6 felony for anyone who "knowingly causes or procures another person to be registered" while "knowing that such other person is not entitled to such registration" (A.R.S. § 16-182).

If you work inside an organization involved in the electoral process and have information that should be reported, contact Muckraker at support@muckraker.com or muckraker.com/contact.

Watch Investigation Here

Our "Great Rare Earth Disconnect" note earlier this week highlighted the widening gap between elevated rare earth prices and tumbling junior miners and producers. William Blair rare-earths analyst Neal Dingmann has also weighed in on the forces driving the selloff.

"Revived rate-hike fears, hot CPI, and other macro concerns along with rare earth headline and company-specific concerns have notably hurt the largely high-beta rare earth group in recent weeks," Dingmann wrote.

The VanEck Rare Earth and Strategic Metals ETF (REMX) has lost more than half its value since peaking in May, even as commodity prices remain strong and demand for conflict-free Chinese supplies continues. That divergence raises one key question: how much of the selloff reflects deteriorating fundamentals, and how much reflects misplaced expectations of easing supply constraints?

Dingmann wrote that investors may be overestimating the relief a thaw in US-China relations would bring.

"Specifically, many investors anticipate (incorrectly, in our opinion) cooling rare earth supply-scarcity with improved U.S./China relations ahead of the next Trump/Xi meetings in November (in China) and December (G20 in Florida)," he said. 

He continued: 

Further, investors appear to have increased liquidity concerns given heavy spending requirements against minimal near-term revenue and milestone-based government funding that for many companies has yet to be collected. 

While we continue to point to strong REE prices and potential long-term volumes, many companies are not yet benefiting from the high levels given limited current output at the mine or processing, alloy, and magnet facilities. 

While we continue to believe the insatiable demand for REE provides a strong long-term backdrop for much of the group, driving many of our Outperform ratings, we remain cautious in the near term over much of the group given the large stock price declines in many REE companies, as it adds to near-term liquidity concerns. 

We continue to favor MP Materials and Lynas Rare Earths most in the near term given the former's attractive offtake agreements and price floors along with the latter's limited funding needs and long-term track record. 

The firm's basket of seven miner stocks (MP, LYSDY, AREC, IPX, NB, UAMY, and TMCR) has tumbled about 30% on average over the previous month at the time of the report. He said interest rate concerns, inflation pressures and expectations of improving US-China relations have compounded worries about spending requirements and delayed government funding. 

Lower share prices are fueling another major concern for these miners: equity financing is more costly for companies building capital-intensive mines, processing plants and magnet facilities. He warned that some of these miners could hit a "debt wall," substantial shareholder dilution or material project delays.

What changed with investors? 

Investors appear to continue to shift their focus from upside driven by government support and strategic value toward actual production and cash flow, causing growing concerns about how capital-intensive projects will be funded at lower equity values. 

With equity prices significantly lower, raising the capital needed to fund these projects becomes increasingly dilutive, leaving companies that still require significant external funding with fewer options. 

From here, we could see a rebound if Chinese restrictions are renewed, government funding, or company-specific production milestones restore urgency to the ex-China buildout. On the flip side, another trade extension, company project delays, or funding delays could keep valuations under pressure and further increase funding risk, dilution risk, and overall company finance risk

Canaccord's critical minerals team, led by Reg Spencer, also questioned the scale of the selloff, highlighting the disconnect between elevated rare earth prices and sharp declines across junior miner and established producer stocks.

Potential catalysts for renewed investor interest across the space include tighter Chinese export restrictions, government funding commitments and production milestones that demonstrate commercial progress. Until then, balance-sheet strength and execution remain key differentiators. Producers with operating assets and robust liquidity to fund their growth plans appear better positioned to weather the shakeout and participate in a recovery once bears are down and dragging the space down. 

Authored by Zachary Stieber via The Epoch Times,

As the measles outbreak in Pennsylvania grows larger, state officials have issued a warning regarding the impact of measles during pregnancy.

"Measles in pregnancy can lead to serious adverse maternal and fetal outcomes. The measles, mumps, and rubella (MMR) vaccine is safe and highly effective," the Pennsylvania Department of Health said in an Oct. 19 health alert. "Getting vaccinated BEFORE pregnancy is the best way to prevent measles and congenital measles."

More cases of measles have been recorded recently during pregnancy, and there are "rising concerns" about congenital measles, or measles transmitted to infants from pregnant mothers, the department said.

Women and teenagers in outbreak areas should receive two doses of the MMR vaccine, separated by 28 days, according to the department. Other women should be offered one dose.

Women should take care not to become pregnant for at least 28 days after receiving a shot.

The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says that pregnant women should not receive the MMR vaccine. Pennsylvania's guidance says the vaccine should not be administered during pregnancy.

Infants born to women who had measles are at risk for symptomatic and transmissible measles infection, Pennsylvania officials said. Infants should be isolated, monitored, and provided with immune globulin, which could prevent measles or reduce symptoms.

Infants showing symptoms within 10 days of birth, such as rash, should be tested, and treatment should include vitamin A, since vitamin A deficiency has been linked with poorer outcomes from measles, they said.

Cases Jump in State

After the alert, Pennsylvania officials said the outbreak's case count rose to 1,317.

Thirty-one of those cases were new, according to the Oct. 21 update.

All but four of those individuals had not received a vaccine, according to the Pennsylvania Department of Health.

Five people who contracted measles have died. That includes at least one death that a coroner deemed unrelated to measles.

A one-year-old is held by his mother while he receives a measles vaccine at a clinic in Lubbock, Texas, on March 1, 2025. Jan Sonnenmair/Getty Images

The CDC lists three of the deaths on its website. The CDC said the number may change as it reviews information it has received.

The CDC is also working with a group of epidemiologists to develop a case definition for deaths due to measles.

Nationwide, there have been 4,410 measles cases this year, 96 percent of which have occurred in people who are unvaccinated or have unknown vaccination status. Ten percent of the patients have been hospitalized.

Vaccination Effort

About 300 state workers are teaming up with community organizations and health care providers to combat the outbreak by providing factual information and access to the MMR vaccine, the Pennsylvania Department of Health said.

State workers have administered more than 6,300 shots across hundreds of pop-up clinics since the outbreak started in April. They've administered more than 3,700 shots in other venues this year.

Healthcare workers are reporting increased interest in the vaccine.

They usually administered about 25,000 doses a month. In September, more than 56,000 doses were injected, and through the first three weeks of October, 39,000 doses have been administered.

The vaccine is estimated to provide 97 percent protection after two doses. Side effects include fever and rash.

Authored by Troy Myers via The Epoch Times,

The Trump administration has petitioned the Supreme Court to allow border wall construction to resume in the Big Bend area of Texas.

In an emergency application filed with the high court on Oct. 21, lawyers for the federal government asked the justices to lift a lower court order halting construction of President Donald Trump's key project that began during his first term in office.

In the Oct. 3 order, U.S. District Judge Kathleen Cardone sided with environmental groups who claimed the work was unconstitutional, breached the separation of powers, and took land from residents.

"This case involves a baseless injunction that halts a major portion of the construction of the border wall," U.S. Solicitor General D. John Sauer wrote in the emergency application. "Leaving a 300-plus-mile gap in border defenses would act as a dangerous magnet for cartels and other bad actors to exploit as other routes close off."

The Trump administration argued that continuing construction was crucial because the Big Bend region encompasses nearly one-quarter of the U.S. - Mexico border.

Between fiscal years 2021 and 2025, Customs and Border Protection (CBP) apprehended more than 89,000 foreign nationals attempting to enter through the Big Bend sector, according to the emergency application, "and those are just the aliens who were detected."

According to CBP data, there were 11,823 apprehensions in the region during 2023 and 3,096 in 2025.

CBP has seized increasing amounts of illegal narcotics across the southwest border, and the Sinaloa and Juarez cartels, which operate south of the Big Bend area, continuously seek to exploit any vulnerabilities in the U.S. border to further drug, human, and weapons trafficking, Sauer stated.

He argued that Cardone's order, if allowed to remain in place, would lead to a number of harms for the federal government, including a disruption of its ability to secure a large portion of the southern border against cartel incursions and activity in addition to irreversible delays, costs, and operational harms from halting already-begun construction.

Sauer accused Cardone of misbalancing the equities and harms in her ruling.

The judge had conceded the federal government "will experience at least some degree of irreparable harm" because of her block. Nonetheless, Cardone "illogically concluded" the environmentalist groups' harms outweighed the government's, Sauer said.

"The notion that respondents' interest in 'escaping from modern life' in the 'wild spaces in the Big Bend Sector' and preserving 'the spiritual, recreational, and aesthetic value of the area,' surpasses the United States' paramount interest in preventing a quarter of the border from becoming a magnet for cartel exploitation defies credulity," the solicitor general wrote.

Plans for border construction in the Big Bend region were announced in January, with administration officials waiving environmental laws to speed up the building.

The plaintiffs, the Center for Biological Diversity, nonprofit Friends of the Ruidosa Church, and Rio Grande river guide and landowner in the Big Bend area Danny William Miller, filed suit in April over the Department of Homeland Security's (DHS) waiving of regulations.

Zeynep Graves, a senior attorney at the Center for Biological Diversity, told The Epoch Times via email that she and the groups are confident the Supreme Court will hand down a favorable decision.

"We're deeply disappointed that the Trump administration is asking the Supreme Court for a green light to bulldoze one of America's wildest, most extraordinary landscapes," Graves said. "Once Big Bend's canyons, cultural treasures and wild ecosystems are destroyed, they'll be lost forever."

By early October, Cardone had sided with the groups.

But Sauer argued in the emergency application that she never had jurisdiction to issue such a ruling.

He cited a section of the Illegal Immigration Reform and Immigrant Responsibility Act of 1996.

Through that legislation, Congress granted authority to the attorney general and secretary of DHS to construct border security measures while making it "harder for federal judges to block those critical national security endeavors."

Congress also allowed the DHS secretary to waive legal requirements he deemed necessary to ensure speedy construction of roadways and barriers.

To further guard against delays of border wall construction, Sauer said, Congress "stripped federal courts of jurisdiction to hear any non-constitutional challenges to" a DHS secretary's waiver decisions.

Under that authority, Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin issued two waivers in 2026 to expedite construction on border walls and roadways in Big Bend.

"The President received a mandate from the American people to build a wall, defeat the cartels, and stop the flow of illegal aliens and dangerous drugs like fentanyl into our country," DHS General Counsel James Percival wrote in a post on X. "[Cardone's] order is as unprecedented as it is flawed, and we look forward to the Supreme Court's expeditious consideration of this important question."

However, Graves told The Epoch Times she believed that the lower court does have authority to resolve the groups' claims, and "only Congress can authorize something as consequential as walling off the entire U.S. - Mexico border."

CBP Commissioner Rodney Scott said he expects the border wall to be completed by the end of 2027.

Authored by Andrew Devine via The Daily Sceptic,

Left-leaning Boomers (born 1946-1964) and Gen Xers (born 1965-1980) view any criticism of 21st century mass immigration through a particular cultural and psychological lens that is outdated and a barrier to having a constructive debate about extremist mass immigration policies in the here and now.

Left-liberal 'progressives' who grew up or were young adults between the 1960s and 1990s were socially and culturally conditioned to believe that any criticism of immigration policies is synonymous with racial hatred. This is because in the eras when they grew up many of the people who opposed the much more limited immigration of those decades were openly racist. This is why it's almost impossible to have a nuanced discussion with 'progressive' Boomers or Gen X about the issue of mass immigration and get them to address the reality of resource constraints caused by excessively high numbers, or how certain immigrant groups like Indian Sikhs or Middle Eastern Christians are a better cultural fit with British and European people than say an Afghan Taliban supporter or an Islamic supremacist from Somalia who openly promotes Female Genital Mutilation as beneficial to society.

The moment a Boomer or Gen X Leftist open borders advocate is faced with anyone critical of 21st century mass immigration policies (which are radically more open than the immigration policies of the 1950s-1980s) all they see and hear in their mind's eye is some frothing at the mouth National Front extremist skinhead from the 1970s or 1980s who believes there shouldn't be a single brown or black face on the island of Britain. Unless you can break through that cultural and psychological conditioning regarding the issue of immigration, it's impossible to have a constructive debate with 'progressive' Gen Xers and Boomers on the issue. While you're trying to have a nuanced discussion on the issue of mass immigration, Left-liberal Boomers and Gen Xers are having a Pavlovian response.

In order to understand the psychology of Gen X and Boomer British 'progressives' further, it's important to understand that we are the generations who grew up listening to music that transcended cultural and racial lines. We grew up listening to Motown and Philly Soul from black America along with black musical giants like Prince, Michael Jackson or James Brown, while even all-white bands like the Rolling Stones, the Beatles, the Who and later U2 paid homage to the black R&B artists who inspired them. In the late 1970s and early 1980s, the 2-Tone music label fused white British Punk Rock with Jamaican Ska and Reggae and the label's multi-ethnic bands such as the Specials topped the charts. It was the norm for us to see black, brown and white musicians in bands together. For those who love football, many black footballers born and bred in England and even Ireland were viewed as belonging to the country as much as any white player. This inclusive ethos that was prevalent in the 1970s and 1980s that emphasised black, white and brown kids uniting in a love of music, fashion and football was all very laudable and it helped foster a cultural norm where genuine racism came to be viewed as anathema by most of the public.

However, the inclusiveness of the 1970s and 1980s led many of the people who adopted this mindset to adopt a very simplistic and shallow minded approach to the issue of immigration which is now influencing how we discuss the very different phenomenon of mass immigration in the 21st century. The Gen X or Boomer 'progressive' erroneously conflates criticism of any non-white, non-European culture with racism which in turn has led to the idea that to oppose unrestricted flows of people with darker skin from all of the world's non-white cultures is synonymous with white supremacy. This is the mindset that has dominated most of the British media and cultural establishment for decades. It shapes everything from how certain news items are reported (or not reported). It explains why TV dramas include the over representation of ethnic minorities even in periods and locations in British history where everyone was white along with the incongruous shoe-horning of radical-Leftist dogma into so much modern entertainment.

It must be infuriating for decent, law-abiding Caribbeans, African Christians and Indians who came to the British Isles many decades ago and are patriotic and well-integrated to be lumped in with Islamic supremacists coming from Afghanistan or Somalia just because they're all non-white. Leftists are so obsessed with skin colour and viewing 21st century mass immigration through the racial politics of the 1970s and 1980s that it blinds them to genuine cultural incompatibilities of certain immigrant groups as well as security threats and resource constraints that result from the 21st century open borders fiasco.

One aspect of the current debate about what it means to be British that needs to be acknowledged is that it was only possible for Caribbean or Indian migrants who came to Britain in the 1950s and 1960s to become culturally British because there was a majority white British population and culture with which to integrate. If you make whole areas of cities non-native British, and especially if those areas become dominated by Islamic supremacists, then there is no native culture for people to integrate with. Civic nationalism can only work when the indigenous people remain the dominant majority and immigrant groups come from compatible cultures who aspire to integrate with the host population.

Boomer and Gen X 'progressives' need to wake up to the fact that it's not the mid to late 20th century anymore. They need to have debates on mass immigration in the 21st century on the conditions and terms of the 21st century. Today's mass immigration is not comparable to the limited migration of the 1950s through to the 1980s. Those of us with centrist or small c conservative views on immigration, including many patriotic ethnic minority citizens, agree with 'progressives' that racism is wrong. Where we disagree with them is how they've extended that term and redefined it beyond its original meaning to the point of utter absurdity.

There is nothing racist about effective border controls or wanting manageable levels of immigration that consider resource constraints and security risks. There is nothing far Right about believing that the native peoples of the British Isles (the English, Scottish, Welsh, Irish and Northern Irish) should remain the majority in these islands and that only cultures that are compatible with ours should be invited to live amongst us. If we forget that, then the national and regional cultures that have shaped the British Isles will disappear.

Andrew Devine is a 2010 Orwell Prize winning blogger and author of Generation F (under the pseudonym Winston Smith). Former radical Leftist. Fully recovered. He blogs on his Substack page, the Devine Message, where this article first appeared.

We publish a variety of perspectives. Nothing written here is to be construed as representing the views of ZeroHedge.

Authored by Matthew Vadum via The Epoch Times,

The Supreme Court sided with New Hampshire Republicans, allowing officials to stop accepting student ID cards as valid proof of identity for voting.

The high court cited the Purcell principle, which guards against changes to election rules close to Election Day.

The court's decision took the form of an unsigned opinion issued late on Oct. 22.

Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson dissented.

The Supreme Court here applied the so-called Purcell principle against last-minute judicially ordered changes to election rules.

A state law known as HB 323 forbids the use of student IDs as valid proof of identity when voting. New Hampshire Secretary of State David Scanlan issued guidance directing election clerks not to accept student IDs as a backup form of identification.

A group called the Coalition for Open Democracy challenged both the state law and the directive in federal court. The group's attorneys argued that the law ran afoul of both the U.S. and New Hampshire constitutions and discriminated against young voters on the basis of age. They also argued Scanlan exceeded his lawful powers as secretary of state.

Earlier this month, U.S. District Judge Joseph Laplante denied the group's request to bar enforcement of HB 323, but temporarily blocked Scanlan from advising election clerks that student IDs were never acceptable. Days later, the judge extended his order to cover public statements to that effect made by Scanlan. Together, the two orders meant clerks had to keep treating a student ID card as possible backup proof.

In its emergency application to the Supreme Court, the state argued that the district court's order came a mere 32 days before the general election, and that this goes against the Supreme Court's rulings, which have repeatedly held that lower federal courts should not "intervene in state election procedures in the lead up to an election."

The justices stayed Laplante's orders.

"This Court has repeatedly emphasized that lower federal courts should ordinarily not alter the election rules on the eve of an election," the justices wrote, citing a 2020 precedent. "Here, the District Court did not point to anything that would justify deviating from that principle."

In her dissent, Jackson said Laplante had determined that it was necessary to correct Scanlan's "publicized misstatement about what New Hampshire's election rules require."

The injunction issued by the district court, Jackson said, "was reasonably designed to address alleged misinformation, not to change the law."

"An injunction to prohibit that conduct does not contribute to public confusion, it prevents that very problem," she said. "I would not disturb a clearly justifiable federal-court order issued to ensure that the public receives accurate information about a State's electoral processes."

New Hampshire Attorney General John Formella hailed the Supreme Court's ruling.

"New Hampshire has a responsibility to protect the integrity of its elections and ensure that election laws are applied as written," he said in a statement.

"The Supreme Court's decision is an important victory for our efforts to defend those laws and prevent last-minute court orders from creating uncertainty for voters and election officials."

The Coalition for Open Democracy criticized the high court's new ruling, calling it "wrong" and a misinterpretation of the Purcell principle.

"We applaud Justice Jackson for her dissent, in which she stands for the Constitution, the right to vote, and a rational application of Purcell," the group said in a statement.

"We will continue to vigorously litigate this case in the defense of the fundamental right to vote of young voters across New Hampshire."

The Supreme Court's order remains in effect through the Nov. 3 general election, while the case continues on appeal in the lower courts.

Amid the record pace in Iranian attacks on crude tankers in the Strait of Hormuz, many have been wondering: where does all that oil end up when it comes to severely damaged or sunken tankers?

On Friday the UAE has confirmed a deeply alarming event: some of its beaches are being shuttered as a major spill is washing up after a tanker was struck by a projectile off the UAE coast, resulting in a fire aboard the vessel and apparent major spillage. The attack incident happened earlier in October.

Authorities have "detected a tanker oil spill affecting Umm Al Quwain's beaches," the Ministry of Climate Change and Environment announced in a statement.

It confirmed that the emirate in question was forced to close its beaches, and that "teams immediately began containment, cordoning, clean-up and remediation... to limit environmental impacts."

International reports have identified that the leak resulted from the Oct.9 incident involving the GEM NO.2 tanker, which had been detailed by the UKMTO

"Gem No. 2, was hit by a projectile Friday off the coast of the UAE resulting in a fire onboard. The ship departed Ras Tanura, Saudi Arabia, in March and has remained in the Persian Gulf since the war began," as reported at the time.

The last week saw increasing complaints by beach area residents of unusual smells - reports that were initially brushed off by local authorities. One regional Gulf outlet documents the following timeline:

October 19: Unusual smells reported

Reports of unusual odours emerged on Monday, October 19, in Sharjah and other parts of the UAE.

The reports prompted authorities to begin monitoring the situation in coordination with federal and local government agencies.

Authorities conducted inspections and assessments to identify the source of the smells and determine whether they posed any risk to residents.

October 20: Sharjah Police reassure residents

Lieutenant General Abdullah Mubarak bin Amer, Commander-in-Chief of Sharjah Police, addressed public concerns during the Direct Line programme broadcast on Sharjah TV and Radio.

