Baltic Dry Index. 5202 +35 Brent Crude 79.28
Spot Gold 1761
October 2, 1904. German General Lothar von Trotha issues order to exterminate Herero people of Namidia, first genocide of the 20th Century, will kill 65,000 Herero and 100,000 of the Nama tribe.
Lothar von Trotha
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lothar_von_Trotha
We have reached the final quarter of 2021 and the most dangerous month for stock casinos, October.
This October looks more dangerous than most.
Central banksters have started talking about reducing or ending their bond buying support. A handful of minor central banks have already started raising their key interest rate.
Global inflation in food and energy, [and just about everything else,] looks to be anything but “transitory.” But don’t worry, according to Fed Chairman Powell, the capo di tutti i capi of global central banksters, transitory inflation has a beginning, a middle, and an end.
Well, I suppose it does like everything else. Still as far as I can see, we haven’t yet left the beginning.
President Biden’s mult-itrillion dollar spending programs have become bogged down in the Congress by a nasty no holds barred fight among Democrats, supposedly his own party.
The US Federal government is about to run out of funding again on December 3rd.
Supply chain bottlenecks now threaten the Christmas retailing season.
Global Covid-19 infections still continue to rise though the death rate seems to be falling.
The northern hemisphere flu season starts next month.
All in all, it’s not a happy October for overpriced stocks looking for a miracle and a “they all lived happily ever after” ending.
“I'm normally not a praying man, but if you're up there, please save me Superman.”
Fed Chairman Powell, with apologies to Homer Simpson, economist.
Wall St Week Ahead Bruised market eyes Treasury yields to gauge stocks' path
October 2, 20212:20 AM BST
NEW YORK, Oct 1 (Reuters) - Investors are focusing on Treasury yields as a key factor in determining how stocks will fare the rest of the year, after a month in which equities notched their steepest losses since the coronavirus pandemic began.
The S&P 500 index(.SPX)posted its biggest monthly drop since March 2020 in September, while pulling back as much as 5% below its all-time high for the first time this year.
Stocks wobbled as yields on U.S. Treasuries shot to a three-month high, exacerbating worries in a market already unsettled by a nasty fight over the U.S. debt ceiling, the fate of a massive infrastructure spending bill and the meltdown of heavily indebted Chinese property developer China Evergrande Group. The S&P 500 is still up 16% this year.
"Investors are looking for a catalyst ... and the catalyst that they are currently focusing on is the direction of interest rates," said Sam Stovall, chief investment strategist at CFRA.
Yields, which move inversely to bond prices, are rebounding from historically low levels and their recent climb is widely seen as a sign of economic strength.
Their rally follows the Federal Reserve'shawkish tilt at its monetary policy meeting last week. The central bank said it may begin tapering its $120 billion-a-month government bond buying program as soon as November and potentially begin raising rates next year, earlier than some were expecting. read more
Yet yield increases, such as the 27 basis point move logged by the 10-year benchmark note after the Fed meeting, could dim the allure of stocks. The 10-year yield was last around 1.47%, paring back gains toward the end of the week.
Stocks and bonds could take cues in the coming week from developments in Washington, where lawmakers continue to debate an infrastructure spending package, as well as next Friday's monthly U.S. jobs report. read more
Among the indicators investors are using to gauge stocks' future trajectory is the spread between the yields on two-year and 10-year Treasuries. Some view this as a barometer of whether the economy is slowing or overheating.
A spread of between zero and 150 basis points is a "sweet spot" for stocks, which has been consistent with an 11% annual return for the S&P 500, based on historical data, according to Ed Clissold, chief U.S. strategist at Ned Davis Research. The S&P 500 has averaged a 9.1% gain annually since 1945, according to CFRA's Stovall.
That spread has recently widened and stood at around 120 basis points on Friday. When the spread exceeds 150 basis points, "that is when stocks tend to struggle," Clissold said, historically equating to an annual S&P 500 return of 6%.
