Fri, Jan 2, 2026

Wall Street opened 2026 reaching for chips. The S&P 500 rose 0.4%, the Nasdaq 1%, Nvidia and Alphabet both up more than 2%.

Tesla surrendered its EV crown to BYD after a 15.6% sales drop in Q4, marking its second year of decline. The market looked at the data, punished the carmaker, and pivoted to the hardware with pricing power.

While Austin stumbled, the rest of the world bid up the plumbing. The FTSE 100 hit a record above 10,000, driven by miners digging for the copper and silver that electrification requires. Silver resumed its chaos: up 4.8% after Wednesday's 9.4% drop, its fifth straight session of 5%-plus swings.

This economic gravity is forcing Washington to break its own character. The administration talks incessantly about containment, yet it quietly granted TSMC a license to import US chipmaking tools into its Nanjing, China facility. The rhetoric is America First. The reality is supply chain preservation. The trade war has exemptions.

Donald Trump delayed some tariff hikes as inflation lingers. Meanwhile, he warned Iran that the US is "locked and loaded" if security forces kill protesters, the sixth day of demonstrations, at least seven dead.

In Venezuela, the administration confirmed its first strike on land: a dock Trump said was loading drug boats. Sanctions hit a Tehran-Caracas drone network the same day.

In New York, Zohran Mamdani took office, vowing a democratic socialist agenda with his hand on the Quran and framing himself as a foil to the White House.

In House testimony, Special Counsel Jack Smith revealed a private truth behind the public act: Trump acknowledged he lost the 2020 election, contradicting four years of rallies.

Dominance is heading east to start the new year. American manufacturing lost its crown to a Chinese car company that makes cheap batteries. The US is shipping innovation to China. Some tariffs are on hold. And buried in a transcript, the admission that four years of rallies tried to drown out: "Can you believe I lost to this fucking guy?"

America is still rich. It just isn’t automatically first.