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Shock, Devastation And Embarrassment Over What Appeared To Be A Glorified Ponzi Scheme

A report from the Marin Independent Journal. “Gloria Othon, 61, poured $115,000 into a year-long project to remodel the bathrooms and kitchen of her San Jose home. Othon and her husband bought the house in the Berryessa neighborhood in 1998 for $350,000. Othon listed the house last week for $1.788 million, hoping offers would pour in. But so far, it’s been crickets. ‘I’m really scared,’ she said. ‘I feel like I might have missed it, and what do I do now?'”

From Go Banking Rates. “As it turns out, a return to normal is probably pretty far off, but racks are starting to emerge in the seller’s market that has defined the real estate industry throughout the pandemic period. ‘The housing market is heading back to sanity in the summer of 2022,’ said Eyal Pasternak, a licensed realtor in Miami. ‘The housing market will not be as expensive as it was last year and buyers will have some leverage this time around. For the next few months, interest rates will rise indefinitely, which will cleanse the market of unnecessary buyers.'”

“It’s starting already. At the end of May, Redfin reported that nearly one in five buyers were lowering their prices, something not seen since October 2019.”

The Royse City Herald Banner on Texas. “Price appreciation in the national and DFW-area real estate market has skyrocketed the past two years, leading to record home prices throughout the North Texas region. According to the report by M&D, home sales spiked two weeks ago in the DFW area with 41% more homes listed for sale than the same time last year as sellers fear they may miss out on the red-hot market. ‘In fact, we saw more homes listed for sale in the area in April 2022 than we have in four years,’ said M&D.”

Just last week, M&D realtors reported seeing other signs of a cooling market, such as open houses with little to no attendance, a slowing pace of offers coming in, and a growing inventory of homes for sale. There were 100 percent more homes on the market for sale this past month in Rockwall County than there was this time last year. In January, there was less than one-month supply of inventory. This month, there is 1.8 months supply, according to NTREIS Trends.”

The Denver Channel. “Colorado homebuyers don’t have to duke it out quite as much to find a home. The state is finally seeing a shift and there are signs it’s becoming a bit more of a competitive market. In May, there were 11,129 new listings in Colorado. That’s a 4 percent increase from April. So, what’s behind the change? We look to the Colorado Association of Realtors for the answer. ‘I’ve been a realtor for 30 years so I’ve been through several ups and downs. I’ve really never seen a market change as quickly as this one did. When the interest rate hike came in April, specifically the week right before Easter, it was a pretty significant rate hike and we saw instantly a real cooling off in buyers.'”

The Bend Bulletin in Oregon. “The median sales price of a single-family home in Bend slipped slightly in Maym and the number of homes on the market increased, indicating a shift in the market, according to monthly real estate report. In Bend the median sales price for a single-family home was $740,000 in May, compared to $770,000 in April. During the same time, the amount of homes for sale grew to about five weeks worth. Since May, Donnie Montagner, owner of Beacon Appraisal Group in Redmond, said he’s seen more price reductions, indicating a softening of the market.”

“And in Sunriver, the median price of a single-family home was $893,000 in May, compared to $1.06 million in April, according to the report.”

From Realtor.com. “Is a buyer out there? David Duchovny is still searching for a sale of his beautiful Manhattan abode. The apartment with Central Park views is back on the market, marked down to $5,995,000. The 61-year-old actor bought it in 2012 for $6,029,700. The upscale Upper West Side unit first became available in May 2021 for a hefty $7.5 million. The price dropped to $6,950,000 before it came off the market in November.”

The Charlotte Business Journal in North Carolina. “Charlotte-based Wyndham Capital Mortgage will lay off nearly 50 employees this summer, according to a Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification filed this week. These aren’t the first mortgage-related layoffs to hit Charlotte this year.”

The Globe and Mail. “A wave of layoffs and hiring freezes in the American tech sector is set to hit Canada hard, industry watchers say. They warn that although job cuts have already happened here, bigger reductions lay ahead. ‘The message everyone is receiving is: ‘Protect your capital.’ There will be many more layoffs, no question,’ said Jacques Bernier, managing partner with Montreal ‘fund-of-funds’ firm Teralys Capital.”

“‘It’s going to be a bloodbath,’ said billionaire Vancouver investor and entrepreneur Markus Frind, who owns a majority of online furniture seller Cymax Group Inc. and backs several venture capital firms, all of whom are telling their companies to review their spending plans. ‘It’s going to be way worse than 2008,’ when the credit crisis sparked a recession.”

From CTV News. “As the Bank of Canada continues to hike rates in order to curb inflation, housing prices in Canada could fall 15 per cent from its peak by the end of next year, a new report says. The average price of a home in Canada peaked at just over $790,000 in February 2022, marking a 50 per cent increase over two years. Desjardins says that average price of a home in Canada fell 2.6 per cent month-to-month in March and 3.8 per cent in April.”

“‘If you rent out a property, sometimes, if you don’t collect enough in terms of rent to make up for the mortgage costs or the utility costs, those decisions were still justified by the idea that prices would keep appreciating,’ said Jimmy Jean, chief economist for Desjardins. ‘Now it’s another story.'”

The Australian Financial Review. “A single mother, an AICD-trained board director and owners of small to medium businesses are among hundreds of investors who lost their life savings in the $124 million collapse of property investment firm Remi Capital. Several of the 433 Remi Capital investors owed more than $60 million spoke to The Australian Financial Review to describe their shock, devastation and embarrassment over what one investor told a creditors’ meeting appeared to be a ‘glorified Ponzi scheme.’ All spoke on condition of anonymity.”

“‘It was worse than I ever imagined,’ Rose said. ‘I can’t believe it.’ I pleaded with them,’ Rose said. ‘I begged them. I’m a single mum. Find the humanity. I said don’t worry about the interest rate, just return my money, return my principal. They never responded.'”

“Mental health worker ‘Trudie,’ in her 50s, said that last August she invested the $50,000 in retirement savings she and her husband had amassed after her accountant emailed his client list about the firm’s seminars. ‘Because it came from him, I trusted it and I was, like, it must be legit,’ she said. However, within three months, the firm failed to pay her first return on time. When she asked for a refund she was assured not to worry and it would be paid. It never was.”

“‘I thought I could retire in five years – I can’t now. It’s just devastating. I’m actually just hoping and praying,’ she said. Worse, her daughter, in her 20s, invested all $40,000 of her savings. ‘That was actually for her house. She saved that money from when she was working since 15 years old,’ Trudie said. ‘What really annoys me is they knew how deep in debt they were – how were they still taking other people’s money?'”

“A Brisbane-based franchisee owner who sank $100,000 into the firm in mid-2021 after a relative in Remi’s capital-raising team pitched him said he had lost confidence in investing. ‘At my stage of life, I’m approaching 63, I cannot afford to lose $100,000 as my earning capacity means I no longer can recoup that money. It was a double whammy. It was devastating,’ he said. ‘I lost confidence in ASIC and in the whole financial investment community in Australia. You don’t expect that in a country like Australia. For a company to go on for so long and get away with it.'”

The Daily Mail. “The plunge in cryptocurrency values in recent weeks has sent many spiralling into dark mental health holes – some so bad they even attempted suicide. David Gerard, an author and crypto expert, said a lack of regulation has doomed the industry and said everyday Australians will be the victims of the latest crash. ‘We have to think about the real victims, the mums and dads, the grannies who think their retirement should go into crypto. There’s a real human cost here and that’s the ordinary people who get scammed,’ he told 60 Minutes.”

