Aug 17

Today’s News 17th August 2021

  • International Travel Goes From Bad To Worse In Early 2021
    International Travel Goes From Bad To Worse In Early 2021

    Coming off the worst year on record for international travel, many had hoped that things could only get better in 2021 for the battered tourism industry. However, as Statista’s Felix Richter notes, as it turns out, the situation went from bad to worse, however, at least when looking at international tourist arrivals in the first five months of the year.

    Having dropped by more than one billion visitors or 73 percent in 2020, international tourist arrivals declined by 85 percent between January and May 2021 when compared to the same period of 2019. According to the UNWTO, tourism destinations around the world recorded 460 million fewer international arrivals in the first five months of 2021 compared to 2019.

    Even compared to 2020, when COVID-19’s crippling effect on international travel became apparent in March, arrivals declined by 65 percent, as travel restrictions remained in place in large parts of the world.

    “Accelerating the pace of vaccination worldwide, working on effective coordination and communication on ever changing travel restrictions while advancing digital tools to facilitate mobility will be critical to rebuild trust in travel and restart tourism” UNWTO Secretary-General Zurab Pololikashvili said in a statement. And while international tourism began picking up in May and some travel restrictions were lifted over the Northern hemisphere’s summer season, the emergence of the Delta variant is clouding the outlook for the remainder of 2021.

    As the following chart shows, Asia-Pacific, where travel restrictions have been particularly strict, has suffered the largest drop in international tourist arrivals this year at -95 percent.

    Infographic: International Travel Goes From Bad to Worse in Early 2021 | Statista

    You will find more infographics at Statista

    At the other end of the spectrum, the Americas have seen the smallest relative decline compared to 2019 at -72 percent.

    Tyler Durden
    Tue, 08/17/2021 – 02:45

  • China's State Media Delete Fake Claims By Fake "Swiss Biologist"
    China’s State Media Delete Fake Claims By Fake “Swiss Biologist”

    Authored by Dorothy Li via The Epoch Times,

    State media in China have quietly scrubbed reports of an alleged Swiss biologist criticizing the United States’ efforts to investigate the origins of the pandemic, after Switzerland’s embassy in Beijing said the biologist was unlikely to be a real person, according to their records.

    Swiss diplomats began searching for the biologist, named Wilson Edwards, after his name dominated Chinese state-backed media reports at the end of July.

    According to Chinese social media chatter and state media reports, the researcher allegedly suffered “intimidation” from the United States for supporting the World Health Organization’s (WHO) investigation into the origins of the CCP (Chinese Communist Party) Virus.

    On Aug. 10, the Embassy of Switzerland in Beijing said that Edwards may not exist. They said there were no registered citizens named Wilson Edwards, nor were any biology papers published under that name.

    “If you exist, we would like to meet you!” the embassy wrote in a post, in both English and Chinese on Twitter and Weibo.

    The embassy said reports on the account are likely to be “fake news” and asked Chinese media outlets to remove such reports.

    https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js

    The story has since removed from China’s English-language broadcaster CGTV and other Chinese state-backed media outlets, but CGTV’s Chinese article could still be viewed as of Friday.

    A Facebook account that acted as the source of information for the Chinese news reports has also disappeared. Swiss diplomats said the account had one post and three friends after it opened on July 24.

    According to reports, Edwards’ Facebook account described him as a Swiss biologist. He wrote that the push for the WHO second phase investigation into the origin of COVID-19 was a “result of political pressure from the U.S.”

    Last month, the WHO announced an audit of the Wuhan lab and research institutions where the virus was first identified. The agency said Beijing didn’t share raw patient data to the probe and called on the Chinese regime to be “transparent” and “co-operative.”

    Beijing has rejected efforts for an unsupervised investigation into the origin of the CCP virus, which causes the disease COVID-19. Top Chinese health officials asked the WHO to “get rid of political interference” on July 22.

    On July 30, state media outlets, such as Global Times and China Daily, shared a report about the Facebook post from China’s central broadcaster CGTV.

    In the report, the so-called biologist cited a source at the WHO, saying the United States was “attacking” the Chinese regime as it was calling for tracing the virus origin. “Some of his fellow researchers were under ‘enormous pressure’ and ‘intimidation’ from the U.S. and some media outlets,” Edwards’ posts stated, as repeated by Chinese media reports.

    Security personnel keep watch outside the Wuhan Institute of Virology during the visit by the World Health Organization (WHO) team tasked with investigating the origins of the coronavirus disease (COVID-19), in Wuhan, Hubei Province, China, on Feb. 3, 2021. (Thomas Peter/Reuters)

    Meanwhile, a recent report by the Center for Information Resilience (CIR) found that a sprawling Chinese social media network has attempted to sow doubts about U.S. claims that there is growing evidence that the CCP virus originated from a Wuhan lab.

    The accounts, existing on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and YouTube, have fake profile images almost indistinguishable from real people. CIR pointed out the network’s intent in their report.

    “Our research shows evidence of a deliberate effort to distort international perceptions on significant issues—in this case, in favor of China,” said Benjamin Strick, the author of the CIR report.

    “The aim of the network appears to be to delegitimize the West by amplifying pro-Chinese narratives,” Strick said.

    “There appears to be close overlaps in narratives shared by the network, to those shared by the social media accounts of China state representatives and state-linked media.”

    A guard wears protective gear as he stands at the entrance to the Hubei provincial centre for disease control and prevention while members of the World Health Organization (WHO) team investigating the origins of COVID-19 visit the centre in Wuhan, China, on Feb. 1, 2021. (Hector Retamal/AFP via Getty Images)

    Intelligence Report

    U.S. intelligence is also currently drafting a report for President Joe Biden as the deadline of a three-month investigation into the virus’s origin approaches. It comes amid the possibility that the CCP virus leaked from Wuhan Institute of Virology (WIV) gains wider recognition.

    Anthony Fauci, the chief of the U.S. National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, said in May he was not confident that the CCP virus developed naturally, though earlier, he insisted that transmission from animal to human was the most likely origin.

    The WHO admitted in July that it was “premature” to rule out the possibility of a lab leak, which the agency had previously said was “extremely unlikely” in a report in March.

    The Chinese regime claimed that the pandemic started from the Wuhan seafood market. However, three members of the WIV were admitted to hospital in November 2019, several weeks before Beijing acknowledged the first infected case.

    Tyler Durden
    Tue, 08/17/2021 – 02:00

  • World's Third-Busiest Port Remains Partially Shut In China, Stoking Fresh Supply-Chain Fears
    World’s Third-Busiest Port Remains Partially Shut In China, Stoking Fresh Supply-Chain Fears

    Last week we reported that with container shipping rates already blowing out to never before seen levels amid continued chaos in Transpacific shipping as a result of massive port backlogs and production delays in China due to the relentless onslaught of the now-endemic covid, a new and even greater price surge was on deck – an outcome which could nuke hopes for renormalization in soaring inflation – as a result of the partial (for now) shutdown of China’s busiest port by volume (and third-largest container port in the world after Shanghai and Singapore) when operations at the Ningbo Meishan Container Terminal, also referred to as the Meishan Terminal, were immediately suspended following positive Covid test results.

    Well, it didn’t take too long for Bloomberg to report that the spread of the delta variant could “lead to a repeat of last year’s shipping nightmares”, and for confirmation look no further than the Port of Los Angeles, the nation’s busiest post, which in June saw its volumes dip because of a Covid outbreak at the Yantian port in China, and which was bracing for another potential decline because of the latest shutdown at the Ningbo-Zhoushan port in China, a spokesman said.

    Anton Posner, chief executive officer of supply-chain management company Mercury Resources, said that many companies chartering ships are already adding Covid contract clauses as insurance so they won’t have to pay for stranded ships.

    The port of Ningbo, the busiest port in the world.

    And here is the core problem with all those endorsing a “transitory” inflation spike captured in a perfect soundbite: just when it seemed as if things were just starting to calm down, “and we’re now into delta delays,” said Emmanouil Xidias, partner at Ifchor North America LLC. “You’re going to have a secondary hit.”

    There was more: we also noted that the shutdown at Ningbo-Zhoushan had raised fears that ports around the world will soon face the same kind of outbreaks and Covid restrictions that slowed the flows of everything from perishable food to electronics last year as the pandemic took hold. Infections are threatening to spread at docks just as the world’s shipping system is already struggling to handle unprecedented demand with economies reopening and manufacturing picking up.

    The silver lining is there was some hope the partial closure would end in a the next few days. However, as of Monday morning, the Ningbo-Zhoushan container port remained partially closed for a sixth day Monday, amid ongoing concern over whether the shutdown will disrupt trade from the region longer term.

