- Italy Approves New Guidelines For Central Bank Digital Currency
Italy Approves New Guidelines For Central Bank Digital Currency
Tyler Durden
Tue, 06/23/2020 – 02:45Central banks around the world are examining the use of digital currencies.
As of recent, central banks of the U.K., Sweden, Thailand, China, and the US are studying whether there are advantages of the digital form of their fiat money.
And the answer is yes, the government and banking elites will seize even more power from the people.
Called central bank digital currencies (CBDCs), this “digital fiat” — digital money can be directly sent to people’s bank accounts. It eliminates physical cash – which is the end game for banking elites.
A CBDC gives a government complete control over its currency. This will increase their financial-surveillance over the people. When a bank fails, there will be no bank run, because people can’t withdraw their money from that bank. This means when a financial crisis strikes, it will allow governments to do “bail-ins” where the people, like it or not, will be forced to take a haircut on their deposits to save the failing institution.
And with that being said, the Executive Committee of the Italian Banking Association recently approved new general guidelines for a CBDC.
“Italian banks are available to participate in projects and experiments of a digital currency of the European Central Bank, contributing, thanks to the skills acquired in the construction of infrastructures and distributed governance, to speed up the implementation of a European-level initiative in a first nation. Since last year, the ABI has set up a working group dedicated to deepening the aspects related to digital coins and crypto-assets. Hence the 10 considerations shared by the Executive Committee,” the Italian baking association said on its website.
Here are the ten criteria for an Italian CBDC:
- Monetary stability and full compliance with the European regulatory framework must be preserved as a matter of priority.
- Italian banks are already operating on a Distributed ledger technology DLT infrastructure with the Spunta project. They are intended to be part of the change brought about by an important innovation such as digital coins.
- A programmable digital currency represents an innovation in the financial field capable of profoundly revolutionizing money and exchange. This is a transformation capable of bringing significant potential added value, particularly in terms of the efficiency of the operating and management processes. Hence the importance of dedicating attention and energy to develop, quickly and with the collaboration of all the ecosystem players, useful tools first of all for the development of the Euro area.
- Digital money needs to be fully trusted by citizens. To this end, it is essential that the highest standards of regulatory compliance, safety and supervision are adhered to.
- In particular, a Central Bank Digital Currency, thanks to the central role played by the Central Bank, represents the tool that more than any other can reconcile the needs of innovation, in line with the current reference framework of rules, existing instruments and interoperability with the analog world. The existence of such an instrument could at the same time reduce the attractiveness of instruments of comparable use but issued by private individuals or (in cases of complete decentralization) which cannot be identified, characterized by an intrinsically higher risk profile.
- With the aim of fully explaining the transformative potential of these instruments, the possibility, at the moment of study, of issuing a European CBDC intended for the public, which could represent an evolution of cash, is of particular interest. Thanks to the role of the banks, it is possible to identify technical solutions and reference models to preserve the current characteristics of cash, while introducing many benefits of the digital world (already proper to electronic payment instruments), such as the possibility of not losing the own money and, in this period of strong attention to health risk, to operate in contactless mode.
- Detailed work will lead to the identification of the distribution, conservation and exchange model of digital currencies that best fits the customer’s service needs, to maintain the effectiveness of the monetary policy transmission mechanisms and regulatory compliance. Of course, in each of these objectives, the role of banks is crucial.
- Achieving high ease of use, while ensuring full interoperability between the digital and analog world and a total level of circularity between all the players in the ecosystem, represents a success factor in the diffusion of these tools.
- Particular attention must be paid, according to the technological choices that will be adopted, to the citizens’ personal data protection profiles.
- Projecting these reflections into the future, it is possible to affirm that the availability of a CBDC will enable a series of use cases of great interest: to favor the transmission of value between peers, thus also facilitating the logic of exchange between person and machine and between machine and machine; allow the settlement of cross-border peer-to-peer transactions, mitigating the interest rate, exchange rate and counterparty risk; Promote, thanks to the programmability characteristic of these currencies, the execution of exchanges upon the occurrence of predefined conditions, ultimately reducing administrative processes.
A post-corona world has given the financial elites a window of opportunity to begin the implementation of transitioning economies into a universal cashless system:
- Bill Gates Goes Viral on Digital ID and Digital Currency
- Coronavirus Swings Society to “Touch Free” Digital ID and Digital Currency
It appears the end of physical cash is ahead.
- When Everyone Kneels, Who Will Stand Up For Western History And Culture?
When Everyone Kneels, Who Will Stand Up For Western History And Culture?
Tyler Durden
Tue, 06/23/2020 – 02:00Authored by Giulio Meotti via The Gatestone Institute,
“Antiracism is no longer the defense of the equal dignity of people, but an ideology, a vision of the world,” said the French philosopher Alain Finkielkraut, son of Holocaust survivors.
“Antiracism has been transformed… At the time of the great migration, it is no longer a question of welcoming newcomers by integrating them into European civilization, but exposing the faults of this civilization”.
He referred to “self-racism” as “the most dismaying and grotesque pathology of our time”.
Its capital is London.
“Topple the racists” consists of a map with 60 statues in 30 British cities. The removal of the statues is being requested to support a movement born in the United States after a white policeman, Derek Chauvin, killed a black man, George Floyd, by kneeling on his neck.
In Bristol, a crowd pushed the statue of philanthropist and slave-owner Edward Colston into the harbor. The act was followed in London by protests vandalizing statues of Winston Churchill, Mahatma Gandhi and Abraham Lincoln. London’s Mayor Sadiq Khan, after removing the monument to Robert Milligan, a Scottish slave trader, from outside the Museum of London Docklands, announced the creation of commission to review tearing down statues that do not reflect “the city’s diversity”. Two more statues were ordered to be removed from two London hospitals.
Vandalism and self-hatred are quickly gaining ground. The epic of great discoveries associated with British Empire has become shameful. The protests are not about slavery. No one in the UK today would cheer that period. It is rather a call for cultural cleansing of all the works contradicting the new mantra: “diversity”.
“A new form of Taliban was born in the UK today”, wrote Nigel Farage, referring to two giant ancient Buddha statue that were blown up by the Taliban in Afghanistan in 2001.
“Unless we get moral leadership quickly our cities won’t be worth living in”.
The list of statues to be removed includes the names of Oliver Cromwell and Horatio Nelson, two major figures in British history, as well as Nancy Astor, the first woman to be elected to the British Parliament and take a seat in 1919. Also on the list were the names of Sir Francis Drake, Christopher Columbus and Charles Gray (the prime minister whose government supervised the abolition of slavery in 1833).
British Prime Minister Boris Johnson, expressing opposition to the removal campaign, said:
“We cannot now try to edit or censor our past. We cannot pretend to have a different history. The statues in our cities and towns were put up by previous generations. They had different perspectives, different understandings of right and wrong. But those statues teach us about our past, with all its faults. To tear them down would be to lie about our history, and impoverish the education of generations to come.”
British post-colonial guilt is, however, having repercussions far larger than statues. There is, for instance, still total silence about persecuted Christians, according to a UK bishop leading a government review into their suffering. There is also, notably, a retreat from the world’s stage.
“When the West loses confidence in itself, because of excessive or misplaced guilt over colonialism, it turns to isolationism”, noted Bruce Gilley, a professor of political science.
“We are afraid that anything we do is colonial. There’s plenty of countries willing to step into that global governance gap: China, Iran, Russia, Turkey”.
Post-colonial guilt is also suffocating freedom of speech in the UK. The former British “equality watchdog” chief, Trevor Phillips, was suspended from the Labour Party after allegations of “Islamophobia”. Phillips’ guilt? Being critical of multiculturalism. According to Phillips:
“In my view, squeamishness about addressing diversity and its discontents risks allowing our country to sleepwalk to a catastrophe that will set community against community, endorse sexist aggression, suppress freedom of expression, reverse hard-won civil liberties, and undermine the liberal democracy that has served this country so well for so long.”
Phillips also claimed that British politicians and journalists are “terrified” of discussing race, thereby leaving multiculturalism to become a “racket” exploited by some to entrench segregation. A man of Guyanese origin, a Labour Party veteran and an equality commissioner spoke the truth to the multiculturalists.
