What a year.
If you’ve read Parts 1 and 2 of the 2025 Year in Review, you already know how unusually intense this year has been - politically, economically, and geopolitically. Writing it was a reminder of just how much ground Moldova covered in twelve short months.
As the year winds down, I want to thank you for reading and supporting Moldova Matters. What started as a once-a-week COVID lockdown project has grown into something close to a full-time operation. In 2025 alone, Moldova Matters published 155 articles - 131 by me and 24 by excellent guest contributors.
This year also marked some important shifts. We formally launched an Investigations section in January. While infrequent, those pieces represent some of the work I’m most proud of. In March, the newsletter moved to its own domain. And in July, I launched Moldova Matters în limba română. That experiment gained readers but wasn’t financially sustainable, so it’s paused for now - with the hope of reviving it in a more durable form1.
Moldova Matters remains an experiment - but a serious one. The fact that thousands of you read this week after week is what makes it possible to keep covering Moldova in depth for an international audience.
This year I also co-founded the Moldova Resilience Fund, a US registered 501(c)(3) supporting independent media and grassroots civil society in Moldova. If you’re US based, and looking for a year-end, tax-deductible donation, I’d encourage you to take a look at our current campaign.
Looking ahead to 2026, I have ambitious plans for this newsletter and several related projects already underway. My goal is to devote even more time to this work - but that depends on reader support. If even a fraction of regular readers became paid subscribers, it would materially change what I can do here.
To those who already subscribe: thank you. To those who don’t: please consider it. Your support directly funds this work.
From my family to yours, I wish you a peaceful holiday season and a strong start to 2026.
David Smith
If you’ve got any bright ideas on how to do this reach out!