Saturday 7 August 2021

Special Update 06/08/2021 Fiat Turns 50! Restoring Notre-Dame.

 

Baltic Dry Index. 371 -05 Brent Crude 70.70

Spot Gold 1763

Covid-19 cases 02/04/20 World 1,000,000

Deaths 53,100

Covid-19 cases 06/08/21 World 202,428,991

Deaths 4,290,712

Coming soon, the 50th anniversary of the Great Nixonian Error of fiat money, communist money, the money that built China into the main USA rival of today. How should we “celebrate” creating the one percent and China? August 15, 1971.

Did Friday’s US employment report signal a change coming soon to the Fed’s Magic Money Tree free money policy?

The gold market certainly thought so, while the punters in the stock casinos were willing to bet that they have the Fed trapped over a barrel, unable to change their easy money policy even if they want to.

The bond market punters are now nervously looking for guidance from the central banksters annual summer junket at the plush watering hole of Jackson Hole.

Meanwhile, with the economy booming, more trillions to fly out of Washington for loosely defined “infrastructure” projects, US inflation looks all set to soar in H2 21 and H1 22.

My take for what it’s worth. I think the stock punters are right and the central banksters can’t change policy even if they wanted to, which the don’t.  Chairman Powell and his ilk, will not bring the house of cards crashing down anytime soon. As in before the US mid-term elections.

In my view, the gold market got it wrong.

Look for Chairman Powell at Jackson Hole to clutch at every straw going starting with Covid-19 Delta, to cover why the economy needs much more Magic Money Tree money, not less.

See the Global Inflation Watch section for where we end up.

Payrolls increase 943,000 in July as unemployment rate slides to 5.4%

Hiring rose in July at its fastest pace in nearly a year despite fears over Covid-19′s delta variant and as companies struggled with a tight labor supply, the Labor Department reported Friday.

Nonfarm payrolls increased by 943,000 for the month while the unemployment rate dropped to 5.4%, according to the department’s Bureau of Labor Statistics. The payroll increase was the best since August 2020.

Economists surveyed by Dow Jones had been looking for 845,000 new jobs and a headline unemployment rate of 5.7%. However, estimates were diverse amid conflicting headwinds and tailwinds and an uncertain path ahead for the economy.

Average hourly earnings also increased more than expected, rising 0.4% for the month and are up 4% from the same period a year ago, at a time when concerns are increasing about persistent inflationary pressures.

“The data for recent months suggest that the rising demand for labor associated with the recovery from the pandemic may have put upward pressure on wages,” the BLS said in the report, though it cautioned that the Covid impact is still skewing data and wage gains are uneven across industries.

Markets reacted positively to the report, with the Dow and S&P 500 hitting new record highs at the open Friday morning.

“It feels like a Goldilocks report. You have not too hot in terms of wages, but not too low in terms of job gains,” said Beth Ann Bovino, chief U.S. economist at S&P Global Ratings.

The drop in the headline unemployment rate looked even stronger considering that the labor force participation rate ticked up to 61.7%, tied for the highest level since the pandemic hit in March 2020. A separate calculation that includes discouraged workers and those holding jobs part-time for economic reasons fell even further, to 9.2% from 9.8% in June.

“This not only was a strong jobs report by nearly every measure, it also signals more good things to come,” said Robert Frick, corporate economist at Navy Federal Credit Union.

As has been the case for the past several months, leisure and hospitality led job creation, adding 380,000 positions, of which 253,000 came in bars and restaurants. The sector took the hardest hit during the pandemic but has been showing consistent gains during the economic reopening.

The unemployment rate for leisure and hospitality tumbled to 9% in July from 10.9% in June and compared to 25% a year earlier, though there are still about 1.8 million fewer workers than prior to the pandemic. Wages in the sector rose 1.2% month over month and are up 3.1% from a year earlier.

More

https://www.cnbc.com/2021/08/06/jobs-report-july-.html

Analysis: Where will yields go? Investors weigh U.S. jobs data against Delta fears

August 6, 2021

With fresh evidence the labor market is on the mend, investors’ focus shifts to inflation in the coming week and whether it will continue to heat up or show signs of abating.