He said the situation was safe and stable, with no indication of a threat to public health or safety.

October 21: Environment ministry provides initial findings

The Ministry of Climate Change and Environment confirmed that it was coordinating with local authorities to investigate unusual odours detected in several areas.

The ministry said its assessments found no cause for concern.

Field monitoring and response efforts were continuing to reduce the odours and help them dissipate.

But then by Friday the oil spill impacting beaches was belatedly confirmed. This came long after oil-like smells began to inundate local social media, and government office call centers.

UAE confirms oil spill off UAQ beaches as cause for smell reported in several emirates. The odours 'pose no health risk' to residents; however precautionary surveys, monitoring and assessments are continuing to gauge impacts and protect the marine environment. The vessel is identified as the GEM NO2, which had been struck earlier in the month. Contributed by @live_ais_com

— Open Source Intel (@Osint613) October 23, 2026

The emerging environmental disaster also impacts the local fishing industry, and boats have been advised to steer clear of the area until a full environmental assessment can be done. Given that the Iranians have recently stepped up their attacks on shipping in the region, more such disasters could soon unfold.

Authored by Jonathan Turley via JonathanTurley.org,

Harvard University is facing another controversy after its medical school held an event on "the Pathology of Unruly Bodies." The most surprising part is that it was not a reference to the Harvard faculty itself. Rather, a panel composed of non-medical experts was railing against anti-obesity drugs as part of "indoctrination" to support the ills of "empire and imperialism." Welcome to the state of higher education in America.

The panel was devoid of actual medical experts. It was dressed up in medical terms with the use of the word "pathology." It could have easily been billed as "GLP-1 Anti-Body." The panel included such experts as Da'Shaun L Harrison, who recently drew notoriety for claiming at the Socialism 2026 conference in Chicago that GLP-1 medications constitute "genocide" against fat people.

Another headliner was Roxane Gay, the Gloria Steinem Endowed Chair in Media, Culture, and Feminist Studies at Rutgers University - New Brunswick and the artist-in-residence at Harvard Medical School. Professor Gay (the cousin of former Harvard University President Claudine Gay) had called for the release of Luigi Mangione, who murdered Brian Thompson, the CEO of UnitedHealthcare, two years ago.

Despite her extremism and penchant for murderers like Mangione, Gay writes for the New York Times and apparently likes to flip off people in public. Harvard decided she was exactly what they needed to help shape their medical students. She is part of the radical chic of higher education, where no views are too far left (while departments purge conservatives and libertarians).

Harrison quickly picked up where she left off at the Socialist Convention with bizarre claims. Rather than claiming that drug companies were engaging in the genocide of fat people with weight-loss drugs, she explained that the companies were really militarizing an imperialist state: "This practice of forcing people into manipulating and changing or shifting how they look is oftentimes about making bodies militarisable. Building up a military to defend an imperialist state."

She further claimed:

"A lot of doctors, medical professionals and folks who collaborate with them - be it through the government or media - are advocating for atrocities that are directly impacting our citizens, but also citizens around the globe.

It then becomes about creating this ideal body that you are always being pushed and pulled towards, as a way to represent this patriotism that is intended to indoctrinate one into the military, into the defense of the country."

The suggestion that weight loss is an imperialist militaristic plot is obviously bonkers. It is the kind of raving you would expect on a subway from someone wearing a handmade cardboard sign and a tin foil hat.

However, Harvard Medical School views that person as a serious expert on the pathologies of weight loss.

Notably, not a single Harvard faculty member expressed unease over the programming. Medical students are facing an array of tough technological and economic conditions. Yet, the administration wants them to sit through far-left indoctrinations from the likes of Gay and Harrison.

Harvard is not alone. Various medical schools have incorporated radical social agendas into their curricula or events. We recently discussed how UCLA Medical School held a panel on which psychiatrists defended self-immolation in protesting Israel. In an earlier post, we discussed a mandatory lecture at UCLA of one of the university's "activists-in-residence" replete with anti-Semitic postings and racist rhetoric.

The hiring of figures like Gay and the radical programs at these schools show that faculty have little intention to change the ideological echo chamber in higher education. It is truly a pathology of unruly bodies.

Jonathan Turley is a law professor and the New York Times best-selling author of "Rage and the Republic: The Unfinished Story of the American Revolution."

Update (1218ET): The New York Post has published additional reporting on the disputed allegations surrounding Omar's marriage to Ahmed Elmi, highlighting a British marriage certificate alongside previously reported financial records and witness claims.

Omar denies wrongdoing, and the material presented does not establish that Elmi is her brother or that their marriage was fraudulent. The Post's cited evidence and allegations include:

• Family records and names: A 1997 British marriage certificate obtained by the Post identifies the father of Leila Nur Said, whom the paper describes as believed to be Omar's sister, as Nur Said Elmi. Sources told the paper this was another name used by Omar's father. The Post also cites the federal filing identifying Omar as “Ilhan Nur Said Elmi, a/k/a Ilhan Abdullahi Omar.” His profession is listed as "military officer."
• A shared address: Omar and Elmi listed the same Columbia Heights, Minnesota, address on their 2009 marriage application. Ahmed Hirsi, the father of Omar's children, also used that address for a business license, according to the Post.
• Overlapping relationships and tax filings: Omar had her third child with Hirsi in 2012 while legally married to Elmi. The Post also cites joint tax returns Omar filed with Hirsi for 2014 and 2015, before her divorce from Elmi was finalized in 2017. Those returns were subsequently corrected.
• A withdrawn immigration application: Citing the Washington Post, the paper reports that Elmi withdrew a marriage-based green-card application in 2019 after immigration authorities requested additional evidence concerning the marriage.
• A disputed witness account: The Post revisits a Somali blogger's 2020 claim to the Daily Mail that Omar had introduced Elmi as her brother and said he needed immigration “papers.” This remains a witness allegation, rather than documentary proof of kinship or fraud.

Omar’s late father, Nur Omar Mohamed, served as a colonel in Somalia’s army under dictator Siad Barre. A 2020 Sahan Journal obituary, citing a fellow former officer, reported that he commanded a regiment during the 1977–78 Somali–Ethiopian War and remained in the military until the regime collapsed in 1991. The New York Post has since quoted historian Mohamed Haji Ingiriis accusing him of helping sustain Barre’s dictatorship and misrepresenting his background when seeking refugee status in the United States. Barre’s forces committed well-documented atrocities against Isaaq civilians, including bombardments of Hargeisa and attacks on fleeing civilians. However, those atrocities and Nur’s military rank do not establish his individual culpability: the reporting cited does not demonstrate that he personally ordered or participated in a specific atrocity.

The New York Post has obtained and published an official copy of Ilhan Omar's sister's marriage certificate. It describes their father as "Nur Said Elmi," and his profession as a "military officer. More evidence that she is not who she says she is. https://t.co/Y7ieXWR73F

— Will Chamberlain (@willchamberlain) October 23, 2026

***

Authored by Aldgra Fredly via The Epoch Times,

President Donald Trump on Oct. 22 urged Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-Minn.) to resign from her congressional role over allegations that she used a fake name to enter Congress.

This followed a motion filed by U.S. Attorney Jeanine Ferris Pirro on Oct. 21 that referred to Omar as "Ilhan Nur Said Elmi, a/k/a Ilhan Abdullahi Omar." The filing was related to a federal search warrant for the congresswoman's home.

"It was just revealed that Ilhan Omar's name is not Ilhan Omar, the one she used to get elected and sworn into Congress, but rather, it's an entirely different name, Ilhan Nur Said Elmi, and that her last name is, incredibly, also the exact name of her brother, Ahmed Nur Said Elmi, the person they said she married and had children with," Trump said in a post on Truth Social.

Omar addressed allegations she married her brother during a recent interview with MS NOW's Chris Hayes, calling the claims insane. When asked whether any of the allegations had a "kernel of truth," she answered: "Not to my knowledge."

"Somebody put in there that, you know, he had to have been my brother or something to that effect," she said in the interview, adding that it started on a Somali blog, without elaborating.

Omar has been married to Tim Mynett since 2020.

Trump said Omar should resign from Congress immediately, adding that she would "not be legally allowed" to remain a member of Congress from this point forward because she used "a fake name to be sworn in."

"When asked whether or not she married her brother, she said, 'Not to my knowledge.' In other words, she somehow didn't know?" Trump said.

Omar's spokesperson did not respond to a request for comment.

Omar, a native of Somalia, moved to the United States with her family in the 1990s amid a civil war. She became a state representative in Minnesota in 2017, and a U.S. representative in 2019.

Federal agents searched the congresswoman's home in Washington on Oct. 12 as part of a criminal probe into allegations of possible immigration fraud. Federal officials have provided few details about what led to the investigation.

Omar, who is seeking a fifth term in the House of Representatives in the midterm elections, has strongly denied immigration fraud allegations.

House Democratic leaders have said that the search was politically motivated and criticized the Trump administration, noting the timing shortly before the Nov. 3 midterms.

"Now, less than 30 days until the midterm election, his violent mass deportation machine has descended upon the home of a duly elected Member of Congress and her family," House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-N.Y.) said in a statement.

Border czar Tom Homan told Fox News on Oct. 17 that investigators have a strong case in their ongoing probe of Omar.

He indicated that Omar could be stripped of her U.S. citizenship and deported if the immigration fraud allegations against her are proven to be true.

"Of course, if you lie during the naturalization process, there is a process to denaturalize somebody. We've done it before. It's a long, tedious process, but it's been done before," he said.

 

France faces a potential credit rating downgrade later today as social unrest, a deteriorating welfare state, a deficit crisis, political paralysis, and years of uncontrolled mass migration collide, forcing the government to repair its finances or risk sparking the next Eurozone crisis. 

UniCredit fixed-income strategist Francesco Maria Di Bella told clients earlier, "Tonight, Moody's will review France's credit rating, which is currently at Aa3 with a negative outlook." 

Di Bella outlined his expectations for Moody's upcoming ratings decision:

We expect the rating agency to downgrade French public debt as deteriorating fiscal indicators are compounded by political constraints that hinder efforts to place public finances on a more sustainable path.

With S&P and Fitch already placing the country's rating credit one notch lower, we think this move is broadly expected and should not lead to a further underperformance of French govies. 

The 10Y OAT-Bund spread is currently trading at around 175bp, 90bp wider than at the beginning of September and at the highest level since its peak in November 2011. 

That said, a rating downgrade would keep investor attention high on the political uncertainty and weakening economic fundamentals in France. 

Next year's presidential election represents a source of concern not only for France but for the entire eurozone, and adds to other risk factors such as geopolitical tensions and elevated energy prices.

Bank of America co-head of global rates strategy Sphia Salim wrote in a note:

Attention is firmly on risk assets. The equity sell-off, wider credit spreads and OAT-Bund breakout increasingly reinforce one another, adding momentum to the duration rally alongside the continued short covering by CTAs & bid for receivers.

After close, we will also get Moody's rating decision for France. If Moody's doesn't deliver a downgrade and simply reaffirms the negative outlook, the decision could offer some reprieve to OAT-Bunds. Absent a stabilization in spread, the pressure will be on the ECB to deliver at least some verbal intervention (Rates - EU).

France's OAT-Bund spread widened to 175 bps Friday morning, approaching levels seen at the height of the eurozone sovereign debt crisis.

France's CDS spreads suggest investors are pricing its sovereign risk more like a low single-A or high-BBB credit.

Here's more commentary from Cosimo Codacci-Pisanelli and Rikin Shah via Goldman Sachs: 

PRESSURE ON FRANCE BUILDS... 

10y OAT-Bund closed at 173bp on Thursday, the widest since November 2011, and France now trades 45bp through Italy. The forced deleveraging of two weeks ago has stopped, yet spreads have gone well through the 12-Oct highs anyway. This is a fundamentals story, not just a positioning one.

Last weekend's protests were the largest since the yellow vests and the 2019/2023 pension strikes, and a post-protest poll now puts Melenchon in the second round. The direct growth hit from the riots looks small, but it is another headwind to an already weak growth outlook: GIR have downside risks to their 2027 growth forecast 0.6% vs the government's 1.0%. Even in the constructive scenario, where the 5.0% 2027 budget deficit target passes by year-end, GIR expect the deficit to realise at 5.3% given their weaker growth forecast. The arithmetic is challenging and unforgiving. With an assumption of 1% real growth, 2% inflation and a 4% borrowing cost, stabilising the debt needs a primary surplus of ~1%, something France has rarely come close to (chart). If funding costs converge to where 10y OATs trade today, just above 5%, that requirement drifts towards 2%. The bigger takeaway from the protests is that this is not a society ready to accept that scale of adjustment, whatever the political will.

There is undoubtedly a market structure component to the moves too. Positioning in the front end has been reduced and changed hands at better levels in the recent sell-off, but is still long. Further out the curve, the most striking thing has been the lack of buying.. even fair value models screening OATs as ~60bp cheap, value alone hasn't brought real money in. So what turns buying momentum? An energy-relief-driven duration rally might help, as might lower vol. Really it needs some fundamental improvement in the outlook... and in the short term that looks challenging, with the calendar showing more potential headwinds than tailwinds: Moody's review today, more protests expected this weekend, downside risks to Q3 GDP (first print 30 Oct), strikes expected on 5th Nov and a the Melenchon rally on 6th Nov. It's hard right now to see a material trigger for a material reversal in spreads, with further widening at risk of becoming even more convex from here. The risk of such moves ahead of clear event risk is enough to deter fair value buyers for now.

France's lower house scrapped key savings measures from the 2027 budget this week, undermining efforts to bring the deficit down to 5% of GDP from 5.4% this year. Opposition parties have shown no appetite for compromise ahead of the presidential election, rejecting spending cuts while pushing for additional outlays. 

"You want to wait and see how the narrative evolves over the next six months into the election. That's going to have a more meaningful impact on the spread," said Rushabh Amin, a portfolio manager at Allspring Global Investments. 

Mike Bell of RBC BlueBay Asset Management expects it could get even uglier if Moody's, S&P, and Fitch all lower France's rating into the BBB category, the lowest investment-grade tier.

Stella Parton, Dolly Parton's younger sister, says a voting machine at the Hermitage Library in Davidson County kept selecting Republican gubernatorial nominee Marsha Blackburn, a candidate she says she would never vote for, forcing her to correct her ballot three times. Mediaite flagged her post. Tennessee's elections coordinator calls such reports unintended touches, and says the paper ballot, not the screen, is what gets counted.

"In Tennessee last week at the Hermitage Library where I voted, I had to go back three times and correct my vote because it kept defaulting to Marsha Blackburn," Parton wrote on Facebook. "Don't let them rig this election." Blackburn, a sitting U.S. senator, faces Democrat Jerri Green, a Memphis city councilmember, in the governor's race.

Parton said she finally called over a poll worker on the third try, and she urged voters to "double check your ballot before you print it out and put it through the machine." It's unclear whether the problem was a malfunction, user error or something else.

She is not the only one. WSMV reported on Oct. 20 that Jackie Herrud, who voted at the Longview Recreation Center in Spring Hill in neighboring Williamson County, said, "I kept punching for the Democrat, Jerri Green, and it kept punching back to Marsha Blackburn." Poll workers there told her they had heard similar complaints. Another Williamson County voter, Toni Fitzgerald, said the button was hard to press and she kept pressing until it registered; her site had no stylus.

In response, Tennessee's Secretary of State's office said it had received one matching complaint out of about 400,000 voters as of that Oct. 20 report, and pointed to the selection screen, the review screen and the paper record as safeguards. More calls came in after the story aired.

By the next day, Elections Coordinator Mark Goins told WSMV: "It's not a vote flipping situation. It's normally like an unintended touch that they may not even realize." He added, "In all the situations, since I've been here, that's exactly what's occurred." Goins said the marking device stores no votes, and the paper ballot is what gets counted. "They're actually being counted on that paper ballot that's going in the scanner," he said. WSMV reported that Davidson and Williamson counties use ballot marking machines, while other counties use different equipment.

For each reported problem, Goins said, his office contacts the county and sends one Republican and one Democratic technician to examine the machine. Neither WSMV report describes the results of any such inspection.

Davidson County Elections Administrator John Richardson told WSMV that about 65,000 people had voted early in the county and only a few had called with concerns. The county is bringing back stir sticks, which work as styluses, because "when they use their finger it doesn't necessarily connect." It used them in 2024 and dropped them over plastic-use concerns. Richardson told NewsChannel 5 the touchscreens, in use for about a decade, respond to pressure, so fingers or nails can be less precise. A Davidson County voter there, Gladys McCowen, said she pressed the middle of Jerri Green's name and Blackburn's appeared, but her paper ballot was accurate. Blackburn urged voters to report irregularities to their local election commission, and Green's campaign manager said voters had reported switching away from Green.

Tennessee has been here before. At an Aug. 5 press conference held jointly by Shelby County's Democratic and Republican parties and the Memphis NAACP, NAACP member Gale Jones Carson said a machine selected a different candidate than the one she chose, and that it took three tries. Separately, the county election commission blamed "human error" for one early voting machine in Bartlett that omitted four state judicial races for 307 voters. In 2024, Shelby County officials said they found no irregularities after similar claims, and in Texas, Tarrant County said one of 58,000 first-day ballots was misprinted due to voter error, CBS News reported at the time.

** PRESS RELEASE ** pic.twitter.com/YC5Gazwnet

— Tarrant County Elections (@tarrantelection) October 22, 2024

Calibration is the likeliest technical explanation on offer. An election expert told the Center for an Informed Public at the University of Washington there are known calibration issues with some older touchscreens, including some used in Tennessee. No cause has been established for any of the Tennessee reports, and no independent inspection of the machines has been published.

Mediaite also cited Nashville turnout "15 times higher" than the 2022 midterm. WPLN reported that figure compares first-day in-person voting, up about 1,400% from 607 voters at the city's sole polling site in 2022. With mail ballots the increase is about 240%, and against the 2018 governor's race, first-day turnout fell nearly 20%. Early voting runs through Oct. 29, and Election Day is Nov. 3.

Authored by Kimberly Hayek via The Epoch Times,

The New York City Council voted on Thursday to pass Romanch's Law, phasing out horse-drawn carriages in Central Park by June 1, 2028.

Forty Council members voted yes. Twenty-nine had signed onto the bill sponsored by Council Member Christopher Marte. Speaker Julie Menin is the first sitting speaker to support such a ban.

"Today, the City Council made history. Our landmark vote to pass Romanch's Law is a demonstration of this Council's commitment to animal welfare, public safety, and worker protection," Menin said in a statement.

The law bars new licenses on or after June 1, 2028. Existing ones expire permanently on May 31, 2028. The law requires the mayor's administration to create a workforce transition program by April 1, 2027, which includes job referrals, career counseling, hiring fairs, and educational opportunities.

It also considers compensation for owners based on business value, licenses, and equipment. Horses must be certified by June 1, 2027, not to be sold for slaughter or other inhumane purposes, and owners may keep them.

A joint working group will include one representative each from the speaker's office, the administration, and labor.

The vote followed the June death of 18-year-old Romanch Mahajan, a tourist from India.

On June 17, Mahajan fell from a carriage after the horse spooked and bolted during a ride with his family. Mahajan hit his head and died. After his death, Menin announced her support for the ban in a video on X.

"The tragic and preventable death of 18-year-old Romanch Mahajan made clear that the status quo is no longer acceptable," Menin said Oct. 14 when announcing the Oct. 22 full council vote on the measure.

Mahajan's death was the first in more than 160 years of horse-drawn carriages operating under the Transport Workers Union, which represents the carriage drivers, in the park.

Mayor Zohran Mamdani confirmed he and the speaker had agreed to the June 1, 2028, end date.

"I think that we have a civic responsibility to ensure that we are not leaving anybody out to dry," Mamdani said at an unrelated press conference on Oct. 14.

The Transport Workers Union denounced the text of the bill as noncommittal, with "no meaningful economic relief for workers."

The bill does not require the city to compensate the 68 owners for their city-issued licenses or medallions.

In a statement, the union denounced Menin for what it described as using "the tragic death of a tourist to contrive a public safety crisis."

President Donald Trump, who is from New York City, criticized the ban on Truth Social, writing: "So sad to see the beloved Central Park Horse-drawn Carriage Industry ending after over a Century, based largely on one tragic accident. When there is a car accident in the area, of which there are many, they don't stop cars from entering the Park. So why would they stop the Carriages? It was a Great Tradition. Another piece of History that's gone. It will be missed!"

In a separate post, he added, "The Horse-drawn Carriage in New York City is a quintessential New York experience. So sad that, for political reasons, we will see it go!"

Animal rights group New Yorkers for Clean, Livable, and Safe Streets (NYCLASS) reacted on X to the ban.