“‘You can’t get rich for free. You’d think that was obvious, but people keep hoping there’s a way out and that they’ll get ahead, but it’s always a false hope. Some people do great but more people get absolutely wrecked,’ he said. He said anyone who started investing in crypto in the last six months have instead been sold ‘magic beans’. ‘They’re trying to work out how to offload them. A lot of them are just going to have to take the hit and it’s not going to be nice,’ he said.”

“On the sub-Reddit for TerraLuna, the main place of discussion for the self-described ‘LUNAtics’, one terrified investor today asked for advice. ‘My friends who I recommended Luna to all hate me now,’ they wrote. ‘Many angry calls and loud knocking at my door from former friends I told to buy Luna early, I feel like s**t we all lost our life savings and they have kids. What do I do?'”

“The sudden collapse of both Terra and Luna, wiping billions off its value, didn’t just anger investors, it also made many grapple with suicidal thoughts. ‘I lost over $450k USD, I cannot pay the bank. I will lose my home soon. I’ll become homeless. Suicide is the only way out for me,’ one wrote. ‘I’m going through some of the darkest, most severe mental pain of my life. It still doesn’t seem real that I lost $US180,000… When I make it through this, I’ll be stronger then ever,’ another added.”

“‘Bro, my little brother lost his entire net worth £350,000, gone like that. I’ve lent him 5k and he’s moved in with me,’ a third wrote. In another story after the crash, an investor begged people to seek out mental health support after their own friend tried to take their own life. ‘My friend and ex-colleague (my manager for 15 years) tried to commit suicide this morning. He basically moved all of his savings to crypto in 2021 and LUNA was a massive player in his portfolio,’ they wrote. ‘Just wanted to tell you guys – if you feel pain and you think your life is miserable without money, you feel failure and stuff… just come to people you love. Do not be alone, this s**t is getting serious. Do not overestimate the value of money, life has a much higher value. I do not post to Reddit at all, but I considered it important to do it now. Wish you good luck.'”

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This Post Has 182 Comments

  2. From the video above:

    HOW MUCH Trouble Are New Home Builders In?

    Jun 5, 2022 Austin Property Tax Evaluations Are The End Of The Austin Housing Market!

    They put up some screen shots with new shacks getting slashed. One thing though, what they are calling Austin sure as heck isn’t. New Braunfels is closer to San Antonio. What they are referring to is the “growth” that’s making it all even more of a sh$thole.

    1. Natural Bridge Caverns that was pretty cool . A year ago my daughter wanted me to move to central Texas so toured the area. Why do all the homes have metal roofs ha. Its Ok but I’m not moving anywhere in the middle of a giant crash.

      1. Natural Bridge Caverns was the end of the year Middle school fun field trip.
        High schoolers went to Garner State Park. ahh, good times!

        Go Warhorses.

    2. New Branufels is 52 miles from Austin and 28 miles from San Antonio, up and down I-35. For reference, that’s like saying Gettsyburg is a suburb of Baltimore (51 miles).

    3. As I said I moved from Liberty Hill and worked in Cedar Park, had a rental property in Burnet. My take is that most of TX looks like a Mexican border town with an American zip code.

      scrub brush.

  3. ‘And in Sunriver, the median price of a single-family home was $893,000 in May, compared to $1.06 million in April’

    Cheaper than renting!

    1. One by product of watching these videos is how absurd these price increases have been since CCP virus. Some little igloo cluster way outside of Toronto goes from insane 600k pesos to a million 2? Sunriver is probably less desirable than Sacramento. Oh nobody could have seen this was a sh$tcart bound to fall over.

      1. oh, funny crack about Sacramento!
        I’ll have you know that our bums & illegals are second to none, by god.

        and with all the fit Ukrainians pouring in our body mass index will tip back to healthy range. which means better insurance rates. so they say.

        1. “fit Ukrainians”

          Not for long. I once worked at a place which took in a couple temp workers from South America. They gained 20+ pounds within months, and they were in their mid-20s. They told me it was because South America didn’t have free refills of Coke and Pepsi, so they were loading up here in the States. High fμctose corn syrup FTW!

  4. “cleanse the market of unnecessary buyers”

    A Realtor is saying this? Kiss those commission checks bye bye.

    Back to the stripper pole, Realtor.

  5. ‘so far, it’s been crickets. ‘I’m really scared,’ she said. ‘I feel like I might have missed it, and what do I do now?’

    Sit down Gloria, take a deep breath, put yer head between yer knees…

    1. I don’t know what she missed. If she bought the house for 350K and then put 115K, she has invested about 500K. Cut the price to 1.5M, and walk away with $1M in cash. Should be even more if she actually paid down her mortgage since 1998, but I am guessing instead she continued to extract equity and blew it.

      2. but I am guessing instead she continued to extract equity and blew it

        $60K+ luxury cars don’t pay for themselves.

        1. Hard to feel sorry for people hoping to take advantage of others by knowingly ripping them off. Don’t they shoot price gougers?

  6. “tried to commit suicide this morning. He basically moved all of his savings to crypto in 2021 and LUNA was a massive player in his portfolio”

    Get
    A
    Job

  7. Re-post from yesterday’s thread.

    Riding The Bus In Denver:

    “The Denver she encountered each day on the bus had been transformed by a new wave of epidemics overwhelming major cities across the country. Homelessness in Denver was up by as much as 50 percent since the beginning of the pandemic. Violent crime had increased by 17 percent, murders had gone up 47 percent, some types of property crime had nearly doubled, and seizures of fentanyl and methamphetamine had quadrupled in the past year.

    In the past two years, Denver-area bus drivers had reported being assaulted by their passengers more than 145 times. Suna had been spit on, hit with a toolbox, threatened with a knife, pushed in the back while driving and chased into a restroom during her break.

    “Last stop,” she announced, a few minutes before 7 a.m. She was scheduled for a six-minute break before turning around to begin her next trip up Colfax, but when she looked in the rearview mirror, there were still seven people sleeping on the bus. Lately, about a quarter of her riders were homeless. The bus was their destination, so they rode until someone forced them to get off.

    Meanwhile, many of her passengers ended up spending their nights at the last stop on the No. 15 route, Union Station, the newly renovated, $500 million gem of the city’s transportation system and now also the place the president of the bus drivers’ union called a “lawless hellhole.”

    https://archive.ph/fo1kO

    A lawless hellhole?

    “They’re not sending their

    1. The joy of public transit:

      “Urine trouble no more, the Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority hopes, with a new program to tackle public urination in system elevators with technology.

      The MBTA, which services Boston and the surrounding area, is launching a pilot program this summer in which urine detection sensors will be placed in four downtown elevators. The sensors alert transit ambassadors, who can dispatch a cleaning crew, the Boston Herald reported.”

      https://nypost.com/2022/06/12/boston-transit-agency-to-try-urine-sensors-on-elevators/

      Sounds like a Democrat Party sh*thole city problem.

      “They’re not sending their best”

  8. ‘I’ve been a realtor for 30 years so I’ve been through several ups and downs. I’ve really never seen a market change as quickly as this one did. When the interest rate hike came in April, specifically the week right before Easter, it was a pretty significant rate hike and we saw instantly a real cooling off in buyers’

    Sound lending? Now we find out.

    1. “I’ve really never seen a market change as quickly as this one did.”

      I bet he didn’t say a peep when the changes were in the upside. Paraphrasing Newton, if it goes up fast, it will come down equally fast.

