Zerohedge

As part of the ongoing ceasefire deal Israeli troops have withdrawn from the militarized zone that cut Gaza in half, called the Netzarim Corridor, and have been removed to the enclave’s eastern border, Al-Jazeera has reported. It has long commonly been called “the death zone”.

The result is that for the first time in well over a year Palestinians can freely cross between the north and south of Gaza. The corridor stretched the Mediterranean Sea, and videos show large groups of people returning to their largely destroyed communities.

Israel’s military has described that troops were “implementing the agreement” to leave the corridor in order to facilitate the return of hundreds of thousands of Palestinians.

Israeli sources told the NY Times that IDF troops have already exited the Netzarim Corridor by Sunday morning. The day prior, Hamas had released three more emaciated-looking hostages. 

Hamas has declared the IDF withdrawal, which was agreed to as part of the 42-day first phase of the ceasefire, a “a victory for the will of our people, a crowning achievement for the steadfastness and heroism of our valiant resistance, and a confirmation of the failure of the goals of the terrorist aggression.”

The deal next stipulates that on day 50 of the ceasefire Israel is required to withdraw from the Philadelphi Corridor.

Since major Israeli ground operations began in the wake of Oct.7, Israel has sought to order all residents of northern Gaza to flee south. However some 400,000 defied these orders and remained in their communities in the north, amid heavy battles.

“We endured famine, thirst, bombings, fear, everything. We lived among corpses, under ruins, eating food that wasn’t fit for animals. But we never left northern Gaza,” one eyewitness, Saaed Salem, told The Guardian. 

“Indescribable,” says journalist Hassan Aslih.

Scenes of extensive destruction have emerged from the Netzarim Corridor in Gaza following the withdrawal of Israeli forces this morning. pic.twitter.com/pGbjfzYEo4

— The Cradle (@TheCradleMedia) February 9, 2025

“Each time the Israeli army ordered an evacuation before a ground invasion, I moved only to a nearby neighborhood. And as soon as the invasion ended, I was the first to return,” he said.

Meanwhile, Trump has continued pressuring Egypt and Jordan to take in the Gaza Strip’s one million plus Palestinians. But the reality is that it will simply be a non-starter and practically impossible, without Arab support. The Arabs in turn have blasted this as brazen and open ethnic cleansing campaign of historic and sovereign territory. The United Nation has also issued such condemnations.

By Peter Tchir of Academy Securities

Data, “Rules” & Messiness

It is difficult to believe that the inauguration was only 2 weeks ago, given the fast and furious pace of executive orders and headlines. DOGE has been even more “prolific” in terms of generating headlines than I would have ever guessed, and I already thought it would be impactful. It is going to be interesting.

But that takes us away from a few key topics for today.

Data

If you thought that we were going to start with jobs data, you are mistaken. Today, “inflation expectations” deserve some attention. Right around 10am ET Friday, the stock market started to decline. Until that moment, it had done fairly well even as yields increased on the back of the jobs report. Then out came the University of Michigan CONsumer CONfidence data, showing 1-year inflation expectations jumping from 3.3% to 4.3%! This was lucky for us, as we had pointed out in our NFP Instant Reaction – What to Do With Data You Don’t Trust that we were moderately bearish risk assets. Consumer inflation expectations were not on my bingo card of what could turn stocks, so I guess that we can classify that under “better lucky than smart.” We should just run with it, but we cannot help ourselves. We have never fully understood:

• Why does the Fed place so much weight on inflation expectations, particularly from survey data? From people who aren’t experts?
• Not saying that “experts” have all the answers, but do these individuals really have precise, realistic estimates in mind? Maybe the options should be high, above average, average, below average, and very low? I’m hesitant to put a specific number on inflation for the next year and I spend a LOT of time thinking about it.
  • For the first time in my life, I was motivated to go to their site and see what it takes to become a respondent. But with my VPN turned on during my flight from San Diego (where Academy just hosted a great Geopolitical Summit), I couldn’t access the site. But it is on my “to do” list now.
• But this is the real kicker!

• I have no idea how UMich comes up with an average of 4.3. Nor do I really care. Not just for the reasons listed earlier, but also the fact that Republicans are expecting 0 and Democrats are looking for 5% seems insane. It is “almost” like Republicans put in low numbers, hoping the Fed sees and cuts rates (or they just believe in DOGE and the president). It is also “almost” like Democrats put in high numbers, hoping the Fed sees and doesn’t cut rates (or they don’t believe in DOGE and the president’s policies). I understand that political views could influence inflation expectations, but this seems extreme!

Since the inflation expectations data helped trigger the risk asset sell-off that I was leaning towards, I should be happy, but it seems so ridiculous that it needed to be highlighted!

“Rules”

Speaking of things so ridiculous that they need to be highlighted, let’s look at some economic “rules.”

