Authored by Lawrence Wilson and Sylvia Xu via The Epoch Times,

There’s a greater than one in 10 chance your hospital is owned by someone who’s trying to double their money in seven years.

If you live in Kentucky, your chances are one in six. In New Mexico, more than one in three.

Walk into an emergency room, and there’s a 40 percent chance the doctor who stitches you up works for a staffing company owned by private investors, not the hospital.

At a time when less than half of Americans report being consistently able to afford healthcare, private investors are looking to hospitals and physician practices as a source of profit.

Private equity firms, which invest money on behalf of pension funds, universities, sovereign wealth funds, and wealthy individuals, buy healthcare providers expecting them to produce a better return than the stock market.

That may be no surprise to the 82 million Americans who make tradeoffs such as choosing between buying food and going to the doctor, nor to the nearly half of Americans with healthcare debt who have drained their savings to pay medical bills.

Providers are attractive targets for private investors for the same reasons any business might be, according to analysts.

Hospitals and physician practices are virtually recession-proof. They’re fueled by a steady supply of aging customers. Historically, there have been lots of small, independent operators in the healthcare industry, ripe for consolidation. And they need vast amounts of capital to expand or even maintain complex facilities.

Private investors bring the business savvy and operational know-how that many healthcare providers lack. That has made physician offices and hospitals more efficient and productive, analysts say.

“Private equity has made a tremendous amount of investments in health technologies,” Kelly Arduino, an executive with 25-years’ experience in healthcare management, told The Epoch Times. “That’s where we would see the biggest success.”

But that success comes at a price.

Gains in efficiency and value to investors have left some hospitals bereft of real assets, loaded with debt, and struggling to maintain quality care, some studies indicate.

Private investors are buying into the healthcare system to extract profit, which can permanently change the structure of a healthcare institution, sometimes for the worse.

Debt Loading

When private equity firms buy an independent hospital or physician practice, they finance the deal mostly with borrowed money.

Investors typically put in between 10 percent and 40 percent of the funding and get the rest from commercial lenders, institutional investors, or high-yield bonds.

But the actual borrower is the provider. The hospital or physician practice takes on the debt and must repay it, often paying management fees to the equity firm as well.

And because the investors typically convert the provider from nonprofit to for-profit status, the provider is also liable for taxes.

When the provider is eventually resold, the debt will likely be paid off from the proceeds. But the new owner, often another private equity firm, may finance its purchase with debt, too.

So hospitals and physician practices can be left with ongoing debt for the sake of generating a profit for private investors.

There’s evidence that debt loading negatively impacts the long-term financial health of these institutions.

A 2025 study of more than 200 hospitals owned by private equity firms found that those re-resold to another private equity group saw operating margins decrease more than 8 percent compared to those sold to other for-profit owners.

Yet even some critics agree that private investment in healthcare can be useful if done responsibly.

“Private investments can sometimes be an important source of capital, especially for small to mid-sized companies that can benefit from the access that this financing provides,” Lina M. Khan, former chair of the Federal Trade Commission, wrote in 2024.

Staff Cuts

Private-equity investment in healthcare came under scrutiny by Congress following the 2024 bankruptcy of Steward Health Care, a chain of 31 hospitals. Many attributed Steward’s collapse to its years under ownership by private equity.

Yet overall, hospitals owned by private investors are not more likely to close than are other hospitals, research shows.

A more consistent problem is significant staff reductions, which affects physician morale and patient satisfaction, according to a 2025 report by a team of academic researchers.

After private-equity takeover, provider staffing was reduced by 6 percent over four years and stayed that way longterm, according to a study of hospital acquisitions.

While the number of doctors, nurses, and other care providers did bounce back, support staffing did not. It was cut an overall 20 percent.

That saved money on wages: about 7 percent in the first four years, and up to 9 percent after eight years.

That focus on efficiency has changed the dynamics of the workplace.

“I think where private equity has struggled the most is in dealing with a lot of professional services providers. So that would be physician practices,” Arduino said.

Patients complain of doctors who are overly busy, long wait times for appointments, driving farther for care, and being rushed through their brief visits with physicians.

More than four in 10 doctors reported symptoms of burnout in 2025, according to the American Medical Association. That’s despite a recent decline in job stress since the COVID-19 era.

One reason is the increased pace of work, said Robert Andrews, CEO of the Health Transformation Alliance.

“The doctor who’s had four or five appointments per hour … now has seven,” Andrews told The Epoch Times. That leads to long days catching up on paperwork and feeling fatigued, he told The Epoch Times.

Beyond that, physicians often feel handcuffed by the clock, prevented from spending the extra minutes with a patient that might improve patient care, Andrews said. “They feel like their professional autonomy has been robbed from them,” he said.

That problem is not unique to private equity-owned hospitals and physician practices.

But it has roots in the rapid consolidation of the healthcare industry that began in the 2010s, which some analysts call a “glorious time” for private investment.

This focus on efficiency changed the mindset of entire hospital systems, said Dr. Patricia Martin, an anesthesiologist in practice for more than 20 years.

“They’re not in the business of providing the best medicine. They’re in the business of providing good-enough medicine for the largest number of people,” Martin told The Epoch Times.

Supporters of private investment say there is no evidence that mortality rates increase under private equity ownership.

Yet hospitals owned by private investors were found to have higher rates of falls and hospital-acquired infections, lower patient satisfaction, and lower scores in standardized quality ratings.

Asset Stripping

One reason the Steward Health Care bankruptcy drew criticism was the allegation that former owner Cerberus Capital Management had sold some of its real assets before selling it in 2020.

Cerberus created Steward Health Care, starting with six financially troubled hospitals acquired from the Catholic Archdioceses of Boston, in 2010.

Cerberus stated that the hospital system was financially sound with more than $400 million in cash when sold to other investors in 2020.

However, critics noted that Steward had earlier sold 13 medical office buildings and the campus of one hospital to a real estate trust, then leased them back.

That tactic is common among private equity investors and is not unique to healthcare.

Many real-estate intensive businesses do this to raise capital and to make the cost of occupying the property more predictable.

While this practice does not affect the provider’s immediate financial picture, researchers found that it does have a longer term impact.

Hospitals that sold their real estate to a real estate investment trust had a significant decrease in fixed asset value, and were about six times more likely to close or file bankruptcy than other hospitals, according to a 2025 study.