    2. it was a pretty significant rate hike and we saw instantly a real cooling off in buyers’

      I thought every transaction was cash and “bidding wars”?

      None where cash nor was there ever any bidding wars. This was coordinated misinformation by NAR and the rest of the housing crime syndicate. You are liars.

      Can you imagine being dumb and shameless enough to believe these lies and repeat them?

    3. “I’ve really never seen a market change as quickly as this one did.”

      Yep, slowly then suddenly!

  10. Geeze the greed. Even if she lists it at $1.55 M and clears $1.4 (after commision etc), she will have made 400% return in 22 years since 1998. Drop now and sell —- Unless she has been taking out $s in HELOCs and Cash-out refinances.


    “Gloria Othon, 61, poured $115,000 into a year-long project to remodel the bathrooms and kitchen of her San Jose home. Othon and her husband bought the house in the Berryessa neighborhood in 1998 for $350,000. Othon listed the house last week for $1.788 million, hoping offers would pour in. But so far, it’s been crickets. ‘I’m really scared,’ she said. ‘I feel like I might have missed it, and what do I do now?’”

    2. a year-long project to remodel the bathrooms and kitchen

      …redo the landscaping, buy a new water heater and other appliances, and replace the roof

      20+ years of fighting depreciation, and you expect to win a prize.

    3. “And if the house doesn’t sell, she and her husband can’t afford to downsize by buying a smaller house or a condo.”

      What did you do with the cash-out refi money, Gloria? Boats and boobs?

      1. ** “ boats & boobs “

        damn that’s funny. I don’t care you are, that right there is goat scratchin’ good!

    4. “Gloria Othon, 61, poured $115,000 into a year-long project to remodel the bathrooms and kitchen of her San Jose home.”

      🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣

      $8k in labor and $12k in materials(being generous with materials) and 2 weeks becomes $115k and 52 weeks?

      dumb.borrowed.money.

      1. no offense but it’s not 1992 anymore. 12k would barely touch ONE bathroom. tradesmen are $100/hour or more. Materials are ridiculous. 10 to 15k for a small avg bathroom is probably average. And Kitchens go crazy really fast. 15 to 20k for a low end kitchen on up over 50k without blinking an eye. And we’re not talking structural changes here that makes it even more. 115k isn’t much on a remodel esp in an expensive city.

        1. Clearly you’re not in the trades. Rate isn’t anywhere near $100 an hour. Who pays trades by the hour for contract? Nobody. They’d be broke and likely in jail. I suppose if you’re buying one sheet at a time from the local hardware store, yeah it gonna be pricey. We don’t source materials from the local hardware store nor do we pay 2x rate…… neither does anyone else in this business.

          Monterey, CA Housing Prices Crater 21% YOY As Central Coast Housing Market Goes Down In Flames

          https://www.movoto.com/monterey-ca/market-trends/

    1. Related article.

      The Number Of Transgender Youth Is On The Rise, Mostly Youth In Democrat Led States (6/13/2022):

      “According to a new study, almost half of the 1.6 million Americans who identify as transgender are teenagers or young adults, and some of the highest rates of youth gender transition are occurring in blue states.

      The percentage of minors who now identify as transgender has nearly doubled since its last estimate in 2016. Transgender youth has reached about 18% of the transgender-identified population in the U.S., up from 10%.”

      https://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2022/06/number-transgender-youth-rise-mostly-youth-democrat-led-states/

      Remember, there is no such thing as a transgender child. There are only groomer parents and groomer teachers.

      Globalists rape kids. That’s what they do. Globalists want to seize custody of your children, mutilate their bodies, and rape them.

      This is who globalists are, and this is what they do.

      And when you vote Democrat Party, you’re voting for raping kids, because the Democrat Party (along with the NAMBLA RINO Republicans at the Lincoln Project) love raping kids. This is the Democrat Party.

      “They’re not sending their best”

      1. There are only groomer parents and groomer teachers.

        Since the suicide rate of these butchered kids is astronomical, I say the parents and groomers are killers.

  12. The new yuck mayor must be thinking, “pay me in dollars, I will even take zimbabwean dollars.”

    1. Coming straight out of the Saul Alinsky playbook, accuse the “other side” of doing what you are actually doing:

      “Major conservative figures and politicians have repeatedly deployed extreme rhetoric about abortion or have lent credence to dangerous disinformation campaigns.”

      https://www.huffpost.com/entry/anti-abortion-violence-murdered-families-roe-v-wade_n_62a37f2ae4b0cdccbe4fa969

      Attempted assassination of a Supreme Court Justice, just last week?

      This summer is gonna be LIT AF.

      Kyle Rittenhouse, please report for duty. America needs you.

      1. More Saul Alinsky tactics:

        “In this conversation, Hassan discusses Trump’s enduring power over his followers and why it has outlasted his presidency. He argues that right-wing Christian churches, Fox News, conspiracy theorists, right-wing social media and other propaganda machines are keeping Trump’s cultists loyal and further radicalizing them. He warns that the cult is actually bigger than Donald Trump and may outlast him, because “today’s Republican Party is part of an authoritarian cult movement that hates democracy and freedom.”

        Hassan also reflects on his own experience as a cult member who was conditioned to be willing to kill on command. He warns that Trump’s most loyal followers would likely obey such orders targeting Democrats, liberals, progressives, Muslims, black and brown people, or other designated enemies.”

        https://www.salon.com/2022/06/13/expert-steven-hassan-sees-95-chance-of-worsening-pro-violence/

        Remember the actual insurrection in 2020? The one with the seizure of territory, and the proclamation of an autonomous zone? Remember that insurrection?

        There was a Fedsurrection in Idaho two days ago. A mix of actual Feds and Lincoln Project employees.

        And no, you’re not fooling anybody with your phony uniforms and phony shields, because you GLOW IN THE DARK.

        Glowie gonna glow.

        2. Hassan also reflects on his own experience as a cult member who was conditioned

          There’s a guy you want advice from, not.

          Our cult was established by the Founding Fathers.

        1. I can’t get the archive website to work on this mobile phone browser, otherwise I would have provided an archive link.

          If you’re on a PC you can copy and paste into archive and it should work.

      3. And remember, the Rv.W Supreme Court ruling isn’t official yet. Then you’re REALLY going to see protests, likely in every state.

        1. The best outcome from that, is that the more violent the riots (they’re not protests) get, more voters will vote R this November on “law and order” concerns, most importantly in the state legislatures, which will then result in more abortion bans and restrictions.

          All those dumb violent leftists (redundant, I know) will be effectively owning themselves, with the consequences of their dumb violent behavior.

          “They’re not sending their best”

    2. “risk of a “season of political violence.”

      So what’s his solution? Mr. Chairman, get to work?

      Little printing fixes everything. LOL

  15. ‘I’m really scared,’ she said. ‘I feel like I might have missed it, and what do I do now?’”

    You get to sawin’ and slashin’ like you mean it, greedhead.

  17. “As it turns out, a return to normal is probably pretty far off, but racks are starting to emerge in the seller’s market that has defined the real estate industry throughout the pandemic period.

    As the weather soars into the 90s here in Colorado, I’ve seen some impressive racks emerge.

    1. “racks are starting to emerge in the seller’s market ”

      More boob jobs? Does that help sell houses?

  18. ‘It’s going to be way worse than 2008,’ when the credit crisis sparked a recession.”

    That’s because the gold collar criminals who caused the 2008 financial crash were never held accountable.

