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A Global Phenomenon Due To Monetary Policy Errors Repeated Across Multiple Advanced Economies

A report from the News Sun in Indiana. “Larry Doyle, president of Campbell & Fetter Bank, ran some sample numbers to illustrate. ‘That’s a $318 increase. Same dollar amount. Same dollar amount borrowed,’ Doyle said. ‘We had nine price reductions (recently) and we haven’t seen price reductions in our market for several years. It just generally hasn’t happened,’ said said Mark Bock, managing broker for Mike Thomas Real Estate in Angola and LaGrange. ‘The sellers who were aggressive or have an aggressive prices have priced themselves out of the market.'”

“‘When I started in banking in 1998, interest rates were about 6% and I personally haven’t seen them reach that level again, until now as they begin to approach 6% once again,’ said Scott Gruner, president of First Federal Savings Bank in Angola. ‘We just experienced a historical long-term, low interest-rate environment. Because of that, many borrowers, particular younger customers, have never seen interest rates at these current levels.'”

“Housing affordability is going to take a shot in the short-term too until more time passes, incomes respond and the elevated interest rates people are seeing now become the new normal, Doyle said. ‘There’s no doubt that the price of either existing homes or new is outpacing people’s income. There’s no doubt about that,’ he said.”

From Yahoo Money. “The housing market has rapidly changed. Sellers, once in the driver’s seat at the start of the year, are much more accommodating to complete a home sale as borrowing costs skyrocket for buyers. A growing number of home sellers have been forced to readjust their home prices in recent weeks. ‘If you overprice your home in any market, you’re going to feel resistance,’ Lizy Hoeffer, owner and mortgage broker at Cross Country Mortgage LLC, said. ‘In the last three years, sellers have been able to get basically whatever they want for their house. We’re just not in a market like that right now.'”

“In the most populated county of Washington State, King County, the average price is over $1 million, according to Adriana Perezchica, real estate broker and owner of Via Real Estate Group. Despite the challenges, Latinos there – which comprise a large portion of her clientele – are buying in the outskirts for an average of $550,000. ‘Most of my clients are first-time buyers, with no knowledge or very little understanding on buying a property. ‘The majority work in the construction, labor and the hospitality industry,’ Perezchica said.”

From Summit Daily in Colorado. “After doubled interest rates, increased real estate demand and inflation, even house loans are now becoming too expensive for first-time buyers in Summit County, according to local officials. Lenders in Summit County are finding that some first-home buyers can’t even afford the mortgage they would be paying as a way to help them buy their new house. To apply and receive a loan, there are three main requirements: credit score, a down payment and income.”

“‘That’s the one that’s always the dealbreaker,’ Berkley said because in order to get a loan, the buyer must make double their debt payment. Meaning, to afford the hypothetical $3,500 mortgage, the buyer would have to be making at least $7,000 a month. ‘$84,000 a year to even qualify for a $400,000 loan,’ Berkley said. He added that even a quick online search would barely yield a single $400,000 home in Summit County.'”

From Yahoo Finance. “‘In the really overpriced markets, like Tampa, Austin, and West Palm Beach, you’re starting to see a lot of price reductions,’ Ralph DiBugnara, president of Home Qualified told Yahoo Finance. ‘A lot of those areas were just very, very overpriced.’ Provo Utah — about 45 miles outside of Salt Lake City — saw 47.8% of its sellers cut their list prices in May. Tacoma, Wash., Denver, Colo., Sacramento, Calif. and Boise, Idaho, are also areas where more than 40% of listings saw price drops in May. Seattle, Wash., San Diego, Calif., Houston, Tex., Phoenix, Ariz. and Orlando, Fla., are just a few of the more than 100 metro areas studied by Redfin in which at least 25% of sellers reduced asking prices in May.”

“The reductions are a sharp reversal from bidding wars and over-asking offers during the pandemic. ‘I think by end of summer, early September, you’re going to see a 10 -15% reduction in prices. But most of that is going to be based around the prices — the houses that are overpriced,’ said DiBugnara.”

“DiBugnara also predicts a slowdown in short-term rental homes. ‘I have about 15 [short term rental] properties in five states. Most of them are still booked through the summer. What I’m seeing is their future bookings — whereas people who are booking way ahead into September, October, and even for the holidays— those bookings have not been coming the same way they were coming over the last two years,’ said DiBugnara.”

From KTLA in California. “The RE/MAX study shows the total number of homes sold dropped drastically over the last year compared to the year previous. The study shows that nearly 25% fewer homes were sold in Los Angeles from May 2021 to May 2022, compared to that same timeframe the previous year. That 24.4% year-over-year decrease in homes being sold is the biggest decline among all metropolitan areas in the nation, according to the RE/MAX study. May is one of the busiest months for homebuyers according to RE/MAX, but despite this, the entire nation saw an 8.5% decrease in homes being sold this year versus last May.”

“James Sander, owner of RE/MAX Estate Properties in Los Angeles. He says the frenzy of appreciation on the housing market was ‘not sustainable’ and says he expects the market to become more stabilized. ‘The rising interest rate environment has returned the LA housing market to a more typical real estate market,’ Sanders said. ‘We’ve seen a drop in demand from 10 to 15%. Our inventory is up 36% from last year but still more than 75% below our typical pre-pandemic levels.'”

“The decrease in home sales isn’t limited to Los Angeles. Just down south in San Diego, home sales declined by 20.4% during that same timeframe.”

