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In The Twilight Of An Incredible Boom

A weekend topic starting with a press release. “ATTOM released its third-quarter 2021 U.S. Residential Property Mortgage Origination Report, which shows that 3.59 million mortgages secured by residential property (1 to 4 units) were originated in the third quarter of 2021 in the United States. It marked the first time in more than two years that total lending decreased in two consecutive quarters. More notably, it was the first time in any year since at least 2000 that lending activity declined in both the second and third quarters, which usually are peak buying seasons.”

“The continued dip in total loan activity during the third quarter represented a growing sign that the nation’s appetite for new home loans is easing – and that the nation’s decade-long housing market boom could even be cooling off. The latest trends have reversed patterns seen from early 2019 through early 2021, when total lending activity nearly tripled amid various forces that pushed a frenzy of refinancing and purchasing.”

The Dallas Morning News. “Here’s another sign that the housing market is slowing: The number of new home loans in Dallas-Fort Worth and nationwide is dropping. In the D-FW area, the number of home loans taken out in the third quarter was down more than 25% from a year ago. Home lending activity fell in the third quarter in more than 85% of the U.S. metro areas Attom Data surveys. The number of home loans fell in all of Texas’ major markets. Austin had the largest decline from a year ago, with the number of new mortgages falling by more than 30% in the third quarter. Houston mortgage activity was down 21%, and in San Antonio there were about 10% fewer home loans made than in third-quarter 2020.”

The Orlando Business Journal in Florida. “There were 31,757 mortgage loans originated for homes in metro Orlando last quarter, down 33% from the year before and down 4.5% from the second quarter, according to a Dec. 2 report by Attom Data Solutions. It was the first time since fourth-quarter 2019 that Orlando’s mortgage lending activity decreased quarter-over-quarter.”

From WFSU. “According to William O’Dell, director of the University of Florida’s Shimberg Center for Housing Studies, many Florida homes are selling for the same price they were before the Great Recession. O’Dell said in Florida, median single family home sales prices peaked in 2006. ‘At approximately $337,000. These numbers are adjusted for inflation. And then, of course, with the great recession, prices bottomed out by 2011 and then began this rise again through the remainder of this past decade,’ O’Dell told lawmakers.”

“O’Dell said in 2020, the statewide median for single family home sales prices was just over $300,000. He said Florida’s beginning to approach its 2006 peak. And he said in the panhandle and portions of North Florida, the median for single family home sales are now at those 2006 prices.”

From Bisnow Boston in Massachusetts. “Boston’s office market stands among the nation’s most resilient in th past year, despite metrics suggesting visitor traffic is down more than 50% over pre-pandemic volume in the city’s downtown. ‘People see Boston as really a safe haven,’ Newmark Executive Managing Director David Douvadjian said. ‘It’s really a developers market because there’s so much money out there right now.'”

“Douvadjian said, half-jokingly, Boston firms don’t know what recourse loans are anymore. ‘It’s so competitive, I hear it all the time,’ he said. ‘Hey Dave, we can’t lend in your market. I’m not going to waste my time because you’re going to beat my deal by 50 basis points.’ And we’re seeing it more and more.'”

From Multi-Housing News. “Multifamily lending is forecast to reach about $421 billion in 2022, up from the record $409 billion projected for 2021 and a 13 percent increase from 2020, according to MBA. ‘When you look at how you’d expect to see 2022 versus 2021, I think there’s still plenty of room to run in the market,’ said Brian Hirsh, vice president of Mesa West Capital Partners. ‘There’s a lot of equity out there that’s yet to be deployed.'”

The Escape Home. “Redfin CEO Glenn Kelman reminds us, ‘the second-home market depends more on the stock market than on interest rates, but rates usually affect the stock market. Rates are going up. Some buying is fueled by investors, but these folks are borrowing money too. An era of very low rates made it easy to cash-flow a house.'”

From Axios on Colorado. “The median price investors paid for a Denver home was $508,700, per Redfin. Troy Miller, executive director of the Investment Community of the Rockies, told the Denver Post, ‘Activity is very high because institutional buyers are chasing yield and are borrowing at close to nothing.’ He estimates that between five and seven institutional buyers are currently active in the Mile High City.”

From CBS News. “Boise is having its biggest gold rush since the 1860s. It’s called real estate, and the Idaho city now has the least affordable housing market in the U.S., according to one study. The issue is home prices in Boise dwarf residents’ incomes. A Boise Regional Realtors study found that the city’s median home price was almost $535,000 — 10 times higher than the city’s median income.”

The Idaho Press. “Idaho’s current median home price is $446,000, Zions Bank Chief Economist Robert Spendlove told the Associated Taxpayers of Idaho annual conference. ‘I know that this level of housing price appreciation is unsustainable,’ Spendlove said. ‘It is, like, literally mathematically impossible for us to continue to have this level of housing price appreciation.’ He said he’d like to see that 38% go back down to something like 5%. ‘My fear, of course, is that we see what we saw in 2009, where that big jump turns into big drops in housing prices.”

The Turlock Journal in California. “The lull is thanks to rising interest rates and increased inventory, says Turlock real estate agent Michael Rocha of Atlantic Realty, as well as ‘burnt-out’ buyers who are waiting for the competition to pass in order to purchase a home. ‘It’s good that we’re starting to see home prices start to become a little more stagnant because it’s a sign of a healthy market,’ Rocha said. ‘And we were in a very unhealthy market for two years.'”

The Tribune News. “As home prices continue their record-breaking climb, the Federal Housing Finance Agency said this week that loan limits for mortgages that can be bought by Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac in 2022 will rise by the largest percentage ever. For much of the United States, the divide between conforming loans and jumbo mortgages will be $647,200. That’s an 18% increase from this year’s limit of $548,250. In pricey housing markets — including much of California, all of New York City, the District of Columbia and the entire states of Alaska and Hawaii — the new limit is $970,800, up from $822,375 in 2021.”

From Mortgage Grader. “Let the good times roll. You now can buy a $1,021,895 home in Los Angeles and Orange counties with as little as 5% down and still get a loan backed by Fannie Mae or Freddie Mac. The Federal Housing Finance Agency announced Tuesday, Nov. 30, the 2022 loan limit for high-cost metro areas like L.A./O.C. will rise to $970,800, up from $822,375 in 2021. As Fannie’s and Freddie’s conservator and regulator, the agency sets the limits for loans qualifying for more favorable interest rates.”

“Can you say boom and bust? Home prices have been rising for almost 10 years. Then, that 95% leverage works against you. If the value of that same $1 million property were to fall 10%, you’d have negative equity, owning a $900,000 home with a $950,000 mortgage.”