There is a series of inflation data expected: the consumer price index and the producer price index, released Wednesday and Thursday, respectively.

Jobs and inflation are two key factors that influence the Federal Reserve in making its decisions on policy. Markets are hanging on anything that will help determine when the central bank will start to step away from the measures it took to support the economy during the pandemic, including its $120 billion per month purchases of Treasury bonds and mortgage-backed securities.

Friday’s July jobs report showed a healthy 943,000 increase in payrolls. That gain is enough to spur Fed watchers into thinking the central bank could announce in the next couple of months that it will dial back its support measures. That’s important since ending the bond-buying program is a first step toward raising interest rates. It’s the Fed’s near-zero rate policy that has helped drive the liquidity feeding the stock market’s gains and keeping rates low.

“I think the keys for the next week are going to be both CPI and PPI. We get some inflation data for consumers and for businesses. Those will be closely watched. Jobless claims as well,” State Street Global Advisors chief investment strategist Michael Arone said.

“The Fed has made it clear that the labor market is key to what they do next,” he added. “Jobless claims will continue to be an item that gets looked at every week. Then finally we’re going to get consumer sentiment. Those are four things that could be market movers.”

The Fed has said elevated inflation, running over 5% at the consumer level recently, is just temporary. Economists polled by Dow Jones expect another hot reading for the consumer price index, with core inflation rising 0.4% or 4.3% year over year. The CPI is released Wednesday. Headline inflation was at 5.4% in June, and core, excluding food and energy, was at 4.5%.

More

https://www.cnbc.com/2021/08/06/inflation-will-be-the-sizzling-topic-for-markets-in-the-week-ahead-.html

Finally, an update on the restoration of Our Lady of Paris cathedral, aka Notre-Dame. In French with subtitles. Approx. 7 minutes

Notre-Dame de Paris: Rebuilding 2 years after the fire

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-Zoq7HiAjcU

Global Inflation Watch.  

Given our Magic Money Tree central banksters and our spendthrift politicians, inflation now needs an entire section of its own.

Farewell to Yet Another Failed Monetary System

August 4, 2021  By Egon von Greyerz

The beginning of the end of the current monetary system and currency collapse started exactly 50 years ago. In the next few years the world will experience the end of the end of another failed experiment of unlimited debt creation and fake fiat money.

Economic history tells us that we need to focus on two areas to understand where the  economy is going – INFLATION AND THE CURRENCY.

These two areas are now indicating that the world is in for a major shock. Very few investors expect inflation to become a real problem but instead believe interest rates will be subdued. And no one expects the dollar to collapse or any major currency collapse at all.

But in the last two years money supply growth has been exponential with for example M1 in the US growing at an annual rate of 126%!  

Von Mises defined inflation as an increase in money supply. The world has seen explosive growth in credit and money supply since 1971 and now we are seeing hyperinflationary increases.

Hyperinflation is a currency event. Just since 2000 most currencies have lost 80-85% of their value. And since 1971 they have all lost 96-99%. The race to the bottom and to hyperinflation is now on.

As I will explain in this article, history is telling us that the explosion of credit and money supply will lead to rapid increases in inflation and interest rates and an even faster fall of the US dollar.

When it comes to monetary events, inflation and the currency are totally interdependent.

Normally an economy will be sound when the currency is sound. And the currency is sound when the economy is sound.

Sounds pretty simple doesn’t it. But then why has no currency ever survived in history? And why has every economy collapsed when there is an underlying currency collapse?

For anyone who has thoroughly studied economic history, monetary chaos never comes as a surprise.

As long as there has been any kind of money or monetary system, chaos has always followed at regular intervals.

---- Thus Nixon was in no way unique in going from a gold backed currency to printing whatever fake money was required to continue the illusion of prosperity. As history tells,  this is an event that has taken place throughout history at an amazing frequency.

---- But Nixon’s promise to the American people 50 years ago on August 15, 1971 that “Your dollar will be worth just as much tomorrow” hasn’t quite held true to say the least.