The activists who campaign to remove the statues want radically to change the look of the British capital. The clash seems to consist of, on one side, violent censors who bully everyone, and on the other side, cowardly, appeasing politicians, who are afraid and bow to the vandals. Monuments are a vital and visible part of a global city; they embody their place in the history of a city, otherwise only bus stops and Burger Kings would remain there. These protestors appear to wish for a revised, sanitized history. If we do not quickly understand that, if we erase our past, as the former Soviet Union tried to do, it will be easier for people to create their vision of our future with no rudder to anchor us or our values. We will be left with nothing in our hands but shattered pieces of our history and culture.
This movement of hating the West — which has, as all of us do, an imperfect history — seems to have begun in British universities. In Cambridge, professors of literature asked to replace white authors with representatives from minorities to “decolonize” the curriculum. The student union of London’s prestigious School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS) asked to remove Plato, Kant, Descartes, Hegel and others from the curriculum, because they were “all white” — as if the color of our skin should be the sole determinant of our thoughts. In Manchester, students painted over a mural based on Kipling’s poem “If”.
A scholar of colonialism, Nigel Biggar, said that a “climate of fear” has returned to British universities. The University of Liverpool recently agreed to rename a building honoring former prime minister William Gladstone. At Oxford, meanwhile, the statue of Cecil Rhodes, philanthropist and founder of Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe), risks being the next to go.
“There is a bit of hypocrisy,” Lord Patten, the chancellor of Oxford, commented, “in Oxford taking money for 100 scholars a year, about a fifth of them from Africa, to come to Oxford, and then saying we want to throw the Rhodes statue… in the Thames”.
He said that his own view remained the same as one “expressed by Nelson Mandela at a celebration of the Rhodes Trust in 2003”: that despite the “problems associated with Cecil Rhodes in history, if it was alright for Mandela, then I have to say it’s pretty well alright for me”. But not for the revisionists.
Western history is seemingly being remade to portray all of Western civilization as just one big apartheid. It is as if we should not only pull down statues but also pull down ourselves. But a successful democracy, cannot be built on just erasing the past.
The statue in London of Churchill — who stood against the Nazis during the Second World War and saved Europe from barbarism — was covered up by the city authorities during recent protests. Its visual erasure reminds one of the nude statues in Rome covered up by authorities to please Iranian President Hassan Rouhani, or the “disappearance” of portraits in the former Soviet Union, of people whom the Politburo decided had fallen out of favor. There is a falsity in erasing one’s history. One may not have a perfect history, but it is one’s history, nevertheless. As the historian Victor Davis Hanson wrote, a country “does not have to be perfect to be good.” Excising the distasteful parts does not change what happened; they may even be replaced with parts that are more distasteful.
Some London museums already adopted this covering-up and self-censorship a while ago. The Tate Gallery in London banned a work by John Latham that displayed a Koran embedded in glass. The Victoria and Albert Museum showed, then withdrew, a devotional art image of Muhammad. The Saatchi Gallery featured two works of nudes overlaid with Arabic script, which prompted complaints from Muslim visitors; the museum covered the works. The Whitechapel Art Gallery purged an exhibit containing nude dolls.
The Merriam-Webster dictionary just revised the definition of “racism” to include “systemic racism”, presumably meaning that the entire society is guilty and unjust.
The censors seem to want to control our mental universe, as in George Orwell’s novel, 1984:
“Every record has been destroyed or falsified, every book rewritten, every picture has been repainted, every statue and street building has been renamed, every date has been altered. And the process is continuing day by day and minute by minute. History has stopped. Nothing exists except an endless present in which the Party is always right”.
This process of Western self-abasement began long ago. The Labour Party councils in the UK, for example, began to examine all the statues under their jurisdiction. The mayor of Bristol, Marvin Rees, instead of defending the rule of law, called the violent removal of the statue of Colston an act of “historical poetry“. When vandals started to destroy statues, many applauded. British Prime Minister Boris Johnson called it “politically correct iconoclasm“.
A week before the statues row, people in the UK knelt in the name of George Floyd. It was as if there was a collective claim that Western society as a whole had to repent. It seemed a form of ideological hysteria, not so distant from that of the Inquisition or the Salem Witch Trials: those who knelt were presumably supposed appear as if they were more moral, on the “right side” of justice. There were even British policemen kneeling, as, in the US, Speaker of the House of Representatives Nancy Pelosi and other Democrats knelt to their overlords. Both were acts of irresponsibility and capitulation. A few days later, the British establishment kowtowed to the new Taliban.
What is this macabre ideological game aimed at accomplishing? Not taking down monuments as such, like the statues of Christopher Columbus which have been torn down or beheaded. It is more than that. It is a power-grab to create a cultural revolution, to prevent anyone from saying that cultures are not all the same; to put Europe’s past on trial; to instill perennial remorse into consciences, and to spread intellectual terror to advance multiculturalism.
How many people will refuse to go along with this coerced suppression of history? If many kneel to this new totalitarianism, who will have the courage to stand up for Western history and culture?
- Is This The Lowest Point In Modern US History?
Is This The Lowest Point In Modern US History?
Tyler Durden
Tue, 06/23/2020 – 00:10Authored by Michael Snyder via TheMostImportantNews.com,
Things have certainly gotten really crazy here in 2020. First we witnessed the eruption of the worst global pandemic in 100 years, then the U.S. economy started collapsing, and then we watched major U.S. cities burn from coast to coast as rioting and looting spiraled out of control. Everywhere you look, people are very angry and deeply frustrated, nearly 46 million Americans have filed for unemployment benefits over the past few months, and fear of COVID-19 continues to paralyze our society to a frightening extent. But can this really be called the lowest point in modern U.S. history?
According to one recent survey, a whopping 72 percent of all Americans actually believe that this “is the lowest point in the country’s history that they’ve ever been alive to see”…
Across two polls, more than 5,000 adult U.S. residents were recently surveyed on the state of America right now. A staggering 83% say that worrying about the future of the United States is a big source of personal stress. Also, 72% believe this is the lowest point in the country’s history that they’ve ever been alive to see.
That appears to be quite a consensus.
Of course many of those that were alive during the Great Depression of the 1930s and the early days of World War II would strongly argue that what we are experiencing today is nothing compared to what they had to deal with.
And without a doubt, the twelve years from 1968 to 1980 were not easy years by any stretch of the imagination. Just like now, Americans of that era were facing great civil unrest, tremendous economic problems, major political shaking and a global pandemic that killed a lot of people. If you don’t know about that pandemic, just Google “the flu pandemic of 1968”.
Having said all that, there is definitely a case to be made for 2020. Not even during the Great Depression did we ever see the kind of apocalyptic spike in unemployment that we have witnessed this year. Even though nearly 46 million Americans have already filed for unemployment benefits since the COVID-19 pandemic began, big firms continue to lay off thousands upon thousands of workers. On top of that, more than 100,000 businesses have already permanently closed their doors, and Americans have already skipped payments on more than 100 million loans.
And as I explained the other day, the most severe pain from this economic downturn won’t even begin to hit us until about six weeks from now.
As emergency government assistance starts to fade, an increasing number of Americans will have a very difficult time keeping up with paying the bills. In fact, another new survey has found that about half of all homeowners are “worried about making future mortgage payments”…
New research offers a glimpse into struggling households, discovers out of the 2,000 American homeowners polled, over half (52%) of respondents say they’re routinely worried about making future mortgage payments and nearly half (47%) considered selling their home because of the inability to service mortgage payments.
The study, conducted by OnePoll and the National Association of Realtors, determined 81% of respondents had experienced unexpected financial stress due to the virus-induced recession. Over half (56%) reduced spending so they could service mortgage payments.
Meanwhile, fear of COVID-19 is going to continue to paralyze our society for the foreseeable future.
I don’t know if you have taken a look at the numbers lately, but the truth is that the number of confirmed cases in the U.S. is starting to surge again. For the planet as a whole, Friday was the worst day of the pandemic so far by a very wide margin, and that means that this crisis is a long, long way from over.
There are already whispers that there may be new lockdowns here in the United States. I seriously hope that does not happen, because that would be another crippling blow for our collapsing economy, and the virus just continued to spread during the first round of lockdowns anyway.
On top of everything else, more rioting, looting and violence could erupt at literally any moment. Since this is an election year, tensions are going to be running even higher than usual, and even a relatively minor spark could cause another round of major civil unrest.
But as bad as things are right now, what most people don’t understand is that this is just the beginning.
As I have warned so many times before, we have entered a time when we are going to be facing one crisis after another, and this is going to be true no matter what happens during the election in November.