  21. Oh dear….

    Mortgaged Aussie households face devastating interest rate shock

    https://www.macrobusiness.com.au/2022/06/mortgaged-aussie-households-face-devastating-interest-rate-shock/

    The Grattan Institute has published analysis showing that Australian households with a mortgage are facing a sharp rise in mortgage interest repayments in the event that projected increases in the official cash rate (OCR) come to fruition.

    The median economist is now tipping the OCR to peak at around 2.75%, whereas the futures market is tipping the OCR to hit 3.7% in May 2023.

  22. ‘open houses with little to no attendance’

    Wa?

    ‘a slowing pace of offers coming in, and a growing inventory of homes for sale’

    WA?

    ‘There were 100 percent more homes on the market for sale this past month in Rockwall County than there was this time last year’

    This county is the fastest growing in the US right now, population wise. I talked with a person a few month a ago who confirmed they are throwing up roads and highways like mad.

    Bonus points for what this county is named after!

    1. ‘ELMS has been unable to secure financing since its founder and CEO departed in February after an investigation found the company’s financial statements to be unreliable.’

      Must be China-ron. This breakdown in accounting is more than concerning. We’ve only got many decades of checks and balances to keep this from happening. Then again people poured trillion$ into magic beans.

    2. We have similar firm in my little burg, which also converts vans to all electric: Lightning Motors. I expect they will eventually be closing their doors.

      1. I’m not so sure. Energy prices are likely to continue going up and will remain so. Also the commies running the show are going to continue subsidizing unicorns while putting the screws to ICE vehicles.

        I’m still planning on keeping Oil and coal stocks because somebody has to keep these EVs going 🙂

  24. CA dreamin ” all the lawns are brown and the sky is grey
    Passed by a gas station along the way
    got down on my knees and started to pray
    you know the governor likes the situation because he knows the middle class will pay
    CA nightmare on such a summers day

    1. The eerie silent streets of spring 2020 may come again. Who wants to drive anywhere far if gas is $10?

    3. zerohedge(dot)com/markets/housing-affordability-hits-record-low-mortgage-rates-soar-61?commentId=8ca1fc34-af8d-4097-bfd2-5e374f76083f

      Taffer

      1 hour ago

      If Big Fat Bastard were here today, he’d be saying “Home prices are going to the moon!”

      Lol!! You must return bfb!! You are internet famous!!

  26. “‘If you rent out a property, sometimes, if you don’t collect enough in terms of rent to make up for the mortgage costs or the utility costs, those decisions were still justified by the idea that prices would keep appreciating,’ said Jimmy Jean, chief economist for Desjardins. ‘Now it’s another story.’”

    That’s called being a home-debtor. It doesn’t fetch enough monthly to cover your mortgage, taxes, insurance and depreciation.

    How many of the BalloonHeads that bought a rapidly depreciating house in the last 20 years performed that math?

    1. Zerohedge(dot)com/markets/housing-affordability-hits-record-low-mortgage-rates-soar-61?commentId=90429ae7-cb05-4c80-9642-969708bcbb4e

      “I’m picturing the Big Fat Bastard, rolling over in his grave, spinning as if he’s on a rotisserie.”

      Bfb, zerohedge needs you like sleepy Joe needs diapers. Please come back!
      Baby come back, you can blame it all on me, I was wrong and I just can’t live without you.

      1977 player
      https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=f4uSzrsOQr8

    2. Zerohedge(dot)com/markets/housing-affordability-hits-record-low-mortgage-rates-soar-61?commentId=90429ae7-cb05-4c80-9642-969708bcbb4e

      “I’m picturing the Big Fat Bastard, rolling over in his grave, spinning as if he’s on a rotisserie.”

      Bfb, zerohedge needs you like sleepy Joe needs diapers. Please come back!
      Baby come back, you can blame it all on me, I was wrong and I just can’t live without you.

      1977 player

  27. Can’t stand those ridicules political surveys on this web site , yes or no true or false , black or white , they are as narrow as you can get , who puts these out , government crime family

  28. In Bend the median sales price for a single-family home was $740,000 in May, compared to $770,000 in April.

    OMFG. I had no idea. These prices are so unbelievably absurd that there are no words. Remember what happened in Bend last bust? An 80% haircut seems likely.

    1. Factoid: “In April 2022, the median listing home price in Fairfax, VA was $699.9K”

      Keep in mind that Fairfax is the home of mucho high-pay defense contractors and cyber careers. Those folks can afford a $700K home. What industry is in Bend to justify these prices? California, I guess.

  29. “Shock, Devastation And Embarrassment Over What Appeared To Be A Glorified Ponzi Scheme”

    The post titles get better by the day!

    1. Forbes Digital Assets
      Editors’ Pick
      Bitcoin Crash Causes Crypto Stocks To Plummet
      Steven Ehrlich
      Forbes Staff
      I write about how digital assets are going to change the world
      Jun 13, 2022,11:54am EDT

      Following the crypto market’s ugly turn on Monday morning, which saw bitcoin fall to its lowest level since December 2020 and ether start to risk falling below $1,000, crypto stocks are feeling the pain.

      Led by business analytics firm MicroStrategy, the world’s largest corporate holder of bitcoin still worth $3 billion, the stock fell over 20% in pre-hours trading and remains down 23.18% today.

      Other stocks feeling the pain include Coinbase, which is down 10.7% on the day and bitcoin miners Marathon and Riot, which are down 9.95% and 8.32% respectively.

      Crypto stocks traditionally outperform bitcoin during bull markets and underperform during bearish periods. As you can see below, while bitcoin is now down almost 50% year to date, each of these stocks have lost between 67-80% in 2022.
      …
      https://www.forbes.com/sites/stevenehrlich/2022/06/13/bitcoin-crash-causes-crypto-stocks-to-plummet/?sh=1d1577476ccd

      1. “I write about how digital assets are going to change the world”

        Fantasy is fun; reality is a bitch.

    1. Really? Markets are behaving as though someone on high decided to rip the bandage off to expose the oozing pus.

      1. The Financial Times
        Markets Briefing Equities
        US stocks trade in bear market territory as sell-off accelerates
        S&P 500 slides for the fourth consecutive day as 10-year Treasury yield hits highest level since 2011
        The US Federal Reserve building in Washington DC
        Analysts have upgraded their forecasts of how far the Federal Reserve will lift interest rates
        Naomi Rovnick in London and Nicholas Megaw and Eric Platt in New York an hour ago

        US stocks dropped sharply into bear market territory on Monday, rattled by worries about high inflation and the prospect of aggressive monetary tightening by central banks.

        Wall Street’s benchmark S&P 500 index slid 3.1 per cent at midday in New York, pushing it more than 20 per cent from its recent all-time high, a decline commonly identified as a bear market. The index briefly flirted with a bear market in late May before rebounding the same day.

        Government bond prices on both sides of the Atlantic also dropped dramatically, with yields hitting the highest levels in over a decade, as strong inflation readings prompt central banks in the US and Europe to raise interest rates and drain liquidity from the financial system.

        Speculative corners of the market including fast-growing tech companies and crypto assets have suffered acutely. The tech-heavy Nasdaq Composite dropped 3.8 per cent, taking its losses for the year above 30 per cent.

        Bitcoin traded below $24,000, having tumbled almost 20 per cent since last Friday. The decline was exacerbated by news that two big players in the crypto market had halted customer withdrawals due to the extreme market conditions.

        If the S&P 500 does not recover by the end of the day, it will mark the first time the benchmark index has fallen more than 2 per cent in three consecutive sessions since August 2015.

