Is It Really One And Done For Rate Cuts After The Fed’s December Meeting?

A federal grand jury in Virginia has refused to indict New York State Attorney General Letitia James for a second time over mortgage fraud claims.

Prosecutors had sought charges against James less than two weeks after a federal judge dismissed the earlier case, saying that Lindsey Halligan, the US Attorney for the Eastern District of Virginia, had been improperly appointed.

"The grand jury's refusal to re-indict Attorney General James is a decisive rejection of a case that should never have existed in the first place," James's lawyer Abbe Lowell said in a statement.

James shouldn't have a premature celebration because the Justice Department might try again to indict her, according to a source familiar with the matter who declined to be identified discussing confidential deliberations.

A representative for the US Attorney's Office for the Eastern District of Virginia had no immediate comment.

"As I have said from the start, the charges against me are baseless," James said in a statement. "It is time for this unchecked weaponization of our justice system to stop."

James had previously called the charges "political retribution" for a civil case she brought against Trump before his second term in office. She pleaded not guilty and challenged the appointment of Halligan, who was named to the post in September after her predecessor resigned under pressure to bring the charges.

The Justice Department's probe into James stemmed from claims by Federal Housing Finance Agency Director Bill Pulte that she may have committed mortgage fraud based on the residence status she listed on loan applications.

The initial charges followed a consistent campaign by Trump for legal action against James.

"We can't delay any longer, it's killing our reputation and credibility," Trump wrote in a Truth Social post in September. "JUSTICE MUST BE SERVED, NOW!!!"

James had campaigned on promises to investigate Trump. In 2022, her office sued Trump and his real estate company, alleging he reaped hundreds of millions of dollars in "illegal profit" by inflating the value of assets, including his Mar-a-Lago estate and Trump Tower penthouse. The complaint alleged Trump and his two eldest sons carried out the scheme for years so he could get better loan terms from Deutsche Bank AG and other lenders.

James won after a trial in which Trump took the witness stand and denied wrongdoing. A judge set the penalty at $464 million. But a New York appeals court in August vacated the fine, ruling it was unconstitutionally "excessive," while upholding the judge's finding that Trump and his company were liable for fraud. Both sides have appealed, escalating the case to the state's highest court.

Source: Bloomberg Europe

Key points:

Russian lenders Gazprombank (GZPRI.MM) and Alfa Bank have sought clearance to begin operating in India, four people familiar with the matter said, as Moscow pushes to grow trade with its top seaborne oil customer.

U.S. President Donald Trump has piled pressure on New Delhi over its ties with Moscow as India and Russia aim for bilateral trade of $100 billion by 2030, from $69 billion currently.

Alfa Bank is Russia's largest privately-owned lender and has been under Western sanctions since 2022 when Moscow launched its full invasion of Ukraine. Gazprombank, partially owned by energy firm Gazprom, primarily handled payments for Moscow's energy exports until it was placed under sanctions last year.

Both banks have sought a licence from India's central bank to open branches in the country and are expected to make an announcement around the time of Russian President Vladimir Putin's two-day visit to India that began on Thursday, the four sources said.

All four spoke on condition of anonymity as they were not authorised to speak to the media. Neither the Reserve Bank of India, India's finance ministry and the Russian embassy nor Gazprombank and Alfa Bank immediately responded to requests for comment.

Russian officials and representatives from the banks held a meeting on the matter with Indian finance ministry officials on Wednesday, one of the sources said.

BOOSTING IMPORTS FROM INDIA

Alfa bank is looking to begin operations in Mumbai and Gazprombank in New Delhi, where it already operates a liaison office, another two of the sources said, with one adding that Gazprombank is currently scouting for a location.

Russia's central bank said on Wednesday it had opened an office in Mumbai "to advance the interests of the Russian financial sector". India already hosts Russian lenders Sberbankand VTB Bank, which opened a new office in the capital on Thursday.

Moscow is discussing ways to cut its trade deficit with India by importing more goods, while Indian refiners are set to reduce their purchases of crude from Moscow to a three-year-low following the tightening of Western sanctions.