"For decades, NYCLASS fought to end cruel and dangerous horse carriages," it wrote. "It took the extraordinary courage, compassion, and unwavering leadership of Speaker Menin."

Horse-drawn carriages have operated in Central Park since 1858. They began as transportation and became a tourist attraction.

Council Member Tony Avella introduced the first ban legislation in 2007. Later efforts, including under Mayor Bill de Blasio in 2014, failed. Ryder's Law after a 2022 horse collapse also did not pass. Council Member Robert Holden reintroduced a version in November 2025 focused on workforce programs, which also stalled.

Carriage license owner Ahmet Bilici, who trained as a veterinarian in Turkey before coming to the United States in 2001, became a carriage driver to support himself as he was learning English.

The job stuck, and he's been a driver for 23 years. He said that if the City Council wanted to work with carriage drivers, drivers would be amenable, but he said the City Council just wants a ban.

"When you take this carriage from me, I am going to lose my quarter century! No way!" he previously told The Epoch Times. "I trusted the city because the city licensed the medallion, and now you are shutting down? No way!"

Bilici said the ban will hurt 300 families including support staff such as stable workers, blacksmiths producing horseshoes, and craftsmen making saddles.

"This is my small business, my investment. It's like my house. You're burning my house!" he said. "There's no way we can accept this."

Another driver, Danielle Slot, also said she was extremely disappointed. She said she thinks there is no solid justification for the ban.

"Our City Council is supposed to look out for people and represent people, and they're supposed to see through these things," Slot previously told The Epoch Times, referring to the long-term campaign of NYCLASS head Steven Nislick to ban carriage horses, which dates to 2008.

"I've just completely lost faith in the government here, which is very sad," she said. "It feels like they're capitalizing on sensationalism.

"It's a really nice thought that there would be some magical sanctuary [for the horses]. But it's just not realistic."

City rules currently limit horses to nine-hour workdays, five weeks of annual vacation, and prohibit work when temperatures are below 18 degrees or above 90 degrees.

Ukraine says its military forces continue to experience disruptions to critical battlefield communications, a day after President Trump declared that these restrictions had been removed.

"President Trump called Elon Musk on Wednesday and asked him to lift restrictions on a military-grade version of Starlink in Ukraine that the SpaceX chief had throttled, U.S. officials said," The Wall Street Journal had initially reported Thursday.

"The system was working more normally Thursday, shortly after their conversation, U.S. and Ukrainian officials said," the WSJ reported further. "Some Ukrainian officials said the system wasn't restored to full functionality but was working at higher speeds than under the cap."

But there are conflicting reports, with on Friday one prominent European source reporting the following:

Officials monitoring the systems said they continued to record instances of terminals losing connectivity when travelling at speeds of 161 kilometers per hour.

Serhii Beskrestnov, an adviser to President Volodymyr Zelensky known by his call sign Flash, confirmed that the restrictions remained in place.

"We are currently seeing no indication that the Starlink restrictions have been lifted," he wrote on Facebook on Friday.

It seems that President Trump threw Elon Musk under the bus to some extent, amid European outrage over the throttling of Starshield systems.

"I don’t comment one way or the other," Trump said on Thursday. "The bottom line: He put it back."

But again, some Ukrainian officials and reports in Western media are questioning whether service has indeed been 'put back' or fully restored. Trump and Zelensky on Friday...

• ZELENSKYY: HOPEFUL THAT SPACEX, US WILL LIFT LIMITS
• US President Trump says if there is still a problem with Starlink in Ukraine, then he will sort it

Meanwhile, Dems in Congress are looking to turn this into a political fight, at a moment President Trump has been lambasting and pressuring Zelensky over long-range drone attacks on Russian oil refineries, exacerbating the global diesel crisis.

A Friday CNBC report lays out the following while highlighting additional complaints that things have not been fully brought back online:

A group of Silicon Valley U.S. House Democrats on Friday demanded the White House investigate recent interruptions of Elon Musk’s Starlink internet service in Ukraine in a letter to White House chief of staff Susie Wiles.

The letter, shared exclusively with CNBC and led by California Democratic Reps. Sam Liccardo, Ro Khanna and Jimmy Panetta, comes after Starshield, the military-grade version of SpaceX’s Starlink, was restricted in Ukraine for a period of time, limiting the besieged country’s military capabilities.

Ukrainian officials told CNN on Friday that restrictions remained in place, despite President Donald Trump’s claim Thursday that Musk had restored access. The officials said the restrictions were disrupting high-speed military drones, hampering Ukraine’s ability to intercept Russian attacks and conduct operations along the front line.

The letter to Wiles demands an "immediate, government-wide investigation into the decision to restrict SpaceX’s Starshield satellite-based intelligence and military support services in Ukraine."

As for whether it has been restored or not, it is curious that Zelensky himself a full week ago indicated that it had. Conflicting reports still persist at this stage.

Bloomberg story counts featuring terms such as "job cuts," "layoffs," and "firings" jumped Thursday to their highest level since early May.

The surge in AI-related layoff announcements shows corporate America is ramping up efforts to reduce its workforce and replace humans with chatbots and other AI-related technologies to drive efficiency.

The latest headlines span American Express on Friday morning, Barclays on Thursday, and eBay and Netflix in recent days and weeks.

The AI layoffs are here: *AMERICAN EXPRESS TO CUT 5% OF JOBS, ABOUT 3,500 EMPLOYEES *BARCLAYS TO CUT 5,000 JOBS AS AI STARTS CREATING EFFICIENCY *EBAY CONFIRMS JOB CUTS OF ABOUT 9% *NETFLIX TO LAY OFF 6% OF GLOBAL STAFF, OR ABOUT 1,000 JOBS: WSJ

— zerohedge (@zerohedge) October 23, 2026

Separately, Yahoo Tech's Katie Teague and Valentina Palladino cite data from job tracker TrueUp showing that tech companies have cut more than 190,000 jobs this year. 

The cuts in the technology space build on the 245,000 layoffs across the sector last year.

Some of the most notable cuts this year have come from Oracle, which eliminated 21,000 jobs over the past year, roughly 13% of its workforce. Oracle linked workforce reductions to its deployment of AI.

"The adoption and deployment of AI technologies across our operations have resulted, and may continue to result, in reductions to our workforce," Oracle said.

Microsoft's latest round affected 4,800 jobs, primarily in its Xbox gaming division. That followed 14,000 tech job losses in June across companies including Lucid, Bungie, and Robinhood. Samsung, Zillow, and even TikTok have pushed forward with job cuts. 

The list of tech job losses below highlights increasing pressure on companies to reduce their total workforce and adopt AI and restructure operations, a trend that could accelerate into the new year: 

October 2026

eBay

eBay will reportedly cut 9% of its workforce in an effort to streamline operations. The latest job cuts come after a previous round of layoffs back in February, which affected about 800 positions. "As we work to capture the significant opportunity ahead, this step was taken to ensure we continue to operate from a position of strength by aligning our teams and resources with our top strategic priorities," an eBay spokesperson said in a statement.

Electronic Arts (EA)

Video game publisher EA will eliminate 400 jobs, or about 3% of its workforce. This includes shutting down BioWare, the development studio behind the Mass Effect games. The next Mass Effect title will be canceled as a result of the layoffs. These job cuts come after EA told investors earlier this year that it would reduce research and development costs as part of a plan to save upward of $700 million.

Netflix

According to a report in The Wall Street Journal, Netflix will lay off about 1,000 people, accounting for about 6% of its global workforce. The report says the bulk of the layoffs will affect Netflix's "product, tech, legal and human-resources teams." This latest round of layoffs is the biggest for the company since 2022, and it comes as Netflix struggles to increase customer engagement and overall growth.

Airtable

A "large part" of the Airtable team was laid off on October 12. Federico Simionato, Airtable owner Bending Spoons' product leader, said on X that the layoffs were not due to the workers' abilities but rather to the company's "deep belief that small teams ship more and better." The exact number of employees affected by the layoffs wasn't disclosed.

Amazon

Amazon has reportedly laid off "fewer than 1,000 white-collar workers" in its stores division. That's the part of the company that oversees the tech giant's e-commerce website. Employees in the U.S., India, and the United Kingdom were reportedly affected.

Workday

Workday will lay off around 140 employees in the Bay Area as part of an effort to trim its tech team. The cuts come as part of a broader plan to cut the company's global workforce by 2.5%.

September 2026

Xbox

Xbox announced it had eliminated 268 roles across Halo Studios, other first-party studios, and additional areas of the Xbox Game Studios division. These layoffs are part of a "reset" it announced this summer; the company had already laid off 1,600 people in July and said at the time that an additional 1,600 terminations were still to come.

Apple

According to a Bloomberg report, Apple has laid off an undisclosed number of employees from Fitness+, the company's exercise subscription service. According to the report, the layoffs affected those who worked on the audio side of the division, which includes features like Time to Walk and Time to Run guided audio workouts. Reportedly, offerings like these will be reduced but not eliminated completely from the service.

Oracle

Oracle employees were impacted by yet another round of layoffs in September. The total number of employees laid off this time around is not currently known. The tech giant reportedly sent employees early-morning emails on Monday, September 14, letting those affected know it would be their last working day. It's also reported that, with these layoffs, Oracle is looking to offset the amount of money it is pouring into AI chips and data centers. Earlier this year, Oracle laid off 21,000 people.

Uber

Uber announced it will cut 3,300 jobs, or about 10% of its workforce, in a big restructuring effort. "We are removing layers, simplifying team structures, refining our global location strategy, and focusing our people and investments against the biggest opportunities ahead of us," CEO Dara Khosrowshahi said in a statement. While the cuts apply to both regular employees and managers, the company stated it will reduce the "number of employees who sit 7+ layers from the CEO" by 20%, and it will cut the number of "micro-teams" by almost 50%. The CEO's memo did not mention AI as a catalyst for the layoffs, but it did explain that this restructuring will allow Uber to bring its services to more people, invest in more drivers and merchants, and "build the autonomous future."

August 2026

Apple

According to an AppleInsider report, Apple laid off at least 60 people in its Vision Group, which is the team responsible for the Vision Pro VR headset. A Bloomberg report notes that Apple is also eliminating roles in its Intelligent Systems Experience group, which is partially responsible for some of the AI systems on Apple devices. Overall, it's estimated that the layoffs affect more than 200 people.

When it comes to the Vision Group and Vision Pro, it's been reported that incoming CEO John Ternus would be putting that product category "on ice," so this seems like the start of that process. The Vision Pro headset came out in 2024 with an eye-watering $3,699 starting price, and it remains to be seen if Apple will be pulling out of the AR/VR category entirely in the future. The Intelligent Systems changes are reportedly tied to necessary changes in the technical architecture of Apple's newly AI-infused Siri.

TikTok

The New York Times reported that TikTok will lay off 250 people and close its Nashville, Tennessee, office in October. This location was home to some of TikTok's content moderation team, although the company has not specified the reason for the layoffs or which teams they primarily affect. "We have decided to close our Nashville office to streamline our operations and better align our teams for long-term growth," a press officer for what is known as the TikTok U.S.D.S. Joint Venture said in a statement to the Times.

Zillow

Zillow will lay off just over 500 people as it enacts organizational changes across the company. "These are difficult decisions that reflect both the strides we're making in our strategy and the reality of what is required of us to grow at scale," CEO Jeremy Wacksman wrote in a press release. Wacksman didn't go into detail about what organizational changes were made or which departments are bearing the brunt of the layoffs. "These changes are about ensuring we have a disciplined cost structure and getting more efficient, with the right people in the right positions," he wrote.

Etsy

Etsy laid off about 220 people, or 12% of its workforce, as it attempts to simplify its organizational structure. The cuts primarily affected the product and engineering teams, and Etsy CEO Kruti Patel Goyal said that the layoffs were necessary to build "the organization we believe Etsy needs for the future." An Etsy spokesperson told CNBC that the cuts were not driven by artificial intelligence adoption.

July 2026

Microsoft

Microsoft has begun another round of layoffs that affects 4,800 jobs, or around 2.1% of its workforce. The Xbox division is getting hit the hardest, with 3,200 roles getting cut through fiscal year 2027, Xbox chief Asha Sharma said in a post on X. A total of 1,600 people were let go on July 6. Shortly after those layoffs were revealed, it was announced that Sharma was appointed to a U.S. Federal Reserve task force to help advise it on "productivity and jobs." Other appointees include Marc Andreessen of Andreessen Horowitz and Charles I. Jones, professor of economics at Stanford University.

Intel

Intel is reportedly downsizing its data center group, despite strong performance. The company hasn't disclosed how many roles would be affected.

Visa

Visa will cut about 2,600 jobs, which amounts to about 7% of its workforce. The layoffs will primarily affect the technology and product teams, and the impetus, in part, is to make the company more efficient. "To capture the opportunities ahead and best position Visa to lead this transformation, we must continue evolving how we work," Chief Executive Officer Ryan McInerney wrote in a memo. "AI is also helping to accelerate this evolution and shape the way work gets done at Visa." But according to Bloomberg's report, AI was not the only factor to influence Visa's decision to carry out these layoffs. The company reportedly intends to reinvest in things like consumer payments and value-added services such as stablecoins.

Monday.com

Software company Monday.com will lay off 20% of its workforce, which comes out to about 630 people. This comes as the company makes a pivot to AI and is attempting to make its AI platform a core offering of its business. Earlier this year, it designed its main product around the idea that business customers increasingly want their employees to work with AI agents.

Patreon

Patreon laid off 20% of its workforce, or 93 people, as part of what it described as "changing our organizational structure and how we work." But Patreon was explicit in its email to creators and staff that "we are not making the above changes because we believe AI replaces humans." However, the email also said, "AI has fundamentally transformed the tech industry, though, including how we work."

Uber

Uber has reportedly laid off 10% of its customer service division, according to a Bloomberg report, as it looks to "embrace artificial intelligence" and simplify its ranks. The company also stated in May that it would slow hiring as it makes greater internal use of AI.

Samsung

Samsung is eliminating 179 jobs as it moves its New Jersey headquarters to Texas later this year. The move is expected to impact around 1,000 workers. We're now getting a fuller picture of what that looks like: according to Reuters, 739 roles at Samsung's New Jersey location have been affected in some way. Some employees have been offered relocation packages as the company shifts its headquarters to Texas, while others have been let go. In addition, it's reported that 100 employees at its Texas location, primarily in the mobile division, have also been let go.

Amazon

Amazon will lay off some people in its artificial general intelligence group, although the company has not disclosed how many roles will be affected. "This is a fast-moving space, and we're sharpening our focus on the initiatives that matter most for customers, so we can move faster on what counts," an Amazon spokesperson told CNBC.

June 2026

Bungie

Sony Interactive Entertainment released a statement saying it's cutting "a significant number of employees" from its Bungie workforce. That includes most of the Destiny team and some Marathon team members, as well as SIE teams that support Bungie's operations. The email didn't say how many employees were affected.

Lucid

Electric vehicle maker Lucid announced it's cutting around 18% of its workforce and also noted that COO Marc Winterhoff is leaving the company, Reuters reported. The layoffs are in an effort to "boost profitability amid growing competition." The cuts affect full-time employees, contractors, and hourly manufacturing workers.

Rackspace

Cloud computing services company Rackspace laid off 750 workers, or around 15% of its workforce. The cuts are driven by a shift in focus toward AI.

Rivian

EV company Rivian let go of hundreds of employees, which amounts to around 2% of the company's workforce, The Wall Street Journal reported. Those affected were part of Rivian's service and customer organization, which handled marketing and sales.

Robinhood

Trading platform company Robinhood is planning to lay off 10% of its staff to restructure, the Robinhood Comms account said on X. That amounts to around 290 jobs. It's unclear if the layoffs are AI-related, but CEO Vlad Tenev noted the company will be "utilizing frontier technologies to push our execution even further."

Salesforce

Salesforce laid off at least 86 employees in California, though Business Insider sources say job cuts also occurred in Washington and outside the U.S.. The cuts reportedly affect employees involved with Salesforce's Agentforce AI product, MuleSoft IT integration tool, and Marketing Cloud software.

May 2026

Groupon

Groupon is planning to lay off roughly 25% of its workforce, which will result in 400 job cuts. Those positions are expected to be eliminated by the end of the third quarter. This is in an effort to restructure the company and rebuild it as an AI-native company.

Wix

In another set of AI-related layoffs, website builder Wix said it was cutting around 20% of staff. Wix co-founder and CEO Avishai Abrahami announced the cuts on X, pointing to the changes AI is bringing to the industry and stating, "we need to become a faster, leaner, and flatter organization." He also put part of the blame on the Israeli shekel-to-U.S. dollar exchange rate, which affects the company because it's based in Israel. The cuts are expected to impact around 1,000 roles, based on Wix's headcount.

Webflow

Webflow, a website builder and hosting company, conducted a round of layoffs that an employee called "a bloodbath" in a statement to the San Francisco Chronicle. It's unclear how many employees were impacted, but one anonymous developer from the company told the Chronicle they believed it was larger than Webflow's last major round of layoffs, which affected 8% of its workforce in 2024. As with other recent layoffs, it looks like a shift to AI is to blame here. "AI is rewriting the rules for how marketing teams create, test, and optimize digital experiences," CEO Linda Tong said in a statement. "And the companies that move decisively through moments like this are the ones that come out ahead."

ClickUp

ClickUp CEO Zeb Evans announced that the company cut 22% of its workforce as it turns toward AI to improve productivity. He claimed it "wasn't about cutting costs," but about funneling savings from the cuts "directly back into the people who stay." The company has introduced million-dollar salary bands reserved for employees who "create outsized impact using AI."

Intuit

Intuit is planning to lay off 3,000 employees, or about 17% of its workforce, Reuters reports. CEO Sasan Goodarzi sent a memo to employees noting the layoffs would help the company's efforts to infuse AI across its services.

Meta

Meta has officially begun cutting 10% of its workforce, totaling around 8,000 employees. In addition, it plans to close 6,000 open roles. The reason is to allow more room for AI spending.

NPR

Like Microsoft, NPR is offering voluntary buyouts to 300 employees in the newsroom, but only 30 will be accepted. However, if the news organization doesn't reach its target number of buyouts, it will conduct targeted layoffs. The cuts are due to the loss of federal funding.

Amazon

The online retail giant cut more jobs this month, this time from the Selling Partner Services organization. These new layoffs come after Amazon cut roughly 30,000 jobs in rounds in October and January. A spokesperson told Business Insider that the most recent layoffs have affected a "small number" of employees. The Selling Partner Services team works with third-party merchants on Amazon, providing onboarding, logistics, and account management support.

Cisco

Cisco is cutting just under 4,000 jobs in Q4, CEO Chuck Robbins said in a blog post. Impacted employees will receive prorated payments of their 2026 bonuses and will also receive "support in finding new opportunities" via Cisco's placement services. In June, it was confirmed that the layoffs include 471 workers in the Bay Area.

"While we are reducing roles in some areas, we are making clear, strategic investments, particularly in silicon, optics, security, and in our employees' use of AI across the company," Robbins said.

LinkedIn

LinkedIn is planning to lay off 5% of its staff, which is around 875 employees, Reuters reports. An anonymous person told Reuters the reason is to reorganize teams and focus employees on areas where its business is growing. However, one of the sources said the reason was "not for artificial intelligence to replace jobs at LinkedIn."

General Motors

GM is letting go of around 500 to 600 employees in the information technology sector, Bloomberg reports. The reason is to "trim costs and clear the way to bring in staff with skills in other technology areas."

Cloudflare

Due to restructuring driven by AI, Cloudflare is laying off more than 1,100 employees. "Today's actions are not a cost-cutting exercise or an assessment of individuals' performance; They are about Cloudflare defining how a world-class, high-growth company operates and creates value in the agentic AI era," Prince and President Michelle Zatlyn said in an email to employees.

PayPal

PayPal is planning to cut around 20% of its staff, or nearly 4,800 employees, over the next few years, according to The Wall Street Journal. "First, we will remove duplication and layers from our organizational structure. Second, we will accelerate our AI adoption and automation across our operations," CEO Enrique Lores said to investors.

Coinbase

Cryptocurrency platform Coinbase is laying off 700 employees, which amounts to around 14% of its staff. CEO Brian Armstrong cites current market conditions and AI-driven changes in how the company works as reasons for the layoffs.

April 2026

Microsoft

Microsoft is offering a first-ever buyout to up to 7% of its employees, CNBC reports. It's a one-time retirement program that's available for workers at the senior director level and below whose combined age and years of employment total 70 or more.

Nike

Nike announced it's laying off 1,400 people this week. "Collectively, these changes will result in a reduction of approximately 1,400 roles in global operations, with the majority in technology," COO Venkatesh Alagirisamy said. "These reductions are very hard for the teammates directly affected and for the teams around them, too."

