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Shocker: Soros-Backed Tides Foundation Funding Wikipedia

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Shocker: Soros-Backed Tides Foundation Funding Wikipedia

X user DataRepublican, also known as Jennica Pounds, who leads DOGE-adjacent efforts in an open-source capacity, has delved deeper into the dark-money-funded NGO world. Her latest target: George Soros and one of the largest soft-power projects of the 1990s, called the Muskie Fellowship program. 

But the focus here is not the Muskie Fellowship program, but rather her question: “This is straight off the Federal Register. Now ask yourself why Wikipedia doesn’t mention the Soros Foundation.” 

She added, “And fun fact — Soros had further grants for these graduates of the Muskie fellowship program. Hard to interpret this as something other than using our taxpayer funds to educate his minions.” 

Responding to Pounds’ thread, X user Leigh Marcotte suggested that Wikipedia’s omission of the Soros Foundation from the Muskie Fellowship program entry may be linked to Soros-backed pass-through grants to the Wikimedia Foundation.

Marcotte explained:

Wikipedia may omit Soros from search results because Tides, an OSF pass-through, grants funds to the Wikimedia Foundation, which operates

Wikipedia and related projects like Wikimedia Commons and Wiktionary. Wikimedia provides infrastructure, funding, and support to keep Wikipedia free and accessible.

Per its 2023 Form 990, Tides Advocacy awarded $3,176,116 to Wikimedia Foundation for general support.

This may explain why Grok increasingly makes errors when fact-checking conservatives’ posts on Soros funding

For context, the Wikimedia Foundation is a nonprofit organization that operates and supports Wikipedia and other projects. 

Marcotte’s post was even read by Elon Musk, who replied, “Noted.” 

Earlier this week, Muk revealed plans to launch “Grokipedia” as a move to counter the world’s largest online encyclopedia, Wikipedia, which has been hijacked by left-wing activists who manipulate narratives and silence dissenting viewpoints. 

“We are building Grokipedia @xAI . Will be a massive improvement over Wikipedia. Frankly, it is a necessary step towards the xAI goal of understanding the Universe,” Musk wrote on X.

The reliability of OpenAI’s ChatGPT and even xAI’s Grok comes into question given Wikipedia’s designation of “reliable source”… 

And then there’s this. 

Related:

The broader message is that the fight for narrative control continues. Wikipedia has received funding (as per the report above) from dark-money NGOs, which undermines credibility and, most importantly, raises questions about the reliability of chatbots that pull information from Wikipedia entries. This may help explain why Musk is preparing to launch a competing “Grokpedia.” The pursuit of truth, or the effort to seize narrative control from the Deep State, marches on.

Tyler Durden
Fri, 10/03/2025 – 18:30

California Ends Kamala Harris’s Truancy Law Punishing Parents

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California Ends Kamala Harris’s Truancy Law Punishing Parents

Authored by Jill McLaughlin via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

California parents will no longer face arrest if their children miss school following Gov. Gavin Newsom’s Oct. 1 decision to approve legislation repealing Kamala Harris’s truancy law.

A school bus heads toward downtown Los Angeles on June 9, 2025. John Fredricks/The Epoch Times

The 2011 law that the former vice president sponsored when she served as the state’s attorney general made it a misdemeanor for parents if their children were chronically truant by missing 10 percent or more of school days, starting in kindergarten.

The law punished parents with a fine of up to $2,000 or one year in county jail. At the time, she said the bill was an “effective strategy” to reduce chronic elementary school truancy and a smart approach to crime prevention.

This week, Newsom signed into law Assembly Bill 461 to end the criminalization of truancy for parents and remove the 2011 law from the state’s penal code. Newsom did not explain why he signed AB 461 in his press release about legislation decisions on Oct. 1. The bill, one of 105 bills signed into law that day, takes effect on Jan. 1.

The bill’s author, Assemblyman Patrick Ahrens, a Silicon Valley Democrat, called the truancy law a “failed policy.”

“Thank you to Gov. Newsom for signing my bill to repeal this failed policy of criminalizing struggling California families for their children missing school,” Ahrens said in a statement. “Fining or imprisoning parents did nothing to get kids the education and support they need.”

