Authored by Ven Ram, Bloomberg cross-asset strategist,

Depending on how you are positioned on rates, there is a virtuous circle - or a vicious cycle - on display in the major global rates markets, with markets feeding off one another.

Correlations between German front-end bonds and comparable Treasuries, usually pretty remarkable, are now close closing in on 0.9.

Which is to say that much of the shift that we have seen in German front-end bonds reflects what is happening across the Atlantic.

That isn’t to say that recent rally in two-year German securities doesn’t have legs.

Between August and the end of November, the markets tried to push the yield on the maturity below 3% several times - and failed at each of those attempts.

But with the disinflationary narrative in the euro zone gaining credibility, the current rally is fully sanctified.

The degree of enthusiasm sweeping through the markets may also be seen in front-end gilts’ correlation with Treasuries, which has shot up from deeply negative levels - when UK and Treasury yields were marching in opposite directions - to around 0.7 now.

Given that the UK has arguably the most deeply embedded and worst inflation outlook among the major markets, one might think that moves in front-end gilts that are in lockstep with Treasuries are hardly justified.

However, there is an underlying message from the markets that speaks to their long-held conviction that central banks hunt in packs, never alone - meaning, should the Fed pivot, so will the European Central Bank and others possibly following in tow.

By Teeuwe Mevissen of Rabobank

Yesterday the first in-person meeting between European and Chinese leaders in four years took place. Covid made an earlier summit like this impossible so it was about time that leaders of both blocks would meet to discuss a plethora of topics that currently define EU-Sino relations. Despite the necessity of talks and policy coordination on cross border challenges, expectations regarding the outcome of the summit were modest at best. According to a summit background document published by the European Commission, five major topics were on the agenda:

• EU-China relations including economic and trade,

• Russia’s war of aggression against Ukraine,

• the situation in the Middle East,

• climate change,

• global health and pandemic preparedness.

While the EU will raise concerns about the current imbalance in EU-China trade relations, China reiterated that they want to be a key trading partner with the EU. This unfortunately does not solve EU’s increasing trade deficit with China and patience seems to be running out. In other words, EU-China’s trade relationship might be in the balance.

It is not expected that a ground-breaking resolution will be agreed upon. But aside from the economic and financial implications of EU-China trade relations, Covid – amongst others – also made clear that being over-reliant on certain key inputs from one or just a few countries leaves one vulnerable in times of crisis. Indeed, only yesterday we published a special report addressing EU’s vulnerabilities in an ever changing and increasingly fragmented world order. The low expectations that were voiced before the summit turned out to be a justified. While it is common that after summits like this a joint press statement is provided, none was given this time. Still it remains important that the EU and China continue to engage via top levels of government if only to cooperate on issues were both share common interests like climate change.  

This morning saw a slew of data coming from Japan. This followed a major shift in market expectations regarding future monetary policy of the Bank of Japan (BoJ). BoJ President Kazuo Ueda addressed members of parliament yesterday with the message that his job will become more challenging next year indicating possible changes in its monetary policy stance i.e. a departure from Japan’s negative policy rate. Soon after his deputy Ryozo rushed in to calm down markets with the message that no significant adverse impact is to be expected from a rate hike. Needless to say that this actually seems to confirm market expectations that the era of negative rates in Japan might soon be over. But looking at the most recent data that came out this morning, the BoJ’s mission to normalize monetary policy could be in jeopardy already. This morning it became clear that in the third quarter Japan’s economy shrunk with an annualized 2.9%, more than expected in the first estimate. Private consumption declined 0.2% compared to the previous quarter so not exactly the window of opportunity that the BoJ was looking for, perhaps.

All of this resulted in considerable strengthening of the yen against the dollar. At one point yesterday the yen gained 4% against the dollar and bearish bets on the yen were quickly abandoned. Thin liquidity added to the large swings that were observed yesterday. However a former executive director of the BoJ - Hideo Hayakawa - warned that markets have overreacted on yesterday’s comments from Kazuo Ueda. According to Hideo Hayakawa “This is probably a temporary market phenomenon,”. He added that “Ueda is looking for evidence. There is no need to rush now after intentionally choosing to be behind in coming this far.” While we already expected an appreciation of the yen vis a vis the dollar, yesterday’s pace already breached our 6 month forecast of 148 and at the moment of writing USDJPY is still at a level of just below 144, as our currency watcher Jane Foley notes. Therefore we also think that USDJPY is oversold at this moment but we do continue to expect a level of 142 in 12 months from now.

Authored by Michael Maharrey via SchiffGold.com,

Are “greedy” corporations driving inflation? Could taxing billionaires solve the federal government’s fiscal problems?

According to President Joe Biden, the answer to both questions is yes.

And the correct answer is no.

So, Biden is either economically ignorant or a liar. Or maybe both.

Biden put his economic ignorance on full display with a couple of comments last week.

Greedy Corporations Are Causing Inflation!

Biden made the first comment in a speech during the launch of a new White House supply chain initiative. It had to do with price inflation.

Any corporation that has not brought their prices back down, even as inflation has come down, even as the supply chains have been rebuilt, it’s time to stop the price gouging. Give the American consumer a break.”

The general public eats this stuff. Blaming greedy corporations for rising prices plays to the president’s base.

The truth is that corporations don’t create price inflation. One simply has to reason through the claim to uncover the absurdity of the idea. If corporations can willy-nilly raise prices and enjoy “excessive” profits, why don’t they do it all the time? Did corporations suddenly get greedy in 2021? And why did the Federal Reserve spend a decade fretting about inflation being “too low” as it struggled to hit its 2% target? Was there not enough corporate greed before the coronavirus?

But government people like Biden can get away with this narrative because they have redefined inflation.

