Fail

You didn’t think the surveillance state would give up that easily did you? Of course not. Unsurprisingly, fresh off the heels of the Paris terror attacks, the usual authoritarian suspects in the U.S. government are running around exploiting the tragedy in a bid to further erode privacy and civil liberties.

BlackRock Inc., the world’s largest asset manager, is winding down a global macro hedge fund after losses and investor redemptions eroded assets. The reason for the liquidation: losses of 9.4% this year, cited by Bloomberg according to an October investor document, leading to the worst year for the asset manager since inception in 2003. The fund, which had $4.6 billion in assets just two years ago, has shrunk to less than $1 billion as of Nov. 1.

• Security jitters drive European investors back to safe havens (Reuters)
• Global Anti-ISIS Alliance Begins to Emerge (WSJ)
• Merkel says cancelling soccer match was 'responsible' decision (Reuters)
• Paris attacker may have had accomplice on journey through Balkans (Reuters)
• Drop Assad demands if you want to unite against Islamic State: Russia to West (Reuters)
• Putin sets up commission to combat terrorism financing (Reuters)

I had never heard the term "safe space" until just a few days ago, but it's a zone in which free speech is completely forbidden, for fear of hurting the feelings of some special snowflake.

Economists have been consistently over-estimating the strength of the economy this year. The magnitude of their misses is not particularly worrisome but volatility measures and the recent record number of consecutive negative readings are suggesting that economists’ models are losing their grasp on the state of the economy.

The notion of free markets, mechanisms where buyers and sellers can meet to exchange securities or various kinds of goods, in which each participant has access to the same information, is a fallacy. Transparency in trading across global financial markets is a fallacy. Not only are markets rigged by, and for, the biggest players, so is the entire political-financial system.

The institutional academic system is broken. We need less systemic, traditional education that only provides knowledge of low utility and more alternative education that provides the right high-utility knowledge to thrive during today's global currency wars.

Here's what's obvious, but unacceptable: we need a new system. Not a system modified with tiny tweaks and a feeding trough filled with borrowed money--an entirely new system designed from scratch to be sustainable and with opportunities to build capital for all.

The Obama administration officially rolled out its MyRA program. MyRA is a special form of IRA that ‘helps’ Americans save for retirement by making it easy for you to loan your money to the federal government. Despite misleading promises that these MyRA accounts are for “people who aren’t saving and who have a fear of losing their principal," the big catch here is that there’s only one investment: US government bonds... So with these MyRA accounts, when adjusted for inflation, you’re guaranteed to lose money.

Centrally issued money optimizes inequality, monopoly, cronyism, stagnation, low social mobility and systemic instability.

The world of Bubble Finance economies created by the Fed and other central banks is fundamentally different than that prevailing under the “Lite Touch” monetary policies which preceded the Greenspan era. The problem today is that the PhDs running the Fed have an economic model which is a relic of the Lite Touch era. It is not only utterly irrelevant in today’s casino driven system, but is actually tantamount to a blindfold. It causes them to look at a dashboard full of lagging indicators like jobs and GDP components, while ignoring the explosive leading indicators starring them in the face on CNBC. The clueless inhabitants of the Eccles Building do not recognize that they have created a world in which Wall Street supersedes main street.

The incentive structure throughout government, Wall Street, and big business generally is that “crime pays,” which is exactly why we’re seeing more and more of it. It will only get worse, until we grow up as a culture and demand accountability.

The perennial hopes of a strong retail shopping season are once again upon us. Given the current deflationary backdrop, small business spending pessimism, the sharp decline in imports and weak wage growth, it is quite likely that actual retail sales will likely disappoint the NRF's forecast of a "shopping season significantly above the 10-year average." But it is truly important to remember that for retailers all #BlackFridaysMatter

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