Trump’s Ukraine Plan Faces New Obstacles After Putin Call 

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2:51with insight on the people, companies, and trends shaping today's complex economy. Plus, global business, finance, and tech news as it happens. The Bloomberg Business Week Daily Podcast with Carol Masser and Tim Stenevek on Bloomberg Radio. All right, everybody, we are getting ready to kick off another year with geopolitics front and center. Now, keep in mind that President Trump today saying, quote, there has to be a disarming of Hamas as he met with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on this Monday. The two did meet to talk about the ceasefire in Gaza, whose troubled opening months ago are stoking concern that regional fighting could resume in the new year.

3:29We did see U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio and the Israeli prime minister talking about regional security, economic cooperation, and the fight against anti-Semitism during that meeting today. That came from the State Department. But it sounded like there was a handful of issues, Vani. I know you were covering the event when President Trump made a few comments on this, but also a lot of other things. The reporters asked about a lot of things. But it sounds like it's not quite done yet. No. And, yeah, as you say, President Trump literally said there were five major subjects that we were discussing.

4:01And that Gaza was one of those subjects. And it was a tough place. But you know he wants to get to phase two of that deal. But it doesn't seem like Netanyahu is comfortable moving off of phase one yet. But of course, Venezuela came up, Russia, Ukraine, a lot, Iran. So with that said, let's talk a little bit more about that. Yeah, well, we'll talk about, you know, that is certainly on our radar. But let's get to also the war between Russia and Ukraine. This is the other geopolitical issue, if you will, that's certainly on our minds. It's getting very close to beginning its fifth year. President Trump held a call with Russian President Vladimir Putin earlier today.

4:35That was according to the White House. And that came one day after the U.S. leader met with his Ukrainian counterpart, President Volodymyr Zelensky. They talked about efforts to bring halt to the Kremlin's war. President Zelensky said he asked President Trump for U.S. security guarantees lasting as long as half a century to help deter any future Russian invasion. We discussed all the aspects of the peace framework, which includes, and we have great achievements, 20-point peace plan, 90 % agreed, and U.S.-Ukraine security guarantees, 100 % agreed. U.S.-Europe, Ukraine security guarantees, almost agreed.

5:12Military dimension, 100 % agreed. Prosperity plan being finalized. And that, of course, is Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky. That was yesterday after a meeting with President Trump. Hey, let's get into this and what's going on with you, the United States involvement between the Russia and Ukraine War. Dr. Angela Stent is back with us. She's senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute, author of Putin's World, Russia Against the West, and with the rest, a former national intelligence officer for Russia and Eurasia, as we said, at the National Intelligence Council. She understands the situation so much.

5:47Great to have you back with us. Angela, I am shocked that we're going into or getting very close to going into the fifth year of this war. What are you seeing, if anything, that tells you we are getting maybe closer to an end or not? Well, we've had very furious negotiations going on now for the past few months with Russia, between certainly Stephen Redkoff, Jared Kushner meeting with Putin, and then with President Zelensky meeting with President Trump, meeting with European leaders. We have two, I think, competing peace plans out there. The 28-point peace plan, which was leaked a few weeks ago, and which sounded as if it had been largely written in Moscow, but it was a joint U.S.-Russian peace plan.

6:37This would have been unacceptable to the Ukrainians and really to the Europeans. And then we now have apparently a 20-point peace plan, which was agreed between Ukraine, its European backers, and I think the United States, which cuts back on some of the compromises that Putin was demanding that Zelensky make. Zelensky yesterday, of course, did say that 90 % had been agreed, but I think it's the last 10 % that's very problematic. Putin called President Trump before he met President Zelensky. They've had another conversation. And I think the Russians are going to string this along, but we still have no real indication that Vladimir Putin is interesting in stopping this war.

7:21You know, Angela, I feel like we've talked about this so much. And, you know, it does sound like President Putin, he wants land. I mean, he got it the first time that he invaded Ukraine and he wants it again this time around. Is there any chance he backs off of this? Because this is what seems to be really a major sticking point. Well, he wants the land, but the land is a means to what he really wants, which is the subjugation of Ukraine. So when he talks about we have to get to the root causes, yes, he would like the whole of the Donbass region and is asking Ukraine to give Russia land that Russia doesn't control.

7:56But that's just a means to an end. It would make Ukraine more vulnerable if the war breaks out again. And he wants Ukraine to say that it's going to remain neutral, that it's not going to join any Western alliance systems. That's what he really wants. And he's using the land question in a way to distract from what the broader goals are. How much is there a time constraint here, Dr. Stent? Because, you know, there are elections. I mean, there's elections coming up in Ukraine. And obviously, at some point, we'll get the midterms here. And then at some point after that, there may or may not be a change of leadership.

