Zero Hedge

Under The Bus You Go, Kurds

Under The Bus You Go, Kurds

Authored by Jason Ditz via AntiWar.com,

With the fighting continue to rage and north and northeast Syria between central government forces and the nation’s Kurdish minority, the US government appears to have decided that they are backing the former, and that US military support for the Syrian Kurds is over.

US envoy Tom Barrack declared the Kurds to have a "great opportunity" to be taken over by the Islamist central government of Syria, led by the Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS). He assured that the Kurds would definitely be offered "equal rights" under the law in this scenario.

AFP/Getty Images

In many ways, Barrack's comments were less about why they are no longer backing the Kurds than why they did in the past, saying at one point in the fight against ISIS, the US didn't consider the Assad government a "viable partner" so they backed the Kurds instead. Now, with the US seeing the HTS as aligned with their interest, that’s no longer the case, so they'll be backing the HTS instead.

Syrian Kurdish officials and locals have expressed disappointment with this turn of events, saying that after more than a decade of being aligned with the US they are being effectively "abandoned" at the exact moment the HTS has begun launching military offensives against Kurdish-controlled territory that the US helped the Kurds gain in the first place.

Though the US has broadly supported the Kurds through the Syrian proxy war and after, it has not been uniform. In 2019, Turkey launched an offensive against the Syrian Kurds and the Trump Administration at the time similarly (and controversially) withdrew backing for the Kurds, with President Trump famously claiming it was because he had just learned that the Kurds were not present at the Normandy Invasion during WW2.

This move may similarly be controversial, even if Normandy isn’t invoked as a justification this time. Sen. Lindsey Graham (R – SC) had warned the HTS against continuing attacks on the Kurds and had warned that the US might reimpose sanctions against Syria if the attacks continued.

That position may have some support in the Senate, though it plainly does not within the White House, as President Trump has been loudly enamored with HTS leader and former al-Qaeda in Iraq figure Ahmed al-Sharaa, praising him as "young, attractive tough guy." When push came to shove, it was perhaps unsurprising that the administration chose Sharaa over the Kurds when the two sides were at odds.

The US has been expressing annoyance with the Kurds for not quietly submitting to Sharaa’s rule for months now, with Barrack, as the representative of the US Federal Government, declaring that they had learned "federalism doesn’t work" and that the Kurds should abandon any hope of autonomy within Syria.

Sharaa, for his part, has given the Kurds a four-day ultimatum to accept his terms for integration into the Syrian state. Since Sharaa had previously denied the Kurds a single spot in his cabinet and postponed parliamentary elections in Kurdish parts of the country, what if any representation that will actually entail remains unclear.

Whatever it is, however, the US clearly views it as sufficient.

Tyler Durden Wed, 01/21/2026 - 20:55

Justice Jackson Cites Racist 'Black Codes' As Precedent To Justify Gun Control In Hawaii

Justice Jackson Cites Racist 'Black Codes' As Precedent To Justify Gun Control In Hawaii

During oral arguments in Wolford v. Lopez, Supreme Court Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson suggested that the post-Civil War “Black Codes” - a set of openly racist laws enacted in the Democrat-controlled South to strip newly freed Black Americans of basic rights, including the right to possess firearms - could serve as legitimate historical precedent under the Supreme Court’s Bruen test. That test evaluates modern gun laws by asking whether similar restrictions were accepted in the nation’s historical tradition. The case concerns a Hawaii law that bars licensed gun owners from carrying firearms onto privately owned property open to the public. Jackson relying on the Black Codes for constitutional guidance is hilarious, as those laws were explicitly designed to deny civil rights to Black Americans in defiance of emancipation.

The exchange unfolded as Justice Jackson pressed U.S. Principal Deputy Solicitor General Sarah Harris on why post–Civil War Black Codes should be excluded from consideration when courts examine modern-day gun control laws. Hawaii relied on a 1865 Louisiana statute as historical support for its law, a statute even Neal Katyal, the lawyer representing Hawaii, admitted was “undoubtedly a relic of a shameful portion of American history.”

“So, I guess I really don’t understand your response to Justice Gorsuch on the Black Codes,” Jackson began. She explained that, under Bruen, courts are required to look to history and tradition to assess constitutionality. “The fact that the Black Codes were, at some later point, determined themselves to be unconstitutional doesn’t seem to me to be relevant to the assessment that Bruen is asking us to make.”

Harris responded by emphasizing the fundamentally racist purpose of those laws. “Black Codes were unconstitutional from the moment of their inception because they are pretextual laws that are designed to ensure that newly freed slaves are returned to a condition of sharecropping.”

Justice Jackson, a black woman, immediately pushed back. “Okay, let me stop you there. They were not deemed unconstitutional at the time that they were enacted,” she said. “They were part of the history and tradition of the country, and when we have a test now that’s asking us to look at what people were doing back then, I don’t understand why they should be excluded.”

Harris reiterated that point. “Because they are outliers. They are, by definition, unconstitutional. They have always been unconstitutional.”

Jackson bizarrely remained unconvinced. “Found later, afterwards, not at the time,” she said, returning to the Bruen framework. “And if the test says what’s happening at the time tells us what’s constitutional for this purpose, why aren’t they in?”

Harris responded by insisting the laws should be disregarded because they were aberrations and unconstitutional from their inception.

But Jackson rejected that framing. She argued that their unconstitutionality was determined later, not contemporaneously, making it a legitimate precedent. And, according to Jackson, if the test looks to historical practice at the time of enactment, she asked, why should those laws be left out?

Harris attempted to explain how a law could be unconstitutional from inception, while still accounting for historical analysis. Jackson claimed that Harris’s position effectively dismissed history altogether. When Harris denied that implication, Jackson underscored the contradiction by noting that history either matters under Bruen or it does not.

Harris then stressed that historical inquiry remains essential, though not indiscriminate. “We should deeply care about the history,” she said, adding that Bruen requires courts to identify a genuine national tradition by excluding aberrations. She described the Black Codes as precisely that — laws enacted “for the purpose of trying to reduce newly freed slaves back to conditions of servitude,” including measures that criminalized carrying arms on private property. “Those are obvious outliers which should not count under the whole point of Bruen.”

Justice Jackson has never distinguished herself on the bench for her bright legal mind, but it was frankly remarkable to see her treating some of the most overtly racist laws in American history as potentially valid reference points for modern gun control. 

Tyler Durden Wed, 01/21/2026 - 20:30

New Jersey Governor Orders State To Accelerate Solar, Storage And Virtual Power Plants

New Jersey Governor Orders State To Accelerate Solar, Storage And Virtual Power Plants

By Robert Walton of Utility Dive

On her first day in office Tuesday, New Jersey Democratic Gov. Mikie Sherrill signed executive orders seeking to freeze electricity cost increases, issue ratepayer relief in the form of bill credits, and increase distributed energy resources, including utility-scale solar and battery storage.

One order directed the state’s Board of Public Utilities to ensure bill credits by July 1 and to “consider pursuing a pause, abeyance, or modification of the schedule governing any proceedings in which electric distribution utilities seek approvals for rate increases or cost recoveries.” It also ordered the board to publish a study within 180 days of how to “modernize” the traditional electric utility business model, including opportunities to make utility revenue models “less dependent on capital spending.”

Another order focused on growing the state’s electricity supply and increasing efficiency. It directed regulators to initiate solicitations for solar and transmission-scale battery storage and to begin development of a virtual power plant program to be administered by electric distribution utilities and third-party suppliers in the state.

Sherrill, who made affordability and rising energy prices a focus of her campaign, said in her inaugural speech that the orders “will deliver relief to consumers and stop rate hikes.” 

“This will also create the conditions to massively expand New Jersey’s power generation, because more power in-state will help lower costs,” she said. 

Electric rates were a key issue in the governor’s race, particularly after bills spiked as much as 20% last year. Another increase is slated to go into effect this summer. The increases are a result of higher capacity prices in PJM’s recent auctions, which are held several years in advance and reflect both current and projected power demand. 

Residential bill credits will rely on the same or similar funding sources used in August 2025 to provide credits, according to Sherrill’s first executive order. Last year, the BPU said all 3.9 million New Jersey residential ratepayers of Public Service Electric and Gas, Atlantic City Electric, Jersey Central Power and Light, and Rockland Electric would receive $100 in direct bill assistance.

PSE&G emailed a statement responding to Sherrill’s orders, saying “steps must be taken to safeguard long-term energy reliability and cost effectiveness for residents as New Jersey relies on imported electricity for more than 40% of its power.”

“We are confident that open dialogue and information sharing will lead to workable solutions,” the utility said.

Grid advocates hailed the governor’s focus on developing new sources of energy.

“These executive orders are tackling peak demand, unlocking customer-sited resources, and speeding deployment of solar and storage,” Katie Mettle, New Jersey state lead at Advanced Energy United, said in a statement.

According to the second executive order, the BPU has 45 days to initiate a solicitation “for qualifying solar facilities or solar facilities in combination with storage” under the state’s Competitive Solar Incentive program. Within the same timeframe, the BPU must also open 3 GW of capacity for registration under New Jersey’s Community Solar Energy Program, “endeavoring to expedite the registration process by any necessary and appropriate means.”

