Donald Trump's Second Term and the Economy

The Fed doesn’t just set interest rates. It needs to be able regulate banks independently too, to make sure the financial system keeps running in good and bad economic times.

The FOMC hasn’t cowed to political pressure from the Trump administration to make drastic interest rate cuts.

Alexandra Petri at The Atlantic spent five months attempting to do federal work targeted for cuts — including forecasting the weather and collecting price data.

Sales were buoyed by expectations that prices would rise even more soon, tarrif concerns, and now-ended electric vehicle tax credits.

Disruptive geopolitical events, like the arrest of Venezuela’s Nicolás Maduro by the U.S., often see investors jump into bonds or sell off a bunch of stocks temporarily. Neither of those happened.

One question hanging in the air right now: How might the U.S. attack on Venezuela affect the value of the dollar?

Venezuela’s current oil production infrastructure “has been held together by string and gum,” said Fernando Valle at Hedgeye Risk Management.

Oil markets and financial markets seem to be shrugging off the U.S. arrest of Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro.

From the BBC World Service: The U.S. stunned the world with the capture of Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro over the weekend. We’ll discuss the fallout.

On Giving Tuesday, one of the biggest fundraising days of the year, more than 38 million people gave a record $4 billion to charities.