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Trump's Reset Moves Into High Gear With Stephen Miran's Fed Nomination Authored by Lau Vegys via InternationalMan.com, Recently, I wrote to you about how Trump had found “the perfect opening” to reshape the Federal Reserve when Governor Adriana Kugler unexpectedly resigned. What I didn't expect was how perfectly this would confirm everything we've been tracking about Trump's Reset. Trump didn't just fill that vacant Fed seat with any dovish voice. He appointed Stephen Miran—the mastermind behind what's probably the most audacious economic strategy in modern history. If you've been following our analysis, you already know Stephen Miran—and if you do, chances are you'll agree this appointment is the clearest sign yet that Trump's Reset isn't just on the horizon. It's already underway. The Architect of Trump's Reset Stephen Miran is the author of A User's Guide to Restructuring the Global Trading System—the blueprint for what's been dubbed the “Mar-a-Lago Accord.”...

S&P Reaffirms U.S. Credit Rating, Citing Tariff Revenues Amid Fiscal Pressures S&P Global Ratings affirmed the United States' sovereign credit ratings, saying tariff revenues under the Trump administration's new trade policies should help cushion the fiscal impact of recent tax and spending legislation. The ratings agency kept the U.S. at AA+/A-1+ with a stable outlook. “The stable outlook indicates our expectation that although fiscal deficit outcomes won't meaningfully improve, we don't project a persistent deterioration over the next several years,” S&P said in its statement. The firm pointed to broad economic resilience, policy continuity, and strong revenue streams, including what it described as “robust tariff income” - as offsets to fiscal slippage stemming from legislative changes. While acknowledging concerns that tariffs could dampen business confidence, growth, and hiring while spurring inflation, S&P said revenue gains would help balance the ledger, WSJ reports. The a...

Pricing In 'Recession Fear' - Goldman Says It's Harder To Find New Macro Tailwinds Goldman Sachs' view in recent months has been that the market could probably continue to climb the “wall of worry”. However, their baseline forecast is still quite benign - with growth recovering in 2026 and the Fed pushing the policy rate steadily lower in the coming months. There are pockets of frothiness across assets and the spot VIX is close to the lowest levels of the year. But, as Goldman's Dominic Wilson highlights below, 3-month VIX futures remain above 20 and the high spread to spot VIX suggests that there may still be risk premium to squeeze out in places if we simply avoid new problems. The VIX is approaching the year's lows, but VIX futures have been stickier, implying lingering risk premium Source: Goldman Sachs As the market has taken more credit for good news, however, it is getting harder to identify clear new macro tailwinds. We think growth pricing has largely taken credit for the...

Justice Delayed: New York Appellate Court Reportedly Split Over Trump Civil Fraud Judgment Authored by Jonathan Turley, Some of us have expressed frustration with the ridiculous delay in the appellate court review of the absurd civil judgment against Donald Trump. It appears to have entered some judicial black hole where neither light nor an opinion can escape. Now, the Wall Street Journal claims that it is due to a deeply divided panel in a column titled “Court Split Leaves Trump's Civil Fraud Appeal Stuck in Slow Lane.” This should not be a close case and certainly should not take this long. The case against Trump was raw lawfare, and the entire trial by Justice Arthur Engoron made a mockery of the court system, particularly his ridiculous half-a-billion-dollar judgment.  Yet, weeks turned into months and then into years as the appellate court seemed lost in navel-gazing. There was also a concern over passive-aggressive delays; the long appeal is not only preventing Trump from movi...

DOJ To Start Producing Epstein Files To Congress Via Headline USA, The Justice Department has agreed to provide to Congress documents from the Jeffrey Epstein sex trafficking investigation, a key House lawmaker said Monday in announcing a move that appears to avert, at least temporarily, a potential separation of powers clash. The records are to be turned over starting Friday to the House Oversight Committee, which earlier this month issued a broad subpoena to the Justice Department about a criminal case that has long captivated public attention, recently roiled the top rungs of President Donald Trump's administration and been a consistent magnet for conspiracy theories. “There are many records in DOJ's custody, and it will take the Department time to produce all the records and ensure the identification of victims and any child sexual abuse material are redacted,” Kentucky Rep. James Comer, the Republican committee chair, said in a statement. “I appreciate the Trump Administration...

