Today’s News 2nd April 2021

• UK Reports 25 New Cases Of Rare Blood Clots Linked To AstraZeneca Jab
  UK Reports 25 New Cases Of Rare Blood Clots Linked To AstraZeneca Jab

  British government ministers practically jumped over one another to defend the AstraZeneca jab from allegations that it might be linked to rare cases of sometimes-deadly cerebral blood clots, particularly in patients who have low blood platelet counts. The British-Swedish multinational has insisted there is no evidence of any link between the jab and clots (despite some researchers in Germany finding possible evidence of a link), yet several governments have restricted or halted the jab, and Germany has decided to limit its use to patients younger than 60.

  

  Europe’s main drug regulator, the EMA, reiterated on Wednesday that “there is no evidence that would support restricting the use of this vaccine in any population” (and yet, they admitted in their safety review that it was possible some patients might experience side effects like these). Germany’s medical regulator has counted 31 blood clots. Nine of those died. In Norway, three medical workers all were afflicted, and one of them died. In total, Norway reported 6 cases, four of whom died. Cases have been reported in Italy, Austria and elsewhere.

  And now, the FT reports that 25 new incidences of blood clots have been reported, bringing the total to 30.

  On Thursday evening, the Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency released information confirming 25 new cases of severe and very rare blood clotting in British patients, on top of five milder cases it had reported earlier this month.They also clarified that they hadn’t seen any such reactions in patients who received the jab developed by Pfizer and BioNTech.

  As the FT pointed out in its coverage of the admission, the new cases will “call into question the view that this is purely a phenomenon being seen in mainland Europe.”

  As with the earlier cases on the Continent, the main condition causing alarm is called cerebral venous sinus thrombosis, when blood forms clots in the veins that run from the brain, a potentially fatal complication. What’s more, as the UK announced new accomplishments in its race to vaccinate its entire population, 17 more reports of CVST have been made this week compared to the previous week.

  MHRA chief Dr. June Raine reiterated that ‘the benefits of the vaccine outweigh any risks’ and that the public should continue to line up and receive their jabs without fear.

  After all, pretty soon, you won’t be able to go anywhere without proof that you got it.

  Tyler Durden
  Fri, 04/02/2021 – 02:15

• Gaslighting: How Leftists Demonize And Demoralize Their Opposition
  Gaslighting: How Leftists Demonize And Demoralize Their Opposition

  Authored by Brandon Smith via Alt-Market.us,

  We have all heard this time honored cautionary mantra: “All governments lie”.

  It’s not a theory, it is a fact that history has proven time after time.

  I would only expand on the rule and say this: All governments, all corporations, all corporate media, all think tanks, and all corporate funded activist groups lie. There is a reason why public trust is at all time lows for the majority of these organizations, and it’s not because they are managed by good and honest people.

  If you operate on the assumption that these groups are lying to you most of the time then you will find yourself on the right side of history.

  

  That said, there are questions we need to ask ourselves if we ever hope to change the world for the better and remove these liars from power: Why do they lie? Why has this become a rule to live by? And, how are they able to lie and get away with it so often?

  Well, it’s not because power corrupts. That cliché might be true to a point, but I think it’s a way for people to dismiss the bigger problem because they are afraid to address the ugly truth. The reality is, power does not necessarily corrupt; it’s that the corrupt seek out power.

  Governments and other mainstream institutions always lie because psychopathic liars always infiltrate and overrun them. We have very few checks in place to prevent this, and very little is understood about psychopaths in the general public. To understand destructive institutions is to understand the character traits and methods of the psychopaths that run them.

  Psychopaths are not very complicated people nor are they all that intelligent, but they often succeed because they are relentless in their pursuits. The common signs of psychopathy include a complete lack of empathy, the obsessive desire for dominance, the use of physical or psychological violence to gain control over others, a narcissistic need to feel superior to everyone else and a habit of playing the victim while victimizing others.

  A common assumption about psychopaths is that they are incapable of working in a group or organizing for mutual gain. This is simply nonsense. In reality, numerous studies have shown that psychopaths are adept at finding their own kind in a crowd and even working together as a pack of predators. Some modern examples would be organized crime, cartels, sex traffickers, online scamming groups and religious cults.

  Almost all psychopaths are inherent cowards; they will rarely pick on anyone their own size unless they have large numbers. The worst case scenario is fully realized organized psychopathy; the advent of a totalitarian culture in which psychopathic behavior is rewarded and defended by those in authority or influence, while honesty, morality and liberty are punished.

  Over the course of generations, psychopaths have used different groups and ideologies to gain control over the public, but today organized psychopaths have chosen the cult of socialism, social justice, fake environmentalism and leftist ideology as their vehicles. Essentially, we are dealing with a modernized version of communism. And if we examine the habits of current leftist and globalist “movements” we will see a lot of similarities to historic communism, not to mention numerous psychopathic behaviors.

  The use of “Gaslighting” as a weapon is a classic mainstay of psychopaths and by extension communist regimes, and it is visible EVERYWHERE in politics and the media right now. It’s perhaps ironic that I am publishing this article on April Fools Day, because gaslighting is very much a kind of trick, a con game. And, in order to control people, it helps to humiliate them and make them doubt their own conceptions of reality.

  The basic definition of gaslighting is the manipulation of a person by psychological means into questioning their own sanity. In other words, making a sane person believe they might be insane. This, however, is not an adequate explanation of gaslighting. It’s not only about questions of sanity, it is also about questions of principle and morality.

  The communist Soviet Union was notorious for gaslighting the public with propaganda that suggested anyone who defied the will of the state and who demanded freedom was “mentally ill”. The Cheka secret police and the KGB had special hospitals set aside for political dissidents called “Psikhushkas”. People of any prominence who were critical of the status quo were immediately disappeared and sent to these facilities after being accused of mental instability.

  In Maoist China, especially during the Cultural Revolution, Mao targeted impressionable and gullible Chinese youth, brainwashing them into believing there was “institutional imperialism” hiding within every facet of Chinese society. The stability of communism in China was under question at the time, and Mao knew a rebellion was possible. So, instead of immediately cracking down with the military, he encouraged Chinese academics and youths to “rebel” and “bring down the secret imperialists”. He redirected social discontent and aimed it at a non-existent ghost so that a rebellion would never rise up against him and the politburo.

  Young and dumb Chinese activists thought they were rebelling when they were actually serving the interests of government elites.

  Gaslighting in China was pervasive. Any person that held the most remote belief in freedom, free markets, business, private property or anyone that had any objections to the crimes of the communists was forced to undergo a trial, a kangaroo court called a “struggle session”.

  During a struggle session, a dissident was sometimes apprehended, or sometimes shamed and compelled to stand before a large crowd of true believers in the communist faith. The crowd would browbeat them with accusations of criminality and immorality, trying to convince them of the evil of their ways. If the dissident bowed and submitted to the collective, begging forgiveness, then they might be allowed to live, but they had to BELIEVE that they had sinned. They had to fully adopt the communist ideology and plead for absolution.

  Many victims that underwent such struggle sessions continued to believe they were criminals for the rest of their lives. They believed they were terrible people, even though they had no idea why they were punished in the first place.

  Gaslighting is a powerful device for subjugation because it makes good people who love freedom think they are evil people that need to be restrained. It is also a way for a corrupt system to maintain control of the general population because it normalizes psychopathic behavior and suppresses moral conscience by convincing people that morality is “relative” or a “matter of perspective”, and that some abusive and destructive behavior is “necessary” in order to achieve a better world. If you can discombobulate a population into questioning their own morality, or if you can convince then to question their own sanity, then you can prevent them from ever rebelling against you.

  These are the tried and true methods of psychopaths. If you ever wonder why abused spouses or family members stay with and even defend their abusers, it is because psychopaths use gaslighting to disarm their victims. If you are crazy or subconsciously treacherous, then maybe you aren’t being abused at all. Maybe, you are being saved from yourself, and maybe society is being protected from you?

  And, if you lash out and defend yourself against the abuser, now you are truly a horrible human being. You just attacked your “protector”. You are now a danger to society. You are now a terrorist. The only way to avoid being labeled a terrorist or a madman is to quietly accept the abuse.

  I see this control tactic all over the world, and it is becoming rather prevalent here in the US. The capitol building protest is a perfect example. Millions of law abiding Americans have been abused and oppressed by the establishment through lockdowns and censorship, while groups of leftists like BLM and Antifa are allowed to run rampant across the country looting and burning as they go. Conservative Americans reacted with a protest after the election, seeing that such abuses were likely to be aided in the near future by the federal government under Joe Biden. They raided the capitol building, without armaments, to make a point. Then, they peacefully left.

  Afterwards, the media bombarded us for months with the narrative that the capitol protest was actually an “insurrection” and an act of domestic terrorism. So, BLM gets to loot and burn their way through dozens of American cities and it’s called peaceful protesting. Conservatives protest at a single building and bust through the doors, and it’s considered an act of war. This is gaslighting.

  Under pandemic mandates a vast portion of the US has been shut down and hundreds of thousands of small businesses have been lost. The fear mongering in the media over the coronavirus has been egregious and ridiculous. Hundreds of thousands of people die every year in America from communicable diseases. Now, suddenly, we are supposed to abandon all of our constitutional rights because of covid?

  Anyone who has disagreed with these measures has been called a “conspiracy theorist” and a danger to others. The science is on our side, and always has been. Every element of the pandemic has been exaggerated and overblown. Every statistic supports our skepticism of the government’s response, as I outlined in my recent article ‘The Real Reasons Why Millions Of Americans Will Defy Covid Mandates And Vaccines’.

  But, when we cite these facts, we are told by the establishment that we are “lunatics” and “idiots”.

  Of course, now we know that the death rate of Covid-19 according to scientific studies is a paltry 0.26% outside of nursing homes. We also know that lockdowns were completely useless in controlling the spread of the virus, as states with the harshest mandates ended up with the highest infections rates. And, finally, we know that masks are also useless in controlling the spread of the disease according to scientific studies and common sense observation.

  Rather than admitting that lockdowns are pointless, that the masks do nothing and that it is silly to take an experimental mRNA vaccine for a virus that is a non-threat to 99.7% of the population, establishment hacks continue to double down on their propaganda when it comes to covid. The media continues to attack anyone that points out the REAL science as “conspiracy theorists”. This is gaslighting.

  And finally, we can’t really have a discussion about gaslighting without mentioning the social justice agenda.

  The phrase “white supremacy” is being repeated by corporate journalists and politicians until they are blue in the face. And more specifically, conservatives are being called out as the “biggest terrorist threat” to the US in decades because of our supposed white supremacist tendencies. The latest “spike” in Asian hate crimes is the new excuse for this propaganda campaign.

  Set aside the fact that millions of conservatives are black and brown, not white. Set aside the fact that the majority of the hate crimes targeting Asians the past couple years were actually perpetrated by black assailants (as I noted in last week’s article), and one of them is even a known BLM activist. Also set aside the fact that around 50% of all violent crime in the US is caused by black perpetrators according to the FBI. Somehow, all of this anarchy is the fault of white people in general and conservatives in particular.

  The race baiting used by leftists the past several years is a prime example of gaslighting – Telling people they are responsible for evils they had nothing to do with and that are completely unrelated to them, then demanding they declare submission and loyalty to an ideology that seeks to enslave them as a means to wash away sins they were never guilty of.

