The Commerce Department reports government stakes in six more companies. 
Routine Practice
CATO reports Government Ownership Stakes in Companies Becoming Routine Under Trump
The Commerce Department announced this week that six more companies are set to join the federal government’s rapidly expanding corporate portfolio, bringing the total to 30 by our count. Perhaps most striking about the announcement is how unremarkable government ownership is becoming.
The seven nonbinding letters of intent would provide up to $874 million in CHIPS and Science Act research and development incentives. Six recipients would be new additions to the portfolio. The seventh, GlobalFoundries, already has a proposed Commerce stake attached to a separate $375 million quantum foundry award. Commerce says a minority, noncontrolling equity stake in each company will be a condition of final funding.
Zoom out and the pattern is more striking. Since December, the CHIPS Research and Development (R&D) Office has announced 19 final or proposed company awards totaling up to $3.8 billion. They cover 18 companies because GlobalFoundries has two separate projects. Three agreements are final, while 16 remain letters of intent. All 19 have been publicly tied to equity.
Commerce’s current funding rules state that award recipients may be required to provide equity, warrants, intellectual property licenses, royalties, revenue sharing, or other instruments to generate a government return. The Biden administration, by contrast, used the same CHIPS R&D appropriation through separate competitions to award funds to private companies without taking ownership stakes. That makes the Trump administration’s insistence on equity a policy choice. The CHIPS Act itself authorizes Commerce to make grants, cooperative agreements, and “other transactions” but doesn’t expressly authorize the department to acquire stock.
Commerce says that these stakes enhance the return for taxpayers, but even a profitable portfolio would not resolve the underlying institutional problem. The federal government is now acting as regulator, customer, financier, and shareholder. Decisions involving contracts, trade restrictions, permits, and additional subsidies can affect the value of its holdings. Competitors have reason to question whether the playing field is level. And if a portfolio company falters, Washington will have an added incentive to protect its investment with more taxpayer support.
Calling the stakes “minority” and “noncontrolling” does not eliminate those conflicts. Public announcements often reveal little about valuations, shareholder rights, oversight, or exit plans. Meanwhile, future administrations will inherit the same tool and can use it to assemble portfolios reflecting their own political priorities.
US Government Stakes in 30 Companies
- U.S. Steel/Nippon Steel 🔩 Steel 🏛️Committee on Foreign Investment Golden share with veto rights over major corporate decisions – June 2025
- MP Materials 🪨 Minerals “🛡️ Defense ” $400 million preferred stock and warrants, 15 percent if converted/exercised – July 2025
- Intel 🖥️ Semiconductors “🏢 Commerce ” $8.9 billion for 9.9 percent stake, plus 5 percent warrant if foundry ownership falls below 51 percent – August 2025
- Trilogy Metals 🪨 Minerals “🛡️ Defense ” Proposed $35.6 million for 10 percent stake, plus warrants for additional 7.5 percent stake – October 2025
- Lithium Americas 🪨 Minerals “🏭 Energy ” $184 million debt-service deferral, with 5 percent company warrants and 5 percent Thacker Pass Joint Venture (JV) investment – October 2025
- Westinghouse ⚡ Energy (nuclear) “🏢 Commerce ” 20 percent upside participation, convertible to equity warrant if initial public offering (IPO) conditions are met – October 2025
- Vulcan Elements 🪨 Minerals 🏢 Commerce 🛡️ Defense Proposed $50 million Commerce equity, conditional $620 million Defense loan plus warrants – November 2025
- ReElement Technologies 🪨 Minerals “🛡️ Defense ” Conditional $80 million Defense loan with warrants – November 2025