“Back in 2000, Tom LaMalfa, President TSL Research & Consulting Co., was sounding the alarm bells to then-Fed Chair Alan Greenspan and plenty of others of an coming Fannie, Freddie crash. ‘We are in a similar situation as 2008. Nobody is expecting a decline in home prices,’ said LaMalfa. ‘There is no material change in underwriting with high loan-to-values, high debt ratios and minimal FICO scores.'”

“About 15% of the mortgage market before the housing crash of 2008 was called Alt-A or subprime, LaMalfa observed. Today, non-qualified mortgage or exotic mortgages are about 3% of the market. His point is F & F had the lion’s share of the mortgage market before the 2008 crash, and it still does today.”

“There are 55 million mortgages in the U.S. Of those, 75-80% are guaranteed by the U.S. government — either by F & F, the Federal Housing Administration, Veterans Affairs or the Department of Agriculture, according to Ed Pinto, senior fellow and director of the Housing Center at the American Enterprise Institute. Keep in mind VA and FHA mortgage limits will mimic those of Fan and Fred after Jan. 1.”

“When it comes to purchases, how much high leveraging is really happening, then and now? It’s eerily similar. Average down payments for Fannie and Freddie mortgages are lower this year than in 2007, the year the meltdown started, CoreLogic figure show. For example, F & F down payments for a U.S. home averaged 15% this year so far, compared with 17% just before the housing crash.”

The Associated Press. “There are further signs Australia’s heated housing market is beginning to cool with demand for mortgages, particularly from first time buyers, remaining in decline in October. The Commonwealth Bank’s head of Australian economics Gareth Aird is predicting interest rates will now be raised in November 2022, marking the first cash rate increase in 12 years. ‘The Australian housing market is in the twilight of an incredible boom that has been fuelled by record low mortgage rates,’ Mr Aird said.”

From DS News. “The CARES Act provided mortgage holders with several tools to help assist struggling homeowners and minimize that potential ‘wave of foreclosures,’ including forbearance programs and moratoria on both foreclosures and evictions. But Tim Rood, Head of Government and Industry Relations for SitusAMC, also noted that the servicing side of the industry benefitted enormously from the fact that the originations sector continued booming despite the health and economic crises the world was pushing through over the past 18 months.”

“‘It was the cash flow from the record origination volume and margins that largely underwrote the federal policies that allowed independent mortgage bankers to make the billions of dollars in servicing advances that they were required to make in support of the mortgage forbearance provisions and policies,’ Rood said.”

From Better Dwelling. “US real estate prices are looking frothy, according to central bank researchers. The US Federal Reserve (the Fed) recently updated its exuberance index for Q2 2021. The little-known index exists to identify housing bubbles early, to minimize damage. For the first time since 2007, that indicator is now warning that US real estate prices are in a bubble. The exuberance index read 2.8 in Q2 2021, more than double the 1.37 threshold needed to see bubbly.”

“By alerting policy makers early, they can act and contain the issue before it gets out of control. The current bubble will be the first time in history that the US has a system in place for an early warning. The question is, will they ignore the warning sign? Central banks have become increasingly political, dismissing even their own research. It wouldn’t be surprising to see them gloss over existing warning systems as they did with inflation. Though the ‘transitory’ narrative was retired shortly after they would have seen this data.”

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This Post Has 167 Comments

  1. I know this is too long, but I felt like there’s a important current of data to put in one place. Especially the Attom stuff and the DS News:

    ‘The latest trends have reversed patterns seen from early 2019 through early 2021, when total lending activity nearly tripled’

    ‘It was the cash flow from the record origination volume and margins that largely underwrote the federal policies that allowed independent mortgage bankers to make the billions of dollars in servicing advances that they were required to make in support of the mortgage forbearance provisions and policies’

    So they triple lending, crash the economy, and push even more loans to pay to stall foreclosures. Now they raise the limits the most ever with no increase in standards.

    REIC: Look at me, Ima running – with scissors!

      1. An extrordinary wealth creating feature at that.

        Wealth is magically borrowed into existance not only for the borrower but also for the numerous strangers who happen to live nearby.

        The appraiser says the value is thus and the borrower makes the value thus. Magic.

        1. strangers who happen to live nearby.

          These neighbors are all impoverished by the foolish deficit spending of the one. Some of them may even be sucked into the evil black hole of debt themselves.

        3. “The appraiser says the value is thus and the borrower makes the value thus. Magic fraud.”

          Fixed… just for you.

  2. ‘Florida’s beginning to approach its 2006 peak. And he said in the panhandle and portions of North Florida, the median for single family home sales are now at those 2006 prices’

    It’s one thing to have a bubble in Miami or Tampa. But now we’re into the sticks.

    And it spreads far and wide:

    ‘there’s so much money out there right now…Douvadjian said, half-jokingly, Boston firms don’t know what recourse loans are anymore’

    Yeah this will end well.

    2. Tallahassee is in that boat. Here incomes are relatively fixed as the largest employers are Florida State Government and Florida State University. Looking at homes here I see 30-50% increases over the last 2 years. Totally unsustainable!

  3. ‘About 15% of the mortgage market before the housing crash of 2008 was called Alt-A or subprime, LaMalfa observed. Today, non-qualified mortgage or exotic mortgages are about 3% of the market’

    ‘There are 55 million mortgages in the U.S. Of those, 75-80% are guaranteed by the U.S. government — either by F & F, the Federal Housing Administration, Veterans Affairs or the Department of Agriculture, according to Ed Pinto, senior fellow and director of the Housing Center at the American Enterprise Institute. Keep in mind VA and FHA mortgage limits will mimic those of Fan and Fred after Jan. 1’

    VA, FHA, USDA loans are all subprime. These low down payment loans are all subprime. Pretty much the majority of loans today and the past several years have been subprime. VA loans are 600% larger segment of the market than last decade, last I saw on the subject. Most are probably zero down. Oh and mel watt took the VA cap off!

    1. “VA, FHA, USDA loans are all subprime. These low down payment loans are all subprime.”

      These are below Subprime.

  5. Anyone who buys a shack or skybox in a Democrat-malgoverned municipality with a Soros-installed DA fatally undermining the criminal justice system needs their head examined.

    Gang member, 25, charged in fatal Manhattan stabbing spree that killed Columbia student and wounded Italian tourist has been arrested 11 times since 2012 and was on parole for gang attack

    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-10274095/Gang-member-25-charged-fatal-Manhattan-stabbing-spree-lengthy-rap-sheet.html

    The suspect accused of killing a Columbia University grad student and stabbing an Italian tourist in a demented Manhattan crime spree is a career criminal who was out on parole for a gang attack, it has been revealed.

    Vincent Pinkney, 25, was escorted into NPYD Central Booking on Friday night, as hundreds gathered on the South Lawn of Columbia in a vigil for Davide Giri, a PhD candidate in computer science.