  If totalitarian control of the population is to be established in the US and the west, we have to be tricked into thinking our values of freedom, truth and meritocracy are somehow inherently evil. We have to be tricked into thinking we are insane for wanting liberty. To be clear, there only three ways that the brainwashing and gaslighting of free people will stop:

  1) We submit and embrace the false narrative as if it is true and give in to psychological slavery.

  2) We separate completely from leftist totalitarians and organized psychopaths and go our own way.

  3) We remove the psychopaths from the picture and rebuild without their influence.

  Until one of these three things happens, like all psychopaths, leftists and globalists will continue trying to wear us down. This is what they do. They have seen it work in the past and they are single minded in their objectives.

  *  *  *

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  Tyler Durden
  Thu, 04/01/2021 – 23:40

• Nothing To See Here: Microsoft Files Patent To Mine Cryptos Using Human Brain Activity
  Nothing To See Here: Microsoft Files Patent To Mine Cryptos Using Human Brain Activity

  Today in “we are totally not heading head-first into a completely dystopian future at a billion miles an hour” news…

  Microsoft is reportedly proposing a method to generate cryptocurrency by “monitoring people’s brain activity and other personal biometric data,” according to a new report in The Independent. 

  The company has reportedly filed for a patent called “Cryptocurrency System Using Body Activity Data” which details how a person could attach sensors to their body to “earn” cryptocurrency through mining. Microsoft is apparently not just satisfied with computers doing the crypto mining, they are pushing for mining via a “human body activity associated with a task”. 

  

  The patent states: “For example, a brain wave or body heat emitted from the user when the user performs the task provided by an information service provider, such as viewing an advertisement or using certain internet services, can be used in the mining process.”

  It continues: “Instead of massive computation work required by some conventional cryptocurrency systems, data generated based on the body activity of the user can be proof-of-work, and therefore, a user can solve the computationally difficult problem unconsciously.”

  Such a system would require “hooking up” a device to sensors on the body that “detect the activity required of the user to generate the cryptocurrency.” The report says that “body fluid flow” and “organ activity and movement” are two such body functions, along with brain waves and body heat, that could be monitored.

  The patent lists 28 concepts for using such a system to mine for cryptocurrency. 

  Tyler Durden
  Thu, 04/01/2021 – 23:20

• San Francisco's Corrupt Politicians Exposed In A Twitter Thread
  San Francisco’s Corrupt Politicians Exposed In A Twitter Thread

  Authored by Andrea Widburg via AmericanThinker.com,

  When we think of corrupt American cities, Chicago always tops the list. However, San Francisco has long had one of the more corrupt American civic governments. However, because the City was still better managed than Chicago, nobody really commented on that fact.

  A Twitter thread about the City’s “stupidvisors” (as I’ve always called them), turning down free internet access highlights just how corrupt they are.

  

  I worked in San Francisco for several decades and spent a great deal of that time dealing with City Hall through the judicial system. It was an enormously frustrating place, with byzantine rules, clerks that spoke minimal English, and few corrupt judges. However, that was small potatoes compared to the Building Department. I knew a man who made a very rich living contracting his services out to people who were trying to build or remodel in San Francisco. If you didn’t have an expensive guide to handle the rules and grease people’s palms, you’d never get anything done.

  Perhaps the greatest corruption, though, was at the political level, among the Supervisors, elected representatives from each San Francisco neighborhood. I never heard stories about these people demanding money for initiatives, although I’m sure some did. The real corruption was ideological. In the 1960s and 1970s, these Supervisors were mostly Democrats. Starting in the 1980s and moving to the present day, the Supervisors (or, as I said, Stupidvisors) were leftists, even if they still used the old Democrat label.

  That’s why I was completely unsurprised when I read Chris Sacca’s Twitter thread about his efforts to give free internet to the City of San Francisco. Everything he writes is consistent with my understanding of how the San Francisco government operates. I’ll stop now and let Sacca take up the narrative:

  15 years ago, I co-led a team trying to give 100% free Internet access to all of San Francisco starting with the poorest neighborhoods first. The network would be anonymous, with no ads, no cookies, etc. Approximately a $20-25 million gift. The result? We were chased out of town. https://t.co/U1azq6S4SQ

  — Chris Sacca 🇺🇸 (@sacca) March 28, 2021

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

  The thread continues (emphasis ours):

  One SF Supervisor told us she would vote against it unless we promised to fund quarterly field trips (eg to the zoo) for the kids in her district.

  Another promised to vote against it because we wouldn’t give free laptops to all of SF. 

  One Supe rejected it because poor people needed “training to use the Net.”

  Countless low/no-income residents spoke at hearings about how they had computers and knew how to use the web, but couldn’t afford Comcast. Supes mansplained back to those very people that they were wrong. 

  We built a demonstration network in a public housing project in Hunters Point. It was saturated with use. Those residents testified that laptops and phones weren’t expensive, cable and data plans were the problem. The Supes just couldn’t accept that those people were Net savvy. 

  Ultimately, one Supervisor told us straight up: He didn’t care what this meant for the people of his district, he was blocking it because it would give the mayor a win in a political year.

  He was the deciding vote and I will never forget what he said… 

  “Stop lecturing me about the digital divide, because I don’t give a fuck. Now get the hell out of my office.”

  Our team walked out stunned, sat in the lobby of City Hall, and realized it was over. 

  My partners and I had done Q&A sessions in every Supe’s district and in community and senior centers all over town. Support for the network was off the charts, particularly among those who needed it most. But it was clear that the Supes didn’t care about poor San Franciscans. 

  They wouldn’t listen to their own constituents. They perpetuated racist tropes and demeaning stereotypes about their poorest residents. And for what? It was all a big game to the politicians. The winners were the Supes’ egos and the losers were the people they supposedly served. 

  San Francisco is a wonderful city that I was lucky to call home for years. But I’ve never seen any place in the world better at cutting off its nose to spite its face. My heart aches for what that city was and could be. Cheers to those of you still trying to help. 

  Epilogue: After SF rejected our offer, we built a free, city-wide network in Mountain View, CA. About 12-15,000 people used it every day for years. The majority of them spoke Spanish as their primary language and told us they couldn’t afford regular Internet access.

  Once upon a time, San Francisco had functional corruption – it existed, both financially and morally, but it wasn’t so bad that it prevented the City from getting things done. Once the old-fashioned Democrats retired, though, and the hard-leftists moved in, San Francisco began its slow slide into dysfunctional leftism. Sacca is describing events from 15 years ago, but there’s no reason to believe that things are any different in the once beautiful City by the Bay. As long as leftists are in charge, it will be governed by people who are racist, power-hungry, arrogant, and short-sighted.

  Tyler Durden
  Thu, 04/01/2021 – 23:00

• Suez Canal Nearly Doubles Capacity To Clear Traffic Jam Of Ships 
  Suez Canal Nearly Doubles Capacity To Clear Traffic Jam Of Ships 

  The Suez Canal Authority (SAC) is working overtime to clear the massive logjam of vessels at either end of the canal. 

  Chairman of the SAC Osama Rabie told Egypt Today that the canal is being upgraded so as many as 95 vessels per day can transit, a 90% increase from the average flow of 50 ships per day. 

  Inchcape Shipping Services, a maritime services provider, reported Thursday morning as many as 324 vessels were waiting to transit the canal. There were 151 vessels north of Suez, and 173 south of Suez. By the day, ships continue to arrive at the canal, and the reasoning behind SAC’s capacity increase is to ensure a logjam of vessels does not persist. 

  Rabie told local news Al-Hayat TV that backlogs are being solved by increased capacity. He said: “We’re planning, God willing, that by Friday night or Saturday morning, to have cleared” the logjam.

  As shown in the map below, dozens of vessels are transiting the world’s most important way, with increased capacity expected to start today. 

  

  Consultant to the SAC, Captain Sayed Sheisha, told Egypt Today that he will lead an investigation into why the Ever Given containership ran aground in the canal’s southern part. 

  The captain revealed, “investigations shall answer the question of whether the ship’s captain followed the instructions of the Suez Canal guide.” He pointed out the investigation will be conducted for the public as it is a “global interest.” 

  He also said, if Ever Given rejects the investigation and doesn’t hand over the necessary information, Egypt will “temporarily confiscate” the vessel and its load, and a civil lawsuit will be filed. He said that process would take upwards of two years but doubts that would happen. He speculates an investigation and resolution to the matter will be reached in 3-4 days. 

  The investigation includes examining the ship’s equipment to determine if the captain used it before entering the canal. 

  We noted Tuesday, one day after Even Given was dislodged from the canal’s bank, huge legal issues mount for Even Given and insurers. 

  Already, shipping insurer Lloyd’s of London expects a “large loss” the could be more than $100 million. Fitch Ratings said the blockage is expected to dent global reinsurers’ earnings, already crushed by the virus pandemic disrupting global supply chains, winter storms in the US, and flooding in Australia. After the Suez crisis, marine reinsurance is expected to rise. 

  The good news is that capacity is nearly doubled on the canal, with normalization nearing, possibly by the weekend. The six-day blockage of the canal was the longest in half a century. 

  Tyler Durden
  Thu, 04/01/2021 – 22:40

• Behold The Chinese Type-100 Class "God Of Submarines"
  Behold The Chinese Type-100 Class “God Of Submarines”

  Via Southfront.org,

  Chinese submarine, identified as the Type-100 Class is reportedly contesting Russian Navy’s mighty Pr.941 Typhoon Class submarine as the largest ever built.

  

  This was reported by H. I. Sutton for Naval News.

  The new submarine is reportedly armed with 48 Submarine Launched Ballistic Missiles (SLBMs). It can also carry massive nuclear-powered nuclear-armed autonomous torpedoes.

  The submarine was unveiled on April 1st

  It was revealed at the Bohai Shipyard in Huludao, China, the new submarine is believed to be the Type-100 ‘Sun Tzu’ class. The timing, together with its type number, appear to refer to the 100th year anniversary of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP).

  The vessel is approximately 210 meters long and about 30 meters across. This compares to a paltry 175 meters and 23 meters for the Typhoon Class. Although figures for the new submarine’s displacement are not known, it is almost certainly greater than the 48,000 ton Typhoon.

  

  This makes the Chinese submarine, three or four times larger than the US Navy’s Ohio-class submarine.

  Furthermore, the Ohio class carries “only” 24 ballistic missiles.

  In the bow are at least 8 Intercontinental nuclear-powered nuclear-armed hydrosonic torpedoes. These weapons are similar to the Russian Navy’s Poseidon weapon.

  The hydrosonic torpedoes have an effectively unlimited range and are difficult to counter with current weaponry.

  According to Sutton, its development, so soon after Russia moved forward with Poseidon, suggests that Poseidon has been exported. Or that some degree of a technology transfer has taken place.

  The shift to a massive submarine may hint, like Typhoon, at an Arctic role. China regards itself as a Near-Arctic country and may intend to use the ice cap to protect its at-sea nuclear deterrence.

  The C-100 also has an open hangar on its back, potentially for the “sailless” submarine, that was built in Shanghai.

  One potential use for this is to provide layered self-defense for the host submarine. Another possibility is that it is for severing undersea internet cables in times of war.

  It has been suggested that this tactic could be used to bring about the immediate collapse of Western economies.

  After all, it should be remembered that April 1st may now go down in history for when the new era of submarines became, as this “God of Submarines” entered the scene.

