TRENDS ON THE ECONOMIC AND MARKET FRONT
HOME SALES, PRICES SLIP IN JUNE: CRASH COMING?
Sales of existing homes, which normally make up most of the housing market, dropped 3.3 percent in June from May to 4.16 million units, down 18.9 percent from a year earlier and the slowest sales pace since January, the National Association of Realtors reported.
ECONOMIC UPDATE – MARKET OVERVIEW
At this point in the stock market game, it’s all about interest rates.
In the U.S., the bet on The Street is that following the Fed’s meeting on Wednesday, there is a 98-percent probability that the central bank will raise interest rates 25-basis points, according to the CME FedWatch Tool.
DOLLAR’S VALUE SINKS FURTHER AS BIG BANKS TURN BEARISH
After closing at 99.91 on 17 July, the U.S. dollar regained little ground against an assortment of other major currencies, trading at 101.08 at 5 p.m. U.S. EDT on 21 July.
CHINA’S ECONOMIC WEAKNESS LEAKS ONTO WALL STREET
Stock-watchers expect a raft of disappointing second-quarter earnings reports from tech firms, luxury retailers, and other companies dependent on China, according to Reuters.
CONSUMERS WAITING “FOR THE OTHER SHOE TO DROP”
Two key surveys of consumers’ views of the economy both posted their most positive results in 18 months or more.
SALES OF NEWLY BUILT HOMES ON THE RISE
Newly built homes made up almost a third of houses for sale in the U.S. in May, compared to the usual 10 to 20 percent, according to the National Association of Realtors (NAR).
WAR SENDS LOCKHEED PROFITS SOARING
Lockheed Martin, the world’s largest defense contractor, reported second-quarter net profits of $1.68 billion, compared to just $309 million for the same period last year and exceeding predictions among economists surveyed by FactSet.
TRENDS ON THE GLOBAL ECONOMIC FRONT
SPOTLIGHT, TOP TREND 2023: OFFICE BUILDING BUST
The number of office buildings burdened with troubled loans, or already repossessed by lenders, jumped 36 percent in this year’s second quarter from the first, MSCI Real Assets reported.
$500 BILLION IN DISTRESSED CORPORATE DEBT PRESAGES WAVE OF BANKRUPTCIES
Corporate loans in “distress”—a pre-default phase in which businesses struggle to gather the assets to make debt payments—now total $500 billion, Bloomberg has calculated, the most since 2008, early in the Great Recession.
WHEN THE ECONOMY FALLS JOBS GO WITH IT
Higher interest rates and rising inflation, plus the cheap money flow that governments pumped into economies to artificially drive up equity markets and economies are causing companies in many sectors to lay off employees.
OIL PRICES SET TO RISE: DEMAND UP, SUPPLY DOWN
Oil producers will struggle to meet demand during the second half of this year, especially as demand in China and India continues to rise, Joseph McMonigle, secretary-general of the International Energy Forum, said in a CNBC interview last week during the G20 economic summit.
U.S. GREEN ENERGY INCENTIVES MOSTLY GOING TO FOREIGN COMPANIES
The U.S. Inflation Reduction Act, passed by Congress last year, offered more than $260 billion in tax and other incentives for green energy manufacturing projects in the U.S.
SURVEY: EMPLOYEES WORK AT HOME LESS THAN THEY WOULD LIKE
“There’s a gap between the number of days that employees would like to work from home and the number that their employers are planning for them,” Mathias Dolls, deputy director of Germany’s Ifo Center for Macroeconomics and Surveys, told a press briefing on release of a recent survey on the subject.
U.K.’S LARGEST ASSET MANAGER REGROUPS FOR RECESSION
Legal & General Investment Management (LGIM), Britain’s largest asset manager, has been selling off stocks and buying bonds on the judgment that the Bank of England (BoE) will be forced to raise interest rates so high that a “significant” recession will be unavoidable.
CANADA GRAPPLING WITH CREEPING MONOPOLIES
Five companies—Costco, Empire, Loblaws, Metro, and Walmart—account for 75 percent of Canada’s grocery sales.
SPOTLIGHT: CHINA’S ECONOMIC STRUGGLE
Despite vowing policy support to jolt China’s economy back to life, the country’s leaders have done little other than make promises, global investors have said as they scaled back their expectations for China’s economic growth this year.
SPOTLIGHT: BIGS GETTING BIGGER
As we had long forecast, the higher central banks raise interest rates, the lower the Merger and Acquisition trend… which hit record highs at the height of the COVID War in 2021 when interest rates sank and governments pumped in countless trillions to artificially prop up sinking economies.
UKRAINE WAR TREND UPDATE
RUSSIA STRIKES UKRAINE PORT AFTER KYIV LAUNCHES DEADLY ATTACK ON CRIMEA BRIDGE
The Western media last week tried, once again, to describe leaders in Moscow as a depraved lot willing to starve the world to achieve their objectives in Ukraine after carrying out a pre-dawn attack in Odessa that targeted a major grain port.
