Archive - Dec 2013

December 29th

Tyler Durden's picture

2013 - The Year Of The Zombies





It was the Year of the Zombies. Not in the sense of most of humanity dying from a horrible plague and then reanimating as mindless flesh-eating ghouls. No, it was much worse than that...

 

Tyler Durden's picture

Jobless Claims - The Economic Miracle That Wasn't





The noise in the jobless claims data over the past few months has been unprecedented and yet the impressive jump lower in recent weeks has been trumpeted as the all-clear for Tapering and as a signal that the recovery is 'real' this time. Except, thanks to a huge 'glitch' in Florida's new CONNECT unemployment claims website, the data is completely FUBAR...

 

Tyler Durden's picture

The NSA's 50-Page Catalog Of Back Door Penetration Techniques Revealed





While the world may have become habituated to (and perhaps revels in, thank you social media exhibitionist culture) the fact that the NSA is watching anyone and everyone, intercepting, recording, and hacking every electronic exchange regardless if it involves foreign "terrorists" or US housewives, the discoveries from the Snowden whistleblowing campaign continue. The latest revelation from the biggest wholesale spying scandal since Nixon, exposed by Germany's Spiegel which continues the strategy of revealing Snowden leaks on a staggered, delayed basis, involves a back door access-focused NSA division called ANT, (which supposedly stands for Access Network Technology), described by Spiegel as "master carpenters" for the NSA's TAO (Tailored Access Operations, read more about TAO here). The ANT people have "burrowed into nearly all the security architecture made by the major players in the industry -- including American global market leader Cisco and its Chinese competitor Huawei, but also producers of mass-market goods, such as US computer-maker Dell." More importantly, thanks to Spiegel (and Snowden of course), the NSA's 50-page catalog of "backdoor penetration" techniques has been revealed.

 

Tyler Durden's picture

Russia Wishes NATO A Happy New Year... As Only Russia Can





Russian Deputy Prime Minister Dmitry Rogozin has sent NATO a rather unusual New Year's card... picturing Santa alongside a Russian inter-continental ballistic missile.

 

Tim Knight from Slope of Hope's picture

Cowgirls Wearing Pink Shades





For the New Year, it seems that SOH, that last true refuge for pensive brooding bears, has been overrun with pompous bulls peddling & pumping a new 21st century high tech plateau of permanent prosperity, that would make even Irving Fisher's rose twittering cheeks blush.  I wonder if old Irving would have Linked himself In or posted his rip roaring 20s rosy market views on a pretty pink Facebook page?

 

Tyler Durden's picture

Steve Keen (Briefly) Explains Why Janet Yellen Won't See The Next Big One Coming





"Conventional economic theory says 'crisis don't happen' unless they are hit by an [outside] shock" exclaims Steve Keen, adding that numerous Nobel Prize winning economists have suggested that "capitalism is stable..." and "the problem of avoiding depressions has been solved for many decades." They are wrong...

 

Tyler Durden's picture

French Constitutional Court Approves 75% Tax On High Earners





Almost a year ago, the French constitutional court ruled against Francois Hollande's triumphal blast into socialist wealth redistribution, with his proposed 75% tax rate on high earners, and so indefinitely delayed the exodus of the bulk of French high earners (even if some, like Obelix, aka Gerard Depardieu, promptly made their way to the country that has become the land of solace for all oppressed people everywhere, Russia) into more tax-hospitable  climes. That delay is now over, when earlier today the same court approved a 75% tax on all those earning over €1 million. The proposal passed after the government modified it to make employers liable for the 75% tax. As BBC reports, the levy will last two years, affecting income earned this year and in 2014.

 

Tyler Durden's picture

Caught On Tape: Suicide Bombing In Russia's Fifth Largest Train Station Kills 15, One Month Ahead Of Sochi Games





"I can give you a guarantee to protect the Winter Olympics in the city of Sochi on the Black Sea next year. The Chechen groups that threaten the security of the games are controlled by us... " - Saudi Arabia's Bandar bin Sultan to Vladimir Putin, spoken in hope of Russia selling out the Syrian regime, summer 2013.

