Baltic Dry Index. 1537 -39 Brent Crude 75.17
Spot
Gold 2716 U S 2 Year Yield 4.37 +0.03
Wall Street people learn nothing and forget everything.
Benjamin Graham.
In
the stock casinos, more Trump bubble madness.
In
the real economy, especially the global economy, particularly Europe’s economy,
a nasty recession looms if it hasn’t already started.
In
the US economy, what will happen if Team Trump fires tens of thousands of
Federal government employees next year?
Dow
rises more than 400 points for record close, Wall Street posts weekly gain:
Live updates
Updated
Fri, Nov 22 2024 4:23 PM EST
The Dow Jones Industrial Average closed
at a new record on Friday, capping off a winning week for stocks.
The
blue-chip Dow gained 426.16 points, or 0.97%, to 44,296.51, a new all-time
closing high and its third straight positive session. The S&P 500 added 0.35% to
finish at 5,969.34 for its fifth winning day in a row.
The
technology-heavy Nasdaq
Composite rose 0.16% to 19,003.65. Gains were restricted by slides of
3.2% and 1.7% in Nvidia and Alphabet, respectively.
The
Dow ended the week about 2% higher, while the S&P 500 and Nasdaq each added
about 1.7%. That marks a turn from last
week, when Wall Street’s postelection rally stalled.
Friday’s
moves marked a continuation of a trend where investors shift exposure from tech
to names in more economically sensitive corners of the market. That can explain
why the industrial and consumer discretionary sectors led the S&P 500
higher, while communication services was the worst performer.
While
tech struggled, bitcoin neared
the long-awaited
milestone of $100,000. Small-cap stocks also showed strength this
week, with the Russell 2000 climbing
1.8% in Friday’s session to finish the week up by roughly 4.5%.
“Investors
are rotating out of the previous high flyers of large-cap communication
services and technology and into other cyclical sectors of consumer
discretionary, industrials, and financials, as well as mid- and small-cap
stocks,” said Sam Stovall, chief investment strategist at CFRA Research.
“Drivers continue to be the traditional end-of-election-year rally, in which
all sizes, styles, and sectors within the S&P 1500 rose in price.”
Stock
market news for Nov. 22, 2024
Wall
Street’s Biggest Risk Takers Are Doubling Down
November
22, 2024 at 11:39 PM GMT
As
Wall Street learned Friday evening that Donald Trump is preparing to announce Scott Bessent, who runs macro
hedge fund Key Square Group, as his nominee for US Treasury secretary,
traders were looking back on a strange week in markets. The buy-everything
mania that greeted Trump’s election has been cooling as his finance fanbase
begins to consider the consequences of some of his economic plans. Yet on the
speculative fringes, the risk-taking extravaganza isn’t just continuing—it’s
getting bigger by the day. Heavy trading—and big price moves—in everything from
crypto to leveraged exchange-traded funds was the story in a
week where swings in the S&P 500 and Nasdaq 100 finally started to abate.
Ground
zero for the casino crowd is the $140 billion complex of amped-up
exchange-traded funds tracking the likes of Big Tech stocks and Michael
Saylor’s Bitcoin proxy MicroStrategy. No corner of the juiced-up ETF world
saw more action than funds centered on the software firm Saylor transformed
into what amounts to a pure-play bet on Bitcoin (more on that below). Two
leveraged funds based on the company saw a combined $420 million inflow amid a
24% surge for the underlying stock this week. The popularity of the two funds
has led some market-observers to point to a leveraged-loop buying frenzy.
More.
Wall
Street’s Biggest Risk Takers Are Doubling Down - Bloomberg
In
EV news, more problems.
Hyundai,
Kia recall over 208,000 electric vehicles to fix problem that can cause loss of
power
22
November 2024
Hyundai and Kia are
recalling over 208,000 electric vehicles to fix a pesky problem that can cause
loss of drive power, increasing the risk of a crash.
The
recalls cover more than 145,000 Hyundai and Genesis vehicles
including the 2022 through 2024 Ioniq 5, the 2023 through 2025 Ioniq 6, GV60
and GV70, and the 2023 and 2024 G80.
Also
included are nearly 63,000 Kia EV 6 vehicles from 2022 through 2024.