The Globe and Mail in Canada. “Here’s one thing the bond markets and the central banks have starkly revealed of late: Postpandemic financial life is terra incognita. No one knows how long it will take to return to normal, or even what normal looks like any more. The current outstanding value of all those IOUs, globally, is US$125-trillion. The bond market dwarfs all the world’s stock markets put together, which traded roughly US$61-trillion in 2019. Hundreds of billions of dollars worth of bonds are bought and sold and hedged and swapped and churned every day.”

“That profitable cycle recurred for 40 years, as rates and yields for the most part gambolled down the hill together. ‘Right now this year,’ Robert Armstrong, the widely read U.S. financial commentator for the Financial Times, told me recently, ‘there are a lot of bond traders who have rarely sold a bond for a loss in their entire careers, because interest rates just helped them all the time. Down and down and down and down rates go, while bond values go up and up and up and up. And you just buy bonds and sell them and you make money. And it’s a pretty good life.'”

“And then, six months ago, bond paradise evaporated, as the spectre of inflation loomed. For the past six months, instead of being a careful hedge against losses in the stock markets – down more than 20 per cent so far this year – bonds have been in their own freefall. ‘For a bond investor,’ said Brian D’Costa, president of Algonquin Capital, a (small) $500-million bond fund. ‘that’s horrific.’ If interest rates rise to 5 per cent, he predicts annual bond value losses of 20 per cent. ‘That wipes out 10 years of investment returns.’ Lots of people won’t be retiring when they thought they would.”

From Better Dwelling. “A global real estate correction has kicked off and Canada is expected to lead lower. That was the message from Goldman Sachs Research’s latest client note on rising rates. Advanced economies left interest rates too low for too long, and are now trying to make up for lost time. Fast-rising rates is slowing the inflation they created, but also the global economy. This will have a big impact on interest-sensitive areas like real estate, first to see the impact.”

“‘The pandemic-induced housing boom appears to be cooling off,’ notes GS. ‘From Toronto to Auckland, a slowdown in the housing market is underway as interest rates in developed economies are set to climb rapidly.’ They also mention home prices have already begun to fall in Canada, Australia, New Zealand, and Sweden. ‘In Canada, house prices have fallen the most in areas that had the most growth early in the pandemic,’ notes the bank to investors.”

“GS isn’t the only one that sees inflated home prices correcting after rate normalization. The Bank of International Settlements (BIS) recently warned low rates produced housing bubbles in advanced economies. While they argue it is a global phenomenon, they say it’s due to monetary policy errors repeated across multiple advanced economies. They suggest higher rates can be painful, but not tackling this problem can make it worse. If the trend isn’t correct, the BIS warns the fallout will be beyond the housing market.”

From Interest New Zealand. “‘The total number of people who are behind on payments is up 11.7% compared to the same time last year, indicating some consumers are starting to experience financial strain,’ says Centrix Managing Director Keith McLaughlin. ‘More than 100 construction companies have been placed into liquidation so far this year and defaults are up 10% compared to same time in 2021. Across the country, 25% of all company liquidations in May were from the construction sector. Credit scores for the sector are also plunging. The average credit score for new credit applications across the sector is down 8 points, as the potential risk of default increases across the sector.'”

The Daily Mail. “Three more Australian building companies have collapsed with millions of dollars in projects abruptly stopped and homeowners left in the dark amid an industry-wide crisis. Victorian builder Langford Jones Homes was the latest to go under, ceasing trading last Thursday owing creditors more than $10million. A father-of-two told News he has lost $300,000 because of Wulfrun going under, and believes there could be dozens of other families who are put under immense financial pressure like his, which is had been trying to refurbish his long-held home.”

“‘The underlying feeling is that fear of losing your home, that piece of land that has been in my family since the 1980s, where you grew up and spent your childhood,’ the man named Mark said.”

“Matthew Mackey, the Executive Director at engineering giant Arcadis, said the government need to get more involved or face a total collapse of the residential construction industry.  ‘There has to be more collaboration at all levels to make sure it moves forward. We’re not going to be talking about builders going under but a complete lack of jobs,’ he told Daily Mail Australia.”

From Domain News. “Interest rates have been hiked a further 50 basis points by the Reserve Bank of Australia in its third monthly rise in a row after inflation showed no signs of a significant slowdown. Ray White chairman Brian White says he’s seen plenty of evidence of people panicking. ‘A lot of them are ‘OMG, OMG! What’s going to happen?, he said. ‘But I believe this is now an excellent time for buyers. When the market is strong, they don’t have much choice or time to work out which property they really want and to make decisions.'”

The Epoch Times. “The flurry of rulings from the Supreme Court has everyone’s head spinning. The most significant among them, even if it doesn’t capture all the headlines, is West Virginia v. EPA. The majority opinion is impressive, but the part I found truly wonderful is the concurring opinion by Justice Neil Gorsuch. This is where we see things headed, toward a major and much-welcome curbing of the power of the administrative state.”

“Just to review what this thing is, it’s an unelected bureaucracy that rules the country without oversight from voters or legislatures. For well over 100 years, most courts have given it a pass, just assuming that the ‘experts’ in the bureaucracies are handling things just fine, faithfully interpreting legislation, and merely creating rules for easy compliance.”

“The thing has taken on a power of its own. Strangely, the topic hardly comes up at all during elections, and that’s for a reason. Politicians running for office like to advertise their power to make change. They might even believe it. In reality, though, elected officials have very little influence over the conduct of public life relative to the administrative state.”