    Amid fading hopes of a quick reopening, Bloomberg reports that the port hasn’t published any updates on its operations since Wednesday, when it halted all inbound and outbound container services at its Meishan terminal after one employee tested positive for Covid-19. Consultant GardaWorld estimated the terminal accounted for about 25% of container cargo through the port, though Ningbo-Zhoushan had said it would redirect ships to other terminals and adjust operating hours at other docks.

    An employee at the port’s media center said they had no new information to share when contacted by Bloomberg News on Monday, adding that no new infections have been reported at the port since the initial case although considering that China is the source.

    Meanwhile, shippers are bracing for further complications: according to Bloomberg, shipping firm Yang Ming Marine Transport warned clients of potential “port congestion” due to the partial closure in an advisory on Monday, while Orient Overseas Container Line reminded customers to check terminals before arranging for their containers to be sent to Ningbo in a Saturday notice. Others are taking more more drastic steps: Maersk said Friday it is having vessels on services between Asia and South America call at the Meishan terminal, and that all will omit Ningbo this month.

    Yards at Beilun and Yongzhou terminals are up to 79% full with laden containers and as much as 85% for empty boxes, Maersk said Monday. Other terminals at the port are operating normally.

    The latest port disruption followed the closure for about a month of Shenzhen’s Yantian port in late May after an outbreak among port staff, which was among the catalysts sparking the avalanche of downstream congestion that has led to record prices. It’s also stoking fears that ports around the world could face similar outbreaks soon given the spread of the highly-infectious delta variant, potentially triggering the sorts of curbs and disruptions that impacted global shipping last year.

    Meanwhile, relief from skyhigh shipping prices which impact intermediate goods costs which have exploded to levels not seen since 1973…

    … is nowhere to be seen.

    Tyler Durden
    Tue, 08/17/2021 – 01:00

  • How Nixon And FDR Used "Crises" To Destroy The Dollar's Links To Gold
    How Nixon And FDR Used “Crises” To Destroy The Dollar’s Links To Gold

    Authored by Jonathan Newman via The Mises Institute,

    Since August 15, 1971, the US dollar has been completely severed from gold. President Richard Nixon suspended the most important component of the Bretton Woods system, which had been in effect since the end of World War II. Nixon announced that the US would no longer redeem dollars for gold for the last remaining entities that could: foreign governments. Gold redemption had been made illegal for everybody else, so this action finally ended any semblance of a gold standard for the US dollar.

    In Crisis and Leviathan, Robert Higgs showed how in the twentieth century the US government grew in size and scope primarily during crisis periods like wars or economic depressions. The powers gained during those periods were often advertised as “temporary,” but history shows that governments rarely relinquish powers. This “ratchet effect” applies to the way Nixon “temporarily” suspended gold redemption in 1971—the resulting regime of unbacked fiat dollars remains in effect today.

    What Was the Bretton Woods System?

    The Bretton Woods system was designed by the Allied nations, led by the United States, near the end of World War II as a postwar international monetary order. The US dollar would become the world’s reserve currency, which foreign governments could redeem for gold, even though US citizens could not. This prohibition was not new for US citizens, since Franklin D. Roosevelt outlawed private ownership of gold coins and bullion in 1933.

    To get foreign governments to join the agreement, the US promised to redeem dollars for gold at $35 per ounce, which limited the extent to which the supply of dollars could be expanded. International trade was slow to restart after World War II, which meant that the Bretton Woods system of gold exchange was not fully tested until the late 1950s.1 Yet, even by this time, US inflation meant that Japan and countries in Western Europe were holding a reserve currency that was falling in value, especially relative to the promised $35-per-ounce price of gold.

    The US could only use diplomatic pressure to slow the foreign governments’ requests for gold redemption. Even so, the US lost about 55 percent of its stock of gold from the early 1950s to the end of the Bretton Woods system in 1971.

    In a last-ditch effort to maintain the Bretton Woods system in 1968, the US tried to implement a “two-tier gold market” such that central banks around the world would participate in one market that would seek to keep the $35-per-ounce dollar-to-gold ratio, and would not buy or sell in the other tier: the private, free gold market.

    This, of course, quickly fell apart. By 1971, President Nixon could not contain the effects of the monetary inflation used to pay for the Vietnam War and Lyndon B. Johnson’s Great Society programs (including Nixon’s own expansions). Amid a host of desperate interventions such as new tariffs and wage and price controls, Nixon also “temporarily” suspended gold convertibility. He sought to “protect the position of the American dollar as a pillar of monetary stability around the world.”

    The dollar was completely severed from any commodity backing, making it a purely fiat money. The Federal Reserve could now inflate without any regard for redemption demands from private citizens, businesses, foreign governments, or foreign central banks.

    The Result: Inflation

    Anyone should have been able to predict the consequences of this event. A government with a ready buyer of debt in the form of an unrestrained central bank can spend much more, since the redistributive effects of inflation are less obvious than taxation. Gold redemption was a strict limiting factor for the Fed—now the only constraints are political and subjective, despite the appearance of technical expertise at the Fed.

    The threat of running out of gold has been replaced with the softer, lagged-consequence question: “To what extent will voters tolerate price increases and financial crises?” And even the negative political consequences may be exploited via Cantillon effects by creating and rewarding a chosen set of powerful, politically connected winners at the expense of a less powerful, propagandized population of losers.

    The consequences of the closure of the Bretton Woods system and the remaining façade of sound money it represented are well documented. Time series of almost any macroeconomic statistic show a “structural break,” i.e., an abrupt change in the trajectory of the series, around 1971 or shortly after. A website with the tongue-in-cheek URL WTFHappenedIn1971.com provides numerous such examples. Measures of monetary inflation, price increases, inequality, financial crises, saving rates, government spending, government size and scope, social/cultural indicators, incarceration rates, and even meat consumption and the number of lawyers all have inflection points in the early 1970s.

    Financial Crisis and Leviathan

    Besides the economic consequences of unhinged central banks, we should also understand the means by which the government was able to acquire so much control over money. Looking at episodes like Woodrow Wilson’s creation of the Federal Reserve, FDR’s confiscation of gold, and Nixon’s cancellation of Bretton Woods, as well as all of the other times the government chipped away at sound money, we notice a commonality. Crises, real or merely perceived, are exploited each time.

    Wilson rode the wave of fear of financial panics and the concern for farmers desperate for credit that had been stirred up by William Jennings Bryan and other progressives. Wilson emphasized the “urgent necessity that special provision be made also for facilitating the credits needed by the farmers of the country” and painted an apocalyptic picture of a world without his proposed banking system reforms:

    I need not stop to tell you how fundamental to the life of the Nation is the production of its food. Our thoughts may ordinarily be concentrated upon the cities and the hives of industry, upon the cries of the crowded market place and the clangor of the factory, but it is from the quiet interspaces of the open valleys and the free hillsides that we draw the sources of life and of prosperity, from the farm and the ranch, from the forest and the mine. Without these every street would be silent, every office deserted, every factory fallen into disrepair.

    FDR was the master of crisis exploitation. Executive Order 6102 begins this way:

    By virtue of the authority vested in me by Section 5 (b) of the Act of October 6, 1917, as amended by Section 2 of the Act of March 9, 1933, entitled “An Act to provide relief in the existing national emergency in banking, and for other purposes,” in which amendatory Act Congress declared that a serious emergency exists, I, Franklin D. Roosevelt, President of the United States of America, do declare that said national emergency still continues to exist and pursuant to said section do hereby prohibit the hoarding of gold coin, gold bullion, and gold certificates within the continental United States by individuals, partnerships, associations and corporations.

    Just one month earlier, FDR had mandated a bank holiday, suspending all withdrawals of gold from banks. His proclamation cited a “national emergency” due to “increasingly extensive speculative activity” and “heavy and unwarranted withdrawals of gold and currency from our banking institutions for the purpose of hoarding.”

    Almost forty years later, we see speculators being used as scapegoats again. In Nixon’s announcement, he accused “international money speculators” of profiting off monetary crises and “waging an all-out war on the American dollar” as if they were the ones causing the volatility in foreign exchange markets and the wholesale drainage of gold from the US, not the US government’s own irresponsible profligacy.

    In all of these episodes, the US presidents framed the power grab as a necessary and sometimes temporary response to a crisis. Financial panics, the threat of starvation, gold hoarders, and external speculative attackers were all used as a basis and cover for doing what governments have done for millennia: debasement, coin clipping, and money printing for the purpose of surreptitious extraction of wealth from a population.

    Only the most naïve could see the history of money and banking in the US as anything other than a ratchet of government growth, especially in the twentieth century. Even recent Fed actions follow the same pattern.