Historically, economists defined inflation as an increase in the amount of money and credit — or put another way, an expansion in the money supply. Over the years, the government, along with its apologists in the corporate media and academia, altered the definition to suit government purposes. Today, inflation just means “rising prices.”

But rising prices in and of themselves aren’t inflation. Prices can go up for all kinds of reasons. For instance, we might have higher demand or supply shortages.

Rising prices aren’t inflation, but they are a symptom of monetary inflation. When governments and central banks increase the money supply,  ALL prices go up more than they otherwise would have.

Economist Ludwig von Mises explains the problem with this change in definitions.

“People today use the term `inflation’ to refer to the phenomenon that is an inevitable consequence of inflation, that is the tendency of all prices and wage rates to rise. The result of this deplorable confusion is that there is no term left to signify the cause of this rise in prices and wages. There is no longer any word available to signify the phenomenon that has been, up to now, called inflation. . . . As you cannot talk about something that has no name, you cannot fight it. Those who pretend to fight inflation are in fact only fighting what is the inevitable consequence of inflation, rising prices. Their ventures are doomed to failure because they do not attack the root of the evil. They try to keep prices low while firmly committed to a policy of increasing the quantity of money that must necessarily make them soar. As long as this terminological confusion is not entirely wiped out, there cannot be any question of stopping inflation.”

If we use the traditional definition of inflation as an “expansion of the supply of money,” the culprit becomes clear. Who expands the supply of money? It’s the Fed and the federal government. So, if you accurately define inflation, you know exactly who’s to blame. But if the government can fool people into believing that the effect of inflation is inflation, they can blame it on everybody but themselves.

Biden played it perfectly. It’s good politics, but it’s horrible economics.

The comment is even dumber than that. Biden implies that inflation “going down” means companies should lower their prices.

That’s not how this works. That’s not how any of this works.

When we say inflation is “cooling,” we just mean that based on the CPI, prices aren’t rising as fast as they were earlier this year. But prices are still rising. Now granted, the CPI in October was flat. Prices didn’t rise during that month. But they didn’t fall either. So, why should corporations cut prices? They are still paying much more to produce goods and services than they were last year.

How much more?

Since January 2022, prices have gone up 9.7% based on the CPI. And you should know that the CPI is designed to understate rising prices. They changed the formula in the 1990s. If we were using the CPI formula they used back then, CPI would be double what it is today.

To sum it up, prices have gone up almost 10% in less than two years (based on questionable government numbers). They are still going up today, just not quite as fast. And Biden is finger-pointing at corporations. Meanwhile, his administration is borrowing and spending like a drunken sailor, which, by the way, is inflationary.

And that brings us to Biden’s second ignorant statement.

Taxing Billionaires Will Fix Everything!

You won’t be surprised to learn Joe Biden wants to tax billionaires more.

A billionaire minimum tax of just 25% would raise $440 billion over the next 10 years. Imagine what we could do if we just made billionaires pay their taxes like everyone else.”

This is typical left-wing class warfare stuff. I don’t even want to get into the value of billionaires to society. Let’s just take it at face value, pretend billionaires are evil parasites, and look at the math.

That $440 billion sounds like a lot of money. And it is to normal people. But in government accounting, it’s basically pennies.

The US government spends around $500 billion every single month. That means the amount of money Uncle Sam could collect with this proposed tax over 10 years wouldn’t fund the government for one single month.

Let’s look at it another way. The US government paid $879 billion in interest expense during fiscal 2023. That means this $440 billion windfall would only pay half of the interest expense for one year.

Out of curiosity, I did a little digging. Turns out there are 740 American billionaires with a collective net worth of $5 trillion. Keep in mind, it’s not like these people have $5 trillion in cash sitting in a vault somewhere. A lot of that wealth is in stocks and real estate. A bad week in the stock market could drastically lower that number very quickly.

But let’s pretend they have that much money in cash. If the government took all of it – every single penny – it wouldn’t fund the government for a single year.

Last year, the Biden administration spent $6.46 trillion. You don’t have to have a Ph.D. in math to realize that’s bigger than $5 trillion.

Democrats especially like to use billionaires as a scapegoat. They pretend that if we just taxed these people more, the government could do whatever it wants, solve world hunger, and give you a unicorn.

It’s just not true.

The truth is the government spends too much. It borrows too much. The Fed creates inflation to do it. You pay the inflation tax every time you go to the grocery or the gas station. The government is stealing your wealth every single day.

Here’s the truth – despite what Joe Biden tells you, none of your problems are because of a billionaire.

Your biggest problem is politicians and government people. And they’re playing you.

With the 2024 election fast approaching and Democrat support for Israel's war on Hamas waning, the Biden administration - which is also trying to sell Congress on handing $14.3 billion in aid to Israel - has been ratcheting up pressure on Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to minimize civilian casualties, recognize and work with the Palestinian Authority, resume peace talks, and commit to not reoccupying Gaza.

The chances of that happening are virtually nil, however, as Netanyahu's government has made clear that Israel plans to destroy Hamas, retain an open-ended security presence in Gaza, impose a buffer zone to keep Palestinians away from the border, and never recognize the Palestinian Authority.

Despite the clear differences in vision for an endgame to this conflict, Israel knows the Biden administration is nothing more than a paper tiger in a dog mask, despite some 16,000 civilians reported dead by Gaza health authorities.

As the Washington Times notes;

But as the death toll in Gaza continues to rise, conditions deteriorate, and Biden enters an election year with significant portions of his Democratic base pushing for an end to Israel’s offensive, these differences are likely to grow in the absence of a clear endgame.

Shavit said that tensions could rise if the U.S. at some point concludes that Israel is dragging its feet or ignoring American demands. But for now, “the Americans want Israel to succeed,” he said.

