Economy

Why Hasn’t The U.S. Gone After Gazprom?

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Gazprom-Logo

– Why Hasn’t The U.S. Gone After Gazprom? (OILPRICE, May 1, 2014):

Amidst the deepening war of words over Moscow’s annexation of Crimea, U.S. President Barack Obama on April 28 added more Russian individuals and companies to a sanctions list that already included influential members of Russian President Vladimir Putin’s inner circle and Bank Rossiya, which has close ties to the Russian leadership. The new list freezes the assets of Igor Sechin, head of Russia’s major oil company, Rosneft, six other individuals and 17 companies.

Significantly, the new U.S. list does not include Alexei Miller, CEO of the Russian natural gas state monopoly, Gazprom.

Read moreWhy Hasn’t The U.S. Gone After Gazprom?

Making $400,000 PER HOUR, The Best Paid Hedge Fund Manager In 2013 Was …

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David-Tepper

– Making $400,000 Per Hour, The Best Paid Hedge Fund Manager In 2013 Was… (ZeroHedge, May 6, 2014):

When it comes to returns, 2013 will be best remembered as the fifth consecutive year in which the S&P 500, lead by Chief Risk Officer and Portfolio Manager Ben Bernanke (replaced by Janet Yellen in 2014 following a bumper 30%+ year), outperformed over 90% of all hedge funds, which as the recent beta blow up has shown, have virtually no original “alpha” ideas, and all merely piggyback on the same high beta “greater fool”, hedge fund hotel trades and/or lever on beta as much as their Prime Broker will allow them (in many cases quite a lot).

And yet, hedge fund investors were perfectly happy to keep handing over 20% of their upside and paying a 2% management fee when they could have generated the same returns for free by simply buying the SPY ETF.

How happy?

According to a just released ranking by Institutional Investor magazine, The 25 top earners of 2013 raked in a total of $21.15 billion. That’s roughly 50 percent more than the 25 best-paid managers reaped in each of the previous two years. Four managers earned more than $1 billion, while a fifth just missed that distinction. To qualify for the list, a manager needed to have earned at least $300 million in 2013, or 50 percent more than the 2013 cutoff.

Read moreMaking $400,000 PER HOUR, The Best Paid Hedge Fund Manager In 2013 Was …

The Destabilizing Truth: Only The Wealthy Can Afford A Middle Class Lifestyle

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… as intended …

“When a country embarks on deficit financing (Obamanomics) and inflationism (Quantitative easing) you wipe out the middle class and wealth is transferred from the middle class and the poor to the rich.”
– Ron Paul

bush-mission-accomplished-iraqMission-Accomplished-Obama
Mission accomplished!

… but it will get much, much worse … soon.

Prepare for the greatest financial collapse in world history.

– The Destabilizing Truth: Only The Wealthy Can Afford A Middle Class Lifestyle (OfTwoMinds, May 6, 2014):

By Charles Hugh Smith

The “middle class” has atrophied into the 10% of households just below the top 10%.

The truth is painfully obvious: a middle class lifestyle is unaffordable to all but the top 20%. This reality is destabilizing to the current arrangement, i.e. debt-based consumerism a.k.a. neofeudal state-cartel capitalism, so it is actively suppressed by the officially sanctioned narrative: that middle class status is attainable by almost every household with two earners (a mere $50,000 annual household income makes one middle class) and middle class wealth is increasing.

It’s not that difficult to define a middle class lifestyle: just list what was taken for granted in the postwar era of widespread prosperity circa the 1960s, four decades ago.

Read moreThe Destabilizing Truth: Only The Wealthy Can Afford A Middle Class Lifestyle

Twitter Tumbles 50% From Recent All Time Highs

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twitter_dead

– Twitter Tumbles 50% From Recent All Time Highs (ZeroHedge, May 6, 2014):

Despite being told for weeks that the always efficient US equity market had “priced in” the end of Twitter’s lock-up period, it seems (surprise, well not really – the riggedyness is such that stock have long forgotten what it means to discount anything) that it hadn’t. Yesterday, some Twitter insiders were promising they would hang on to their stock now that the selling lock up has been lifted.

To wit:

“We’re going to hold,” said Chris Sacca, an early Twitter investor, who manages about 15 percent of the company’s shares through various arrangements. Analysts and other investors are focusing too much on user growth and instead should “just recognize how much money Twitter is going to continue to put up on the board.”

