For the first time ever, the New York Stock Exchange and Nasdaq have jointly rung their bells from the White House.
President Trump rang the opening bells of both exchanges from the Oval Office on Monday, marking the official launch of Trump Accounts for children.
'Children, at the age of 18 and after, become very wealthy people, come into the world with essentially no money and end up, at a pretty young age, being very rich.'
The accounts, created under the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, became available for contributions starting July 4 and are open to children who won't turn 18 by year's end.
Every eligible child gets a one-time $1,000 seed contribution from the federal government, and family or employers can add more, up to annual limits. The money is invested — by default in an S&P 500 ETF, with more options coming — and grows, tax-advantaged, until the child turns 18. Parents can enroll for free at TrumpAccounts.gov.
Attendees included Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas), Michael Dell of Dell Technologies and his wife, and NYSE President Lynn Martin, along with executives from Nasdaq and other major firms. Michael and Susan Dell pledged a $6.25 billion commitment — $250 each to the first 25 million qualifying children signed up for Trump Accounts.
At the event, Trump urged attendees to "go out and buy a Dell computer" — and Dell stock jumped more than 7% following his remarks.
Numerous companies including Goldman Sachs, BlackRock, JPMorgan Chase, and Robinhood also pledged to match the government's initial contribution for employees' children's accounts, while SpaceX President Gwynne Shotwell said she would give company stock to Trump Accounts for more than 2 million children nationwide.
Trump touted the accounts as a way for children to "become very wealthy people ... come into the world with essentially no money and end up, at a pretty young age, being very rich" by adulthood, adding that between individual contributions and seed funding, roughly $800 million in new capital would flow into the stock market for children this week alone.
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OpenAI CEO Sam Altman has likened artificial intelligence to utilities that are required to live.
Altman was discussing his company's plans during BlackRock’s U.S. Infrastructure Summit on Wednesday. A mix of politicians, union leaders, and industry executives were in attendance when he dropped the news about his vision for AI.
'People buy it from us on a meter and use it for whatever they want to use it for.'
Speaking to Bayo Ogunlesi, chairman and CEO of BlackRock's Global Infrastructure Partners, Altman likened AI to lifesaving utilities that are typically viewed as human rights.
"We see a future where intelligence is a utility like electricity or water, and people buy it from us on a meter and use it for whatever they want to use it for," Altman explained.
The CEO then claimed that the "demand" for metered AI usage is high and that the idea only continues to become more popular. His claims contained a warning though, in that "if we don't have enough" AI, it will become too expensive and "kind of goes to rich people."
This claim was seemingly based off Altman's plans to build a massive AI infrastructure system in the United States through his Stargate Project.
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Announced at the beginning of 2025, the Stargate Project is a $500 billion investment plan to build sprawling AI infrastructure for OpenAI and its partners by 2029.
This would allegedly "generate massive economic benefit for the entire world," the press release stated.
However, as it stands, there is only one data center under the project currently operating: the flagship location in Abilene, Texas.
The 980,000 square foot site produces an estimated 200+ megawatts, capable of powering 50,000 NVIDIA GB200 NVL72s in each of its buildings — which are essentially AI supercomputers.
Another data center in Port Washington, Wisconsin, is scheduled to be open in 2028.
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"If we don't have enough [AI], we either can't sell it or the price gets really high, and it, you know, kind of goes to rich people or society makes a bunch of sort of central planning decisions that I think almost always go badly about, you know, we're going to use our limited compute supply for this and not that," Altman said at the BlackRock event.
He added, "So the best thing to me throughout all the history of capitalism, innovation, whatever you want, is to just flood the market," which seemingly means the flooding should go through OpenAI.
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As part of his affordability agenda, President Trump has been looking for ways to bring down housing costs.
He’s had some success. Mortgage rates are lower than at any point since his first term. The National Association of Realtors’ Housing Affordability Index has started ticking up again. And as Trump noted during his State of the Union address, the cost of buying a house has dropped about $5,000 since he took office.
Affordability is the target. A serious policy needs to increase the number of homes Americans can actually buy, not just score points against investors.
More work remains. Trump brought a guest to the State of the Union to make the point. Rachel Wiggins, a Houston mom of two, told a story many families recognize: She bid on 20 homes and “lost all of those bids to gigantic investment firms that bypassed inspection, paid all cash, and turned all those houses into rentals, stealing her American dream,” Trump said.
That experience explains the executive order Trump signed to curb large institutional investors from dominating the single-family market — driving up prices for buyers and renters alike while shrinking supply for both.
Trump’s order sets a clear policy: Large institutional investors should not buy single-family homes that families could otherwise purchase. It does that by restricting federal approval, insurance, guarantees, securitization, and other forms of facilitation for institutional purchases of single-family homes that could go to owner-occupants. It also limits the disposal of federal assets in ways that transfer single-family homes to large institutional investors.
