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VW Supervisory Board Recommends Another 4,100 Job Cuts At Porsche

Submitted by Thomas Kolbe

The hailstorm of bad news from Germany’s auto industry simply refuses to end. Again and again, heavy hailstones from corporate press offices crash down on anxious workforces at the automakers, ruining politicians’ election campaigns and destroying the last hopes of those still clinging to the promise of an electric car made in Germany.

The latest impact: According to a report by Handelsblatt, citing an internal recommendation by Volkswagen’s Supervisory Board, the personnel scalpel is once again being applied to the “Sport Luxury” division, meaning Porsche. Another 4,100 jobs are to be eliminated at Porsche, after it had already become clear that a total of 9,000 positions would disappear over the coming years. Porsche currently still employs 41,800 people.

According to the Supervisory Board’s proposal, Porsche is supposed to improve its operating profit by €3.8 billion by the end of the decade. In overhead costs alone, the Supervisory Board’s calculation shows a gap of around €700 million. That gap is to be closed through the additional job cuts. Volkswagen’s austerity program now seems to be updated almost weekly.

The notion that Volkswagen’s luxury brand Porsche could shield itself from the group-wide restructuring — or, better put, the clear-cutting — is now finally gone. The crisis runs deep, it is comprehensive, and it has already cost 150,000 jobs across the automotive sector. For consulting firm Roland Berger, there is still no end in sight. Berger expects another 200,000 jobs to disappear from Germany’s automotive sector by 2030. Entire value chains — and with them purchasing power, knowledge and prosperity — are disappearing.

A catastrophe for suppliers, for entire regions and for municipal treasuries that had relied so heavily on revenues from what was once Germany’s flagship industry. But that is what happens when you become ideologically entrenched …

Stuttgart is the blueprint for industrial locations across the republic that until recently threw themselves with fervor into the warm, ecologist current. The home of Porsche and Mercedes-Benz closed the last fiscal year with a deficit of €712 million — and the comfortably wealthy city could become a poorhouse if nobody pulls the emergency brake. Residents of these regions will have to prepare for public services — well-equipped schools, municipal sports facilities, swimming pools and recreational centers — to become luxury goods. The automotive industry is leaving; it is leaving behind empty coffers and high unemployment. A German Rust Belt is emerging before our eyes.

The downward spiral has engulfed every segment of Germany’s automotive industry: intense competitive pressure from China, tariff tensions with the United States, towering energy costs at home and an endless regulatory frenzy are all battering the business. It was therefore only a matter of time before even a luxury brand like Porsche would come under the wheels. And the company’s communications strategy seemed strangely familiar: In a kind of salami tactic, common in politics, the company has been announcing since 2024 that Porsche would initially allow temporary production contracts to expire. Around 1,500 employees were affected that year. In February 2025 came the announcement that around 1,900 jobs in Zuffenhausen and Weissach would be eliminated by 2029. Another 500 temporary contracts were not to be renewed.

In May 2026, it continued: Porsche announced the closure of its subsidiaries Cellforce, eBike Performance and Cetitec. More than 500 jobs were lost. At the end of July this year, the future package was finally presented: Another 5,000 jobs are to be eliminated by 2035, naturally in a socially responsible manner. So much should the future be worth.

Taken together, that amounts to around 9,000 jobs — meaning that more than one in three positions at the home location will disappear. Now another 4,100 new job cuts are being added — the company is being ground down further and further.

Volkswagen’s decline is accelerating. A look at its compressed margins is more than alarming: Originally, management had calculated on an operating margin of between 4 and 5.5 percent this year. It has now shrunk to 1 percent. A €10 billion special effect is weighing on the result. The ailing group is in intensive care.

What is happening at Volkswagen is the great mirror image of German industry: poor domestic conditions and excessively high energy costs following disastrous political decisions are making industrial production at home almost impossible. Since 2018, around 15 percent of German industrial production has disappeared. Around 420,000 jobs in manufacturing have been lost since 2019. With these jobs, engineering expertise is disappearing as well — expertise that is indispensable to a society. Disastrous construction projects such as Berlin Brandenburg Airport, Stuttgart 21 or the Hamburg Opera, where costs and schedules regularly spiral out of control, loudly testify to Germany’s brain drain.

Germany in 2026: Some are no longer capable of organizing infrastructure projects, while others, representatives of business and labor unions, are incapable of anticipating trends in global markets. Together, in their hour of need, they strike up a hymn to moralism, in a green overtone, always self-assured and arrogant toward dissenting criticism. A melody of decline.

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About the author: Thomas Kolbe, a graduate economist, has worked for or over 25 years as a journalist and media producer for clients from various industries and business associations. As a publicist, he focuses on economic processes and observes geopolitical events from the perspective of the capital markets. His publications follow a philosophy that focuses on the individual and their right to self-determination.

Tyler Durden Mon, 09/21/2026 - 06:30

Venezuela's Oil Revival Faces "Decade Or Two" Climb Back To Record Output, Piper Sandler Warns

President Trump's "Donroe Doctrine" positions energy security in the West as a key pillar of US national security. 

The removal of socialist Nicolás Maduro and the subsequent massive Venezuelan oil deal represent the opening act in a longer-term effort to rebuild production and secure supplies closer to the Gulf of America. 

Piper Sandler global energy strategist Jan Stuart's view, however, highlights the time required for these new Venezuelan supplies to ramp up: any meaningful recovery in Venezuelan output could take years, with a return to historic production highs potentially requiring a decade or two. That timeline clashes with the view that additional Venezuelan barrels could provide near-term relief to US refiners amid the global diesel crisis.

"We'll stay tuned but suspect that reaching the old record highs will take a decade or 2 and oodles of good fortune," Stuart wrote in a note. 

Trump described the US-Venezuela deal as the "biggest oil deal in history" and said it would amount to control of 65 billion barrels of oil reserves.

North American Blue Energy Partners is set to develop the oil fields, with the Department of War holding a 35% stake in the venture and rights to a portion of its production. Venezuelan royalties and taxes could total roughly $200 billion over 25 years.

A Reuters report last week said ExxonMobil was negotiating a return to Venezuela's Orinoco Belt for the first time in nearly two decades.

Venezuelan bonds have rallied around these developments but the risk to investors is for a prompt revival. 

Beyond energy supplies, Venezuela reportedly prepared its first aluminum shipment to the US in years last week: 15,000 metric tons from state-owned Venalum, facilitated by Mercuria Energy Group and Heeney.

The cloud hanging over Venezuela's resources revival is the outcome of the US midterms. Stuart questioned whether US military backing for the oil deal would survive the next US election. Rebuilding production could take a decade or two. Investors now have to ask whether Trump's commitment can last that long.

Tyler Durden Mon, 09/21/2026 - 05:45

Utah Valley University Faculty's Sickening Post-Assassination Emails About Charlie Kirk Exposed

New public records indicate that faculty members at Utah Valley University sent hostile messages regarding Charlie Kirk to the university's administrators in the weeks following his assassination on the UVU campus, even though the university had previously issued public statements advocating civility and free expression.

Utah Valley University campus

Judicial Watch obtained the 133 pages of emails and text messages through a Utah Government Records Access and Management Act request. The records went to then-UVU President Astrid S. Tuminez and other administrators.

Kirk, the founder of Turning Point USA, was assassinated on the UVU campus while launching a nationwide campus speaking tour. University administrators spent the following months talking about healing and dialogue. Some of the correspondence flowing into the university president's inbox tells a different story.

On September 22, 2025, a UVU instructor wrote to Tuminez, framing Kirk as a threat to "students we are trying to educate." Kirk "appealed to the worst of us," the instructor wrote, adding that he "spoke his prejudices openly, not to test free speech, but to shape minds," and that he "targeted impressionable youth, feeding on their fears and anxieties."

The email continued:

The hidden message in his rants was clear: hate is natural, and to resist it is to deny who you are. Hate masquerading as justice is nothing of the sort. True justice seeks fairness, accountability, and protection for all, while hate targets, divides, and destroys....

That is why we must resist any effort to memorialize him or turn him into an icon.... Charlie Kirk did not stand for civility, compassion, or truth. There was nothing civil about him.

The instructor closed by warning that "to memorialize him would be a grave mistake."

A second email, dated November 4, 2025 and signed as a "faculty member," escalated the anti-Kirk venom.

I've had a hard time dealing with the aftermath of the shooting on our campus, and in particular, I cannot understand how people could support or mourn someone who was so divisive and spewed such vituperation in his "debates." I regret that he was invited to UVU at all, and wish you had rethought the decision to allow him a forum on our campus.

That faculty member then turned to the proposed campus memorial, warning administrators that the Utah legislature holds "enormous power" and predicting a mass faculty exodus if UVU honored Kirk.

