- Transgender Biological Male Cleared To Compete In Women's Weightlifting In Tokyo Olympics
Transgender Biological Male Cleared To Compete In Women’s Weightlifting In Tokyo Olympics
In continuing with the total farce this year’s Olympics has become thanks to Tokyo’s overzealous response to Covid, the International Olympic Committee has given the “all clear” for a transgender biological male to compete on behalf of New Zealand in the women’s weightlifting super-heavyweight category.
43 year old Laurel Hubbard’s inclusion “does not violate the current rules on the books,” the committee ruled, according to the New York Post. She would be the first transgender athlete to compete in the Olympic Games, despite the fact that transgender athletes have been allowed to compete in the Olympics since 2015.
IOC head Thomas Bach commented: “The rules for qualification have been established by the International Weightlifting Federation before the qualifications started. These rules apply, and you cannot change rules during ongoing competitions.”
Bach also noted the rules were “currently under evaluation” and would be reviewed “at a later date”, the Post wrote.
He continued: “The IOC is in an inquiry phase with all different stakeholders… to review these rules and finally to come up with some guidelines, which cannot be rules because this is a question where there is no one-size-fits-all solution. It differs from sport to sport.”
The idea of transgender women in sports remains a point of contention in the U.S., with states like Florida and Montana looking to bar then from middle school and high school sports. Skeptics argue that “women” who go through bone and muscle development as biological men have (obviously) unfair advantages.
Meanwhile, we’ve spotted the other women competing against Hubbard…
Tyler Durden
Mon, 07/19/2021 – 02:45 - 'Havana Syndrome' Strikes U.S. Diplomats In Vienna
‘Havana Syndrome’ Strikes U.S. Diplomats In Vienna
Authored by Rick Moran via PJMedia.com,
The New Yorker reported on Friday that State Department and intelligence officials were probing a recent spate of mysterious illnesses that have struck U.S. diplomats in Vienna.
Sources say that many of the symptoms resemble those experienced by diplomats in Cuba in 2016-17. The illnesses have been investigated by intelligence agencies, the State Department, and the National Academy of Sciences with no conclusions drawn about what is causing them.
The illnesses were first reported in Havana, but other embassies in Eastern Europe have also reported outbreaks of the illness. Individual cases have been reported in Washington, D.C., and several cases were discovered in Miami.
The State Department refers to the conditions, commonly known as “The Havana Syndrome,” as “unexplained health incidents (UHI).”
“In coordination with our partners across the U.S. government, we are vigorously investigating reports of possible unexplained health incidents among the U.S. Embassy Vienna community,” the State Department said.
“Any employees who reported a possible UHI received immediate and appropriate attention and care.”
Some in the intelligence community believe the UHIs are the result of some kind of directed energy weapon. There are some scientists who doubt whether the UHIs are the result of a “weapon” of any kind, and suggest that the symptoms can be explained as some kind of “mass psychogenic illness” in which people learning of others with symptoms begin to feel sick themselves.
A State Department report on “Havana Syndrome” obtained by CNN through a Freedom of Information Act request “concludes that the US government’s response and investigation into the so-called Havana Syndrome may have been botched from the beginning” and was characterized by “chaos” and disorganization.
The Vienna-based employees have reported suffering from mysterious symptoms since President Joe Biden was inaugurated, according to the officials. The Vienna cases were first reported Friday by The New Yorker magazine.
Vienna has for centuries been a center for espionage and diplomacy and was a hub for clandestine spy-versus-spy activity during the Cold War. The city is currently the site of indirect talks between Iran and the United States over salvaging the nuclear deal that was negotiated there in 2015.
Those talks are now in hiatus and it was not immediately clear if any members of the U.S. negotiating team were among those suffering from injuries.
Try as they might, investigators have been unable to duplicate the symptoms of UHI using microwaves or any other energy source. In fact, there is nothing in the scientific literature that suggests anything similar happening anywhere.
If this is, indeed, an attack, it’s an act of war. But even if scientists figure out exactly what’s causing the symptoms, who or what is responsible may never be revealed.
How close would the “weapon” have to be to cause the symptoms? How much energy would have to be released? Would such a weapon be mobile enough to carry in a car or truck? What parts of the brain are being “attacked”? That’s what leads some scientists to believe in the mass psychogenic illness theory.
Some of the symptoms apparently linger for months. Most have reported headaches, dizziness, and symptoms consistent with concussions. Some have reported hearing a loud noise before the sudden onset of symptoms.
Whatever is causing Havana Syndrome, American diplomats appear to be walking around in some countries with bullseye on their backs.
Tyler Durden
Mon, 07/19/2021 – 02:00 - Russiagate: Luke Harding's Hard Sell
Russiagate: Luke Harding’s Hard Sell
Authored by Joe Lauria via ConsortiumNews.com,
The only interests this leak serves – if it was a leak – are those of Harding and U.S. intelligence, who were hung out to dry by the collapse of the Russiagate narrative…
Luke Harding of The Guardian on Thursday came out with a new story that looks at first glance like an attempt to rescue the Russiagate story and the reputations of Harding and U.S. intelligence.
The headline reads, “Kremlin papers appear to show Putin’s plot to put Trump in White House” with the subhead: “Exclusive: Documents suggest Russia launched secret multi-agency effort to interfere in US democracy.”
Harding’s report says that during a Jan. 22, 2016 closed session of the Russian national security council, President Vladimir Putin ordered Russian spies to back a “mentally unstable” Donald Trump for the White House to “help secure Moscow’s strategic objectives, among them ‘social turmoil’ in the US.”
“Russia’s three spy agencies were ordered to find practical ways to support Trump, in a decree appearing to bear Putin’s signature,” Harding writes. “A report prepared by Putin’s expert department recommended Moscow use ‘all possible force’ to ensure a Trump victory.”
The article, starting with the headline, is littered with the use of qualifiers such as “appears,” “suggests,” “apparent,” and “seems.” Such qualifiers tell the reader that even the newspaper is not sure whether to believe its own story.
Quoting from what he says is an authentic document marked “secret,” Harding writes that there is “apparent confirmation” that the Kremlin had dirt on Trump it could use to blackmail him, gathered during earlier Trump “‘non-official visits to Russian Federation territory.’”
This would seem to confirm a central part of the so-called Steele dossier, which Harding hawked in his bestselling book Collusion.
Harding’s newest story though says nothing about the involvement of Trump operatives with this Kremlin plot, as that was unfounded by Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s report.
Harding also suggests that the documents that came into his possession provides evidence of a Russian hack of Democratic National Committee computers.
Harding at the Nordic Media Festival, 2018. (Thor Brødreskift / Nordiske Mediedager/ Wikimedia Commons)
He writes:
“After the meeting, according to a separate leaked document, Putin issued a decree setting up a new and secret interdepartmental commission. Its urgent task was to realise the goals set out in the ‘special part’ of document No 32-04 \ vd. …
The defence minister was instructed to coordinate the work of subdivisions and services. [Sergei] Shoigu was also responsible for collecting and systematising necessary information and for “preparing measures to act on the information environment of the object” – a command, it seems, to hack sensitive American cyber-targets identified by the SVR. …
The papers appear to set out a route map for what actually happened in 2016.
A matter of weeks after the security council meeting, GRU hackers raided the servers of the Democratic National Committee (DNC) and subsequently released thousands of private emails in an attempt to hurt Clinton’s election campaign.”
These documents would perfectly confirm the story put out by U.S. intelligence and an eager Democratic media: that Russia’s defense intelligence agency GRU hacked the DNC and Russia leaked DNC emails to damage Hillary Clinton.
Except that Shawn Henry, the head of the company CrowdStrike hired by the Democratic Party and the Clinton campaign (while keeping the FBI away) to examine the DNC servers declared under oath to the House Intelligence Committee that no evidence of a hack was discovered. “It appears it was set up to be exfiltrated, but we just don’t have the evidence that says it actually left,” Henry told the committee.
WikiLeaks, which Harding doesn’t mention, has also denied getting the DNC material from Russia that Harding says was released by Moscow. And Harding ignores the true contents of the emails.
Dmitri Peskov, Putin’s spokesman, told The Guardian the story was “great pulp fiction.”
Let’s look at the motives of the players involved in this story.
The Kremlin, Moscow. (Pavel Kazachkov/Flickr, CC BY 2.0, Wikimedia Commons)
Harding’s Motives
Henry’s denial of a hack and Mueller’s inability to prove Collusion, embarrassed Harding after he staked his reputation on his bestseller of that name. The book is essentially the story of Christopher Steele, the ex-MI6 agent, who was paid by the DNC and the Clinton campaign to come up with opposition research against Trump.
Harding, like the Democratic media establishment, mistook opposition research, a mix of fact and fiction to smear a political opponent, for an intelligence document paid for by taxpayers, presumably in the interests of protecting the country rather than a political candidate. Of course, the FBI and the CIA sold it to the media as such to undermine the other candidate.
Harding has had a major omelet on his face after the Russiagate tale was ultimately exposed as opposition research paid for by the Democrats, who elevated it to a new Pearl Harbor.
Now I will engage in qualifiers here but it seems Harding is desperate to find anything that might rescue the story and his reputation. That’s a vulnerable position to be in, easily exploited by intelligence operatives, the way he was exploited with the original story.
An earlier attempt by Harding at rescuing himself was the disastrous piece he wrote for The Guardian that Paul Manafort, briefly Trump’s 2016 campaign manager, had visited Julian Assange at the Ecuador Embassy in London. It blew up in Harding’s face though his paper has never pulled the story.
U.S. Intelligence Motives
Members of the U.S. intelligence committee were staring at possible prosecution in the investigation run by U.S. Attorney John Durham for their role in pushing the opposition research as truth, leading, among other things, to a doctored FBI report to the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court to monitor a Trump campaign worker.
The Steele dossier became the basis for other shenanigans by U.S. intelligence. Though in the end there were no indictments, the reputation of especially the FBI took a hit.
Leaking a story now that it was all true, after all, might do wonders to restore its standing among wide sections of the U.S. public who lost faith in the bureau over Russiagate.
A Kremlin Leakers’ Motives
A military parade on Red Square. May 9, 2016 Moscow. (Kremlin)
Harding writes in a cryptic way about how he got hold of these materials. He says the story is based on “what are assessed to be leaked Kremlin documents.” As they were marked “secret,” and supposedly came from Putin’s innermost circle, as Harding says, it stands to reason that few people in the Russian government would have had access to them outside of that circle.
We are being asked to believe that someone closet to Putin leaked these documents either directly to Harding or to U.S. or British intelligence who then passed it on to Harding. (Harding calling it a leak would rule out that they were obtained through a Western intelligence hack.)
It can’t be dismissed that U.S. intelligence may have an active mole inside the Kremlin. But one must ask would that mole — if he or she exists — risk their freedom by leaking documents that have absolutely no current strategic or even political significance, rather than, say, classified information about Russian troop movements and military intentions?
The only interests this leak serves — if it was a leak — are those of Harding and U.S. intelligence, who were hung out to dry by the collapse of the Russiagate narrative.
Evaluating the Story
Harding is clearly reporting from Russian-language documents, snapshots of which are reproduced in The Guardian article. He writes that these documents were shown to “independent experts” who said they “appear” to be “genuine.” Harding does not reveal who these experts are.
To evaluate the credibility of Harding’s story would require knowing how he got the documents, not the names of the person or persons who gave them to him, but the interests they represent. He is especially vague about this.
Harding writes:
“Western intelligence agencies are understood to have been aware of the documents for some months and to have carefully examined them. The papers, seen by the Guardian, seem to represent a serious and highly unusual leak from within the Kremlin.”
If they were handed to Harding by U.S. or British intelligence who had them for months, the idea that these are the products of spycraft cannot be dismissed. Crafting what looks like classified evidence from an adversarial power and then leaking it to friendly press has long been in the arsenal of intelligence agencies around the world.
It is unlikely we will ever know how Harding came into possession of these documents or who the experts are who said they “seem” genuine.
But the purpose of this piece may have already been achieved.
Tyler Durden
Sun, 07/18/2021 – 23:30 - Visualizing The Best-Selling Car In America, Every Year Since 1978
Visualizing The Best-Selling Car In America, Every Year Since 1978
Cars have been a staple of the U.S. economy almost since their inception. But, as Visual Capitalist’s Omri Wallach notes, as vehicle designs have evolved over time, and consumer tastes alongside them, the best-selling car in America has changed as well.
Finding the right mix of affordability, style, and features has meant that different manufacturers have been in the market lead during different decades.
This infographic from Alan’s Factory Outlet shows the most-purchased cars in the U.S. since 1978, not including trucks and SUVs.
What Is The Best-Selling Car in America By Year?
From 1978 to 2020, over 348 million cars were sold in the U.S., or an average of 8.1 million cars per year. Car sales were especially strong during times of high oil prices, such as following the 1979 oil crisis, as consumers avoided less fuel-efficient trucks and SUVs.
And throughout most of the 20th century, car sales in the U.S. were led by American manufacturers.
From 1978 to 1988, two of the “Big Three” Detroit-based auto manufacturers had the best-selling cars in the country. GM had two models of the Oldsmobile Cutlass and two different Chevrolets in the top spot, while Ford was able to compete with the compact Ford Escort.
But since the late 1980s, Japanese manufacturers started to take over in affordability, reliability, and overall sales.
After Honda and Ford fought closely for the most popular cars with the Accord and the Taurus, Toyota grabbed the crown with the ultra-popular Toyota Camry.
Toyota, which was the world’s largest automaker by market cap for a majority of the last 30 years, also has the world’s best-selling car of all-time with another popular model, the Toyota Corolla.
The company’s cars have resonated with consumers due to reliability, safety, and efficiency in spite of being mass-produced and affordable. High ownership satisfaction and low incidence rates also led Camrys to have high resale value.
Runner Ups and Best-Selling Trucks and SUVs
Just behind Toyota for many years was another Japanese automaker, Honda. The company’s Accord and Civic models consistently ranked just behind the Toyota Camry in U.S. sales throughout most of the 2000s.