President Trump Addresses Backfiring Green Policies Sparking Mid-Atlantic Power Bill Crisis  President Trump weighed in on the Mid-Atlantic power crisis on Truth Social early Tuesday, echoing our warnings last week about the fallout from Democrats' multi-year "green" crusade to replace reliable, low-cost fossil fuel power plants with unreliable solar and wind amid power demand surges from AI data centers and other electrification trends. The result has been financially crushing for some residents across the Mid-Atlantic. In Maryland, Democrats' approval ratings are already tanking. "STUPID AND UGLY WINDMILLS ARE KILLING NEW JERSEY," President Trump wrote on Truth Social moments ago.  He continued, "Energy prices up 28% this year, and not enough electricity to take care of state. STOP THE WINDMILLS!" Trump's use of Truth Social to address the unfolding power bill crisis in the Mid-Atlantic comes after our year-long reporting (read) on the emerging crisis, whi...

Tri-ing It On By Benjamin Picton of Rabobank European leaders, including Volodymyr Zelenskyy, convened at the White House yesterday to discuss plans for peace in Ukraine. In defiance of the European position, President Trump reiterated that he is not interested in temporary ceasefires and will instead push for a lasting settlement. That will likely include “exchanges of territory” whereby Ukraine will presumably be forced to accept that Donbas will become part of Russia (and that Crimea already is) in exchange for freezing the frontline elsewhere and security guarantees being extended by Europe and the United States. Vladimir Putin would likely see this as a significant victory because Russia does not currently control the entirety of the industrialised Donbas region where the need to 'protect' the Russian speaking population had been one of Putin's professed cassus belli at the outbreak of the war. For Ukraine's part, Zelenskyy said that no “unacceptable decisions” were made yeste...

Hamas Agrees To Ceasefire-Hostage Release Deal With Israel Authored by Debra Heine via American Greatness, Hamas has agreed to a new proposal for a ceasefire-hostage release deal with Israel. The “comprehensive two-stage plan” was based on a framework advanced by US envoy Steve Witkoff and presented to Hamas by Qatari and Egyptian mediators, according to the BBC. It would see Hamas free around half of the 50 remaining Israeli hostages – 20 of whom are believed to be alive – in two stages during a 60-day temporary truce. During that time, there would be negotiations on a permanent ceasefire and an Israeli troop withdrawal. The Egyptian and Qatari mediators reportedly met with Hamas representatives Sunday in Cairo, and presented them with the plan. In a post on Facebook Monday, Hamas leader Basem Naim said Hamas and other Palestinian terror groups had agreed to the deal: “The movement has submitted its response ? approving the new mediators' proposal,” Naim wrote in Arabic...

Europe To Spend $100BN It Doesn't Have, To Buy Weapons America Doesn't Have, To Arm Soldiers Ukraine Now Lacks Part of Zelensky's motive for wearing a suit Monday to the White House has become clearer with fresh reporting in the Financial Times, which reviewed a document showing Ukraine will promise to buy $100 billion of American weapons financed by Europe in a bid to obtain robust US security guarantees. Additionally, "Under the proposals, Kyiv and Washington would also strike a $50bn deal to produce drones with Ukrainian companies that have pioneered the technology since Russia's full-scale invasion in 2022," the report continues. Ukraine pitched its plan during the Monday White House summit, which also involved seven EU leaders - and the $100BN arms deal became part of the key talking points pushed by the European allies. Getty Images This is an effort by design meant to ensure Ukraine can procure what it wants - and that its war efforts can still be funded uninterrupted - w...

Home Depot Misses Across The Board But Stock Jumps On Sticky Guidance Home Depot's sales improved during its fiscal second quarter as consumers remained focused on smaller projects amid cost concerns and economic uncertainty, but its performance missed Wall Street's expectations. Revenue for the three months ended August 3 climbed to $45.28 billion from $43.18 billion, but fell short of the $45.41 billion estimated by about 30bps. Gross margins beta by 20 bps and operating margins were largely in-line. Comp store sales rose 1%, also missing the 1.3% estimate. In the U.S., comp store sales increased 1.4%. According to Goldman, "comp sales were about 30 bps light and exactly what almost all previews and inbounds suggested."  While customer transactions declined ~1% in the quarter, the amount shoppers spent rose to $90.01 per average receipt from $88.90 in the prior-year period. Q2 EPS of $4.68 also missed consensus $4.72. The company earned $4.55 billion, or $4.58 per share, for...

