Baltic Dry Index. 978 +0.01 Brent Crude 81.07
Spot Gold 1962 U S 2 Year Yield 4.82 +0.02
“War is peace. Freedom is slavery. Ignorance is strength.”
In the gambling stock casinos, an interesting, if uncertain week ahead. How will rebalancing the Nasdaq 100 play out among the hedge and pension funds?
In the real world, what happens next to food prices, food availability?
Will no one bring NATO’s proxy war on Russia in the Ukraine to an end, before like nearly all European wars, it spreads.
European
markets close higher as traders react to earnings, look ahead to Spanish
election
UPDATED FRI, JUL 21 2023 11:51 AM EDT
LONDON — European markets
closed higher Friday as investors digested a fresh round of corporate earnings
and looked ahead to a crucial Spanish election over the weekend.
The pan-European Stoxx 600 closed
0.3% higher, with most sectors in positive territory. Households goods added
1.2% to lead gains, while mining stocks shed 1.5%.
Shares in Asia-Pacific were
mixed on Friday as investors reacted to Japanese inflation figures, with the
core consumer price index rising slightly in June from the previous month.
U.S.
stocks were higher as the Dow Jones Industrial Average headed
for its tenth-straight session of gains for the first time in nearly six years.
The S&P 500 and Nasdaq also
climbed in early trade.
Back in Europe, U.K. Prime
Minister Rishi Sunak’s Conservative Party suffered a heavy blow in a series of
by-elections Thursday night, losing two seats in parliament to the main
opposition Labour Party and centrist Liberal Democrats. The results were
ominous for Sunak’s ruling party as it looks ahead to a general election in
2024.
Spanish voters head to the polls
on Sunday in a pivotal snap general election that could end the four-year
tenure of left-wing Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez and mark a shift to the right
in Europe’s sixth-largest economy.
Corporate earnings on Friday came
from Swiss miner Glencore.
Earnings season kicks off in earnest next week, when Europe’s major banks,
pharmaceutical firms, automakers, energy giants and aircraft manufacturers are
all due to report.
Europe
markets open to close ahead of Spanish election, earnings (cnbc.com)
Wall Street heavyweights mixed ahead of Nasdaq 100 rebalance
July
21, 20235:34 PM GMT+1
July 21 (Reuters) -
Shares of Wall Street's most valuable companies were mixed on Friday ahead of a
rebalance of the Nasdaq 100 index (.NDX) to address the benchmark's
"overconcentration."
Nvidia (NVDA.O) and Tesla (TSLA.O) dipped 1.4% and 0.4%,
respectively, while Alphabet (GOOGL.O) added nearly 1% and Apple (AAPL.O) and Amazon (AMZN.O) were near unchanged.
Before trading
begins on Monday, exchange operator Nasdaq (NDAQ.O) will trim the weight of a
handful of companies that make up close to half of the Nasdaq 100.
Nasdaq describes the Nasdaq
100 as a "modified market capitalization-weighted index," with
company weights depending on their stock market value, while also applying
rules to limit the influence of the largest stocks in the index.
The Nasdaq 100 includes 100
of the largest companies that trade on the Nasdaq exchange, and changes to the
index will force investment funds that track it to adjust their portfolios and
sell shares of companies that have their weight in the index reduced.
"We estimate that declining
weights will drive passive net selling worth more than a day's average trading
volume in GOOGL and more than one-third of a day's volume in MSFT, AMZN, and
NVDA," Goldman Sachs wrote in a client note on Monday.
Broadcom (AVGO.O), which will likely see its weight
increase in the Nasdaq 100 following the rebalance, rose 1.6%. The chipmaker
currently makes up 2.4% of the index, according to Refinitiv data.
Microsoft, Apple,
Nvidia, Amazon and Tesla have been among the biggest winners in the U.S. stock
market's recovery this year, increasing their combined influence in the Nasdaq
100. That has helped the Nasdaq 100 surge 42% in 2023, compared to a 25%
increase in the Nasdaq 100 Equal Weighted Index (.NDXE).
The Nasdaq 100 was near flat on
Friday.
Nasdaq announced its plan to rebalance the
index on July 7.
More
Wall
Street heavyweights mixed ahead of Nasdaq 100 rebalance | Reuters
Is
Ukraine’s counteroffensive failing? Defense experts say the risks facing Kyiv
are growing
Ukraine’s counteroffensive has been more sluggish
than many expected and military analysts warn that the window of opportunity
for breaking through Russian defenses — and making territorial gains — could
close soon.
Kyiv’s counteroffensive was launched in June after
months of preparation, but its progress has disappointed some onlookers who
hoped for a faster regaining of Russian-occupied territory in the south and
east of the country.