 

 

December 28th

Tyler Durden's picture

The New New Great Game: Geography, Energy, The Dollar And Gold





Sir Halford Mackinder’s 1904 speach in which he outlined his “Heartland Theory” was a founding moment for geo-politics. He argued that control of the Eurasian landmass (Europe, Asia and the Middle East), which contained the bulk of the world’s population and natural resources, was the major geo-political prize. As time passed, energy (first crude oil then natural gas), became increasingly integral to this concept and its strategic significance cannot be overstated. Remarkably, Mackinder’s theory has remained equally valid, if not more so, in the modern era - although key “pivot areas” for exercising control have evolved. In addition to Central Asia and Trans-Caucasus in Mackinder’s day, the oil producing nations of the Middle East took on increasing importance in the “New Great Game”. We see a “New New Great Game” emerging.

 

Tyler Durden's picture

President Obama's Hawaii Vacation (In One Cartoon)





Presented with no comment...

 

Tyler Durden's picture

Overstock CEO On Bitcoins, Gold, Austrian Economics, And... Zombies





Patrick Byrne, the embattled CEO of Overstock.com, had plenty to say in a recent Fortune interview. The outspoken CEO, whose company recently became the first US retailer to accept Bitcoin (beginning later next year) aligns his beliefs with Ron Paul, holds enough gold that if "zombies walked the Earth," he'd be taken care of. Byrne believes "the long-run value of all fiat money is zero," adding that,"we're not going to get rid of the Federal Reserve any time soon, so bitcoin is a step in the right direction."

 

Tyler Durden's picture

Keynes & Copernicus: Debasement Of Money Overthrows The Social Order And Governments





The US Senate moves toward the confirmation of Janet Yellen, now posited for next January 6th, as chair of the Federal Reserve System. Let us in this moment of recess reflect on eerily similar observations by two of history’s most transformational figures:  John Maynard Keynes and Nicolas Copernicus. One of Keynes’s most often-cited observations, from his 1919 The Economic Consequences of the Peace, chapter VI, contains an indictment of policies very like those which the Federal Reserve System has been implementing for the past dozen, and more, years.  These policies in slow motion are at the root of  the very political, social, and cultural dysphoria — uneasiness or generalized dissatisfaction — predicted by Keynes.

 

Tyler Durden's picture

David Collum's Year In Review - The Interview





For some, despite being the holidays, reading all 89 pages of David Collum's annual epic 'year in review' is tough to squeeze in between earning minimum wage at Toys'r'Us for 85 hours straight or "consuming" as much food and iPads as possible. Luckily, Erin Ade of Boom Bust sat down with David to discuss the critical aspects of his voluminous tome. Given his initial comments, we suspect the 20 minutes are well worth watching...

 

williambanzai7's picture

THeMe OF 2014...





In two words...

 

Tyler Durden's picture

Why The Turkish Government May Be The Casualty Of A $119 Billion PetroDollar "Loophole"





It was in October 2012 when we explained how Iran evades the Western blockade (ostensibly with the implicit nod of none other than the US), and when we first defined the concept of PetroGold in the context of the Turkey-Dubai-Iran crude-for-gold triangle. One year later, following Iran's unperturbed ability to exist in a world without US dollars, the blockade of Iran is a thing of the past, and the west has engaged in a full-blown detente with the country, much to the fury of both Israel and Saudi Arabia, lowering and in many cases outright eliminating Iran sanctions, which proved futile. So a happy ending for Iran (if only briefly). However, one country that has seen better days, whose government may be on the edge of collapse due to an unprecedented corruption scandal precisely for enabling said PetroGold scheme, and which has been in the news on a daily basis recently, is Turkey. As Turkey's Today's Zaman explains in "Iran's Turkish Gold Rush", the political crisis Turkey finds itself in may be nothing but a consequence of the PetroGold scheme conceived over a year ago, and in which Turkey played a crucial role.  Here is how the Turkey-Dubai-Iran PetroGold triangle, or as the Zaman calls it, "gas for gold", may soon result in the toppling of yet another government, simply because it showed that existence outside of the clutches of the 'Petrodollar' is perfectly possible...

 
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