The
affiliated Korean automakers say in government documents that a
transistor in a charging control unit can be damaged and stop charging the
12-volt battery.
Dealers
will inspect and replace the control unit and a fuse if needed. They also will
update software. Owners whose vehicles were recalled earlier this year to fix
the same problem will have to visit their dealer again.
Owners
will be notified by letter in December and January.
Hyundai,
Kia recall over 208,000 electric vehicles to fix problem that can cause loss of
power
Finally,
as a service to President Putin and Prime Minister Netanyahu, plus a few others,
the list of countries to avoid visiting even if by accident. I hope neither has
a Swiss bank account.
The
States Parties to the Rome Statute
124
countries are States Parties to the Rome Statute of the International Criminal
Court. Out of them 33 are African States, 19 are Asia-Pacific States, 19 are from Eastern Europe, 28 are
from Latin American and
Caribbean States, and 25 are from Western European and
other States.
UN Treaty - Rome
Statute of the International Criminal Court
States Parties -
Chronological Lists
The States Parties
to the Rome Statute | International Criminal Court
Orban
invites Netanyahu to Hungary as ICC warrant divides Europeans
By Krisztina Than and Friederike Heine November 22, 20242:50 PM GMT
BUDAPEST,
Nov 22 (Reuters) - Prime Minister Viktor Orban invited Israel's Benjamin
Netanyahu on Friday to visit Hungary but several other European
nations said the Israeli premier would be detained if he set foot on their
soil, following the issuing of an arrest warrant for him.
The
International Criminal Court issued arrest
warrants on Thursday for Netanyahu, his former defence chief Yoav
Gallant, and for a Hamas leader, Ibrahim Al-Masri, for alleged war crimes and
crimes against humanity in the Gaza conflict.
All
EU countries are members of the court, which means they are supposed to enforce
its warrants.
But
the diverging
reactions - and the fact that EU heavyweights Germany and France have
not said if they would arrest Netanyahu - highlight the major diplomatic and
political challenge posed by the ICC decision, which drew swift condemnation
from Israeli leaders and the White House.
"For
us Europeans, this warrant exposes a real dilemma between international law,
which is our law, and our foreign policy, especially for those member states
that are unconditionally backing Israel," Eurointelligence analysts wrote
in a note.
More
Orban
invites Netanyahu to Hungary as ICC warrant divides Europeans | Reuters
Global Inflation/Stagflation/Recession
Watch.
Given our Magic Money
Tree central banksters and our spendthrift politicians, inflation/recession now needs an entire
section of its own.
Europe’s
Economic Woes Deepen With Private Sector Slump
November 22, 2024 at 6:00 PM GMT
Euro-area business activity shrank in November, underscoring the
damage being wrought by political chaos and heightened discord over trade. New
data from the Purchasing Managers’ Index by S&P Global revived wagers that
the European Central Bank will make heftier interest rate cuts. The result
doesn’t come as a total shock amid the steady flow of dismal economic news,
especially in Germany, the region’s biggest economy and driver of growth. With
the car industry on the ropes and the government in disarray, the nation’s
economy grew just 0.1% in the third quarter — less than
initially reported. France’s private sector activity also shrank at the fastest pace since January, and the
UK suffered similarly amid shifting fiscal plans. Our latest News Now podcast
on the region’s slump is here. — Joshua Gallu
Europe’s
Economic Woes Deepen With Private Sector Slump - Bloomberg
Recession risk as Britain
reels from Reeves’s Budget
22 November 2024
Economists have sounded the alarm over a UK
recession after data showed Britain’s economy was reeling from the effects of
Rachel Reeves’s tax-raising Budget.
Britain is now “close to stagnation” after closely
watched PMI figures showed activity among the UK’s private sector companies
shrank for the first time in more than a year in November.
Sterling dropped to its lowest against the dollar
since May and banking stocks plunged on Friday. Economists said they were “more
worried” that Britain’s performance might not be as good as previous forecasts.
Chris Williamson, chief business economist at
S&P Global Market Intelligence said: “Companies are giving a clear ‘thumbs
down’ to the policies announced in the Budget, especially the planned increase
in employers’ National Insurance contributions.”
Recession
risk as Britain reels from Reeves’s Budget
Thousands
of jobs to go at Bosch in latest blow to German car industry
November 22,
2024
Bosch will cut up to 5,500 jobs as
it struggles with slow electric vehicle sales and competition from Chinese
imports.