Amazon

Amazon is planning to temporarily close a warehouse in Homestead, Florida, which will eliminate more than 600 jobs, Newsweek reports. The job cuts will start in July and continue through September, but the company is giving employees the option to relocate to other facilities. The warehouse has only been open for just under two years, but Amazon is already looking to update the site.

Redwood Materials

Battery recycling company Redwood Materials laid off 10% of its employees, totaling 135 people, TechCrunch reports. Those who were let go received an email from the chief HR officer telling them the layoffs were made "to sharpen our focus, our work and the size of our teams to support the direction Redwood is going in the future."

Snap

Snap is laying off 1,000 workers, which is 16% of its staff, Variety reports. The Snapchat parent company made the announcement just weeks after Irenic Capital Management asked the company to make changes to improve performance and revenue.

Snap is using AI to streamline operations and assist the now-smaller workforce. "We have already witnessed small squads leveraging AI tools to drive meaningful progress across several important initiatives," Snap CEO Evan Spiegel said.

Disney

Just two months after taking over as CEO of Disney, Josh D'Amaro announced the company is laying off 1,000 of its employees, AP News reports. In addition, Marvel let 8% of its staff go after the call was made.

"Over the past several months, we have looked at ways in which we can streamline our operations in various parts of the company to ensure we deliver the world-class creativity and innovation our fans value and expect from Disney," D'Amaro said in a memo to employees. "Given the fast-moving pace of our industries, this requires us to constantly assess how to foster a more agile and technologically-enabled workforce to meet tomorrow's needs."

GoPro

The wearable camera maker will eliminate 145 positions this year due to a restructuring plan to cut costs, The Wall Street Journal reported. The cuts are expected to last until the end of the year.

Vimeo

Vimeo is going through its third round of layoffs since it was acquired by Bending Spoons. This time, the company let go of more than 120 people, which is about 25% of its city staff.

Meta

It's been reported that 200 Meta employees in the Bay Area will lose their jobs at the end of May. That includes 124 employees in Burlingame and 74 in Sunnyvale. The company last laid off workers just a few weeks ago.

March 2026

Oracle

Oracle has begun implementing a big cull of its employee base. On the final day of March, more than a dozen Oracle employees announced on LinkedIn they had been let go from their jobs, Business Insider reports. It's unclear at this time how many workers were affected, but it was projected to be thousands at the start of this month.

Those laid off received the same email: "After careful consideration of Oracle's current business needs, we have made the decision to eliminate your role as part of a broader organizational change."

The job cuts are reportedly to help Oracle stem a cash drain related to its expenditures on AI infrastructure. In June, Oracle revealed that it had laid off 21,000 people as part of the cuts.

Eidos-Montréal

Deus Ex studio Eidos-Montréal announced on March 30 that it's laying off 124 people. In response, studio head David Anfossi has decided to leave the company.

The cuts are a result of "changing project needs and impacts across production and support teams," the gaming company said in a LinkedIn post. It also noted that the decision to lay off these employees is not related to their talent or performance.

T-Mobile

After already having layoffs in January, T-Mobile has cut even more of its workers, GeekWire reports. It's unclear how many people were laid off at this time, but it could be in the hundreds.

"To move even faster in a dynamic market while continuing to deliver best-in-class digital experiences for our customers, we're further aligning our IT organization to support future growth and innovation… This includes the difficult decision of eliminating some roles while continuing to invest and hire in areas," T-Mobile told GeekWire in a statement.

Meta

Meta began laying off hundreds of employees on March 25, totaling around 700 people, per The New York Times. Those impacted were part of the Reality Labs team, as well as social media and recruiting teams. Though still significant, this is a much smaller number compared to a Reuters report that suggested 20% of staff would be affected by layoffs due to the increased spending on AI.

This change comes as the company is shifting away from its metaverse creation, which includes Horizon Worlds for its Quest VR headset that's operated by the Reality Labs team.

Epic Games

The gaming giant on March 24 announced it was laying off more than 1,000 workers in an effort to right-size the staff of its popular free-to-play online shooter, Fortnite. CEO Tim Sweeney sent a note to his staff, citing the "downturn in Fortnite engagement," which means "we're spending significantly more than we're making, and we have to make major cuts to keep the company funded." He made it a point to note the layoffs are not related to AI.

Ubisoft

Ubisoft laid off 105 employees from the Red Storm Entertainment team in an effort to cut costs, IGN reports. Game development has ended at the studio, so the downsizing will remain permanent. The company employed 180 people in 2022 but has seen multiple layoffs over the years.

Atlassian

Roughly 1,600 employees were laid off at Atlassian on March 16, which is around 10% of total workers. Ahead of the layoffs, Atlassian CEO Mike Cannon-Brookes shared a message with the entire team, letting them know the reason was to "self-fund further investment in AI and enterprise sales, while strengthening our financial profile. We're also changing the way we work and reorganising around our System of Work to move faster." Impacted employees received an email shortly after this message went out.

Together, this all shows an acceleration by corporate America to streamline operations and improve productivity in the era of AI.

Preliminary October UMich Sentiment held steady this month, registering a tiny 0.1pt decline below September (Current Condiutions dipped but Expectations ticked up)...

Increases in sentiment among Republicans and Democrats were balanced by declines among independents.

While year-ahead business conditions improved about 14%, they stand 16% less than last October’s read.

This month’s decline in the Current Conditions subindex was driven entirely by buying conditions for durables, which plunged 18% on the basis of higher interest rates and rising concerns about the affordability of such purchases.

Inflation expectations over both time horizons increased for the second straight month to their highest readings since May.

• Long-run inflation expectations also stepped up from 3.4% in September to 3.5%, notably higher than their 2024 range of 2.8% to 3.2%.  

• Year-ahead inflation expectations ticked up from 4.6% last month to 4.7% this month.

Frustration over high prices eroding consumers’ living standards continues to mount.

For the fourth straight month, an increasing share of consumers spontaneously mentioned that high prices are dragging down their personal finances, at 56% this month, compared with 45% in January of this year. As seen in the chart below, these increases are seen across the political spectrum, with Republicans exhibiting the largest proportional rise. In contrast, the wealthiest consumers report little change in the burden of high prices since January. Gasoline prices remain highly salient this month, mentioned unprompted by over 40% of respondents. 

Purchasing power continues to dominate consumer views of the economy.

Sentiment is now 10% below a year ago and 15% less than February, just prior to the Iran conflict.

Finally, some crazy context, Wall Street (S&P 500 Total Return Index) has surged to record levels, while the Main Street (UMich Consumer Sentiment) has plunged near its all-time low...

This gap reflects a market powered by corporate profits, tech concentration, and investor optimism even as households report deep frustration over high prices, borrowing costs, and weakened current economic conditions (which hit a record low of 44.7). Such extremes have historically been rare and highlight how equity markets and everyday consumer experiences have decoupled.

After surging in September (and prompting some exciting moves in Treasuries - and STIRs), preliminary October PMIs from S&P Global were expected to drop modestly (for both Manufacturing and Services).

Instead it was more mixed with Manufacturing better than expected (56.0 vs 55.9 prior vs 55.5 exp) but Services down a little (57.9 vs 58.8 prior vs 58.0 exp).

That is a 53-month high for the Manufacturing sector...

The US remains the strongest economy in the world based on these surveys...

“October’s flash PMI data indicate that the US economy continues to boom at the start of the fourth quarter," according to Chris Williamson, Chief Business Economist at S&P Global Market Intelligence.

The output readings from the survey are consistent with GDP growing at a 5% annualized rate after a 4% expansion was signalled for the third quarter.

Especially healthy corporate earnings and profits are also indicated, and hiring has surged as companies seek to boost capacity to fulfil stronger customer demand.

“If the reopening of the economy after COVID is excluded, recent months have seen the best growth spell for US businesses since early 2015."

However, Williamson notes that "cost pressures remain a key concern, notably as the renewed surge in oil prices reverberates through to impact a wide variety of goods and services."

Supply chain bottlenecks have meanwhile intensified, and order book backlogs are growing, making it easier for companies to pass higher costs on to customers.

The result is the sharpest increase in selling prices for over four years to a pace that indicates consumer price inflation is likely to rise further above the Fed’s target in the coming months.

Not a good signal for The Fed next week.

Ukrainian media is widely reporting that a key aspect of the US peace proposal heading into agreed-to trilateral talks, likely to come sometime in November, is that Ukraine would permanently abandon its bid to join the NATO alliance and in exchange it would be offered European Union membership.

Additionally, a demilitarized zone in the Donbass is envisioned, along with a resumption of Russian gas supplies to Europe and via Nord Stream. The alleged new details in the plan, which haven't been officially confirmed by the Trump administration, were first outlined in The Economist.

Further, other economic incentives are said to include commercial agreements between Moscow and American companies, sanctions relief, and of course fully restored political ties with Washington. 

The full list of alleged details in the plan is being reported by Ukrainian media citing Ukrainian officials in The Economist. The new Trump peace plan includes:

• Demilitarized zone in Donbas
• Ukraine abandons NATO
• Investment package & EU membership for Ukraine
• Russian business deals with US companies, lifting sanctions & normalization of political relations
• Resumptions of Russian gas supplies to Europe & Nord Stream

Details have yet to be handed from Washington to the Ukrainian side, but reportedly only a draft outline has been circulating, coming at a time Zelensky is under immense pressure and criticism from the Trump White House.

According to Kyiv Post, in reference to The Economist, "One Ukrainian official told the magazine that Kyiv fears US representatives could pursue lucrative deals with Moscow before the war ends, allowing Russia to gain economic and diplomatic benefits while fighting continues."

President Zelensky has meanwhile vented his frustration in a fresh interview, saying:

"The way Trump talks about me, he needs to adopt that kind of rhetoric about Putin.

Maybe they have a special relationship. Maybe something else. I can't tell you."

As for the above peace plan outline, the resumption of Russian gas flows would require Europe to be on board in a big way, which could be a tall order at this point, given the European powers have of late been angry at Trump's 'turn' against Zelensky.

Both the Ukrainians and Europeans remain worried that Washington could move toward deals which improve Washington-Moscow bilateral relations before reliable security guarantees have been agreed to that are essential for Ukraine.

The US new peace plan to end the war in Ukraine has been revealed: -A demilitarised zone will be created along the current frontline or when the fighting for the Donbas has concluded. -Trilateral negotiations will start between Ukraine, Russia and the US to end the war. -Ukraine will drop NATO bid and in return will be given investments and EU integration. -Many sanctions will be lifted on Russia and US investment will take place, as well as the west and Europe normalising relations with Russia. -Potential restart of Nord Steam gas pipeline into Europe supplying energy.

— WarMonitor🇺🇦🇬🇧 (@WarMonitor3) October 23, 2026

As for Kremlin concerns, President Putin has long insisted that his 'special military operation' will continue until Russia's goals are complete, with or without a peace settlement. This insistence has featured that the annexed territories be politically recognized as Russia's on a permanent basis. However, Russia may see in this 'demilitarized' Donbass clause a way forward towards future political recognition. 

Last night we were fairly confident how the Korean session would go.

Three hours until Korea is halted seconds after the open

— zerohedge (@zerohedge) October 22, 2026

Well, we were half right. The Kospi did crater at the open, sliding as much as 4.1% and more than halfway to triggering a market halt as Asia digested the overnight carnage in US tech (SOX -6.7%, META -7.0%). And then, over the course of the session, it climbed all the way back and closed green, up 0.30% at 5,550.

What changed? Well, according to Bloomberg, the biggest AI news out of Asia overnight was that SK Hynix scrapped plans for a potential $10 billion US listing of its Solidigm unit after facing strong opposition from regulators and shareholders. SK Hynix shares, which had dropped as much as 4.3% early, immediately reversed and rallied as much as 4.5% on the news, defying a broad market slide triggered by the rout in US tech.

SK Hynix Pulls Solidigm’s $10 Billion IPO on Regulatory Pushback: BBG

— zerohedge (@zerohedge) October 23, 2026

Seoul Says No To The "Duplicate Listing"

The retreat followed domestic regulatory scrutiny over concerns that Solidigm's IPO could dilute share value for SK Hynix's minority investors and complicate SK Group's ownership structure. In a Friday regulatory filing, the company also halted talks on a pre-IPO investment, citing - what else - "recent capital market conditions."

The deal was meant to be a monster. Solidigm, one of the world's largest makers of the flash memory used for storage in AI data centers (it was carved out of Intel's NAND and SSD business, which SK Hynix bought in 2021), had already picked banks including Goldman and Morgan Stanley and was looking to raise about $10 billion as soon as next year, at a valuation of as much as $100 billion. When the spin first hit the tape last month, Goldman's TMT specialist desk was passing along talk of a valuation of "up to $150bn", which tells you how hot things were running just four weeks ago.

Investors in the parent never liked it. When the IPO reports first hit on Sept 28, Hynix fell 5.0%, and Goldman's Korea desk noted that "local reports attributed today's weakness in Hynix to headlines that said its US subsidiary Solidigm is considering a US IPO as soon as next year," with foreigners dumping $1.27 billion of the stock that day. The math is simple enough: why own the parent at a big discount when the crown jewel is about to list separately in New York, with the family controlling both?

The regulators, it turned out, agreed. In its Oct 19 open, Goldman's Seoul desk flagged that the FSC governor said "both the FSC and FSS judge that Solidigm falls under the restriction on duplicate listing," the same morning President Lee said the government "should press ahead with efforts to improve corporate governance." Once Seoul had openly made Solidigm a test case for the "Korea discount" crusade, the IPO was probably dead on arrival.

Governance activists were thrilled. Namuh Rhee, chair of the Korean Corporate Governance Forum, called it "great news" and "a sign that the company is aware of conflict of interest between Chairman Chey and minority shareholders." Terton Capital's Ryan Albert called it "a major positive for Korean corporate governance."

Not a sentence you often read about a chaebol.

One Stock, One Green Close

So did the Solidigm reversal save the Kospi? The Goldman Korea desk's closing wrap (available to pro subs) makes it pretty clear who did the heavy lifting:

KOSPI grinded higher after falling as much as -4.1% in the early morning, eventually closing +30bps. The recovery was mainly led by SK HYNX(000660) +4.4%, while most other sectors still finished lower (weak breadth with 719 declining vs. 173 advancing in KOSPI) as risk off sentiment persisted amid geopolitical tensions and fragile sentiment toward Tech.

Translation: more than four stocks fell for every one that rose, and the index still closed green (a mirror image of what happened in the US the day before). Goldman's regional wrap said the same thing, noting Korea "recovered from a 4.1% intraday decline to close 0.30% higher, driven by SK Hynix, although breadth remained weak." Samsung helped a little, closing +0.5% after being down as much as 5.1%.

There is a wrinkle, though. The Solidigm filing came out before the open, and Goldman's morning call still had Kospi futures -2.6% with Korea "poised to extend its losses." Hynix then dropped 4.3% anyway before turning higher, and the desk says the chipmakers recovered "despite no fresh intraday catalyst (appeared partially driven by local insto bids)." In other words, the IPO news gave Hynix a reason to rally, while the actual buying came from Korean institutions:

Flow-wise, foreigners were net sellers in both Hynix (-$422mn) and Sammy (-$152mn), while local instos were net buyers (+$450mn in Hynix and +$102mn in Sammy). Retail investors were more on the sidelines today in the chipmakers, ending as marginal net sellers in Hynix (-$12mn) and net buyers in Sammy (+$2.5mn).

Across the whole market, foreigners were the only net sellers at -$729 million (of which -$672 million in tech), local institutions bought +$655 million, and retail - once the most feared dip-buying army on the planet - added a rounding error of +$22 million. Turnover ran 16.2% below the 20-day average. That is a very specific kind of rally: foreigners selling into domestic institutional bids on light volume.

Maybe that was just Korean pension and insurance money seeing value in Hynix. Maybe it was something a bit more... encouraged. The same morning, Goldman's regional wrap credited China's surge (CSI 300 +1.7%, ChiNext +4.0%) to "state-backed 'national team' ETF buying" with RMB84 billion of turnover across nine favored ETFs, and Indonesia's fourth straight gain to Danantara sovereign fund support. Asia, it seems, has decided it will not go down quietly with the Nasdaq. Whatever the source, the regulator's success in killing the Solidigm deal gave local buyers a convenient headline to lean on.

Supply Destruction, IPO Edition

There's a broader reason the market cheered the death of a $10 billion deal, and Goldman's EMEA head of one-delta trading Richard Privorotsky spelled it out in his flow and positioning observations this morning (available to pro subs):

Perhaps we're overthinking the concerns around AI demand and the issue is simply a repricing of the cost of capital. The assumption of effectively unlimited cheap capital to fund this buildout is being challenged. You either cut capex, delay deployment or increasingly fund through equity. None are particularly supportive of equity prices.

A $10 billion AI storage IPO sits squarely in the "fund through equity" bucket, and the market just watched one disappear. Solidigm also joins data center developers Firmus Grid and AirTrunk on the list of high-profile deals suspended or cancelled as AI bubble fears roil markets, while OpenAI is reportedly now targeting a $1.25 trillion valuation in its latest $30 billion round, down from $1.4 trillion. Back in Seoul, data center infrastructure name Elice dropped 32% in its trading debut this week, the worst opening day ever for a sizeable Korean listing. In this tape, the best IPO is the one that doesn't happen.

The AI casualty list is getting longer by the week:

As for Korea, Privorotsky admitted he was braced for worse:

Korea is actually holding up better than I would have expected given the acute liquidation across Europe and the US (Kospi flickering green having been down a lot on open)... Putting my trading hat on, I expected Korea to be down another mid-single digits this morning. The fact that we're not seeing another complete air pocket is encouraging.

He was not alone (see our tweet above). Goldman's Asia sales trader Peter Sheren also argued in "Stress Without Capitulation" that October's drawdown looks like "a concentrated positioning/technical reset rather than systemic capitulation," with GS desk flows "active but largely balanced and rotational." Korea, notably, was a net buy on the desk on Friday:

Sheren also points out the concentration problem every EM manager is wrestling with: TSMC, Samsung and SK Hynix together account for more than 30% of MSCI EM. When one of the three gets a governance-friendly headline on a day like this, an index can flip on its own.

The Buyback Is Done, The DRAM Price Isn't

Context matters here, because Hynix needed the win. The stock had plunged about 60% from its June peak before today, a slide that accelerated right after the company completed its $26.5 billion ADR listing in July, the biggest US listing by a foreign company ever. Regular readers will recall we asked at the time whether SK Hynix's US debut was the AI bubble top (Jul 11); two days later the stock suffered its steepest decline on record, sending the Kospi down as much as 9%.

Then came South Korea's biggest-ever "buyback bazooka" in August, which for a while was the only thing holding the market together. As we said in September, once retail fled, only record buybacks were preventing a Kospi crash. Earlier this month, the bid vanished:

The only thing that was propping up the Kospi in the past months is ending: the frenzied, record buyback spree by Samsung and SK Hynix is now over, earlier than expected, as it was running far faster than expected: 55 trillion won in stock bought back. Kospi closed at the lows.

— zerohedge (@zerohedge) October 7, 2026

Goldman's Asia macro sales desk confirms in its Asia FX Weekly (available to pro subs) that SK Hynix is "finishing its 40 trillion won buyback early and preparing further returns on Oct 28." So the next shareholder-friendly catalyst is barely a week away, and cancelling a dilutive spin right before it doesn't hurt the pitch.

Meanwhile, the fundamentals that made Hynix a $679 billion company keep heading the other way from the stock. As Russell Clark notes in his latest Capital Flows and Asset Markets note, "SK Hynix has typically been pretty responsive to spot DRAM prices. Not for the last three months." His chart shows the DDR5 spot price still grinding to new highs while Hynix shares have collapsed (perhaps this simply means that real DDR5 prices are far lower than represented by yet another gamed index):

Since November 2024, DRAM spot is up more than 1,000% versus 530% for Hynix shares, and as recently as June the stock was running well ahead of memory prices. Bank of Korea Governor Shin, per Goldman's FX desk, is "brushing off KOSPI softness given robust DRAM prices." Clark himself admits that "starting from a point of 'equities are wrong' is a recipe for disaster," which is about as honest a disclaimer as you'll find this month.

A Governance Win In A Market Still Looking For A Floor

The cancellation is good news for Hynix shareholders: no duplicate listing, no dilution of the parent's economic interest, no parent-subsidiary discount. Fibonacci Asset Management's Jung In Yun said as much, and Seoul gets a clean win for its "Korea discount" campaign.