U.K.’S MILITARY CHIEF USES MOSCOW’S ATTACK ON GRAIN STORAGE AS REASON WEST CANNOT RELENT IN ITS SUPPORT FOR UKRAINE
James Cleverly, the U.K.’s defense chief, said in an interview last week that Russia’s move to bomb the Ukrainian port should strengthen the resolve of the West in its commitment to help Kyiv see the war through.
SENDING F-16s TO UKRAINE, U.S. RAMPING UP UKRAINE WAR
The U.S. announced last week that it will supply Ukraine with F-16s. Dmytro Kuleba, the Ukrainian foreign minister, said he expects these jets to be flying over Ukraine by the first quarter of 2024.
PUTIN: COUNTEROFFENSIVE HAS FAILED
Russian President Vladimir Putin gloated last week that Ukraine’s counteroffensive has failed, dashing the hopes of Kyiv’s Western allies that these forces would break through Russia’s frontlines.
U.S. AT WAR WITH RUSSIA: WASHINGTON SENDING $1.3 BILLION FOR UKRAINE
The U.S. announced last week that it will provide Ukraine another $1.3 billion in military support as Kyiv’s counteroffensive fails to yield any major battlefield advances.
BULLSHIT BLINKEN: UKRAINE HAS SEIZED 50 PERCENT OF OCCUPIED TERRITORY FROM RUSSIA
Antony Blinken, the U.S. secretary of state, said in an interview that aired Sunday that Ukraine has managed to retake about 50 percent of the territory that has been seized by Russia—and reiterated the White House propaganda that Russian President Vladimir Putin has already failed.
UKRAINE’S BURISMA: HUNTER BIDEN ‘STUPID,’ BUT PAID BIDENS $10 MILLION
Congress published an FBI agent's redacted write-up from June 2020 that claimed President Joe Biden and his troubled son Hunter both pulled in $5 million in bribes from Mykola Zlochevsky, the owner of Burisma—who felt “coerced” to make the payment.
FEATURED TRENDS GUEST ARTICLE by John & Nisha Whitehead
MENTAL HEALTH ROUNDUPS: THE NEXT PHASE OF THE GOVERNMENT’S WAR ON THOUGHT CRIMES
“There are no dangerous thoughts; thinking itself is a dangerous activity.”—Hannah Arendt
FEATURED TRENDS GUEST ARTICLE by Dr. Joseph Mercola
WAS COVID A BIOWEAPON THAT TARGETS CERTAIN RACES?
According to mainstream media, Presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr. recently made claims about COVID-19 being an ethnically targeted bioweapon. That is false.
FEATURED ARTICLE BY GUEST WRITER by Philip Giraldi
IT’S PAST TIME TO BE HONEST ABOUT ISRAEL
One might think that since Honest Joe Biden declared his latest war entitled the U.S. National Strategy to Counter Anti Semitism in May the media has certainly taken up the task of exposing evil in these United States by reporting every affront to Jewish groups or individuals and to the Jewish state, Israel.
PRESIDENTIAL REALITY SHOW® 2024
ABOUT HALF OF U.S. VOTERS SAY THEY’RE OPEN TO A THIRD POLITICAL PARTY
A newly released Quinnipiac University poll found that 47 percent of voters in the U.S. said they could consider voting for a candidate running for president from a third party.
DESANTIS CAREFUL WITH ANSWER ON WHETHER HE WOULD PUSH FOR ZELENSKY TO CEDE LAND FOR PEACE
Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, a Republican hopeful for president, refused to say if he would push Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky to cede land to Russia to bring peace and stability to Ukraine.
TRENDS IN TECHNOCRACY by Joe Doran
GLYPHOSATE AND GENE-EDITED POPLARS (AND MAYBE PEOPLE) GOOD FOR THE EARTH, SAY CLIMATE ACTIVISTS
Altering the natural genetics of trees and increasing the use of glyphosate might not strike many sensible people as “environmentally friendly.”
SEVEN MAJOR TECH COMPANIES SIGN ONTO “GOVERNMENT AI”
This past week, seven major AI focused tech companies agreed to abide by and work with the Biden Administration’s AI guidance policies.
It made the announcement via a 21 July “FACT SHEET: Biden-Harris Administration Secures Voluntary Commitments from Leading Artificial Intelligence Companies to Manage the Risks Posed by AI.”
UH-OH: CLAUDE AI GOES OFF THE WOKE GUARDRAILS, AS ANTHROPIC SIGNS ON TO BIDEN “GOV AI” TAKEOVER
What’s an aspiring AI company that’s trying to go along to get along, going to do when it finds that its AI is committing “dangerous” and “harmful” acts, as defined by government ideologues?
GOOGLE PITCHES “GENESIS” TO PUBLISHERS, AS HUMAN CREATIVES REBEL AGAINST TECH COMPANY CONTENT HIJACKING
Google wants journalists to have their own specialized AI assistant.
It’s called Genesis.
TRENDS IN CRYPTOS
SYNERGIES SPELLING NEXT CRYPTO WAVE
At least five factors are fast setting the stage for not just crypto recovery, but a next wave that may see 2021 look like a blip on a radar screen in comparison.
