TRENDS ON THE ECONOMIC AND MARKET FRONT
MORE THAN A THIRD OF NONFINANCIAL U.S. BUSINESSES IN “DISTRESS”
Thirty-seven percent of U.S. businesses outside of the financial industry are in serious trouble, according to a report by the U.S. Federal Reserve.
ECONOMIC UPDATE — MARKET OVERVIEW
“The Trend is Your Friend.” As we had forecast back in November 2022, and as Gerald Celente and The Trends Journal has been repeating since, the S&P 500 would rise at least 16 percent in the following 12 months. It has now hit that mark.
INFLATION, CONSUMER SPENDING SLOWED IN MAY
Overall inflation in the U.S. pulled back to a 4-percent annual rate in May, its slowest in two years, the U.S. commerce department reported. The Personal Consumption Expenditures Price Index, the U.S. Federal Reserve’s preferred inflation gauge, slowed to 3.8 percent.
AMERICANS THINK THEY NEED $1.3 MILLION TO RETIRE COMFORTABLY, STUDY FINDS
To be comfortable in retirement, Americans think they need about $1.3 million, according to a survey by Northwestern Mutual of 2,740 U.S. adults in February and March this year.
PRIVATE EQUITY FIRMS OPT FOR SMALLER DEALS
Amid a cloudy economic future and rising interest rates, private equity deals are getting smaller.
INVESTMENT BANKING FEES PLUNGE
With fewer mergers, acquisitions, and initial stock offerings taking place this year, investment banks have seen their revenue from managing such deals fall to $12.8 billion this year through May, down 35 percent compared to the first five months of 2022, the Financial Times said.
TOP TREND 2023, OFFICE BUILDING BUST: OREGON’S LARGEST CITY LOSING POPULATION
Portland, Oregon’s flagship city known for being clean and safe and for its hip vibe, watched its population swell by 23 percent during this century’s first two decades.
TRENDS ON THE GLOBAL ECONOMIC FRONT
EUROPE GOING FROM DIRTY CASH TO DIGITAL TRASH
The European Commission (EC), the European Union’s administrative body, has published draft rules that would govern the creation and implementation of a digital euro.
ASIAN JUNK-BOND DEFAULTS SET RECORD
In 2022, 18 Asian companies defaulted on their dollar-denominated junk-rated bonds, a record that tripled the number of defaults in 2021, according to S&P Global Ratings.
MARKETS SEE $1 TRILLION LESS IN M&As, IPOs THIS YEAR
Through June, this year’s initial public stock offerings (IPOs) and corporate buyouts and takeovers are worth $1 trillion less than the value of those deals made during the same period last year, Bloomberg reported.
EUROZONE INFLATION FALLS
Inflation across the 20 countries sharing the euro currency fell to 5.5 percent in June from 6.1 percent in May, beating economists’ forecast of 5.6 percent in a Reuters poll.
ECB MUST CONTINUE TO RAISE INTEREST RATES
The European Central Bank (ECB) should continue to raise interest rates into the future, bank president Christine Lagarde said in a 27 June statement at a financial conference in Portugal.
WHEN THE ECONOMY FALLS JOBS GO WITH IT
It’s plain and simple. Across the globe, as we note in this and previous Trends Journals, there are more and more forecasts for rising interest rates and more fears of recession. Thus, the deeper economies around the world fall, the more jobs will be cut.
CHIEFS OF FEDERAL RESERVE, BANK OF ENGLAND REMAIN INTEREST RATE HAWKS
Jerome Powell, chair of the U.S. Federal Reserve, and Bank of England governor Andrew Bailey both signaled that they expect, and support, moves by their banks to continue raising interest rates.
JAPAN’S ECONOMY EXPANDS MORE THAN PREDICTED, BUT…
Japan’s troubled economy grew at an annual pace of 2.7 percent during this year’s first quarter, according to revised government figures. The initial estimate was 1.6 percent.
MORE THAN 63 PERCENT OF NIGERIANS ARE “MULTIDIMENSIONALLY POOR,” STUDY SAYS
About 133 million people living in Nigeria—roughly 63 percent of the population—are “multidimensionally poor,” meaning they lack adequate food, sanitation, and health care, the country’s National Bureau of Statistics reported.
TOP TREND 2023: OFFICE BUILDING BUST, HSBC LATEST TO FLEE LONDON’S CANARY WHARF
HSBC, Europe’s largest bank, announced on 26 June it will leave its self-named Canary Wharf headquarters and move its 8,000 staff members to smaller digs in “The City,” the London district equivalent to New York’s Wall Street.