But let's not confuse one stock's governance win with a bottom. Breadth was dreadful, foreigners sold for yet another day, Kospi turnover was light, and the index closed at 5,550 - down from 6,890 on Sept 28, when it was falling on the very Solidigm headline it rallied on today. In other words, the Kospi has lost about a fifth of its value in less than a month, and Friday's "rescue" came from local institutions bidding up the one name with a fresh catalyst. Next week brings the hyperscaler earnings that Privorotsky calls "critical," plus Hynix's Oct 28 shareholder return update. Until then, we'd lean toward this being a governance pop inside an ongoing AI deleveraging rather than the start of something bigger.

Then again, after we called for a halt at the open and got a green close instead, we'll leave the Korea predictions to the national teams for now.

Much more in the full GS Korea Final, and Privorotsky's "GS flow and positioning observations" notes, all available to pro subs.

Authored by Timothy Frudd via The Epoch Times,

President Donald Trump invoked the Defense Production Act of 1950 in a memorandum on Oct. 22 to increase oil production in the United States as prices remain elevated amid the Iran conflict.

In Thursday's memorandum, Trump determined that ensuring the United States had a resilient domestic petroleum production, refining, and logistics capacity was essential for national defense.

The memorandum directed Secretary of War Pete Hegseth to complete purchases, make commitments, and use financial instruments to expand domestic petroleum infrastructure, including exploration and production, storage, marine terminals, and gathering and transmission pipelines.

"Petroleum fuels the Nation's Armed Forces, industrial base, and crucial infrastructure," Trump wrote. "Without immediate Federal action, United States defense capabilities will remain vulnerable to disruption."

The Defense Production Act, which was enacted during the Cold War, gives the president authority over the domestic industrial base in the interest of national security. Under the legislation, the president can incentivize the domestic industrial base to increase the production and supply of critical goods and materials through direct purchases, purchase commitments, loans, and loan guarantees.

Trump's memorandum said the fastest and most cost-effective ways to meet the energy demands needed for U.S. national security are the purchases, commitments, and financial support made possible under the Defense Production Act.

The president previously issued Executive Order 14156 in January 2025, declaring a national emergency under the National Emergencies Act. At the time, Trump said that America's energy production, refining, transportation, and generation capacity was inadequate and represented an "unusual and extraordinary threat" to both the economy and U.S. national security.

Trump cited the January 2025 executive order in his memorandum to Hegseth on Thursday. The memorandum said the United States would not be able to provide the energy capabilities needed in a timely manner without taking action under the Defense Production Act due to supply chain limitations, financing constraints, infrastructure and permitting bottlenecks, and lengthy lead times.

In the memorandum, Trump said expanding petroleum production, refining, and logistics capacity "is necessary to avert an industrial resource or critical technology item shortfall that would severely impair national defense capability."

The president also waived standard statutory requirements under the Defense Production Act, citing the need to expand that capacity.

Last week, Vice President JD Vance announced that the Trump administration was planning to use the Defense Production Act to expand fuel production at a petroleum refinery in Tyler, Texas, owned by Delek US Holdings.

"We want millions of gallons of commercial-grade and military-spec fuel to come out of this refinery, in addition to what it's already producing," he said.

Trump previously invoked the Defense Production Act in April and issued multiple memoranda to increase domestic coal supply chains, liquefied natural gas capacity, and natural gas transmission.

The Trump administration's use of the Defense Production Act on Thursday came as oil prices have significantly increased since the start of the Iran war in February. As of Thursday, the price of a barrel of Brent crude oil, the global benchmark, was more than $113 per barrel.

In addition, the average cost for a gallon of regular gasoline in the United States was $4.27, while the average cost for a gallon of diesel was $6.30 on Thursday, according to AAA.

Trump accused Iran on Thursday of attempting to increase oil prices ahead of the November midterm elections.

"Iran is doing everything they can to drive up the price of Oil prior to the U.S. Midterm Election," Trump wrote in a statement on Truth Social. "They are even making up fake hits, mines, and everything else, because more Oil is coming through the Hormuz Strait now than it did even prior to the beginning of the Conflict."

Elon Musk is accelerating plans to build a fourth major nationwide wireless carrier, with SpaceX seeking access to at least 80,000 US cell sites, according to Bloomberg News. The prospect of a new rival to AT&T, Verizon, and T-Mobile lifted tower stocks in premarket trading, while shares of those legacy carriers fell as traders continued to assess that new emerging competitive threat.

The report stated that SpaceX is in talks with a number of tower companies, including Crown Castle, which, along with American Tower Corp. and Vertical Bridge Holdings, is among the largest owners of cellular towers.

"You can assume that we're talking to all parties," Crown Castle CEO Chris Hillabrant said Wednesday when asked about discussions with SpaceX, Amazon and other satellite telecommunications providers.

Crown Castle shares jumped as much as 10% in late trading following the report, while AT&T, Verizon, and T-Mobile each fell about 5%. 

The report follows news earlier this month that SpaceX acquired low-band spectrum and received Federal Communications Commission approval to launch 15,000 satellites designed to connect directly to smartphones.

This is the last critical piece of the spectrum puzzle needed for SpaceX to provide complete phone coverage in America

— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) October 8, 2026

Leasing tower space would establish ground coverage, including in buildings, under bridges, in homes, and in places where satellite coverage is ineffective. The satellites would help bridge gaps in tower coverage in remote places and areas without obstructions.

"We will be building out our terrestrial networks so there's broad-based connectivity anywhere that SpaceX and Starlink are allowed to operate," Musk told investors on an earnings call earlier this week. He said satellite launches and spectrum purchases would put Starlink Mobile on the path to become a major US carrier. 

"Whether SpaceX ultimately leases anything close to that figure remains uncertain, but the reported scope suggests a far greater level of commitment than spectrum accumulation alone. AT&T, Verizon, and T-Mobile shares are trading down in after-hours trading, adding to an already difficult year for the group," Bernstein analyst Laurent Yoon wrote in a note.

Separately, BNP Paribas analyst Sam McHugh offered his first take:

Would this be good enough to compete in wireless?

The 80,000-tower figure is at the upper end of the telcos' tower counts (TMUS has c. 85k, alongside c. 60k small cells). If SpaceX did build out to this many sites, even with the limited spectrum it has today, the service would be somewhat comparable to that of the existing carriers, given that it would start with no customers loading the network. However, it would not be capable of matching the existing carriers when loaded with millions of subscribers. This also somewhat undermines the argument that SpaceX can have a structural cost advantage by using its satellites for coverage or pursuing a more "femto or small cell" strategy, which, in a roundabout way, is one positive to take from these headlines.

Do we think they will do it?

It depends on what "It" is… Replicating the wireless carriers' networks (towers, spectrum, distribution, etc.) from scratch looks like a mammoth exercise, with very questionable payback for the company. So why would SpaceX do this? We do think it has a long-term ambition to build a more upload-focused network to complement its satellites that can provide connectivity to edge / physical AI (cars, robots, etc.). If, along the way, it can make enough noise and scare a telco into giving it an MVNO, then that would be a big win for SpaceX.

Would they buy instead?

In addition, by talking down the industry and depressing multiples, SpaceX creates additional optionality/upside on potential acquisitions, which, in our view, is a much clearer path to value creation (with TMUS potentially being the most credible target). It also recently acquired X and Cursor, showing it is more than willing to buy to accelerate its ambitions.

MVNO pressure?

As we wrote in Further SpaceX Spectrum Thoughts, our view is that we are past the point at which one of the carriers would fold and give SpaceX an MVNO. All that would do is help facilitate a more economical buildout for SpaceX, as it would allow the company to start generating revenue today, prove the business case, and then begin targeting investment in areas with high subscriber density. Without an MVNO/roaming deal, however, SpaceX will have to substantially build out a network before having a reasonable product proposition for customers, massively depressing the IRR.

What to watch for next?

• Given that the telcos are unlikely to budge and SpaceX has time on its hands (buildout obligations are long-dated), we continue to think this uncertainty will persist until at least the Upper-C band auction in April next year, when SpaceX will have the opportunity to put incremental capital to work to prove its commitment to a consumer-focused mobile network (as opposed to its existing spectrum holdings, which are probably better suited to an IoT-like service).

• If SpaceX does sign a tower deal, how many sites are covered and for what duration will be critical to assessing its ambitions.

• Another spectrum deal (SpaceX or someone else). There are pockets of spectrum still out there that SpaceX or the telcos could move on before the C-Band auction (details at the bottom of this note), and the risk here is that SpaceX acquires more, or a telco acquires more defensively.

• SpaceX touted the possibility of hosting an investor call to outline more specifics of its wireless ambitions soon. No firm event has been confirmed yet.

• We continue to field questions around "Title 3 data roaming" requirements in the US, a topic we addressed earlier this year. See SpaceX's Backdoor MVNO: Expert Call Takeaways. We think this is a dead end for SpaceX. Still, after the midterms, we do see a scenario where SpaceX potentially tries to bring legal action against the telcos on the basis of a "concerted refusal to deal", or perhaps attacks the satellite JV (SpaceX) as a way to exert more pressure. Indeed, the SpaceX CFO referred to the telcos as a cartel at a public investor conference in September.

US futures are lower, erasing a modest overnight bounce, as markets scramble after Thursday's violent AI liquidation while oil rises again: Brent hit the highest level since May after the Houthis fired another missile at Riyadh and an IRGC official declared traffic of "illicit" vessels through Hormuz "completely stopped" (contradicted by a Bloomberg headline just minutes prior), while Thursday's haven bid fades; as a result Treasuries give back part of their biggest rally in more than two years with the 10Y yield rising back to 4.99%. As of 8:00am ET, S&P futures are down 0.2% at 7,687 while Nasdaq futures are down 0.1% at 29,100; Dow futures underperform, sliding 0.6%. That follows Thursday's chaotic session, when the S&P dropped 1.2% and the Nasdaq 100 tumbled almost 3%, its worst day since June, even as two-thirds of the S&P rose and the hedge fund VIP basket suffered its worst day since 2011 (as we detailed last night). In premarket trading, Mag 7 names are mixed with Nvidia (+0.6%) and Tesla (+0.8%) higher while Meta and Microsoft (both -0.7%) lag; tower companies jump and wireless carriers slide after SpaceX was said to be targeting 80,000 or more US cell sites, while Deckers tumbles after cutting its full-year sales guidance. The day's driver is the AI trade (what else): OpenAI is now targeting a $1.25 trillion valuation for its $30 billion raise, $150 billion below last month's ask, and SK Hynix scrapped a US listing of its Solidigm unit, yet chips are modestly higher after the Kospi erased a 4.1% plunge to close up 0.3%; according to Bloomberg, "this looks less like capitulation than a repricing of who pays for the build-out." Bonds are cheaper across the curve in a bear-flattening move, as the tech rout eases and oil climbs further, complicating the inflation outlook; French bonds outperform after the OAT-Bund spread opened at a fresh post-2011 high of 176bps, even as France's flash PMIs collapsed into contraction ahead of tonight's Moody's review. The Bloomberg Dollar Spot Index is up 0.1% and the euro slips 0.2% after the dismal French PMI, while the kiwi outperforms on ANZ calling for three RBNZ hikes. In commodities, WTI rises 1.8% to $101.22 and Brent 1.4% to $114.80; gold is flat near $4,030 and silver slides 1.1%. Bitcoin rises 0.5% to about $81,600. US economic data slate includes the October S&P Global flash PMIs (9:45am), the final October University of Michigan sentiment and inflation expectations (10am) and the Kansas City Fed services survey (11am). The Fed is in its blackout period ahead of next Wednesday's FOMC, so there are no Fed speakers.

In premarket trading, Mag 7 stocks are mixed (Alphabet (GOOGL) -0.2%, Amazon (AMZN) -0.2%, Apple (AAPL) -0.1%, Meta Platforms (META) -0.5%, Microsoft (MSFT) -0.5%, Nvidia (NVDA) +0.2%, Tesla (TSLA) +0.1%)

• Tower companies gain and wireless carriers slide after SpaceX was said to be targeting 80,000 or more US cell sites, with talks under way with at least one infrastructure owner. Crown Castle (CCI) +9%, American Tower (AMT) +6%; AT&T (T) -4%, T-Mobile (TMUS) -4%, Verizon (VZ) -3.8%
• Autoliv (ALV) falls 5% after the maker of airbag systems cut its adjusted operating margin forecast for the full year.
• Bloom Energy (BE), which has more than doubled this year on demand for AI power sources, is down 3% after its quarterly report.  Bloomberg Intelligence notes that “operating cash flow turned negative in 3Q as contract assets, receivables and inventory rose.”
• Deckers Outdoor (DECK) falls 7% after the footwear company cut its net sales guidance for the full year, which also fell short of the consensus estimate.
• MaxLinear (MXL) climbs 2% after the semiconductor device company’s third-quarter results beat expectations and it gave a revenue forecast that is seen as strong.
• Newmont Corp. (NEM) inches 1% lower after the miner forecast higher than expected 2027 spending for its Red Chris copper-gold mine in British Columbia.
• Norwegian Cruise (NCLH) slips 3% after JPMorgan downgraded the stock to underweight and reduced his price target to a Street-low $11 per share. Norwegian is due to report third-quarter results on Oct. 29.
• RingCentral (RNG) rises 16% after the communications software company raised its full-year forecast for adjusted earnings. It also reported third-quarter results that beat expectations.

In other corporate news, OpenAI's valuation ambitions got a $150 billion haircut: the ChatGPT maker is now targeting $1.25 trillion in the final stages of negotiations for its roughly $30 billion funding round, led by UAE investors, down from the $1.4 trillion it was seeking last month (good thing Anthropic is reportedly aiming for $2 trillion in its IPO). SK Hynix scrapped plans for a potential $10 billion US listing of its Solidigm unit. American Express raised its full-year EPS forecast to $18.30-$18.60 from $17.30-$17.90. BASF is said to have raised its bid for rival Evonik to about €24 per share, and SLB sees growth driven by a Middle East oil field recovery. Citigroup won approval to launch a wholly-owned securities business in China after a nearly five-year wait. Nvidia invested in AI video and image generator Higgsfield. Alnylam reported positive data for its Huntington's disease drug. Calpers is pivoting from US tech giants to private equity, the FT reports. Canadian oil and gas producer Logan Energy is exploring options including a potential sale, while allergy and autoimmune biotech Lycia Therapeutics raised $317.5 million in an upsized IPO priced at the top of its range. Apple's $2,000-and-up foldable iPhone Duo went on sale today, with new orders being offered delivery at the end of January. Infosys narrowed its FY revenue growth outlook to 1%-2% from 1.5%-3%, and China's Cambricon reported 3Q revenue of 3.53 billion yuan, well below the 6.26 billion estimate.

Stocks are set for a relatively steady start as investors look beyond AI winners, Bloomberg's Michael Msika writes: shares seen as vulnerable to disruption are now outperforming those seen as the technology's biggest beneficiaries. Thursday's decline was concentrated in technology, but the broader market carried on, with the equal-weight S&P 500 finishing up 0.8%, its best day since 2024 relative to the cap-weighted index; advancers outnumbered decliners by about two-to-one and 61% of S&P members are now above their 50-day moving average, the highest in two months.

The AI trade is the culprit once again, but investors do not appear to be turning risk-off so much as repricing the build-out, taking money off the semiconductor trade to reinvest into defensive sectors like staples and utilities. A basket of AI winners is now down 23% from its June highs, while stocks at risk of AI disruption have surged nearly 60% over the same period and now lead for the year.

“Yesterday the market did not stop believing in AI, it simply started asking who pays for it, and at a 5% bond yield that question has an opportunity cost,” said Florian Ielpo, head of macro research at Lombard Odier Asset Management.

“What we’re seeing is a repricing of valuations across the board as rates rise, with neoclouds and other leveraged operators hit hardest,” said Hugh Lam, investment strategist at Betashares in Sydney. “Those financing concerns are weighing on hardware-linked markets like Japan and Korea, which have seen more volatility in recent months.”

The financing angle is the crux: Meta's spending commitments have swelled to $825 billion and its CDS hit a record after results (as we reported), CoreWeave's 5Y CDS blew out to 1,162bps (Bernstein sees a $76 billion funding hole), and credit metrics are flashing their biggest risk-off signal in more than a year. Meanwhile, the S&P Consumer Staples index is up 12% in October, on track for its best month since October 1998, as investors rotate out of tech and into defensives.

Goldman's Rich Privorotsky called Thursday the session that "made the least sense of any day in this selloff", with AI versus the S&P ex-AI suffering its worst relative day since the DeepSeek moment. His summary of the AI capex dilemma: "You either cut capex, delay deployment or increasingly fund through equity. None are particularly supportive of equity prices." The flip side, as he puts it: "Rates: AI loses, bonds win" (a theme his desk laid out earlier this week and McElligott echoed). Goldman Prime notes that all three hedge fund strategy groups lost more than 1% on the same day for the first time since Covid, with multi-strats down 1.9%, the second-worst day since the April 2025 tariff selloff, while TMT specialist Sean Johnstone sums up the mood: "strong AI demand is not enough."

JPMorgan's Market Intel desk says Thursday's Nasdaq selloff showed the fragile sentiment around AI financing, with chatter around a possible US/Israeli strike on Iran after the midterms sparking a broader tech-led de-risking; its cash desk saw long-onlys 3x better for sale while hedge funds were 2.6x better to buy, mostly covering. With MSFT, GOOGL and AMZN reporting next week, investors "may remain low conviction to add risk", though the team stays Tactically Bullish, favoring cyclicals outside tech while selectively buying tech weakness in semis and memory. JPM's Jay Barry notes Thursday's 15-21bp drop in Treasury yields was the largest one-day decline since March 2023, as yields have become increasingly correlated with the Nasdaq.

Elsewhere, SpaceX continued to disrupt the telecom market, aiming to secure at least 80,000 US cell sites and in talks with at least one major infrastructure owner, which is why towers are flying and carriers are getting hit on both sides of the Atlantic. Governments, banks and airlines are still racing to patch critical flaws in PHP, the language underpinning as much as 70% of the internet, which researchers uncovered with the help of AI tools (as we noted yesterday). In politics, President Trump travels to Florida today after rallying in Iowa for GOP Senate hopeful Ashley Hinson, while Goldman desks flag a Democratic sweep at roughly 70% on Polymarket as another AI overhang.

In Europe, the French bond crisis takes a breather: the OAT-Bund spread opened at a fresh high of 176bps, the widest since 2011, before narrowing slightly, but remains set for its biggest weekly widening on record (“Everyone has blown up”). Moody's review of France's rating is due after the close, with a downgrade likely given its negative outlook, and France is deploying the military to back up police ahead of weekend protests. Goldman FICC's take on hedging all of this is here.

In Europe, the Stoxx 600 is down 0.5% at 634.75, falling for a second day as disappointing earnings, including from Kering's Gucci, add to concerns over the AI trade and elevated oil prices. Telecoms are the worst-performing sector on the SpaceX cell-site report, while energy leads gains alongside construction and real estate. Volvo Car plunged as much as 32% to its lowest since its 2021 listing as cratering China sales and US tariffs hit its turnaround, Kering slid as much as 12%, and Intrum crashed as much as 43% to a record low. Flash PMIs did not help: the euro-area composite fell to 51.9 vs 52.7 expected, dragged down by a surprise plunge into contraction in France (composite 48.4 vs 50.3 est.), while the UK composite jumped to 53.1 vs 51.7 expected. JPM notes semis, luxury, ceasefire and software are among the worst-performing baskets.

Here are the biggest European movers:

• Electrolux shares gain as much as 12% after the Swedish home-appliance maker’s 3Q EBIT beat expectations by about 5%. Citi says the result comes despite challenging end markets.
• Sodexo shares rise as much as 6% after the French caterer reported better-than-expected organic sales growth, earnings and dividend for the most recent fiscal year.
• Munters shares rise as much as 11% after the Swedish heating and air treatment solutions firm reported third-quarter orders that beat the average analyst estimate.
• Signify shares rise as much as 10% after the light manufacturing company posted results that Morgan Stanley described as a small positive, given relatively low expectations.
• Kering shares slide as much as 12% after the French luxury-goods company saw further deceleration of third-quarter revenue growth at its key Gucci unit, slower growth in North America as well as persistent weakness in China.
• Volvo Car shares sink as much as 32% to their lowest since its 2021 listing after what analysts called a weak third quarter, as cratering China sales and US tariffs complicate the automaker’s turnaround.
• Intrum shares fall as much as 43%, hitting a record low, after the Swedish debt collector reported a goodwill impairment of SEK1.5b due to underperformance in Germany.
• European Telecom operator shares drop after Bloomberg News reported that SpaceX is in talks to access cell sites in the US, adding to investor concerns around increased competition within the sector.
• Volvo shares fall as much as 3.5% after the truckmaker’s results were described as a lower-quality beat by analysts.
• Safran shares fall as much as 7% after the company reaffirmed its guidance when analysts had been expecting upgrades to the group’s outlook.
• Valeo fell as much as 13% after analysts noted a language change in forecasts for the rest of the year in the auto company’s third-quarter results.