Despite most of the world preferring cars for vehicle purchases, the U.S. has become light truck and SUV dominant since the 2000s.
The proliferation of light trucks also meant that Toyota, one of the world’s leading hybrid sellers, saw the crossover/SUV Toyota RAV4 Hybrid beat the well-known Prius consistently in U.S. sales.
Meanwhile, electric car sales in the U.S. are still far behind, climbing up to 1.8% of sales in 2020 from 1.4% the year before. Compared to countries like Norway where electric cars make up the majority of vehicle sales, the U.S. will likely be dominated by light-trucks for years to come.
Tyler Durden
Sun, 07/18/2021 – 23:00 - "World's Most Bearish Hedge Fund" Goes Short Tech
“World’s Most Bearish Hedge Fund” Goes Short Tech
The world’s financial graveyards are covered with the career tombstones of those who, over the past decade, have called the end to a tech bubble that not only has yet to pop but has culminated with just 5 tech names – the FAAMGs – comprising 23% of the S&P’s market cap vastly surpassing the lofty dot com days, with a combined valuation of over $7 trillion.
Among those who were steamrolled by the tech juggernaut is Ned David Research, traditionally known for its accurate market timing calls if certainly not this time: two months ago it slapped a sell reco on tech right before it ripped the bears’ faces off and embarked on a 14% rally. And then, just as the FAAMGs fell out of bed late last week, the firm’s strategists pulled a Gartman, and abandoned their underweight stance, expecting that the rotation out of reflation and into growth, coupled with a plunge in yields, will lead to more tech buying when we may well be facing the first market rout since March considering last week’s coordinate selloff.
“The rapidly evolving COVID landscape, coupled with the Fed’s more hawkish tone at the June FOMC meeting” have “gone against cyclical Value sectors that tend to be positively correlated to interest rates and the yield curve,” said Ned Davis strategist Rob Anderson. “The progression of the virus will likely influence whether Growth or Value sectors gain the upper hand in the second half.”
After trailing small-cap stocks which were the biggest beneficiaries of economic reopening, the Russell 100 Index erased its underperformance last Wednesday. The momentum continued this week, when small caps plunged 3.9%, while the Nasdaq 100 Index fell 0.2% and tech stocks in the S&P 500 added 0.4%.
As Bloomberg further notes, halfway into July, small caps trail their megacap peers by the most since March 2020, adding anxiety that a once-hot reflation trade is sputtering, with the delta variant of coronavirus quickly spreading and economic indicators moderating after a breakneck advance.
By abandonging its bearish bias, Ned Davis joins a host of Wall Street strategists who are currently bullish on tech including Goldman Sachs, Citigroup, UBS, Oppenheimer and JPMorgan, all of whom are overweight the sector while Deutsche Bank, Morgan Stanley, BMO, Bank of America and BTIG strategists are neutral on information technology.
Yet as institutional strategists cover their bearish bets at the first sign of a substantial uptick, the mega bears crawl out of the woodwork, and in the world of bears (those that manage money) none is more familiar to our readers than Russell Clark, formerly of Horseman – which had earned the reputation of the world’s most bearish hedge fund on these pages – and currently of Russell Clark Investment Management, who in his latest letter tells his patient investors that his fund, which is now down to just $296MM in AUM, had its worst month of the year in June when it dropped 5.37%…
… and may be en route to much more painful months if indeed the tech rally is just getting restarted. Why? Because as Clark says, “I am thinking of going net short in tech.” The only question is where.
This is how Clark lays out the investment thesis:
First of all, I now understand why tech stocks, even loss-making ones, have been able to move such excessive valuations. Amazon showed that loss making companies capturing the consumer can build a monopoly position. Facebook shows even when firms abuse a monopoly position, the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) can only fine USD 5bn, and not force a breakup. A Supreme Court ruling in 2019 (Ohio v American Express) showed that the court only considers a company to be a monopoly if it raises prices to both its suppliers and its customers. In American Express’ case, it could charge high fees to retailers, but unless it could be proven that consumers suffered, the Supreme Court would do nothing to stop the abuse of market power. The potential implications of cases like these is that investors could find potential consumer facing monopolies, and force excessive valuations to make both capital raising and M&A easy (making it more likely companies are the dominant player). This has a knock-on effect of making M&A targets more attractive. You can see this effect in stocks like Tesla, Adobe, Slack, and it seems to be present in every 20 times sales loss making company I can find.
The question then, is “why should this end?”
Well, as mentioned last month, the US House of Representatives are keen to regulate big tech. But as mentioned above, the Supreme Court is still supportive of monopolies. So much so its dismissal of a lawsuit by the FTC against Facebook saw Facebook shares rally 5%. China has recently enacted very similar regulations against tech companies. And of course, in China government is king, with no Supreme Court to get in the way. The regulations, basically stop the two big tech oligopolies from favouring subsidiaries, has had a dramatic effect. Vipshop, TAL Education, Oriental Education and KE Holdings have all seen share prices break away from the Nasdaq, some falling 50% or more.
Taking this argument to its absurd extreme, Clark concludes that while Facebook, Amazon, Netflix and Facebook (FANG) stocks continue to rise, “it is beginning to look more difficult to invest in loss making stocks in the hope they can become a monopolist or be bought by a monopolist. The combination of the current US administration and the Chinese authoritarian government will ensure that every transaction will be scrutinised, and competition will be encouraged. For venture capital, this could be a disaster, particularly for those invested in Chinese start-ups. I am encouraged to take this view by the poor performance of Softbank, which has also diverged radically from the Nasdaq. The Softbank Vision Fund is the largest VC fund in the world, by quite a margin.”
Going even further, Clark picks up on a point BofA CIO Michael Hartnett has been making for the past year, and claims that as China is attacking income inequality, he believes that Beijing is leading the world here, and is not an outlier:
Its policies are set to reduce liquidity in markets, keep a strong currency, whilst raising wages, and promote competition. These policies now seem to be taking hold, which means we are adjusting the fund’s portfolio.
In practical terms, this means that Clark has started to short Chinese tech, “as many of these companies seem to have no business strategy for making money” and he is also looking at loss making tech companies in the West whose exit strategy was M&A and shorting them as he believes that they are set to underperform.
At the same time, Clark will pair trade his growing tech short with agricultural related longs, “but we are going to hedge with liquidity driven assets that are being affected by Chinese monetary policy, namely crypto and gold.”
As a result, Clark concludes that he expects his fund – which has been net short for much of the past decade before briefly turning bullish around the time of the covid crisis helping its 14.3% return in 2020…
… once again “being mildly net short either this month or next month” as he is “long farmers, and short monopolists and proto monopolists.”
While we wish Clark all the best, we would like to remind him that by going short tech he is not only fighting the central banks whose primary goal – above all else – is to prop up the wealth effect and nowhere do they have as much leverage as with the 5 companies which account for more than 20% of total market cap, but will also now be fighting the retail/reddit crowd which hones in like a heatseeker missile on any fund net short and then squeezes its biggest short holdings until the fund taps out (see Melvin). So while we wish Clark all the best – as we have for so many years – we can’t help but wonder if the fund’s AUM one year from now won’t be in the double (or fewer) digits, if it’s still around at all…
Tyler Durden
Sun, 07/18/2021 – 22:30 - French Face 6 Months In Jail For Entering A Bar Or Restaurant Without A COVID Pass
French Face 6 Months In Jail For Entering A Bar Or Restaurant Without A COVID Pass
Authored by Paul Joseph Watson via Summit News,
People in France who enter a bar or restaurant without a COVID pass face 6 months in jail, while business owners who fail to check their status face a 1 year prison sentence and a €45,000 fine.
Yes, really.
The punishments are part of a draconian effort by the French government to force citizens to get the coronavirus jab amidst multiple unruly protests across numerous major cities.
President Emmanuel Macron announced earlier this week that those unable to prove they’re vaccinated or a negative COVID test (at their own cost) will be banned from using public transport, entering a cinema, shopping mall, bar, cafe, restaurant and other venues from August 1st.
“People unable to present a valid health pass risk up to six months in prison and a fine of up to €10,000 (£8,500), according to the draft text of the law, while owners of “establishments welcoming the public” who fail to check patrons’ passes could go to jail for a year and be hit with a €45,000 fine,” reports the Guardian.
There will soon prison sentences attached to the new French law for vaccine passports.
If you are caught in a restaurant without proof of vaccination, you face up to six months in jail.
The restaurant owner faces up to a year for hosting you.
Does that sound extreme?
— Dr. David Samadi (@drdavidsamadi) July 16, 2021
https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js
The sanctions represent the most authoritarian move to force vaccine compliance in the west, and probably outstrip a lot of actual dictatorships in other parts of the world.
The Guardian rather euphemistically describes it as a “big stick approach,” which would be true if that ‘big stick’ were an electric cattle prod the size of the One World Trade Center building in New York.
The government had to withdraw a similar law back in December following numerous riots, but merely re-introduced the same legislation with even tougher punishments for dissenters.
As we previously highlighted, police in Paris used tear gas to disperse demonstrators protesting against the measures in scenes that unfolded in several other major cities throughout the country.
We are now entering the phase of the pandemic where it’s becoming clear that those who refuse to take the vaccine will remain under the most onerous lockdown measures yet in perpetuity.
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Tyler Durden
Sun, 07/18/2021 – 22:11 - Indiana To Build Wireless In-Motion Charging For Electric Vehicles On Highway
Indiana To Build Wireless In-Motion Charging For Electric Vehicles On Highway
The Indiana Department of Transportation (INDOT) has begun the first phase of a project to transform a segment of the state’s highway into wireless charging pavement for electric vehicles, according to local news WRTV.
INDOT partnered with Advancing Sustainability through Power Infrastructure for Road Electrification (ASPIRE) Initiative, in a three-phase project that will use magnetizable concrete, developed by a German startup Magment GmbH, to allow seamless wireless charging of electric vehicles while in motion.
“We’re quite eager to see this first of its kind project unfold in Indiana,” David Christensen, the ASPIRE Innovation Director, said. “This partnership that includes Magment, INDOT, Purdue University, and the larger ASPIRE consortium has great promise to really move the needle on technology development, which will, in turn, enable more positive impacts from deeper electric vehicle adoption.”
The project will be conducted in three phases. The first and second will be pavement testing at Purdue University’s West Lafayette campus. The third phase will be INDOT installing a quarter-mile-long wireless charging pavement on a stretch of highway in the state.
“Indiana is known as the Crossroads of America and we’re committed to fortifying our position as a transportation leader by innovating to support the emerging vehicle technology,” Gov. Eric Holcomb said. “This partnership to develop wireless charging technology for highways sends a strong signal that Indiana is on the leading edge of delivering the infrastructure needed to support the adoption of electric vehicles.”
Projects like these are set to spring up across the country as funding for green projects could flourish once Washington passes an infrastructure program.
Tyler Durden
Sun, 07/18/2021 – 22:00 - Ending Anonymity: Why The WEF's Partnership Against Cybercrime Threatens The Future Of Privacy
Ending Anonymity: Why The WEF’s Partnership Against Cybercrime Threatens The Future Of Privacy
Authored by Whitney Webb via TheLastAmericanVagabond.com,
With many focusing on the recent Cyber Polygon exercise, less attention has been paid to the World Economic Forum’s real ambitions in cybersecurity – to create a global organization aimed at gutting even the possibility of anonymity online. With the governments of the US, UK and Israel on board, along with some of the world’s most powerful corporations, it is important to pay attention to their endgame, not just the simulations.
Amid a series of warnings and simulations in the past year regarding a massive cyber attack that could soon bring down the global financial system, the “information sharing group” of the largest banks and private financial organizations in the United States warned earlier this year that banks “will encounter growing danger” from “converging” nation-state and criminal hackers over the course of 2021 and in the years that follow.
The organization, called the Financial Services Information Sharing and Analysis Center (FS-ISAC), made the claim in its 2021 “Navigating Cyber” report, which assesses the events of 2020 and provides a forecast for the current year. That forecast, which casts a devastating cyber attack on the financial system through third parties as practically inevitable, also makes the case for a “global fincyber [financial-cyber] utility” as the main solution to the catastrophic scenarios it predicts.
Perhaps unsurprisingly, an organization close to top FS-ISAC members has recently been involved in laying the groundwork for that very “global fincyber utility” — the World Economic Forum, which recently produced the model for such a utility through its Partnership against Cybercrime (WEF-PAC) project. Not only are top individuals at FS-ISAC involved in WEF cybersecurity projects like Cyber Polygon, but FS-ISAC’s CEO was also an adviser to the WEF-Carnegie Endowment for International Peace report that warned that the global financial system was increasingly vulnerable to cyber attacks and was the subject of the first article in this 2-part series.
Another article, published earlier this year at Unlimited Hangout, also explored the WEF’s Cyber Polygon 2020 simulation of a cyber attack targeting the global financial system. Another iteration of Cyber Polygon is due to take place tomorrow July 9th and will focus on simulating a supply chain cyber attack.
A major theme in these efforts has not only been an emphasis on global cooperation, but also a merging of private banks and/or corporations with the State, specifically intelligence and law enforcement agencies. In addition, many of the banks, institutions and individuals involved in the creation of these reports and simulations are either actively involved in WEF-related efforts to usher in a new global economic model of “stakeholder capitalism” or are seeking to imminently introduce, or are actively developing, central bank-backed digital currencies, or CBDCs.
In addition, and as mentioned in the first article in this series, a cyber attack like those described in these reports and simulations would also provide the perfect scenario for dismantling the current failing financial system, as it would absolve central banks and corrupt financial institutions of any responsibility. The convergence of several concerning factors in the financial world, including the end of LIBOR at the end of year and the imminent hyperinflation of globally important currencies, suggests that the time is ripe for an event that would not only allow the global economy to “reset”, but also absolve the fundamentally corrupt financial institutions around the world from any wrongdoing. Instead, faceless hackers can be blamed and, given recent precedents in the US and elsewhere, any group or nation state can be blamed with minimal evidence as politically convenient.