BOSSES REQUIRING EMPLOYEES TO RETURN TO THE OFFICE ARE LOSING WORKERS
Among employers who have forced employees to come back to a central office, 42 percent report losing more workers than they expected, according to a new survey from office consulting firm Unispace. Twenty-one percent said “key” staff members had quit.
SPOTLIGHT: CHINA’S ECONOMIC STRUGGLE
China’s factory activity continued weak in June, although less so than in April and May, government figures showed. Exports shrank in May at an annual rate of 7.5 percent.
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 during the COVID war when interest rates sank and governments pumped in countless trillions to artificially prop up sinking economies.
UKRAINE WAR TREND UPDATE
RUSSIA: WASHINGTON’S LATEST UKRAINE INJECTION CONFIRMS ‘OBSESSION’ WITH INFLICTING STRATEGIC DEFEAT ON MOSCOW
As the U.S. money flow to keep bloodying the Ukraine killing fields continues, the Russian embassy in Washington criticized Washington’s latest injection of $500 million in weapons for Ukraine, and said the move shows just how committed the Biden administration is to the strategic defeat of Russia.
DUH-MOCK-RACY IN ACTION: UKRAINE’S ZELENSKY POSTPONES ELECTIONS UNTIL AFTER WAR
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky is a dictator.
ORBAN WANTS AUDIT ON HOW UKRAINE SPENT BILLIONS OF EUROS BEFORE NEW INJECTION
Viktor Orban, the Hungarian prime minister, bristled at the idea of the European Commission preparing another round of financial aid for Ukraine until there is some clarity on how the previous €70 billion was spent.
UKRAINE RECEIVED MORE THAN $170 BILLION TO FIGHT RUSSIANS
A German economic research center released a recent study that tried to put a number on how much total aid Ukraine has pulled in since the start of the war and identified $170 billion in humanitarian, financial, and military aid.
SWITZERLAND: NO THANKS, WE WON’T SEND UKRAINE TANKS
Neutral means isolation these days in Europe.
Switzerland decided last week that it will not provide Ukraine with...
AUSTRALIA SENDS MORE MONEY TO KEEP BLOODYING UKRAINE KILLING FIELDS
Despite Russia posing no threat to Australia, Canberra announced last week that it will provide Ukraine with another $110 million in aid.
AS FORECAST: DON’T COUNT ON UKRAINE’S COUNTEROFFENSIVE
The Ukrainian government continues to buy time for the long-anticipated counteroffensive to take hold and is insisting that the sporadic reports of small gains is just a “preview” of what’s to come on the battlefield.
UKRAINE SAYS RUSSIA IS GOING TO BLOW UP NUKE PLANT IT OCCUPIES… AND THE MAINSTREAM MEDIA SELLS THIS BULLSHIT
Kira Rudik, a Ukrainian politician, said Monday that the situation around the Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant is incredibly dangerous and Kyiv is preparing for a nuclear explosion.
MEDVEDEV: NUCLEAR WAR CHANCES ‘QUITE PROBABLE’
We have long been warning that World War III has begun and if we do not have peace on earth it will escalate into nuclear war.
FEATURED TRENDS GUEST ARTICLE by John & Nisha Whitehead
A STATE OF MARTIAL LAW: AMERICA IS A MILITARY DICTATORSHIP DISGUISED AS A DEMOCRACY
The government is goose-stepping all over our freedoms. Case in point: America’s founders did not want a military government ruled by force. Rather, they opted for a republic bound by the rule of law: the U.S. Constitution.
FEATURED TRENDS GUEST ARTICLE by Dr. Joseph Mercola
HOW TO PREVENT AND TREAT ALZHEIMER’S DISEASE
In 2014, Dr. Dale Bredesen published a paper demonstrating healthy lifestyle choices could reverse Alzheimer’s in 9 out of 10 patients. His team is now launching a new randomized, controlled trial at six sites. Biological aging, brain aging and epigenetics will be included in this trial, using newer blood tests that weren’t available even a few years ago.
PRESIDENTIAL REALITY SHOW® 2024
WHITE HOUSE STARTS TO SELL ‘BIDENOMICS’ TO AMERICANS
President Joe Biden is beginning to focus on the 2024 presidential election and his team sees the economy playing an important role in his re-election hopes.
‘EXTREME PRIDE’ IN BEING AMERICAN CONTINUES TO HOVER AT ALL-TIME LOWS
A newly released Gallup poll found just 39 percent of Americans consider themselves to be “extremely proud” of their nationality—which is just about unchanged from last year and far below the 2001 benchmark of 55 percent.
TRENDS IN TECHNOCRACY by Joe Doran
PROGRAMMABLE CITIZENS: THE AGE OF ARTIFICIAL LIFE AND SYNTHETIC ASCENDANCE
The brave new world is rushing at us faster than ever. Technocrats are impelled by an ideology of science-fueled “progress” to attempt to exert more comprehensive and precise control over all phenomena and environments.
