Money, Wealth & Power—A Daily Look at the Financial World
Federal officials say a vast web of pandemic aid abuse has erupted into one of the largest fraud scandals in California’s history, with suspicious loans now pegged at $8.6 billion. The scale of the alleged scheme, centered on emergency programs created during COVID, is forcing a reckoning over how the state handled crisis-era money and…
President Donald Trump is selling his sweeping tariff regime as an “American economic miracle,” crediting higher import taxes with reviving growth, taming inflation, and rescuing U.S. industry. The data now available from government agencies and independent analysts points in a very different direction, showing higher costs for households, pressure on manufacturers, and only modest movement…
Tariffs were sold to voters as a way to punish foreign competitors, but the bill is increasingly landing in American shopping carts and factory budgets. The first wave of price increases has been painful enough, yet the structure of President Trump’s trade war means a second, more entrenched round of inflation is still building in…
Russian President Vladimir Putin is facing the most serious internal warnings about the country’s economic stability since the full‑scale invasion of Ukraine began. Instead of sounding the alarm himself, he is now the recipient of stark briefings from his own financiers and officials, who reportedly caution that a severe crisis could erupt within months if…
American households are being squeezed by a rapid run-up in electricity costs at the same time the federal government is pulling support from hundreds of energy projects. Since January 2025, typical power bills have climbed sharply even as officials cancel or pause investments that were meant to expand supply and modernize the grid. The result…
Stalled offshore wind projects are no longer an abstract climate debate, they are a looming line item on household power bills. Utility leaders are warning that pausing nearly finished wind farms will force customers to absorb higher costs for backup power, legal fights, and construction delays. The clash between President Donald Trump’s energy regulators and…
Financial markets are sailing into a hotter, harsher world using maps that still assume a relatively stable climate. The models that guide governments, central banks and investors were built for small, smooth shocks, not for cascading disasters and irreversible damage. As climate impacts intensify, a growing group of researchers warns that this blind spot could…
The Dow Jones Industrial Average has vaulted into uncharted territory, closing above 50,000 points for the first time and capping a stunning reversal from a bruising three day sell off. The move crowns a decade of extraordinary gains and crystallizes how central large cap American companies have become to both household wealth and political narratives….
Anthropic spent one extraordinary week proving that in the age of generative AI, a single product update can erase hundreds of billions of dollars in market value and still leave investors clamoring to pour in more cash. Its latest Claude Opus upgrade rattled software, legal and IT services stocks around the world, even as the…
Donald Trump’s push to secure fresh money for his media venture has collided with a Washington fight that suddenly gives Democrats leverage they rarely enjoy in the Trump era. As the president’s allies try to protect his financial interests and broader economic agenda, a messy clash over immigration and Homeland Security funding has opened a…