For Esther George, the former Kansas City Fed president and one of the most reliably hawkish voices to ever sit on the rate-setting Federal Open Market Committee, Americans making long-horizon financial decisions should stop expecting relief from borrowing costs, and instead, start preparing for them to rise.

“If I were someone planning with that kind of horizon, I’d plan for higher rates coming ahead,” George told Fortune.

Confirmed by the Senate by a 54-45 vote in May, Warsh takes over from Jerome Powell at a difficult moment for monetary policy. His first FOMC meeting concluded June 17 with a unanimous vote to hold the benchmark federal funds rate steady at 3.5% to 3.75%, as the consumer price index for May showed a 4.2% annual inflation rate (prices have held above the Fed’s 2% target for more than five years already.)

Nine of the 18 FOMC members projected a rate hike before year-end in their dot-plot submissions. Meanwhile, Bank of America now forecasts three quarter-point hikes this year, lifting the benchmark rate to 4.25%–4.5%.

George, when asked directly whether she would cut rates, answered almost as quickly as the predictions for Warsh have come rolling in: “No I would not.”

“Inflation is a problem right now, and it’s been a problem for a while in the United States,” she said. “The real choices they’re looking at is, can we hold and see inflation fall? Are we going to have to raise rates? And I think there’s probably a good chance that you’ll have to talk seriously about raising rates, not cutting.”

The economy’s resilience, she argued, only reinforces that case. Three rate cuts late in 2025 loosened financial conditions, and George raised the question of whether they were warranted at all. “The question is, should the committee take those back? Is the economy performing at a level that really put it back at a higher interest rate?”

As tariffs, an energy price spike tied to the conflict in Iran, and immigration policy all squeeze household budgets, George said there are limits to what monetary policy can accomplish.

“The Fed can only do the job it was given. The job it can do is keep inflation down by using its interest rate tool. It cannot fix the affordability crisis, it cannot offset tariffs, it can’t change the path of immigration with supply issues around the workforce.”

She said that’s something Warsh has embraced. “He’s focused on where do we have impact, and where do we, like the rest of us, sit there and watch how it’s going to unfold.”

George endorsed Warsh despite the political turbulence surrounding his confirmation. “I worked with Kevin Warsh when he was at the Fed before, and so I welcome him to come back,” she said. “He’s got experience, he’s, I think, a good candidate to lead.”

On the question of Fed independence—central to anxiety throughout Warsh’s confirmation, given Trump’s pressure on the central bank to cut rates—George said she expects Warsh to hold firm. “He’s not there to do the president’s work. The central bank has to be independent in its decision-making if it’s going to serve the public’s interest and its mandate from Congress.”

But not everyone shares her confidence. Former Fed economist Claudia Sahm warned that Warsh’s plans to overhaul the Fed’s communications—including his skepticism of forward guidance and the dot plot—risk undoing two decades of hard-won transparency. And Wall Street has been watching closely for signs of whether Warsh will prove a consensus builder or an ideologue on the committee.

George joined the Kansas City Fed in 1982 and served as its president and CEO from 2011 through January 2023, sitting on the FOMC for more than a decade and becoming known for persistent advocacy for tighter monetary policy. George earned her reputation the hard way: During her tenure on the FOMC, she dissented in favor of tighter policy more than any other Fed official of her era, repeatedly calling for rate hikes before her colleagues were ready to move.

Warsh previously served on the Fed Board of Governors from 2006 to 2011—overlapping with George’s rise through the Kansas City Fed’s ranks—before departing for the private sector. She said she’s watching closely to see how his reform agenda translates into actual policy. “He’s laid out a game plan for this year of things he wants to look at,” she said.

“All fair game, I think. We’re waiting to see how much change.”

Futures tied to the Dow Jones industrial average rose 128 points, or 0.25%. S&P 500 futures were up 0.38%, and Nasdaq futures added 0.35%.

But energy markets were still a little spooked as the mere threat of continued fighting around the Strait of Hormuz threatens the nascent recovery in ship traffic through the vital chokepoint.

