At The Money: The Finances of Divorce with Patrick Kilbane (February 4 , 2026)

Divorce is an expensive, confusing, and stressful experience. Dividing up family assets, including not just the family home, but portfolios, real estate, trusts, and other businesses. There are big mistakes to avoid.

Full transcript below.

~~~

About this week’s guest:

Patrick Kilbane is General Counsel of the RIA Ullman Wealth Partners, where he leads the Divorce Advisory Group. In addition to his years as a divorce attorney, he is also a Certified Divorce Financial Analyst (CFDA) and Wealth Advisor at the firm.

For more info, see:

Professional Bio

LinkedIn

~~~

 

Find all of the previous At the Money episodes here, and in the MiB feed on Apple Podcasts, YouTube, Spotify, and Bloomberg. And find the entire musical playlist of all the songs I have used on At the Money on Spotify

 

APPLE EMBED

 

 

TRANSCRIPT:

 

Is there any life event that’s more expensive, confusing, and stressful than a divorce? You’re not only dividing your family, you’re also figuring out the disposition of a lot of assets: portfolios, real estate, trusts, businesses, more. I’m Barry Ritholtz, and on today’s edition of At the Money, we’re gonna discuss the finances of divorce. And full disclosure, I am and remain happily married for 32 years.

To help us unpack all of this and what it means for your portfolio, let’s bring in Patrick Kilbane of the RIA Ullman Wealth Partners. He’s General Counsel for the firm, and also leads the Divorce Advisory Group.

So Patrick, let’s start with the basics. You focus on people. Going through divorce, what’s the first financial triage you do when a new client calls?

Patrick Kilbane: Barry, great to be with you. Thank you for having me. When somebody gets hit with this bomb, when this bomb is dropped on them, you know, I, I’m a, I’m a big fan of Coach Lou Holtz and he has an acronym WIN, and it stands for what’s important now.

So I generally talk to the person who this might be their first exposure with the legal system. And I figure out what their goal is – has their estranged spouse cut them off from the cash flow from the assets? Is this a child custody situation? You know, what is the first thing that we need to handle?

And then it’s sort of giving them the confidence and the reassurance that, hey, you’re not the first or the last who’s gonna go through this, and I’m gonna be your Sherpa through this process.

Barry Ritholtz: I imagine there are some consistent large money mistakes people make in the first 30 to 60 days of a separation. Obviously it’s very emotional and you know, most people don’t go through these sort of things repeatedly. What sort of mistakes do you see before the lawyers and the written agreements start showing up?

Patrick Kilbane: Like most people who have a long history together, they. Have solved a lot of problems together; I see people trying to work the divorce settlement out among themselves. The spouse that may not have all of the data, all of the information, may not know the extent of their holdings, may make some agreements before they have any idea. What their rights are.

Like you, Barry, I’m a lawyer, although I’m not practicing anymore. I litigated high-net-worth divorce cases for 10 years. And what I try to do is not give legal advice, but say, Hey, let’s slow down a little bit and let’s make sure that you have a full understanding of what you agreeing to or waiving before you do it.

Barry Ritholtz: I think about all the assets that are involved in a family dissolution. There’s cash, there’s retirement accounts, there’s property, there’s business interests. How do you help clients understand the value of what they’re negotiating, either cash upfront versus a longer-term set of assets?

Patrick Kilbane: I try to divide everything into different buckets, so I make sure that my clients aren’t comparing apples to giraffes. They’ve gotta be comparing apples to apples.

Depending on where the spouses are situated and where each one of them wants to go, we know that all assets aren’t created equal. So there may be an opportunity to work together. To reach a divorce settlement that’ll be more advantageous for both spouses than what they would end up with in court, if the court just took a meat cleaver and busted everything in half.

Barry Ritholtz: You have a background as a matrimonial lawyer. How does that change the way you sit down as a financial advisor when you’re having these conversations with clients who are just starting the divorce process?

Patrick Kilbane: I have a perspective from litigating these cases for 10 years and seeing people at the very beginning of the process, and I think a financial planner, a wealth manager, an asset manager who may not have that same experience, may want to get right into the details.

You mentioned the word triage earlier in this conversation. This client, this family is coming to you, they are experiencing trauma. The wound may be fresh, so I think we really have to slow down. And it’s sort of like, you know it, when you see it, you’re ready to delve into the financial planning and start talking about Barry 2.0 when Barry is ready to start thinking about Barry 2.0.

But a lot of these people come in and they’re at a total fog. They’re trying to figure out. Where their next dollar is gonna come from? How is cashflow gonna go? Where am I gonna live? So we have to sort of satisfy that basic level of Maslow’s hierarchy of needs before we can even get into that financial planning conversation.

Barry Ritholtz: The past few divorces I’ve witnessed from relatively close, the big question becomes who gets the house? It always seems to be one of those things – it’s an emotional decision, it’s a financial decision. Is there a better framework for addressing that? How do you avoid that from becoming so toxic, so War of the Roses sort of a disaster?

Patrick Kilbane: I think you have to really start and understand why somebody wants the house. You made a great point. Is this an emotional decision? Is this a financial decision? Do I have comfort in my neighbors? Is the house in a public school district where I want my children or child to continue to go to school until they reach the age of 18?

And then once you really have a good idea why that’s the case, maybe that spouse wants the house just because they know the other spouse wants the house. We have to take a step back and understand the true motivations. And then we start talking about the financial problems and the tax problems that come.

A married couple, if this has been your primary residence for two of the last five years, you can exclude up to half a million dollars of a capital gain if there is one. Of course. If you’re single, then you can only exclude up to $250,000 of the gain. What’s the basis? Do we have a state tax situation? There are a lot of different layers,

Back to my previous comment, I don’t think we can even hit on that until we have a true understanding of what the client’s motivation is and when they’re emotionally prepared to have that financial discussion.

Barry Ritholtz: You mentioned taxes, it’s easy to imagine how taxes can just flip the math.

What are the big tax traps in divorce settlements to avoid?

Patrick Kilbane: All of these assets are different. They may be tax at ordinary income rates, capital gains rates. Your audience is sophisticated, but some of our clients who are going through this process are also very sophisticated, but that hasn’t been their role in the household.

A lot of it is re-educating them and understanding or trying to have an idea what is their tax situation going to be post filing, they may be in a totally different tax filing status. They may be going back to work. They may not be going to work. They may have investment income imputed to them. They may have to use IRS, uh, rule 72T if they’re before 59 and a half to be able to tap into retirement accounts, um, because of imputed investment income.

Of course, those laws vary by state, but that’s why it’s so helpful to have somebody who really knows that perspective and can work with the various tax and estate planning professionals to be thinking about these issues.

Barry Ritholtz: What about retirement assets? What do people need to know about avoiding penalties or getting a bad allocation? There’s a whole other QDRO thing that I’m wholly unfamiliar with. What are the issues in divorce with? 401Ks, 403Bs. IRAs. Any joint or individual retirement asset?

Patrick Kilbane: Quadro is an acronym that’s, uh, stands for qualified domestic Relations order. It is a subsequent court order that it, that is used to segregate a retirement plan that’s subject to ERISA (Employee Retirement Income Security Act). But if your spouse is a participant in a government plan, a government plan may not accept a QDRO, then how in the heck do we divide that marital asset?

It always requires us to stay, take a step back and get a hold of a document called a summary plan description. Which sets out the rules and regulations of each retirement account.

We’ve heard people say all the time, the only way to eat an elephant is one bite at a time, and whether it’s a retirement account or some other asset, we have to be very intentional and very careful and go with each asset.

What is it? Is it a qualified or a non-qualified account? How do we divide it? What are the tax consequences? There are other contingent assets, like carry and restricted stock and so on. But what’s the best way to actually accomplish this on each asset?

Maybe with that asset, with that asset, we say, wait a minute, I don’t want to have to deal with my estranged spouse in the future to get my fair share. Isn’t there a way that I can barter this away and get something else that works better for me? So those are all the discussions that are asset by asset level.

Barry Ritholtz: That’s complicated. Let’s talk about something even more complicated. What do you do with illiquid assets, private businesses? Hey, it’s easy to split a portfolio of publicly traded stock. What do you do about a company that is private and one of the spouses is running, and how do you you know, figure out what it’s worth and who gets what?

Patrick Kilbane: You and I can look at our brokerage account statement or retirement account statement. Have a pretty good idea what that asset is worth with an asset that we know that has value, but we’re not sure what that value is. You are required to hire another professional called a business appraiser or a valuation expert.

And the crazy thing about the divorce world, Barry, is it imposes these. Fantasy rules and regulations that you and I would never, you know, have to discuss with a married couple. We talk about enterprise, goodwill and personal goodwill when we come to the value of a business.

A valuation expert can say, okay, this firm is worth X, you know, million dollars. But in a divorce context, especially my home state of Florida, we have to look at what’s the value of Barry’s firm, without Barry? And the value of Barry’s firm, without Barry, that’s the marital asset in Florida, that’s what we have to divide.

So a year prior, somebody may have offered to buy the family business for $15 million, but if you take Barry outta that family business and the value of the office buildings and the furniture and so on and so forth is a million, then the marital share is 500 grand. And you have a spouse thinking, wait a minute, I’m gonna end up with seven and a half million dollars of this asset. But really it may be half a million dollars or you know, and you can pick any other example.

So you need that expert. And then you need to understand how the state dissolution of marriage laws apply to valuing that asset within the context of a divorce.

Barry Ritholtz: What do you tell clients about cash flow planning right after the divorce? Suddenly, whatever emergency funds, credit, even just a household budget, all that stuff gets thrown out of the window. How, how do you rebuild that? How do you face that first year of spending reality?

Patrick Kilbane: In the context of the divorce negotiations, I try to help my clients and lawyers think about asking for a larger-than-normal emergency savings fund.

We talk about “this is how much money you have to spend on a monthly basis,” But that first year where this now single person is in charge of their monthly budget, there may be some surprises, and there may be a learning curve, and so on and so forth. I aim to build that experience and, even if it’s not an alimony case, help settle the case if alimony is possible for a short period to help with that transition and ease somebody into being responsible for probably the first time in a long time for managing their own cash flow.

Barry Ritholtz: Final question. If you could give one piece of advice to someone starting the divorce process, what’s the best decision or even document that improves the outcome for everybody?

Patrick Kilbane: In my state, there is a document that’s required to be filed by each party in every case, and it’s called a financial affidavit. I see in New York, it’s called a net worth statement or so on and so forth.

It is a daunting, overwhelming document, but really it’s a forum that. You’re normally required to, you know, sign, you take an oath and say that what you put on here is truthful, but you outline all of your sources of income, all of your expenses, all of your assets, and all of your liabilities.

From a financial standpoint, if you can take the time and make that as accurate as possible, um, that’s gonna really go a long way to helping you, your lawyer, and the other financial professionals on your team to get a really precise idea of what we’re dealing with.

Spend that time, take the time upfront, and you may not have all the information that you need to answer that question until you get the discovery from the other side. And what I tell people all the time is, that’s okay. Disclose it, and then put a footnote that says, “Hey, I don’t have this information. And when I get it. I’ll update it” and then when you really break it down like that and let people know, Hey, you can amend this document, I see them start to relax a little bit and say, okay, I got this.