This report will closely examine both FS-ISAC’s recent predictions and the WEF Partnership against Cybercrime, specifically the WEF-PAC’s efforts to position itself as the cybersecurity alliance of choice if and when such a catastrophic cyber attack cripples the current financial system.
Of particular interest is the call by both FS-ISAC and the WEF Partnership against Cybercrime to specifically target cryptocurrencies, particularly those that favor transactional anonymity, as well as the infrastructure on which those cryptocurrencies run. Though framed as a way to combat “cybercrime”, it is obvious that cryptocurrencies are to be unwanted competitors for the soon-to-be-launched central bank digital currencies.
In addition, as this report will show, there is a related push by WEF partners to “tackle cybercrime” that seeks to end privacy and the potential for anonymity on the internet in general, by linking government-issued IDs to internet access. Such a policy would allow governments to surveil every piece of online content accessed as well as every post or comment authored by each citizen, supposedly to ensure that no citizen can engage in “criminal” activity online.
Notably, the WEF Partnership against Cybercrime employs a very broad definition of what constitutes a “cybercriminal” as they apply this label readily to those who post or host content deemed to be “disinformation” that represents a threat to “democratic” governments. The WEF’s interest in criminalizing and censoring online content has been made evident by its recent creation of a new Global Coalition for Digital Safety to facilitate the increased regulation of online speech by both the public and private sectors.
FS-ISAC, its influence and its doomsday “predictions” for 2021
FS-ISAC officially exists to “help ensure the resilience and continuity of the global financial services infrastructure and individual firms against acts that could significantly impact the sector’s ability to provide services critical to the orderly function of the global economy.” In other words, FS-ISAC allows the private financial services industry to decide on and coordinate sector-wide responses regarding how financial services are provided during and after a given crisis, including a cyber attack. It was tellingly created in 1999, the same year that the Glass-Steagall Act, which regulated banks after the onset of the Great Depression, was repealed.
Though FS-ISAC’s members are not publicly listed on the group’s website, they do acknowledge that their membership includes some of the world’s largest banks, Fintech companies, insurance firms and payment processors. On their board of directors, the companies and organizations represented include CitiGroup, Bank of America, Wells Fargo and Morgan Stanley, among others, strongly suggesting that FS-ISAC is largely a Wall Street-dominated entity. SWIFT, the society that manages inter-bank communication and dominates it globally, is also represented on FS-ISAC’s board. Collectively, FS-ISAC members represent $35 trillion in assets under management in more than 70 countries.
FS-ISAC also has ties to the World Economic Forum due to the direct involvement of its then-CEO Steve Silberstein in the WEF-Carnegie initiative and FS-ISAC’s participation in the initiative’s “stakeholder engagements.” There is also the fact that some prominent FS-ISAC members, like Bank of America and SWIFT, are also members of the WEF’s Centre for Cybersecurity, which houses the WEF Partnership against Cybercrime project.
At the individual level, the founding director of FS-ISAC, Charles Blauner, is now an agenda contributor to the WEF who previously held top posts at JP Morgan, Deutsche Bank and CitiGroup. He currently is a partner and CISO-in-residence of Team8, a controversial start-up incubator that operates as a front for Israeli military intelligence in tech-related ventures that is part of the WEF Partnership against Cybersecurity. Team8’s CEO and co-founder and the former commander of Israeli intelligence outfit Unit 8200, Nadav Zafrir, has contributed to WEF Centre for Cybersecurity policy documents and WEF panels on the “Great Reset”.
In addition, current FS-ISAC board member Laura Deaner, CISO of Northwestern Mutual, served as the co-chair for the WEF’s Global Futures Council on Cybersecurity. Teresa Walsh, the current global head of intelligence for FS-ISAC, will be a speaker at the WEF’s Cyber Polygon 2021 regarding how to develop an international response to ransomware attacks. Walsh previously worked as an intelligence analyst for Citibank, JP Morgan Chase and the US Navy.
The FS-ISAC’s recent report is worth looking at in detail for several reasons, with the main one being the sheer power and influence that its members, both known and unknown, hold over the current fiat-based financial system. The full report is exclusive to FS-ISAC members, but a “thematic summary” is publicly available.
The FS-ISAC’s recent report on “Navigating Cyber” in 2021 is “based on the contributions of our members and the resulting trend analysis by FS-ISAC’s Global Intelligence Office (GIO)” and includes several “predictions” for the current calendar year. The group’s GIO, led by Teresa Walsh, soon-to-be speaker at Cyber Polygon 2021, also “coordinates with other cybersecurity organizations, companies and agencies around the world” in addition to its intelligence gathering from FS-ISAC members.
At the beginning of 2020, when the COVID-19 crisis resulted in an overt push towards digitization, FS-ISAC launched a “new secure chat and intelligence sharing platform” that “provided a new way for members to discuss threats and security trends.” It is fair to assume that the private discussions on this platform directly informed this report. According to the recent FS-ISAC report, the main trends and threats discussed by its members through this service over the past year were “third party risks”, such as the risk presented by major hacks of third party service providers, like the SolarWinds hack, and “geopolitical tensions.”
The report contains several “predictions for 2021 and beyond.” The first of these predictions is that adversarial nation-states will team up with “the cybercriminal underworld” in order to “obfuscate their activity and complication attribution.” FS-ISAC does not provide evidence of this having happened, but supporting this claim makes it easier to blame state governments for the activities of cybercriminals when politically convenient without concrete evidence. This has happened on several occasions with recent high-profile hacks, most recently with SolarWinds. As noted in previous reporting, prominent companies that contract for the US government and military, like Microsoft, and intelligence-linked cybersecurity companies, are often the sole sources for such narratives in the past and, in those cases, do not provide evidence, instead qualifying such assertions as “likely” or probable.” Even mainstream outlets reporting on FS-ISAC’s “predictions” noted that “FS-ISAC did not point to specific examples of spies relying on such tradecraft in the past,” openly suggesting that there is little factual basis to support this claim.
Other predictions focus on how third party service providers, such as SolarWinds and the more recently targeted Kaseya, will dominate, affecting potentially many thousands of companies across multiple sectors at once. However, the SolarWinds hack was not properly investigated, merely labeled by US intelligence as having “likely” ties to “Russian” state-linked actors despite no publicly available evidence to support that claim. Instead, the SolarWinds hack appears to have been related to its acquisition of an Israeli company funded by intelligence-linked firms, as discussed in this report from earlier this year. SolarWinds acquired the company, called Samanage, and integrated its software fully into its platform around the same time that the backdoor used to execute the hack was placed into the SolarWinds platform that was later compromised.
FS-ISAC also predicts that attacks will cross borders, continents, and verticals, with increasing speed. More specifically, it states that the cyber pandemic will begin with cyber criminals that “test attacks in one country and quickly scale up to multiple targets in other parts of the world.” FS-ISAC argues that it is therefore “critical to have a global view on cyber threats facing the sector in order to prepare and defend against them.” Since FS-ISAC made this prediction, cyber attacks and especially ransomware have been occurring throughout the world and targeting different sectors at a much more rapid pace than has ever been seen before. For instance, following the Colonial Pipeline hack in early May, Japan, New Zealand, and Ireland all experienced major cyber attacks, followed by the JBS hack on June 1. The hack of Kaseya, believed by some to be just as consequential and damaging as SolarWinds, took place about a month later on July 2, affecting thousands of companies around the world.
The final, and perhaps the most important, of these predictions is that “economic drivers towards cybercrime will increase.” FS-ISAC claims that the current economic situation created by COVID-related lockdowns will “make cybercrime an ever more attractive alternative,” noting immediately afterwards that “dramatic increases in cryptocurrency valuation may drive threat actors to conduct campaigns capitalising on this market, including extortion campaigns against financial institutions and their customers.”
In other words, FS-ISAC views the increase in the value of cryptocurrency as a direct driver of cybercrime, implying that the value of cryptocurrency must be dealt with to reduce such criminal activities. However, the data does not fit these assertions as the use of cryptocurrency by cybercriminals is low and getting lower. For instance, one recent study found that only 0.34% of cryptocurrency transactions in 2020 were tied to criminal activity, down from 2% the year prior. Though the decrease may be due to a jump in cryptocurrency adoption, the overall percentage of crime-linked crypto transactions is incredibly low, a fact obviously known to FS-ISAC and its members.
However, cryptocurrency does present a threat to the plans by FS-ISAC members and its partners to begin producing digital currencies controlled either by approved private entities (like Russia’s Sbercoin) or central banks themselves (like China’s digital yuan). The success of that project depends on neutering the competition, which is likely why FS-ISAC subtitled its 2021 report as “the case for a global fincyber utility,” with such a utility framed as necessary to defend the financial services industry against cyber threats.
The WEF’s Partnership Against Cybercrime
Conveniently for FS-ISAC, there is already a project that hopes to soon become this very global fincyber utility – the WEF Partnership Against Cybercrime (WEF-PAC). Partners in WEF-PAC include some of the world’s largest banks and financial institutions, such as Bank of America, Banco Santander, Sberbank, UBS, Credit Suisse and the World Bank, as well as major payment processors such as Mastercard and PayPal. Also very significant is the presence of all of the “Big Four” global accounting firms: Deloitte, Ernst & Young, KPMG and PricewaterhouseCoopers.
Think tanks/non-profits, including the Council of Europe, Third Way and the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace as well as the WEF itself, are also among its members as are several national government agencies, like the US Department of Justice, FBI and Secret Service, the UK’s National Crime Agency and Israel’s National Cyber Directorate. International and regional law enforcement agencies, such as INTERPOL and EUROPOL, both of which are repeat participants in the WEF’s Cyber Polygon, are also involved. Silicon Valley is also well represented with the presence of Amazon, Microsoft, and Cisco, all three of which are also major US military and intelligence contractors. Cybersecurity companies founded by alumni and former commanders of Israeli intelligence services, such as Palo Alto Networks, Team8 and Check Point, are also prominent members.
The Israeli intelligence angle is especially important when examining WEF-PAC, as one of its architects and the WEF’s current Head of Strategy for Cybersecurity is Tal Goldstein, though his biography on the WEF website seems to claim that he is Head of Strategy for the WEF as a whole. Goldstein is a veteran of Israeli military intelligence, having been recruited through Israel’s Talpiot program, which feeds high IQ teenagers in Israel into the upper echelons of elite Israeli military intelligence units with a focus on technology. It is sometimes referred to as the IDF’s “MENSA” and was originally created by notorious Israeli spymaster Rafi Eitan. Eitan is best known as Jonathan Pollard’s handler and the mastermind behind the PROMIS software scandal, the most infamous Israeli intelligence operation conducted against Israel’s supposed “ally”, the United States.
Due to its focus on technological ability, many Talpiot recruits subsequently serve in Israel’s Unit 8200, the signals intelligence unit of Israeli military intelligence that is often described as equivalent to the US’ NSA or the UK’s GCHQ, before moving into the private tech sector, including major Silicon Valley companies. Other Talpiot-Unit 8200 figures of note are one of the co-founders of Check Point, Marius Nacht, and Assaf Rappaport, who designed major aspects of Microsoft’s cloud services and later managed that division. Rappaport later came to manage much of Microsoft’s research and development until his abrupt departure early last year.
In addition to his past as a Talpiot recruit and 8 years in Israeli military intelligence, the WEF’s Tal Goldstein had played a key role in establishing Israel’s National Cyber Bureau, now part of Israel’s National Cyber Directorate, now a WEF-PAC partner. The National Cyber Bureau was established in 2013 with the explicit purpose “to build and maintain the State of Israel’s national strength as an international leader in the field” of cybersecurity. According to Goldstein’s WEF biography, Goldstein led the formation of Israel’s entire national cybersecurity strategy with a focus on technology, international cooperation, and economic growth.
Goldstein was thus also one of the key architects of the Israeli cybersecurity policy shift which took place in 2012, whereby intelligence operations formerly conducted “in house” by Mossad, Unit 8200 and other Israeli intelligence agencies would instead be conducted through private companies that act as fronts for those intelligence agencies. One admitted example of such a front company is Black Cube, which was created by the Mossad to act explicitly as its “private sector” branch. In 2019, Israeli officials involved in drafting and executing that policy openly yet anonymously admitted to the policy’s existence in Israeli media reports. One of the supposed goals of the policy was to prevent countries like the US from ever boycotting Israel in any meaningful way for violations of human rights and international law by seeding prominent multinational tech companies, such as those based in Silicon Valley, with Israeli intelligence front companies. This effort was directly facilitated by American billionaire Paul Singer, who set up Start Up Nation Central with Benjamin Netanyahu’s main economic adviser and a top AIPAC official in 2012 to facilitate the incorporation of Israeli start-ups into American companies.
Goldstein’s selection by the WEF as head of strategy for its cybersecurity efforts suggests that Israeli intelligence agencies, as well as Israeli military agencies focused on cybersecurity, will likely play an outsized role in WEF-PAC’s efforts, particularly its ambition to create a new global governance structure for the internet. In addition, Goldstein’s past in developing a policy whereby private companies acted as conduits for intelligence operations is of obvious concern given the WEF’s interest in simulating and promoting an imminent “cyber pandemic” in the wake of the COVID crisis. Given that the WEF had simulated a scenario much like COVID prior to its onset through Event 201, having someone like Goldstein as the WEF’s head of strategy for all things cyber ahead of an alleged “cyber pandemic” is cause for concern.
A Global Threat to Justify a Global “Solution”
Last November, around the same time the WEF-Carnegie report was released, the WEF-PAC produced its own “insight report” aimed at “shaping the future of cybersecurity and digital trust.” Chiefly written by the WEF’s Tal Goldstein alongside executives from Microsoft, the Cyber Threat Alliance, and Fortinet, the report offers “a first step towards establishing a global architecture for cooperation” as part of a global “paradigm shift” in how cybercrime is addressed.
