Baltic Dry Index. 1612 -94 Brent Crude 96.19
Spot Gold 1665 US 2 Year Yield 4.30 -0.09
Coronavirus
Cases 02/04/20 World 1,000,000
Deaths 53,100
Coronavirus Cases 28/10/22 World 634,611,578
Deaths 6,589,835
There can be few fields of human endeavour in which history
counts for so little as in the world of finance. Past experience, to the extent
that it is part of memory at all, is dismissed as the primitive refuge of those
who do not have the insight to appreciate the incredible wonders of the
present.
John Kenneth Galbraith.
In the stock casinos, a bad day looks like turning into a very bad day for those long sinking stocks.
Of course, the gambling stock casinos are only a reflection of how the central banksters are easing or tightening the price of credit, and right now just about every central bank is tightening.
With inflation in the G-7, Japan excepted, running in double digits or close to double digits, and key interest rates lagging far behind from 1.5 percent to 3.25 percent, interest rates still have to close that gap.
That will put pressure on real estate, consumer spending and corporate investment. Already there are signs western consumers are scaling back, whether out of choice or lack of money, credit and savings.
While a “Black Friday” today is unlikely, Monday is the end of the first month of Q4 22. Time to dispose of the weakest and laggards. Time to be raising cash for buying opportunities at some point next year.
Did the Musk takeover of Twitter just confirm
that stock bubble top is well and truly in?
Hong Kong stocks
lead losses in Asia-Pacific; Bank of Japan keeps rates unchanged
UPDATED FRI, OCT 28 2022 12:35 AM EDT
Hong Kong stocks led losses as shares in the
Asia-Pacific fell as the Bank of Japan’s left its benchmark interest rate
unchanged.
The Hang Seng
index in Hong Kong lost 2.32%, with
the Hang Seng Tech index sliding 3.57%. In Australia, the S&P/ASX
200 fell 0.93%.
The Nikkei
225 in Japan fell 0.6%, while the
Topix was fractionally lower. The Japanese yen was trading at 146-levels, stronger than levels
seen last week before an intervention reportedly took place.
The Bank of Japan kept rates at ultra-low
levels, in line with expectations in a Reuters poll.
South Korea’s Kospi was 0.53% lower. MSCI’s broadest index of
Asia-Pacific shares outside Japan fell 1.1%.
In mainland China, the Shanghai
Composite was 0.83% lower and
the Shenzhen Component shed
1.62%.
Some Chinese airlines listed in Hong Kong will
report earnings, along with electric vehicle maker BYD. South Korea’s LG
Electronics is also scheduled to report earnings.
Overnight in the U.S., the
Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 194.17 points, or 0.6%, to end at 32,033.28
in its fifth straight positive session. The S&P 500 closed 0.6% lower at
3,807.30, and the Nasdaq Composite lost 1.6% to 10,792.68.
Asia markets:
Shenzhen stocks down 2%, BOJ hold interest rates steady (cnbc.com)
Nasdaq futures
fall after weak Amazon guidance adds pressure to tech rout
UPDATED THU, OCT 27 2022 10:43 PM
EDT
Nasdaq 100 futures were lower Thursday night
after disappointing Amazon earnings added to the already pressured index.
Futures tied to the Nasdaq dropped 0.7%. Dow
Jones Industrial Average futures fell 0.5%, and S&P 500 futures lost 0.1%.
Amazon led the declines in extended trading,
having plunged after the company posted weaker-than-expected quarterly revenue and issued disappointing fourth-quarter sales
guidance.
Apple shares were initially lower too after the
company reported weaker-than-anticipated iPhone revenue, but they have since reversed higher. The company still
beat Wall Street estimates for quarterly earnings and revenue.
Tech names were a dark cloud over the market in
regular trading, too. Earlier in the day, the Nasdaq Composite lost 1.6%, due
to a rout in Meta and other tech stocks, and the S&P 500 fell 0.6%.
Meanwhile, the Dow rose 194.17 points, or 0.6%, for its fifth straight day of
wins, helped by GDP data that hinted that inflation may be waning.