While California’s truancy law remained on the books for more than a decade, school districts were becoming less likely to enforce the punitive measures against parents, according to EdSource, a nonprofit educational resource focused on the state’s school systems.

The first arrests under the law were of five parents in Orange County in 2011. The parents were handcuffed and taken to Orange County Jail before being released on their own recognizance for ignoring repeated requests to get their children to school.

While parents have been arrested in California under the truancy law, it was unclear how many cases resulted in criminal charges. Most school districts instead went beyond the law to reach out to parents with emails, letters, and phone calls to resolve truancy problems, according to the California District Attorney’s Association.

The new law was sponsored by End Child Poverty California, Service Employees International Union (SEIU) California, and the Western Center on Law and Poverty. Several justice and parent organizations, including the California State Parent-Teacher Association (PTA), also supported it.

“No parent wants their child to miss out on critical learning opportunities in school; repeated unexcused absences are a sign families may be in need of support to secure a doctor’s note or to address bullying at school,” SEIU California stated.

The Western Center on Law and Poverty also expressed gratitude for the change.

“This outdated and ineffective strategy criminalizes families rather than offering support,” the organization said in a statement. “This bill will assist families who may be facing challenges, such as fear of deportation, poverty, and mental health challenges.”

The Epoch Times reached out to Harris and received no response by publication time.

Tyler Durden
Fri, 10/03/2025 – 18:05

Portland Police Detain Journalist, Not Antifa Soldiers, Spurring White House Probe 

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Portland Police Detain Journalist, Not Antifa Soldiers, Spurring White House Probe 

White House officials are alarmed by the arrest of conservative journalist Nick Sortor in Portland. Sortor was taken into custody late Thursday night while documenting Antifa terror cells creating chaos outside a U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) facility.

The arrest occurred after the Portland Police Bureau reported that it was “monitoring the protest during the evening and observed some protest participants engaging in fights.” Sortor was charged with second-degree disorderly conduct.

“This was as big of a surprise to me as it was to everybody else. All of a sudden, you know, I’m being jumped by Antifa thugs,” Sortor told Fox News’ Bill Melugin following his release from jail. “I get back up, I stumble away and go back toward cops where I think, you know, at least, all right, well, maybe that’ll be a safer place for me to go… never suspected that I was going to be the target of the arrest, that they were coming in to me.”

“And when they put me into handcuffs, the first thing that went to my mind wasn’t, ‘Oh, you’re being arrested.’ It’s, ‘Oh, they’re trying to help you and get you out of here and make it look like they’re doing something.’ Because they weren’t telling me what they were doing. They weren’t telling me I was under arrest. They weren’t telling me what I was being charged with. And it took over an hour for me to find out what I was charged with,” Sortor continued. 

The journalist said Antifa “threw multiple punches at me. They broke my camera by hitting that. So I was on the ground at that point. I tried to swing. I missed. I think I have every right to swing on somebody that has got me on the ground after punching me and after breaking my equipment.” 

Yet, the Portland Police Bureau arrested the journalist, not the Antifa woke warriors who despise free speech, instead promote a communist-inspired agenda.

This troubling arrest prompted Attorney General Pam Bondi to begin an investigation into what Sortor called “my wrongful arrest last night.” 

White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt told reporters that Sortor’s arrest is very concerning.

“You PROVED what we’ve all been saying for years: you’re CORRUPT and CONTROLLED by vioIent Antifa thugs who terrorize the streets,” Sortor wrote on X. 

Just remember why Democrats protect Antifa.

 Leavitt hints at where Office of Management and Budget Director Russ Vought’s next cuts are likely to be made (here are the latest cuts). 

And it begins. 

. . .  

Tyler Durden
Fri, 10/03/2025 – 17:40

New York Targets Bitcoin Mining With Proposed Tax Hike Bill

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New York Targets Bitcoin Mining With Proposed Tax Hike Bill

Authored by Frank Corva via BitcoinMagazine.com,

Yesterday, two members of the New York State (NYS) Senate introduced Senate Bill 8518 (S8518), which imposes excise taxes on digital asset mining using the proof-of-work consensus mechanism, making it even more difficult than it already is for bitcoin miners to operate in the state.