The foreword was authored by Jürgen Stock, the Secretary-General of INTERPOL, who had participated in last year’s Cyber Polygon exercise and will also participate in this year’s Cyber Polygon as well. Stock claims in the report that “a public-private partnership against cybercrime is the only way to gain an edge over cybercriminals” (emphasis added). Not unlike the WEF-Carnegie report, Stock asserts that only by ensuring that large corporations work hand in glove with law enforcement agencies “can we effectively respond to the cybercrime threat.”
The report first seeks to define the threat and focuses specifically on the alleged connection between cryptocurrencies, privacy enhancing technology, and cybercrime. It asserts that “cybercriminals abuse encryption, cryptocurrencies, anonymity services and other technologies”, even though their use is hardly exclusive to criminals. The report then states that, in addition to financially motivated cybercriminals, cybercriminals also include those who use those technologies to “uphold terrorism” and “spread disinformation to destabilize governments and democracies”.
While the majority of the report’s discussion on the cybercrime threat focuses on ransomware, the WEF-PAC’s inclusion of “disinformation” highlights the fact that the WEF and their partners view cybercriminals through a much broader lens. This, of course, also means that the methods to combat cybercrime contained within the report could be used to target those who “spread disinformation”, not just ransomware and related attacks, meaning that such “disinformation” spreaders could see their use of cryptocurrency, encryption, etc. restricted by the rules and regulations WEF-PAC seeks to promote. However, the report promotes the use of privacy-enhancing technologies for WEF-PAC members, a clear double standard that reveals that this group sees privacy as something for the powerful and not for the general public.
This broad definition of “cybercriminal” conveniently dovetails with the Biden administration’s recent “domestic terror” strategy, which similarly has a very broad definition of who is a “domestic terrorist.” The Biden administration’s strategy is also not exclusive to the US, but a multinational framework that is poised to be used to censor and criminalize critics of the WEF stakeholder capitalism model as well as those deemed to hold “anti-government” and “anti-authority” viewpoints.
The WEF-PAC report, which was published several months before the US strategy, has other parallels with the new Biden administration policy, such as its call to crack down on the use of anonymity software by those deemed “cybercriminals” and calling for “international information sharing and cross-border operational cooperation,” even if that cooperation is “not always aligned with existing legislative and operational frameworks.” In addition, the Biden administration’s strategy concludes by noting that it is part of a broader US government effort to “restore faith” in public institutions. Similarly, the WEF-PAC report frames combatting all types of activities they define as cybercrime necessary to improving “digital trust”, the lack of which is “greatly undermining the benefits of cyberspace and hindering international cyber stability efforts.”
In discussing “solutions”, the WEF-PAC calls for the global targeting of “infrastructures and assets” deemed to facilitate cybercrime, including those which enable ransomware “revenue streams”, i.e. privacy-minded cryptocurrencies, and enable “the promotion of illegal sites and the hosting of criminal content.” In another section, it discusses seizing websites of “cybercriminals” as an attractive possibility. Given that this document includes online “disinformation” as cybercrime, this could potentially see independent media websites and the infrastructure that allows them to operate (i.e. video sharing platforms that do not censor, etc.) emerge as targets.
The report continues, stating that “in order to reduce the global impact of cybercrime and to systematically restrain cybercriminals, cybercrime must be confronted at its source by raising the cost of conducting cybercrimes, cutting the activities’ profitability and deterring criminals by increasing the direct risk they face.” It then argues, unsurprisingly, that because the cybercrime threat is global in scope, it’s “solution must also be a globally coordinated effort” and says the main way to achieve this involves “harnessing the private sector to work side by side with law enforcement officials.” This is very similar to the conclusions of the WEF-Carnegie report, released around the same time as the WEF-PAC report, which called for private banks to work alongside law enforcement and intelligence agencies as well as their regulators to “protect” the global financial system from cybercriminals.
The Framework for a Global Cyber Utility
This global coordination, per the WEF-PAC, should be based around a new global system uniting law enforcement agencies from around the world with cybersecurity companies, large corporations such as banks, and other “stakeholders.”
The stakeholders that will make up this new entity, the structure of which will be discussed shortly, is based around 6 founding principles, several of which are significant. For example, the first principle is to “embrace a shared narrative for collective action against cybercrime.” Per the report, this principle involves the stakeholders comprising this organization having “joint ownership of a shared narrative and objective for the greater good of reducing cybercrime across all industries and globally.” The second principle involves the stakeholders basing their cooperation on “long-term strategic alignment.” The fifth principle involves “ensuring value for participating in the cooperation”, with such that “value” or benefit being “aligned with the public and private sectors’ strategic interests.” In other words, the stakeholders of this global cyber utility will be united in their commitment to a common, public-facing “narrative” that serves their organizations’ “strategic interests” over the long term. The decision to emphasize the term “shared narrative” is important as a narrative is merely a story that does not necessarily need to reflect the truth of the situation, thus suggesting that stakeholders merely be consistent in their public statements so they all fit the agreed upon narrative.
Many organizations that are related to or are formally part of WEF-PAC are deeply invested in Central Bank Digital Currencies (CBDCs) as well as efforts to digitalize and thus more easily control nearly every sector of the global economy and to regulate the internet. Therefore, it is reasonable to conclude that many of these groups may look to justify regulations and other measures that will advance these agendas in which they have long-term “strategic interests” through the promotion of a “shared narrative” that is deemed most palatable to the general public, but not necessarily based in fact. Business is business, after all.
The WEF-PAC report concludes with its three-tier model for “a global architecture for public-private cooperation against cybercrime.” The top level of this system is referred to as the “global partnership”, which will build on the existing WEF-PAC and will “bring together international stakeholders to provide an overarching narrative and commitment to cooperate; foster interaction within a global network of entities that drive efforts to fight cybercrime; and facilitate strategic dialogues and processes aiming to support cooperation and overcome barriers in the long term.”
Elsewhere in the report it notes that chief among these “barriers” are existing pieces of legislation in many countries that prohibit law enforcement agencies and government regulators from essentially fusing their operations with private sector entities, particularly those they are meant to either oversee or prosecute for wrongdoing. In addition, the report states that this “global partnership” would focus on fostering “a shared narrative to increase commitment and affiliation”, amplifying “operational cooperation” between the public and private sectors and improving “stakeholders’ understanding of respective interests, needs, goals, priorities and constraints.”
The second level of this system is called “permanent nodes” in the report. These are defined as “a global network of existing organizations that strive to facilitate public-private cooperation over time.” The main candidates to occupy the role of “permanent nodes” are “non-profit organizations that are already spurring cooperation between private companies and law enforcement agencies,” specifically the Cyber Threat Alliance and the Global Cyber Alliance. Both are discussed in detail in the next section. Other potential “permanent nodes” mentioned in the report are INTERPOL, EURPOL and, of course, FS-ISAC. While the top level “global partnership” represents the “strategic level” of the organization, the “permanent node” level represents the “coordination level” as the nodes would supply necessary infrastructure, operational rules, and management, as well as “strategic dialogue” among member organizations.
The permanent nodes would directly enable the third level of the organization, which are referred to as “Threat Focus Cells” and are defined as representing the organization’s “operational level.” The WEF-PAC defines these cells as “temporary trust groups consisting of both public- and private-sector organizations and they would focus on discreet cybercrime targets or issues.” Per the report, each cell “would be led jointly by a private-sector participant, a law enforcement participant and a designated representative” of the permanent node that is sponsoring the cell.
Ideally, it states that cells should have between 10 to 15 participants and that “private-sector participants would typically represent organizations that can act to enhance cybersecurity on behalf of large constituencies, that have unique access to relevant cybersecurity information and threat intelligence, or that can contribute on an ecosystem-wide basis.” Thus, only massive corporations need apply. In addition, it states that law enforcement members of threat cells should “represent national-level agencies” or hail from “network defence or sector-specific agencies” at the national, regional or international level. Cell activities would range from “scouting a new threat” to “an infrastructure takedown” to “arrests.”
The WEF-PAC concludes by stating that “in the coming months, the Partnership against Cybercrime Working Group will continue to prepare the implementation of these concepts and widen the scope of the initiative’s efforts”, including by inviting “leading companies and law enforcement agencies” to pledge their commitment to the WEF-PAC’s efforts. It then states that “the suggested architecture could eventually evolve into a newly envisioned, independent Alliance to Combat Global Cybercrime.” “In the interim,” it continues, “the World Economic Forum and key stakeholders will work together to promote the desired processes and assess the validity of the concept.”
Meet the “Nodes”
Among the organizations that the WEF-PAC highlights as shoo-in candidates for “permanent nodes” in their proposal for a global cyber utility, there are two that stand out and are worth examining in detail. They are the Cyber Threat Alliance (CTA) and the Global Cyber Alliance (GCA), both of which are formal members of the WEF-PAC.
The Cyber Threat Alliance (CTA) was initially founded by the companies Fortinet and Palo Alto Networks in May 2014, before McAfee and Symantec joined CTA as co-founders that September. Today, Fortinet and Palo Alto Networks are charter members alongside Check Point and Cisco, while Symantec and McAfee are affiliate members alongside Verizon, Sophos and Avast, among several others. The mission of CTA is to allow for information sharing among its many partners, members, and affiliates in order to “allow the sharing of threat intelligence to better protect their customers against cyberattacks and to make the defense ecosystem more effective,” according to CTA’s current chief executive. CTA, per their website, also focuses on “advocacy” aimed at informing policy initiatives of governments around the world.
CTA is directly partnered with FS-ISAC and the WEF-PAC as well as the hawkish, US-based think tank the Aspen Institute, which is heavily funded by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation and the Carnegie Corporation. Other partners include: MITRE Engenuity, the “tech foundation for public good” of the secretive US intelligence and military contractor MITRE; the Cyber Peace Institute, a think tank seeking “peace and justice in cyberspace” that is largely funded by Microsoft and Mastercard (both of which are WEF partners and key players in ID2020); the Cybersecurity Coalition, whose members include Palo Alto Networks, Israeli intelligence front company Cybereason, intelligence and military operative Amit Yoran’s Tenable, Intel, AT&T, Google, McAfee, Microsoft, Avast and Cisco, among others; the Cybercrime Support Network, a non-profit funded by AT&T, Verizon, Google, Cisco, Comcast, Google and Microsoft, among others; and the Global Cyber Alliance, to be discussed shortly. Another key partner is the Institute for Security and Technology (IST), which has numerous ties to the US military, particularly DARPA, and the US National Security State, including the CIA’s In-Q-Tel. The CEO of the Cyber Peace Institute, Stéphane Duguin, was a participant in Cyber Polygon 2020, and the CEO of the Cybercrime Support Network, Kristin Judge, contributed to the WEF-PAC report. Some of the CTA’s partners are listed in the WEF-PAC report as other potential “permanent nodes.”
The CTA is led by Michael Daniel, who co-wrote the WEF-PAC report with Tal Goldstein. Daniel, immediately prior to joining CTA as its top executive in early 2017, was a Special Assistant to former President Obama and the Cybersecurity coordinator of Obama’s National Security Council. In that capacity, Daniel developed the foundations for the US government’s current national cybersecurity strategy, which includes partnerships with the private sector, NGOs and foreign governments. Daniel has stated that some of his cybersecurity views at CTA are drawn “in part on the wisdom of Henry Kissinger” and he has been an agenda contributor to the WEF since his time in the Obama administration. Daniel is one of Cyber Polygon 2021’s experts and will be speaking alongside Teresa Walsh of FS-ISAC and Craig Jones of INTERPOL on how to develop an international response to ransomware attacks.
The fact that CTA was founded by Fortinet and Palo Alto Networks is notable as both companies are intimately related. Fortinet’s founder Ken Xie, who sits on CTA’s board and is a founding member and advisor to the WEF’s Centre for Cybersecurity, previously founded and then ran NetScreen Technologies, where Palo Alto Network’s founder, Nir Zuk, worked after his earlier company OneSecure was acquired by NetScreen in 2002. Zuk is an alumni of Israeli intelligence’s Unit 8200 and was recruited directly out of that unit in 1994 by Check Point, a CTA charter member, WEF-PAC member and tech company founded by Unit 8200 alumni. Zuk has been open about maintaining close ties to the Israeli government while operating the California-based Palo Alto Networks. Fortinet, for its part, is known for hiring former US intelligence officials, including former top NSA officials. Fortinet is a US government and US military contractor and came under scrutiny in 2016 after a whistleblower filed suit against the company for illegally selling the US military technological products that had been disguised in order to appear as American-made, but were actually made in China. Fortinet’s Derek Manky is one of the co-authors of the WEF-PAC report.
Check Point’s co-founder and current CEO, Gil Shwed, currently sits on CTA’s board of directors and is also a WEF “Global Leader for Tomorrow”, in addition to his longstanding ties to the Israeli National Security State and his past work for Unit 8200. Another Check Point top executive, Dorit Dor, is a member of the WEF Centre for Cybersecurity and a speaker at Cyber Polygon 2021, where she will speak on protecting supply chains. Gil Shwed, over the past few weeks, has been making numerous appearances on US cable television news to warn that a “cyber pandemic” is imminent. In addition to those appearances, Shwed produced a video on June 23rd asking “Is a Cyber Pandemic Coming?”, in which Shwed answers with a resounding yes. The term “cyber pandemic” first emerged on the scene last year during WEF chairman Klaus Schwab’s opening speech at the first WEF Cyber Polygon simulation and it is notable that the WEF-connected Shwed uses the same terminology. Schwab also stated in that speech that the comprehensive cyber attacks that would comprise this “cyber pandemic” would make the COVID-19 crisis appear to be “a small disturbance in comparison.”
In addition to CTA, another international alliance named by the WEF-PAC as a “permanent node” candidate is the Global Cyber Alliance (GCA). The GCA was reportedly the idea of Manhattan District Attorney Cyrus Vance Jr. who “knew that there had to be a better way to confront the cybercrime epidemic” back in 2015. GCA was born through discussions Vance held with William Pelgrin, former President and CEO of the Center for Internet Security (CIS) and one of New York Governor Andrew Cuomo’s top cyber advisors. Pelgrin and Vance later approached Adrian Leppard, the then- police commissioner of the City of London, the controversial financial center of the UK. Unsurprisingly, CityUK, the City of London’s main financial lobby group, is a member of the GCA.