It is the latest blow to the European car
industry after Volkswagen and Ford announced thousands of job cuts in the last
month.
Cheaper Chinese-made electric cars have
made it trickier for European manufacturers to remain competitive while demand
has weakened for the driver assistance and automated driving solutions made by
Bosch.
The company said a slower-than-expected
transition to electric, software-controlled vehicles was partly behind the
cuts, which are being made in the car parts division.
Demand for new cars has fallen overall in
Germany as the economy has slowed, with recession only narrowly avoided in
recent years.
The final number of job cuts has yet to be
agreed with employee representatives. Bosch said they would be carried out in a
"socially responsible" way.
About half the job reductions would be at
locations in Germany.
More
Thousands of jobs
to go at Bosch in latest blow to German car industry
Auto worker wipeout: Why car companies are
cutting thousands of jobs
November 21,
2024
Major automakers
around the world have announced multiple rounds of layoffs and factory closures
in recent weeks as they struggle to turn a profit on EVs and face a
potential onslaught of cheaper competition.
Ford, General Motors,
and Stellantis plan to
slash thousands from their workforce in the coming months. Volkswagen has
announced plans to shutter three of its factories in Germany, which could come
with massive layoffs.
Unfortunately
for the world's major carmakers, they aren't facing one issue but an
agglomeration of several significant interconnected challenges at once. Add to
that an ultracompetitive business with high overhead costs and low profit
margins, and things quickly get very difficult.
When market
dynamics, regulatory requirements, and financial costs shift dramatically in a
relatively short period of time, the results can be dire. That's what we're
seeing play out.
A massive and
expensive pivot to EVs has failed to turn a profit
The auto
industry has invested or announced plans to invest more than $300 billion in US
EV and battery production since 2016, the NRDC estimates. That's
led to a slew of new models on the market and (relatively) cheaper pricing for consumers.
But despite that
growth — and with EVs accounting for roughly 10% of US auto sales — companies
not named Tesla have struggled to make their EV businesses profitable.
GM, for example,
has invested $35 billion in its EV and autonomous-driving businesses, which has
led to new electric models like the Hummer EV and Cadillac Lyriq. Despite the
warm reception from the public, the company's profits this year are entirely
driven by the strong sales of its internal-combustion trucks and SUVs.
GM has said it expects its EVs to reach
profitability sometime before the end of the year.
It's the same
story at Ford.
The company's
Model e EV division lost nearly $3.7 billion during the first nine months of
this year, including $1.2 billion in the last quarter alone.
The rapid
transformation of the Chinese market
The exponential
growth in China's appetite for cars over the past two decades made it a steady
profit center for global automakers like VW Group and GM. From 2014 to 2018, GM
took in an average of $2 billion a year from its Chinese joint ventures.
But in recent
years, Chinese consumers have increasingly turned to competitive domestic automakers like BYD and the Geely Group, whose brands have sold 1.6 million
vehicles in the market so far this year.
GM's market
share in the country peaked at around 15% in the middle of the last decade and
was down to just 6.5% in the most recent quarter.
So far this
year, Volkswagen Group's sales in China, its largest market, are down about 10%
over last year, and the company predicts the situation may deteriorate further.
In response to
the potential competition, European leaders have readied tariffs on cars
imported from China. VW warned that potential retaliatory tariffs on European
cars by China could only make things worse.
An increasingly
competitive domestic market
Competition for
automakers in their domestic markets has heated up.
In the US, Stellantis saw its sales plummet by 17% this year thanks to slower sales of its Jeep-branded SUVs and Ram
pickup trunks.
Price seems to
be a major factor. The average price of a Stellantis vehicle is around $56,000,
far above the industry average of $48,000.
The company had
to offer aggressive incentives (on top of lower production) during the third
quarter to help dealers clear the glut of unsold cars off their lots. Analysts
say inventory levels are improving at Stellantis and industry-wide as
automakers react to a slower sales environment.
But uncertainty
looms large as President-elect Donald Trump threatens tariffs on all goods
imported into the United States and eyes ending tax credits for electric vehicles, which could be another headwind for sales, industry experts say.