SoFi head of investment strategy Liz Young said
the pain investors are feeling in earnings was inevitable and necessary to move
forward in the current cycle.
“We’ve been waiting for this to happen,” she
said on CNBC’s “Closing Bell: Overtime.” “There’s usually a sequence of events:
First the market goes, then earnings go, then the economy goes. So this is
finally that part where we’re seeing earnings get hit and I don’t think it’s
any mistake that it’s tech getting hit the most. Tech is what has been under
pressure in this market since the beginning.”
“This is just another check on the list of
things that we need to get through before we can really be done with this part
of the cycle,” she added.
The Dow and S&P are on pace to end the week higher
by about 3% and 1.5%, respectively. The Nasdaq is set to finish slightly lower.
Friday brings a quieter day for earnings. As
investors digest the bloodbath in tech, they’ll have Chevron and Exxon Mobil on
deck before the bell as well as AbbVie and Colgate-Palmolive.
In economic data, traders are looking forward to
the Personal Consumption Expenditures Price Index, the Federal Reserve’s
preferred inflation gauge, as well as consumer sentiment and pending home
sales.
Nasdaq futures
fall after weak Amazon guidance adds pressure to tech rout (cnbc.com)
Wall
St loses over $200 billion in value after report from Amazon
October 27, 2022
10:37 PM GMT+1
Oct 27 (Reuters)
- Over $200 billion in U.S. stock market value went up in smoke in extended
trade on Thursday, after a weak forecast from Amazon (AMZN.O) added
to a string of downbeat quarterly reports from Big Tech companies.
Amazon's stock
tumbled 17% after the bell, wiping out $190 billion in market capitalization
after the retail and technology heavyweight projected a
holiday slump that would leave current-quarter sales below Wall Street
estimates.
Also after the
bell, Apple (AAPL.O) shares
fell about 1%, erasing about $30 billion of its stock market value after the
Cupertino, California company reported quarterly
iPhone sales that fell short of Wall Street targets.
The latest in a
string of poor quarterly results from some of Wall Street's most widely owned
companies underscores deep worries about the health of the global economy as
central banks raise interest rates in a battle against inflation
"Big Tech
companies are not impervious to slowdowns in the economy, particularly if they are
consumer driven," said Rick Meckler, a partner at Cherry Lane Investments
in New Vernon, New Jersey.
"As the Fed
embarks on this planned slowdown, it is eating away at some of their
consumer-faced businesses, and given their high multiples it is causing big
contractions in their stock prices," Meckler said.
Amazon's weak
report sent Nasdaq futures tumbling about 3%, showing traders expect Wall
Street to open with a deep decline on Friday. Google-owner Alphabet (GOOGL.O) and Microsoft (MSFT.O) dropped
about 1% each, adding to losses following their own poorly received quarterly
reports on Tuesday.
Thursday's
late-day reports also followed disappointing results from Facebook-owner Meta
Platforms (META.O) that
earlier sent its stock plummeting 25%. Thursday's drop left Meta's stock market
value at about $260 billion, with the one-time behemoth now about the 20th most
valuable company on Wall Street.
More
Wall St loses over
$200 billion in value after report from Amazon | Reuters
Global Inflation/Stagflation/Recession
Watch.
Given
our Magic Money Tree central banksters and our spendthrift politicians,
inflation now needs an entire section of its own.
ECB warns of 'looming
recession' as it again hikes rates
Issued
on: 27/10/2022 - 16:08
Frankfurt
(AFP) – The European Central Bank
announced another jumbo interest rate hike on Thursday and said further
increases would follow to combat soaring inflation, even as its president,
Christine Lagarde, warned a eurozone recession was looming.
The ECB's 25-member governing council
repeated last month's unprecedented move and opted for another bumper increase
of 75 basis points, leaving its three main rates sitting in a range of between
1.5 and 2.25 percent.
"We will have further rate
increases in the future," Lagarde said. "There is still ground to
cover."
The Frankfurt institution is under
pressure to rein in record-high inflation, mainly driven by surging food and
especially energy prices in the wake of Russia's war in Ukraine.