    Conclusion

    The Bretton Woods system was the last remaining vestige of the gold standard. As weak as it was, it limited the Fed’s ability to expand the supply of dollars due to the possibility of other governments redeeming their dollars for gold. When Nixon suspended the key component of the international agreement, he ushered in a new era of central bank monetary policy unhindered by any promise to redeem dollars for a certain weight of gold.

    The economic and cultural consequences of this event have been disastrous: even more inflation; exacerbated inequality via Cantillon effects; more government, both in size and scope; higher rates of time preference; severe financial crises and business cycles; and, of course, higher prices.

    The end of the Bretton Woods system followed the same pattern all other episodes in the demise of the gold standard followed. A crisis (real or just perceived) was exploited to announce a “temporary” measure or an “essential reform” of the existing system. The bigger picture shows a government that has finally gained 100 percent control over money and banking in the form of unbacked fiat money issued by an unrestrained central bank.

    Tyler Durden
    Tue, 08/17/2021 – 00:00

  • WSJ Op-Ed: Covid-19 Most Likely 'Worked On' In Lab, Then Escaped
    WSJ Op-Ed: Covid-19 Most Likely ‘Worked On’ In Lab, Then Escaped

    A scathing Op-Ed in the Wall Street Journal concludes that SARS-CoV-2 “was most likely uncontained in a laboratory where it was being worked on, and that it escaped unintentionally.”

    Authored by former CDC Director Dr. Robert Redfield and NYU clinical professor Dr. Marc Siegel, the Op-Ed calls out the Chinese government for preventing the CDC from visiting Wuhan, China or the Wuhan Institute of Virology in early 2020 – which forced US investigators to “put together the circumstantial pieces of the puzzle on our own.”

    The doctors note:

    On Sept. 12, 2019, coronavirus bat sequences were deleted from the institute’s database. Why? It changed the security protocols for the lab. Why? It put out requests for more than $600 million for a new ventilation system. What prompted this new need?

    In January 2020 two hypotheses emerged about the origin of the novel coronavirus: that it began in a bat, then infected another animal before spreading to humans in a Wuhan “wet market,” where wild animals are sold for meat; or that it emerged from the Wuhan laboratory. The wet-market story was pushed by the Chinese CDC and the World Health Organization. Public-health leaders argued that Covid-19 was like SARS and MERS, earlier coronaviruses that emerged from bats and spread through an intermediate animal.

    But neither of those viruses has ever evolved to the point where it can transmit efficiently from one human to the next. There have been fewer than 10,000 cases of each virus world-wide since SARS was discovered in 2003 and MERS in 2012. What virus comes out of a bat cave and infects humans by the millions? It’s not biologically plausible. If instead it evolved slowly over many years in nature, how come no one knew of it? -WSJ

    What does bear investigation, they write, is the hypothesis that SARS-CoV-2 was “taught” to infect humans using humanized mice (grafted with human tissue and immune cells) in order to test whether the virus’s ‘cleavage site’ was manipulated to more easily infect a human cell.

    They also note a “growing body of circumstantial evidence” supporting the lab-leak theory – including info gleaned by the US State Department that Wuhan lab workers fell ill with Covid-like symptoms in the fall of 2019.

    The story of SARS-Cov-2 started long before January 2020. We believe the virus was most likely uncontained in a laboratory where it was being worked on, and that it escaped unintentionally. A Harvard study of satellite images revealed a shutdown of traffic around the Wuhan lab in the late summer and early fall of 2019. Weeks later, in late September, the hospital parking lots were filling up.

    There were hallmarks of scientific arrogance and failures in the containment system. China’s CDC initially appeared to be out of the loop but later became a key messenger, selling the natural-origin and wet-market theory. Another apparent misdirection was several key scientists’ insistence on a narrow definition of “gain of function” research to include remodeling, overt bioengineering, shaping or constructing a virus. As far as we’re concerned, if a virus is taught to or evolves in a lab to infect human tissue more efficiently, that’s gain of function. -WSJ

    According to the doctors, there is a ‘global need’ to know the truth, because it affects how we approach the problem, and “variants are emerging rapidly that continue to change the game. All this is in keeping with a virus that more likely jumped from a bat to a lab, not to a rat or a rabbit.”

    Until we know what happened in Wuhan, Redfield and Siegel have called for a moratorium on so-called ‘gain-of-function’ research while authorities carefully craft policy to avoid the next pandemic.

    Tyler Durden
    Mon, 08/16/2021 – 23:40

  • Homeland Security Ignoring Congressional Requests For Info On Where Illegal Immigrants Are Being Sent
    Homeland Security Ignoring Congressional Requests For Info On Where Illegal Immigrants Are Being Sent

    Authored by Mark Tapscott via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

    Illegal immigrants are crossing into the United States from Mexico in record-shattering numbers, but the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) is ignoring a congressional request for information regarding where the government is relocating them, lawmakers say.

    “On April 15, 2021, 34 Members of the House of Representatives sent a letter requesting important information regarding the destinations within the interior of our nation of the heavy illegal migration over our nation’s border,” Sen. Mike Braun (R-Ind.) and Rep. Louie Gohmert (R-Texas) told DHS Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas in an Aug. 5 letter.

    A group of more than 350 illegal immigrants wait for Border Patrol after crossing the Rio Grande from Mexico into Del Rio, Texas, on July 25, 2021. (Charlotte Cuthbertson/The Epoch Times)

    The letter was also addressed to Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) Secretary Xavier Becerra. The two departments are responsible for implementing President Joe Biden’s open border policies on immigration.

    “As of the date of this letter, the response from [HHS] deferred to [DHS], and regrettably, DHS has not responded to the Congress’ letter,” Braun and Gohmert told Mayorkas and Becerra.

    The lawmakers said the repeated requests for relocation information were made because “border crossings remain unsustainably high. In July, it was reported that attempted crossings at the U.S.–Mexico border remain at a historically high level not experienced in at least 21 years.

    “In June, more than 188,829 individuals were taken into custody by Customs and Border Patrol (CBP), including 15,018 unaccompanied children. This former figure represents an alarming 141 percent increase from January 2021. Like so many in our nation, we remain deeply concerned about this unlawful, manmade humanitarian and national crisis that is being facilitated on our southern border.”

    In addition to Braun and Gohmert, the April and August letters were signed by Sens. Kevin Cramer (R-N.D.), Cindy Hyde-Smith (R-Miss.), and Cynthia Lummis (R-Wyo.).

    Members of the House of Representatives who signed the letters include Reps. Diana Harshbarger (R-Tenn.), Matthew Rosendale (R-Mont.), Glenn Grothman (R-Wis.), Greg Steube (R-Fla.), Randy Weber (R-Texas), Ben Cline (R-Va.), Jeff Duncan (R-S.C.), Bob Good (R-Va.), Mo Brooks (R-Ala.), Andy Biggs (R-Ariz.), Lauren Boebert (R-Colo.), Chip Roy (R-Texas), Jodey Arrington (R-Texas), Michael Cloud (R-Texas), Kevin Hern (R-Okla.), Madison Cawthorn (R-N.C.), Paul Gosar (R-Ariz.), Ted Budd (R-N.C.), Debbie Lesko (R-Ariz.), Scott Perry (R-Pa.), Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.), Bill Posey (R-Fla.), Vicki Hartzler (R-Mo.), and Pete Sessions (R-Texas).

    Representatives from DHS didn’t respond to a request for comment by press time.

    The information sought by the lawmakers includes the following:

    “The locations where illegal immigrants have been sent, transported, or provided ability or funding to travel to, or allowed to travel to by other funding including their own or private funding for all individuals who entered the U.S. without visas.

    “For each named location, the total number of immigrants who have been sent, transported, or provided ability or funding to travel to, or allowed to travel to by other funding, including their own or private funding to such city.

    “The number of immigrants tested for the novel coronavirus (COVID-19), the number of immigrants that tested positive for COVID-19, and [DHS’s] course of action to respond to immigrants that test positive for COVID-19.”

    The signers noted that “this requested information is critical to understanding how the unabetted flow of illegal aliens over the Southern border affects all Americans in each of the 50 states.”

    “It must be reiterated that members of the executive branch have a duty, and many have sworn an oath that would include the requirement to carry out the lawfully enacted legislation under the Constitution,” the letter reads.

    “With an open border facilitating illegal entry into our nation and the manifold resulting criminalities, the executive branch is failing miserably in its duty.

    “Your failure to provide this requested information over the past three months, an eminently reasonable amount of time, raises further concerns about the lack of transparency and your unwillingness to provide this important information to elected representatives of the people of this nation.”