Barry Ritholtz: To wrap up, I’m gonna quote Patrick, “Divorce is really a financial or tax problem disguised in a divorce costume.” And that really sums it up. It’s as much about. Separating your personal lives as it is to figuring out your financial and asset lives going forward. Take it seriously. Make sure you get good counsel and follow the process that your lawyer and financial advisor walk you through.

I’m Barry Ritholtz. This has been Bloomberg’s at the Money.

~~~

Find our entire music playlist for At the Money on Spotify.

 

The post At The Money: The Finances of Divorce appeared first on The Big Picture.

Speculation US May Announce New Nuclear Plant During Korea Trade Negotiations

At a time when China, which is now leaps and bounds ahead of the US in energy generation, is building 29 nuclear power plants compared to zero for the US...

Since the last update, Russia has added one additional nuclear reactor under construction (up to 5).

China is still at 29; the US is still at 0 https://t.co/u9SnLCeFkI pic.twitter.com/2lUIFnXtOL

— zerohedge (@zerohedge) November 2, 2025

...  South Korean news agencies report that the US government is proposing South Korea build a nuclear power plant in the US as part of ongoing trade negotiations. South Korea’s Industry Minister is in the U.S. this week and is scheduled to meet with Secretary Lutnik to clarify Seoul's position on a delayed Korea-U.S. trade deal.

Providing some added credibility to the report out of South Korea, Reuters reports the industry minister is scheduled to meet Secretary Wright as well before he departs February 5th. 

South Korea and the US are already coordinating on multiple different ventures as previously announced last year through multiple different MOUs. Korea Hydro & Nuclear Power Co. (KHNP) is working with multiple reactor developers to further develop and progress the construction of their designs. KHNP is also working with Centrus Energy to rapidly expand enrichment capacity.

Korean industrial company Doosan Enerbility is also working with Fermi America to construct a supply chain for the four AP1000 reactors to be built at the AI mega-campus in Texas.

While the reactor that will be potentially constructed by Korea has yet to be confirmed or announced by either country, it will likely be an AP1000 to strengthen a high-demand grid and stand as a signal that the U.S. government is pursuing lower energy prices for consumers. The reactor design is licensed for use by reactor owners from Westinghouse, which is owned by Canadian companies Cameco and Brookfield. 

Cameco (CCJ) happens to be Goldman Sachs' highest conviction play for the nuclear theme as all of this goes on. Goldman also recently noted “the biggest near-term potential uplift to EBITDA forecasts as through FIDs on new AP1000s, as each reactor provides ~$225mn of EBITDA generation over a ~12-year time frame.”

The first two, and only two, AP1000 designs built in the U.S. were constructed in Georgia with both horrific cost overruns and grossly overblown timelines. The nuclear industry is desperate for the opportunity to prove it has learned its lessons and can come down the cost curve. Utilizing the most proficient nuclear power plant construction teams, outside of China, is a best case scenario. 

Tyler Durden Wed, 02/04/2026 - 10:25

Tom Homan Announces 700-Agent Drawdown As Minnesota Counties Begin Cooperating With ICE

Border czar Tom Homan revealed moments ago at a press conference in Minneapolis that an unprecedented number of counties are now coordinating with federal authorities and allowing ICE to take custody of illegal aliens before they reach the streets. As a result, Homan noted, fewer federal agents are needed in the metro area.

"We currently have an unprecedented number of [Minnesota] counties communicating with us now and allowing ICE to take custody of illegal aliens before they hit the streets," Homan said.

MASSIVE: Border Czar Tom Homan: “We currently have an unprecedented number of [Minnesota] counties communicating with us now and allowing ICE to take custody of illegal aliens before they hit the streets.” pic.twitter.com/AGGASjS0gd

— RedWave Press (@RedWave_Press) February 4, 2026

Homan continued, "I have announced that, effective immediately, we will draw down 700 people effective today. 700 law enforcement personnel."

Tom Homan: "I have announced effective immediately, we will draw down 700 people effective today. 700 law enforcement personnel." pic.twitter.com/Vbylc3iIBd

— CSPAN (@cspan) February 4, 2026

At the end of last week, Homan said federal immigration officials had made "a lot of progress" with local officials in Minnesota, signaling a possible shift in enforcement tactics amid rising tensions following recent deadly shootings involving federal immigration agents.

Homan's second news conference in Minneapolis comes after he replaced Gregory Bovino as the lead of ICE operations.

He recently warned that "justice is coming" for the far-left groups funding the attacks on ICE on the ground.

Much of the chaos in Minneapolis stems from the sanctuary state not honoring ICE detainers. This forced the Trump administration to surge federal agents into the Democratic-run town to retrieve illegals. Then, far-left militant groups and nonprofits unleashed a well-coordinated pressure campaign ("Signal-Gate"), which only suggests to us that the Democrats' plan all along was in hopes of spreading revolution nationwide ahead of spring.

Well played by Homan and the Trump administration in pushing for a major de-escalation now that local counties are coordinating with federal authorities on ICE detainers.

But why were ICE detainers not being honored in the first place? It's time to rethink the sanctuary status of left-wing-controlled cities.

Tyler Durden Wed, 02/04/2026 - 10:15

US Services Sector Surveys Signal Solid Growth In January, But...

Following the dramatic rebound in US Manufacturing survey data - driven by a surge in new orders - 'Soft' data has bounced back dramatically from its post-government shutdown lows (which is ironically occurring as the hard data - which was so resilient through the shutdown - has started to roll over)...

...and this morning's Services Sector survey data builds on that rebound

• S&P Global's US Services PMI signaled a better than expected expansion of 52.7 in January (52.5 exp), rebounding from April 2025 lows.

• ISM's US Services PMI survey also beat expectations in January (53.8 vs 53.5 exp), but was flat from a revised lower 53.8.

But both still solidly in expansion...

The S&P Global US Composite PMI recorded 53.0 in January. That was up from 52.7 in December and represented a solid rate of growth in private sector activity. Both sectors covered by the survey recorded stronger output expansions, in line with faster gains in new business. Employment meanwhile rose only marginally, while confidence in the outlook softened.

Despite the rebound, US has been overtaken by UK and Japan in terms of global PMIs...

“Sustained service sector growth, supported by a robust rise in manufacturing output in January, indicates the economy is growing at an annualized rate of around 1.7%," according to Chris Williamson, Chief Business Economist at S&P Global Market Intelligence.

However, that is a lower gear compared to the pace of expansion seen prior to December’s slowdown, and hints at GDP growth cooling in the first quarter.

Consumer-facing companies are increasingly reporting a challenging environment, with demand for services falling in January having nearly stalled in December, "reflecting low levels of consumer sentiment and cost of living pressures," Williamson noted.

The ISM data showed a triple whammy of higher prices, lower new orders, and lower employment...

However, as Williamson concludes, “inflationary pressures in the service sector meanwhile remain elevated, blamed on the pass though of tariff related price increases and wage growth, though stiff competition is often reported to have limited the impact on final selling prices.”

“While financial and business service providers are reporting a more resilient picture, demand growth here is also showing signs of fraying amid heightened concerns over the economic outlook, in turn often blamed on political uncertainty.

However, there is a silver lining, as Williamson concludes: "lower interest rates and favorable financial conditions, higher government spending, combined with more active sales and marketing efforts, are propping up business sentiment and spending, and also encouraging modest hiring."

Tyler Durden Wed, 02/04/2026 - 10:06

The post Donald Trump Says His Team are Total Morons: Can’t Find Millions of Illegal Voters appeared first on CEPR.

Putin 'Kept His Word' On Ceasefire, Trump Says, As Large Attacks On Kiev Resume

President Trump has praised his Russian counterpart for keeping his word on the brief winter freeze ceasefire. Last week Trump had picked up the phone and urged President Putin to refrain from attacking Kiev and other major cities.

Trump said of the surprise pause that Putin had agreed to halt strikes for one week. Trump has newly told reporters that the agreement expired on Sunday, and that Russia kept its word.

"It was Sunday to Sunday, and it opened up and he hit them hard last night," Trump explained at the White House on Tuesday. "He kept his word on that… we’ll take anything, because it’s really, really cold over there."

Russian attack in the Ukrainian capital on Feb. 3, 2026. via Associated Press

But it was only last Thursday Jan.29 that first Trump unveiled the contents of the prior Putin call. It seems the pause lasted a little short of a full week, but maybe Trump is only counting business days? It is possible the phone call in question was held significantly before the announcement, but it remains there has not been a full week that Kiev hasn't seen bombs or drones in the sky.

What Trump said at the time was: "Because of the extreme cold…I personally asked President Putin not to fire on Kiev and the cities and towns for a week." He went on to say Putin "agreed to do that," adding that "we’re very happy" with the outcome.

On Wednesday, American, Ukrainian and Russian representatives are once again gathered the United Arab Emirates for the next round of trilateral talks in an effort to forge a final peace. The Abu Dhabi talks are expected to run until Thursday. 

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky is complaining about the timeline of Trump's winter brief truce, saying it only began last Friday, a day after Trump announced he reached the temporary deal.

And then as Reuters reported:

Russia's air attack on Ukraine's energy system overnight on Tuesday was the biggest since the start of 2026, Ukraine's leading private energy company said.

Power generation and distribution facilities came under attack, and thousands of people were left without electricity, DTEK said on the Telegram messaging app. 

Over 70 missiles and several hundred drones were sent, some knocking out power and thermal plants, amid ongoing slow and costly repairs.

"We await the reaction of America to the Russian strikes," Zelensky said in a Tuesday night statement. “It was the U.S. proposal to halt strikes on energy during diplomacy and severe winter weather. The president of the United States made the request personally. Russia responded with a record number of ballistic missiles.”

He is demanding that Russia feel the pain. "The US Congress has long been working on a new sanctions bill, and there must be progress on it. European partners can take decisive steps regarding Russian oil tankers’ earnings for the war. Russia must feel pressure so that it moves in negotiations toward peace," Zelensky added - though one wonders what there is left to sanction.

The consequences of the attack on Kyiv. pic.twitter.com/XSCs8eRgLY

— WarTranslated (@wartranslated) February 3, 2026

Ukrainian officials have condemned what they are calling a "winter genocide" - given that the latest big strike happened when it is -20C (-4F) in the capital. That's where more than 1,000 tower blocks in the capital were left without heating once again in the wake of the assault which marked the end of the Trump-Putin short truce.

Tyler Durden Wed, 02/04/2026 - 09:50

New York To Deploy Legal Observers From AG James' Office To Monitor Federal Immigration Agents

Authored by Troy Myers via The Epoch Times,

New York is launching a new initiative to monitor immigration enforcement in the state, Attorney General Letitia James said Tuesday.

Her announcement comes amid heightened tensions and increasing protests, threats, and violence against federal agents carrying out arrests of illegal aliens. As part of James’s initiative, her office will deploy legal observers to document immigration enforcement in New York.

The attorney general said the Legal Observation Project’s goal is to protect her citizens’ rights.

“As Attorney General, I am proud to protect New Yorkers’ constitutional rights to speak freely, protest peacefully, and go about their lives without fear of unlawful federal action,” she said in the Tuesday news release.

Wearing purple safety vests, James’s staffers will observe enforcement operations where appropriate and document actions by federal agents.

The legal observers will participate on a voluntary basis, the news release said, serving as neutral witnesses and recording information that could be used in future legal actions.

As enforcement against illegal immigrants continues nationwide, the attorney general said the Legal Observation Project aims to ensure operations stay within the bounds of the law.

“We have seen in Minnesota how quickly and tragically federal operations can escalate in the absence of transparency and accountability,” James said, adding her legal observers will begin monitoring in the coming weeks.

