Trump V Powell Round 4; Google Gathers the Infinity Stones of AI Commerce; and A16z’s New $15 Billion Fund

12th January 2026

Pressure is mounting across the world’s most powerful institutions. In Washington, federal prosecutors have opened a criminal investigation into Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell, a move that escalates President Trump’s long-running battle with the central bank and raises fresh questions about the Fed’s independence. In the UK, private equity firms are increasingly shifting funds offshore, intensifying transparency concerns post-Brexit. Meanwhile, Google is deepening its push into AI-powered commerce with new shopping tools, and Andreessen Horowitz has raised another $15 billion, cementing its grip on Silicon Valley’s capital engine. All this and more in today’s Read It And Eat!

Major Headlines 

• Trump V Powell Round 4: A Criminal Investigation

Federal prosecutors have opened a criminal investigation of Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell over his June testimony before Congress about the central bank’s $2.5 billion renovation of its headquarters in Washington, DC, The stunning action against the independent Federal Reserve was met with an equally extraordinary statement posted by Powell in a video Sunday night, in which he said the investigation was a direct result from his ongoing struggle with the administration over interest rates. 

Powell said it was a consequence of broader “threats and ongoing pressure” by the administration. “The threat of criminal charges is a consequence of the Federal Reserve setting interest rates based on our best assessment of what will serve the public, rather than following the preferences of the President,” Powell said in a statement late Sunday. The probe sends a chilling message to Powell  and to whomever might next lead the Fed. President Donald Trump’s unyielding attacks on the Fed chair, whom the president has said he will not renominate, have hammered on the Fed’s traditional political independence. Trump has even said he should have a say in rate decisions.

But the criminal probe takes Trump’s fight with the Fed to a whole new level. It shows that whoever Trump selects to replace Powell at the conclusion of his term in May will face continuing pressure from the administration to lower interest rates. Investors and economists across the globe prize the Fed’s independence. It guarantees policymakers will think of the long-term ramifications of setting monetary policy and not short-term political whims when steering the economy. On Sunday, Powell directly linked the probe to the question of the Fed’s independence and its ability to set interest rates without political interference.“This is about whether the Fed will be able to continue to set interest rates based on evidence and economic conditions—or whether instead monetary policy will be directed by political pressure or intimidation.” CNN

• Google inks Partnerships like Infinity stones to Dominate the AI E-Commerce Space

At the kickoff of the National Retail Federation's annual show on Sunday, Google announced the launch of what it's calling the Universal Commerce Protocol. The company wants UCP to become an industry standard that retailers use for their AI agents and systems across tasks like discovery, buying and "post-purchase-support."

Google says the open-source protocol creates a unified system spanning the shopping experience, from searching to payment, so that retailers don't have to build their own tools and connect the various functions. "It's very important to have a standardized way so we can scale these things and everyone can be prepared for all the various steps to happen," Vidhya Srinivasan, vice president of Google ads and commerce, said in an interview. "Businesses can pick and choose what they want so there's flexibility for them."

E-commerce has emerged as one of the major battlegrounds in the booming generative AI market, with Google facing off against OpenAI, Perplexity and Amazon, as they all try and get consumers to use their various apps and services to begin their shopping journey. By 2030, the retail market could represent a $3 trillion to $5 trillion opportunity globally due to AI-powered tools and agentic commerce, according to a report in October from McKinsey.  Google said UCP was co-developed with companies including Shopify, Etsy, Wayfair and Target. The protocol will soon power a new checkout feature allowing users to buy direct from Google's AI Mode or Gemini App. They can pay via Google Wallet, but Srinivasan said the company plans to include other payment methods like PayPal in the future. Financial Times 

• UK private equity firms sharply increase use of offshore funds 

UK personal fairness corporations have sharply elevated their use of offshore jurisdictions since Brexit, elevating considerations about transparency simply because the trade is pulling in more cash from particular person traders. British teams arrange half of their funds overseas over the previous 4 years, up from round 1 / 4 between 2010 and 2015, with a few third in Luxembourg, in accordance with research from the College of Glasgow.

The nation has more and more attracted the personal fairness trade due to its legal and regulatory environmental pattern that personal fairness legal professionals stated had grown due to investor demand for funds which are based mostly within the EU. However the shift has raised considerations about transparency for traders as offshore areas typically require much less stringent disclosure in regards to the identification of traders behind funds or have registries which are more durable to entry. “What I see is an growing tendency for PE (corporations) to make use of offshore jurisdictions for registering their funds and their portfolio corporations, which . . . means issues are much less seen to the general public eye,” stated Paul Lavery, a finance lecturer on the College of Glasgow who performed the research, and a earlier one with comparable findings.

Momentum that had constructed round Luxembourg meant that many worldwide backers of personal fairness funds favoured it as a result of their legal professionals already understood the jurisdiction, they added. About 18 per cent of all UK personal fairness funds arrange over the previous 4 years had been registered in Guernsey, in accordance with the College of Glasgow analysis. The island is taken into account as a less expensive choice for smaller funds in contrast with Luxembourg or the UK.  Michael Moore, chief government of trade physique the British Enterprise Capital and Non-public Fairness Affiliation, stated the UK had a “world-leading transparency regime” and was the second-largest personal capital hub on this planet. Financial Times

• VC Firm A16z Raise a Fresh $15 billion fund

Andreessen Horowitz just announced the firm has raised a little more than $15 billion in new funding. The haul represents over 18% of all venture capital dollars allocated in the United States in 2025, according to firm co-founder Ben Horowitz, but even more jaw-dropping is that it brings the organization to more than $90 billion in assets under management, putting it neck-and-neck with Sequoia Capital as among the largest venture firms in the world. Which is fitting, since a16z appears to be very friendly with actual sovereign wealth funds, including at least one from Saudi Arabia.

The firm, which employs many hundreds of people across five offices,  three in California, plus New York and Washington, D.C.;  has become a globe-spanning operation with employees on six continents. In December, it opened its first Asia office in Seoul for its crypto practice. That newly committed capital breaks down across five funds: $6.75 billion for growth investments, $1.7 billion each for apps and infrastructure, $1.176 billion for “American Dynamism” (more on that shortly), $700 million for biotech and healthcare, and another $3 billion for other venture strategies. It’s the kind of money that makes you wonder where it all comes from and, more importantly, where it all goes.

The “where it comes from” question is one the firm has historically declined to answer. When we asked a16z this week about its limited partners and its distributed-to-paid-in capital ratio  the DPI, or how much actual cash the firm has returned to investors over its 16-year history  the firm didn’t respond. What we do know is that CalPERS invested $400 million in 2023, marking the first time in a16z’s history it took money from a major California pension fund, probably because institutions with transparency requirements don’t really align with the firm’s preference for opacity. We also know that Sanabil Investments, the venture arm of Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund, listsAndreessen Horowitz among its portfolio holdings. TechCrunch

Minor Headlines 

• Trump calls for one-year cap on credit card interest rates at 10% Reuters

  
  

• SpaceX gets FCC approval to launch 7,500 more Starlink satellites TechCrunch

  
  

• Meta signs deals with three nuclear companies for 6-plus GW of power TechCrunch 

  
  

• UK's former US envoy apologises to Epstein's victims, not for his own ties Reuters

  
  

• Iran warns against potential US involvement as protest death toll tops 500  CNN

  
  

• ‘South Korea’s Google’ pitches AI alternative to US and China Financial Times 

  
  

• Saks Fifth Avenue Files for Chapter 11 Bankruptcy Bloomberg

  
  

• K-pop Demon Hunters took home best animated feature, and its song “Golden” won best original song BBC