Daniel Levy, a former Israeli peace negotiator who is president of the U.S./Middle East Project, a policy institute that studies the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, said the Americans are unlikely to put their foot down.

He cited what he described as a tepid American response to heavy civilian casualties in southern Gaza as an indicator of what lies ahead.

“Israelis have a sense that their road to run is not endless, but they still feel they have lots of road to run,” he said.

As we noted over the weekend, Biden's Defense Secretary, former Raytheon board member Lloyd Austin warned that Israel needs to be careful about civilian deaths.

"If you drive them into the arms of the enemy, you replace a tactical victory with a strategic defeat," he said. "So I have repeatedly made clear to Israel’s leaders that protecting civilians in Gaza is both a moral responsibility and a strategic imperative."

And on Thursday, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken issued a stern warning, that "civilian casualties remain too high and that Israel must step up its efforts to reduce them."

Blinken has also called on Israel to allow more humanitarian aid into Gaza.

On Wednesday, UN Secretary-General António Guterres invoked Article 99 of the UN charger, which allows him to raise to the Security Council's attention "any issue that may aggravate existing threats to the maintenance of international peace and security."

The letter to the 15-member council - the seventh in the UN's 78-year history in which Article 99 has been invoked - urged the body to "press to avert a humanitarian catastrophe," and unite in a call for a full humanitarian ceasefire.

I've just invoked Art.99 of the UN Charter - for the 1st time in my tenure as Secretary-General.

Facing a severe risk of collapse of the humanitarian system in Gaza, I urge the Council to help avert a humanitarian catastrophe & appeal for a humanitarian ceasefire to be declared. pic.twitter.com/pA0eRXZnFJ

— António Guterres (@antonioguterres) December 6, 2023

In response, Israeli Foreign Minister Eli Cohen flipped out - calling Guiterres' tenure "a danger to world peace," and that the call for ceasefire in Gaza amounted to supporting Hamas and their Oct. 7 terrorist attack on Israel.

Guterres’ tenure is a danger to world peace.
His request to activate Article 99 and the call for a cease fire in Gaza constitutes support of the Hamas terrorist organization and an endorsement of the murder of the elderly, the abduction of babies and the rape of women.
Anyone who…

— ??? ??? | Eli Cohen (@elicoh1) December 6, 2023

The Security Council was expected to hold an emergency meeting at 10AM ET on Friday in New York, after the UAE on Thursday submitted a draft resolution calling for an urgent humanitarian ceasefire which has the support of Arab and Islamic nations.

The UAE calls for a humanitarian ceasefire resolution to be adopted urgently and has just submitted a draft to the UNSC.

The situation in the Gaza Strip is catastrophic and close to irreversible. We cannot wait. The Council needs to act decisively to demand a humanitarian… https://t.co/mDr4c2F2FP

— UAE Mission to the UN (@UAEMissionToUN) December 6, 2023

Is 'King Bibi' sacrificing Israel to save his political career?

As The Cradle noted on Tuesday, while Netanyahu faces international pressure from both allies and adversaries to rethink his strategy, he's also trying to tamp down a domestic revolt withing his own Likud party - with reports circulating about deposing him through a Knesset vote of no confidence, after which another party member would be selected to lead the government.

Essentially, Netanyahu's political survival strategy centers on portraying himself as the lone defender against shallow US rhetoric for a two-state solution. Attempting to sidestep responsibility for the occupation state’s failures, Netanyahu now faces a resurgent Benny Gantz in the opposition. Recent Israeli polls predict a significant shift among the wider public, favoring opposition and Arab parties over the current right-wing coalition. Per the polling, a new coalition could be expected to win 79 seats, compared to 41 seats for the parties of the current Likud-far-right government. 

Israel’s precarious political situation has Netanyahu resisting any solution, settlement, or exit that could lead to legal consequences for him. He undermines his party by threatening immediate elections post-war if Likud's internal machinations against him don't stop - having already refused to step down from his post. 

More worrisome yet is that despite Israel's devastating past war experiences in Lebanon, Netanyahu may view a northern war as his only potential escape route - a way to reshuffle his political fortunes to avoid corruption charges and face his military failures. Why not play Russian roulette with Lebanon when the only other option is a long stretch in a prison cell?

Meanwhile, the clock is ticking on the 2024 US election, and then there's the matter of the $14.3 billion courtesy (though not by choice) of the US taxpayer.

Authored by James Rickards via DailyReckoning.com,

Are gold prices and interest rates joined at the hip? Based on recent market action, it would appear the answer is: yes.

A major rally in gold is now underway. Gold moved from $1,831 per ounce on Oct. 6 to $2,091 per ounce on Dec. 1, a 14.1% rally in just eight weeks and a new all-time high price for gold.

Gold has pulled back to $2,037 as of today, but that’s not surprising given its previous surge. Like every other asset, gold can sometimes get ahead of itself and experience a pullback. Importantly, it’s still holding firm above $2,000.

This rally correlated almost perfectly with the rally in 10-year Treasury notes that occurred at the same time. Treasury note rates plunged from 5.00% on Oct. 19 to 4.17% as of today. That 83-basis point drop may seem small but it’s not.

That’s like an earthquake in the world of Treasury notes. As explained below, market signs indicate that these dual rallies and close correlations will continue for months to come.

This dual rally gives investors a double-barreled opportunity to make huge gains.

DVO1: A Quirk of Bond Math

As interest rates drop, the market value of Treasury notes goes up. That’s bond math 101. Yet there’s a quirk in the bond math that many investors (and even financial advisers) don’t appreciate.

When interest rates drop, bond prices go up. But the rate at which they go up relative to each drop in rates (measured in basis points or 0.01%) isn’t constant.