Regulators must also accelerate the development of grid-scale storage through the Garden State Energy Storage Program by holding a solicitation within 45 days, launching Phase 2 of the program within 90 days, and “thereafter establishing a specific tranche of capacity for electric distribution utilities to develop to support interconnection of distributed energy resources and grid stability.”

And, within 180 days, the BPU must begin development of a virtual power plant program that aims “to drive down peak demand by aggregating behind-the-meter distributed energy resources.”

“Virtual power plants are a proven, cost-effective way to lower peak demand, improve reliability, and put downward pressure on energy bills,” AEU’s Mettle said.

Allison McLeod, interim executive director of the New Jersey League of Conservation Voters, said the group was “particularly encouraged” by the actions aimed at solar and battery storage development.

“These are two of the fastest, most affordable tools we have to bring energy online and stabilize our grid,” McLeod said in a statement. “While taking some pragmatic steps to lower emissions and increase efficiencies in the near term with our existing fleet, New Jersey is continuing to lay the groundwork for a truly clean energy future.”

Tyler Durden Wed, 01/21/2026 - 20:05

Second Biggest Australian Pension Fund Trimming US Dollar Exposure

Second Biggest Australian Pension Fund Trimming US Dollar Exposure

It's not just the Danes who are virtue signaling their adherence to a dying globalist world order by loudly liquidating their tiny allocation of US Treasuries, which as Scott Bessent correctly pointed out they were already selling anyway and amount to a rounding error in terms of total US holdings...

... overnight Australia's second-biggest ​pension fund also said it is reducing its exposure to the US dollar through currency ‌hedging as falling interest rates and ongoing global volatility have investors around the world reassessing their U.S. allocations.

Andrew Fisher, Australian Retirement Trust's (ART) general manager of total portfolio management and resilience, told Reuters that the prospect of US rate cuts while some other major economies were expected to lift rates would weaken the dollar this ‌year. Financial markets have already priced in 50 basis points worth of interest rate ​by the Fed in 2026, whereas rates are expected to rise in Japan and Australia and remain steady in Europe.

ART has A$353 billion ($237.39 billion) of funds under management and is the second-largest fund in Australia's ‍A$4.5 trillion pension system, known as superannuation.

Fisher said while ART was not reducing its U.S stock holdings, it was increasing its currency hedging position to reduce exposure to a forecast weakening greenback.

"The U.S. dollar seems to be the ⁠one place where I think the U.S. administration is going to get what it wants, which ‍is a weaker dollar," Fisher told Reuters in an interview on Monday.

"They made it clear they want the dollar ‌to ‌weaken. It's hurting US competitiveness, and I think they're going to succeed."

Previously, almost all pension fund investors in U.S. equities would have very little currency hedging because the dollar was expected to rise on negative shocks.

A low-hedging strategy would insulate a fund because if the value of its U.S. stocks ⁠fell, it would be cushioned ⁠by the dollar also ​going down. ART holds about A$53 billion of U.S. stocks, according to the fund's figures.

"We're not going to change our allocation to U.S. equities, we're just going hedge more of the U.S. equities and unhedge more of the ‍other equities," Fisher said.

"Our Japanese exposure might be fully unhedged and our U.S. exposure might be much more hedged than it has been in the past to try and get that balance right," he said.

While the dollar traded ​near a six-week high last week, the currency has eased ‍this week against the safe-haven yen and Swiss franc after US President Donald Trump threatened additional tariffs on goods imported from European nations ​that oppose his planned takeover of Greenland.

Tyler Durden Wed, 01/21/2026 - 19:40

Waste Of The Day: Texas Southern Univ. Spending, Inventory In Shambles

Waste Of The Day: Texas Southern Univ. Spending, Inventory In Shambles

Authored by Jeremy Portnoy via RealClearInvestigations,

Topline: Texas Southern University has no idea where most of its inventory is located, ignored safeguards meant to prevent overspending, and reported inaccurate information to the Texas Comptroller, according to a state audit released Dec. 31. 

Key facts: University policy requires inventory to be physically counted every year, but a count has not happened since 2019, according to the audit.

Auditors randomly selected 60 pieces of property owned by TSU, and university employees were unable to locate 50 of them. 

Every piece of property must have a “custodian” responsible for its care. Half of the university’s property either had no custodian or had a custodian who no longer worked for TSU.

The university’s purchasing system was equally disastrous. Employees need signed approval before making purchases to ensure the school does not spend more than its budget allows. But auditors reviewed 60 random purchases and found that not a single one had approval.

Purchases over $25,000 must include a written contract, but 77% of a random sample of purchases had no contract. When contracts did exist, they could often only be located after “extensive research,” and 97% of them had incorrect information.

The school’s reported expenses were “significantly inflated” because school employees recorded many purchases twice in the university’s accounting software.

The university’s financial statements from 2023 and 2024 were completed months after the state deadline and contained “significant errors,” including misstating how much the school spent paying back bond debt.

In a written response, TSU President J.W. Crawford III agreed with all of the audit’s findings. 

Background: TSU is one of the nation’s largest public, Historically Black Colleges and Universities, or HBCUs. It received $111 million in state funding and $130 million in federal grants and contracts in fiscal year 2025. 

TSU had not been audited since 2006, according to Crawford.

Both the auditors and Crawford blamed some of the issues on staffing vacancies in warehouses and the Information Technology department.

Financial records support that claim. Payroll data obtained by Open the Books and university financial statements both show the school’s payroll expense decreased between 2019 and 2024 — a rarity for any college or public entity.  The nearby University of Texas at Austin, for example, increased its payroll by more than $500 million in the same timeframe.

Open the Books has not yet obtained Crawford’s salary. His predecessor, Lesia Crumpton-Young, made up to $434,000 in a single year.

Search all federal, state and local salaries and vendor spending with the world’s largest government spending database at OpenTheBooks.com. 

Critical quote: “The results of the State Auditor’s report released today on Texas Southern University are beyond disturbing,” Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick said in a statement. “The Governor, Speaker, and I have already taken action by putting a stop to any spending on any contracts other than ongoing university expenses to keep the school open. 

“It is my hope, for the sake of the students at the university, that TSU can continue. However, to do so, dramatic and permanent changes must occur immediately to comply with state standards.”

Patrick also directed the Texas Department of Public Safety to investigate any potential criminal wrongdoing at TSU.

Summary: Any entity receiving hundreds of millions of dollars of taxpayer funding should be able to track how the money is being spent.

The #WasteOfTheDay is brought to you by the forensic auditors at OpenTheBooks.com

Tyler Durden Wed, 01/21/2026 - 19:15

Operation Of Australia's Largest Coal Power Station Extended To 2029

Operation Of Australia's Largest Coal Power Station Extended To 2029

Authored by Rex Widerstrom via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

The 2,880-megawatt Eraring coal-fired power station will continue to operate until 2029, operator Origin Energy has announced.

Eraring coal-fired power station, the largest in Australia, on the shores of Lake Macquarie southeast of Newcastle in New South Wales, Australia. Nick Pitsas/CSIRO

The facility is the country’s largest power station by output and is situated on the banks of Lake Macquarie, north of Sydney in New South Wales (NSW).

In an announcement to the ASX (pdf), Origin said the move would reduce risks to system security, highlighted by the Australian Energy Market Operator (AEMO) in its recent Transition Plan for System Security.

That report warned that, in NSW alternative energy assets required to “maintain system security are not currently scheduled to be operational before the announced retirement date of Eraring Power Station.”

“We’ve taken the decision to extend Eraring’s operations after assessing a range of factors, including the needs of our customers, market conditions and the important role the plant plays in the NSW energy system,” Origin CEO Frank Calabria said.

“Good progress has been made on the delivery of new energy infrastructure, including major transmission works and projects like our large-scale battery at Eraring, but it has become clear Eraring Power Station will need to run for longer to support [a] secure and stable power supply.”

The decision is aimed at providing more time for the delivery of renewables, storage, and transmission projects, he said. It also reflected uncertainty about the reliability of Australia’s ageing coal and gas fleet.

The company originally planned to close it in 2025, then extended it to August 2027 after the NSW Labor government struck a $450 million risk-sharing deal for the ageing facility, which committed the state to covering a percentage of losses up to $225 million per year if given advance notice by Origin.

About half of Australia’s national electricity grid is powered by black coal-fired power stations such as Eraring.

Government Welcomes Extension

The state’s Minister for Energy Penny Sharpe welcomed the announcement in a statement.

“My number one job is keeping the lights on and putting downward pressure on power prices. NSW is making real progress in replacing ageing coal-fired power stations. Since the election, we have increased the amount of renewable energy capacity in operation by almost 70 percent. That’s equivalent to Eraring’s capacity,” Sharpe said.

“Current energy security projections show NSW is expected to have sufficient energy supply when Eraring closes in 2029, thanks to new renewable generation and storage coming online.

“The agreement reached with Origin in 2024 gets the balance right and has so far not cost NSW taxpayers a single dollar.”

The guarantee is due to expire in August 2027.

Extending Eraring’s life is not expected to affect Origin’s 2030 emissions reduction targets or its long-term ambition to achieve net zero by 2050, the company said.

