[shadowgovt]

... but it's a pretty big lever. And they don't even have to pass the laws; a person in position of authority can shock a market with a credible threat to take an action.

Such a tool was actually used to disrupt a rice panic once. Without releasing any surplus, an announced joint intent to release surplus drove speculators out of the market. https://www.npr.org/sections/money/2011/11/04/142016962/the-...

[tharne]

I remember Hillary Clinton doing that in 2016 with a single sabre-rattling tweet about the pharma industry.

[throwaway0a5e]

Obama made some suggestions about normalizing relations with Iran and all the defense stocks went crazy though nothing ever came of it

Politicians suggesting things impacts the market all the time.