"Should a memorial to him be erected on our campus, I fear you will lose many faculty members, including myself," the email said. The same faculty member closed with a threat dressed as principle, writing, "I would not work at a university that supports Charlie Kirk's ideals in any way."

Nine days after the assassination, someone whose name Judicial Watch redacted from the release pitched the university on a different project. The pitch called for a $1 million fundraising drive named "Our Better Selves for a Better America."

"I would like to raise $1 million for this proposal," it read. "I have one pledge for $100k. I would like to raise the other $900k quickly."

UVU ran with it. The university launched Our Better Selves for a Better America as an official presidential initiative built around civil dialogue, conflict navigation, and peacemaking.

"The killing of Charlie Kirk on September 10, 2025, was a grievous tragedy that reverberated through the Utah Valley University (UVU) community and nation. It challenged civility, respectful disagreement, and freedom of speech - core freedoms written in the United States Constitution," the university's webpage about the initiative reads. "In the wake of this tragedy, UVU President Astrid S. Tuminez, Ph.D., asked, 'What is this moment asking of us? Of UVU? Of the nation?'"

While the university publicly promoted civility and open discourse, the correspondence landing in its president's inbox ran the other way.

"Charlie Kirk was assassinated while exercising his right to speak on a college campus," Judicial Watch President Tom Fitton said in a statement. "These records reveal that, even as Utah Valley University publicly called for free expression and civil discourse, some faculty members were making hateful and vicious comments about him, objecting to his invitation to campus, and threatening to leave if his memory were honored."

Charlie Kirk's family moved this month to put Utah Valley University and state officials on notice that it intends to sue, accusing the school of security failures that let his assassination happen.

"Placing a politically controversial figure like Charlie Kirk in an outdoor event in the quad surrounded by tall buildings and other elevated observation platforms is accurately described as walking him into a fishbowl," the notice of claim read.

🚨🚨🚨NEW this morning: Charlie Kirk’s family has filed a notice of claim against UVU, the state of Utah and some current and former university leaders over security failures that they allege allowed Charlie’s murder to happen.

Among the allegations is that campus TPUSA… pic.twitter.com/jj9k77yLqi

— Michael Ruiz (@mikerreports) September 16, 2026

"Through a series of stunning failures and reckless decisions, the UVU Parties created a foreseeable danger to Charlie," the document continued. "Those decisions ultimately rendered Mr. Kirk helpless to the rooftop shooter in an assassination that could have been avoided had the UVU Parties only taken reasonable steps to plan and oversee a safe event, steps outlined below that have been standard practice for other universities hosting controversial speakers."

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Tyler Durden Mon, 09/21/2026 - 05:15

European Central Bank President Blocked Binance's EU Entry: Report

Authored by Mathew Di Salvo via Bitcoin Magazine,

European Central Bank President Christine Lagarde stopped Binance from operating in the European Union, according to a Wall Street Journal report.

The newspaper on Thursday reported that the top crypto exchange was on the cusp of operating in the trading bloc but then was told it couldn't after the central bank chief waded in.

EU law requires that local Crypto-Asset Service Providers (CASP) have a MiCA license.

Binance does not.

Binance in June withdrew its MiCA application in Greece.

"Lagarde wanted to keep the controversial crypto exchange, which pleaded guilty to financial-crime violations in the U.S., out of the European Union," the newspaper report said, citing interviews with officials.

Lagarde has long been anti-Bitcoin and pro-central bank digital currencies. Back in 2021, Lagarde said that the leading cryptocurrency was "a highly speculative asset" used for money laundering. She also criticized cryptocurrencies as a whole and said central banks would never hold bitcoin.

On CBDCs, though, Lagarde takes a different approach.

A CBDC is a digital form of fiat money, like the US dollar or euro; nations around the world are in different stages of researching and releasing them.

The EU under Lagarde is fast moving forward with a digital euro. Lagarde has described the digital euro as key to Europe's financial autonomy while taking aim at privately issued stablecoins.

CBDCs have been criticized by bitcoiners and others in the crypto industry who think they could be used to surveil citizens.

U.S. President Donald Trump signed an executive order banning CBDCs when he took office.

The WSJ report added, citing various interviews, that Lagarde was worried Binance would embed the dominance of dollar-based stablecoins in Europe, instead of encouraging euro counterparts.

Binance is the world's biggest crypto exchange and billions of dollars in stablecoins are traded on its platform daily.

A controversial company, Binance and its CEO, Chanpeng Zhao, in 2023 pleaded guilty to anti-money-laundering violations and paid a record $4.3 billion fine.

Binance in June said it was still working to pursue MiCA authorization in another EU Member State.

Tyler Durden Mon, 09/21/2026 - 05:00

These Are The Countries Where Bond Yields Are Rising Fastest

The 10-year Treasury briefly poked above 5% this week - peaking at 5.04% on Bloomberg's tape, the highest since 2007 - before backing off. It's the first time it has been there since the October 2023 spike, and this time it arrived with company: Japan's 10-year is above 3% for the first time in three decades, Bunds are at their highest in a decade and a half, gilts are at a post-2008 high, and a Bloomberg gauge of G7 sovereign debt started the month yielding its highest on average since 2000.

The drivers are familiar: oil-fed inflation impulse, massive deficits, and bondholders who have finally started charging for the privilege of holding the long end. The surprise is the geography: the US 10-year has repriced 97 basis points higher over the past twelve months, and that doesn't even make the top four - South Korea is up 178, Japan 145, Australia 114, France 102.

As Visual Capitalist's Dorothy Neufeld explains further, government bond yields are climbing across major economies as investors contend with higher oil prices, inflation pressures, and growing government borrowing needs.

This graphic compares 10-year government bond yields across major economies, based on Bloomberg market data as of September 15, 2026.

Borrowing Costs Reach Multi-Decade Highs

Long-term borrowing costs are reaching levels not seen in decades, with the U.S. 10-year Treasury briefly hitting 5.04% on September 15, its highest level since 2007.

Still, yields have risen faster in South Korea, Japan, Australia, and France than in the U.S. over the past year.

Country Sept. 2025 Sept. 2026 Change (bps) 🇰🇷 South Korea 2.81% 4.59% +178 🇯🇵 Japan 1.58% 3.03% +145 🇦🇺 Australia 4.27% 5.41% +114 🇫🇷 France 3.48% 4.50% +102 🇺🇸 U.S. 4.04% 5.01% +97 🇬🇷 Greece 3.33% 4.28% +95 🇮🇹 Italy 3.48% 4.42% +94 🇩🇪 Germany 2.69% 3.54% +85 🇵🇹 Portugal 3.09% 3.91% +82 🇨🇦 Canada 3.17% 3.96% +79 🇬🇧 UK 4.63% 5.40% +77 🇪🇸 Spain 3.24% 4.01% +77 🇳🇱 Netherlands 2.85% 3.61% +76 🇸🇬 Singapore 1.76% 2.51% +75 🇲🇽 Mexico 8.80% 9.54% +74 🇳🇿 New Zealand 4.30% 5.03% +73 🇧🇷 Brazil 13.74% 14.45% +71 🇨🇭 Switzerland 0.19% 0.55% +36

Japan's rise marks a significant shift from the ultra-low-rate environment that defined its bond market for decades. Its 10-year yield has crossed 3.0%, reaching its highest level in 30 years as markets anticipate further monetary tightening from the Bank of Japan. Higher yields could also add pressure to Japan's already large government debt burden.

The sell-off has also spread across Europe. Germany's 10-year yield reached its highest level since 2009 on September 15, while U.K. borrowing costs have climbed above 5.0%.

How Higher Yields Affect the Economy

Government bond yields act as benchmarks for borrowing costs across the economy. As they rise, financing can become more expensive for mortgages, corporate debt, and other forms of credit.

Governments face pressure as well. Higher yields make refinancing debt more expensive at a time when public debt levels are already elevated across many advanced economies.

The implications also extend to stocks.

With 10-year Treasuries yielding around 5.0%, investors can earn higher returns from relatively safe government debt, raising the hurdle for riskier assets such as equities. Global fund managers now rank turmoil in bond markets as their leading market risk.

Tyler Durden Mon, 09/21/2026 - 04:15

Meloni: Italy Set To Ban Face Coverings In School, Limit Foreign Students Per Class

Authored by T.J. Muscaro via The Epoch Times,

Italy is moving to ban face coverings in schools and limit the number of foreign students per class, Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni announced at a youth event on Sept. 19.

