More Great Disconnect.

 Baltic Dry Index. 2217 -02  Brent Crude 78.81

Spot Gold 1812

Coronavirus Cases 02/04/20 World 1,000,000

Deaths 53,100

Coronavirus Cases 28/12/21 World 281,887,770

Deaths 5,423,198

“If you tell the truth, you don't have to remember anything.”

Mark Twain.

In central bankster fantasy land, the triumph of Magic Money Tree fiat money, since the discovery of the Magic Money Tree forests in March 2020.

Japan’s Nikkei 225 leads gains as Asia stocks mostly rise after S&P 500 closes at new record overnight

Published Mon, Dec 27 2021 6:34 PM EST Updated An Hour Ago

SINGAPORE — Shares in Asia largely rose in Tuesday trade after the S&P 500 notched yet another record close on Wall Street overnight.

Japan’s Nikkei 225 led gains among the region’s major markets as it gained 1.13% while the Topix index advanced 1.04%.

Elsewhere, Hong Kong’s Hang Seng index sat slightly lower by the afternoon.

Hong Kong-listed Chinese tech stocks largely fell, with shares of Tencent down 2.87% while Meituan dropped 2.21%. Alibaba shares, on the other hand, gained 0.44%. The Hang Seng Tech index declined 0.99%.

Those moves came after the Financial Times reported Didi has indefinitely barred employees from selling their shares. Meanwhile, uncertainty remains over the outlook for Chinese companies looking to pursue overseas IPOs.

In mainland China, the Shanghai composite slipped 0.16% while the Shenzhen component advanced 0.103%.

South Korea’s Kospi gained 0.12%.

MSCI’s broadest index of Asia-Pacific shares outside Japan climbed 0.21%.

Markets in Australia are closed on Tuesday for a holiday.

S&P 500 rises to new record again

Overnight stateside, the S&P 500 jumped almost 1.4% to its 69th record close of the year. The tech-heavy Nasdaq Composite also saw robust gains, surging 1.39% to 15,871.26. The Dow Jones Industrial Average climbed 351.82 points to 36,302.38.

More

https://www.cnbc.com/2021/12/28/asia-markets-sp-500-record-china-tech-currencies-oil.html

Back in the real world, more on that Great Disconnect between the central bankster stock casinos and the reality of the actual global economy. Too much central bankster, newly created out of nothing Magic Money Tree fiat money, now chases after broken supply chains and goods and services in inelastic supply. 

But now new virus threats looms in the real world.

Massive New Bird Flu Outbreak Could Be 2022’s Deadly Pandemic

Mon, December 27, 2021, 3:34 PM

Israel’s National Security Council has assumed control of a massive bird flu outbreak in the Galilee, which scientists warn could become a “mass disaster” for humans.

Over half a billion migrating birds pass through the area every year, heading for warm African winters or balmy European summers, making this a catastrophic location for a major bird flu outbreak—right at the nexus of global avian travel.

The virus can be deadly if it infects people. The World Health Organization says more than half of the confirmed 863 human cases it has tracked since 2003 proved fatal. Most strains or variants of avian flu, H5N1, are relatively difficult to transmit to people.

Yossi Leshem, one of Israel’s most renowned ornithologists, told The Daily Beast, however, that it is the ability of these viruses to mutate into new strains that poses such a threat, as we have seen with the coronavirus.

“There could be a mutation that also infects people and turns into a mass disaster,” said Leshem, a zoologist at Tel Aviv University and director of the International Center for the Study of Bird Migration at Latrun.

So far, at least 5,400 wild cranes have died infected with the new H5N1 avian flu, which Israeli authorities fear could expand into a global emergency.

Of the 30,000 Eurasian cranes passing this winter at the Hula Nature Reserve, 17 percent are dead, and scientists fear the worst for their surviving brethren, at least 10,000 of which appear to be ailing. The infection of the cranes is the same strain of avian flu which infected chicken coops throughout northern Israel, and led to the cull in recent days of nearly 1 million birds.

Israelis will be without their beloved chicken schnitzel—and without eggs—until a supply chain of imported birds is established.