Yet the Center for Economic and Policy Research found a pattern of private equity companies using the proceeds from hospital and nursing home real estate sales to pay dividends to investors rather than making capital improvements. At the same time, the new real estate owners sometimes charged the healthcare providers inflated rents.

Better Incentives

While the dangers of private equity investment in healthcare are real, industry insiders warn against applying blanket solutions.

Not all hospital failures can be laid at the feet of investors, Arduino said.

“When I look at the hospitals that have struggled or failed, it’s not a function of private equity. It’s a function of long-term mismanagement, operational challenges, disconnected systems, and poor reimbursement,” she said. “The hospital business is super hard.“

Kahn was critical of what she called “strip and flip” tactics used by some private investors. But, she said, “some private equity firms take a more long-term view and focus on creating real operational improvements to generate value in ways that provide broader benefits.”

Andrews, whose firm works with more than a dozen physician groups owned by private-equity firms, said the ownership structure is far less important than the rules by which they operate.

“If you incent primary care practices to rush people in and out the door, that’s what they’ll do,” Andrews said. “If you incent them to spend time, understand what’s going on with the patient, and reward them when the patient’s healthier, that’s what they’ll do.”

Nine states have enacted legislation regarding private-equity investment in hospitals since 2024. Most involve notification requirements regarding changes of hospital ownership.

A Connecticut law bars private-equity owners from having a majority stake in a hospital or interfering with clinical decision making, and prohibits hospital sale-and-lease-back transactions.

Boeing CEO Kelly Ortberg has been on the job for two years and over trhe weekend, we got reports that he may be facing yet another fire to put out, as a software glitch affecting the 737 MAX could complicate the rollout of the 737 MAX 10.

The Wall Street Journal reported Monday afternoon that airlines were notified in August of a previously known glitch that could cause an automated navigation function to cut out during aborted landings.

The report said some airlines have requested deliveries with an older software version that avoids the glitch.

But, now, Boeing must develop a software patch to fix the problem. 

Bloomberg reports that certification of Boeing’s long-delayed 737 Max 10 variant will be held up by the Federal Aviation Administration over a new software issue, just as the US planemaker was in the final stages of winning approval to begin deliveries to airlines.

The FAA is holding off on certification of the largest member of Boeing’s best-selling narrowbody family until it has determined whether or not a recently flagged software concern constitutes a safety of flight issue, Administrator Bryan Bedford told reporters on Monday at an event near Washington.

News of the FAA approval delay sent Boeing shares down 6.1% in late-afternoon trading, the largest intraday decline since Ocotber 20, 2025.

Ortberg told investors this month that the new jet could be approved “very soon” after FAA regulators cleared the shorter 737 MAX 7 earlier this summer. 

Orders for the 737 Max 10 exceed 1,500 aircraft, making it one of the more popular Max variants.

The new MAX 10 is designed to carry more passengers and lower operating costs per seat. It can seat up to 230 passengers, compared with 220 for the MAX 9 and 210 for the highest-capacity MAX 8.

FAA Administrator Bedford said the agency certified the smaller 737 Max 7 with the latest version of the software, which fixed a known issue on the vertical navigation system but unexpectedly introduced a new, but smaller, bug.

“The pilots remain in control of the airplane. They train for these scenarios,” he told reporters. “The issue that we’re looking at right now is the workload component under these more obscure situations and how we feel about that.”

“We haven’t concluded whether this is a safety of flight issue or not,” he added. “But we will be delaying the 10 until we’re satisfied we don’t have an issue here.”

Shares are down 14% this year and have traded sideways since the twin MAX jet crashes, one in 2018 and the other in 2019.

According to Bloomberg, Wall Street analysts tracked by Bloomberg are mostly bullish, with 27 “Buy”, 5 “Holds” and zero sells. The 12-month price target of those analysts is $273.58.

Time to get to work, Ortberg. 

A New Mexico jury has found Facebook liable for tens of millions of violations of the state’s consumer protection law, potentially exposing the social media platform to billions of dollars in fines.

A Santa Fe jury on Friday found Facebook committed over 43.8 million violations of New Mexico’s Unfair Practices Act through false or misleading statements to consumers, according to the state Department of Justice.

“The verdict marks a significant victory for New Mexico consumers and holds one of the world’s largest technology companies accountable for its conduct,” the department said.

The verdict followed a roughly two-week trial stemming from a lawsuit New Mexico filed in 2021 over Facebook’s handling of user data and statements it made to consumers.

As Bill Pan reports further for The Epoch Times, the case traces back to the Cambridge Analytica scandal, in which the now-defunct British political consulting firm obtained personal information from as many as 87 million Facebook users and used the data for political profiling and targeted advertising.

New Mexico alleged that Facebook misled users about how their personal information could be shared with third parties and the extent of users’ control over their data.

The state also challenged statements Facebook made after the Cambridge Analytica disclosures. Facebook said it would investigate applications that had obtained large amounts of user information, audit suspicious developers, ban those that misused data, and notify affected users.

Overall, the jury found 26 of the 29 Facebook statements challenged by the state to be misleading. Those statements covered Facebook’s data practices as well as how it handled hate speech, misinformation, and exceptions to its platform rules.

Meta, Facebook’s parent company, disputed the verdict.

“We disagree with the verdict and will continue to defend ourselves against efforts to distort our record,” a Meta spokesperson said in a statement to The Epoch Times.

“Meta’s platforms are forums for free expression. We have a First Amendment right to manage those platforms in a way we believe best serves the interests of our community.

“This means prioritizing free speech, protecting our users’ information and giving them control over their data.”

The size of any penalty has not yet been determined.

New Mexico Attorney General Raúl Torrez said the state will seek the maximum penalty of $5,000 for each willful violation.

If imposed across all violations found by the jury, the theoretical maximum would exceed $219 billion. The final amount will be determined by the judge.

The state is also seeking court-ordered changes to Facebook’s practices. Torrez said those could include requiring the company to correct previous statements and undergo an audit of how it manages user data.

The verdict is Meta’s second major courtroom loss in New Mexico this year.

In a separate case involving the safety of young users, a jury in March imposed $375 million in civil penalties. A judge later ordered Meta to pay an additional $567 million to address youth mental health harms and imposed court-supervised changes to Facebook and Instagram, bringing the company’s total financial exposure in that case to $942 million.