We have reached a moment in history when all of the cycles are ending, all of the bubbles are bursting, and we are going to experience the consequences of all the very foolish decisions that we have been making for decades.
At this point, the immediate outlook is so bleak that it is turning all sorts of people into raging pessimists. For example, Wolf Richter just posted an article in which he explained why he just shorted the entire stock market…
I’m sharing this trade so that everyone gets to ridicule me and hail me as a moron and have fun at my expense in the comments for weeks and months every time the market goes up. And I do not recommend shorting this market; it’s nuts. But here’s why I did.
The stock market had just gone through what was termed the “greatest 50-day rally in history.” The S&P 500 index had skyrocketed 47% from the intraday low on March 23 (2,192) to the close on June 8 (3,232). It was a blistering phenomenal rally. Since June 8, the market has gotten off track but not by much. It’s still a phenomenal rally. And it came during the worst economy in my lifetime.
I know that a lot of people will criticize him for making such a move, but I applaud him for his bravery.
Even if his timing turns out to be a bit early, I certainly concur with him that this latest Fed-fueled bubble will inevitably burst.
But ultimately we are going to be facing problems that are much more severe than a stock market crash. In fact, a market crash will be among the least of our problems.
Because it isn’t just our economy that is collapsing.
Our entire society is in the process of imploding, and if you don’t like 2020, then you really aren’t going to like what is going to happen in 2021 and beyond.
- Behind Bars: America's Biggest Coronavirus Clusters
Behind Bars: America’s Biggest Coronavirus Clusters
Tyler Durden
Mon, 06/22/2020 – 23:50Out of America’s eight biggest coronavirus outreaks, Statista’s Niall McCarthy reports that seven are in jails or correctional facilities.
That’s according to a list from the New York Times which shows that the biggest national cluster is in the Marion Correctional Institution in Ohio which has 2,439 cases as of June 16, 2020. Another facility in Ohio, the Pickaway Correctional Institution, has 1,791. The third largest cluster was identified in the Trousdale Turner Correctional Center in Hartsville, Tennessee.
You will find more infographics at Statista
Even though prisons account for the largest outbreaks in the U.S. with deaths within their walls increasing 73 percent in the past month alone, the vast majority of outbreaks have occurred in U.S. nursing homes and long-term care facilities. The toll on inmates has still been heavy, however, with 600 estimated to have died during the pandemic so far.
- Schlichter: The Elites Are Revolting
Schlichter: The Elites Are Revolting
Tyler Durden
Mon, 06/22/2020 – 23:30Authored by Kurt Schlichter via Townhall.com,
Our Establishment is revolting – in fact, it stinks on ice. What you see out there is our alleged betters struggling mightily to hold onto the power that we Normal people dared to wrest away from them in 2016. One component of their campaign is the burning and looting information operation conducted by black-clad pawns. The other component is the soft power corporate/media/cultural conspiracy to silence dissent and enforce fearful conformity to their narrative. Usually, a revolution is conducted by the peasants to throw off a tyrannical ruling class. Here, the ruling class is waging a political and cultural war to retake and then tighten its grip on the masses. They are no longer even pretending to seek the consent of the governed. And once they retake power, that’s it – they will never give up power again.
This is about casting off the “tyranny” of you having rights and interests that get in the way of the best and the brightest doing whatever the hell they want, a continuing theme in my new book The 21 Biggest Lies about Donald Trump (and You!). And a key component of this cynical plot is systematically denying you the protection of norms and laws, all while subjecting you to them where it benefits the elite.
Let’s review.
Remember free speech? That was fun while it lasted. Oh, it still exists, to the extent that you may speak freely as long as your free speech conforms to the Establishment narrative. Do you feel like you can say whatever you think freely and without restraint? Or do you experience a twinge of fear of the consequences if you get online and state that no, you do not support the Marxist goals of Black Lives Matter? If so, their plan is working. You are supposed to be afraid and intimidated – and while the endless list of people cancelled, abused, and fired from jobs because they refused to kowtow to the mob serves to outrage us, it also serves to teach us that there is a fearsome price to be paid for failing to go along and cheer the Emperor’s new duds.
Remember the big lie that Trump is the great destroyer of norms? What about the norm of free speech? Not the First Amendment – that’s a constitutional guarantee. It’s the norm, the general consensus that people will not be punished for their views even outside the law, that’s dead, and not at the hand of The Donald.
Maybe you can appeal for support to the neutral truthtellers of the media, the brave firefighters who ensure the little guy gets a fair shake. Nah. Our garbage media is dedicated to reinforcing the status quo – instead of comforting the afflicted and afflicting the comfortable, it afflicts the afflicted and sucks up to the comfortable.
Hey, maybe academia will stand up for truth, justice, and equality. And maybe you just took an enormous bong hit.
Ok then, the objective science people of science will tell us the truth because science is important and science is scientific and they surely would never get involved in politics. Except they lie about global warming, and about masks, and they give a free pass to woke protests while scolding those gnarly (and probably racist) Ozark proles about how their pool party will become an orgy of death. Never mind that a month on, there’s still no pile of pangolin flu corpses to point at.
Well, at least our military remains above the fray. Oops. In an era when our Navy ships can’t keep from running into other boats and turbaned banditos continue to roam freely through the Hindu Kush after two decades, we see the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs appear on video to apologize for appearing in public with the guy we elected his commander-in-chief. The military cannot be political, the guys who can’t win a war tell us, as they become super-political. The ChiComs, who have a serious military unlike our shamefully frivolous one, would be wise to time their inevitable devastating sneak attack for when our armed forces are on a three-day diversity training stand-down. If only our armed forces had a recent track record of victory to match its track record of wokeness.
How about our police? We’ve seen some signs of push-back, like in Atlanta, but if they won’t even protect their station house from the woke mobs, are they going to protect your house? And don’t think some are not eager to join in the petty oppression – how many cops obediently hassled mommies for letting their kids play outside during the pandemic panic?
And don’t think you can rely on constitutional guarantees. You can have guarantees all day long and they don’t mean a thing unless they are enforced by the courts. Do you see the courts enforcing your rights? Look at Chief Justice John Souter – I mean Roberts – and his antics. Yeah sure. DACA is one (preferred) president creating a law via decree that overrides an actual law – you know, one of those “I’m Just a Bill” laws – but it can’t be undone by a subsequent (non-preferred) president. Huh?
Oh, and remember your right to worship? You might think that a right to practice your religion means some bureaucrat can’t ban church while clapping like a trained seal as thousands of woke protestors mix n’ mingle, but no. According to Souter II, the First Amendment doesn’t make your silly Jesus hootenannys special, even though it expressly does. Why, your church can be treated just like a movie theater or bowling alley – that is, much worse than, say, massive political donor Walmart.
What are the chances that the Supreme Court, led by Chief Justice Grown-In-Office, would again construe the Second Amendment’s admonition that the right to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed to mean the right to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed? We should be glad that the Supreme Court hasn’t taken up a gun case in a decade.
And forget equal justice under criminal law. It’s dual justice. Felonia Milhous von Pantsuit commits crimes that would get you locked up but she gets a pass. McCabe, Brennan, Clapper, Comey and the rest lie and walk free, while Mike Flynn commits no crime and has to fight the power to even get a dismissal of a plea obtained by the rankest prosecutorial misconduct. Rioters and criminals get released with a wave and a smile; cops get threatened with death row for fighting back when a career criminal tries to taser them. It’s all a lie and a scam.
This is all part and parcel of a strategy to strip us of any kind of refuge or recourse from abuse. We cannot look to the marketplace of ideas to make our case because our case has been declared verboten. The institutions are arrayed against us. The law means nothing because it will not be enforced neutrally. So why again do we consider ourselves bound by the social contract the establishment has been using like Charmin?
What we are seeing is the elite’s ruthless pursuit of the power we stripped them of back in 2016 when we made the Hillary fans cry. And since then, despite it all, we have made progress – some good judges, no more wars, trade realism with China. But this is intolerable to the leftist Establishment.
We the People must be overthrown. Now the question is whether We the People are going to let that happen.
- April Pot Sales Grew Like A Weed During Lockdowns
April Pot Sales Grew Like A Weed During Lockdowns
Tyler Durden
Mon, 06/22/2020 – 23:10The rise in cannabis demand in March was not just an anomaly but continued into April. It appears Americans were getting high during lockdowns to cope with pandemic stress.