BLOCKCHAIN BATTLES
Japan envisions web3 technology as the next wave of economic empowerment and inclusion.
The country has been formally focused on providing legal clarity and friendliness to development and infrastructure for web3 since January of 2022.
TRENDS IN THE COVID WAR
CAR THEFTS SURGE IN U.S., VIOLENCE STILL MUCH HIGHER THAN PRE-LOCKDOWN LEVELS
Car thefts in 32 of the 37 largest cities in the U.S. jumped 33.5 percent in the first six months of 2023 compared to the same time frame last year, according to the Council on Criminal Justice.
TRENDS IN GEOPOLITICS
OPERATION BARBAROSSA 2.0: GERMANY’S RHEINMETALL TO BUILD TANK PLANT IN UKRAINE
Germany, which killed some 24 million Russians in World War II, and who, according to former President John F. Kennedy, destroyed Russia’s farms, factories, homes, and cities equivalent to destroying from Chicago to America’s east coast... is on the attack against Russians again.
MIDDLE EAST MELTDOWN: U.S. DEPLOYS NEW FORCES TO GULF OF OMAN AMID TENSIONS WITH IRAN OVER OIL TANKERS
The U.S. announced last week that it will send additional assets to the Gulf of Oman as tensions escalate in the region over the seizures of oil tankers.
U.K. ECONOMY SUCKS, VOTERS DON’T WANT SUNAK CLUB
British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak is learning that hatred for Russians can only get you so far when the economy tanks.
MASSIVE PROTESTS BREAK OUT IN ISRAEL AFTER PASSING OF JUDICIAL REFORM’S ‘REASONABLENESS BILL’
Demonstrations broke out across Israel on Monday after Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s government passed a key part of its judicial overhaul package called the “reasonableness bill,” which normally allows the Supreme Court to overrule legislation it deems unreasonable.
3 MILLION SUDANESE DISPLACED, ABOUT 3,000 DEAD…BUT WHO GIVES A SHIT?
Rival factions have been fighting in Sudan since mid-April leading to a humanitarian crisis that has been essentially ignored by the Western media presstitutes because they’re not Ukrainians.
WHAT APARTHEID? U.S. HOUSE GIVES ITS BLESSING TO ISRAEL AFTER RECENT ATROCITIES
Politicians in Washington continue to be owned and operated by Israel after the House overwhelmingly passed a resolution that rejected claims that the country is racist against Palestinians or an apartheid state.
TRENDS-EYE VIEW
WANT TO SEND YOUR KID TO A TOP-RANKED COLLEGE? BETTER BE RICH!
Parents who dream of sending their children to a top college in the U.S. are faced with soaring tuition costs as more Americans consider if a diploma is worth the financial pain.
AMERICANS LOSING FAITH IN MAJOR INSTITUTIONS
Americans continue to have little faith in some of the country’s biggest institutions and the presidency and Supreme Court have seen the biggest declines.
TRENDS IN HI-TECH SCIENCE by Ben Daviss
SCIENTISTS FIND SIX CHEMICAL COMBINATIONS THAT REVERSE ILLNESSES OF AGING
For almost two decades, scientists have been experimenting with “Yamanaka factors,” special molecules that convert adult cells into stem cells—cells that can be nudged to become any of a range of different kinds of cells.
BUILDING A BETTER TREE
Using Nobel Prize-winning CRISPR gene editing technology, researchers at North Carolina State University have smartened up poplar trees to make them a better source of wood fibers.
RENEWABLE ENERGY WILL MEET “NET ZERO” TARGET BY 2050, NEW STUDY SAYS
If current trends persist, renewable energy will claim a third of new global electricity generating capacity by 2030, according to a new report from the nonpartisan, nonprofit Rocky Mountain Institute (RMI).
TRENDS IN AI
HUMAN CREATORS DEMAND PAYMENT FROM AI DEVELOPERS
Major AIs – ChatGPT, Google’s Bard, Stable Diffusion, image creator Dall-E, and others—learned by ransacking the Internet and internalizing its contents. Now it uses that content to create original essays, news stories, pictures, and other works.
GOOGLE READIES CHATBOT TO ANSWER YOUR MEDICAL QUESTIONS
Google is testing Med-PaLM2, its chatbot that will be able to answer common medical questions.
AI: TEACHERS’ NEW BEST FRIEND
Schools may have doubts about students using AI in their schoolwork, but teachers have made chatbots their new classroom utility players.
META READIES OPEN-SOURCE CHATBOT
Meta Platforms is preparing to release LLaMA, its no-charge large language model AI to compete with ChatGPT and Google’s Bard.
AI DEVELOPERS URGE REGULATIONS PROTECTING “MENTAL PRIVACY”
At a 13 July conference, the UN’s Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) launched an effort to frame a set of ethical standards around “neurotech,” the use of computers to connect with and analyze the human mind.
YO HABLO CHATBOT
Racing to claim a larger share of the global AI market, Google has released a version of its Bard AI that can chat with you in 43 languages as well as English.