  One should also remember that the commissioning of the Russian Project 941 Typhoon-class submarines took place between 1981 and 1989, and then all except a single one were scrapped within the next 20 years. As of 2021 there is only one of these submarines left, since a massive underwater monster isn’t too hard to track, find and even potentially destroy.

  One should keep in mind that this report is almost 100% certainly an April Fools’ Day joke, but on the off-chance it isn’t the West better prepare itself.

  Tyler Durden
  Thu, 04/01/2021 – 22:20

• March Payrolls Preview: Big Data Hints At Blowout Numbers
  March Payrolls Preview: Big Data Hints At Blowout Numbers

  The March nonfarm Payroll Report will be released at 8:30 am tomorrow, on Good Friday, when most markets will be shut, and those that are open – like US cash Treasurys, which close at noon – will suffer from thin liquidity conditions, and therefore, potentially choppy price action.  As noted earlier, amid expectations of a potentially blockbuster payrolls report where consensus is 660K but whisper numbers are at or above 1 million…

  

  … due to much stronger “big and/or alternative data” reads (see below), JPM warned that markets should expect extra treasury volatility should the jobs number emerge as a big upside (or downside) surprise due to the lack of liquidity in the bond market. As the bank warned, “our work in the past has shown that Treasury yields are sensitive to payroll surprises and that these moves can be amplified when employment data are released on holiday-shortened trading sessions.”

  

  The chart above shows the average absolute change in 10-year yields over various periods around payrolls releases, normalized by the average size of payrolls surprise, during various types of trading sessions. The data show that in the hours following payrolls releases on Good Friday 12pm early-close sessions, Treasury markets appear to be approximately 2 times more volatile than observed during a normal session, for a given magnitude of surprise, and in 2pm early close sessions, they are roughly 3 times more volatile than that of a full session following releases. Looking ahead, JPM concludes that “these results suggest that Treasury yields could exhibit greater volatility in response to a surprise in the employment report on Friday.”

  Blockbuster surprise – and fireworks in the bond market – aside, current expectations are as follows:

  • Change in non-farm payrolls +660k in March from the 379k printed in Feb;
    • Change in private non-farm payrolls +643K, up from 465K
  • Unemployment rate 6.1% from 6.2%.
  • Average hourly earnings M/M +0.1%, from 0.2%
    • Average hourly earnings Y/Y +4.5%, from 5.3%
  • Labor force participation rate 61.5%, from 61.4%

  As Newsquawk adds, the signals from the weekly initial jobless claims data are subject to distortions, making it difficult to infer an accurate read: initial jobless claims in the week that corresponds to the jobs report survey window jumped in the week, although this was a result of the sharp rise in Texas, which accounted for around half of the rise, due to weather conditions seen in February; but PUA benefit claims fell, which could have been a result of claims in Ohio, which were reported to be subject to fraud, came down. Continuing claims in the corresponding week, however, fell by more than analysts were anticipating, which bodes well for the BLS data.

  In its preview of tomorrow’s jobs report, Goldman is far more upbeat than consensus and estimates that nonfarm payrolls rose 775k in March, roughly double the 379k pace in February and above the consensus of 660K, as falling infection rates and a net easing of business restrictions likely supported job growth in virus-sensitive industries, particularly leisure and hospitality. Big Data employment signals also indicate a pickup in job growth, with the more accurate measures clustered in the 700-900k range.

  Additionally, Goldman expects a rebound from the winter storms in February, with a net boost to March job growth on the order of 50-100k. Finally, the bank believes higher jobless claims readings this year mostly reflect policy incentives and non-economic factors, as opposed to new layoffs.

  The surge in payrolls means that Goldman also estimates a three-tenth decline in the unemployment rate to 5.9% (consensus 6.0%), reflecting a strong expected gain in household employment. That being said, a vaccine- and reopening-related rebound in labor force participation is likely to start this month, and this could limit the magnitude of the decline in the jobless rate.

  On the wage side, Goldman estimates a 0.1% increase in average hourly earnings (and 4.5% yoy, in line with consensus), due to negative calendar effects and negative composition effects.

  Below are some data points arguing for a better-than-expected report:

  • Reopening. While cases remain elevated in much of the country, infection rates generally fell and the severity of business restrictions eased between the February and March survey period. Reflecting this, restaurant seatings on OpenTable rebounded sharply to -37% from -57% (yoy survey week to survey week). And in Texas, dining activity had returned to normal shortly after the end of the survey week.

  

  • Big Data. High-frequency data on the labor market were generally positive in March, with five of the seven measures Goldman tracks indicating a better-than-expected report relative to consensus, and stronger gains in the more reliable datasets

  

  • Better weather. Winter storms in the eastern half of the country weighed on February job growth, with an outright decline in US construction employment (-61k, weakest since the April 2020 lockdowns), and nonfarm payroll declines in the West South Central region (-38k, includes Texas). Normalization in the weather suggests scope for a boost to March job growth of 50-100k (mom sa).
  • Employer surveys. Business activity surveys increased on net in March. The employment components of both services (+0.9pt to 58.5) and manufacturing (+0.7 to 58.1, the highest level since August 2018) survey trackers increased.
  • Job availability. The Conference Board labor differential—the difference between the percent of respondents saying jobs are plentiful and those saying jobs are hard to get — increased into expansionary territory (to +7.8 in March from -0.8 in February), its highest level since March 2020 (+29.5).
  • Job cuts. Announced layoffs reported by Challenger, Gray & Christmas fell by 16% in March after declining by 59% in February (mom, SA by GS). Layoffs were at the lowest level since May 2018 (30k, SA by GS).

  Neutral/mixed factors:

  • Jobless claims. Initial jobless claims declined during the March payroll month, averaging 749k per week vs. 827k in February, although the decrease likely overstates the underlying labor market improvement, since claims in Ohio and Illinois normalized from inflated levels. Continuing claims fell 549k between the payroll survey weeks, but this decline partly reflects expiring regular-state-programs (as opposed to reemployment). Across all employee programs including emergency benefits, continuing claims increased by 82k (some of which reflect benefit renewals following the Phase 4 package).
  • ADP. Private sector employment in the ADP report increased by 517k in March, below consensus expectations but above the pace of the official measure in February. Goldman warns that the ADP panel methodology may undercount workers returning to their previous employers, which would argue for a larger gain in the official payroll measure.

  As always, pay close attention to the number of unemployed workers on temporary layoff, which spiked to a record-high 18.1mn last April but had retraced to 2.2mn by February of this year.

  

  The smaller number of workers left on temporary layoff reduces the scope for the rapid pace of gains seen last summer, but it remains a positive factor relative to the pre-coronavirus pace of job gains.

  Tyler Durden
  Thu, 04/01/2021 – 22:00

• Biden Won't Revive SALT Deduction, Risking Ire Of Moderate Democrats
  Biden Won’t Revive SALT Deduction, Risking Ire Of Moderate Democrats

  Update (2154ET): According to Axios, the Biden administration is “unlikely to propose reinstating state and local tax deductions in his second tax-and-spending package,” which – to put it lightly – could “complicate his goals of passing a multitrillion-dollar infrastructure proposal.”

  The deduction allows taxpayers who itemize their deductions to include certain taxes already paid to local governments – which President Trump capped at $10,000 per year.

  According to the report, senior admin officials have soured on SALT deductions for two main reasons: It would cost too much and it would undercut their working-class messaging. To reinstate the deduction, tax revenues would fall by an estimated $70 – $80 billion per year – which is around half the proposed Biden increases on corporate tax rates.

  More via Axios:

  • The SALT deduction is a top priority for a number of Democrats representing blue states. Its supporters include Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and — during the Democratic primary — Biden himself.

  • The president is now signaling he won’t fight to lift the caps that former President Trump imposed as part of a 2017 tax package that lowered corporate rates.

  • The White House omitted lifting the SALT caps from Biden’s first infrastructure and tax package, which the president unveiled Wednesday. But some Democrats held out hope that SALT would be addressed in a second package to be announced in the coming weeks.

  • White House press secretary Jen Psaki told reporters on Thursday that eliminating SALT “is not a revenue raiser … it would cost more money,” but if Democrats “want to propose a way to pay for it, and they want to put that forward, we are happy to hear their ideas.”

  • “Final decisions are still being made on the second package, so any speculation is premature,” said a person familiar with the deliberations.

  According to the report, Trump’s capping of SALT was actually a good thing.

  Biden(‘s decision makers) aren’t outright rejecting a SALT repeal outright – rather, telegraphing to lawmakers that they’ll need to include it in their negotiations.

  Read the rest of the report here.

  *  *  *

  President Biden is feeling pressure from progressive Democrats to dramatically increase the size of the next economic stimulus – after they introduced a new measure that would invest $10 trillion over 10 years in renewable energy, green infrastructure, and climate justice initiatives.

  

  The proposed bill – known as the “Transform, Heal and Renew by Investing in a Vibrant Economy (THRIVE) Act, would make a series of sweeping changes to American infrastructure – and contains elements of the Green New Deal – including, as Fox Business notes, “establishing a goal of 100% zero-carbon electricity by 2035, zero emissions from new buildings by 2025 and expanding clean public transit options to most Americans by 2030.”

  The THRIVE act also directs at least 40% of federal investments towards communities which have been “excluded, oppressed and harmed by racist unjust practices,” according to the report.

  “We are facing a series of intersecting crises: climate change, a public health pandemic, racial injustice and economic inequality,” said co-sponsor Sen. Ed Markey (D-MA) at a Monday press conference. “We can’t defeat any of these crises alone. We must develop a roadmap for recovery that addresses them all.”

  Biden’s $2.25 trillion infrastructure proposal on Wednesday – the first component of more than $3 trillion in proposals – just isn’t enough for progressives, despite the fact that it’s already going to be tough sledding to pass given the Democrats’ narrow margin in the Senate – and is receiving criticism from all sides. Meanwhile in the House, Speaker Nancy Pelosi can only afford to lose three Democratic votes if Republicans are unified in opposition.

  One key moderate, Sen. Rob Portman (R-Ohio), took a shot at Biden’s plan Wednesday, calling the proposal to raise corporate tax rates “the wrong approach,” an early sign that attracting Republican votes will be difficult.

  “This might be the last opportunity we have to really do big things under reconciliation. We need to see more here, and I think that’s the universal thought across the movement right now,” said Yvette Simpson, the CEO of Democracy for America, a progressive advocacy group, referring to special budget rules that allow Democrats to pass bills through the Senate with simple-majority votes.

  Senate Majority Leader Charles Schumer (D-N.Y.) is making the argument to the Senate parliamentarian that Democrats should be allowed to move two more packages under those special budgetary rules. -The Hill

  Last week progressive Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) raised concerns that Biden’s focus on popular priorities in the first infrastructure proposal, such as fixing highways, bridges and upgrading ports, could make it much harder to pass additional legislation that addresses economic inequality.

  “I want to see the details of how they’re planning to make sure that the climate issues and the child care issues don’t get left behind. We can’t have the train leave the station and critical parts are left on the platform,” said Warren, who tweeted on Wednesday that.

  Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) said on Tuesday that Biden’s plan needs to be “way bigger,” tweeting “This is not nearly enough. The important context here is that it’s $2.25T spread out over 10 years. For context, the COVID package was $1.9T for this year *alone,* with some provision lasting 2 years.”

  Another progressive lawmaker, Rep. Pramila Jayapal (D-WA) who heads the Congressional Progressive Caucus, said on Tuesday that the White House needs to go even bigger – and that Biden’s proposal is far smaller than what he promised last year on the campaign trail.