U.S. oil futures climbed 0.33% to $69.46 a barrel, while Brent crude was flat at 1.1% to $71.97.

Sources told Axios that both sides agreed to halt attacks on each other and meet in Qatar on Tuesday to resolve differences over the Strait of Hormuz.

Earlier on Sunday, Iran launched new attacks on Kuwait and Bahrain, while threatening a “complete halt” to peace talks. It continuined a tit-for-tat cycle of retaliation after U.S. airstrikes punished the regime for targeting commercial ships with drones.

The renewed skirmishes came as Iran seeks to shut down an alternate route through the strait that’s protected by the U.S. and bypasses a Tehran-backed channel meant to normalize its control over the narrow waterway.

President Donald Trump accused Iran of violating the two-week-old ceasefire deal and lobbed more of his signature apocalyptic threats, though he has also signaled reluctance to restart all-out war.

“There may come a point when we are no longer able to be reasonable, and will be forced to militarily complete the job that we very successfully started,” he wrote on Truth Social. “If that happens, the Islamic Republic of Iran will no longer exist!”

For now, the U.S. Navy appears to be making of a point of showing that the alternate route is still safe, as Gulf traffic data Sunday revealed a convoy of tankers heading through the strait under escort with their transponders turned on.

But Iran observers noted the regime was forcing the U.S. into an escalation trap over the Strait of Hormuz that could lead to more war.

“For the US, the fact that the Oman route might be blocked presents it with a big ultimatum: either the US escalates or gives IRGC control of the Strait of Hormuz. Logic says there’s no way that would happen, so escalation will continue,” HFI Research posted on X.

For its part, Tehran isn’t budging from its position that control over the strait rests with Iran. Earlier this month, it created the Persian Gulf Strait Authority and suggested ships would have to pay fees to cross Hormuz.

Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi claimed on Sunday that the memorandum of understanding the U.S. and Iran signed gives the regime the exclusive right to manage traffic.

“The management and full restoration of maritime traffic in the Strait of Hormuz is Iran’s responsibility,” he said, according to state media. “No other country or entity has any responsibility or authority in this matter.”

Meanwhile, investors are looking for rebound in a holiday-shortened week after tech stocks led a deep selloff last week.

With the U.S. observing Independence Day on Friday July 3, the Labor Department’s monthly jobs report will come on Thursday, a day earlier than usual.

Wall Street expects June payrolls to increase by 118,000, down from May’s gain of 172,000, and for the unemployment rate to remain steady at 4.3%.

Following the revolution in 1979, Iran became one of the most sanctioned nations on Earth over its nuclear program and support for regional militias. But the White House is now orchestrating a stunning reversal as part of a broader deal to open the Strait of Hormuz, lower global energy prices and end its unpopular war.

It’s hardly been a linear process. On Friday, President Donald Trump accused Iran of violating a fragile ceasefire and US Central Command launched fresh strikes on Iranian targets. There’s also continuing disagreements that could unravel the deal. 

Still, the pace and scale of the effort has stunned longtime sanctions observers. The US has already authorized the sale of Iranian oil and fuels and pledged to unlock billions in frozen funds. 

The 14-point memorandum of understanding signed by Trump and Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian on June 17 includes the removal of all US sanctions on Iran on “an agreed upon schedule.” It also directs the Treasury Department to issue waivers for existing sanctions for 60 days as technical negotiations unfold.

The disorienting change will be tricky to implement in a way that appeals to risk-averse US financial institutions and other firms, according to former Treasury officials, sanctions attorneys and industry sources monitoring the process.

“You want to be 100% sure that you’re within compliance,” said Adam Smith, a former senior adviser to the director of the Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control, which oversees US sanctions. “One-off transactions that close within the 60 days could work but there may be challenges finding banks and other intermediaries willing to process transactions.” 

Amid the uncertainty, some Iran hawks are pushing the administration to shift from cash payments for Iranian oil sales to one requiring funds be placed in an escrow account where US officials can ensure it doesn’t go to proxy groups such as Hezbollah or Hamas, according to people familiar with the matter.