The New York Office of Attorney General staffers will not interfere with law enforcement activity, the news release read.

James’s initiative comes a day after Homeland Secretary Kristi Noem said federal officers in Minneapolis, where large-scale immigration enforcement has been ongoing for weeks, will now be wearing body cameras.

In recent weeks, federal agents fatally shot two protesters in Minneapolis during altercations: A woman who appeared to ram an officer with her car and a man who was carrying a pistol and two magazines when he approached federal agents. Federal officials have maintained the shootings were tragic but justified.

As funding becomes available, body cameras for federal agents will be widely deployed.

"We will rapidly acquire and deploy body cameras to DHS law enforcement across the country,” Noem wrote in her announcement on X.

Body cameras are commonly worn among local and state law enforcement, but Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents are not required to wear them.

Although as part of a pilot program that began in 2024, body cameras have been deployed to some ICE officers.

In addition to body cameras being deployed nationwide in the coming weeks for federal officers, James also urged New Yorkers to submit their own videos and documentation of immigration enforcement activities.

Her office said it set up an online portal to which citizens can send their reports.

Tyler Durden Wed, 02/04/2026 - 09:30

No Surprises In Treasury Refunding Statement: No Auction Size Increases For "Next Several Quarters"

Ahead of today's much-anticipated quarterly refunding announcement by the US Treasury, some were hopeful that Bessent could pull an anti-Yellen and forecast a gradual decline in long-term issuance in coming quarters, sending yields lower. None of the happened, however, and instead the Treasury did not surprise markets, announcing that this quarter's refunding total would come in line with estimates, at $125BN (to refund $90.2BN in securities). And while the Treasury said that auction sizes would be unchanged for "next several quarters" as expected, the department said it would continue to rely on bills to fund the increasing amount of federal spending. That said, by late March, the Treasury anticipates incrementally reducing short-dated bill auction sizes in light of the April 15 tax date. These reductions will lead - the Treasury believes - to a cumulative $250-300 billion net decline in total bill supply by early May.

Here is a summary of what the Treasury announced:

No surprises in today's Refunding statement

1. No change in net issuance: Treasury says will keep coupon, floating rate note auction sizes unchanged for "next several quarters" as expected. No ramp in issuance yet. 
2. Refunding size: Treasury offering $125BN in quarterly refunding, as expected. Will sell $58BN in 3Y, $42BN in 10Y and $25BN in 30Y, and will keep auctions sizes unchanged through May. 
3. Bills:  Despite QE Lite, the Treasury expects to "maintain the offering sizes of benchmark bills at current levels into mid-March" By late March, Treasury anticipates incrementally reducing short-dated bill auction sizes in light of the April 15 tax date. These reductions will lead to a cumulative $250-300 billion net decline in total bill supply by early May
4. Cash: Treasury assumes an $850BN cash balance at the end of March.  However, based on current projections for the upcoming refunding quarter, Treasury estimates that the size of the Treasury General Account (TGA) could peak around $1,025 BN by late April.
5. Buybacks: Treasury expects to purchase up to $38BN in off-the-run securities across buckets for "liquidity support" and up to $75 billion in the 1-month to 2-year bucket for cash management purposes in the coming quarter.

Taking a closer look at the Treasury's quarterly refunding statement published at 8:30am Wednesday, the department said it anticipated keeping auction sizes unchanged for nominal notes, bonds and floating-rate notes, “for at least the next several quarters”, a paraphrase of the same forward guidance that debt managers have used for two years now.

As for next week’s refunding auctions, they will total $125 billion, as expected, and will be made up of: 

• $58 billion of 3-year notes on Feb. 10
• $42 billion of 10-year notes on Feb. 11
• $25 billion of 30-year bonds on Feb. 12

The refunding will raise new cash of approximately $34.8BN, net of the $90.2BN in maturing securities.

The Treasury also said it’s “monitoring” the Federal Reserve’s expanded purchases of bills, which mature in a year or less. The central bank in December stunned markets (if not ZH readers, who knew about the move well ahead of time), when it said it would buy $40 billion a month of Bills until April, in an effort to ensure ample reserves in the banking system. And the department is keeping an eye on “growing demand for Treasury bills from the private sector."

As a result, based on current fiscal forecasts, Treasury expects to maintain the offering sizes of benchmark bills at or near current levels into mid-March.  By late March, Treasury anticipates incrementally reducing short-dated bill auction sizes in light of the April 15 tax date.  These reductions will likely lead to a cumulative $250-300 billion net decline in total bill supply by early May. The Treasury "will continue to evaluate near-term borrowing needs and assess additional adjustments to bill auction sizes as appropriate."

The department has for several quarter relied on T-Bills to fund the steadily increasing amount of federal spending. Amid that focus, some market participants ahead of Wednesday’s release reported speculation of aggressive moves to outright reduce bond issuance to help pull down yields that serve as a benchmark for mortgages and other loans. That did not happen.

Separately, the Treasury also "continues to evaluate potential future increases to nominal coupon and FRN auction sizes, with a focus on trends in structural demand and potential costs and risks of various issuance profiles,” the department said. FRNs refer to floating rate notes.

“While the administration’s focus on affordability measures has brought back questions about potential efforts to lower borrowing costs via more active adjustments to the issuance mix, we do not expect Treasury to do so at this point,” Goldman Sachs strategists William Marshall and Bill Zu wrote ahead of Wednesday’s release. Goldman’s take reflected the views of many dealers. Any move to cut sales of bonds, or 10-year notes, would have run against the department’s long-standing pledge to be “regular and predictable” in its debt management. Bessent himself invoked that language in a speech in November.

“The statement itself was very much steady-as-she-goes, with the Treasury reiterating the view that nominal coupon and FRN auction sizes will hold ‘for at least the next several quarters,’” said John Canavan, lead analyst at Oxford Economics.

Meantime, the Fed’s purchases reduce “the risk of Treasury oversupplying” the market with more bills than investors are prepared to handle, Morgan Stanley strategists led by Martin Tobias wrote in their refunding preview. Beyond April, the Fed’s plans are unclear, however — all the more so given Kevin Warsh’s nomination to become the next chair in May. Warsh has in the past advocated shrinking the Fed’s securities portfolio.

Two more things to note: 

While the Treasury assumes an $850 billion cash balance at the end of March, based on current projections for the upcoming refunding quarter, the Treasury now estimates that the size of the Treasury General Account (TGA) could peak around $1,025 billion (plus or minus $50 billion) by late April, before declining rapidly in May after tax day (this estimate reflects significant uncertainty regarding the size of April tax receipts, as well as macroeconomic factors and the path of fiscal and monetary policy).

Additionally, as part of its quarterly Treasury buyback schedule release, the Treasury said it anticipates that, over the course of the upcoming quarter, it will purchase up to $38 billion in off-the-run securities across buckets for liquidity support and up to $75 billion in the 1-month to 2-year bucket for cash management purposes. 

Digging a little deeper we find the following:

1. The minutes of the Treasury Borrowing Advisory Committee’s Feb. 3 meeting indicated the following:

Debt Manager Liang Jensen summarized primary dealers’ views on floating-rate notes indexed to the Secured Overnight Financing Rate (SOFR). Most dealers expressed support for Treasury issuing SOFR-indexed FRNs.

• Supporters argued that a Treasury SOFR FRN would diversify Treasury’s front-end issuance mix and potentially reduce funding costs, given the strong incremental demand
• Some dealers emphasized the risk of potentially cannibalizing demand for Treasury bills and for the existing 2-year Treasury FRN, while several dealers cautioned that Treasury could be exposed to spikes in SOFR during periods of funding market stress
• Most dealers pointed to a 1-year final maturity as particularly attractive in meeting demand from Money Market Funds
• Committee briefly discussed the feedback from dealers and the pros and cons of Treasury issuing a SOFR-linked FRN, and concluded that Treasury should study the idea further

Committee discussed the first charge, addressing bill purchases and the consolidated balance sheet  —  concept of a consolidated balance sheet between the Federal Reserve and Treasury was previously addressed in a February 2020 Committee presentation

• Committee then discussed the circumstances where Treasury should focus on the composition of privately-held Treasury debt outstanding or the composition of total debt outstanding
• Presenter reviewed how key elements of the Fed’s balance sheet alter effective interest rate risk when considered on a consolidated basis
• The presenter noted that, in the current environment, it would be reasonable for Treasury to meet some portion of the Federal Reserve’s System Open Market Account (SOMA) demand for Treasury bills through increased issuance in this sector of the curve
• Also discussed how the results of the Committee’s optimal debt issuance model might change when separating the interest-bearing and non-interest-bearing components
• Presenter advised that Fed policy inflection points are relevant times to consider the composition of privately-held Treasury securities when making issuance decisions

Committee discussed second charge, which addressed trends in demand for Treasury securities. Presenter highlighted several structural shifts shaping demand, including runoff from SOMA, growth in MMF assets, expanding bank portfolios, evolving pension plan structures, increasing Treasury holdings by foreign private investors, and potential demand associated with stablecoins

• The discussion covered key considerations—such as collateral needs, duration management, diversification benefits, and central bank reserve management—that are influencing Treasury allocations in portfolios
• Presenter concluded incremental demand for Treasuries might evolve going forward, noting that the short and intermediate sectors of the curve were likely to experience the broadest growth

2. TBAC (Treasury Borrowing Advisory Committee) said it had a “robust” discussion on the relative tradeoffs of increasing auction sizes more gradually, perhaps earlier than needed, compared to a more accelerated path of increases when the financing gap is larger. While noting the importance of keeping the mandates of the Federal Reserve and Treasury separate, the committee said there can be “cross effects.” 

• The committee in a letter to Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent discussed the level of demand at various points of the curve, while noting that dynamics may continue to evolve prior to the need to raise coupon auction sizes
• “As always, the Committee felt strong communication to ensure a regular and predictable operating framework would help to facilitate any adjustment period for market participants,” TBAC wrote
• Committee also discussed the value of Treasury securities as a portfolio diversification tool, noting that in recent years it has been more volatile, with Treasury securities at times being positively correlated with equity returns
• Reduced diversification value could be a headwind for some segments of Treasury demand, though some TBAC members felt that the markets were returning to more typical countercyclical performance versus risky assets
• Committee concluded that the demand function for Treasury securities was healthy, with several members noting that the distinction between buying Treasury securities for duration and buying them on an asset swapped basis was meaningful.
  • Committee noted the reduction of demand for longer-duration sovereign debt in certain jurisdictions and, in some cases, the shift to shorter issuance from those respective debt management offices
• Committee discussed how Treasury should consider the composition of privately-held Treasury securities compared to total Treasury debt outstanding, including the holdings of the Federal Reserve’s System Open Market Account (SOMA), when evaluating its issuance mix
  • It was in broad agreement that the Fed policy inflection points are relevant times to consider the composition of privately held Treasury securities when making issuance decisions
  • The Fed has a recent history of meaningful Quantitative Easing (QE) actions over short periods of time, the effects of which Treasury could consider in due course. QE that has run its policy course changes the composition of private holdings