Beyond 2029, Eraring will remain a part of the National Electricity Market thanks to its battery, the first stage of which commenced commercial operation in 2025, with the final stages expected to come online in the first quarter of 2027. Once all stages are complete, the battery will deliver 700MW, providing an average storage capacity of 4.5 hours.

The power station first started operating in 1984, and Origin paid $75 million to take it over when it was privatised in 2013.

Tyler Durden Wed, 01/21/2026 - 18:25

Oklo Upgraded At BofA On Meta Deal

Oklo Upgraded At BofA On Meta Deal

Bank of America upgraded Oklo from Neutral to Buy following Meta’s recent, massive nuclear deal. According to the BofA report (available to pro subs), Meta's agreement with the hyperscaler provides investors with “tangible evidence advanced nuclear is moving from concept to execution.”

Meta prepaid $25 million for Phase 1 of Oklo‘s nuclear campus construction in Ohio for approximately 150 MW of energy. The funding is expected to be used for fuel procurement, site preparation, and early development ahead of final PPAs.

With 16 reactors expected to come online between 2030 and 2036, this drives BofA’s 2036 targets to $5.9 billion in revenue (vs. $5.5 billion prior), 117 units (vs. 111 prior), and 6.7 GW deployed (vs. 6.3 GW prior), leading to a price target of $127, up from $111 prior.

BofA analyst Dimple Gosai, who covers US cleantech at the bank, highlights the sequencing of a ramp to 1.2 GW thanks to the Meta deal, which moves “Oklo‘s opportunity set from ‘conceptual’ to ‘actively financed’ development.”

The bank also expects longer-dated cashflow thanks to continued progress on fuel supply and licensing. Specifically for the Ohio nuclear campus, Phase 1 is projected at 150 MW from two reactors online in 2030/31, Phase 2 adding two more reactors in 2032/33, Phase 3 adding four reactors in 2033/34, and finally Phase 4 adding eight reactors in 2035/36.

BofA has yet to take into account any of the fuel recycling potential with regards to the mega-project announced for Tennessee. The campus in Tennessee is expected to include recycling and reprocessing facilities to convert used nuclear fuel from traditional reactors into fuel for Oklo‘s fast-spectrum Aurora reactors, as well as process plutonium for use in their Pluto reactor design. Pluto reactors are expected to be deployed at the recycling site in Tennessee as well.

Oklo also has multiple other projects, including the Air Force has in Alaska and likely many other hyperscaler deals on the horizon.

Not long ago, OpenAI boss Sam Altman left Oklo's board to preclude any conflicts of interest, hinting at a possible deal on the horizon with OpenAI.

The positive news still need to be counterbalanced with potential construction and operation headaches of these novel reactor designs. While it is not the first time the US has constructed sodium reactors, the time it takes to achieve operational proficiency and maintain availability greater than 90%, similar to the current commercial fleet, could take years or even decades.

More in the full note available to pro subs.

Tyler Durden Wed, 01/21/2026 - 18:00

Fraud Is 'Fundamental' Part Of Child Transgender Medical Field

Fraud Is 'Fundamental' Part Of Child Transgender Medical Field

Authored by Darlene McCormick Sanchez via The Epoch Times,

One of the architects of the Health and Human Services (HHS) review of medical interventions for pediatric gender dysphoria said in a recent interview that fraud is an integral part of the transgender medical field.

​Nearly a year after President Donald Trump signed an executive order to protect “children from chemical and surgical mutilation,” Leor Sapir, who assembled a team of experts to produce the HHS review, emphasized that doctors relying on unproven gender-affirming guidelines are misleading patients.

​Sapir, an HHS report author and senior fellow at the Manhattan Institute, told The Epoch Times there is no solid evidence that puberty blockers, hormones, or surgery benefit children who reject their sexual identity, but that evidence exists that these procedures can cause harm.

​The 409-page HHS report states that psychotherapy, rather than unproven medical interventions, has greater benefits for children with gender dysphoria, reinforcing the need for evidence-based approaches.

​“Fraud is not just a feature, or, I should say, it’s not just something that happens in this field. It’s almost fundamental to the field itself,” Sapir said during an interview with American Thought Leader host Jan Jekielek that aired Jan. 15.

​Sapir said that doctors and organizations often rely on guidelines from the World Professional Association for Transgender Health (WPATH), which he describes as an activist group that presents itself as a medical organization. The group is key in influencing current practice.

​WPATH doesn’t advocate for mental health assessments and helps make sure that the procedures are covered by insurance, he said.

​An Alabama lawsuit involving WPATH disclosed internal documents indicating that WPATH withheld negative findings about treatments for transitioning children, he added.

​Groups like the American Academy of Pediatrics, WPATH, and The Endocrine Society cite one another’s guidelines as evidence that the treatments are safe, he said.

​In part, support for medically transitioning children came about because it was framed as a civil rights matter, according to the report. Additionally, this led many in the medical community to neglect the evidence against it and to curtail debate.

​Medical organizations often formed specialized committees to recommend protocols for treating gender dysphoric children. For example, some committees focused on LGBT issues and, according to the report, members’ careers depend on supporting pediatric transitioning.

​The HHS report, titled “Treatment for Pediatric Gender Dysphoria: Review of Evidence and Best Practices,” was originally released in May 2025. While it received many positive peer reviews in November 2025, it also received backlash from those supporting medical intervention for gender dysphoria.

​Sapir noted that the HHS review is unique because it is the first to address the ethics of medically transitioning children and to critique the language that inaccurately describes the procedures.

​“It seems so intuitively obvious that this is ultimately an ethical debate,” he said.

​Ethical considerations include an examination of the risks and benefits of treatment and the idea of patient autonomy, which allows the patient to choose whether to have a procedure.

​The report situates medical ethics within a historical context, referencing the Hippocratic Oath and the principle of “do no harm.”

​One potential harm is that children with gender dysphoria often later identify as gay, so they are disproportionately impacted by transitioning.

“We know, based on research, that a significant portion of these kids, if not socially and medically transitioned, will actually come out to be gay later on in life,” Sapir said.

Medical ethics has shifted toward informed consent, strengthening protections for patients against unwanted medical interventions. But the doctor still has an obligation to protect and promote patient health, especially when it comes to children, according to the HHS report.

​“Patients don’t get to demand treatments from doctors. Doctors have a professional, ethical obligation to only prescribe things that are more likely than not to benefit their patients and not likely to harm them,” Sapir said. ​“But in the context of gender medicine, the principle of autonomy has been reinterpreted to mean the doctors have to give patients what they want.”

​The very idea that children, some as young as 8 or 9, are mature enough to understand the consequences of puberty blockers and medical transition is called into question in the report. Medical providers “often fail” to inform patients that there’s no strong evidence that the procedures benefit those with gender dysphoria.

The report noted that language has “distorted the clinical picture” in pediatric gender medicine. Therefore, doctors should use language that is accurate and not misleading.

​Terms such as “gender-affirming care” were also called into question by the report. The procedure of removing breasts in physically healthy females is referred to in euphemisms such as “gender-affirming chest surgery” or “top surgery” rather than a mastectomy.

Likewise, phrases such as “sex assigned at birth” used in the industry imply that sex is determined subjectively rather than biologically.

“The American Psychological Association style guide, for example, classifies ‘birth sex’ and ‘natal sex’ as ‘disparaging terms’” because they imply that sex cannot be changed, according to the report.

​The test used to determine if a child is transgender is to ask the child, the report says. Children know who they are, according to advocates of the gender-affirmation model.

​“There is a conscious, deliberate, systemic effort in the field of pediatric gender medicine to treat children, even children who are not even in puberty, as if they’re mature adults,” Sapir said.

Tyler Durden Wed, 01/21/2026 - 17:40

Trump Right About Arctic Security, NATO's Rutte Says

Trump Right About Arctic Security, NATO's Rutte Says

In what could have been the starting gun of Trump's de-escalation, NATO Secretary-General Mark Rutte said today at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, that the US President was right about security in the Arctic.

“When it comes to the Arctic, I think President Trump is right. Other leaders in NATO are right. We need to defend the Arctic,” the former Dutch prime minister said. “We know that the sea lanes are opening up.”

Rutte said that China and Russia were becoming increasingly active in the Arctic Circle, and acknowledged that this posed a problem for the alliance.

“There are eight countries bordering on the Arctic. Seven are members of NATO. That’s Finland, Sweden, Norway, Denmark, Iceland, Canada, and the U.S.,” Rutte said.

“And there’s only one country bordering on the Arctic outside NATO, and that’s Russia. And I would argue there is a ninth country, which is China, which is increasingly active in the Arctic region. So, President Trump and other leaders are right, we have to do more there, we have to protect the Arctic.”

Furthermore, as Guy Birchall reports for The Epoch Times, Rutte also praised Trump for upping the contributions from many NATO member states to the alliance’s budget.

“Do you really think that without Donald Trump, eight big economies in Europe, including Spain, Italy, and Belgium, Canada, by the way, also outside Europe, would have come to 2 percent in 2025 when they were only on 1.5 percent at the beginning of the year?” Rutte said.

“No way. Without Donald Trump, this would never have happened. They are all on 2 percent now.”

Rutte’s comments about NATO’s presence in the Arctic come as Trump’s stated ambition of annexing Greenland has driven a wedge between Washington and European allies.