        The latest bout of selling was encouraged by unexpectedly high US inflation figures released this past Friday, which showed consumer prices rose 8.6 per cent year on year in May as Russia’s invasion of Ukraine raised fuel and food costs.

        Analysts have upgraded their forecasts of how far the Federal Reserve will raise interest rates, with some speculating the central bank might implement an extra large 0.75 percentage point increase at its monetary policy meeting this week.

        Money markets are now pricing in a 3.4 per cent federal funds rate by December, up from a range of 0.75 per cent to 1 per cent currently.
        …

    1. Dow sinks 800 points and stocks enter bear market on worries of drastic rate hikes
      By David Goldman, CNN Business
      Updated 10:59 AM ET, Mon June 13, 2022
      Workers consider cost of commute: ‘It doesn’t make sense’
      On GPS: How bad is the economy really?
      Retirees becoming homeless at higher rate than other age groups amidst inflation
      World Bank president on handling ‘biggest slowdown of the global economy in 80 years’
      Treasury secretary warns of ‘unacceptable levels of inflation’
      JPMorgan Chase CEO warns of an economic ‘hurricane’
      Larry Summers: More rate increases ahead to contain inflation
      ‘I was wrong’: US treasury secretary admits she was wrong about US inflation in 2021
      How the Biden WH predictions about inflation are biting back now

      New York (CNN Business)
      US stocks plunged into bear market territory Monday morning as Wall Street investors grew increasingly nervous about the prospect of even more harsh medicine from the Fed to take the sting out of inflation.

      The Dow (INDU) sank 825 points, or 2.7%, and the Nasdaq fell 4.3%.

      The broader S&P 500 fell 3.6%. That index is now more than 20% below its all-time high set in January, putting stocks in bear-market territory.

      Inflation and recession fears had eased somewhat at the end of May, and stocks regained some ground. But Friday’s miserable Consumer Price Index report showed US inflation was significantly higher than economists had expected last month, which could make the Federal Reserve’s inflation-control efforts more difficult.
      …
      https://www.cnn.com/2022/06/13/investing/dow-stock-market-today/index.html

  33. “‘We have to think about the real victims, the mums and dads, the grannies who think their retirement should go into crypto. There’s a real human cost here and that’s the ordinary people who get scammed,’ he told 60 Minutes.”

    “Have fun staying poor.”

      1. Perhaps you missed my sarcasm. The Bitcon speculators are the ones who tell everybody that, so I threw it back at them as they’re going broke.

      2. 46&2 is clearly mocking the crypto maximalists, +1. These jokers deserve to lose because they chose to deride instead of diversify. But don’t celebrate too hard yet. These cryptos have a way of rising from the dead.

        1. “In the long run we are all dead.”

          — John Maynard Keynes

          Especially cryptocurrencies!

        3. These cryptos have a way of rising from the dead.
          Agreed, I find it absolutely amazing but they so far have done so many times.

          1. Markets
            CNBC TV
            Tech
            The luna cryptocurrency has been resurrected after its $40 billion collapse. It’s already crashing
            Published Mon, May 30 2022 6:24 AM EDT
            Updated Mon, May 30 2022 10:08 PM EDT
            Ryan Browne
            Key Points
            — Terra has launched a new version of its failed luna cryptocurrency, which plunged to $0 this month.
            — At its height, the old luna — now known as “luna classic” — had a circulating supply of over $40 billion.
            — The revived luna token is already trading on exchanges. But its price is crashing.
            LUNA.CM=-0.00001603 (-21.63%)
            Luna, the sister cryptocurrency of controversial stablecoin TerraUSD, dropped to $0. The collapse of the algorithmic stablecoin TerraUSD has raised question about the future survival of similar crypto assets.
            Dan Kitwood | Getty Images News | Getty Images

            A new version of the collapsed luna cryptocurrency is already live on major exchanges — and it’s gotten off to a bad start.

            Last week, supporters of the Terra blockchain project voted to revive luna but not terraUSD, a so-called “stablecoin” that plunged below its intended peg to the dollar, causing panic in the crypto market.

            TerraUSD, or UST, is what’s known as an algorithmic stablecoin. It relied on code and a sister token, luna, to maintain a $1 value. But as digital currency prices fell, investors fled the stablecoin, sending UST tumbling — and taking luna down with it.

            At its height, the old luna — now known as “luna classic” — had a circulating supply of over $40 billion.

            Now, luna has a new iteration, which investors are calling Terra 2.0. It is already trading on exchanges including Bybit, Kucoin and Huobi. Binance, the world’s largest crypto exchange, says it will list luna on Tuesday.

            Its launch has not gone well.

            After reaching a peak of $19.53 on Saturday, luna dropped as low as $4.39 just hours later, according to CoinMarketCap data. It has since settled at a price of around $5.90.

            Analysts are deeply skeptical about the chances of Terra’s revived blockchain being a success. It will have to compete with a host of other so-called “Layer 1” networks — the infrastructure that underpins cryptocurrencies like ethereum, solana and cardano.
            …
            https://www.cnbc.com/2022/05/30/terra-2point0-new-luna-cryptocurrency-is-already-crashing.html

    1. The Fed may have to do something it hasn’t done since 1994 to tame inflation
      By Paul R. La Monica, CNN Business
      Updated 10:37 AM ET, Mon June 13, 2022

      New York (CNN Business)
      Just one month ago, Federal Reserve chairman Jerome Powell said that the central bank was not “actively considering” raising interest rates by three-quarters of a percentage point to fight inflation. But after Friday’s consumer price index report showed inflation is rising faster than expected, Wall Street is worried that Powell may have to change his tune.
      Stocks plunged Friday and were down sharply again Monday across the globe. The yield on the benchmark US 10-year Treasury bond rose to 3.27%, the highest level since November 2018.
      Investors are nervous because the Fed could be heading into uncharted territory. A three-quarter point rate increase would certainly show that the Fed is really worried about inflation.

      But a move of that magnitude, although not unprecedented, is exceedingly rare. The last time the Fed hiked rates by 75 basis points was in the Alan Greenspan era: November 1994.
      …
      https://www.cnn.com/2022/06/13/investing/federal-reserve-rate-hikes/index.html

      1. “inflation isn’t peaking, it isn’t even plateauing. It is still accelerating, and it will likely do so again in June.”

        Yep…

        1. Bowell will not do anything. He will do half-hearted 50 basis points.

          Too little too late so far & Pause by September

          1. There is no pause coming. That’s delusional rhetoric from the speculators who are getting annihilated right now, and their only hope is hanging their hat on another FED put. Not happenin’. They’re toast. BTFD, focktards.

          2. We’re going to have a party summer, but September is going to be ugly. Bad harvests, high gas prices, mild food shortages in the US (with famine overseas), and just wait until the layoffs hit. They next layoffs won’t be COVID-style low-level service job layoffs. They will be real; it’s already started with the mortgage originators. Memo to work-at-homers who bought an expensive house in the exurbs: you had better be as efficient and productive as you say you are.

            Biden told Powell to kill inflation, and at the current rate he will get what he wanted — good and hard, just in time for an election. No, I think Biden will call up the Fed and tell them to pause and pivot.

    1. 1. Strong dollar
      2. Manipulated paper ounces
      3. Check the price of a physical ASE. It’s not $21.

    2. Gold and silver (always physical) are insurance, not investments. They sit in your safe just in case. Bullets, coffee and whiskey last a long time too, just in case.

    3. 1. Gold and silver pay no income, unlike Uncle Buck, which pays interest at an accelerating rate of increase.