8:31Is Putin focused on things like that? Well, Putin is demanding elections in Ukraine. But of course, there can't be elections in Ukraine unless the fighting has stopped. And you have to have a ceasefire first. And Putin has not agreed to a ceasefire. Yes, we have midterms coming up here. And a majority of Americans now, more and more Americans support Ukraine and are much more wary about what Putin is doing. And that includes Republicans not only in the Senate, but Republicans in the rest of the country. So I don't think Putin feels any time constraints. But the Ukrainians do, because they are running out of manpower.

9:07They do have manpower problems. They need more weapons. And the U.S. is selling weapons to the Europeans, who are then giving it to Ukraine. But there's not an infinite supply of those weapons. And we have winter coming up now. It's already upon us. That could be more difficult for the Ukrainians. The Russians are bombing all of their energy infrastructure and depriving them of heat and light and things that they need for the winter. So I would say the Ukrainians are under more time constraints than the Russians are. But they're not losing this war, as the Russians claim they are. And they have taken back some territory recently that the Russians claim that they hold.

9:46But certainly Putin believes that time is on his side. The security proposal under discussion, it's apparently for a 15 year term. Zelensky wants that to be a lot longer, perhaps as long as 50 years. Will he get it? Well, we're not really clear what those security provisions are. I mean, Europeans are willing to provide troops to enforce any kind of peace. The US has said that there'll be some kind of backstop. They've talked about Article 5 type guarantees, which is what NATO countries have, which means if one NATO country is attacked, the rest of them would consider that an attack on all of them.

10:23But it's very hard to see how you get those kind of guarantees if Ukraine isn't a member of NATO. And again, you know, we could have a different government in the United States. You can have different governments clearly in Europe, the different elections coming up. So I think a 50-year guarantee is probably unrealistic. But one understands why Zelensky wants it, because, you know, as long as Putin's in power or people like him, they're not going to give up on subjugating Ukraine. so there could be another reinvasion in the coming years. Angela, is it clear what the U.S. position is, especially after President Trump was asked in the earlier press conference when Benjamin Netanyahu and he were together, President Trump said he was very angry when he heard from Russian President Vladimir Putin about an alleged attack on one of his residences.

11:12Again, allegations we're not quite sure. I believe Ukraine has maybe denied this. But I'm just curious, is it clear where the U.S. stands Or is that part of the negotiating tactic of being kind of friend and foe and it changes maybe from week to week or day to day? Well, what's clear is that Trump wants to improve ties to Russia. He's wanted to do that since day one of this term, that he's offering the Russians economic incentives, which he thinks may bring them round. He does want to bring the war to an end. I think he genuinely wants to end the war and then he also wants to claim credit for it.

11:48But, you know, yesterday he said some things. He equated the Russian bombing of Ukrainian civilian structures, energy infrastructures with the Ukraine, the Ukrainians sometimes hitting Russian energy installations. And so and then he also said yesterday that Putin wanted Ukraine to succeed, which is a rather extraordinary thing to say since they've been making war on Ukraine, you know, for nearly five years now. So, yeah, I'm not sure what the U.S. position is, but I do think the Trump administration wants the war to end. All right. 10 or 15 seconds. I'm not going to ask you to bet the House on this.

12:24But do you think we wrap up this war? Does it get wrapped up in 2026? Just quickly. I wish it could. I wish it could wrap up. I'm not sure that it will. All right. Dr. Angela Stent, thank you so much. Dr. Angela Stentis, Senior Fellow at the American Enterprise Institute and author of Putin's World, Russia Against the West and with the rest. Stay with us. More from Bloomberg Businessweek Daily coming up after this. They told us to expect change. They warned us about the transition. But honestly, they forgot the best part. This is the chapter where we finally focus on us. Life MD delivers expert menopause and midlife care right from your home.

13:09From hormone health to holistic wellness, Life MD helps you feel your best for the best years of your life. Life MD, it's just getting good. Visit lifemd.com slash goodlife. So there's a lot of noise about AI, but time's too tight for more promises. So let's talk about results. At IBM, we work with our employees to integrate technology right into the systems they need. Now, a global workforce of 300 ,000 can use AI to fill their HR questions, resolving 94 % of common questions. Not noise. Proof of how we can help companies get smarter by putting AI where it actually pays off, deep in the work that moves the business.