The deaths of thousands of wild birds in the Hula Nature Reserve, one of the world’s premier bird sanctuaries, “is an extraordinary event with global ramifications,” warned Tel Aviv University Professor of Zoology Noga Kronfeld Shor in an interview with Reshet Bet Radio.

Shor, who is also the chief scientist at Israel’s Ministry of the Environment, noted that the carcasses of other waterbirds, such as pelicans and egrets, have already been found.

Israelis have been warned not to approach any wild bird that looks sick, and not to touch any bird droppings.

Yoav Motro, a specialist in vertebrates and locusts at Israel’s Ministry of Agriculture, said that for now, H5N1 is presenting “like the opposite of COVID. Compared to COVID, the chances of [humans] catching this are very, very slight—but unlike COVID, the risks of dying from it if you do catch it are very high.”

“It is a tragic ecological event,” he said. “And we simply do not know how it will end, or where it will lead.”

Israeli scientists don’t yet know the full scale of the die-off in Israel because of the dangers inherent in fishing around marshes and wetlands. Observing birds that shy away from human contact and the urgent matter of retrieving bird carcasses is proving even more challenging because of the lack of waterproof protective gear currently available in the arid country.

While the disaster is evident in the Hula Valley, in Israel’s fertile north, crane mortality has also been observed in other sites, though not yet in Jerusalem, according to Yotam Bashan of the Jerusalem Bird Observatory.

“There is no way to know what is going to happen,” Motro said in an interview with The Daily Beast. “When you identify avian flu in chicken coops you kill all the chickens and disinfect the coops. In the wild, at this level of infection, I don't know where it will lead. I’m worried.”

Shalom Bar Tal, an experienced wildlife photographer, told The Daily Beast that he was one of the only people allowed nocturnal access to observe the dead and dying birds. “It could turn into an ecological disaster no less significant than the corona epidemic,” he said.

For now, no Israeli is known to be infected with H5N1, but Israelis who were exposed to wild birds are taking the antiviral Tamiflu.

More

https://www.yahoo.com/news/massive-bird-flu-outbreak-could-153426477.html

Flu is making a comeback in US after an unusual year off

By CARLA K. JOHNSON December 27, 2021

The U.S. flu season has arrived on schedule after taking a year off, with flu hospitalizations rising and two child deaths reported.

Last year’s flu season was the lowest on record, likely because COVID-19 measures — school closures, distancing, masks and canceled travel — prevented the spread of influenza, or because the coronavirus somehow pushed aside other viruses.

“This is setting itself up to be more of a normal flu season,” said Lynnette Brammer, who tracks flu-like illnesses for the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

The childhood deaths, Brammer said, are “unfortunately what we would expect when flu activity picks up. It’s a sad reminder of how severe flu can be.”

During last year’s unusually light flu season, one child died. In contrast, 199 children died from flu two years ago, and 144 the year before that.

In the newest data, the most intense flu activity was in the nation’s capital, Washington, D.C., and the number of states with high flu activity rose from three to seven. In CDC figures released Monday, states with high flu activity are New Mexico, Kansas, Indiana, New Jersey, Tennessee, Georgia and North Dakota.

The type of virus circulating this year tends to cause the largest amount of severe disease, especially in the elderly and the very young, Brammer said.

Last year’s break from the flu made it more challenging to plan for this year’s flu vaccine. So far, it looks like what’s circulating is in a slightly different subgroup from what the vaccine targets, but it’s “really too early to know” whether that will blunt the vaccine’s effectiveness, Brammer said.

More

https://apnews.com/article/coronavirus-pandemic-science-health-flu-8895782660eb8491856e81fd387d6591

Expect More Shipping Chaos as Omicron Forces Transport Workers to Quit

·         About 20% of professional truck driving jobs globally unfilled

·         Seafarers also reluctant to come back after 2021 experience

More

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2021-12-27/truck-drivers-to-seafarers-quit-as-covid-shutters-borders-again

 

Global Inflation/Stagflation Watch.