Bloomberg, citing data from BDS Analytics, said cannabis sales erupted in April as dispensaries in many legal states were declared essential businesses.
On a year-over-year basis, April pot sales in Maryland doubled, sales in Arizona rose 49%, Oregon saw +40%, Colorado +8%, and California +4%. However, Nevada reported a 30% decline for the month due to a collapse in the travel and tourism industry, or mainly because Vegas was closed.
h/t Bloomberg BDS data also showed sales on April 20 (4/20, also known as a marijuana holiday) were not stellar when compared to last year.
“Overall, 4/20 sales in California, Colorado, Nevada, Oregon, and Washington fell 22% from 2019, according to data from Headset Inc. That may be at least partly because the celebration fell on a Monday this year and a Saturday last year,” Bloomberg said.
At the beginning of the lockdown, we noted how Americans were panic hoarding pot, long lines outside of dispensaries were spotted across the country.
- It’s Not Just Toilet-Paper & Hand-Sanitizer – Condoms & Pot Sales Soar Amid Global Lockdown
- Vice, Vice, Baby! Americans (Ab)Use Porn, Booze, & Chocolate To Cope With Lockdown
The pot industry appeared to be booming during lockdowns, though ETFMG Alternative Harvest ETF (MJ) has plunged by at least 65% in the last year. No love for pot stocks?
With the economy in the dumps, tens of millions unemployed, and a pandemic still raging – Americans are heavily medicating themselves with pot.
- Stanford Prof: Median Infection Fatality Rate Of COVID-19 For Those Under-70 Is Just 0.04%
Stanford Prof: Median Infection Fatality Rate Of COVID-19 For Those Under-70 Is Just 0.04%
Tyler Durden
Mon, 06/22/2020 – 22:50Authored by Daniel Payne via JustTheNews.com,
A scientist known for his contrarian takes to dire COVID-19 predictions has released a paper claiming that antibody evidence suggests the median coronavirus infection fatality rate for those under 70 is just 0.04%.
The estimate throws into sharp relief the lopsided mortality figures for the disease, which has claimed an inordinate number of elderly people across the planet while leaving younger individuals mostly unscathed.
John Ioannidis, a professor of epidemiology and population health at Stanford University, argues in a paper published earlier this month that COVID-19 “seroprevalence studies,” which measure infection rates using the presence of antibodies in blood samples, “typically show a much lower fatality than initially speculated in the earlier days of the pandemic.”
“It should be appreciated,” he writes in the paper, “that [the fatality rate] is not a fixed physical constant and it can vary substantially across locations, depending on the population structure, the case-mix of infected and deceased individuals and other, local factors.“
In the paper, which has not yet been peer-reviewed, Ioannidis surveyed 23 different seroprevalence studies and found that “among people <70 years old, infection fatality rates ranged from … 0.00-0.23% with median of 0.04%."
The median fatality rate of all cases, he writes, is 0.26%, significantly lower than some earlier estimates that suggested rates as high as over 3%.
In the paper, Ioannidis acknowledges that “while COVID-19 is a formidable threat,” the apparently low fatality rate compared to earlier estimates “is a welcome piece of evidence.”
“Decision-makers can use measures that will try to avert having the virus infect people and settings who are at high risk of severe outcomes,” he writes.
“These measures may be possible to be far more precise and tailored to specific high- risk individuals and settings than blind lockdown of the entire society.”
- Which States Are Removing The Most Confederate Monuments?
Which States Are Removing The Most Confederate Monuments?
Tyler Durden
Mon, 06/22/2020 – 22:30The killing of George Floyd has sparked a resurgence in the removal of Confederate monuments to prominent slave-owning Democrats throughout US history.
Greg Rones/Shutterstock. Graphic: Nathaniel Blum In recent weeks, Virginia, Florida and Texas top the states which have removed the most Confederate symbols, according to an analysis by BeenVerified.
For every monument which has been removed, approximately 10 remain according to the study. Meanwhile, West Virginia, South Carolina and Mississippi are the top three states in which the least Confederate monuments have been removed.
Top takeaways via BeenVerified:
- States that have the largest percentage of remaining symbols: West Virginia (100%), South Carolina (99%), Mississippi (99%) and Arkansas (96%), followed by Georgia, North Carolina and Alabama (95% each).
- Maryland and California have the top percentage of removals: Out of states that had at least 10 Confederate symbols, Maryland has removed 70%, followed by California (50%), Florida and Oklahoma (22% each), Missouri and the District of Columbia (17% each).
- States with the most remaining symbols: Virginia (244), Texas (207), Georgia (199), South Carolina (194), North Carolina (169), Mississippi (147), Alabama (125), Tennessee (99), Louisiana (84) and Florida (67).
- For every removal, 10 monuments and symbols remain: In total, states have removed 172 Confederate symbols over the years; but 1,712 still remain, our analysis shows.
- Most removed since 2013: States that have removed the most monuments and symbols since 2013 are: Texas (39), Virginia (30), Florida (17), Tennessee (10) and Georgia (7).
- Most removed in wake of George Floyd protests: Virginia (12), Texas and Florida (5 each) Alabama (4), Georgia and Kentucky (2). (Some planned removals in Virginia, however, are being challenged in court.)
- Not just located in the South: While the greatest concentration of symbols remain in former Confederate states and Border States, many exist in Northern states and new states formed after the Civil War, including: California and Ohio (5 each), New York and Pennsylvania (3 each); Washington, Idaho and Montana (2 each).
- Who they honor: Robert E. Lee, Jefferson Davis and Thomas Jonathan “Stonewall” Jackson are the top Confederates with statues, roads and schools in their name; Nathan Bedford Forrest, the Confederate general who was the first Grand Wizard of the Ku Klux Klan, has the sixth most number of monuments.
There are still 1,712 Confederate monuments and symbols in public which remain – which include statues, school names, roads, military bases, buildings, parks, monuments and other public designations honoring Democratic heroes.
BeenVerified also analyzed Confederate symbol removal by year, with senior data analyst Brian Ross noting “The Confederate symbol removal gained traction after the 2015 Charleston, South Carolina, church shootings, which ignited a nationwide debate on these symbols and their prominence in public spaces,” adding “But after peaking in 2017, the trend has been on a decline—until the death of George Floyd.“
The overwhelming majority of Confederate symbols across the country are dedicated to Robert E. Lee, Jefferson Davis and Thomas Jonathan “Stonewall” Jackson.
Will Rick Wilson’s cooler be next?
- Right Now There Is A "Mad Rush" To Get Out Of The Cities
Right Now There Is A “Mad Rush” To Get Out Of The Cities
Tyler Durden
Mon, 06/22/2020 – 22:10Authored by Michael Snyder via TheMostImportantNews.com,
So many wealthy people are rushing to move away from the big cities that it is creating a bit of a “real estate boom” in many suburban areas, small towns and rural communities. Fear of COVID-19, a collapsing economy and the tremendous urban violence that we have witnessed in recent weeks have combined to create a frenzy of activity. Last week, my wife and I heard from a friend in New York City that is all of a sudden desperate to move to another state, and I certainly can’t blame him for wanting to relocate. If I was in his shoes, I would be wanting to move too. But at this point so many people are all thinking the same thing that the demand for housing in certain areas threatens to greatly exceed the supply.
In fact, one real estate agent in the San Francisco area is describing it as “a mad rush to get out of the city”…
“There’s a mad rush to get out of the city,” said Ginger Martin, a real estate agent with Sotheby’s who concentrates on high-end properties in the San Francisco Bay Area. “What I’m really doing well with right now is anything that’s turnkey.”
Unfortunately, mortgage lending standards have really tightened up over the past few months, and so this is limiting the number of people that are able to successfully relocate.
Mostly, in this environment it is just “wealthy folks” that are able to move away from San Francisco and purchase a new home somewhere else…
Relocation, at the moment, is only by wealthy folks, who still have the financial mobility to move as the real economy implodes and paralyzes the bottom 90% of Americans. Even with a good credit score, lenders are not preapproving folks like they once were. Many people over the years flooded into San Francisco as the economy boomed, and tech flourished. Now with an economic downturn, social unrest, and pandemic — the city is becoming too dangerous to raise a family.
Over on the east coast, violence is one of the primary motivating factors that is causing people to suddenly pick up and move.
By now, virtually everyone has seen stunning footage of the rioting and looting that took place in the heart of New York City, and it certainly wouldn’t take much to spark more episodes of widespread violence.