More
Factories struggling as supply constraints hit, costs rise
October 1, 202111:37 AM BST
LONDON/TOKYO, Oct 1 (Reuters) - Global manufacturing activity took a big hit from supply chain bottlenecks and escalating costs, exacerbated by pandemic-induced factory shutdowns in Asia and signs of slowing Chinese growth, surveys showed on Friday.
While countries where outbreaks of the Delta coronavirus variant receded saw an improvement in activity, growth shrank in some as chip shortages and supply disruptions impacted those still struggling to shake off the hit from COVID-19.
Euro zone and British manufacturing growth remained strong but activity suffered from logistical issues, product shortages and a labour crunch that are likely to persist and keep inflationary pressures high.
"Though some of the bottlenecks should soon start to ease, many sectors – most notably those requiring semiconductors – are likely to face disruption for much of 2022," said Martin Beck, senior economic advisor to the EY ITEM Club.
"This signals activity is likely to remain constrained for some time to come."
IHS Markit's final manufacturing Purchasing Managers' Index (PMI) sank to 58.6 in September from August's 61.4 and Britain's PMI fell for a fourth month in a row, dropping to 57.1 from 60.3. Anything above 50 indicates growth.
Factories in Germany, Europe's largest economy, had been humming along almost undisturbed during the pandemic lockdowns that have impacted the services sector but shortages of intermediate goods and some raw materials are now holding industry back.
Growth in French manufacturing weakened a tad more than initially forecast, its PMI showed, as problems over supplies of goods weighed on the industry.
Those supply bottlenecks kept pressure on the costs of the raw materials factories need and manufacturers passed some of those increases to customers and the euro zone output prices index approached the record high seen in the summer.
More
Another day, another dodgy US central bankster exposed. What part of ethical public service don’t US Central Banksters understand?
Clarida Traded Into Stocks on Eve of Powell Pandemic Statement
By Craig Torres2 October 2021, 00:41 BST
· Disclosures show transactions as Covid-19 fears spread
· Clarida trades were ‘pre-planned rebalancing,’ Fed says
Federal Reserve Vice Chair Richard Clarida traded between $1 million and $5 million out of a bond fund into stock funds one day before Chair Jerome Powell issued a statement flagging possible policy action as the pandemic worsened, his 2020 financial disclosures show.
Clarida’s trades, described in forms filed with the government ethics office, show the shifting of the funds out of a Pimco bond fund on Feb. 27, 2020, and on the same day buying the Pimco StocksPlus Fund and the iShares MSCI USA Min Vol Factor exchange-traded fund in similar dollar ranges. For the year, he listed five transactions.
More
Finally, the UK power grid hooks up to Norway just in time for winter.
World's longest sub-sea power cable linking UK and Norway starts operations
Friday 1 October 2021 7:24 am
A 450-mile subsea power cable linking the UK and Norway has started commercial operations, allowing the two countries to share renewable energy, National Grid said this morning.
Water flowing from mountains to fjords and harnessed by hydropower stations in Norway will power British homes, as the world’s longest “interconnector” hooks up the two countries’ grids.
The cable will also allow excess wind power from Britain, when turbines are producing high levels of electricity in windy conditions but demand is low, to be exported to Norway to power homes there.
This will mean the Norwegian grid can effectively store energy, by conserving water in the Scandinavian country’s vast Blasjo reservoir which is used to feed hydropower plants, for use at another time.
The £1.4bn North Sea Link, a joint venture between National Grid and Norwegian system operator Statnett, will help reduce the burning fossil fuels for power in the UK.
National Grid said it would help avoid 23 million tonnes of carbon emissions by 2030.
The 6in (15cm) wide cables which connect Blyth in Northumberland with the Norwegian village of Kvilldal, western Norway, will start by running with a maximum capacity of 700 megawatts (MW) and gradually increase to the link’s full capacity of 1,400 MW over a three month period.