S8518, which was co-sponsored by Liz Krueger (D) and Andrew Gounardes (D), stipulates that bitcoin and digital asset miners in the state will pay increased taxes based on the amount of energy that they use.

The rates are as follows:

  • 0 cents per kilowatt-hour (kWh) for every kWh less than or equal to 2.25 million kWh per year

  • 2 cents per kWh for every kWh between 2.25 million and 5 million kWh per year

  • 3 cents per kWh for every kWh between 5 million and 10 million kWh per year

  • 4 cents per kWh for every kWh between 10 million and 20 million kWh per year

  • 5 cents per kWh for every kWh over 20 million kWh per year

The proposed taxes will not apply to miners who utilize renewable energy sources, as defined by Section 66-P of NYS public service law, to power their facilities. The mining facility would also have to “not [be] operated in conjunction with an electric corporation’s transmission and distribution facilities,” according to the bill.

The bill also stipulates that all taxes, interest, and penalties collected as a result of this potential law be used to subsidize energy customers enrolled in NYS energy affordability programs.

The introduction of this bill comes approximately one year after NYS’ digital asset mining moratorium expired. The moratorium banned any digital asset mining that required the use of fossil fuels.

Now that bitcoin mining companies can technically operate in the state again, they will likely think twice about doing so, as the increased taxes will likely cause these companies to look to set up facilities elsewhere in the U.S..

This new bill is just another in a series of bad regulatory proposals from Democratic lawmakers and bureaucrats in NYS that disincentivize the Bitcoin and crypto companies from setting up in NYS.

Instead of thinking about the jobs that the bitcoin mining industry could bring to upstate New York, home to a number of cities and regions that suffer from poverty in this post-industrial era, Democrats seem more hellbent on sticking it to bitcoin miners.

Tyler Durden
Fri, 10/03/2025 – 17:15

Hegseth Announces 4th Deadly Strike On ‘Narco-Terrorist’ Boat Off Venezuela 

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Hegseth Announces 4th Deadly Strike On ‘Narco-Terrorist’ Boat Off Venezuela 

Pentagon chief Pete Hegseth announced Friday another military strike on an alleged drug-smuggling boat off Venezuela which killed four people.

This marks at least the fourth such attack, and after President Trump formally notified Congress this week that the US was entering a “non-international armed conflict” with drug cartels. Hegseth made clear on social media, “These strikes will continue until the attacks on the American people are over!!!!”

USS Sampson (DDG 102), a U.S. Navy missile destroyer. via Anadolu Agency

Hegseth affirmed in a social media post that he had directed the latest strike on Trump’s orders, and released overhead drone video of the attack.

“The strike was conducted in international waters just off the coast of Venezuela while the vessel was transporting substantial amounts of narcotics – headed to America to poison our people,” Hegseth said on X.

“Our intelligence, without a doubt, confirmed that this vessel was trafficking narcotics, the people onboard were narco-terrorists, and they were operating on a known narco-trafficking transit route,” he added.

Trump’s rationale for the attacks in the aforementioned memo states the cartels are “non-state armed groups” whose actions smuggling drugs “constitute an armed attack against the United States”.

As for Hegseth, his post claimed the boat was “affiliated with Designated Terrorist Organizations” – however there remains a legal dispute as to whether merely labeling a cartel as an FTO automatically warrants military action, and without warning or attempt to intercept the vessel.

In particular the administration has essentially declared war on the Tren de Aragua cartel, and says it is cooperating with the Maduro government, which Caracas has rejected, and so the presence of the cartel’s members in the US is a “predatory incursion” by a foreign nation.

The new footage of the Friday (presumably) drone attack…

The Washington Examiner on Thursday said that war could be on the horizon. The publication “understands that military planners believe the assembled forces are now sufficient to seize and hold key strategic facilities such as ports and airfields on Venezuelan territory (the Washington Examiner is withholding some details for national security reasons).” And for now it appears the occasional attack on small alleged drug boats will continue.

