Crypto News: Trump’s team zeroes in on China

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Just days after he won a return to the White House, the outlines of Donald Trump's foreign policy are becoming clear: squeeze Iran, support Israel, confront China.

The expected appointment of Marco Rubio as secretary of state and the naming of combat veteran Mike Waltz to the post of national security adviser and Elise Stefanik as US ambassador to the United Nations leave little room for doubt.

All three, along with Vice President-elect JD Vance, are sharp critics of Xi Jinping's government in China — Rubio has been sanctioned twice by Beijing — with Waltz calling it the top threat to the US. Trump has vowed to impose tariffs as high as 60% on Chinese goods that could decimate trade between the world's two biggest economies.

Trump is likely to pressure Israel to wrap up its campaigns against Hamas in Gaza and Hezbollah in Lebanon. But don't expect him to echo the criticism of the Joe Biden administration when it comes to the civilian death toll.

WATCH: Trump has started to choose the team he wants to implement his "America first" policies. Kriti Gupta reports on Bloomberg TV.

Trump has told Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to "do what you have to do" when it comes to Iran and its militant proxy groups. But support for a "maximum pressure" campaign against Iran has probably waned among Gulf states that are trying to improve relations with Tehran.

Trump's White House is almost certain to try to expand the Abraham Accords reached during his first administration that normalized ties between Israel and several Arab countries. Yet Saudi Arabia has suggested that for it to join them, there must be significant movement toward a Palestinian state.

Saudi Arabia's Crown Prince, Mohammed Bin Salman, yesterday called the war in Gaza "genocide."

So expect the new administration to seek quick ends to conflicts in the Middle East and Ukraine — Rubio supports negotiations that could result in Kyiv ceding occupied territory to the Russian invaders.

The ultimate goal is to zero in on enemy number 1: China. — Karl Maier

Trump during a campaign event in New Hampshire in January. Photographer: Adam Glanzman/Bloomberg

China may embrace greater stimulus, bolster manufacturing, and allow the yuan to weaken to offset the negative effects of a second Trump term, according to a Bloomberg poll of analysts. The threatened US tariffs on Chinese goods may complicate Beijing's efforts to stabilize an economy hit by a years-long property slump and persistent deflationary pressures.

German Chancellor Olaf Scholz's Social Democrats and opposition lawmakers agreed to bring forward the next national election to Feb. 23 from the end of September, sources say. Scholz dismantled his coalition with the Greens and the Free Democrats last week due to a policy dispute with FDP Finance Minister Christian Lindner, depriving himself of a parliamentary majority and potentially paving the way for the poll-leading conservatives to regain power after three years in opposition.

Japanese Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba pledged more than $65 billion of fresh support for the nation's semiconductor and artificial intelligence sector as Tokyo looks to keep up with a global spending spree on cutting-edge tech. Japan and its allies including the US are racing to keep ahead of China in AI-powering semiconductor capabilities, a domain that policymakers see as essential for economic security.

The Taliban government in Afghanistan said it wants a fresh start with the US under Trump and access to more than $9 billion of the Asian nation's foreign-exchange reserves seized three years ago. Normalizing relations with Washington would help the Taliban's efforts to secured international recognition, while the funds would be a huge relief for the cash-strapped government in Kabul.

Taliban fighters in Kabul in August. Photographer: Wakil Kohsar/Getty Images

A three-term Mauritian prime minister is set to reclaim the top post in the Indian Ocean island nation after being voted out a decade ago. The four-party coalition led by Navinchandra Ramgoolam, the son of Mauritius' first post-independence leader, won Sunday's election by a landslide.

A Spanish socialist with a long record in charting her country's climate policy is on the cusp of taking over from big-tech nemesis Margrethe Vestager as the European Union's next antitrust chief.

Climate negotiators secured a breakthrough on day one of the COP29 summit by agreeing on rules for a United Nations-administered global carbon market.

Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni's plans to resettle some asylum seekers in Albania suffered a further blow when a court in Rome said a second batch of migrants should return to Italy.

Mozambique's main opposition leader urged his supporters to disrupt key trade routes and ports in continuing protests over a disputed presidential election.

The US House returns to the Capitol today with Republicans on the cusp of keeping control of the chamber, even as Trump appointments could winnow what's likely to be another slender majority for Speaker Mike Johnson.

Trump choosing Representatives Stefanik and Waltz to join his administration presents something of a dilemma for Johnson, because if they leave, their seats would remain vacant until special elections are held.

In the last Congress, disputes and defections in the Republican ranks at times paralyzed the chamber. Johnson will likely have to navigate some of those conflicts again, and without the counsel of Stefanik, the fourth-ranking GOP officer in the chamber.

At the same time, if Trump chooses Rubio, a senator, as his top diplomat, Florida Governor Ron DeSantis can quickly name a Republican replacement.

One person to watch today: Biden will meet with his Israeli counterpart, Isaac Herzog, at the White House.

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Bitcoin's record-breaking rally took the digital asset past $89,000 and lifted the overall value of the crypto market above its pandemic-era peak as traders bet on a boom under Trump. The president-elect has vowed friendlier crypto rules and his Republican Party is tightening its grip on Congress, boosting the odds of pushing through his agenda. Trump's other pledges include setting up a strategic Bitcoin stockpile and fostering domestic mining of the token to make the US the world's crypto capital. The largest token has jumped about 32% since the election.

A nighttime biking craze has sparked a backlash from Chinese officials concerned about traffic chaos and caught off guard by a surprise mass-cycle of university students — a demographic that led both the Tiananmen Square pro-democracy protests of 1989 and nationwide anti-Covid control demonstrations in late 2022. Thousands of cyclists flooded a six-lane highway this weekend, according to videos that swept social media, as they made the 50-kilometer (31-mile) trip from Zhengzhou to an ancient city in central Henan.

College students on the "midnight ride" from Zhengzhou to Kaifeng. Photographer: Jiao Xiaoxiang/VCG/AP

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