- Korea Zinc/Crucible Metals 🪨 Minerals 🏢 Commerce 🛡️ Defense $210 million CHIPS funding, Commerce gets indirect Korea Zinc stake through the Crucible JV; Defense $150 million of JV equity and $1.25 billion of JV debt financing – December 2025
- xLight 🖥️ Semiconductors “🏢 Commerce ” $150 million CHIPS funding, with Commerce equity stake – December 2025
- L3Harris/Missile Solutions 🚀 Rocket motors “🛡️ Defense ” $1 billion convertible preferred security in Missile Solutions, plus warrants; converts to common at IPO – January 2026
- Atlantic Alumina Company 🪨 Minerals “🛡️ Defense ” $150 million Defense preferred equity stake – January 2026
- USA Rare Earth 🪨 Minerals 🏢 Commerce Up to $277 million direct funding and up to $1.3 billion loan, with shares and warrants – January 2026
- GlobalFoundries ⚛️ Quantum computing “🏢 Commerce ” Proposed up to $675 million across two CHIPS LOIs: $375 million for a quantum foundry and $300 million for silicon photonics. A separate agreement gives Commerce an approximately 1% equity stake. – May 2026
- IBM/Anderson ⚛️ Quantum computing “🏢 Commerce ” Proposed $1 billion for a minority stake in Anderon; IBM will contribute $1 billion plus assets and intellectual property – May 2026
- Atom Computing ⚛️ Quantum computing “🏢 Commerce ” $100 million planned funding, with minority equity stake – May 2026
- Diraq ⚛️ Quantum computing “🏢 Commerce ” Up to $38 million planned funding, with minority equity stake – May 2026
- D-Wave Quantum ⚛️ Quantum computing “🏢 Commerce ” Proposed $100 million for $100 million equity stake at final award – May 2026
- Infleqtion ⚛️ Quantum computing “🏢 Commerce ” Proposed $100 million for common stock priced 15 percent below the lower of the letter of intent-date or final agreement market price – May 2026
- PsiQuantum ⚛️ Quantum computing “🏢 Commerce ” $100 million planned funding, with minority equity stake – May 2026
- Quantinuum ⚛️ Quantum computing “🏢 Commerce ” Proposed $100 million for common at lower of 20 percent below $60 IPO price or 15 percent below the award date closing price – May 2026
- Rigetti Computing ⚛️ Quantum computing “🏢 Commerce ” Proposed $100 million over three years for common stock priced 15 percent below the lowest of the May 20 or award-date close – May 2026
- SandboxAQ 🖥️ Semiconductors “🏢 Commerce ” $500 million CHIPS funding, with minority equity stake – June 2026
- I-Pulse 🖥️ Semiconductors 🏢 Commerce $250 million CHIPS funding, with minority equity stake – June 2026
- Kepler Computing 🖥️ Semiconductors 🏢 Commerce Proposed up to $245 million in CHIPS funding, with minority equity stake – July 2026
- Multibeam Corporation 🖥️ Semiconductors 🏢 Commerce Proposed up to $140 million in CHIPS funding, with minority equity stake – July 2026
- Extropic 🖥️ Semiconductors 🏢 Commerce Proposed up to $75 million in CHIPS funding, with minority equity stake – July 2026
- Thintronics 🖥️ Semiconductors 🏢 Commerce Proposed up to $50 million in CHIPS funding, with minority equity stake – July 2026
- OBSIDIA Semiconductors 🖥️ Semiconductors 🏢 Commerce Proposed up to $34 million in CHIPS funding, with minority equity stake – July 2026
- Aeluma 🖥️ Semiconductors 🏢 Commerce Proposed up to $30 million in CHIPS funding, with minority equity stake equal to the award amount. – July 2026
Notes
- The points exclude Development Finance Corporation (DFC) transactions because Congress expressly authorized DFC to make minority equity investments in the 2018 BUILD Act, years before the second Trump administration.
- The U.S. Steel golden share is included because it grants the federal government firm-specific veto rights despite carrying no conventional economic interest.
Four Key Issues
- The federal government is now acting as regulator, customer, financier, and shareholder. Decisions involving contracts, trade restrictions, permits, and additional subsidies can affect the value of its holdings.
- Competitors have reason to question whether the playing field is level.
- Calling the stakes “minority” and “noncontrolling” does not eliminate the conflicts. Public announcements often reveal little about valuations, shareholder rights, oversight, or exit plans.