  • Treasury may find that it can make cost- and risk-efficient adjustments to its issuance mix due to the resulting changes in supply and demand, within its ever-important “regular and predictable” framework.  Present day considerations include increased demand for Treasury bills as part of Federal Reserve MBS run-off reinvestments and RMPs
• “The separation of mandates for the Treasury and Fed is important, but it is well understood that there can be cross effects; Treasury could factor in the impact of these effects on privately-held Treasury balances when it evaluates its issuance mix,” TBAC wrote

Tyler Durden Wed, 02/04/2026 - 09:20

EU vs. Elon Musk: The Battle Over Free Speech Escalates In Paris

Submitted by Thomas Kolbe

A raid on Elon Musk’s company X in Paris: On Tuesday morning, the French public prosecutor gained access to the company’s offices. The stated purpose of the investigation is the dissemination of child pornography and violations of personal rights through the spread of Deepfakes.

X’s offices in Paris, which were searched by investigators from the Paris prosecutor’s office, the national cyber crime unit and Europol

The French prosecutor’s office carried out the search Tuesday morning at Elon Musk’s X offices in Paris. Officially, the raid targets suspicions of distributing child pornography, according to a statement from the authority. As a further justification, the “Internet and Cybercrime” division cited the recently criticized so-called sexual Deepfakes.

These photo and video manipulations are generated using the AI of the Grok application, which the X platform provides to its users. Another allegation against the platform’s operators concerns the distribution of material denying the Holocaust.

The French prosecutor’s office is thus deploying maximum heavy artillery against X at the next escalation level. These appear to be politically motivated accusations, as the operator of a communication platform ethically cannot be responsible for content published by individual users.

Different Stage 

Clearly, there is more at stake. At the center is the conflict between the European Union and the U.S. government. The recurring point of contention: enforcing European censorship laws under the Digital Services Act (DSA)—now using a morally escalated strategy. Child pornography, Holocaust denial—hardly worse can be imagined. Such content is commercially damaging. And this aligns precisely with the French government’s strategic line, acting here as the executing arm of the EU Commission.

The fight for free speech in Europe has now shifted to a moral battlefield, where rule of law, freedom of expression, and responsibility for certain content are merged into a politically exploitable attack vector.

The message is clear: Those who do not comply with our censorship framework will be pelted with dirt until something sticks. The framework covers the entire conceivable range of direct and indirect censorship—from chat monitoring to editorial oversight of forum content, to post deletion or algorithmic reach limitations.

There is no other way to interpret it: rising criticism from the European public regarding EU Commission policies, open borders, and the green transition has gone too far for the leadership circles. Political fractures loom, seemingly irreparable.

The raid at the Paris office also resembles a classic political smoke screen. France, one of the many fading stars in the EU sky, would have every reason to debate other pressing topics rather than media-staged raids on X in the style of classic police states. Over all government action—or more precisely, inaction—hangs a veritable fiscal crisis. The welfare state is overstretched, the migration crisis forces the country into ever-expanding social programs, and debt is rising again this year by a dramatic five percent of GDP. France is approaching 120 percent debt-to-GDP, nearing de facto insolvency.

Wouldn’t even this visible plunge into the debt spiral alone warrant a deeper debate and new elections, Monsieur le Président?

That a president without a popular mandate, Emmanuel Macron, with approval ratings around 15 percent, chooses to engage in an escalating conflict with Elon Musk on a side front to distract from fundamental problems may be politically understandable. Yet it also exposes the full impotence of France and European politics in general.

The European Union presents itself as a political paper giant, now seeking open conflict with perceived internal and external enemies: internally corroded, lacking trust from the public, economically in decline, and an energy parasitic actor that has shot itself in the foot multiple times by entering a conflict with its most important supplier, Russia, blindly. The colossus staggers toward its end like a mindless schoolyard bully.

Against this backdrop, the rising pressure on opposition voices must be understood. Open resistance is forming in the digital space against the Euro-regime, now fighting back against the unraveling of its climate and power complex, which can no longer be saved. That efforts are being intensified to suppress dissenting opinions fits seamlessly into this logic of decline.

In the case of platform X, the conflict culminates with the disliked American government under President Donald Trump, alongside whom Elon Musk stands as a vocal defender of free speech—and against whom EU elites are now aggressively focusing their attacks. Whether one likes it or not: Trump remains one of the last relevant actors actively defending core Western values like free speech and market economy, while the EU mutates into a substantial control leviathan across all levels of society.

Eerie Silence 

In Europe, it has become eerily quiet around proponents of enlightened politics, those who would defend individual freedoms against an increasingly repressive state apparatus. Tuesday’s actions by French authorities fit perfectly into the EU’s general line: gradually undermining civil rights and freedom of speech through the growing censorship apparatus of the DSA.

And the more cohesive, powerful, and vocal the opposition in Eastern Europe and beyond the Atlantic becomes, forming a strategically acting unit against Brussels’ centralism, the more aggressive—and simultaneously defensive—the Brussels body reacts. Its gestures resemble a staggering boxer sensing the next punch could switch off the lights.

Repeated references to child pornography or alleged copyright violations to justify censorship appear as crude deception maneuvers that even the last supporter of the von der Leyen-Macron EU can see through. These are classic issues for which existing criminal law would suffice.

Yet this finding does nothing to change the central fact: Europe still lacks a firm, decisive confrontation of the bourgeois remnants of our society with this increasingly despotic pseudo-elite.

* * * 

About the author: Thomas Kolbe, a Germany a graduate economist, has worked for over 25 years as a journalist and media producer for clients from various industries and business associations. As a publicist, he focuses on economic processes and observes geopolitical events from the perspective of the capital markets. His publications follow a philosophy that focuses on the individual and their right to self-determination.

Tyler Durden Wed, 02/04/2026 - 07:20

Gold Giant Bundesbank Signals An Open Vote Of No Confidence in Global Monetary Stability

Submitted by Thomas Kolbe

The German Bundesbank hoards the second-largest gold reserves among central banks. The precious metal serves as an insurance policy for both states and private individuals. Its massive price surge shows that the dice have already been cast: governments will attempt to inflate their debts.

Anyone acquiring precious metals in these weeks simultaneously casts a verdict on their currency. This may be a conscious portfolio decision or simply an undefined desire to have a monetary insurance policy at hand. One never knows what the future holds.

Gold jewelry or collectible silver coins are aesthetically appealing and trigger our instinct to collect. What private purchases and the massive hoarding of gold by central banks share is their monetary-policy background.

In honest moments, looking at the soaring global sovereign debts and escalating geopolitical conflicts, we know that our monetary system is heading for severe turbulence. In many places, the fiscal Rubicon has long been crossed. With debt-to-GDP ratios well above 100 percent—in the U.S., China, and numerous European countries—only a massive expansion of the money supply can ensure the public sector’s ability to pay.

Bundesbank Holds Massive Gold Reserves

This occurs at the expense of those trusting in cash. In this context, it is noteworthy that the German Bundesbank hoards the second-largest gold reserves among global central banks.

3,350 tons of gold, with a market value of roughly half a trillion euros, are split between the Bundesbank’s vaults in Frankfurt (50 percent), the New York Federal Reserve (37 percent), and a storage facility in the City of London (13 percent). It is an inheritance from the old Bretton Woods system, when gold was stored near major global trade hubs.

The time is drawing closer to bring the reserves stored abroad back home. In a fragile monetary system, precaution is not alarmism—it is pure self-protection.

Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni must have thought the same. She is working under intense pressure to formally transfer the Italian central bank’s gold reserves to the state—a step equivalent to an open vote of no confidence against the European Central Bank. 

Italy holds 2,452 tons of gold, ranking third internationally behind the U.S. and Germany, giving it, like Germany, a bargaining chip to restart its own currency should a severe euro crisis ever occur.

From the Frankfurt ECB Tower, these developments are viewed with the utmost concern. Nothing corrodes a monetary system faster and more effectively than a loss of confidence in creditworthiness. The banking system, as well as pension funds and retirement insurance, rely on the stability of government bonds recorded on their balance sheets.

Once it became clear that states could no longer consolidate fiscally, the bond market corrected sharply. Billions in losses are on the books, only not written off due to special valuation rules granted by lawmakers.

From the ECB’s perspective, the hoarding of national gold reveals dangerous secession tendencies. It still holds around 500 tons of gold from the early days of the monetary union, when member states contributed gold reserves proportionally to their GDP to support the euro. This is far from sufficient to provide the euro with a stable, metal-backed anchor after decades of money growth.

The repeated desire of ECB President Christine Lagarde to centralize national gold reserves at the ECB vault is almost universally rejected by eurozone members. So much for the repeatedly touted integration of the euro system.

Gold as a Global Trust Anchor

Elsewhere, gold has also become central to stabilizing trust. The BRICS nations have for years worked on creating a payment system independent of SWIFT but have failed so far because no one trusts the Asian hegemon, China.

The solution—the pegging of mutual transfers to gold—was adopted by China during the global financial crisis more than fifteen years ago, when it became the largest buyer in the precious metals market. With roughly 2,300 tons, China now holds the fourth-largest gold reserves in the world.

Besides China, Russia, Turkey, India, and Poland, as well as countries like Egypt and Thailand, have significantly increased their gold holdings since 2008. The price increase is therefore justified and likely to continue in the long term, albeit with growing volatility. 

A positive side effect of this reevaluation is a kind of balance-sheet repair. The deep gaps created by the bond market crisis are closed by the appreciation of gold for those who recognized the approaching sovereign debt danger early.

In Germany’s Bundesbank, gold now represents roughly 80 percent of the entire balance sheet. There is thus motivation in many places to continue boosting the gold price. It is an elegant way to stabilize the monetary system while simultaneously repairing past damages across different institutional levels through a simple repricing.

States Strive for a Gold Monopoly

It is almost a historical irony. When U.S. President Richard Nixon terminated the dollar’s convertibility into gold in 1971 amid soaring debt and massive inflation of liabilities, the so-called fiat credit money system was set in motion. Debts exploded, and states could borrow nearly without limit.

Unbacked credit, combined with ever-lowering reserve requirements, created a perfect Ponzi system, which has now entered its crisis stage.

German policymakers tried to escape this debt spiral by enshrining the so-called debt brake a few years ago. Yet the corrosive erosion of this fiscal constraint began immediately afterward and was ultimately buried last year by Chancellor Friedrich Merz and his high-stakes special fund gamble.

With this policy of unlimited state credit, citizens are driven toward safe havens such as precious metals, accelerating the decline of the fiat credit money system.

The relationship of states to gold remains ambivalent. Aside from committed fiat regimes like Canada, which holds no gold at all, it is becoming increasingly clear that gold can either extend the Ponzi scheme or initiate a new monetary system.

However, citizens fleeing into the safe haven of precious metals become potentially dangerous antagonists, prompting an immediate political counterreaction. Gold purchases are recorded, limited, and legislated in ways clearly designed to capture future portfolio gains.

The Netherlands, for example, is expected to begin taxing unrealized capital gains in 2028—a clear warning.