At the same time, overall crime rates in NYC have been absolutely skyrocketing, and this is helping to fuel an exodus to “rural communities in New York and New Jersey”…
During May, overall crime declined compared to the same period last year. But the New York City Police Department (NYPD) said murders in the city increase by 79%, shootings jumped by 64%, and burglaries rose 34%.
The surge in violent crime is expected to supercharge a trend of New Yorkers fleeing the metro for rural communities in New York and New Jersey.
In the middle of the country, the city of Chicago is experiencing even more violence than New York City is.
In fact, dozens of people were just shot over Father’s Day weekend…
Nine people have been killed, including four under the age of 18, and 47 more were injured in shootings across Chicago on Father’s Day weekend, police said.
Two teenage boys, a 3-year-old, and a 13-year-old girl are among those who were killed, officials told ABC7 in Chicago.
And just a few weeks ago, we witnessed the most violent day ever recorded in the Windy City…
While Chicago was roiled by another day of protests and looting in the wake of George Floyd’s murder, 18 people were killed Sunday, May 31, making it the single most violent day in Chicago in six decades, according to the University of Chicago Crime Lab. The lab’s data doesn’t go back further than 1961.
If the problems that we are facing were just very temporary in nature, most people would probably be willing to ride them out.
Unfortunately, it appears that things aren’t going to be getting significantly better any time soon.
Now that the lockdowns have ended, the number of confirmed COVID-19 cases in the U.S. is starting to surge once again. On Friday, we witnessed more than 30,000 newly confirmed cases in the U.S. for the first time in many weeks, and it was actually the worst day so far for newly confirmed cases for the globe as a whole.
In other words, the coronavirus pandemic is getting worse. Whether you want to call it “the first wave” or “the second wave”, the truth is that cases are surging and that could have very serious implications for the months ahead.
Meanwhile, the U.S. economy continues to deteriorate very rapidly. Nearly 46 million Americans have now filed new claims for unemployment benefits since this pandemic first began, more than 100,000 businesses have permanently shut their doors, and U.S. consumers have skipped payments on more than 100 million loans. It is an economic meltdown of unprecedented size and scope, and many more months of extreme economic pain lie ahead of us.
On top of everything else, we are in an election year, and even a very small spark could set off more rioting, looting and violence.
At this point, tensions are so high in this country that a recent survey found that 34 percent of all Americans believe that there could be a “civil war” within the next five years…
The latest Rasmussen Reports national telephone and online survey finds that 34% of Likely U.S. Voters think the United States will experience a second civil war sometime in the next five years, but that includes only nine percent (9%) who say it’s Very Likely.
I have never seen our nation so deeply divided in my entire lifetime, and that makes me incredibly sad.
At a time when we should be coming together like never before, we are allowing strife, discord, anger and hatred to divide us even more deeply.
A house that is divided will surely fall, and the future of America looks extremely bleak if we continue down this path.
As one lone individual, there isn’t much that you can do to stop what is coming, but at least you can try to get to somewhere safe before everything falls apart.
But if you are going to move, you will need to do it quickly, because as I have discussed in this article there are lots of other people thinking the exact same thing.
- Dust-pocalypse Blankets Caribbean, Storm Nears Southern US
Dust-pocalypse Blankets Caribbean, Storm Nears Southern US
Tyler Durden
Mon, 06/22/2020 – 21:50A massive dust storm from the Sahara desert in Northern Africa traversed above the tropical Atlantic Ocean and is causing havoc in the Caribbean region, is expected to move into the Gulf of Mexico and Southern US later this week, reported The Weather Channel.
The plume of dust originated from the deserts of Western Africa last weekend and has now traveled more than 3,000 miles across the Atlantic Ocean to the Caribbean Sea.
Before and after pictures show the dust-apocalypse unfolding across parts of the Caribbean.
Before & After St. Barthelemy on Sunday. h/t Mark Sudduth Astronaut Doug Hurley tweeted a picture of the massive dust storm from low Earth orbit. He said, “We flew over this Saharan dust plume today in the west-central Atlantic. Amazing how large an area it covers!”
We flew over this Saharan dust plume today in the west central Atlantic. Amazing how large an area it covers! pic.twitter.com/JVGyo8LAXI
— Col. Doug Hurley (@Astro_Doug) June 21, 2020
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NOAA’s GOES satellite captured a stunning short clip on Friday of the dust storm over the Atlantic.
Today’s view of a large Saharan dust plume.
Watch in near-realtime: https://t.co/mtWrgxAxqY. pic.twitter.com/aq4Ozto4Ng
— CIRA (@CIRA_CSU) June 19, 2020
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Here’s another view of the dust storm, still intact during most of the trans-Atlantic journey, entering the Caribbean on Sunday.
The mid-afternoon closeup. In HD#SaharanDust #SAL pic.twitter.com/zKSgMJZT2o
— John Morales (@JohnMoralesNBC6) June 21, 2020
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More before and after photos recently taken on Caribbean islands like Antigua, Puerto Rico, and Trinidad:
“Here is an amazing comparison with a near perfect day to today. Looking east over the #VCBirdAirport, #Antigua towards the Atlantic. You can barely see beyond 3 miles,” tweeted 268Weather.
h/t 268Weather Saharan dust leaving poor visibility in San Juan, Peurto Rico on Monday.
WOW! The Saharan Dust has arrived in San Juan, Puerto Rico. Most significant dust reported in ~50 years according to residents. 📸Harvey Jaael @StormHour pic.twitter.com/7OqhRDqa4I
— Scot Pilie’ (@ScotPilie_Wx) June 22, 2020
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Dust storm in Trinidad.
h/t Kedi_shaaa The dust particles are expected to reach Texas and the rest of the Southern US by late week, creating hazy skies and potentially dangerous air to breathe.
This is super-interesting to me. We are in the middle of a huge dust storm here in Puerto Rico. The dust has traveled nearly 6,000 miles across the sea from the Sahara. pic.twitter.com/xbLUWcVxNA
— Jeff Hardy (@jeffreyjhardy) June 22, 2020
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First pandemic, then economic crash, morphing into social unrest, and now a massive dust storm?
Is America ready for the dust-apocalypse later this week?
- Chinese Gold Miners Continue To Gobble Up Gold Companies
Chinese Gold Miners Continue To Gobble Up Gold Companies
Tyler Durden
Mon, 06/22/2020 – 21:30Authored by Lawrence Thomas via GoldTelegraph.com,
Chinese gold companies continue to pursue and acquire mining companies aggressively.
The Buyouts:
- Continental Gold Inc. was acquired for C$1.3 billion in early March by Zijin Mining Group Co. The company’s asset, the Buriticá Project, is the most advanced underground gold mining operation in Colombia. Buriticá is one of the world’s largest high-grade gold projects, with production scheduled to begin in 2020. Mineral reserves are estimated to be 3.7 million ounces of gold with 8.4 g/t of gold (13.7 million tons).
- TMAC Resources entered into an agreement in early May with one of China’s biggest gold producers, Shandong Gold Mining, to sell the company for C$230 million. TMAC’s Hope Bay Property is a high-grade gold district with established Measured and Indicated Mineral Resources totaling approximately 5.17 million ounces of gold at an average grade of 7.4 g/t Au and Inferred Mineral Resources totaling approximately 2.13 million ounces of gold at an average grade of 6.1 g/t Au. However, the Canadian government is currently reviewing the buyout as Shandong Gold Mining Co. Ltd. is a Chinese state-owned enterprise.
- Guyana Goldfields was acquired by Zijin Mining Group for C$323 million on June 12th.. Zijin won the bidding war as it valued the company 35% higher than the previously accepted offer from Silvercorp Metals. Guyana Goldfields is a mid-tier gold producer primarily focused on the exploration, development, and operation of gold deposits in Guyana, South America. Its 2019 production guidance was between 145,000 – 160,000 ounces.
- Cardinal Resources was acquired by Shandong Gold Mining for A$300-millio on June 18. Cardinals Namdini Project has a Proved and Probable Ore Reserve of 5.1 Moz.
It is worth noting; China is already producing the most gold in the world.
The recent acquisition spree by Chinese companies should send a signal to the market that the country will be strategically utilizing the precious metal in the future with regards to it being a reserve asset.
It was interesting to learn from Zerohedge that Beijing is beginning to sound the alarm about the dollar’s reserve currency status:
Guo Shuqing, chairman of the China Banking and Insurance Regulatory Commission, delivered a strong warning on the U.S. currency last week, which might explain all of the gold mining takeovers.