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

British government says no new Covid curbs for England in 2021

Published Mon, Dec 27 20211:18 PM EST

England will not get any new Covid-19 restrictions before the end of 2021, British health minister Sajid Javid said on Monday, as the government awaits more evidence on whether the health service can cope with high infection rates.

British Prime Minister Boris Johnson continues to resist new measures, which would be unpopular within his own party, despite Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland all bringing in new rules.

Although partial figures reported by the government on Monday showed 98,515 new cases of Covid-19 in England, Javid said ministers would not be taking any new steps to limit the spread of the coronavirus in the coming days.

Once data for Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland is added to the English figures, it is likely to show cases for Britain as a whole only slightly below a Dec. 24 peak of 122,186.

“There will be no further measures before the new year,” Javid told reporters, adding: “When we get into the new year, of course we will see then whether we do need to take any further measures.”

He said that the highly transmissible Omicron variant of the virus now accounted for around 90% of cases across England and urged people to celebrate New Year cautiously.

The government’s attention is focused on the number of patients being hospitalized with Omicron after early data last week suggested the variant carried a lower risk of admission.

The latest data showed the number of patients in hospitals in England with Covid-19 was its highest since March, at 8,474, but a long way off peaks above 34,000 in January.

More

https://www.cnbc.com/2021/12/27/british-government-says-no-new-covid-curbs-for-england-in-2021-.html

World Economy Now Set to Surpass $100 Trillion in 2022

Sun, December 26, 2021, 12:05 AM

(Bloomberg) -- The world economy is set to surpass $100 trillion for the first time in 2022, two years earlier than previously forecast, according to the Centre for Economics and Business Research.

Global gross domestic product will be lifted by the continued recovery from the pandemic, although if inflation persists it may be hard for policy makers to avoid tipping their economies back into recession, the London-based think tank said.

“The important issue for the 2020s is how the world economies cope with inflation,” said Douglas McWilliams, the CEBR’s deputy chairman. “We hope that a relatively modest adjustment to the tiller will bring the non-transitory elements under control. If not, then the world will need to brace itself for a recession in 2023 or 2024.”

The forecast is in line with estimates of the International Monetary Fund, which also predicts global GDP measured in dollars and in current prices will pass $100 trillion in 2022.

In its annual World Economic League Table, the CEBR also predicted:

·         China will overtake the U.S. in 2030, two years later than forecast a year ago

·         India will regain sixth position from France next year and become third largest economy in 2031, a year later the previously predicted

·         The U.K. is on track to be 16% larger than France in 2036 despite Brexit

·         Germany will overtake the Japanese economy in 2033

https://news.yahoo.com/world-economy-now-set-surpass-000500732.html

Iron Ore Drops With Steel Demand Set to Weaken in 2022

Mon, December 27, 2021, 7:14 AM

(Bloomberg) -- Iron ore declined as investors weighed expectations that the steelmaking raw material will face a surplus next year.

Futures in Singapore slumped as much as 5.4% on Monday, the most in a month, after six weeks of gains. Iron ore has found support from moves by China’s authorities to bolster the real estate sector, as well as expectations for more fiscal stimulus and forecasts that steel output will rebound this month.

“We think overall iron ore supply and demand will further loosen in 2022,” China International Capital Corp. analysts Zhilu Wang and Chaohui Guo said in a note. They said they expect steel consumption in 2022 to decline by 1.2% from last year, dragged down by a weaker construction sector and the government’s carbon goals, and a 25-million-ton rise in shipments from major miners.

The comments echo forecasts from the government-backed China Metallurgical Industry Planning and Research Institute, which indicated that steel consumption will fall 4.7% in 2022.

Still, “if real estate investment rebounds more than expected or the constraint on steel production is weaker than expected, iron ore prices may remain above $100,” the CICC analysts said.

Also weighing on markets, China reported over the weekend the highest number of local virus cases since January. An outbreak in Shaanxi province is becoming one of China’s biggest challenges yet to its zero-Covid policy.

https://www.yahoo.com/news/iron-ore-drops-steel-demand-022310617.html

 

Covid-19 Corner

This section will continue until it becomes unneeded.

