November 14 2024

1.  Dollar Surge Follows Election, Reaches Year-High, Weighs on Global Economy
2.  Global Emissions Stagnate, Report Warns of Dangerous Rise by 2100
3. FBI Seizes Phone of Polymarket CEO
4. China Gains Influence in Latin America as Xi Prepares Tour
5. Trump Transition Diary
November 14, 1832: NYC’s first mass transit debuts: a horse‑drawn streetcar

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FLASH...SEN THUNE (SD-R) WINS SENATE LEADERSHIP RACE…BITCOIN HITS ALL-TIME HIGH OF $93K…CIA AGENT IN CAMBODIA ARRESTED BY FBI FOR LEAKING ISRAEL STRIKE DOCS ON IRAN…

1.  Dollar Surge Follows Election, Reaches Year-High, Weighs on Global Economy

The day after the election, the dollar rose the most it had in years against a basket of other major currencies. And it has continued to rise, hitting a fresh high for the year on Wednesday, as economists and traders considered the policies proposed by the president-elect and revised their forecasts for the world’s dominant currency. Such strength is a sharp shift from three months of sustained weakening, with the dollar hitting its low point for the year at the end of September. Sharp moves in the value of the dollar can have a destabilizing effect on the global economy, because the U.S. currency is on one side of nearly 90 percent of all foreign exchange transactions. Essential commodities, like oil, are typically priced in dollars. A stronger dollar makes it cheaper for Americans to buy foreign goods and to travel abroad, but U.S. companies that export products may become less competitive. Outside the United States, a strengthening dollar stokes inflation in countries with weaker currencies and makes it harder to pay debts denominated in dollars, weighing on the global economy.  

Article Source: NYT

2.  Global Emissions Stagnate, Report Warns of Dangerous Rise by 2100

Countries have made scant progress in curbing their greenhouse gas emissions over the past year, keeping the planet on track for dangerous levels of warming this century, according to a new report published Thursday. The report by the Climate Action Tracker, a research group, estimates that the climate and energy policies currently pursued by governments around the world would cause global temperatures to rise roughly 2.7 degrees Celsius, or 4.9 degrees Fahrenheit, above preindustrial levels by 2100.  

Article Source: NYT

3. FBI Seizes Phone of Polymarket CEO

The Federal Bureau of Investigation seized the phone of the founder and chief executive of Polymarket, the crypto-based prediction market that was a popular platform for bets on the U.S. presidential election, a person familiar with the matter said. Federal agents woke Shayne Coplan at his Manhattan home early Wednesday morning to carry out the search, the person said. It wasn’t immediately clear what prompted the FBI’s search of Coplan, the 26-year-old entrepreneur behind one of the most successful prediction markets in history. But Polymarket quickly tied the raid to its track record in the recent presidential election, in which bettors on its platform correctly anticipated that Donald Trump would beat Vice President Kamala Harris.

Article Source: WSJ

4. China Gains Influence in Latin America as Xi Prepares Tour

South of the border, China is ascendant.  Chinese leader Xi Jinping arrives this week in a region where China has replaced the U.S. as the dominant trading partner for most big economies, with the exceptions of Mexico and Colombia. Beijing has signed up most of Latin America and the Caribbean to an infrastructure program that excludes the U.S. In Peru, Xi will inaugurate a megaport to speed trade with Asia. China is a voracious buyer of Argentina’s lithium, crude oil from Venezuela, and Brazilian iron ore and soybeans. The $286.1 billion in Chinese projects in the region tallied by the AidData research lab at William & Mary in Williamsburg, Va.—including metro lines in Bogotá and Mexico City and hydroelectric dams in Ecuador—is approaching the value of China’s work in Africa, but with a revamped lending model and less backlash.   

Article Source: WSJ

5. Trump Transition Diary

Editors note: Trump II is barely underway and already an unbelievable amount of stuff is happening. I am going to have a temporary section in my newsletter that covers the Trump transition. For those of you interested in the very consequential things that are happening in American political life, I will cover it there. And for those of you that are already fatigued by everything Trump, you can skip it.  

A. A STUNNING VICTORY has crowned Donald Trump the most consequential American president since Franklin D. Roosevelt. After defeating Kamala Harris—and not just narrowly, but by a wide margin—America’s 45th president will become its 47th. The fact that Mr Trump will be the first to win non-consecutive terms since Grover Cleveland in 1892 does not start to do justice to his achievement. He has defined a new political era, for America and the world.  

Trump Administration roles 

Tulsi Gabbard offered Director of National Intelligence 

Matt Gaetz offered Attorney General 

Editors note: this one is also out there. With this pick (and others), I see two things: 1) Trump is arguing that the traditional “adults in the room” over the past few decades have done a poor job and that his election gives him a mandate from the American people for big change, and 2) there is a bit of “Art of the Deal” to some of these picks. The shock of the initial pick softens up the Senate for the real pick. Who knows, but its a mistake to underestimate Trump. Just ask the Democrats.  

B. President-elect Donald Trump’s former trade chief and those close to him are preparing to aggressively sell their plans for massive new tariffs on imports that will go far beyond anything seen in Trump’s first term. Robert Lighthizer, a gruff, Ohio-born trade lawyer, and his allies have been circulating memos among themselves as they prepare to convince lawmakers and the public that their plans for dramatically higher tariffs will energize the economy instead of tanking it, according to a document viewed by POLITICO, provided by a person close to the policy planning. The economic justification for the tariffs could be released by Trump allies in the coming weeks, said the person, and will show “the failures of economic models to accurately predict changes to the economy” as a result of tariffs. Trump’s proposals, which aim to promote domestic manufacturing and lessen reliance on foreign countries, include a “universal” tariff of up to 20 percent on all goods coming into the U.S. and at least a 60 percent tariff on all imports from China. Traditional economic models “assume that tariffs can never stimulate domestic production,” the circulated document reads. However, it adds “[w]hen the U.S. [International Trade Commission] studied the Trump tariffs, they found that domestic production increased in every single industry — a result in the real economy that these models all assume could never happen.”  

C. President-elect Donald J. Trump’s demand that Senate Republicans surrender their role in vetting his nominees poses an early test of whether his second term will be more radical than his first. Over the weekend, Mr. Trump insisted on social media that Republicans select a new Senate majority leader willing to call recesses during which he could unilaterally appoint personnel, allowing him to sidestep the confirmation process. His allies immediately applauded the idea, intensifying pressure on G.O.P. lawmakers to acquiesce.

Article Source: Economist, Politico, NYT

November 14, 1832: NYC’s first mass transit debuts: a horse‑drawn streetcar

Sources

2. https://www.nytimes.com/2024/11/14/business/strong-dollar-trump.html

3. https://www.nytimes.com/2024/11/14/climate/climate-action-tracker-temperatures-emissions.html

4. https://www.wsj.com/us-news/law/fbi-polymarket-ceo-investigation-75472d18?st=DGDN6Z&reflink=article_copyURL_share

5. https://www.wsj.com/world/china-xi-jinping-latin-america-acf6dbc1?st=bysPo6&reflink=article_copyURL_share

6. A https://www.economist.com/leaders/2024/11/06/welcome-to-trumps-world
B https://www.politico.com/news/2024/11/12/lighthizer-trump-new-tariff-plan-00189114
C https://www.nytimes.com/2024/11/12/us/politics/trump-republicans-senate.html?smid=nytcore-ios-share&referringSource=articleShare