A general, sharp appreciation of precious metals could create tens of thousands of capital-strong, independent families, particularly in Europe. It is precisely this independence that vexes the etatists in Brussels and EU capitals. The fiscal effect of harvesting book gains in the private sector also plays a role, given runaway sovereign debt.

The ambivalence of gold—and this applies to precious metals as well as other assets without counterparty risk, such as Bitcoin—inevitably provokes massive repression in political regimes focused on citizen control.

Expect other European states soon to follow the Netherlands’ example. The fight for sovereignty has begun.

* * * 

About the author: Thomas Kolbe, a Germany a graduate economist, has worked for over 25 years as a journalist and media producer for clients from various industries and business associations. As a publicist, he focuses on economic processes and observes geopolitical events from the perspective of the capital markets. His publications follow a philosophy that focuses on the individual and their right to self-determination.

Tyler Durden Wed, 02/04/2026 - 03:30

China's Rare Earth 'Monopoly' - And Why Markets Will Break It

Authored by Walter Donway via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

Commentary

With its recent announcement of a trade deal with China, the White House intended to reassure markets, manufacturers, and the military that China would not sever the supply lines of “rare earths” to the United States. Among other concessions, Beijing committed itself to avoid restricting exports of rare earth elements and related critical minerals essential to advanced manufacturing, clean “green” energy, and modern weapons systems. The agreement was described as a win for American economic strength and national security. But the very need for such a promise reveals an uncomfortable truth: the United States, long the world’s leading industrial power, has become dependent on the goodwill of a strategic rival for materials central to its economy and its defense.

Environmental impact is visible near an industrial plant in Baotou, Inner Mongolia, China, on Feb. 4, 2016. ebenart/Shutterstock

That dependence did not arise because rare earth minerals are scarce. They are not. Nor did it arise because China alone possesses the technical capacity to mine or refine them. It arose from a long chain of economic and political decisions—made largely in free societies—that concentrated production in a country willing to accept costs others would not.

Understanding how that happened is essential to understanding why China’s apparent monopoly is far less “coercive,” and far less durable, than it looks.

Not Rare, Just Hell to Process

Rare earth elements are a group of seventeen metals mostly in the first row below the main periodic table in the lanthanide series (elements 57–71), plus Scandium (Sc, #21) and Yttrium (Y, #39), which share similar properties and are found in the same deposits as the lanthanides. They are “transition metals” with distinctive magnetic and fluorescent characteristics. The first was identified in 1787, and by 1947 all had been identified. (“Earths” is an archaic term for oxides, the form in which these elements are found.)

Think of these elements not as bulk materials but as metallurgical spices, used in tiny quantities to produce dramatic improvements in performance. Add neodymium to iron and boron and get the strongest permanent magnet known. Add yttrium to turbine alloys and jet engines can tolerate extraordinary heat. Europium makes modern display screens possible; terbium enables efficient electric motors; samarium strengthens guidance systems and sensors.

Despite their name, rare earths are widespread. Significant deposits exist in the United States, Australia, Brazil, India, and elsewhere. What makes them challenging is not their scarcity but their processing. The essential problem is that they are chemically almost identical, so how do you devise subtly different processes to separate them? More generally, they are chemically stubborn—for example, often intermingled with radioactive materials, and require dozens—sometimes more than a hundred—separation and purification steps. Each step consumes energy and produces toxic waste, making rare earth refining among the most environmentally punishing metallurgical processes in the modern economy.

The crux of the matter is straightforward. Mining rare earths is manageable. Processing them cleanly and at scale is hard, expensive, and politically fraught.

How China Built Dominance

China’s rise to dominance in rare earths was neither accidental nor inevitable. Beginning in the 1980s and accelerating through the 1990s and 2000s, China’s one-party dictatorship made a deliberate choice to invest heavily in mining and processing capacity. It did so under the conditions of a command economy that differed starkly from those in the West. Environmental controls were lax or poorly enforced. Local opposition carried little weight. State support absorbed losses and encouraged long-term specialization.

The outcome was leadership—at a price paid largely by Chinese communities and ecosystems. In Inner Mongolia, the world’s largest rare-earth mining region, toxic tailings ponds and contaminated water became infamous. Workers there suffered severe health issues from chronic exposure to toxic dust, heavy metals, and radioactive materials. There were—and are—high rates of respiratory, bone, and other diseases, compounded by environmental devastation and working conditions in the heavily polluting industry. Those costs, however, paid by workers and nearby communities for decades, translated into lower global prices. Western manufacturers benefited as consumer electronics became cheaper, and electric motors became smaller and more efficient. Companies like Apple could embed rare earth magnets throughout their products because the marginal cost was low. Magnets made of rare earth alloys like neodymium, the strongest by weight we know, give that satisfyingly decisive “click” when your laptop closes—and have uses in EVs, phones, and defense systems.

Over time, markets adapted rationally to these price signals. Western processing facilities closed. The United States, once a major producer, allowed its separation capacity to disappear. Even when rare earths were mined in California or Australia, the ore was shipped to China for refining. By the early 2020s, China accounted for roughly 70 percent of global rare-earth mining and more than 90 percent of processing and finished metal production.

Laissez-faire indifference did not produce this concentration. It owed as well to asymmetric regulation. Western governments imposed strict pollution controls and heavy liability that raised domestic costs, while China tolerated environmental and human damage in pursuit of strategic advantage. Markets responded to prices and rules as they existed, and production flowed—over time—to where it was cheapest and easiest to operate, even when that ease was politically manufactured. In this sense, China’s dominance was market-mediated, but politically orchestrated.

(In fact, a few analysts warned for years that China’s tolerance for environmental damage and state-directed investment would translate into strategic leverage. They included Jack Lifton of Technology Metals Research, Dudley Kingsnorth of Industrial Minerals Company of Australia, and researchers at the Congressional Research Service and RAND Corporation—warnings that were widely noted but largely discounted at the time.)

From Specialization to Vulnerability

For years, this arrangement appeared stable. Rare earths are used in surprisingly small quantities, even at scale, and the total global market is modest—comparable in value to the North American avocado market. Shortages were rare. Prices generally trended downward. Supply chains became hyper-specialized, optimized for cost rather than resilience.

The strategic implications were visible, but easy for businessmen and politicians alike to ignore—until China began to test its leverage.

In 2010, during a diplomatic dispute with Japan, Chinese rare-earth exports suddenly slowed. Prices spiked. Panic followed. Although China denied imposing a formal embargo, the message was unmistakable.

A decade later, amid rising trade tensions with the United States, Beijing made its intentions clearer. Export controls were tightened. Licensing requirements expanded. Restrictions on rare-earth processing technologies were imposed.

By 2025, China was openly treating rare earths as a strategic asset, one that could be weaponized in response to tariffs, sanctions, or military pressure. The risks could no longer be ignored. Modern defense systems depend heavily on rare earths. An F-35 fighter jet contains hundreds of pounds of rare-earth materials. Missiles, radar, satellites, and secure communications systems all rely on specialized magnets and alloys for which there are no easy substitutes.

And 2026 continues the uncomfortable dilemma. The United States has the resources, capital, and technical expertise to rebuild domestic capacity—but not quickly. Processing facilities take years to permit and construct. Skilled labor must be trained. Supply chains must be reassembled. In the short run, dependence remained. Trump’s sudden tariff war, framed by Beijing as yet another affront to China’s long-promised redemption from its “century of humiliation,” sharpened the confrontation between what the Chinese Communist Party perceives as a resurgent Middle Kingdom and a declining hegemon.

All of this helps explain the White House’s eagerness to secure Chinese assurances. The deal bought time. It did not solve the problem.

Coercive Monopolies Are Fragile

It is tempting to describe China’s position as a market failure or a natural monopoly. Neither description is quite right. China’s dominance is better understood as a coercive monopoly—one sustained not by insurmountable efficiencies, but by political and regulatory asymmetries. It exists because the command economy of one country accepted environmental and social costs that others rejected, and because governments elsewhere constrained domestic production without fully accounting for strategic consequences.

Coercive monopolies are inherently unstable. They persist only so long as the costs of entry exceed the perceived risks of dependence. Once that balance shifts, the monopoly begins to erode. China’s own actions are now accelerating that shift.

Export restrictions and licensing regimes raise prices and introduce entrepreneurial uncertainty. Those effects are painful in the short term, but they also activate powerful counterforces. Higher prices make alternative supply economically viable. Unreliable supply makes diversification valuable. Strategic risk becomes something investors and manufacturers are willing to pay to avoid. This is the market logic that China cannot escape. By tightening its grip, Beijing invites others to loosen it.

From the American Institute for Economic Research (AIER)

Tyler Durden Tue, 02/03/2026 - 20:55

Sixth Circuit Throws Out DOJ Misconduct Complaint Against Judge Boasberg

The Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals has dismissed a Department of Justice misconduct complaint targeting U.S. District Judge James Boasberg.

Boasberg, an Obama appointee, has been under fire from the right for multiple partisan rulings against the Trump administration and for approving warrants in former special counsel Jack Smith's Arctic Frost investigation that allowed investigators to seize the phone records of Republican members of Congress, a decision widely seen as a politically motivated assault on lawmakers aligned with the president.

The misconduct complaint stemmed from remarks Boasberg reportedly made at the March 2025 Judicial Conference. According to the complaint, he warned Chief Justice John Roberts that the Trump administration intended to “disregard rulings of federal courts” and provoke “a constitutional crisis.”

The Trump administration argued those comments crossed ethical lines and violated the judicial code of conduct.

The complaint also pointed to Boasberg’s 2025 ruling blocking Trump’s plan to deport Venezuelan nationals to El Salvador’s CECOT prison under the Alien Enemies Act. That decision fueled accusations that Boasberg harbored an ideological bias against Trump’s immigration enforcement priorities.

Sixth Circuit Chief Judge Jeffrey S. Sutton formally dismissed the misconduct complaint on December 19, 2025, though the decision did not become public until this week. 

In his decision, Sutton emphasized that the federal government provided no credible evidence of the alleged comments. He wrote that the allegations lacked any corroborating source, and "a recycling of unadorned allegations with no reference to a source does not corroborate them." Sutton added that "a repetition of uncorroborated statements rarely supplies a basis for a valid misconduct complaint."

Even if the comments attributed to Boasberg were verified, Sutton argued, the Trump administration failed to demonstrate how they violated the Codes of Judicial Conduct. He described the Judicial Conference of the United States as "the policymaking body for the judiciary," composed of a diverse group of federal judges from across the country appointed by different presidents. The conference addresses a broad spectrum of judicial issues, from budgets and courthouse maintenance to workplace conduct, judicial security, and judicial independence.

Sutton noted that candid discussions among federal judicial leaders on matters of common concern are a core function of the Judicial Conference. "A key point of the Judicial Conference and the related meetings is to facilitate candid conversations about judicial administration among leaders of the federal judiciary about matters of common concern," he wrote. 

