FINANCIAL TIMES
-Elon Musk's SpaceX and xAI are set to secure multibillion-dollar valuation jumps through new deals, as investors race to support Musk's business interests. SpaceX is preparing to launch a tender offer in December, selling existing shares at $135 each, valuing the rocket builder at over $250B. Similarly, xAI has raised $5B at a valuation of $45B, almost double its valuation a few months ago. The double fundraising comes as Musk expands his focus beyond Silicon Valley to Washington DC, having helped deliver the US election to Donald Trump and becoming a key confidant. Trump has appointed Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy to lead a new "department of government efficiency" to provide advice and guidance from outside the government and dismantle bureaucracy.
-The 2024 election may signal a more authoritarian future for the world, as the US has become increasingly polarized since the 1990s. The term "fascist" is often used to describe the current political landscape, with some comparing Trump to fascist dictators from India, Russia, Turkey, and Hungary. However, the leadership cult of Maga values virility and masculinity that has few parallels in Europe.
Political polarization is a key difference between the US and other democracies worldwide.
-German Chancellor Olaf Scholz has spoken to Russian President Vladimir Putin for the first time in nearly two years, as western powers position for an incoming Trump administration that has made ending the Ukraine war a priority. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy believes Scholz's call is a Pandora's box, as resuming contacts with western leaders is exactly what Putin has wanted for a long time - ending Russia's isolation. The call took place at a critical time for Ukraine, as Russian troops intensified their attacks and advancing into Ukrainian territory at a faster rate than at any point since 2022. Trump's victory in the US presidential election has raised doubts about future US aid to Kiev.
-Netflix's push into streaming live events was tested with the boxing match-up between Mike Tyson and Jake Paul. The bout, won by Paul, was available to all of Netflix's 280M subscribers at no extra charge, a departure from the expensive pay-per-view or premium TV packages associated with professional boxing. Boxing used to be a lucrative business for pay-TV networks HBO and Showtime, but both exited the sport due to declining popularity. Netflix's Tyson-Paul bout aimed to attract new subscribers, particularly to its advertising-supported service, which has about 70 million subscribers. Analysts at JPMorgan said the boxing mega-event should boost audience engagement and attract advertising-tier subscribers, viewers, and dollars.
-Donald Trump's cabinet nominees, including Matt Gaetz for US attorney-general and Robert F Kennedy Jr for health and human services secretary, are set for a rigorous Senate confirmation process that could potentially turn into a series of spectacles. The process will involve weeks of public scrutiny, televised congressional committee hearings, and make-or-break votes on Capitol Hill. Trump allies have been scrambling to protect the nominees, and some have even proposed circumventing the confirmation process and installing them via recess appointments, allowing the president to bypass Senate approval. The US Constitution grants the Senate the power to be consulted on and approve senior government positions, so a simple majority of senators must approve each of Trump's cabinet appointees. Although Republicans will control the Senate by a 53-47 margin from January, early signs suggest that Trump's most polarizing picks may struggle to win over a critical number of lawmakers.
-Spanish regional leader Carlos Mazon has claimed that an "information blackout" linked to the Madrid government was responsible for delays in sending out emergency alerts following the devastating floods in Valencia. Mazon, who has faced calls for his resignation and sparred with Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez over the crisis, did not mention his 3-hour lunch with a journalist and instead blamed deficient reporting by a river basin authority overseen by one of Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez's ministers. The crisis has led to the death of over 220 people, wrecked homes and businesses, and highlighted the threat of extreme weather linked to climate change. Mazón has faced calls for his resignation and has sparred with Sánchez over the crisis. He has sought to change the narrative in an address to the Valencian legislature on Friday.
-Russia has urged US President-elect Donald Trump to remain in the Paris agreement, while Saudi Arabia committed to transitioning to a green energy system at the UN COP29 summit in Baku. The geopolitics of the summit have been heightened by the threat of a US withdrawal from the pact. Argentina's President Javier Milei withdrew his negotiating team from the summit, raising concerns about an exit from the Paris agreement. In Baku, Azerbaijan, countries that have historically been viewed as blockers of progress at global climate talks defended the Paris agreement. Boris Titov, Russian President Vladimir Putin's special representative for international cooperation in sustainability, said it is not the right move for countries like Argentina and the US to leave the agreement.
-Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's chief of staff, Tzachi Braverman, has been questioned by police over suspicions of altering the timeline of his phone calls during Hamas's October 7 attack. The probe comes amid pressure over a separate investigation into the leak of classified documents to the foreign press, which led to the arrest of a media adviser and four military personnel. Braverman, who has been Netanyahu's chief of staff since 2022, was questioned on suspicion of forgery and breach of trust. His lawyer, Jack Chen, defended Braverman, stating that the claims against him were "baseless" and that the chief of staff acted within his authority and scope of position. The investigation relates to the first minutes of Hamas's attack on Israel, which is considered the worst security and intelligence failure in the country's 76-year history.
NEW YORK TIMES
-President-elect Donald J. Trump's pick for health secretary, Robert F. Kennedy Jr., is a polarizing choice with views on certain public health matters beyond vaccination. Kennedy opposes fluoride in water, favors raw milk, which the Food and Drug Administration deems risky, and has promoted unproven Covid therapies like hydroxychloroquine. He has threatened to prosecute medical journals and has slash 600 jobs at the National Institutes of Health. Kennedy's nephew, Robert F. Kennedy Jr., is the nation's chief critic of vaccines, a public health intervention that has saved millions of lives. His views on certain public health matters beyond vaccination are far outside the mainstream. His relatives called his presidential bid "dangerous for our country." Kennedy's nephew, who calls himself a vaccine safety activist, has been criticized by the press, anti-vaxxers, and conspiracy theorists. Regardless of his views, Kennedy is a polarizing choice whose views on certain public health matters are far outside the mainstream.
-President-elect Donald Trump has named Karoline Leavitt, who served as his campaign's press secretary and worked in the White House during his first administration, as his White House press secretary. Leavitt, who is 27 years old, will be the youngest person ever to assume the role. She will be responsible for fielding questions from reporters in the White House briefing room on behalf of Trump, who has an adversarial relationship with the mainstream media. Trump expressed confidence in Leavitt's intelligence, toughness, and effectiveness as a communicator, stating that she will excel at the podium and help deliver the message to the American people as they work to Make America Great Again.
-Senators from both parties have sought to see the results of a bipartisan investigative report on former Representative Matt Gaetz's conduct, who Trump said would be his attorney general nominee. Speaker Mike Johnson has stated that he would "strongly" discourage the release of the report, which could lead to an extraordinary constitutional clash between the two chambers. Senators are charged with vetting and confirming a president's nominees, including the attorney general.
-The stock market's excitement following Donald J. Trump's presidential election has waned, with investors pondering mixed signs of what could come next for the U.S. economy. The S&P 500 fell 1.3% on Friday, dragging the index down 2% for the week, but major stock indexes are still up since Election Day. The drop is a reversal from the index's 4.7% gain last week, its biggest weekly rise in over a year. The post-election and post-rate cut enthusiasm has lost steam as investors are weighing the economic implications of Trump's proposed policies and his initial cabinet picks, along with comments from the Fed's chair indicating that the central bank may not be in a hurry to keep cutting interest rates. Cryptocurrencies are still rising on expectations that the Trump administration will be a boost to the industry through softer regulations, with Bitcoin crossing the $90,000 price threshold for the first time this week.
-President-elect Donald Trump is seeking to repeal a $7,500 electric vehicle tax credit, which would hurt American automakers. The Trump transition team is exploring steps to make electric vehicles more competitive with gasoline-powered ones, culminating with the elimination of the $7,500 tax credit for people who buy electric vehicles. Harold G. Hamm, an oil billionaire, has been discussing the $7,500 credit with the Trump transition team. The growth of electric vehicles poses a threat to the oil and gas industry, with the International Energy Agency estimating that the global rollout of electric vehicles could reduce oil demand by nearly six million barrels a day by 2030. Elon Musk, another Trump associate, owns Tesla and believes that getting rid of the tax credit would hurt Ford, GM, and other competitors to Tesla.
