This week in business: cold fronts, cool stores, and a hot mess in Washington

A weak La Niña with not-so-weak implications, rare-earth jitters rock Wall Street and crypto, and retailers split between expansion and retrenchment.

There’s a chill in the air—and not just from the weather. A newly arrived La Niña pattern is setting the stage for a potentially wild winter, with experts predicting snow-packed northern states, a drier South, and maybe even more late-season hurricanes. Meanwhile, markets caught their own cold snap after fresh U.S.–China trade tensions sparked a global sell-off.