“Once you see the problem, you can’t unsee it. Consider the problem with inflation alone: it’s largely the responsibility of the Federal Reserve, which is among the most terrifying of the deep-state agencies. This thing was founded in 1913 with the promise that it would end ‘wildcat banking’ and contain the expansion of money and credit so that we would have a more stable economic environment to encourage growth.”

“Even now, people believe that the Fed is going to somehow fix recessions and inflations, even though a deeper analysis reveals that the Fed itself is the cause of both. The Fed surely can’t be both the problem and the solution, which is becoming as obvious as the fact that the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention can’t make a textbook pathogen go away with power and potions.”

“Now, the Fed has been revealed to be utterly incompetent, in a way that is no different from the CDC, NIH, DOL, DOE, DOT, HHS, DHS, FTC, SEC, and all the rest of these glorified 3-letter agencies employing nearly 3 million people who can’t be fired or controlled. The unique feature of our times is that the expert class in government has been unmasked as fakes at best and unrelenting menaces at worst.”

Related Posts

The Crash of Flipping Homes With Algorithms

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_a2kAzFBGtc https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rk5Jj6ezP5o https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ioaOXz2B7DQ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rSzwO5CU3Go https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=taSzZhcZhcc https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nXcz6CHDtwo

This Post Has 139 Comments

  1. Before I do anything else this morning I’ve got to address some of what’s been said recently. If yer gonna start talking about me, or this blog, I’m going to read what you post first. That means yer on moderation. And I’m pretty busy. It may even take a couple of days or I might just delete it cuz I don’t have time. Like this morning, I’m waiting to hear if I need to drive over a hundred miles to work.

    I don’t charge anyone to read or post here. I haven’t done a fundraiser for years. So I don’t want to hear complaints. I simply don’t have time to hold everybody’s hand. And I have read certain posters saying “oh Ben said this ten years ago” and I don’t agree. I don’t have time to argue about it either. I’m not the subject of this blog, the blog isn’t the subject. I suggest if you want to comment here stick to the subject.

    Oh and yeah, we discuss some other things. That happened cuz the powers that be went on a censorship war like none ever seen.

    2. All good –
      and as I tried to explain before – it’s all about some ‘deja vue’ -(of ‘housingbubbling’) and as I (we) had the fortune 12 years ago to interview the regulars of this blog – and what was said ‘then’ –
      amazingly!!! –
      – could be said now –
      we are re-editing ‘the wise words’ from 2010 and juxtapose them with the words of 2022 – and in order to clarify some of these words – I felt the duty to ask some questions – and this comment doesn’t need to be posted at all – as it is my last… information.

      All the best!

        1. ‘What happened to those videos?’

          as they became dated they disappeared in the archives of Public German TV – but there are still the original tapes of the interviews.

          2. you definitely want to interview mafia blocks about all of their stellar data!!

            “Median Days on Market
            10,809”

  2. From the 10 minute Arizona video:

    They Tried & FAILED… | Arizona Real Estate Market.

    Premiered Jul 3, 2022 There has been a huge uptick of listings that have not sold in the Arizona real estate market.
    We are seeing people giving up quickly if the listing does not sell within two weeks.

    The 8 minute K-da video:

    5 Depressing Stats About The Current Market You Should Know Before Selling

    Jul 4, 2022 Is the real estate market crashing? See the stats here for the month of June. The real estate market took another big hit in the month of June. If you’re thinking of selling your house anywhere in the Greater Toronto Area please watch this before listing it.
    I cover Durham to Halton in this video. More detailed videos coming up later this week on each city.

    1. ” The unique feature of our times is that the expert class in government has been unmasked as fakes at best and unrelenting menaces at worst.”

      This quote should be saved and posted repeatedly as this crash gains momentum. None of the ‘experts’ have a clue. Once you understand this you can formulate a plan to lowball like a boss once they are all neck deep in foreclosed property.

      I am currently putting a list together of cars I would like to have. I believe we are going to see a glut of older cars that will be given away at auctions for pennies on the dollar. They handed out car loans to anyone who could fog a mirror. The astute HBB’er will be treated to all kinds of amazing deals in a few years. I will be waiting until the pigs are stuffed and then will step in when there are no competing bids. I will be looking for blood on the street. I encourage all HBB’ers to do the same. At the cycle low, serious generational wealth can be accumulated for pennies if you have cash. Now is the time to begin formulating a plan, current data points are already highly predictive.

      1. None of the ‘experts’ have a clue.

        This reminds me of a low budget sci fi alien invasion movie I watched some years ago, I think it was called Alienate. The protagonist is some kind of architectural designer who flies to Dumver from Salt Lake for a bid presentation.

        After he lands, at a cafe he sees in the news that dozens of airliners have mysteriously fallen out of the sky. The talking heads on the TV speculate on what is happening. Someone else is also watching the news and comments “They have no idea what’s happening”. It turns out the aliens were shooting down anything that could fly, before landing themselves.

      2. ‘serious generational wealth can be accumulated for pennies if you have cash’

        Very well said.

  3. Oh dear…Aussie builders are going belly-up left & right as the housing bubble bust moment of truth slouches closer.

    ‘Dream gone’: Customers reeling as another Victorian builder goes bust

    Customers have been left hundreds of thousands of dollars out of pocket as yet another builder goes bust, owing $14.2 million.

    Dozens of homeowners and hundreds of tradies have been left reeling after a Victorian building firm quietly collapsed.

