Thursday, March 24, 2016

The Latest Key Developments In The Brussels Terror Attacks



Two days after the tragic terrorist attacks in Brussles, the situation remains extremely fluid, with the largest concern being that more sleeper cells may be activated especially since the third man who participated at the Zaventerm airport suicide bombing is still at large. Here, courtesy of the Guardian and Politico, are the most recent key developments out of Belgium.



Brussels Suicide Bombers Planted Hidden Camera At Home Of Top Belgium Nuclear Official

"I don’t understand how you could have been in possession of this video since Nov. 30, but on Jan. 13, when I questioned you on this, you answered, ‘There is no specific threat to the nuclear facilities.’ ”


Stocks Slammed Into Red For 2016; Bond Yields Plunge Most In 6 Months; Gold Bouncing Back

The last two days have seen 30Y yields plunge over 12bps (the biggest move since September's Fed fold) to one-month lows. At the same time, thanks to The Fed's hawkish jawboning, stocks are dumping also with The Dow joining the rest in the red for 2016. Gold is rallying back from its monkey-hammering yesterday but remains the laggard post-Fed.


Global Government Debt Is Actually Triple What We Thought, Thanks to Pensions

by Timothy Martin, WSJ:

Government debt in 20 industrialized countries stands at $44 trillion.
But it’s actually a lot more than that, according to a new report. After factoring in public pension and other retirement liabilities, the debt levels nearly triple to a staggering $122 trillion.
That’s the math according to a new report from Citigroup Inc report called, “The Coming Pensions Crisis,” which analyzed government pension liabilities from 20 countries that are members of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development .
Read More


What Killed The Middle Class?

If the four structural trends highlighted below don't reverse, the middle class is heading for extinction.



Core Durable Goods Tumble For 13th Month, Longest Non-Recessionary Stretch In 70 Years

Durable Goods New Orders (Ex-Transports) or so-called "Core" durable goods dropped 0.5% YoY, extending its losing streak to 13 months. This is the longest streak in the history of the series with no recession. All segments of the durable goods report saw negative MoM moves with headline down 2.8% (small beat) but preior data was revised dramatically lower, Capital goods orders were drastically revised lower but still fell more than expected (-1.8% MoM) and finally shipments ex-aircraft dropped 1.1% MoM (missing the expedcted rise of 0.3% notable) with significant downward revisions once again.



The Initial Jobless Claims Mystery Continues

Still hovering near 43 year lows, initial jobless claims printed a better than expected 265k against expectations of 269k. Continuing claims also dropped from 2.218m to 2.179m - also back near 43 year lows. So, the mystery is - why is the ISM's composite manufacturing and services employment index collapsing to 6 year lows?


Subprime Nightmare on Wall Street for TBTF Grupo Santander

from Wolf Street:

On January 23, 2014, the shares of Santander Consumer USA Holdings (SCUSA), the U.S. auto-lending unit of Spain’s largest bank, were launched on the New York stock exchange. For the bank’s Spanish owners and management — in particular the firm’s president and undisputed capo of Spanish banking, Emilio Botín — it was a dream come true, the culmination of decades of rampant international growth and consolidation. Finally, Spain’s biggest bank had made it to the top of the global financial heap.
But the plan has gone awry. Auto-lending in the U.S. is no longer the low-risk, high-growth business it was cracked up to be, Emilio Botín has passed to the other side, and Santander’s American dream, now under the supervision of his daughter, Ana Botín, is turning decidedly sour.
Read More





Activist Hedge Fund Starboard, Expert On Salt Content Of Pasta Water, Now Wants To Overthrow Yahoo's Board

A year and a half after Starboard proposed that the only thing Oliver Garden needs to attract new clients is to change the salt content of its pasta water, the activist fund has just unleashed a campaign seeking to overthrow the entire board of Yahoo, because the fund which clearly was a nutritional expert in late 2014, now thinks that its 1.7% in YHOO stock hodlings entitle it to the intimate knowledge of just how to "fix" Yahoo. Perhaps, the thinking goes, all it takes for people to start using Yahoo again is a new board?



Swiss National Bank Admits It Spent $470 Billion On Currency Manipulation Since 2010

Swiss policy makers rarely state outright that they’ve intervened, and analysts use data on sight deposits and foreign currency reserves to gauge the scope of the central bank’s actions. Breaking with the usual protocol, Jordan said in June the SNB had acted to stabilize the franc amid the Greek debt crisis. The bottom line: CHF86.1 billion spent on FX intervention in 2015 and a whopping $470 billion since 2010.


If Your Country’s Broke, Don’t Hold All of Your Savings There

from Sovereign Man:
On Friday March 15, 2013–just over three years ago–people across the entire nation of Cyprus went to bed believing that everything was OK.
The next morning they woke up to a different reality.
It turned out that their banking system was totally broke. After suffering enormous losses, banks no longer had sufficient liquidity or capital to maintain customer account balances.
People realized immediately that just because you can log in to a bank’s website and see an account balance printed on the screen that doesn’t actually mean that the money is there.
To make matters worse for depositors, the government was insolvent and unable to lift a finger to support the banks.
Read More





U.S. Futures Slide, Crude Under $39 As Dollar Rallies For Fifth Day

Following yesterday's dollar spike which, which topped the longest rally in the greenback in one month, the prevailing trade overnight has been more of the same, and in the last session of this holiday shortened week we have seen the USD rise for the fifth consecutive day on concerns the suddenly hawkish Fed (at least as long as the S&P is above 2000) may hike sooner than expected, which in turn has pressured WTI below $39 earlier in the session, and leading to weakness across virtually all global risk assets.



