SEC dangles $50K incentive to quit, retire

The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission is offering eligible employees a $50,000 incentive to resign or retire by April 4, according to an email reviewed by Bloomberg.

The message, sent Friday by SEC Chief Operating Officer Ken Johnson to all staff, comes as the Trump administration seeks to slash the size of the federal government and fire thousands of workers.

The offer is a voluntary separation incentive or voluntary early retirement program, according to the email. The deadline to apply is March 21.

Eligible employees must have been on the agency’s payroll before Jan. 24. They must voluntarily leave through resignation, transfer to another agency or immediate retirement. If they accept a voluntary separation agreement and return to the SEC within five years, they must pay back the incentive in full, the guidance states. The agency last week instructed all staff, including the unionized workforce, to return to the office starting April 14.

Markets plunge on Trump’s tariffs

U.S. stocks tumbled Monday and wiped out even more of their gains since President Donald Trump’s election in November, after he said that tariffs announced earlier on Canada and Mexico would take effect within hours.

The S&P 500 dropped 1.8% after Trump said there was “no room left” for negotiations that could lower the tariffs set to begin Tuesday for imports from Canada and Mexico. Trump had already delayed the tariffs once before to allow more time for talks.

Trump’s announcement dashed hopes on Wall Street that he would choose a less painful path for global trade, and it followed the latest warning signal on the U.S. economy’s strength. Monday’s loss shaved the S&P 500’s gain since Election Day down to just over 1% from a peak of more than 6%. That rally had been built largely on hopes for policies from Trump that would help strengthen the U.S. economy and businesses. The Dow Jones Industrial Average dropped 649 points, or 1.5%, and the Nasdaq composite slumped 2.6%.

Monday’s slide punctuated a rocky couple of weeks for Wall Street. The market began diving following weaker-than-expected reports on the U.S. economy. U.S. households are getting much more pessimistic about inflation because of the threat of tariffs.

Farmers getting first of $30B tranche

American farmers will soon start receiving the first tranche of $30 billion in funding approved by Congress to fight a downturn in the markets, according to Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins.

Speaking at the Commodity Classic event in Denver, Rollins said that the initial $10 billion in assistance should start moving in the next few weeks, adding that she asked her team to “think creatively” about how to make the application process for the funds to move quicker. Farm income has been under pressure for the last three years after crop prices declined, while the cost of seeds, fertilizer and equipment kept going up. The U.S., known for being a global agriculture powerhouse, is also losing share in overseas markets and has never imported so much food.

“The state of the ag economy, especially for row-crop producers, is perhaps the worst it’s been in 100 years,” Rollins said on Sunday. “The last thing we want to be is the bottleneck to get the funds that are so desperately needed.”

Compiled from Bloomberg and AP reports.