Sberbank said on Tuesday it had launched a rupee-denominated letter of credit with deferred payment for purchases in India, which will help Russian companies increase imports from the South Asian country.

Source: TradingView

Philippine inflation slowed in November, supporting another cut in benchmark interest rates as a graft scandal shattered consumer and investor confidence.

Consumer prices rose 1.5% in November from a year ago, the Philippine Statistics Authority said on Friday. That was lower than the 1.7% median estimate in a Bloomberg News survey and the 1.7% rate in October. It marked the ninth straight month that inflation came below the central bank's 2%-4% target.

Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas Governor Eli Remolona has said monetary authorities will consider another reduction in the benchmark interest rate next week to help spur demand, with inflation expectations more or less anchored. The policymaking Monetary Board will hold its rate-setting meeting on Dec. 11.

The ongoing graft scandal over flood infrastructure in the Southeast Asian nation has hit consumer demand and investor sentiment, causing economic growth to slump to a four-year low in the third quarter.

The central bank has slashed its key rate by 175 basis points since August last year. The overnight target reverse repurchase rate stands at 4.75%, the lowest since September 2022.

Source: Bloomberg Europe

Crude oil soared on Thursday as expectations of an end to the Russia-Ukraine war dimmed, with Russia adamant about holding the captured territories while Ukraine remains unwilling to cede the regions.

WTI Crude Oil for January delivery was last seen trading up by $0.70 (or 1.19%) at $59.65 per barrel.

In the series of ongoing efforts by U.S. President Donald Trump to end the Russia-Ukraine war, after back-to-back talks with Russia and Ukraine, the U.S. envoy to Russia Steven Witkoff talked with Russian President Vladimir Putin on Tuesday in Moscow for more than four hours.

The talks did not come close to the signing of a deal as Putin remains obstinate in retaining the Russian-occupied territories in Ukraine, especially the Donbas and Novorossiya region.

Ukraine has so far rejected demands for ceding its territories to Russia, a contention which Ukraine-friendly European nations have also supported. European leaders criticized Putin for being 'insincere' in his attempts to resolve the conflict peacefully.

With a compromise evasive, Trump sounded cautiously optimistic about the future outcome of his peace plan.

Today, Ukrainian officials are in the U.S. to discuss with their American counterparts on taking things to the next stage.

The U.S-imposed sanctions on Russian oil persist despite traders wanting the war to end soon and thereby see free flow of Russian oil into the market.

On the war front, Ukraine continues to target oil refineries in Russia and sea-borne Russian-flagged vessels.

Reuters reported that Ukraine struck the Druzhba oil pipeline in Russia's central Tambov region, damaging the Taganrog-Lipetsk section. Russia is yet to confirm this officially though.

Ukraine has conducted around 14 strikes on Russian refineries in November alone.

The crisis that erupted in South America after U.S. advanced its military preparedness to attack Venezuela is intensifying.

Accusing Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro of promoting narco-trafficking and human-trafficking, the effects of which penetrates into the U.S., the Trump administration is set for a military confrontation.

Dismissing Trump's allegations, Maduro accused the U.S. of eyeing its rich oil reserves under the pretext of curbing the illegal drug trade.

Though the tension has reduced a little after Maduro confirmed yesterday that he had a 'respectful and cordial' discussion with Trump around 10 days before, the threat has increased the risk premium for oil prices.

In their most recent meeting, the OPEC alliance reaffirmed last month's commitment to halt production increases for the first quarter 2026.

Bloomberg has reported that Saudi Arabian state producer Aramco has cut the price of its flagship Arab Light crude grade by 60 cents.

Owing to excess supply from the U.S. and production increases that OPEC commenced since this April, in 2025, oil prices have seen a fall of roughly 16%.

Potential oversupply concerns were precipitated after yesterday's U.S. Energy Information Administration data for the week ending November 28 showing an increase by 0.57 million barrels in crude oil inventories. The numbers also revealed a rise in gasoline and distillate stocks.