Read more: US Waives Iran Oil Sanctions as Peace Deal Brings Huge Shift

Trump has suggested publicly Iran’s money may go into escrow accounts controlled by the US, or that Tehran can only spend it on US farm goods — ideas that were not in the MOU and which Iran has mocked and rejected.

The idea of using the frozen funds to purchase US agricultural goods was first discussed about a month ago during an Oval Office meeting with Trump, Vice President JD Vance and other advisers on Iran, according to a person familiar with the matter. 

It was seen as a way to insulate the White House from the criticism Republicans leveled at the Obama administration for delivering Iran “pallets of cash,” the person said, adding they believed Iran had little choice but to accept such a mechanism.

Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said on Wednesday Iran will invoice its oil sales in US dollars. The comments marked a departure from Washington’s longstanding goal of locking Tehran out of the US financial system.

To make that work, the US would need to enlist some of the biggest US or US-linked banks, which have been hesitant to handle any transactions that risk violating sanctions, according to a former Treasury official.

The first step came Monday when Treasury issued General License X, which allowed oil sales to be conducted in “US dollar-denominated funds.” 

Read more: Bessent Says Iran Talks Feature Shift to Dollar Invoicing

In addition to the license, companies are likely to request clear guidance from Treasury — such as comfort letters or fact sheets that are regularly issued for thorny cases — in order to reassure compliance departments it’s okay to participate in these sorts of transactions, according to a person with knowledge of the assurances the oil industry is planning to seek.

Firms are looking for the kind of guidance issued for Venezuela after the US captured then-president Nicolas Maduro in January, the person said.

“Financial institutions are typically more risk adverse than are their clients when we see sanctions programs unwind,” said Michael Huneke, a trade and national security lawyer at Morgan, Lewis & Bockius LLP. “I would expect them to be very cautious here as well.”

Rushing in and risking a possible violation is not an appealing gamble. BNP Paribas paid a nearly $1 billion settlement to the US in 2014 for allegedly violating sanctions on Iran and Sudan. Other banks also paid steep fines.

Successive US administrations, along with Congress, have levied hundreds of sanctions on Iran over the years, creating layers of restrictions designed to be difficult to remove in one fell swoop.

A 2015 law called the Iran Nuclear Agreement Review Act mandates that Congress review and approve any nuclear agreement reached with Iran. It was passed following the signing of the 2015 Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, which was implemented during the administration of then-President Barack Obama — an agreement Trump repeatedly assailed before pulling out of it in 2018.

Some hawkish US lawmakers believe the administration may circumvent the law by saying the Iran MOU is not a nuclear agreement, even though it deals squarely with the issue, according to a person familiar with the matter.

If that happens, they are likely to place additional pressure on banks and companies doing business with Iran, reminding them of their obligations under US law, the person said, requesting anonymity to discuss internal deliberations.

The person pointed to a 2012 law called the Iran Threat Reduction and Syria Human Rights Act that requires companies that list on US stock exchanges to report certain Iran-related activities to the Securities and Exchange Commission, potentially exposing themselves to future congressional scrutiny should the deal fall apart.

“General License X is unprecedented in the relief it offers Iran,” said Chris Kennedy, economic statecraft lead at Bloomberg Economics. However, relying on waivers rather than new legislation means that “over the longer term, the Trump administration will face an uphill battle delivering on its promise to permanently remove sanctions on Iran.”

On Saturday, Iran launched drones at Bahrain, which is home to a U.S. Navy base. The Islamic republic was also likely responsible for an attack on a commercial ship.

Hours later, the U.S. continued the tit-for-tat exchanges, as Central Command announced strikes on Iranian military surveillance infrastructure, communication systems, air-defense sites, drone storage facilities, and minelayer capabilities.

