Baltic Dry Index. 1632 +46 Brent Crude 74.28
If there were
no bad people, there would be no good lawyers.
Charles Dickens.
Hours after landing in
a peculiar, hot, dry, summery Great Britain, in a spectacular display of errant
gunnery testing, the great battleship USS Trump Trade War, blew British Prime
Minister Mrs May’s flagship HMS Europe Pinafore, launched only last Friday, completely
out of the water.
In just about a month, President Trump is on a dragon
slaying roll, having dispatched Prime Minister Trudeau, Chancellor Merkel, and
the collapsing Mrs May. Russia’s
President Putin must be ecstatic at what a Russian baker and a few St
Petersburg internet trolls could accomplish in 2016, completely foiling the
CIA, the FBI, the NSA, and the Obama-Clintonista New World Order Democrat
Party.
It is Friday the
thirteenth, and President Trump rolls on to have lunch with the blackened Prime
Minister May at her grace and favour country retreat, before travelling to next
door to me Windsor, for tea with Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth. What could
possibly go wrong? Europe hasn’t seen anything like this since the grandsons of
Genghis Khan showed up leading the Mongol Horde back in the 1200s.
Below, reasons to
look up the betting odds of Prime Minister May and HMG’s longevity.
July 11, 2018 / 10:46 PM
Trump blasts May's Brexit plan, says it puts trade deal in doubt
BLENHEIM
PALACE, England (Reuters) - U.S. President Donald Trump said a free trade deal
with Britain might be impossible if London went ahead with Prime Minister
Theresa May’s proposals for post-Brexit ties with the European Union, in
damaging remarks that could widen domestic criticism of her plans.
In an interview with Britain’s Sun newspaper published late on Thursday,
Trump said May’s plans for a business-friendly Brexit would leave it too close
to the EU to allow a new trans-Atlantic trade deal to be struck.
Just hours earlier at a lavish dinner to mark Trump’s first visit to
Britain as president, May made a direct pitch for a deal with Washington. She
praised the friendship between the two allies, glossing over Trump’s previous
remarks that Britain was a “hot spot” in turmoil over Brexit.
Referring to May’s Brexit proposals, Trump told the Sun, Britain’s
top-selling newspaper: “If they do a deal like that, we would be dealing with
the European Union instead of dealing with the UK, so it will probably kill the
deal.”
Trump chastised May for ignoring his advice on Brexit and not making a
credible threat to walk away from talks.
“I would have done it much differently,” he told the Sun, which urged
its readers to back Brexit before a referendum in June 2016. “I actually told
Theresa May how to do it, but she didn’t listen to me.”
His comments came at the end of a tumultuous few days for May, during
which two senior ministers resigned in protest at her plans for trade with the
EU after Britain leaves the bloc next March.
Trump said that one of them, former Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson,
“would be a great Prime Minister.”
After the story was published, White House spokeswoman Sarah Sanders
said the president “likes and respects Prime Minister May very much,” adding
that he said in the interview she “is a very good person,” and that he “never
said anything bad about her.”
----Trump is due to have lunch with May on Friday. Her office had no immediate reaction to his remarks, beyond referring back to her speech.
May has previously said she does not believe her Brexit plans should
rule out a trade deal with the United States.
More
Trump rips Theresa May, says ‘soft’ Brexit would ‘kill’ any future U.S.-U.K trade deal
Published: July 12, 2018 8:29 p.m. ET
Bombshell interview could undermine May’s leadership position
----In a bombshell interview with the British newspaper The Sun, Trump said May has ignored his advice on how to conduct Brexit negotiations.“I would have done it much differently,” Trump told The Sun. “I actually told Theresa May how to do it but she didn’t agree, she didn’t listen to me. . . . I think what is going on is very unfortunate.”
Trump said a “soft” Brexit that May has backed, in which the U.K. and the European Union would maintain some ties after the U.K. leaves, would “definitely affect trade with the United States, unfortunately in a negative way.”