Tyler Durden
Fri, 10/03/2025 – 15:20

Trust In Media Among Americans Hits Record Low: Gallup Survey

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Trust In Media Among Americans Hits Record Low: Gallup Survey

Authored by Zachary Stieber via The Epoch Times,

Trust in media among Americans has hit a record low, according to a Gallup survey released on Oct. 2.

Just 28 percent of adults told Gallup that they have a great deal or fair amount of trust in the media.

That’s a decline from 31 percent in 2024, 32 percent in 2023, 40 percent in 2020, and a peak of 72 percent in 1976, shortly after Gallup first started asking about trust in the media in 1972.

In the latest survey, carried out Sept 2–26, 8 percent of respondents said they have a great deal of confidence in mass media, such as newspapers and television, to report the news fully, accurately, and fairly.

Twenty percent said they have a fair amount of confidence, 36 percent of respondents said they have not very much confidence, and 34 percent said they have none at all.

When divided by party affiliation, Republicans were the most likely to say they do not have confidence in the media. Sixty-two percent of Republican respondents said they have no confidence, and 30 percent said they have little confidence. Just 5 percent expressed a fair amount of confidence in the press, with the remaining 3 percent expressing a great deal of confidence.

Among independents, 7 percent said they have a great deal of trust in the media, 21 percent said they have a fair amount of trust, 38 percent said they have not very much trust, 32 percent said none at all, and 2 percent said they did not know.

Most Democrats—51 percent—have a great deal or fair amount of confidence in the media. While that was a majority of Democrat respondents, it is also a tie for the record low among Democrats. Thirty-nine percent said they have a little trust, 9 percent said they have no trust, and 1 percent said they were not sure.

Older adults were more likely to express trust in the media. Thirty-seven percent of adults aged 55 and older said they have a great deal or fair amount of trust in the media, compared to 21 percent of people aged 35 to 54 and 24 percent of younger adults.

“With confidence fractured along partisan and generational lines, the challenge for news organizations is not only to deliver fair and accurate reporting but also to regain credibility across an increasingly polarized and skeptical public,” Gallup stated.

The survey from September was conducted over the telephone with adults living in all 50 states and the District of Columbia. The results are based on a random sample of 1,000 respondents. The margin of sampling error was plus/minus 4 percent.

Tyler Durden
Fri, 10/03/2025 – 15:00

“Huge Red Flag” – Chanos Joins Growing Crowd Questioning Subprime Credit In “The Golden Age Of Fraud”

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“Huge Red Flag” – Chanos Joins Growing Crowd Questioning Subprime Credit In “The Golden Age Of Fraud”

In a 2020 Lunch with the FT interview, Jim Chanos said financial markets were in “the golden age of fraud”.

On Thursday he said this phenomenon had “done nothing but gallop even higher” since he made the remark. 

And now, as we have been highlighting recently, the dominoes may have started falling…

Beneath the surface of what’s been a remarkably resilient US economy, a series of small shocks in the world of consumer credit have combined to rock companies that service financially-vulnerable Americans, raising major questions about the true strength of the supposedly omniscient consumer’s health.

Following the collapse of Tricolor Holdings (a subprime auto lender), and weak second-quarter results from CarMax; we have seen car parts supplier First Brands Group…

…wrongfooting investors further with payments company Klarna and buy-now, pay-later firm Sezzle also suffering declines alongside the ‘Alts’ market and private credit…

And as alternative asset managers tumble, The FT reports that 67 year old Chanos likened the near $2tn private credit apparatus fuelling Wall Street’s lending boom to the packaging up of subprime mortgages that preceded the 2008 financial crisis, due to the “layers of people in between the source of the money and the use of the money”.

“With the advent of private credit . . . institutions [are] putting money into this magical machine that gives you equity rates of return for senior debt exposure,” he said, adding that these high yields for seemingly safe investments “should be the first red flag”.

In the case of Tricolor and First Brands, questions (though no official allegations) have been raised about the substantial use of off-balance sheet financing and the possibility of rehypothecation of invoices (pledging collateral multiples times).

Chanos said:

“We rarely get to see how the sausage is made.”

Indeed, but one cut and the guts come spilling out

“The opaqueness is part of the process,” Chanos said.