Italy's Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni waits to welcome Austria's chancellor at the Palazzo Chigi in Rome on Feb. 10, 2025. Filippo Monteforte/AFP via Getty Images

The event was hosted by her political party, Brothers of Italy. It marks a push by her government to respond to the continuing influx of non-European immigrants, especially those from the Islamic world, with the goal of ensuring these children can better assimilate into Italian society.

"For us, anyone who comes to Italy and wants to build their future here must learn our language, understand our culture, and respect our rules," she said to a standing ovation. "It is the only serious way to welcome them."

One major element of this education reform will be making learning Italian mandatory.

"If there is only one child in a class who doesn't understand Italian, that child will likely be able to learn the language and integrate quickly with the help of classmates and teachers," she said. "However, if the number of children who don't understand the language becomes large - or even the majority - that is no longer integration; it is neglect."

Meloni declined to specify what that limit would be. But according to research institute Fondazione ISMU, currently 11.6 percent of students in Italian schools are foreigners, nearly 12 of every 100 students.

The banning of face coverings was included in the push for increased assimilation.

"You must go to school with your face uncovered, and in Italy no one, in the name of a real or supposed tradition, can decide that a young woman must hide herself," Meloni said.

She did not mention hijabs, traditional headscarves that do not cover the wearer's face, in her address.

If approved by the government, this measure will need parliamentary approval within 60 days.

Meloni's government has made an effort over the years to curb illegal immigration, winning legal battles to fast-track deportation and keep out illegal immigrants who may have entered Europe illegally through its territory but were caught outside of it

Italy has also taken measures against Spain, citing a "high risks to internal security" and a possible terrorist-infiltration threat, after tens of thousands of Moroccan nationals overran Spain's North African enclave, Ceuta, between July 30 and July 31.

Meloni recently reached a historic milestone by becoming the longest-serving uninterrupted Italian prime minister since World War II.

The Associated Press and Reuters contributed to this report.

Tyler Durden Mon, 09/21/2026 - 03:30

America Spends More On Defense R&D Than Any Other OECD Country - By A Mile

On the OECD's yardstick - defense R&D budget allocations per $1,000 of GDP - the United States spends $3.64. The next country on the list, South Korea, spends $2.06, and nobody else clears a dollar.

Britain is third at $0.97, Germany fourth at $0.79, France fifth at $0.50. The average across the 20 countries ranked is $0.58; the median is $0.27. Greece, at the bottom, spends nine cents.

The gap is about to get wider: the Department of War's request for fiscal 2027 is $1.5 trillion, 42% above this year's funding.

As Visual Capitalist explains further, defense research and development is one way countries invest in future military capabilities, from advanced weapons systems to emerging technologies.

This visualization ranks selected OECD countries by defense research and development (R&D) budget allocations per $1,000 of GDP. The data comes from the OECD Economic Outlook, Volume 2026 Issue 1, with figures covering 2024 or the latest available year as of August 2026.

Defense R&D has also historically played an important role in shaping civilian technologies. Research tied to national security has helped support breakthroughs in fields such as computing, aerospace, satellites, medicine, and advanced materials. However, the link between military spending and innovation is not automatic, as secrecy can impede knowledge diffusion, among other factors.

The U.S. Leads by a Wide Margin

The United States ranked first, with defense R&D budget allocations equal to $3.64 per $1,000 of GDP. In absolute terms, the U.S. is also the world's highest military-spending country by a wide margin, with 2025 spending totaling $954 billion and accounting for one-third of global military spending that year.

The U.S. allocation was nearly 1.8 times South Korea's and more than 3.7 times the United Kingdom's, which ranked second and third, respectively.

The table below shows defense R&D budget allocations per $1,000 of GDP for selected OECD countries:

Rank Country Defense Budget R&D Allocation per $1,000 of GDP 1 United States $3.64 2 South Korea $2.06 3 United Kingdom $0.97 4 Germany $0.79 5 France $0.50 6 Poland $0.49 7 Japan $0.42 8 Slovenia $0.35 9 Norway $0.30 10 Netherlands $0.28 11 Australia $0.26 12 Sweden $0.26 13 Spain $0.23 14 Estonia $0.19 15 Türkiye $0.19 16 Finland $0.18 17 Latvia $0.15 18 Belgium $0.10 19 Hungary $0.10 20 Greece $0.09

Although U.S. military spending as a share of GDP decreased in 2025 compared with the annual average between 2015 and 2022, the Trump administration's U.S. Department of War announced in April 2026 that its Fiscal Year 2027 (FY27) Defense Budget would request an unprecedented $1.5 trillion, a 42% increase compared with 2026 funding.

Included in that amount are plans to increase defense R&D spending from $16.6 billion in 2026 to $18.7 billion in 2027, with a stated focus on a general science and technology fund.

South Korea and Europe Round Out the Top Five

Allocating $2.06 per $1,000 of GDP to defense R&D, South Korea ranked second, making it the only other OECD country above $2.

South Korea has emerged as one of the world's fastest-growing arms producers and exporters, supported by sustained government investment in its defense industry.

Reflecting this growth, four South Korean companies appear in the SIPRI Top 100 list of global arms producers with the largest arms sales revenues in 2024. Their combined revenues increased by 30% from 2023 to 2024.

Following South Korea, the ranking drops quickly. The United Kingdom placed third at $0.97 per $1,000 of GDP. Between 2019 and 2024, the UK's Ministry of Defense tripled its net expenditure on R&D from £1.02 billion to £3.07 billion.

Germany followed in fourth place at $0.79 per $1,000 of GDP, while France ranked fifth at $0.50 per $1,000 of GDP. France and Germany are the European Union's largest and second-largest defense R&D spenders, respectively.

Most Countries Spend Far Less on Defense R&D

Across the 20 OECD countries shown, the average defense R&D allocation was $0.58 per $1,000 of GDP.

The median was much lower, at $0.27 per $1,000 of GDP, showing how much the top spenders skew the average.

Within the top 20, the drop-off is steep. The U.S. allocation of $3.64 per $1,000 of GDP was more than seven times fifth-ranked France's $0.50 and more than 40 times 20th-ranked Greece's $0.09.

Defense R&D intensity varies considerably among wealthy economies because countries may prioritize procurement, active personnel, operations, or research differently.

Tyler Durden Mon, 09/21/2026 - 02:45

All Eyes Are On Belarus Ahead Of The US' Reported European Military Drawdown

Authored by Andrew Korybko via Substack,

The potential pullback of some US forces from the Baltic States upon the completion of its force posture review could be followed by European NATO if Russia agrees to pull back some of its forces from Belarus in order to then establish partial buffers in the post-war European security architecture.

NBC reported last week that the US is considering withdrawing up to half of its ~80,000 troops that are deployed to Europe along with large amounts of equipment. This coincides with European fearmongering led by Poland and France that Russia plans to ramp up its hybrid attacks against European NATO (E-NATO) into increasingly regular kinetic ones that it'll then deny. E-NATO is also undergoing rapid militarization led by Poland and Germany while deploying ever more forces to Russia's doorstep.

These sky-high NATO-Russian tensions might be reduced upon the US' potential drawdown of its forces in Europe depending on the success of the following creative diplomatic proposal. If some US forces are pulled from the Baltic States, then the US might coerce its E-NATO allies to follow suit if Russia does the same with at least some of its forces in Belarus, which they fear could be exploited by it as a launchpad into the Baltic States. The military-strategic logic behind this proposal requires some explanation.

Just as E-NATO fears that Russia could exploit Belarus as a launchpad into the Baltic States, so too does Russia fear that E-NATO could exploit the Baltic States as a launchpad into either Kaliningrad, Belarus, or "mainland Russia". E-NATO claims that its gradual military build-up in the Baltic States is to deter Russia while Russia's own regional build-up is arguably to deter E-NATO. The resultant security dilemma risks a major war by miscalculation or a (Ukrainian?) false flag and is why tensions must urgently be reduced.

The key to this proposal is Belarus, Russia's mutual defense and Union State ally with which the US is in the midst of a fast-moving rapprochement marked by phased sanctions relief in exchange for the release of so-called "political prisoners". President Alexander Lukashenko is receptive to Trump 2.0's outreaches in order to reduce multifaceted Western pressure on Belarus since the large-scale phase of the Ukrainian Conflict began nearly half a decade ago and to counterbalance disproportionate dependence on Russia.

They and Putin could thus agree to an arrangement whereby any planned American military drawdown from the Baltic States leads to a partial drawdown of Russian forces in Belarus, incentivized by more sanctions relief for both of them, conditional on E-NATO pulling back its forces from the Baltic States. Poland, where Trump is considering a permanent US military presence and which already commands E-NATO's largest army, could then become the bloc's military bastion if they redeploy their forces to there.