    Last week, staff, contractors, suppliers and homeowners learned that Langford Jones Homes had been placed into voluntary liquidation, with liquidators putting out a statement on Monday evening.

  5. Garland, TX Housing Prices Crater 20% YOY As North Dallas Rot-Riddled Housing Market Slips Deeper Into Default

    https://www.movoto.com/tx/75043/market-trends/

    As a national land broker explained, “There is a globe full of land where 95% of it goes undeveloped. If you paid more than $500 an acre, you got ripped off.”

  6. There’s only one appropriate response to “woke” censorship: an upraised middle finger.

    Scrabble players quit game after 400 offensive words banned from list

    https://www.news.com.au/lifestyle/real-life/news-life/scrabble-players-quit-game-after-400-offensive-words-banned-from-list/news-story/d03dfaadb9a08337057b1f5f4a093017

    Scores of scrabble players are quitting the competitive game after hundreds of “offensive” words were banned.

    More than 400 terms including racial slurs, sexuality and gender insults were taken off the game’s official online words list, GB News reports.

    According to Spectator columnist and player Jonathan Maitland, many people are quitting the board game because of the changes.

  7. Because of that, many borrowers, particular younger customers, have never seen interest rates at these current levels.’”

    The dumbed-down special snowflakes coming out of our NEA indoctrination mills have zero capacity for independent thought or critical analysis. They are going to pay a terrible price for being such lemmings and tools for the corrupt status quo.

  8. ‘There’s no doubt that the price of either existing homes or new is outpacing people’s income. There’s no doubt about that,’ he said.”

    Thanks for that penetrating analysis, Captain Obvious.

  10. ‘Most of my clients are first-time buyers, with no knowledge or very little understanding on buying a property. ‘The majority work in the construction, labor and the hospitality industry,’ Perezchica said.”

    These “unsophisticated” buyers are being preyed on by unscrupulous fellow Latinos in the REIC who exploit their Spanish language skills and cultural affinity.

  12. “After doubled interest rates, increased real estate demand and inflation, even house loans are now becoming too expensive for first-time buyers in Summit County, according to local officials.

    Left unsaid: soaring Bidenflation and Jimmy Carter 2.0 stagflation means anyone who signs on Mr. Banker’s dotted line for an insanely overpriced shack is almost certainly going to lose it to foreclosure down the road. Heckova job Jerome Powell, Yellen the Felon, & Brandon.

  14. Summit County?

    Have fun waiting 45 minutes in line to get a latte, because there are no workers that can afford to live in Summit County.

    1. *”Have fun waiting 45 minutes in line to get a latte, because there are no workers that can afford to live in Summit County.”

      same if not longer wait here in greater sacramento area for any govt./utility customer service:

      ex: recent mandate specifying must put food waste into separate pails. supplied by waste management.
      well, two weeks past the deadline there are no pails from said company. also no replacement regular trash cans. all you get is the runaround when calling but boy howdy I bet those waste management execs are all lined up eager beaver when it’s time for muni contract renewal!

      hmm. lets see if the CAPTIVE CUSTOMERS can get way with not paying their overdue bill for 2 weeks without incurring a monetary penalty?!?
      but when bidnezz does it? “oh gosh golly darn it ritchie, so sorry. apologies”.

      no $$ penalty.
      no firings.

      of course public utilities arrogantly do whatever they want now thanks to the govt backstopping them w/property liens.

      whoops, I meant, the covid is to blame. yep, that darn covid. like hitler, society will blame covid for the next 80 years of problems. if we survive that long.

      so far it’s been donald trump as the boogeyman.
      before that it was reagan. funny how it’s never a democrat party president.

  15. If you want to see the “fundamental transformation” the globalists and their Democrat-Bolshevik Quislings have in mind for America, just look at the creepy Orwellian surveillance & control measure the DNC’s ideological mentors in the CCP have implemented in the PRC.

    A Massive Police Database of Allegedly 1 Billion Chinese Citizens Is Being Sold Online

    https://www.vice.com/en/article/y3pgyw/china-leak-1-billion-shanghai-police

    The sample files contain a trove of crime reports, including cases of looting, fraud, and “illegal” handjobs.

    1. but will the sheeple show the same mindless compliance with “preventive measures” that don’t work this time around?

      The Euros will. They will line up for the latest booster, which is supposed to be omicron specific, even though it hasn’t been tested at all.

      1. From the article:
        —–
        “Top U.S. FDA official Peter Marks said in an interview that regulators from other countries were seriously considering using new boosters based on the BA.1 Omicron variant that caused the massive surge in cases last winter, because those shots can be available sooner than the BA.4/5 based booster the United States plans to use.”
        —–

        Seriously what is this BS? Omicron BA.1 has gone extinct, and we already know that BA.4 and 5 escape natural immunity from BA.1. Available sooner? Well why don’t we just get a measles vaccine, since that’s just as effective and available right now.

        1. Seriously what is this BS?

          It’s to make big pharma and wealthy insiders even wealthier. Did you really have to ask? This isn’t about health. It never has been. It’s about globalists strip-mining governments and sheeple.

          1. Hi 46&2,
            Eggzactly… right on the money.
            Watch and learn, Oxide. Watch and learn.
            This was never about public health.
            –Geezer

          1. Real answer: Alpha variant. That’s why COVD took such a dive in summer 2021. It was all Alpha at the time. Then COVID started mutating faster than the vaccines could keep up.