    Tyler Durden
    Mon, 08/16/2021 – 23:20

  • Australia's Outbreak Worsens Despite Authorities' Draconian Lockdowns
    Australia’s Outbreak Worsens Despite Authorities’ Draconian Lockdowns

    New South Wales, Australia’s most populous state, suffered one of its darkest day yet over the weekend, as it reported 478 new cases, and 7 deaths, during a single 24-hour period. The worsening outbreak has raised concerns about the potential impact on Australia’s mostly unvaccinated aboriginal population.

    Elsewhere in Australia, public health officials have confirmed another 19 new cases in Canberra, which imposed its first lockdown in more than a year last week. That lockdown has already been extended by 2 weeks, as paranoia  over the delta variant is amplified by Australia’s relatively low vaccination rates.

    Daniel Andrews, the Premier of Victoria, asserted Monday that authorities wouldn’t hesitate to go “door-to-door” in their efforts to help carry out mandatory COVID tests on Australians.

    Andrews made the comments during a press conference, where he doubled down on his commitment to pursue Australia’s ludicrous “zero COVID” policy, which requires draconian, economy-crushing lockdowns in response to just a handful of new cases.

    “We’re not at a point where we need to be going door to door,” said Andrews. “We’re not at a point where we need entire suburbs to come out and get tested. If we get to that stage, then we won’t hesitate. I think we’ve shown, in fact I know we’ve shown that we’re prepared to do what has to be done, popular or otherwise.”

    Summit News’ Paul Joseph Watson mused about members of the Australian military helping to enforce lockdowns, and wondered how members of the military and the public who refuse vaccines and tests might be treated. PJW warned that going from door-to-door testing to door-to-door testing might be too big of a step.

    “This is a difficult conversation to have with people now, in an almost threatening tone, when people who want to get vaccinated can’t because we don’t have enough stuff. There will come a time though when I think restrictions will apply to those who have not been vaccinated, rather than restrictions applying to all of us.”

    Andrews also signaled that those who refuse to take the vaccine could be forced to submit to lockdown rules indefinitely.

    “This is a difficult conversation to have with people now, in an almost threatening tone, when people who want to get vaccinated can’t because we don’t have enough stuff. There will come a time though when I think restrictions will apply to those who have not been vaccinated, rather than restrictions applying to all of us.”

    “Now if that’s not an incentive to go and get vaccinated I don’t know what is. But I can see a time when to get into a venue, to attend a major event, to participate fully as a customer, a client, a ticket holder, a patron, a viewer, however you want to look at it, being vaccinated will mean that you get in, and being vaccinated will mean that you don’t.”

    Aussies have also been told not to go anywhere near their grandkids and not to engage in conversation with each other, even if they’re wearing masks.

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    Let’s not forget: one Australian was involuntarily admitted to a mental institution in Australia after refusing to get the COVID jab. The patient was “involuntarily” taken to a hospital in Perth, where he was told that he had suffered a “nervous breakdown”

    Sydney, Australia’s largest city by population, was the first major city to enter lockdown seven weeks ago.

    So far at least, it doesn’t look like it’s had much success. But Australian authorities are unfazed.

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    In other lockdown news, Victoria, which includes the city of Melbourne, tightened its lockdown restrictions, imposing a curfew of 2100 local time to 0500 and closing outdoor playgrounds. The Northern Territory, whose capital is the city of Darwin, went into a snap 72-hour lockdown after the discovery of a single asymptomatic infection.

    Tyler Durden
    Mon, 08/16/2021 – 23:00

  • Rubin: Why Joe Biden's Afghanistan Speech Was A Disaster
    Rubin: Why Joe Biden’s Afghanistan Speech Was A Disaster

    Authored by Michael Rubin via 19fortyfive.com,

    President Joe Biden addressed the nation on the unfolding tragedy in Afghanistan. He was unrepentant.

    “I Do Not Regret My Decision,” he declared.

    His speech did little to resolve the concerns a bipartisan array of Americans have for two reasons: First, he relied on a dishonest strawman and, second, the Afghan withdrawal contradicts the reasons he cited to justify his policy.

    First, the strawman: “I cannot and will not ask our troops to fight on endlessly in another country’s civil war,” he declared.

    But, no one was asking that, and it is not what American troops were doing.

    Over the past five years, the Pentagon had reduced the American presence to under 10,000 troops.

    The presence was a deterrent and led to few American casualties.

    Indeed, over that period, far fewer Americans have died in Afghanistan than residents of Baltimore have died in automobile accidents.

    Past efforts to nation-building were an expensive and misguided mistake, but not the American military presence which had evolved into a mission set not dissimilar from what the Pentagon maintains in Korea.

    Biden, like President Donald Trump before him, also justified his desire to withdrawal in order to “face threats of today…not yesterday’s.”

    The problem here is that he accomplishes neither. He is right that terrorism is a worldwide phenomenon. President George W. Bush and NATO allies ordered forces into Afghanistan in order to deny Al Qaeda a safe haven from which they could again attack the American homeland or Europe. What Biden now does in the name of being forward-looking is to create a vacuum into which terrorist groups will again sink root.

    Deterrence will be difficult.

    After all, the Taliban believes they defeated the United States and will not take future threats from the Oval Office seriously.

    Rather than move on from a past threat, Biden resurrects them.

    As to future threats, Biden—like Trump—worries about China. (Both Biden and Trump may also say they worry about Russia, but the sum of both their policies—both bullying Ukraine and Biden allowing Nord Stream-2 to move forward—empower the Kremlin).

    Rather than enhance America’s position against China, however, Biden has hemorrhaged it.

    If Americans are tired of defending Afghanistan as Biden claims, should Beijing believe they will stand up to defend Taiwan?

    By enabling China to advance its interests in Afghanistan, Biden is also enables it to cut-off India and other American allies from Central Asia.

    Simply put, If Biden considers surrendering Afghanistan to the Taliban to be a forward-looking strategy as his speech implies, then the worst is yet to come.

    Biden’s incompetence now risks the entire post-World War II liberal order. 

    God help the United States.

    *  *  *

    Michael Rubin was not alone in his disdain for President Biden’s comments, Somehow MSNBC allowed ‘No One Left Behind’ co-founder Matt Zeller to speak his truthful mind about what was said today…

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    Tyler Durden
    Mon, 08/16/2021 – 22:40

  • Natgas Futures Surge As New Models Suggest Warmer Weather
    Natgas Futures Surge As New Models Suggest Warmer Weather

    US natural gas futures are up more than 2% Monday after new models forecast warmer weather. 

    Futures for September delivery gained 2.33% to $3.952 Metric Million British Thermal Unit as of 1045 ET in New York. 

    According to Bloomberg, the weather forecast for Aug. 16-21 is expected to be “much warmer” across the south-central and the eastern US. Much cooler conditions are forecasted for the west and the north-central US. 

    For the week ending Aug. 21, cooling degree days (CDD) for the US is forecasted around 11 CDD, more than the long-term averages for this time of year. This week’s CCD will be about 77, last week’s was 93, and the norm for this week is approximately 66. 

    Here’s the weekly CCD forecast with the most significant deviations from averages: 

    • Pacific: 75 forecast versus 43 normal
    • Mountain: 88 forecast versus 68 normal
    • E N Central: 54 forecast versus 43 normal

    States

    • Nevada: 147 forecast versus 105 normal
    • Minnesota: 69 forecast versus 28 normal
    • Utah: 80 forecast versus 46 normal

    For readers who aren’t familiar with CCD forecasting, it’s the number of degrees that the mean daily temperature is above 65 degrees Fahrenheit. Higher values indicate hotter temperatures and increased demand for air conditioners which boosts demand for natural gas.

    The good news is that the dog days of summer could be winding down as the average temperatures for the US Lower 48 are set to drop after Aug. 26. 

    On another relevant subject about the weather. We told readers late Sunday that three storms are brewing in the tropics. 

    Tyler Durden
    Mon, 08/16/2021 – 22:20

  • Brace For A Big Miss In July Retail Sales
    Brace For A Big Miss In July Retail Sales

    Just a quick note ahead of tomorrow’s retail sales data, which consensus expects to come in at -0.2% headline at +0.2% ex autos, but which will be a big miss.

    Last week we pointed out that BofA’s latest internal debit and credit card spending data showed a sharp slowdown in the month of July (whether due to covid fears, new restrictions, burning through savings, an outsized slowdown in good spending, etc), with total BofA card spending down 1.3% on a month-over-month seasonally adjusted basis, the biggest drop in the past 12 months…

    … and down almost double for retail sales ex-autos, which BofA founds shrank by 2.4% mom sa.