The dollar value of the capital gain for each basis point drop in rates rises as interest rates hit lower levels. (The technical name for this is DVO1 for “dollar value of one basis point.” You don’t need to be expert on this; it’s just useful to understand the concept).

Put differently, if interest rates drop from 7.0% to 6.5%, notes have a capital gain. If rates drop from 4.0% to 3.5%, they also have a capital gain. In both cases, the rate drop is 0.50%. But the capital gain in the second case is materially larger than in the first case.

Right now, we’re in that zone where rates are low and going lower, which means the capital gains are getting larger. That’s a big win for investors on a security with almost no credit risk.

What Explains the Gold Rally?

What accounts for the rally in gold prices? There are numerous factors that affect the gold price, but certain factors dominate at certain times. Right now, the key factor is interest rates. Rates are going down at a rapid pace and gold is going up in a kind of synchronicity. Why?

The simplest explanation for the correlation is that Treasury notes and gold are both high-quality assets that compete for investor allocations. Gold does not have a yield (although it can produce significant capital gains).

When yields on Treasuries drop, the zero yield on gold is relatively more attractive compared with the note yield and gold prices start to rally.

The key questions for investors are: Will rates continue to drop? And will gold continue to rally in sync with falling rates?

To forecast rates, we have to look at economic fundamentals. (By the way, the Federal Reserve is almost irrelevant for this purpose. The Fed controls the short end of the yield curve only and has almost no impact on longer-term rates including the 10-year Treasury note rate we are considering here.)

One conundrum of recent U.S. economic performance is that GDP has remained robust while signs of a recession and possible a financial crisis keep accumulating.

The Trend Isn’t the Economy’s Friend

U.S. GDP was 2.2% in the first quarter of 2023, 2.1% in the second quarter and a strong 4.9% in the third quarter. The best estimate for fourth-quarter growth from the Atlanta Fed is currently 1.2%, a substantial drop from the third quarter.

If that Q4 figure holds, growth for the entire year of 2023 will come in around 2.5%. That’s not too shabby, and it’s slightly better than the 2.2% average annual growth from 2009–2019 in the 10-year period between the global financial crisis and the pandemic.

In any case, it’s a far cry from a recession.

Still, a focus on full-year growth of around 2.5% ignores the trend. When growth goes from 4.9% in the third quarter to 1.2% in the fourth quarter, something extreme happened. It’s almost certainly the case that consumers slammed on the brakes in October.

Recession signs are real and growing worse. These include credit contraction, rising bad debts, increasing jobless claims, collapsing commercial real estate markets, contracting world trade, inverted yield curves and many other reliable technical indicators.

How can the economy be headed into recession after such strong growth recently?

The Credit Crunch Reckoning Begins

The riddle is solved by the fact that the economy has been propped up by the consumer. That explains the growth. But the consumer has been on a non-sustainable path. That explains the warning signs.

The consumer came out of the pandemic with a head of steam provided by handouts from Trump ($1,800 per adult), and Biden (also about $1,400 per adult) between April 2020 and March 2021. That was supplemented by $900 billion of Paycheck Protection Program loans, which were forgiven one year later.

Student loan payments were suspended from 2020–2023. The Federal Reserve held interest rates at zero from 2020–2022. Then the misnamed Inflation Reduction Act of August 2022 handed $1 trillion of taxpayer money to Green New Scam businesses and other pet projects.

With that money, Americans were able to pay down credit card balances and build up savings. It was a powerful double-dose of fiscal and monetary stimulus. Much of this operates with a lag so the growth momentum carried over into 2023.

Now it’s all gone. Short-term interest rates are over 5%. Mortgage rates are over 7%. Student loan repayments have started again. There are no more pandemic handouts. Americans’ savings are depleted, and their credit cards are tapped out.

Now the reckoning begins. In fact, the recession may already be here.

Bad Omens

Interest rates do not typically peak at the start of a recession; they peak somewhat after the recession begins. Businesses see revenues decline and turn to lines of credit to help with cash flow.

Only later, when unemployment goes up and credit losses accumulate, do banks rein in credit and then interest rates start to decline. We may already be at that stage. The fact that interest rates are already in sharp decline suggests the recession has already begun.

The importance of this for investors is that interest rate declines have much further to go (probably down to the level of 2% or lower over the next six months), which means gold prices have further to rise (perhaps to the $2,300 per ounce level or higher).

With both trends in place and a positive feedback loop between them, this is a once-in-a-decade opportunity for investors.

It really doesn’t get much better than that!

Authored by Paul Joseph Watson via Modernity.news,

Comedian Bill Burr told talk show host Jimmy Kimmel that liberals are “fucking stupid” to have turned Trump into a martyr and that “he’s coming back” for revenge.

Burr made the comments in the context of saying how he’d teach his kids about narcissists and sociopaths.

“If you wanna see a great case on narcissism, liberals are so fucking stupid the way they handled Trump – you should shut up!” said Burr, adding “he’s a narcissist – neutral energy – neutral.”

Kimmel, who had one of the most severe cases of Trump derangement syndrome for years, wondered if the Donald would “go away” if leftists ignored him.

BILL BURR: “Liberals are so f**king stupid the way that they handled Trump…You should shut up…! You idiot liberals…indicted him! And now he’s a martyr!”

pic.twitter.com/ORSMQo9Baq

— Benny Johnson (@bennyjohnson) December 7, 2023

Burr suggested that Trump was fading away until “you idiot liberals…indicted him and now he’s a martyr,” adding, “He’s coming back, Jimmy! He’s coming back! It’s gonna be great for comedy – he’s coming back!”

The comedian went on to assert that he wanted to vote for someone in their 40’s for president who would have to “live with their decisions.”