Yes, one dollar is still one dollar. But in purchasing power terms it is only worth 2 cents today compared to 1971. So in half a century, the dollar has lost 98% of its value compared to real money i.e. GOLD.

But the real collapse of the dollar has not started yet in spite of the 98% fall since 1971.

---- Since the Great Financial Crisis in 2006-9, there has been an exponential growth in US Money Supply.

Looking at US M1 money supply, the graph below shows how it grew from $220 billion in August 1971 to $19.3 trillion today.

From 1971 to 2011 the growth seems modest at a compound annual growth (CAGR) of 6%. If the dollar purchasing power declined by the same rate, it would lead to prices  doubling every 12 years. Or put in other terms, the value of the currency on average would drop by 50% every 12 years.

Then from 2011 when Money supply started growing in earnest, M1 has grown by 24% annually.  This means that prices in theory should double every 3 years.

Finally, from August 2019 to August 2021 M1 has gone up by 126% a year. If that was translated to the purchasing power of the dollar it would lead to prices doubling every 7 months.

More

https://goldswitzerland.com/farewell-to-yet-another-failed-monetary-system/

Treasury launches £750m insurance scheme to cover Covid-related live event cancellations

Thursday 5 August 2021 10:30 pm

Costs associated with the cancellation of festivals, conferences and other live events due to Covid-related restrictions will be covered almost entirely by the government under a new £750m scheme.

The Treasury will team up with Llloyd’s of London to deliver the Live Events Reinsurance Scheme, which will give companies the option of purchasing cover from next month.

The scheme will run from September 2021 to September 2022, which will likely prompt speculation that Covid restrictions could be reintroduced at some point later this year or early next year.

Companies will be able to purchase cover alongside any insurance they currently have and will be able to make claims “for government-enforced cancellation due to the event being legally unable to happen due to government Covid restrictions”.

Chancellor Rishi Sunak said: “The events sector supports hundreds of thousands of jobs across the country, and I know organisers are raring to go now that restrictions have been lifted.

“But the lack of the right kind of insurance is proving a problem, so as the economy reopens I want to do everything I can to help events providers and small businesses plan with confidence right through to next year.”

The government will pay 95 per cent of each claim and insurers will pay 5 per cent to begin.

The government will eventually pay 100 per cent of each claim later in the scheme, however this date is not set.

A number of insurers that operate within the Lloyd’s insurance market like Arch, Beazley, Dale, Hiscox and Munich Re will be involved in the programme.

https://www.cityam.com/treasury-launches-750m-insurance-scheme-to-cover-covid-related-live-event-cancellations/

Below, why a “green energy” economy may not be possible anyway, and if it is, it won’t be quick and it will be very inflationary, setting off a new long-term commodity Supercycle. Probably the largest seen so far.

The “New Energy Economy”: An Exercise in Magical Thinking

https://media4.manhattan-institute.org/sites/default/files/R-0319-MM.pdf

Mines, Minerals, and "Green" Energy: A Reality Check

https://www.manhattan-institute.org/mines-minerals-and-green-energy-reality-check

"An Environmental Disaster": An EV Battery Metals Crunch Is On The Horizon As The Industry Races To Recycle

by Tyler Durden Monday, Aug 02, 2021 - 08:40 PM

https://www.zerohedge.com/markets/environmental-disaster-ev-battery-metals-crunch-horizon-industry-races-recycle

Covid-19 Corner             

This section will continue until it becomes unneeded.

Amazon pushes back on return to office as Delta variant takes hold in US

Friday 6 August 2021 7:09 am

Amazon has postponed the return to the office for its employees until January 2022 amid concerns about continued surging coronavirus cases worldwide.

The retail giant said on Thursday it would not expect its corporate employees – who had been due to return to their desks next month – to return to the office until 3 January next year.

Amazon’s work from home period would be extended for employees “in the US and other countries”, according to an internal memo sent by Bath Galetti, a senior vice-president at Amazon. The new deadline is understood to include the company’s 40,000 UK staff, too.