“After yesterday’s U.S. strikes in response to the Iranian attack on M/V Ever Lovely, Iran was given a chance to honor the ceasefire agreement but elected not to when its forces launched a one-way attack drone that hit M/T Kiku this morning at 4:30 a.m. ET,” it said in a post on X.

That came a day after Central Command said it struck Iranian missile and drone locations as well as coastal radar sites in response to earlier attacks on ships trying to cross the Strait of Hormuz.

It was the latest attempt by Tehran to scare away vessels that are not using the regime-approved route through the narrow waterway that’s critical to the global energy market and is Iran’s main source of leverage.

Meanwhile, the U.S. previously carved out an alternate path that runs along Oman’s coast and said Saturday that it’s been expanded to accommodate inbound and outbound traffic, making it more appealing as supplies that had been bottled up in the Gulf during the war need to get out.

“Iran is likely attempting to prevent vessels from using non-Iranian shipping channels with force in the immediate term as it continues negotiations with the Gulf Arab states to secure long-term recognition of its control,” the Institute for the Study of War said in a note on Friday.

The think tank also highlighted other efforts to undermine Iran’s influence over the strait. For example, Oman and the International Maritime Organization established a mechanism to help hundreds of vessels move through the route along the Omani coast.

Central Command also said it’s providing “safe passage coordination” in the strait, while the U.S. and the Gulf Cooperation Council issued a joint statement Thursday stressing free navigation through the strait and rejecting any tolls, fees, or other attempts to assert control.

Iran has responded with drone attacks and additional warnings that safe passage through the strait can’t rely on “parallel routes” or decision-making outside Tehran, according to ISW.

At the same time, the regime is engaging in diplomacy with its Gulf neighbors in an attempt to solidify its control over the strait. But ISW said it’s not working, adding that Iran can’t keep relying on military options.

“Iran needs Gulf states’ recognition of its control over Iran’s route to maintain control over the strait because it cannot conduct attacks in perpetuity without risking instability and additional attacks,” the note said.

The renewed hostilities follow the first meeting last weekend between the U.S. and Iran since the ceasefire extension was signed.

While both sides touted progress, much more work has to be done to address Iran’s nuclear program, unfreezing of its assets, and easing of U.S. sanctions—not to mention the continued fighting over the Strait of Hormuz.

Its closure soon after the U.S. and Israel launched their war on Iran crippled global energy markets, and a return to normal is expected to take months.

The U.S. was unable to restore freedom of navigation through the strait, despite its ability to shepherd through a trickle of ships, allowing Iran to hold the threat of another closure over the world economy.

With that knowledge, Tehran has tried to normalize its control, establishing a Persian Gulf Strait Authority and insisting it can charge fees on ships.

The recent flurry of drone attacks on commercial ships raised the ante, while the U.S. also ramps up its effort to punch a bigger hole through the strait. On Saturday, the Joint Maritime Information Center raised the threat level in the strait to “substantial” from “moderate.”

“But be prepared for it to return to S#!T at any moment,” Campbell University professor Sal Mercogliano, who specializes in military and maritime history, said in a post on X.

Trump said on his Truth Social platform that his new pick for the immigration enforcement agency is a former U.S. Marine and a “PATRIOT with real operational experience.” He called Schroyer a “proven leader with DECADES of experience locking up the worst of the worst.”

Schroyer hails from the same home state as the new Department of Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin, a former congressman. Earlier this month, Mullin brought Schroyer onstage at a National Sheriffs’ Association event, calling him a “good friend of mine” and noting DHS had recently hired him.

On Saturday, Mullin quickly praised Schroyer in a statement highlighting the former trooper’s 29-year career and his work with federal and state partners on a U.S. immigration enforcement program.

“President Trump made a great pick, and I’m confident Lance’s strong leadership and firsthand experience will empower the men and women of ICE to deport criminal illegal aliens, secure the homeland, and protect the American people,” Mullin said.

If confirmed, Schroyer will lead ICE at a time when the public mood has soured on Trump’s immigration crackdown, which sent surges of federal immigration officers into American cities to round up immigrants. Those raids sent tensions soaring and prompted clashes between protesters and law enforcement, leading to the fatal shootings of two U.S. citizens in Minneapolis earlier this year.