  6. It was cheaper than renting….

    Maryland homeowner who tried to get rid of a snake infestation by smoking out the reptiles sets off massive blaze and burns down $1.8M house

    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-10273755/Maryland-homeowner-sets-home-ablaze-rid-snake-infestation-smoking-critters-out.html

    A boneheaded Maryland homeowner who tried to rid the $1.8 million house of a snake infestation by smoking out the reptiles set his million property ablaze, leaving a charred shell.

    The unidentified homeowner used coals as a heat source in an effort to smoke the snakes out but placed them too close to combustibles, sparking the massive fire on November 23, according to county fire investigators.

    2. and to pay 1.4 mill just plain stupid, no brook, pump, 5000 gallon water tank or even a pool to fight a fire.

      To make matters worse, MCFRS spokesman Pete Piringer said there was no fire hydrants near the home, which has a nearly mile-long driveway.

      2. This is so stupid and improbably that I think it’s some kind of scam. It’s a story he came up with to cover some of the facts.

  7. Maryland Manor Burns Down After Homeowner Tries To Smoke Out Snakes

    By CBS Baltimore Staff
    December 3, 2021 at 4:40 pm

    BALTIMORE (WJZ) — A Maryland homeowner’s ill-advised plan to ward off a snake infestation using smoke took a disastrous turn when they accidentally burned down their Montgomery County manor.

    It took 75 firefighters to get the fire under control, but by that point the home was toast. It’s estimated the fire caused over $1 million in damage to the home, which property records show was purchased in 2014 for $1.85 million.

    https://baltimore.cbslocal.com/2021/12/03/maryland-manor-burns-down-homeowner-smoked-out-snakes/

    1. wow! timely story about a house fire, and what a strange way it was started, as my constant worry about my house catching fire has been somewhat eased with the purchase of a home security system w/live-feed cameras. NO monitoring company/fees. nice.

      several aging smoke alarm batteries have recently been giving me mini-heart attacks when away from home & neighbor calls asking if “everything is ok?” after 10 minutes of beeping low-battery loud chirping!

      (ok, so I will now PAY ATTENTION to those Duracell 9-volt expiration dates. haha)

      1. Make it a New Year’s Day chore, every year. The batteries’ expiry date is for when they’re not installed.

        1. Don’t forget to change the furnace filter on the 1st day of each new quarter, while you’re at it.

          1. While your at it, attach a hose to the spigot on your hot water heater (assume natural gas fired) and drain for about 10 minutes.. Flushes out settled sludge and extends the life of heater.

  9. The destruction of formerly great American cities is happening by design, thanks to the globalist oligarchs and their Democrat-Bolshevik Quislings.

    George Soros’ network of woke DA’s he has bankrolled in cities across the US: How the Billionaire Democrat megadonor gave Chicago’s Kim Foxx $2M and Philly’s DA – where murder has doubled – got $1.7M

    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-10271987/How-billionaire-George-Soros-bankrolled-DAs-Democrat-cities-HIGHEST-crime-rates.html

    Billionaire Democrat donor George Soros has bankrolled District Attorneys in America’s most crime ravaged cities, where criminals are being allowed to walk out of jail on low cash bonds or aren’t even being charged.

    Soros, the most prolific Democratic donor, is most known for giving to Presidents Clinton and Obama but he has also been pumping money into a far-left effort to overhaul the criminal justice system by giving millions to a network of woke prosecutors in Democratic races.

    1. Most Khmer Rouge senior leaders were Paris-educated and radicalized during their university years, before going on to commit genocide while imposing “true Communism” on Cambodia. Our Marxist-controlled universities are still churning out Pol Pot wanna-bes with dreams of genocide, once their globalist puppet masters figure out a way to disarm Les Deplorables.

  12. “Idaho’s current median home price is $446,000, Zions Bank Chief Economist Robert Spendlove told the Associated Taxpayers of Idaho annual conference. ‘I know that this level of housing price appreciation is unsustainable,’ Spendlove said. ‘It is, like, literally mathematically impossible for us to continue to have this level of housing price appreciation.’ He said he’d like to see that 38% go back down to something like 5%. ‘My fear, of course, is that we see what we saw in 2009, where that big jump turns into big drops in housing prices.”

    I’d love to read Mr. Spendlove’s internal memos from about six months ago instructing everyone at his bank to stop lending money. What is that you say, his memos say “Pedal to the metal!”?!

    Way to go bankers, destroying people’s lives while getting big bonuses to do so. Almost like drug dealers.

    1. “Way to go bankers, …”

      Thank you.

      “… destroying people’s lives while getting big bonuses to do so.”

      Easy money. Legal as well.

      “Almost like drug dealers.”

      Almost. The difference lies in the details.

      😁

      Reply

    2. “Zions Bank Chief Economist Robert Spendlove”

      Charles Dickens couldn’t have come up with a better name for a banking industry economist.

    3. “‘It is, like, literally mathematically impossible for us to continue to have this level of housing price appreciation.’ He said he’d like to see that 38% go back down to something like 5%.”

      LMAO…let’s go from a ginormous impossible number to a smaller one.

  13. Libtards reaping what they voted: LA edition. Real Journalists working for globalist propaganda mouthpieces must observe the usual journalistic omertà when it comes to pointing out the obvious: vibrants are committing crimes with impunity because they CAN, thanks to the corrupt, incompetent Democrat (redundant) “leadership” installed by moral degenerates.

    Brutal, brazen crimes shake L.A., leaving city at a crossroads

    https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/crime/brutal-brazen-crimes-shake-la-leaving-city-at-a-crossroads/ar-AARsCHd

    Crews of burglars publicly smashing their way into Los Angeles’ most exclusive stores. Robbers following their victims, including a star of “The Real Housewives of Beverly Hills” and a BET host, to their residences. And this week, the fatal shooting of 81-year-old Jacqueline Avant, an admired philanthropist and wife of music legend Clarence Avant, in her Beverly Hills home.

    1. “The fact that this has happened, her being shot and killed in her own home, after giving, sharing, and caring for 81 years has shaken the laws of the Universe,” declared Oprah Winfrey, expressing her grief over Avant’s killing to her 43 million Twitter followers. “The world is upside down.”

      And you helped flip it over, Oprah.

      Just watch. Celebs like Winfrey are going to quietly move out of Clownifornia, and spend far more time in their mansions in safer states, if they aren’t doing that already.

      1. heard that pelosi has already moved to florida. i’m sure the rabid communist hating cubans in exile will welcome her with open arms, and a big grin.