He made four points in a speech at the Lujiazhui Forum in Shanghai:
-
The Fed is the de facto central bank of the world. When its policy targets its own economy without considering the spillover effect, the Fed is “very likely to overdraft the credit of the dollar and the U.S.”
-
The pandemic may persist for a long period of time, and countries keep throwing money at the problem with a diminished impact. “It is recommended that you think twice and reserve some policy space for the future.”
-
There is no free lunch. Watch out for inflation.
-
Financial markets are disconnected from the real economy, and such distortions are “unprecedented.” It’s going to be “really painful,” when the policy withdrawal starts.
Is China preparing to issue a gold-backed currency? Only time will tell, but there have been plenty of rumblings since 2008 of China pushing a gold-backed yuan.
If more companies continue to be gobbled up by Chinese mining companies, there certainly seems that something strategic is going on behind the scenes.
- Markets Immediately Reverse Earlier Plunge After Navarro Walks Back China Comments
Markets Immediately Reverse Earlier Plunge After Navarro Walks Back China Comments
Tyler Durden
Mon, 06/22/2020 – 21:26Update (1010ET): If ever there was evidence of the farce this so-called market (and perhaps also the Trump administration) has become, it is this.
Shortly after stocks and the yuan plunged following Peter Navarro using the words “it’s over” when discussing the US-China trade deal, the White House Advisor rapidly backtracked, claiming in a statement that the comment was “taken wildly out of context.”
Additionally, Axios reports that the President’s chief economic adviser Larry Kudlow refuted Navarro’s earlier comments:
“The U.S. remains engaged with China over the phase one trade deal signed last January and according to trade negotiator Bob Lighthizer the deal is going well. President Trump has made similar comments just recently.”
The response was instant spike in stocks…
And yuan…
And just like that – everyone’s stops were run!
* * *
Global pandemic, meh, buy stocks!
Global economic collapse, meh, buy stocks!
US-China trade deal is over? Sell, Mortimer, Sell!
US equity futures and offshore yuan are plunging in early Asia trading after White House trade adviser Peter Navarro said on Monday the trade deal with China is “over.”
“It’s over,” Navarro told Fox News in an interview when asked about the trade agreement.
Reuters reports that Navarros says the “turning point” came when the US learned about the spreading coronavirus only after a Chinese delegation had left Washington following the signing of the Phase 1 deal on Jan. 15.
“It was at a time when they had already sent hundreds of thousands of people to this country to spread that virus, and it was just minutes after wheels up when that plane took off that we began to hear about this pandemic,” Navarro said.
This follows various threats of US-China decoupling from the White House, and also an increasing anti-dollar rhetoric from Chinese officials.
Futures are getting hammered…
And Yuan collapsed….
Source: Bloomberg
Gold is bid…
And bond yields plunged…
Trump will not be pleased at the market drop – but then again, that’s Powell’s problem now! The question is why now? Which makes us wonder if the Trump admin realizes ‘we, the people’ need a non-domestic enemy to focus on and distract from the unrest at home.
- Roosevelt Statue To Be Removed From NYC's Museum Of Natural History
Roosevelt Statue To Be Removed From NYC’s Museum Of Natural History
Tyler Durden
Mon, 06/22/2020 – 21:15A statue of Theodore Roosevelt, the 26th president of the United States, will be removed from the front steps of the American Museum of Natural History in New York City, according to Mayor Bill de Blasio – who said in a Sunday evening statement that the museum made the request.
“As we strive to advance our institution’s, our City’s, and our country’s passionate quest for racial justice, we believe that removing the Statue will be a symbol of progress and of our commitment to build and sustain an inclusive and equitable Museum community and broader society,” said museum President Ellen Futter of the bronze statue which has stood at the institution’s Central Park West entrance since 1940.
The statue features Roosevelt on horseback with a Native American man and an African man who are standing next to the horse. In 2017, it was coated in red liquid by protesters, who called for its removal as a symbol of “patriarchy, white supremacy and settler-colonialism.”
Ms. Futter made clear that the museum’s decision was based on the statue itself — namely its “hierarchical composition”—- and not on Roosevelt, whom the museum continues to honor as “a pioneering conservationist.”
“Simply put,” she added, “the time has come to move it.” –NYT
According to the NYT, it is unknown when the statue will come down or where it will end up. According to the report, de Blasio says the city supports the museum’s request, and that “It is the right decision and the right time to remove this problematic statue.”
Teddy Roosevelt, whose face is on Mount Rushmore, served as the governor of New York from 1899 to 1900. During the Spanish-American war he lead the Rough Riders – the United States’ first volunteer cavalry, returning a national hero.
As president, he expanded the Navy, began construction of the Panama Canal, and won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1906 for brokering the end of the Russo-Japanese war. By the late 1970s he was consistently rated one of the top five best US presidents by the heads of 100 history departments.
Tear the entire museum down. It’s on stolen land. It has to go. https://t.co/oAKLZYvquk
— Stephen L. Miller (@redsteeze) June 21, 2020
- Canadian College Exec Apologizes, Resigns After 'Liking' Conservative Tweets
Canadian College Exec Apologizes, Resigns After ‘Liking’ Conservative Tweets
Tyler Durden
Mon, 06/22/2020 – 21:10The Chair of the University of British Columbia Board of Governors has resigned after a college activist group was triggered by several tweets he “liked.”
Michael Korenberg was targeted for cancellation by pro-antifa campus activist group, UBC Students Against Bigotry, after he liked tweets from Ann Coulter, Charlie Kirk and Dinesh D’Souza – as well as tweets wishing President Trump a happy birthday, according to True North.
One of the ‘liked’ tweets was critical of Black Lives Matter – drawing condemnation from far-left media outlets, as well as UBC staff such as professor Annette Henry, who said Korenberg’s Twitter activity has reflected a “white supremacist capitalist [hetero]patriarchy” worldview, adding that “It’s unfortunate that we have people in such positions of authority at UBC.”
According to Henry, UBC ‘still keeps hiring white people where we have the opportunity not to.’
UBS professor Jennifer Berdahl called on Korenberg to resign.
And now, he has, accompanied by a lengthy apology.
“Over the past two weeks some articles/statements that I ‘liked’ on Twitter supported regressive voices and took aim at thousands of brave individuals who are standing up against racism, discrimination and hatred,” wrote Korenberg in a Saturday tweet containing a typed statement.
“I accept that in liking these social media posts, I damaged what I support and that I hurt people. I wholeheartedly apologize to them, particularly to the students, faculty and staff of UBC…I have stepped down because it is the right thing to do.”
Today I stepped down as Chair of the Board of Governors of UBC. I owe all students, faculty and staff and all those who stand against all forms of discrimination, an apology. I do so with all my heart. pic.twitter.com/tDczgwvmbp
— Michael Korenberg (@Mikey4493) June 21, 2020
And as TNC‘s Lindsay Shepherd notes:
And that really is all he is resigning for, folks: because he liked some tweets featuring basic, mainstream Republican talking points.
Korenberg was showing signs, early on, that he was the “apologize and resign” type. He told PressProgress that he regrets liking the tweets, giving the weak excuse that he liked them late at night.
But for the rest of us, if we are ever targeted by a mob of leftist campus activists and media outlets for something so minuscule as liking conservative-minded tweets, I hope we can muster up some courage and not be the type to “apologize and resign.” –True North
We’re sure the woke mob will forgive his transgressions and he’ll regain his previous stature within academia. Or not.
- Iran's IRGC To Establish Permanent Military Base In Indian Ocean
Iran’s IRGC To Establish Permanent Military Base In Indian Ocean
Tyler Durden
Mon, 06/22/2020 – 20:50The Iranian Revolutionary Guard announced its intention to establish a permanent military base in the Indian Ocean by next March, with the aim of providing security in the waters of the Gulf of Oman and the ocean, and protecting fishermen and merchant ships from piracy.
The commander of the Naval Forces, Ali Reza Tungsiri, said that the Guards have directives from Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, to be present on the high seas permanently.
Via The National Interest In a press statement, Tungsiri said that the Iranian Army and Revolutionary Guards have previously sent fleets to the high seas, stressing that other future fleets will be sent.
The military official pointed out that Iranian fishermen and merchant ships were exposed to harassment by pirates in the Gulf of Oman and the Indian Ocean, stressing that the permanent presence of the guards in those areas would prevent any future attacks.
