Archive - Dec 12, 2015

Great news! The "greatest threat to future generations of the world" has apparently been solved. World leaders Saturday adopted an historic international climate accord in Paris, the first-ever agreement to commit almost every country to fight climate change. However, as we knew all along and just got confirmation, the 31-page pact does not have binding language or a mechanism to force countries to live up to the promises to cut greenhouse gases.

The middle class has one foot in the grave and the other foot on a banana peel, thanks to our corrupt and dysfunctional system of money. It’s time to end crony capitalism, which is leading us deeper into fascism.

China’s sweeping crackdown on sellers, “manipulators”, frontrunners, financial journalists and anyone else “suspected” of acting in such a way as to sow fear and uncertainty in the wake of the dramatic meltdown in Chinese equities that unfolded over the summer has ensnared money managers, high profile executives, and government officials alike. Earlier this week, it reached a crescendo with the disappearance of Guo Guangchang, known to some as “China’s Warren Buffett. We now have a bit more in the way of color regarding Guo’s detention and sure enough, he’s being “held in connection with an investigation.”

The doors are closing for investors looking to get out before the Crisis hits.

Seven years of zero rates, massive monetary inflation and incessant market backstopping have desensitized and anesthetized. Rational thought ultimately succumbed to "perpetual money machine" quackery. And now all of this greatly increases vulnerability to destabilizing market dislocations, as senses are restored and nerves awakened. "A lot of this looks like late 2007 or early 2008," warns one manager, but today, market mispricing is systemic and global – virtually all securities classes at home and abroad.

"In the past there had been cases where some panels in the building explode spontaneously"....

"I am not terrified of the terrorists; i.e., I am not, myself, terrorized. Rather, I am terrified of the terrorized; terrified of the bovine masses who are so easily manipulated by terrorists, governments, and the terror-amplifying media into allowing our country to slip toward totalitarianism and total war." – Dan Sanchez

If anyone on this planet could be accused of tying Marissa Mayer's sexuality to her career, I think one need look no farther than the woman herself.

"As the leader of a military brigade, I am not fully satisfied with the government's action, and we are here to say that Iraq's patience has run out."

"We call on the Security Council to demand that Turkey withdraw its forces immediately and not to violate Iraqi sovereignty again."