It was earlier explained why "Poland Would Be The Baltic States' Best Security Guarantor In NATO 3.0", namely due to geographic reasons, the aforesaid military factors, and its envisaged leadership of the Intermarium. If this arrangement is implemented, then it could turn the Baltic States and Belarus into partial buffers, both of which would remain under their allies' mutual defense umbrellas for deterrence purposes, which could spark progress on Ukraine's negotiated demilitarization for the same purpose.

If coupled with a Russian-American(-Polish?) mechanism for verifying compliance and addressing issues as they may emerge (e.g. Ukrainian drone flights over Belarusian and Baltic airspace), then tensions could be reduced and a basis for the post-war European security architecture would be established. All eyes are therefore on Belarus ahead of the US' reported European military drawdown since that country and its leader are the key to this vision for averting a major war in the most realistic way possible.

Tyler Durden Mon, 09/21/2026 - 02:00

Shurk: Bush's Islamic Appeasement Greatly Damaged America

Authored by J.B. Shurk via American Thinker,

Last week, President George W. Bush sat down with his former secretary of state, Condoleezza Rice, to discuss the September 11, 2001, Islamic terror attacks on the United States. While reflecting on his actions twenty-five years earlier, Bush went out of his way to defend Islam: "I also made it clear that Islam was a religion of peace, not a religion of war, and that these people subverted their religion." Bush's absurd statement echoed a similarly absurd statement he made days after the attacks when he told the world, "Islam is peace," even though the burned bodies of three thousand dead Americans strongly suggested otherwise.

There have been 50,000 Islamic terror attacks since 9/11. Without question, Islam is a cult of conquest, misery, and war.

Bush's Islamic appeasement angered me twenty-five years ago, and his continued appeasement infuriates me today. I cannot believe that the man who asked Americans to go to war against an Islamic menace that threatened (and still threatens) the world can be so intellectually shallow and morally obtuse. "Islam is a religion of peace," is a disingenuous stock phrase that is too cute by half. President Barack Obama loves to tell the same lie.

While Americans fought and died in foreign lands in an effort to keep Islam's homicidal evil from causing further harm to the United States, Bush and Obama resettled Muslims into America's heartland. Twenty-five years ago, the sight of a woman wearing a burqa in the Midwest would have shocked and worried passersby. Today, it is too common for anyone to feign surprise. Both the number of Muslims and the number of mosques in the United States have more than doubled since the Islamic terror attacks that changed our country permanently. Bush told Americans that we had to fight the terrorists "over there" so that we would never again have to fight them "over here." While brave American warriors died "over there," Bush and Obama betrayed those warriors' sacrifice by inviting more Muslims "over here," ensuring that Americans will continue to endure Islamic terror attacks until this existential threat is honestly recognized and neutralized.

President Bush is eighty years old, plenty old enough to have learned that he has no business telling Muslims what their "religion" means. If he were telling black Americans what it means to be black, critics would rightfully accuse him of "whitesplaining." Does Bush believe himself to be an expert on the Quran? Has he become a Texas imam or an "austere religious scholar" during retirement? If not, then why does he insist on telling Americans that Islamic terrorists "subverted their religion"? The opposite seems patently clear: Wherever the scourge of Islam stretches its poisonous tentacles, Islamic violence is certain. Muhammad was a pedophile who encouraged the rape, torture, and murder of innocents. It should be no surprise that pedophiles, rapists, and murderers consider that malevolent deviant a "prophet."

Writer Antonio Graceffo wrote a well-researched essay this month describing in detail how Muslims are persecuting and murdering Christians across Africa, the Middle East, and parts of Asia. Carrying out massacres against Christians with hammers, machetes, axes, and guns, Muslims are right now engaging in a genocide that corporate news media and Western governments entirely ignore. In Nigeria, the Congo, Mozambique, Syria, Pakistan, Iraq, Egypt, Iran, Lebanon, Turkey, Algeria, and Indonesia, Muslims threaten Christian lives. These are the barbaric conquerors whom Bush defends as noble representatives of the "religion of peace." No self-described Christian should stay silent while Muslims slaughter Christ's followers around the world. Somehow, Bush remains quiet about Islam's unquenchable thirst for Christian blood.

Islamic bloodlust continues to exsanguinate much of Europe. A recent German report shows that foreign migrants (most of whom are Muslim) are responsible for 47% of all violent crime in Bavaria. Over 80% of North African asylum-seekers in Switzerland have been accused of committing crimes while in the country. While British children beg the government not to resettle illegal immigrants into their tiny villages, the United Kingdom is granting settlement or citizenship to one new migrant every single minute.

How is the British government combating this unsustainable invasion? The Home Office hands each Islamic migrant a nine-page booklet explaining that rape and pedophilia are illegal and that women have the same rights as men. In this behavioral guide written primarily for Muslims, the British government outlines how it is not okay to beat women, mutilate girls' genitals, have sex with children or unconscious women, or leave babies alone. The document further advises Muslims that "women must consent to sex in all situations" and "are allowed to work, study, and make their own decisions" without "permission from men."

In a section on rape, Muslim men are informed that it is not appropriate to threaten someone into having sex or to have sex with someone who is "asleep, drunk, or unable to respond." The British government warns Islamic immigrants: "If you have sex with someone without their consent, this is called rape. Rape is a serious crime in the UK. You could go to prison, lose your support and accommodation, and it will affect your asylum claim." Furthermore, there are no exceptions for child rape: "Even if they say yes, it is still illegal." Finally, Britain's new Muslims are reminded that it is not acceptable to intimidate or abuse people or take sexual pictures or videos of strangers without their consent. These "religion of peace" people sure do need a lot of help figuring out that it's not okay to rape or beat women and children! Perhaps the Brits should stop dropping them off in rural villages where they quickly outnumber the locals ten to one.

A rational person should have no problem understanding Islam as a threat to the world. President Bush held a position of immense power from which he could see Muslim atrocities as key features of that cult belief system. The fact that he remains too much of a moral coward to confront and denounce Islam's murderers, rapists, and terrorists with clarity and resolve has contributed greatly to the current moral confusion plaguing the United States.

We now have members of Congress who openly support Hamas and Hezbollah terrorists. A terrorist-sympathizing Muslim is the mayor of New York City twenty-five years after his "religion of peace" friends flew hijacked commercial airliners into the Twin Towers and murdered thousands of civilians. Another terrorist-sympathizing Muslim running for the U.S. Senate from Michigan agrees with Muslim members of Congress that 9/11 was worse for Muslims who subsequently endured "Islamophobia." When Islamic terrorists aren't trying to murder Americans with their vehicles, bombs, firearms, or knives, they're rioting in the streets and demanding "justice" for Hamas animals who rape and kill women and behead and microwave babies.

Bush's inability to identify Islam as a murderous cult ideology has exacerbated the Islamic supremacy problem in the United States. In preparation for the twenty-fifth anniversary of 9/11 this year, public school administrators instructed teachers in Fairfax County, Virginia, to avoid associating the attacks with Islam. Teachers were even told to treat Muslims as heroes and to create "safe spaces" for Muslim students. Virginia's Democrat governor commemorated 9/11 by ignoring the act of Islamic mass murder and pretending that three thousand Americans died from some kind of inexplicable natural disaster. While New York City's Muslim mayor laughed during the 9/11 Ground Zero ceremony, New York's Democrat governor left early, so that she could appear on cable news. Meanwhile, Gen Z Americans are largely indifferent to the September 11, 2001, Islamic terror attacks on the United States. Some even celebrate Osama bin Laden.

Americans promised never to forget Islam's war against the West. Twenty-five years later, it is obvious that too many did forget. President Bush's moral equivocations are partially to blame for this travesty.

We publish a variety of perspectives. Nothing written here is to be construed as representing the views of ZeroHedge.

Tyler Durden Sun, 09/20/2026 - 23:30

Space Weapons Grabbed MSM Headlines, But USAF Secretary Hinted What Could Replace MQ-9 Reaper

The Air & Space Forces Association's Air, Space & Cyber Conference opened earlier this week at the Gaylord National Resort & Convention Center in National Harbor, Maryland. Air Force Secretary Troy Meink's disclosure that the Space Force had launched "space control weapons" into orbit quickly dominated the news cycle.

Beyond the USAF's new space warfare capabilities, Meink's remarks about the service's plan to build out an upgraded unmanned aircraft fleet over the next six years warrant closer attention. His remarks offered potential clues about plans for a successor to, or an alternative operating alongside, the General Atomics MQ-9 Reaper.

2024 image of American MQ-9 Reaper UAV brought down in Yemen’s Marib. ClashReport/X

The following excerpts from Meink's speech suggest a shift in unmanned aircraft procurement and hint that a Reaper replacement  - or perhaps a cheaper alternative - may soon be approaching: 

And this is not the only class of autonomous aircraft we are aggressively pursuing. As we saw in Epic Fury, ISR strike platforms have been essential. We have used MQ-9 and even now the ULTRA aircraft to great effect.