When it is at full capacity, it will provide enough clean electricity to power 1.4m homes, National Grid said.
---- Cables from the converter station, which is linked up to the Norwegian grid next to the hydropower plant, have been laid through the lake and a tunnel to blast through the hill to the nearby fjord and then out to the North Sea.
Sub-sea cables carry the renewable power to another converter station at Blyth where it enters the British grid.
The scheme, which took six years, is the fifth interconnector for National Grid, which also operates links to Belgium, France and the Netherlands.
The company says that, by 2030, 90% of the power imported via the interconnectors will be from zero carbon sources.
https://www.cityam.com/worlds-longest-sub-sea-power-cable-linking-uk-and-norway-starts-operations/
Domestic inflation reflects domestic monetary policy.
Martin Feldstein.
Global Inflation Watch.
Given our Magic Money Tree central banksters and our spendthrift politicians, inflation now needs an entire section of its own.
‘Stagflation’ fears mount as UK manufacturing hit by shortages
Friday 1 October 2021 10:13 am
Chronic shortages of materials and workers caused by supply chains buckling under the weight of a resurgence in global demand are intensifying the spectre of “stagflation” looming over the UK economy.
A sharp slowdown in growth in Britain’s manufacturing industry has prompted Rob Dobson, director at IHS Markit, a producer of a closely watched economic survey, to warn “the UK [is] descending towards a bout of ‘stagflation’.”
“Production growth is severely impacted by the ongoing strain across supply chains and, with demand far exceeding supply, the inevitable result has been higher prices, which will ultimately hurt the pockets of consumers,” he said.
IHS Markit and CIPS’ manufacturing purchasing managers’ index fell to 57.1 in September, its lowest reading since February and down for the seventh month in a row.
Delays in deliveries of materials used to manufacture goods extended at one of the fastest paces in the survey’s history, driven supply chains breaking down due to a lack of workers and ongoing Brexit and Covid-19 related disruption.
https://www.cityam.com/stagflation-fears-mount-as-uk-manufacturing-hit-by-shortages/
Euro zone inflation hits highest level in 13 years as energy prices soar
Published Fri, Oct 1 2021 5:02 AM EDT
LONDON — Euro zone inflation hit its highest level in 13 years in September, as the bloc battles surging energy costs.
Headline inflation came in at 3.4% last month, according to preliminary data from Europe’s statistics office Eurostat. This was the highest level since September 2008 when inflation stood at 3.6%. It comes after German consumer prices rose by 4.1% in September — the highest level in almost 30 years.
The rise has been driven higher by surging energy prices, deepening concern among policymakers. The front-month gas price at the Dutch TTF hub, a European benchmark, has risen almost 400% since the start of the year.
What’s more, this record run in energy prices is not expected to end any time soon, with energy analysts warning market nervousness is likely to persist throughout winter.
France has become the latest country to step up measures to mitigate the costs for consumers. Prime Minister Jean Castex said Thursday the government would be blocking further natural gas price increases as well as rises in electricity tariffs. However, before these measures kick in, gas prices will rise by 12.6% for French consumers as of Friday.
Italy, Greece and Spain have also taken steps to address the price increases.
More
Supply chain woes from Covid and energy may spark ’70s-style inflation, economist Stephen Roach warns
Published Thu, Sep 30 2021 7:02 AM EDT
Economist Stephen Roach is warning that the U.S. may be on a collision course with 1970s-type inflation.
The former Morgan Stanley Asia chairman is worried that the impact of energy price spikes on China’s struggling supply chain will be the tipping point.
Crude oil topped $80 a barrel this week for the first time since 2018 before settling to the mid-$70s.
“We’ve had supply chain issues really now for the past year and a half. They’ve afflicted many commodities, inputs like semiconductors and now there’s energy and power related shortages in China,” Roach told CNBC’s “Trading Nation” on Wednesday.
He started sounding the alarm about China’s supply chain problems last year as the country was trying to cope with Covid-19 shutdowns.