“The deployment of the fleet by the IRGC navy to distant waters has been done in the past, and our second fleet was also sent to the waters of the Indian Ocean,” the naval commander said.
“[Building a permanent marine base will improve] security in the mouth of the Indian Ocean that will also be of great help to the growing presence of Iranian fishing and fishing development in the region,” he added.
Meanwhile, Bloomberg mentioned that the Monday comments in Fars News Agency Agency didn’t specify a planned location for the base. Bloomberg also recalled that:
In April, Guard Corps gunboats approached American ships at close range, prompting President Donald Trump to order the U.S. Navy to open fire in any repeat confrontation. Iran, Russia and China late last year held joint naval drills in the Gulf of Oman and northern Indian Ocean.
It is also noteworthy to mention that Iran possesses the strategic port of Chabahar on the waters of the Indian Ocean and the Sea of Oman, but its development suffers from difficulties due to the U.S. sanctions on Tehran.
- China Kicks Off 10 Day Dog Meat Festival
China Kicks Off 10 Day Dog Meat Festival
Tyler Durden
Mon, 06/22/2020 – 20:30You’d think eating random animals – not to mention pets – in China would be frowned upon at this point. But a little global pandemic hasn’t stopped organizers from kicking off a 10 day dog meat festival, despite pushback from activists and government, according to the South China Morning Post. This despite earlier reports that China would no longer market dogs as livestock.
The festival is known to attract “thousands of visitors” who buy dogs “for the pot” that are on display. Animal rights activists are trying diligently to get the festival disbanded permanently.
Animal rights activist Peter Li said: “I do hope Yulin will change, not only for the sake of the animals but also for the health and safety of its people. Allowing mass gatherings to trade in and consume dog meat in crowded markets and restaurants in the name of a festival poses a significant public health risk.”
The article claims that the coronavirus has forced China to “reassess its relationship with animals”, although with an event like, well, a 10 day dog meat festival, it appears to us the country has a lot more reassessing to do.
Back in April, Shenzhen banned the consumption of dogs and other provinces are expected to follow suit. The agriculture ministry also decided to classify dogs as pets instead of livestock, SCMP noted. That did not last long.
Another activist, Zhang Qianqian, said: “From what we understand from our conversations with meat sellers, leaders have said the consumption of dog meat won’t be allowed in future. But banning dog-meat consumption is going to be hard and will take some time.”
- 22 Market Observations From Goldman's Head Of Hedge Fund Sales
22 Market Observations From Goldman’s Head Of Hedge Fund Sales
Tyler Durden
Mon, 06/22/2020 – 20:10By Tony Pasquariello, global head of HF Sales at Goldman
For the financial markets, the period since late February has been a watershed – a genuinely epic sequence of action and reaction.
In tactical terms, there’s no shortage of stories to recount. there was the day when S&P closed down … 12% (and, thereafter, the VIX touched 85). or, the time when the US long bond rallied 40bps … in 24 hours. and, to be sure, no greatest hits list would be complete without reference to the futures expiry when WTI sold off, ahem, 305%.
Jumping off those points, below is a simple layout of 22 line items that stuck out to me over the course of the past several months.
This sequence wasn’t constructed to represent a cohesive theme or directional bias, but I think we can agree on the following: this period has been epochal. we’re passing the early chapters. and, perhaps most importantly, the interplay between the financial markets and policy has been truly enormous and without precedent; the undeniable fact that government has been an overwhelming force in markets is shot through the list below:
1. 2020 has likely featured the sharpest — but, the shortest — recession in US history (certainly since the 1850s for the US, and since WWII on a global scale). credit: Jan Hatzius, GIR.
2. in turn, we’ve just seen the strongest rally out of a bear market since … 1932. credit: Ben Snider, GIR.
3. the US alone had conducted $2.3tr of QE in the past three months (Treasuries + mortgages). for those keeping score at home, that’s an average of around $35bn of bond buying per business day since mid-March. credit: David Mericle, GIR.
4. GIR expects zero interest rates in the US for several more years — until the economy reaches 2% inflation and full employment — which is perhaps not until 2025 (link).
5. GIR expects another $1.5tr of US fiscal support to come this summer (link).
6. largely thanks to fiscal support, GIR expects US disposable income to grow 4.0% in 2020 (link).
7. the US Treasury planned to borrow $3tr in Q2 alone (link); despite that supply glut, we’re just off the all-time low yields in US 2yr notes and 5yr notes.
8. in that same general context, US 30yr mortgage rates are down to all-time lows (link).
9. the past six weeks have seen the largest amount of global equity issuance on record, at $205bn (link).
10. March saw record outflows from corporate bond funds (-$42bn); we’re now witnessing record inflows to corporate bond funds (+$85bn since the start of April); link.
11. it’s not just that we’re witnessing record new issue in the credit markets, it’s that we’re also seeing record low corporate financing costs (e.g. AMZN raised $10bn of capital at the lowest 3/5/7/10 and 40yr yields ever; link).
12. March saw record outflows from equity mutual funds and ETFs; one can argue we’re now seeing legitimate signs of retail investor euphoria (e.g. a record # of account openings at US retail brokers; link).
13. buybacks: GS executed repurchase is down ~ 50% YTD (link). that said, it wouldn’t be surprising to see AAPL + MSFT + GOOG collectively buy back $75bn this year.
14. subject to your interpretation: the market cap of MSFT is larger than the entire US High Yield market (link).
15. Michele Della Vigna, GIR: “we estimate that clean tech can drive $1-2tr pa of green infrastructure investments and create 15-20mm jobs worldwide, mostly through public-private collaboration, low financing costs and a supportive regulatory framework … renewable power will become the largest area of spending in the energy industry in 2021” (link).
16. related: ESG funds comprised 31% of all YTD flows to global passive equity funds (link).
17. randomly found in a comment section on the world wide web: “does not capitalizing the first word in a paragraph make a writer appear to be cool or is it simply that Tony Pasquariello is an idiot.” I’m not bolding any part of this sentence.
Finally, these were some of the more striking charts from H1’20:
18. for better or for worse, this clearly illustrates the top heavy nature of S&P 500 returns YTD (credit to Cole Hunter, GIR):
19. despite an absence of available yield, we live in a world of record inflows to money market funds (link). I find it a little interesting that we’re seeing a tentative inflection lower here:
20. an updated chart of the y/y % change in US money supply (credit William Marshall in GIR. your interpretation of this chart may hinge on whether you’re a first or second derivative kind of person:
21. yes, there’s been some significant rotation of late in things like leaders vs laggards. for example, you can see there was some recent retracement in names were hit hard by the health crisis (see white line below, which is a ratio vs S&P). that said, note that the stocks most leveraged to the stay-at-home theme continue to outpace most everything else in the market (blue line):
22. last but not least, through thick and thin, the big S&P bull trend line still holds:
- NYC Sees 400% Jump In Shootings As Undercover Unit Disbanded
NYC Sees 400% Jump In Shootings As Undercover Unit Disbanded
Tyler Durden
Mon, 06/22/2020 – 19:50As the NYPD disbands its undercover investigations unit, taking hundreds of crime-spotting undercover officers off the streets (a decision that will almost certainly lead to fewer low level arrests, but also leaves an opening for more serious crime to make a comeback), it appears one of the most closely followed crime metrics in NYC has skyrocketed compared with the same period last year.
According to stats released by the department, the number of shootings reported in NYC over the past week hit 55, compared with just 12 during the same period last year. That’s a nearly 5-fold rise.
Commissioner Dermot Shea officially disbanded the plainclothes unit a week ago. The results since then have been startling.
Meanwhile, the hundreds of “journalists” who live in NYC have been obsessed with a bogus ‘conspiracy theory’ about the surfeit of fireworks heard around the city is part of a ‘conspiracy’ to stop black and brown people from getting enough sleep, in order to fomet more unrest.
Even Commissioner Shea acknowledges that the rank and file are “demoralized” after weeks of sometimes deadly interactions with protesters and looters and rioters. On Sunday, video of an officer applying a chokehold while detaining a suspect in Rockaway Beach, Queens led to his suspension without pay, further rankling the rank and file after Shea limply defended the decision to foster more “accountability in policing.”
The city council last week passed a new law requiring cops who use chokeholds to be charged with a misdemeanor, regardless of whether the subject is injured.