If one is familiar with Cyrus Vance’s time as Manhattan DA, his interest in meaningfully pursuing crime, particularly if committed by the wealthy and powerful, is laughable. Vance infamously dropped cases against and/or declined to prosecute powerful New York figures, including Donald Trump’s children and Harvey Weinstein, subsequently receiving massive donations to his re-election campaigns from Trump family and Weinstein lawyers. His office also once lobbied a New York court on behalf of intelligence-linked pedophile Jeffrey Epstein, who was seeking at the time to have his registered sex offender status downgraded. Vance’s office later U-turned in regards to Weinstein and Epstein after more and more accusers came forward and after considerable press attention was paid to their misdeeds. Vance also came under scrutiny after dropping charges against former head of the International Monetary Fund (IMF), Dominique Strauss-Kahn, for the sexual assault of a hotel maid.
Vance used $25 million in criminal asset forfeiture funds to create GCA, in addition to funding from Pelgrin’s CIS and the Leppard-run City of London police. Its official yet opaque purpose is “to reduce cyber risk” on a global scale in order to create “a secure, trustworthy internet.” Their means of accomplishing this purpose is equally vague as they claim to “approach this challenge by building partnerships and creating a global community that stands strong together.” For all intents and purposes, GCA is a massive organization whose members seek to create a more regulated, less anonymous internet.
The role of the Center for Internet Security (CIS) in the GCA is highly significant, as CIS is the non-profit that manages key bodies involved in the maintenance of critical US infrastructure, including for US state and local governments and for federal, state and local elections. CIS, which is also partnered with CTA, also works closely with the main groups responsible for protecting the US power grid and water supply systems and is also directly partnered with the Department of Homeland Security (DHS). Its board of directors, in addition to William Pelgrin, includes former high-ranking military and intelligence operatives (i.e. the aforementioned Amit Yoran), former top officials at the DHS and the National Security Agency (NSA) and one of the main architects of US cyber policy under the administrations of both George W. Bush and Barack Obama. CIS was created through private meetings between “a small group of business and government leaders” who were members of the Cosmos Club, the “private social club” of the US political and scientific elite whose members have included three presidents, a dozen Supreme Court justices and numerous Nobel Prize winners.
GCA’s main funders are the founders listed above as well as the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation, the foundation of the co-founder of Hewlett-Packard (HP), a tech giant with deep ties to US intelligence; Craig Newmark Philanthropies, the “philanthropic” arm of the Craigslist founder’s influence empire; and Bloomberg, the media outlet owned by billionaire and former Mayor of New York Mike Bloomberg. GCA’s premium partners, which also fund GCA and secure a seat on GCA’s Strategic Advisory Committee, include Facebook, Mastercard, Microsoft, Intel, and PayPal as well as C. Hoare & Co., the UK’s oldest privately owned bank and the fifth oldest bank in the world. Other significant premium partners include the Public Interest Registry, which manages the .org domain for websites, and ICANN (the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers), that manages much of the Internet’s global Domain Name System (DNS). Those two organizations together represent a significant portion of website domain name management globally. Notably, the founding chairwoman of ICANN was Esther Dyson, whose connections to Jeffrey Epstein and the Edge Foundation were discussed in a recent Unlimited Hangout investigation.
In terms of partners, GCA is much larger than CTA and other such alliances, most of which are themselves partners of GCA. Indeed, nearly every partner of CTA, including the CTA itself are part of the GCA as is CTA co-founder Palo Alto Networks. GCA’s partners include several international law enforcement agencies including: the National Police, National Gendarmerie and Ministry of Justice of France, the Ministry of Justice of Lagos, the Royal Canadian Mounted Police, the UK Met Police, and the US Secret Service. The state governments of Michigan and New York are also partners. Several institutions and companies deeply tied to the US National Security State, such as Michael Chertoff’s the Chertoff Group, the National Security Institute, and MITRE, are part of GCA as are some of the most controversial and intelligence-connected cybersecurity companies, such as Crowdstrike and Sepio Systems, another Unit 8200 alumni-founded company whose chairman of the board is former Mossad director Tamir Pardo. The Israeli intelligence-linked initiative CyberNYC is also a member. Major telecommunication companies like Verizon and Virgin are represented alongside some of the world’s largest banks, including Bank of America and Barclays, as well as FS-ISAC and the UK’s “most powerful financial lobby”, the CityUK.
Also crucial is the presence of several media organizations as partners, chief among them Bloomberg. Aside from Bloomberg and Craig Newmark Philanthropies (which funds several mainstream news outlets and “anti-fake news” initiatives), media outlets and organizations partnered with GCA include Free Press Unlimited (funded by George Soros’ Open Society Foundations, the European Union, and the US, Dutch, Belgian and UK governments), the Institute for Nonprofit News (funded by Craig Newmark, Pierre Omidyar’s Omidyar Network and George Soros’ Open Society Foundations, among others), and Report for America (funded by Craig Newmark Philanthropies, Facebook, Google and Bloomberg). PEN America, the well-known non-profit and literary society focused on press freedom, is also a member. PEN has become much more closely aligned with US government policy and particularly the Democratic Party in recent years, likely owing to its current CEO being Suzanne Nossel, a former deputy Assistant Secretary of State for International Organizations at the Hillary Clinton-run State Department. The many other members of GCA can all be found here.
The End of Anonymity
The considerable involvement of some of the most powerful corporations in the world from some of the most critical sectors that underpin the current economy, as well as non-profits that manage key internet, government and utility infrastructure in these organizations that comprise WEF-PAC is highly significant and also concerning for more than a few reasons. Indeed, if all were to follow the call to form a “shared narrative”, whether it is true or not, in pursuit of long-term “strategic interests”, which the WEF and many of its partners directly relate to the rapid implementation of the 4th Industrial Revolution via the “Great Reset”, the WEF-PAC global cyber utility could emerge sooner rather than later.
As evidenced by the architecture put forth by WEF-PAC, the power that organization would have over the public and private sectors is considerable. Such an organization, once established, could usher in long-standing efforts to both require a digital ID to access and use the internet as well as eliminate the ability to conduct anonymous financial transactions. Both policies would advance the overarching goal of both the WEF and many corporations and governments to usher in a new age of unprecedented surveillance of ordinary citizens.
The effort to eliminate anonymous transactions in digital currency has become very overt in some countries in recent weeks, particularly in the US. For instance, Anne Neuberger, current Deputy National Security Adviser who has deep ties to the US-Israel lobby, stated on June 29 that the Biden administration was considering obtaining more “visibility” into ransomware groups’ activities, particularly anonymous cryptocurrency transactions. Such efforts could easily cross the line into state surveillance of any and all Americans’ online crypto transactions, especially given the US government’s history of habitually engaging in surveillance overreach in the post-9/11 era. One specific possibility mentioned by Neuberger was to prohibit companies from keeping crypto payments of concern secret, suggesting possible, imminent regulation of cryptocurrency exchanges. Current efforts, per Neuberger, also include an effort to build “an international coalition” against ransomware, which will likely tie into WEF-PAC given that the FBI, DOJ and US Secret Service are already members.
Neuberger also stated that the recent public-private partnership that took down the Trickbot botnet “should be the kind of operation used to tackle ransomware gangs in the future.” However, that effort, led by WEF partner Microsoft, preemptively took down a network of computers “out of fear that hackers could deploy [that network] to launch ransomware attacks to inhibit election-supporting IT systems” ahead of the US election. Using Trickbot as the model for future ransomware operations means opening the door to companies like Microsoft taking preemptive action against infrastructure used by people that the government and private sector “fear” may engage in “cybercrime” at some point in the future.
Notably, on the same day as Neuberger’s statements, Congressional representative Bill Foster (D-IL) told Axios that “there’s significant sentiment in Congress that if you’re participating in an anonymous crypto transaction that you are a de facto participant in a criminal conspiracy.” Coming from Rep. Foster, this is quite significant as he is a member of the Financial Services Committee, the Blockchain Caucus and a recently formed Congressional working group on cryptocurrency. His decision to use the phrase “anonymous crypto transaction” as opposed to a transaction linked to ransomware or criminal activity is also significant, as it suggests that the possibility that complete anonymity is seen to be the target of coming efforts to regulate the crypto space by the US Congress. While Foster claims to oppose a “completely surveilled environment” for crypto, he qualifies that by stating that “you have to be able to unmask and potentially reverse those [crypto] transactions.” However, if this becomes government policy, it will mean the only group allowed to have complete anonymity in online financial transactions will be the State and will open the door to the government’s abuse of “unmasking”, which the US government has done in numerous instances over the years through the systematic abuse of FISA warrants.
It is also important to mention that the US is hardly alone in its effort to wipe out online financial anonymity in the crypto world, as several governments that are supporting Central Bank Digital Currency (CBDC) projects, which includes the US, are either moving towards or have already cracked down on the crypto space. For example, soon after China introduced the “digital yuan”, it cracked down on bitcoin miners and companies that provide services, including ads and marketing, to crypto-related entities. This had major implications for the crypto market and resulted in a considerable reduction in bitcoin’s value, which it has yet to fully recover. It is reasonable to assume that other governments will work to aggressively regulate or even ban crypto markets following the introduction of their CBDC projects in order to force widespread adoption of the digital currency favored by the State. It is also worth highlighting the additional fact that, as China introduced the digital yuan, it also sought to crackdown on cash, stating that the anonymity offered by cash – much like anonymous crypto transactions – could also be used for “illicit activity.”
However, there are some obvious holes in the WEF-PAC’s narratives and justifications for its “solutions.” For example, even if cryptocurrencies are banned or heavily regulated, it is unlikely that this will end cyber attacks, with hackers likely finding a new way to conduct operations that provide them with some sort of financial benefit. Cyber attacks and cybercrime precede the creation of crypto considerably and would continue even if crypto were somehow magically removed from the equation.
In addition, there has been speculation about the nature of the 3 big hacks that took place over the past year: SolarWinds, Colonial and JBS. In the case of SolarWinds, attribution of blame to “Russian hackers” came down to CIA-linked cybersecurity firm FireEye claiming that the “disciplined” methodology of the hackers could only possibly have been individuals tied to Russia’s government and because FireEye’s CEO received a postcard he “suspects” was Russian in origin. Left uninvestigated was the firm Samanage, which is linked to the same intelligence networks in which the WEF’s current head of cyber strategy worked for years.
Regarding the Colonial pipeline hack, there is the fact that the original narrative was later proven false, as the pipeline itself remained functional, but services were halted due to the company’s concerns about their ability to bill customers properly. In addition, the US Department of Justice managed to seize the vast majority of the bitcoin ransomware payment Colonial had made, suggesting that extreme regulation of the crypto market may not actually be necessary to deter cybercriminals or recuperate ransomware payments. Surely, WEF-PAC is aware of this because the US Department of Justice is one of its members.
With the JBS hack, there is the fact that the company, the world’s largest meats processor, had partnered with the WEF just months before regarding the need to reduce meat consumption and had begun to heavily invest and acquire non-animal-based alternatives. Blackrock, a major WEF partner, is the 3rd largest shareholder in JBS. Notably, after the hack, the situation was quickly used to warn of upcoming, widespread meat shortages, even though the disruption of the hack paused operations for just one day. In addition, the JBS hack was supposedly executed by “Russian hackers” being given “safe haven” by Russia’s government. However, JBS somehow has no problem partnering the WEF, which co-hosts Cyber Polygon alongside the cybersecurity subsidiary of Sberbank, which is majority owned by the same Russian government supposedly enabling JBS’ hackers.
In addition to the effort to regulate crypto, there is also a push by WEF-partnered governments to end privacy and the potential for anonymity on the internet in general, by linking government-issued IDs to internet access. This would allow every piece of online content accessed to be surveilled, as well as every post or comment authored by each citizen, supposedly to ensure that no citizen can engage in “criminal” activity online. This policy is part of an older effort, particularly in the US, where creating a nationwide “Driver’s License for the Internet” was proposed and then piloted by the Obama administration. The European Union made a similar effort to require government-issued IDs for social media access a few years later.
The UK also launched its Verify digital ID program around the same time, something which former UK Prime Minister and WEF associate Tony Blair has been pushing aggressively to have expanded into a compulsory requirement in recent months. Then, just last month, the EU implemented a sweeping, new digital ID service that could easily be expanded to fit with the Union’s past efforts to link such IDs to access to online services. As Unlimited Hangout noted earlier this year, the infrastructure for many of these digital IDs, as well as vaccine passports, have been set up so that they are also eventually linked to financial activity and potentially online activity as well.
Ultimately, what WEF-PAC represents is a global organization that aims to neuter anonymity online, whether for financial purposes or for browsing and other activities. It is a global effort combining powerful governments and corporations that seeks to usher in a new age of surveillance that makes such surveillance a requirement to participate in the online world or use online services. It is being sold to the public as the only way to stop a coming “pandemic” of cybercrime, a crisis taking place largely in murky parts of the internet that few understand or have any direct experience with. Having to rely on State intelligence agencies and intelligence-linked cybersecurity firms for attribution of these crimes, it has never been easier for corrupt actors in those agencies or their partners to either manufacture or manipulate a crisis that could upend online freedom as we have known it, something these very groups have sought to implement for years.
All of this should serve as a poignant reminder that, as much as our lives have become interconnected with the internet and online activity, the fight to protect human freedom, dignity and liberty against a predatory, global oligarchy is fundamentally one that must take place in the real world, not only online. May the coming “cyber war”, whatever form it takes, remind many that online activism must be accompanied by real world actions and organizing.