13:50Let's create smarter business. IBM. Support for the show comes from Public. Lately, it feels like there are two types of investing platforms. Some are traditional brokerages that haven't changed much in decades, and others feel less like investing and more like a game. Public is positioned differently. It's an investing platform for people who are serious about building their wealth. On Public, you can build a portfolio of stocks, options, bonds, crypto without all the bugs or the confetti. Retirement accounts? Yep. High-yield cash? Yes, again. They even have direct indexing. Public has modern design, powerful tools, and customer support that actually helps.

14:28Go to public.com slash market and earn an uncapped 1 % bonus when you transfer your portfolio. That's public.com slash market. Ad paid for by Public Holdings. Brokered services by Public Investing, member FINRA SIPC. Advisory services by Public Advisors, SEC Registered Advisor. Crypto services by ZeroHash. All investing involves risk of loss. See complete disclosures at public.com slash disclosures. Here's a paradox. We buy insurance for peace of mind, yet the very policies we trust can deliver the biggest financial shocks. Across America, millions of claims are denied every year, not because people did anything wrong, but because policies quietly excluded the things that happened.

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15:41Before you trust your policy to protect you, let My Policy Advocate tell you what it really says. Visit MyPolicyAdvocate.com today. Peace of mind starts with knowing the truth. MyPolicyAdvocate.com You're listening to the Bloomberg Business Week Daily Podcast. Catch us live weekday afternoons from 2 to 5 p.m. Eastern. Listen on Apple CarPlay and Android Auto with the Bloomberg Business app. Or watch us live on YouTube. Hey, we want to stay with all of the geopolitics that continue to come at us. Henrietta Traes is with us. She's Veda Partners Managing Partners. She's also Director of Economic Policy.

16:17She also served in the U.S. Senate as a tax banking and finance legislative assistant. So she understands the private and the public sector. She's done a lot. Henrietta, good to have you back with us. I do want to go domestic, but first I've got to go global. The president's spending a lot of time on foreign affairs. What is, is this important in terms of the U.S. economic situation, the U.S. business environment going forward? You know, I think what's clear from that press conference and what we saw from Zelensky's meeting today, and then to tie it into China, as the president did earlier, even on the China front with all three of these instances, with the U.S.

16:57trade deal with China, the negotiations between Ukraine and Russia and the Gaza and Hamas and Israel situation, is that there's got to be devils everywhere. The devil is in the details, and we don't have any details. There are no hard and fast details. The president wasn't able to give any of them, neither on the Abraham Accords or, as you just mentioned, on the West Bank, on timing. There's daylight between Netanyahu and Trump, and I think there's a lot of daylight between Zelensky and Putin, to say the very least. And there's a lot of daylight between the U.S. and China on just our terms of trade deal.

17:32So I think it's pretty clear that all this is going to drag into 2026, and the president is extremely occupied with these issues. The issue for the president and then, therefore, for the Republican Party down ballot is that Americans are not focused, and they don't even have in their top 10 issues that they care about foreign policy going into next year's midterm elections. So to tie in the foreign policy part is really interesting for the president to double down like this on these issues, which are obviously important to him, but are not making forward progress and don't impact the U.S. consumer or voter.

18:03I love that you went there. And certainly for the global investing audience, this can matter, right, in terms of opportunities or relationships. But having said that, when it comes to the midterms, which will also be important to financial markets and what more of the president's agenda he can get, you know, done in the second half of this second term for him. So this focus is surprising. Do you think he shifts in the new year? I think he tries to do both. You know, he's tried to do both in the first year where he did the one big, beautiful bill, which was very economically oriented, three and a half trillion dollars in deficit increasing tax cuts principally to corporations in 25, with some of it coming for individuals in 26.

18:41I think the Republican conference and the president feels like they've done their job on the economy and now we need to wait and let it work out. That's certainly what they're hoping for going into next year. The trade or rather the tariff dividend that the president touts is$450 billion of money he's not going to get out of Congress to send home to the American public. So there's not another fiscal package coming from D.C. He has to keep an attention on other things while touting the one big beautiful bill because there's not going to be another piece of legislation that passes in 2026, in my opinion.

19:14That's going to keep the issue alive. Well, and the other thing, I'm just kind of blown away by some of the notes that you guys shared with our team. The most controversial view VEDA has going into 2026 is that when SCOTUS rules on those tariffs, if they rule against them, the president will not quickly move to replace them with new authorities, as he and his economic advisors insist. But he would say that SCOTUS would be handing the president a domestic gift by striking down the tariffs, which equate to about$1 ,800 per household at their current levels. Do you expect SCOTUS to strike them down?