  “The Biden infrastructure proposal on the campaign trail was significantly larger than what’s been discussed so far with Build Back Better,” she said during a call with reporters, citing a $6.5 trillion – $11 trillion previously estimated cost over 10 years. “So we really think that there’s ample room to get the overall number up to somewhere in that range in order to really tackle the scale of investment that we need to make,” she added.

  Jayapal supports including tax hikes in the package but primarily as a way to bring more “fairness” to the tax code, rather than simply to offset the cost of infrastructure improvements. 

  “Democrats should not constrain ourselves or lower our ambitions because of manufactured concerns about the deficit,” she said. 

  Among progressive activists, there are growing questions about whether Biden’s infrastructure plan will do enough to tackle economic inequality in historically marginalized communities. 

  “There’s a lot more that needs to be addressed, especially when we think about how equity has been reflected in climate justice work,” said Joanne Pérodin, an activist with Florida Rising. “This is the time for us to get bolder.”

  She said the White House and Congress needs to make sure investment will be equitably spread across “Black communities, brown communities, indigenous communities.” -The Hill

  On Tuesday, Sen. Markey called the $10 trillion proposal a “historic opportunity,” adding “With a Democratic White House and Senate and House of Representatives we have a chance to lift the gaze of our country to the constellation of possibilities in job creation and to finally rectify the historic racial injustices so many people of color have faced in this country, all while solving the climate crisis at the same time.“

  Nevermind who’s going to pay for it… eventually.

  Tyler Durden
  Thu, 04/01/2021 – 21:54

• White House Enlists Governors To Help Boost "Public Confidence" In JNJ Jab
  White House Enlists Governors To Help Boost “Public Confidence” In JNJ Jab

  Despite releasing trial results from Pfizer on an almost daily basis this week, the federal government is still worried about public confidence in Biden’s vaccine effort (even after the president made a spectacle out of doubling his target for doses distributed during his first 100 days). And as skepticism about the efficacy of the JNJ jab, which only requires one dose instead of the two required for Moderna and Pfizer, persists, the Hill reports that the White House has enlisted the help of Democratic governors to “boost confidence” in the jab.

  

  Several governors have purposely taken the JNJ jab in recent weeks to try and show the vaccine is safe at the behest of the White House. A few weeks ago, Biden held a call with top communications staff from a bevy of governors, including Tim Walz from Minnesota and JB Pritzker from Illinois. 

  Now, the government is once again in damage-control mode after reports that 15MM doses were ruined during a manufacturing snafu, the latest public issue related to the jab.

  When approached by the Hill, the governors’ denied that they took their marching orders from the president.

  Not every governor opted for the Johnson & Johnson shot because of the White House ask, but some said it influenced their choice”

  “Governor Northam’s decision to get the Johnson & Johnson vaccine two weeks ago was intended to increase public confidence in that particular vaccine,” said Marissa Astor, a spokesperson for Northam. “He felt it was important to demonstrate that there are three safe and effective vaccines available, including Johnson & Johnson.”

  A spokesperson for Walz stressed that the governor wants to assure Minnesotans that “the best vaccine is the one you’re offered.”

  Walz’s decision to get the Johnson & Johnson shot was intentional, the spokesperson said, but it was made before White House officials specifically encouraged governors to get that vaccine.

  Stitt, who got the vaccine this week, got the Johnson & Johnson shot because the state health department had it available, an official with his office said. Oklahoma is among the top 10 states for vaccines administered, the official noted, and Stitt wanted to publicly encourage residents to get their shot.

  A White House official who spoke with the Hill “was adamant” that they were seeing “enthusiasm” for the JNJ jab (and presumably, vaccines generally), and that any outreach to governors was part of “a multipronged stragey to engage government, religious and cultural leaders”.

  Dr. Anthony Fauci also helped out with the charm offensive. He appeared in a video posted by the White House last week in which he laid out the basis about the JNJ vaccine and assured the public it was safe and effective.

  “I would definitely take the Johnson & Johnson vaccine,” Fauci said, noting it’s “virtually 100 percent protective” against hospitalization and death. “This is a vaccine that works, and it only requires one dose.”

  Why would the administration be so concerned about the JNJ shot in particular? Well, so far, all the trial data released show it is significantly less effective than its rivals, raising concerns that those who receive it either won’t be fully protected, will need to get a “booster shot” (or two) later on, or both.

  Tyler Durden
  Thu, 04/01/2021 – 21:40

• Texas COVID-Positivity-Rate Plunges To Record Low After Mask-Mandate Lifted, Restaurants Back To Pre-Crisis Levels
  Texas COVID-Positivity-Rate Plunges To Record Low After Mask-Mandate Lifted, Restaurants Back To Pre-Crisis Levels

  According to the relentless pro-mask propaganda, this wasn’t supposed to happen.

  For the better part of the past year, the US public was bombarded with “science” how only the wearing of a mask (or two masks, or three masks or more) was the only thing that stood between the Western way of life and Armageddon (despite the periodic emergence of cold, hard data showing no improvement in covid transmission in states that mandated masks vs those that did not, at least until Twitter decided to ban it). Then, one month ago, Texas had had enough and its governor shocked the Faucis of the world – and the White House – when he declared that the mask mandate in the state was officially over.

  

  What happened then?

  Well, in a development that would likely shock Dr. Fauci, newly confirmed Coronavirus cases in Texas plunged to their lowest since June, roughly three weeks after the state lifted its mask mandate and reopened businesses.

  

  Additionally, the 7-day Covid positivity rate dropped to a new recorded low: 4.95%…

  

  Source

  Texas Governor Greg Abbott wrote in a tweet over the weekend. “Everyone now qualifies for a shot. They are highly recommended to prevent getting Covid but always voluntary.”

  Today the 7-day Covid positivity rate dropped to a new recorded low: 4.95%

  Hospitalizations dropped to a 6 month low

  This week we have 1 million 1st vaccines available

  Everyone now qualifies for a shot. They are highly recommended to prevent getting Covid but always voluntary

  — Greg Abbott (@GregAbbott_TX) March 28, 2021

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

  The 4.95 percent test positivity rate is the lowest the state has seen since the start of the pandemic. According to the Texas Department of State Health Services, some 1,900 new virus cases were reported on Sunday, which is the lowest daily number the state has seen since early June.

  Data from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention showed that the seven-day moving average number of cases in Texas dropped to the lowest level since mid-June. According to the CDC, Texas was averaging 3,783 daily cases as of March 27.

  Abbott’s tweet also noted that hospitalizations dropped to their lowest number in the past six months. According to data from the Texas Department of State Health Services (DSHS), 3,104 COVID-19 patients were in hospitals across the state as of Saturday. Data shows that the state has not recorded a number this low since September 19, when there were 3,081 hospitalizations. As of Monday, Texas has reported more than 2.3 million confirmed coronavirus cases and at least 47,156 deaths.

  In an updated tweet from Wednesday, Abbott noted that Covid hospitalizations dropped to a new 6 month low, with the 7-day Covid positivity rate remaining below 6% for the 9th day in a row.

  240,162 Texans got a Covid shot today.

  We surpassed 11 million total shots–just 5 days after passing 10 million.

  Hospitalizations went down to a new 6 month low.

  The 7-day Covid positivity rate has remained below 6% for the 9th day in a row.

  Great work Texans!

  — Greg Abbott (@GregAbbott_TX) March 31, 2021

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

  The drop in virus cases, hospitalizations and the testing positivity rate comes three weeks after the state officially lifted its pandemic restrictions, including a statewide mask mandate.

  Abbott first announced the removal of most COVID-19 restrictions on March 2, when he tweeted that “Texas is OPEN 100%.”

  “I also ended the statewide mask mandate,” Abbott wrote in the tweet. His executive order reopening the state went into effect March 10.

  Separately, in a note from Goldman, the bank found that in Texas dining activity is now back above pre-crisis norms. The bank goes on to note that “while this may increase public health risks in coming months, it also suggests scope for a more rapid normalization in business activity in the interim.” Another way of saying this: small business are rejoicing having had the oppressive boot of government interference lifted from their daily lives.

  

  Meanwhile, as Newsweek notes, Mississippi also removed its COVID-19 restrictions around the same time. Like Texas, Mississippi has seen a drop in virus cases and hospitalizations. According to CDC data, as of Saturday Mississippi was seeing an average of 254 daily cases, which is a decrease from the previous month, where the state was averaging around 520.

  According to the state’s health department, Mississippi also saw a drop in COVID-19 hospitalizations, reporting 238 hospitalized patients with confirmed infections this past Friday, which is the lowest the state has seen since May.

  Before the decreases in cases and hospitalizations in Texas and Mississippi, the two states received daily criticism for their coronavirus policies, including from Joe Biden’s teleprompter. Shortly after both states said they were lifting their COVID-19 restrictions, Biden said, “The last thing we need is Neanderthal thinking, that, in the meantime, everything’s fine, take off your mask, forget it. It still matters.”

  It appears that the Neanderthals were right, after all.

  Tyler Durden
  Thu, 04/01/2021 – 21:20

• Japan's Economy Is Again Struggling
  Japan’s Economy Is Again Struggling

  Authored by Bruce Wilds via Advancing Time blog,

  Japan. the world’s third-largest economy is highly dependent on exports and the reality it is still struggling even after a great deal of America’s stimulus money leaked into buying imported goods speaks volumes. While it feels a bit like ancient history, Japan’s GDP contracted at an annualized rate of 28.8 percent in Q2 of 2020, the biggest decline on record. Even after bouncing back 21.4 percent quarter-on-quarter in Q3 and 12.7 percent in Q4 Japanese national accounts are still lagging behind mid-2019 levels. For all of 2020, spending by households with at least two people fell 5.3% due to the hit from the pandemic. It was down 6.5% for all households, the worst drop since comparable data became available in 2001.

  

  All in all, this means the country is still playing catch up, partly because Japan also experienced two additional quarters of negative growth in Q1 of 2020 and Q4 of 2019. Adding to the problem is Japan’s household spending fell for the first time in three months in December, in a sign consumer sentiment was weakening even before the government called a state of emergency to control a new wave of the coronavirus. Lower demand for services such as travel tours also weighed, as the pandemic forced the cancellation of domestic tourism promotions. Last year, spending on accommodations fell 43.7%, while overseas and domestic tour travel expenditure slumped 85.8% and 61.9%, respectively.

  Not only is Japan again struggling to stay out of recession, but it also faces a wall of debt that can only be addressed by printing more money and debasing its currency. This means they will be paying off their debt with worthless yen where possible and in many cases defaulting on the promises they have made. Japan currently has a debt/GDP ratio of about  240% which is the highest in the industrialized world. With the government financing almost 40 percent of its annual budget through debt it becomes easy to draw comparisons between Greece and Japan. 

  Over the years Japan has been able to sidestep default due to the good fortune of sporting a huge trade surplus with America and forming tight economic ties with China during the years it was rapidly growing. Unfortunately, for Japan, the benefit of both those forces may be waning. China has moved up the manufacturing chain and no longer needs Japan as much as it did. This leaves Japan in the unenvious position of having to find new ways to move forward at a time when few friendly trends have surfaced to aid in its endeavor.