In physics, what we consider rules are termed laws. But for most people, rules are a set of “things” that need to be followed. Whether they are laws or axioms, they are things that are clear and explicitly define and control actions. On the other hand, conjectures, educated guesses, and “rules of thumb” are general guidelines that often work or point you in the right direction. But by no means are they immutable rules that must be followed.

So why do economists insist on terming certain things rules that are really conjectures? Probably because it sounds better, especially if you want people to believe that they work. Or maybe it just makes it easier to win prestigious economic awards?

But we revisit this subject today, not to focus on how inaccurate it is to call many of these things rules, but to highlight that the so-called rules definitively don’t work when they are based on inaccurate data!

Let’s look at the Sahm Rule which came to prominence this summer. It predicts that when relatively rapid changes in the unemployment rate occur, a recession will follow. I was too lazy to look up the exact definition (airline wi-fi, limitations of working on a laptop, lack of interest), but it is something like when you get a 0.5% increase from high to low (using a 3-month average) within 6 months, we get a recession. Many claimed it happened this summer. Some, I think, argued that with rounding, it didn’t occur. But NONE OF THAT MATTERS! We just learned on Friday that the BLS said there were 2 MILLION more workers in the labor force last year than previously thought! A big enough number, that if we knew in real-time, would likely have dramatically changed all of the unemployment rate data that not only triggered things like the Sahm Rule, but also probably affected monetary policy!

*POWELL: QCEW REPORT SUGGESTS PAYROLLS MAY BE REVISED DOWN

Oh no, the Fed was relying on doctored and made up government data meant to boost Biden’s reputation and to confuse the Fed?

Unpossible

— zerohedge (@zerohedge) September 18, 2024

And let’s not even get started on things like the Taylor Rule or anything that depends on R*.

GDP – a somewhat wild guess that gets amended, often significantly.

Inflation, time and again, seems to defy what we live and breathe. With hedonics, measurement issues, and well-known issues (like the lag on OER), it is difficult to take it as seriously as we are expected to (measured to 1 or 2 decimal places).

So, basing “rules” on things where the data is unlikely to be accurate is bad enough, and then layer in the risk of treating something as a rule, rather than a decent theory, and we are ripe for more policy mistakes (yes, I believe these issues contributed to transitory, etc.). Let’s not even get started on R* or the neutral rate.

If this rant seems at all familiar, it is because we covered it last month in Jobs and AI. Maybe I’m motivated to hammer this home because I’m actually hopeful that there is the possibility of achieving some change?

Whether or not we like any, all, or none of the things this administration is doing, they do seem open to change.

If we could get better, more accurate, and timely data, we should be able to make better decisions.

That would reduce the risk of policy error, poor business decisions, etc., which would be great and is why I think it should be a priority for the government to revisit – especially in this day and age where almost everything is stored electronically, updated in real-time, and we have the ability to harness AI like we’ve never had before!

Elon, if you read this, please think about it! Wouldn’t you want better, more accurate, and more timely information in your decision making?

Messiness

Reciprocal Tariffs came up on Friday, adding to the problems stocks and bonds were facing. This is very much in line with my current concerns and the view that this year will be messy, but manageable.

• The market seems to have settled on the view that these are all just “negotiating” ploys. That has led to muted or short-lived market reactions. While we were fully on board with fading last weekend’s tariff war (kind of comical to write that sentence), we are not so comfortable fading tariffs now.
  • Both Canada and Mexico got 30-day reprieves (to some extent) just for agreeing to do what they had already been planning to do on some level. Small win for the president, but not overwhelming. In the case of Canada, I expect the president to decide that it wasn’t enough, and he needs more tariffs. I think that is a mistake for many of the reasons (regarding supply chains) listed last weekend in The New Trump Tariffs. The complexity of existing agreements and the efficiencies built into the supply chain will be disrupted, causing more harm than good for both countries.
  • There are many in the administration (presumably based on UMich responses) that like the idea of getting more and more revenue from tariffs (in order to cut taxes). I cannot say that I completely disagree with that view, but it could be taken to extremes.
  • You can rattle the cage (so to speak) so often before the people inside that cage start making some plans of their own. Tariff uncertainty, even if intended to be a bargaining tool, could turn into tariffs depending on the responses, but could also cause changes to supply chains as companies get tired of the risk. If you assume, as I do, that supply chains are fairly optimized to be efficient, changes (for whatever reason) will be problematic (with inflation being the first potential issue).

Expect more noise on tariffs as the market has become too complacent, and I think that it is now far more likely to face a downside rather than an upside surprise from “negotiations.” A different view than I had last weekend, but things move fast in 2025!

Crypto

We now, apparently, have a sovereign wealth fund (more on that in the future). We have a “Crypto Czar” who gave a speech surrounded by crypto supporters. We have multiple states trying to pass some sort of crypto reserve (no idea why, other than it is popular and probably attracts some nice campaign promises), yet as of the time that we are writing this, Bitcoin is “only” at $96k.