Before departing for the summit, Trump expressed confidence that NATO and the United States would reach a deal on the Arctic island that benefits all parties.

“I think that we will work something out where NATO is going to be very happy and where we’re going to be very happy,” Trump said during a Jan. 20 White House press conference.

“We need it for national security and even world security. It’s very important.”

U.S. Vice President JD Vance and Second Lady Usha Vance tour the U.S. military's Pituffik Space Base in Greenland on March 28, 2025. Jim Watson/AP

During his speech in Davos, the president ruled out taking the island by force but remained forthright in his insistence that the United States must acquire the territory.

“People thought I would use force, but I don’t have to use force. I don’t want to use force. I won’t use force,” Trump said.

“We want a piece of ice for world protection, and they won’t give it. They have a choice: They can say yes, and we will be very appreciative, or you can say no, and we will remember.”

Trump also said that Denmark promised to spend “over $200 million to strengthen Greenland’s defenses” and that it has “spent less than 1 percent of that.”

He was referring to a 2019 commitment from the Danish government, made during his first presidency, when the idea of the United States taking control of the territory was first raised.

Copenhagen has not disputed that the implementation of that commitment has been slow.

Tyler Durden Wed, 01/21/2026 - 17:20

Twice Bitten, Thrice Shy: What Oil Majors Want Before Betting On Venezuela A Third Time

Twice Bitten, Thrice Shy: What Oil Majors Want Before Betting On Venezuela A Third Time

Authored by Kevin Stocklin via The Epoch Times,

President Donald Trump has encouraged American oil companies to reinvest $100 billion in Venezuela to spur energy production and to rescue Venezuelans from desperate poverty.

Oil companies, however, are taking stock of the decrepit state of Venezuela’s energy infrastructure after decades of communism, and seeing a number of critical impediments.

“We’re going to have our very large United States oil companies—the biggest anywhere in the world—go in, spend billions of dollars, fix the badly broken infrastructure,” Trump stated in a Jan. 11 press conference following a meeting with top oil executives.

Venezuela has the world’s largest known oil reserves, estimated by rating agency S&P at 300 billion barrels, which are located in a region along the Orinoco River called the Orinoco Belt. At its peak—and with investment and expertise from oil majors including Exxon Mobil, ConocoPhillips, Chevron, BP, Total, and Norway’s Statoil—Venezuela produced more than 3 million barrels per day and was America’s largest foreign supplier.

America’s gulf coast refineries were built to process the heavy sour crude from Venezuela, and they can refine it much more efficiently than the light crude produced from fracking. But trade with Venezuela slowed to a trickle after then-president Hugo Chavez seized the assets of western oil companies in 2007, leading to the imposition of U.S. sanctions. Since Venezuela’s wells and other equipment were nationalized, output collapsed by about 70 percent and is currently less than 1 million barrels per day, according to statistics website Worldometer.

Venezuela thus presents a massive opportunity for Western oil companies to rebuild what had once been a top global oil producer. But daunting problems remain.

“Commercially, the upside is long-life reserves, portfolio diversification, and service and infrastructure opportunities if the country becomes investable again,” Jason Isaac, CEO of the American Energy Institute, told The Epoch Times.

“But the investment case only works if companies can actually control operations, get paid, and move barrels transparently—otherwise the ‘gain’ is trapped capital and political risk.”

Venezuela Currently ‘Uninvestable’

On Jan. 9, Exxon Mobil CEO Darren Woods expressed little enthusiasm for an immediate return to Venezuela, stating in a meeting hosted by Trump at the White House that the country, in its current state, is “uninvestable.”

“We’ve had our assets seized there twice,” Woods said. “And so, you can imagine to re-enter a third time would require some pretty significant changes from what we’ve historically seen here and what is currently the state.”

In an aerial view, the Exxon Mobil Baytown Refinery is seen in Baytown, Texas, on Jan. 13, 2026. President Donald Trump has threatened to sideline Exxon Mobil from Venezuela's energy market after expressing that he "didn't like Exxon's response," while making a push for oil companies to begin investing there. Exxon remains interested and is prepared to send a team to assess the existing oil infrastructure. Brandon Bell/Getty Images

Patrick Pouyanne, CEO of Total, likewise said that he would consider investing in Venezuela again at some point, but it is “not high on my agenda.”

Venezuela first expropriated the assets of western oil companies in the 1970s and again in 2007. By contrast to many governments in the Middle East and Africa that had done the same, Venezuela refused to compensate oil companies for their losses, leading the companies to sue and win in U.S. and international courts, claiming damages of around $60 billion.

Oil companies will likely want these claims to be paid before putting new money into Venezuela, but the country has little means to do so. Oil production has dwindled to less than 1 million barrels per day and, even at that level, still comprise about two-thirds of the government’s entire budget. China has replaced the United States as the top importer of Venezuelan oil, currently buying an estimated 80 percent of it, but at a discount.

And while Venezuela faces tens of billions of dollars in claims from western oil companies, it is now indebted to China as well. According to the U.S.-China Economic and Security Review Commission, Chinese banks have at least $10 billion in outstanding loans to Venezuela.

Venezuelan Crude Expensive to Extract

Beyond these factors, there are also technical problems. Venezuela’s oil reserves, though abundant, are a particularly dense and sulfur-rich form of crude oil that requires a level of investment and expertise to extract and process that only the world’s largest companies can provide, experts say.

“Venezuela has very large reserves, but when we’re talking about the actual production of them, they’re very difficult to produce and very expensive to produce,” Kenny Stein, a policy expert at the Institute for Energy Research, told The Epoch Times.

Another issue for America’s oil companies is that the full extent of the damage to Venezuela’s infrastructure has yet to be assessed, and the cost of rebuilding it could go well beyond the $100 billion figure that has been estimated.

“The total investment required is not immediately clear, given the lack of transparency under the Chavez and Maduro regimes, but it is likely to be substantial and exceed initial estimates,” Ryan Yonk, senior fellow at the American Institute for Economic Research, told The Epoch Times. “Rebuilding the oil infrastructure is likely to be a long-term project spanning multiple years and potentially decades, rather than the short-term expectations some hold for rapid development and immediate effect.”

Experts say that equipment located in Venezuela has not only been neglected but pilfered as well.

“The infrastructure, the wells, the pipelines, the entire oil industry in Venezuela has been really stripped down to the bone and is barely functional,” Stein said. In addition to theft by government officials, he said, “employees of the state oil company have been stealing copper from their facilities to sell to feed their families.”

Oil companies will likely want government co-investment in some form to help pay for the reconstruction, Yonk said.

Another issue when deciding whether to invest in Venezuela is that Western oil companies must weigh it against the alternatives.

“They could go to Brazil or Guyana, or places in the United States, that are all less expensive to produce,” Stein said. “There would be faster production, they’re not as volatile, and you’re not as much at risk of losing everything.”

Aerial view of an oil well in eastern Monagas, in Maturin, Venezuela, on Feb. 13, 1998. Bertrand Parres/AFP via Getty Images

What It Will Take

For all these reasons, it will take significant changes for Venezuela to attract capital again, experts say.

“U.S. companies will not commit serious capital to Venezuela without a credible reset on rule of law,” Isaac said. “That means binding contract protections, enforceable dispute resolution, and a settlement framework for legacy expropriation and unpaid joint-venture debts.”

Oil companies will likely seek guarantees from the U.S. government that oil sanctions will not be reimposed, that whatever agreements they enter into will be honored, and that they can operate safely and repatriate whatever profits they may earn, he said.

“Without those conditions, any U.S. presence will stay limited to short-cycle, low-exposure activity,” Isaac said.

Exxon Mobil’s CEO stated that he is willing to take initial steps to help with Venezuela’s reconstruction “while these longer‑term issues are being worked.”

“We haven’t been in the country for almost 20 years,” Woods stated. “We think it’s absolutely critical in the short term that we get a technical team in place to assess the current state of the industry and the assets to understand what would be involved to help the people of Venezuela get production back on the market.”

If Exxon is invited by the Venezuelan regime and has security guarantees from the Trump administration, Woods said he is “ready to put a team on the ground.”

Chevron is the only U.S. oil major currently operating Venezuela, producing about 240,000 barrels per day in a joint venture with PDVSA, the country’s state-owned oil monopoly, though experts say much of that effort is simply to preserve the assets they already have in the Orinoco Belt.

“Chevron’s has continued to operate there, but basically doing the bare minimum to keep their wells from being ‘bricked,’” Stein said. “Because of the thickness and tar-like state of the oil, if you don’t keep it continually maintained and flowing at a minimum level, the well will be destroyed.”

Nonetheless, Chevron’s vice chairman Mark Nelson told Trump on Jan. 9 that he believed they could double their output in Venezuela immediately.

An incremental increase in Venezuela’s oil production is more likely than a rapid return to pre-Chavez levels, Isaac said, predicting that the country could reach approximately 1.3 million barrels per day within a couple years, and perhaps 2 million barrels per day within a decade.

President Donald Trump speaks during a meeting with US oil companies executives in the East Room of the White House in Washington, DC, on Jan. 9, 2026. Saul Loeb/AFP via Getty Images

Strategic and Economic Goals

Despite the hesitancy of oil majors to commit significant capital to Venezuela at this point, the Trump administration has stated its strategic interest in preventing China and other U.S. adversaries from stepping into the void.