While Ukraine planned its counteroffensive over the
winter — and waited for more military hardware from its international allies —
Russian forces were heavily fortifying their positions along a 900-kilometer
(559-mile) front line stretching from the Kharkiv-Luhansk border in the
northeast of Ukraine, toward Kherson in the southwest.
Military analysts note that Ukraine now faces
successive lines of Russian defenses that are, in some cases, 30 kilometers
deep and consisting of minefields, anti-tank obstacles, and extensive networks
of trenches and bunkers that are covered by Russian drones, artillery and
helicopters.
Small window of opportunity
One of the biggest
problems for Ukraine is that the time frame for breaking through Russia’s
defenses is limited, with only a few summer months left in which to make
serious gains.
For Michael Clarke, a defense analyst and former
director-general of the Royal United Services Institute (RUSI) think tank,
there’s a risk that the first phase of the counteroffensive, designed to probe
Russia’s defenses, takes too long.
“It was always intended to be a
two-stage offensive, with a sort of probing first stage to try to identify
weaknesses in the Russian frontline, followed by a second stage where they put
their big forces into it. And we’re still on the first stage which has lasted
longer than they expected,” Clarke told CNBC Wednesday.
“If this first phase lasts too long, they leave themselves insufficient
time before the weather changes, before the second phase starts,” he said.
Although he believed it to be an unlikely scenario, Clarke noted that time
pressures could prompt Ukraine to deploy military units destined for use in the
second phase of the counteroffensive sooner than planned — something he said
Russia is hoping for.
“The danger then is that they will
not be able to use the bulk of their forces in sufficient mass to make a
difference ... to create a real punch when they decide to really start,” he
added. “I’m not pessimistic about this offensive but the risks that it may not
work are increasing as the days tick on.”
One of the most pressing time
constraints is the inevitable change of weather, with Ukraine’s
infamous muddy season in the fall set to make the offensive far
more challenging and at times — with unpassable roads and fields — practically
impossible.
Konrad Muzyka, a military intelligence specialist
and president of Rochan Consulting, said “the weather has always been the
factor” for Kyiv.
“I think that the Ukrainians expected the
counteroffensive to gather sufficient momentum to allow them to continue to
push south at a much faster rate. Unfortunately, it didn’t happen,” he told
CNBC on Wednesday.
More
Ukraine counteroffensive: Defense analysts on what could happen next (cnbc.com)
Russians
Attack At Pyatikhatki, Avdeevka, Artemovsk and Kupyansk. Military Summary For
2023.07.21
“There is no instance of a nation benefitting
from prolonged warfare.”
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.
'Something very strange' explains
why a US recession has been delayed
Fri, 21 July 2023 at 1:26 am BST
Since the Federal Reserve began
aggressively hiking interest rates last year, more and more economists warned that a US
recession was imminent.
But that recession has not yet
arrived, and there's no sign a recession is near even after reliable indicators like the inverted
yield curve flashed red flags.
According to Societe Generale,
"something very strange has happened" that explains why a US
recession has been delayed, and it has to do with some timely moves made by
corporations.
The bank highlighted that going
back to at least 1975, corporate net interest payments would rise as the Fed
raised interest rates. But for the first time in a long time, that isn't
happening. Instead, as the Fed raised rates over the past 15 months, corporate
net interest payments actually fell.
"Normally when interest
rates rise, so too do net debt payments, squeezing profit margins and slowing
the economy. But not this time," Societe Generale's Albert Edwards said in
a Thursday note, pointing to a chart that he called the "strangest"
he has seen in a very long time.
So, what exactly is happening?
It turns out that during the
period of near-zero interest rates, especially leading up to the pandemic and
during the pandemic, corporations took advantage and refinanced a ton of their
liabilities into long-term, low-rate, fixed debt.
According to data from Bank of America earlier this year, companies bought themselves some
time to navigate higher rates. The debt composition of S&P 500 companies includes just 6% in short-term floating
rate debt, just 8% in long-term floating rate debt, 10% in short-term fixed
debt, and a whopping 76% in long-term fixed debt.
This "helps explain the
recession's tardiness," SocGen's Edwards said, highlighting that net
interest payments have fallen 25% at a time when they would have risen sharply
based on history.
"Companies have effectively
played the yield curve in reverse and become net beneficiaries of higher rates,
adding 5% to profits over the last year instead of deducting 10%+ from profits
as usual," Edwards said.
The lack of a profit decline
means companies didn't have to resort to a big wave of layoffs that would have
dented the economy and thrown it into a recession.
The low-rate, long-term debt held
by corporations, combined with their pricing power during a time of elevated
inflation, means most businesses were able to grow profits in a big way.
"Interest rates simply
aren't working as they once did. It is indeed a mad, mad world," Edwards
concluded.
All of this could change if
companies have to refinance their debt at higher rates. But with most of their
debts not maturing until 2025, 2026, 2027 and beyond, it's possible that
interest rates could move lower between now and then, enabling companies to
continue to ride the coattails of low rates and ultimately stave off a recession.