        1. Biden sent the Cubans back home.
          The only group not allowed in.
          I saw raw footage of the Gore /Bush voting chad fiasco and the Cubans literally broke down the closed and locked door to bust the Dems for punching voter cards. The floor was filled with chad where they had worked in secret to steal the vote.
          It was macho Cuban men who broke that whole scene open and saved us from Gore, ultimately.

  14. Maybe it was just a coincidence.

    German Doctor Murdered Hours After Exposing Graphene Hydroxide In Vaccines

    Infowars.com
    December 4th 2021, 10:03 am

    Dr. Andreas Noack claimed to have discovered tiny carbon particles in the Covid injection that act as thousands of tiny razor blades circulating throughout the cardiovascular system.

    GERMAN DOCTOR MURDERED HOURS AFTER EXPOSING GRAPHENE HYDROXIDE IN VACCINES!!

    First published at 11:11 UTC on December 4th, 2021.

    https://www.bitchute.com/video/VrGqQT2ZoZm5/

    1. How do you say “Arkancide” in German.

      There is no way in hell I’m taking the kill shot. I’ll leave the country if I must.

        1. Doesn’t look like it was a hoax. This is from David Brock’s Media Matters site, a site that attacks “right-wing conspiracy theorists.”
          ………………

          “A ConspiracyTok creator’s COVID-19 denial content has gone viral
          Finally, paranomal_activity, an account with over 33,400 followers, posted a two-part video claiming that a doctor’s apartment was stormed because of supposedly revealing truths about “the global elite” and COVID-19. The doctor, Andreas Noack, is actually an anti-lockdown activist, but the “storming” was not related.

          According to Lead Stories, “the chief prosecutor’s office, the Generalstaatsanwaltschaft in Berlin, confirmed that the house search was part of an investigation into another person and that Noack’s political views were irrelevant to the operation. Police had a search warrant for the whole building in which Noack rents an apartment. The YouTuber and two other individuals present during the raid were not arrested.”

          Although this creator’s follower count is relatively low compared to other ConspiracyTok creators, the two-part video series racked up over 1.5 million views and builds upon a growing body of other coronavirus-related conspiracy theories on the platform. For example, this user also posted a common COVID-19 misinformation video claiming that a televised vaccination was staged without a needle.

          https://www.mediamatters.org/tiktok/tiktok-influencers-are-pushing-dangerous-far-right-conspiracy-theories-their-young-audience

        2. but the “storming” was not related.

          Process what you posted. Some guy, who nobody ever heard of before, was not arrested, but after the arrest he was murdered by the police, for posting a looney video about razor blades?

        3. from David Brock’s Media Matters site, a site that attacks “right-wing conspiracy theorists.”

          Stops reading.

          1. I was using Brock’s site in order to show that this story isn’t just being posted on “right wing conspiracy theory” sites. There does appear to be some truth to the story — the police have acknowledged that they did raid that building and this anti-lockdown activist’s apartment. They later claimed that it was not related to his anti-lockdown activities, but you can process the info for yourselves.

          2. There does appear to be some truth to the story

            I like a good conspiracy theory as well as the next guy. I looked for this “Doctors” creds and couldn’t find anything except the razor blade thingy and that he was murdered.

            He claimed he studied up on activated carbon. That’s the equivalent of charcoal. He was a sales manager for such. That’s a stretch to carbon razor blades, which he really didn’t explain how they’re there. His video was a flight of fancy, excited but as a Chemical Engineer/Biologist I found riddled with gaping flaws and contradictions.

            We are under attack, being fed lies on a daily basis. We need to be vigilant that we don’t accept lies from those posing as our friends (and then supposedly being vaporized).

    2. Quite the video

      Miles – Christi – English

      Nov 20, 2020
      German police arrests lockdown critic Dr. Andreas Noack in a shocking video. Reports from Germany indicate that a German doctor, Dr. Andreas Noack was arrested during a police raid while he was recording a live video. The reasons for the police raid and arrest of the german doctor have not been officially revealed yet. However, there are rumors that Dr. Andreas Noack provided medical assistance to hundreds of protestors during lockdown protests against the administration. Dr. Andreas Noack, a german doctor arrested in a police raid Reports also indicate that Dr. Andreas Noack was under investigation by the authorities for being non-compliant with the COVID-19 lockdown laws enacted by the German government

      https://gloria.tv/post/AV1wVag1cb4z3Hdb94KzqeHh8

      1. I saw the video of the supposed arrest. It wasn’t even the same guy in the Razor Blades video. That guy said he was a doctor of chemistry or some such, not a medical doctor.

        BTW, in Germany you can earn the title Dr. in what qualifies as a BS in the US.

      2. Sadly this brilliant scientist who was a passionate humanitarian died to get us this information.
        He was murdered for making the video.
        Not a matter to be flippant about.

  15. Oh dear….

    Kaisa edges closer to default after failing to extend maturity

    https://www.aljazeera.com/economy/2021/12/3/kaisa-edges-closer-to-default-after-failing-to-extend-maturity

    Chinese developer’s growing risk of default comes as property sector is gripped by an unprecedented liquidity squeeze.

    Chinese property developer Kaisa Group Holdings Ltd has said it failed to secure the minimum 95 percent approval it needed from offshore bondholders to extend the maturity of a $400m note due next week, raising the risk of default.

    With the Chinese property sector gripped by an unprecedented liquidity squeeze, Kaisa now faces the possibility of defaulting on its 6.5 percent offshore bonds due on December 7 and drawing renewed focus on other developers also staring at a wall of offshore debt maturing over the next few months.

  17. I hope Hui Ka-yan isn’t too attached to his organs.

    Evergrande to work on US$260 million of debt obligation under state supervision as it runs out of cash

    https://www.scmp.com/business/banking-finance/article/3158254/debt-laden-developer-china-aoyuan-tumbles-after-failing

    China Evergrande Group is restructuring its debt under the watch of the Guangdong provincial government, after the world’s most indebted developer failed to meet the demands on a US$260 million guarantee, a move that sent financial regulators scrambling to ensure financial stability in China’s capital markets.

    The Shenzhen-based company said it and its financial and legal advisers had been evaluating all available options and maintaining ongoing dialogue with offshore creditors to find a way out of its liquidity crisis.

    Chinese billionaire Hui Ka-yan, the controlling shareholder of China Evergrande, has been summoned by the Guangdong government to discuss his company’s liquidity crisis. The government has set up a working group for the company.

    1. The Chinese government is trying very hard to convince the outside world that Evergrande is an isolated case of mismanagement, and all is well in the rest of the Chinese real estate sector.

      Judging from junk bond lending rates, they are only fooling themselves.

      1. “Kaisa edges closer to default after failing to extend maturity”

        There seems to be more than one cockroach…what a surprise?