London copper prices are near record highs at the start of the week, reinforcing the supercycle commodity bull-cycle thesis former Goldman Sachs commodities chief Jeff Currie outlined in August: “get long and buckle up.” The convergence of tight physical markets, currency debasement and policy intervention is creating conditions for a sustained repricing of scarce resources.

From refined petroleum products and rare earths to industrial metals and certain agricultural commodities, tightening physical markets underpin our “own the bottlenecks” theme.

Deutsche Bank’s head of metals research, Daniel Ghali, added urgency to that theme on Monday morning, warning that available copper inventories globally have fallen to “unprecedented lows.” As US and Chinese stockpiling squeezes supplies available elsewhere, Ghali sees copper rallying roughly 50% to $22,050 a ton by the second quarter of 2027.

Ghali estimates China’s strategic reserves hold about 2.05 million tons, equivalent to 43% of global above-ground inventories. Meanwhile, US tariff-driven stockpiling demand could leave 1.3 million tons tied up at warehouses by year-end. Together, the bank estimates US and Chinese stockpiling will encumber 71% of global inventories.

“The combination of de-globalization and decades of underinvestment in supply has created vulnerabilities such that, by year-end, stockpiling in the USA and China will have encumbered 71% of global inventories,” he warned.

At the current stockpiling pace, Ghali forecasts that freely available inventories would approach zero by the end of 2028, adding that this would be the exact breaking point the market must prevent through demand destruction, or higher prices. 

Ghali called this the “most acute copper scarcity on record” and a “de-globalization endgame.” The industrial metal’s story is quickly shifting from an AI data center boom to a liquidity crisis, as free-floating copper inventories decline to unprecedented levels.

More bad news:

The risk now is a bidding war for the remaining accessible metal that ends only when demand destruction arrives. Access to metal is critical as resource nationalism engulfs the world, with China restricting rare earths and other critical metals. These materials are essential to defense and the looming rearmament theme in the West.

More evidence that readers may want to “own the bottlenecks” as critical material supplies tighten. This theme should gain traction across Wall Street.

Last week, Stifel metals analysts pointed out one mind-boggling chart:

Time to own the bottlenecks.

Authored by Jacki Thrapp via The Epoch Times,

Outrage over proposed data centers surged across America, from the Birthplace of Rock ‘n’ Roll to Kansas corn country, amid a heated U.S. – China technology race, turning server farms into one of the defining issues of the midterm elections this fall.

In some primaries, candidates who backed the artificial intelligence (AI) boom were given the boot by voters who preferred politicians encouraging guardrails – or a hard stop – before big tech turned country pastures into concrete parks.

Meanwhile, the Trump administration has said AI-related development is imperative to protect U.S. interests and ensure national security.

Here’s how the data center debate could weigh on some national elections this fall.

Voter Sentiment

Americans have grown protective of remaining open space after seeing acreage – larger than the size of Florida – be converted from rural or agricultural land into urbanized landscape between 1982 and 2017, according to data released by NumbersUSA’s USA Sprawl project.

A lot of the development was due to population growth, but now some fear data centers will scoop up additional land.

“It’s not that Americans think that all of that development was bad, but they’re taking the trade-offs very seriously,” Jeremy Beck, the co-president of NumbersUSA, told The Epoch Times.

“You see that in the polling. They’re concerned about water. They’re concerned about resources.”

Voters told The Epoch Times they’re worried new tech developments would strain local water resources, increase electricity bills, boost governmental surveillance, or become another abandoned building if the AI bubble bursts.

“Data centers are politically interesting because they make the national AI and energy debate a local issue,” Energy policy analyst Yagiz Sullu told The Epoch Times.

“Most voters may not track data center policy, but they do notice changes in electricity bills, water use, new infrastructure, tax incentives, and development in their neighborhoods.”

Voters in a handful of states, including Wyoming, told The Epoch Times that their votes during recent primary elections were swayed by a candidate’s stance on data centers.

In Wyoming, local opposition helped shape the state’s gubernatorial and U.S. Senate primary election in mid-August in very different ways.

President Donald Trump’s endorsement fell short in the Cowboy state’s gubernatorial primary when his pro-data center pick, Megan Degenfelder, lost to Republican Eric Barlow.

Some voters told The Epoch Times during the primary election that a candidate’s stance on data centers played a role in how they voted.

Degenfelder, who received 29.6 percent of the vote, supported the data center boom, suggesting the United States needed to win the AI technology race against China.

Barlow, who won 45 percent of the vote, had a more cautious approach to data centers, suggesting local leaders should control their development.

In Kansas, the physics teacher who was dragged out of an Emporia City Commission meeting and arrested because he clapped when people spoke in opposition to the data center told The Epoch Times he fears the AI bubble could pop and leave his city with more empty buildings.

“I don’t want them to spend, you know, 5 to 10 years building a data center, only for the AI bubble to finally burst and crash,” Lux Claridge said.

Claridge and his wife, Jessica Danford, told The Epoch Times they were “all in” on Democrat Cindy Holscher to be the next governor of Kansas due to her proposed moratorium on data centers.

Holscher is facing Republican Ty Masterson in the state’s gubernatorial primary.

However, while serving in the state Senate, Holscher and Masterson both supported state legislation to expand data centers.

Holscher walked back her stance after announcing her run for governor, calling for a statewide moratorium on new data centers until Kansas has “common-sense guardrails” to protect taxpayers and natural resources.

Meanwhile, Masterson said all data centers must “cover their own power and infrastructure costs.”

David McGarry, research director of the government watchdog group Taxpayers Protection Alliance, does not think that citizens will vote out their representatives who have not acted swiftly on AI and data center concerns ahead of the midterm elections.

“I doubt that Congress’s lack of action will overtake the kitchen table issues as voters decide which candidates and which party are best positioned to improve everyday lives for Americans,” McGarry told The Epoch Times.

McGarry predicts the midterm races will be decided on larger national issues, such as the economy.

Candidates’ Response

Some candidates have underscored just how important the impact of data centers and AI was to their constituents.