          2. IIRC, we were already onto Delta in August 2021 when my family first had it.

          4. IIRC, the “vaccine” is based on the original Wuhan strain whereas Alpha was the first variant of concern.

          5. That’s why COVD took such a dive in summer 2021.

            Your “vaccine” is neither safe nor effective. It’s a molecular WMD for global genocide.

          7. IIRC, the “vaccine” is based on the original Wuhan strain

            One would tend to assume so, even though some guy in China was the only one with a sample to do DNA mapping seemingly before the fact. I suppose that by now the tracks of any possible fraud are well obscured.

          8. the tracks of any possible fraud are well obscured

            Obscured but being pieced back together.

            Absolute proof: The Gp-120 sequences prove beyond all doubt that “COVID-19” was man-made
            The “missing link” was there in Pradhan’s paper all along, we just needed to ask the right question: “where are the genome sequences for the Gp-120 inserts”

            “TLDR: In order to get the 3 inserts of Gp-120 to exist in SARS-Cov-2, the genomic sequences that coded for them had to have got there by recombination from another organism or in a lab. Because they don’t exist anywhere in nature it is not possible to have come from another organism. Ecohealth’s proposal in 2018 perfectly described those inserts.”

    3. Definitely an odd duck. I can’t imagine a proprietor looking into his eyes and then selling him a firearm.

      Fifty years ago this guy would have have a UAW job in one of the auto assembly plants making a living wage, driving a 4×4 truck and getting laid once or twice a week. However, zoom forward to the present, and this guy can work 40-hrs per week and not be able to rent a studio apt and feed himself. Hence, the firearm is not the problem.

      1. Bingo. They destroyed pricing and the quality of life in the US. Jerome Powell and Co. should be awaiting the guillotine.

  18. Watch & learn, Jerome Powell, Yellen the Felon, & Brandon.

    Sri Lanka promises to stop printing money soon as inflation hits 60%

    https://www.independent.co.uk/asia/south-asia/sri-lanka-inflation-rate-money-printing-b2115862.html

    Sri Lanka, which is facing one of the worst economic crises in years with depleting foreign reserves, recorded the highest inflation in Asia amid plans to stop printing local currency to pay salaries.

    Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe said on Tuesday that the inflationrate is expected to reach 60 per cent. Printing local currency was an attempt at quashing what’s been called Asia’s fastest inflation.

    1. “Sri Lanka promises to stop printing money SOON”

      Actually, Sri Lanka is taking a page out of the Fed’s playbook.

  21. “Meaning, to afford the hypothetical $3,500 mortgage, the buyer would have to be making at least $7,000 a month”

    Total BS! When I got into the mortgage biz 25 years ago a healthy DTI was 30% of gross income and usually the cutoff for a conforming deal. 50% is subprime.

    1. What I forgot to say is that is total debt-to-income, not just the mortgage. The numbers we’ve seen lately are doomed to fail.

      1. “The numbers we’ve seen lately are doomed to fail.”

        Indeed. A computer isn’t required; a simple napkin calculation hasn’t penciled-out for many years.

    2. 🤣🤣🤣The screaming at the end is priceless!

      That guy should host a new Tv show and name it Problem Solvers.🤣👍

    3. “I guess getting shot hurts.”

      I do believe that is the stupidest thing I have ever seen a human being do.

      I know it is, spellchecker had to help me with stupidest because I never needed to spell it until I saw that dumb@ss take off his shirt so he could duke it out with a 9mm.

  26. “Support Ukraine”=NATO needs a bail out for Germany. Is it that difficult to figure?

    Germany…. the poorest country in Europe is captive to the largest NG supplier, in this case Russia. Who’s fault is that? Sounds like whomever agreed to this deal got ripped off…. much like buying a rapidly depreciating asset like a house at a grossly inflated price… then doubling down on those losses by financing for decades.

    Check out the german $hitbags mocking President Trump. Now they got the NATO limpwrists pimping another crisis.

    https://youtu.be/FfJv9QYrlwg

  27. Austin Housing Market Update (June 2022) | Is the market COOLING? Is NOW the time to BUY?

    Jul 4, 2022 In this video, I cover housing market stats for the North Austin area suburbs of Cedar Park, Leander, Liberty Hill, Lago Vista, Round Rock, and Georgetown

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1vj_6Jv77iQ

    21 minutes. The way I watch a video like this is to mouse over the bar at the bottom til I see a chart. I’m pretty sure all of these are now down in median price.

  28. Tampa Bay Real Estate Market Update 6/28 – 7/4

    Jul 5, 2022 Here is the Tampa Bay Real Estate Market update for the week of June 28 – July 4, 2022.

    Market Updates 6/28 – 7/4

    Hillsborough County

    450 New Listings
    454 Price Decrease
    476 Sold
    395 Went Under Contract
    26 were less than $250k
    244 were $250k-$500k
    117 were $500k-$1M
    18 were more than $1M

    Pinellas County

    286 New Listings
    274 Price Decrease
    243 Sold
    253 Went Under Contract
    15 were less than $250k
    141 were $250k-$500k
    72 were $500k-$1M
    28 were more than $1M

    Pasco County

    271 New Listings
    257 Price Decrease
    277 Sold
    241 Went Under Contract
    49 were less than $250k
    137 were $250k-$500k
    58 were $500k-$1M
    2 were more than $1M

    As you can see, homes under $500k are still moving, with $250k-$500k still being the bulk!!!

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IFw0LPXLJRs

    3 minutes.

    2. Powell says, “The markets are underestimating me.” The markets, however, realize that Powell has no stones in his trousers.