Tyler Durden
Sun, 07/18/2021 – 21:30 - Damage Control: Elon Musk Admits Cybertruck Could "Flop", Writes Off Summon Feature As Just A "Fun Trick"
Damage Control: Elon Musk Admits Cybertruck Could “Flop”, Writes Off Summon Feature As Just A “Fun Trick”
As the cold hard reality of Elon Musk’s promises of years past start to catch up to the Tesla CEO – who last week testified in a trial where he is alleged to have made a unilateral decision to poorly allocate shareholder capital by bailing out his cousin’s failing Solar City business that was on the verge of insolvency – Musk now appears to be embarking on a journey to try and talk his way out of past promises and manage expectations.
And while the mainstream financial press and regulators seem to be just fine with allowing Musk to get away with this, we’d be remiss if we didn’t point out each time the Earth’s boy genius attempts to re-write history right in front of our faces, with a smile, as though no one would notice and/or remember a half-decade of missed deadlines and false promises along the path of selling equity to investors and pushing poorly made vehicles, many hand-assembled in a makeshift tent (hereinafter referred to as “the Alien dreadnaught”) to marks willing to buy.
Musk Walks Back Full Self Driving
The walk back of history began with a mega-huge whopper about 2 weeks ago when, at the beginning of July, Musk admitted that Full-Self Driving – a non-existent feature customers have been paying for for a half-decade – was a “hard problem”, casually dropping into conversation the idea that the company may not be anywhere close to meeting Musk’s promises about FSD.
As a reminder, Musk said in 2019 he was “very confident” in predicting autonomous robotaxis “next year”, which would have been 2020, which has now turned into “last year” and is six months away from being “two years ago”. Earlier this year Tesla offered up another reality check when it admitted to regulators that it was still “firmly in level 2” autonomy.
“Generalized self-driving is a hard problem, as it requires solving a large part of real-world AI. I didn’t expect it to be so hard, but the difficulty is obvious in retrospect. Nothing has more degrees of freedom than reality,” Musk wrote on Twitter in early July.
It’s a far cry from what Musk was saying years ago. “Tesla will have over 1 million robotaxis on the road next year,” Musk proclaimed in April of 2019, now more than 2 years ago.
Great, so you’ll just issue refunds to everyone who has paid for the feature over the last 5 years, right?
Regardless, even the latest much heralded update to Full Self Driving, which arrived about a month late and had been touted as a solution to the last beta, which was such a disaster it was pulled off the market quickly, appears to be more of the same: jerky movements, uncertain vehicle operation and constant necessary interruptions from the driver.
After Full Self Driving 9.0’s release, even the company’s biggest fans like Galileo Russell said he saw little difference between the last beta and this one – and he still thinks the company is “still a long way away” to truly autonomous driving “where you never have to intervene”.
Musk Walks Back Cybertruck Expectations
In another walk-back and reset of expectations last week, Elon Musk also Tweeted that there was “always some chance” that the Cybertruck – a product introduced almost two years ago in November 2019 to ridiculous fanfare – could “flop”.
This stands at obvious odds with statements Musk made in September at the company’s shareholder meeting, where he said “The orders are gigantic” about the truck. Musk claimed there were ”… well over half a million orders.” He continued: “It’s a lot, basically. We stopped counting.”
Recall, at the introduction of the Cybertruck, Musk had an assistant come on stage and try to break the truck’s armored glass.
“Normal glass shatters immediately,” Musk said as his assistants, dressed like characters from The Matrix, dropped a metal ball on conventional glass, causing it to shatter.
At which point another of Musk’s assistants gently threw a similar metal ball at the Cybertruck parked on stage. The driver’s side window promptly broke.
“Oh my fucking God,” Musk nervously said, live on the stream, after the front window shattered into a million pieces.
Are you not amused? And if this demo wasn’t enough to “manage expectations”, Musk is now admitting the truck could “flop”.
But don’t worry shareholders, Musk has your back. He Tweeted: “To be frank, there is always some chance that Cybertruck will flop, because it is so unlike anything else. I don’t care. I love it so much even if others don’t. Other trucks look like copies of the same thing, but Cybertruck looks like it was made by aliens from the future.”
Actually, it appears Musk doesn’t have your back – it appears he’s going to do whatever the hell he wants regardless of whether or not it’s good for the company.
“In end, we kept production design almost exactly same as show car. Just some small tweaks here & there to make it slightly better. No door handles. Car recognizes you & opens door. Having all four wheels steer is amazing for nimble handling & tight turns!” Musk gushed about the truck, which is still not in production.
Some critics not only believe the truck is already a “flop”, but also that its claimed specs are outright fraudulent.
“This fraud is no different from those of Theranos or Nikola,” Stanphyl Capital’s Mark Spiegel wrote on Twitter last week.
I hadn’t realized until a friend pointed it out today that Tesla claims this completely fraudulent price & range (100 miles more & $15,000 less than the new Model S) for the Tri-Motor Cybertruck. This fraud is no different from those of Theranos or Nikola.
That is all.$TSLA pic.twitter.com/mNz7XZqswh
— Stanphyl Capital (@StanphylCap) July 16, 2021
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Time will tell the tale.
Musk Walks Back Years Of Bluster About “Smart Summon”
And now, the most recent walk-back. Shortly after Musk’s Cybertruck comments came Musk’s “realigning” of expectations about Tesla’s Summon feature, which Musk has been boasting about whilst collecting order money, for years.
This series of Tweets is a great starter thread on Musk’s previous statements about summon – including ones claiming it can go across the country and others using Summon as a reason to bump up the price of the non-existent Full Self Driving – (additional sources here), which include:
- January 10, 2016: “In ~2 years, summon should work anywhere connected by land & not blocked by borders, eg you’re in LA and the car is in NY.”
- October 20, 2016: “When you want your car to return, tap Summon on your phone. It will eventually find you even if you are on the other side of the country.”
- October 31, 2018: “By next year, a Tesla should be able to drive around a parking lot, find an empty spot, read signs to confirm it’s valid & park.”
- November 1, 2018: “Tesla advanced Summon ready in ~6 weeks! Just an over-the-air software upgrade, so will work on all cars made in past 2 years (Autopilot hardware V2+).”
- November 1, 2018: “Car will drive to your phone location & follow you like a pet if you hold down summon button on Tesla app.”
- April 6, 2019: “Tesla Enhanced Summon coming out in US next week for anyone with Enhanced Autopilot or Full Self-Driving option.”
- May 23, 2019: “Smart Summon coming soon!”
- October 11, 2019: “Now that Tesla V10.0 with Smart Summon is out, Full Self-Driving price will increase by $1000 on Nov 1.”
- April 16, 2020: “We’re working super hard on getting traffic lights & stops released. Reverse summon (auto park) will be part of the core Autopilot software upgrade for FSD later this year.”
And then, finally, just this past week: “Current Summon is sometimes useful, but mostly just a fun trick,” Musk nonchalantly wrote on Twitter this weekend.
Current Summon is sometimes useful, but mostly just a fun trick. Once we move summon (plus highway driving) to a single FSD stack, it will be sublime.
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) July 17, 2021
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More than five years after Musk claimed Summon would work cross-country, it appears he is now giving up on the feature as it stands today. It’s yet one more walk back and re-writing of history that both customers and regulators will likely be just fine with.
Everyone Can See It Except Regulators And Tesla Cultists
Keep in mind these walk-backs don’t even include the company’s Solar Roof rollout. Even the mainstream media is catching up to that disaster: Bloomberg’s Dana Hull published a piece last month aptly titled “Tesla’s Solar Roof Rollout Is a Bust — And a Fixation for Elon Musk”.
“It needs to be beautiful, affordable and seamlessly integrated,” Musk said about the company’s solar roof shingle back in 2016. “You’ll want to call your neighbors over and say, ‘check out this sweet roof.’”
Except now it’s a half decade later and the company has barely rolled out any solar roofs, struggling to hit 200 installations per week. This is despite the fact that Musk set a goal to install more than 1,000 of them a week back in 2019. It raised prices in April of this year, leading to a slew of cancellations, Hull notes.
We don’t seem to be the only ones exasperated about the lack of regulatory oversight on Musk’s actions, either. For example, many on social media and podcasts have honed in on the fact that Full Self Driving is a complete and total bait and switch – except the “switched” item doesn’t seem to exist, either!
There are people who’ve paid up to $10,000 up to and beyond 3 years ago for FSD who still don’t have it and Tesla is now slanging a $199/month version (that they also can’t deliver lol). Cold https://t.co/4up0KmGBYV
— Seth Weintraub (@llsethj) July 17, 2021
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Some call it “the greatest consumer fraud in history”:
Five years in and it’s finally clear to the world:
Tesla will never achieve advanced autonomy and FSD is the greatest consumer fraud in history.
Elon’s plan is threefold: (1) Keep pretending it’s close. (2) Keep rewriting history. (3) Fight every lawsuit to the bitter end.
— TC (Justice Warrior) (@TESLAcharts) July 18, 2021
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Even owners and cultists are starting to notice…
🚨🚨🚨 #TESLA OWNERS ARE FURIOUS OVER “FULL SELF DRIVING”:
“Why the fuck do y’all LIKE being misled and practically scammed?”
“Practically scammed? Straight up scammed! … [Updates] have been making things worse.”
“I feel shafted.”#FullSelfDriving #FSD #Vaporware $TSLA $TSLAQ pic.twitter.com/ONNYmywJxc— Claire Musk (@ClaireMusk) July 18, 2021
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The “false advertising” seems to be clear as a bell to some…
I’m old enough to remember when false advertising was illegal. https://t.co/DS6xpgf0Vh
— Dean Sheikh (@DeanSheikh1) July 17, 2021
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As does the walk-back of “features” Musk has already sold customers on…
Any other “features” you sold to customers you’d like to admit don’t work? https://t.co/9te0NDnSEe
— Quoth the Raven (@QTRResearch) July 18, 2021
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Calling a software package Full Self-Driving™ when it isn’t full self-driving, then saying that customers can add Full Self-Driving™ capability to their cars sort of feels like legally adding “PhD” to the end of your last name rather than going to grad school. pic.twitter.com/kwHz0CAyHc
— Mahmood Hikmet (@MoodyHikmet) July 17, 2021
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Once again – the only people Musk’s constant pathological lying hasn’t become clear to are the ones keeping him afloat: the cult-members that continue to happily shovel Musk their hard earned (or government issued) cash, and the regulators tasked with making sure that executives – and specifically car companies – don’t do…well…exactly what Musk is doing.
Tyler Durden
Sun, 07/18/2021 – 21:11 - Walmart Brings Automation To Regional Distribution Centers
Walmart Brings Automation To Regional Distribution Centers
The progressive press had a field day with “woke” Walmart highly publicized February decision to hikes wages for 425,000 workers to an average above $15 an hour. We doubt the obvious follow up – the ongoing stealthy replacement of many of its minimum wage workers with machines – will get the same amount of airtime.
As Chain Store Age reports, Walmart is applying artificial intelligence to the palletizing of products in its regional distribution centers. I.e., it is replacing thousands of workers with robots.
Since 2017, the discount giant has worked with Symbotic to optimize an automated technology solution to sort, store, retrieve and pack freight onto pallets in its Brooksville, Fla., distribution center. Under Walmart’s existing system, product arrives at one of its RDCs and is either cross-docked or warehoused, while being moved or stored manually. When it’s time for the product to go to a store, a 53-foot trailer is manually packed for transit. After the truck arrives at a store, associates unload it manually and place the items in the appropriate places.
Leveraging the Symbiotic solution, a complex algorithm determines how to store cases like puzzle pieces using high-speed mobile robots that operate with a precision that speeds the intake process and increases the accuracy of freight being stored for future orders. By using dense modular storage, the solution also expands building capacity.
In addition, by using palletizing robotics to organize and optimize freight, the Symbiotic solution creates custom store- and aisle-ready pallets.
Why is Walmart doing this? Simple: According to CSA, “Walmart expects to save time, limit out-of-stocks and increasing the speed of stocking and unloading.” More importantly, the company hopes to further cut expenses and remove even more unskilled labor from its supply chain.
This solution follows tests of similar automated warehouse solutions at a Walmart consolidation center in Colton, Calif., and perishable grocery distribution center in Shafter, Calif.
Walmart plans to implement this technology in 25 of its 42 RDCs.
“Though very few Walmart customers will ever see into our warehouses, they’ll still be able to witness an industry-leading change, each time they find a product on shelves,” said Joe Metzger, executive VP of supply chain operations at Walmart U.S. “There may be no way to solve all the complexities of a global supply chain, but we plan to keep changing the game as we use technology to transform the way we work and lead our business into the future.”
Tyler Durden
Sun, 07/18/2021 – 21:00 - Beijing's Grip Means Hong Kong Is No Longer Special
Beijing’s Grip Means Hong Kong Is No Longer Special
By Ye Xie, Bloomberg report and macro commentator
Three things we learned last week:
1. Beijing signals that Hong Kong is preferable to New York for Chinese IPOs
China plans to exempt companies that are going public in Hong Kong from seeking approval from its cybersecurity regulator, following its recent proposed new laws requiring vetting companies for IPOs in foreign countries.
The move sends a clear signal that Hong Kong, Shanghai and Shenzhen are the preferred destinations for Chinese tech companies that want to go public, as the government grows warry that the vast data controlled by tech giants can be vulnerable to the prying eyes of foreign governments. Startups including Xiaohongshu, or “Little Red Book,” are putting their U.S. IPOs on hold.
Meanwhile, the Biden administration warned investors Friday about the risks of doing business in Hong Kong, issuing an advisory that China’s push to exert more control over the financial hub threatens the rule of law and endangers employees and data.
At least Presidents Xi Jinping and Joe Biden can agree on one thing: Hong Kong is no longer special. It’s basically the same as any other Chinese city.
2. China’s economy is doing fine.
The surprising cut to the reserve requirement ratio earlier this month triggered concern in markets that China’s economy may be deteriorating fast under the weight of slower credit growth and Beijing’s zero-tolerance policy for Covid. But it turns out there was little reason to worry, as data from retail sales to trade all beat economists’ forecasts. The RRR cut was largely a fine-tuning of its monetary policy toward supporting more growth, but it wasn’t the start of an easing cycle.