That seems odd to me. Never has there been so much public support, but so much has been priced in that it is difficult for it to go higher. Maybe, also, on the down days, we realize that because it is hard enough to put a price on things that in theory we know how to value (stocks and bonds), it is nearly impossible to figure out a “fair value” for a bunch of 1s and 0s? The Rise and Fall, or more like the Meteoric Rise and Plummet of meme coins, might also be making some wonder about the validity of the “store of value” nature of this “scarce asset?”

When you get positive headline after positive headline and don’t get the response that you expect, it is time to get nervous.

Bottom Line

Look for moderately higher yields. Shorts have been squeezed. This market, which seems to rapidly oscillate between overbought and oversold, appears to be overbought again. Expect a lot more “cost savings” headlines from DOGE, especially as they start looking at big programs (like Medicare and the Defense Budget). However, it won’t be enough to offset spending, tax cuts (the deficit will continue to rise), or the very real risk that supply chains will be less efficient (due to tariffs or the response from tariff noise) creating inflation pressures (for Democrats, Republicans, and Independents, alike). Still targeting 4.8% to 5% on 10s with 2s/10s getting to at least 50, with 75 as a longer-term target. Bessent does seem focused on getting 10s down, but that might be far easier said than done, especially given the current policy priorities.

On equities, look for some overall weakness in U.S. markets. Expect value and equal weighted indices to outperform market weighted indices. Be wary of small caps. As much as I’d like to include small caps in my list of outperformers, they seem more likely to bear the brunt of tariffs and policy mistakes than large companies. Just above 5,800 on the S&P 500 is my target, with risk of a big move to the downside if markets decide we’ve been too optimistic about what can be done quickly. Longer term I’m optimistic, but I don’t like the overall market right now (especially since I don’t think yields/the Fed will be helpful).

Look for foreign markets to outperform the U.S. (positioning is so tilted the other way, that it won’t take much to get this going). Especially if the dollar continues to increase on the back of tariffs.

I don’t like commodities themselves, but I do like the commodity producers and those companies that play an important role in the extraction and processing of commodities!

For the first time in what seems like eons (I’m pretty sure it has been shorter than that) I’m leaning towards being bearish credit spreads. Last time we were bearish on corporate credit, this time it is on spreads (in addition to overall yields).

• IG is tight. We all know that, but with all the uncertainty, it could be difficult to maintain current levels of tightness. A strong dollar may hurt profitability at some large global corporations. If spreads weren’t so tight, not a big deal, but they may need to widen a touch on that. If M&A is returning (part of our thesis), that tends to be negative for IG as those are the companies that can be levered up. Not thinking a big move, but time for some caution.
• HY is more susceptible than IG. If I’m getting a bit worried about small caps, I have to worry a bit about high yield. Though there seems to be an entire cottage industry dedicated to shorting high yield, so any damage to the market should be small.

Good luck and hopefully I’m not the only one who already feels like this has been a long year! No shortage of things to think about, to react to, to anticipate, and to do!

While Americans are getting ready for the 59th Super Bowl, the rest of the world isn’t as fussed about what is arguably the biggest overall spectacle in the world of sports. 

With all the headlines surrounding the Super Bowl and the show that comes with it, Statista’s Felix Richter notes that it’s easy to overestimate the global appeal of the biggest game in (American) football.

Speaking of football, soccer, i.e. the proper kind of football from a European perspective, far exceeds the Super Bowl in terms of global interest. The FIFA World Cup Final, played every four years to culminate a month-long tournament of 32 nations, really is the biggest game in the world, regularly reaching more than a billion people across the globe.

 

You will find more infographics at Statista

According to FIFA, the 2022 World Cup Final between Argentina and France reached an average live audience of 571 million viewers across the globe, with more than 1.4 billion people watching at least one minute of the 120-minute thriller live. 

The 2024 Super Bowl pales in comparison, despite reaching new viewing records both domestically and internationally. 

According to Nielsen, Super Bowl LVIII drew an average audience of 123.7 million viewers in the U.S. plus a total international audience of 62.5 million.

Over the past decade, Super Bowl viewership has experienced fluctuations. 

After a peak in 2015, where Super Bowl XLIX was watched by almost 115 million people, viewership declined in four consecutive years, even dropping back below 100 million in 2019 and 2021. 

However, recent games have seen a resurgence in audience numbers, culminating in the record-breaking viewership of Super Bowl LVIII, which some have attributed to Taylor Swift’s unmatched popularity and her relationship with Travis Kelce, tight end for the Kansas City Chiefs.

 

You will find more infographics at Statista

The Swift-Kelce storyline has further added to the Super Bowl’s significance not only as a sporting event but also as a cultural phenomenon that captivates millions across the nation. It is this combination of sports, show and commerce that makes it true must-see TV.

Authored by Tom Ozimek via The Epoch Times,

Elon Musk said Saturday that the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) and the U.S. Treasury Department have agreed on new anti-fraud measures aimed at preventing tens of billions of dollars in fraudulent government entitlement payments each year.

