Flagship

Trump calls for immediate Iran talks

US President Donald Trump said Wednesday he wants to negotiate a nuclear deal with Iran, shortly after ordering a “maximum pressure” campaign. Trump said work on a “Verified Nuclear Peace Agreement” should begin “immediately,” marking a departure from his first term decision to withdraw from a previous nuclear deal. Iran may be open for talks: A US flag painted on the floor of Iran’s presidential complex for visitors to trample on was quietly removed before Trump’s inauguration. Trump has a “brief window” to halt Tehran’s nuclear ambitions, two former Biden officials argued, adding that US sanctions relief, in exchange for international monitoring and reduced uranium stockpiles, may be his best bargaining chip.

US envoy to present Ukraine peace plan

The Trump administration is set to present a plan to end Russia’s war in Ukraine next week, Bloomberg reported, after months of speculation about how the US president hopes to resolve the conflict. Trump’s envoy for Russia and Ukraine has previously suggested Ukraine should cede territory Russia currently occupies, and that the US should offer Kyiv security guarantees short of NATO membership. The Kremlin said its contact with Washington has “intensified” recently, although Trump has declined to say whether he has directly spoken with Russia’s Vladimir Putin about Ukraine. Achieving a settlement will be “a long journey,” a Russia expert at the Council on Foreign Relations argued, and would likely entail a series of negotiated agreements on Ukrainian and European security.

Musk faces Dem, legal pushback

Tech billionaire Elon Musk’s slash-and-burn approach to the US government is facing mounting challenges from Democrats and federal employees. Musk and his Department of Government Efficiency have been sued by public sector unions, workers, and retirees in a series of lawsuits that together “amount to the opening shots in an emerging legal battle over the constitutional order,” The New York Times wrote. Musk also provides Democrats with a figure who isn’t Donald Trump to rally against, The Wall Street Journal noted. Republicans, meanwhile, don’t seem interested in restraining Musk yet, but one lawmaker told Semafor’s Burgess Everett: “I can see things where Musk… could go too far.”

Tariffs loom over China holiday boom

Spending on movies, travel, and goods during the Lunar New Year holiday hit record levels in China, even as investors remained wary of an escalating trade war with the US. China’s key stock indexes opened higher Wednesday before sinking, signaling a “lack of confidence” amid tit-for-tat tariff moves by the two superpowers, an analyst told Nikkei Asia. The uncertainty over exports has sharpened focus on China’s domestic consumption, as Beijing attempts to jumpstart demand with incentives like vouchers and trade-ins amid sluggish economic growth. The volatility is unlikely to abate soon, Goldman Sachs analysts said, and an expected call between US President Donald Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping will likely be “key.”

Bytedance slow-rolls TikTok negotiations

TikTok’s Chinese owner seems to be stalling negotiations for its sale to a US buyer, suggesting Beijing could take a “hard-line approach” amid rising trade tensions, The Washington Post reported. Despite a concerted push by Donald Trump-allied investors to hash out a deal, China is yet to give the green light for TikTok’s sale, as it expects broader trade and tech policy negotiations with Washington. Chinese officials have discussed how TikTok fits into their wider strategy for dealing with Trump, and retain a formal veto on any sale. “It’s not like [China] would never do it, but they will need a lot in return,” one person familiar with the negotiations told the Post. “They are willing to pull the plug.”

DeepSeek raises data security concerns

India’s finance ministry on Wednesday warned employees against using DeepSeek, a day after Australia banned the Chinese AI startup’s chatbot from government devices over security concerns. Italy, Taiwan, and the US have also banned or limited its use, as have “hundreds” of companies, with officials citing unacceptable risks. Separately, researchers said DeepSeek may be scraping user data for China Mobile, a company banned from the US. Some argue the concerns are overblown: An Australian official behind the ban on China’s Huawei said, “I’m not worried about a little app,” adding that Chinese tech embedded in electric vehicles posed a greater security risk. And a US expert said that all the valid concerns with DeepSeek “are present in U.S. AI products, too.”

Modi’s party predicted to win Delhi

Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Hindu nationalist party is eyeing a return to power in the country’s capital after 27 years, potentially dislodging Delhi’s incumbent anti-corruption party over graft allegations. Several exit polls predicted a clear victory for the Bharatiya Janata Party in Delhi’s state elections Wednesday, a result that would topple the Aam Aadmi Party after more than a decade. AAP rose to power on the back of its welfare policies and anti-corruption fight, but its leaders were arrested last year on graft charges they claimed were politically motivated. This is “an existential battle” for AAP, The Print wrote. The BJP, meanwhile, is hoping that the national government’s decision last week to cut taxes for the middle class pays off.