3. Yuan carry trade is alive and well
The trade-weighted yuan has reached the strongest level since 2016. China’s currency has benefited from investors’ preferences for carry trades after Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell reiterated that the central bank is a “ways off” from tapering. Adjusted for volatility, the yuan ranked as the world’s fourth highest-yielding currency, trailing only the Argentine peso, Turkish lira and Indian rupee.
Tyler Durden
Sun, 07/18/2021 – 20:30 - Will Biden Burst The Record M&A Bubble
Will Biden Burst The Record M&A Bubble
2021 has been a blockbuster year for virtually every banking product: from IPOs and equity offerings, to investment grade and junk bond sale and yes – even M&A: according to Goldman, through July 15, some $1.9 trillion of deal value for US-based acquirers has been announced, the highest volume of M&A by this point in the year since at least 2000.
Specifically, among the strategic deals over $100 million that have been announced by US-based acquirers, Tech, Leisure & Recreation, and Telecom firms account for a combined 56% of total deal value. Why? Because thanks to the 2020 depression and subsequent Fed nationalization of the bond market, we saw record debt and equity issuance resulting in trillions in cash new cash. Now, corporate cash balances are among the highest ever and S&P 500 managements are deploying some of the cash on M&A deals.
While there is nobody doubt the M&A market is gripped by epic euphoria, Goldman’s David Kostin observes a curious twist: companies are funding their mergers in an anomalous way compared to history, paying above-average premiums and using less stock consideration than usual given high equity multiples,almost as if they have cash to burn. During the last 20 years, high S&P 500 forward P/E multiples have been associated with greater stock consideration in M&A deals.
This is intuitive; when equity multiples are high, the acquirer’s stock becomes more valuable in potential transactions. On an absolute basis, the S&P 500 trades at a near record high valuation. However, as shown in the chart above, only 28% of completed deal value (>$100 million) for strategic US acquirers has been in stock consideration vs. the almost 50% that history would imply. Within that universe, deals have also been completed at a larger premium than usual. In the last two decades, the mean deal premium to pre-bid price has been 32%. The average $100+ million deal in 2021 has been struck at a 44% premium to pre-bid price, showing buyers’ appetites to pay a premium for acquisitions post-pandemic.
Looking ahead, there are two possible paths: continued record activity or a regulatory crackdown by the BIden admin.
As Kostin notes, one reason M&A could continue to surge is the $104 billion in equity capital raised YTD across 336 SPAC IPOs, augmenting the $77 billion in SPAC issuance in 2020. Already, 154 de-SPAC mergers have been announced in 2021, absorbing $54 billion of SPAC equity capital and driving $384 billion of deal EV. But the Goldman strategist estimates that there is still $118 billion of cash in 394 SPACs currently searching for a target. On average, the aggregate ratio of target EV at merger announcement to SPAC capital is roughly 7x, implying that SPACs could drive $800 billion of M&A enterprise value during the next two years.
All else equal, Goldman forecasts that S&P 500 companies will spend $324 billion in cash M&A in 2021 (+45% year/year) and $340 billion in 2022 (+5%). The bank recently noted that cash M&A growth is positively correlated with S&P 500 earnings growth, and Goldman forecasts that S&P 500 earnings growth of 35% this year will drive a rebound in cash M&A, supported by the strong backlog of announced deals and record-high cash to asset ratios.
But while Goldman – which makes generous fees on advisory assignments – would love nothing more than continued record M&A activity, storm clouds are gathering. One headwind to the cash component of M&A is elevated equity valuations. On the other hand, the low interest rate environment that has supported equity valuations also makes it easier for companies to issue debt to fund acquisitions with cash.
A bigger concern as Goldman itself admits, and why the bank expects more muted growth in cash M&A in 2022, is due to policy risk, or as Kostin put it: “A key risk to the outlook for M&A is increased regulatory scrutiny due to antitrust concerns. This week, we explored the topic in more detail in our report on antitrust risk in the US stock market (Equities, antitrust, and the “inestimable” value of due process, Jul. 13, 2021).” The bottom line, according to Goldman, is that increased antitrust scrutiny has different implications for key stakeholders in the capital markets ecosystem:
- First, company managements may find the prospect of growing by way of acquisition less appealing in a stricter regulatory environment. President Biden released an executive order earlier this week that calls for the FTC to take a more aggressive approach to regulating merger activity. The initiative will affect firms in a variety of sectors, primarily by making it more onerous to complete deals as regulators review the competitive implications of proposed transactions. Hurdle rates for mergers will be higher and deal break fees greater than they would have been prior to the Executive Order. Firms whose business models have previously relied on external growth may pivot to organic growth initiatives to boost profits. The cutoff rate for possible capital spending projects may actually decline from current thresholds.
- Second, merger arbitrage investors may see the timing, odds of success, and spreads in their trades shift significantly. Merger arbitrage spreads have declined but are now likely to widen. The amount of time between the announcement of a $5+ billion deal and its completion has been relatively stable at around 7 months for the past several years. A more interventionist FTC will hinder merger activity. Announced deals may face additional uncertainty, take longer to execute, and be assessed as generally less likely to succeed, which could result in wider merger arb spreads.
Passive or index investors could also be affected by the new era of antitrust given the companies in the S&P 500 that are most likely to be subject to scrutiny are also the largest constituents in major equity benchmarks.President Biden’s executive order, proposed legislation, and pending lawsuits specifically target “Big Tech” (AAPL, AMZN, FB, and GOOGL).
These four firms have a current aggregate equity cap of $7 trillion and comprise 17% of the S&P 500 equity cap and 28% of the Russell 1000 Growth benchmark…
… and Goldman notes that in an increasingly concentrated market, risks to the trajectory of sales growth and profitability of these companies represent risks for the broader market. However, a sum-of-the-parts valuation could be higher or lower than the original company’s valuation and would impact the stock market accordingly if a full break-up were undertaken. In addition to the largest companies, the FTC’s stricter regulatory posture could also indirectly weigh on potential M&A targets.
Goldman concludes by listing its tactical research team’s basket of likely M&A candidates screens for companies that its analysts deem to have at least a 15% likelihood of being acquired. The basket sharply outperformed as the economy reopened, corporate balance sheets improved, and M&A activity picked up. However, since March of this year, the basket has underperformed the market by 7 pp and trades at a valuation discount of 20% vs. the S&P 500.
The list of basket constituents is shown below.
Kostin’s bottom line is rather obvious: “More regulatory scrutiny could represent a persistent overhang to potential M&A targets, particularly in industries with high market concentration. On the other hand, if strategic buyers take a step back from M&A, it could create an opportunity for private equity firms: alternatives have $3.3 trillion in dry powder.”
Tyler Durden
Sun, 07/18/2021 – 20:00 - Did Japan Just Warn The US Of An Impending Joint Attack From China And Russia?
Did Japan Just Warn The US Of An Impending Joint Attack From China And Russia?
Authored by Aden Tate via The Organic Prepper blog,
Four days before Americans celebrated Independence Day, the number two defense official in Japan offered some strange advice that has many Americans concerned.
After noting the Chinese and Russians are excellent allies and have engaged in several military drills together of late, Japanese State Defense Minister Yasuhide Nakayama, in a press interview, had this to say, “[Russian naval forces] are really exercising just right in front of the western part of Honolulu, and so I don’t want to remind the [sic] seventy years ago, but we have to be careful of the exercising of the Russians.”
Nakayama made this statement because many Russian ships are operating just 35 miles off of Hawaii’s coast. They conducted several drills, one of which has been a rehearsal on sinking an aircraft carrier. And what could Nakayama possibly be alluding to that happened in Hawaii roughly seventy years ago?
So what exactly does Nakayama mean by this?
Is he alluding to the possibility of a surprise attack by a joint China-Russia military operation on military soil? Or are people reading into this too much?
According to American Military News, the above statement is clear and presents evidence that just such an alliance prepares for action. And while I do not doubt that both Russia and China are hostile to the US, I have to wonder, is this the best evidence to fall back on for such?
Nakayama went on to describe potential nuclear destruction:
“If some country shoot’s [a nuclear weapon] from their continent towards Honolulu, that missile’s…the warheads compared to Hiroshima, it’s 200 times more than Hiroshima.”
He went on to add, “So I’ve been to Hiroshima before and I went to the museum before, from that experience and the perspective, if 200 times more strong atomic bombs or torpedoes or missiles, warheads towards Honolulu, I think Honolulu will be erased from the map. So we have to think before using those powers, we have to think how to stop it.”
Is this how World War 3 begins?
Isn’t that a rather strange subject to bring up?
Why would Nakayama point out to the US the dangers of a nuclear attack – and the potential devastation – on American soil? Is 35 miles a significant enough distance away to survive the destruction caused by a 200 times more powerful bomb than Hiroshima?
He went on to offer some advice, saying, “We have to show the deterrence towards China, and not just China but also the Russians, because, as I told you, that they are doing their exercises together.”
So Nakayama seems to believe that America needs to take a stronger stance militarily on proving that we can and will defend ourselves. While I most certainly believe the same thing, his next statement may (or may not) give us a little more insight:
“What we can do is show the deterrence and also [that an attack] or happening towards Taiwan, it’s straight to relate to not just Japan, but also the US-Japan alliance even.”
Is this his inspiration for such a warning all along?
I don’t think there’s any doubt in anybody’s mind that Taiwan is now screwed. It’s only a matter of time before the Chinese invade and take it. Really, what’s stopping them now?
Absolutely nothing.
And Taiwan is a very short hop away from Japan, potentially serving as a perfect launching point for future offensives. And China hates Japan.
Is Nakayama providing this warning to the US to bolster Japan’s own chances of defense against a Chinese invasion? Is there something more that he knows but isn’t stating? What conclusions can we draw from all this?
I’ll leave that up to the reader to decide, but to reiterate, here’s where we’re at:
- Russian ships just practiced sinking an aircraft carrier roughly 35 miles off of Honolulu’s coast
- Russia and China are engaging in a large number of military drills together
Speaking of China, an article published on The Organic Prepper pointed out that America’s military may soon be unable to equip itself for modern warfare without relying on Chinese suppliers.
Is American Military News on point with this being a valid indicator of an impending attack? Are the quotes being read into too much? Or, in light of other current happenstances, are they something Americans should take note of?
Tyler Durden
Sun, 07/18/2021 – 19:30 - "Most People Don't Wanna Turn To Brian Stelter To Tell Them What's Real": CNN Guest Obliterates 'Reliable Sources' Host
“Most People Don’t Wanna Turn To Brian Stelter To Tell Them What’s Real”: CNN Guest Obliterates ‘Reliable Sources’ Host
Controversial author Michael Wolff (of dubious Trump White House ‘tell-all’ and earpiece malarkey fame) was trotted out on CNN Sunday, where he proceeded (was allowed) to excoriate “Reliable Sources” host Brian Stelter for doing a “terrible job” and being “full of sanctimony.”
“You become part of, one of the parts of the problem of the media. You know, you come on here, and you have a monopoly on truth – you know, you know exactly how things are supposed to be done. You know, you are why one of the reasons people can’t stand the media, I’m sorry.” said Wolff.
To which Stelter laughed, saying “You’re cracking me up.”
“It’s your fault,” Wolff shot back, to which Stelter asked what he could do better.
“You know, don’t talk so much, listen more. You know, people have genuine problems with the media, the media doesn’t get the story right. The media exists in its own bubble,” Wolff replied. “Also, you’re incredibly repetitive. It’s week after week,” Wolff continued. “I mean, you’re the flip side of Donald Trump. You know, fake news and you say virtuous news.”
When Stelter then asked him why he’s been on CNN several times this week, Wolff hung his head and replied: “You know, I’m a book salesman.”
Michael Wolff: “You are the flip side of Donald Trump… most people don’t want to turn to Brian Stelter to tell us what’s real.”
Stelter: “Then why did you bother coming on CNN a few times this week?”
Wolff: “You know, I’m a book salesman.” pic.twitter.com/iIC8jMNyBT
— Justin Baragona (@justinbaragona) July 18, 2021
Were Wolff’s comments truly off-the-cuff? Or as one Zero Hedge reader suggested, could CNN be resorting to a “very strategic capitulation” in order to “turn over a new leaf” and regain credibility amid dismal ratings and all-time low trust in the media?
Tyler Durden
Sun, 07/18/2021 – 19:00 - Johnstone: Violent Extremists Took Over The US Capitol Long Before January 6
Johnstone: Violent Extremists Took Over The US Capitol Long Before January 6
Authored by Caitlin Johnstone,
No longer content with absurd claims that the January 6 Capitol riot was as bad as the 9/11 attacks, Democratic Party-aligned pundits are now insisting that it was in fact worse.
On a recent appearance with MSNBC’s ReidOut with Joy Reid, former Bush strategist Matthew Dowd said he felt the Capitol riot was “much worse” than 9/11 and that this is the “most perilous point in time” since the beginning of the American Civil War.
“To me, though there was less loss of life on January 6, January 6 was worse than 9/11, because it’s continued to rip our country apart and get permission for people to pursue autocratic means, and so I think we’re in a much worse place than we’ve been,” Dowd said. “I think we’re in the most perilous point in time since 1861 in the advent of the Civil War.”
“I do too,” Reid said.
This is absolutely BONKERS and offensive to the thousands murdered on 9/11.
Appearing alongside MSNBC’s Joy Reid, Matt Dowd says “January 6th was worse than 9/11 because it’s continued to rip our country apart and give permission for people to pursue autocratic means” pic.twitter.com/UnJfAID5SN
— Curtis Houck (@CurtisHouck) July 6, 2021
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Not to be outdone, Lincoln Project co-founder Steve Smith cited Dowd’s hysterical claim but adding that not only was January 6 worse than 9/11, but it was actually going to kill more Americans somehow, even counting all those killed in the US wars which ensued from the 9/11 attacks.
