Chapter 1: What are President Trump's plans for banning institutional investors from buying homes?
The U.S. says it'll control Venezuelan oil sales indefinitely and seizes two more oil tankers at sea.
So the U.S. isn't just going after Venezuelan oil. It's going after all of those countries that rely on this dark fleet to carry its sanctioned oil.
Plus, why President Trump wants to ban institutional investors from buying homes.
Chapter 2: How is the U.S. tightening its grip on Venezuela's oil industry?
And new dietary guidelines say you should probably be eating more protein. It's Wednesday, January 7th. I'm Alex Osola for The Wall Street Journal. This is the PM edition of What's News? The top headlines and business stories that move the world today. It's a full day of news from the Trump administration.
Chapter 3: What impact does the U.S. plan to sell Venezuelan oil indefinitely have?
First up, we're reporting that the president says he'll be banning large investors from buying single-family homes. Wall Street firms and other institutional investors have bought up hundreds of thousands of homes in the U.S. that they rent out. That's a tiny slice of the overall housing market.
But some housing analysts say it leaves fewer homes for sale and drives up prices in some neighborhoods, even as the country faces a lack of affordable housing. The president asked Congress to codify a ban. It's not clear he could ban such sales himself without congressional approval.
Chapter 4: What strategies is the Trump administration using to pressure Venezuela's government?
Turning to Venezuela, Trump is tightening his grip on the country's oil industry. This morning, you heard about the administration saying Venezuela intends to give the U.S. up to 50 million barrels of sanctioned oil. That's as much as 15 percent of the country's output. And now the White House says the U.S. will sell Venezuela's oil indefinitely. An administration official says the U.S.
Chapter 5: Why is the U.S. seizing oil tankers related to Venezuelan oil?
is rolling back some sanctions so Venezuelan crude can be sold to global markets. Meanwhile, the U.S. also seized two more oil tankers, in the Atlantic and near the Caribbean, as it cracks down on Venezuela's oil exports. U.S. Energy Secretary Chris Wright says the administration is using oil to pressure Venezuela's government, in comments at a conference today filmed by CNBC.
We need to have that leverage and that control of those oil sales to drive the changes that simply must happen in Venezuela.
For more on the Trump administration's plans for Venezuelan oil, I'm joined now by senior video correspondent Shelby Holliday. Shelby, let's start with these oil tankers.
Chapter 6: What are the implications of the new dietary guidelines announced by RFK Jr.?
The U.S. has indicated that it will continue seizing vessels near Venezuela. What is the administration's goal with going after these tankers?
Well, before the capture of Nicolas Maduro, the U.S. was seizing tankers and the oil that was on them to exert pressure on the Maduro regime. Now that he's out of power and there's this interim government in Caracas, the U.S. has indicated that it's going to continue seizing tankers and continue seizing oil.
To exert pressure on this new leadership, Secretary Rubio said the best leverage the U.S.
Chapter 7: How do the updated dietary guidelines affect Americans' protein intake?
has is the oil. And so it will continue enforcing what it calls this quarantine of Venezuelan oil to get what the U.S. wants.
One of the tankers that U.S. forces went after didn't actually hold any oil and they pursued it for like two weeks. Why did they go after something that wasn't actually holding oil?
That's a very good question. So this tanker, which is formerly known as the Bella One, an analyst said it was empty. It didn't have any oil on it.
Chapter 8: What challenges do Americans face with mental health care coverage?
The Coast Guard continued to pursue it. And halfway across the Atlantic, this ship changed its registration to Russia, and it claimed Russian protection. Russia asked the U.S. to back off of the ship. The U.S. clearly did not do that. It boarded the ship this morning with a ton of firepower and special forces. And this rusty old oil tanker became a flashpoint in U.S.-Russia relations.
One of the strategies that the U.S. has articulated is not just that it wants to control Venezuela, but it wants to get rid of Russian influence, Iranian influence, Chinese influence across the Western Hemisphere. And so that could potentially be why the U.S.
thought it was so important to seize this tanker, was just to show the Kremlin that these tankers will not be tolerated in America's backyard. Can we expect any pushback or blowback from Russia on this? Russia put out a statement saying that it hopes the US treats the people on board humanely and that it expects them to return to their homeland as soon as possible.
It hasn't indicated that it will retaliate, but that is certainly a concern for authorities.
How does seizing oil tankers fit in with the Trump administration's intention to sell Venezuelan oil? What do those two pieces mean together?
So these tankers are known as dark fleet tankers. They essentially hide what they're transporting. They transport Venezuelan oil, but they're also part of this global fleet that transports black market oil themselves. to and from countries like Russia, China, India, Cuba. So the U.S. isn't just going after Venezuelan oil.
It's going after all of those countries that rely on this dark fleet to carry its sanctioned oil. Now there's a very clear new strategy that if you take the tankers out of operation, you can clamp down on this broader black market of oil.
So it's a war essentially on sanctioned global oil.
Yes. Illicit oil and illicit tankers that are engaged in deceptive practices. Which then puts pressure on U.S. adversaries. Exactly.
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