- Future administrations will inherit the same tool and can use it to assemble portfolios reflecting their own political priorities.
Corporatist Industrial Policy
This is state capitalism / corporatist industrial policy. Calling it communism overstates the case.
However, and unfortunately, it’s more government economic intervention into the markets.
The irony Cato highlights is real: a Republican administration is normalizing tools that expand the state’s direct financial interest in private firms with risks to taxpayers.
That’s on top of government favoritism creating a very unwelcome shift towards government favoritism picking winners and losers.
MAGA cheers.
Fascists and dumb people go together like peanut butter and jelly.
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A few ideas to play devils advocate.
I think you’re on the right track. The principles of Austrian economics are valid, but economists have a habit of forgetting about the military aspect of society while focusing on short-term economic efficiencies.
Economists never seem to remember or take account of the fact that producing for exchange is only one of three workable ways of dealing with other people: you can also threaten them (the method of soldiers) or deceive them (the method of the people I call priests – in modern Western society, educators, media people, and the judiciary. I don’t include politicians in this group because I see them as brokers – people who make a living by standing between the government and its prey. I don’t include bankers because although they do deal in a falsehood – fiat money – they don’t originate it. I know that this may be debatable.)
I would be careful about disparaging the free market, because you can’t have free people without a free market. As for the Chinese, they are copying as usual. They finally worked out that they had been sold a pup when they bought into Karl Marx’s bogus economics and bad interpretation of history (and his borrowed Christian morality), and they decided to adopt the principles of modern central banking instead. They didn’t know that modern central banking is just the latest version of a very old phenomenon, government interference in the market, mostly for corrupt purposes.
The market always tends to restore itself and find a way around problems and obstacles. The government, generally speaking, tries to use problems to aggrandize itself. That is just human nature.
When you are running a government, you have an obligation to think of the military aspect as well as the economic aspect. That is what Trump is doing. How well it all turns out is still unknown. I am not optimistic, but I don’t blame Trump: I blame all the fools who will probably follow him and undo whatever he has been able to achieve. That is what happened to Otto von Bismarck, Ronald Reagan, and Margaret Thatcher.
I believe that the US Government should be investing in more churches.
They have tried more shenanigans than you can shake a stick at.
It appears the Americans have little left to try save prayer and lots of it.
what is the symbol for the mutual fund of the 30 stocks ?
If this were part if a coherent plan, this might make sense…same as with tge tarriffs. But it is only more panicked chaos.
All tactics and no strategy is the noise before defeat.
Isn’t that what you Democrat Socialists wanted: government “controlling the means of production”? So whats the probem,Mish?
Unlike Trump, Mish isn’t a Democratic Socialist.
Oligarchy is staring us in the face. Yet people worry this is like socialism or communism?
Oligarchs have done an “excellent” job confusing matters.
Search for
why-china-doesnt-have-a-wall-street-and-why-it-doesnt-want-one/
The comment system is rejecting this comment so far…
Oh good. It worked after removing the website.
And when democrats take control, they will take it even further and start quasi-nationalizing firms and maybe industries. All brought to you by Trump and scumbag republicans initially.
Throw in 80m socialist leeches on ss and medicare and you start to see the full socialist picture quite clearly.
Do worry, Trump, Walrus and the GOP will find a way to make things even worse.™
>> 80m socialist leeches on ss and medicare
I’m disabled. Worked myself sick over decades. Sickness changed me from “star performer” to a has-been. Never bought a new car and took few vacations. I watch every penny. Do you want me to live on the street too?
The leeches are the owners and controllers of finance and warfare.
And to the extent many common folk contributed “little” most of their lives, I ask: who miseducated them and misallocated capital to move them into useless or harmful pursuits?
Lovely person.
Most of the cases listed above look like venture capital financing. And many of them will be poisoned gifts to future administrations because as we know many little companies funded by VC fail.
Strategic exigencies trump free market fundamentalism.
Beat China by becoming just like China.
Got it.
Beast China by becoming a crappy Chinese knockoff China!
It’s genius!
This is ridiculous. Its half fascism and half communism.
