“These supply chains have momentum as they get going...so as you establish those far downstream component manufacturing, you start to recruit all of the upstream manufacturing... The question now is whether that snowball effect kicked off by the IRA will continue.”

NEW: U.S. Steel is planning a “direct reduced iron” plant at Big River Steel Works in Arkansas, where it’ll combine with electric arc furnaces to create a model for cleaner steelmaking. https://www.canarymedia.com/articles/green-steel/us-steel-build-2b-plant-arkansas

"The petrodollar story gets cause and effect exactly backwards. Oil producers priced barrels and profits in dollars in the 1970s because an infrastructure of global dollar banking, what we now call the eurodollar system, was already in place — not in New York, but in London."

🤷🏻‍♀️🤷🏻‍♀️🤷🏻‍♀️

Leon Black's father was Eli Black, who is the reason why we have the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act b/c of what he did as CEO of United Fruit .. he jumped out of his office window b/c he knew that his bribery of the president of Honduras was about to come out what a family

I tried to summarize the BII and BlueOrchard fund capital structure that aims to tap into insurance capital interested in climate EMDEs after Solvency UK was passed www.bii.co.uk/en/news-insi...

I’ve never seen so many luxury European cars (especially German) than in Korea (Gangnam). Maybachs, high-end Benz, Porsche, RR and on and on. To the point that now Korea runs a trade deficit with Germany on cars.

If I ever became president, I’d replicate the Korean health checkup system. A super-efficient, one-stop facility where people can complete a full battery of health tests quickly, conveniently and at low cost. Preventive diagnosis that is simple, affordable, accessible.

Green hydrogen investment of €1bn supported by over €300mn in EU subsidies. But who receives subsidies must use EU-made (or EU FTA) electrolyzer stacks under new Industrial Accelerator Act www.ft.com/content/32cc... www.hydrogeninsight.com/electrolyser...

“This is the Epstein class in all its glory. It’s an elite that schemes to remain as unaccountable for sexual crimes as it does for corporate crimes.”

“One widely held idea to be dismissed off the bat is that in order to field a currency that acts as a global reserve asset, a country needs to run trade deficits. This is not true.”

“Today, New York City’s rental market is defined by two colliding forces: tenants’ need for affordable rents, and landlords’ need to repay their creditors. Only public ownership offers an escape from the mounting pressure.”

What is meant by Abundance: YIMBYism + supply focus or a centrist omnicause? (first time I hear about “deportation abundance”) newsletter.mikekonczal.com/p/what-progr... rooseveltinstitute.org/publications...

“Back in 2013, Bill Gates remarked that it would take a decade to know whether education technology really worked. More than ten years and hundreds of billions of dollars later, the answer is increasingly clear. ‘Imagine if all that money had gone into teachers instead.’”

"They are channeling an immigration regime instituted in 1924, when strict racial quotas — driven by fears of foreigners and a rise in eugenic thinking — led to a bottoming-out of foreign-born Americans that lasted for decades... protecting a white, Christian character for the country."

"Shrinking the balance sheet has had only a modest impact on financial conditions because quantitative easing has proven to be not very powerful in providing stimulus to the economy. ... If the Fed were to continue QT it would eventually have two options:" www.bloomberg.com/opinion/arti...

"The answer must be to take away ICE and CBP’s money, headcount, and guns. The only politically sensible way to mount this direct challenge is by dismantling the agencies, rather than accept the premise that we need to streamline them and limit their focus to going after the truly “bad guys.”"

Amazing that the first issue for Larry Fink and Ken Griffin is the deficit and governments "spending well beyond their means", the "recklessness" of this current moment in history. Lagarde adds at least some nuance between productive/unproductive deficits. www.weforum.org/meetings/wor...

Signs of times when Davos has panels titled "Governments as Economic Super Actors" and "Hard Choices for Industrial Policy"

"At present, Europe has no sovereign digital payment system and its entire architecture depends on US service providers" Roadmap for Euro to become a global reserve currency: - swap lines - own payment system - avoid US stablecoins - true, common safe asset - capital markets integration

Dallas Fed: "Employment of unauthorized immigrants has contracted an average 26K/m through July/25, or an annual equivalent decline of 310K. However, if the recent pace of decline continues, these immigration outflows could result in a net loss of 51K/m in 2025, or 612K for the year."

Probably this speech from Carney on the end of the "rules based international order" and need for polyalignment will be his most famous and consequential, surpassing the tragedy of the horizon ten years ago. www.youtube.com/watch?v=dE98...

Trump mafioso tactics on IMO net zero framework: "US officials have written to countries that support the measure and besieged them with phone calls threatening to impose tariffs, withdraw visa rights and take other retaliatory action." www.theguardian.com/environment/...

Should we be worried about domestic debt sustainability at all in an economy running a current-account surplus of 5% of GDP?