  The Japanese economy has been no stranger to recessions even before the coronavirus outbreak. In fact, Japan experienced three mild recessions between the COVID-19 pandemic and the global financial crisis. The first was caused by the devastating earthquake and tsunami that rocked Japan in 2011. The other two and single negative growth quarters appeared to be just part of the long stagnation the Japanese economy has been in since its asset price bubble burst in the 1990s. 

  In the aftermath of the crisis, Japan amassed a mountain of debt that it carries to this day. Japan’s aging population and  shrinking consumer market have made it hard to revive the Japanese economy. The country’s continued reliance on exports and tendency to invest overseas rather than at home have become a big part of what Japan does. For years the now-former Prime Minister Shinzo Abe promised the country relief through his “Abenomics” economic revival program but it never did lift the country out of stagnation. The Abe administration significantly eased monetary policy and increased government spending, while simultaneously talking about needed structural reforms most of which always seemed to be pushed back or get delayed.

  

  Japan’s GDP Is Flat Since 1990

  Not all economists see more deficit spending as the answer to Japan’s problems and argue that more spending will only hurt efforts such as the recent consumption tax hike to improve Japan’s overall fiscal health. Japan holds the title of having the industrial world’s heaviest public debt burden. Its debt is more than twice the size of its $5 trillion economy.

  The world’s negative-yielding debt hit a record $17 trillion at the start of September, mostly as a result of most Japanese debt trading in negative territory as the Bank Of Japan continues to monetize the country’s debt. All this also flows into Japan’s stock market where, when we see Japanese shares rise we are now forced to wonder how much of it has to do with Kuroda and the BOJ pumping up Japan’s stock market by buying more ETFs. It is difficult to argue that in effect, the BOJ buying stock is not nationalizing Japanese companies.

  

  The BOJ Owns Nearly 80% Of Japan’s ETFs

  All this has morphed into a program that seems akin to fraud based on doing “whatever it takes” to give the appearance their economy is moving forward. Following along the line of thought that while there is no way of avoiding the final collapse of a boom brought about by credit expansion years ago, Ludwig von Mises wrote; “The alternative is only whether the crisis should come sooner as the result of a voluntary abandonment of further credit expansion, or later as a final and total catastrophe of the currency system involved.” In short, the BOJ now has little choice but to go all-in which strips away any illusion all is well. In some ways, the actions of Japan’s central bank could be considered nothing more than a new model of “stealth nationalization.” This is a course filled with moral hazard.

  What we see occurring in Japan stems from a far greater problem than simply slow growth. At some point, reality will set in and the yen will suffer as a result of Japanese policies. For many years Japan’s relationship with China has bolstered the yen. The collapse of the yen would debunk the myth that major currencies in our modern world are immune to failure and release a slew of new problems across the world. While this has been expected for some time it most likely will not be the catalyst for global financial collapse since the yen constitutes around only 4% of the world’s reserve currency, however, it would gravely wound fiat currencies and alter how they are viewed. 

  Factoring into all of this, in September of 2020, Yoshihide Suga, became Japan’s new prime minister. Suga took over from 65-year-old Shinzo Abe, the country’s longest-serving prime minister, who resigned due to health reasons. On the domestic stage, Suga inherits a troubled agenda swamped by the coronavirus pandemic, he also has to deal with the disaster of the postponed Tokyo Olympics. As the leader of one of America’s closest allies he also has to navigate a tense geopolitical climate resulting from the rapidly deteriorating U.S.-China relations and the idea Japan wants the U.S. to deter China’s military aggression in Asia.”

  Borrowing a huge part of a nation’s economic output every year to prop up the status quo is akin to putting a Band-Aid over a wound, that in this case, is rapidly growing larger. In short, Japan’s flawed prescription for future growth will never work. Many of the policies that have failed in Japan over the decades are now being played out across the world. Interestingly, over time, the “Japanification” of the world’s economy may play out far worse for the global financial system than it did for Japan.

  Tyler Durden
  Thu, 04/01/2021 – 21:00

• A Step-By-Step Look At How COVID Passport Propaganda Works
  A Step-By-Step Look At How COVID Passport Propaganda Works

  Authored by Adam Dick via The Ron Paul Institute for Peace & Prosperity,

  With reports that President Joe Biden’s administration is planning for imposing a vaccine passport mandate in America, expect to see in the media a deluge of vaccine passport propaganda. What will that propaganda look like? A template illustrating several elements you can expect to see in the propaganda push was provided several weeks ago in a CNN interview.

  

  In the first week of March, host Fareed Zakaria and his guest Arthur Caplan provided at CNN a textbook example of how to present vaccine passport propaganda to the American people. Let’s look at some of the major elements of the propaganda template as demonstrated by Zakaria and Caplan.

  1) Include some short expression that the idea of vaccine passports can be troubling, but make sure to only bring this up superficially. This is accomplished in the CNN segment by starting with a clip from a short scene from the movie Casablanca. In the clip, a policeman asks to see a man’s “papers,” the man says he does not have them, and the policeman responds, “in that case we’ll have to ask you to come along.” Not shown is the remainder of the scene in which the accosted man, after presenting apparently expired papers, attempts to flee only to be gunned down. Not showing the full scene demonstrates the care demanded in the propaganda to not allow any depiction of potential dire consequences from imposing vaccine passports.

  2) Frame the imposing of a vaccine passport mandate as something that is both inevitable and threatens only minimal, if any, harm. Zakaria accomplishes this task with the first sentence he utters to begin the media segment. Zakaria states: “From Casablanca to today, a demand to produce personal documents can be uncomfortable, but, post-pandemic, it’s something we’ll all likely have to get more and more comfortable with.” Masterfully, Zakaria, in addition to minimizing the problems with passports as just causing discomfort, asserts that even that discomfort with time will disappear, suggesting objecting to vaccine passports is just an irrational or silly reaction.

  3) Bring on a guest who, despite his description making him sound like someone who would be looking out for the interests of people concerned about vaccine passports, pretty much says that vaccine passports are the best thing since sliced bread. In the CNN interview the guest performing this role is Arthur Caplan, who Zakaria introduces as a “medical ethicist” and “professor at NYU.” A medical ethicist will surely provide some warning about dangers from vaccine passports, right? Yes, in many cases. But, Caplan is not that sort of medical ethicists. He is the one picked to be interviewed in a media segment designed to promote acceptance of vaccine passports.

  4) Reiterate that vaccine passports are inevitable, and that people should support them. Zakaria hits the nail on the head with this, presenting this first question to his guest: “So explain why you think, basically, that this is the future and we should be comfortable with it.”

  Here’s my “vaccine passport” pic.twitter.com/W7jQetW719

  — Rep. Jeff Duncan (@RepJeffDuncan) March 31, 2021

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

  5) Declare that vaccine passports must be imposed on the American people because of coronavirus. Caplan accomplishes this task in his first words in the media segment. He states: “Well, I’m sure that the future holds vaccine passports for us, partly to protect against the spread of Covid.” Of course, as coronavirus has turned out not to be a major danger to most people, imposing a vaccine passport mandate to counter it makes no more sense than doing it to counter any other of many diseases. But, this is not a topic to be brought up when selling people on vaccine passports. Fearmongering, no matter how ridiculously unjustified, is the name of the game. This is the fraudulent message people are encouraged to act on without much critical thought: Coronavirus is gonna kill us all unless we take the shots and show our papers!

  6) Say that mandating vaccine passports is really no big deal because of some other supposedly very similar restriction to which some people are already subjected. Caplan states: “And, you know, it’s not a new idea, we have it for yellow fever; there are about more than a dozen countries that say you can’t come in if you haven’t been vaccinated against yellow fever, and many others require you to show proof of vaccination if you transit through those countries.” Are the yellow fever-related requirements justified? Caplan does not say more than that, because these somewhat similar restrictions exist someplace, the mandating of vaccine passports in America is fine. That’s medical ethicist reasoning? Anyway, the yellow fever stuff, because most Americans have no experience with or knowledge of it, is a fine example for the propaganda. Few watchers of the segment will have any basis for questioning the current practice that is used to justify the new desired mandate. One big difference, though, jumps out on further consideration. Caplan explains that the yellow fever requirements apply for just coming to several countries. In contrast, Zakaria early in the interview says the vaccine passports that will, he claims, inevitably be imposed on Americans will be required for people “to get on an airplane, to go to a concert, or to go back to work.” The vaccine passport mandate is, thus, much more troublesome for most Americans than yellow-fever-related requirements for entry into a few countries that most Americans never visit. But, the point is to quickly present the example as if it provides conclusive support no matter how far that representation is from the truth.

  7) Dismiss as insignificant people’s concerns about being required, in order to go about their daily activities, to present a vaccine passport and to take a vaccine, or, really, an experimental coronavirus vaccine that is not even a vaccine under the normal meaning of the term. Assert instead that the only danger to freedom could be something theoretical that could be additionally required in the future. Here is how Zakaria puts it in a question to Caplan: “What about the concerns that many people have about privacy, about the privacy of their health data, that, you know, is there a slippery slope here — ‘OK, I’m comfortable telling you whether or not I have Covid, but does that mean it becomes OK to ask about other things?'” Of course, many people are justifiably wary of being pressured to take the shots and then having their mandated vaccine passport used to track them as they go about their daily activities. That is why this media segment and others like it are being presented, after all.

  8) Dismiss any concern that vaccine passports can in fact harm freedom. Instead, describe people as benefiting from and gaining freedom by their being mandated to take experimental coronavirus vaccines and present vaccination passports in order to go about their daily activities. Oh yeah, and keep quiet about all the mass surveillance facilitated by a vaccine passport program, the vaccinations-based caste system resulting from the mandate that will make people who do not take the shots suffer, and how the vaccine passport program can be expanded to advance many additional types of control over people. Here is how Caplan puts it: “With a Covid certification, you’re going to gain freedom, you’re going to gain mobility, and I’m going to suggest that you’re probably going to be able to get certain jobs.” Talk about turning things on their head. The mandate really means that people who do not comply will be barred from the mobility they already have and fired from their jobs. Freedom is supported by rejecting the mandate, not by supporting it.

  9) Insist that the vaccine passport mandate is fine because it will be applied equally to all people. This is something Zakaria and Caplan spend a long time talking about in the CNN segment. Come on guys, something bad does not become good because it is applied to the maximum number of people, irrespective of their race, sex, or whatever. We are dealing with a mandate here, not giving everyone a serving of his favorite dessert.

  10) Declare that a vaccine passport mandate helps encourage people to take the shots. (Unlike the other nine elements of the vaccine passport mandate propaganda template, this one is likely true. Threats can yield compliance. Still, the threats could deter some people from taking the experimental coronavirus vaccine shots. It sure makes you wonder about shots’ supposed safety when an extreme, and unprecedented, act of force is employed to ensure people take the shots.) States Caplan in the interview: “It also gives you an incentive to overcome vaccine hesitancy. Some people are not sure still whether they want to do the vaccine, but if you promise them more mobility, more ability to get a job, more ability to get travel, that’s a very powerful incentive to actually achieve fuller vaccination.” What Caplan is really talking about is coercion. He is saying that people who would otherwise refuse taking the shots will be forced to do so by the vaccine passport mandate severely restricting their activities and even depriving them of the ability to earn an income so long as they do not give in to the demand they take the shots. All this authoritarianism is dressed up in deceptive language. “Vaccine hesitancy” is substituted for “vaccine refusal” to disguise that the vaccine passport mandate is about stopping people from exercising free choice. “Incentive” is substituted for “coercive technique.”