During the U.S. Senate primary in Wyoming, voters told The Epoch Times they backed candidates who worked to protect their communities and appreciated when U.S. Rep. Harriet Hageman, the Republican nominee for U.S. Senate, demanded accountability from Meta after its Cheyenne Data Center contaminated the city’s wastewater system.

Hageman, a Trump-backed Republican, is saddling up to face Democratic state Rep. James Byrd, who wants a “full stop” on data center development, in the general election for the U.S. Senate seat this fall.

Some pro-data center candidates kept their name on the ticket.

In Nevada’s gubernatorial primary election, incumbent Joe Lombardo, who is pro-data centers, won in a landslide and will face Democratic Attorney General Aaron Ford this fall.

Lombardo promised to protect people from rising costs as he vouched for data centers, suggesting they will bring jobs, investment, and economic growth to Nevada.

Ford wants to pause new tax breaks for the centers until they can prove they will provide their own clean energy, grid upgrades, and water.

The Cook Political report ranks the race as a toss-up.

In the Texas U.S. Senate race, Attorney General Ken Paxton beat incumbent John Cornyn in the GOP primary runoff election and then pitched a “Texas First Data Center Plan” on Aug. 24, which puts guardrails on proposed centers.

“My Texas First Data Center Plan will protect our grid, our communities, and our children while ensuring America beats Communist China in the AI race,” Paxton wrote in an X post on Aug. 24.

His opponent, Democrat James Talarico, also proposed guardrails and stopping “data centers from being built in our communities if they cannot meet the most basic demands of those communities.“

The Cook Political report moved the U.S. Senate race’s ranking in Texas from Lean Republican to Toss Up on Aug. 20.

Meanwhile in Arizona, gubernatorial candidates Rep. Andy Biggs (R-Ariz.), a Republican, and incumbent Gov. Katie Hobbs, a Democrat, agreed on issuing a moratorium on tax incentives and subsidies for businesses wanting to bring a data center to Arizona.

In Tennessee, Trump-backed GOP state Sen. Brent Taylor will face Democratic state Rep. Justin Pearson for the remapped District 9, which stretches all the way from the Memphis area to just south of Nashville.

Pearson has strongly opposed Elon Musk’s Colossus, a supercomputer that powers Grok.

“In Congress, one of my top priorities will be to establish data center regulations to protect our families,” Pearson wrote on Sept. 3.

Taylor suggested he will make “data centers pay their own way instead of passing the costs on to everyone else.“

Working With Trump

The election this fall can help decide if the president’s agenda during his remaining years in the White House will be a success or a standstill, including with AI.

Trump dismissed concerns about data centers and AI in a Truth Social post on Sept. 14. The president urged that expansion needs to continue in order to win the world’s AI race, and especially against China.

“There is a SICK conspiracy going on against AI and Data Centers, and the only one that is happy about it is China,” Trump said.

“WHOEVER WINS AI, WINS! We are leading China, and all others, and will continue to do so. Conspiracy Theorists, Treasonists, Traitors, and Leakers, BEWARE! Thank you for your attention to this matter!”

Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei urged artificial intelligence companies to slow the development of their most advanced models after Jacob Coxon, a former OpenAI researcher who resigned from Anthropic, suggested on Sept. 8 that people building AI think that it could kill us all “by the end of the decade.”

The calls caught the attention of Congress, prompting many proposals such as the Ratepayer Protection Act, which landed in the Senate after it passed the House 417-3.

But any new bills by U.S. representatives won’t move fast, as House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) sent members home for an early recess that will last until after the November midterm elections.

The early recess received pushback from 107 members of Congress, who urged Johnson to keep the House in session so they can address how AI risks “mass cybersecurity breaches and development of biological or chemical weapons,” according to a press release shared by U.S. Rep. Gabe Vasquez (D-N.M.).

Johnson mostly sides with Trump about the AI issue, telling CNN’s Jake Tapper on “State of the Union” on Sept. 13 that he worried regulation ordered by Congress would make America lose the race to the Chinese communist regime.

Some Republicans have differed from Trump’s position, such as Sen. Jon Husted (R-Ohio) and Rep. John James (R-Mich.), who both have elections this fall.

The lawmakers warned that rapid data center growth will affect their constituents, who worry about power bills rising, water issues, and control.

“I say not one more data center until we PROTECT our people,” James wrote in an X post on Sept. 14.

Husted, who was appointed to fill Vice President JD Vance’s U.S. Senate seat in 2025, is running in a special election on Nov. 3 to keep his position. James is the GOP nominee for Michigan governor.

Authored by Aldgra Fredly via The Epoch Times,

An external review released on Sept. 25 has found no evidence that Utah Valley University employees acted in “bad faith” following Charlie Kirk’s assassination last year, but found several security lapses, including the failure to conduct a formal security assessment.

The university commissioned an independent review to examine its security measures following the Sept. 10, 2025 fatal shooting of Kirk, co-founder of nonprofit organization Turning Point USA (TPUSA). The conservative commentator was shot and killed while speaking to a crowd of students during a TPUSA event at the university in Orem, Utah.

The 158-page report found that the university had not prepared a formal event action plan for the TPUSA event, which it said was essential for major outdoor events involving a high-profile speaker. Several key security decisions were also deferred to the TPUSA, it stated.

The report said university officials had raised concerns about holding the event in the courtyard but ultimately agreed after TPUSA “insisted upon” an outdoor venue, with one TPUSA representative saying Kirk had previously spoken on campus and the organization was familiar with the location.

The university also proposed using its ticketing system for the event, but TPUSA requested to use its own. The report said the university should have retained decision-making authority over key security matters.

“Those decisions placed the event in an area that was more difficult to control and limited [Utah Valley University’s] ability to obtain reliable, real-time information regarding anticipated attendance and crowd size,” the report stated.

The event location “created significant protective operations considerations,” the report said, but the planning process failed to include a documented line-of-sight assessment, pre-event briefing, or walk-through with security stakeholders. Nor was there clear coordination with Kirk’s private security team and external law enforcement partners, it said.

According to the report, Utah Valley University Police Department chief Jeff Long attempted to arrange a face-to-face meeting with TPUSA security supervisor Dan Flood before the event, but it did not take place.

“Such a meeting would have provided another opportunity to review roles, confirm post assignments, address concerns, identify changes in conditions, and ensure that both groups had a shared understanding of the security posture,” it stated.