    Today, when looking at its own card spending data, JPM also poured cold water on any hope of sustained economic activity in the US, writing that there is concern that the delta wave is depressing sentiment. On the heels of a drop in global business and consumer confidence in July, JPM eyed the University of Michigan survey which reported an unexpected plunge in US consumer confidence last Friday with the headline reading plummeting from 81.2 to 70.2 in August, refuting the far more optimstic Conference Board survey result.

    This decline, JPM concludes, “aligns with recent indications that the Delta variant may be suppressing consumer spending and we look for a well below consensus 1.5% m/m drop in tomorrow’s July retail sales report.”

    And so between two of the biggest issuers of debit and credit cards, both of whom are seeing a sharp slowdown in spending – as we observed last week in “A Sudden Negative Change In The Economy”: Consumer Spending Slides As Majority Now Expect A New Slowdown – we can conclude that tomorrow’s retail sales number will be a big miss to expectations…

    … which of course should send stocks quickly to new all time highs.

    Tyler Durden
    Mon, 08/16/2021 – 22:00

  • Lockdowns Widen In China As Locals Doubt Official COVID-19 Data
    Lockdowns Widen In China As Locals Doubt Official COVID-19 Data

    Authored by Nicole Hao via The Epoch Times,

    People in many Chinese cities, under heavy lockdown due to COVID-19 outbreaks, are concerned that infection numbers are being underreported.

    A spokesperson for the Chinese National Health Commission Mi Feng said at a press conference on Friday: “As of now, the diagnosed local [COVID-19] cases have risen for 19 consecutive days, and involved 16 provinces.”

    On Saturday and Sunday, the regime announced more infections but many people  interviewed by the Chinese-language Epoch Times said they didn’t believe the numbers because of the regime’s past underreporting on COVID-19.

    The regime has reported relatively small-scale local outbreaks this year until July 20, when Nanjing in eastern Jiangsu Province announced airport workers were diagnosed with COVID-19. Since then, the CCP (Chinese Communist Party) virus, commonly known as novel coronavirus, has spread to dozens of cities across the country.

    In its counting of COVID-19 cases the Chinese regime doesn’t include infected people not showing obvious symptoms. The regime also claims that anyone found to have COVID-19 who travelled overseas in the past month must have contracted the CCP virus when they were out of China, and count them as imported cases.

    Local cases end up being those who haven’t visited other countries in the past months and have symptoms.

    A woman receives a test for COVID-19 in Zhengzhou, central China’s Henan Province on July 31, 2021. (AFP via Getty Images)

    Zhengyang County

    In Zhengyang County in central Henan Province, the regime only announced one person diagnosed with COVID-19 in recent weeks, but have locked down residential compounds and villages.

    The regime even planned to test all residents in the county again on Friday, although it didn’t report any infections in a first round of tests carried out two days earlier.

    As of around midday Monday local time, Zhengyang County government had only announced that it had found one case that tested positive on Aug. 9 and another that was counted as an individual showing symptoms on Thursday. However, the county has strictly controlled people’s movements.

    On Saturday, local residents in the county said lockdown measures meant they couldn’t leave home and many believed the real infection figure must be larger than what the authorities are admitting.

    “All of us have been fully vaccinated (with two doses),” Wang, a staff member of Zhengyang train station, said in a phone interview on Saturday.

    “All of us have been tested for COVID this week. And all of us have to take the second test tomorrow or the day after tomorrow,” Wang said. “The outbreak is very severe here.”

    Wang said he didn’t know the true scale of the outbreak, but he didn’t believe the government’s announcements.

    The Zhengyang City government announced that no private or business vehicles were allowed on roads from Saturday. Only ambulances, garbage trucks, and other emergency vehicles were allowed to use the roads.

    A Zhengyang farmer told the Chinese-language Epoch Times on Saturday that even farmers aren’t allowed to leave their homes or work their fields.

    “If there’s only one infection [in Zhengyang], the regime shouldn’t be so nervous, and shouldn’t ask us to test at night. They said we will be tested again,” the farmer said.

    “They [the regime] don’t allow us to farm our lands, don’t allow us to visit the city, don’t allow us to visit our friends and relatives. All schools and after-school classes were closed,” she said.

    A firefighter sprays disinfectant at a residential area in Yangzhou, eastern China’s Jiangsu Province on Aug. 11, 2021. (STR/AFP via Getty Images)

    Yucheng County

    In Yucheng County—some 200 miles northeast of Zhengyang—the local authorities were criticised by state-run Beijing Daily on Saturday because the county announced four diagnosed cases in a news release. The state-run media questioned the county government why it only announced four diagnosed cases when the total infections should have been five.

    Following the report the Shangqiu City government increased their lockdown measures by closing all highways and clinics, and launching a third-round of large-scale COVID-19 testing of all residents.

    One Yucheng resident named Zhao told the Chinese-language Epoch Times that officials had given them little information.

    “From Friday, all stores and shops were closed in Yucheng County and Shangqiu City. It’s very scary,” Zhao said on Saturday. 

    “Even hospitals [in Yucheng] stopped receiving any patients, and nobody is allowed to leave the county.”

    Wen, a staff member at a Yucheng bus station, said in a phone interview on Saturday that the whole county had halted all public transportation on that day. Even hospitals were closed due to the outbreak and the lockdown policy.

    “We have no idea about the true situation. [The officials] didn’t say when [the county] will be unlocked,” Wen added.

    Tyler Durden
    Mon, 08/16/2021 – 21:40

  • Shipping Container Freight Rate Inflation Slows, But…
    Shipping Container Freight Rate Inflation Slows, But…

    With international container shipping rates blowing out like never before amid chaos in Transpacific shipping due to massive port backlogs and production delays in China due to a resurgence of COVID-19, new data suggests the rate of increase in container shipping prices is slowing, according to Bloomberg. 

    The five-week average increase in the WCI Composite Container Freight Benchmark Rate shows the upward momentum in prices has been waning since mid-July. The rate is about 1.4 percentage points, a considerable change from early July when it was around five percentage points. 

    Bloomberg points out, “market is also anticipating inflation to be higher in the near term, but expect it to be transitory, buying into the Fed’s narrative.” 

    Looking at inflation swaps and the U.S. breakeven curve, rate traders expect lower inflation down the road. The chart below shows inflation swaps at 3% in a year, but then slumping back to 2% the years after.

    On a seasonal basis, container rates tend to increase this time of year as retailers stock up on goods ahead of the holiday season. 

    With container rates slowing today, the question is whether prices have peaked or if the next leg up is imminent?

    That would be good news for the American consumer, whose confidence and buying attitudes just collapsed, but Goldman Sachs is pouring cold water in this hope, explicitly warning that “port closures or stricter control measures at ports could also put further upward pressure on shipping costs, which are already very high.“

    Tyler Durden
    Mon, 08/16/2021 – 21:20

  • New Jersey Gov. Phil Murphy Vacations In $7 Million Italian Villa Despite Delta Variant Surge And Travel Warnings
    New Jersey Gov. Phil Murphy Vacations In $7 Million Italian Villa Despite Delta Variant Surge And Travel Warnings

    It’s yet another case of “do as I say, not as I do” to add to the long line of liberal hypocrisy regarding Covid-19 restrictions. 

    New Jersey governor Phil Murphy – who has been amongst the most adamant supporters of lockdowns and Covid-19 restrictions – is doing a little social distancing of his own.

    In fact, he hopped aboard a jet this week with his family to vacation in his “23-room mansion” in Umbria, Italy, while both his state and Italy battle the Delta Variant, according to the NY Post.

    Meanwhile, his trip comes as the U.S. State Department has asked Americans to “reconsider travel to Italy due to COVID-19.” 

    Murphy said of his trip last week: “After this past 17 months, just having a few days together is something that I think all of us want to do with our family, and I’m looking forward to that.”

    His villa in Italy reportedly has a horse stable, tennis court and pool. It’s worth more than $7 million, the report says. 

    “While ‘Rome is burning’ here in New Jersey, Murphy is living in the lap of luxury and too rich to care about the communities and families impacted by the small businesses who had to close their doors forever,” Republican gubernatorial candidate Jack Ciattarelli responded.  

    Tyler Durden
    Mon, 08/16/2021 – 21:00

  • Taliban "Collect" Weapons From Civilians In Kabul As They "No Longer Need Personal Protection"
    Taliban “Collect” Weapons From Civilians In Kabul As They “No Longer Need Personal Protection”

    The Taliban were quick to humiliate the Biden administration, taking over the country just days after US forces departed, but now that they are fully in control, they appear set on pursuing one of progressive America’s core tenets: confiscating weapons.

    Taliban fighters in the Afghan capital, Kabul, started collecting weapons from civilians on Monday because “people no longer need them for personal protection”, a Taliban official told Reuters.

