Worse Than Venezuela? 😬

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Round two is almost confirmed. Round one didn't land a knockout. But nobody's walking away from the table either.

The U.S. and Iran are heading back to Pakistan next week for a second round of peace talks, according to two senior Pakistani officials involved in coordinating both sides.

White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt confirmed the talks would "very likely" be held in Islamabad again, calling Pakistan "the only mediator in this negotiation."

The current ceasefire expires Tuesday, April 21.

Nobody wants it to lapse. But nobody's officially agreed to extend it either.

A possible two-week extension is on the table to buy time for technical talks. Specifically around two sticking points:

The first round last weekend was a 21-hour marathon led by VP JD Vance, Steve Witkoff, and Jared Kushner. They came out with no deal and apparently no sleep.

But there's been real progress

Axios reported Tuesday that negotiators are closer to a framework agreement than at any point since talks began.

Pakistan, Egypt, and Turkey are all working overtime as mediators. Pakistan's Army Commander Field Marshal Asim Munir flew to Tehran on Wednesday to close remaining gaps personally.

Trump's team spent Tuesday on phones, backchannels, and draft proposals. Vance told a crowd in Georgia: "I think the people we're sitting across from wanted to make a deal. I feel very good about where we are."

The pressure on Tehran right now is genuinely severe.

Trump's naval blockade has cut off ~1.5 million barrels of oil per day — worth roughly $140M daily in lost exports.

That's not all. Iran is also dealing with:

One U.S. official put it bluntly: "Iran has no money. They're broke. We know it. And they know we know it."

Another official warned that if Iran can't export oil and runs out of storage, it may be forced to shut wells offline entirely. The comparison being floated internally: "worse than Venezuela under Maduro."

That's not a negotiating metaphor. That's a country on the edge.

1. Trade the Ceasefire Countdown
The April 21 deadline is a binary event. A deal pumps oil down and risk assets up. No deal sends oil spiking and markets nervous. Either way, something moves hard.

📌 Action: Watch energy ETFs like $XLE ( ▲ 1.54% ) and $USO ( ▲ 2.57% ) into Tuesday. A confirmed extension or deal is your signal to rotate into risk-on plays like $QQQ ( ▲ 0.38% ) or $SPY ( ▲ 0.25% ) .

2. Play the Iran Reconstruction Trade
If a deal gets done, Iran's economy needs rebuilding fast. That means oil infrastructure, steel, and industrial supply chains firing back up. The "peace dividend" trade is real and it moves early.

📌 Action: Keep $XME ( ▲ 0.24% ) (metals & mining ETF) and $FCX ( ▼ 0.61% ) (copper/industrial metals) on your watchlist. A framework agreement headline is your entry trigger.

3. Go Long on Oil Tanker Stocks
The Strait of Hormuz is still restricted. When it reopens, tanker demand surges as suppressed Iranian oil floods back into global shipping lanes. That's a direct revenue event for tanker operators.

📌 Action: Watch $FRO ( ▼ 0.96% ) (Frontline) and $STNG ( ▲ 0.08% ) (Scorpio Tankers). Buy the rumour of a Hormuz deal, sell the news once volumes normalise.

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Donald Trump has made it official: Jerome Powell either steps down from the Fed's Board of Governors on time, or Trump fires him.

No grey area. No diplomatic softening.

Trump is also keeping the DOJ probe alive. And made it clear he's not dropping it. He's pushing for an investigation into the Fed's building renovation project and reiterated that he wants Kevin Warsh confirmed as the next Fed chair.

"We have to find out what happened," Trump told Fox Business.

For context, Powell said back in March that he won't leave his Board seat until the Justice investigation involving him wraps up. Trump, predictably, doesn't see that as Powell's call to make.

Under the Federal Reserve Act, a president can remove a Board member "for cause." What counts as "for cause?" Nobody actually knows. It's deliberately vague.

And that ambiguity is now sitting right in the middle of a constitutional standoff.

On Tuesday, three DOJ officials made a surprise visit to the Fed's Washington headquarters, attempting to access a construction site linked to the renovation project.

They were turned away. Safety and clearance protocols, apparently.

The Fed's outside counsel, Robert Hur, wasn't pleased. He fired off a letter to the DOJ arguing prosecutors were trying to skip the established legal channels. He also pointed to a prior court finding suggesting the DOJ's interest in the renovation project was more pretext than principle.

The DOJ pushed back. Jeanine Pirro cited cost overruns approaching 80% as justification for the scrutiny, framing it as a broader oversight question about one of the most powerful financial institutions on earth.

So: unannounced visit, denied entry, duelling legal letters, and an 80% budget blowout at the Federal Reserve.

Totally normal day.

Retail traders just got a major buff.

The SEC just killed the $25,000 rule. And the market loved it.

Shares in Robinhood $HOOD ( ▼ 0.53% ), Webull $BULL ( ▼ 0.23% ), and eToro $ETOR ( ▲ 2.25% ) surged 7.8%, 8.9%, and 5.2% respectively on Wednesday morning after regulators greenlit a rule change that opens the door to day trading for millions of small investors.

Until now, anyone labelled a "pattern day trader" had to keep at least $25,000 in a margin account just to keep trading. Miss that threshold? You're locked out.

A pattern day trader, for context, is anyone who makes four or more day trades within five business days. So basically, anyone who's remotely active.

The new rule scraps the flat $25k requirement entirely.

Instead, traders just need to hold margin equity that reflects their actual market exposure at any given moment. In other words: size your account to your risk, not to an arbitrary number a regulator picked decades ago.

FINRA proposed the change. The SEC fast-tracked it.

The ripple effect hit the whole brokerage sector.

Coinbase $COIN ( ▲ 2.0% ), which now offers stock and ETF trading alongside crypto, climbed 3.8%. Morgan Stanley $MS ( ▼ 2.44% ) gained 5.1% after also posting strong Q1 earnings (it owns E*Trade). Charles Schwab $SCHW ( ▼ 7.34% ) added 1.1% and Interactive Brokers $IBKR ( ▼ 0.4% ) rose 2.6%.

More traders in the market is good for everyone selling access to it.