  18. Remember, crypto baggies: It takes a big man to cry, but a bigger man to laugh at that man.

    Crypto crash: $570 billion wiped off market cap after major sell-off over regulation fears

    https://www.news.com.au/finance/markets/world-markets/crypto-crash-570-billion-wiped-off-market-cap-after-major-selloff-over-regulation-fears/news-story/c6adbadfbd3c2d57a176dded6062f0cb

    Cryptocurrency has been battered in a brutal 24-hour period, with bitcoin in particular suffering a $14,000 loss in the space of just 60 minutes.

    1. Is $570 bn alot?

      It seems like crypto is not too-big-to-fail, because we read stories about half-a-trillion in losses about once every two months, and then it’s off to the races again, with no lasting impact. Remember, this so-called currency does not physically exist, and only has value in the collective imaginations of the HODLers. So no real harm is done when its nominal value goes POOF.

      1. This kind of speculative malinvestment is only possible in a world with ever-expanding central bank balance sheets and limitless Yellen Bux “stimulus.”

      2. Portfolio
        Is Bitcoin Too Big to Fail?
        Even as the cryptocurrency hits record highs, threats to its long-term success remain. (Part of the crypto column series.)
        By Leah McGrath Goodman
        November 05, 2021

        Every few months or so, when Bitcoin inevitably swoons, there’s another bumper crop of doomsday stories about whether the cryptocurrency is going straight to zero. This autumn, that question was entertained by The Economist, Bloomberg, and, JPMorgan Chase & Co. CEO Jamie Dimon, who called it “worthless,” again.

        It is unclear what is gained from the near-obsessive warnings about Bitcoin. But this has not stopped Dimon, billionaire Warren Buffett, and others of their ilk from taking swipes whenever they get in front of a microphone. After deriding the cryptocurrency last month, Dimon hastened to add, “I don’t want to be a spokesperson; I don’t care. It makes no difference to me.”

        But if it makes no difference, why keep banging on about it? Somewhere beneath all the crypto-pageantry and peculiar moralizing about what makes other investments legitimate — while Bitcoin, according to economist Nouriel Roubini, remains merely a “pseudo-asset” — seems to be a deep-seated and very real fear that, one day, the world will wake up and Bitcoin, along with the entire $2.6 trillion cryptoverse, will have vaporized.

        Although Dimon himself appears to think that is unlikely, worries about Bitcoin’s long-term future are not just idle catastrophizing. Many traders, hedge fund managers, and institutional investors across Wall Street are genuinely struggling to size up crypto’s systemic risks — and finding that it’s no simple network-mapping exercise. “It’s the question on everybody’s lips,” says a director at Coinbase, a cryptocurrency platform with partners in more than 100 countries. “Could this all go horribly wrong?”

        With institutional acceptance on the rise and ever larger amounts of capital at stake, there is indeed a hunt for crypto’s Damoclean sword. Specifically, market participants don’t want to finally invest in Bitcoin only to witness the long-feared “cryptocalypse” (as The Economist delicately puts it). For naysayers, there’s clearly something about crypto that gives them an unshakable sense of impending doom. Perhaps it is the vestigial effects of the global financial crisis. They lived through it and remember it well. Why shouldn’t they ask if Bitcoin is another house of cards?

        In the eyes of Bitcoin evangelists, however, there’s no greater risk than not hoovering up the cryptocurrency whenever the price dips. Over the past month, Bitcoin struck a fresh record high above $67,000, climbing nearly 20-fold from the pandemic’s lows. So much for heading to zero. This time, the cryptocurrency’s rally followed the late-October launch of the first Bitcoin exchange-traded fund on the New York Stock Exchange.

        “The fact is, Bitcoin’s been one of the greatest investments that human beings have ever been able to get their hands on,” says Daniel Masters, chairman of CoinShares, a digital asset investment firm based in New York, London, and the Channel Islands. “Not just at the institutional level, but at the retail and disenfranchised level. If you have an internet connection, you can participate in crypto. It’s made a lot of people a lot of money.”
        …

  19. More fear pron, courtesy of 9News:

    Doctors see serious COVID-19 complications in unvaccinated pregnant women and their babies.

    An obstetrician at Presbyterian St. Luke’s says the most important message for pregnant patients to prevent serious illness or death, is to consider vaccination.

    1. And in vaccinated women, they’re seeing increases in late-term miscarriages, stillbirths and newborn deaths.

        1. It’s not a vaccine.

          ‘majority of COVID-19 hospitalizations and deaths’

          Even if they died in a motorcycle crash. The ship to believe any of this horsesh$t sailed long ago.

          1. You guys are welcome to believe what you choose, but having had COVID-19 twice already, once without and once with the (non)vaccine, I can speak from first hand knowledge the second experience was far more benign.

            I do feel somewhat disappointed in Dr Fauci’s failed recommendation that vaccinated individuals could safely attend Thanksgiving gatherings without masks. Our family’s experience put the lie to that guidance, big time. But he’s only human.

          2. ‘having had COVID-19 twice already’

            You don’t have any idea what you had. Did someone tell you that? Like they told us US flu deaths went from 30,000 in 2019 to 3,000 in 2020. Because that didn’t happen.

          3. Well actually I did test positive last week for SARS-CoV-2. And in February 2020, on the eve of Governor Newsom’s big pandemic panic moment, I had the same symptoms…dry cough, upper and lower respiratory tract congestion, persistent fever, night sweats, etc. Several other family members who are generally healthy and who all had the flu vaccine concurrently had similar cases. There were no tests available to confirm, so it’s hard to know for sure if that was COVID-19.

          4. But he’s only human.

            He’s a monster. He used foster children as guinea pigs to test AIDS drugs.

          4. I do by following physicians and scientists, not MSM.

            Even Soviet era Russians knew that Pravda was pure BS.

          5. to attack someone

            Says the misinformed condescending elitist who said I was posting “denialism claptrap.”

          7. Argument is sometimes futile.

            I may be arguing against PB, but he’s not the person(s) I’m trying to convince. From the looks of it, PB’s lost.

        3. And in unvaccinated people, they are seeing the majority of COVID-19 hospitalizations and deaths.

          At this point, I don’t believe jack sh!t regarding US numbers, or the claims that hospitals are overrun with Covid patients.

          Why would I believe them, when they keep moving the goal posts and what was derided months ago as conspiracy theory is gaslighted into an Orwellian “we always said it would be like this”? Or how Social Media is censoring all dissenting opinions regarding the pandemic, while they use fear and induced panic to get the masses to obey?

          1. I played along with most of this for the first year of it, but I’ve moved on.

            This is the United States, this isn’t Australia and this isn’t Europe.

            Assuming I don’t die from two shots of that mRNA poison last spring, I’m gonna trust what’s left of my immune system for the rest of my life.