      2. The inflation hedge value of gold and silver was long ago priced in, similar to other risk assets with no use value.

    1. A former Fed chair still wants the punch bowl — and a high-proof punch
      Review by Steven Pearlstein
      May 27, 2022 at 12:20 p.m. EDT
      Federal Reserve Board Chairman Ben Bernanke testifies before the Senate Banking Committee in 2012.
      (Win McNamee/Getty Images)

      Federal Reserve Chairman William McChesney Martin spoke for generations of monetary policymakers when he famously declared in 1955 that the job of the central bank was to take away the punch bowl “just when the party was really warming up.”

      But in recent years, this puritanical approach to managing the ups and downs of the economy had fallen into disrepute. Citing structural changes in the economy and the lessons learned from the two most recent recessions, central bankers have come to believe that they must “do whatever it takes” to pull an economy out of a serious downturn and keep the cheap money flowing until the economy has fully recovered — and then some. Taking away the punch bowl too early, they have come to believe, results in jobless recoveries in which the economy never reaches its full potential and workers never gain the leverage to bargain for a decent wage.

      Among the intellectual godfathers for this more muscular, run-it-hot monetary policy, none is more respected than Ben Bernanke, the Princeton academic who courageously and creatively led the Fed into and through the Great Recession. In his latest book, “21st Century Monetary Policy: The Federal Reserve from the Great Inflation to COVID-19,” Bernanke aims to build public support for this new monetary framework.

      Unfortunately for Bernanke, however, his book arrives just as this new framework is being put to the test, with an inflationary spiral taking hold, an economic slowdown on the horizon, and tech and crypto bubbles starting to burst. Earlier this month, as the current Fed chair and his colleagues scrambled to hike interest rates and halt a multi-trillion-dollar bond-buying spree, a somewhat-chastened Jerome Powell admitted that they had left the punch bowl out too long.
      …
      https://www.washingtonpost.com/outlook/2022/05/27/former-fed-chair-still-wants-punch-bowl-high-proof-punch/

  37. We can’t get lights delivered.

    For multiple reasons. First, because of the “bipartisan” Congressional economic betrayal that sent all the manufacturing jobs overseas. Second, because of phony @ss CCP Flu with the 99.98 survival rate, Commie China is on lockdown, so no lights from China. Some of them come from Mexico, but most of them come from China.

    No lights means no above ceiling inspection, no final inspection, no turnover, and the tenant can’t move in.

    Every day I wonder if this Brandon economy can fail any harder, and every day I learn that yes, it can.

    “This sucker could go down” — George W. Bush

      1. They don’t exist. There is no rising from the dead for a delusion.

        Do you refer to the entire two years or the current situation (as reported)?

    2. All Div 16 and 17 item lead times are in the months now. Fabricated equipment is months out too. I got so sick of the excuses I just punt to legal now. I’m not dealing with it anymore.

      Somebody is going to pay for these delays. Construction contract durations and requirements aren’t magically suspended because of the flu and a stolen election. The claims for time delays and extended overhead are racking up.

    1. Date Event Price Price/Sq Ft
      06/11/2022 Price Changed $1,980,000 $516
      05/25/2022 Price Changed $2,395,000 $625
      05/17/2022 Listed $2,600,000 $678
      12/02/2014 Listing removed $1,198,888 $315
      11/26/2014 Relisted $1,198,888 $315
      10/16/2014 Listing removed $1,198,888 $315
      08/01/2014 Listed $1,198,888 $315

      Nervous Nellie only had it on the market for less than a month. Shift!

      1. How many hundreds of thousands did the dingbat sink into it in “upgrades”? How about a $115k year long bathroom?🤣

          1. “Over $1.2M remodel completed in 2018”

            🤣🤣🤣

            That’s 5 new houses on the same street. Somebody got rrrrrrriped off.

      2. The listing agent sent out a mailer boasting about the $251K over asking price on the Orchard Gate property. He got greedy.

        04/01/2022 Sold $2,450,000 $634
        02/16/2022 Listed $2,199,000 $569
        03/30/2020 Sold $1,349,900 $349

    2. That Orchard Gate property looks kinda fun, but I don’t like the multilevel main living areas, or that sharp-angle peninsula in the kitchen. Stairs and angles are disasters for anyone who is elderly or disabled in any way. And the pool is far too small.

    3. Are you still planning to buy in Poway? This crash may go down much farther and faster than the 1991-1996 or the 2007-2012 episodes, as I see no evidence of Fed interference this time.

      1. Yep, we’re still planning to buy in Poway. These two houses and a third recent sale are comps for the house I’m eyeing with the realtor/widower with $900K in mortgages at 84yo.

      2. as I see no evidence of Fed interference this time

        A lot of people seem to think, or hope, the Fed will reverse course despite messaging to the contrary.

    4. How’d you like to be the “winnah” of the second house bought at the top of the market and is already down about $500k ?

  39. Paul Joseph Watson points out what a poster here did this weekend…

    “that a ‘far-right group’ infiltrated by authorities which had planned ‘violent riots’ at an LGBT event peacefully allowed themselves to be hog tied before sitting politely on the grass before being carted away”

    … they were obviously Federally financed Jan 6 like white supremacist paid actors.

    This isn’t weird at all.
    24,745 viewsJun 13, 2022

    https://youtu.be/LpcPsMVDKtE

    1. As I posted above, it was a mix of actual Feds and Lincoln Project employees. Everyone who was there was getting paid to be there.

  42. This is a urine soaked mattress article.

    Did you know that the 2020 election was stolen? The 2020 election was stolen.

    Politico — Trump backers unbowed in push to overtake state election offices (6/13/2022):

    “Nevada Republicans are about to decide whether the leader of a Trump-aligned group of election conspiracy theorists will be one step away from becoming the battleground state’s chief elections officer.

    In the past two years, former state Assemblymember Jim Marchant lost a congressional race by 5 points — then sued unsuccessfully to overturn the defeat. He said he wouldn’t have certified President Joe Biden’s 2-point victory in Nevada had he been secretary of state. And he has pushed to do away with ballot-counting machines and instead count votes only by hand, which officials say would make tallying election results slower, more expensive and less accurate.

    Marchant, one of several Republicans running in Tuesday’s primary for secretary of state, has also been a leader of the “America First Secretary of State Coalition” — a collection of like-minded candidates running in states across the country. Marchant arranged a “private strategy session” in Las Vegas in May 2021 to coordinate, according to the group’s website, and he regularly promotes the effort in far-right media outlets including Steve Bannon’s podcast.

    The primary in Nevada is another reminder of the unusually high stakes in this year’s campaigns for election administration positions — longtime political backwaters that have gotten little attention in the past. But followers of former President Donald Trump — and his false claim that the 2020 election was stolen from him — have poured into secretary of state races in 2022, especially in the battleground states that will play a key role in deciding the next presidential contest.”

    https://www.politico.com/news/2022/06/13/trump-state-election-offices-00038956

    The 2020 election was stolen.

    Did you know that the 2020 election was stolen?

    Wait? What? You don’t?

    The 2020 election was stolen.

      1. Great song!

        Long time no hear.

        Brings back some great memories and possibly some partial blackouts during a wild part of my life back in 1979-1980 I believe.

        This ain’t no party, this ain’t no disco
        This ain’t no fooling around 🙂

  46. ‘It was a double whammy. It was devastating,’ he said. ‘I lost confidence in ASIC and in the whole financial investment community in Australia. You don’t expect that in a country like Australia. For a company to go on for so long and get away with it’

    I meant earlier to nominate this for best humor of the day.