“With any luck, they’ll both die of natural causes before the election and maybe you could get somebody that still has something to live for,” said Burr, referring to Biden and Trump.

Kimmel then tried to move the show on quickly while Burr exclaimed, “Wait a minute!”

Maybe Burr should give the same advice to his own wife, who very much appears to be suffering from her own clinical case of Trump derangement syndrome too.

*  *  *

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Microsoft and OpenAI's multibillion-dollar partnership is under scrutiny from the UK's Competition and Markets Authority over potential competition concerns. 

In a statement Friday, CMA said it's considering whether Microsoft's partnership with ChatGPT-creator OpenAI is effectively a merger. It said it had begun an "information gathering process," which typically comes before an investigation. 

"There have recently been a number of developments in the governance of OpenAI, some of which involved Microsoft. In light of these developments, the CMA is now issuing an ITC [Invitation to Comment] to determine whether the Microsoft / OpenAI partnership, including recent developments, has resulted in a relevant merger situation and, if so, the potential impact on competition," CMA said. 

Last month, Sam Altman, founder of OpenAI, was abruptly terminated by the company's board. However, he rejoined the company a week later following a threatened mass exodus by most staff. This incident led to a shakeup of the board, resulting in Microsoft, which owns a 49% share in OpenAI, gaining one board member seat. 

CMA also said the pace of AI technology is "unrivaled in economic history" and that conversational generative artificial intelligence chatbots like OpenAI's ChatGPT or Elon Musk's xAI's Grok represent a "pivotal moment in the development of this transformative technology."

"The invitation to comment is the first part of the CMA's information gathering process and comes in advance of launching any phase 1 investigation, which would only happen once the CMA has received the information it needs from the partnership parties," Sorcha O'Carroll, senior director for mergers at the CMA, said in a statement.

Microsoft President and Vice Chair Brad Smith responded to the CMA news, telling The Wall Street Journal: 

"Since 2019, we've forged a partnership with OpenAI that has fostered more AI innovation and competition, while preserving independence for both companies. The only thing that has changed is that Microsoft will now have a non-voting observer on OpenAI's board, which is very different from an acquisition." 

CMA has investigated Microsoft before. Earlier this year, it blocked the takeover of Activision Blizzard until Microsoft changed the deal to sell cloud gaming rights outside Europe to Ubisoft. 

The US Office of the Comptroller of the Currency - the powerful federal banking regulator - issued guidance to banks and federal savings associations to address the rising risks surrounding the buy now, pay later (BNPL) craze sweeping across consumers. 

BNPL allows consumers to spend money they don't have over several interest-free installments, which are generally unreported to credit bureaus. The overuse and poor understanding of BNPL terms can be disastrous for consumers and lead to overindebtedness. 

OCC's guidance to banks stated they "should maintain underwriting, repayment terms, pricing, and safeguards that minimize adverse customer outcomes and should ensure that marketing materials and disclosures are clear and conspicuous." 

"As the buy-now-pay-later market grows and we enter the holiday shopping season, the guidance confirms our expectation that OCC-supervised institutions offering these products do so in a responsible manner," Acting Comptroller Michael J. Hsu wrote in a statement. 

OCC's guidance to banks to safeguard consumers comes as BNPL usage during Black Friday and Cyber Monday surged to record highs. 

According to the Bank for International Settlements, BNPL is mainly used by folks with low income, lacking education, and under 35. 

BIS warned: "There is evidence from the United States that BNPL users are particularly risky." 

There are many hidden risks of using BNPL, such as missing a payment, which could trigger high fees and interest. 

The higher use of BNPL is no surprise, considering 'Bidenomics' has failed the working poor.

The Dubai conference on climate change, or COP28, is currently underway, running from November 30 to December 12, 2023.

The international conference will bring together representatives from countries that are signatories to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change.

One of the main objectives of COP28 is to continue the development of energy transition and accelerate the phase-out of fossil fuels, major sources of greenhouse gasses and air pollutants. Beyond their impact on the climate, fossil fuels such as coal, oil, and gas also pose significant pollution problems; for example, their combustion emits fine particles (PM2.5).

According to the World Health Organization (WHO), prolonged exposure to these particles is likely to create or worsen various health problems, such as high blood pressure or diabetes. While the WHO has recommended a maximum level of five micrograms of PM2.5 per cubic meter of air for prolonged exposure since 2021, the vast majority of cities in the European Union far exceed this threshold.

As Statista's Anna Fleck shows in the infographic below, based on data from the European Environment Agency compiled by Toute l’Europe, the most polluted city with PM2.5 in the EU in 2021-2022 was Slavonski Brod, Croatia, where the average was nearly six times the recommended maximum level, or 28 µg/m³.

Moreover, many of the cities most affected by PM2.5 are located in Poland, a country still heavily dependent on coal, which emits a high amount of fine particles when burned.

In Italy, the Po Valley, due to its geography and concentration of industrial activities, remains one of the most polluted regions in Europe by fine particles, leading to the presence of two Italian cities at the top of the list.

You will find more infographics at Statista

On the other end of the spectrum, based on data from the European Environment Agency compiled by the website Toute l’Europe, ten cities in Europe remained below the recommended level of fine particles by the WHO.

You will find more infographics at Statista

In 2021-2022, the least polluted European city in the study was Faro, Portugal, where the average concentration of PM2.5 in the air was only 3.7 µg/m³. Next were two Swedish cities, Umeå (3.9 µg/m³) and Uppsala (4 µg/m³).

Welsh students are falling further behind their peers in the United Kingdom at school, according to the newly released 2022 results of the Program for International Student Assessment (PISA) by the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD).