‘One supply chain glitch away from stagflation’
“We were sort of one supply chain glitch away from stagflation,” said Roach, a Yale senior fellow and leading authority on Asia. “That seems to be playing out, unfortunately.”
Stagflation refers to pressures that push prices higher during periods of slowing growth.
“It’s worrisome for the overall economic outlook and raises serious questions about the wisdom of central bank policies — especially that of the Federal Reserve,” he said.
Roach is critical of the Fed’s historic easy money policies, questioning the need for excess stimulus amid sharp and likely long-term inflation.
“The likelihood of continued [supply chain] bottlenecks moving from one area to another, which is strikingly reminiscent of what we saw in the early 1970s, suggests that inflation will stay at these elevated levels for longer than we thought,” Roach said. “The Federal Reserve is already beginning to back pedal on its recent view that these pressures will fade quickly.”
If stagflation materializes, he contends, it could coincide with the holiday spending season.
“The impact will primarily be through the price level,” said Roach. “We need to look much more carefully about the potential risks.”
His latest prediction comes two months after he warned on “Trading Nation” that the U.S. and China were in the early stages of a cold war. According to Roach, the relationship is still contentious as China’s “common prosperity” push looks to level out wealth.
“The real risk is this potential sea change in policy strategy,” Roach said.
https://www.cnbc.com/2021/09/30/supply-chain-chaos-may-spark-1970s-type-inflation-stephen-roach.html
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
Covid-19 Corner
This section will continue until it becomes unneeded.
Global COVID-19 deaths hit 5 million as Delta variant sweeps the world
October 2, 20215:31 AM BST
Oct 1 (Reuters) - Worldwide deaths related to COVID-19 surpassed 5 million on Friday, according to a Reuters tally, with unvaccinated people particularly exposed to the virulent Delta strain.
The variant has exposed the wide disparities in vaccination rates between rich and poor nations, and the upshot of vaccine hesitancy in some western nations.
More than half of all global deaths reported on a seven-day average were in the United States, Russia, Brazil, Mexico and India.
While it took just over a year for the COVID-19 death toll to hit 2.5 million, the next 2.5 million deaths were recorded in just under eight months, according to a Reuters analysis.
An average of 8,000 deaths were reported daily across the world over the last week, or around five deaths every minute. However, the global death rate has been slowing in recent weeks.
More
Newly discovered biomarker predicts COVID-19 death days in advance
September 30, 2021
Researchers from The Mount Sinai Hospital have found changes to electrical activity in the heart can help predict which hospitalized COVID-19 patients are more likely to decline and die. The biomarker is easily measurable and potentially predicts death several days in advance.
When hospitals are overwhelmed with COVID-19 patients it can be challenging for doctors to work out where to best focus their limited attention and resources. A number of blood-based biomarkers have been found to help assess those patients most at risk of severe disease decline.
But blood tests take time to be collected and analyzed. This new biomarker can be measured using a simple electrocardiogram (EKG) machine, at a patient’s bedside. And the researchers claim it can predict whether a patient is likely to die at least two days in advance.
A retrospective investigation of health records from 140 COVID-19 patients revealed diminishing QRS waveforms were an indication of a patient declining in 74 percent of cases.
The criteria developed by the Mount Sinai team is dubbed LoQRS, and they propose it to be an effective way of triaging those patients most likely to decline. The median time to death from the first LoQRS reading detected in the study was 52 hours.
“Our study shows diminished waveforms on EKGs over the course of COVID-19 illness can be an important tool for health care workers caring for these patients, allowing them to catch rapid clinical changes over their hospital stay and intervene more quickly,” says Joshua Lampert, senior author on the new study. “With COVID-19 cases and hospitalizations continuing to rise again, EKGs may be helpful for hospitals to use when caring for these patients before their condition gets dramatically worse.”