    1. The Financial Times
      Markets Briefing Equities
      US stocks sink 3.9% to close in bear market as inflation fears mount
      Treasury yields soar by the most in years on concerns Federal Reserve will raise rates sharply
      The US Federal Reserve building in Washington DC
      Analysts have upgraded their forecasts of how far the Federal Reserve will lift interest rates
      Nicholas Megaw and Eric Platt in New York and Naomi Rovnick in London
      4 hours ago

      US stocks closed in a bear market on Monday after a dramatic late-session sell-off, while government bond yields soared, with investors unnerved over stubbornly high inflation and the prospect of aggressive monetary tightening by central banks.

      Wall Street’s equities benchmark S&P 500 slid 3.9 per cent in New York to close at its lowest level since January 2021. The move left the index more than 20 per cent below its January 2022 all-time high, a decline commonly identified as a bear market.

      Government bond prices on both sides of the Atlantic also dropped, sending yields to the highest levels in more than a decade, as strong inflation readings drive central banks in the US and Europe to raise interest rates after years of relaxed policy.

      The heavy selling was triggered by unexpectedly high inflation figures released this past Friday, which showed US consumer prices rose 8.6 per cent year on year in May as Russia’s invasion of Ukraine raised fuel and food costs.

      Analysts have upgraded their forecasts of how far the Federal Reserve will raise interest rates at its monetary policy meeting which concludes on Wednesday, with increasing speculation that the central bank might implement an extra large 0.75 percentage point increase.

      Futures markets now show investors expect the federal funds rate to hit 3.6 per cent by the end of the year, compared with the current range of 0.75 to 1 per cent. A week ago, investors had only expected the rate to reach 2.9 per cent this year.

      “I think with this latest [inflation] number, the Fed is really going to go for it and this will cause an economic slowdown,” said Julian Howard, lead investment director for multi-asset solutions at fund manager GAM. “It’s all looking pretty ugly in the short term and there is nowhere really to escape from it, apart from going into cash for now.”

      Expectations of higher interest rates have had an especially pronounced effect on more speculative corners of the market including fast-growing tech companies and crypto assets. The tech-heavy Nasdaq Composite closed down 4.7 per cent, taking its losses for the year to 31 per cent.

      Bitcoin, the most widely held cryptocurrency, traded at less than $24,000, having tumbled 20 per cent since last Friday. The decline was exacerbated by news that two big players in the crypto market had halted customer withdrawals due to the extreme market conditions.
      …

    1. Americans ‘are well positioned have to face these challenges’ thanks to the President

    1. DOW 30,516.74 -2.79%
      S&P 500 3,749.63 -3.88%
      NASDAQ 10,809.23 -4.68%

      Welcome to the year of the bear
      By Allison Morrow, CNN Business
      Updated 9:02 PM ET, Mon June 13, 2022

      (CNN Business)
      Hello from the mountains of northwest Pennsylvania, where I’ve spent much of the weekend staring into the woods in the hopes of spotting my local bear. True story: she’s out there, according to witnesses. But for whatever reason, I can’t seem to time my visits right. I’ve been grumbling about it for months.
      In a fun cosmic twist, Monday arrived with a big bear of another sort.

      Here’s the deal: We’re officially in a bear market, which happens when stocks close down 20% or more from their most recent high.
      — The S&P 500, the broadest measure of Wall Street, ended the day down 3.9%. It’s down more than 21% from its high reached in early January.
      — That means the bull run that started on March 23, 2020, has come to an end. (But the bear market technically began on January 3 of this year, when the index hit its all-time high.
      — The Dow fell 875 points, or 2.8%.
      — The Nasdaq, which slipped into bear territory in March, fell 4.7%.
      — Bitcoin, ethereum and other cryptos joined the meltdown (more on that in a minute).

      Why are stocks falling?

      In short: Inflation, and the Federal Reserve’s efforts to tame it.

      Investors’ nerves were already fried, and then Friday happened. A closely watched inflation report showed prices rising 8.6% in May, the fastest rate since 1981. Inflation isn’t a new problem, but that reading dashed all hopes that it’s slowing down.

      To investors, the inflation reading signals that the Fed is going to have to get much more aggressive with interest rate hikes, which Wall Street hates. Higher interest rates make it more expensive to borrow money, and that tends to sap earnings and stock prices.
      …
      https://www.cnn.com/2022/06/13/investing/stocks-bear-market-nightcap/index.html

    2. The Financial Times
      Markets Briefing Equities
      Asian markets sink after Wall Street enters bear market
      Stock market sell-off deepens on threat of aggressive tightening by the Federal Reserve
      Traders look at screens in New York
      Treasury yields have soared by the most in years after US inflation data showed a jump for consumer prices
      Hudson Lockett in Hong Kong
      49 minutes ago

      Asia-Pacific equities slid in the wake of a sell-off that plunged stocks on Wall Street into a bear market, as the prospect of aggressive tightening by central banks rattled global investors.

      Japan’s Nikkei 225 and China’s CSI 300 index each dropped 2 per cent on Tuesday while Australia’s benchmark S&P/ASX 200 index shed 4.6 per cent.

      The falls for Asian markets followed a day of sharp selling on Wall Street, where the S&P 500 tumbled almost 4 per cent to the lowest level since the start of 2021. That left the benchmark down more than 20 per cent from its all-time peak in January, a scenario typically referred to as a bear market.

      The rout for global equities was triggered by a higher-than-expected reading US inflation on Friday, which showed consumer prices had jumped 8.6 per cent from a year ago in May as Russia’s invasion of Ukraine raised food and fuel costs.

      The surge in consumer inflation has stoked expectations that the US Federal Reserve could implement an extra-large rate rise of 0.75 percentage points at its monetary policy meeting, which concludes on Wednesday.

      Economists at Goldman Sachs raised their forecast for the federal funds rate to include rate rises of 0.75 per cent in both June and July, warning that if the Fed’s moves met market expectations, it “would imply a meaningful further drag on growth”.
      …

  56. Even though cryptocurrency technically isn’t money, is there a cryptocurrency “bank run” underway?

    1. The Wall Street Journal
      Markets
      Bitcoin Price Plunges as Crypto Lender Celsius Halts Withdrawals
      The cryptocurrency’s slide since November has contributed to a roughly $2 trillion wipeout in the broader market
      Bitcoin has fallen more than 60% from its November high.
      Photo: Valeria Mongelli/Bloomberg News
      By Elaine Yu , Joe Wallace and Paul Vigna
      Updated June 13, 2022
      11:03 pm ET

      Bitcoin’s selloff, sparked by a reversal of the buying mania that drove it higher, has now become the fourth-deepest in the cryptocurrency’s 13-year history.

      On Monday, bitcoin fell 15% to $23,250.72 as of 5 p.m. ET, according to Dow Jones Market Data, its lowest level since December 2020. That reflected a 66% drop from its high of $67,802.30 in November 2021. The popular digital currency dropped further late in the day to about $21,000, according to CoinDesk.
      Continue reading your article witha WSJ membership
      View Membership Options
      …

    2. The Financial Times
      Cryptocurrencies
      Bitcoin tumbles after crypto lender Celsius blocks all redemptions
      Binance exchange halts bitcoin withdrawals for hours as pressure mounts on digital asset market
      Bitcoin, ether and other major tokens have wobbled in recent weeks while inflation has surged
      Adam Samson, Eva Szalay and Scott Chipolina in London and Hudson Lockett and William Langley in Hong Kong
      2 hours ago

      Binance on Monday halted withdrawals of bitcoin for several hours after crypto lender Celsius also blocked customers from pulling funds from its platform, citing “extreme market conditions”, while digital assets slumped in price.