Eurozone inflation stood at 9.9 percent in
September, nearly five times the ECB's two-percent target.
Inflation "remains far too
high" in the 19-nation currency club, Lagarde said.
Like other central banks, the
ECB is fighting back with a series of rate hikes intended to dampen demand by
making credit more expensive for households and businesses.
But higher borrowing costs also
weigh on economic activity, and the eurozone outlook has deteriorated
significantly.
"The likelihood of
recession (is) looming much more on the horizon," Lagarde told a press
conference.
And inflation could go
"higher than expected if there are increases in the prices of energy and
food commodities", she added.
"Obviously we're
concerned, particularly about those who have low income," Lagarde said.
Political grumbling
Moscow's move to curb gas
supplies to Europe has triggered an energy crisis on the continent, fuelling
fears of power shortages and sky-high heating bills this winter.
If Russia completely cuts off
gas flows to Europe, the eurozone economy could shrink by nearly one percent in
2023, ECB vice-president Luis de Guindos recently warned.
That scenario has become more
likely after Russia in late August shut down the crucial Nord Stream 1 pipeline
to Europe's economic powerhouse Germany.
As European governments race to
unveil multi-billion-euro support measures to help citizens through a
cost-of-living crisis this winter, the ECB's monetary policy tightening has
come under scrutiny.
Italian Prime Minister Giorgia
Meloni this week criticised the ECB's "rash choice" to aggressively
hike rates, saying it created "further difficulties for member states that
have elevated public debt".
French President Emmanuel
Macron expressed "concern" that the ECB was "shattering
demand" in Europe.
More
ECB warns of
'looming recession' as it again hikes rates (france24.com)
Shoppers
buying less of some products after price hikes, says Dove owner Unilever
THURSDAY 27 OCTOBER 2022
7:35 AM
Dove maker Unilever has seen consumers buying less
of some home care products after price hikes.
The London-listed consumer goods giant admitted
price increases had had “some negative impact” on volume, with its home care
division declining 3.6 per cent.
However, the company saw underlying volume growth
improve across four business groups in the third quarter.
Underlying sales growth
reached 10.6 per cent in the quarter, with the brand posting a turnover of 17.8
per cent to €15.8bn, boosted by the sale of global tea business ekaterra last
year.
Shoppers buying
less of some products after price hikes, says Dove owner Unilever (cityam.com)
Below, why a “green energy” economy may not be possible, 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.
With Covid-19 starting to become only endemic,
this section is close to coming to its end.
Please share! This Dangerous Research must
be stopped.
Due to its importance, we will leave this YouTube clip up all week.
New
Boston [SARS] virus Approx. 19 minutes.
[Kills
80 percent of humanised mice.]
Chinese
cities double down on zero-COVID as outbreaks widen
October 27, 202
29:14 PM GMT+1
China on Thursday reported a
third straight day of more than 1,000 new COVID cases nationwide, a modest
tally compared with the tens of thousands per day that sent Shanghai into a
full-blown lockdown earlier this year but enough to trigger more restrictions
across the country.
China's
coronavirus case load has remained small by global standards, but its
ultra-strict and disruptive containment measures this year against the highly
transmissible Omicron variant have weighed heavily on the world's
second-largest economy.
Guangzhou,
China's fourth-biggest city by economic output and the provincial capital of
Guangdong, on Thursday sealed up more streets and neighbourhoods and kept
people in their homes as new areas were deemed high-risk in a COVID resurgence
that persisted into its fourth week.
---- As of
Oct. 24, 28 cities were implementing varying degrees of lockdown measures, with
around 207.7 million people affected in regions responsible for around 25.6
trillion yuan ($3.55 trillion) of China's gross domestic product, according to
Nomura.
That is the
equivalent of nearly a quarter of China's 2021 economic output.
Mainland China
shares edged lower on Thursday as the outbreaks and gloomy data on a
COVID-battered industrial sector hurt
sentiment.
WUHAN WOES
Wuhan, site of
the world's first COVID-19 outbreak in late 2019, reported around 20 to 25 new
infections a day this week, prompting local authorities to order more than
800,000 people in one district to stay at home until Sunday.