“That’s a feature not a bug.”

The ‘opaqueness’ surprised many, as we detailed previously, 

Nevertheless, while traders can’t pin down the driver of the weakness in ‘Alts’, The FT concludes that several large banks have also been caught up in the collapse, including JPMorgan Chase and Fifth Third, which are exposed to losses on hundreds of millions of dollars’ worth of auto loans.

A second investor who has since sold their position in packaged-up Tricolor loans said they had no idea how potential financial irregularities went unnoticed by JPMorgan Chase, one of the banks that underwrote debt offerings.

“That’s the shocking part of it,” the investor said. “JPMorgan is one of the most sophisticated lenders in the entire world. How the hell could they have missed this?”

JPMorgan declined to comment.

Tyler Durden
Fri, 10/03/2025 – 14:40

Illegal Immigrants And Federal Health Benefits: What To Know

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Illegal Immigrants And Federal Health Benefits: What To Know

Authored by Lawrence Wilson via The Epoch Times,

Republicans and Democrats offer competing claims about whether people who entered the country unlawfully are benefiting from Medicaid.

“The law prohibits undocumented immigrants from getting payments from Medicare, Medicaid, or the ACA. There’s no money, not a penny of federal dollars that are going there,” Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) said on Sept. 30.

Yet Republicans say millions of people who entered the country illegally do receive federal health benefits.

“By some estimates, 20 million illegal aliens came [here] from every country, all around the world,” House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) told reporters on Oct. 2, referring to the years of the Biden administration.

“[Democrats] gave them all this parole status so that they could get enrolled onto taxpayer benefits.”

The war of words has erupted during a government shutdown because of Democrats’ demand that all health-related portions of the One Big Beautiful Bill Act (OBBB) be repealed as part of a continuing funding resolution.

The dispute is over competing visions for the scope of government-funded health. Democrats favor a more expansive list of noncitizens who can apply for federal benefits. Republicans, through the OBBB, have shortened the list considerably.

Here’s a look at which immigrants can now apply for Medicaid, and how that’s set to change in 2026.

Qualified Aliens

Under current federal law, “qualified aliens” can apply for federal benefits. This category includes people lawfully admitted for permanent residence.

Generally, there is a five-year waiting period before eligibility begins, though most states waive that for immigrant children and pregnant women.

Parolees are also qualified aliens. Federal law gives the director of Homeland Security the discretion to release them into the United States temporarily, “only on a case-by-case basis for urgent humanitarian reasons or significant public benefit.”

More than 2.8 million people were paroled into the country between February 2021 and January 2025, according to the Department of Homeland Security. Parolees are eligible for Medicare, Medicaid, or the ACA Marketplace after one year.

Immigrants who are granted asylum or refugee status are also qualified aliens. They have no waiting period.

Qualified aliens also include people who are under an order of deportation that has been withheld, come from certain designated countries, are victims of domestic violence, are victims of sex trafficking, are members of certain Indian tribes, or certain others.

Asylum Seekers

More than 1.7 million people applied for asylum in the United States from 2021 through 2024. Until Oct. 1, there was no fee for applying for asylum, and immigrants could do so at a port of entry, via the CBP One app, or after entering the country unlawfully.

Asylum seekers are not counted as qualified aliens, but some states have found a workaround to enroll them. For example, California requires asylum seekers to document that they have applied for Temporary Protected Status to enroll in Medicaid.

Temporary Protected Status allows people from countries experiencing humanitarian emergencies, armed conflict, or natural disasters to remain in the United States. This status is granted to immigrants from 12 countries, but those from other countries may apply.

Most states also require immigrants to have an Employment Authorization Document to apply for Medicaid. That document is issued by the U.S. Customs and Immigration Service after a five-month waiting period.

The Social Security Administration automatically mails a Social Security Card to those granted an Employment Authorization Document. More than 4 million noncitizens obtained Social Security cards between January 2021 and March 2025, according to Antonio Gracias, formerly with DOGE.

Lawfully Present

Under current rules, a person must be “lawfully present” in the United States to enroll in Medicaid, CHIP, or the ACA Marketplace.

This category, as defined by the ACA Marketplace, includes all qualified aliens and a few other groups.