“No, if they do that I would say that that would probably end a major trade relationship with the United States,” Trump said.
More
July 13, 2018 / 1:41 AM
Asian shares extend rebound but trade fears dog China stocks
SHANGHAI
(Reuters) - Most Asian share markets rose on Friday, heartened by gains on Wall
Street fuelled by expectations of strong U.S. earnings, but China’s markets
wobbled as investors braced for the impact of broadening, tit-for-tat
Chinese-U.S tariffs.
Adding to fears that even stronger punitive measures from Washington may
be on the way, China reported a trade surplus with the United States of $28.97
billion in June, the highest on record, according to Reuters calculations.
China’s overall global export growth topped expectations, however,
possibly as its exporters and big American customers rushed to beat U.S.
tariffs.
MSCI’s broadest index of Asia-Pacific shares outside Japan was up 0.6
percent, adding to a 0.6 percent rise on Thursday, after U.S. stocks ended the
day higher.
The MSCI index rose on gains in Taiwan shares, which rose 0.8 percent,
Seoul’s Kospi, which added 1 percent, and Hong Kong’s Hang Seng index, which
was 0.5 percent higher.
Australian shares turned lower, falling 0.2 percent after adding 0.8
percent Thursday. Japan’s Nikkei stock index was 1.3 percent higher.
In China, the blue-chip CSI300 index was up 0.1 percent after dipping
into the red, and the Shanghai Composite index was 0.4 percent lower. There was
little immediate reaction in Chinese markets to the trade data.
More
Meanwhile Mrs May’s
choice of surrender to Europe over a USA trade deal looks like backing the
wrong horse. Poor GB, what were the odds
of getting a run of “Lord North” Prime Ministers, Major, Bliar, Brown, Cameron,
and May?
12 July 2018 - 11H23
EU slashes eurozone growth forecast on US trade war tensions
BRUSSELS (AFP) -
The EU on Thursday slashed its growth forecast for the eurozone in 2018,
warning that the rising trade tensions with the United States were hitting the
economy.
The European Commission, the EU's executive arm, said the 19-country
single currency bloc would expand by 2.1 percent in 2018, lower than the 2.3
percent forecast just weeks ago in early May.
"Our forecast is for a continued expansion in 2018 and 2019,
although a further escalation of protectionist measures is a clear downside
risk," said EU Economic Affairs Commissioner Pierre Moscovici in a
statement.
"Trade wars produce no winners, only casualties," he added.
The commission added that the economy in the eurozone would expand by
2.0 percent in 2019, the same forecast as in May.
The worry about the European economy stems from the ongoing trade
dispute with the administration of US President Donald Trump, which has now
threatened to impose tariffs on European auto imports, with German auto giants
the intended target.
If confirmed, the policy would be one of the most aggressive
transatlantic blows since the Great Depression and risks bitterly splitting the
allies amid divisions over the Iran nuclear deal and the Paris climate accord.
The threat by Trump comes after the mercurial leader already slapped 25
percent tariffs on steel and 10 percent on aluminium on imports from Europe and
other key allies.
"First and foremost, if trade tensions with the US were to escalate
further, this could dampen confidence more permanently, ... likely disrupting
the current global (economic recovery)," the commission said in its
forecast report.
More
Finally, while we await the latest in the trail of
destruction from President Trump’s Mongol sweep across Europe, the long arm of
English law, almost gets its man.
Laws are like cobwebs, which
may catch small flies, but let wasps and hornets break through.
Jonathan Swift
July 12, 2018 / 1:47 PM
Former Barclays trader found guilty of rigging Euribor
LONDON (Reuters) - A French former Barclays (BARC.L) trader, tried in his absence by a London court, has been convicted by a jury of conspiring to rig global interest rates.Philippe Moryoussef, a 50-year-old former senior derivatives trader, was found guilty of conspiracy to defraud by dishonestly manipulating Euribor - or Euro interbank offered rate - between January 2005 and December 2009 after an 11-week trial.
