Wall Street Journal

In short, we have yet to see evidence that we are nearing a peak in oil production. On the contrary, agencies like EIA and IEA have predicted a stable increase in crude oil production for the next few years at least. But supplies may not be the only, or even the most important factor when analyzing the end of the oil era. The world is making progress at moving beyond oil. So instead of discussing Peak Oil in terms of supply, perhaps it is now more useful to analyze ‘Peak Demand’.

Last week the government reported personal income and spending for April. After months of blaming non-existent consumer spending on cold weather, shockingly occurring during the Winter, the captured mainstream media pundits, Ivy League educated Wall Street economist lackeys, and Keynesian loving money printers at the Fed have run out of propaganda to explain why Americans are not spending money they don’t have. The corporate mainstream media is now visibly angry with the American people for not doing what the Ivy League propagated Keynesian academic models say they should be doing. An economy built upon the consumption of iGadgets, Cheetos, meat lovers stuffed crust pizza, and slave labor produced Chinese baubles, along with the production of enough arms to blow up the world ten times over, and the doling out of trillions to the non-productive class, is doomed to fail.

After the carnage of the 2008 crash, former Federal Reserve Chairman Paul Volcker proposed a rule that would prevent banks from making short-term proprietary trades with financial instruments. In other words, no gambling allowed. This rule would become known as The Volcker Rule, and it went into partial effect on April 1, 2014. Full compliance is required by July 21, 2015. Of course, the bank lobbyists were hard at work, and numerous exceptions and loopholes were created.

The key events on tap for next week.    

If you still think that the establishment Republicans in Congress represent real opposition to President Obama’s policies, you’re either extremely brainwashed or extremely stupid. Honestly, we wonder what it will take for some people to wake up. How many times do you need to be used, abused and conned by slimy politicians before you can shake off your political Stockholm Syndrome? Today's example is from chief ObamaTrade proponent Paul Ryan who gaffed Pelosi-like when he admitted (with regard to the super-secret TPP) "It’s declassified and made public once it’s agreed to," in other words - “we have to pass the bill so that you can find out what is in it.”

Moscow-based cybersecurity firm Kaspersky Lab has released a detailed report that outlines how spyware (which some suggest originated in Israel) was used to infiltrate the hotels that hosted the Iran nuclear negotiations. From the report: "Earlier this year, during a security sweep, Kaspersky Lab detected a cyber intrusion affecting several of its internal systems. Following this finding, we launched a large-scale investigation, which led to the discovery of a new malware platform. Notably, some of the new 2014-2015 infections are linked to the P5+1 events and venues related to the negotiations with Iran about a nuclear deal."

As China builds its own multilateral institutions, Beijing has been keen to dispel the notion that it seeks to supplant the Bretton Woods order with its own brand of Eastern hegemony and although one can certainly question the degree to which China’s aims are rooted purely in an inclination to be benevolent towards nations in need of fixed asset investment, Beijing is making an effort to distance itself from the way the US governs the institutions under its control.

The United States Department of Justice is using federal grand jury subpoenas to identify anonymous commenters engaged in typical internet bluster and hyperbole in connection with the Silk Road prosecution. DOJ is targeting Reason.com...

OPEC's next task is to convince those making new investments in oil that rather than catching a bottom in oil prices, they have caught a falling knife. The cartel must dampen enthusiasm for investment for the long term if the organization's members are going to benefit. A crippled U.S. oil industry without friends in the investment world is the only way to assure that rising prices won't simply lead to a stampede back into U.S. shale deposits.

"These record profits that companies are reporting are not all they're cracked up to be."

David Nicholls: “Banks do not collude to try to set a Libor rating. “I think I am just hearing a lot of hysteria about Libor that is just misinformed."
John Ewan: “A cabal of them could.”
Nicholls: “What’s a cabal?”
Ewan: “A group together could."
Nicholls: “That’s an interesting conspiracy theory."

DAX futures have jumped 50 points (back above 11,000), and Dow Futures are up 60 points off the day's lows as yet another Greek rumor headline hits the wires. While the market reads the WSJ headlines on the extension of third Greek bailout to March 2016 as positive, Tsipras has already, according to the WSJ, rebuffed it as "unacceptable" because in exchange for the offered extension, Juncker and Dijsselbloem require implementing policy overhauls as well as pension cuts and tax increases, both of which just happen to be the Greek 'red lines.'

Steve Liesman is quaking in his reporter's boots this morning as the SF Fed & BEA's credibility-crushing "double-seasonal-adjustment" thesis is crushed into statistical neverland by the The NY Fed. A study by economists at the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve did not find significant statistical evidence for such distortions on the aggregate GDP level, despite meteoroconomist Joe Lavorgna's assertion that Q1 grew 1.2% thanks to the magic of made-up numbers. As The NY Fed concludes, in a tone that suggests "sigh, again, "it will not be surprising if the question of residual seasonality comes up again next year when first-quarter growth numbers are announced."