Asian stocks steadied after a chip-led selloff, with most indexes well off their opening lows, though the MSCI Asia Pacific Index is headed for a fourth straight weekly loss. The Kospi staged an impressive turnaround, closing up 0.3% at 5,550 after plunging as much as 4.1% at the open, led by SK Hynix (+4.4%) and local institutional buying even as foreigners dumped $729 million, per Goldman's Seoul desk; there didn't appear to be a particular catalyst, and the Kospi is still down about 21% in October, the world's worst major market this month. Japan's Nikkei 225 fell 0.3% to 62,693 after briefly dipping below 62,000, finding support near its 200-day moving average. In China, the CSI 300 jumped 1.7% and ChiNext 4% as state-backed "national team" ETFs saw about RMB84 billion of turnover, a day after the CSI 300 entered a bear market, while the Hang Seng rose 0.7% back above 23,000 led by EV makers. India's Nifty fell 0.8%, capping its worst week since March, while Taiwan was closed for a typhoon and Thailand for a holiday.

In FX, the Bloomberg Dollar Spot Index is little changed to 0.1% higher, though still on track for a second weekly decline, and the DXY trades in a 101.48-101.85 range. The euro is down 0.2% at 1.1195 after a very poor French PMI reading in which all components fell into contraction, while cable halved its losses after the UK PMI beat and trades near 1.3386. The yen reversed early haven-driven gains: USD/JPY is up 0.1% near 157 after falling as much as 0.4% to 156.08, the lowest since Sept. 18, even after a source report that the BOJ will keep rate hikes on a fast track with December in focus. The kiwi tops the G-10 board after ANZ forecast RBNZ hikes at each of the next three meetings, and the Swiss franc lags.

In rates, Treasuries extend losses, unwinding a portion of Thursday's aggressive rally as the rout in tech shares eases and oil prices rise further, complicating the inflation outlook. US yields are 3bp to 6bp cheaper across the curve in a bear-flattening move, with 5s30s about 1bp tighter and the 10Y up 4bp near 4.99%, just shy of the 5% line it broke below on Thursday. Bunds and gilts outperform Treasuries by 3bp and 1bp in the 10-year sector and French 10-year bonds by an additional 6bp, as OATs rebound about 30 ticks from Thursday's beating; that erodes some of the flight-to-quality bid for German and US paper. Long gilts continue to outperform ahead of Prime Minister Andy Burnham's first budget next week. There are no Fed speakers with the central bank in its blackout period, and the IG dollar issuance slate is empty so far following muted activity Thursday. Next week brings $69 billion of 2-year notes on Monday, $70 billion of 5-year on Tuesday and $44 billion of 7-year on Thursday, per Goldman. Meanwhile, JPMorgan notes the odds of a December hike have slipped to 88%.

“USD/JPY edged higher on profit-taking, but AI jitters remain a JPY tailwind,” said Moh Siong Sim, FX strategist at OCBC Bank Singapore.

In commodities, WTI for December delivery is up 1.8% at $101.22 and Brent 1.4% higher at $114.80, the highest since May, as attacks on Saudi Arabia intensified: Saudi air defenses intercepted a Houthi ballistic missile fired at Riyadh, and an IRGC official told Fars that traffic of "illicit vessels" through Hormuz has been "completely halted" after strikes on three tankers Thursday and the destruction of another overnight. President Trump says the US crushed Iran and may want to do it "a little bit more", while UN Ambassador Waltz told the FT the US could still be mired in a stalemate with Iran a year from now. On the supply side, Trump invoked the Defense Production Act to expand petroleum capacity and will release $150 million for refining, while a tanker carrying Russian diesel from Primorsk intermittently signaled New York, potentially the first shipment under the Putin-Trump fuel-supply deal. Goldman's oil desk says the market is already pricing more than $20/bbl of risk premium. Spot gold is flat near $4,030/oz after briefly dipping below $4,000 overnight, silver drops 1.1% to $54.05, and base metals are mixed. US natgas is down 2.5% at $2.73 while UK natgas rises 3.9%.

US economic data slate includes the October S&P Global flash manufacturing, services and composite PMIs (9:45am), the final October University of Michigan sentiment, expectations and 1-year and 5-10 year inflation expectations (10am) and the Kansas City Fed services activity index (11am). The Fed is in its blackout period ahead of the Oct. 28 FOMC decision.

American Express, SLB, Booz Allen, First Citizens, Flagstar, Rithm Capital and Gentex report before the open. Moody's rating decision on France is due after the close, alongside S&P on Germany and Scope on Italy, while Brazil holds its presidential runoff on Sunday.

Market Snapshot

Top Overnight News

• Iran’s message is stark: If the U.S. and Israel restart their air campaign, Tehran will respond with strikes not only on American bases and warships but on airports, pipelines and other civilian targets in the neighboring countries of the Persian Gulf. WSJ
• The US is preparing for a protracted conflict with Iran, even as the Trump administration hopes its bombing campaigns and economic sanctions will force major concessions from the Islamic republic. Mike Waltz, Donald Trump’s ambassador to the UN, acknowledged that a year from now the US could still be mired in a stalemate with Iran, without a deal on Tehran’s nuclear program or a return to prewar shipping through the Strait of Hormuz. FT
• The movement of “illicit vessels” through the Strait of Hormuz has “completely halted” after the latest Iranian attacks against ships, Iran’s semi-official Fars news agency cites an official close to the IRGC as saying. BBG
• A tanker carrying diesel left the Russian port of Primorsk and intermittently signaled New York, potentially marking the first such shipment following a fuel-supply agreement between Vladimir Putin and Donald Trump. BBG
• SpaceX aims to secure a minimum of 80,000 cell sites across the US, and is in talks with at least one major cellular infrastructure firm to reach that goal. BBG
• OpenAI, which is seeking to raise around $30 billion in a fresh funding round, is now targeting a valuation of $1.25 trillion during the final stages of negotiations, a $150 billion drop from the $1.4 trillion it was seeking last month. BBG
• Global hedge funds suffered one of their broadest declines since the Covid pandemic following the stock market selloff on Thursday, according to Goldman Sachs Group Inc.’s prime brokerage desk. BBG
• Metrics across global bond markets are signaling their biggest risk-off sentiment in more than a year, as a selloff in AI stocks and growing geopolitical tensions caused investors to seek out safe-haven assets. BBG
• The BOJ may maintain a continued fast pace of rate hikes given price trends and a view at the bank that the impact of increases on the economy so far has been limited, with December the next potential move, people familiar said. BBG
• Japan’s key price gauge rose above the Bank of Japan’s target level for the first time this year, supporting the case for a widely expected BOJ interest rate hike in December. BBG
• The ECB will lift rates for the final time in December following a pause next week, economists said. That’s at odds with market bets on far more hikes lying ahead. Central bank data showed inflation expectations among households increased slightly last month. BBG
• Eurozone flash PMIs for Oct were soft, w/the composite number coming in at 51.9 (down from 53.1 and below the Street’s 52.7), w/a lot of the weakness stemming from the French services sector (due to unrest in that country), while manufacturers reported a spike in input cost inflation. S&P
• France is bracing for a new round of protests tomorrow, rolling out the military to back up police in a bid to prevent a repeat of last weekend’s riots that led to violence, looting and arrests. BBG
• Brazil’s President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva and challenger Flávio Bolsonaro are tied at 50% each of valid votes before Sunday’s runoff election, a new poll showed. BBG
• SK Hynix scrapped plans for a potential $10 billion US listing of its Solidigm unit. BBG
• BASF is said to increase its bid for rival Evonik to about €24 per share. BBG
• The Trump administration is looking to restrict US investment in Chinese biotech companies, proposing the addition of biotechnology to a list of sensitive technologies. BBG
• Russia's central bank left its key rate at 14.00%, in line with estimates, as Ukrainian strikes spur inflation. BBG
• US President Trump will deliver remarks in Florida on Friday, Georgia on Saturday and Michigan on Sunday: The White House
• Goldman's Prime desk says Global Fundamental L/S funds fell 1.4% Thursday, their worst day since July 16, while TMT funds are down 9.6% month-to-date. GS
• JPM's Feroli expects the October flash manufacturing PMI to decline to 54.5 from 55.9 and the services PMI to ease to 58.0 from 58.8. JPM

A more detailed look at global markets courtesy of Newsquawk

APAC stocks were mostly negative following the weak lead from Wall St, where a deepening of the tech rout had spurred a flight to quality, while geopolitical concerns linger following reports that the US and Israel have drawn up plans for renewed strikes on Iran, which could be implemented following the US midterm election. ASX 200 was dragged lower by weakness in mining, materials, resources and tech stocks, although the downside was stemmed by some resilience in consumer discretionary, financials, real estate and utilities, while preliminary PMI data was uninspiring, with all main figures in contraction territory. Nikkei 225 briefly retreated beneath the 62,000 level with notable weakness in tech and mining stocks, while the latest inflation data from Japan mostly matched estimates and showed an acceleration from the previous, with headline and core readings back above the 2% price target. KOSPI underperformed as the tech sell-off rolled over into Asia, and with SK Hynix also not helped after it pulled the plug on plans to list its Solidigm unit on the Nasdaq due to regulatory and market volatility concerns. Hang Seng and Shanghai Comp were mixed as the Hong Kong benchmark rebounded from an early dip with the help of resilience in China's top EV makers, while the mainland initially conformed to the mostly downbeat mood. Note, the Taiwan session was suspended amid the approaching typhoon; potentially pushing pressure onto regional peers.

Top Asian News

• China is to accelerate the development of new roles within the AI space, Xinhua reported.
• Japanese Prime Minister Takaichi told reporters that she would instruct the Minister of Economy, Trade and Industry to consider subsidies for gasoline and other fuel, JiJi reported.
• China's Politburo held a meeting today and said it is to maintain a high-pressure posture against corruption and will continue to deepen reform efforts and conscientiously implement reform tasks, according to Xinhua. Emphasises effectively strengthening leadership building and enhancing cohesion.
• Japan's Economy Minister Kiuchi said government decision whether to declare official end to deflation will be made looking comprehensively at CPI, GDP deflator and background behind moves in underlying inflation. Don't think conditions met for the government to declare an official end to deflation. Hope the BoJ guides policy appropriately based on joint statement with the government stipulating need for stable and sustainable price stability.
• Japan's Finance Minister Katayama said she believes Japanese financial institutions handled PHP issue relatively smoothly and expect them to continue to take necessary action. Cannot comment on revival of gasoline subsidies and will take household situation into consideration.
• Australia proposes to raise the cap on banks covered bond issuance and opens consultation on financial sector competition.
• SK Hynix (000660 KS) cancels its plans to list Solidigm on the Nasdaq with an announcement expected soon, according to Korean press.

A softer start for much of Europe. Euro Stoxx 50 -0.7% and Stoxx 600 -0.5%, as the US tech-led (SOX -6.7%) pressure reverberated into the region, before pressure in European bourses was then exacerbated by a set of dismal French PMI data and poor earnings from several pertinent names. Following earnings, Kering, -11.8%, after missing marginally on overall revenue, but more pertinently as they highlighted traffic as an ongoing constraint and particularly within China, not expecting a H/H margin performance improvement and Q4 thus far has been in-line with Q3. Sticking in France, L’Oreal, +4.5%, gains after Q3 sales topped expectations, and the Chinese market only slowed a bit. Also hit, and at their lowest ever share price, Volvo Car, -26.7%, pressured by a dire set of earnings where China revenue fell near 50% Y/Y. European sectors hold a strong negative bias. Unsurprisingly, Energy takes the top spot, given the strength in underlying oil prices; Construction & Materials, and Real Estate complete the top three. To the downside, Telecoms is the clear underperformer, weighed by the SpaceX update (see below), with Industrials following closely behind. US equity futures (ES -0.1% NQ U/C RTY -0.5%) are trading mixed; the tech-heavy NQ is faring a little better vs peers, whilst the RTY lags. The relative outperformance comes as tech rebounds a touch from the hefty losses seen in the prior session, with focus on SK Hynix (+5.2% pre-market), after the Co. has paused its Solidigm IPO.

Top European News

• SpaceX (SPCX) in talks to access 80,000 cell sites for new network.
• OpenAI is raising up to USD 30bln in funding round at a USD 1.25tln valuation, led by UAE investors, according to CNBC, citing sources; OpenAI is negotiating a commercial deal that would secure more computing capacity from the UAE.
• UK is expected to make a pre-budget announcement on an AI package on the weekend, Politico reported; Housing Secretary Rayner is booked for the Sunday media rounds, potentially indicating a Housing, Communities & Local Government related update.

FX

• G10s were initially mixed against the USD, but now display a negative bias as the USD gradually moved higher alongside upside in energy prices. The Kiwi outperforms vs peers after hawkish RBNZ calls from analysts at ANZ; the Swiss Franc is the relative underperformer, as yield differentials widen once again. EUR was mildly pressured following a very poor French PMI reading, whereby all components surprisingly fell into contractionary territory.
• DXY currently holds within a 101.48 to 101.85 range, a touch firmer this morning, but net-weaker since the start of the week. The data docket lacked any Tier-1 US data and Fed speak, so USD action was largely dictated by credit-related woes, which hampered sentiment in the US. Next week, attention will be on the FOMC Policy Decision, where rates are expected to be kept on hold.
• The Kiwi is the mild outperformer this morning, and holds towards the upper end of a 0.5679 to 0.5699 range. Strength which comes after analysts at ANZ expect the RBNZ to deliver rate hikes at the next three meetings, citing Q3 core inflation data.
• The CHF is the slight laggard this morning, paring some of the strength seen in the prior session, as US yields rebound a touch today. Similarly, JPY holds towards the bottom of the pile, but faring a touch better vs its haven-counterpart. This comes after a source report which suggested that the BoJ is set to keep rate hikes on a fast track, adding that interest rates are still far from neutral. Only very mild strength was seen in JPY following this report, given it does not shift market expectations; money markets assign c. 80% chance of a hike in December. USD/JPY currently trades towards the upper end of a 156.07-157.16 range.

Central Banks

• BoJ is expected to continue rapid rate hikes, with focus on December, sources suggest; report suggests that interest rates are still far from neutral, adding that inflation needs to stabilise.
• BoJ Financial Stability Report: Japan's financial system has been maintaining stability on the whole.
• European ECB Consumer Inflation Expectations (Sep) 3.1% (Prev. 3%).
• Former German Finance Minister Kukies is said not to succeed Schnabel at the ECB.
• ANZ sees RBNZ raising rates at next three meetings, citing the Q3 core inflation data.
• PBoC injected CNY 258bln in overnight reverse repos, while 7-day reverse repo volume is at zero.
• PBoC set USD/CNY midpoint at 6.7180 vs exp. 6.6758 (prev. 6.7195).
• Indonesia's central bank official said rupiah movement still manageable following MSCI announcement last week and said it will respond if needed to ensure supply and demand in the FX market.
• Monetary Authority of Singapore, Malaysia Central Bank and Bank of Thailand are partnering on cross-border digital money settlement.

Fixed Income

• A mixed start for benchmarks, as the complex takes a bit of a breather from the recent rally in core counterparts as growth concerns dominated the narrative for debt that is not dominated by domestic political and fiscal concerns.
• USTs are lower by a few ticks, in a pullback from the 106-16 high which printed on Thursday, rather than in reaction to a fundamental development, though energy continues to tick higher and the risk tone is gradually improving, Currently, holds at the base of a 106-05 to 106-14 band.
• Bunds essentially flat, just off lows in a 122.13-54 band. Upside was seen through the morning’s first Flash PMI from France, with Bunds peaking on the German series but then waning and proving relatively unreactive to the EZ-wide figure. For the EZ, the series points to growth of 0.3% in the period, a touch slower than September’s implied pace, but still robust enough to keep the ECB on track to tighten, and perhaps more so than currently assumed by desks, particularly as inflationary pressures mount; a dynamic that may explain the pullback in Bunds following the German data and into the EZ print.
• OATs are, of course, the focus for today. This morning’s Flash PMIs were dire. All three main components fell into contractionary territory. A finding that does not bode well, as recent civil unrest and spread widening will not have been fully accounted for by the respondents. Further, we still await Moody’s verdict on the sovereign tonight, with a downgrade a real possibility given recent events and price action, and then further protest action on the weekend.
• As it stands, OATs are firmer by around 30 ticks, in a bit of a rebound from the c. 50 ticks of pressure seen on Thursday, but still set to end the week with downside of over 120 ticks as things stand. Given this, the OAT-Bund 10yr yield spread has narrowed by a handful of bps on the session overall, but it did commence it at a fresh high of 176bps; at wides since 2011, when 191bps printed.
• Gilts are flat and marginally lag European peers within 85.01-36 parameters in a modest reversal of the prior day's action. Overnight focus showed Chancellor Healey continues to underscore a pro-business approach, and was absent of anything which changes the majority view of the budget passing without trouble. The morning's retail sales data contracted at a greater pace than expected, October Flash PMIs were particularly strong, and chime with expectations for a November BoE hike.
• UK DMO said it is to hold a tender for up to GBP 1bln of 0.25% Treasury Gilt 2031 on October 29.
• China's Finance Ministry auctions 30-year bonds at 2.06% yield.
• Australia sold AUD 1.0bln in 1.0% November 2031 bonds, avg. yield 4.8708%, bid-to-cover 4.32.

Commodities

• Crude is firmer this morning, with WTI and Brent up by 1.6% and 1%, respectively. Benchmarks eased a touch off earlier highs, but then reversed this following reports that the Houthis fired missiles at Saudi interests. WTI currently holds within a USD 98.84-101.30/bbl range, whilst Brent sits at the upper end of a USD 112.74-114.72/bbl band.
• Strength today comes as the geopolitical environment remains tense and rhetoric remains punchy. Starting with US-Iran, the IRGC continues to strike ships traversing the “illegal” route, with little fresh indications of diplomacy. President Trump suggested that Iran was fabricating reports of these attacks, whilst warning that they may want to “crush” Iran a little more. On the Saudi-Houthi front, the risk of further supply disruptions remain, given that tit-for-tat strikes continue. Over in Israel, PM Netanyahu held an emergency meeting to discuss a recent attack on five IDF soldiers in the West Bank; he eventually decided to close off the area. This decision will only bolster speculation that the PM would like to postpone the election; a former Israeli premier had previously accused Netanyahu of this, arguing that preparing infrastructure to go to war is a way to delay the Knesset election.
• Spot gold is flat and trades around the USD 4k/oz mark, currently holding within a USD 3,986-4,032/oz range. The yellow metal is net-lower since the start of the week, with pressure facilitated by inflationary concerns, related to elevated energy prices. It seems as if the gold remains worried about the inflationary implications of the war, whilst haven counterparts (USTs/JPY) have recently been focusing on AI funding concerns and potential hits to growth.
• Base metals are mixed this morning; 3M LME copper currently trades firmer by around a percent, and holds within a USD 14,059.2-14,270/t range.
• UAE Environment Ministry said a tanker oil spill is impacting beaches in Umm al-Quwain.
• Japan government considers cutting gasoline subsidies from December, according to officials.
• US President Trump said he will release USD 150 mln to increase US refining capacity.
• US President Trump invokes Defense Production Act for petroleum capacity and waives Section 303 rules to expand oil capacity.

Trade/Tariffs

• French Trade Minister has requested a US tariff exemption covering cognac and champagne.
• German President Steinmeier to visit China on the 27th of October.
• US Trump Admin is looking to restrict US investment in Chinese biotech companies.
• China's Commerce Ministry urges the US to correct its approach on research ties between the two nations.