Trump returned to the White House on a promise of mass deportations, and ICE has been a central executor of that vision. The agency is undergoing massive growth from a one-time injection of $75 billion last year, which has allowed for the hiring of 12,000 officers and increased detention capacity.

Mullin, who started in his role in March, has promised to keep his department out of the headlines and has indicated a softer tone on immigration, although he is expected to align with the president’s priorities on mass deportations.

Claire Trickler-McNulty, a former senior ICE official, said prior confirmed ICE directors have often been attorneys, though some state and local law enforcement officials have also been nominated. She said his background in Oklahoma suggests Mullin likely had influence over the pick.

“I think probably given the attention on ICE, he wants to feel like he has somebody he can trust in there,” she said in an interview.

John Torres, another senior ICE official, said Schroyer faces an uphill climb toward Senate confirmation but his experience being at the state and local level instead of the federal level might help.

“He won’t have any of that baggage, where they’re going to turn around and say, oh, well, he worked for this administration or that,” Torres said.

Schroyer’s nomination comes after former ICE director Todd Lyons resigned at the end of May. David Venturella, a former executive at a private prison operator, has been serving as the acting head of the agency. Venturella is expected to stay on as the acting director until Schroyer is Senate confirmed, according to a DHS official speaking on condition of anonymity.

ICE has not had a Senate-confirmed director since the Obama administration, a result of polarizing politics around the agency and immigration policy.

A telltale sign is the Kremlin’s abandonment of any fiscal discipline as the costs of fighting the Ukraine war, which is now in its fifth year, strain existing resources.

Alexandra Prokopenko, who is now a fellow at the Carnegie Russia Eurasia Center, pointed out in a recent Financial Times op-ed that the war has forced Russia to unwind its long-touted fiscal restraint.

In a striking example of the turnaround, Russia’s parliament recently gave the finance ministry a blank check to spend more and borrow past its debt ceiling without a formal budget or explicit legislative approval.

That’s as the budget deficit through May is already double 2025’s full-year level, hitting 2.6% of GDP, or about $83 billion. At the same time, Russia’s sovereign wealth fund, which has been tapped to cover budget shortfalls, is being rapidly depleted and just a fraction of prewar levels.

“A cornered autocracy is rewriting the fiscal rules as it goes, cutting parliament out of the loop, and will not admit to dangers it cannot control,” Prokopenko wrote. “It’s less dramatic than a palace coup, but this is what decline looks like.”

The precipitous deterioration in Russia’s finances coincides with Ukraine’s stunning military successes this year. Advanced drones and new tactics have allowed Kyiv to not hold off the Russian military’s attacks but push them back and regain territory. Long-range drones are also reaching deep into Russia, including St. Petersburg and Moscow, targeting refineries and the defense industrial base.

The result has been devastating battlefield casualties that now outpace the ability to raise fresh recruits as well as soaring death-benefit payouts and widespread fuel shortages across the country.

Meanwhile, the Kremlin has been unable to defend against all of Ukraine’s drone attacks, forcing companies to spend more than $1 billion of their own money on makeshift protection. But Moscow also refuses to reimburse them.

Putin’s “juggling act” has now come to an end as he can no longer fund his war, keep a lid on inflation, and continue growing the economy all at once, Prokopenko said.

“The war is increasingly paid for by quietly invoicing the population and suspending the state’s own rules,” she added. “A regime sustained this way is heading for a poorer, angrier country, a financial system out of control, and war funding it cannot count on. The end, when it comes, will spring from this kind of decline, the sort that begins long before anyone names it.”

For now, Putin’s grip on power is secure, but public discontent is growing as average citizens buckle under the pressure of high inflation and onerous interest rates.

Russia’s fuel shortage has added to the misery, creating long lines at gas stations with motorists waiting for hours to fill up. Frustration is boiling over, and fights are breaking out between people struggling to buy rationed supplies of gasoline.