The university also did not specifically assign any personnel to monitor camera feeds in real time for security purposes during the event, according to the report.

In a statement, Utah Valley University president Jon Anderson said the university has a responsibility to “learn from the findings of this review” and implement its recommendations.

Kirk’s family lawyer Brett Parkinson said in a statement that Utah Valley University hosted the event and therefore assumed responsibility for the safety of all in attendance, including Kirk.

“The buck stopped with UVU leadership and law enforcement,” Parkinson said, referring to the university. “Justice for Charlie and his family requires true accountability for UVU’s fatal shortcomings that day.”

Last week, Kirk’s family announced a wrongful death notice accusing Utah Valley University officials of hastening his death through “reckless decisions,” including failing to conduct an adequate risk assessment, establish a secure perimeter, and to have first responders immediately available, which led to Kirk being taken to a hospital in a private vehicle instead of an ambulance.

Tyler Robinson has been charged with Kirk’s killing, and a judge has ruled the 23-year-old will stand trial for aggravated murder. Robinson has pleaded not guilty.

As we await a maelstrom of Level 1 macro data this week, you could be forgiven glancing wistfully at this morning’s Dallas Fed Manufacturing survey’s modest headline beat (small decline MoM) and thinking “meh.”

That would be a mistake…

Production is soaring (yay!!) and is forecast to remain strong…

Employment is up (yay)… BUT is expected to plunge…

And more worryingly, Prices Paid and expected Prices Received are accelerating  again…

Ok so with all that in mind, here are the (uniformly negative) responses from the surveyed group of manufacturers. They don’t sound like a bunch of business owners expecting new orders and production to improve…

• Tariffs and fuel prices are affecting incoming and outgoing products/costs. Customers have hit the limit on what they can pay. We are getting pushback and cancellations (Beverage and tobacco product manufacturing

• Fuel costs (diesel, in particular) are adversely impacting our bottom line and that of our customers. We’d welcome a quicker resolution to the conflict with Iran as we believe that could potentially provide more favorable outcomes, improved margins and stability in interest rates. Insurance rates continue to increase in cost with a decrease in coverage. Overall, however, we continue to expand operations with an ever-increasing backlog that will provide a record year of revenue and net income for our enterprise in 2026 (Machinery manufacturing)

• We are now facing increased difficulty obtaining raw materials domestically. Items that were readily available now take long lead times or are not available in the same specifications we have historically purchased (Miscellaneous manufacturing)

• The price of diesel fuel is hurting our gross margin. We are unable to pass this through to our customers. We are bidding new jobs using $6.00 [per gallon] for diesel cost (Nonmetallic mineral product manufacturing)

• Broadly speaking, very little to no manufacturing growth exists as pricing is being driven down by Asian and Chinese suppliers. AI and heavy transportation are growing. Other sectors are weak (Plastics and rubber products manufacturing)

• Our business has been able to maintain its volume, primarily because several competitors have experienced significant difficulties, including the largest producer in our industry announcing the closure of two plants, one of which is relatively close to us in Louisiana. Our primary concern going forward is the outcome of the U.S.-Mexico trade negotiations. There are significant flows of foreign aluminum into Mexico, including from countries with substantial non-market production and subsidization including Russia and China at prices far below U.S. prices. We are concerned that reduction in tariffs on Mexican aluminum products will give these non-market economies a significantly advantaged conduit into our domestic markets. Rules of Origin policies sound good in theory but experience shows that this relies on the honesty of those doing the reporting. PROSECs (Program for Sectoral Promotion) are also problematic in giving Mexican companies the ability to use these same foreign-supplied raw materials in downstream products. For U.S. aluminum producers, the issue isn’t simply the tariff rate applied to Mexico. It is making sure that Mexico does not become a lower-tariff pathway for heavily subsidized aluminum produced in Russia, China or elsewhere in Asia to reach the U.S. market. (Primary metal manufacturing)=

• Incoming orders have really slowed down, and now that we are finishing up on some large projects that have kept us very busy since mid-spring, things are slowing down. We have to believe it’s due to the uncertainty around the chaos out of Washington, D.C. and lack of a clear path forward. Add to this the higher cost of living and rising fuel costs, especially for diesel that affects all modes of shipping, it seems to be a logical reason for slower levels of activity amongst our customers (Printing and related support activities)

• High interest and energy costs are a double hit. We can’t do any planning (Transportation equipment manufacturing)

Forgive rus our ignorance here but how the fuck is a sentiment index higher pretty much across the board and yet respondents are literally uniformly negative?

We guess that’s why the smarty pants PhDs get paid the big bucks…

Authored by Matthew Piepenburg via Von Greyerz,

With everything from yields, fuel prices and populism rising with open elan as trust in U.S. leadership sinks to an historical nadir, most would agree that we are experiencing a palpable as well as intuitive feeling of what George Lucas might otherwise describe as a “disturbance in the force.”

Markets, led today by a narrow handful of tech juggernauts, continue their nervous melt-up despite openly embarrassing indicators of both over- and malinvestment, as yet another game-changing technological wave of AI dystopia seduces the retail plankton into a textbook setup for an historical meltdown.

In the interim, a small minority of early IPO participants and C-suite insiders with advantageous access to easy capital from the big, credit-extending banks will make fortunes.

Unfortunately, small businesses across the rest of the ignored landscape of the American nightmare just posted a 64% Year-over-Year increase in bankruptcy filings.

From Capitalism to Neo-Feudalism

Such trends, numbers and “forces” are screaming indicators of what I have long described as an America whose superficial claims of “capitalism” are little more than terms of art masking the darker reality of the neo-feudalism now staining the façade of the so-called American dream.

As my son and I enjoyed yesterday’s football game (against Iowa) live from the University of Michigan’s impressive “Big House” stadium, that same university’s infamous consumer sentiment indicator just posted its worst numbers in its five-decade+ history.

Such data effectively confirms that a recession is not only off our bow, but it’s under our keel.

But hey, why worry? We can rename Lake Ontario to “Lake America”, and all will be well again, right?

And let’s not forget that the NASDAǪ 100 has given us five-year returns North of 100%, right?

Even Pam Bondi can remind us to focus on the DOW to keep our faith in American Exceptionalism forever flamed, right?