The national averages for performance across maths, science and reading were lower in Wales than in England, Scotland and Northern Ireland, highlighting a regional education gap that persists in the UK.

As Statista's Anna Fleck reports, Wales was also the only country of the four to drop below the OECD averages, which were calculated based on the test results of 690,000 students across 81 countries and economies. And it seems that this gap is getting wider: Where the national scores dropped in all three core subjects across the four UK regions, the greatest declines for each subject were in Wales.

You will find more infographics at Statista

As this chart shows, England achieved the highest scores for maths, science and reading.

Scotland performed second-best for reading, while Northern Ireland was second runner for science.

Students performed the worst in maths in each UK country in 2022 and it was also the subject with the greatest fall in attainment per country since 2018. This mirrors a global trend, as the OECD nations analysed showed an average decline of 15 points in maths since 2018.

According to the OECD, a change of 20 points equates to approximately a full year of education. This means that since the last PISA exams in 2018, students in Wales performed on average as if they were a full year behind in maths, just under a year behind in reading and three-quarters of a year behind in science.

Plaid Cymru’s education spokesperson, Heledd Fychan MS, has cited youth poverty rates leading to? high pupil absenteeism, school budget deficits and a recruitment crisis in the education sector among the reasons for the lower results.

“Despite the hard work and dedication of an overstretched workforce, the pupil attainment gap is widening and we cannot ignore the link between poverty and [Tuesday’s] disappointing results”, she said.

In the OECD report, other reasons for the observed declines across many OECD countries include interruptions from school closures during the Covid-19 pandemic as well as the longer-term issues of teaching quality and lack of resources.

Since the 2022 PISA tests were taken, Wales has already started rolling out a new Curriculum for Wales.

There were an estimated 1.3 million new HIV infections in 2022, according to UNAIDS latest report.

While still too high, this figure is the lowest in decades, with declines particularly strong in regions with the highest HIV burdens.

As Statista's Anna Fleck shows in the following chart, Eastern and southern Africa have seen a fall of 57 percent of new HIV infections between 2010 and 2022.

However, the region still has the highest number of new cases annually, with 500,000 recorded new infections in 2022.

You will find more infographics at Statista

Asia and the Pacific had the second highest number of new cases at 300,000 worldwide, yet also saw a substantial fall, this time of -14 percent, over the 12 year period.

Three regions have seen increases in the number of HIV infections in that time frame:

• Latin America (+8 percent), 

• Eastern Europe and central Asia (+49 percent),

• and the Middle East and North Africa (+61 percent).

According to the report, the biggest decreases in numbers of new infections were among children (aged 0-14 years) and young people (aged 15-24 years).

This is partly due to fewer new HIV infections in women and higher coverage of treatment among people living with HIV.

December 1 marked World AIDS Day.

Authored by Albin Sadar via American Greatness,

The release of more video and cell phone tapes from January 6 by new House Speaker Mike Johnson shows further evidence of a setup by the Feds that their so-called insurrection was staged.

All sides will acknowledge the fact that then-Speaker Nancy Pelosi refused to have extra security on January 6.

However, there is a bigger question that no one, Left, Right or Center, seems to be asking:

Why?

Why wouldn’t Pelosi want to be sure that “Democracy was secure” so that Vice President Mike Pence could certify the Electoral College vote? Making sure that the Capitol was safe and sound would mean that Joe Biden’s presidency would be assured. After all, the election of 2020 was “the most secure in American history,” so why wouldn’t you want that obvious fact certified and rubber-stamped by Congress?

The only obvious answer to why Pelosi wanted to guarantee a riotous breach of the Capitol was what she knew would be the actual results of the Electoral College vote if the process were allowed to run its course. Senators Ted Cruz and Josh Hawley, among others, had previously made noise about challenging election results in several swing states. And despite what many have debated, there was tangible potential for Pence to delay the certification for a couple of weeks to look into the evidence of significant vote-tampering and fraud.

How do we know that the vice president had the authority to stop the certification? Well, because the ability for the position of vice president to do just that was changed by a vote of Congress relatively recently after the events of January 6. Why would you change something that did not need to be changed?

So, at the time, Pelosi knew that a halt in the proceedings would lead to an investigation. And an investigation would lead to those questions being covered, albeit reluctantly, by the entire mainstream media. What actually transpired over the three additional days of counting in the 2020 Election would be exposed. And the narrative of the most secure election in American history would crumble in front of the eyes of everybody in this country and across the globe.

To this day, then, as the new Speaker takes a serious look at the events of January 6 and as America and the world itself can see exposed in the recently-released video evidence, we must address what happened that particular day – specifically, the reason that the crowds of tens of thousands had gathered. The patriots in Washington, D.C. showed up to highlight one very important message: “Stop the Steal.”

Pelosi’s action – as well as inaction – diverted attention from that message; she refocused our sights on the word “insurrection” in order to keep President Donald Trump from returning to the White House as a result of the true, states’ election totals of 2020. And the Left continues nonstop that charade in order to keep Trump from the White House in 2024.

With each passing day, it is becoming increasingly apparent that the two biggest blemishes recently on America as a great and free nation are the stolen presidential election of 2020, and the subsequent incarceration of those patriots who exercised their guaranteed First Amendment right to free speech to contest it. The election tampering advanced the Left’s directive of “fundamental transformation” of the country, which included imprisonment without bail or trial of those with whom the tyrannical administration disagreed.

So, what next?

Unless the country itself can see that the narrative presented by the Left regarding January 6, 2021, was a smoke screen for the real insurrection of November 3, 2020, America will need to brace itself for a repeat performance of that nefarious action on November 5, 2024.

*  *  *

Albin Sadar is author of Obvious: Seeing the Evil That’s in Plain Sight and Doing Something About It, as well as the children’s book collection, Hamster Holmes: Box of Mysteries.