During an interview with NBC’s Meet the Press, Secretary of State Marco Rubio said that Venezuela had become “a crossroads for the activities of all of our adversaries around the world.”

For Venezuelans, however, the riches of oil have been both a blessing and a curse.

Calling Venezuela “a case study in the perils of becoming a petrostate,” a 2018 study by the Council on Foreign Relations stated that “since it was discovered in the country in the 1920s, oil has taken Venezuela on an exhilarating but dangerous boom-and-bust ride that offers lessons for other resource-rich states.”

In what has been called “Dutch disease,” developing countries that suddenly get rich from the discovery of natural resources develop a singular dependence on those resources, leaving other sectors of the economy to languish while government corruption and theft proliferate, with little of the wealth ultimately going to benefit the citizens at large.

For this reason, some analysts say that the best solution for Venezuela is to establish a system of free markets, democratic traditions, stability, and the rule of law, similar to what Poland and Chile have done since emerging from authoritarian regimes. Key elements of Poland’s reforms included a legal system that protected property rights, political stability under a democratic system, privatization of state-owned companies, a stable currency, and a tax regime that allowed investors to earn a decent return.

“Under the ‘warm embrace of communism,’ [Poland] was an economic basket case,” the Committee to Unleash Prosperity, a nonprofit founded by free-market economists Arthur Laffer and Steve Moore, stated in an op-ed.

Having embraced democracy and free markets, Poland recently achieved GDP growth rates of about 4 percent per year, and is predicted to overtake the UK in GDP-per-capita by the end of this decade, they said.

Tyler Durden Wed, 01/21/2026 - 17:00

The Quiet Spread Of AI-Generated 'Brainrot' Across Social Media

The Quiet Spread Of AI-Generated 'Brainrot' Across Social Media

Authored by Jacob Burg via The Epoch Times,

Elephants drop-kicking crocodiles while breaking the laws of physics, bewildering deepfakes of politicians and deceased public figures, and seemingly animated children’s videos of Jesus fighting the Grinch: generative artificial intelligence (AI) is sweeping across online video platforms and may now account for a sizable portion of YouTube’s short-form video feed, recent research shows.

After being accused last year of causing users to end up in psychiatric wards and allegedly helping multiple depressed teenagers take their own lives, generative AI tools are also inspiring new genres of online content.

AI-generated images and clips were found in 21 percent of the 500 short-form videos screened in a study released last November by the video editing software company Kapwing, with some of the channels analyzed amassing millions of subscribers and billions of views.

Some, such as India-based channel Bandar Apna Dost, were estimated to generate millions of dollars in YouTube ad revenue annually. These channels are found worldwide, with those based in Spain and South Korea garnering the “most devoted viewerships,” according to the study.

“Generative AI tools have dramatically lowered the barrier to entry for video production,” Rohini Lakshané, an interdisciplinary technology researcher, told The Epoch Times.

“So, the channel can churn out massive amounts of content and maintain a high frequency of posting. Channels using these methods can flood recommendation feeds simply by volume, irrespective of intrinsic quality.”

Here’s what we know about “brainrot” and “AI slop,” what’s at stake for viewers and content creators, and why you might want to pay closer attention when browsing social media.

‘Brainrot’ and ‘AI Slop’

Kapwing determined that 33 percent of the videos it screened after creating a new account on YouTube appeared to have the hallmarks of “brainrot” content, which Oxford defines as “trivial or unchallenging” and considered to deteriorate a “person’s mental or intellectual state.”

Existing long before the advent of generative AI, “brainrot” includes memes, humor, nonsensical skits, videos of children or animals engaging in “silly” actions or behaviors, and other forms of content that minimally engage users intellectually or convey little or no meaning beyond randomness or absurdity.

Combining generative AI with “brainrot” characteristics gives rise to the emerging genre many refer to as “AI slop,” which Kapwing defines as “careless, low-quality content” generated with AI tools that is intended to “farm views and subscriptions or sway political content.”

By its definition, what content may be considered as “brainrot” or “low-quality” can vary from person to person. For example, one person might describe all short-form “comedy” videos as “brainrot,” while another might find them genuinely entertaining and choose a different label.

The same may be said about “AI slop,” as some content creators, such as Montreat College language professor T. Michael Halcomb, use generative AI tools as an extension of their own academic work.

Halcomb, who also parodies “AI slop” and “brainrot” with his student-led comedy club, told The Epoch Times that he uses AI tools to make short-form videos based on posts he writes on his blog, deploying the technology to create video clips, clone his voice for narration purposes, and generate text on the screen.

There’s a lot of overlap between users that maintain a human element while taking advantage of AI tools and those merely using AI to create what others would refer to as “slop” or mass-produced content aimed at farming views, he said.

“I do think the human element isn’t completely gone. It just allows humans to speed up things,” Halcomb said, adding that even some of the so-called “AI slop” channels such as Spain’s “Imperio de jesus,” which features AI-generated animations of Jesus fighting Satan and the Grinch, play into “shock humor” and absurdism—driving curiosity among viewers.

There’s also a “lore” element to many of these videos, as the channel above has repeated story tropes that build on previous videos, which Halcomb compared to “inside jokes” in comedy, allowing one video to lead to another, and so on.

Looking at the Bandar Apna Dost channel, which, according to its creators, features a “realistic monkey in hilarious, dramatic, and heart-touching human-style situations,” the videos utilize AI for everything from their visuals to background audio.

The videos are popular, Lakshané says, because they mimic scenes from popular Indian films and display “the trope of a hypermasculine male protagonist who commits illegal or abusive acts or commits superhuman feats, and, at times, has an outlandish amount of social or political power.”

“The videos in the channel are disjointed and do not follow a storyline or narrative. No prerequisite knowledge or context is required to watch the short videos. There are characters, such as one with a likeness of the Incredible Hulk—named Hulku—which gives the videos an appeal and broad demographic reach,” she said.

Other channels may use less overt AI, or AI harder to detect for some viewers, like a video found by The Epoch Times, which “looks” like a real safari video of an elephant protecting another from a crocodile.

But once viewers see the second elephant drop kick the crocodile more than 30 feet in a way that breaks the laws of physics, it becomes much clearer that the video was made with AI, even though its creator seemingly went to great lengths to make sure the OpenAI-made tool Sora’s watermark only appears on a single frame—three seconds in—on the eight-second video.

A screen displays examples of AI prompt-created videos, made with Xai’s Grok app in London on Jan. 12, 2026. Leon Neal/Getty Images

Risks of AI-Generated Videos

As with the example above, many AI videos are intentionally generated to look as lifelike as possible, which increases the risk of deception and misinformation online, some organizations say.

AARP, a nonprofit and advocacy group for Americans aged 50 and older, warned last month that “AI slop” videos are making it increasingly difficult for some users to “detect what is real.”

The organization noted ChatGPT creator OpenAI’s decision in October 2025 to block “disrespectful” AI-generated “deepfake” videos depicting the likeness of Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. in its Sora 2 video creation app.

Quickly generated “AI slop” deepfake videos also permeated online platforms throughout the 2024 presidential election, and the Brennan Center for Justice warned last March that AI videos could have serious impacts on future voting cycles.

Science researchers are worried this phenomenon may creep into medical information and educational videos, where there are “specific hazards to learning from purportedly educational videos made by AI without the use of human discretion,” according to a study released by the National Library of Medicine in November 2025.

That study screened 1,082 online videos in the “preclinical biomedical sciences” educational category and found that 5.3 percent appeared to be “AI-generated and low quality,” suggesting the technology is still in slow adoption among online medical information content, but that its proliferation may be slowly increasing.

Even in the absence of misinformation, the “AI slop” videos that are sweeping across YouTube and TikTok have psychological impacts on users, Jeff Burningham, a tech industry venture capitalist and author of “The Last Book Written by a Human: Becoming Wise in the Age of AI,” told The Epoch Times.

“I think it’s pretty probably self-evident as to why it’s becoming popular, and it’s not something that I or we as a collective society should be proud of,” he said.

“It preys on kind of our most base desires. And I think it’s an indication of dopamine over discernment … [and] engagement over insight.”

Burningham says in his book that the real danger with AI isn’t necessarily the technology itself, but the “atrophy of human attention and awareness.”

A woman holds a phone displaying the Youtube app, in this file photo, on Aug. 11, 2024. Oleksii Pydsosonnii/The Epoch Times

Results of Experiment

The Epoch Times created a new YouTube account using a new email address on a private web browser to prevent previous browser cookies from impacting the type or genre of videos first seen.

We then analyzed the first 300 short-form videos shown on YouTube after initially logging into the account and found that the vast majority—88 percent—had the characteristics of “brainrot,” with little or no meaning beyond the absurd, random, or attention-grabbing.

However, some of these videos fell into gray areas, particularly within the amorphous “comedy” genre, making it difficult to pin down exactly how many would fit the “brainrot” category, which Halcomb says is largely subjective.

In our analysis, only 8 percent of the first 300 videos seen on the new YouTube account appeared to be AI-generated, with some using AI-images, while others—like the elephant video and another that features a woman hiding in her car’s hatchback to escape a horde of wolves trying to attack her—appear to be fully AI-generated video clips.