      1. Not true.
        If Powell has no stones, then he will pivot.
        If Powell pivots, then the dollar will weaken the and DOW will go up.
        If the DOW is going to go up, then the correct course of action would be to buy the effin dip and wait for the rally. Not sell.
        Yet, they are selling.
        So they must think there will be no relief rally, no pivot, and therefore there are stones.
        Q.E.D. 🤪

        (at least for the moment. My guess is that Jay is waiting for Joe to ask him to pivot. The Jay can blame it on Joe.)

        2. My guess is that Jay is waiting for Joe to ask him to pivot. The Jay can blame it on Joe

          That would be hilarious – “Biden begs Powell for more inflation.” Ain’t happenin’. Inflation angers everybody.

          1. No, it will be more like: “Biden begs Powell for relief for hungry families.” Because that’s what a recession brings: job losses and a tanking market.

          3. “Biden begs Powell for relief for hungry families.” Because that’s what a recession brings: job losses and a tanking market.

            Inflation is not “relief.” You are mixed up. Maybe fearful your shanty price is going to crash?

          4. what a recession brings

            Recession brings a correction toward reality, which is a relief for the majority. Scary stuff.

          5. Inflation means “relief” because Congress can take that printed money and send out stimmie chex.

            I’m not too worried about my house value atm. I don’t need to sell anytime soon.

          7. Inflation means “relief” because Congress can take that printed money and send out stimmie chex.

            You seem to not be fully understanding what’s going on right now. Those “stimmie chex” are absolutely destroying the working class and the poor, financially. The more “stimmie chex” they send out, the worse it gets. Even the pants-sh!tting Brandon understands this, which is why “stimmie chex” are a thing of the past.

    1. “Most notably, US retail gasoline prices have fallen for 21 straight days according to AAA.”

      It has stopped rising here, but prices have been sticky and haven’t dropped yet.

  33. Do you wish you had ignored the hype that lured millions of people into buying cryptocurrency just before the Ponzi collapse?

    1. The Financial Times
      Cryptocurrencies
      Crypto collapse reverberates widely among black American investors
      Higher exposure to digital assets leaves owners vulnerable to downturn
      The film-maker Spike Lee has called digital assets ‘positive, inclusive’
      Taylor Nicole Rogers in New York yesterday

      The widespread losses caused by the cryptocurrency crash are even broader among black investors.

      A quarter of black American investors owned cryptocurrencies at the start of the year, compared with only 15 per cent of white investors, according to a survey by Ariel Investments and Charles Schwab. Black Americans were more than twice as likely to purchase cryptocurrency as their first investment.

      The value of those investments has imploded. The total market capitalisation of cryptocurrencies has plunged below $1tn from more than $3.2tn last year. The fall in digital assets comes alongside a bear market in US stocks.

      Black Americans’ higher exposure to cryptocurrencies has left them more vulnerable to the financial downturn, even as their households on average hold less wealth.

      The attraction of building wealth, amplified by marketing, drew many black investors into cryptocurrencies. The dollar price of bitcoin rose by 9,300 per cent in the five years to its peak in November.

      Jefferson Noel, 27, said he gained his first exposure to crypto in January 2019 when he accidentally invested $5 in bitcoin while using Cash App, a payment service.

      “I had no idea what it was, and I don’t even remember doing it,” he said.

      By last May his unintentional investment was worth $70. The astronomical gain inspired him to take a friend’s advice to plough $20,000 of his savings into other cryptocurrencies, such as dogecoin, over more traditional investments such as index funds.

      “[Black Americans] do not want to be left behind again,” Noel said. “As far as I can tell, the black community sees crypto as a way to even the playing field and get in the game before the gatekeepers prevent others from participating.”

      But he is now rethinking that decision. Persistent losses have wiped more than 20 per cent from his crypto investment. He is researching mutual funds on the advice of his uncle, but still buying more crypto.

      Historically, black investors have tended to be conservative, investing more of their money into low-risk assets such as insurance and savings bonds. Black Americans are less trusting of the stock market and financial institutions than white Americans, according to the Ariel-Schwab survey. Separate studies have tied their apprehension to decades of discrimination in the financial system.

      Jatali Bellanton, the author of a personal-finance curriculum geared towards young black Americans called Kids Who Bank, sees cryptocurrencies as a way to make up for wealth-building opportunities that were historically unavailable in housing and stock markets.

      “We do not like to get left behind when it comes to new technology,” she said.

      The promise of cryptocurrencies as a wealth builder has been supercharged by celebrity endorsements, sponsorships and advertising.

      Prominent black Americans including the musicians Jay-Z and Snoop Dogg, the boxer Floyd Mayweather, the actor Jamie Foxx and the film-maker Spike Lee have promoted crypto to their communities.

      Lee appeared in commercials for crypto ATM operator Coin Cloud last year, saying that “old money is not going to pick us up; it pushes us down” and “systematically oppresses”, whereas digital assets are “positive, inclusive”.
      …

      1. The MSM can make ANYTHING racist.

        I was on a flight about a year ago and a young black guy kept checking his phone over and over, and he held up his phone so basically anyone could see it. It must have been a crypto account and was in the tens of thousands of dollars. I wonder a) how often is he checking it now, and b) is it now in the tens of dollars?