    “We understand people kept weapons for personal safety. They can now feel safe. We are not here to harm innocent civilians,” the official told Reuters.

    Or, as Spike Cohen summarized: “Give us your guns. We will protect you.” – Every government that is about to commit mass murder ever.

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    City resident Saad Mohseni, director of the MOBY group media company, said on Twitter that Taliban soldiers had come to his company compound to enquire about the weapons kept by his security team. Very soon, nobody but the Taliban, which courtesy of the chaotic departure of US forces which let the Taliban take possession of some of the most advanced US weaponry, will be armed ensuring that no armed overthrow of the regime will be possible.

    Tyler Durden
    Mon, 08/16/2021 – 20:40

  • Thousands Of Counterfeit COVID-19 Vaccination Cards From China Seized In Tennessee
    Thousands Of Counterfeit COVID-19 Vaccination Cards From China Seized In Tennessee

    By Nicole Hao of The Epoch Times

    More than 3,000 fake COVID-19 vaccination cards from China have been seized by federal agents in Memphis, Tennessee, en route to other cities in the United States.

    U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) caught a shipment from Shenzhen, China, to New Orleans that contained 51 blank counterfeit vaccination cards, CBP said in an Aug. 13 statement.

    “It was the 15th such shipment of the night,” the statement reads.

    The FBI stated on March 30 that buying, selling, or using counterfeit COVID-19 vaccination cards is a crime, and violators will face a fine and up to five years in prison.

    White House coronavirus response coordinator Jeff Zients also said on Aug. 13 that it’s “a crime” to falsify COVID-19 vaccination cards, amid new restrictions set by several major cities.

    After New York City announced that it would mandate vaccine passports at certain businesses starting next month and as a growing number of colleges and universities across the country are requiring vaccination for students to attend in-person classes, there has been a surge in the fraudulent documents.

    The counterfeit COVID-19 vaccination cards that were seized in Memphis, Tenn., in August 2021 come with a CDC logo on the top. (U.S. Customs And Border Protection)

    Fake Cards

    “This fiscal year to date, Memphis has made 121 seizures totaling 3,017 of these vaccination cards,” the CBP statement reads. “They are always from China.”

    The shipments were all described as “Paper Greeting Cards/Use For-Greeting Card” or “PAPER PAPER CARD.”

    “The cards have blanks for the recipient’s name and birthdate, the vaccine maker, lot number, and date and place the shot was given, as well as the Centers for Disease Control [and Prevention] (CDC) logo in the upper right corner,” the statement reads.

    But CBP officers knew the cards were fake because “it was imported by a non-CDC or medical entity, and this was not the first time they had seen this shipper.”

    Such counterfeit cards have typos, unfinished words, and some of the Spanish verbiage on the back was misspelled.

    “If you do not wish to receive a vaccine, that is your decision. But don’t order a counterfeit, waste my officers’ time, break the law, and misrepresent yourself,” said Michael Neipert, area port director of Memphis.

    A health care worker displays a COVID-19 Vaccination Record Card during a vaccine and health clinic at QueensCare Health Center in a predominantly Latino neighborhood in Los Angeles, on Aug. 11, 2021. (Robyn Beck/AFP via Getty Images)

    Active Black Market

    The city and university policies have resulted in an active black market for vaccination cards. On Instagram, Telegram, Reddit, Twitter, and similar social media platforms, users can get the contact information of vaccination card sellers, who sell them from $25 to $200 each. These cards might not be genuine.

    According to a tally by The Chronicle of Higher Education, at least 675 colleges and universities require proof of COVID-19 inoculation in the United States. The process to confirm vaccinations at many schools can be as simple as uploading a picture of the vaccine card to the student’s portal, The Associated Press reported on Aug. 9.

    While COVID-19 vaccines are easily available across the United States, some people are reluctant to vaccinate because of religious reasons, personal beliefs or philosophical reasons, safety concerns, or a desire for more information from health care providers.

    Some social media users share the cases of death and side effects associated with the vaccine, while others express concerns that the vaccination can’t protect people from being infected with COVID-19.

    According to USA Facts, 60 percent of Americans had received at least one dose of a COVID-19 vaccine by Aug. 13, while 51 percent of the population had been fully vaccinated.

    Tyler Durden
    Mon, 08/16/2021 – 20:20

  • This Is What Hedge Funds Bought And Sold In Q2: Complete 13F Summary
    This Is What Hedge Funds Bought And Sold In Q2: Complete 13F Summary

    For once, the “smart money” was not caught off guard by the resurgent covid pandemic, and as a barrage of 13F filings published today showed, during the second quarter hedge funds loaded up on companies that would benefit from a new wave of the pandemic even before the delta variant began to rapidly spread throughout the U.S.

    As Bloomberg summarizes, Chase Coleman’s Tiger Global Management and Philippe Laffont’s Coatue Management both increased their stakes in food delivery service DoorDash in the second quarter. Coatue also added to its bet on vaccine maker Moderna, while Stephen Mandel’s Lone Pine Capital took a new stake in the biotech company worth more than $900 million. These purchases were a reversal from the first quarter, when many hedge funds cut positions in Work From Home companies like Peloton and Zoom as vaccinations began to ramp up in the U.S. That, in turn, fueled wagers on companies that had been hardest-hit by travel restrictions and remote work.

    Tiger and Coatue also increased their stakes in Zoom in the three months through June, their 13F filings revealed. The two funds, along with D1 Capital Partners, were among those that added to positions in Peloton, while Viking Global Investors made a new bet on the exercise equipment company.

    13F filings also showed that funds including Soros Fund Management and Temasek snapped up shares of fintech companies. Marqeta was a top new buy for Soros, while Temasek disclosed new positions in SoFi Technologies, Flywire and Payoneer Global. Marqeta and SoFi tumbled last week after reporting disappointing second-quarter results. Temasek also snapped up shares in two new BlackRock carbon transition ETFs (LCTU and LCTD), while Soros took a new position in electric-vehicle producer Proterra, as clean energy continues to be a prominent trend among investors.

    Coatue, Viking and Gabe Plotkin’s Melvin Capital Management also added new positions in Beijing-based JD.com Inc. in the quarter, a move that would prove to be rather unfortunate as shares of the giant online vendor have slumped 16% since June 30. Chinese shares have tumbled since June as Beijing banned for-profit tutoring companies and ordered more than two dozen tech firms to carry out internal inspections and address issues such as data security.

    Some, such as Soros were either lucky or good in cutting their exposure to Chinese ADRs in the second quarter, ahead of the furious selloff. Soros Fund Management exited many of its investments in Chinese ADRs including Baidu, Vipshop Holdings, Tencent Music Entertainment Group and IQiyi, positions it snapped up during the collapse of Archegos Capital Management in March and April, as noted previously.

    Other funds also dumped China-based companies with listings in the U.S. D1 Capital sold its 25-million-share stake in New Oriental Education & Technology Group, while Soroban Capital Partners exited its 2.06-million-share stake in Alibaba. Soroban’s largest new positions favored tech, with the top three additions being Facebook, Twitter and Netflix.

    Some other notable 13F findings:

    • Michael Burry, of “The Big Short” fame, owned puts on Cathie Wood’s ARK Innovation ETF and increased its Tesla puts (more here).
    • Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway added to just three positions in the quarter and trimmed its holdings in several companies, including a full exit of controversial Alzheimer’s drug developer Biogen. As first noted earlier, Berkshire’s only new position in the quarter, 1.55 million shares of Organon was the result of a spinoff of the women’s health pharmaceutical company from Berkshire holding Merck. Its most significant addition was a 21% increase in its position in grocer Kroger. Besides Biogen, exits included Liberty Global’s Class A shares and Axalta Coating Systems, while Berkshire trimmed positions in Marsh & McLennan, Abbvie, General Motors and Bristol-Myers Squibb.
    • Seth Klarman’s long-standing investment in Rupert Murdoch’s media empire finally came to an end during the second quarter. Baupost Group sold its entire Fox Corp. stake, including 7.6 million Class A shares and 5.7 million Class B shares with a combined market value of $446 million at the end of March.
    • Carl Icahn, who runs a concentrated portfolio with just 17 reportable investments, sold all of his 9.59 million shares of Tenneco in the quarter. He also has a new undisclosed position in an unnamed stock — an unusual step that requires a separate filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission.
    • Dan Loeb’s Third Point added SentinelOne Class A to its investments and exited IAA in the second quarter. The fund also added to its holdings in Intel, boosting its stake to 14 million shares from 1 million, while decreasing its stake in Charter Communications Class A. Upstart Holdings was Third Point’s biggest holding, representing 9.8% of disclosed assets
    • Elliott Investment Management’s largest purchases of the quarter included a 3-million-share buy of Twitter. The increase in shares comes despite Elliott partner Jesse Cohn’s departure from Twitter’s board on June 9. He originally joined the board as part of a partnership Twitter entered with Elliott and Sliver Lake on March 9, 2020.
    • Singapore state-owned investment fund Temasek Holdings’s largest new purchase in the quarter was a 4.84-million-share position in Airbnb. Airbnb reported strong second-quarter earnings last week that were offset by tepid guidance, according to analysts. Temasek also disclosed new positions in SoFi Technologies, Flywire and Payoneer Global.