Building on these lessons, we are developing a family of low-cost multi-role strike platforms called the Mass Modular Aircraft, or MMAs.

MMAs will provide affordable, attritable, long-range strike, and we will be able to field them at scale. Our intent is to field 100 MMAs in 2029 at even a lower cost than the CCAs and a fraction of the cost of manned aircraft we build today. Then by 2032, 500 of these platforms will join our force operational fleet.

One platform worth watching is ULTRA, a Group 5 unmanned aircraft system developed by DZYNE Technologies, now part of Ondas.

ULTRA could assume part of the MQ-9 Reaper's surveillance workload, particularly missions that prioritize endurance and operating costs over weapons capacity. Its potential role is strongest in intelligence gathering, where extended flight times could reduce aircraft rotations.

In late summer, The National Interest examined the Air Force's search for a Reaper successor in an article titled "Why the US Air Force Wants a Replacement for the MQ-9 Reaper." Mounting Reaper losses in the Gulf conflict have increased the focus on a lower-cost alternative. ULTRA's capabilities support the case for a much cheaper alternative with longer endurance and, considered alongside Meink's remarks, may suggest that the alternative has been found: ULTRA.

Tyler Durden Sun, 09/20/2026 - 23:00

Leftists Rally To Stop Trump's Renovations To Crumbling Kennedy Center

Why is it a bad thing to repair Washington DC's crumbling landmarks and famous buildings?  It's only a bad thing when Donald Trump is doing it.  This attitude has led to numerous delays and problems with overall renovations across America's capital; from vandalism to direct interference with work crews to legal warfare as a way to stall various projects. 

It's the kind of "monkey wrenching" that is typical among communist organizations and it's designed to make political opponents look ineffective or incompetent through constant sabotage.  The goal of these people to to ensure that nothing good or positive is accomplished by their enemies.  No visual examples of improvement are allowed - The enemy cannot be seen as helping the public at large; only communism is allowed to "help the public".

The ongoing battle to finish renovations for the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts might seem like a minor issue, but it represent a much bigger conflict between the people who want to reform and rebuild American society vs the people who want to burn everything to the ground.  

In response to the Trump Administration's plans for much needed repairs to the Kennedy Center building, activists are once again turning a reasonable effort into an "act of evil".  Leftists claim the renovations cover for Trump to "destroy the Kennedy Center because he can't add his name to the building".

Huge crowd for the Hands Off the Kennedy Center demonstration in DC to send the message to Trump: Don’t you dare knock down this living memorial to a slain President. pic.twitter.com/v52ofBwEof

— Jim Acosta (@Acosta) September 18, 2026

Protesters have been surrounding the building in hopes of blocking workers from entering and completing the job.  President Trump, as chairman of the Kennedy Center board of trustees, has led a plan for a major two-year overhaul of the main building of the center. The project is funded primarily by about $257 million appropriated by Congress.

The board selected a full closure of the main building (rather than a longer, more expensive phased renovation) so work can proceed without interruption. Some newer and more modern sections of the center are slated to stay open for limited programming and as a memorial space.

"Hands off!"

"Hands Around the Kennedy Center" rally in Washington, DC. pic.twitter.com/o2g10JJNAz

— CSPAN (@cspan) September 19, 2026

Draft plans prepared by consultants and reviewed by the board include:

Exterior and waterproofing:  Polishing the Carrara marble facade, plaza-level waterproofing, terrace/roof work, garage and subgrade repairs, landscaping, and fountain restoration.   

Building systems:  Full replacement of aging HVAC, plumbing (described as decades old), electrical, fire-protection, elevator, and escalator systems, plus technical stage equipment. 

Public spaces (“front of house”):  New marble flooring, furniture, draperies, and lighting in the Grand Foyer and similar areas; relocated box office; new coffee shop; restroom upgrades (including a VIP restroom); wayfinding improvements.   

Performance venues:  Upgrades to the Concert Hall (including acoustical work and work around its pipe organ), Opera House, Eisenhower Theater, and smaller spaces such as the Family Theater, Terrace Theater, and Theater Lab—new seating, flooring, lighting, and related modernization. 

The monument has been falling apart for years.  According to government records, 456 leaks were recorded in the building from 2018 to 2023.   Water intrusion has caused severe decay to internal walls and sensitive electrical areas.  The cooling and heating for the building is 30 years old and needs replacement.  Wiring is rotting and elevators need new parts.  Some plaster ceilings have recently collapsed after heavy rains. 

Another warning we can’t ignore. A section of the Grand Foyer ceiling collapsed after this week’s storms. Thankfully no one was hurt. Decades of deferred maintenance made this inevitable.

Chairman President Trump has been right: America’s cultural center needs to close,… pic.twitter.com/Z1KrNsk78p

— The Kennedy Center (@TKCOfficial) September 5, 2026

Many of these problems were flagged during the Biden Administration, but nothing was done.  Leftists claim these ceiling cave-ins are part of a "conspiracy" by Trump to push forward the renovations, but similar issues have been cited for years, well before Trump entered office. 

The motive behind left wing interference in these projects is simple:  To agitate and obstruct until people give up on having nice things.  When the public gives up and society is awash in decay, communists can step in and argue that they are the answer.  In other words, they intend to hold the country hostage and prevent improvement until the public gives them the power they desire.    

Tyler Durden Sun, 09/20/2026 - 22:00

Pentagon Releases UFO Files Examining Warp Drives, Stargates, & Cloaking

Authored by Tom Gantert via The Epoch Times,

The Pentagon on Sept. 18 released its sixth batch of declassified and historical UFO files, including papers examining speculative concepts such as warp drives, cloaking devices, stargates, and wormholes.

In July 2025 in the northeastern United States, an eyewitness observed an intense bright light in their backyard as they parked their car upon returning home from work. This is a screenshot from the witness's personal video. Screenshot by The Epoch Times/Courtesy of the Pentagon

The documents, produced through the Advanced Aerospace Weapon System Applications Program, examine subjects including discussions on ideas such as antigravity, negative-mass propulsion, and invisibility. The Pentagon cautioned that these were reference papers, not proof that the concepts are workable or validated.

The files span events from 1952 to as recent as 2025.

One 2010 file discusses "early experiments behind invisibility cloaking, describing several ways an object might be hidden from visual or sensor detection, including camouflage, transparency effects, and optical cloaking that bends light around an object."

Another 2010 file examined wormholes and stargates as "hypothetical spacetime structures within general relativity that theoretically offer a means of faster-than-light travel or communication."

A Pentagon research paper from the time describes injuries suffered by three healthy antenna engineers following what it called an "anomalous 'accident.'"

Within 72 hours, the engineers experienced skin heat and redness, fever, pain, headaches, numbness, nausea, diarrhea, hair loss, heart palpitations, insomnia, and anxiety. Two developed extreme light sensitivity and inflamed, bloodshot eyes. One showed signs of radiation illness and later developed indications of malignant changes.

The paper attributed the symptoms to accidental close-range exposure to a mixture of radiofrequency, microwave, and ultraviolet radiation. It characterized the investigation as "extensive, but controversial."

The files were published through the Presidential Unsealing and Reporting System for UAP Encounters, or PURSUE, according to Pentagon spokesman Sean Parnell.

Parnell did not describe the number or contents of the newly released files in the announcement. He said the Pentagon and other federal agencies are working on the next release and will continue publishing additional material.

Previous releases included a pitch involving a Hollywood actor to NASA and a 1957 report of a UFO sighting in Germany.

In 2001, space advocate Carol Rosin wrote a letter to a NASA official with a proposal to bringing her husband, actor Jon Cypher, to the official's office to promote a space initiative. Her sales pitch stressed Cypher's appearances on "Hill Street Blues" and "Major Dad," his Broadway performance in "Man of La Mancha," his ability to sing opera in four languages and his fondness for discussing space.

Rosin assured the recipient that their proposal would not cost NASA "a dime" and would require only as much time as he wanted. She then invited him and his associates to lunch or dinner.

The 1957 report was an FBI file from a U.S. citizen who was a war prisoner in Germany. He reported seeing a UFO while working in Germany in 1944.

Tyler Durden Sun, 09/20/2026 - 21:30

Bechtel Splits With TerraPower As Holtec Postpones IPO

Bechtel and Bill Gates-backed TerraPower are parting ways over the next phase of the Natrium reactor project in Wyoming, adding a construction headache to a sector already digesting Holtec’s postponed IPO.

According to a layoff notice reported by Washington Business Journal, the companies failed to reach an agreement and “have decided to move forward separately.” 

