How Argentina Turned to Trump

Wednesday, Sept 24th, 2025

World News — Carney Touts Trade Opportunities With China

Bloomberg

Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney signaled a push to deepen trade ties with China, highlighting opportunities in clean and conventional energy as well as agriculture, while Foreign Affairs Minister Anita Anand prepares diplomatic visits to Beijing and New Delhi to advance Canada’s Indo-Pacific strategy. Speaking after a meeting with Premier Li Qiang at the UN General Assembly, Carney pointed to China’s role as a buyer of Canadian liquefied natural gas and said he expects to eventually meet with President Xi Jinping. While Carney defended Canada’s steel tariffs as necessary to fend off dumping, he emphasized that broader commercial opportunities remain, even as Chinese levies on Canadian canola, pork, and seafood continue to weigh on farmers. With U.S. protectionism under Donald Trump straining Canada’s reliance on its largest trading partner, Ottawa is seeking to diversify markets, balancing cooperation and confrontation with China while also repairing strained relations with India.

Tech — Micron With Solid Forecast

Bloomberg

Micron Technology Inc. delivered a strong quarterly outlook on the back of surging demand for artificial intelligence hardware, projecting first-quarter revenue of about $12.5 billion and profit of $3.75 a share, both ahead of analyst expectations. The company has emerged as a key player in supplying high-bandwidth memory critical to AI systems, with sales rising 46% last quarter to $11.3 billion as data center and storage chip demand outpaced supply. CEO Sanjay Mehrotra said Micron is uniquely positioned as the only U.S.-based memory manufacturer to capture AI-driven growth, though spending is set to rise with investments in new plants and technology, including next-generation HBM4 chips. While its shares have already nearly doubled this year, buoyed by AI optimism, Micron’s forecast underscores its growing lead against competitors Samsung and SK Hynix in advanced memory, securing long-term contracts that should stabilize revenue.

Economics — How Argentina Turned to Trump

FT

Argentina’s President Javier Milei, once hailed for bringing inflation under control and restoring fiscal balance, is now facing a deepening economic and political crisis after his party’s unexpected landslide loss in Buenos Aires local elections rattled markets. Milei’s strategy of keeping the peso artificially strong backfired, stunting growth, draining reserves, and undermining investor confidence just as corruption allegations, policy missteps, and broken alliances compounded instability. The peso slid sharply, bond prices fell, and the central bank burned through reserves to defend the currency, prompting U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent to signal that the Trump administration was ready to step in with potential support. Milei’s temporary elimination of agricultural export taxes has bought some breathing room by unlocking much-needed dollars from crop stockpiles, but analysts warn U.S. or IMF assistance will not resolve Argentina’s structural problems without deeper political consensus and consistent monetary policy.

Business Schools — How Top MBA Programs Are Ending Their DEI

Bloomberg

Top U.S. business schools are dismantling or suspending their participation in diversity, equity, and inclusion initiatives after the federal government’s sweeping crackdown declared such efforts tantamount to racial discrimination, prompting institutions to cut decades-long ties with organizations like the Consortium for Graduate Study in Management, Prospanica, Management Leadership for Tomorrow, Forté Foundation, and Reaching Out MBA. Schools including UT Austin’s McCombs, UVA’s Darden, Chicago Booth, Northwestern’s Kellogg, Wharton, and Harvard have withdrawn from or paused external partnerships once central to recruiting underrepresented minorities and women into MBA programs, often citing regulatory pressure or risk management. While student advocates and admissions experts warn the retreat will undercut enrollment of minority and disadvantaged candidates, school leaders largely frame the changes as compliance with new federal rules, even as many acknowledge the uncertainty these moves create for future diversity in elite business education.

The Daily Spark

The consensus probability of a recession over the next 12 months continues to decline and currently stands at 30%, see chart below.

Quote of the Day

“Success does not lie in sticking to things. It lies in picking the right thing to stick to and quitting the rest.”

― Annie Duke, Quit