Read moreTwitter Tumbles 50% From Recent All Time Highs

And The First Thing Ukraine Will Buy With IMF Money Is … Over $1 BILLION Of Gold!

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The people should demand regular audits of those gold reserves.

Flashback:

– Was The Price Of Ukraine’s ‘Liberation’ The Handover Of Its Gold To The Fed?

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– And The First Thing Ukraine Will Buy With IMF Money Is… (ZeroHedge, May 6, 2014):

A month ago, it was alleged, that Ukraine – under cover of night – loaded its gold reserves onto a plane and shipped them off (for safekeeping) in the US, as the potential price of ‘liberation’. So how ironic that, given the massive gas debts that Ukraine owes to Russia (and prepayments pending), and sizable bond maturities pending, the first thing that Ukraine’s National Bank governor will be buying with his freshly minted loan from the IMF is… buy a billion dollars of gold.

We presume Gazprom still gets its payment and bondholders get paid off – because that seriously impair ‘investor confidence’ which is, as they note below, is what is crucial to stabilize the nation’s economy… but it seems the Central bank has other priorities…

Read moreAnd The First Thing Ukraine Will Buy With IMF Money Is … Over $1 BILLION Of Gold!

Will Detroit Be The First Major Chinese City In The United States?

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FYI.

China-Wants-To-Construct-A-50-Square-Mile-Self-Sustaining-City-South-Of-Boise-Idaho

– Will Detroit Be The First Major Chinese City In The United States? (Economic Collapse, May 5, 2014):

Is Detroit destined to become a Chinese city?  Chinese homebuyers and Chinese businesses are starting to flood into the Motor City, and the governor of Michigan is greatly encouraging this.  In fact, he has formally asked the Obama administration for 50,000 special federal immigration visas to encourage even more immigration from China and elsewhere.  So will Detroit be the first major city in the United States to be dominated by China?  It could happen.  Once upon a time, Detroit was the greatest manufacturing city in the history of the world and it had the highest per capita income in the entire country.  But now it is a rotting, decaying, bankrupt hellhole that is in desperate need of a savior, and Michigan Governor Rick Snyder appears to be fully convinced that China can be that savior.

Read moreWill Detroit Be The First Major Chinese City In The United States?

Leaked Documents Show How Blackstone Fleeces Taxpayers Via Public Pension Funds

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From the article:

“Read it and weep:…”

– George Carlin: The American Dream (Video):

“…they want your fucking retirement money.

They want it back, so they can give it to their criminal friends on Wall Street.

And you know something? They’ll get it. They’ll get it all from you, sooner or later, because they own this fucking place.”


A short excerpt from the video “Life Is Worth Losing” (2005).

– Leaked Documents Show How Blackstone Fleeces Taxpayers via Public Pension Funds (Liberty Blitzkrieg, May 5, 2014):

The following story by David Sirota at PandoDaily is simply excellent. It zeros in on the secretive and rapidly expanding relationship between private equity firms and the public pensions that invest in them. It shows a crony capitalist love affair greased by lobbyist influence peddlers known as “placement agents,” as well as non-public agreements between PE firms and public pensions chock full of conflicts of interest, extremely high fees and underperformance. Unbelievably, in many instances the trustees of the public pensions are not allowed to know what funds the “fund of funds” invest in. This makes due diligence impossible, and in one particularly egregious example it led the Kentucky Retirement Systems to unknowingly invest in SAC Capital despite the fact it was under SEC investigation at the time.

Furthermore, with the Wall Street Journal reporting back in 2011 that $37 of every $100 dollars invested in Blackstone’s investment pool coming from state and local pension plans, it appears that taxpayers are once again being fleeced by the financial oligarch class. Additionally, it appears to answer a recent question I posed in my piece: Is the Credit Bubble Popping? Carlyle Group Warns on Frothiness and Junk Bond Deals Get Pulled. After reading about a growing pool of insane “dividend deals” and payment-in-kind” notes being issued, I wondered who in their right mind was buying these deals. Well, based on the complete lack of competence and due diligence happening at public pension funds, I think we have solved part of the mystery. 

Read moreLeaked Documents Show How Blackstone Fleeces Taxpayers Via Public Pension Funds

A Jewish Defector Warns America: Benjamin Freedman Speaks On Zionism – Part I, Part II And Part III

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From the article:

“Act I was World War I. Act II was World War II. Act III is going to be World War III.”