U.S. East Coast On Alert As Powerful Hurricane Erin Approaches The U.S. East Coast dodged a massive bullet this week as powerful Category 3 Hurricane Erin passed near the Bahamas on Tuesday morning. Instead of making landfall, Erin is expected to unleash rough surf from Central Florida to Canada before curving out into the western Atlantic later this week. This has certaintly brought excitement for East Coast surfers.  At 0500 ET, Erin was approximately 700 miles southwest of Bermuda and 750 miles south-southeast of Cape Hatteras.  "Erin forecast to substantially grow in size while moving over the western Atlantic through the week," National Hurricane Center Meteorologist Robbie Berg wrote in a note, warning, "Dangerous rip currents expected along U.S. East Coast beaches."  Tropical storm and storm surge watches have been issued for the Outer Banks of North Carolina all the way up to the Mid-Atlantic states.  Local media outlets reported that evacuations are underw...

Small Business Lending Faces Mixed Signals Amid Economic Shifts Authored by Andrew Moran via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours), Small businesses in the United States encountered growing challenges accessing credit in June, according to Equifax's latest small-business lending index. People walk past small businesses in Doylestown, Pa., on Nov. 4, 2021. Matt Rourke/AP Photo Lending volumes fell by 3.3 percent month over month, although they remained up by more than 2 percent from the same period in 2024, according to the report released on Aug. 18. The index's three-month moving average jumped to 1 percent, fueled by robust lending activity volumes in April that have since eroded. Regionally, 23 states experienced year-over-year declines in 12-month rolling lending volumes, with California (minus 10 percent), Nevada (minus 9 percent), and Georgia (minus 6 percent) leading the decline. Across industries, nominal (noninflation-adjusted) lending decreased in six of the 17 sectors tracked. Accommoda...

Trump 'Assures' No US Boots On Ground To Enforce A Peace Deal In Ukraine President Trump has made it clear that he will not send American troops to enforce a possible peace agreement in Ukraine centered on 'security guarantees' - despite having appeared possibly open to the idea just a day earlier. In a phone interview on Fox News Tuesday morning, Trump was asked what assurances he could offer that American forces wouldn't end up defending Ukraine's borders, and beyond his time in office. The question was based on his campaign and opening months in office - when he repeatedly vowed no more boots on the ground in entangling conflicts abroad. "You have my assurance, and I'm president," Trump responded. European leaders are pressing for the strongest possible security guarantees for Ukraine, to ensure it can never be attacked in the future, once a peace settlement is reached. A White House official additionally confirmed on Tuesday that Trump has definitively ruled out deploying ...

Guard Towers For The Gilded Class Submitted by QTR's Fringe Finance The Financial Times just reported that the nation's tech titans are spending record sums on personal security. Zuckerberg shelled out $27 million last year to keep himself and his family safe. Elon Musk reportedly travels with 20 bodyguards like some Bond villain or on-stage hip hop performer. Even Nvidia's Jensen Huang, the newly minted $153 billion man, had to bump his security budget 60% because people keep mobbing him at conferences—sometimes even in the bathroom (pardon me while I lose my lunch). You could dismiss this as just another absurd detail from the endless parade of Silicon Valley excess. You know, things like gold-plated panic rooms and CEOs wives pumped full of enough silicon and botox they look like those evil balloons Joker had in the 1980s version of Batman. But the truth is it's not just about tech CEOs. It's a preview of where America is headed. As the wealth gap widens, security for the rich w...

'Coalition Of The Willing' Failed To Outplay Trump, Russia's Medvedev Says Former Russian President and top Kremlin national security official Dmitry Medvedev said on Tuesday that European leaders had failed to outplay Donald Trump, and that it remains unclear just how Ukraine's Zelensky will prevent the issue of territorial concessions. White House officials, including Trump himself in prior statements, have made it known that compromise regarding territory is indeed on the table. "The anti-Russian warmongering Coalition of the Willing failed to outplay @POTUS on his turf," Medvedev said on X. "Europe thanked & sucked up to him." The below optics certainly don't contradict Medvedev. One commenter observes that Trump had likely "been waiting for a moment like this his whole life"... I suppose Trump had been waiting for a moment like this his whole life… If you truly represent a sovereign nation, you don't just go along. You tell the host that this spectac...