"Confirming the point, the Chief Justice's 2024 year-end report raised general concerns about threats to judicial independence, security concerns for judges, and respect for court orders throughout American history," Sutton added. That report, in his view, validated the appropriateness of similar concerns being voiced at the Judicial Conference.

The White House was not happy with the ruling.

"Left-wing, activist judges have gone totally rogue," a White House official told Fox News Digital. "They're undermining the rule of law in service of their own radical agenda. It needs to stop. And the White House fully embraces impeachment efforts." 

The White House official also argued President Donald Trump needs the freedom to “lawfully implement the agenda the American people elected him on.” The official argued that judges who repeatedly hand down partisan rulings cross a line from interpreting the law to shaping policy, turning the bench into a political weapon. In doing so, the official said, those judges undermine public trust and surrender any legitimate claim to impartiality. The administration has made clear it views activist judges as a fundamental threat to its ability to govern. 

The dismissal of the misconduct complaint hardly ends Boasberg’s troubles. The White House may still pursue other avenues, and he could still face impeachment. During a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing last month, Sen. Ted Cruz urged the House to begin impeachment proceedings against Boasberg over his controversial gag orders in 2023. 

Tyler Durden Tue, 02/03/2026 - 20:30

RFK Jr. Announces $100 Million Program Aimed At Homelessness And Addiction

Authored by Zachary Stieber via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. on Feb. 2 announced a new $100 million program that he said will help homeless people find jobs and treat drug abuse.

Health Secretary Robert Kennedy Jr. in the East Room of the White House on Jan. 16, 2026. Madalina Kilroy/The Epoch Times

The $100 million investment is aimed at assisting homeless people and drug users in recovering from addiction, finding employment, and locating stable housing.

Kennedy told an event on Prevention Day—which is sponsored by the government and dedicated to preventing drug abuse—in Washington on Monday that the health care system under the previous administration was designed to cycle people who suffer from mental illness and drug addiction “between sidewalks, emergency room visits, jails, mental hospitals, and shelters.”

“No one took responsibility for the whole person. No one stayed long enough to help them recover, to help them reestablish their links, and teach them the lessons of how to live in a community,” he said. “That system is neither humane nor effective.”

Kennedy, who has said his addiction to heroin ended with help from 12-step programs, said that the $100 million would fund pilot initiatives that are crafted to resolve long-term homelessness and reduce opioid addiction by expanding treatment regimens that emphasize recovery and self-sufficiency. The program is known as Safety Through Recovery, Engagement, and Evidence-based Treatment and Supports, or STREETS.

“STREETS will engage people continuously, from first contact on the street through recovery, through employment, and through self-sufficiency,” Kennedy said. “Law enforcement, first responders, courts, housing providers, and health care systems will work as one team, so people will no longer fall through the cracks.”

Anyone else rewatching The Wire rn?

STREETS follows an executive order President Donald Trump signed in January that says drug addiction is a chronic disease and that the administration needs to prioritize addiction treatment and recovery.

The new program builds on an investment federal health officials awarded in 2025 to boost homes for recovering addicts. Kennedy says he knows many people who have recovered in such homes.

Kennedy also announced the government will be providing $10 million through an assisted outpatient program to help adults designated as having serious mental illness, which he said will reduce hospitalization, incarceration, and homelessness.

Officials also said that the Department of Health and Human Services will, moving forward, let states use federal funding to pay for addicted parents to receive Food and Drug Administration-approved medications.

And they said that they would be giving faith-based organizations that meet certain standards funding to help with drug addiction recovery.

“This is a chronic disease. It’s a physical disease, it’s a mental disease, it’s emotional disease, but above all, it’s a spiritual disease,“ Kennedy said. ”And we need to recognize that, and faith-based organizations play a critical role in ... helping people reestablish their connections to community.”

Tyler Durden Tue, 02/03/2026 - 20:05

Why Skyrocketing Premiums Were Inevitable With Obamacare's Design

Authored by Lawrence Wilson via The Epoch Times,

The Affordable Care Act would “bend the cost curve” in health care, “moving the health care system toward higher quality and more efficient care.” So said a White House statement in 2013.

Many people now agree that didn’t happen.

“We pay more than any other country in the world for worse health care,” Sen. Elissa Slotkin (D-Mich.) said while campaigning for office in 2024.

“Families pay more, get less, and we’re left with few choices,” Rep. Mike Lawler (R-N.Y.) testified in a December 2025 committee hearing.

A combined 70 percent of Americans believe the U.S. health care system is either in crisis or has major problems, according to a 2025 Gallup poll.

Health insurance premiums have more than doubled since Obamacare began in 2014, rising twice as fast as inflation. And satisfaction with the cost of health care registered a record low in 2025, at 16 percent.

How did that happen?

Many consumers believe insurance companies are responsible. Insurers shift the blame to hospitals and pharmaceutical companies. Pharmaceutical companies say pharmacy benefit managers are at fault. Political parties blame each other.

Some independent observers agree that the rise in premiums, especially recently, is largely driven by external forces, including the increased use of expensive medications, rising labor costs, and inflation, which reached a 40-year high in 2022.

Others see a more basic cause, one with roots in the Affordable Care Act, the federal law that created Obamacare. Some of the same policies that make Obamacare popular with consumers are actually cracks in its foundation, these observers say. Those policies all but guaranteed premium increases, especially in the program’s early years.

House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) speaks to reporters as he leaves the House chamber at the U.S. Capitol on Dec. 17, 2025. On Jan. 8, 2026, seventeen House Republicans joined Democrats to pass a three-year extension of the expired Affordable Care Act premium tax credits. Kevin Dietsch/Getty Images

Here are the key provisions of Obamacare, which some experts say undermined its success.

Foundations of Obamacare

The Affordable Care Act made profound changes in the health insurance industry. One of the changes required insurance companies to issue health insurance in the individual and small-group markets to any applicant, regardless of pre-existing illness.

Americans generally like that idea. More than two-thirds of the public says that provision is very important, according to polling by health care research group KFF. That includes 54 percent of Republicans, 66 percent of independents, and 79 percent of Democrats.

Known as guaranteed issue, this was one of four foundational provisions built into Obamacare to make health insurance available to more Americans.

The second foundation was community rating, which required insurers to rate, or price, their plans based on the demographic profile of a community, with only limited increases based on age and tobacco use. According to this provision, premiums for people of the same age group in the same geographic area are pretty much the same.

The third foundation was the requirement that certain essential health benefits be included in every plan, except for catastrophic health plans. This ensured that consumers would get real value for their money and not be surprised to find that services such as emergency room visits or maternity care were not covered.

The Department of Health and Human Services eventually decided on 10 essential health benefits.

The final foundation was the individual mandate. This required most adults to either buy health insurance or pay a fine. The point was to keep overall costs down by ensuring that young, healthy people, who would likely incur fewer charges, would stay in the market. The fine was $95 per adult in 2014 and rose to $695 by 2016.

Informational pamphlets are displayed during a health care enrollment fair in Richmond, Calif., on March 31, 2014. Health insurance premiums have more than doubled since Obamacare began in 2014, rising twice as fast as inflation. Justin Sullivan/Getty Images

Though some of these provisions were popular with consumers, they increased both cost and risk for health insurers. And though the new rules made insurance premiums lower for some customers, prices went up for some others.

And the new rules applied to all new plans for individual and small-group insurance sold in the United States, guaranteeing a shift in the entire market, not just the Obamacare exchanges.

Higher Cost, Increased Risk

As the Affordable Care Act was being considered and implemented, stakeholders warned that these sweeping changes could make insurance more expensive. At a minimum, they said, the requirement that plans cover a suite of essential health benefits could raise premiums.

The Board of Health Care Services at the National Academies warned that including too many essential health benefits could make insurance unaffordable for individuals and small businesses.

“If this occurs, the principal reason for the [Affordable Care Act]—enabling people to purchase health insurance and thus covering more of the population—will not be met,” the board wrote in 2012.

Insurers were wary too. America’s Health Insurance Plans, an industry trade group, told regulators in a 2012 letter that the choice of essential health benefits would have “far-reaching implications” on the affordability of health insurance.

Increased risk was also a concern.

Insurers speculated on the legality of the individual mandate and warned that Obamacare wouldn’t be viable without it.

“The insurance market reforms cannot function as Congress intended without the mandate and therefore should be struck down if the mandate is held to be unconstitutional,” the insurance trade group argued in a brief filed with the Blue Cross Blue Shield Association.

The old risk management strategy of medical underwriting—pricing premiums based on the underlying health risks of an individual or members of a small group—was no longer an option.

Community pricing would reduce premiums for people with pre-existing conditions or other health risks. But premiums would increase for younger and healthier people. Some observers feared that younger people might stay out of the market, then buy health insurance only when they became ill.

If that happened, it would throw off the risk predictions insurers had made, leaving them with an older, sicker population to cover. In the insurance business, this situation is known as adverse selection.

Timothy Jost of Washington and Lee University School of Law, in a 2010 report for The Commonwealth Fund, called that possibility “the greatest threat facing exchanges.”

Michael F. Cannon, a health policy expert at the Cato Institute, in 2010 saw the potential for an “adverse-selection death spiral.”

Risk Mitigation

The Affordable Care Act acknowledged the increased risk for insurers and included three provisions to keep premium prices stable.

First, the law included a risk adjustment. This was meant to protect health plans that wound up ensuring an exceptionally high-risk group of people. Plans that wound up with a lower-than-average risk group would make a payment to plans having a higher-than-average risk group.

Second, the law included a reinsurance program. This was to help plans deal with unexpectedly high medical costs for an individual enrollee. All insurers paid into a reinsurance pool. At the end of the year, each could submit a claim for individual enrollee costs that exceeded a certain threshold. This program, which was intended to be temporary, ran from 2014 through 2016.

Third, the law created risk corridors. This was to help health plans whose total claim payments exceeded the predicted amount. Plans that had lower-than-expected claim totals would pay into a fund. The fund would make payments to plans with claim costs higher than their target amount. This program was also intended to be temporary and ran from 2014 through 2016.

A customer meets with a Sunshine Life and Health Advisors agent while waiting for the Affordable Care Act website to come back online to purchase a health insurance plan in Miami on March 31, 2014. Joe Raedle/Getty Images

The Spiral Begins

The first several years of Obamacare saw lower-than-expected enrollment, higher-than-anticipated costs, and diminishing choice in the marketplace.

Enrollment was significantly lower than expected in the early years, which observers had warned could be a sign of adverse selection.

After a shaky start due to glitches in the online marketplaces, enrollment in 2014 actually exceeded the modest Congressional Budget Office forecast.