Interestingly, the researchers also found LoQRS measures were effective in detecting those patients with influenza who were most likely to die. The median time to death from the first LoQRS measure in influenza patients, however, was around six days. The researchers point out this indicates COVID-19 is a much more virulent disease than influenza.
As LoQRS measures can only be detected over time across several EKG tests, Lambert proposes EKG measurements are taken for all COVID-19 patients when they are initially admitted.
“When it comes to caring for COVID-19 patients, our findings suggest it may be beneficial not only for health care providers to check an EKG when the patient first arrives at the hospital, but also follow-up EKGs during their hospital stay to assess for LoQRS, particularly if the patient has not made profound clinical progress,” says Lampert. “If LoQRS is present, the team may want to consider escalating medical therapy or transferring the patient to a highly monitored setting such as an intensive care unit (ICU) in anticipation of declining health.”
The new study was published in the American Journal of Cardiology.
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 vaccines. https://www.who.int/publications/m/item/draft-landscape-of-covid-19-candidate-vaccines
NY Times Coronavirus Vaccine Tracker. https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2020/science/coronavirus-vaccine-tracker.html
Regulatory Focus COVID-19 vaccine tracker. https://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
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.
U.S. must prepare now to replace International Space Station, experts urge
Sept. 21, 2021 / 3:00 AM / Updated Sept. 21, 2021 at 1:27 PM
Sept. 21 (UPI) -- Policymakers warned Tuesday that Congress must move quickly to extend the life of the International Space Station to 2030 and develop new space stations or risk a costly gap in space exploration.
Abandoning the space station, which is to be decommissioned in 2028, without replacements would only serve the interests of China, which has a new space station in orbit, U.S. Rep. Brian Babin, R-Texas, said during a congressional hearing held virtually Tuesday morning.
"If they [China] are the only game in town, other nations will seek to partner with them to gain access to space. This would erode America's strategic leadership," Babin said.
NASA and space industry experts delivered the testimony to the House Space and Science Subcommittee, chaired by U.S. Rep. Don Beyer, D-Va.
RELATED NASA mulls how to dispose of International Space Station
The committee made no formal budget or policy recommendations, but Beyer said it was important to approach the space station's role and upcoming funding needs "with eyes wide open."
NASA has solicited proposals and received more than 10 from U.S. companies that want to build and launch new orbiting habitats, said Robyn Gatens, NASA's director of the space station.
NASA alone spends $3 billion to $4 billion per year on the International Space Station, and expects to save up to $1 billion per year if it can rely on private space stations instead, Gatens said.
"Extending the operation of the ISS could give us private industry time to develop the capabilities and experience to operate in [low-Earth orbit] and to deploy the platforms that will meet the needs of NASA and other users there," Gatens said.
"NASA envisions a transition period of roughly two years, during which both ISS and commercial ... destinations are operational."
But space industry representatives said Congress must adequately fund NASA to stimulate the growth of commercial activity in orbit.
More
This weekend’s musical diversion. Another obscure, but very talented Italian. Approx. 10 minutes.
Pietro Alessandro Guglielmi (1728-1804) - Quartetto in sol maggiore, Op.1 (c.1768)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vyinOHSsHfw
This weekend’s chess update. Approx. 10 minutes.
Now That's A Champion's Move!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3j5gYJEGyK4
This weekend’s maths update. Approx. 8 minutes.
How to multiply ANY numbers the fast way - Fast Math Trick
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LgJ5bNHBbD4
Finally, Meteor Crater Az. explained. I detoured to visit Meteor Crater when I drove 7,800 miles around the USA in 1974. It was well worth the visit, even if it was cloudy with a cold 20 to 30 mph wind. At the time, unsurprisingly, I was the only person there. Approx. 14 minutes.
Meteor Crater - The World's Best Preserved Asteroid Impact Crater
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=704POGQFDoQ
The road to economic well-being is to reward productive economic activity and to provide a moderate and predictable growth of money to finance real economic growth without reigniting the fires of inflation.
Paul Craig Roberts.
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