China local symptomatic COVID cases rise for a 4th day as Xian outbreak expands

Tue, December 28, 2021, 1:03 AM

BEIJING (Reuters) - China's local symptomatic coronavirus cases rose for a fourth consecutive day on Monday, with Xian city reporting more infections in a flare up that has put 13 million residents under lockdown.

Xian reported 175 symptomatic cases, up from the previous day's 150, official data showed on Tuesday.

No Omicron infections have been announced yet from the 810 confirmed cases in Xian from Dec. 9 to Monday. China has reported only a handful of Omicron infections among international travellers and in its south.

Nationwide, mainland China detected 182 local symptomatic cases for Monday, according to a statement by the National Health Commission, compared with 162 a day earlier and marks a fourth consecutive day of increase.

Monday's national local symptomatic case load also marks the highest daily count since the official daily bulletin started to classify asymptomatic carriers separately at the end of March last year.

Case numbers in Xian and in China are small compared with many clusters in other countries, but officials have imposed tough curbs on travel within the city and on leaving it, in line with the national guideline to immediately contain outbreaks.

Since last week, Xian residents have not been allowed to leave the city without clearance from their employer or authorities.

Officials have restricted permission for people to go out for necessary shopping during a new round of mass testing which started on Monday, and banned non-essential vehicles from entering roads.

There were no new deaths on Monday, leaving the national death toll at 4,636. Mainland China had 101,486 confirmed symptomatic cases as of end Dec. 27, including both local ones and those arriving from abroad.

https://www.yahoo.com/news/china-reports-209-covid-19-010352617.html

South Africa jubilant as Omicron wave subsides as quickly as it came with minimal hospital admissions and deadly Delta killed off

Monday 27 December 2021 11:04 am

Optimism is growing rapidly in South Africa as the wave of Covid infections caused by the Omicron variant seems to subside as quickly as it came.

Infections are down and multiple Covid experts have confirmed the Omicron wave is subsiding quickly.

Ridhwaan Suliman, a senior researcher at the South African Council for Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR), said the country has “surpassed the peak of the Omicron wave now, driven by the significant decline in the populous province and epicentre: Gauteng,” the province that is home to Johannesburg, the country’s largest city.

Although test positivity remains “still high at 29.8 per cent,” the fact the figure is decreasing confirms “the decline in infections is real and not a testing artifact.”

Other Covid researchers are saying the same. Michelle Groome, of the National Institute of Communicable Diseases (NICD), told reporters that “we have surpassed the peak of infections.”

Figures from the NCID showed that new cases dropped by 23 per cent over the past seven days, following a 14 per cent decrease a week earlier.

Moreover, the death figure is “substantially lower” than that experienced with the Delta variant, South African vaccinologist Shabir Mahdi told CNN.

Hospitalizations and deaths from this wave have proven to be “significantly lower relative to that experienced in previous waves,” Suliman agreed.

Suliman stressed that this wave as a “steeper but significantly shorter wave,” as it took “about half the number of days to reach the peak compared with previous waves in South Africa.”

It also seems the much more deadly Delta mutation has largely been replaced by Omicron, which – according to multiple studies – seems to be the mildest variant so far.

The Covid expert who has been leading the country’s pandemic response, Salim Abdool Karim – South Afrcia’s most important infectious-diseases scientist – said the peak of the Omicron wave has passed and he is convinced “every other country, or almost every other, will follow the same trajectory.”

“If previous variants caused waves shaped like Kilimanjaro, omicron’s is more like we were scaling the North Face of Everest,” Abdool Karim told The Washington Post, referring to the near-vertical increase in infections that South Africa recorded in the first weeks of December.

Also, the widely-respected and well-known chairwoman of the South African Medical Association, Dr. Angelique Coetzee, told CNN’s New Day program oSouth Africa was “over the curve” and said numbers are “much lower.”

More

https://www.cityam.com/south-africa-jubilant-as-omicron-wave-subsides-as-quickly-as-it-came-with-minimal-hospital-admissions-and-deadly-delta-killed-off/

Cruise passengers on holiday trip deal with outbreaks: 'We're sailing on a petri dish'

Sun, December 26, 2021, 12:04 AM

Ashley Peterson had a different mental image of her Christmas break than what actually transpired: The 32-year-old thought she would finally visit the Caribbean reef-lined island of Bonaire, the 99th country in her quest to travel at least 100.