Auto worker wipeout: Why car companies are cutting thousands of jobs
Jaguar warned of 'commercial suicide' with
'woke' rebrand: 'It's a joke!'
21 November 2024
British car
manufacturer Jaguar has been warned of "commercial suicide" after
rebranding their logo and releasing a bold new television advert.
The luxury
vehicle maker, founded in 1922, has swapped their iconic jaguar logo for a
curved geometric J badge, removing any depiction of the animal the brand is
based on.
In defence of
their rebrand, Jaguar said in a statement that the vision for their new image
is built around "Exuberant Modernism".
However,
motoring author and co-founder of the International XK Jaguar Club, Philip
Porter said the rebrand comes across as a "bad joke", warning the
company of "commercial suicide".
Porter told GB
News: "I think it's commercial suicide. I think it's a bad joke, it's
hilarious.
"I think
it's just absolutely crazy. There's always been a passion about Jaguar, and
this logo is is just ridiculous, isn't it? It takes a long time to build a
brand, but you can crash it overnight."
In defence of
Jaguar, commentator Amy Anzel said the new advert is "fantastic" and
"thrilling".
Anzel explained:
"I think it's fantastic. I think that ad is thrilling and exciting and
like a coming attraction as to what's to come. If I want to describe it, it's
definitely bold and artistic and imaginative.
More, inc.
video.
Jaguar warned of 'commercial suicide' with 'woke' rebrand: 'It's a joke!'
Covid-19
Corner
This section will
continue until it becomes unneeded.
Nuts, plus I wouldn’t
put this former UK Health minister in charge of running a tea trolley let alone
deciding vaccine policy.
Hospitals were 'hours from running out of PPE'
during early months of Covid, Hancock says
Former health secretary Matt Hancock told the Covid-19 inquiry that some
PPE was in very short supply during the first wave of the pandemic, and said
that he "ruffled some feathers"
22:04, 21 NOV 2024
Matt Hancock has revealed England's hospitals were
on the brink, mere "hours" away from exhausting supplies of certain
personal protective equipment (PPE) during the initial months of the Covid-19 crisis.
The ex-health secretary disclosed to the Covid-19
inquiry that some PPE was in critical shortage across the first pandemic wave.
He holds a firm belief that in any forthcoming
pandemics, vaccines should be compulsory for NHS and social care workers, and that masks ought to be obligatory in
hospitals immediately. When probed by lead counsel
to the inquiry, Jacqueline Carey KC, about the pre-pandemic lack of gowns
impacting the capacity to provide adequate PPE, Mr Hancock admitted: "The
stockpile that we had was not as good as it needs to be in the future, absolutely."
Enquired whether England ever completely depleted
its PPE stock, he conceded: "As a whole? No, but individual locations did.
"We came extremely close. We came within small
numbers of items on a regular basis during April and May 2020 – by the second
wave, we were in better shape.
"Gowns I think at one point we got to within
six or seven hours of running out.
"We were working incredibly hard to make sure
that we didn’t (run out). We nearly did."
On the topic of facemask usage in hospitals during
future pandemics, he commented: "It should be brought in immediately, and
supplies need to be ready, preferably in each hospital, to make that
possible."
Additionally, Mr Hancock stated that ensuring
health and social care workers are fully vaccinated is a "reasonable step
that should be expected" and advocated for simultaneous implementation in
the NHS and social care sectors. The policy requiring Care Quality
Commission-registered care home staff to be fully vaccinated to work in care
homes, unless medically exempt, came into effect in November 2021, with full
enforcement from April 2022.
Mr Hancock expressed regret over not applying this
rule to both social care and the NHS at the same time, emphasising: "If
you are employed to care for others, then you should take reasonable steps to
ensure you are not harming those in your care."
"A clinically proven vaccine is a reasonable
step that should be expected."
Earlier, Mr Hancock, who was booed by a campaigner
as he arrived to give evidence, claimed he had "ruffled some
feathers" by shielding the NHS from political interference.
He also told the inquiry meddling from Number 10
created "incredible difficulties" in Covid-19 testing efforts.
The inquiry's third module is scrutinising the
repercussions of the virus on healthcare frameworks within the UK's four
nations.
More
Regular nut consumption after this age wards off
dementia and disease
By Michael Franco November 21, 2024
Adding another plus in the "nuts are good for
you" column, new research shows that regular consumption of the superfood
not only holds off death, but it also keeps the mind sharp and limits
persistent disability. But age was a factor in the study.