Geopolitics: Middle East

• US President Trump said regarding Iran that they have crushed the Islamic Republic and may want to do it a little bit more.
• US President Trump's ambassador to the UN Waltz said the US is prepared for long stand-off with Iran and acknowledged that the US could still be mired in a stalemate with Iran a year from now, according to FT.
• Iran's IRGC threatens to target US bases if commercial ships continue transiting Strait of Hormuz, according to Fox News.
• IRGC official said "today we not only possess power but also the will to use power"; "if the enemy wants to commit the slightest folly again, we will deliver an unprecedented blow", Al Mayadeen reported.
• IRGC official said "traffic of violating vessels in the Strait of Hormuz has been completely stopped", Fars reported. "An informed official close to the IRGC Navy announced that after the destruction of the navigational aid systems used by the violating vessels, the hitting of 3 oil tankers yesterday and the destruction of another violating oil tanker last night, the traffic of violating vessels has been completely stopped". "This informed official warned that if oil smuggling resumes, the dealing with violating vessels and their supporting technical systems will be carried out with much greater severity". "He also emphasized that the renewed air intervention of the US military and support for oil smuggling will be met with a more direct and decisive response, and the US military will be responsible for the consequences".
• Iran's Foreign Minister Araghchi called out French President Macron regarding his JCPOA stance contradictions.
• BeamTracker reported sound of an explosion was heard in Strait of Hormuz area, with cause and origin not yet known, although the site of the explosion is a location that has previously been the passage point of violating ships in the strait.
• Saudi Arabia has launched a "raid" on eastern Taiz within Yemen, Sabereen reported.
• Two Saudi airstrikes targeted the water authority building in Al Hazm district of Al Jawf province, Yemen.
• Saudi‑led coalition said air defences intercepted and destroyed ballistic missile launched by Houthi militia towards Riyadh.
• "Missile launch by the Yemeni Armed Forces towards Saudi interests", via Sabereen.
• Saudi sources report loud explosions heard in Riyadh, according to Al Masirah.
• Yemeni forces warned airlines again not to enter Saudi airspace or airports, according to Nour News.
• Israeli PM Netanyahu said "I have instructed the security forces to impose a siege on the city of Hebron and to completely close off the West Bank".
• US State Department spokesperson said there is no US-Turkey proposal regarding Lebanon and no US-backed proposals to change Lebanon's political structure.

Geopolitics: Ukraine

• Russia's Defence Ministry said Russia hit a railcar depot in the Poltava region in Ukraine and a cargo vessel in the Black Sea, while it also hit the Port of Vilkovo in the Odesa region.
• Ukraine energy company DTEK said a Russian attack hit one of its power stations.
• Ukraine seeks to move customs checks inside the EU to avoid Russian drones, with Kyiv in discussions with Poland and Slovakia about moving customs checks into their territories to try and make trucks safer, according to FT.
• Ukraine Air Force reported guided bombs striking Donetsk and Dnipropetrovsk.
• EU considers sanctions reprieve for Chinese fabric-maker accused of aiding Russia, according to SCMP.

Crypto

• Bitcoin is a touch lower this morning and hovers around the USD 82k mark.

US Event Calendar

• 9:45am: Oct P S&P Global US Manufacturing PMI, est. 55.5, prior 55.9
• 9:45am: Oct P S&P Global US Services PMI, est. 58.0, prior 58.8
• 9:45am: Oct P S&P Global US Composite PMI, est. 57.6, prior 58.4
• 10:00am: Oct F U. of Mich. Sentiment, est. 46.3, prior 46.3
• 10:00am: Oct F U. of Mich. Expectations, est. 47.1, prior 47.3
• 10:00am: Oct F U. of Mich. 1 Yr Inflation, est. 4.7%, prior 4.7%
• 10:00am: Oct F U. of Mich. 5-10 Yr Inflation, est. 3.5%, prior 3.5%
• 11:00am: Oct Kansas City Fed Services Activity

Central Bank Speakers

• None: the Fed is in its external communications blackout ahead of the Oct. 28 FOMC decision

DB's Jim Reid concludes the overnight wrap

As storm Austen hits these shores this morning, clouds kept darkening for markets yesterday, as the wobbles of recent weeks all collided at once. First, there was mounting stress around France, with the Franco-German 10yr spread (+14.8bps) seeing its biggest daily widening since the initial pandemic turmoil in March 2020. Second, AI fears continued to gather pace, with the Philly semiconductor index (-6.72%) falling to its lowest level since July, which dragged down equities more broadly. And third, the latest geopolitical fears meant oil prices kept rising as well, with Brent crude (+4.00%) hitting a 5-month high of $113.17/bbl. So collectively, those concerns drove a huge risk-off move, with the 10yr Treasury yield (-16.6bps to 4.95%) seeing its biggest daily decline since August 2024. Although Asian markets are also down, US and European equity futures are relatively flat as I type so the sell-off hasn't accelerated overnight. Today we see global flash PMIs which will as ever be interesting. Note that exactly a month ago today, the US flash numbers were strong and helped drive an almost 15bp increase in both 2yr and 10yr Treasury yields. This felt like a very outsized move relative to the importance this data usually has in the US, but it showed the mood in global bond markets at the time. That couldn’t have been further from the mood in the last 24 hours so an interesting set up for today.

It’s difficult to know where to start given everything going on at the moment, but it was France that led the day’s biggest market moves yesterday. There wasn’t an immediate catalyst for the selloff, but the other two stress points (AI growth fears and higher oil prices) both hit risk appetite, which left France as the most vulnerable given it was already facing market pressure. So all that pushed the Franco-German 10yr spread up to 174bps, taking it to levels last seen at the peak of the sovereign crisis in November 2011. Moreover, the 10yr spread now isn’t too far away from its single-currency-era peak that month, when it closed as high as 189bps.

Those French moves were part of a clear risk-off pattern rather than a global bond selloff, as the 10yr OAT yield (+5.8bps) hit a post-2002 high of 5.07%, whereas the 10yr bund yield (-8.7bps) fell back instead to 3.32%. Moreover, those moves cascaded elsewhere, with the Italian 10yr spread to bunds (+8.7bps) widening to 124bps, the most since the Liberation Day turmoil in April 2025. And the stress was clear from other asset classes, as the STOXX Banks (-4.17%) hit a 4-month low, some -14% off their recent highs in mid-September. The Euro also weakened -0.14% against the US Dollar, while defensive currencies including the yen (+0.87%) and the Swiss France (+0.48%) benefited.

Given the latest stress, yesterday led to fresh questions about whether the ECB would even be able to hike rates again this year. Admittedly, that’s still the baseline market expectation. But with a 69% chance of another hike priced by December this represented a sharp pullback from 90% at the close on Wednesday. So doubts on the sustainability of further ECB hikes are rising. Indeed, the market moves were also creating a broader tightening in financial conditions, with the STOXX 600 down -1.05%, whilst European HY spreads widened +20bps to their highest level since April 2025 at 369bps.

As all that was happening, yesterday also brought a fresh wave of concern around AI-driven growth, reversing some of the optimism from earlier in the week. So it was a rough session for several of the most affected names, and the Philly semiconductor index (-6.72%) had its worst day since June, whilst CoreWeave’s share price (-10.06%) fell to its lowest since May 2025. That carried over into the CDS space too, where CoreWeave’s 5yr CDS widened +66bps to 1162bps. After its results the night before, Meta (-6.98%) fell and its CDS widened +7.2bps to 118bps. That marked a sharp turnaround from the initially positive after-market reaction to its results on Wednesday night as the sentiment around the company’s rising capex plan soured. Put together, this all helped drive the broader indices lower, with the S&P 500 (-1.21%) posting its worst daily performance since July, whilst the NASDAQ (-2.60%) had its biggest decline since June. However, note that the main defensive sectors rallied strongly, with consumer staples (+3.11%) and utilities (+1.98%) leading the way as two thirds of S&P 500 constituents moved higher, helped by the fall in yields. This also marked the biggest outperformance of the equal-weighted S&P 500 (+0.77%) over the market cap index since July 2024.

The other important theme yesterday was the latest jump in energy prices, driven by mounting fears of a fresh escalation in the Middle East. Indeed, yesterday saw Brent crude (+4.00%) close at a 5-month high of $113.17/bbl, which added to fears about more persistent inflation. Moreover, European natural gas futures (+2.99%) hit another post-2022 high of €90.04/MWh, which particularly hit the continent as growth concerns interacted with the fiscal stress. In part, the latest moves followed a New York Times report we mentioned yesterday, saying that the US and Israel had drawn up plans for renewed strikes against Iran after the midterm elections. So that drove speculation about some kind of escalation after the November 3 vote. And we also heard the Houthis claim a recent attack on Saudi Arabia’s Yanbu oil site, which follows a drone attack at a Saudi oil field the previous day.

In the midst of all these market pressures, an interesting theme was the flight to US Treasuries, which returned to its traditional risk-off role in periods of turmoil. In fact, the 10yr yield fell -16.6bps to 4.95%. Moreover, that came despite some strong US data, demonstrating how the financial stress was weighing on sentiment rather than the fundamentals. For instance, the weekly initial jobless claims fell to a 3-month low of 194k in the week ending October 17 (vs. 200k expected). And in turn, that pushed the smoother 4-week moving average to its lowest since September 2022, back when the unemployment rate was just 3.5%.

Asian equities are weak but the sell-off hasn't accelerated so far and most indices are well off their opening lows. The Nikkei (-0.90%) and KOSPI (-0.89%) are recovering from notably higher losses. In China, the CSI 300 (-0.54%) and Shanghai Composite (-1.20%) are at 15-month lows but may recover a bit after the lunch break. The Hang Seng (+0.58%) has rallied as I've been writing this. S&P 500 (-0.13%), Nasdaq (-0.03%) and Stoxx (-0.08%) are only very slightly lower, showing the sell-off has stabilised for now.

In Japan, September inflation rose as expected overnight, with core CPI accelerating to a nine-month high of +2.1% y/y and moving above the BOJ’s target, supported by higher energy costs and yen weakness. Core-core CPI increased to +2.4% from +1.9%, while headline CPI rose to +2.1% from +1.9%. Meanwhile, JGBs are rallying with global bonds, with 10-year yields down -9.5bps to 2.77% and 5-year yields falling -7.8bps to 2.20%.

Separately, Japan’s manufacturing sector expanded at a slower pace in October, while services activity strengthened. The flash manufacturing PMI eased to 53.3 from 54.1, while the services PMI improved to 52.0 from 51.3. The composite PMI held steady at 52.3, signalling a 19th consecutive month of private-sector expansion.

Looking at the day ahead now, data releases will include the October flash PMIs from Europe and the US, along with UK retail sales for September, and the University of Michigan’s final consumer sentiment index for the US in October. Otherwise from central banks, we’ll get the ECB’s Consumer Expectations Survey for September, and we’ll hear from the ECB’s Cipollone.

Authored by Steve Watson via Modernity.news,

A Glasgow museum has pulled Egyptian mummies and other human remains from public view because the long-dead never provided "informed consent" to be displayed.

Yes, really, they've been moved to storage because the 5,000 year old people didn't say it was OK to display their remains.

The decision at Kelvingrove Art Gallery and Museum follows a draft Human Remains Policy from Glasgow Life, the SNP-funded body that runs the venue, which insists remains should only appear if there is "documented and informed consent from the deceased individual or, in appropriate circumstances, their descendants."

'How absolutely insane.'

GB News' Will Kingston discusses a 'woke madness' debate that has arisen over the removal of mummies on display at a Scottish museum because they cannot give 'informed consent'. https://t.co/LnCYuZTS6V

— GB News (@GBNEWS) October 22, 2026

Visitors found a sign where a painted coffin containing the remains of the priest Nekht once stood: "We have removed human remains from this display as a mark of respect." Also gone are a mummified male head, a mummified right hand recovered from the Valley of the Kings in Luxor, and a mummified right foot.

The artefacts range from roughly 2,000 to 5,000 years old. Glasgow Life says the change "reflects contemporary museum practice" and cites the International Council of Museums' revised Code of Ethics from June 2026, which calls on museums to "uphold the inherent dignity of human remains and promote respect for their significance."

It also references a 2025 All-Party Parliamentary Group on Afrikan Reparations report raising ethical concerns about displaying ancient Egyptian remains.

Of course, the reparations crowd had to be somehow involved.

A Glasgow Life spokesman stated: "In the absence of such consent, we believe removing ancient Egyptian human remains from display is more respectful to the deceased individuals."

The organisation is also removing archaeological human remains from the History Discovery Centre and the Scotland's Early People gallery at Kelvingrove, with further removals planned at St Mungo Museum.

What's next? Removing Neanderthals from the Neanderthal museum because they never signed a waiver?

Scottish Conservative MSP Murdo Fraser called the move "woke madness at its most ridiculous." He said: "Even Egyptian mummies are now being cancelled by a society so obsessed with modern sensibilities that it has lost all sense of perspective."

"People visit museums to learn about ancient civilisations, not to see history hidden away because it fails to meet today's ideological standards," he added, noting that Glasgow's museums "should be showcasing our history, not quietly removing it to appease the latest trend in political correctness."

Chris McGovern, chairman of the Campaign for Real Education and a former adviser to the Policy Unit at 10 Downing Street, described it as "more virtue-signalling, woke nonsense" and "the triumph of educational stupidity and ignorance." He noted: "It is not possible to seek permission from those who died thousands of years ago." He suggested Scottish authorities take their lead from Egyptian museums that "respectfully display human remains."

One visitor, Jonny McFarlane, brought his daughter to the ancient Egypt display after she had been "quite animated" by a book on the subject, only to find the exhibits replaced by the respect sign.

This is not an isolated episode of museums subordinating public education and historical display to contemporary ideological preferences. London institutions have repeatedly altered or obscured exhibits under similar rationales.

In March, London Museum Docklands half-covered a large early 19th-century portrait of Beeston Long, a former Bank of England governor who held investments in Jamaican plantations worked by slave labour, with multicoloured Madras cloth.

The exhibition trail "Caribbean Voices: Shaping Docklands" aimed to "reclaim the histories of colonised Caribbean nations" and celebrate the Windrush Generation's influence.

Information panels stated that artworks which might "obscure" or "sanitise" connections to slavery can "evoke emotional responses" and that museums should give a "voice to those whose cultures have been impacted by colonialism."

Some Caribbean partners reportedly felt "bitter and provoked" or "angry, furious and violated" by the uncovered painting. The cloth, historically exported to the Caribbean, was presented as representing Caribbean nations. A statue of slave trader Robert Milligan had already been removed from outside the museum in 2020 and placed in storage.

In Januar, the Young V&A in Bethnal Green placed books featuring graphic nudity and contested LGBTQ+ material in its children's reading room alongside titles such as The Gruffalo. It Isn't Rude To Be Nude displayed drawings of naked adults with exposed genitalia and captions including "willies aren't silly," with the cover declaring "contains nakedness - and that's OK!"

Another title, Rainbow Revolutionaries, included a glossary defining "gender affirmation surgery," "polyamorous," and "asexual" for young readers.

Parents described the selection as "pornographic," "a useful tool for paedos to groom children," and "psychological warfare." One said an essential part of safeguarding is to alert adults when strangers discuss intimate areas, "never mind actually showing them to kids."

Kate Barker of LGB Alliance called it "grooming in plain sight" and "an egregious safeguarding failure." Shadow equalities secretary Claire Coutinho noted the absurdity of banning children from wearing costumes while allowing material on polyamory and pansexuality. The V&A, chaired by Minouche Shafik and run by Sir Tristram Hunt, said staff had reviewed the books to ensure they were "age appropriate."

In December 2025, Brighton and Hove Museums published a blog post arguing that Santa Claus is "too white" and that his judgment of children as "naughty" or "nice" enforces colonial binaries and assumptions of cultural superiority.

The post suggested challenging the binary, recasting Santa in diverse forms including multiple Santas or "Mother Christmases," and prioritising cultural exchange over judgment.

Toby Young of the Free Speech Union called the museum "po-faced" and asked whether non-Christian countries should leave notes saying "sorry, but this is a decolonised fireplace and white supremacists dressed in red aren't welcome."

Alka Sehgal Cuthbert of Don't Divide Us described the idea as "laughable" and "intellectually vacuous," accusing museums of seeking to "rupture our sense of belonging to a common past and culture." A museum spokesman said the post was intended to prompt reflection and discussion rather than prescribe views.

In April 2024, an LGBTQ audio guide at the Queen's House in Greenwich, produced by a drag performer as part of a "Fierce Queens" event and LGBTQ+ History Month programming, claimed Queen Charlotte, wife of King George III, was "the nation's first royal person of colour" and that "insecure white boys writing history" had omitted this due to "structural racism."

After backlash, the museum later stated the guide was "light-hearted entertainment" by performance artists and "was not 'fact checked'." Critics noted Queen Charlotte was of German ancestry with no evidence of non-European heritage.

Former Royal Navy officer Chris Parry called the material "stupid," said it "degrades and defiles our national reputation for historical scholarship," and described the antics as "profoundly racist," calling for public funding to be removed.

In March 2024, Hastings Museum and Art Gallery, in association with the Hastings Queer History Collective and funded by Arts Council England, claimed that some birds are "queer" because female pheasants supposedly change sex after they stop laying eggs and develop male-coloured feathers.

The pamphlet stated that "queer behaviour in the animal kingdom" had been "ignored or hidden from the public" since the 18th century and that "with queerness visible in the natural world, the argument that it is somehow 'unnatural' begins to unravel."

A fossilised dinosaur footprint was even said to have "queer history" because of the personal life of the boy who found it.

Biologist Dr Emma Hilton stated: "The only vertebrates that change sex are all fish. Birds do not change sex." She noted that older female animals can develop male features due to hormonal changes, "but we would not say that older women had changed sex if they have a bit of a moustache."

In January 2024, Madrid's Prado Museum reviewed thousands of painting descriptions and signs to remove terms such as "dwarf," "deformed," and "disabled" to align with Spanish disability legislation.

Descriptions of Velázquez works were altered, titles such as "Prince Felipe and the Dwarf, Miguel Soplillo" were shortened, and "Portrait of a Dwarf" became "Portrait of a Buffoon." The museum said it was listening to "political consensus" and revisiting signs that "now we find are out of step with the times."

Across these cases, publicly funded institutions have repeatedly prioritised contemporary ideological frameworks over the straightforward presentation of artefacts, art, and evidence.

Critics consistently describe the pattern as the subordination of history and education to political fashion.

Museums exist to show the past as it was, not as current sensitivities require it to appear. When they hide the dead, cover the portraits, rewrite the labels, and invent queer animals, they stop being museums and become something else entirely.

Volvo Cars shares in Stockholm crashed the most since the company's October 2021 listing. The Swedish automaker announced another 2,500 job cuts and warned that its Chinese sales are under severe pressure.

Third-quarter deliveries in China plunged 40% as domestic brands gained ground with cheaper electric vehicles.

"Nobody will be successful with the old recipe where you had global cars developed in Europe and sold them at a premium price" in China, CEO Hakan Samuelsson told analysts on the earnings call earlier today.

Samuelsson emphasized, "Those times are gone." In other words, Volvo is no longer competitive in overseas markets.

The 2,500 job cuts represent about 6% of Volvo's workforce and will primarily affect Sweden. They form part of a turnaround strategy to save an additional 5 billion kronor, following 3,000 job cuts announced last year.

Bank of America analyst Stephanie Vincent recommended buying protection against a default by Volvo Car AB, warning that deteriorating finances and prolonged weakness in China and the U.S. are leaving the Swedish automaker's senior unsecured bonds maturing in 2029 and 2030 at risk.

Vincent added more color:

Spreads not reflecting b/s risks: Buy 5y CDS/UW ‘29s-‘30s 

We move our recommendation on VOVCAB 5Y CDS to Buy Protection, from Sell Protection. We maintain our UW recommendation on the VOVCAB' 29-'30s senior unsecured bonds on fundamental deterioration at the company (free cash flow, or CFO less capex, has been negative for three straight quarters and for full-year 2025) and relative value (the bonds still trade tight to BB2-BB1 credits in the ICE BofA BB Euro High Yield Index). Volvo's 3Q and ytd results have been negatively impacted by a significant downturn in China (ytd revenues down 40%) and the U.S. (ytd revenues down 19%). 30th September 2026 cash balances have declined to levels not seen since 2018, while gross debt has remained roughly stable since 2025. Further volatility could be seen if the new management team re-evaluates the medium-term production plans and footprint (Klaus Zelllmer plans to assume the President/CEO position in 3Q27). We are MW on near-term maturities (VOVCAB' 27s/'28s) due to the business' previous market access and overall liquidity.

U.S., China very tough markets for Volvo Car

The U.S. market was hit by current tariffs and the removal of incentives for electrified cars that hit imported EV margins (Volvo Car only produces the EX90 in the U.S. at present, with the XC60 planned to have a SOP in January 2027). The plan for the U.S. market is to localise production for the XC60, and to also bring product offering, marketing and sales closer to its U.S. customers along four regions. There will also be PHEV offerings for the XC90 and XC60 shortly after deliveries start in Europe. In China the market remains very challenged particularly for the Western Premium manufacturers and management notes "the next two years will remain very tough." The production plans are to deliver the first two of six new cars tailored for China, developed in partnership with Geely. Europe is the sole profitable market now, with BEV/battery electric sales reaching 45% share in 3Q (versus 30% in 3Q25), driven by the EX30.

Cash flow a core focus. 