“He couldn’t be more right,” Schmidt said at a town hall for the Lincoln Project.
“The 1/6 attack for the future of the country was a profoundly more dangerous event than the 9/11 attacks. And in the end, the 1/6 attacks are likely to kill a lot more Americans than were killed in the 9/11 attacks, which will include the casualties of the wars that lasted 20 years following.”
A total of 2,996 Americans were killed in the 9/11 attacks, and a further seven thousand US troops have been killed in Iraq and Afghanistan. Exactly one person was killed in the January 6 riot, and it was a rioter shot by police inside the Capitol Building. Early reports that rioters had beaten a police officer to death with a fire extinguisher turned out to have been false.
These bizarre alternate-reality takes are awful for a whole host of reasons, including the fact that this so-called “insurrection” everyone is still shrieking about never at any point in its planning or enactment had a higher than zero percent chance of overthrowing the most powerful government in the world, and the fact that they are manufacturing consent for new authoritarian measures just like 9/11 did.
But perhaps the most annoying thing about all the melodramatic garment-rending over how close the US Capitol came to being taken over by violent extremists is that the US Capitol has been under the control of violent extremists for a very long time already.
For all the fretting everyone has been doing about fascists and white supremacist groups, those are not the violent extremists posing the greatest threat and amassing the highest body count today. Neither are the communists. Neither are the anarchists. Neither are the radicalized Muslims, nor the fundamentalist Christians, nor the environmentalists, nor the incels. No, the most dangerous and deadly group of violent extremists in our day are adherents of the mainstream status quo politics of the US-centralized power alliance.
And it’s not even close. Certainly many of the groups listed above are dangerous and undesirable, but they’re not the ones raining explosives upon families around the world for power and profit. They’re not the ones brandishing nuclear weapons with steadily increasing recklessness as they ramp up a new cold war against Russia and China. They’re not the ones poisoning the air and the water and rapidly destroying the environment we all depend on for survival. They’re not the ones enslaving humanity to a brutal, oppressive and exploitative global capitalist system which leaves far too many toiling for far too little when there’s plenty for everyone.
That would be the so-called “moderates” of the western empire, who in reality are anything but.
BREAKING: Sources report violent right-wing extremists have seized the US Capitol, established a globe-spanning empire, and murdered millions of people.
— Caitlin Johnstone ⏳ (@caitoz) July 10, 2021
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It is violent to wage nonstop campaigns of military mass murder and impose civilian-killing economic sanctions on nations which disobey your dictates. It is extremist to brutalize, brainwash and enslave humanity while continuously shoving the world in the direction of extinction and armageddon in the name of profit and unipolar hegemony. Because US officials sit almost entirely on the right side of the global political spectrum, we can accurately say that everyone is fretting about violent right-wing extremists storming a Capitol building that had already long been occupied by violent right-wing extremists.
And yet when Facebook started sending Americans warnings that they may have viewed “extremist content” scrolling through their feeds, posts supporting this most dangerous group of extremists were not the content they were being warned about, but any kind of content which opposes the status quo those extremists have created. They’re killing the ecosystem and murdering people every single day while imperiling us all with the risk of nuclear war, my social media feeds are full of Americans literally trying to crowdfund their own survival while the world’s worst add trillions to their wealth, but it’s the people who want to change this abusive system who are the dangerous extremists.
Some analysts focus primarily on criticizing the really obvious monsters who spout racist and bigoted rhetoric to advance their toxic agendas. Others focus more on criticizing the monsters that are harder to see through the fog of feigned politeness and propaganda distortion, the ones you see in government buildings and on Fortune Magazine covers and on TV news shows telling you what to think about the world. Those who spend their time criticizing the latter more than the former are often attacked and ridiculed as fascist sympathizers and Kremlin assets, but only by those who don’t actually see the monsters that they are pointing to.
Hollywood trained us to fear psychopathic killers prowling around in the dark so we won’t notice the psychopathic killers who rule our world in broad daylight. We’ve been trained to fear the serial killer covered in blood and wielding a chainsaw so we won’t notice the serial killer wearing a suit and wielding a pen.
Our collective maturity cannot begin until we learn to see the violent extremist monsters where they actually exist, and not just where we’ve been trained to look for them.
* * *
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Tyler Durden
Sun, 07/18/2021 – 18:30 - Xiaomi Dethrones Apple As The World's #2 Smartphone Maker
Xiaomi Dethrones Apple As The World’s #2 Smartphone Maker
Could the bedrock of the smartphone market be moving before our very eyes?
A new report from market research firm Canalys last week suggests that could be the case.
The report revealed that Chinese smartphone maker Xiaomi had surpassed Apple in the second quarter of 2021 to become the world’s number two smartphone maker, according to Reuters. The report measures the number of handsets that manufacturers sell to distributors.
It was the first time Xiaomi took the second place spot, with the company getting 17% of worldwide smartphone shipments, up from 3% the previous quarter.
The market for global smartphone shipments was up 12% in the second quarter, with Samsung leading the charge at 19% per share and Apple in third place at 14% per share. Chinese smartphone makers Oppo and Vivo had 10% each.
Xiaomi phones are about 40% tp 75% cheaper than its Samsung and Apple rivals, according to Canalys Research Manager Ben Stanton. The company now has its sights on prioritizing its high-end devices.
Shipments for Xiaomi were up 300% in Latin America, 150% in Africa and 50% in Western Europe, according to the report.
Lei Jun, founder and CEO of Xiaomi, called it an “important milestone in Xiaomi’s history.”
“Notwithstanding the celebrations now, I want to make sure we can maintain our second place steadily and firmly in the future,” he wrote in a letter to employees last week.
The company’s stock was up about 5% on Friday.
Tyler Durden
Sun, 07/18/2021 – 18:00 - Buchanan: Is Biden Really The Lincoln Of Our Time?
Buchanan: Is Biden Really The Lincoln Of Our Time?
Traveling to Philadelphia Tuesday, President Joe Biden laid out in apocalyptic terms the gravity of the “threat” to American democracy from Republican efforts to reform and rewrite state election laws.
“We are facing the most significant test of our democracy since the Civil War. That’s not hyperbole. Since the Civil War. The Confederates back then never breached the Capitol as insurrectionists did on Jan. 6.”
Biden is inviting a comparison of what he faces with what Abraham Lincoln faced when he took office in 1861 with seven Southern states having voted to secede and Fort Sumter a month away.
The Republican “threat” to our democracy, implied Biden, is mortal.
“I never thought in my entire career I’d ever have to say it. But I swore an oath to you, to God — to preserve, protect and defend the Constitution. And that’s an oath that forms a sacred trust to defend America against all threats both foreign and domestic.
“The assault on free and fair elections is just such a threat.”
Republicans seek to deny “full and free and fair elections” and are engaged in “the most un-American thing that any of us can imagine, the most undemocratic, the most unpatriotic.”
Un-American? Undemocratic? Unpatriotic?
When Sen. Joseph McCarthy challenged the patriotism of Truman Democrats in such terms in the 1950s, he was censured by the Senate.
Is Biden really saying that minor alterations in election laws, all of which would have to pass muster with federal courts and the Supreme Court, represent an existential threat to our republic?
This is beyond hyperbole. It is ridiculous. It is absurd.
Such hype is a measure of just how far out of touch with the real world the rhetoric of our reigning elites has drifted.
Yet, by casting himself and his party as today’s party of Lincoln, and Republican governors as Confederates, with the stakes equal to the survival of the Union, Biden has raised the stakes of this minor political skirmish.
And raised the political risk to himself, if he fails, as is likely.
Biden has just shoved a large pile of his political chips into the middle of the table in a show of confidence that he can bring off Senate passage of the For the People Act and the John Lewis Voting Rights Act, when both pieces of legislation look to be certain losers.
Neither has the 60 votes needed for passage. Neither has a single Republican vote. Nor is there evidence either can gain the 50 Democratic votes in the Senate that would require a unanimous caucus.
And if either measure got the 50 votes needed for passage, Democrats would still need 50 votes to break a GOP filibuster. Yet, Democratic senators such as Joe Manchin and Kyrsten Sinema are opposed to abolishing the filibuster. As six-term Sen. Joe Biden appears to be himself.
Is Biden putting on a show of defiance for the progressive wing of his party? For, again, what is at issue here so critical as to elicit comparison with a Civil War that cost 600,000 American lives?
To prevent voting legislation from being enacted into law, Texas Democrats fled from the state legislature in Austin and from Texas itself — to deny Republicans a quorum.
And what do the liberal and progressive Texans fear?
Two pieces of legislation, says The New York Times:
“Both measures would ban 24-hour voting and drive-through voting; prohibit election officials from proactively sending absentee ballot applications to voters who had not requested them; add new voter identification requirements for voting by mail; limit the types of assistance that can be provided to voters; and greatly expand the authority and autonomy of partisan poll watchers.”
Are such modest proposals, all within the prerogatives of state government under the Constitution, truly a threat to the republic as serious as the possibility of a second Civil War?
Democrats are faking this, casting themselves in the familiar role of progressives fighting heroically for democracy against neo-fascist forces of the right.
Declared Biden at the National Constitution Center: “The 21st-century Jim Crow assault is real. It’s unrelenting.”
Yet, with all his rhetoric placing himself in the tradition of Lincoln, and casting Republicans in the role of die-hard segregationists and vote deniers, Biden is promising something he almost surely cannot deliver.
What lies ahead?
Having raised the stakes in this fight, Biden has raised the cost of his likely defeat. The probable elements of that defeat will be a failure to bring about a unanimous Democratic Senate vote or the refusal of Democratic senators to break a Republican filibuster.
Out of this will come anger at Biden among progressives for his not going public to demand suspension of the filibuster, rage at Manchin and Sinema and other Democratic senators who secretly back retention of the filibuster, another victory for Sen. Mitch McConnell, and more lost time for the bigger items on the Biden agenda.
All the price of Joe Biden’s absurd rhetorical hype.
Tyler Durden
Sun, 07/18/2021 – 17:30 - Uber's $59 Million Fine Over Sexual Assault Data Was Just Reduced To $150K
Uber’s $59 Million Fine Over Sexual Assault Data Was Just Reduced To $150K
Uber has ‘come to an arrangement’ with a California regulator that would reduce a $59 million fine to just $150,000, according to the proposed agreement filed Thursday.
In December of 2020, the California Public Utilities Commission (CPUC) fined the ride-sharing company $59 million and threatened to suspend its license if they didn’t comply with a request for data on sexual assaults, according to The Verge.
Under the terms of the new deal, however, Uber will provide anonymized data on sexual assault incidents and will give accusers the ability to opt-in to being contacted by CPUC in the future. The company will also contribute $5 million to the California Victims Compensation Board, and $4 million towards developing industry-wide efforts to report and respond to these types of incidents. Uber will deposit the combined $9 million with the CPUC’s Fiscal Office.
The CPUC fine was in response to a damning 84-page safety report published in 2019, which included aggregate data on thousands of sexual assaults in the US between 2017 and 2018 during trips taken in Uber vehicles.
Uber called the report “jarring,” but declined to provide more specific information about the assaults when the CPUC came asking. The CPUC also wanted to know more information about who at the company authored the report, especially because Uber admitted in the fine print that it did not “assess or take any position on whether any of the reported incidents actually occurred.” (The CPUC has regulatory authority over transportation companies in California and regularly investigates complaints against them.)
Uber refused to answer the CPUC’s questions and hand over the data on the grounds that it would put sexual assault survivors at risk. It appealed the CPUC’s fine in January, calling the $59 million fine “extraordinary” and claiming that the CPUC was “penaliz[ing] Uber for its good-faith efforts to stand with survivors.” –The Verge
Uber has faced numerous lawsuits stemming from alleged sexual assault. In April, 2019, a Washington DC woman sued the company for negligence and consumer protection violations after she says a driver sexually assaulted her. In 2017, a woman in India who says she was raped in 2014 by an Uber driver also sued the company – after an Uber executive illegally disclosed a portion of her medical records to other Uber employees, including former CEO Travis Kalanick.
In 2019, 19 women sued Uber competitor Lyft for failure to prevent sexual assault perpetrated by drivers on the platform, then doing virtually nothing to investigate the complaints.
Tyler Durden
Sun, 07/18/2021 – 17:00 - Goodhart's Law: When Investors Mistake The Distortions Of The Wall Of Money For Wisdom
Goodhart’s Law: When Investors Mistake The Distortions Of The Wall Of Money For Wisdom
By One River Asset Management CIO, Eric Peters
“When a measure becomes a target, it ceases to be a good measure,” said the Englishman, stepping outside of himself. “That’s Goodhart’s Law.”
Charles Goodhart observed that central banks measured money supply, and found certain M1 growth rates to be optimal. But once they targeted that optimal range, M1 lost its value as a measure.
Market and economic actors adjusted their behavior to game the M1 system. So central bankers shifted to M2, then M3, and M4.
“Investing is obviously not a science, but if it were, we would say that you can’t act on something and observe it at the same time.” French colonialists discovered this in rat infested Hanoi, when they offered a bounty for killing rodents. To receive the reward, the Vietnamese were required to produce severed tails.
Soon thereafter, tail-less rats scurried throughout the city. The bounty hunters removed their tails and released them to the filthy sewers to breed. Boosting their bounty.
“Investors discover pricing anomalies from the past. And they pile into them, ensuring that for a time they persist.” They mistake the distortions of their wall of money for the wisdom of their observations.
They interact with the market as if they’re exogenous, when, in fact, they’ve become endogenous. “Today’s greatest example of Goodhart’s Law in action can be found in volatility markets.”
The VIX index measures the expected volatility of the S&P 500, and is calculated by multiplying expected 30-day variance by 100. As a measure of market fear, it was quite useful, until it became something that could be traded.
“The sheer size of outstanding positions in VIX futures, VIX options, ETFs, ETNs and bank volatility selling programs is such that those trading these markets can no longer separate the true measure of volatility from their own actions.”
Tyler Durden
Sun, 07/18/2021 – 16:31
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