Flashback:

– Top Israeli Rabbi Aharon Shteinman: Gentiles Are ‘Murderers, Thieves, Brainless’ (National Prayer Network)

– Influential Rabbi Ovadia Yosef: Non-Jews Are Donkeys, Created To Serve Jews (Jerusalem Post)

– Israel: Influential Rabbi Ovadia Yosef Calls For Palestinians To ‘Perish From The World’ (Daily Mail)

– Former Israeli Minister: ‘It’s a Trick, We Always Use It.’ (calling people ‘anti-Semitic’) (Democracy Now – Video)

– On RECORD: Benjamin Netanyahu: ‘America is something that can easily be moved.’ ‘The world won’t say a thing.’ ‘The world will say we’re defending.’ (Video)

A Hebrew Israeli radio station, Kol Yisrael, on October 3rd 2001 reported that during an argument in an Israeli cabinet meeting, Shimon Peres warned Prime Minister Ariel Sharon that unless he would heed American requests for a cease fire with the Palestinians, he could cause America to turn against Israel. In a fit of anger, Sharon responded to Peres:

“I want to tell you something very clear: Don’t worry about American pressure on Israel. We, the Jewish people, control America, and the Americans know it.”
– Ariel Sharon (Hebrew Israeli radio station, Kol Yisrael, on October 3rd 2001)

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– A Jewish Defector Warns America: Benjamin Freedman Speaks on Zionism – Part I (Veterans Today, Sep 8, 2011):

This speech was given 50 years ago – half a century ago! It is a classic now – well-known to many dissidents, especially historical revisionists. I am posting it today for those who never heard of it, because it permits us to look at today in light of yesterday and see a lot of parallels.

Let this lecture speak for itself:

Introductory Note

Mr. Freedman, born in 1890, was a successful Jewish businessman of New York City who was at one time the principal owner of the Woodbury Soap Company. He broke with organized Jewry after the Judeo-Communist victory of 1945, and spent the remainder of his life and the great preponderance of his considerable fortune, at least 2.5 million dollars, exposing the Jewish tyranny which has enveloped the United States.

Mr. Freedman knew what he was talking about because he had been an insider at the highest levels of Jewish organizations and Jewish machinations to gain power over our nation. Mr. Freedman was personally acquainted with Bernard Baruch, Samuel Untermyer, Woodrow Wilson, Franklin Roosevelt, Joseph Kennedy, and John F. Kennedy, and many more movers and shakers of our times.

This speech was given before a patriotic audience in 1961 at the Willard Hotel in Washington, D.C., on behalf of Conde McGinley’s patriotic newspaper of that time, Common Sense. Though in some minor ways this wide-ranging and extemporaneous speech has become dated, Mr. Freedman’s essential message to us — his warning to the West — is more urgent than ever before.

Read moreA Jewish Defector Warns America: Benjamin Freedman Speaks On Zionism – Part I, Part II And Part III

China Manufacturing PMI Misses 6th Month In A Row As Home Sales Collapse 47% YoY

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– China Manufacturing PMI Misses 6th Month In A Row As Home Sales Collapse 47% YoY (ZeroHedge, May 4, 2014):

For the 6th month in a row, China HSBC Manufacturing PMI missed expectations. With a 48.1 flash print for April (vs 48.3 expectation) this is a very modest rise from March’s 48.0 but is the 4th month in a row of contraction for the broader-based HSBC-version of the PMI (as opposed to the official more-SOE-biased version which remains in modest expansion). This is the longest streak of contraction since Oct 2012 (and the 3rd consecutive month of new order contraction). As if that was not enough to upset the ‘recovery is around the corner’ crew, home sales in China in the most recent (most frenetic typically) period, collapsed 47% year-over-year (and a stunning 65% in tier-2 cities). But apart from that – everything’s great in the newly appointed largest economy on earth…

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RECOVERY: The Number Of Working Age Americans Without A Job Has Risen By 27 MILLION Since 2000

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– The Number Of Working Age Americans Without A Job Has Risen By 27 MILLION Since 2000 (Economic Collapse, May 4, 2014):

Did you know that there are nearly 102 million working age Americans that do not have a job right now?  And 20 percent of all families in the United States do not have a single member that is employed.  So how in the world can the government claim that the unemployment rate has “dropped” to “6.3 percent”?  Well, it all comes down to how you define who is “unemployed”.  For example, last month the government moved another 988,000 Americans into the “not in the labor force” category.  According to the government, at this moment there are 9.75 million Americans that are “unemployed” and there are 92.02 million Americans that are “not in the labor force” for a grand total of 101.77 million working age Americans that do not have a job.  Back in April 2000, only 5.48 million Americans were unemployed and only 69.27 million Americans were “not in the labor force” for a grand total of 74.75 million Americans without a job.  That means that the number of working age Americans without a job has risen by 27 million since the year 2000.  Any way that you want to slice that, it is bad news.