Sefa Karacan/Anadolu via Getty Images

In addition, the Russian military’s “meat-grinder” tactics in Ukraine, where troops suffer ruinous losses for barely any gain, are creating a backlash.

In fact, the average life expectancy of a new recruit is about 10 days to three weeks, and once on the battlefield, their survival averages just 20-35 minutes, according to Russian military bloggers. 

One Russian blogger, who is a veteran the Ukraine war going by the name Aleksandr Lunin, posted a video on Thursday that went viral. In it, he described regular torture of soldiers by their own commanders, according to Radio Free Europe.

Lunin also demanded a live, on-air meeting with Putin and warned that if it did not take place soon, “the army will turn its weapons against the Kremlin.” He added that he was relaying the sentiment of active-duty military and security officials who met with him earlier.

But he walked back the mutiny threat on Friday, explaining that if soldiers wanted to rebel, they would do it quietly and not ask him to issue a warning for them

Still, the original video was so widespread that Putin’s spokesman was asked to comment on it, and said the Kremlin was aware “that such an appeal exists.”

Peter Frankopan, a professor of global history at the University of Oxford, cautioned in a Foreign Policy article that a revolution in Russia is not likely.

Instead, continued economic pain and disenchantment over the war will convince certain factions in the regime “that it is time for a new start,” he said, adding that “today’s cracks can become tomorrow’s fissures.”

But that could also make Putin more dangerous as fights to cling to power, raising the risk of escalation in Ukraine or other parts of Europe.

“Beware the drowning man: The coming months will likely be dangerous outside and inside Russia as Putin tries desperately to stay afloat,” Frankopan warned.

In a guest essay in The New York Times on June 22 headlined “This Doommaxxing Has Got to Stop,” the Yale economist  expanded on his Nobel-prize winning work on how markets misprice risk. He’s now interested in the cause of that mispricing, and the cause, he argued, is about narrative, the stories people tell each other about where the economy is headed.

“When millions of people make millions and millions of decisions based upon negative expectations, there is a risk that fear can actually help birth the reality,” he warned.

The fear that the machines are coming for workers is an old one. But in each instance, fear ran ahead of the actual displacement, according to Shiller. Luddites revolted against the loom in the 1830s, while newspapers perpetuated the drama.  The 1920s got a hit play R.U.R., in which the robots rise against the people who built them.

Similarly, the 1929 stock market crash couldn’t have caused the Great Depression as only about 2% of American households owned stock at the time. What deepened the economic ruin was a collapse in consumer spending, driven by sudden, widespread uncertainty about future income.

And a 1957–58 downturn was branded the “Automation Recession” by journalists who pinned it on factory machines; it was later re-described as an ordinary cyclical dip. 

Shiller worries the same misattribution is underway now. The job market has slowed for a host of reasons, he wrote, but there are reports that fear of an AI apocalypse is “worsening the freeze and contributing to record lows in consumer sentiment.”

Seventy percent of Americans told Quinnipiac in March they expect AI to leave fewer jobs for people, up from 56% a year earlier, yet the Yale Budget Lab has found no significant change in the occupational mix among the jobs most exposed to AI since ChatGPT launched in late 2022.

This round is even worse, he said, because the source of the fear is coming from the leaders of the AI buildout themselves. Anthropic’s Dario Amodei has said AI could erase half of entry-level white-collar jobs within five years; Microsoft AI chief Mustafa Suleyman has put most white-collar automation inside 12 to 18 months. Both have since walked the timelines back. 

Shiller’s one note of hope is leadership; he cites a recent paper finding that President Franklin Roosevelt’s 1935 fireside chat measurably raised spending in cities with more radio exposure.

“There’s only so much Washington can do about these narratives. And, suffice to say, Donald Trump is no Franklin Roosevelt,” Shiller concluded. “As such, perhaps the best we can do is to appeal directly to the leaders of Silicon Valley who have been promoting these negative narratives with such vigor. Surely the resulting media attention highlighting how dangerously powerful your A.I. model is may help you sell more wares, but it may be far harder to do so in a period of recession.”