'Something very strange' explains why a US recession has been delayed (yahoo.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.
Protective gene may help some dodge Covid-19 symptoms, study
suggests
July 20, 2023
A gene variant
may have helped a lucky few avoid suffering Covid-19 symptoms,
according to a new study.
Scientists have
found that so-called “super-dodgers” carry a gene that helps them to fend off
the virus before
it causes symptoms such as coughs, shivers, fatigue and other signs of illness.
It is
the first evidence that there is a genetic basis for
asymptomatic Covid.
Researchers
believe that new treatments and vaccines could
be developed as a result of the findings.
The
study, published in the journal Nature, focuses on human leukocyte antigens
(HLAs) — proteins found on the surface of cells which help the immune system to
recognise whether a particular cell is an unwelcome invader.
The
protective gene allows the immune system to recognise that an HLA found on the
coronavirus responsible for Covid-19 is similar to the HLA found on seasonal
coronaviruses that cause routine colds.
This
means if you have the protective gene and have previously been exposed to a
seasonal coronavirus, your immune system will mobilise its defensive weaponry
against a Covid-19 infection, so you will not suffer symptoms.
The
gene variant, called HLA-B15, is only carried by about 3,000 of the study’s
30,000 subjects, who were tracked through the first year of the pandemic.
Professor Jill Hollenbach, of the Weill Institute
for Neurosciences at the University of California San Francisco, who oversaw
the research, said: “If you have an army that’s able to recognise the enemy
early, that’s a huge advantage.
“It’s like having soldiers that are prepared for
battle and already know what to look for, and that these are the bad guys.”
The study found that people with one copy of the
protective gene were more than twice as likely to remain asymptomatic, compared
with people without the gene.
Meanwhile, people with two copies of the gene were
more than eight times as likely to not suffer symptoms during a Covid
infection.
Protective gene may help some dodge Covid-19 symptoms,
study suggests (msn.com)
Technology Update.
With events happening fast in the
development of solar power and graphene, I’ve added this section.
Graphene Makes PE Stretch Film
Ultrathin and Strong
Film
manufacturer Packseven is rolling out a recyclable polyethylene stretch film
made with Gerdau’s graphene masterbatch that reduces virgin resin use by 15% to
30%.
When blended with plastics, graphene lends its strength to the polymer
matrix and greatly strengthens the blended plastic. Graphene improves physical
and mechanical properties like puncture-resistance and increases barrier
properties against liquids and gasses. It also protects against weather,
oxidation, and ultraviolet light, and boosts electrical and thermal
conductivity.
Packseven’s graphene-enhanced stretch film is
expected to be available for sale in the third quarter of 2023, launching
in Brazil.
Additionally, “The Poly-G masterbatch used to
create Packseven’s product is currently available in Brazil and Japan. In
Japan, Gerdau Graphene has a strong partnership with Sumitomo to commercialize
the product,” Alex Correa, CEO of Gerdau Graphene, tells us.
Poly-G can be exported to US plastics
manufacturers, he adds.
Initial testing of Packseven’s ultra-thin stretch
film shows that the film can pack 120% more material without breaking, vs.
other stretch films. Graphene-enhanced stretch films are more resistant to
being punctured by sharp objects, as well.
The graphene-enhanced film’s durability translates
into reduced consumption of stretch film per pallet and safer packing and
loading. Its improved strength and durability also make it possible to
significantly reduce the thickness of the film.
This weekend’s music
diversion. An almost unknown German Lutist composer. A
big contrast to the flamboyant Te Deum of Lully of last week. Approx. 12 minutes.
Gottfried
Meusel (1688-1727) - Concerto in C-Dur
Gottfried Meusel (1688-1727) - Concerto in C-Dur -
YouTube
Lute
A lute (/ljuːt/[1] or /luːt/) is
any plucked string instrument with a neck and a deep round back enclosing a hollow cavity,
usually with a sound hole or opening in the body. It may be either fretted or unfretted.
More specifically, the term
"lute" commonly refers to an instrument from the family of European
lutes. The term also refers
generally to any necked string instrument having the strings running in a plane
parallel to the sound table (in the Hornbostel–Sachs system).
More
This weekend’s chess update. Approx. 7
minutes.
Magnus
Goes King's Gambit + 3.Qh5
Magnus Goes King's Gambit + 3.Qh5 - YouTube
No maths update this weekend. This
weekend, what went wrong at the world’s longest sea bridge. Approx. 13 minutes.
The
Colossal Failure of the World's Longest Sea Bridge
The Colossal Failure of the World's Longest Sea Bridge
- YouTube
“I know not with what weapons World War III
will be fought, but World War IV will be fought with sticks and stones.”
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