            And no, you’re not leaving the country. We’re gonna fight these globalists, and we’re gonna win 🙂

        2. The original source is the BBC documentary Guinea Pig Kids from 2004. It was an horrific scandal in NYC back then.

        4. From anecdotal “I had Covid twice and can tell you” to factcheck by Reuters then on to Snopes.

          You’re a bundle of entertainment!

          1. Yeah I laughed at that too!
            A test with a 90% inaccuracy rate.
            Lol
            He proclaims he had it so he knows all about it. Now that’s science.

        5. I can’t watch the video posted below. The article disgusts me enough.

          ‘Guinea Pig Kids’: Fauci’s Legacy of Cruel Experiments on Kids
          Recent revelations about Dr. Anthony Fauci shed new light on a 2004 BBC documentary, “Guinea Pig Kids.” The film exposed the cruel experiments — approved by Fauci and funded by U.S. taxpayers — on poor minority children as part of Fauci’s search for a cure for AIDS.

          Guinea Pig Kids BBC Documentary – Fauci (25m44s)

        7. The head of Snopes sounds like such a trustworthy guy……

          ‘Snopes co-founder banned for plagiarizing dozens of stories on fact-checking site’

          https://nypost.com/2021/08/13/banned-snopes-co-founder-plagiarized-dozens-of-stories/

          “How can fact checking organizations like Snopes expect the public to place trust in them if when they themselves are called into question, their response is that they can’t respond.”

          ” This creates a deeply unsettling environment in which when one tries to fact check the fact checker, the answer is the equivalent of “its secret.” Moreover, David’s responses regarding the hiring of strongly partisan fact checkers and his lack of response on screening and assessment protocols present a deeply troubling picture of a secretive black box that acts as ultimate arbitrator of truth, yet reveals little of its inner workings. ”

          https://www.forbes.com/sites/kalevleetaru/2016/12/22/the-daily-mail-snopes-story-and-fact-checking-the-fact-checkers/?sh=2f3b9302227f

    2. “Doctors see serious COVID-19 complications in unvaccinated pregnant women and their babies.”

      I’d never recommend a COVID-19 vaccination for a pregnant spouse, but it’s her body, so ultimately her decision.

    1. Health chiefs reveal 55% of those with Covid super-strain had both jabs amid fears it can dodge shots – as UK daily cases creep up

      Better rush out and get that booster.

  21. While the DNC’s FBI Chekists are going all-out to identify, prosecute, and convict all of the J6 “insurrectionists” – most of whom are guilty of nothing more than taking an unguided tour of the Capitol Building – Democrat DAs & judicial systems are coddling and enabling the real criminals and domestic terrorists.

    LA cops arrest 14 suspects in connection with 11 smash-and-grab robberies – but release ALL of them because of California’s ‘zero bail’ policy

    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-10271809/LA-cops-arrest-14-suspects-11-smash-grab-robberies-freed-zero-bail-policy.html

    Police in Los Angeles have announced 14 arrests in connection with 11 recent smash-and-grab robberies at stores where nearly $340,000 worth of merchandise was stolen, but all the suspects have been released.

    Los Angeles Police Chief Michel Moore said that most of the accused robbers suspected of ransacking businesses between November 18 and 28 bailed out or met no-bail criteria, and one is a juvenile.

  23. “As home prices continue their record-breaking climb, the Federal Housing Finance Agency said this week that loan limits for mortgages that can be bought by Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac in 2022 will rise by the largest percentage ever.”

    Because our policy is to automatically dump gasoline onto a raging inferno…

  24. Coming soon to Biden’s America.

    Three teens in custody after wild Howard Springs escape

    https://www.news.com.au/travel/travel-updates/incidents/nt-police-investigating-reports-several-people-escaped-howard-springs-quarantine-facility/news-story/34cda0ab3af2eca1f8580ec52b23d724

    Three teens are in custody after breaking out of Australia’s most isolated quarantine facility and spending time in the community.

    A trio of teens who spent the morning on the run after absconding from the Howard Springs quarantine facility could face the possibility of restarting their isolation.

    The teens, aged 15, 16, and 17 years old, have all tested negative to Covid-19 and are now in police custody after scaling a fence and fleeing the area in the early hours on Wednesday morning.

      1. I can’t stop coming back to this blog because I love hearing Ben talk about ropes….

        P.S. dear globalists, GFY

      2. True. My mother grew up under Nazi rule and my grandparents were very highly involved in the underground movement (and worked with the Russians) against the Nazis. As punishment, the Nazis took my mother away from her parents and put her in a “re-education camp” for children of dissidents.

        Never trust a government that uses these tactics. They will always end up on the wrong side of history.

        1. Never trust a government that uses these tactics.

          by the time they are using ‘these tactics’ it’s already too late.

  25. Are you concerned that Mr Market may find it challenging to remain aloft once the Fed takes away its pandemic punchbowl?

    1. Incessant jawboning about a mythical pending tapering, and actually tapering, are two very different things.

    2. Detroit Free Press
      MICHIGAN BUSINESS
      Confirmation of omicron variant in the U.S. rattles stock market
      Benzinga
      Published 6:59 AM EST
      December 4, 2021

      The S&P 500 traded sharply lower as investors continue to assess economic risk of the omicron coronavirus variant.

      The first confirmed U.S. cases of the omicron variant rattled the stock market last week, even though anecdotal reports suggest omicron symptoms have been mild so far. New global omicron travel restrictions hit travel and leisure investments hard, including cruise lines, airlines and casino stocks.

      On Friday, the Labor Department reported the U.S. economy added just 210,000 jobs in November, well short of consensus economist estimates of 573,000 jobs. Wages were up 4.8% compared with a year ago, further stoking market concerns about inflation.

      On Tuesday, Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell told Congress the economy is “very strong” and said he will “retire” the word “transitory” when describing the current environment of elevated U.S. inflation. Powell also said the Fed will likely soon discuss ending its $120 billion in monthly asset purchases “perhaps a few months sooner” than originally planned.
      …

    3. The Financial Times
      Markets Briefing Equities
      Investors dump tech stocks in Wall Street sell-off after US jobs report
      Mixed employment data seen as paving way for more hawkish policy from the Fed
      A job fair in California: US employers added 210,000 new jobs last month when economists had expected to see a gain of 550,000
      © AP
      Joe Rennison in New York and Naomi Rovnick in London yesterday

      Investors retreated from US stocks on Friday, dumping shares in large technology companies and sending the tech-heavy Nasdaq Composite index sharply lower.

      The Nasdaq closed down 1.9 per cent in New York, as a mixed US jobs report was seen as paving the way for more hawkish monetary policy, which would lead to tighter financial conditions and weigh on corporate valuations.