Instead, her cruise ship, the Carnival Freedom, sailed past its destination Wednesday after a port turned away the boat because of coronavirus infections on board. At least four sailings on Royal Caribbean, Holland America, Carnival and others this week were altered by coronavirus outbreaks as cruise ships prepared for pre-pandemic levels before sailings were paused. Although vessels resuming cruising have beefed up coronavirus precautions, requiring vaccinations and testing passengers, the wave of new infections, fueled by the quickly proliferating omicron variant, has knocked the devastated industry and alarmed cruisers.

"We're sailing on a petri dish," Peterson said. "I feel like I just spent my past week at a superspreader event."

Carnival did not respond to a question about how many people have tested positive on the ship that was denied entry to Bonaire and Aruba, but it said "a small number of people infected aboard the Freedom ship have been isolated from other passengers and crew."

----"The rapid spread of the Omicron Variant may shape how some destination authorities view even a small number of cases, even when they are being managed with our vigorous protocols," according to the company's statement. "Some destinations have limited medical resources and are focused on managing their own local response to the variant."

The ship is among dozens under investigation or being monitored by the CDC.

Some cruise companies have said they will alter rules in response to the rise in cases. Royal Caribbean announced it will not be accepting new bookings until Jan. 10 after dozens of people tested positive on Royal Caribbean's Odyssey of the Seas and Symphony of the Seas, based in Florida, which has experienced a surge in cases over the past week at a greater average rate than the United States overall. The Odyssey of the Seas, turned away from Curaçao and Aruba, is set to return to Fort Lauderdale on Sunday.

In the busiest time for travel in nearly two years, the omicron variant has brought about staffing problems that have contributed to flight cancellations, upending people's get-togethers and leading people to isolate or quarantine.

Peterson and four other Carnival Freedom passengers who spoke to The Washington Post spent much of their Christmastime avoiding public areas of their ship, unsure of how many people have tested positive or unwittingly spread the virus. One passenger from a recent voyage on the same ship, isolated in a hotel in Miami for a week because he tested positive the day after the cruise, told The Post that has six-day Caribbean vacation has become a month-long ordeal because he cannot travel home to Canada.

More

https://www.yahoo.com/news/cruise-passengers-holiday-trip-deal-000419707.html

Microsoft joins Google, Amazon, others in canceling in-person presence at CES

December 25, 2021 8:54 AM GMT

(Reuters) - Microsoft Corp (MSFT.O) said on Friday it will not participate in person at the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) 2022 in Las Vegas, joining a list of companies opting not to have a physical presence at next month's event on concerns over the rapid spread of the Omicron COVID-19 variant.

The U.S. software giant added that it will continue to participate at CES remotely, according to an emailed statement. The Verge was the first to report on Friday that Microsoft will not participate physically AT CES.

Several other companies including U.S. automaker General Motors Co (GM.N), Alphabet Inc.'s (GOOGL.O) Google and its self-driving auto-technology company Waymo, Facebook parent Meta Platforms Inc (FB.O), Twitter Inc (TWTR.N), Lenovo Group (0992.HK), AT&T Inc (T.N) and Amazon.com Inc dropped in-person attendance plans earlier this week.

CES officials on Thursday said the event will still be held in person Jan. 5-8 with "strong safety measures in place," which include vaccination requirements, masking and availability of COVID-19 tests.

https://www.reuters.com/technology/microsoft-will-not-participate-physically-ces-the-verge-2021-12-24/?utm_source=newsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=technology-roundup&utm_term=Technology%20Roundup%20-%202021%20-%20Master%20List

Next, some 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 other useful Covid links.

Johns Hopkins Coronavirus resource centre

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

Rt Covid-19

https://rt.live/

Centers for Disease Control Coronavirus

https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/index.html

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.

No update today, hopefully tomorrow.

“Heaven goes by favor. If it went by merit, you would stay out and your dog would go in.”

Mark Twain.