  Watch Zakaria and Caplan’s interview here:

  Hopefully, many people will see through the deception and be able to prevent the implementation of the vaccine passport mandate Zakaria, Caplan, and others are promoting in the media.

  Tyler Durden
  Thu, 04/01/2021 – 20:20

• Biden Taps Susan Rice To Expand Vote By Mail
  Biden Taps Susan Rice To Expand Vote By Mail

  President Biden has put former national security adviser Susan Rice in charge of directing hundreds of federal agencies and departments to comply with a March executive order expanding voting registration procedures for voting by mail. Per the EO, federal agencies must submit to Rice “a strategic plan outlining the ways identified under this review that the agency can promote voter registration and voter participation” within 200 days of the order, according to the Washington Free Beacon.

  

  “Agencies shall consider ways to expand citizens’ opportunities to register to vote and to obtain information about, and participate in, the electoral process,” reads the order. “The head of each agency shall evaluate ways in which the agency can, as appropriate and consistent with applicable law, promote voter registration and voter participation.”

  It requires agencies to distribute registration and vote-by-mail ballot application forms, as well as to assist any applicants in completing the forms. It also pushes agencies to allow “approved, nonpartisan third-party organizations and State officials to provide voter registration services on agency premises.”

  Biden arrived in the White House thanks in large part to the record number of mail-in ballots in the 2020 election. Former president Donald Trump led in many major swing states at the close of Election Day, only to see his lead evaporate as mail-in ballots were counted that heavily favored Biden.

  Critics of Biden’s order warned that it represents a massive federal government overreach into election policies put in place by state lawmakers. Chase Martin, legal affairs director for the Foundation for Government Accountability, said the order is “an overly broad federal mandate.”

  “The order is about inflicting the federal government’s will on the states,” Martin said. “There’s a ton of room for this process to be abused.” –Free Beacon

  The EO followed in the wake of the extremely contentious 2020 election, which also led to a new election law in Florida which created new regulations to improve the integrity of both mail-in and in-person voting. Biden, criticizing the law, said Georgia Republicans are recreating “Jim Crow in the 21st century.” Hilariously, the Washington Post debunked Biden’s criticisms, saying he misrepresented the new law’s impacts on early voting.

  “The Post awarded Biden four Pinocchios after voting experts said the final bill expanded opportunities for early voting. That has not stopped several groups from filing lawsuits against the Georgia law, alleging that Republican lawmakers put the law in place after Democrats won the state in the presidential election as well as two runoff elections in January,” according to the Free Beacon.

  In February, the Brennan Center for Justice found that 43 states are considering bills which seek to limit mail-in voting or institute voter ID requirements on in-person voting, which Democrats say disenfranchise people of color despite the obvious impacts they would have on election integrity.

  Tyler Durden
  Thu, 04/01/2021 – 20:00

• Hooray! The Price Of Toilet Paper Is Going Up Again, Are You Cheering Too
  Hooray! The Price Of Toilet Paper Is Going Up Again, Are You Cheering Too

  Authored by Mike Shedlock via MishTalk,

  The Fed is rooting for more inflation. It’s coming and the Fed is cheering.

  

  1000 Sheets Will Now Cost More

  Huggies maker Kimberly-Clark announced price hikes, joining General Mills, Hormel and others in passing along added costs.

  The Fed is undoubtedly pleased that Higher Commodity Costs are Now Passed on to Shoppers. 

  Makers of everything from diapers to cereal are starting to feel the strain of higher commodity prices, and some are passing the added cost along to consumers.

  Kimberly-Clark Corp. (KMB) said Wednesday it plans to raise selling prices across much of its North America consumer-products business to help counter rising raw-material costs.

  Kimberly-Clark said its increases, which will be implemented almost entirely through changes in list prices, are needed to help offset significant commodity cost inflation.

  Price Hikes 

  • The maker of Huggies diapers and Scott paper products said the percentage increases would be in the mid- to high-single digits and take effect in late June. They will apply to the company’s baby- and child-care, adult-care and Scott bathroom-tissue businesses.

  • Cheerios maker General Mills Inc. (GIS) said it will raise prices to partly offset higher freight and manufacturing costs, in addition to rising commodity prices. “Our competitors and retailers are facing the same thing we are,” General Mills Chief Executive Jeff Harmening said.

  • Hormel Foods Corp. (HRL)said in February it raised prices of its turkey products, such as Jennie-O ground turkey, to counter sharply higher grain costs. If the rally in the commodity markets were to continue, the company would likely pass along further increases, Chief Executive Jim Snee said. Hormel also raised prices of its Skippy peanut butter.

  • J.M. Smucker Co. (SJM)  said it recently raised prices for its Jif peanut butter and that it might do the same with pet snacks because of higher shipping costs and other inflationary pressure. Smucker Chief Executive Mark Smucker said retailers are passing increases along to consumers. “We only raise prices when costs are meaningfully higher, and we partner with the retailers to make sure it’s justified and that we move together,” he said.

  Hooray! Hooray! Hooray!

  In addition to toilet paper, price hikes are slated for Huggies, Cheerios, peanut butter, and turkey.

  No doubt, that’s just a start.

  The Fed is very pleased that your dollar buys less than a month ago. Are you cheering  too?

  Easy Money Quote of the Day: Fed “Won’t Take the Punch Bowl Away”

  On March 25, I noted the Easy Money Quote of the Day: Fed “Won’t Take the Punch Bowl Away”

  San Francisco Fed President Mary Daly won the gold medal for easy money statements.  She said the central bank would show at least “a healthy dose” of patience. ”We are not going to take this punch bowl away,” said Daly.

  She wants higher inflation as do four other Fed presidents I cited. 

  Spotlight on the Fed

  Fed Chair Jerome Powell wants to let inflation run hot to make for alleged lack of inflation in the past.  

  In short, he is unhappy to have failed at destroying the purchasing power of your dollar fast enough.

  He would not recognize inflation if it jumped off the table and spit grapefruit juice in his eyes.

  As discussed previously, Inflation is Poised to Soar, 3% by June is “Almost Certain”

  Historical Perspective on CPI Deflations

  A BIS study of deflations shows the Fed’s fear of deflation is foolish.

  “Deflation may actually boost output. Lower prices increase real incomes and wealth. And they may also make export goods more competitive,” concluded the study.

  For discussion, please see Historical Perspective on CPI Deflations: How Damaging are They?

  Japan has tried what the Fed is doing now for over a decade, with no results.

  Yet, Powell hell bent on producing more than 2% inflation until the strategy “works”.

  It already has, using the word “works” rather loosely.

  Home Prices Rise at Fastest Pace in 15 Years

  

  Inflation is Rampant and Obvious 

  Yesterday I commented Hello Fed, Inflation is Rampant and Obvious, Why Can’t You See It?

  The national level average year-over-year increase in home prices is 11.2%.

  Click on the above link for a series of 5 charts that explain what’s happening.

  What Would I Do?

  For the answer, please see Reader Question: What Would I do Differently Than the Fed?

  Tyler Durden
  Thu, 04/01/2021 – 19:40

• Will Biden's 'Infrastructure' Plan Pass Congress?
  Will Biden’s ‘Infrastructure’ Plan Pass Congress?

  Yesterday in Pittsburgh, Joe Biden proposed the first part of his long-term plan to sustain the economic recovery. As Rabobank’s Philip Marey summarizes (full PDF note here), this first part – the American Jobs Plan – focuses on infrastructure(and care), the second – the American Family Plan –is expected to focus on health care, child care and poverty reduction. The American Jobs Plan amounts to $2.25 trillion in government spending on infrastructure and care for the disabled and the elderly, to be spent in 8 years. It should be fully paid for in the next 15 years. The American Family Plan, which is scheduled to be presented later in April, could add a sizeable amount bringing the total of the two plans to $3-4trillion. As Rabobank previously noted in its American Rescue Plan report, the spending spree of the Democrats only started with the covid relief package signed into law by President Biden on March 11.

  First, a little background: what’s in the Plan?

  The American Jobs Plan focuses on infrastructure, but also contains a large component aimed at care for the disabled and the elderly. The largest spending item in the American Jobs Plan is transportation ($620 billion). This includes a $174 billion investment in electric vehicles, $115 billion spending on bridges, highways and roads, $85 billion on public transit and $80 billion on passenger and freight trains. However, the plan also supports manufacturing ($300 billion), including $50 billion to support the domestic production of semiconductors and $46 billion for clean energy. The plan also provides money for buildings ($286 billion), including $213 billion for affordable housing, and utilities ($266 billion), including $111 billion for removing lead pipes and improving water system safety and $100 billion for improving the power grid infrastructure. The plan also supports job creation and innovation ($280 billion) through investment in R&D and training. The plan also supports education ($137 billion), including $100 billion for upgrading and building new public schools. In addition to infrastructure spending, the plan includes a large chunk for home-and community-based care for the disabled and the elderly ($400 billion),which should create caregiving jobs for low-skilled job seekers.

  

  How will the Plan be funded?

  To pay for the $2.25 trillion in spending the American Jobs Plan proposes to raise the corporate tax rate to 28% from 21%. In addition, there should be a 21% global minimum tax for corporates, at present it is 10.5%. The deduction for offshoring jobs will be abolished and IRS enforcement against companies will be ramped up. During his Pittsburgh speech Biden pointed out that a middle class couple pays 22% in federal income taxes, while Amazon pays 0%. The American Jobs Plan does not include tax hikes for households. In fact, during his speech Biden repeated his promise not to raise taxes for people making less than $400,000 per year. However, this still leaves room for tax hikes for higher income individuals in the next plan, the American Family Plan.

  Besides finding money to pay for new government spending, the Democrats want to raise taxes to reduce inequality. Progressives point to polling data showing that people think companies and wealthy people pay too little in taxes. As Marey notes, “at least the Democrats are still thinking within the boundaries of mainstream thought about fiscal policy where public debt has to be repaid by tax payers. Hence tax hikes.” The alternative, of course, is to invoke MMT and keep spending until inflation gets out of hand. Either way, spending discipline does not seem to be part of the Democratic approach, as Rabo wryly observes.

  Republican response

  While there may be some common ground between Democrats and Republicans on infrastructure, for a large part they are thinking about different forms of infrastructure. While Republicans may be willing to spend federal money on highways, bridges and airports, Democrats are thinking of green infrastructure facilitating clean energy and electric vehicles. In early March after Biden had a bipartisan meeting with members of the House of Representatives on infrastructure spending, Republican Representative Sam Graves already said that Republicans won’t support another Green New Deal disguising itself as a transportation bill. In fact, a few moderate Democrats may also be opposed to it. Besides different preferences regarding the type of infrastructure to invest in, finding the funds to invest has been a challenge for decades. Keep in mind that President Trump promised a $1 trillion infrastructure bill during his 2016 campaign., but did not find support for this in Congress. And President Trump was focused on the Republican definition of infrastructure, not the greener Democratic one. What’s more, the Republicans passed the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act in 2017, through budget reconciliation, reducing the corporate tax rate from 35% to 21%. It is very unlikely that four years later they are going to support raising that rate to 28%.