Semafor’s 2025 World Economy Summit will bring together US Cabinet officials, global finance ministers, central bankers, and over 200 CEOs of the world’s largest companies. Supported by a world-class advisory board, including Dr. Albert Bourla, CEO and Executive Chairman, Pfizer; Gina Chon, Senior Editor, Semafor; ES Chung, Executive Chairman, Hyundai Motor Group; Aliko Dangote, President, Dangote Group; Jorge Paulo Lemann, Co-Founder and Chairman, 3G Capital; Rich Lesser, Global Chair, Boston Consulting Group; Sowmyanarayan Sampath, CEO, Verizon Consumer; Justin B. Smith, Co-Founder and CEO; and John Waldron, President and Chief Operating Officer, Goldman Sachs, the three-day summit will feature on-the-record discussions exploring innovative solutions for expanding the global economy.

Apr. 23–25, 2025 | Washington, DC | Join Waitlist

Urgency to rid seabeds of bombs

The growth of seabed infrastructure like wind farms, cables, and pipelines has accelerated the clearing of unexploded World War II bombs from the Baltic Sea. Thousands of tons of mostly German ordnance was dumped off the coast between 1945 and 1949, and most remains there. Chemical weapons have injured fishermen and tourists, and there are growing concerns about the potential environmental and health impacts. Disposal teams have slowly been clearing the water, but have had to step up efforts in recent years as commercial interest in the seabed grows: Germany backed a cleanup campaign with $105 million in 2024, deploying undersea drones to clear the munitions more efficiently, Wired reported.

Ebola vaccine progress in trials

The World Health Organization began an Ebola vaccine trial in Uganda this week, with recent medical advances raising hopes in the battle against the disease. The first Ebola vaccine was approved in 2019, but a real-world trial during the 2018-2020 outbreak in the Democratic Republic of Congo found that so-called “ring” vaccination of patients’ contacts or at-risk groups dramatically reduced transmission. The new trial will test a vaccine designed for the Sudan strain of the virus that has hit Uganda. Ebola is unlikely to ever be eliminated — it is endemic in various animal species and occasionally leaps to humans — but reducing the risk of widespread outbreaks is increasingly plausible.

AI reveals burnt scroll contents

Scientists have digitally “unwrapped” a scroll burnt in the 78 AD eruption of Mount Vesuvius, revealing its text for the first time in almost 2,000 years. The scroll, one of hundreds found in the eviscerated Roman resort of Herculaneum, is too fragile to be opened. Scientists used a particle accelerator to take detailed X-rays of the scroll, and then reconstructed it using AI tools developed through the Vesuvius Challenge, which offers rewards to decipher the Herculaneum scrolls. Researchers believe they will be able to read “pretty much the whole scroll”; the text is thought to contain Epicurean philosophy, but others could hold lost classical works, like the original writings of Sappho or Aristotle.

Feb. 6th

• Donald Trump’s nominee for US trade representative, Jamieson Greer, faces confirmation hearings in the Senate.
• Amazon, AstraZeneca, and Eli Lilly report earnings.
• New York Fashion Week begins.

American expressionist painter Edward E. Boccia may finally be finding fame, a little more than a decade after his death. A collection of the artist’s work is currently on display in New York at the Calandra Italian American Institute, including paintings, drawings, and journals dating from 1958 to 1995, offering a window into his long but little-known career. Boccia “infused modernist language with monumental philosophical and stylistic questions,” Artnet wrote, his work often touching on religious themes and surrealism. One curator told the outlet that Boccia was “like an Italian Renaissance artist, in the sense that he was interested in technique and the depiction of sort of illusionism and realism, but was also very devout.”

Donald Trump’s threatened tariffs on Mexico and Canada underscore just how difficult it would be for the US to function as an energy island, Semafor’s Tim McDonnell wrote.

Trump’s 10% tariff threat on Canadian energy would have been especially painful for energy companies and consumers, driving up the prices of gasoline and electricity. While Trump has vowed to offset losses from tariffs with domestic production, that’s harder to do with energy, McDonnell argued, because it is bound by physical constraints that can’t be reengineered.