In the U.S., markets are decisively certain that Kevin Hassett, a supporter of low-interest rates would be Trump's preferred candidate to replace the current U.S. Federal Reserve Chair, next year. Alongside a slew of recent jobs data indicating weakness in the U.S. labor market, traders are pricing in a rate cut by the Fed next week.

Oversupply concerns and rate cut expectations limited the gains in oil prices.

Source: dpa-AFX

Russian President Vladimir Putin and Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi arrive for an informal dinner at the Prime Minister's Residence in New Delhi, India December 4, 2025. Sputnik/Alexander Kazakov/Pool via REUTERS

Russian President Vladimir Putin will hold summit talks with Prime Minister Narendra Modi in New Delhi on Friday, aiming to boost trade with the top buyer of Russia's arms and seaborne oil as Western sanctions squeeze their decades-old ties.

Putin is on his first visit to India in four years at a time when New Delhi is engaged in talks with the U.S. for a trade deal to cut punitive tariffs imposed by President Donald Trump on its goods over India's Russian oil purchases.

Moscow has been India's top arms supplier for decades and has said that it wants to import more Indian goods in an effort to grow trade to $100 billion by 2030 that so far has been skewed in its favour due to New Delhi's energy imports.

Since European countries cut back their reliance on Russian energy after Russia invaded Ukraine nearly four years ago, India has ramped up its purchases of discounted Russian crude.

"India faces a conundrum; by taking steps to strengthen ties with Moscow or Washington, New Delhi risks setting back ties with the other," Michael Kugelman, senior fellow at Washington's Atlantic Council think tank, wrote in Foreign Policy magazine this week.

Modi and Putin are also expected to discuss other topics including labour and civil nuclear energy, with the sides expected to announce new agreements to showcase resilience of their relations.

HUGS AND HANDSHAKES

The Indian leader received Putin with a hug and handshake as he walked down the red carpet after arriving at an airport near New Delhi on Thursday for the two-day visit. Modi later hosted the Russian president for a private dinner at his residence.

A business and government delegation has accompanied Putin for the visit, including his defence minister, Andrei Belousov, who held talks with his Indian counterpart Rajnath Singh on Thursday.

Belousov "stated that the Russian defence industry is ready to support India towards becoming self-reliant in the field of defence production," India's defence ministry said after the talks.

Putin arrived in India a day after holding talks with Trump's top envoys on a possible peace deal to end the war in Ukraine, but they did not reach a compromise.

India has resisted condemning Russia over the war and called for peace though dialogue and diplomacy, while saying that its ties with Moscow were being unfairly targeted by Western nations that continue to do business with Moscow when it is in their interest.

Source: Reuters

Florida's entire U.S. congressional delegation on Thursday urged President Donald Trump to leave their state out of a plan by his administration to expand oil and gas drilling to new coastal areas, saying it would threaten the state's military and tourism industries.

WHY IT'S IMPORTANT

The letter to Trump from Florida Senators Rick Scott and Ashley Moody and the state's 28 members of the House of Representatives was a rare bipartisan pushback against the Republican president's policies. Most of Florida's members of Congress are Republicans.

KEY QUOTE

"The risks posed by new offshore drilling far outweigh any short-term gains," the lawmakers said in their letter.

BY THE NUMBERS

More than 50,000 jobs in the Florida Panhandle are tied to operations at military facilities connected to the Gulf Test Range, a vast area over the Gulf of Mexico where advanced weapons and air combat tactics are tested, the letter said, noting that drilling would result in encroachment of the Gulf Test Range.

Florida beaches generate $127.7 billion a year in tourism spending and support 2.1 million jobs.

CONTEXT

The Interior Department last month unveiled a proposal that opened the door to future leasing in the eastern portion of the Gulf of Mexico, which has long been protected from energy development because it is used for military testing and training. Florida officials, including Republican Governor Ron DeSantis, have opposed changes to that policy.

Trump's Florida residence, Mar-a-Lago, is on the eastern side of the state.

THE REPLY

The White House did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Source: Investing