We did not see videos from any of the channels mentioned in Kapwing’s study under its “Most Subscribed AI Slop YouTube Channels,” which may come down to location or other variables, particularly if previous browser cookies can influence which videos a new account sees on the platform.

Another possibility is that AI slop, even though it’s increasingly growing in popularity, is simply not yet outpacing the other forms of so-called “brainrot” that The Epoch Times did see in its experiment: meme videos, people performing skits in front of their cameras, and bizarre attempts at comedy that are otherwise filmed and edited by real people.

Even if AI-generated content explodes in prevalence as some predict, its rise may not be as apocalyptic as some fear as long as humanity can face this existential reckoning moment as an opportunity to evolve, Burningham said, describing AI technology as a “cosmic mirror to humanity.”

“A reflection can be a powerful thing, because you see yourself a little more clearly, and with that, you know additional clarity—you’re able to pivot or change. Now, will humans do this? I don’t know,” he said.

“It’s hard to be optimistic, but this is the opportunity that I think that AI allows us. These things thrive because right now, attention is cheap and it’s fragmented in a million different ways, and we’re exhausted. But my fear, obviously, and I think the danger of AI slop is when attention collapses, so does wisdom, so does memory, and so does meaning, and that’s a scary place for humanity.”

Tyler Durden Wed, 01/21/2026 - 16:20

Pope Leo Evaluating US Invitation To Join Trump's Gaza Board Of Peace

Pope Leo Evaluating US Invitation To Join Trump's Gaza Board Of Peace

Pope Leo XIV has been invited to join President Donald Trump’s "Board of Peace," according to a fresh Wednesday statement from the Vatican’s secretary of state. "We’ve also received this invitation and the pope received it and we are looking at what to do. We are researching and I believe it’s a question that demands a little time to be considered in order to give a response," the Vatican’s number two, Pietro Parolin, told journalists at an event in Rome.

So neither a yes or no has yet been given in response. The Vatican had throughout the 2-year long Gaza war constantly spotlighted the issue and called for immediate peace. But the Vatican could actually be "considering" the invitation.

via Associated Press

Leo has also been outspoken on the protection of Palestinian Christians, also after his predecessor Francis was known to phone Gaza City's lone Catholic Church each night in solidarity, when the strip was under constant bombardment from Israeli forces.

As the first American pope, he carried on Francis' theme of standing up for the downtrodden, and his very first Christmas sermon stated that God ​had "pitched his fragile tent" among the people of the world. "How, then, ‍can we not think of the tents in Gaza, exposed for weeks to rain, wind and cold?" he posed.

However, Leo has generally been less 'political' and more diplomatic than his predecessor. 

But this doesn't mean his American cardinals have been quiet on world events. According to The Washington Post this week:

Echoing concerns of Pope Leo XIV over a new era of unilateralism and warfare, the three highest-ranking U.S. Catholic archbishops on Monday said “the moral foundation for America’s actions in the world” has been thrown into question by a resurgence in the use or threat of military force, including in Venezuela and Greenland.

The archbishops, Cardinals Blase Cupich of Chicago, Robert McElroy of D.C. and Joseph Tobin of Newark, in a statement released Monday, amplified comments by Leo, the first U.S.-born pontiff, who earlier this month lamented the demise of multilateralism.

“In 2026 the United States has entered into the most profound and searing debate about the moral foundation for America’s actions in the world since the end of the Cold War,” the archbishops wrote. “The events in Venezuela, Ukraine and Greenland have raised basic questions about the use of military force and the meaning of peace.”

There are reports that some US Roman Catholic bishops have even said Catholic servicemembers could conscientiously object to carrying out orders to invade or occupy Greenland.

As for the Gaza board, invitations have been sent to a broad group of countries in Europe, the Middle East, and Asia, including US allies and key regional players. Already, countries and leaders as different and geographically distant as Hungary under Prime Minister Viktor Orban and Vietnamese Communist Party chief To Lam have accepted their invitations. Putin has also been invited.

It is shaping up to be a 'mini UN' of sorts, as the peace board plan calls for an international council to manage reconstruction financing, security coordination, and political cooperation in Gaza - all while working in cooperation with a Palestinian technocratic administration.

Yet there are other peculiar aspects. For example Bloomberg recently reported that the Trump administration is asking nations interested in holding a permanent seat on a proposed Gaza Strip "Board of Peace" to pledge at least $1 billion in funding. Otherwise they will just hold a three-year seat, according to some initial details. Would the Vatican contemplate this?

Tyler Durden Wed, 01/21/2026 - 15:40

Watch Live: President Trump's (Delayed) Interview With CNBC's Joe Kernen

Watch Live: President Trump's (Delayed) Interview With CNBC's Joe Kernen

President Trump will sit down for an interview with CNBC’s Joe Kernen in Davos, Switzerland on Wednesday.

Earlier, Trump gave a speech at the World Economic Forum where he touted the strength of the U.S. economy and criticized Europe, saying it "is not heading in the right direction."

Trump also doubled down on his desire to take control of mineral-rich Greenland, but said he wouldn’t use force to achieve this goal.

“People thought I would use force. I don’t have to use force. I don’t want to use force. I won’t use force,” Trump said in the highly anticipated address to the WEF.

The question is - will Trump refocus his attention on domestic matters - affordability - or keep going on the earlier more interventionist speech.

This will also be the first opportunity for President Trump to respond to the EU's decision to freeze the trade deal with the US... and unleash their ACI.

Watch live (due to start at 1300ET delayed start to 1400ET):

Tyler Durden Wed, 01/21/2026 - 15:10

US Slaps Down French Calls For NATO Drills In Greenland, Mocks Macron

US Slaps Down French Calls For NATO Drills In Greenland, Mocks Macron

Among the big and more notable quotes to come out of President Trump's Davos address is his statement that he "won't use force" to take over Greenland while calling for "immediate negotiations" to discuss the "acquisition" of the Arctic territory by the United States from Denmark.

"This enormous unsecured island is actually part of North America," Trump said before the World Economic Forum. Still, he asserted "That's our territory." He added: "The fact is, no nation or group of nations is in any position to be able to secure Greenland other than the United States. We're a great power, much greater than people even understand. I think they found that out two weeks ago in Venezuela."

via Reuters/India Today

Denmark has greeted the part of Trump's remarks wherein he said he won't use military force as "positive". Leading European powers are still trying their best to flex their might, however.

As French President Emmanuel Macron addressed the summit, donning his aviator shades, he called on NATO allies to conduct a military exercise in Greenland amid Trump's bellicose rhetoric related to potentially seizing the Danish territory..

"France calls for a NATO exercise in Greenland and is ready to contribute to it," Macron's office confirmed Wednesday just ahead of Trump's arrival and speech in Switzerland. 

It remains unclear whether Macron also has US military participation in mind, or whether this would be a purely European NATO thing. Since near the beginning of Trump's recently ramping up his rhetoric over Greenland, shortly on the heels of the Venezuela operation to overthrow Maduro, the Europeans have pursued an alternative strategy to divert Trump into assisting with joint Arctic monitoring. 

He's complained of inroads in the resource-rich region by Russian and China, and so Europe is seeking to satisfy Trump's call for Greenland to be a secure American outpost. EU leaders then hope he would eventually give up the idea of owning Greenland.

But Washington is seeing through this, with top US officials quickly pushing back against the idea of NATO drills there. Speaking on the sidelines of the WEF, US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent took a swipe at Macron:

He described as “inflammatory” statements on Tuesday by the French president, Emmanuel Macron, who said Europe preferred “respect to bullies” and “the rule of law to brutality”, and Ursula von der Leyen, president of the European Commission, who promised an “unflinching” tariff response.

“If this is all President Macron has to do when the French budget is in shambles, I would suggest he focuses on other things for the French people,” Bessent said. He urged leaders in Davos not to show “reflexive anger” and “bitterness”.

Already France along with a handful of other EU nations has dispatched a small military contingent to Greenland and has plans to send more sea, air and land forces. Even Canada is said to be mulling some kind of troop deployment.

As for the NATO secretary-general, the alliance's chief Mark Rutte kicked off the week by telling reporters that he does "not at all" see NATO as in crisis, brushing off much of the escalating Greenland back-and-forth.

"I think we are really working in the right direction," Rutte said - but we can imagine Putin and Kremlin officials are currently kicking back to enjoy the popcorn and the show, also as the Ukraine war has momentarily taken a back seat among Western officials.

Tyler Durden Wed, 01/21/2026 - 15:00

Von Der Leyen Hand-Wrings About "Raw Power" Under Trump After Venezuela Silence

Von Der Leyen Hand-Wrings About "Raw Power" Under Trump After Venezuela Silence

EU Commission President Ursula von der Leyen warned Wednesday before the European Parliament that the 27-member EU must accelerate efforts to strengthen both its economy and its defenses, as it confronts a shifting global order shaped by what she called "raw power."

She took the opportunity to caution Washington and President Trump over his Greenland ambitions, saying that tensions between supposed "allies" over Greenland risk strengthening the West's geopolitical rivals. Indeed, over in Davos, the Greenland question and US rhetoric has completely overshadowed efforts at furthering the Ukraine peace deal. But sadly truce efforts have in reality been going nowhere anyway.

