The temperature was decidedly not turned down during a week filled with headlines pointing to a growing US appetite for (or perhaps just acceptance of) a “decoupled” global trade order. The Trump administration announced several moves that seemed to bring the lines dividing the green, yellow, and red buckets into clearer resolution, including a new critical minerals pact with Australia, firmed up support for Argentina, abrupt cancellation of talks with Canada, aggressive new sanctions on Russian oil, and accelerating military maneuvers at the periphery of South America. Much or all of this may still just amount to the theatrics demanded by the Strategic Uncertainty playbook, but these moves collectively set up an intriguing and precarious backdrop for next Thursday’s pivotal Trump-Xi meeting at the APEC Conference in South Korea. Even after all the posturing, late night tweets, bazillion percent tariffs, and federal equity stakes, the modal outcome is probably still some kind of Artful DealTM given that Nothing Ever Happens. If that’s the case, it’s probably good for another leg up in stonks even from all-time highs, but we think most of the mainstream financial cognoscenti are still underweighting the probability of a more structural, long-lasting shift away from the Acela Corridor’s Flat World paradigm, not to mention the implications that such a transition would have for domestic industry, Fed independence, and scarce, credibly neutral reserve assets.

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