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The Last Two Times This Happened, The Stock Market Crashed

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Related info:

– Marc Faber Warns ‘Social Media Stocks Are Just The Start, Market Crash Coming In 2nd Half’

– Gerald Celente: Economic Collapse By The End Of The Second Quarter 2014 (Video)

– The Last Two Times This Happened, The Stock Market Crashed (Testosterone Pit, May 2, 2014)

The last two times when margin debt reversed and fell after a record-breaking spike, all hell broke loose. In 2000, it was simultaneous. In 2007, it was delayed by a few months. Today, on the surface, everything is still hunky-dory. The Dow is just fractions below its all-time high that it set on Wednesday. But beneath the surface, parts of the stock market are already coming unglued, and holders of momentum stocks have been eviscerated.

The Nasdaq Biotech Index had beautifully shot up along an exponential curve. Then the hot air hissed out of it, and it swooned 21% in six weeks. The index includes big players, like Biogen, not just startups with big dreams and no drugs. After some buying on the dip, the index closed on Thursday down “only” 15%. But that hasn’t saved smaller momentum stocks: Exelixis is down 58% from its 52-week high and 92% from its all-time high shortly after its IPO in early 2000; Halozyme is down 60% from its high in early January. And so on.

Read moreThe Last Two Times This Happened, The Stock Market Crashed

Workers Younger Than 55 Lost 259K Jobs In April

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– Workers Younger Than 55 Lost 259K Jobs In April (ZeroHedge, May 2, 2014):

Taking another peek beneath the only headline that vacuum tubes and algos care about, namely the headline establishment survey print, reveals another mockery of a “recovery”, because in addition to the farce that 1 million Americans were added to the “not in labor force” number, a breakdown of jobs added by age group reveals more of the same. Namely, in the one most important age group for jobs, those workers aged 25-54 which represent the bulk of the US labor force and are also the best and most productive group, the total number of jobs tumbled from 95,360K to 95,151K, a drop of 209K!

But wait, because it wasn’t just the most important age group bucket: it was all younger workers who got the shaft: jobs in the 16-19 age group dropped by 24K, while those in the 20-24 age group declined by another 26K, which means that in the “young” workers category, those under 55, some 259K jobs were lost.

So did anyone gain jobs in April? Why yes: according to the establishment survey, the only beneficiary of whatever this “recovery” is, were workers aged 55-69, who gained 174K jobs.

…

Related info:

– Another Million People Drop Out Of Labor Force – Now An All Time High 92 Million People Are Out Of The Labor Force

Marc Faber Warns ‘Social Media Stocks Are Just The Start, Market Crash Coming In 2nd Half’

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Related info:

– Gerald Celente: Economic Collapse By The End Of The Second Quarter 2014 (Video)

– Marc Faber Warns “Social Media Stocks Are Just The Start, Market Crash Coming In 2nd Half” (ZeroHedge, May 2, 2014):

Having called for the demise of the hype/hope growth stocks, biotech, and social media schemes at the end of 2013, Marc Faber believes the weakness in those sectors is a signal of things to come (and that the so-called “rotation” to quality stocks is fallacious in the medium-term). Faber carefully notes that the size of markets allows some stocks to move up as others move down and so the overall market “looks” ok, but warns “we have already had a big break in parts of the market… but we haven’t had the big break in the overall market,” adding that “it’s too late to buy the US stock market,” confirming what we noted about Jeremy Grantham’s dismal outlook for US equities in the medium-term (and how and when the bubble bursts). Simply out, given yields around the world and the fundamentals, “individual investors have excessively optimistic expectations about their future returns,” which is terrible news for the record amounts of Greater Fools piling in as professionals pile out.