Nvidia Is Developing New AI Chip For China That Outperforms H20 Having recently agreed on a China "revenue-share" deal with the Trump admin, the world's leader in chatbot chip production, Nvidia, is developing a new AI chip especially for China based on its latest Blackwell architecture that will be more powerful than the H20 model it is currently allowed to sell there, Reuters reported citing sources.  The new chip, tentatively known as the B30A, will use a single-die design that is likely to deliver half the raw computing power of the more sophisticated dual-die configuration in Nvidia's flagship B300 accelerator card, the sources said. A single-die design is when all the main parts of an integrated circuit are made on one continuous piece of silicon rather than split across multiple dies. The new chip would have high-bandwidth memory and Nvidia's NVLink technology for fast data transmission between processors, features that are also in the H20 - a chip based on the company's ...

UK Agrees To Drop Demand For Apple To Create Backdoor Access: Gabbard Authored by Aldgra Fredly via The Epoch Times, The UK government has agreed to drop its request that Apple provide it with backdoor access to user data, U.S. Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard said on Monday. Gabbard stated on X that the agreement came after months of working with UK partners, alongside President Donald Trump, and Vice President JD Vance, to ensure Americans' private data and civil liberties are protected “As a result, the UK has agreed to drop its mandate for Apple to provide a 'back door' that would have enabled access to the protected encrypted data of American citizens and encroached on our civil liberties,” she said. Earlier this year, reports emerged that the UK government had issued Apple a “technical capability notice,” requiring the company to provide access to encrypted user data under the Investigatory Powers Act of 2016. In response, Apple halted its Advanced Data Protecti...

New Yorkers: Pay Attention To What's Happening In Chicago Authored by Daniel Idfresne , Micky Horstman via RealClearPolitics, Zohran Mamdani attributes his Democratic nomination for New York City mayor to the confidence he has inspired in younger voters. “I've been heartened in many of my conversations with older New Yorkers, who've told me they were introduced to the campaign by their son or their daughter,” Mamdani quipped. “I think it's indicative of a new generation of leadership.” His social media-savvy campaign promises to make NYC affordable and pursue social justice. We get the appeal as Gen Zers – the generation who led Mamdani to triumph over Cuomo in the primary. We're part of the most housing-burdened generation, and increasingly reliant on public transit. But young voters shouldn't be fooled by Mamdani's vision. These lofty promises aren't new. After all, Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson has battle-tested Mamdani's proposed solutions to housing, crime, and public ...

Renter Nation Returns: Multi-Family Unit Starts Hit 2 Year Highs But Permits Plunge On the heels of homebuilder sentiment hitting COVID lockdown lows... Source: Bloomberg ...US housing starts and permits data was mixed in July with Starts surging 5.2% MoM (far better than expected and following an upwardly revised 5.9% MoM jump in June). However, Building Permits disappointed, dropping 2.8% MoM (vs 0.5% MoM decline expected)... Source: Bloomberg This is the fourth month in a row of declining building permits (the most forward-looking indicator for the US housing market), now at its lowest since the COVID lockdowns... Source: Bloomberg The decline in Permits was dominated by multi-family units (down 9.9% MoM) while Housing Starts saw multi-family units jump 11.6% MoM in July (after surging 34.5% MoM in June)... Source: Bloomberg The number of multi-family unit starts is at the highest since June 2023... Source: Bloomberg But, and it's a big but, there is a big housing problem: US home construc...

Global Stock Rally Fades As Ukraine Talks Continue, Focus Turns To Jackson Hole Futures are flat ahead of consumer-sector earnings kicking off today, starting with a miss by Home Depot this morning. As of 8:00am ET, S&P futures were unchanged while Nasdaq futures drop 0.1% as Mag7 names are mostly lower ex-NVDA. Semis are mostly weaker ex-INTC which gained more than 6% on news SoftBank would invest $2 billion in the chipmaker and the US would take a 10% stake. Defensives are slightly outperforming Cyclicals. Europe's Stoxx 600 rose 0.5% as signs of progress toward a peace settlement in Ukraine lifted sentiment. The dollar nudged lower. Treasuries eked out gains after S&P Global Ratings affirmed its AA+ long-term rating for the US, with the 10-year rate falling one basis point to 4.32%. Commodities are weaker dragged lower by energy despite strength in precious and Ags. BBG flags a trade escalation from Friday where Trump expanded the metals tariffs to more than 400 consumer goods, incl...