In a Feb. 8 statement shared on social media, Musk described the scale of the problem as “utterly insane,” citing estimates that at least $50 billion annually is being lost due to improper payments, including funds going to individuals without Social Security Numbers or even temporary ID numbers.

Musk, who leads DOGE and has been designated a “special government employee” by President Donald Trump, revealed in the post that Treasury officials estimated that $100 billion in annual entitlement payments may be going to individuals without verifiable identification.

In a discussion with Treasury personnel, Musk said he asked for an estimate of how much of that is “obvious and unequivocal” fraud, and the consensus was that at least half—$50 billion per year, or around $1 billion per week—is fraudulent.

“This is utterly insane and must be addressed immediately,” Musk wrote, adding that the DOGE team and Treasury have jointly agreed to a series of reforms.

One of the most significant changes will be the requirement that all outgoing government payments include a payment categorization code. According to Musk, these codes are essential for financial audits, yet they are frequently left blank, making it nearly impossible to track where taxpayer dollars are going.

Under the new rules, every payment will also need to include a rationale in the comment field. Currently, many government payments lack any explanation, making it difficult to assess their legitimacy, Musk said. While he emphasized that no judgment will be applied to these rationales at this stage, requiring at least some justification for payments is expected to serve as a deterrent against waste and fraud.

Another reform involves more effective implementation of Treasury’s Do-Not-Pay list, which is meant to prevent payments to fraudulent entities, deceased individuals, suspected terrorist fronts, and other entities or people who should not be paid by federal agencies. Musk said that this list has not been strictly enforced, with some payments still being made to flagged entities. He also pointed out that it can take up to a year for names to be added to the list, calling for weekly or even daily updates to prevent ongoing fraud.

Musk said that the above “super obvious and necessary” changes will be implemented by existing, long-time career Treasury employees; not anyone from the DOGE. His remarks in this regard align with Treasury Department Scott Bessent’s insistence that DOGE members have read-only access to Treasury data and that they have not been “tinkering” with sensitive payment systems at the department.

The development comes as DOGE focuses its cost-cutting and efficiency-enhancing efforts at multiple federal agencies, including Treasury, as part of the Trump administration’s broader aim of reducing deficits and eliminating fraud, waste, and abuse from government.

Republicans have praised DOGE’s efforts to identify government waste, while Democrats have denounced the body’s actions as an abuse of power and its operations as skirting congressional oversight. There have been protests over DOGE by members of Congress, federal employee unions, and privacy advocates, along with a number of lawsuits targeting its activities. Recently, a judge blocked DOGE’s access to the personal financial data of millions of Americans at the Treasury Department.

Bessent recently defended DOGE’s actions at Treasury. He said in an interview with Bloomberg that the DOGE team is made up of highly trained professionals and “not some roving band running around doing things,” possibly in reference to claims by critics that DOGE has embraced and is applying the adage “move fast and break things,” which is part of the Silicon Valley start-up culture of being innovative, nimble, and disruptive.

“This is methodical and it’s going to yield big savings,” Bessent said of DOGE’s work at Treasury.

In a follow-up post on Saturday, Musk said that the reason no action was taken under prior Treasury leadership to tackle the $50 billion or more in fraudulent government payments is complacency.

“Nobody in Treasury management cared enough before,” Musk wrote. “I do want to credit the working level people in Treasury who have wanted to do this for many years, but have been stopped by prior management. Everything at Treasury was geared towards complain minimization.”

The Epoch Times has reached out to the Treasury Department with a request for comment.

Donald Trump has been in office for about three weeks. In that time, he signed an executive order to secure the southern and northern borders, deploying thousands of US military troops to restore national security. Now, a senior official at one of the nation’s busiest illegal border crossings has taken to X to highlight the stark difference at the border under the Biden-Harris regime in the last four years and the current situation. 

🚨 #BREAKING: The Pentagon is deploying an additional 1,500 active duty troops to the southern border, bringing their total to 3,600, per AP.

Trump is LOCKING DOWN the border! 🔥 pic.twitter.com/tikkmQYCgx

— Nick Sortor (@nicksortor) February 7, 2025

On Saturday afternoon, San Diego County Supervisor Jim Desmond said the San Diego border region was one area left wide open by Democrats… 

“For the past four years, our border has been wide open, allowing millions of people to enter the country without proper vetting, including hundreds of thousands here in San Diego. I saw it firsthand—human traffickers dropping people off and walking through into the country without being stopped. Last year, for the first time since the 1980s, San Diego had the highest number of border crossings in the nation,” Desmond said. 

The official then described the current border situation under Trump and his new policies: “With a new administration in place, I went back to the San Diego border to see what’s happening now. The numbers have dropped dramatically—less than 100 people are crossing a day in San Diego. It’s a stark contrast to the chaos we saw just months ago.” 

