Hard Numbers

Hard Numbers: US doubles Maduro’s bounty, Trump appoints new Fed member, Modi and Lula combine forces, & more

​Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro addresses supporters during a march marking the first anniversary of his victory in the disputed July 28 presidential election, in Caracas, Venezuela July 28, 2025.
Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro addresses supporters during a march marking the first anniversary of his victory in the disputed July 28 presidential election, in Caracas, Venezuela July 28, 2025.
REUTERS/Leonardo Fernandez Viloria

$50 million: The US doubled its bounty to $50 million for Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro’s arrest. The reward is linked to a 2020 case at the US Department of Justice that accused Maduro and other Venezuelan officials of narco-terrorism, corruption, and drug trafficking. Venezuela has dismissed the move as “political propaganda.”

7: US President Donald Trump will nominate Stephen Miran, a tariff advocate and critic of current Fed chair Jay Powell, to temporarily join the seven-member Federal Reserve board, a move analysts say could be positioning Miran to take over for Powell once his term is up in February of 2026. Miran is known for supporting the goal of structurally weakening the US dollar – more on that here.

50: Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva hopped on a call to discuss a unified response to Trump’s tariffs, which currently stand at 50% against Brazil and 25% against India. The call comes the day after Lula announced he would try to rally BRICS countries to push back on the US leader’s trade policy.

8: Check m8. OpenAI’s model beatElon Musk’s Grok, and Google’s Gemini model came after a three day chess tournament this week. The competition took place between eight AI companies' normal AI products – rather than models designed for chess – testing their reasoning skills at a task they are still improving at.

More For You

Likud Party leader and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu delivers a speech to supporters at the Likud campaign headquarters following the release of exit polls and initial results of the general election in Jerusalem on October 28, 2026.
Anadolu via Reuters Connect

About 77% of Israel’s eligible voters cast ballots, the highest in more than two decades, to decide whether to give Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his coalition another term or hand power to a loosely organized opposition led by former IDF chief Gadi Eisenkot.

Brazilian Senator Flavio Bolsonaro disembarks from a plane after arriving at Opa-locka Executive Airport near Miami, Florida, U.S., October 28, 2026.
REUTERS/Eva Marie Uzcategui

Flávio Bolsonaro, the right-winger who lost Brazil’s presidential runoff to incumbent lefty Lula on Sunday, landed in the Magic City with his family on Wednesday morning.