It's a hard flip from April when Bechtel was celebrating mobilization and field execution at Kemmerer Unit 1. And just last month, TerraPower was still targeting completion in 2030 for the project, which is a 345 MW sodium-cooled reactor plus a molten-salt storage system.

Nothing has pointed yet to an actual halt in the construction efforts. But this isn't exactly the cleanest spot to suddenly change contractors. The fact that the industry is in the midst of its greatest attempted comeback yet makes it significantly more awkward that the two leading nuclear parties are struggling to work with each other.

While there is a sufficiently large construction industry for TerraPower to choose a new partner from, the list becomes incredibly short when considering which EPC firms hold the actual talent and nuclear industry experience required to complete the project on time and on budget.

On the domestic side, Fluor is likely high on the list, as they are arguably the number two nuclear construction firm behind Bechtel. In April, it signed an agreement with X-energy for initial planning and project-definition work on the proposed four-reactor development at Dow’s Seadrift site in Texas.

If Bechtel does get outright replaced, though, a name higher on the list than Fluor is likely South Korea’s Hyundai Engineering & Construction. Under an August framework agreement, TerraPower selected Hyundai as their EPC contractor for up to eight future Natrium reactors, with completion, price and performance guarantees intended to support commercial financing.

Meanwhile, Holtec has supplied the week’s other unwelcome headline. As we covered in our Labor Day nuclear roundup, the company had marketed 50 million shares at $15 to $18 each, seeking up to $900 million.

Barely a week later, Holtec confirmed the postponement, citing deteriorating investor sentiment and uncertainty around data-center development. It intends to keep its SEC registration statement on file and says work on Palisades and its SMR program will continue.

Tyler Durden Sun, 09/20/2026 - 21:00

Trump Announces 'AI Force', Plans To Name AI Czar As US Pushes Tech Dominance

Authored by AG News Staff via American Greatness,

President Donald Trump announced plans to form an "AI Force" and appoint an artificial intelligence czar as his administration looks to promote the rapidly growing technology while using existing laws to address potential wrongdoing.

Trump argued Democrats are attempting to create public doubts about AI after criticism of data centers failed to gain traction.

"It all began with an attack on our Data Centers, until people realized how wealthy and prestigious they were for the Communities in which they were built," Trump wrote on Truth Social, pointing to what he described as higher salaries, lower taxes and safer streets.

Trump said his administration would resist efforts to slow the industry's growth.

"We will not in any way hinder or stifle the Growth of this incredible Industry. Rather, we will cherish it, help it, and watch over it, as it grows!" Trump wrote.

The president also acknowledged the potential for harmful activity involving AI, but said existing criminal and civil laws could be used to address misconduct.

"For this purpose, I am forming the AI Force, much like I did Space Force, which has been a tremendous SUCCESS, in my First Term," Trump wrote.

Trump said he would soon announce an AI czar to help oversee the effort, adding, "Only High I.Q. individuals need apply!"

The president portrayed artificial intelligence as a potentially transformative force for the American economy, comparing its significance to the Industrial Revolution and the internet.

Trump said AI could eventually have an economic impact equal to as much as 25% of U.S. gross domestic product.

"We are leading China, and the rest of the World, and I intend to keep it that way!" Trump wrote.

In a separate post on Saturday, Trump said many people do not think the term “artificial intelligence” is an accurate way to describe the technology.

“A far more elegant and accurate description of this new phenomena would be Superior Intelligence (SI) or, Extreme Intelligence (EI) or, Supreme Intelligence (SI),” Trump wrote.

“This is a Poll, and I would appreciate everybody voting! Which is the best name for this ever-growing ‘Revolution?’”

California Gov. Gavin Newsom, a Democrat who is considering a bid for the White House, criticized Trump’s statements about AI on Saturday.

“Instead of regulating AI, he’s posting polls to rename it,” Newsom wrote.

“California is taking action. I just signed an executive order accelerating America’s first independent AI safety oversight framework.”

The president’s announcement comes amid calls from some lawmakers to further regulate the technology and local protests against the construction of new data centers.

Tyler Durden Sun, 09/20/2026 - 20:30

Oracle Loans Backing Massive New Mexico Data Center Tumble To Stressed Levels

Overnight we explained why the AI supercycle now hinges on the ever faster issuance of more and more debt, so critically needed to fund trillions in capex in the coming years...

... and which according to Goldman will look something like this.

The problem is that as spreads keep blowing out as more investors do the ugly math (discussed extensively here), the pace of debt issuance is starting to slow as credit markets get cold feet.

The latest example comes courtesy of the same Oracle which we profiled as the "first AI domino to fall", back in November '25, and whose $18 billion in leveraged loans tied to a New Mexico data center leased to the company slid into stressed territory on Friday, highlighting investors’ fear that increasing local backlash will derail the tech group’s massive AI infrastructure build-out. 

According to the FT, loans linked to the $165 billion “Project Jupiter” were quoted at 89 to 91 cents on the dollar by syndicate banks including Santander and Jefferies. Healthy debt typically trades within a tight band near par.

Oracle's massive Project Jupiter data center in New Mexico.

What makes the price slide from par in just a few months especially concerning is that the 1,400-acre data center campus in Doña Ana County is at the heart of Oracle’s landmark $300bn contract with OpenAI to provide computing power. The marquee project secured $18Bn of loans from a consortium of banks late last year to kick-start construction, along with billions of equity investment from Blue Owl.

According to the FT report, efforts to offload the debt to a broader group of investors have hit a wall due to concerns around Oracle’s massive borrowing and declining creditworthiness. The debt secured a private investment-grade rating from credit rating agencies but that's largely thanks to the SPV structure which is synthetically boosting the project's overall credit rating (as discussed previously).

Indeed, as Barclays wrote in its latest credit report on ORCL, despite the overall improvement the bank has seen in the credit, one area that remains less comfortable is "the timeline for its data center projects, particularly for those that have faced setbacks such as New Mexico/Jupiter."

And amid the growing grassroots pushback to data centers, the market is also turning increasingly less comfortable, with the company's gargantuan debt load is not helping.

Oracle’s corporate credit rating currently sits just one notch above junk following a downgrade from S&P in July. That, together with the recent meltdown in lower-rated AI credits, meant that banks were now forced to hold more Oracle-linked project debt on their balance sheets than initially planned. And judging by the trajectory of Oracle's CapEx, which is now growing at an explosive pace, they will end up holding much more in the coming months.

Separately, Oracle’s 82-year-old co-founder Larry Ellison abruptly cancelled a $7.5Bn share-trading plan last weekend, just one day after unveiling it, without explanation.

One thing that is very clear is that the market is not giving the company much if any credit for its massive, if questionable, backlog, which has been made possible only thank to the company's even more massive debt spree.

Oracle’s stock has plunged 50% since it unveiled its $300bn deal with OpenAI a year ago.

And if the massive debt wasn't enough of a problem, Project Jupiter has faced its own share of delays due to fierce local opposition over concerns about its impact on the local area’s water supply and air quality. The project was initially going to be powered by 2.2 gigawatts of gas turbines, but the state land office blocked a request to run a natural gas pipeline to the data centre.

In April, Oracle announced that it would power itself with Bloom Energy fuel cells, which emit less sulphur and nitrogen oxides, but permission to connect a pipeline to feed these was also blocked. 

The project’s air permit application was paused in August after lawsuits from two environmental groups, although a judge said the process could continue on Thursday. 

Deb Haaland, New Mexico’s Democratic gubernatorial nominee and a former US Interior secretary, said she would pause all new data centres if elected in November and require developers to heavily invest in renewable energy.  State filings show Oracle donated more than $12,000 to her campaign in late August.

It is not clear how a moratorium could affect the company’s sites, although it would like lead to even more delays.  

“Big Tech’s mantra may be ‘move fast and break things’, but here in New Mexico, we do things our way,” Haaland said in a press conference.

Comparable to nationwide trends, a recent poll by New Mexico's Albuquerque Journal found that 65% of its residents were against the development of large data centres, versus only 20% of respondents supporting such construction. 

Project Jupiter’s initial phase is as of this moment at least seven months behind its proposed date to come online, according to market intelligence firm SynMax. It was expected to be completed by November this year. It won't be; in fact it may not be completed for years. 

Tyler Durden Sun, 09/20/2026 - 20:00

India's Clean Energy Boom Halts Coal Power Growth

Authored by Tsvetana Paraskova via OilPrice.com,

India's coal power generation did not grow between the first half of 2024 and the first half of 2026, for the first such two-year period in over 50 years in which coal power has remained flat in the world's second-largest coal consumer, a new analysis by the Centre for Research on Energy and Clean Air (CREA) for Carbon Brief showed.