Both are unacceptable.
Make America China Again
Where does Fascism come into this picture?
It’s not a trick question, because what Trump is doing is by definition ~ Fascism.
Who does Trump work for?
How long until Trump Crypto is added to the list?
Well this will probably end badly.
With that being said the system seems broken to begin with. The gov gives research money out. Then private companies or individuals take over and profit. We the people are supposed to benefit and i guess we do if we can afford it. . But the government does not get it money back because corporations and wealthy individuals dont pay taxes.
How much of musk wealth with tesla was driven by tax incentives for his cars. I mean he dropped 180 million to drop on elections.
“Calling it communism overstates the case.”
It’s socialism or communism if the government invests hundreds of billions into r&d, markets most of the advances themselves, and uses profits to offset taxes on the bottom 90%.
It’s capitalism, oligarchy, or fascism if the government invests hundreds of billions into r&d, practically gives the tech away to corporations owned 60% by a tiny sliver of citizens, and crafts laws to ensure this tiny sliver pays little or no taxes on the profits that are in turn used, as always, to buy the media to control voters minds and buy politicians to change the laws further to their favor. Then compound that for decades. <= You are here.
All I can smell is the political sewage wafting from the self‑anointed “almighty” leader and the office he occupies. And somehow Americans keep pretending the stench is just “freedom’s fragrance.”
The whole place reeks of political rot from the top down, yet Americans keep holding their noses and calling it leadership. Hard to understand the tolerance for that kind of aroma.
This sort of reminds me of Mussolini.
Fascism – Germany
Government thought they could control business, businesses thought they could control the government. At the end of the day it’s bad bad bad bad bad bad. If there is ever a downturn in the markets the new backstop will be to just inject more debt-financed government money into the markets–hence, no downturn. The Fed Put has just become THE PUT. There is no reason to own stakes in companies. If a national interest were perceived AND Congress approves, government could I suppose own an entire company/industry but to own pieces and act as legal adjudicator, auditor, tax enforcer (or ignorer), regulator in general will always trigger an arbitrary administrative response AND it imperils the competition if any non-monopolistic enterprises coexist. Why is Mish the only one covering this in the main. I knew of Intel….now it’s up to 30?!!
Imagine anyone NOT in the market–they have been encumbered by all the associate risks, paid with debt money they must finance, but do not participate in the capital gain. The most disgusting form of picking winners and losers. K-shaped economy continues with Government now acting in a rob-from-the-poor-and-give-to-the-rich, stupid b*tch (Monty Python Dennis Moore theme on repeat).
Who appropriated the funds to invest in markets? Who bent whose ear, twisted whose arm to get, say, 100M for D-Wave Quantum. Blue Horseshoe must have loved D-Wave. (etc)
Is it really fascism if the oligarchs control government officials who just got some ownership into their companies?
It looks more like industry is trying to capture the government.
“trying”? 😉
We know who sustains the first losses in this scenario: we the wretched masses of the former middle class. We have been shoved down the far side of the balance sheet. We are the insurance assets whose patrimony will be liquidated to prop up these state darlings.
It reminds me of the fall of the USSR: everybody got equity tickets that were unusable: actually lots of pink slips. Everybody got fired. Only the most ruthless and connected “apprentices” thrived.
It is fascism, not communism.
The marriage of govt and corporate interests is the very definition economically of fascism. That’s the word for it. It is bad enough via the conduit of the regulatory state without this interlinking. Fascism is an apposite word also for the warlike nature of the US Empire since WWII as well. Has the word been too bandied about to communicate via the original meaning?
While taco and his boot lickers are calling the dems socialists, they should look in the mirror first. I am agreeing with either side as both are wrong.
Doesn’t the fed finance these rals?
Socialism for the rich, the peons get austerity and lecures on living within one’s means.
So $$$$$ goes into a NGO run by official family members then gets put into a business. I assume. Can we see the books on how it gets spent? I smell a Diaper.
Calling this state capitalism puts lipstick on these newfangled corporate pigs. The principal-agent problems created by having the state as a shareholder are not that different from moving to straight nationalization and, and one step further, to communism.