Venting to the New York Post, one law enforcement source claimed that this is what the politicians want, they want an increase in crime so they can further demonize police, while letting “non violent” offenders out of Rikers by the hundreds. “This is what the politicians wanted – no bail, nobody in Rikers, cops not arresting anyone,” one angry law enforcement source said Friday. “All those things equal people walking around on the street with guns, shooting each other.”
NYC isn’t alone: Chicago witnessed an explosion of violence over father’s day weekend.
- Doug Casey: The Deep State Is Responsible For All Economic Turmoil
Doug Casey: The Deep State Is Responsible For All Economic Turmoil
Tyler Durden
Mon, 06/22/2020 – 19:30Authored by Doug Casey via CaseyResearch.com,
I’d like to address some aspects of the Greater Depression in this essay.
I’m here to tell you that the inevitable became reality in 2008. We’ve had an interlude over the last few years financed by trillions of new currency units.
However, the economic clock on the wall is reading the same time as it was in 2007, and the Black Horsemen of your worst financial nightmares are about to again crash through the doors and end the party. And this time, they won’t be riding children’s ponies, but armored Percherons.
To refresh your memory, let me recount what a depression is.
The best general definition is: A period of time when most people’s standard of living drops significantly. By that definition, the Greater Depression started in 2008, although historians may someday say it began in 1971, when real wages started falling.
It’s also a period of time when distortions and misallocations of capital are liquidated, and when the business cycle, which is caused exclusively by currency debasement (also known as inflation), climaxes. That results in high unemployment, business failures, uncompleted construction, bond defaults, stock market crashes, and the like.
Fortunately, for those who benefit from the status quo, and members of something called the Deep State, the trillions of new currency units delayed the liquidation. But they also ensured it will now happen on a much grander scale.
The Deep State is an extremely powerful network that controls nearly everything around you. You won’t read about it in the news because it controls the news. Politicians won’t talk about it publicly. That would be like a mobster discussing murder and robbery on the six o’clock news. You could say the Deep State is hidden, but it’s only hidden in plain sight.
The Deep State is the source of every negative thing that’s happening right now. To survive the coming rough times, it’s essential for you to know what it’s all about.
The State
Now, what causes economic problems? With the exception of natural events like fires, floods, and earthquakes, they’re all caused directly and indirectly by the State, through its wars, taxes, regulations, and inflation.
Yes, yes, I know this is an oversimplification, that human nature is really at fault, and the institution of the State is only a mass dramatization of the psychological aberrations and demons that lie within us all.
But we don’t have time to go all the way down the rabbit hole, so let’s just talk about the proximate rather than the ultimate causes of the Greater Depression. And here, I want to talk about the nature of the State, in general, and then something called the Deep State, in particular.
A key takeaway (and I emphasize that because I expect it to otherwise bounce off the programmed psyches of most people) is that the very idea of the State itself is poisonous, evil, and intrinsically destructive. But, like so many bad ideas, people have come to assume it’s part of the cosmic firmament, when it’s really just a monstrous scam.
It’s a fraud, like your belief that you have a right to free speech because of the First Amendment, or a right to be armed because of the Second Amendment. No, you don’t. The U.S. Constitution is just an arbitrary piece of paper… entirely apart from the fact the whole thing is now just a dead letter. You have a right to free speech and to be armed because they’re necessary parts of being a free person, not because of what a political document says.
Even though the essence of the State is coercion, people have been taught to love and respect it. Most people think of the State in the quaint light of a grade school civics book. They think it has something to do with “We the People” electing a Jimmy Stewart character to represent them.
That ideal has always been a pernicious fiction, because it idealizes, sanitizes, and legitimizes an intrinsically evil and destructive institution, which is based on force. As Mao once said, political power comes out of the barrel of a gun. But things have gone far beyond that. We’re now in the Deep State.
The Deep State
The concept of the Deep State originated in Turkey, which is appropriate, since it’s the heir to the totally corrupt Byzantine and Ottoman empires. And in the best Byzantine manner, the Deep State has insinuated itself throughout the fabric of what once was America. Its tendrils reach from Washington down to every part of civil society. Like a metastasized cancer, it can no longer be easily eradicated.
I used to joke that there was nothing wrong with Washington that 10 megatons on the capital couldn’t cure. But I don’t say that anymore. Partially because it’s too dangerous, but mainly because it’s now untrue. What’s now needed is 10 megatons on the capital, and four more bursts in a quadrant 10 miles out.
In many ways, Washington models itself after another city with a Deep State, ancient Rome. Here’s how a Victorian freethinker, Winwood Reade, accurately described it:
“Rome lived upon its principal till ruin stared it in the face. Industry is the only true source of wealth, and there was no industry in Rome. By day the Ostia road was crowded with carts and muleteers, carrying to the great city the silks and spices of the East, the marble of Asia Minor, the timber of the Atlas, the grain of Africa and Egypt; and the carts brought out nothing but loads of dung. That was their return cargo.”
The Deep State controls the political and economic essence of the U.S. This is much more than observing that there’s no real difference between the left and right wings of the Demopublican Party.
It’s well known by anyone with any sense (that is, by everybody except the average voter) that although the Republicans say they believe in economic freedom (but don’t), they definitely don’t believe in social freedom. And the Democrats say they believe in social freedom (but don’t), but they definitely don’t believe in economic freedom.
Who Is Part of the Deep State?
The American Deep State is a real, but informal, structure that has arisen to not just profit from, but control, the State.
The Deep State has a life of its own, like the government itself. It’s composed of top-echelon employees of a dozen Praetorian agencies, like the FBI, CIA, and NSA… top generals, admirals, and other military operatives… long-term congressmen and senators… and directors of important regulatory agencies.
But the Deep State is much broader than just the government. It includes the heads of major corporations, all of whom are heavily involved in selling to the State and enabling it. That absolutely includes Silicon Valley, although those guys at least have a sense of humor, evidenced by their “Don’t Be Evil” motto.
It also includes all the top people in the Fed, and the heads of all the major banks, brokers, and insurers. Add the presidents and many professors at top universities, which act as Deep State recruiting centers… all the top media figures, of course… and many regulars at things like Bohemian Grove and the Council on Foreign Relations. They epitomize the status quo, held together by power, money, and propaganda.
Altogether, I’ll guess these people number 1,000 or so. You might analogize the structure of the Deep State with a huge pack of dogs. The people I’ve just described are the top dogs.
But there are hundreds of thousands more who aren’t at the nexus, but who directly depend on them, have considerable clout, and support the Deep State because it supports them.
This includes many of the wealthy, especially those who got that way thanks to their State connections… the more than 1.5 million people who have top secret clearances (that’s a shocking, but accurate, number)… plus top players in organized crime, especially the illegal drug business, little of which would exist without the State. Plus, mid-level types in the police and military, corporations, and non-governmental organizations.
These are what you might call the running dogs.
Beyond that are the scores and scores of millions who depend on things remaining the way they are. Like the 50%-plus of Americans who are net recipients of benefits from the State… the 60 million on Social Security… the 66 million on Medicaid… the 50 million on food stamps… the many millions on hundreds of other programs… the 23 million government employees and most of their families. In fact, let’s include the many millions of average Joes and Janes who are just getting by.
You might call this level of people, the vast majority of the population, whipped dogs. They both love and fear their master, they’ll do as they’re told, and they’ll roll over on their backs and wet themselves if confronted by a top dog or running dog who feels they’re out of line.
These three types of dogs make up the vast majority of the U.S. population. I trust you aren’t among them. I consider myself a Lone Wolf in this context and hope you are, too. Unfortunately, however, dogs are enemies of wolves, and tend to hunt them down.
The Deep State is destructive, but it’s great for the people in it. And, like any living organism, its prime directive is: Survive! It survives by indoctrinating the fiction that it’s both good and necessary. However, it’s a parasite that promotes the ridiculous notion that everyone can live at the expense of society.
Is it a conspiracy, headed by a man stroking a white cat? I think not. I find it’s hard enough to get a bunch of friends to agree on what movie to see, much less a bunch of power-hungry miscreants bent on running everyone’s lives. But, on the other hand, the top dogs all know each other, went to the same schools, belong to the same clubs, socialize, and, most important, have common interests, values, and philosophies.
The American Deep State rotates around the Washington Beltway. It imports America’s wealth as tax revenue. A lot of that wealth is consumed there by useless mouths. And then, it exports things that reinforce the Deep State, including wars, fiat currency, and destructive policies. This is unsustainable simply because nothing of value comes out of the city.
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