"The period from the first half of 2024 to the first half of 2026 saw the largest increase in non-fossil power generation on record in India," Lauri Myllyvirta, lead analyst at the Centre for Research on Energy and Clean Air (CREA), wrote in the analysis.

Moreover, the clean energy boom led to the first time in more than 50 years that India has seen no growth in coal power generation over a two-year period, even as electricity demand grew overall.

Despite the record clean energy growth, India continues to pursue major capital investments in fossil fuels, including new coal-power capacity, plans for conversion of coal-to-chemicals, and efforts to boost domestic coking coal production for the steel sector, CREA noted.

A total of 43 gigawatts (GW) of coal-power capacity was under construction in India as of the end of June 2026, according to the analysis.

Overall coal-fired capacity installations in India continue to rise, and coal remains a key pillar of India's electricity mix - about two-thirds of total power output.

Despite booming renewable capacity additions, India continues to rely on coal to meet most of its power demand as authorities also look to avoid blackouts in cases of severe heat waves.

Coal will still be a key part of India's power system for the next two decades, Rajnath Ram, adviser for energy at the government policy think tank, NITI Aayog, said at the end of last year.

"We cannot be subjective about coal. The question is how sustainably we can use it," the official noted.

Tyler Durden Sun, 09/20/2026 - 19:30

Germany's Merz Admits "Disaster" After AfD Victory As CDU Crash Out Of State Parliament

Update: The situation for Merz's party just went from "disaster" to full Titanic as projections signal the CDU will get just 4.9% of the vote - below the critical threshold required to enter parliament...

This would be the first time the CDU failed to enter state parliament since the founding of the federal republic in 1949.

Two days ago Friedrich Merz said Germany was "a country of immigration."

Today, his party collapsed. 🇩🇪 pic.twitter.com/d8dvWPe92r

— Inevitable West (@Inevitablewest) September 20, 2026

Merz's approval rating is at a record low...

*  *  *

German Chancellor Friedrich Merz's political troubles deepened as exit polls put his Christian Democrats on course for their worst-ever result in a state election.

MERZ'S CDU PARTY POSTS WORST RESULT EVER IN A GERMAN STATE VOTE

AFD AHEAD OF SOCIAL DEMOCRATS IN NORTHEASTERN STATE VOTE

ANTI-CAPITALIST LEFT PARTY LEADING IN BERLIN ELECTION

— zerohedge (@zerohedge) September 20, 2026

Right-wing Alternative for Germany (AfD) is set to win most votes in the state of Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania while the socialist Left Party has surged to first place in Berlin, according to initial projections.

Local outlet Deutsche Welle adds more color:

In Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania, the AfD is projected to take 37%, edging out the center-left Social Democratic Party (SPD) on 35.5%.

The center-right Christian Democratic Union (CDU), the party of Chancellor Friedrich Merz, is projected to slump to 5.5%, barely above the threshold to enter the state parliament.

In Berlin, the CDU suffered another alarming setback, polling at just 20% against 24.8% for the far-left anti-capitalist 'Left Party'.

AfD is third on 15.7%, up 6.9 points. 

Sunday’s showing could mark the first time the CDU is expelled from a state parliament since the founding of the federal republic in 1949.

“We can’t sugarcoat it, it was a disaster,” Merz told reporters in Berlin in a statement directly after exit polls were released, but offered no sign that he would step down.

He gathered senior CDU officials to party headquarters, where he sought to gauge their support for his leadership.

Lars Klingbeil, the SPD co-leader and vice chancellor, said the government needs to take stock and ask why voters voiced such uncertainty about policymaking in Berlin, where Merz’s coalition has struggled to sell its plan to overhaul the pension system and take on more debt to boost spending on defense and infrastructure.

“I take this very seriously,” Klingbeil told ARD.

“I also believe that we need to look at results like these with humility and ask ourselves: What can we do differently? What can we do better?”

The AfD party’s national co-leader, Alice Weidel, said Merz was the “wrong chancellor” and doing damage to his party.

“He’s dragging the CDU down with him,” Weidel told ARD.

“The CDU must ask itself — especially now — whether it wants to continue with this chancellor and with these left-wing policies. Because it won’t be able to carry on like this.”

AfD wrote on X:

"Chancellor Merz is not stepping down after the CDU disaster - no, instead he's telling the citizens that there won't be any 'back to the good old days'.

But, Mr. Merz. There will be. With the Alternative for Germany, which aligns its policies exclusively with the interests of its own citizens—and which will replace the CDU. Everywhere,"

"I am taking over this responsibility because I want to bring our country forward," Merz said.

Yet deindustrialization is really what's on the ballot, as Merz and the German political establishment have failed the nation.

Germany's political landscape is fragmenting in three directions at once: the CDU in the center, the AfD on the right, and the Left Party on the far left. No single coalition appears to be taking shape. This comes weeks after AfD's victory in Saxony-Anhalt. The results intensify pressure on Merz only 16 months into his chancellorship.

Andrzej Szczepaniak, a senior European economist and executive director at Nomura International in London, wrote in recent weeks that Europe has entered an 18-month election cycle that could accelerate the continent's shift toward populism, with high-profile elections already underway. 

Szczepaniak emphasized the "seeds of political change" are already here, indicating that "politics in Europe is lurching towards more populism." 

Read the full report here. 

The political shift extends well beyond Europe. In Brazil, foreign capital is beginning to flow in as right-wing challenger Flávio Bolsonaro leads socialist President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, suggesting investors are positioning for a potential change in economic policy. 

Tyler Durden Sun, 09/20/2026 - 19:00

Drug 10 Times Stronger Than Fentanyl Seized In San Francisco

Authored by Cynthia Cai via The Epoch Times,

San Francisco police have arrested four suspects, recovered multiple firearms, and seized over 20,000 counterfeit pills - some containing cychlorphine, a new synthetic drug that is up to 10 times stronger than fentanyl.

The arrests resulted from a months-long investigation that started with the fatal overdose of a San Francisco teenager, according to San Francisco Police Department (SFPD) Chief Derrick Lew on Monday.

SFPD opened its investigation after officers responded on April 7 to a home on Bush Street, where a mother had found her teenage son deceased due to a suspected overdose.

Officers from the narcotics unit collected evidence, including what appeared to be pharmaceutical medication, to determine the source of the pills, SFPD said in a statement.

During testing, officers found that the pills were counterfeit, with some containing the synthetic drug cychlorphine.

The drug was first detected in the United States at a Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) laboratory in Florida in April 2024. Later that year, the Center for Forensic Science Research and Education confirmed identity of the drug through reference materials, according to the U.S. National Library of Medicine.

Cychlorphine can be up to 10 times more potent than fentanyl and is currently undetectable by drug test strips or hospital opioid urine tests, according to an April 30 advisory from the White House Office of National Drug Control Policy.

As of March 2026, at least 24 states have reported overdoses or deaths related to cychlorphine. East Tennessee has reported a cluster of 19 confirmed deaths, with other cases spread among states including California, Illinois, Kentucky, Ohio, and Texas.

Due to the strength of cychlorphine, the DEA says reversing the effects of the synthetic drug "might require several doses of naloxone to be effective."

In San Francisco, investigations into the teen's death eventually led officers to the potential source of the pills. They carried out multiple controlled drug buys to identify the suspects before obtaining warrants.

On Sept. 8, officers served a search warrant on the 700 block of O'Farrell Street, where they seized a few oxycodone pills and cocaine and arrested 46-year-old Nicholas Wallace.

The next day, search warrants led officers to the 300 block of Executive Park Blvd. and the 1300 block of Newhall Ave. where they arrested 46-year-old Leander Pitts and 39-year-old Starr Lamare.

Officers seized over 20,000 pills, including suspected counterfeit Xanax, oxycodone, hydrocodone, cyclobenzaprine, and fentanyl, among other deadly narcotics.

Law enforcement also recovered a semi-automatic assault rifle, a semi-automatic pistol, $2,267 in cash, and 6.5 grams of black tar heroin - a sticky, rock-like form of heroin that primarily originates from South America.

All four suspects have been booked in San Francisco County Jail on various charges, which include possession for sale of narcotics and firearms, according to SFPD.

"Our investigators will stop at nothing to ensure deadly narcotics are taken off our streets and individuals who peddle them are arrested and held accountable," Police Chief Derrick Lew said. "This tragic case highlights the dangers these deadly drugs pose to our community."

Although arrests have been made, police say the investigation remains active and they will continue to follow leads to identify additional arrests. Members of the public are encouraged to contact SFPD with tips at 1-415-575-4444.