19:46Yes, I do. And I think I'm in pretty good company on that one. As you know, the courts below the Court of International Trade and the Court of Appeals have both rejected it. My odds are 65 % that the Supreme Court's rejected it. I'm hopeful that they do it in the first quarter and get this binary event,$3 trillion binary event off our backs. But the single best thing that could happen to this administration and again to Republicans down ballot is for the president to get the tariffs revoked by the Supreme Court. He doesn't have to admit failure or anything along those lines. You just say the Supreme Court won't let me do it and then just not migrate to 338 or balance of payments authority or 232 or 301.

20:25They're going to be threatened. But look at the ones that have already been threatened and aren't yet on pharmaceuticals, semiconductors. Where's the critical minerals investigation. It was supposed to be released on the 27th. It might be on the president's desk, but he's clearly sitting on it. And that's because he can't afford to have prices continue to rise by imposing new tariffs, especially on those items. So I think it's the best case scenario for this president, for the Supreme Court to take the tariffs down. That would clear the de minimis tariffs. That would clear all the IEPA retaliatory tariffs and give the president the ability to take a more nuanced approach to trade instead of the blunt acts that was Liberation Day.

21:03And I go one step further, if I may, and say if he takes the opportunity to reimpose all these tariffs, it's going to be so confusing for small and large businesses alike. It will be the equivalent of Liberation Day 2.0. You can't just swap them out. So, you know, prepare for April 4th again. Well, that means it's going to be an interesting 2026, no doubt about it, whichever way it goes. Henrietta, I always enjoy getting some time with you. Henrietta Trays, Veda Partners Managing Partner and Director of Economic Policy joining us here. So there's a lot of noise about AI, but time's too tight for more promises.

21:36So let's talk about results. At IBM, we work with our employees to integrate technology right into the systems they need. Now, a global workforce of 300 ,000 can use AI to fill their HR questions, resolving 94 % of common questions. Not noise, proof of how we can help companies get smarter by putting AI where it actually pays off deep in the work that moves the business. Let's create smarter business. IBM. Support for the show comes from Public. Lately, it feels like there are two types of investing platforms. Some are traditional brokerages that haven't changed much in decades, and others feel less like investing and more like a game.

22:14Public is positioned differently. It's an investing platform for people who are serious about building their wealth. On Public, you can build a portfolio of stocks, options, bonds, crypto without all the bugs, or the confetti. Retirement accounts, yep. High yield cash, yes again. They even have direct indexing. Public has modern design, powerful tools, and customer support that actually helps. Go to public.com slash market and earn an uncapped 1 % bonus when you transfer your portfolio. That's public.com slash market.

22:55All investing involves risk of loss. See complete disclosures at public.com slash disclosures. We buy insurance for peace of mind, but every year millions of claims are denied. Not because people did anything wrong, but because their policies quietly excluded what happened. Insurers know every detail. Policyholders rarely do. That's why My Policy Advocate exists. For just 27 cents a day, their platform reads your policies and explains where you are vulnerable. They don't sell insurance. They deliver transparency. Before you trust your policy to protect you, let My Policy Advocate tell you what it really says.

23:29Go to MyPolicyAdvocate.com. Everyone has been there. Your team's feedback is scattered across emails, chats, and sticky notes. It's a mess. But PDF Spaces and Adobe Acrobat gives you one collaborative workspace to streamline every file and comment. So, if you need six departments to finally agree on a proposal, do that with Acrobat. Need to turn a mountain of feedback into one plan of action? Do that with Acrobat. Want to stop searching for files and finally get everyone on the same page? Do that. Do that. Do that with Acrobat. Learn more at adobe.com slash do that with Acrobat. This is the Bloomberg Business Week Daily Podcast.

24:13Listen live each weekday starting at 2 p.m. Eastern on Apple CarPlay and Android Auto with the Bloomberg Business app. You can also listen live on Amazon Alexa from our flagship New York station. Just say Alexa, play Bloomberg 1130. Well, from the fintech sector to the commodity space, we're seeing a major pullback. Well, I would say, you know, a modest pullback, really, in gold and silver. But the two metals did top records earlier this week. I mean, they just went on a tear. Here to break down the recent moves, Mike McGlone, senior commodity strategist with Bloomberg Intelligence. So, Mike, how much of all of this was just pure speculation?

24:50Just about all of it, I think, Vani. When you get to these extreme levels, particularly in thin markets with things like gold and particularly silver, silver is known as the devil's metal for a reason. But they're up so much this year. Silver, as both of you have mentioned, we've noted a lot. It's the best year since 1979 for both of those metals. And history has proven when you rally this velocity, my rule as a strategist is I take off that fundamental technical outlook. I switch over to a money manager. I say typically new longs at these levels do very poorly. So I'll give you an example. Silver settled 1979 at thirty two dollars and twenty cents an ounce.