The order goes farther. It directs the administration to promote sales to individual owner-occupants — people who actually live in the homes and care for the neighborhoods — through first-look policies, disclosure requirements, and anti-circumvention provisions. It also directs the legislative affairs office to produce legislation to codify the order.
The order includes narrow exceptions for build-to-rent projects planned, permitted, financed, and constructed as rental communities, as well as other tailored cases. It also directs the Treasury Department to tighten rules affecting housing acquisition and instructs the attorney general and the Federal Trade Commission chairman to review major acquisitions, especially serial purchases, and to prioritize antitrust enforcement as warranted.
Trump also directed Housing and Urban Development Secretary Scott Turner to require owners and managing agents of single-family rentals participating in federal housing assistance programs to disclose indirect owners, managers, and affiliates and to report changes in ownership.
In other words, Trump offered a concrete proposal: prioritize owner-occupants, expand supply, and curb the worst market distortions without choking off lawful investment that supports construction and growth.
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Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) offered something else.
Warren unveiled legislation last week before the Senate Banking Committee, where she serves as ranking member. Her approach targets the tax incentives that support housing investment. It would impose higher taxes on any person or entity that owns more than 50 single-family homes. It would also bar access to Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac-backed mortgages and restrict purchases of foreclosed homes.
That is less a housing plan than a punishment plan. It aims to drive investors out, even though big investors have never owned more than about 4% of U.S. housing stock. The core problem is supply: The country does not have enough homes for a growing population. The answer is not to chase away capital that can help build housing. The answer is to align incentives so that families — owner-occupants — get first priority.
Sen. Jeff Merkley (D-Ore.), Warren’s co-sponsor, said he’s willing to work with anyone trying to bring down home prices. Trump should take him up on that offer and make the point directly: The goal is not to punish firms that operated lawfully. The goal is to create rules that prioritize families, encourage construction, and expand affordable supply.
Affordability is the target. A serious policy needs to increase the number of homes Americans can actually buy, not just score points against investors.
The Supreme Court’s latest delay in its tariff case is fueling speculation that justices are trying to craft a behind-the-scenes compromise to avoid market shock — even if it means quietly curbing presidential trade authority.
But Daniel Horowitz explains that the tariff ruling may be less important than the remedy itself, especially as another crisis tightens its grip on Americans: a frozen, inflated housing market that government policy continues to prop up instead of letting it reset.
“I think what they’re trying to do is two things. ... One is, they want to do it with as little disruption as possible. So they’re trying to think how that remedy works. And number two, I think particularly maybe for Thomas and Alito, they’re trying to figure out how not to get involved in a political question,” Horowitz tells BlazeTV host Steve Deace on the “Steve Deace Show.”
“And that’s really where I am. As you well know, I don’t believe the court should ever be the arbiter of a fundamental political disagreement. If it’s a problem, Congress should oppose and deal with it,” he continues.
Trump has also announced his plan to go after residential homes being bought up by global corporations like BlackRock, which sounds great to everyday Americans, but Horowitz believes the solution is even simpler.
“It was announced, no more, you know, BlackRock owning of homes, residential, you know, mass production of, or acquisition, I should say, of residential homes, things of that nature,” Deace says.
“This is a primary thing that the young male demographic that voted our way in the last election cares about. It’s a primary driver of the current situation in the economy. Not to mention the fact it’s the greatest source for individual liquidation that exists right now to the average American,” he continues.
“We’re sitting on all this liquid that could go back into the economy if we can get the housing market moving. What should they be doing, do you think?” Deace asks.
“Very simple. Let the bubble pop. And I know it sounds very simplistic, but it’s something that they refuse to do, and everything that they’re proposing will further fuel it. Corporate ownership is a symptom of the problem, not the problem,” Horowitz responds.
“The president needs to be honest with people. The biggest problem with the president economically is he doesn’t understand the mutual exclusivity of things. So, he wants insurance to cover everything, but he wants premiums to go down, right? He wants the welfare state, but he doesn’t want inflation. He wants seniors to have a checking account in the form of fake housing on unrealized gains, but he wants young people to be able to afford them,” he continues.
“If you want to actually get the economy back to what we all said we did, which is a broad-based income economy rather than an asset bubble, you’ve got to pull the plugs on all the things doing this. And it’s the exact opposite of what the president is saying,” he adds.
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You won’t hear many people object to President Trump’s executive order to ban corporate purchases of residential homes. The idea sounds like common sense. But it targets a minor symptom while leaving the real disease untouched — and in some respects, it risks making that disease worse.
Institutional home-buying already peaked during the COVID-era bubble and has receded since then. In most markets, corporate ownership represents a small share of total inventory. Even at its height, it never explained why housing costs exploded for everyone else. High prices created the opportunity for institutional buyers, not the other way around.