Hmmm…

The Hidden Crimes

But what few (so very, very few) have realized is that when measured in real money, namely gold, those so-called impressive returns reveal a loss of >20% rather than a gain of 100%.

In other words, if many still think a mythical stock market bubble is going to save us, it’s only because they still think measuring wealth in that melting ice cube, otherwise known as the nominal U.S. dollar, is an actual measure of anything.

For bonds, the story is far darker. Over the last 12 years, USTs, when measured in gold rather than dollars, have punished “safe investors” with a net loss of 90%. How’s that for wealth preservation?

That’s not a typo. It’s a crime.

Based on decades of monetizing trillions in budget deficits with trillions in magical money mouse-clicked at the Eccles Building, the so-called “experts” have been killing the purchasing power of your currency (and hence wealth) in an incremental death by a thousand cuts.

This murder has now become so exponential that even Wall Street has finally given it a name: “The Debasement Trade.“

But there’s more to this Debasement Trade than its name.

The actual, sad and oh-so dangerous reality of this trade is nothing more than an invisible tax on your wealth, which operates in actual (yet hidden) fact as unarmed robbery on a historical scale.

The Hidden Criminals…

If this engineered wealth transfer makes you angry, and it should, the natural reaction to such a crime is to better understand who committed it.

As usual, the best evidence trail for such questions and crimes is simple: Just follow the money…

And this trail, not surprisingly, begins and ends with the centralized power, centralized crimes and centralized (yet hidden) motives of our centralized banks, whose real mandate was never controlling “inflation and employment.”

Their real motive was equally simple. It was simply to control your money.

The Not-So Federal Reserve

When the U.S. Federal Reserve (which is neither federal nor a reserve) was not so immaculately conceived on Jekyll Island and later birthed in 1913 in Washington, DC by a cabal of private bankers, Woodrow Wilson signed his shaking pen to the greatest wealth transfer in the history of our nation.

Rather than allow the natural forces of supply and demand to determine the cost and supply of credit, a handful of private bankers took monopoly control of the same.

Banking Unveiled – Benefiting the Few at the Expense of the Many

The net result has been precisely what our 7th President, Andrew Jackson, warned as far back as 1832, namely, that our financial system would be prostituted for the “benefit of the few at the expense of the many.”

Jackson knew this because long before this otherwise unconstitutional central bank made its ironic yet deliberate way to Constitution Avenue, he understood the history, tricks and secrets of powerful banks and powerful bankers.

He knew, for example, that indebted princes, kings, presidents and even warlords of flag after flag and nation after nation never held the real power.

Real power, even the power behind armies and capitols, is nothing without the money to wield it, and that money begins and ends with banks and bankers.

He also knew that nations beholden to banks can also extract money from the masses, which is why it was no coincidence that in the very same year the Fed came into law in 1913, so too did the first Federal Income Tax legislation…

The Crazy Mechanics of Credit (and Money) Creation

Jackson further understood how banks actually operate, which is something almost no one is meant or taught to understand, and that’s because it’s so crazy that if they did, it would unmask the crime at the base of our so-called free society and free markets.

Banks, for example, are not just helpful little servants of Bedford Falls public trust who carefully manage depositor monies by judiciously re-lending one dollar of deposited cash for one dollar of wisely underwritten loans.

Oh no, not at all.

Instead, banks take a dollar of your depositor wealth and then add massive turns of leverage when they make their interest-carrying (typically risky) and bank-profiting loans of your money.

They then use very clever (and legalized) double-entry accounting tricks to hide the dirty little secret that whenever they are extending credit, they are actually creating money.

Such money creation via credit extension may seem academic, but when done at the scale of trillions and trillions, what was once academic just becomes inflationary, debasing, and- at levels this high – just plain criminal.

Credit Is Not Created Equal

By extending credit, leverage and money creation (i.e., debasement), powerful banks are also extending privilege, and this privilege is not shared equally.

Big banks, you know – the kind that are too big to fail – hold balance sheets in the trillions (especially when you tack on their notional derivatives exposure), which means they need to make big rather than small loans to move their money and extend their risk exposures.

Needless to say, small businesses and small citizens are not at the top of the priority list for these mega banks.

Instead, the big boys like to make deals with other big boys, which explains why access to capital is not created equal in the so-called land of the free.

Instead, the bigger loans are made to VC funds, mega tech monopolies and pooled superstars in the private equity and private credit corners, temporarily profiting from “sea to shining sea” from Palo Alto to New York City, but largely bypassing the little guys in the flyover states.

The Big Boys Are Not the Smart Boys

But just because these loans and capital infusions are unfairly distributed to the big boys, this by no means implies that they are made to the smartest boys.

Bailing Out the Bad Boys

But power protects power, and the very credit (i.e., banking) system which triggers the next mega crisis in a nation already $40T in public debt will be once again rescued (“bailed out”) by the very bankers and Treasury Secretaries (i.e., former bankers) who systematically created the crisis.

Remember TARP? Remember the BTFP?

In fact, the very same year our TBTF banks broke the global economy in 2008, over 500 bankers received bonuses in excess of $1M each…

It is fascinating how exempt such a system can be from accountability when the criminals are also the judges…

When the Cure and the Sickness Are One & the Same

Of course, the amount of “stimulus,” “accommodation”, and “synthetic liquidity” required to “save” the next banking (and hence credit) crisis will be historically expensive and hence historically ruinous to paper currencies in general and the USD in particular.

Yes, there is theoretically no crisis a money printer can’t solve, and no market dip or even market implosion that a money printer can’t remodel into a V-shaped “recovery.”

But such “solutions” or “recoveries” are as sickening as the very crises they pretend to “cure,” as they can only be achieved by even greater debasement (and money creation) than the debasement and money creation crisis by which the banking system is inherently defined.

In short, the sickness and the cure are one and the same, and the patient zero is always (and I mean always) a bank.

Gold: The Only Honest Solution

The more honest solution, of course, is as obvious as it is ignored by the vast majority of investors, bankers and even innocents of the ignored Main Streets.

That solution is now, and has always been, gold.

In crisis after crisis, bank disaster after bank disaster, and currency failure after currency failure, those families, institutions and sophisticated investors who held gold rather than paper money in a crisis where always the same ones who prevailed rather than failed when their currencies were inflated away/debased into nothing.