More
Chinese cities
double down on zero-COVID as outbreaks widen | Reuters
Less Than 1 in 100 Million Chance That COVID-19 Has Natural
Origin: New Study
October 23,
2022 Updated: October 24, 2022
A new study on the origins of the pandemic,
“Endonuclease fingerprint indicates a synthetic origin of SARS-CoV2,” published
on the preprint server bioRxiv, concludes that it is highly likely that the
SARS-CoV-2 virus that causes COVID-19 originated in a laboratory. The odds of a
natural origin, according to the study, are placed at less than 1 in 100 million.
Unlike previous studies that analyzed qualitative aspects such as
virus features, the new study for the first time assesses the likelihood of a laboratory
origin on a quantitative basis. This breakthrough methodology allowed the
authors to present objective findings that appear to exceed any previous
studies.
Significantly, the new study does not rely on any of the known evidence
pointing toward a lab origin of the SARS-CoV-2 virus. For instance, it does not
take into consideration the highly unusual Furin Cleavage Site that makes the
virus particularly virulent and which it is widely thought to have been inserted into the virus at the Wuhan Institute of Virology. Nor does
it factor in the huge coincidence that the pandemic started on the door steps
of the world’s premier coronavirus laboratory.
---- The authors conclude that SARS-CoV-2 was assembled in a lab
using common methods for assembling viruses. The authors do not speculate on
which lab the virus escaped from.
In response to the new study, Kristian Andersen, the leading
author of the Proximal Origin paper—the Dr.
Anthony Fauci-led effort to dispel the lab leak theory—went on Twitter to slam the new study as “kindergarten molecular biology.”
Andersen’s criticism is that cutting sites are common in naturally occurring
SARS viruses. However, this criticism does not explain the very unusual
placement of cutting sites in SARS-CoV-2.
More
Less Than 1 in 100 Million Chance That COVID-19 Has
Natural Origin: New Study (theepochtimes.com)
Next, some vaccine links
kindly sent along from a LIR reader in Canada.
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
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, among other things, I’ve added this
section. Updates as they get reported.
Novel
rule-breaking material behaves like "conductive Play-Doh"
Nick Lavars October 26, 2022
Scientists
working with an experimental class of materials have made a breakthrough that
could shape a new generation of electronic devices. The researchers’ creation
is likened to a conductive “Play-Doh” that can be easily shaped, combining two
characteristics in a way they say defies a theoretical explanation.
Materials
that conduct electricity such as aluminum, copper or other metals tend to have
some things in common. They consist of neat rows of atoms or molecules arranged
in a tight configuration, which was thought to be crucial to allow electrons to
travel freely through the material.
University
of Chicago researcher Jiaze Xie had been exploring other possibilities. He was
experimenting with materials based on molecular strings made of carbon and
sulfur, interspersed with nickel atoms, and produced some unexpected results.
To he and the team’s surprise, the material turned out to be a very efficient
conductor of electricity, and was able to maintain its performance in a range
of inhospitable conditions.
---- The scientists say the conductive material is
unprecedented in the way it can both be pliable and conduct electricity, with
Anderson likening it to “conductive Play-Doh – you can smush it into place and
it conducts electricity.”
Through chemical
treatments, scientists have been able to make conductors with organic materials
that are easier to process and offer some flexibility, but their conductivity
typically wanes under high temperatures or when exposed to moisture. With an
ability to withstand these factors, the scientists believe they’ve laid the
groundwork for a new class of conductive materials.
“In principle, this
opens up the design of a whole new class of materials that conduct electricity,
are easy to shape, and are very robust in everyday conditions,” said Anderson.
More
Novel
rule-breaking material behaves like "conductive Play-Doh"
(newatlas.com)
Another weekend and a weekend of worry
for the punters still holding stocks. What if the rest of 2022 turns out as bad
as the first nine months? Sell? To whom? Have a great weekend everyone.
If economists could manage to get themselves thought of as humble, competent people on a level with dentists, that would be splendid.
John Maynard Keynes.
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