In the world of nutrition, nuts are a bit of a show
off. In addition to their well-known abilities to improve cardiovascular health, the tiny protein-packed snack has also been shown to improve sperm count and motility, and fight obesity, diabetes, and inflammation. Plus the magnesium they contain has been linked to warding off DNA damage, while their omega-3 and omega-6 fatty acids have been shown to reduce the risk of 19 types of cancer.
Now, a new study from Monash University has given
nuts another public relations boost.
More
Regular nut consumption after this age wards off dementia and disease
Technology Update.
With events happening
fast in the development of solar power and graphene, I’ve added this section.
Your Junk Is Needed for the New Electric Era
In remote Quebec, mining giant Glencore is turning America’s
electronic trash back into treasure
Nov. 20, 2024 5:30 am ET
ROUYN-NORANDA, Quebec—One of the world’s
largest miners is digging into America’s junk drawers, old phones and
landfills. The quarry: bits of copper to meet the needs of the energy
transition and data boom.
Shredded cellphones, obsolete computer
cables and chewed-up cars are heaped 30 feet high outside Glencore’s GLEN 0.69%increase; green up pointing triangle 97-year-old copper smelter deep in Canada’s
sparsely populated boreal forest. There, the scrap is melted with copper
concentrate from mines to produce fresh slabs of metal.
Old electronics have long augmented the
smelter’s input. But these days Glencore and other copper producers are casting
wider nets for scrap and spending big to boost recycling capacity.
Shifting from fossil fuels to more
renewable electricity promises to remake commodity markets. If America requires
less crude oil and coal, it will in turn need a lot more lithium for electric-vehicle
batteries, precisely shaped pine trees for
bigger utility poles—and copper for everything electric.
“In the next 25 years we will consume
more copper than humanity has consumed until now,” said Kunal Sinha,
Glencore’s global head of recycling. “That’s the scale of the challenge.”
Copper consumption surged in recent
decades as China modernized. Demand got another boost from 2022’s climate and tax law, which promotes
renewable energy development in the U.S. The data centers being built to
facilitate artificial intelligence and store smartphone videos are full of
copper. So are the phones.
Glencore estimates that global copper
supply must grow by about one million metric tons a year through 2050. That
would require annually adding the equivalent of the world’s largest mine,
Chile’s Escondida.
Even if such rich deposits are found, it
can take decades to bring mines online. That prevents miners from responding
quickly to new demand, which leaves scrap to balance the market, said Citigroup
metals strategist Tom Mulqueen.
Unlike commodities such as oil or corn,
copper never goes away and is infinitely recyclable.
Miles worth are strung through homes and
cars and along rights of way, carrying electricity and drinking water. But a
lot sits in junk yards and landfills. When prices rise, there is more incentive
to get it. Copper prices are currently among the highest ever.
“Scrap is really determining, in some
respects, what price level you’ll get to,” Mulqueen said. “What price level
will you need to get to above today to incentivize sufficient scrap recovery?”
More
Your Junk Is Needed for the New Electric Era - WSJ
Next, the
world global debt clock. Nations debts to GDP compared.
World Debt Clocks (usdebtclock.org)
This
weekend’s music diversion. The Great Mr. Fasch again. Opening Allegro 4 minutes.
Total approx. 12 minutes.
J.F.Fasch:
Concerto in D major for 2 Fls, 2 Obs, Bn, 2 Hns, Strings & B.c FWV L:D15
J.F.Fasch:
Concerto in D major for 2 Fls, 2 Obs, Bn, 2 Hns, Strings & B.c FWV L:D15 -
YouTube
This
weekend’s WW2 update. Approx. 38 minutes.
U-505
- When the US Navy stole a whole German submarine
U-505 - When the
US Navy stole a whole German submarine
This
weekend’s final diversion, pure maths fun for Thanksgiving on Thursday. Approx
32 minutes of interesting algebra.
What's
the next freak identity? A new deep connection with Sophie Germain primes
What's the next
freak identity? A new deep connection with Sophie Germain primes
The intelligent investor should recognize that market panics can
create great prices for good companies and good prices for great companies.
Benjamin Graham.
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