The jury at Southwark Crown Court in London acquitted Achim Kraemer, a
Deutsche Bank DBKGN.DE manager still employed by the bank. The jury were unable
to reach a verdict on another three traders on trial.
A conspiracy to defraud conviction carries a jail sentence of up to 10
years.
Reporting restrictions on the verdicts were lifted on Thursday after the
jury failed to agree on a decision for co-defendants Carlo Palombo, an
Italian-born former junior Barclays trader, Sisse Bohart, a Danish former
Barclays junior trader and rate submitter and her former boss, Colin Bermingham.
A prosecutor for the UK’s Serious Fraud Office said a decision will be
made within seven days as to whether to seek to re-try the three individuals.
A sixth defendant, 46-year-old former Deutsche Bank star trader
Christian Bittar, a Frenchman who investigators said was once one of the
world’s best-paid traders, pleaded guilty before the trial began. He is already
in custody.
Brussels-based Euribor is a benchmark for interest rates on around $150
trillion to $180 trillion of financial contracts and consumer loans worldwide.
Revenge is an act of passion;
vengeance of justice. Injuries are revenged; crimes are avenged.
Samuel Johnson
Crooks and Scoundrels Corner
The bent, the seriously bent, and the totally doubled over.
Today, a warning from the past to Wall Street, the City, and all bent
banksters, crooked politicians, and pretzel shaped central banksters. To which
we can add, San Francisco hospitals.
“They
look upon fraud as a greater crime than theft, and therefore seldom fail to
punish it with death; for they allege, that care and vigilance, with a very
common understanding, may preserve a man's goods from thieves, but honesty has
no defence against superior cunning; and, since it is necessary that there
should be a perpetual intercourse of buying and selling, and dealing upon
credit, where fraud is permitted and connived at, or has no law to punish it, the
honest dealer is always undone, and the knave gets the advantage.”
Jonathan
Swift, Gulliver's Travels
San Francisco hospital treated Korean tourists’ baby with a nap and a bottle of milk formula. The bill was US$18,000
The case of baby Park Jeong-whan, who bumped his head, highlights the growing tendency of US hospitals to charge ‘trauma response fees’ that go into effect regardless of the eventual treatment and run as high as US$51,000
PUBLISHED : Friday, 06 July, 2018, 9:45am UPDATED : Friday, 06 July, 2018, 9:49pm
On the first morning of Jang Yeo-im’s vacation to
San Francisco in 2016, her eight-month-old son, Park Jeong-whan, fell off the
bed in the family’s hotel room and hit his head.
There was no blood, but the baby was inconsolable. Jang
and her husband worried he might have an injury they couldn’t see, so they
called 911, and an ambulance took the family – tourists from South Korea – to
Zuckerberg San Francisco General Hospital (SFGH).
The doctors at the hospital quickly determined that baby
Jeong-whan was fine – just a little bruising on his nose and forehead. He took
a short nap in his mother’s arms, drank some infant formula and was discharged
a few hours later with a clean bill of health. The family continued their
vacation, and the incident was quickly forgotten.
Two years later, the bill finally arrived at their home:
They owed the hospital US$18,836 for a visit lasting three hours and 22
minutes, the bulk of which was for a mysterious fee for US$15,666 labelled
“trauma activation,” also known as “a trauma response fee.
It’s a huge amount of money for my family,” said Jang, whose family had
travel insurance that would cover only US$5,000. “If my baby got special
treatment, OK. That would be OK. But he didn’t. So why should I have to pay the
bill? They did nothing for my son.”
American hospital bills are today littered with multiplying fees, many
of which don’t even exist in other countries: fees for blood draws, fees for
checking the blood oxygen level with a skin probe, fees for putting on a cast,
minute-by-minute fees for lying in the recovery room.
But perhaps the pinnacle is the “trauma fee,” in part because it often
runs more than US$10,000 and in part because it seems to be applied so
arbitrarily.