    Here are some other moves made by prominent funds tracked by Bloomberg:

    APPALOOSA

    • Top new buys: UBER, PHM, BODY, TCVA
    • Top exits: CRM, ADBE, DIS, PYPL, IQ, DISCA, BIDU, SHOP
    • Boosted stakes in: MOS, FCX
    • Cut stakes in: PCG, MU, TMUS, AMZN, CHK, BABA, FB, GOOG, HCA, XLE

    BAUPOST GROUP

    • Top new buys: SJR, RTPY, 1865300D
    • Top exits: FOXA, FOX, PEAK, FNF, RTP, HIPO
    • Boosted stakes in: FB, MU, QRVO, TBPH
    • Cut stakes in: INTC, WLTW, EBAY, PSTH, SSNC, ADV, AJAX, NXST, DBRG, LBTYK

    BERKSHIRE HATHAWAY

    • Top exits: AXTA, BIIB, LBTYA
    • Boosted stakes in: KR, RH, AON
    • Cut stakes in: GM, BMY, ABBV, LBTYK, CVX, MMC, USB

    CORVEX MANAGEMENT

    • Top new buys: CRM, ZNGA, BOAC, ROVR, TWCT, LGV
    • Top exits: FISV, EXPE, GLD, FE, GPN, RADI, ORGN, TALK, ELMS, NFLX
    • Boosted stakes in: BLMN, AMZN, GOOGL, DIS, MSFT, CCEP, ATUS, EXC, DOMA, FB
    • Cut stakes in: ATVI, TMUS, AJAX, CFAC

    D1 CAPITAL PARTNERS

    • Top new buys: PCOR, FTCH, PODD, ALKT, CMG, DLO, DECK, STNE, CRWD, FTV
    • Top exits: HLT, NFLX, EDU, BAX, NKE, PPD, LVS, FIS, BX, BMBL
    • Boosted stakes in: AMZN, EXPE, CVNA, PTON, BBWI, JD, RH, BLL, BKNG, DIS
    • Cut stakes in: MSFT, TMUS, FB, COUP, DHR, DDOG

    DUQUESNE FAMILY OFFICE

    • Top new buys: NFLX, ABNB, MRNA, SMAR, GM, COUP, MAR, FTCH, CF, RBLX
    • Top exits: C, GOLD, MELI, UBER, TSM, LIN, RUN, JPM, AA, ASHR
    • Boosted stakes in: GOOGL, AMZN, CVNA, FB, KBR, MA, V, SBUX, EXPE, OPCH
    • Cut stakes in: MSFT, SE, ON, BLDR, PLTR, FLEX, TMUS, SNOW, TECK, FCX

    ELLIOTT INVESTMENT MANAGEMENT

    • Top new buys: DUK, DBX, HRB
    • Top exits: DISCK, CYH, FB
    • Boosted stakes in: TWTR, ETWO, PINS
    • Cut stakes in: SNAP, HWM

    GLENVIEW CAPITAL MANAGEMENT

    • Top new buys: CNC, AMZN, BABA, CCCS, UBER, AMGN, CHNG, OUST, BOWX, LSAQ
    • Top exits: NUAN, LH, MSFT, CAR, LYFT, MAR, PPD, NBSE
    • Boosted stakes in: GPN, CCEP, APTV, WBA, DD, CTVA, DVA, NSC, HOLX, ESI
    • Cut stakes in: CI, TAK, HCA, MCK, DXC, FB, ANTM, BSX, BAX, FISV

    GREENLIGHT CAPITAL

    • Top new buys: SPY, PLBY, GPK, NWS, SRNG, EXPE, DMYI, LIVN, UWMC, PANA
    • Top exits: ADT, ALIT, TALK, SEAH
    • Boosted stakes in: TECK, GPRO, ODP, CC, CPRI, JOBY, SATS, ASTS, FUBO, REZI
    • Cut stakes in: DNMR, APG, KPLT, CNX, XOG, CNXC, JACK, SNX, NUVB, CEIX

    ICAHN

    • Top exits: HLF, TEN
    • Boosted stakes in: IEP, XRX
    • Cut stakes in: OXY, DK, WBT

    JANA PARTNERS

    • Top new buys: CSOD
    • Boosted stakes in: CONE, VG, SPY, EHC
    • Cut stakes in: LH, CAG, THS

    LANSDOWNE

    • Top new buys: ILMN, WMG, NVT
    • Top exits: ED, DAR, AES, REGI, CDE, PAAS, USO
    • Boosted stakes in: ETN, FCX, CARR, AER, DAL, IEUR, BLBD, VMC, RBLX, UVXY
    • Cut stakes in: AMAT, TSM, LRCX, MU, RYAAY, GE, ENIA, EGO, ADI, BKNG

    MAVERICK CAPITAL

    • Top new buys: CNC, JLL, CANO, FTCH, GPN, BHG, CMAX, ADSK, SE, JWSM
    • Top exits: FIS, PLD, ELAN, LVS, SPFR, MAC, DASH, TJX, ZBRA, HPQ
    • Boosted stakes in: CVNA, ASO, SNOW, V, BABA, EXPE, TMUS, CCK, XP, ATRA
    • Cut stakes in: SEER, AMAT, ALNY, LRCX, AON, AMZN, LPLA, SUM, TGTX, GOOG

    MELVIN CAPITAL MANAGEMENT

    • Top new buys: JD, DASH, PYPL, DPZ, MSFT, TGT, VMEO, SE, SHOP, DDOG
    • Top exits: NFLX, NUAN, PINS, AAP, NKE, MU, SIG, TPX, TPR, WYNN
    • Boosted stakes in: AMZN, ATVI, ALGN, LYV, LH, EXPE, SEAS, SNOW, PVH, TXRH
    • Cut stakes in: MA, FB, BBWI, GOOGL, SBUX, UBER, FICO, NTES, HLT, NOW

    OMEGA ADVISORS

    • Top new buys: LAD, BHC, VOO, PFSI, EFA, IVW, COG, SCHO, IEUR, EWJ
    • Top exits: MGY, IFF, CMCSA
    • Boosted stakes in: FOA, WSC, VRT, NRG, PXD, ABR, ASH, ASPU, BABA, FLMN
    • Cut stakes in: FOE, NAVI, OCN, TRN, BBDC, FCRD, SRGA, FB, SNR

    PERSHING SQUARE

    • Boosted stakes in: DPZ
    • Cut stakes in: LOW, QSR, HLT, A

    SOROBAN CAPITAL

    • Top new buys: FB, TWTR, NFLX, WAB, KAHC, LGV, BKI, PLNT, MSDA, TIOA
    • Top exits: BABA, CMCSA, DPZ, RTX, GRA, GWRE, ALIT, SFTW, SPFR
    • Boosted stakes in: LOW, CSX, ADI, UNP, FIS, VYGG, BTNB
    • Cut stakes in: ATUS, SPGI, PAYO, KVSB, ME, SUNL, BGRY, GNAC, DOMA, NSH

    SOROS FUND MANAGEMENT

    • Top new buys: FIGS, INFO, PTRA, MQ, PPD, VER, NUAN, MGLN, INDI, ACN
    • Top exits: BIDU, DEN, VIPS, TME, IQ, DISCK, XLE, MU, ASHR, WAL
    • Boosted stakes in: AMZN, MXIM, ELAN, GOOGL, CLVT, DIS, OPEN, W, CRM, SYF
    • Cut stakes in: LQD, QS, VICI, UPST, TXN, LVS, ADI, NXPI, DHI, LPLA

    STARBOARD

    • Top new buys: PZZA, WPCB, LEGA, KAHC, SLAM, FRXB, ATMR, ROSS, MACC, ACAH
    • Boosted stakes in: CERN, BOX, IWM, IWR, TWCT, KVSC, DGNU, PRPB, LNFA, ON
    • Cut stakes in: CTVA, IWN, ACM, MAAC, SCOR, NLOK, MMSI, ELAN, CVLT

