Welcome back to The Breakdown with me, NLW.

It's a daily podcast on macro, Bitcoin, and the big picture power shifts remaking our world.

What's going on, guys? It is Friday, February 7th, and today we are doing a very janky Friday 5. Before we get into that, however, if you are enduring the breakdown, please go subscribe to it, give it a rating, give it a review, or if you want to dive deeper into the conversation, come join us on the Breakers Discord. You can find a link at the show notes or go to bit.ly slash breakdown pod. All right friends, well, as you can hear from

my voice, things have not gotten better over here, but I didn't feel like I could do two AI episodes in a row. So we are going to persevere. And Scott, my normal co-hosts for the Friday 5 was out this week. So we're just going to do our own little version of a Friday 5, Frog Voice edition. Kicking it off is Tariffs and the Sovereign Wealth Fund. This week started with what was

potentially world-changing macro news after President... Frog Voice Edition. Kicking it off is tariffs and the Sovereign Wealth Fund.

This week started with what was potentially world-changing macro news after President Trump announced

tariffs on the top three trading partners for the U.S. over the weekend.

The 25% tariffs on Canada and Mexico were quickly walked back, with a one-month delay agreed on Monday.

However, increased tariffs on Chinese goods went into effect.

Removal of the de minimis

expectation on directly imported consumer goods through the postal system in a disarray for a few

days, but that also seems to be back on track. Beijing appears to be coming to the negotiating table,

but the most recent reports suggest that Trump is in no rush to get a deal done. Also on Monday,

Trump signed an executive order to establish a sovereign wealth fund.

Macro analysts were somewhat perplexed as it's basically unprecedented for a deficit

country to operate such a fund, and details were scant. But Commerce Secretary Howard

Lutnik was previously on record outlining a plan to take an equity stake in large government

contractors. Suffice it to say there are lots of questions around what this might actually look like.

The one thing that's clear is that no one exactly knows how to make sense of Trump 2.0.

The administration seems to be adopting the strategy of flooding the zone, the idea being to move at a

rapid pace and clog the media with so many stories they can't even report it all. There's no

signs that the administration will slow down anytime soon. Vice President J.D. Vance said, this is the new normal. Expect this rapid-fire breakneck pace to continue for four full years. Already, many close observers have had their expectations defied. For example, Treasury Secretary Scott Besson did have a stated goal to reshape the global trade and financial system around a decoupling from China. But when it came to tariffs, he was much more interested in a slow and predictable rollout. He also didn't seem

...