      Etsy, Adobe and Tesla were all among the biggest losers on the day, falling more than 5 per cent. Facebook fell 1.1 per cent on the day and is now down more than 20 per cent from its intraday peak in September. The blue-chip S&P 500 stock index declined 0.8 per cent.

      The sharp drops marked a volatile end to a fortnight of trading characterised by big swings in prices across asset classes.

      “I believe investors are now expecting monetary policy to get more hawkish, and that has historically put downward pressure on tech stocks,” said Kristina Hooper, chief global market strategist at Invesco.
      …

  26. Some quality candidates you have there, DNC.

    Woke New Jersey Dem fooled by fake rabbi’s parody Twitter account

    https://nypost.com/2021/12/04/woke-new-jersey-dem-fooled-by-fake-rabbis-parody-twitter-account/

    A lefty New Jersey Democrat learned the hard way that not all rabbis are kosher.

    The campaign of Imani Oakley, a 31-year-old progressive activist running for Congress in Newark, thought it was in negotiations to organize a fundraiser with like-minded Linda Goldstein — the “chief rabbi” of Gaza — but instead were chatting up a Big Apple lawyer running a parody Twitter account.

    On the bizarre parody account, Rabbi Linda Goldstein warns Hamas fighters to practice social distancing in terror tunnels; posts photos of herself posing with a menorah made of Qassam rockets; and bills herself as the “Jewish issues advisor” to Hamas boss Ismail Haniyeh.

    “Excited to announce #Hamas has given me permission to build the first and only #Jewish #Ghetto in #Gaza

  27. The mixed mushroom pack I buy at the Asian grocery to make soup just went from 7.99$ to 10.99$ in one jump. There is almost nothing left on my grocery list that hasn’t gone up by at least 10-20% in the last year.

    This has to be the end of this inflationary cycle because people just can’t fork out anymore $ for food, gas, shelter, etc.

    How long do folks believe the Fed’s Taper Tantrum will last before everything starts imploding and they have to go back to Big Bang style money printing? My guess is that by March or April they will have reversed course on the taper. How can you taper with 5-6% inflation and 100 trillion $ in bonds that earn less than 1%? Who is going fill that hole in the bond market? Nobody.

    1. It must be a tough choice for the Fed between continuing to pump up the value of risk asset HODLers’ wealth portfolios or upholding its policy mandate to contain inflation.

      1. I think its core policy mandate is to do what politicians want so the Fed itself retains and gains power, and incumbent politicians retain and gain wealth and power.

        The Fed firehosing printed money at government and Wall Street, and crushing interest rates, keeps one, smaller constituency happy (top 10-20 pct of income earners, plus the politicians themselves, being part of that group). The other constituency (bottom 80 pct of income earners), larger, not happy with paying more, and less able to painlessly absorb the higher costs, may take out its ire on election day. Politicians on the whole need to balance these two forces, and see which they think yields the most benefit to them.

    2. If risk asset prices start to dive, you might be amazed at how many investors would gladly HODL Treasurys yielding 1%. You do what works.

      1. But isn’t there a contradiction there? Who will buy MBS that yield less than inflation when the assets that back the bonds, houses, are falling in value?

        1. Isn’t the purpose of increasing nationalization of the treasury and MBS markets (i.e. the Fed buying all issuance, all the time) to avoid private sector forces and its tantrums and vigilantes?

          Look at Japan – this is from an Economist article from August 28, 2021, titled “Trading in Japanese government bonds is drying up. Does that matter?”:

          “NOBODY BOUGHT Japan’s ten-year government bond in over-the-counter trading on August 3rd. Such a lull in the world’s second-largest market for sovereign bonds would once have been remarkable. But in fact this was not even the first time activity dried up. Once-frenetic trading desks in Tokyo have fallen silent over the past half-decade.

          Sceptics of the central bank’s enormous quantitative-easing (QE) programme warned this moment would come. With the Bank of Japan (BoJ) hoovering up securities, they argued, benchmark bonds would become scarce, causing price volatility and stopping investors pricing risks properly. Financial institutions would be deprived of the collateral they needed to operate. But, curiously, there is little sign that the drying up of the Japanese market has had such effects. Should anyone, other than the poor souls who used to buy and sell the bonds for a living, lose sleep over it?”

          The financial sector, an absolutely miniscule group of people, may not value the debt issued by a government. But if the people continue to accept the slips of paper as currency – this is the dream of central bankers and politicians.

  28. Peak Prosperity “No Discernable Relationship” between Vaccines and Cases:

    As time rolls on and the months go by, more data is becoming available around the actual efficacy, safety and other attributes of the new experimental mRNA technologies which have been injected into billions of people. And that data is becoming less convincing and reassuring by the minute.

    “At the country-level, there appears to be no discernable relationship between percentage of population fully vaccinated and new COVID-19 cases in the last 7 days. In fact, the trend line suggests a marginally positive association such that countries with higher percentage of population fully vaccinated have higher COVID-19 cases per 1 million people. Notably, Israel with over 60% of their population fully vaccinated had the highest COVID-19 cases per 1 million people in the last 7 days. The lack of a meaningful association between percentage population fully vaccinated and new COVID-19 cases is further exemplified, for instance, by comparison of Iceland and Portugal. Both countries have over 75% of their population fully vaccinated and have more COVID-19 cases per 1 million people than countries such as Vietnam and South Africa that have around 10% of their population fully vaccinated.” – Source: US National Library of Medicine, National Institutes of Health

    (emphasis added)

  30. Once the citizens have been disarmed, the globalists & their Quislings quickly drop the mask.

    Victim of COVID-19 Tyranny Describes Experience in Australian Internment Camp

    https://thelibertyloft.com/2021/12/04/victim-of-covid-19-tyranny-describes-experience-in-australian-internment-camp/

    Melbourne, Australia — “I’ve become convinced… that there’s something here that goes beyond just vaccines and public health. It is impossible to make sense out of what is transpiring in the world right now just as an explanation of public health and in vaccine policy or antiviral policy, and I have become convinced that we’re in a situation in which we’re all having our rights eroded and that there is a larger force beyond this.”—Dr. Robert Malone, Life Site News interview.

    1. As I said, all they have to do is tell you that you were in contact with someone infected and off to the gulag you go. And being vaxxed isn’t a get out of jail free card.

      Pure tyranny.

  33. California’s Democrat-Bolshevik “leaders” are instituting water rationing while continuing to welcome the teeming hordes of illegals pouring in across the southern border. One of these things is not like the other.