A trauma fee is the price a trauma centre charges when it activates and
assembles a team of medical professionals that can meet a patient with
potentially serious injuries in the ER. It is billed on top of the hospital’s
emergency room physician charge and procedures, equipment and facility fees.
----“It’s
like the Wild West. Any trauma centre can decide what their activation fee is,”
says Dr Renee Hsia, director of health policy studies in the emergency medicine
department at the University of California-San Francisco.
Hsia is also an emergency medicine doctor at Zuckerberg San Francisco
General Hospital, but was not involved in the care of the patients discussed in
the story – and spoke about the fees generally.
Comprehensive data from the Health Care Cost Institute shows that the
average price that health insurers paid hospitals for trauma response (which is
often lower than what the hospital charges) was US$3,968 in 2016. But hospitals
in the lowest 10 per cent of prices received an average of US$725 – while
hospitals in the most expensive 10 per cent were paid US$13,525.
----According
to Medicare guidelines, the fee can be charged only when the patient receives
at least 30 minutes of critical care provided by a trauma team – but hospitals
do not appear to be following that rule when billing non-Medicare patients.
At the turn of the century such fees didn’t even exist.
More
Technology Update.
With events happening fast in the
development of solar power and graphene, I’ve added this section. Updates as they
get reported. Is converting sunlight to usable cheap AC or DC energy mankind’s
future from the 21st century onwards?
German Wind, Solar Power Beat Coal Generation for First Time
By Brian Parkin
10 July 2018, 15:41 GMT+1 Updated
on 10 July 2018, 16:38 GMT+1
Germany’s wind and solar farms surpassed lignite and hard coal as
sources of electricity for the first time during the six months to June, a sign
the market is starting to squeeze out the dirtiest fossil fuels.
The power mix in Europe’s biggest economy hit a turning point when clean
generation surged 10 percent to 118 billion kilowatt-hours through June, the
BDEW utilities federation said Tuesday. Coal’s share of the market dropped 10
percent from 2017 to 114 billion kilowatt-hours.
“A market-driven, step-by-step exit from coal power is already in full gear,” said the Berlin-based federation, which represents utilities including RWE AG and EON SE. “Renewables are on the march but what we need more urgently than ever is to accelerate expansion of the grid.”
The priority given to clean power on Germany’s grid, along with the rising cost of carbon permits has helped to dislodge coal from the energy mix. The development may be fortuitous for Chancellor Angela Merkel as her administration struggles to make good on a pledge to phase out coal power.
Merkel has set up a commission of 28 experts, which includes environmentalists, who are mapping out a final exit from coal power. The group is due to present its findings in December and will probably recommend a staggered, target-based retirement of coal plants that could mix market incentives and compensation to encourage closures, officials have said.
About 50 percent of current coal-power capacity must be withdrawn from the grid by 2030 to meet the energy sector’s carbon pollution reduction target, the Economy and Energy Ministry said.
Germany must guard against blackouts as coal power declines and the last nuclear reactors are shuttered in 2022, the BDEW said Tuesday. The nation’s seven atomic reactors boosted output in the first half make up 11.3 percent of total supply, up from 10.2 percent a year ago.
Another weekend and the
Trump team head to Trump Turnberry in Scotland for a round of golf, and a meeting
with Boris Johnson and Nigel Farage? And onward to Helsinki, and an easy
meeting with Russia’s President Putin. Have a great weekend everyone, they won’t
be having one in the NATO capitals.
I learned law
so well, the day I graduated I sued the college, won the case, and got my
tuition back.
Fred Allen
The monthly Coppock Indicators finished June.
DJIA: 24,271 +221 Down. NASDAQ:
7,510 +267 Down. SP500: 2,718 +169 Down.
All
three slow indicators moved down in March and have continued down in April. May
and June. For some a new bear signal, for others a take profits and get back to
cash signal.
No comments:
Post a Comment