  

  Will The Biden Plan Pass Congress

  With two packages and only one more budget reconciliation procedure left in 2021, one package would have to get a supermajority to be passed this year. The most obvious candidate is the infrastructure plan, as both parties may be willing to do something about the outdated infrastructure of the country. However, when Democrats and Republicans talk about infrastructure they think of very different things. Hence in order to get a supermajority it would have to be a traditional infrastructure plan. The greener it gets, the less likely it is to get Republican support. Republican senator John Thune (South Dakota) has already indicated that the Republicans would not support an infrastructure package if Democrats were lining up another package -that Republicans would oppose – to be passed at a later stage through budget reconciliation. In other words, in terms of Republican support, part 2 of the plan makes part 1 less likely or at least smaller in size.

  Sure enough, on Wednesday, Mitch McConnell repeated that the infrastructure proposal is a Trojan horse with massive tax increases and more borrowed money. Then on Thursday, Politico reported that Mitch McConnell ruled out all support from Republicans for President Biden’s new infrastructure plan, all but ensuring that the proposal will have to pass with lockstep Democratic unity in the Senate.

  Mitch McConnell has ruled out support from Republicans for President Biden’s new infrastructure plan, all but ensuring that the proposal will have to pass with lockstep Democratic unity in the Senate. https://t.co/PzARup25Un

  — POLITICO (@politico) April 1, 2021

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

  Meanwhile, some Democrats, even progressives, are skeptical of linking complicated tax reforms to straightforward infrastructure spending, fearing it will slow down the process.

  Will Democrats Be United Enough?

  With McConnell stating that Republicans will not support the Plan, it means that either this plan will have to be slashed down considerably, or the Democrats will have to resort to budget reconciliation to get the plan through Congress. However, this means that this shortcut – which only requires a simple majority in the Senate – will already be used for fiscal year 2022.  Consequently, the Democrats will have to wait for fiscal year 2023 to use the budget reconciliation trick again, or they will have to find bipartisan support for the American Family Plan to pass the Senate. The delay, according to Rabo’s Marey, will further increase the pressure of progressive Democrats on centrist Democrats to eliminate the filibuster in order to get rid of supermajority requirements altogether.

  Meanwhile, taking the route of budget reconciliation is not a guarantee for success. In the Senate, the Democrats cannot afford a single dissenter. Centrist Senators such as Joe Manchin and Kyrsten Sinema, who also featured in Rabo’s American Rescue Plan report, may be difficult to keep on board. In other words, while the American Jobs Plan has the potential to unite the Republicans in their opposition to Biden, it will also put tremendous pressure on the internal relations between the left and the right of the Democratic Party.

  Tyler Durden
  Thu, 04/01/2021 – 19:20

• Rand Paul "Pages" Fauci With CDC Confirmation That Vaccinated And Recovered Cannot Pass On COVID
  Rand Paul “Pages” Fauci With CDC Confirmation That Vaccinated And Recovered Cannot Pass On COVID

  Authored by Steve Watson via Summit News,

  Senator Rand Paul shared video Wednesday of CDC Director Rochelle Walensky announcing that new data suggests vaccinated and recovered people do not carry Covid-19.

  

  Paul directed his comments at White House chief medical advisor Anthony Fauci, writing “paging Dr Fauci:  please end the mask theater now that cdc admits evidence that the vaccinated do not carry the virus.”

  paging Dr Fauci: please end the mask theater now that cdc admits evidence that the vaccinated do not carry the virus. https://t.co/ux2vcVHdnd

  — Senator Rand Paul (@RandPaul) March 31, 2021

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  In a further post, Paul also shared a study examining T cell responses in people who have recovered from Covid-19.

  “T cell immunity after natural infection shown to include variants,” Paul, who is also a physician, noted.

  He again addressed Fauci, asking “Do we still need to wear multiple masks after we’ve recovered or been vaccinated?”

  Dr. Fauci, great news! T cell immunity after natural infection shown to include variants. Do we still need to wear multiple masks after we’ve recovered or been vaccinated?https://t.co/sSsE66wJbs

  — Senator Rand Paul (@RandPaul) March 31, 2021

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  The Senator clashed with Fauci a fortnight ago, telling him “You’ve been vaccinated and you parade around in two masks for show. You can’t get it again.”

  “There’s virtually zero percent chance you’re going to get it and you’re telling people that have had the vaccine who have immunity — You’re defying everything we know about immunity by telling people to wear masks who have been vaccinated,” Paul charged during the hearing.

  Fauci has repeatedly flip flopped on the efficacy of masks, and has admitted that there is little science behind lockdown restrictions.

  Nevertheless, Facui still will not drop the mask charade, even suggesting that the world needs to carry on wearing them into 2022, and that children should be wearing them in order to play together, until they are all vaccinated from the age of 6 months old.

  US: Dr. Fauci: “There’s no reason to be walking around with a mask.”
  “When you’re in the middle of an outbreak wearing a mask might make people feel a little bit better, and it might even block a droplet, but it’s not providing the perfect protection people think that it is.” pic.twitter.com/9qNxoG7fZx

  — Apex World News (@apexworldnews) October 20, 2020

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

  *  *  *

  Brand new merch now available! Get it at https://www.pjwshop.com/

  *  *  *

  In the age of mass Silicon Valley censorship It is crucial that we stay in touch. We need you to sign up for our free newsletter here.  Support our sponsor – Turbo Force – a supercharged boost of clean energy without the comedown. Also, we urgently need your financial support here.

  Tyler Durden
  Thu, 04/01/2021 – 19:00

• Biden To Propose New Sanctions Relief Deal As Iran Again Expands Enrichment Capability
  Biden To Propose New Sanctions Relief Deal As Iran Again Expands Enrichment Capability

  Iran’s President Hassan Rouhani on Wednesday slammed the Biden administration’s lack of initiative in rejoining the 2015 nuclear deal, in contrast to Biden’s previously hyping such a move as he sought election (which he used to set his foreign policy vision apart from Trump’s on the campaign trail last year).

  Rouhani said in his latest remarks he’s seen “no serious efforts” from the Biden White House on reviving the JCPOA. He called out the apparent hypocrisy in Biden’s denouncing Trump’s “maximum pressure” campaign while yet still keeping full sanctions in place. 

  Earlier this week Politico revealed a new Biden administration proposal in the works which would partially lift sanctions in exchange for an immediate reversal of some key nuclear deal violations on the part of Tehran, especially a reversal of its 20% uranium enrichment. Further, it would require Iran shutting down use of its advanced centrifuges. 

  

  Officials told Politico that the new US plan is expected to be pitched as early as this week; however, it appears Iran has already preemptively rejected it, reiterating its demands that all sanctions be dropped first as part US compliance to what it previously agreed to in 2015. 

  Iranian Foreign Minister Javad Zarif said in a recent interview which underscored that the Islamic Republic can no longer trust the United States: “If the U.S. passes the test of [the 2015 deal], which doesn’t seem very likely, then we can consider other issues.” He added: “But I don’t think the U.S. would be prepared to discuss those issues. Is the U.S. ready to reduce its arms shipments to the region?”

  Politico detailed of the sensitive timing of Biden’s new proposal:

  “Iran is poised to blow through additional nuclear deal restrictions in the next few weeks. This is the crucial time to avoid an escalation of the situation,” said Daryl Kimball, executive director of the Arms Control Association, an organization that has closely tracked nuclear negotiations involving Iran.

  One reason for a sense of urgency among some U.S. officials as well as those outside American government is that Iran holds presidential elections in June, with campaign season kicking off in May. The politics surrounding the 2015 nuclear agreement are very sensitive in Iran, so the theocratic regime there is unlikely to allow any major moves on it amid a campaign.

  Meanwhile the clock is ticking, given Iran’s latest further uranium enrichment breach of JCPOA caps.

  On Thursday morning Reuters is reporting that Iran has “started enriching uranium with a fourth cascade of 174 advanced IR-2M centrifuges at its underground Natanz plan.”

  “On 31 March 2021, the Agency verified at FEP that: Iran had begun feeding natural UF6 into a fourth cascade of 174 IR-2m centrifuges,” the International Atomic Energy Agency said in the report dated Wednesday, referring to the underground Fuel Enrichment Plant and to uranium hexafluoride, the form in which uranium is fed into centrifuges for enrichment.

  The report says the fresh information is based on new International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) findings obtained by Reuters.

  Tyler Durden
  Thu, 04/01/2021 – 18:40

• Rehypothecated Leverage: How Archegos Built A $100 Billion Portfolio Out Of Thin Air… And Then Blew Up
  Rehypothecated Leverage: How Archegos Built A $100 Billion Portfolio Out Of Thin Air… And Then Blew Up

  One week after the biggest, and most spectacular hedge fund collapse since LTCM, we now have an (almost) clear picture of how Bill Hwang’s Archegos family office managed to single-handedly make a boring media stock the best performing company of 2021, but then when its luck suddenly ended it was margin called into extinction, leading to billions in losses for the banks that enabled what Bloomberg has dubbed its “leveraged blowout.”

  Thanks to detailed reports by the Financial Times and Bloomberg, we now have the missing pieces to complete the picture of the biggest hedge fund implosion of the 21st century.

  As a reminder, and as we previously discussed, we already knew how Archegos was building up stakes in its various holdings: unlike most other investors, the fund never actually owned the underlying stock or even calls on the stock, but rather transacted by purchasing equity swaps known as Total Return Swaps (TRS) or Certificates For Difference (CFD). Similar to Credit Default Swaps, TRS exposed Archegos to the daily variation margin on the underlying stock, and as such while the fund would benefit economically from increases in the underlying stock price (and, inversely, would be hit by price drops forcing it to put up more cash as margin any day the stock price dropped) it would never be the actual owner of record of the underlying stock. Instead, the stock that Archegos was long would be “owned” by its prime broker, the same entity that allowed it to enter into TRS in the first place. As such Archegos also never had any disclosure requirements, allowing it to transact completely in the dark while being fully compliant with SEC disclosure requirements – since it didn’t own the underlying stock, Archegos did not have to disclose it. Simple and brilliant.

  This part is important because the lack of a documented trail of ownership to Archegos is what enabled the entire Ponzi bezzle… and the staggering leverage the fund applied to its portfolio. Furthermore, well aware that there was almost no way to verify just how much of a given stock he owned, Hwang proceeded to have nearly identical positions with not one, not two but at least eight prime brokers (the final number is still being determined as more and more come out of the woodwork).

  Not that Archegos prime brokers were completely clueless as to what was going on.

  As Bloomberg reports, while much of the investing world watched in stunned silence how an “old media” company – ViacomCBS – shot up almost 300% in weeks, becoming the best performing stock in the S&P500 and prompting investors to speculate that the stock was was either undervalued, or like GameStop, or a takeover target, a handful of execs at Wall Street’s top trading firms were aware of what was behind the move: it was Archegos Capital Management, who was building a massive position in ViacomCBS and a handful of other stocks… using leverage the same banks so generously offered with stock which the banks themselves technically owned!

  

  But while banks around the world – from Goldman, Morgan Stanley and Wells in the US, to Credit Susse, UBS and Deutsche Bank in Europe, to Nomura and Mitsubishi UFJ in Japan – kept giving Hwang the leverage he needed to acquire more and more of the stock, until he became the biggest economic if not registered owner of Viacom, what they did not know – thanks to the was Total Return Swaps are structured – was the full extent of his wagers. Which were massive: he stealthily amassed $10 billion of Viacom.

  Viacom was just one of many: using even more TRS and even more leverage across even more Prime Brokers, Archegos was able to place colossal wagers while avoiding the disclosures required of most investors. And so “almost invisibly” Hwang accumulated a portfolio which according to Bloomberg sources was as much as $100 billion!