The goal should not be cheaper debt. It should be cheaper homes.
Government policy inflated the housing market. Institutional buyers simply responded.
During COVID, the Federal Reserve pushed interest rates toward zero. Mortgage rates fell below 3%. At the same time, the Fed bought roughly $2.7 trillion in mortgage-backed securities, and HUD expanded “affordable homeownership” programs that widened the pool of subsidized buyers. Those policies produced predictable results.
When the government offers 2.5% interest for 30 years — often paired with minimal down payments backed by the FHA — buyers flood the market. Sellers respond by raising prices. The bubble becomes a feature, not a bug.
Institutional buyers entered that environment because it looked like easy money. Higher home prices also pushed rents up, so developers built more homes for long-term rental. Both trends flowed from the same source: a government-shaped market that made housing unaffordable, then subsidized the unaffordability.
Trump now seems focused on the symptom — corporate buyers — while ignoring the machinery that inflated the market in the first place.
He has spent months fighting Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell to bring rates back down toward zero. Meanwhile, the Federal Reserve still holds about $2.1 trillion in mortgage-backed securities. Trump has also announced a plan for Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac to purchase another $200 billion in MBS. The stated goal is to lower mortgage rates.
But the goal should not be cheaper debt. It should be cheaper homes.
Artificially lowering rates props up prices and slows correction. Prices in many markets have begun to soften. That correction should continue. Policies designed to suppress rates will keep prices elevated and risk inflating the next bubble.
That brings us back to corporate home-buying. Even at the COVID peak, institutional buyers — defined as entities owning at least 100 single-family homes — owned about 3.1% of the housing stock. That number has since fallen to around 1%. Investors see the market turning, and they have started backing away.
So Trump’s corporate-purchase ban arrives late, targets a relatively small share of the market, and risks becoming cosmetic cover for policies that keep the bubble inflated.
If Trump wants to drive prices down and permanently realign housing with median incomes, he has to reverse the policies that inflated the bubble. That means attacking the structure, not the headline.
Get government out of the mortgage market. Trump’s next Federal Reserve chair must commit to unwinding the Fed’s mortgage-backed securities portfolio. That $2.1 trillion cushion keeps mortgage rates lower than the market would otherwise set. Those artificially low rates inflate home prices.
End universal “homeownership for everyone” policy. The federal government keeps subsidizing buyers who are not ready to buy. Those programs inject cash into housing demand that would not exist in a real market. The goal should align prices with income, not chase a utopian dream of universal ownership. After decades of subsidies, deductions, and federal credit support, the home ownership rate still sits around the mid-60% range.
Stop chasing near-zero interest rates. A 30-year loan at 2% sounds appealing until you realize what it does to prices. Cheap money bids up homes across the board. Buyers pay the price forever even as politicians brag about the “deal.” Trump should let the market set rates. Recent rate cuts have not restored normal home buying either. Sales remain weak because prices remain too high.
End the 30-year fixed mortgage. Instead of floating longer loans — 50 years? Madness! — the country should move in the opposite direction. Before the New Deal era, short-term mortgages, often three to seven years, dominated the market. Federal policy transformed that structure.
Franklin D. Roosevelt signed the National Housing Act of 1934, establishing the Federal Housing Authority. The FHA insured long-term, fully amortizing mortgages with fixed rates, low down payments, and standardized payment schedules. That system moved the market away from short-term balloon loans and laid the foundation for longer terms.
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Congress eventually authorized the 30-year mortgage in 1954. VA loans under the GI Bill and the expansion of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac later built a secondary market that made long-term fixed-rate loans attractive to lenders.
Government insurance, guarantees, and liquidity support made 30-year fixed mortgages feasible, which is why they represent 80%-90% of U.S. mortgages today. Without those interventions, lenders would not carry that risk.
The larger point remains simple: Sellers can’t charge prices buyers can’t pay. Prices explode only when government subsidies and government-backed long-term debt expand what buyers can “afford” on paper.
Unwind the subsidies. Unwind the guarantees. Unwind the cheap-money machinery. Let incomes, not federal policy, set the ceiling.
Housing should function like other consumer markets, not be engineered by Washington. Prices should reflect what people earn.
That’s the fix. Everything else treats symptoms and pretends to solve the problem.
The Federal Retirement Thrift Investment Board's contracts with BlackRock and SSGA to oversee a federal retirement program contain DEI mandates that are at odds with Trump's agenda.
How does LGBT propaganda infiltrate conservative states and areas, turning them into sensual celebration grounds? The answer: through children backed by big billionaires.
The World Economic Forum has become a globalist deep state with tentacles reaching the highest levels of government throughout the West.
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Oprah and The Rock are facing MAJOR BACKLASH over THIS