Fortnite, Minecraft, Call of Duty, Super Mario or Grand Theft Auto: Even many non-gamers recognize at least some of these highly successful titles and franchises, be it by name or their cultural impact.

As Statista's Florian Zandt details below, when viewed through an economic lens, there are two game series that have dominated the sales charts in the United States for the past decade.

The first and overall leader in terms of total entries in the top 10 selling games in the U.S. between 2013 and 2022 according to market analysts at NPD Group is Call of Duty. The franchise has been present among the top sellers with 11 individual games since 2013, snagging the top spot every single year apart from two instances.

You will find more infographics at Statista

In 2018, Red Dead Redemption 2 trumped Call of Duty: Black Ops 4, while Grand Theft Auto V rushed to the top in 2013, followed by Call of Duty: Ghosts.

It's worth noting that while Call of Duty turned out to be a cash cow for its parent company, this success can't overshadow that Activision Blizzard, which is now owned by Microsoft, was at the center of several scandals surrounding alleged toxic workplace culture and sexual harassment over the past years.

The second and third spots are indicative of U.S. Americans' love for all things sports.

The American Football simulation Madden was represented in the top 10 every single year, while Take-Two's NBA 2K series dropped out of the ranking of the best-selling games in the U.S. starting with NBA 2K21.

Grand Theft Auto V remains a singularity in this ranking, though. While most other games managed to enter the top 10 with new franchise installments, Rockstar Games achieved this feat for five years with a single game.

Authored by Bin Zhao and Sean Tseng via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

In a landmark ruling, a Japanese court has convicted a non-profit executive of facilitating illegal overseas organ transplants for Japanese citizens.

On Nov. 28, the Tokyo District Court sentenced 63-year-old Hiromichi Kikuchi, chairman of the Association for Patients of Intractable Diseases, a non-profit organization. Kikuchi received an eight-month prison term and a fine of 1 million yen (around $6,800) for arranging organ transplants abroad for two Japanese citizens without government approval. His organization, which has been working with transplant patients for over fifteen years, is now under scrutiny.

The case, the first of its kind in Japan, has prompted widespread media coverage and heightened concerns over illegal organ transplants.

Mr. Kikuchi's conviction shows Japan's efforts to crack down on organ trafficking and forced organ harvesting. The transplants that led to his arrest took place in Belarus in 2022. However, the case has drawn attention to the grim reality of forced organ harvesting in China, as Mr. Kikuchi admitted that the vast majority of the transplants he has orchestrated since 2007 involved organs from China.

On June 25, 2022, The Epoch Times Japanese edition published an exclusive interview with Ushio Sugawara, a former member of Japan's largest "Yakuza" crime syndicate, Yamaguchi-gumi.

Mr. Sugawara, who left the underworld in 2015 to become an economic commentator, recalled an incident from 2007. At that time, he was involved in a liver transplant for a friend's brother, arranged through an intermediary, and costing about $220,000. The liver transplant took place at Beijing's Armed Police General Hospital.

After arriving in China, Mr. Sugawara visited his friend's brother at the hospital the day before the scheduled surgery.

He described seeing the donor, a 21-year-old Falun Gong practitioner labeled a "terrorist" and sentenced to death, unconscious and medicated, with bandages on his hands and feet. The hospital staff explained that the severing of tendons in the donor's hands and feet was to prevent escape and ensure the quality of the organs.

The transplant ultimately failed, resulting in the deaths of both the recipient and the donor.

After the report on forced organ harvesting practices by The Epoch Times Japan, several prominent Japanese media outlets, including Yomiuri Shimbun, Japan's largest newspaper, launched investigations into Japanese intermediaries in overseas organ transplants and found evidence against the Association for Patients of Intractable Diseases and Mr. Kikuchi.

The non-profit, according to its website, has been connecting Japanese patients with overseas hospitals, primarily in China, for organ transplants since 2003.

This timeline coincides with when Chinese hospitals began aggressively marketing organ transplants to foreign nationals.

Canadian human rights lawyer David Matas and the late David Kilgour, a former Canadian cabinet minister, have long investigated the Chinese Communist Party's (CCP's) organ transplant practices. Their 2006 report, which was expanded into the book "Bloody Harvest," raised suspicions that the CCP was illicitly harvesting organs and particularly targeting Falun Gong practitioners.

In 2016, Mr. Matas, together with Kilgour and London-based investigative journalist Ethan Gutmann, published "Bloody Harvest/The Slaughter: An Update." The 680-page report estimated that China was conducting 60,000 to 100,000 transplant surgeries annually.

Presiding Judge Baba Yoshiro said Mr. Kikuchi recruited patients for overseas organ transplants and expedited organ transplant surgeries within a matter of a few months. Japan's organ transplant law outlaws the sale of human organs and profiting through intermediaries.

In a startling admission, Mr. Kikuchi revealed that over the past two decades, his organization had facilitated about 170 transplants, with 90 percent of patients receiving transplants in Chinese hospitals. He highlighted the cost-effectiveness of the operations, noting that prices in China were significantly lower than in the United States. Following the COVID-19 pandemic and ensuing travel restrictions, Mr. Kikuchi shifted his focus to Eastern Europe and Central Asia.

Mr. Kikuchi also outlined the costs involved: 20 million yen (approximately $136,000) for a kidney, 30 million yen (around $204,000) for a liver, 30–40 million yen ($204,000–$272,000) for a heart, and 40–50 million yen ($272,000–$340,000) for lungs. These figures included surgery, travel, and intermediary fees.

On Nov. 28, the court handed down its final verdict: Mr. Kikuchi was sentenced to eight months in prison and fined 1 million yen (about $6,778).