    California Will Curtail Water to Farms and Cities Next Year as Drought Worsens

    https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2021-12-01/california-to-cut-water-to-farms-and-cities-as-drought-worsens?sref=ibr3A0ff

    California plans to dramatically curtail water delivery next year from its network of canals, pipelines and reservoirs to 27 million Californians and three-quarters of a million acres of farmland because of a two-year drought.

    The California Department of Water Resources said it will prioritize delivery from the State Water Project only for health and safety needs, to maintain salinity control in key wetlands, to protect endangered species and to put water in reserve. That means farmers won’t get any water from the system they had applied for unless conditions improve.

    1. This will be the end of the small family farms that lack the financial resources to drill deep wells and pay for the pumping costs. The lawyers already have their farm units identified on ArcGIS maps.

  34. Oliver Darcy, a journalist at CNN who made headlines for stating that cable companies should pull the plug on outlets like Newsmax and OANN, was tragically shot and killed during a car jacking today. There are no witnesses or suspects at this time.

    When we are tired enough.

        1. WARNING: Dianne Feinstein photo

          That’s a decent photo. Now try Federal Reserve Bank of Cleveland President Loretta Mester for a cutie pie!

    2. This vicious violence is always destructive and sad and ai wouldn’t wish it on anyone.
      But I will say that we are in a war and an enemy just died.

    3. For some reason, I’ve not been able to find anything on Oliver Darcy (he’s one of the main players behind the massive censorship movement that we’ve been witnessing over the past ~5 years).

    4. For some reason, I’ve not been able to find anything on Oliver Darcy (he’s one of the main players behind the massive censorship movement that we’ve been witnessing over the past ~5 years).

  37. Columbia Journalism Review: Journalism’s Gates keepers

    I recently examined nearly twenty thousand charitable grants the Gates Foundation had made through the end of June and found more than $250 million going toward journalism. Recipients included news operations like the BBC, NBC, Al Jazeera, ProPublica, National Journal, The Guardian, Univision, Medium, the Financial Times, The Atlantic, the Texas Tribune, Gannett, Washington Monthly, Le Monde, and the Center for Investigative Reporting; charitable organizations affiliated with news outlets, like BBC Media Action and the New York Times’ Neediest Cases Fund; media companies such as Participant, whose documentary Waiting for “Superman” supports Gates’s agenda on charter schools; journalistic organizations such as the Pulitzer Center on Crisis Reporting, the National Press Foundation, and the International Center for Journalists; and a variety of other groups creating news content or working on journalism, such as the Leo Burnett Company, an ad agency that Gates commissioned to create a “news site” to promote the success of aid groups. In some cases, recipients say they distributed part of the funding as subgrants to other journalistic organizations—which makes it difficult to see the full picture of Gates’s funding into the fourth estate.

    During the pandemic, news outlets have widely looked to Bill Gates as a public health expert on covid—even though Gates has no medical training and is not a public official. PolitiFact and USA Today (run by the Poynter Institute and Gannett, respectively—both of which have received funds from the Gates Foundation) have even used their fact-checking platforms to defend Gates from “false conspiracy theories” and “misinformation,” like the idea that the foundation has financial investments in companies developing covid vaccines and therapies. In fact, the foundation’s website and most recent tax forms clearly show investments in such companies, including Gilead and CureVac.

    1. Gates is one of the leading figures behind this “pandemic” and the Great Reset agenda. He needs to be investigated and prosecuted for his crimes.

      In many of his televised pieces, he doesn’t disclose his conflicts. He’s invested in everything from “tracking and tracing” technology, vaccines, patents on viruses, digital IDs and currencies, etc. He should never be allowed to speak publicly without giving full disclosure.

      1. Bill Gates’s Charity Paradox
        A Nation investigation illustrates the moral hazards surrounding the Gates Foundation’s $50 billion charitable enterprise.

        Through an investigation of more than 19,000 charitable grants the Gates Foundation has made over the last two decades, The Nation has uncovered close to $2 billion in tax-deductible charitable donations to private companies—including some of the largest businesses in the world, such as GlaxoSmithKline, Unilever, IBM, and NBC Universal Media—which are tasked with developing new drugs, improving sanitation in the developing world, developing financial products for Muslim consumers, and spreading the good news about this work.

        The Nation found close to $250 million in charitable grants from the Gates Foundation to companies in which the foundation holds corporate stocks and bonds: Merck, Novartis, GlaxoSmithKline, Vodafone, Sanofi, Ericsson, LG, Medtronic, Teva, and numerous start-ups—with the grants directed at projects like developing new drugs and health monitoring systems and creating mobile banking services.

          3. I think that the embedded option (, remove spaces) is better. It quotes and italicizes he test. There is no button for it, though.

          5. Whatever you do to make those pasted quotes light grey, please stop.

            I have local changes to the JT Extension to darken up blockquotes, but never pushed the release…will try to remember to do that this week!

          6. The WordPress default aesthetics are pretty lame despite readily available ADA compliant CSS theme suggestions to address colorblind challenges.

          7. readily available ADA compliant CSS theme suggestions to address colorblind challenges

            Do you have something you can point me to/I can maybe incorporate?

          8. Don’t touch that!

            My general convention is anything below a link is taken from that link. The blockquote button is easier than adding quotations marks surrounding the quoted text then modifying quotations in the quoted text. I also don’t like blockquote italicizes quoted text. I won’t use it again unless drumminj changes the parameters.

          11. “Do you have something you can point me to/I can maybe incorporate?”

            I don’t, but I remember the HMI C# guys had a booklet of well researched visual ADA tips for adjacent line colors on charts with multiple lines since our SCADA rendering included many sensors per sheet. We had to sub out this HMI work since we didn’t have the (gov) ADA compliance experience in-house.

            I worked primarily with user location permissions granularity via db tables, which started out simple, but really morphed as system growth and security became an issue.

    2. Gates Foundation had made through the end of June and found more than $250 million going toward journalism

      Knock me over with a feather. As I said yesterday, I now just assume that everything the MSM reports is a bald faced lie, nothing more than manipulative propaganda. They are the enemy of the people.

      1. Same. I only trust independent journalists who have consistently gotten things right over the years. The MSM is totally corrupt at this point.

  40. Little play on Paul Simon – Kodachrome lyrics for the Covid jab cavers

    https://youtu.be/N4ltLp30KVs

    When I think back
    On all the crap I learned in high school
    It’s a wonder
    I can think at all
    And though my lack of Vaccinations
    Hasn’t hurt me none
    I can read the writing on the wall

    Omicron

    They’ll give us those mail in ballots
    They’ll give us those vaccine mandates
    Then they’ll lockdown the world on a sunny day
    I’ll get a Pfizer booster
    Then I’ll put on my mask
    So Fauci please take that Omicron away

    Fauci please take that Omicron
    Fauci please take that Omicron
    Fauci please take my Omicron away

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