For the past four years, our border has been wide open, allowing millions of people to enter the country without proper vetting, including hundreds of thousands here in San Diego. I saw it firsthand—human traffickers dropping people off and walking through into the country… pic.twitter.com/7h4BgeEMus

— Supervisor Jim Desmond (@jim_desmond) February 8, 2025

At the end of Trump’s first full week in office, the president posted a graph on Truth Social that shows the collapse in daily encounters of illegals on the border. 

Voters are witnessing swift progress at the border, strengthening their confidence in the president. Folks have now seen firsthand that securing the border only takes a few short weeks and an executive order. At the same time, globalists in the Biden-Harris regime lied to the American people that the only way to secure the border was through Congress. 

Meanwhile, globalist Democrats and their billionaire funders who pushed open borders and wrecked national security will no longer be able to hide behind their public/private censorship blob as Trump, Elon Musk, and DOGE rip down the leftist Matrix. The era of accountability has arrived. 

Authored by Tom Ozimek via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

President Donald Trump has expanded his lawsuit against CBS, doubling the damages sought to $20 billion and adding CBS parent company Paramount Global as a defendant.

The amended complaint, filed on Feb. 7 at the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Texas, alleges news distortion, election interference, and financial harm caused by CBS’s handling of its “60 Minutes” interview with Democratic presidential candidate Vice President Kamala Harris.

“It is beyond dispute that Defendants wanted Harris to win the Election, and indeed political gain for Harris was certainly Defendants’ intent behind their tampering with the Interview,” the amended complaint reads. “But Defendants’ primary motivation was commercial and pecuniary gain.”

Trump’s legal team claims that CBS deceptively edited Harris’s responses to make her appear more articulate and composed, while also diverting viewership from Trump’s media platform, Truth Social, reducing ad revenue. The complaint asserts that CBS intentionally aired different portions of Harris’s remarks on “Face the Nation” and “60 Minutes,” misleading the public about her full statements.

“Once Defendants finally released the unedited version of the Interview, it became apparent that they had engaged in gross broadcast distortion cover-up and manipulated not only Harris’s Reply about Prime Minister Netanyahu, but the Interview in its entirety,” the amended complaint reads.

CBS has dismissed the claims and maintains its edits were standard journalistic practice.

“We are posting the same transcripts and videos of our interview with Vice President Kamala Harris that we provided to the FCC [Federal Communications Commission],” the network said in a Feb. 5 statement. “They show–consistent with 60 Minutes’ repeated assurances to the public–that the 60 Minutes broadcast was not doctored or deceitful.”

CBS further stated that a longer portion of Harris’s response aired on Face the Nation while a shorter one aired on 60 Minutes for the sake of brevity.

“As the full transcript shows, we edited the interview to ensure that as much of the vice president’s answers to 60 Minutes’ many questions were included in our original broadcast while fairly representing those answers,” the network stated. “60 Minutes’ hard-hitting questions of the vice president speak for themselves.”

The uncut transcript reveals that some of Harris’s answers were cut roughly in half and clarifies her full response to a question about the Israel–Hamas war, which Trump’s campaign claimed was awkwardly phrased and was unfairly edited to improve her image. The transcript also shows that Harris’s complete answer was a combination of the two aired clips.

“Well, Bill, the work that we have done has resulted in a number of movements in that region by Israel that were very much prompted by, or a result of many things, including our advocacy for what needs to happen in the region. And we’re not going to stop doing that. We are not going to stop pursuing what is necessary for the United States to be clear about where we stand on the need for this war to end,” Harris said, per the transcript.

Reacting to the transcript’s release, Trump wrote in a post on social media that it shows CBS had removed Harris’s “horrible election changing answers” and replaced them with better ones and that this was election interference and “election fraud at a level never seen before.” He also called for CBS to lose its broadcasting license.

Trump’s original lawsuit, filed on Oct. 31, 2024, sought $10 billion in damages from CBS for alleged news distortion and election interference. The amended complaint seeks an additional $10 billion under the Lanham Act, which covers false advertising and unfair competition, citing harm to Trump’s business interests, including Truth Social.

“As a direct and proximate result of Defendants’ misconduct, significant viewership was improperly diverted to Defendants’ media platforms, resulting in lower consumer engagement, advertising revenues, and profits by TMTG and President Trump’s other media holdings,” the amended complaint reads.

The new filing also names Rep. Ronny Jackson (R-Texas) as a plaintiff, arguing that he was harmed as a consumer of misleading broadcast news.

Trump’s lawsuit coincides with the Federal Communications Commission’s (FCC) decision to reopen a news distortion complaint against CBS, initially dismissed in January but revived by new FCC Chairman Brendan Carr.

“CBS played the same question on two different programs and clearly the words of the answers were very different,” Carr said in a Fox News interview. “Was it edited for clarity and length—which would be fine—or are there other reasons?” 