"The shift in the international order is not only seismic, but it is permanent," she told lawmakers, presenting as a pressing example the "volatile situation" surrounding Greenland, Russia's ongoing attacks on Ukraine which is plunging it into darkness, as well as rising tensions in the Indo-Pacific.

via China Focus

"We will need a departure from Europe’s traditional caution," said the European Commission president. "We now live in a world defined by raw power - whether economic or military, technological or geopolitical. And while many of us may not like it, we must deal with the world as it is now."

Von der Leyen also called out President Trump's recent threat to impose tariffs on European allies as "simply wrong".

"If we are now plunging into a dangerous downward spiral between allies, this would only embolden the very adversaries we are both so committed to keeping out of the strategic landscape," she said. "We are at a crossroads" - but it remains that "Europe prefers dialogue and solutions - but we are fully prepared to act, if necessary, with unity, urgency and determination," she said.

While she and other EU elites are prattling on about this dubious concept called the 'ruled-based order' it must be remembered she and most of Europe were completely silent - and even seemed to give tacit approval for - the US invasion of Venezuela and overthrow of Nicolás Maduro.

According to one European-perspective report filed withing days after Maduro's ouster:

The EU watches from the sidelines as the crisis in Venezuela unfolds, following the U.S. military operation that captured the self-proclaimed president, not recognised by most world governments, Nicolas Maduro, and his wife, Cilia Flores. A blitz that reportedly claimed at least 80 victims in Caracas, including civilians and military personnel. The EU High Representative for Foreign Affairs, Kaja Kallas, called for “calm and restraint by all actors,” and reminded Washington that, as a member of the UN Security Council, it “has a particular responsibility” to uphold the principles of international law. 

The statement released by Kallas has the backing of 26 member states – Hungary opted out – and it is the first coordinated reaction of the EU bloc, almost 48 hours after the unprecedented attack ordered by Donald Trump against the Venezuelan leadership. Brussels has avoided an explicit condemnation of the US military incursion – only Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez has openly accused Washington of violating international law – and has preferred to emphasise the illegitimacy of Maduro, who has been in power in Caracas for over a decade and is responsible for a ferocious repression against the democratic opposition in the country. A risky balancing act, which once again exposes the EU to accusations of double standards.

This spectacle of von der Leyen now dramatically warning about how this menace of "raw power" is upending the international community and 'global order' is clearly absurd and hypocritical on its face, and is obviously empty of any real content other than the usual performative moral posturing for the consumption of her fellow EU elites.

Independent journalist Ben Norton agrees that "There is no end to the imperial hypocrisy of the European Union."

"They never abandoned colonialism; they just became junior partners in crime to the US empire," he adds, and continues: "Warmongering EU chief von der Leyen refuses to utter a word about Trump bombing Venezuela, kidnapping its president, and announcing an open-ended US colonial occupation to 'run' the country (and pillage its oil)."

"The craziest part of all is von der Leyen cynically pretends to care about international law and the UN Charter, which her masters in Washington just tore up and spat on," Norton concludes.

Tyler Durden Wed, 01/21/2026 - 14:25

Bessent Says Deutsche Bank CEO Called To Dismiss Research Note On US Assets

Bessent Says Deutsche Bank CEO Called To Dismiss Research Note On US Assets

US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, speaking at the World Economic Forum earlier today, said Deutsche Bank AG CEO Christian Sewing called him to disavow an analyst report from the bank that warned European investors could sell US assets amid the latest President Donald Trump-EU dispute over Greenland.

"We saw a six standard deviation move in Japanese bonds, which has spilled over to other markets, and I've been in touch with my Japanese economic colleagues, and I'm assured that they will take measures to stabilize that market and just so everyone knows that this notion that Europeans would be selling US assets came from a single analyst at Deutsche Bank. Of course, the fake news media led by the Financial Times amplified it, and the CEO of Deutsche Bank called to say that Deutsche Bank does not stand by that analyst report," Bessent told reporters at Davos.

The research note in question comes from DB's chief forex strategist, George Saravelos, who told clients on Sunday that Europe held approximately $8 trillion of US equities and bonds, making it America's largest creditor and underlining Washington's reliance on foreign capital to finance deficits.

"We spent most of last year arguing that for all its military and economic strength, the US has one key weakness: it relies on others to pay its bills via large external deficits. Europe, on the other hand, is America's largest lender," Saravelos wrote.

Saravelos did not predict a sell-off but warned that rising geopolitical tensions could force some European investors to rebalance away from the dollar, citing past repatriation by the Danish pension fund.

Headline yesterday...

"In an environment where the geoeconomic stability of the Western alliance is being disrupted existentially, it is not clear why Europeans would be as willing to play this part . . . With [US dollar] exposure still very elevated across Europe, developments over the last few days have the potential to further encourage dollar rebalancing," he said.

We cited Bloomberg macro strategist Simon White, who noted earlier: "Any potential threat by Europe to sell its Treasuries in retaliation for President Donald Trump's aim to annex Greenland is likely to be empty."

Read White's note here.

Tyler Durden Wed, 01/21/2026 - 13:50

Appalachian NatGas Output Faces "Intense Losses" As Arctic Blast Drives Power Grid Risk Higher

Appalachian NatGas Output Faces "Intense Losses" As Arctic Blast Drives Power Grid Risk Higher

The Lower 48 has entered the depths of Northern Hemisphere winter. A series of Arctic cold blasts, combined with fears of a 1996-style blizzard stretching from Texas through the Mid-Atlantic and into the Northeast, has sent U.S. natural gas futures quite literally vertical, marking the largest weekly spike on record (that's if gains hold through Friday).

But the next focus now turns to Appalachian Basin gas production, which sits at the center of severe winter reliability risk just as demand surges across the eastern half of the country.

Criterion Research's James Bevan, vice president of research, has drawn our attention to freeze-off risks across the critical gas production hubs in the Appalachian region. This area is driven by the Marcellus Shale and Utica Shale, which produce roughly one-third of total U.S. NatGas.

Bevan explains:

The Appalachian production basin is poised for intense losses with the incoming winter storm. As volumes stand today at 35.5 Bcf/d, they have regained some of the last few days of freeze off losses but they are far shy of recent highs closer to 37 Bcf/d.

We should see some more upwards movement in the next 2–3 days before the next round of cold hammers the region.

Freeze offs are going to happen again by the weekend. It's just a matter of how much and how long those impact supply.

Winter Storm Elliott in December 2022 pushed Pittburgh to overnight lows of -3.7F at the peak cold that weekend, and production was crushed as a result.

Winter Storm Elliott in December 2022 had a massive impact on regional production.  As regional temps fell into the single digits, observed production nominations declined 26% at their lowest to a minimal 25.2 Bcf/d.

We overlaid the Pittsburgh, PA low temperatures during Winter Storm Elliott (2022) with the coming cold shot, and the 1/30 cold event has similar overnight lows on 1/23-1/24.  However, the cold lingers long after that versus the rapid warming seen during Elliot that propelled averages back into the 40-50F range within a week.

Appalachian gas production is going to fall substantially over the weekend, and that could push it to 30 Bcf/d or lower depending on what infrastructure is impacted during the event.

The screenshot from our Mapping Analytics Platform below shows all production meters in the region (green dots) and processing plants (pink dots) — and the key item to watch is where winter precipitation hits and where the power outages hit.  Those two factors will drive how bad production losses end up

The MAP Analytics tool also lets you dig into specific states and pipelines, isolate what their production receipts looked like during specific events and times like Winter Storm Elliott or other deep freezes.

Review note from earlier:

Our risk assessment suggests that the combination of dangerously cold air and a major winter storm could cascade into a severe power grid risk. Freeze-offs and power outages across the Appalachian region could materially disrupt NatGas flows to power plants at the exact moment demand is peaking.  

Recall Winter Storm Uri in 2021, when extreme cold paralyzed the NatGas supply and collapsed the ERCOT grid in Texas for a week. A scenario like that could be in play in parts of the eastern US, regions where power grids are already tight because of bad 'green' energy policies colliding with the era of data centers.

Tyler Durden Wed, 01/21/2026 - 13:35

Stellar 20Y Auction Stops Through With Near Record Bid To Cover, Record Directs

Stellar 20Y Auction Stops Through With Near Record Bid To Cover, Record Directs

In a week when global yields have exploded higher following the historic rout in Japan's bond market, many were nervous about the outcome of today's 20Y Treasury auction. In retrospect, they had no reason to be worried: the auction closed with flying colors amid solid demand. 

The high yield of today's sale of $13BN in 20Y paper was 4.846%, up from 4.798% a month ago and the highest since August; it also stopped through the When Issued 4.856% by 1bps , the biggest stop through since October, and also the 6th stop in the past 7 auctions.

More impressive still, the bid to cover was 2.86, up from 2.67 in December and the second highest on record (only June 2023 was higher).

The internals were a touch softer with Indirects awarded 64.72%, down from 65.19%, but above the six auction average of 63.5%. And with Directs taking 29.1%, tied for the highest on record, Dealers were left with just 6.2%, one of the six year history of the auction.

Overall, this was a stellar 20Y auction, and one which pushed yields in the secondary market slightly lower after news of the break, although with many other factors determining yields (Japan, Greenland, earnings), don't expect the auction's impact on the broader market to last.

