Good Morning! Today’s edition is 898 words, a 4-minute read.

What’s on tap: 

• Colleges reopen in Gaza

• Italian cuisine gets UNESCO designation

• “Sundown scaries”

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Big Stories

Fed Cuts Rates Again

• The Federal Reserve cut interest rates by a quarter point on Wednesday for the third time this year, bringing rates to their lowest level since late 2022. The cut could lower borrowing costs for consumers but risks stoking inflation that remains above the Fed's 2% target.

• Fed Chair Jerome Powell said the job market is weaker than data suggests, with payroll numbers overstated by about 60,000 jobs monthly. He also blamed tariffs for driving inflation above target, saying, 'It's really tariffs that's causing most of the inflation overshoot.’

• Three Fed officials dissented, marking the most friction since 2019. The Fed projects one more rate cut next year but signaled Wednesday's cut is likely the last for now. President Trump said the cut should have been ‘at least doubled.'

Machado's Daughter Accepts Nobel Prize

• María Corina Machado's daughter accepted the Nobel Peace Prize on her mother's behalf in Norway on Wednesday after the Venezuelan opposition leader was unable to attend while in hiding. Machado has not been seen publicly since being briefly detained at a Jan. 9 protest in Caracas. The Nobel committee said she faced "extreme danger" trying to attend.

• Machado won Venezuela's opposition primary but was barred from challenging President Nicolás Maduro in the 2024 election. Retired diplomat Edmundo González ran in her place, but the electoral council declared Maduro the winner despite widespread fraud allegations and repression.

• Machado said in an audio message that people 'risked their lives' to help her attempt to reach the ceremony. Four Latin American presidents attended in solidarity with Venezuela's opposition.

Higher Education Resumes in Gaza

• Universities in Gaza are reopening after two years of war that destroyed over 100 university buildings and killed roughly 200 employees. Al-Azhar University has resumed in-person classes despite its main campus being completely leveled during the conflict.

• The IDF said it destroyed Al-Azhar's campus after finding Hamas tunnels and weapons. Still, university officials argued that targeting educational institutions violates the Geneva Convention.

• Students face major obstacles returning to class. Transportation from southern Gaza to classes costs around $50 per day, and Dental students lost specialized labs and equipment needed for training. University officials said the reopening shows 'our buildings were destroyed, but our will was not.’

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Quick Stories

US News

• The US seized what President Trump called the largest oil tanker ever taken off Venezuela's coast, escalating tensions as he threatens to expand strikes onto Venezuelan land. (More)

• A federal judge ordered the release of grand jury materials from Jeffrey Epstein's 2019 case, completing the unsealing of evidence from Epstein and Maxwell investigations under a new congressional transparency act. (More)

• The Trump administration proposed requiring visitors from 42 visa-waiver countries, including the UK and France, to disclose five years of social media history before entering the US for tourism or business. (More)

World

• Ukrainian President Zelensky offered to hold elections within three months if the US guarantees voter safety, responding to Trump's accusation that his government uses the war to stay in power. (More)

• UNESCO recognized Italian cuisine as intangible cultural heritage, the first national food culture on the UN list. (More)

• Canada launched a $1.2 billion program to recruit over 1,000 top researchers and doctors, capitalizing on US restrictions that now charge $100,000 for skilled worker visas. (More)

Business & Economy

• US stock markets closed higher on Wednesday (S&P +0.67%, Nasdaq +0.33%, Dow +1.05%). Major stock indexes jumped after the Fed cut interest rates again. (More)

• Philanthropist MacKenzie Scott donated $7.1 billion to nonprofits in 2025, more than tripling her recent annual giving and bringing her total charitable contributions since 2019 to $26.3 billion. (More)

• Oracle shares fell 7% after revenue missed expectations despite AI demand, with software sales down 3% offsetting strong cloud growth and a 438% surge in future contracted revenue. (More)

Sports & Entertainment

• Former Michigan football coach Sherrone Moore was detained by police in Michigan and investigated for potential charges, hours after the university fired him for an inappropriate relationship with a staff member. (More)

• Writer Sophie Kinsella, whose "Confessions of a Shopaholic" sparked a bestselling series selling over 45 million copies worldwide, died Wednesday at 55 from glioblastoma, an aggressive brain cancer. (More)

• CBS News appointed Tony Dokoupil as anchor of "CBS Evening News" starting January 5, the first major hire under new editor-in-chief Bari Weiss following Paramount's takeover of the network. (More)

Science, Health, & Tech

• Researchers found evidence in England that humans learned to make fire over 400,000 years ago, 350,000 years earlier than believed, by striking iron pyrite against flint to create sparks. (More)

• Adobe integrated Photoshop, Express, and Acrobat into ChatGPT, letting users edit images, create designs, and modify PDFs through the chatbot. (More)

• A temporary lake reappeared in Death Valley after record fall rainfall brought twice the area's yearly amount. (More)

Extra Credit

Ranking the states attracting the most new residents.

San Francisco woman gives birth in a self-driving taxi.

How new parents can survive the “sundown scaries.”

Why do we only say “merry” for Christmas?