This Socialism.
Nationalist socialism? What’s another name for that?
State capitalism seems to run better than this “capitalism” if China is any model.
Only one other commenter here called this by it’s textbook name, Fascism. No need to go out inventing new terms. It’s just Fascism. It’s just the next step on the Road to Serfdom.
It is the very definition.
And in Germany the companies thought they were getting the upper hand and could control Government. Goverment thought they could get the upper hand and control business. That worked out infamously bad and always will. It is Fascism. Another commenter used the term National(ist) Socialist and was looking for another name, hmmm. This Administration using this public corporation approach, the last one CREATED quasi corporations for their “investment” called NGOs and all manners of ill were funded, completely off book, unaudited, sinister and corrupt. Neither are appropriate.
If they couldn’t run a deficit none of this could happen. None. The 30 year bond yield at 20 year high, frankly it should be double based upon what’s being funded and how it’s being mismanaged. As much as the 5.27% sounds compared to recent yields, how does it not go higher without massive economic slowdown? How does the Treasury rollover the debt at these rates? I think things might get a bit “disorderly”.
This is certainly an alarming innovation. But at least a stake in a company can be sold. Keeping a separate corporate structure means that the incentive to be competitive is not eliminated, as it was in government-owned enterprises in earlier times.
From a libertarian point of view, as I see it, the whole idea of modern corporations is illegitimate. A financial corporation has no actual existence: it is a creation of government. It buys and sells, hires and fires, but it doesn’t actually exist, except perhaps as an internal system of government, like the biological systems in the living body that I learned about in high school physiology.
Individual humans are to government like cells to a body, bees to a hive, or ants to a nest: as individuals, they are totally expendable.
This is not an innovation. Government ownership of companies has been around forever.
Adam Smith back in the 1700’s repeatedly pointed out that government decision-making can be distorted by favoritism, patronage, and non-economic goals, and he implied that officials don’t have the same “competitive pressure” that private managers face.
I don’t think they shared the ownership by simply buying stock, though. What they did was to seize assets and appoint their own minions to run them. Buying stocks which can be sold again isn’t quite the same thing. I’m not saying that it won’t turn out badly, but it is not the same sort of foolishness as socialist control by “the workers.”
So, the question is…”Should I buy stock of the aforementioned companies?”
Rather, “short the stock of the aforementioned companies.”
If you can’t form your own commercial judgement on their activities, you’ll have to decide whether you have confidence in the commercial judgement of whoever is buying them for the government.
Meanwhile, from the horse’s mouth: “WATCH OUT!!! LEFTIST DEMOCRATIC SOCIALIST COMMUNIST MARXISTS ARE COMING RIGHT AT US!!! WE HAVE TO VOTE RED OR BE DEAD!!!!!!!!!!!!!!”
The difference, for those of you who care, is that Trump is apparently a textbook Marxist-Leninist, not a democratic socialist. Don’t get the two confused or El Presidente will be upset.
Socialism for Wall St. is capitalism. Welfare for we the people is socialism.
MAGA
Socialism in America is when the government does what it was elected to do and functions on a basic level. Capitalism post Reagan is when you rob people and loot as much as you can before the building you just set on fire (which happens to be your home) collapses on top of you.
The East India Company was an English, and later British, joint-stock company that was founded in 1600 and dissolved in 1874. Guns and butter: ie trade.
And they swear they aren’t fascists.
Can this even get undone or are we just a new normal of fascist “democracy”?
The answer to the question is of course it can be undone. I mean it took them nothing to buy, it would take the same level of nothing to sell. It’s just all bad not only because of the optics but it is a direct picking winners-and-losers via taxpayer-financed deficit spending.
Everything within the state, nothing outside of the state…What a state we’re in, huh?
Facism at its best
Big agree, Facism is best 👍👍
It’s so great that it’s losing yet another stupid war it started, cratering it’s own economy, protecting pedophiles again, and this time the insane zionists are in on the fascism too! How could it get any better?