Management explicitly highlights that cash is being prioritised. We note that Volvo management believes 4Q26 cash flow will be stronger than 3Q26 due to inventory reductions (however this action could pressure margins due to de-stocking). Overall liquidity is well above management’s view of the minimums needed: the business has cash of SEK 32bn and total liquidity of SEK 55bn. However, the net cash position has deteriorated meaningfully, to a level of SEK 725mn (our estimate, from peak levels of close to SEK 37bn, seen in 4Q21).

LT targets maintained. 

Capex, cost actions at forefront. Volvo Car is maintaining its longer-term goal of adjusted EBIT margins >8% and is adding new initiatives: a 30% reduction in capex versus 2024 levels (could lead to lower cash needs of c. SEK 13bn by our estimates) and reinforcing the cost savings. The company is also targets another SEK 5bn in additional cost savings by the end of 2027 (primarily via headcount initiatives).

Volvo shares in Stockholm crashed 30% on Friday morning, marking their worst intraday decline on record.

The selloff reduced Volvo's market value to 29.8 billion kronor ($2.68 billion), about 80% below its 2021 listing valuation.

Beyond Volvo, many other European automakers are in turmoil, including VW. Just go down the list.

The elites in Brussels were, oddly enough, more concerned about deindustrialization and mass migration than ensuring the bloc could survive another decade. Now Europe is facing the risk of another debt crisis, with France at the center. 

Authored by Kevin Stocklin via The Epoch Times,

Global sales of electric vehicles (EVs) in 2025 increased by 20 percent over the previous year, exceeding 20 million units worldwide, with much of the increase driven by Europe, where sales jumped by 30 percent, according to the International Energy Agency (IEA).

But even in a red-hot market, European carmakers are struggling to turn a profit on EVs.

50K LAYOFFS
Volkswagen, Europe's largest electric vehicle maker, announced in September that it would lay off 50,000 workers.

Stellantis, Europe's second-largest auto manufacturer, reported write-downs of 22.2 billion euros ($24.9 billion) as part of its EV "reset" in the second half of 2025, largely due to overinvestment in electric cars.

Operating profit margins at Volkswagen, Europe's largest carmaker, fell to 1.8 percent in 2025 from 5.6 percent in 2024, and the company announced that it would lay off an additional 50,000 workers, amounting to 15 percent of its workforce.

Europe's automakers are caught between two adversaries: Chinese automakers that are aggressively taking market share and undercutting profit margins, and their own governments, which have attempted to force a complete transition to EVs regardless of consumer demand.

In 2023, the European Union mandated a 100 percent elimination of tailpipe carbon dioxide emissions starting in 2035, effectively banning the sale of new internal combustion engine vehicles, though it recently revised that to a 90 percent emissions cut.

In response to these and other mandates, car companies invested in new EV production lines, with Volkswagen alone committing $193 billion in 2023 to electrify its fleet.

"I think that European auto manufacturers are paying the price for paying more attention to what regulators want than what their customers are asking for," Jeff Degner, a research fellow at the American Institute for Economic Research, told The Epoch Times.

He calls much of the money spent on the EV transition "government-induced malinvestment."

Volkswagen assembly workers perform final checks and corrections on electric cars in the paint shop at the Volkswagen electric car factory in Emden, Germany, on Feb. 24, 2026. Focke Strangmann/Getty Images

Overestimating Demand, Underestimating China

In announcing this year's write-downs from its EV "reset," Stellantis CEO Antonio Filosa concurred.

"The charges announced today largely reflect the cost of overestimating the pace of the energy transition that distanced us from many car buyers' real-world needs, means and desires," Filosa said in a February statement.

America's largest auto manufacturers, Ford and General Motors, have been more cautious about going electric than their European counterparts and have pulled back faster as losses have accumulated.

"The number one trend in the auto industry so far this decade is just the explosive growth in Chinese auto exports."
- Garrett Nelson, equity analyst, Center for Financial Research and Analysis

In January, General Motors announced a $6 billion write-down, shortly after Ford announced a $19.5 billion write-down, as both companies stepped back from their EV commitments.

"EV adoption hasn't developed at the pace or with the economics many of those original commitments assumed, and at the same time, European automakers are facing a much more competitive market," Stephanie Valdez Streaty, director of industry insights at Cox Automotive, told The Epoch Times.

After starting from virtually zero several years ago, Chinese autos made up 20 percent of the EU's battery-electric sales by May 2026, Streaty said.

Chinese automakers have captured the majority of global EV sales, matching Western carmakers in quality and features and beating them on price. Some Chinese models, such as BYD's Seagull, which sells for approximately $10,000 in China, are not only undercutting competitors on price but also delivering on quality, according to reviews by publications such as InsideEVs and Top Gear Philippines.

For European markets, BYD rebranded and upgraded the Seagull as the Dolphin Surf, which launched at a discount price of $22,400 but now sells for about $25,800. This falls under the price of comparable European-made models such as the Citroën ë-C3, which starts at about $26,200, but remains higher than budget models such as the Dacia Spring at $20,100 and the Renault Twingo E-Tech at $21,800.

"The number one trend in the auto industry so far this decade is just the explosive growth in Chinese auto exports," Garrett Nelson, equity analyst at the Center for Financial Research and Analysis, told The Epoch Times. He estimates that China is now exporting more than 1 million vehicles per month.

"They've invested very heavily in infrastructure, in logistics, in order to be able to export so much more than they used to," Nelson said.

China's automobile exports rose by 53 percent in the first half of 2026 compared with the same period a year earlier, while exports of new energy vehicles more than doubled, according to Chinese regime data.

"The European market is really being flooded with low-cost Chinese EVs," Nelson said, and Europe's 10 percent tariffs and other duties on Chinese cars have failed to halt China's expansion.

Vehicles made by Chinese EV manufacturer BYD, at the Port of Guangzhou, Guangdong Province, China, on Feb. 22, 2025. Pedro Pardo/AFP via Getty Images

China's Competitive Advantages

The major Chinese auto brands are BYD, Geely, SAIC, and Changan. In 2025, BYD overtook Tesla as the world's largest seller of EVs.

According to Degner, BYD's production costs are 20 percent to 30 percent lower than those of European carmakers for similar models. But European regulators, even as they pushed domestic auto companies to switch to EVs, simultaneously passed mandates that made manufacturing in Europe significantly more expensive.

This included a state-mandated transition away from coal and other fossil fuels in favor of wind and solar power, resulting in Europeans now paying some of the highest energy and electricity costs in the industrialized world, multiples of those in China.

"The Chinese have a competitive advantage, but that competitive advantage was created because of the high cost that European regulators are imposing," Degner said.

Europeans are now paying some of the highest energy and electricity costs in the industrialized world.

"I would say that the Europeans only have themselves to blame as they have put into place, whether at the national or international level in the EU, the kinds of regulations that are making life more difficult for the [auto] industry as a whole."

In addition, over decades, China has built a global infrastructure for mining and shipping raw materials for batteries, including graphite, lithium, and cobalt. The majority of these materials are also refined, processed, and manufactured into batteries in China.

And Chinese companies benefit from scale and an enormous domestic market.

An employee works on batteries for electric vehicles at the Leap Energy factory, in Huzhou, Zhejiang Province, China, on April 26, 2026. Adek Berry/AFP via Getty Images

Of the 20 million EVs sold worldwide last year, more than 13 million were sold in China, and more than half of worldwide sales were Chinese-made vehicles, according to the IEA.

In addition, a February report by the Rhodium Group states that Chinese automakers benefit from extensive vertical integration of the manufacturing process, as well as state grants, tax incentives, and preferential financing.

Lessons for US Carmakers

Is Europe's EV adventure a cautionary tale for the United States?

The Trump administration believes that it is. The administration eliminated federal tax breaks for EV buyers and canceled the tailpipe emissions and fuel efficiency regulations imposed by the Biden administration that would have effectively phased out many gasoline-powered models.

And there is reason to doubt that most Americans want electric cars.

While EV sales surged in Europe, the United States went in the opposite direction, with electric car sales plummeting by 45 percent in the fourth quarter of 2025 compared with the fourth quarter of 2024. America's annual EV sales in 2025 ended up slightly lower than in 2024, at about 1.5 million vehicles.

EVs remain a niche market in the United States, where driving distances are often longer and the charging infrastructure remains sparse enough to give EV owners "range anxiety" on longer trips. Beyond this, there is the concern that EV demand has been highly dependent on government mandates and subsidies.

According to the IEA, the increase in European sales was partially driven by political mandates, specifically the tightening of the EU carbon dioxide emissions limits that came into effect in 2025, targeting a 15 percent reduction from 2021 levels.

Conversely, the sharp decline in U.S. sales coincided with the Trump administration's cancellation of the $7,500 tax credit for EV purchases.

"Once that expired, the demand went from about 12 percent of the U.S. auto market down to 6 percent within a year, and so I think that is an indicator that the overall consumer taste for EVs is still not where regulators would like to see it," Degner said.

EVs remain a niche market in the United States, where driving distances are often longer.

Having a market so dependent on government incentives creates a significant risk for carmakers when deciding on corporate strategy and potentially hundreds of millions of dollars in capital investments. Even Tesla, which has been selling EVs profitably, reported in July that its operating income fell by 57 percent.

However, outside of the United States, EVs are expanding rapidly throughout North America and South America.

While to date, trade barriers have largely kept Chinese cars out of the United States, America is being encircled, with Chinese carmakers making rapid inroads in Brazil, Mexico, and Canada.

Electric and gas-powered vehicles are parked in a lot at the Tesla factory in Fremont, Calif., on July 26, 2025. Gary Wang/The Epoch Times

BYD began selling EVs in Brazil, South America's largest market, in 2022. By 2025, Chinese carmakers produced 85 percent of EVs sold in Brazil, according to an IEA report.

Recent trade deals among China and Mexico and Canada have opened those markets to Chinese carmakers, and sales of Chinese cars surged in Mexico last year, according to the Council on Foreign Relations.

"This is very concerning for U.S. automakers," Nelson said. "You're seeing trade groups raise red flags and sound the alarm regarding what this might mean."

Finding Ways to Compete

Could U.S. automakers compete in the EV market if they wanted to? Some analysts say yes, with conditions.

"In the U.S. market, in light of rising gas prices right now, we're seeing a decline in EV demand, but a significant increase in the demand for hybrid engines, which do have, of course, some electronic and battery components," Degner said.

"By cutting red tape and access to those kinds of technologies, and certainly those kinds of natural resources, there's ample evidence that the U.S. could compete with BYD if those barriers were removed."

America could match China's access to essential raw materials, but mining prohibitions and other regulations have held up this development, Degner said.

A plug-in hybrid vehicle in Irvine, Calif., on Nov. 28, 2023. A plug-in hybrid drives like a fully electric car for short trips, but operates like a gasoline or hybrid vehicle for long-distance travel. John Fredricks/The Epoch Times

Japanese automakers Toyota, Honda, and Nissan have largely sidestepped the battery-electric vehicle market, focusing instead on hybrids, in addition to traditional gasoline-powered cars.

Regarding cost advantages, a Rhodium Group report titled "Why Are Chinese EVs So Cheap?" disputes that Chinese carmakers are more efficient, stating that, measured by revenue per employee and despite high levels of automation, Chinese auto companies "significantly underperform Western peers," including Tesla, whose employees generate more than six times more revenue than BYD employees.

Instead, the report states that Chinese carmakers win through vertical integration, control of their supply chains, an enormous domestic market, and generous financing from suppliers.

Chinese carmakers win through vertical integration, control of their supply chains, an enormous domestic market, and generous financing from suppliers.

Matching China's cost structure, the Rhodium report states, would require Western firms to develop similar supply chains, particularly in mineral mining, refining, and processing, to expand automation, reduce labor head count, and even build factories in China, where labor and energy are cheaper.

"Europe's experience shows the importance of maintaining flexibility as the market evolves," Streaty said.

"EV adoption continues to grow, but we're also seeing manufacturers adjust their strategies and maintain a broader mix of powertrains.

"That flexibility allows automakers to continue investing in electrification while responding to what consumers are buying today."

Of all the people who could end up on a US sanctions list for bankrolling stolen Google AI technology, a former Microsoft executive hand-picked by Sam Altman to run Y Combinator's China arm was probably not on many bingo cards. And yet here we are.

On Monday, the State Department blacklisted Shanghai Zhisuan Technology, the AI startup founded by convicted ex-Google engineer Linwei Ding, along with MiraclePlus, the Chinese venture firm founded by ex-Microsoft AI scientist Lu Qi, and three MiraclePlus-managed funds, for providing seed financing to Zhisuan. According to Bloomberg, the measures may include freezing US assets and banking restrictions.

The best part of the story is Lu's resume, which reads like a tour of every major tech power center of the past 20 years: the stuff corporate espionage movie scripts are made of. Per Bloomberg:

Lu, a former Microsoft executive, was recruited in 2017 by Baidu Inc. to oversee the Chinese search leader's AI efforts, only to quit a year later citing personal reasons. In 2018, Lu – recruited by then-Y Combinator President Sam Altman – joined the US firm to help create YC China.

When Y Combinator abandoned the expansion a year later, Lu and his team simply kept going under the MiraclePlus brand. That's the same MiraclePlus that, according to the State Department, gave a Chinese startup seed money in exchange for equity after its founder showed up touting his inside knowledge of Google's AI infrastructure.

"An Important Missing Piece Of Our Puzzle"

Some quick background on Lu Qi (who also goes by Qi Lu, depending on which side of the Pacific is writing the press release). After rising to executive vice president of engineering at Yahoo, Lu was personally recruited by Steve Ballmer to Microsoft, where he ran Bing, Office and Skype and later helped shape Satya Nadella's AI and bots strategy. In January 2017, Baidu poached him as group president and COO to run its AI push. He lasted 16 months, leaving in May 2018 for "personal and family reasons" and which, as CNBC reported at the time, really meant he just wanted to spend more time in the US.

Three months later he had a new job. In August 2018, Altman's Y Combinator announced Lu would lead YC China (as well as YC's research arm and a new research center in Seattle), with Altman (who just like Ballmer, personally recruited Lu) calling China "an important missing piece of our puzzle."

Well, the puzzle didn't stay assembled for long. In November 2019, in the middle of the trade war, YC pulled the plug on China. Lu spun the team out as MiraclePlus (Qiji Chuangtan in Chinese), which has since become one of China's busiest early-stage investors: it writes $300K checks for 7% stakes and runs two cohorts a year. Its portfolio includes some of China's hottest AI names, among them AI inference platform SiliconFlow and robotics maker AgiBot, both of which are considering Hong Kong listings (and both of which now have a sanctioned backer, which is probably not the line the bankers wanted in the prospectus).

"Replicate Google's Technology... To Fit China's National Conditions"

So how did a Beijing incubator end up on the same list as the guy who walked out of Google with its AI supercomputer blueprints?

According to the State Department fact sheet, Ding applied to MiraclePlus's incubation program on behalf of Zhisuan, "touting his experience with and knowledge of Google's technology and internal systems" and claiming Zhisuan could replicate Google's "super intelligence" infrastructure technology. State says Ding used the program to pitch his ability to replicate Google's technology to fit China's national conditions, and that "MiraclePlus gave seed capital in exchange for an ownership stake in Zhisuan."

That pitch will sound familiar to regular readers. When we first covered Ding's arrest back in March 2024, the indictment quoted a WeChat promo for his Shanghai startup, in which he bragged:

"We have experience with Google's ten-thousand-card computational power platform; we just need to replicate and upgrade it—and then further develop a computational power platform suited to China's national conditions."

In other words, the business plan was the stolen goods. You'd think a seasoned VC might have asked one or two follow-up questions about where the "experience" came from.

MiraclePlus, for its part, denies investing in Zhisuan at all. In a statement on Tuesday, the firm said the sanctions were imposed without any prior communication, and that it is in talks with relevant parties to have them lifted and expects the matter to be resolved through "candid communication." Which, coming from a firm called MiraclePlus, may take a miracle of its own.

The penalties were imposed under the Protecting American Intellectual Property Act (PAIPA), signed into law in January 2023 to go after foreign beneficiaries of US trade-secret theft. In addition to Zhisuan and MiraclePlus (formally Qiji Chuangtan Beijing Investment Management), the list includes MiraclePlus's Phase I and Phase II venture funds and an entity wholly owned by Phase I. Put differently, Washington went after the money too.

Apple Notes, A Borrowed Badge And A One-Way Ticket

As for the man, the Ding saga has been a long one. Between May 2022 and April 2023, the Google software engineer uploaded more than 2,000 pages of confidential AI trade secrets to his personal Google Cloud account, covering the architecture of Google's custom TPU chips, its GPU systems, the software that orchestrates thousands of chips into a supercomputer, and a custom SmartNIC used for high-speed networking. In other words, the crown jewels of Google's AI stack.

The method was low-tech to the point of comedy: Ding copied the data into the Apple Notes app on his Google-issued MacBook, converted it to PDFs and uploaded those. He also had a colleague scan his access badge so it looked like he was working from Google's US office while he was actually in China. He secretly affiliated himself with two China-based AI companies while still on Google's payroll, applied to a Shanghai government "talent plan" promising to help China build "computing power infrastructure capabilities that are on par with the international level," and downloaded more files less than two weeks before resigning in December 2023. Then he booked a one-way ticket to Beijing.

When the charges first dropped, we couldn't resist pointing out the obvious problem with stealing from Google in the Gemini era:

An ex-Google engineer was charged with stealing artificial intelligence technology while secretly working with two companies based in China. So China's AI is now racist, woke and wrong about everything

— zerohedge (@zerohedge) March 6, 2024

The case later became Exhibit A in what Meta's AI chief Alexandr Wang called China's "open secret" tech-theft operation (Jun 14, 2025), in which Wang argued that China is on par with the US on algorithms "because of large-scale espionage."

Fourteen Convictions, One Year

On January 29, a San Francisco jury convicted Ding on seven counts of economic espionage and seven counts of trade secret theft, which on paper carried a maximum of 15 years and 10 years per count, respectively. Then the case started to deflate.

In August, Judge Vince Chhabria tossed all seven espionage convictions, ruling there was insufficient evidence Ding intended to benefit the Chinese government (as opposed to just Chinese companies, which apparently is a different thing). And on September 1, he was sentenced to 12 months minus one day, plus two years of supervised release, about $198,000 in restitution to Google and a $2,500 fine. Prosecutors had asked for 70 months; the defense wanted three months of home confinement.

"The idea of a non-custodial sentence is very hard to swallow for me," Chhabria said, which tells you how close Ding came to serving his time from the couch. For context, $198,000 in restitution for the blueprints of Google's TPU stack, which is precisely what anyone trying to build an AI supercomputer without access to Nvidia's best chips would want, is what one might call a bargain.

Which is probably why Washington is now going after the money instead. If the courts won't make the penalty sting for the engineer, the State Department can at least make it sting for whoever funded him.

Beijing, naturally, is not amused. On Tuesday China's commerce ministry expressed "firm opposition" to the sanctions, urged the US to "correct its erroneous practice," and threatened unspecified "necessary measures." The ministry also insisted China's AI achievements are the result of long-term basic research and open cooperation, and have "nothing to do with the so-called 'stealing of trade secrets.'" Sure.

Altman's China Problem, Then And Now

None of this is Altman's fault, of course: he hired a Microsoft and Baidu veteran with a sterling resume in 2018, and YC exited China a year later. MiraclePlus's alleged Zhisuan deal came four years after that. Still, the irony is hard to miss.

The same Altman who once called China the "missing piece" of YC's puzzle spent last month lining up with Dario Amodei and Elon Musk to ask Washington for embedded evaluators, an antitrust waiver and a talk with Beijing, while China goes full send, as we discussed in "'Pace The Frontier': Amodei, Altman & Musk Team Up Against The AI Singularity While China Goes Full Send". Meanwhile, OpenAI is busy defending itself against Apple's lawsuit alleging that OpenAI misused Apple's hardware trade secrets after hiring its former VP of iPhone and Apple Watch product design. Trade secrets, it seems, are having a moment.

The Real Penalty Lands On The Cap Table

The sanctions themselves are probably more symbolic than crippling. MiraclePlus is a Beijing-based firm investing in Chinese startups, and its exposure to the US banking system is likely limited. But the signal matters: for the first time in this case, Washington is targeting the capital behind the theft as well as the thief, and it is doing so with a law built for exactly that purpose.

The more interesting question is what happens next to the MiraclePlus portfolio. SiliconFlow and AgiBot are both eyeing Hong Kong IPOs, and global investors tend to get nervous when a company's early backer is on a US sanctions list, regardless of what the backer says about "candid communication." We suspect the lawyers for those deals are having a busy week.

As for Ding, a jury found he stole Google's AI crown jewels, a judge gave him a year, and his alleged backers got blacklisted. Something tells us the next would-be Ding will look at that math and decide the risk-reward is still pretty attractive.