It was a week in global politics that had even the most seasoned observers doing double takes. In a span of just a few days, President Donald Trump issued a headline-grabbing pardon, diplomatic relations between the U.S. and Canada took a sharp nosedive, and Japan shattered a glass ceiling that had stood for its entire modern history. Meanwhile, economic signals from the U.S. sent mixed messages as a government shutdown threatened to obscure the true state of inflation. Each of these developments, on their own, would have been enough to dominate front pages. Together, they painted a portrait of a world in flux, where power, money, and precedent are being upended in real time.
Let’s start with the most controversial move: President Trump’s pardon of Changpeng Zhao, the founder and former CEO of Binance, the world’s largest cryptocurrency exchange. On October 23, 2025, Trump granted clemency to Zhao, who had pleaded guilty in 2023 to failing to maintain effective anti-money laundering controls. The case had been a major win for the Biden administration, with Zhao serving a four-month prison sentence and Binance agreeing to pay roughly $4.3 billion in penalties to U.S. authorities. Zhao was released in September 2024, but the shadow of his conviction lingered—until now.
The White House, in a statement quoted by CNN, characterized the move as a corrective to what it called the Biden administration’s “war on cryptocurrency.” Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt described the pardon as “a corrective measure against the Biden administration’s war on cryptocurrency.” The statement continued, “President Trump exercised his constitutional authority by issuing a pardon for Mr. Zhao, who was prosecuted by the Biden administration in their war on cryptocurrency. The war on crypto is over.”
For supporters of digital assets, the pardon was a clear signal that the Trump administration intends to roll out the red carpet for crypto entrepreneurs. Some analysts, as reported by CNN, saw the move as a boost for financial innovation, suggesting it could pave the way for Binance’s return to the U.S. market after years of regulatory scrutiny. Zhao and Binance had previously admitted that their lax controls allowed criminals to conduct transactions on the platform, including cases tied to child exploitation, drug trafficking, and terrorism financing.
But not everyone was celebrating. The Wall Street Journal published a blistering editorial on October 25, 2025, calling the pardon a “conflict of interest” and drawing a direct line between Zhao, Binance, and the Trump family’s own crypto interests. The editorial highlighted a $2 billion transaction earlier in the year between an Emirati investment fund and the Trump family-owned World Liberty Financial, a cryptocurrency platform hosted on Binance. “It sure looks like a conflict of interest,” the WSJ wrote. “A reasonable person would look at this and easily conclude that presidential leniency can be bought.” The paper didn’t mince words, comparing the move to Bill Clinton’s notorious pardon of financier Marc Rich, which had also raised questions about the intersection of money and presidential power.
Trump, for his part, defended his decision in typically combative fashion. “I gave him a pardon at the request of a lot of very good people,” he told reporters. “A lot of people say that he wasn’t guilty of anything.” Yet Zhao’s own plea deal with the Justice Department, as reported by WSJ, included an admission that he had turned a blind eye as terrorists, cybercriminals, and foreign adversaries used Binance to launder cash. At least $890 million was transacted through Binance between the U.S. and Iran, according to court documents.
The reaction was swift and, at times, scathing. Democrats and even some Republicans called the pardon inappropriate, especially given the Trump family’s financial ties to Binance. Billionaire venture capitalist Joe Lonsdale, co-founder of Palantir, weighed in on X (formerly Twitter): “POTUS has been terribly advised on this; it makes it look like massive fraud is happening around him in this area. I love President Trump; this is possibly the greatest admin of my lifetime—except for these pardons. If I’m calling balls and strikes, these are hit-by-pitches!!”
Meanwhile, the White House’s rationale for the pardon—that Zhao had been “too aggressively pursued” by Biden’s Justice Department—did little to quell the controversy. Critics pointed out that Zhao applied for a pardon just days after facilitating the $2 billion transaction involving the Trump family’s crypto venture, raising uncomfortable questions about timing and motivation.
All of this unfolded against a backdrop of economic uncertainty in the U.S. On October 24, 2025, the Labor Department reported that the consumer price index (CPI) rose by 0.3% in September, bringing the annual inflation rate to 3%. The core CPI, which excludes volatile food and energy prices, also undershot economists’ expectations—a sign, perhaps, that the worst of the post-pandemic price surges could be behind us. But as Invezz noted, the ongoing government shutdown, now in its fourth week, threatened to prevent the release of October’s inflation data. With data surveyors sidelined by the funding lapse, policymakers and markets are essentially flying blind as they try to gauge the health of the world’s largest economy.
And then, in a move that stunned diplomats and trade watchers alike, President Trump announced the abrupt termination of all U.S. trade negotiations with Canada. The catalyst? A TV ad from the Ontario provincial government that featured former President Ronald Reagan criticizing tariffs. Trump, seizing on a complaint from the Ronald Reagan Presidential Foundation that the ad was “FAKE,” accused Canada of trying to “interfere with the decision of the US Supreme Court” on the legality of his tariff regime. The diplomatic fallout was immediate, with cross-border talks grinding to a halt and both sides bracing for economic aftershocks.
Internationally, hopes for a breakthrough in the Ukraine war were dashed when a planned Trump-Putin summit was put on hold. According to officials cited by Invezz, Moscow rejected a U.S.-backed call for an immediate ceasefire, insisting on territorial and political preconditions that Kyiv and its allies refused to accept. The impasse left the conflict at a stalemate, with no clear path forward.
Amid this swirl of controversy and uncertainty, Japan quietly made history. On October 21, 2025, its parliament elected Sanae Takaichi as the country’s first female prime minister. The 64-year-old conservative, a longtime admirer of Margaret Thatcher, secured a clear majority in the Lower House as leader of the ruling Liberal Democratic Party, thanks in part to a last-minute coalition deal with the Japan Innovation Party. Takaichi’s rise comes at a challenging economic moment for Japan, the world’s fourth-largest economy, and signals a new chapter in a nation long dominated by male leaders.
It was, in short, a week that defied easy summary—a week when old rules were rewritten, new power players emerged, and the world was reminded that, in politics as in markets, surprises are always just around the corner.