TRENDS IN CRYPTOS
CRYPTO ADOPTION CONTINUES TO RISE IN DEVELOPING REGIONS AND CUTTING EDGE TECH HUBS
As The Trends Journal has been forecasting and chronicling crypto adoption is happening most rapidly in emerging markets and regions that are either (1) generally friendly to tech innovation, and / or (2) areas where governments and financial systems are most badly failing their citizens.
BLOCKCHAIN BATTLES
Bitcoin ordinals, or the ability to create BRC tokens comparable in at least some ways to Ethereum tokenizing abilities, hit a new development twist as of 20 June.
TRENDS IN GEOPOLITICS
U.S. DISASTROUS WITHDRAWAL FROM AFGHANISTAN: WASHINGTON’S STUPIDITY
The U.S. State Department released its review of the U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan in 2021 that has been panned by observers as an unmitigated failure that Afghans are paying for to this day.
NETANYAHU SAYS HE’LL DROP KEY PART OF JUDICIAL OVERHAUL BILL
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu announced that he pulled a key provision from his controversial judicial overhaul plan—and said he would not insist on a clause that would give the Knesset the ability to override the country’s supreme court.
NETANYAHU’S HARDLINE COALITION TAKES HOLD AMID SURGE IN VIOLENCE AGAINST PALESTINIANS
As forecast, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s hardline coalition of anti-Palestinian racists—are living up to expectations amid the recent uptick in violence and new settlement announcements.
U.S. CONTINUES TO PROVOKE CHINA, SENDS ITS BIGGEST SUB TO SOUTH KOREA
The USS Michigan, a nuclear-powered submarine, visited the Korean Peninsula as tensions between Seoul and Pyongyang remain high—but is also likely to be seen as a clear indicator to Beijing about the U.S.’s growing presence in the region.
AS PROTESTS AGAINST HIS JUDICIAL REFORM ESCALATE AND ITS AIRPORT IS SHUT DOWN, ISRAEL LAUNCHES BIGGEST MILITARY OPERATION AGAINST PALESTINIANS IN DECADES
Gerald Celente has famously said, “When all else fails, they take you to war.”
The theory is that failing political leaders know the most effective way to distract the public is to engage in a military conflict.
TRENDS-EYE VIEW
IAEA HEAD TO VISIT JAPAN TO GIVE FUKUSHIMA TOXIC DUMP FINAL BLESSING
Rafael Mariano Grossi, the head of the UN’s International Atomic Energy Agency, is expected to visit Japan’s Fukushima nuclear plant before the country releases 1.25 million tons of the treated wastewater into the Pacific.
TRENDS IN HI-TECH SCIENCE by Ben Daviss
ROBOT LEARNS TO DO YOUR CHORES BY WATCHING HOW-TO VIDEOS
At Carnegie Mellon University, engineers are teaching robots to handle routine household chores by showing them how-to videos.
NEW PROCESS PULLS STRAY LITHIUM FROM OIL AND GAS WELLS
It’s ironic: in a world running short of the lithium needed to ease the world past the oil age, oil and gas wells can help make up that shortage.
A WHOLE NEW WAY FOR COMPUTERS TO REMEMBER
Silicon-based computer chips remember things by storing each bit of data as a 1 or a 0 and putting the pieces in different places. Shuttling those data bits back and forth and collating them together takes time and energy.
TRENDS IN AI
AI PREDICTS PANCREATIC CANCER THREE YEARS BEFORE DOCTORS CAN SEE IT
Using only a patient’s medical records, artificial intelligence predicted a person’s likelihood of developing pancreatic cancer at least as well as doctors using family histories and genetic screenings, according to a study by Harvard University, Boston-area hospitals, and the University of Copenhagen in Denmark.
FINANCIAL CRIMES? GOOGLE’S AI IS WATCHING
Bank employees scrutinize accounts to flag sketchy customers and suspicious transactions, but don’t always find them. Google wants to help.
AI RESCUES ADOBE
For Adobe, Firefly came just in time. The company known for PDFs introduced its AI-based “Firefly” photo and video editing tool in March. With simple voice commands, the program can place an image in any background, change lighting, and make almost any other adjustments.
AI IS WIMBLEDON’S NEWEST COLOR COMMENTATOR
When the elites of tennis take to Wimbledon’s grass courts this week, a new eye will be analyzing their moves and assessing their chances.
AI WILL BE “AS GOOD A TUTOR AS ANY HUMAN EVER COULD,” BILL GATES SAYS
Chatbots will soon be tutoring children individually to improve their reading and writing abilities, according to Bill Gates in comments he made at a San Diego tech conference earlier this month.