Yet the overall market grew by just 4.2 million that year, as many of the 8 million Obamacare enrollees were people who had moved over from the commercial market, according to a report by Amanda E. Kowalski of Yale University.

By 2018, Obamacare enrollment stood at 11.8 million, nearly 1 million less than in 2016 and less than half of the 25 million predicted by that date.

Data suggest that many of the missing enrollees were young adults.

Obamacare needed an enrollment mix that included 38 percent young adults to avoid a “death spiral,” Cato Institute reported in early 2014.

At the close of its first enrollment period in 2014, Obamacare had an enrollment pool that was just 28 percent young adults aged 18–34. A Commonwealth Fund report indicated that people whose premiums increased had been slightly less likely to buy insurance in 2014. Young adults would have been among those whose rates went up.

The individual mandate, which aimed to offset this factor, faced court challenges beginning in 2010. Though it was not ultimately ruled unconstitutional, Congress set the penalty for noncompliance at $0 in 2017, effectively ending the federal mandate.

A pedestrian walks past an insurance agency that offers Affordable Care Act plans, in Miami on Jan. 28, 2021. Following the COVID-19 pandemic and enhanced subsidies approved by Congress in 2021, enrollment more than doubled, reaching a record 24.3 million in 2025. Joe Raedle/Getty Images

Enrollee age was not the only indicator of adverse enrollment, Kowalski reported. Her analysis of cost data concluded that marketplaces in at least 16 states experienced adverse enrollment in 2014.

Data indicate the cost of insuring Obamacare enrollees exceeded expected levels in the early years.

The reinsurance program had obligations exceeding income by nearly $10 billion over three years.

The risk corridors program fared no better. Income was insufficient to meet obligations in 2014, so all 2015 income and at least a part of 2016 income was used to pay off the 2014 shortfall.

The increased coverage requirements had the predictable effect of increasing premium prices, according to a 2017 report by the Department of Health and Human Services.

“In most states these regulations increased insurance coverage requirements and would be expected, on average, to increase the price of [Affordable Care Act]-compliant plans relative to pre-[Affordable Care Act] plans all else equal.”

Premiums increased 22 percent in the first year and a total of 84 percent by 2018.

Insurers began to leave the marketplace. In 2015, an average of 8.8 insurers in each state participated in Obamacare, according to KFF. By 2018, that number had dropped more than one-third.

The COVID Years and Beyond

In the middle years of Obamacare, enrollment decreased, then plateaued after reaching a high of 12.7 million in 2016. Premiums decreased somewhat too, dropping about 9 percent over four years from their high point in 2018. And insurer participation ticked up slightly in 2019.

Then came COVID-19 and the enhanced premium subsidies created by Congress in 2021.

A woman wearing a face mask walks past a COVID-19 test site in Manhattan, N.Y., on Nov. 2, 2020. Chung I Ho/The Epoch Times

Those enhanced subsidies, which expired in 2025, provided financial help to Americans with higher incomes and further lowered the cost of Obamacare for low-income people. Enrollment more than doubled, reaching an all-time high of 24.3 million in 2025.

Yet as enrollment spiraled upward, so did premiums. Prices reached a new high in 2025, averaging $497 per month for a 40-year-old enrolled in the most popular plan.

What didn’t change dramatically was the age profile of enrollees. Though some young adults entered the market in the era of enhanced subsidies, their numbers never exceeded the 2014 rate of 28 percent.

And despite a rise in the number of insurers doing business in Obamacare, some of the largest companies say they find it unprofitable.

David Joyner, the CEO of CVS Health, testifying before Congress on Jan. 22,  said its costs exceeded income in the Obamacare marketplaces last year, and Gail Boudreaux, CEO of Elevance Health—the parent company of Anthem—said it did not turn a profit from Obamacare in 2025.

David Cordani of The Cigna Group said, “We lost money in the exchange all but two years since 2014.”

Tyler Durden Tue, 02/03/2026 - 17:40

English Only: Florida Eliminates Foreign Language Options For Driver's License Testing

Florida announced on Friday that all driver's license exams will be conducted in English only starting Feb. 6, and will end testing in other languages such as Arabic, Chinese, Haitian Creole, Spanish, and Russian, the state's Department of Highway Safety and Motor Vehicles said.

Vehicles travel along I-95 in Miami, Fla., on May 24, 2024. Joe Raedle/Getty Images

The change applies to both commercial and non-commercial driver's licenses and permits. 

The move comes after federal authorities mandated last year that all commercial drivers be proficient in English to ensure safety - leading to 9,500 commercial truckers getting booted from service by December 2025 for failing proficiency checks. 

"This is a much needed step forward to protect Floridians," said Florida Chief Financial Officer Blaise Ingoglia in a post to social media. 

Miami-Dade County Tax Collector Dariel Fernandez agreed, writing on social media "This decision was made to strengthen roadway safety, ensure clear communication, and support consistent understanding of traffic laws across our state." 

That said, Fernandez acknowledged that this may be difficult for Floridians who don't speak English natively, writing "[As] an immigrant, I understand the challenges many in our community may face."

As the Epoch Times notes further, Florida, in recent years, has increased restrictions on the issuing of driver’s licenses, citing an effort to combat illegal immigration. In 2024, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis signed into law legislation that stripped recognition of out-of-state licenses and identity cards issued to illegal immigrants and increased criminal penalties for driving without a Florida-recognized license.

“We don’t give driver’s licenses to illegal aliens, which you shouldn’t,” DeSantis remarked at an event in March 2024. “This is going to be a deterrent for illegal immigration into the state of Florida.”

Last August, an Indian national was accused of causing a deadly crash that killed three people when he made an illegal U-turn driving a semi-truck in Florida. The Department of Transportation found that Harjinder Singh, an illegal immigrant, did not pass an English proficiency exam. He was issued a commercial driver’s license by both Washington state and California.

Singh pleaded not guilty to charges of vehicular homicide in September 2025.

Tyler Durden Tue, 02/03/2026 - 17:20

Trump Says Administration Will Seek $1 Billion In Damages From Harvard

Authored by Aldgra Fredly via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

President Donald Trump said on Feb. 2 that his administration would demand Harvard University to pay $1 billion in damages, labeling the university as “strongly antisemitic.”

A flag hangs on campus at Harvard University in Cambridge, Mass., on Sept. 4, 2025. Shannon Stapleton/Reuters

“We are now seeking One Billion Dollars in damages, and want nothing further to do, into the future, with Harvard University,” the president said in a Truth Social post.

The Trump administration last year attempted to freeze billions of dollars in federal funding from Harvard following an investigation into diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) initiatives and claims of anti-Semitism in higher education. The White House said in April that Harvard had failed to protect its students from harassment and violence on campus.

“Harvard has been, for a long time, behaving very badly! They wanted to do a convoluted job training concept, but it was turned down in that it was wholly inadequate and would not have been, in our opinion, successful,” Trump wrote.

“It was merely a way of Harvard getting out of a large cash settlement of more than 500 Million Dollars, a number that should be much higher for the serious and heinous illegalities that they have committed.”

Trump also accused Harvard of “feeding a lot of ‘nonsense’” to The New York Times, but did not provide further details.

The Epoch Times has reached out to Harvard for comment, but did not receive a response by publication time.

Jewish students at Harvard reported incidents of harassment following the Oct. 7, 2023, attacks against Israel by Hamas-led terrorists and the subsequent Israeli military offensive in Gaza. Students sued the school, and its former president, Claudine Gay, resigned after congressional hearings on campus anti-Semitism.

Harvard President Alan Garber arrives to speak at the 374th Harvard Commencement in Cambridge, Mass., on May 29, 2025. Rick Friedman/AFP via Getty Images

Harvard President Alan Garber, who succeeded Gay, rejected a list of conditions outlined by a federal anti-Semitism task force and filed a lawsuit against the administration in April 2025, seeking to restore $2.2 billion in grants and contracts withheld by the government.

A federal judge later reversed the funding freeze, ruling that the government violated the First Amendment through its efforts to combat anti-Semitism. The Justice Department appealed the decision in December 2025.

Trump also issued a proclamation on June 4, 2025, seeking to end Harvard’s visa program for international students, prompting the university to file another legal challenge.

Several other Ivy League schools, including Columbia University and Brown University, have reached agreements with the administration and accepted certain government demands. Columbia agreed to pay more than $220 million to the government, and Brown said it will pay $50 million to support local workforce development.

Reuters, Aaron Gifford, and Travis Gillmore contributed to this report.

Tyler Durden Tue, 02/03/2026 - 17:00

Third Georgia Democrat Lawmaker Accused Of Pandemic Fraud

A Democrat member of the Georgia House of Representatives was charged Friday with lying to obtain thousands of dollars in emergency pandemic unemployment assistance, according to federal prosecutors - the third Democrat in the Georgia House to be accused of doing so. 

Rep. Dexter Sharper, 54

Dexter Sharper, 54, of Valdosta, is accused of falsely claiming he was unemployed while collecting benefits intended to those who had lost their jobs during the COVID-19 pandemic. Sharper allegedly received $13,825 in unemployment assistance between April 2020 and May 2021, while continuing to earn income from various sources. 

"While many of his constituents and fellow citizens were losing jobs and desperately needed unemployment assistance during the pandemic, Representative Sharper allegedly pretended to be out of work to collect a share of unemployment benefits for himself," said US Attorney Theodore S. Hertzberg. 

Court records reveal that Sharper certified in 38 weekly filings that he was unemployed and was actively seeking employment. Investigators say he was lying and continued to receive weekly pay from the Georgia General Assembly, as well as from his party rental business - with additional income as a musician. 

“These charges point to some disgraceful conduct at the highest level, which should shock and repulse every citizen”, said Georgia State Inspector General Nigel Lange. “The alleged activities describe a disgusting abuse by an elected official who appeared to trade his integrity for money destined for those in need. Shameful.” 

Two other Democratic state reps have been indicted on similar charges related to pandemic unemployment fraud;

In December, Rep. Sharon Henderson was charged with two counts of theft of government funds and 10 counts of making false statements, resulting in her suspension last week by Gov. Brian Kemp. 

Rep. Sharon Henderson (D)

Meanwhile, Rep. Karen Bennett resigned from office two days before she was charged and pleaded guilty to making false statements earlier in January. 

Rep. Karen Bennett (D)

Birds of a feather, eh? 

Tyler Durden Tue, 02/03/2026 - 16:40

Mamdani NYC Housing Plan Has Insiders Curious, Skeptical

Authored by Petr Svab via The Epoch Times,

The new mayor of New York City, Zohran Mamdani, has put forward a plan to make housing more affordable, including the government building more housing, freezing rents, and potentially taking over properties from landlords who fail to fix them up.

Affordability is indeed an issue worth addressing, several industry insiders told The Epoch Times. But they weren’t sure how Mamdani could succeed where previous administrations largely hadn’t.

“He’s proven to be really skilled at walking a fine line between opposing parties with different priorities and making each party feel like they’re being catered to,” said Devin Lynch, sales manager at Howard Hanna NYC, a real estate brokerage.

Lynch pointed to the housing ballot proposals that gave the mayor more power over approving housing projects. Many Mamdani voters opposed the measures, worrying they would strip local communities of a voice in the approval process, Lynch said.

“He couldn’t do that because he also courted the union vote, and they all needed the construction and the ‘Yes’ on those ballot proposals for their members. So he’s really threading the needle between these two different opposing goals in his constituency.”

There’s also much uncertainty about the specifics of Mamdani’s plan, given that he has just assumed office, said Michelle Griffith, a real estate agent at the New York City-based Douglas Elliman brokerage.

“We’re all trying to be as optimistic as possible. But the truth is, he’s been mayor for not even four weeks. So we still don’t know what is going to happen,” she said.