The decision was widely discussed online, with some Japanese netizens expressing outrage: "This group's inhumane acts, forcibly extracting organs from young individuals in China, are utterly deplorable," read one post.

Another post criticized the leniency of the sentence: "Kikuchi is essentially an accomplice to murder; this punishment is insufficient."

Initially, Mr. Kikuchi had maintained his innocence, claiming his actions "saved hundreds of lives." However, Hiroaki Maruyama, a representative for the Stop Medical Genocide (SMG) Network, vehemently disagreed with this perspective.

In an interview with The Epoch Times, Mr. Maruyama said the "Chinese hospitals' organ extractions from living persons for profit" contrasted with the principles of medical ethics.  Mr. Kikuchi, by engaging in these activities, not only abetted them but also implicated many Japanese patients unaware of the truth, he said.

Mr. Maruyama emphasized that Mr. Kikuchi's arrest and conviction, along with the media coverage surrounding it, shed light on a network of illegal intermediaries tied to the global organ black market, particularly CCP's large-scale forced organ harvesting.

These revelations represent just the surface of a much darker reality, he stressed. He called for legislation preventing Japanese citizens from seeking organ transplants in countries like China, which are known for human rights violations.

Authored by Megan Redshaw via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

New legislation in Illinois would allow individuals receiving blood donations to know whether they’re receiving blood from an individual vaccinated with a COVID-19 vaccine or another messenger RNA (mRNA) vaccine.

Bill HB4243, introduced on Nov. 29 by Illinois state Rep. Jed Davis, amends the Illinois Clinical Laboratory and Blood Bank Act and would require blood banks to test donated blood for evidence of COVID-19 vaccines and other mRNA components, including lipid nanoparticles and spike protein—and requires a blood donor to disclose during each donor screening process whether they have received a COVID-19 vaccine or any other mRNA vaccine during their lifetime.

Additionally, the bill imposes labeling requirements for blood or blood components that test positive for evidence of a COVID-19 vaccine or other mRNA vaccine component or were obtained from a donor who received a COVID-19 vaccine or other mRNA vaccine.

“A constituent approached me concerned about her son's upcoming surgery. What if he needed a blood transfusion with the long-term impacts concerning mRNA vaccines unknown? As a parent myself, her concern and corresponding question feel warranted,” Mr. Davis told The Epoch Times in an email.

“This conversation was the catalyst for my bill delineating blood donations and mRNA vaccines. We disclose medical information all the time with providers, so why not our vaccine history? It's an easy ask, and I'm proud to sponsor this bill.”

Once a bill is introduced in Illinois, it is read and referred to the Rules Committee and will then be assigned to a substantive committee. For elected officials like Mr. Davis, he believes that part of his job is to translate the concerns or ideas of constituents into legislation when applicable—and that every bill, including HB4243, originated from someone walking through his office door. “Without hesitation, helping people is such a blessing and honor,” he said.

Concerned about blood transfusions from people vaccinated against COVID-19, a Republican lawmaker in Montana introduced a bill earlier this year that would have made it a misdemeanor offense for anyone who received a COVID-19 vaccine to donate tissue or blood. However, the bill was tabled quickly in a 19 to 1 vote.

Unlike the bill introduced in Montana, HB4243 does not criminalize individuals who donate blood if they’ve received a COVID-19 vaccine. It merely allows people receiving blood products to know whether the blood they’re receiving came from a vaccinated individual and requires blood blanks to add this information to product labels so that patients can make informed decisions.

According to the Red Cross, there is no waiting period for those who received a COVID-19 vaccine—as long as they are symptom-free and feel well at the time of donation. If an individual doesn’t know which vaccine they received, they must wait two weeks to donate blood.

The Association for the Advancement of Blood & Biotherapies, America’s Blood Centers, and the American Red Cross do not believe COVID-19 vaccines pose a risk to patients receiving blood transfusions.

In a joint statement issued on Jan. 26, the three organizations said there is no “scientific evidence that demonstrates adverse outcomes from the transfusions of blood products collected from vaccinated donors and, therefore, no medical reason to distinguish or separate blood donations from individuals who have received a COVID-19 vaccination.”

The statement further reads that the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA), on multiple occasions, has confirmed that there is no evidence to support concerns about the safety of blood donated by vaccinated individuals. However, the FDA has not provided data showing it is safe to receive blood donated from vaccinated individuals, and many studies have found mRNA from COVID-19 vaccines circulating in the blood or plasma of recently vaccinated individuals.

A 2022 study published in Biomedicines found synthetic mRNA in Pfizer’s COVID-19 vaccine persists in the blood of vaccinated individuals for at least two weeks post-vaccination.

A January study published in the Journal of Pathology, Microbiology, and Immunology found full-length or traces of SARS-CoV-2 spike mRNA vaccine sequences from both Pfizer and Moderna in the blood of some vaccinated individuals up to 28?days after COVID-19 vaccination.

“We expect that vaccine mRNA detected in plasma is contained within LNPs [lipid nanoparticles] and that the LNPs in plasma have been slowly released from the injection site either directly to the blood or through the lymph system,” the authors wrote.

In a January study in Circulation, researchers found persistently elevated circulating levels of full-length spike protein in the blood of adolescents and young adults who developed myocarditis following COVID-19 vaccination.

A 2022 study in Clinical Infectious Diseases found circulating S1 antigens from the SARS-CoV-2 spike protein in the plasma of participants vaccinated with Moderna’s COVID-19 vaccine. Antigens are the weakened or inactive parts of a particular organism—in this case, the spike protein—that triggers an immune response within the body. Researchers also confirmed that the detected S1 antigens resulted from vaccination and not natural infection.