          1. The Financial Times
            Opinion Cryptocurrencies
            Cryptocurrencies are not the new monetary system we need
            They proliferate uncontrollably and are objects of speculation rather than stores of value
            James Ferguson illustration of a man’s hand in suit holding cryptocurrency coins
            Martin Wolf 6 hours ago

            Money has already evolved from coins, to notes, entries in balance sheets and bits on computers. The institutions that provide, operate, guarantee and regulate money have evolved with it. So how should it evolve in the digital era? The invention of cryptocurrencies has forced everybody involved and above all the central banks — the agents of the state in managing the public good of money — to confront this question. If crypto is not the answer, what is?

            The Bank for International Settlements — the club of central banks — has been prominent in the effort to address this question. The latest result is part of its Annual Report, which analyses the emerging ecosystem of cryptocurrencies, stablecoins and exchanges.

            This brave new system is — it concludes — inherently flawed. The crypto crash (and preceding bubble) shows that cryptocurrencies are objects of speculation rather than stores of value. That also makes them unusable as units of account. As the BIS notes: “The prevalence of stablecoins, which attempt to peg their value to the US dollar or other conventional currencies, indicates the pervasive need in the crypto sector to piggyback on the credibility provided by the unit of account issued by the central bank. In this sense, stablecoins are the manifestation of crypto’s search for a nominal anchor.”

            Yet their failings are deeper than that. There are now some 10,000 cryptocurrencies. There could just as well be 1bn. But this tendency to fragment, “with many incompatible settlement layers jostling for a place in the spotlight”, is, the BIS argues, inherent in the system’s economic logic, not just its technological ability to multiply without limit.

            In a good monetary system, the greater the number of users the lower the costs of transactions and so the greater its utility. But, as more people use a cryptocurrency, the greater the congestion and the more costly the transactions. This is because self-interested validators are responsible for recording transactions on the blockchain. The latter must be motivated by monetary rewards high enough to sustain the system of decentralised consensus. The way to reward validators is to limit the capacity of the blockchain and keep fees high: “So, rather than the familiar monetary narrative of ‘the more the merrier’, crypto displays the property of ‘the more the sorrier’.”
            …

          2. “If crypto is not the answer, what is?”

            Gold. Don’t take my word for it. Ask the Bank of International Settlements themselves. In 2017 they designated gold bullion as a Tier 1 reserve asset. There is only one other Tier 1 reserve asset: the US dollar.

          3. I haven’t seen the survey, but I would guess the majority of gold owned in the US by value is in the possession of old white people.

          4. “The prevalence of stablecoins, which attempt to peg their value to the US dollar or other conventional currencies”

            I have always thought cryptos were a joke, but these stablecoins seem to be the antithesis of what cryptos were created to avoid, namely currency devaluation.

          5. “…but these stablecoins seem to be the antithesis of what cryptos were created to avoid,…”

            We don’t trust traditional fiat currencies, but nonetheless we tether the value of our cryptocurrencies to them.

            It makes no sense whatsoever.

        2. You do realize that they can now label the crypto crash as more *ism: i.e.: The Man took our money — again. Of course, plenty of whites (and brown and yellows) are going to lose money too, but they won’t see that.

          1. People prefer to paint themselves as victims, rather than owning the fact that they decided to engage in high risk gambling activity that had predictable consequences.

          2. People prefer to paint themselves as victims,
            Well, yes they do, because the only other choice is to admit they are dumb as he$$. And that ain’t happening.

          3. choice is to admit they are dumb

            I think taking investment advice based only on skin tone is quite enough evidence of stupid.

    2. Bloomberg
      WealthCrypto
      Crypto Investors Who Bought the Hype Are Getting Hit Hardest
      Most cryptocurrency traders bought in the past year, surveys show. Bitcoin is now trading at its lowest level in 18 months.
      Crypto Plunges as Lender Celsius Freezes Withdrawals
      By Misyrlena Egkolfopoulou and
      Claire Ballentine
      June 13, 2022 at 12:59 PM PDT

      Retail investors who rode the crypto hype train over the past year are getting hammered.

      Data show that the majority of crypto traders are relative newbies, making them the largest and hardest-hit group in Monday’s brutal bout of selling, which sent Bitcoin to its lowest level in 18 months. It’s now lost about two-thirds of its value since hitting a high of nearly $70,000 in November, and has significantly underperformed the S&P 500 Index.
      …
      https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2022-06-13/should-i-buy-bitcoin-btc-newest-traders-hit-hardest-by-inflation-selloff

    3. How Wall Street Escaped the Crypto Meltdown
      As cryptocurrency prices plunged and funds failed, strict rules on risky assets helped Wall Street companies sidestep the worst. Retail investors weren’t as lucky.
      By Emily Flitter
      July 5, 2022
      Updated 5:47 p.m. ET

      Last November, in the midst of an exuberant cryptocurrency market, analysts at BNP Paribas, a French bank with a Wall Street presence, pulled together a list of 50 stocks they thought were overpriced — including many with strong links to digital assets.

      They nicknamed this collection the “cappuccino basket,” a nod to the frothiness of the stocks. The bank then spun those stocks into a product that essentially gave its biggest clients — pension funds, hedge funds, the managers of multibillion-dollar family fortunes and other sophisticated investors — an opportunity to bet that the assets would eventually crash.

      In the past month, as the froth around Bitcoin and other digital currencies dissipated, taking down some cryptocurrency companies that had sprung up to aid in their trading, the value of the cappuccino basket shrank by half.

      Wall Street clients of BNP who bet that would happen are sitting pretty. Those on the other side of the trade — the small investors who loaded up on overpriced crypto assets and stocks during a retail trading boom — are reeling.