One point re: “where would all that money go” is that some portion could just go to cash in non-$ currencies, which might be a prudent thing to do for non-US (or even US) holders of US equities after the run. There would be FX effects but, e.g., lower EURJPY might be welcome all around?

"ICE began this chapter by antagonizing and detaining people whom it alleged were undocumented, but the danger has spread far beyond any single community to anyone—across lines of gender, background, or citizenship status—with the temerity to dissent." www.newyorker.com/news/the-led...

My weekend essay in @unherd.com on why central bank independence is a distraction. The real danger lies not with unelected technocrats but in the aggrandisement of power by authoritarians and the global financial sector—that’s true even for the Fed. unherd.com/2026/01/the-...

This slide from Rodrik is a good companion to this interesting FT piece on how China surpassed the West's technological and industrial edge on green energy. The other side of the story is how solar and green tech has become cheap (with each country playing its role) www.ft.com/content/3749...

This is so true ime. Rare mentions and focus on China: "At development and climate meetings, he said, you can go a long time without hearing anyone acknowledge that China matters vastly more to the climate-change story than anything happening anywhere else, very much including the US."

In addition, the outpouring of support for Powell this week often cites his personal virtues and draws on his long-standing bi-partisan relationships in DC ... he's out as Chair in a matter of months. Then what? Everyone is as exposed as Lisa Cook?

All of which raises the question of whether a more forceful response to the attack on Cook was warranted.

Worth pointing out: while Fed Chair Powell has called the DOJ criminal probe a “pretext” for a president who wants lower rates, he has largely declined to comment on the proceedings against Gov Cook. Many have called her firing similarly pre-textual. His comments on Sunday failed to mention Cook.

"suggested the Chair step down [aka give in to intimidation tactics that would end the Fed's independence] to protect the institution’s independence" 🙄

The Virgin Democratic Party Establishment Candidate: "ICE isn't coordinating with local police. This is no way to bring down prices!" The Chad Episcopalian Bishop: "I have instructed my priests to prepare for martyrdom."

Trump to ConocoPhillips yesterday: "We're not going to look at what people lost in the past because that was their fault. That was a different president. You're gonna make a lot of money, but we're not going to go back. You left a lot of money behind. 12 billion. Well, good write off."

I realize this puts me in oft mocked MMT territory, but it seems to me the value of taxing the rich is not to fund government but to compress the wealth distribution, so as to ensure those up top are not so disproportionately wealthier than others as to be able to exercise vast undemocratic power.

"Unconstrained resources have enabled the growth of the far-right enforcement regime; reckoning with its budgetary and institutional foundations will be necessary to stop it."

There is absolutely no reason for Dems to vote for GOP nominees, to facilitate the smooth operation of Congress, nor to withhold impeachment of the President and his appointees. Do it all.

"[Bush] managed to bring the G8 and the community of nations together to do something no one thought possible: to nullify private agreements in an act of internationally sanctioned eminent domain, without compensation or due process — functionally abrogating the enforcement rights of creditors"

“This episode seems to indicate that the president can do almost anything in the context of foreign policy, and the media will still overwhelmingly adopt language that is flattering and sanitizing to the administration when describing what has unfolded”

The weak response from Can, EU and UN to Trump's flagrant crimes in Venezuela is striking. It exposes that much of the world has been cowed. Most notable exception: the Latin American left. That is why the Trump Admin has gone to enormous lengths to defeat the left across the continent. 1/3

Europe and Canada are often seen as the last bastions of international law and the liberal rules based order, but look at their responses and time and again they offer milquetoast, bootlicking statements that essentially support the moral premise and provide no opposition.

yes, but i don't think that most people know that the 2nd most popular china substack is a senior fellow of these guys.

"If I can put capital in an AI data centre in Virginia and get 18 per cent dollar (return), why would I go [invest in climate infrastructure] for 15 per cent rupee IRR?’ No fiduciary, no pension fund, no insurance company is going to put (in) money" indianexpress.com/article/busi...

"the high measure of American real estate wealth is not the result of better housing and rising standards of living. It is the result of a regressive transfer of incomes from tenants and new homebuyers to existing real estate owners."

Superior stock trading performance by US congressional leaders, from Shang-Jin Wei and Yifan Zhou www.nber.org/papers/w34524

"industrial policy did not make its way onto the World Bank policy map for developing countries in other regions in the more than three decades that followed... In the practice of economic development, a singular market-oriented approach reigned for another three decades."

This is an excellent mini-documentary from the New York Times on the spiralling consequences of an aggressive immigration raid in LA youtu.be/9ws1r6CaSXs?...

“The second half of 20th century involved most countries becoming like the US. It is increasingly obvious that the first half of this century will require countries to become more like China if they want to stand a chance to meet the aspirations of their citizens.”

another robot highlight for 2025: man wearing humanoid mocap suit kicks himself in the balls