      Bitcoin, ether and other major tokens have wobbled in recent weeks while inflation has surged and big central banks have signalled they will cut back dramatically on stimulus. The price of bitcoin fell as much as 10.3 per cent on Tuesday to an 18-month low of $20,823.56, according to Bloomberg data.

      The drop followed a sharp decline the previous day on signs of strain in the infrastructure underpinning the digital asset market. Binance blamed a “stuck transaction” for its suspension.

      Bitcoin, the world’s most actively traded cryptocurrency, has dropped almost 20 per cent since Friday to below $24,000, its lowest level since December 2020, according to CryptoCompare data. Meanwhile, the value of the broader crypto market has fallen from a peak of $3.2tn in November to about $1tn on Monday.

      Celsius is one of the biggest players in the market for digital yield products, providing users with the ability to lend out their tokens as collateral for other crypto projects. In return for lending their tokens, traders were able to earn annual yields of as much as 17 per cent.
      Line chart of $ per coin showing bitcoin has sunk to its lowest level since late 2020

      Sentiment towards these high-risk projects cooled sharply after the terra and luna tokens — which were the foundation of another popular yield platform — last month collapsed in a matter of days. The value of assets deposited on Celsius’s platform shrivelled to less than $12bn as of May 17 from more than $24bn in late December.

      Ether, which is considered a proxy for sentiment for digital asset projects that offer investors high yields, has dropped almost 30 per cent since Friday, leaving it down two-thirds in dollar terms this year to trade at $1,195.

      Selling on Monday also ricocheted into the shares of crypto-focused companies. MicroStrategy, a tech company that invests heavily in bitcoin, lost a quarter of its value in early trade on Wall Street while Nasdaq-listed crypto exchange Coinbase fell 16 per cent.
      …

    4. Cryptocurrencies
      Crypto
      Bitcoin tumbles below $21,000 in crypto crash. This chart shows how much worse a selloff could get.
      Last Updated: June 13, 2022 at 10:34 p.m. ET
      First Published: June 13, 2022 at 8:45 a.m. ET
      By Barbara Kollmeyer
      Troubles across some cryptocurrency plaforms also rattle investors
      A “buy bitcoin” sign is seen in a Coinstar ATM in the exhibition hall during the Bitcoin 2022 Conference at Miami Beach Convention Center on April 8 in Miami. Getty Images

      Referenced Symbols
      BTCUSD -3.42%
      ETHUSD -4.58%
      DOGEUSD -1.23%
      ES00 0.19%
      MSTR -25.18%

      Cryptocurrencies kicked off a new week with deep losses, extending weekend selling following surprisingly high U.S. inflation data and troubles for a major cryptocurrency exchange.

      Bitcoin (BTCUSD, -3.42%) has slumped around 17% over the past 24 hours, trading as low as $20,889 on Monday night, according to Coindesk data, a level not seen since December 2020. Bitcoin is down more than 60% from its November 2021 high.

      Ethereum (ETHUSD, -4.58%) fell more than 16% to around $1,099, also hovering at its lowest since December 2020. Meme coin Dogecoin (DOGEUSD, -1.23%) lost 16%.

      Investors were reassessing exposure to perceived riskier assets in the wake of U.S. data showing persistent inflation pressures in May, and the fastest pace of increase since December 1981. Crypto prices tend to be tightly correlated with the performance of U.S. stocks, and equity futures (ES00, 0.19%) pointed to a bruising followup to Friday’s sharp losses.

      Also not helping sentiment were hints of industry panic. Crypto lending platform Celsius announced it was pausing all withdrawals and transfers amid “extreme market conditions,” as its CEL digital token plunged 50%. And shares of technology services group MicroStrategy (MSTR, -25.18%) slumped on worries a margin call may force it to sell bitcoins.

      Others were rattled by news cryptocurrency exchange Binance had “temporarily paused #Bitcoin withdrawals on the $BTC network,” due to a “stuck on-chain transaction,” the company tweeted.

      Some looked at past bitcoin selloffs to judge how deep the rout may go. the co-founder and chief operating officer of crypto price-tracking company CoinGecko, Bobby Ong, warned Sunday over Twitter that even if a bottom was close, “that doesn’t mean that price can nuke 50% further.”

      Others see support near the $20,000 mark.

      “Since hitting a brief low of ~25,000 in mid-May, bitcoin has held up relatively well. It’s inability to hold above 30,000 however makes it difficult to defend here with little meaningful support until ~20,000,” said Jonathan Krinsky, chief market technician at BTIG, who provided this chart in a note to clients on Monday:
      BTIG/Bloomberg

      Also on Monday, Ong tweeted that investors should also keep an eye on stablecoin in USDD, whose price fell to around $0.97 on Monday.

      Stablecoins normally aim to peg their value to the U.S. dollar or other assets. A May crisis, saw stablecoins Terra and luna lose all their value, and untold losses for investors. That turmoil also drove weakness for bitcoin and the overall crypto space.

      The backer of USDD is the TRON DAO, one of the largest decentralized organizations, and its own cryptocurrency TRX was down about 17% over the last 24 hours. The TRON DAO announced Monday that it would use $2 billion to fight short sellers of TRX, but Tron’s founder Justin Sun tweeted that this may be futile.

      “Funding rate of shorting #TRX on @binance is negative 500% APR. @trondaoreserve will deploy 2 billion USD to fight them. I don’t think they can last for even 24 hours. Short squeeze is coming,” he said. Read more on that here.

      CEO of Euro Pacific Capital and chairman of SchiffGold, Peter Schiff, who has been a longtime critic of cryptocurrencies, tweeted that total market cap of cryptocurrencies is now under $1 trillion, a warning sign for investors.

      https://www.marketwatch.com/story/bitcoin-tumbles-through-24-000-in-crypto-crash-this-chart-shows-how-much-worse-a-selloff-could-get-11655124356

    5. Cryptocurrency
      Russian Lawmakers Consider Bill to Ban Crypto Payments
      By PYMNTS
      Posted on June 13, 2022

      The lower house of Russia’s parliament is considering legislation that would bar crypto platforms from hosting purchases with crypto assets, Bitcoin.com reported.

      According to Bitcoin.com, the backers of the legislation specifically want to stop the use of digital assets for real-world transactions within the Russian Federation. Crypto could still be used for international trade.

      In addition to banning purchases with cryptocurrencies, the proposed law would ban the exchange of digital tokens as a means of payment.

      Bitcoin.com reported that the bill’s main backer is Anatoly Aksakov, chairman of Financial Market Committee of the legislative body, the Doumas. Bitcoin credited Forklog with reporting Aksakov’s role.

      A first vote on the measure could occur in mid-June, according to a Doumas website cited by Bitcoin.com

      Bitcoin.com further reported that the backers of the legislation also noted that the Russian ruble is the only legal currency in the country. The proposed measure would, translated to English, prevent the use of crypto assets as “monetary surrogates” within the Russian Federation.

      Russian finance authorities already have expressed opposition to the use of cryptocurrencies, citing them as a threat to the Russian Federation’s financial stability, Bitcoin.com reported. The Russian Federal already has regulated some cryptocurrency-related activity through a 2020 law, Bitcoin.com reported.
      …
      https://www.pymnts.com/cryptocurrency/2022/russian-lawmakers-consider-bill-to-ban-crypto-payments/

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