“As we continue to closely watch local conditions related to COVID-19, we are adjusting our guidance for corporate employees,” the note said.

Covid infections are surging in the US, driven by the spread of the more transmissable Delta variant of the virus that also accounts for the majority of cases in the UK. Daily cases hit a six-month high in the US on Thursday, with more than 100,00 new infections reported – the highest daily rate in the world.

Amazon is the latest tech behemoth to push back on its planned return to office schedule. Last week, Twitter closed its reopened US office over third wave fears, Facebook said it would require all US employees to be vaccinated in order to return, and Google’s parent family Alphabet said it would extend working from home through to 18 October.

https://www.cityam.com/amazon-pushes-back-on-return-to-office-as-delta-variant-takes-hold-in-us/

COVID: 90% of patients treated with new Israeli drug discharged in 5 days

The Phase II trial for an Israeli COVID drug saw some 29 out of 30 patients, moderate to serious, recover within days.

ROSSELLA TERCATIN   AUGUST 5, 2021 22:24

Some 93% of 90 coronavirus serious patients treated in several Greek hospitals with a new drug developed by a team at Tel Aviv’s Sourasky Medical Center as part of the Phase II trial of the treatment were discharged in five days or fewer.

 

The Phase II trial confirmed the results of Phase I, which was conducted in Israel last winter and saw 29 out of 30 patients in moderate to serious condition recover within days.

 

“The main goal of this study was to verify that the drug is safe,” Prof. Nadir Arber said. “To this day we have not registered any significant side effect in any patient from both groups.”

 

The trial was conducted in Athens because Israel did not have enough relevant patients. The principal investigator was Greece’s coronavirus commissioner, Prof. Sotiris Tsiodras.

Arber and his team, including Dr. Shiran Shapira, developed the drug based on a molecule that the professor has been studying for 25 years called CD24, which is naturally present in the body.

 

“It is important to remember that 19 out of 20 COVID-19 patients do not need any therapy,” Arber said. “After a window of five to 12 days, some 5% of the patients start to deteriorate.”

 

The main cause of the clinical deterioration is an over activation of the immune system, also known as a cytokine storm. In case of COVID-19 patients, the system starts attacking healthy cells in the lungs.

 

“This is exactly the problem that our drug targets,” he said.

More

https://www.jpost.com/health-science/covid-90-percent-of-patients-treated-with-new-israeli-drug-discharged-in-5-days-675961

Moderna says delta variant will lead to more breakthrough cases among vaccinated

By Kelly Hayes  August 5, 2021

CAMBRIDGE, Mass. - Moderna said Thursday it believes the highly contagious delta variant of the coronavirus will lead to an increase in breakthrough infections among vaccinated people as they begin moving indoors during the upcoming colder months.

The company said its two-dose COVID-19 vaccine remained 93% effective at preventing symptomatic disease up to six months after the second shot, citing data recently analyzed from its large clinical trial. By comparison, Pfizer-BioNTech said last week that its COVID-19 vaccine efficacy declined to around 84% after six months.

But Moderna officials believe such protection will begin "to wane and eventually impact vaccine efficacy" amid the ongoing circulation of the delta strain.

"We believe that increased force of infection resulting from Delta, non-pharmaceutical intervention (NPI) fatigue, and seasonal effects (moving indoors) will lead to an increase of breakthrough infections in vaccinated individuals," Moderna said in a presentation shared alongside its earnings report. 

Given the anticipated decline of protection, Moderna said it believes a booster shot "will likely be necessary prior to the winter season."

The warning comes as the delta variant continues to spread in more than 130 countries, including in the United States where it now makes up 93% of reported COVID-19 cases and has fueled record hospitalization rates. 

More

https://www.fox5ny.com/news/moderna-says-delta-variant-will-lead-to-more-breakthrough-cases-among-vaccinated

Next, some very useful vaccine links kindly sent along from a LIR reader in Canada. The links come from a most informative update from Stanford Hospital in California.