  Eventually, Archegos built positions in at least nine stocks that were big enough to rank him among the largest holders, fueled by a level of bank leverage that would have been unusual even for a hedge fund.

  While we previously discussed the leverage aspect of Archegos strategy, here it is again: with Bill Hwuang managing approximately $10BN in assets under management, the multiple Total Return Swaps with unwitting prime brokers allowed the fund to build up a staggering $100 billion in positions, implying a huge 10x leverage. This is the kind of leverage one associated with the likes of financial titans like Citadel and Millennium, not a smallish family office which has zero downside protection (as we would eventually learn).

  

  What is amazing about this unilateral Ponzi scheme is that it relied on what we have dubbed rehypothecated leverage: the fund never even owned the underlying stock which was layered with billions in generous Prime Broker debt, but it was Archegos’ Prime Brokers who not only would own the actual stock but would also allow Hwang to add tens of billions in leverage… on an asset that they owned!

  What is also remarkable is that Archegos’ ponzi scheme could have continued indefinitely if only Viacom stock had i) continue to rise or ii) avoided a crash. After all, having ignited the initial upward moment, Archegos had effectively forced benchmark-tracking investors, exchange-traded funds, CTAs and other momentum investors to buy as well.

  Sadly for Hwang (and his Primer Brokers) the upward momentum ended with a bang last Monday, when with its shares trading at $100, Viacom announced a $3BN stock sale, which hammered the stock, followed by a round of analyst downgrades, which sent the stock tumbling. It was at this point that Archegos was now facing tens of billions in margin calls on its VIACA Total Return Swaps from its Prime Brokers.

  

  And therein lies the rub, because when the time came to unwind the Archegos Ponzi, the Prime Brokers’ counterparty was not Archegos but other Prime Brokers. This is what led to the infamous meeting late last Thursday, where a bunch of PBs tried to reach an amicable resolution ahead of Friday’s bloodbath. As Bloomberg adds, at several points during those exchanges, bankers implored Hwang to buy himself breathing room by selling some stocks and raising cash to post collateral. But “he wouldn’t budge.”

  As a result, Morgan Stanley and Goldman promptly started dumping blocks of stock backing Archegos TRS in the open market. In doing so the started a margin call liquidation, in which those who sold first – like Goldman, Morgan Stanley and Deutsche – would avoid massive losses, while those who waited like Nomura and Credit Suisse… would not. Indeed, we already knew that Nomura, Japan’s largest investment bank, said its losses could hit $2Bn, while losses at Credit Suisse could be as large as $4Bn according to the FT.

  At this point, many questions popped up, especially (and belatedly) inside the banks themselves: as the FT reports, executives within the prime brokerage divisions of at least two banks “are being quizzed by risk managers over why they offered a business as small as Archegos tens of billions of dollars of leverage on trades in volatile equities through swaps contracts,.”

  As the FT further notes, echoing what we said above, while prime brokerage clients typically provide few details about their other trading activities, “executives from at least two of the six banks are investigating whether Hwang deliberately misled them or withheld vital information about mirror positions he had built up at rival banks, according to people involved in the probes.”

  Well, no: Archegos did not mislead anyone. He simply used (and abused) a system where – as we put it – one investor can create as much rehypothecated leverage as the investors’ banks and Prime Brokers will allow him. In this case we know the number may have been as high as a mindblowing $90 billion.

  Naturally, had the banks known that in a worst case scenario they would be facing other banks – since such replicated, or rather rehypothecated position would magnify the risks on each of the trades making a bank less likely to extend so much credit against them  – none of this would have been possible. However, as long as everything was going up, and all of Archegos positions were pleasasntly surging nobody seemed to care… or bother to calculate just how big the downside risk was (one can thank the Fed Put for that).

  One final remarkable aspect of this whole story is that this is not Hwang’s first crisis. In 2012 he submitted a guilty plea on behalf of his hedge fund to a charge of wire fraud, and he resolved related civil claims of insider trading without admitting or denying wrongdoing. Archegos is the family office he formed after winding down that firm, Tiger Asia Management.

  However, as if nothing had ever happened, prime brokerages immediately began lining up to help the new business. Morgan Stanley was among his early backers. Deutsche Bank signed him as a client at the urging of at least one senior executive, according to Bloomberg, “who was unperturbed by the insider-trading taint and didn’t believe Hwang had done anything wrong, according to a person familiar with that decision.” Ironically, just a few years later, Hwang did something wrong and it would prove to be the biggest hedge fund collapse in post-LTCM history.

  Not every bank acted like an idiot: one firm resisted the lure. Archegos approached JPMorgan sometime between 2016 and 2018 and was rebuffed, according to the Bloomberg report. At the time, JPMorgan was still revamping the equity prime-brokerage unit it had acquired with Bear Stearns during the 2008 financial crisis. “Dumb luck or not, the bank dodged a bullet.”

  * * *

  The rest of the story is mostly known, so now what.

  Well, as we first hinted and as Bloomberg reports, already regulators are dropping hints of new rules to come, with SEC officials signaling to banks that they intend to make trading disclosures from hedge funds a higher priority, while also finding ways to address risk and leverage.

  Senior finance executives acknowledge that a crackdown of some form, whether on borrowing or transparency or both, is inevitable.

  Amusingly, and picking up on the FT’s reporting, Bloomberg also notes that while some of those firms have disclosed the financial impact of their roles in the Archegos collapse, none is willing to comment on how or why they enabled Hwang to become such a force in the market. After all what can they say: “the other guys vetted him, so we assumed he was clean”…

  There are also questions whether Hwang’s counterparties knew about his relationships with other banks and the scale of the leverage he was using for what appear to be concentrated positions in a handful of companies. And – more ominously – if they did not know anything about his exposure, why the hell not?  As we reported on Tuesday, JPMorgan (which successfully managed to avoid this scandal completely) estimated that the Prime Brokers facing Archegos may end up absorbing as much as $10 billion in combined losses.

  Already credit rating agencies have downgraded outlooks for Credit Suisse and Nomura, citing concerns over “the quality of risk management” while activist investors are demanding better governance and would not mind if senior execs were summarily fired over this episode to restore confidence.

  “Risk controls still are not where they should be,” David Herro, one of Credit Suisse’s biggest shareholders, said Wednesday in a Bloomberg TV interview. “Hopefully, this is a wake-up call to expedite the cultural change that is needed in this company.”

  But going back to Bloomberg’s original point, for all their silence the prime-brokerage units of Nomura, Goldman Sachs, Morgan Stanley, Credit Suisse and others, had clues about what Archegos was doing. These firms knew about the trades they had financed, of course, and also had some visibility into his total borrowings. And yet they didn’t bother to ask about what, if any, risk management was being implemented to avoid an uncontrolled unwind. Or rather, the questions emerged only after the margin call.

  What the Prime Brokers also didn’t know is that Hwang was taking parallel positions at multiple firms, piling more leverage onto the same few stocks, which brings us back to our rehypothecated leverage concept which we are confident we will use much more in the coming months, especially since “unwinding a series of large, leveraged bets placed by a single account is one thing; doing so when rival banks are liquidating the same positions held by the same client is quite another.”

  Archegos’ own “Lehman moment” came late on March 25 when Hwang’s prime brokers met again and discussed the possibility of standing down temporarily to let tensions ease, as we reported previously, but any attempt at solidarity proved short-lived: shortly after some PBs sent Archegos notices of default, clearing the way for Goldman and Morgan Stanley to dump Hwang’s positions.

  “Hopefully this will cause the prime brokerages of regulated banking organizations (and their supervisors) to re-assess their relationships with highly leveraged hedge funds,” former FDIC chair Sheila Bair tweeted.

  A few silver linings: no one is talking about bailing out its counter-parties and hopefully this will cause the prime brokerages of regulated banking organizations (and their supervisors) to re-assess their relationships with highly leveraged hedge funds.

  — Sheila Bair (@SheilaBair2013) March 31, 2021

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  She is, of course, wrong.

  In fact, if anything we expect Prime Brokers will make leverage even easier to obtain for non-bank, hedge fund and family office clients, because the one big mistake Archegos (and its Prime Brokers) made was that it was not big and systemic enough to merit a Fed bailout. Now, if Archegos had a portfolio of $200 billion, $300 billion or more, while using Citadel’s 50x leverage, now we’re talking “size”…  size enough for the Fed to step in and make everyone whole on the back of taxpayers… the same way the Fed bailed out Citadel, Millennium and Point72 in September 2019 during the repo crisis (as both Zero Hedge and subsequently Bloomberg, explained).

  There is another reason nothing will change: hedge funds, Prime Brokers, banks – in fact the Fed itself – are all incentivized to not look at what skeletons may be found in the closet. Why? Because if the banks are forced to admit that there are more Archegos funds – and there are countless – Prime Brokers will have no choice but to sequester collateral from more clients, sparking more margin calls, leading to more stock liquidations, and resulting in even bigger investor panic. Call it a side effect of building castles on crooked foundations in an artificial, fake, Fed-supported market.

  Is another market panic what the Fed wants? Or what the Biden admin wants? Of course not.

  Which is why we will get a token Congressional hearing where politicians care more to hear themselves talk than listen to the answers, the banks will slap a few hands, one or two small sacrificial hedge funds will be shut down, and the world will move on, especially once Archegos is no longer on the front page of the financial media.

  It’s also why when the next major hedge fund implosion does happen, it will be far more catastrophic.

  Tyler Durden
  Thu, 04/01/2021 – 18:13

• ​​​​​​​April Temperature Anomalies Spike In Central US As Farmers Prepare For Early Spring Planting 
  ​​​​​​​April Temperature Anomalies Spike In Central US As Farmers Prepare For Early Spring Planting 

  Weather models are forecasting warmer than average temperatures for much of the Central US. This is excellent news for farmers who may have an early start to the planting season as soft commodity prices have seen a parabolic rise due to demand increases from China. 

  BAMWX meteorologist Kirk Hinz wrote in his latest weather note that “one of the more robust warm ensemble model solutions” is being seen across the Central US. He said the weather model shows the 5-10 day period in some regions across Central US could experience “+15-20F” above-average temperatures for April. 

  

  Hinz’s temperature anomaly shows the most above-average region in April spans from parts of the Rockies into the Northern and Central Plains and northern Great Lakes.

  One of the more robust warm ensemble model solutions I’ve seen in quite some time, being depicted in the 5-10 day period ahead across the central US. Some areas looking to see +15-20F, or higher, temps above “normal” into early April! #AGwx #OATT #Plant21 #natgas #energy pic.twitter.com/rSU0JuipoN

  — Kirk 🌽 Hinz | BAM Weather (@Met_khinz) March 31, 2021

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  This is terrific news for farmers who have kept a close eye on skyrocketing soft commodity prices. An early spring may suggest more planting acres which would help alleviate supply constraints after China boosted demand for American farm goods. 

  In mid-March, David Iverson, the national secretary of the United Soybean Board, told Agweek that soaring soybean prices had boosted interest in the bean to its highest levels in recent memory. 

  “We’ve had down prices for a number of years and all of a sudden we get a big rally. So there’s more interest in soybeans now,” said Iverson said. 

  Soybean prices are now at the highest price since late 2014.

  

  Perhaps an early start to the planting season, combined with soaring Chinese demand for US farm goods, maybe a boon for farm income after years of depression. 

  Tyler Durden
  Thu, 04/01/2021 – 18:00

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