Democrat FCC Commissioner Anna Gomez called the move a retaliatory effort to intimidate the media.

The Epoch Times has reached out to CBS and Paramount with requests for comment on the amended complaint.

In an unexpected development, Syria’s Islamist Hay’at Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) government says it is ‘open’ to allowing Russia to keep its permanent air and naval bases on the Mediterranean coast.

Russian forces throughout the country had rapidly pulled back to the two bases since Bashar al-Assad’s December 8 ouster. Since then the naval base at Tartus and the Khmeimim Air Base near Latakia have seen a scramble of personnel packing up equipment, with the fate of the bases uncertain.

Regional reports have said that much of the equipment is being relocated to a ‘friendly’ port in eastern Libya under warlord Khalifa Haftar. But Moscow would clearly like to maintain its only deep-water Mediterranean port, and wants the best outcome for its strategic presence in the Middle East.

Of course, the West is pressuring HTS and self-declared President of Syria Ahmed al-Sharaa (aka Jolani) to boot the Russian bases.

The Washington Post reports, “Syria is open to letting Russia keep its air and naval bases along the Mediterranean coast as long as any agreement with the Kremlin serves the country’s interests, Syrian Defense Minister Murhaf Abu Qasra said in an interview this week, underscoring the pragmatic approach taken by his government as it charts new alliances and reassesses old ones forged under the previous regime.”

It appears the new Syrian government realizes it may be more valuable to deal with Russia closely rather than force its exit from the region, as part of a pragmatic approach:

Russia’s attitude toward the new Syrian government has “improved significantly” since the fall of President Bashar al-Assad in December, and Damascus is weighing Moscow’s demands, Abu Qasra said, signaling a dramatic shift among the former militants who make up the new Syrian government.

Until recently, rebel fighters like Abu Qasra, a key leader in Syria’s insurgency, were under constant bombardment by Russian warplanes. But “in politics, there are no permanent enemies,” he said of Moscow, once Assad’s most powerful ally. Asked if Russia would be allowed to maintain its naval port at Tartus and the Hmeimim air base in Latakia, Abu Qasra said: “If we get benefits for Syria out of this, yes.”

One major card that Washington has yet to play is the ongoing crippling sanctions which still have not been lifted. Currently the EU is said to be discussing lifting its sanctions on the country’s oil and energy sector, but the US appears in no hurry.

Washington might attempt a quid pro quo which requires Damascus to tell the Russians to finally pack it up and leave, and in return US sanctions would be dropped. The capital and most other cities still only have perhaps an hour of electricity a day, and food and basic necessities of life are still extremely expensive after sanctions-induced inflation.

But also, other US officials might see Russia as possibly a stabilizing presence at a moment Trump is said to be mulling a US withdrawal from Syria. Russia is generally friendly with the US-backed Syrian Democratic Forces, made up largely of Syrian Kurds, and the fear is that Turkey will move in to northern Syria. A Russian presence might dissuade or balance this, however.

Authored by Joseph Lai via RealClearPolitics.com,

President Trump says what he means and means what he says. 

Global business leaders would be well advised to believe him when he told those assembled at the World Economic Forum on Jan. 23: 

“Come make your product in America, and we will give you among the lowest taxes of any nation on Earth” and added, “but if you don’t make your product in America, which is your prerogative, then, very simply, you will have to pay a tariff.”

On Feb. 1, Trump announced tariffs against China, Canada, and Mexico. Citing the “extraordinary threat posed by illegal aliens and drugs, including deadly fentanyl,” he imposed an additional 10% tariff on all imports from China and 25% tariffs on all imports from Mexico and Canada. Although President Trump granted a temporary reprieve following phone calls with leaders of Mexico and Canada, those tariffs will be implemented in March unless Trump modifies his executive order. 

More brinksmanship over trade is on the horizon. 

On the first day of his second term, the president ordered national security reviews of bilateral trade relationships and multilateral trade deals. These reports and their findings are due April 1. Potential sectoral and country-specific tariffs are expected thereafter. For China, expect Trump to pursue maximum pressure in the form of further increased tariffs on Chinese imports. Trump will seek as much leverage as he can ahead of potential trade talks with President Xi.

Expect the unexpected in tariff policy. 

The business community should hope for the best but plan for the worst as America’s trade deals are revised. 

Here are four guideposts for global businesses as they navigate the early months of Trump’s second term:

First, when Trump says, “tariffs are the most beautiful words to me in the dictionary,” believe him. 

His philosophy on trade has been consistent going back to his public statements on trade and tariffs amid Japan’s 1980s boom. Business leaders would be wise to onshore as much of their operations as is practical.

Second, the age of globalization and transnational supply chains is ebbing. 

When engaging with Trump and his team, business leaders should downplay their defense of globalization and pursue onshoring strategies that allow their companies sufficient time to transition supply chains domestically. 

Third, lowering or eliminating bilateral trade deficits is a priority. 