Another Million People Drop Out Of Labor Force – Now An All Time High 92 Million People Are Out Of The Labor Force

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– One Million People Dropped Out Of Labor Force In April: Participation Rate Plummets To Lowest Since 1978 (RT, May 2, 2014):

And so the BLS is back to its old data fudging, because while the Establishment Survey job number was a whopper, and the biggest monthly addition since January 2012, the Household Survey showed an actual decline of 73K jobs. What is much worse, is that the reason the unemployment rate tumbled is well-known: it was entirely due to the number of Americans dropping out of the labor force. To wit, the labor force participation rate crashed from 63.2% to 62.8%, trying for lowest since January 1978! And why did it crash so much – because the number of people not in the labor force soared to 92 million, the second highest monthly increase ever, or 988K, only ‘better’ than January 2012 which curiously was the one month when the establishment survey reported a 360K “increase” in jobs.

End result: the number out of the labor force is now an all time high 92 million, and the labor force tumbled by 800K to 155.4 million from 156.2 million as the delayed effect of the extended jobless benefits ending finally hits. What is most amusing is that the “persons who currently want a job” was unchanged at 6,146K – even the BLS said it was “puzzled why so many unemployed people are not looking for jobs.” We have some ideas, and no, they don’t include the addition of 234K “birth/death adjustment” jobs.

Participation Rate:

Read moreAnother Million People Drop Out Of Labor Force – Now An All Time High 92 Million People Are Out Of The Labor Force

EU Commissioner Warns “Any ‘Sensible’ Person Should Oppose Further Russia Sanctions”

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– EU Commissioner Warns “Any ‘Sensible’ Person Should Oppose Further Russia Sanctions” (ZeroHedge, May 2, 2014):

Obama won’t be happy! “It would harm everybody, the Europeans and the Russians,” warned Olli Rehn, the European Commissioner for Economic Affairs, adding that “any ‘sensible’ European Union citizen should oppose further sanctions on Russia because of the economic cost for Europe.” As Merkel and Obama cozy’d up for discussions this morning, we can only imagine the promises being made if only she will support his crusade (which she clearly was unwilling to judging from the press conference). Perhaps she should check in with her nation’s CEOs (who have vociferously demanded no more sanctions) and, as Rehn acknowledges, the slowing Russian economy is already having a “negative impact” on Finland and Austria, and “that economic fallout probably will spread to Germany, Poland and the Baltic countries.”

As Bloomberg reports, Europe should shun Russia sanctions on economic cost, according to Olli Rehn:

Read moreEU Commissioner Warns “Any ‘Sensible’ Person Should Oppose Further Russia Sanctions”

17 Facts To Show To Anyone That Believes That The U.S. Economy Is Just Fine

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– 17 Facts To Show To Anyone That Believes That The U.S. Economy Is Just Fine (Economic Collapse, April 29, 2014):

No, the economy is most definitely not “recovering”.  Despite what you may hear from the politicians and from the mainstream media, the truth is that the U.S. economy is in far worse shape than it was prior to the last recession.  In fact, we are still pretty much where we were at when the last recession finally ended.  When the financial crisis of 2008 struck, it took us down to a much lower level economically.  Thankfully, things have at least stabilized at this much lower level.  For example, the percentage of working age Americans that are employed has stayed remarkably flat for the past four years.  We should be grateful that things have not continued to get even worse.  It is almost as if someone has hit the “pause button” on the U.S. economy.  But things are definitely not getting better, and there are a whole host of signs that this bubble of false stability will soon come to an end and that our economic decline will accelerate once again.

The following are 17 facts to show to anyone that believes that the U.S. economy is just fine:

Read more17 Facts To Show To Anyone That Believes That The U.S. Economy Is Just Fine

Meanwhile, Gazprom Sends Ukraine A New Invoice … $3.49 BILLION! And Its Due The 7th Day Of May!

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Gazprom-Logo

– Meanwhile, Gazprom Sends Ukraine A New Invoice (ZeroHedge, April 30, 2014):

As the day of the IMF’s release of funds to Ukraine draws near – solving all their problems with yet more debt, we are told to believe – Russia’s Gazprom has gently reminded the Ukrainian government that it owes them… $3.49 billion! and its due the 7th day of May!

  • *GAZPROM SAYS UKRAINE OWES $3.49B FOR GAS AS OF APRIL 30

As Bloomberg reports,

Read moreMeanwhile, Gazprom Sends Ukraine A New Invoice … $3.49 BILLION! And Its Due The 7th Day Of May!