-Elon Musk, the founder of Tesla, has been known to cut costs by slashing them first, then fixing them later. In December 2022, he summoned finance executives at Twitter to a conference call and analyzed a spreadsheet containing the company's expenditures. Despite Twitter having shed over three-quarters of its employees, the company's spending still appeared out of control. Musk ordered workers to account for each item and ordered some items, such as car services for executives, to be cut completely. He confronted an employee responsible for a multimillion-dollar contract related to website security and claimed Tesla spent far less on the same task. After the employee pushed back, Musk said she was no longer with Twitter. This meeting was characteristic of Musk's approach to cutting costs. He preferring to cut too much rather than too little and dealing with the fallout later. Under Donald Trump, he is set to apply these tactics to the U.S. government.
-President Biden and China's top leader, Xi Jinping, are set to meet in Peru, where China has expanded its influence in a challenge to the United States in its own region. The two leaders have sparred for years about how the world should be ordered, with Biden describing Xi as a "dictator" and stating that the preservation of democracy is the "defining challenge of our age." Xi has accused the United States of being the "biggest source of chaos" in the world and warned against dangerous Western liberal ideas. As the two leaders meet as world leaders for probably the last time in Peru, it appears that Biden's vision of the world appears to be in retreat. The U.S. president is exiting the global stage with his stature diminished after Americans voted Donald J. Trump back into power.
-President Biden expressed concern about the "dangerous and destabilizing cooperation" between North Korea and Russia during a meeting with the leaders of South Korea and Japan at the global summit of Asia Pacific leaders in Peru. Biden, Shigeru Ishiba, the prime minister of Japan, and President Yoon Suk Yeol of South Korea strongly condemned the cooperation between North Korea and Russia, including the decision by North Korea to send thousands of troops to Russia to help President Vladimir V. Putin in his war with Ukraine. The three leaders emphasized the egregious nature of deepening military cooperation between the DPRK and Russia, including munitions and ballistic missile transfers, given Russia's status as a Permanent Member of the UN Security Council.
- Representative Jared Golden, a three-term Democrat from Maine, has defeated Republican challenger Austin Theriault in a narrow victory in his largely white, rural, and working-class district. Golden's narrow victory in this district, one of five Democratic-held districts won by Donald J. Trump in 2020, is a positive for Democrats and will help ensure that the Republicans' House majority in the next Congress remains narrow. Throughout the campaign, Golden emphasized a hyperlocal and nonpartisan message aimed at working-class people of all political stripes. He campaigned as a potential governing partner with Trump, saying he could work with whoever won the White House. For House Republicans, Theriault's loss underlined Golden's status as one of the Democrats' most battle-tested members.
-Georgia poll workers Ruth Freeman and Shaye Moss, who were defamed by Rudolph W. Giuliani after the 2020 election, received a watch collection, a ring, and a vintage Mercedes-Benz from Giuliani's lawyer, Joseph Cammarata. The deliveries were a long-awaited for the women, who are mother and daughter, and it was also a small down payment on what the former New York City mayor owes them.
NEW YORK POST
-Foreign leaders, Hollywood stars, and US political heavyweights attended a black-tie Mar-a-Lago gala to discuss new and rumored Cabinet picks in President-elect Donald Trump's second administration. The event took place nine days after Trump's electoral defeat of Democratic Vice President Kamala Harris, with the group looking to gain the ear of the 47th president. The gathering also welcomed MAGA faithful from across the globe, including Kellyanne Conway, who was instrumental in Trump's 2016 electoral victory over Hillary Clinton. Trump, 78, also got caught up in the good feeling, dancing for the crowd and announcing a new administration selection during his America First Policy Institute event: North Dakota Gov. Doug Burgum.
-World Bank officials are concerned about severe budget cuts as President-elect Donald Trump pledges to cut US government spending. The bank has faced accusations of operating like a slush fund for bureaucrats despite a mandate to fight poverty and climate change. Top brass at the Washington-based lender have been on edge since Trump's election victory. Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy are slated to lead a White House advisory body called the Department of Government Efficiency, which could have the World Bank in their sights. This has sparked fear as they will desperately try to show they are saving money.