ISIS Sends 400 Specially Trained Fighters To Unleash "Wave Of Bloodshed" In Europe

"Security officials have told The Associated Press that the Islamic State group has trained at least 400 attackers and sent them into Europe for terror attacks."



China Sends Fed A Warning: Devalues Yuan By Most In 2 Months

With the USD Index stretching to its longest winning streak of the year, jawboned by numerous Fed speakers explaining how April is 'live' (and everyone misunderstood the dovishness of Yellen), it appears that The PBOC wanted to send a message to The Fed - Raise rates and we will unleash turmoil on your 'wealth creation' plan. Large unexpected Yuan drops have rippled through markets in recent months spoiling the party for many and tonight, by devaluing the Yuan fix by the most since January 7th, China made it clear that it really does not want The Fed to hike rates and cause a liquidity suck-out again.



The Reasons Why People Hate Cultural Marxists

The process of forced multiculturalism is driving large portions of the EU and America to become violently opposed to cultural Marxists. I fear that this is leading to irreconcilable division to the point of war, just as what took place during the last Great Depression. And, as I pointed out at the beginning of this article, cultural Marxists are a tiny minority, a paper tiger posing as the real thing. If they do not stop with their incessant subversion and cultism they will end up being the first to pay the price. The rest of us will pay later.



Why Oil Prices Are About To Plunge Again: 31 Million Barrels In Floating Storage Are Coming On Shore

Based on the all-in cost of operating tanker storage (dirty VLCC tanker day rates, financing, transit and transfer loss, insurance and bunkers, Figure 5), the current storage cost is too high relative to the steepness of the Brent forward curve. This means that prices do not justify inventory build, but rather gradual inventory drawdown as existing storage trades are unwound.  Comparing the current level of floating storage (157.3 million barrels) versus that in early February (126.6 million barrels), there may be an additional 31 million barrels of inventory to be drawn down between now and the next inventory trough over the next several months.


America’s Fake War Against ISIS Grinds On

by Tony Cartalucci, Activist Post:
A recent US Senate Armed Services Committee (SASC) hearing considering the nominations of General Joseph Votel and Lieutenant General Raymond Thomas for command of US Central Command and US Special Operations Command respectively, exposed the absurdity of America’s war on the so-called “Islamic State” (ISIS).
While the Syrian Arab Army backed by Russian airpower successfully cuts off entire armies of terrorists from their supplies abroad, while encircling and eradicating them within Syrian territory, the US appears instead to be attempting to stretch out ISIS’ existence while maintaining the illusion of fighting the terrorist organization for as long as possible.
During the hearing, several times US senators including US Senator John McCain (R-AZ) would credit US operations for the recent setbacks faced by ISIS, including pressure recently placed directly on Al Raqqa – the defacto capital of ISIS in eastern Syria.
Read More

Super Soft On Islamic Terror: Obama Says That ISIS ‘Is Not An Existential Threat To Us’

by Michael Snyder, The Economic Collapse Blog:

In the wake of the horrible bombings in Brussels, Barack Obama is insisting that there is no need to change our approach in the fight against ISIS.  He believes that Islamic terror is not a fundamental threat to our way of life, and he wants all of us to be convinced that the way that he is handling ISIS right now is just fine.  Well, in this article you are going to learn some very shocking things about Obama and ISIS that are likely to make you very angry.  It turns out that our allies Saudi Arabia and Turkey have been arming, funding and aiding ISIS and other radical jihadist groups such as the al-Nusra Front (al-Qaeda in Syria), and Obama has known about it all along.  The goal was to take down the Assad regime in Syria, and the American people were never supposed to find out the truth.
Read More

France Approves Plan to Ban Bee-Harming Neonicotinoid Pesticides

by Julie Fidler, Natural Society:
France gets it when it comes to pesticides. Lawmakers in the country just approved plans to totally ban some widely used pesticides blamed for harming bees, going above and beyond European Union (EU) restrictions.
Two years ago, the EU limited the use of neonicotinoid chemicals, commonly known as neonics, produced by companies including Bayer CropScience and Syngenta, after studies showed the pesticides threatened bees, which play a vital role in pollinating crops.
Read More

The View Hosts Admit Trump Was Right About Brussels: “I Can’t Believe It, He Seems Reasonable”

by Mac Slavo, SHTFPlan:
Is Donald Trump really the voice of reason the day after the attacks in Brussels?
These left-leaning women from The View are besides themselves in having to admit that they agree with The Donald on his foreign policy and ISIS views.
He apparently called months ago that something was going on in Belgium, and that new waves of terror attacks were forthcoming.
Read More

The Health Insurance Scam – “Coverage” Doesn’t Mean Affordability or Access

from Liberty Blitzkrieg:
An architect of the federal healthcare law said last year that a “lack of transparency” and the “stupidity of the American voter” helped Congress approve ObamaCare.
He suggested that many lawmakers and voters didn’t know what was in the law or how its financing worked, and that this helped it win approval. 
– From the post: Video of the Day – Obamacare Architect Credits “Lack of Transparency” and “Stupidity of the American People” for Passage of Healthcare Law
Read More…




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