World Health Organization - Landscape of COVID-19 candidate vaccineshttps://www.who.int/publications/m/item/draft-landscape-of-covid-19-candidate-vaccines

NY Times Coronavirus Vaccine Trackerhttps://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2020/science/coronavirus-vaccine-tracker.html

Stanford Websitehttps://racetoacure.stanford.edu/clinical-trials/132

FDA informationhttps://www.fda.gov/media/139638/download

Regulatory Focus COVID-19 vaccine trackerhttps://www.raps.org/news-and-articles/news-articles/2020/3/covid-19-vaccine-tracker

Some more useful Covid links.

Johns Hopkins Coronavirus resource centre

https://coronavirus.jhu.edu/map.html

Rt Covid-19

https://rt.live/

The Spectator Covid-19 data tracker (UK)

https://data.spectator.co.uk/city/national

 

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.

Towards next-gen computers: Mimicking brain functions with graphene-diamond junctions

Scientists mimic the brain’s functions with junctions between vertically aligned graphene and diamond

Date: August 4, 2021

Source: Nagoya University

Summary: The human brain holds the secret to our unique personalities. But did you know that it can also form the basis of highly efficient computing devices? Researchers recently showed how to do this, through graphene-diamond junctions that mimic some of the human brain's functions.

The human brain holds the secret to our unique personalities. But did you know that it can also form the basis of highly efficient computing devices? Researchers from Nagoya University, Japan, recently showed how to do this, through graphene-diamond junctions that mimic some of the human brain's functions.

But, why would scientists try to emulate the human brain? Today, existing computer architectures are subjected to complex data, limiting their processing speed. The human brain, on the other hand, can process highly complex data, such as images, with high efficiency. Scientists have, therefore, tried to build "neuromorphic" architectures that mimic the neural network in the brain.

A phenomenon essential for memory and learning is "synaptic plasticity," the ability of synapses (neuronal links) to adapt in response to an increased or decreased activity. Scientists have tried to recreate a similar effect using transistors and "memristors" (electronic memory devices whose resistance can be stored). Recently developed light-controlled memristors, or "photomemristors," can both detect light and provide non-volatile memory, similar to human visual perception and memory. These excellent properties have opened the door to a whole new world of materials that can act as artificial optoelectronic synapses!

This motivated the research team from Nagoya University to design graphene-diamond junctions that can mimic the characteristics of biological synapses and key memory functions, opening doors for next-generation image sensing memory devices. In their recent study published in Carbon, the researchers, led by Dr. Kenji Ueda, demonstrated optoelectronically controlled synaptic functions using junctions between vertically aligned graphene (VG) and diamond. The fabricated junctions mimic biological synaptic functions, such as the production of "excitatory postsynaptic current" (EPSC) -- the charge induced by neurotransmitters at the synaptic membrane -- when stimulated with optical pulses and exhibit other basic brain functions such as the transition from short-term memory (STM) to long-term memory (LTM).

More

https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2021/08/210804123628.htm?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+sciencedaily%2Fmatter_energy%2Fgraphene+%28Graphene+News+--+ScienceDaily%29

This weekend’s musical diversion.  Another almost unheard of German genius. Approx. 11 minutes.

Johann Samuel Endler (1694-1762) - Sinfonia (in D) à 6 strumenti (1757)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=27TeXKrX8FE

This weekend’s chess update. Approx. 13 minutes.

He Does it Again! || Karjakin vs Fedoseev || FIDE World Cup Semifinals (2021)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YLRCmT7_Vn8

This weekend’s maths update. The Goldbach conjecture. Approx, 10 minutes. For the next couple of weekend maths updates, some serious maths.

Goldbach Conjecture

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MxiTG96QOxw

The abandonment of the gold standard made it possible for the welfare statists to use the banking system as a means to an unlimited expansion of credit. In the absence of the gold standard, there is no way to protect savings from confiscation through inflation. There is no safe store of value. Deficit spending is simply a scheme for the hidden confiscation of wealth. Gold stands in the way of this insidious process. It stands as a protector of property rights. If one grasps this, one has no difficulty in understanding the statists' antagonism toward the gold standard.

Alan Greenspan.

 

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