“I’d love to fire his ass,” President Donald Trump said of Fed Chair Jerome Powell today, drawing laughs at the U.S.-Saudi Investment Forum. Trump went on to threaten Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent’s job too. When you elect the “you’re fired” guy, you get what you get, I guess.

The President has been riding Powell for months over interest rates, which he insists are more than triple where they should be. But Powell doesn’t set rates alone, and just-released minutes from the October Fed meeting showed officials were divided on their most recent rate cut, and December's cut is far from certain.

The thing is, setting monetary policy is hard right now, thanks in part to the data blackout from the government shutdown (more on that below) and President Trump’s tariffs, which have strong potential to drive up prices on a variety of goods. With that, let’s look at a key skirmish in the ongoing trade war with China. — Tony Wagner, newsletter editor

Soybeans have become a flashpoint in President Trump’s trade war with China. But China’s moratorium on purchasing U.S. soybeans appears to be over. 

Chinese buyers put in a big order this week, bringing the total volume for 2025 up to almost 1 million tons. That’s a small step toward the 12 million tons Trump says China has committed to buying before the end of the year. 

For context, that would amount to less than half of what it imported last year. 1 million tons of U.S. soybeans is a fraction of what China would normally have purchased by November. 

But it’s more than zero tons, which is what we were looking at before President Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping started talking. 

“It’s also psychologically good for the market because the markets look at this and go, ‘Oh, this is the first of more to come,’” said Stephen Nicholson, global sector strategist for grains and oilseeds at Rabobank.

He said there’s reason to be skeptical: Xi hasn’t actually confirmed that commitment to ramp up orders by the end of the year. Plus, the supply chain won’t reboot overnight.

“By the time you get all the buying done, you know the logistics, the vessels in place, get it loaded, it’s just going to be really tough,” Nicholson said.

And China’s track-record of sticking to trade war promises is rocky, according to Kristen Owen, an agriculture sector senior analyst at Oppenheimer. 

“We’ve seen this playbook before where there is a commitment and ultimately China becomes a price-sensitive buyer,” she said.

And you know who’s gearing up for a bumper crop of cheap soybeans? Brazil and Argentina — the countries that have been stepping in to supply the Chinese market. 

A relatively small number of H-1B visa recipients work in healthcare, but those that do overwhelmingly work in underserved communities. The Trump administration dramatically hiked the fee employers must pay to bring on international workers back in September, and rural hospitals are struggling to come up with the funds to staff up. 

We’ve been intrigued by prediction markets for a while now. They predicted last year’s presidential election more decisively than the polls could, and they’re blurring the regulatory line between investing and gambling.