“Short term, there’s going to be a rent freeze, so that’s how he’s going to try to soften it for people immediately. And then long term, it’s building more affordable housing.”

Rent Freeze

There are significant caveats to Mamdani’s proposed rent freeze, according to Lynch.

The mayor doesn’t have direct authority to freeze rents city-wide. What he could do is to appoint members to the Rent Guidelines Board, which could freeze rents across rent-stabilized housing units. More than 40 percent of all rental units in the city, almost one million, are rent-stabilized. Their tenants pay rent that is on average about 25 percent below market.

Mamdani can appoint five members of the nine-member board this year, giving him a majority. Whatever decision the board makes would come into effect on Oct. 1 and only for leases that start on that date or later.

However, it’s not just tenants who are struggling with affordability. Costs for landlords have increased, too.

“You already have a lot of landlords that are really struggling to operate in the black,” said Seamus Nally, the chief executive at TurboTenant, a property management platform that caters to smaller-scale landlords.

Maintenance costs have increased by some 40 percent since 2019 and insurance costs skyrocketed by 150 percent, according to a report by the Furman Center, New York University’s housing think-tank.

Meanwhile, New York’s 2019 Housing Stability and Tenant Protection Act not only made it nearly impossible to release rental units from rent-stabilization, but also capped how much landlords can hike rents, regardless of how much they need to invest in renovations.

Since then, net income from rent-stabilized units has dropped by some 12 percent, according to the Furman Center.

Mamdani’s rent freeze would add yet another squeeze.

“The landlords we’ve got an opportunity to talk to in the area, they’re very concerned,” Nally said.

There also appears to be a growing phenomenon in the city, where landlords leave vacated rent-stabilized apartments empty.

There are now estimated 50,000 to 100,000 such empty units in the city now, Lynch said.

Landlords used to be able to release such homes from rent-stabilization and thus have a prospect to recoup the substantial capital investment many require. In some cases, however, that led to abuse where landlords harassed tenants into leaving so they could hike rents. The 2019 law put a stop to that.

However, it now appears that some landlords are stuck with dilapidated apartments that are not worth fixing.

“You’re looking at non-compliant electric, non-compliant plumbing, potentially structural issues that need to be addressed. And that’s in addition to the standard stuff, like replacing floors, replacing appliances,” Lynch said.

Rather than sinking capital in such projects, some landlords bank on the building going up in price over time or that the law will eventually change, he said.

Government Intervention

Mamdani tapped Cea Weaver, a tenant activist, to head his Office to Protect Tenants. Weaver lobbied for the 2019 state law and has proposed that the city buy “buildings where the landlord is no longer interested in ownership.”

In January, Mamdani tried to delay the sale of one such distressed landlord, Pinnacle Group, which went bankrupt after its business model of hiking rents on rent-stabilized units unraveled. However, the sale went through, and Summit Properties USA obtained over 5,000 mostly rent-stabilized housing units for less than $90,000 per unit.

Lynch doubted whether Mamdani would actually pursue the course outlined by Weaver, as it would come with political responsibility for extensive tenant complaints.

It’s easy to be the “knight in shining armor” speaking on behalf of dissatisfied tenants, but “once you directly assume those problems and the realities of addressing the problems, you learn it’s much harder,” he said.

Public Construction

Another aspect of Mamdani’s plan involves substantially increasing the quantity of affordable housing paid for with public funds. He has promised 200,000 housing units in 10 years at the cost of $100 billion.

He proposed financing this by drawing on municipal bonds and hiking taxes on richer city dwellers. Both of those proposals, however, would require state approval.

Mamdani may get some support from Gov. Kathy Hochul, who may be eager to court his voters, Lynch said.

“That will be a big part of her voting base if she runs for reelection” later this year, he said.

Still, the city already carries a substantial debt burden with its interest expenses having risen by more than 20 percent since 2023.

Mamdani promised to expedite approvals of affordable housing projects, while at the same time promising to use all union labor, which would significantly limit capacity.

There’s still much uncertainty about how the plan will look and what aspects of it will materialize, Griffith said.

Mamdani promises that the public will pay, while the previous mayor, Eric Adams, promised the private sector would pay. And before that, Mayor Bill DeBlasio was “somewhat in the middle of those two,” she said.

“And where are we at now? We still have an affordability crisis,” Griffith said.

The next big question is what will happen with whatever housing Mamdani manages to build. The city’s public housing projects have been notorious for slow and inadequate maintenance, even as the city’s housing expenses nearly doubled since 2022.

Nally argued it may be more effective to make it easier for the residents, rather than the government, to build housing. He gave the example of Austin, Texas, where easing regulations helped to spur a housing construction boom.

“I’m skeptical that what will work is more government involvement when some of the petri dishes that we’ve seen work across the United States have actually used less government involvement,” he said.

Tyler Durden Tue, 02/03/2026 - 15:20

Gabbard Defends Presence At Fulton County Election Warrant Execution

Authored by Zachary Stieber via The Epoch Times,

National Intelligence Director Tulsi Gabbard on Feb. 2 defended her presence at a Fulton County elections office while FBI agents executed a search warrant there, saying President Donald Trump had requested that she go to the Georgia office and that she has the authority to take action related to election integrity and security.

“Interference in U.S. elections is a threat to our republic and a national security threat,” Gabbard said in a letter to members of Congress.

“The president and his administration are committed to safeguarding the integrity of U.S. elections to ensure that neither foreign nor domestic powers undermine the American people’s right to determine who our elected leaders are.”

She said that Trump tasked her office with taking appropriate action under the authority granted by Congress toward ensuring the integrity of elections, and specifically directed her to observe the execution of the warrant in Fulton County near Atlanta on Jan. 28.

She also said she facilitated a call in which Trump briefly thanked the agents for their work. Trump did not ask any questions during the call, and neither the president nor Gabbard issued directives, she said.

FBI officials previously described agents as executing a court-authorized warrant about a month after the Trump administration filed a lawsuit against the county seeking voting records from the 2020 presidential election. County officials have said the records were under seal and could not be produced absent a court order.

Trump has alleged that he lost in Georgia in 2020 because of election fraud.

Sen. Mark Warner (D-Va.) and Rep. Jim Himes (D-Conn.), top Democrats on congressional intelligence committees, in a Jan. 29 letter said Gabbard’s presence was “deeply concerning.”

“The intelligence community should be focused on foreign threats and, as you yourself have testified, when those intelligence authorities are turned inwards the results can be devastating for Americans privacy and civil liberties,” they wrote.

The lawmakers asked for Gabbard’s reasoning for attending the FBI operation and legal authorities for her involvement and that of other intelligence officials.

Rep. Raja Krishnamoorthi (D-Ill.) was among other critics of Gabbard’s actions.

“The seizure of ballots in Fulton County may trace back to Trump’s refusal to accept his 2020 loss, but the danger is forward-looking. Tulsi Gabbard has no legal role in domestic law enforcement, and the FBI should not be seizing ballots,” he said on social media on Feb. 1.

Gabbard said in response that personnel from the National Counterintelligence and Security Center traveled with her to Fulton County but were not present during the execution of the warrant. She said that she has not seen the warrant, which is under seal, or evidence submitted to the court by the Department of Justice.

She also said that to preserve the integrity of American elections, officials must determine whether there has been malign interference and whether election systems are vulnerable to future exploitation.

“Election security is a national security issue,” Gabbard wrote.

The National Security Act gives the Office of the Director of National Intelligence the authority to coordinate and integrate national intelligence, including intelligence related to elections, Gabbard said.

She promised that the office would not “irresponsibly share incomplete intelligence assessments” concerning election interference.

Joe Kent, director of the National Counterterrorism Center, said on X this week that Gabbard had found 2020 election fraud. Kent, who did not elaborate, later shared Gabbard’s letter to Warner and Himes.

Tyler Durden Tue, 02/03/2026 - 14:00

Kremlin Says India Hasn't Confirmed Oil Cutoff As Modi Govt Mute, Hasn't Ratified

The Kremlin on Tuesday pushed back on Trump's claims that India is preparing to cut off Russian oil purchases following his major Truth Social announcement of a new US-India trade deal that sharply reduces tariffs on Indian exports.

"So far, we haven't heard any statements from New Delhi on this matter," Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters, signaling that Moscow has received no official confirmation from India in light of Trump's assertions.

via Reuters

Peskov said Moscow is still "carefully monitoring the news" around Trump's claims, on the heels of his "wonderful" phone call with India's Modi and the tariff relief.

Trump had announced the US will trim its punitive tariff on Indian imports to 18% after striking what he hailed as a new "trade deal” with Prime Minister Narendra Modi. Crucially it hinges on New Delhi having reportedly ended its purchases of Russian crude and swapping them for massive US energy and goods buys.

"Out of friendship and respect for Prime Minister Modi and, as per his request, effective immediately, we agreed to a Trade Deal between the United States and India, whereby the United States will charge a reduced Reciprocal Tariff, lowering it from 25% to 18%," Trump posted. "Our amazing relationship with India will be even stronger going forward."

And yet, 24 hours later and India's Foreign Ministry has also remained silent on the question of abandoning Russian oil.

Given all of this, and that the potential remains that Trump's statements were too out front and presumptuous in terms of anything India may have actually agreed to in a finalized way, Peskov additionally said that while Russia "respects" US-Indian relations, Moscow's priority remains its own "strategic partnership" with New Delhi.

"And we intend to continue to comprehensively develop our bilateral relations with New Delhi, which is exactly what we’re doing," he emphasized.

As recently as December, President Vladimir Putin said Russia was prepared to continue “uninterrupted shipments” of oil to India despite pressure from Washington.

Modi's learning from Trump's social media about how India will not buy Russian oil & details of US India trade deal (before any Indian announcement) is certainly a first...

Modiji has undoubtedly given many firsts to India. Learning from Trump’s X account about how India will not buy Russian oil & details of US India trade deal (before any Indian announcement) is certainly a first. Jai Modiji pic.twitter.com/Yt44xgcVeA

— Mahua Moitra (@MahuaMoitra) February 2, 2026

Perhaps Trump's statement was intentionally premature in order to build more leverage and pile the pressure on Modi? The 'devil is in the details' in terms of what was actually agreed to in the phone call. The coming days will likely tell.

* * *

Below is more commentary via Rabobank...

Trump also struck a trade deal with India, reducing reciprocal tariffs to 18% and dropping the additional 25% after claiming India would stop buying Russian oil in favor of Venezuelan, showing how geopolitics links up. This isn’t the FTA the EU just signed, but let’s see which proves more important over time: as a well-placed Indian source noted to me, there‘s no growth in Europe vs. the US.

The fact the US will insist on the same no-transshipment rules for Chinese goods that it has with other trade partners is a blow to Beijing; equally, it blows up European hopes of building a trade coalition without the US (and in India frictions will continue, i.e., the EU agreed on green tech collaboration with Delhi, but the US said it is going to sell it more coal). The defense component will also be key. Europe now has a strategic partnership with India in that regard, but national governments hold sway there: will they want to see their defense industries moved to South Asia(?) By contrast, the US is able to move faster, though we shall see what they are prepared to share with India. Delhi at least gets to play both sides off against the other.

Tyler Durden Tue, 02/03/2026 - 13:40