Tyler Durden Wed, 01/21/2026 - 13:29

The Stock Market Isn't A Market Anymore - It's A Political Control Mechanism

The Stock Market Isn't A Market Anymore - It's A Political Control Mechanism

Authored by Nick Giambruno via InternationalMan.com,

It has become increasingly clear to me that the stock market is no longer a stock market in the traditional sense.

Its primary purpose was once straightforward: a venue where companies could raise capital by selling shares to the public, and where investors could freely buy and sell those shares among themselves.

Today, the market still performs that function — but it has been far overshadowed by three larger, unofficial roles that have become existential to social and political stability:

  1. Liquidity Sponge: All the trillions in newly created currency units have to go somewhere. Better to have them chasing stocks than bidding up the price of groceries.

  2. De Facto Savings Account: Most people treat their brokerage account as if it were a savings account. Their financial futures depend on the stock market continuing to rise. But putting money into the stock market is not saving — it’s investing, and that’s a very different thing. The rapid debasement of fiat currency has destroyed savings for the average person, forcing them into riskier assets like stocks in a desperate attempt to outpace inflation.

  3. Crucial Tax Revenue: Taxes on capital gains, dividends, corporate profits, and other market-related activity have become an essential pillar of government funding.

As the failure of DOGE — the most serious attempt to cut federal spending in most people’s lifetimes — demonstrated, it’s politically impossible to even slow the growth rate of federal spending, let alone cut it. It doesn’t matter which party is in office; they’re all headed in the same direction. It’s like riding a runaway train with no brakes.

Issuing debt and then printing money to buy that debt remains one of the primary ways this out-of-control spending is financed.

All those new currency units need an outlet.

If people lose interest in the stock market because it has declined, those freshly created dollars will start flowing elsewhere, bidding up the prices of housing, food, and other basic necessities, which could trigger real social upheaval.

Another reason the government cannot allow the stock market to fall is that it would devastate retirement savings and infuriate the most politically active demographic.

It’s a near-guaranteed way to lose the next election.

A third reason is fiscal. A declining market would slash hundreds of billions in federal revenue from taxes on capital gains, dividends, corporate profits, and other market-linked activity. That shortfall would further explode the deficit, which would then need to be financed by even more borrowing and even more money printing, compounding the problem.

This is why, in short, the political establishment cannot tolerate a sustained downturn in the stock market. It would unleash intense social and political instability that could bring down the entire system.

And this is also why the stock market is no longer primarily a stock market in the traditional sense. It has become a mechanism that the political establishment relies on to maintain control.

This is the backdrop behind today’s absurd valuation metrics.

The S&P 500’s Price-to-Earnings (P/E) and CAPE (Cyclically Adjusted P/E) ratios are near historical highs, while Free Cash Flow Yield and Dividend Yield are near historical lows.

Meanwhile, Market Cap to GDP (the Buffett Indicator) sits at a record high. It measures the total value of the US stock market relative to US GDP. Today, that ratio stands at roughly 221% — far exceeding prior peaks of 139% at the height of the dot-com bubble in 2000 and 106% at the peak of the housing bubble in 2007.

These are just a few examples. Nearly every fundamental measure of valuation is at or near all-time highs — and still climbing.

This highlights the biggest challenge with investing today: rampant money printing by central banks has distorted financial markets like never before, rendering traditional fundamental analysis far less effective. It’s like using a measuring stick where the length of a centimeter keeps changing.

As a result, finding high-quality businesses at reasonable valuations through Graham-and-Dodd-style securities analysis is becoming increasingly difficult, if not impossible.

You would be mistaken to believe today’s insane valuations reflect a voluntary free market of rational buyers and sellers operating with honest money. What we are witnessing instead is the financial equivalent of a carnival fun house — a distorted, warped mirror shaped by an ever-increasing supply of fake money.

Many are understandably confused because today’s stock market valuations don’t make financial sense. But what they overlook is that these valuations do make political sense — and political concerns will continue to trump fundamentals as long as politicians control the money printer.

The financial fun house illusions will persist, and they will become even more absurd.

To distill it down to its most concise form: the US government can either let the stock market decline and watch the whole house of cards come tumbling down, or continue to goose it with easy money. It’s not difficult to predict which option they’ll choose.

That is why, if we do see a stock market decline, I do not expect it to be prolonged. In the past 26 years, the only extended downturns were the dot-com bust and the 2008 financial crisis. Every other pullback — including the 2020 Covid collapse — was so brief that if you’d taken a long vacation, you might have missed it entirely. That’s because at the first sign of trouble, the Federal Reserve stands ready to create as many currency units as necessary to prop up the system.

I expect this dynamic to persist. If another downturn is coming, I wouldn’t expect it to last very long.

The far more likely outcome is that we’ll continue to experience a melt-up (in nominal terms) until they destroy the currency.

Ludwig von Mises, the godfather of free-market Austrian economics, summed up the US government’s dilemma:

“There is no means of avoiding the final collapse of a boom brought about by credit expansion.

The alternative is only whether the crisis should come sooner as the result of a voluntary abandonment of further credit expansion, or later as a final and total catastrophe of the currency system involved.”

The US government will not voluntarily “abandon credit expansion,” as Mises puts it, because Washington is dependent on issuing increasing amounts of debt — which the Fed buys with dollars it creates out of thin air — to pay for the ever-growing costs of Social Security, national defense, welfare, and interest on the federal debt.

That means their only choice is to debase the US dollar by ever-increasing amounts until, as Mises puts it, the “final and total catastrophe of the currency system involved.”

It’s like a drug addict who needs to keep raising his dose to get the same effect… until he dies of an overdose.

Could that happen in 2026?

I think it’s a growing possibility, but not the most likely outcome. I believe it’s more likely the melt-up continues.

My primary mission at Financial Underground: SPECULATOR is to put together the pieces to reveal the true Big Picture and get positioned in unstoppable investment trends ahead of the crowd with smart speculations.

I’m more interested in getting the Big Picture right than gambling on short-term trades in rigged markets.

In my latest free PDF report, The Most Dangerous Economic Crisis in 100 Years… the Top 3 Strategies You Need Right Now, I break it all down, explore what’s in store, and determine the best ways to get positioned for profits amid what promises to be a tumultuous year.

Click here to download the free PDF now.

Tyler Durden Wed, 01/21/2026 - 13:15

Walz, Ellison, Frey's Offices Served Grand Jury Subpoenas

Walz, Ellison, Frey's Offices Served Grand Jury Subpoenas

Authored by Debra Heine via American Greatness,

The Department of Justice on Tuesday served grand jury subpoenas to five Democrat-controlled government offices in Minnesota, including Gov. Tim Walz’s office, Attorney General Keith Ellison’s office, and Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey’s office, according to Fox News. 

The subpoenas are part of a federal investigation into alleged conspiracy to obstruct or impede federal law enforcement in the state.

The FBI is seeking records and communications related to Democrat officials’ responses to federal immigration enforcement actions.

Approximately 3,000 federal agents are currently deployed in Minnesota, as part of an immigration operation dubbed “Operation Metro Surge.” The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) announced on Monday that the operation has resulted in the arrests of 3,000 criminal illegal aliens, “including vicious murderers, rapists, child pedophiles, and incredibly dangerous individuals.”

However, the law enforcement effort has been hampered at every turn by highly trained and coordinated anti-ICE militants in what Trump administration officials have called an “insurgency,” and “domestic terrorism.”

“Mayor Jacob Frey, Governor Tim Walz, and Attorney General Keith Ellison have deliberately, willfully and purposefully incited this violent insurgency against Immigration and Customs Enforcement, and against Border Patrol, top White House advisor Stephen Miller said during appearance on Fox News’ Ingraham Angle, last week.

Miller pointed out that the insurgents routinely disrupt operations by tracking ICE vehicles through spotters and blocking them.

“Then they dox ICE officers. They follow them home, they follow them to where they sleep at night,” he said.

“It’s a sophisticated insurgency involving a large number of radicalized extremist, violent leftwing operators stoked by the Democrat party,” Miller declared.

Their reckless tactics resulted in the fatal shooting of anti-ICE agitator Renee Good by an ICE officer on January 7, which sparked more violent riots and calls from the Democrat state leaders for ICE to leave the state.

Walz, Frey, and Ellison have all publicly denounced the federal presence, with Ellison filing a lawsuit calling it an unconstitutional “federal invasion.”

Frey’s office has been called to appear at the U.S. federal courthouse on Feb. 3, according to FOX 9.

In a statement, Frey said:

“When the federal government weaponizes its power to try to intimidate local leaders for doing their jobs, every American should be concerned. We shouldn’t have to live in a country where people fear that federal law enforcement will be used to play politics or crack down on local voices they disagree with. In Minneapolis, we won’t be afraid. We know the difference between right and wrong, and, as Mayor, I’ll continue doing the job I was elected to do: keeping our community safe and standing up for our values.”

Gov. Walz released the following statement on social media, calling the DOJ investigation a “partisan distraction.”

Keith Ellison on Tuesday released a statement declaring his intention of staying in the race for Minnesota’s attorney general “as the federal government targets Minnesota.”

Tyler Durden Wed, 01/21/2026 - 11:40

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