Lawfully present immigrants include temporary residents with work visas or student visas, lawful temporary residents, and people under deferred action or deferred enforced departure.

As of August 2025, Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) recipients are no longer eligible for Marketplace coverage.

As of December 2024, 19 states require Medicaid or ACA Marketplace enrollees to have a qualified alien status, not a lawfully present status.

Republican Changes

Republicans have consistently pointed out that many of the people who now qualify for benefits may have entered the country illegally and been allowed to stay temporarily only because of a severe backlog of immigration cases.

In October 2023, the height of the immigration surge, some 2 million people were awaiting immigration hearings with fewer than 700 judges available to hear them.

The OBBB narrows the list of those eligible for federal health benefits to include only U.S citizens, lawful permanent residents, certain Cubans and Haitians in the United States, and those living here under a prior agreement with the Federated States of Micronesia and the Republic of the Marshall Islands.

That portion of the law takes effect on Oct. 1, 2026.

“We’re not going to incentivize illegal immigration,” Johnson said.

“We voted against this,” Schumer said. “We’ve tried to undo it three times. And the American people are going to be totally on our side.”

A fourth Senate vote on this matter is expected today, Oct. 3.

Tyler Durden
Fri, 10/03/2025 – 14:20

‘Wokest Insurance Company’ Exposed By Consumer Advocacy Group

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‘Wokest Insurance Company’ Exposed By Consumer Advocacy Group

A major insurance company, labeled the “wokest insurance company” by critics, appears to be at odds with President Donald Trump’s anti-DEI agenda, according to a conservative consumer advocacy group.

Consumers’ Research, in a letter to the Justice and Treasury Departments, accused Chubb Insurance of practices that may violate the Civil Rights Act and other federal anti-discrimination laws, according to Fox News.

Chubb’s website is filled with woke language, declaring that “racial justice and equity is both an individual journey and collective duty” and emphasizing an “anti-racist” stance, claiming mere opposition to racism is “insufficient.” Based in Zurich with its U.S. headquarters in New York City, Chubb has implemented internal training programs to push employees to “combat racism,” a move many Americans view as divisive and disconnected from mainstream values.

Chubb’s website promotes its “Advancing Racial Justice” initiative, spotlighting support for Equal Justice USA (EJUSA), a group tied to controversial figures like convicted cop-killer Mumia Abu-Jamal, Fox News found. “We believe in being anti-racist because a rejection of racism alone is insufficient,” the company states, doubling down on its social justice agenda.

The company has also aligned with progressive priorities when it comes to climate change. As of March 2025, Chubb introduced stringent guidelines for oil and gas projects, refusing to underwrite new coal-fired plants or companies deriving over 30% of revenue from coal mining or energy production, Fox News reports.

Meanwhile – chairman and CEO, Evan Greenberg, has repeatedly taken aim at Trump’s America First agenda, writing in 2017 that he was deeply concerned with “brand of nationalism and its impact on our image and leadership in both trade and geopolitics,” Carrier Management reports.

Greenberg has also attacked Trump’s trade policies, echoing globalist talking points common among corporate elites.

“Our approach to bilateral negotiations now seems to reflect a narrow view of our interests while ignoring the interests of trading partners as if somehow it is simply a privilege to trade with the United States,” Greenberg wrote. “It overestimates our power and underestimates the value of trade agreements for the country.”

Chubb’s commitment to progressive ideology runs deeper than Greenberg’s opposition to Trump, with the company’s Executive Vice President, Joseph Wayland, boasting about how, “Diversity, equity and inclusion are the foundation of our Chubb culture.” in an interview with LEADERS Magazine in 2021.

“Chubb Insurance is fully committed to radical woke ideology. CEO Evan Greenberg openly opposes protections for women’s spaces, undermines democratic laws, embraces DEI, and supports groups exposing children to dangerous transgender activism,” said Will Hild, Executive Director of Consumers’ Research, in a statement to Fox News.

“On climate, Chubb weaponizes insurance to harm America’s energy sector, slashing support for coal and natural gas to pursue leftist climate goals,” Hild added. “Woke corporations like Chubb are going to extremes, and everyday Americans are footing the bill.”