But just because your banking system has failed to protect your deposits or dollars in gold, this doesn’t mean you can’t be smarter than your “experts.”

Once you understand their tricks, powers and historical failures – it’s almost too easy. Gold is no longer a debate; it’s the solution.

And while goldbugs wait, there is now an option to collect as much as 4% yield on physical, paid out as additional ounces of physical gold, something our friends at Monetary Metals have been perfecting for years.

MongoDB shares plunged earlier Monday morning after CEO Chirantan “CJ” Desai abruptly stepped down and was tapped to lead Meta’s new AI platform for enterprise customers, which Mark Zuckerberg called “the next major pillar of our business.”

“To lead this effort, I’m excited that Chirantan “CJ” Desai will join Meta as Chief Enterprise Platform Officer, reporting directly to me,” Zuckerberg wrote on X around 0835 local time in New York. 

The business unit, called Meta Enterprise Platform, aims to “help businesses use AI to grow and transform in new ways as well,” Zuckerberg said. 

Zuckerberg continued, “CJ is an experienced enterprise leader with a track record of building full-stack software and delivering results in AI, infrastructure, business applications, and security.” 

To lead this effort, I’m excited that Chirantan “CJ” Desai will join Meta as Chief Enterprise Platform Officer, reporting directly to me. CJ is an experienced enterprise leader with a track record of building full-stack software and delivering results in AI, infrastructure,…

— Mark Zuckerberg (@finkd) September 28, 2026

MongoDB’s stock was down as much as 21% to $326.51 around 11 am local time in New York. This was the worst intraday decline since March 3. 

Needham software analyst Mike Cikos called the development “unfortunate, as it comes just a day before MongoDB’s Investor Day.” 

Here’s Cikos’ first take:

We view the timing of the announcement as unfortunate, as it comes just a day before MongoDB’s Investor Day (where Mr. Desai is still featured prominently on the company website).

In our view, MongoDB is executing strongly and Mr. Desai’s departure is not a reflection of MongoDB’s growth algorithm. If anything, we believe he leaves the company in a stronger position than when he found it – further maturing the go-to-market; and we note CFO Mike Berry has done an exceptional job instilling investor confidence in the guidance philosophy and demonstrating margin leverage.

However, we acknowledge the poor optics and timing of the CEO announcement, likely leading to bearish questions on competitive concerns (i.e. Postgres) and MongoDB’s ability to capture the AI Revenue opportunity.

Raymond James software analyst Mark Cash separately wrote:

MongoDB announced that CEO CJ Desai stepped down, effective immediately, while reaffirming guidance for F3Q27 (Oct.) and FY27 (Jan.). The announcement comes one day ahead of its analyst day, with Dev Ittycheria stepping in as Interim President and CEO. Ittycheria is MongoDB’s longtime former CEO (September 2014-November 2025) and a current board member; the board has initiated a search for a permanent CEO. 

MDB shares are sharply lower on the news, as we believe investors viewed Desai as having brought critical capabilities to execute MongoDB’s next phase of growth, particularly around scaling the business and deepening enterprise relationships to unlock incremental workloads. Desai had also made several leadership changes to position the company for the AI opportunity, and his departure introduces uncertainty around whether additional organizational changes could follow. We also believe Desai had been reshaping MongoDB’s messaging around the importance of its hybrid differentiation versus a more Atlas-centric focus, and we’ll be watching for how the longer-term vision is portrayed at tomorrow’s analyst day. Desai is now taking on leadership of Meta’s newly announced Enterprise Platform.

The abrupt leadership change certainly caught MongoDB analysts off guard this morning and just one day before Investor Day.

Summary

• Trump signals Iran sanctions relief in exchange for nuclear concessions, triggering a sharp drop in oil prices.

• US-Iran talks may resume, but only indirectly, this week; however Tehran remains skeptical after Trump rejected its ceasefire proposal.

• Iran announced targeting 19 vessels over a 48 hour period this weekend and is threatening to escalate further.

• Oil prices fall: Brent below $100 and WTI below $95 as markets price in potential diplomacy.

• Iran’s economy feels the pressure, with the rial hitting a record low near 2.3 million per dollar.

*  *  *

Oil Tumbles on the Unexpected: Trump Signals Sanctions Relief (…TACO Monday)

Al Jazeera is reporting that President Trump is signaling he’d be open to providing Iran with sanctions relief in return for nuclear concessions – though it remains that Tehran has throughout the war insisted that a ceasefire deal must be achieved first, before the nuclear file is dealt with.

US official says US President Trump is prepared to ease sanctions on Iran and release its frozen assets in exchange for progress on the nuclear issue, reports Al Jazeera

And…

CNN and Axios also run US offiicial comments (echoing Al Jazeera) that US President Trump is willing to grant Iran sanctions relief and release frozen funds in exchange for real progress on the nuclear issue.

As stocks jump, crude big plummet…

Note via Newsquawk: Oil sees downside, with slight Dollar pressure, while Treasuries, stocks, and spot gold see upside amid reports that Trump is ready to ease sanctions on Iran and release its frozen assets in exchange for progress on the nuclear file. Meanwhile…

IRAN OFFICIALS PESSIMISTIC ABOUT DEAL WITH US BEFORE MIDTERMS

The Iranian response is what’s going to matter here. They will likely see in this another ploy to merely talk down oil prices, and have already repeatedly said they ‘don’t trust’ Trump. It was only on Friday night into Saturday that Trump outright rejected Iran’s 7-day ceasefire pitch – with not even so much as an effort to sit down and talk details. But apparently that could happen this week on an indirect basis, via the typical Gulf mediators.

Ayatollah New Threat

After a weekend which saw President Trump reject an Iranian proposal for a 7-day ceasefire and roadmap to peace, and Tehran in turn targeting 19 ships in the Strait of Hormuz, the two sides once again have their fingers on the trigger.

Iran has said while it remains open to diplomacy, it is ‘fully prepared’ to resume the full-scale war with Washington, according to Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi on Sunday. On Monday, Supreme Leader Mojtaba Khamenei – who still hasn’t been seen since the war’s start and after his father’s assassination – has proclaimed his military has driven the ‘enemy’ from waters off southern Iran to the Arabian Sea.

“Having suffered painful blows from our valiant combatants and the guardians of the Strait of Hormuz, they [the enemy] dare not venture beyond the Arabian Sea,” Khamenei said in a new message. He warned that war could soon come to the Arabian Sea as well.