A May lawsuit filed in Orange County, Fla. by a trust representing shareholders alleged that Thai Union Group, one of the world’s largest seafood producers whose shares trade on the Stock Exchange of Thailand (SET), exploited its controlling stake, CNBC reported. 

“Thai Union doubled down on a campaign to squeeze out every drop of value that it could through uneconomic contracts that benefited Thai Union and made no economic sense for Red Lobster,” the lawsuit read.

In fact, the endless shrimp promotion at one point left the company $11 million in the red in a single quarter.

Red Lobster and Thai Union did not immediately respond to Fortune’s request for comment.

The shareholders claim they are owed millions after the chain filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy in May 2024 and are also looking to dissolve some $32 million in transactions that Thai Union allegedly pressured the chain to enter into in 2023, Bloomberg reported. They are demanding a jury trial to determine the damages they are owed.

Red Lobster had run the endless shrimp offer as a seasonal promotion for two decades, and it consistently helped bring in customers. But the offer worked was temporary. 

Instead, the shareholders allege, Thai Union pushed to make the promotion permanent starting in 2023 and turned “a successful legacy Red Lobster strategy” into “a car crash,” CNBC reported, citing the lawsuit. 

Thai Union bought a minority stake in Red Lobster in 2016 and in 2020 led a buyout that gave it majority control. Thai Union then helped install Paul Kenny, a shareholder and experienced restaurant exec, as interim CEO in 2022.

Soon after, the shareholders allege, Kenny pushed to make the endless shrimp promotion permanent and to make Red Lobster’s controlling shareholder, Thai Union, the chain’s exclusive shrimp provider, the suit alleged.

Kenny, the suit claims, would “often remark that Red Lobster ‘owed’ it to Thai Union to purchase its products exclusively.”

After Kenny unilaterally made the endless shrimp promotion a regular offering in 2023, Red Lobster restaurants moved quickly to implement and promote it. Yet, even as customers rushed to take advantage of the promotion, this new influx of sales wasn’t enough to counteract “the losses incurred by offering premium shrimp at such a low price.” 

Kenny did not immediately respond to a request for comment through Linkedin. 

Restaurants nationwide were “immobilized” as they quickly ran out of shrimp, the lawsuit claimed. Meanwhile, the promotion shifted customers away from higher-margin items on the menu, driving down the amount of money customers spent per visit.

“When it was clear that the Everyday $20 Ultimate Endless Shrimp offering was wreaking havoc on Red Lobster and its balance sheet, Kenny doubled down. He responded by continuing the offering—and generating tens of millions of dollars more in overpriced shrimp orders for Thai Union—and ultimately left Red Lobster with a massive oversupply, according to the lawsuit.

Red Lobster raised the price of the promotion twice, from $20 to $22, then again to $25, before eventually pulling it from the menu altogether in 2024. But by then the chain had already defaulted on a $275 million term loan from Fortress Investment Group in September 2023, a sign of just how quickly its finances had deteriorated.

The endless shrimp wasn’t the only reason behind the company’s declining financial position. Other factors included the difficult macroeconomic environment and increased restaurant industry competition, former CEO and restructuring expert Jonathan Tibus wrote in a court filing when the company filed for bankruptcy. Still the endless shrimp played a role.

By the time the chain filed for bankruptcy protection in May 2024, Thai Union had divested from Red Lobster, contributing no capital to the Chapter 11 bankruptcy process.

Red Lobster emerged from bankruptcy in September 2024, but not before it shuttered about 130 locations and cut about 10% of its corporate staff.

Under new boss Damola Adamolekun, Red Lobster has worked to revitalize its menu and improve its service standards. In February, the CEO told the Wall Street Journal that sales were up 10% compared to a year prior. 

Adamolekun had once declared endless shrimp would never return “because I know how to do math.” Yet in April, Red Lobster brought it back—this time, only for a limited time.