Consumers’ Research has launched WokeChubb.com and a national ad campaign to expose Chubb’s progressive agenda, with mobile billboards outside Chubb’s offices in Washington, D.C. and New York City.

*  *  *

Tyler Durden
Fri, 10/03/2025 – 14:00

“Steel Is Real”: No Steel Production Means No Military Power, No Industrial Backbone, No Sovereignty

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“Steel Is Real”: No Steel Production Means No Military Power, No Industrial Backbone, No Sovereignty

By Stefan Koopman, Senior Macro Strategist at Rabobank

Steel Is Real

“Steel is real” isn’t just a mantra for moustached, espresso-sipping cycling purists who swear by the ride quality of classic steel frames over flashier materials like carbon or titanium. It’s also a hard truth in geopolitics and economics. As we’ve argued over and over: no steel production capacity means no military power, no industrial backbone, no leverage in the great game – and by extension, no sovereignty. Whether you’re building tanks, turbines or yes, even bicycles, steel and other basic industries remain the foundation.

This broader rethink of industrial strategy comes as Europe faces mounting geopolitical pressure. Our latest Monthly Outlook dives deeper into the shifting global landscape, where hybrid warfare, supply chain weaponization, and economic statecraft are rapidly replacing traditional policy tools. From Russian aerial incursions and drone strikes on refineries to the US weaponizing supply chains and swap lines, the lines between markets and military strategy are blurring fast.

Of course, it doesn’t always deliver the right results. Treasury Secretary Bessent told CNBC that substantial financial support for US soybean farmers will be announced Tuesday, lamenting that Beijing has completely stopped buying US soybeans since May, shifting instead to Brazil and (also) US bailed-out Argentina (oops!). The move echoes the $32bn bailout of the sector during Trump’s first term, with fresh tariff revenues earmarked in some sort of money-go-round. In our view, this announcement suggests a near-term breakthrough in US-China agricultural trade should not be expected. For more on the beans and other ag markets, please see our latest ACMR Monthly Outlook.

Brent crude dipped to a 4-month low of USD 64/bbl before recovering to USD 64.80, as OPEC+ signals it may vote this weekend for further supply increases in November. With 2.2m bpd already restored this year and rising output from Brazil and Guyana, oversupply concerns are mounting. China’s strategic stockpiling has so far helped cushion prices, but market sentiment remains bearish for Q4 2025 and into 2026. We agree supply will exceed demand, though not to the extent suggested by consensus. A key source of price support is US production, which is already stalling near 13.4m bpd at current prices. We forecast Brent to average USD 61 in Q1 2025, then USD 58–60 through 2026.

Markets remain largely unfazed by the ongoing US government shutdown, with equities grinding higher, Treasuries stable, and the dollar firming against major peers. Gold briefly hit a record before easing. The prevailing view is that the shutdown has limited macro or monetary policy implications. However, risks are building beneath the surface. President Trump is now openly backing the Project 2025 blueprint and weighing permanent federal job cuts, with budget director Russ Vought pushing for dramatic downsizing. While markets are sanguine – believing this is just part of a game of chicken in US Congress – such cuts could trigger a reflexive process: news of permanent layoffs may dampen consumer confidence and spending, prompting the private sector to retrench further. With job growth already stalling, this feedback loop could accelerate a downturn more quickly than expected.

On that note, the September Challenger report showed hiring intentions at just 117k, down sharply from 403k a year ago. Retailers and transport firms, in particular, appear cautious ahead of the holiday season. At the same time, planned job cuts also declined, pointing to a labor market with low hiring and firing, echoing the JOLTS report and Powell’s recent remarks. Separately, new kid in town, Revelio Labs, reported a 60k increase in employment for September, led by gains in education, health services, and retail trade. Leisure and hospitality, along with business services, saw declines. This contrasts sharply with ADP’s estimate of a 32k drop. Until we hear from the BLS, it’s unclear whether the US added or lost jobs last month – and even then, revisions may leave us guessing for another year. In this labor market, the only certainty is uncertainty.

Tyler Durden
Fri, 10/03/2025 – 11:40

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