His words were issued on the annual remembrance of the Iran-Iraq War, as well as the anniversary of Israel’s killing of Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah in 2024.

“Whenever they have risked doing so they have only inflicted harm upon themselves, and the time is fast approaching when the Arabian Sea, too, will be cleared of their presence,” Khamenei’s message added. This marks an extension of threats from Iranian security officials last week which warned that war is coming to the Indian Ocean more broadly.

However, the reality also is that oil exports from the Persian Gulf and Gulf of Oman have been climbing over the past week. But renewed hostilities in the Strait of Hormuz, where Iranian forces are trying to hinder this uptick in transit, is looking more and more likely.

This as diplomacy is obviously stalled. Bloomberg observes, “Iran and the US appeared far apart on a new ceasefire deal or the reopening of the Strait of Hormuz, with Tehran saying it’s sticking to a proposal US President Donald Trump has rejected.” And, “In futures, oil rose as Iran and the US appeared far apart on a new ceasefire deal or the reopening of the Strait of Hormuz, with Tehran saying it’s sticking to a proposal that US President Donald Trump has rejected.”

Return to ‘Talks’ Narrative

Like clockwork, anonymous diplomatic officials are once again in pre-market Monday morning hours pushing a “talks” narrative. According to more latest from Bloomberg:

Mediators expected to hold separate talks with US and Iran on Monday or Tuesday, with Iran Foreign Minister Araghchi and Qatari mediators remaining in the US, according to sources. Talks to focus on amended version of 7-day proposal Iran presented on UNGA sidelines.

Over the weekend, Trump rejected Iran’s latest proposal to reopen the Strait of Hormuz, while Iran said any reopening remains contingent on its conditions being met and its UN delegation reportedly has no plans for talks with the US. Trump nonetheless expects negotiations to resume this week, with the Iranian President also supporting talks.

And the Wall Street Journal has a parallel Monday morning story: “Peace negotiators are pressing Iran to make a concession on its nuclear program to revive ceasefire talks with the U.S. after President Trump rejected Tehran’s truce proposal, in a race to stop the conflict from escalating back into all-out war,” the publication says. On the headlines:

• Brent Dec fell from USD 100.70/bbl to around USD 99.60/bbl.
• WTI Nov dipped from USD 96/bbl to USD 94.90/bbl.

Trump in new comments to Axios:

“I expect more talks with Iran (this week),” Trump told Axios in a phone interview. “They want to make a deal, but it is not the deal that I want to make. It is what we would have maybe agreed to a year ago. They overplayed their hand.”

Araghchi apparently stayed in New York through the weekend following his attendance of the UN General Assembly, with President Pesheshkian having departed back to Iran.

Ready for “apocalyptic war” if it comes to that…

🔸New: Iran’s FM Araghchi:

“President Pezeshkian and I did not come to New York to sell a war. We came to forge peace.

Iran nonetheless remains steadfast in the face of any aggression—even if it comes to an apocalyptic war. At the same time, we are ready for real diplomacy.” https://t.co/V1VtKDuk4L

— Drop Site (@DropSiteNews) September 27, 2026

Meanwhile the US economic war is continuing to bite, with Iran’s currency has hitting another historic low against the US dollar, exacerbated by severe inflation and the Trump/Bessent ‘Economic D-Day’ and ‘Operation Economic Outcast’ campaigns which seek to strangle the country. Financial trackers note that the free market exchange rate has escalated to 2.3 million rials per US dollar. 

Weekend & Overnight Developments

via Newsquawk

• US President Trump said he rejected a deal from Iran to open the Strait of Hormuz, while he stated Iran wants to make a deal in which they open the strait immediately because it is losing so badly.
• US President Trump said he expects talks with Iran to resume this week even though he rejected Iran’s latest proposal, while he stated the conditions Iran wants are something the US may have agreed to around a year ago and that Tehran overplayed its hand, according to Axios.
• US President Trump said that as soon as the Iran war is over, which is soon, oil will drop, while he stated that they took out a record oil amount from Hormuz on Saturday night. Trump also stated that they will win against Iran in military and economic warfare, while he didn’t want to say regarding striking Iran before the Midterms and noted that Iran inflation was at 318%.
• US President Trump told Chinese President Xi during the summit to stop supporting Iran, according to Axios on Friday, citing US Ambassador to Beijing Perdue.
• Iran’s delegation in New York has no plans for talks with the US, according to a source close to the delegation cited by IRNA.
• Iranian Foreign Minister Araghchi said they have seen the initial response from US President Trump to the 7-day ceasefire proposal, but are waiting to receive the official response via mediators, while he added that only a negotiated solution can get them out of this deadlock. Araghchi also stated that Iran’s conditions are clear and that any move towards reopening the Strait of Hormuz is contingent on these conditions being met.
• Iranian Foreign Minister Araghchi said he and Iranian President Pezeshkian did not come to New York to sell a war and that they came to forge peace, while he added that Iran remains steadfast in the face of any aggression even if it comes to an apocalyptic war, but is at the same time, ready for real diplomacy.
• Iranian President Pezeshkian said regional states can safeguard their own security, and he denied Iran’s direct involvement in Yemen, describing the situation as unrelated to Iran, but stated that Iran is ready to help resolve the conflict and urged Houthis and Saudi Arabia to enter talks instead of escalating.
• IRGC spokesman said not only is the Strait of Hormuz not open, but it is a hunting ground for the IRGC Navy against US submersibles.
• Iran army spokesman said Iran’s armed forces are prepared for any renewed US attacks after US President Trump said he rejected a deal from Iran.
• Local sources reported that a sea cruiser fired at a violating vessel in an unauthorised route of the Strait of Hormuz, according to Fars News.
• Saudi authorities suspended in-person classes in Riyadh for a week on Sunday, following reports the day before that Saudi air defences said they intercepted Houthi drones headed toward the capital and ballistic missiles targeting Khamis Mushait.
• Iranian President Pezeshkian said Iran remains ready for dialogue despite being attacked during previous talks, but pressure and attacks will not force Iran to surrender.
• Source said Iran is prepared to compromise on its nuclear programme but wants guarantees Israel will not attack again after a US deal, N12 reported.