    TEMASEK HOLDINGS

    • Top new buys: ABNB, INTA, FLYW, PAYO, KRE, STEM, LCTU, INTC, SOFI, COPX
    • Top exits: XLF, ADBE, INDA, EWZ, ACIU, PCVX
    • Boosted stakes in: BILL, BEAM, TMO, DELL, EWY, IBN, IAU, CRM, SNOW, AFRM
    • Cut stakes in: WISH, IWM, BABA, MSFT, XLB, CTVA, DASH, RBLX

    THIRD POINT

    • Top new buys: S, SOFI, EDR, ZBH, PTON, RTPY, JWSM, ASZ, IACC, AUS
    • Top exits: IAA, RACE, KMX, Z, SHOP, CVNA, ETRN, NYT, WISH, RKT
    • Boosted stakes in: INTC, AMZN, DELL, CANO, EL, UBER, SU, RH, DD, AES
    • Cut stakes in: CHTR, PCG, JD, IQV, DIS, RADI, APTV, BOAC, MTTR, TEL

    TIGER GLOBAL

    • Top new buys: PCOR, PATH, COIN, DV, BHG, DLO, APP, S, GRUB, KPLT
    • Top exits: ASO
    • Boosted stakes in: DASH, DOCU, ZM, SHOP, SE, SNOW, CVNA, PTON, YSG, RNG
    • Cut stakes in: CRM, TAL, JD, EDU, RBLX, GDS, UBER, DESP, BABA, RDFN

    Source: Bloomberg

    Tyler Durden
    Mon, 08/16/2021 – 20:00

  • Afghanistan: We Never Learn
    Afghanistan: We Never Learn

    Authored by Matt Taibbi via TK News,

    Secretary of State Anthony Blinken, when asked months ago about the possibility that there might be a “significant deterioration” of the security picture in Afghanistan once the United States withdrew its forces, said, “I don’t think it’s going to be something that happens from a Friday to a Monday.”

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    Blinken’s Nostradamus moment was somehow one-upped by that of his boss, Joe Biden, who on July 8th had the following exchange with press:

    Q: Your own intelligence community has assessed that the Afghan government will likely collapse.

    BIDEN: That is not true, they did not reach that conclusion… There is going to be no circumstance where you see people lifted off the roof of an embassy… The likelihood that you’re going to see the Taliban overrunning everything and owning the whole country is highly unlikely.

    Down to their own stunningly (perfectly?) inaccurate mis-predictions of what would take place once our military forces left the country, Biden administration officials could not have scripted a worse ending to the twenty-year disaster that has been our occupation of Afghanistan.

    Every image coming out of Afghanistan this past weekend was an advertisement for the incompetence, arrogance, and double-dealing nature of American foreign policy leaders. Scenes of military dogs being evacuated while our troops fire weapons in the air to disperse humans desperate for a seat out of the country will force every theoretical future ally to think twice about partnering with us:

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    News that the military was forced to re-deploy troops to Afghanistan in order to ensure an “orderly and safe” withdrawal is being met with justifiable eye-rolling worldwide. It’s a little late for that:

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    The pattern is always the same. We go to places we’re not welcome, tell the public a confounding political problem can be solved militarily, and lie about our motives in occupying the country to boot. Then we pick a local civilian political authority to back that inevitably proves to be corrupt and repressive, increasing local antagonism toward the American presence.

    In response to those increasing levels of antagonism, we then ramp up our financial, political, and military commitment to the mission, which in turn heightens the level of resistance, leading to greater losses in lives and treasure. As the cycle worsens, the government systematically accelerates the lies to the public about our level of “progress.”

    Throughout, we make false assurances of security that are believed by significant numbers of local civilians, guaranteeing they will later either become refugees or targets for retribution as collaborators. Meanwhile, financial incentives for contractors, along with political disincentives to admission of failure, prolong the mission.

    This all goes on for so long that the lies become institutionalized, believed not only by press contracted to deliver the propaganda (CBS’s David Martin this weekend saying with a straight face, “Everybody is surprised by the speed of this collapse” was typical), but even by the bureaucrats who concocted the deceptions in the first place.

    The look of genuine shock on the face of Tony Blinken this weekend as he jousted with Jake Tapper about Biden’s comments from July should tell people around the world something important about the United States: in addition to all the other things about us that are dangerous, we lack self-knowledge.

    Even deep inside the machine of American power, where everyone paying even a modicum of attention over the last twenty years should have known Kabul would fall in a heartbeat, they still believe their own legends. Which means this will happen again, and probably sooner rather than later.

    Tyler Durden
    Mon, 08/16/2021 – 19:40

  • Mainstream Media Rediscovers Decade Old Ron Paul Afghanistan Speech: "He Was Right"
    Mainstream Media Rediscovers Decade Old Ron Paul Afghanistan Speech: “He Was Right”

    There’s always a clip… the great Ron Paul predicted everything. While horrific scenes from Kabul airport drove headlines in the West, former Congressman Paul’s words are trending once again. Newsweek of all outlets is on Monday running a simple headline: ‘Ron Paul Was Right’.

    In 2011, two years before he retired from Congress, he stepped to the House floor to take up the question of ‘should we leave Afghanistan’. He said exactly ten years ago: “If we don’t get out now, we’ll be there for another ten years.”

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    “I think the answer is very clear and it’s not complicated. Of course we should as soon as we can. This suggests we should end by the end of the year,” he began the prescient and prophetic floor speech.

    “If we don’t we’ll be there for another decade – will be my prediction. The American people are with us.”

    He went on at the time to once again warn of the perils of nation-building and of foreign intervention, and “democracy building”. He predictions were so right on that on Monday even the mainstream media is “rediscovering” the remarks.

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    “It’s time to get out of Afghanistan. it’s a fruitless venture, too much has been lost, the chance of ‘winning’ since we don’t even know what we’re going to win doesn’t exist… financially there’s a good reason to come home as well,” he spelled out at the time.

    “We can’t change Afghanistan,” he said. “Even if you could, you’re not supposed to. You don’t have the moral authority, you don’t have the constitutional authority.”

    When will the beltway blob actually listen?

    Dr. Paul proven right once again… watch the full speech below:

    Tyler Durden
    Mon, 08/16/2021 – 19:20

  • Fauci Downplays New COVID-19 Vaccine Study
    Fauci Downplays New COVID-19 Vaccine Study

    Authored by Jack Phillips via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

    White House COVID-19 adviser Anthony Fauci on Aug. 15 downplayed a recent study from a prominent medical research center that deemed the Pfizer vaccine less effective than the Moderna vaccine.

    The Mayo Clinic and Cambridge-based biotech company nference, found in the study that both mRNA COVID-19 vaccines’ effectiveness dropped in the month of July. The researchers, while saying the vaccines provided good protection against the virus, found that Moderna’s vaccine effectiveness was 76 percent, as compared with Pfizer’s 42 percent.

    “That study … is a pre-print study, it hasn’t been fully peer-reviewed,” Fauci said on CBS’s “Face the Nation” of the recent Mayo-nference study’s findings, which was published on the website medRxiv.org. The study gathered data from about 25,000 Minnesota residents from January and July.

    “I don’t doubt what they’re seeing, but there are a lot of confounding variables in there, about when one was started, the relative amount of people in that cohort who were Delta versus Alpha,” he said, referring to two COVID-19 variants. He didn’t elaborate.

    Both the Moderna and Pfizer vaccine should be used as booster shots, he said.

    “Right now, if we get boosters … it’s clear we want to make sure we get people, if possible, to get the boost from the original vaccine,” Fauci said.

    Fauci has been the head of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases since 1984 and has become one of the federal government’s public faces in its messaging about COVID-19. In the interview, Fauci also said he hopes the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) fully authorizes the vaccines.

    COVID-19 is the illness caused by the CCP (Chinese Communist Party) virus.

    The Mayo Clinic didn’t respond to a request for comment on Fauci’s remarks by press time.

    Mayo Clinic and nference researchers examined records to determine the vaccines’ efficacy; the scientists noted that the study hadn’t been peer-reviewed.

    Despite their findings, the researchers touted the effectiveness of the mRNA vaccines, saying that they “strongly protect” against COVID-19 and “severe disease.”

    “Larger studies with more diverse populations are warranted to guide critical pending public and global health decisions, such as the optimal timing for booster doses and which vaccines should be administered to individuals who have not yet received one dose,” they wrote.

    When reached for comment, Pfizer previously told The Epoch Times that it and partner BioNTech are “driven by science to discover the best approaches” to combat the virus. Moderna didn’t respond to a request for comment by press time.

    Days ago, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) approved booster shots of the two mRNA vaccines for people with compromised immune systems. The decision doesn’t apply to the Johnson & Johnson vaccine, which uses different technology and requires only one dose.

    Tyler Durden
    Mon, 08/16/2021 – 19:00

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