Leading economists still seem unwilling to confront the blunt reality of the current economic crisis. James Bullard, president of the St. Louis Federal Reserve Bank, told CBS’s “Face the Nation” audience on 12 April that he didn’t believe the U.S. jobs market was in “free fall,” despite 10 percent of the American workforce suddenly becoming idle. “The uptake on the...
ECONOMIC DAMAGE TO WORSEN
As federal relief funds work their way through bureaucratic pipelines to banks and other agencies that will distribute them, the damage the funds are targeting continue to mount. More than 16 million Americans are out of work, with more destined to be laid off before federal money can reach the companies that were to use the money to keep them...
U.S. MARKETS: UP AND DOWN
Yesterday, the Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 329 points to close at 23,390. The NASDAQ rose 39 points to 8,192. The Dow’s loss can be attributed to investors taking profits from last week’s gains and waiting out first-quarter earnings reports due from big banks, which are expected to be negative. Last week, the S&P index logged its best week since...
VENEZUELA: CACHES & WARSHIPS
The Trends Journal has been reporting on the United States ongoing actions to overthrow Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro when he was sworn in to a new term in January 2019 and replace him with self-declared president Juan Guaidó. As reported, on 26 March, the United States placed a $15 million-dollar bounty on President Maduro, accusing him of narco-terrorism. It offered...
YEMEN: THE VIRUS OF WAR CONTINUES TO SPREAD
While COVID-19 continues to dominate headlines and TV news reports 24/7, there is barely any mention on a true crisis far deadlier than coronavirus: in Yemen, at least 14 million people are on the brink of starvation, according to the United Nations. The cause is not a virus, but the disease of war, which has been reported in the Trends...
THE “CURE” IS WORSE THAN THE DISEASE
A United Nations report released on 8 April states that coronavirus and the shutting down of the global economy to deal with it could push half a billion more people into poverty. This represents about an additional 8 percent of the entire population becoming impoverished. Even if the lower end of the estimated range is reached, the global level of...
HOSPITAL BLUES
For months, we’ve been hearing hyper-ventilated calls from political leaders and mainstream media about the emergency crisis caused by lack of ventilators to handle coronavirus patients with the most severe symptoms. Now that hard data and firm science is starting to emerge, it turns out the safety and health advantages of ventilators for COVID-19 have themselves been hyper-ventilated. In New...
SHUT DOWNS & SHUT INS
Taking advantage of successful fear campaigns, political leaders continue to shut down economies and shut in their citizens based on their individual temperament rather than hard data. As of last week, over 100 countries were in full or partial lockdown affecting billions of people. Looking for consistency? In Italy, where it is now known that 99 percent of those who...
CRACKS IN THE DEBT BUBBLE
by Gregory Mannarino We have entered a new paradigm, one that for years I have outlined would occur, and, now, it is here: an era in which massive debt expansion, on an unprecedented scale, is taking place. What we now are witnessing is a global takeover by the new World Central Bank, formally known as the Federal Reserve. Parabolic debt....
REAL ESTATE DEAD? TIME TO BUY?
With the economy at a standstill, U.S. office space under long-term leases is no longer a safe investment. Long-term leases no longer offer a guaranteed return if the tenant can’t pay rent or goes out of business. As a result, investors are bailing out of real estate investment trusts as tenants successfully pressure their landlords for lower rents. In Manhattan,...