Tyler Durden Sun, 09/20/2026 - 18:30

Trump Would 'Probably Be Open' To Meeting Iranian President, Who Will Address UN

President Trump in a Sunday morning Fox News interview repeated some of his talking points about a big decision he is preparing to make regarding what comes next in the Iran war

He told the outlet he's currently in "deciding mode" on Iran and that "very big things" are coming, and once again suggested it would either involve major military escalation or else a drawdown in tensions.

The president said: "My question is, if and when do I blow the entire nation up? They better behave."

But he went from saying that he's mulling the destruction of an entire society, to then suggesting it could be the opposite - top negotiations could happen, to the point that he could meet Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian.

He said he might allow Iran to "rot" economically or else a deal could be forged, adding that "very big things are going to be happening in the not-so-distant future."

Interestingly, the US actually issued visas to allow Iranian top officials and diplomats to travel for the UN General Assembly meeting through this week. According to Iran's PressTV:

Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian is set to travel to New York to attend the 81st session of the United Nations General Assembly next week.

Pezeshkian is scheduled to address the General Assembly on Wednesday, September 23, where he’s expected to present the Islamic Republic’s stance on international developments and the US-Israeli war of aggression against the country.

On the sidelines of the gathering, the president is also expected to hold meetings and consultations with world leaders.

Trump was asked about the high level UN meeting which opens Monday, and surprisingly signaled a willingness to engage diplomatically, going so far as to say he would "probably be open" to meeting with Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian.

In Trump's mind, there seem to be three options on the table, or as he put it--"to obliterate Iran, letting it rot economically or reach a deal."

Iran has meanwhile over the weekend once again warned US allies in the region that they'll be considered "complicit" if the US resumes it military assault on the Islamic Republic. The Iranian military HQ stated that "any mistakes will result in painful attacks."

Tehran further indicated Sunday that it is still awaiting Trump's response to its conditions for ending the war. Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf confirmed to AFP that Iran's demands were sent to Washington via the Qataris.

🚨General Staff of the Iranian Armed Forces:
According to intelligence received, the US has once again decided—with the green light from certain regional countries—to resume actions against Iran during a joint meeting in a European nation.

— IRIB (Islamic Republic of Iran Broadcasting) (@iribnews_irib) September 20, 2026

These conditions have been summarized as "the end of the war on all fronts, the release of frozen assets and the end of the naval blockade."

Releasing all frozen funds is a tall ask, given the White House has only become more aggressive it waging economic war on the Iranians. But Iran has blasted the theft and hijacking of its funds and sovereign assets.

* * *

Tyler Durden Sun, 09/20/2026 - 18:00

"Not Enough Raw Material!" - Resource Wars Put Tungsten In Crosshairs As Western Rearmament Supercycle Looms

Submitted by Almonty Industries CEO Lewis Black, 

The UK just invested £71m to restart a tungsten mine, with an option on half the output. Other governments will follow. I should be pleased – I've spent years arguing the West needs to fund its own supply.

The problem is I've seen what happens next. In 2008, Japan and South Korea poured billions into securing critical mineral supply chains. They funded projects across Australia and Canada. The result: no material produced. The money went to a generation of junior mining executives. I remember them on their boats in Monaco – very grateful, very happy. Governments have good ideas. The people they back to deliver on them are sometimes another matter.

The challenge is that a government is a jack of all trades – it can't tell a good mine from a bad one, so it hires engineers who write glowing feasibility reports with a waiver in the small print. And there is no shortage of people who call themselves management. Most of them are clowns who shouldn't be left alone with a box of matches.

Japan and South Korea learned. They stopped trying to pick winners and pushed the risk onto their industrial base – the companies that buy the stuff. Those companies know how to protect a dollar. If the new money follows that model, the checks might land somewhere useful this time.

Tungsten markets

Michael Dornhofer, ISBP – assessment as of 11 September, 2026

Tungsten prices in the USA and Europe stay unchanged for another week and are still around 3000 USD/mtu WO3. Reports from China show their domestic price trend moved to an upward tendency.

The reason is quite simple: There is not enough raw material! As the APT price in China is only about one third of the western price, Chinese APT producers are not willing to buy western concentrates on western price level. But without a significant amount of imported raw material, the industry is running short on raw material. Soon it will become clear whether the Chinese domestic prices will go up towards western levels, or China might reduce output of downstream products for export.

The coming weeks will show us. And there's another interesting development that even some "experts" overlooked. On 5 August, China placed several foreign entities under sanctions and banned them from operating in China. One entity on this list is the non-profit organization RBA.

RBA (Responsible Business Alliance) is the world's largest industry coalition dedicated to promoting responsible business conduct. RBA has more than 600 member companies including Apple, Tesla, Microsoft, Amazon etc. and runs the RMI (Responsible Minerals Initiative) program.

Nearly the entire western downstream industry insists on RMI certificates for their total supply chain. When, due to the ban of RBA, no RMI audits and certificates are possible in China, western downstream producers cannot accept any tungsten material or downstream products coming out of China.

China wants to replace the RMI audits by audits performed by CCCMC (Chinese Chamber of Commerce for Metals & Chemicals). But knowing that China imports thousands of tonnes of concentrate from countries like Myanmar and North Korea, and so material from these countries are in the tungsten supply chain in China, it's questionable who would trust Chinese audit certificates.

So, this easy-to-overlook new regulation in China could lead to an additional "firewall" between China and RoW, which might have a very significant effect on the tungsten world market.

Michael Dornhofer is founder of ISBP (Independent Supply Business Partner) in Graz, Austria. He has spent more than 20 years in tungsten, including 13 years at Wolfram Bergbau und Hütten, Sandvik's tungsten business, and has worked as an independent agent and consultant to the tungsten and hard metal industry since 2019.

From January, the door shuts

Since 2023, the Pentagon has barred Chinese, Russian, Iranian and North Korean tungsten from defense contracts. From 1 January 2027, that restriction moves upstream. It will no longer matter where the tungsten was melted or processed. What matters is where it was mined. Ore, feedstock, recycled material: if it started life in one of those four countries, it is out. The route that kept the loophole open – mine in China, process somewhere friendlier, sell it as non-Chinese – closes for good.

That's the American side. On the other side, producer countries are shutting their own doors. Zimbabwe banned exports of tungsten ore and concentrates in July, confirmed by the Ministry of Mines and reported by Bloomberg last week. Vietnam's industry ministry has drafted a proposal to pull tungsten off the permitted-export list entirely. Vietnam is the world's second-largest producer, at around 3,400 tonnes a year. If that draft becomes law, the non-China supply pool gets a lot smaller.

Zimbabwe barely produces any tungsten. The volume is negligible. But the pattern is worth watching – one more producer country pulling raw material off the open market. The list of places you can actually buy tungsten outside China keeps getting shorter.

Opinion

People ask why we don't branch out. Gold is on a run. Lithium gets headlines. Every commodity has someone telling you it's the one to watch. We do tungsten and molybdenum. We don't know anything else – and I would rather say that than pretend otherwise.

A vet treats everything that walks through the door. Dogs, cats, parrots. A doctor specializes. The guy who whips out your appendix does not do brain surgery, unless you're on a budget.

Mining is the same. Every deposit has its own geology, its own metallurgy, its own set of problems you only discover once you are underground. The companies that chase whatever commodity is fashionable learn everything at surface level and nothing underneath. We have been at this long enough to know what we don't know – and we don't know gold or lithium or anything that's not a refractory metal.

We are the doctor.

In the media

The analysts have arrived. Jefferies has initiated coverage of Almonty with a Buy rating, citing the tightening tungsten market and the growing need for supply outside China. With the shares up considerably over the past year, interest in both Almonty and tungsten has clearly moved on.

What matters now is execution – bringing new supply into a market that badly needs it.

*  *  *

On the tungsten news front, Almonty partnered with Rwanda's government last Monday, securing a foothold in Africa's largest tungsten-producing nation. By Thursday, the miner, which expects to become the leading Western producer of conflict-free tungsten (ex-China), tapped Swedish mining equipment maker Sandvik's Wolfram Bergbau und Hütten AG unit to process existing tailings from its Los Santos mine in western Spain.

As last week's news proved, Almonty's move is about bringing the most immediately available tungsten supply to the West as resource wars and China's critical materials chokehold on the world collide with the US rearmament supercycle set to kick off in the near term.

In other words, the West doesn't have the time to open new mines. 

via Christian Keller, Barclays' global head of economics research

Without critical materials, the West's rearmament supercycle, reindustrialization, data center buildouts and a nearly endless list of other projects would not be possible. Wall Street should refocus on producing miners that can deliver today because they're the ones providing the building blocks that make Western reindustrialization possible. 

Tyler Durden Sun, 09/20/2026 - 17:30