Trump continues to focus on America’s trade deficits with countries such as China, Mexico, and Germany. Corporate leaders seeking stability should engage Washington stakeholders and leaders in foreign capitals.

Fourth, trade policy should not be viewed in isolation from the rest of Trump’s pro-growth economic agenda. 

The president is determined to extend the 2017 tax cuts for businesses and individuals, reduce regulations on businesses, make the federal permitting system transparent and predictable, and provide a more permissive environment for mergers and acquisitions.

President Trump views his reelection as a mandate for change. He will do everything he can to upend decades of trade and economic orthodoxies. Business leaders should take Trump’s inaugural address and remarks to the World Economic Forum literally and seriously. Together, they offer a roadmap for what to expect from the next four years.

In the three months between November and January, three incidents of damage to Baltic Sea underwater cables have taken place, severing at least partly seven different telecommunication links that connect Baltic states like Sweden, Finland, Germany, Estonia and Latvia. 

All in all, Statista’s Katharina Buchholz has counted damage to 10 different Baltic underwater cables and three gas pipes, starting with the highly publicized rupture of the Nord Stream 1 and Nord Stream 2 pipelines back in 2022.

 

You will find more infographics at Statista

A report by The Washington Post citing anonymous officials said on January 19 that intelligence and other evidence pointed to negligence rather than malice in the case of the three incidents that took place in 2023 and 2024. Suspected in these are two Chinese-registered ships – both reportedly with Russian links – and one vessel believed to be part of Russia’s so-called shadow fleet dodging sanctions by transporting oil. Since then, however, an additional incident – the third in just three months – took place, stoking suspicion of sabotage once more. Another Russian-crewed cargo liner was detained and searched by Norwegian authorities on January 31 near Tromso at the request of Latvia after the incident that took place five days earlier, but was cleared later. Sweden meanwhile detained another ship, the Bulgarian-operated Vezhen, and determined it had damaged the cable, if accidentally.

Doubts about the events being a coincidence are persistent, however, mostly due to the 2022 Nord Stream 1 and Nord Stream 2 incidents that have at this point almost certainly been deemed sabotage. The damage done on September 26, 2022, was as dramatic as it was symbolic when detonations ruptured the two gas pipelines connecting Russia and Germany seven months after the Russian invasion – amid Europe finding it near impossible to wean itself off Russian fossil fuel. However, Russia has not been zeroed in as the only likely perpetrator in the case, with some theories now also pointing to Ukraine.

Considering this background, it’s not a surprise that Norway’s search of the Silver Dania wasn’t the only one in the context of ruptured Baltic undersea cables. 

Denmark intercepted and boarded the Chinese Yi Peng 3, suspected to have caused cable damage in November, while Finland seized the Russian Eagle S that it identified as having caused cable and pipeline damage this past Christmas Day. It did not help suspicion that the last remaining ship implied in the damages, the Chinese Newnew Polar Bear, carried on into Russian waters after the incident that took place in 2023 and was escorted by a Russian state-owned ice breaker.

The way in which commercial vessels have been damaging pipelines and cables is different from the initial Nord Stream 1 and Nord Stream 2 ruptures, where traces of explosives were found. The ships have been slicing the cables and pipes by dragging their anchors – often for extended periods of time. While this has led some experts to believe that the vessels in question are poorly maintained and have poorly trained crews, others have said that they find it unlikely that the crews would not notice such an issue. While damage by anchors is not as extensive as by explosives, it is still costly and can disrupt communications, electricity and gas supply for the countries in question significantly until repairs can be carried out.

With uncertainty about accident or attack persisting in Europe, other cable cutting incidents have likewise raised suspicion, for example in Taiwan earlier this month. A governing body estimates that around 150 to 200 cable damage incidents happen per year around the world mostly from anchoring and fishing – which equates to around three cable repairs per week. While this makes the recent cluster of Baltic Sea cable incidents not impossible but still unlikely to occur, suspicion will continue amid ongoing tensions of Europe and other Western powers with China and Russia as well as the history of almost definite sabotage incidents in Baltic waters.

Authored by Jacob Burg via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

As the second Trump administration nears the end of its first three weeks leading the federal government, Elon Musk’s advisory commission, the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), has deployed teams within multiple agencies to use technology to cut costs and streamline processes.

Moving at breakneck speed as President Donald Trump shakes up the executive branch, Musk’s engineers and advisers have accessed information technology (IT) systems in several federal departments.

Anonymously sourced reports, not yet independently verified by The Epoch Times, allege DOGE is probing several other agencies, and groups are filing lawsuits to bar Musk’s advisers from accessing those departments’ computer systems.

DOGE’s actions, which Musk says are aimed at reducing government spending and waste, have spurred a backlash from some Democratic lawmakers who describe it as a breach of congressional oversight by an unelected “special government employee.”

Rep. Dan Goldman (D-N.Y.) cited cybersecurity concerns if DOGE is connecting to federal databases with “their own unvetted commercial servers.”

This week, during a House Oversight Committee on “Reducing Waste in Government,” Rep. James Comer (R-K.Y.) defended Musk’s unprecedented role in the executive branch, saying “real innovation isn’t clean and tidy.”

President Donald Trump defended DOGE’s access to federal data systems on Friday, adding that the Pentagon and the Department of Education are next.

“We’re going to be looking at tremendous amounts of money … being spent on things that bear no relationship to anything and have no value,” Trump said.

“I’m very proud of the job that this group of young people … [are] doing. They’re doing it at my insistence. It would be a lot easier not to do it, but we have to take some of these things apart to find the corruption.”

So far, the DOGE team has accessed IT systems at agencies, including the Treasury Department, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS), the Department of Energy, and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), while a coalition of labor unions has sued to block access at the U.S. Department of Labor.

Additionally, students in California are suing the Department of Education, alleging that DOGE staffers are accessing confidential student data.

The Epoch Times could not independently confirm other agencies—including the U.S. Office of Personnel Management and the U.S. Agency for International Development—where DOGE may have received access to internal systems or databases.

Treasury Department

The Treasury Department confirmed in a Feb. 4 letter to Congress that DOGE staff had been given “read-only” access to the agency’s nearly $6 trillion federal payments system.

According to the letter, Cloud Software Group CEO Tom Krause will work with the agency as a “special government employee” to review the Bureau of the Fiscal Service for operational efficiency and prevent abuse, fraud, and waste. The work will be done in conjunction with career Treasury officials.

On Feb. 5, the Justice Department wrote in a court filing that it would, for now, restrict DOGE’s access to Treasury Department payment systems.

Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services

DOGE was also granted access to systems and technology at CMS, the agency said on Feb. 5. CMS will be in direct collaboration with DOGE while two senior agency staffers will direct the effort.

CMS, which is within the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, oversees the Medicare and Medicaid programs. Medicare is a health insurance plan for older and disabled Americans, while Medicaid covers low-income enrollees.

While DOGE has said it wants to cut $2 trillion in government spending, the goal would likely be difficult to reach without reducing spending on health and social assistance programs.

Medicare, Medicaid, the Children’s Health Insurance Program, and the Affordable Care Act marketplace health insurance subsidies made up 24 percent of the 2024 federal budget, according to the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities.

However, Trump told reporters last week that there would be no impacts on Medicare, Medicaid, or Social Security unless his administration finds waste or abuse.

“The people won’t be affected,” Trump said, referring to recipients of those benefits.

National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration

DOGE has also been granted access to NOAA’s IT systems through the Department of Commerce, according to several Democratic lawmakers.

“Elon Musk and his DOGE hackers are ransacking their way through the federal government … and gutting programs people depend on,” Reps. Jared Huffman (D-Calif.) and Zoe Lofgren (D-Calif.), two of the lawmakers confirming the development, wrote in a joint statement.

NOAA is the “principal federal agency tasked with understanding and predicting changes in climate, weather, oceans, and coasts,” according to the Congressional Research Service.

Huffman and Lofgren noted that Americans rely on NOAA’s services “day in and day out” for warnings on “incoming severe weather, such as hurricanes, wildfires, and tornadoes.”

The NOAA is home to the National Weather Service and National Hurricane Center, two critical tools for weather forecasting and warning residents in vulnerable areas about approaching storms.

Department of Energy

Energy Secretary Chris Wright confirmed to CNBC on Feb. 7 that DOGE staffers were actively probing the U.S. Department of Energy but denied allegations that Musk’s people had access to U.S. nuclear secrets.

“I’ve heard these rumors. They’re like seeing our nuclear secrets. None of that is true at all,” Wright told CNBC’s Brian Sullivan.

The Department of Energy manages the nation’s nuclear infrastructure and implements U.S. energy policy. The agency also funds scientific research into energy, while one of its central responsibilities is maintaining and modernizing the U.S. nuclear stockpile.

Other Developments

A coalition of labor unions sued the U.S. Department of Labor, its acting secretary, Vince Micone, and Musk on Feb. 5, alleging that DOGE plans to illegally access the agency’s computer data.

The coalition also alleges that DOGE intends to “fire any employee who protects the integrity of those systems” and that Musk would have access to information on Labor Department investigations into his business dealings.

On Feb. 5, White House spokeswoman Karoline Leavitt said Musk would stay out of matters where he has conflicts of interest.

The University of California Student Association sued the U.S. Department of Education on Feb. 7, alleging that DOGE staffers are illegally accessing confidential student data.

The lawsuit, filed in Washington federal court, accuses DOGE of violating federal privacy laws by accessing Education Department computer systems containing student financial aid information.

DOGE did not respond to a request for comment by publication time.

Andrew Moran, Stacy Robinson, Zachary Stieber, and Reuters contributed to this report.