      “The moves in crypto were coincident with retail money flooding into U.S. equities and equity options,” said Greg Boutle, who heads BNP’s U.S. equities and derivatives strategy group, which put together the trade. “There’s a big bifurcation between retail positioning and institutional positioning.” He declined to name the specific stocks that BNP clients got to bet against.

      In the great cryptocurrency blood bath of 2022, Wall Street is winning.
      …
      https://www.nytimes.com/2022/07/05/business/economy/wall-st-cryptocurrency-prices.html

      1. Does it seem like Wall Street’s most lucrative trades involve taking the other side of the bet from a herd of sheep piling into a doomed asset class?

        1. This is quite reminiscent of the subprime mortgage lending era, when the loans which everything knew were most likely to fail earned the largest commissions.

          Somehow Wall Street always manages to make bank by taking the opposite side of doomed financial strategies.

      2. Bitcoinist.com
        Jordan Belfort, The ‘Wolf Of Wall Street,’ Advises: Buy Bitcoin Today And Make Money
        by Jet Encila
        4 hours ago

        The famed stockbroker Jordan Belfort, whose life inspired the 2013 smash flick “The Wolf of Wall Street,” stated that he would be “shocked” if investment in Bitcoin did not prove successful within the next three to five years.

        The man whose memoir inspired the Martin Scorsese film (starring Hollywood actor Leonardo DiCaprio) advised investors on the new Yahoo Finance show The Crypto Mile to view Bitcoin as a long-term hedge against economic instability.

        Not always has Jordan Belfort been sympathetic to the plight of the most popular cryptocurrency in the world. In 2018, he claimed that Bitcoin is founded on the Great Fools Theory and that investors should exit its system to avoid losing all their money.
        …
        https://bitcoinist.com/jordan-belfort-advises-to-buy-btc/

        1. Personal endorsements from highly successful investors with no vested interests whatever always make me eager to dive in!

          1. vest·ed in·ter·est
            /ˌvestəd ˈint(ə)rəst/
            noun
            a personal stake or involvement in an undertaking or state of affairs, especially one with an expectation of financial gain.
            “banks have a vested interest in the growth of their customers”

  34. Home sellers today are funny. They expect you to care about what someone paid for their neighbors house last year.

    Maybe some $65K paying Bitcoiners could explain to them how it really works? 🤣🤣

  35. The Financial Times
    Markets Briefing
    US Treasury bonds
    Oil slides and US bond market flashes warning on recession fears
    US yield curve ‘inverts’ in sign of darkening outlook for world’s largest economy
    A survey on the American manufacturing sector pointed to declines last month in new orders and employment, which has triggered concerns about the state of the US economy
    Adam Samson and Ian Johnston in London 21 minutes ago

    Oil sold off and the bond market flashed a warning sign over the trajectory of the US economy on Tuesday as recession fears gripped global markets.

    Investor sentiment has weakened in recent days on signs that elevated prices of everything from fuel to food, along with rising borrowing costs, are taking a heavier toll on businesses and households.

    Oil prices on Tuesday sustained their heaviest falls since March, as a jolt of concerns about demand hit the commodities market. Brent, the international benchmark, tumbled almost 11 per cent to $101.31 a barrel, while US marker West Texas Intermediate dropped 9.4 per cent to $98.25.

    Citigroup commodities strategists said on Tuesday that a recession was “increasingly likely”. In that scenario, they said the oil price could reach $65 a barrel by the end of this year and $45 by the end of 2023, assuming Opec and its allies do not intervene in the market.

    A survey late last week from the Institute for Supply Management on the US manufacturing sector pointed to declines last month in new orders and employment, which has triggered concerns about the state of the world’s largest economy.

    An Atlanta Federal Reserve forecast that takes into account incoming economic data now points to an annualised decline of 2.1 per cent in US economic output in the second quarter, following a drop in the first quarter. A recession is typically defined as two consecutive quarters of contraction.

    In a sign of the deteriorating long-term economic outlook, yields on 10-year US government bonds slumped below those on two-year notes for the third time this year. So-called “inversions” of the yield curve have preceded every US recession in the past 50 years, not immediately but within the subsequent two years.

    Economic angst deepened on Tuesday as Bank of England governor Andrew Bailey warned that “the global economic outlook has deteriorated markedly” and a strike at Norwegian gas and oilfields threatened to intensify upward pressures on European inflation.

    Meanwhile, the euro dropped to its lowest level in two decades as traders rushed into the safety of the US dollar.

    “The dollar remains this primary safe haven . . . and that is a factor which is exacerbating the [euro] movement. People want dollars in times of stress and anxiety,” said Jane Foley, head of FX strategy at Rabobank.

    Equities prices were also under pressure, with the US blue-chip S&P 500 down 0.9 per cent and Europe’s Stoxx 600 falling 2.1 per cent.
    …

  36. Cryptocurrency
    Bitcoin (BTC) Was Down 45% in June, Notching Its Worst Month Ever
    by Tor Constantino | Published on
    July 5, 2022
    A pensive person reads a graph on a laptop in an office late at night.

    Macroeconomic drivers include record inflation levels, the Russian-Ukraine war, as well as a possible recession.

    Key points
    – The most valuable crypto — Bitcoin (BTC) — fell 45% in June, registering its largest decline in a single month since its creation. According to CoinMarketCap, the peak to valley for June was a high of $31,693 which fell as low as $17,708.
    – Macroeconomic conditions and a flight from riskier investments are the key downward drivers.
    …
    https://www.fool.com/the-ascent/cryptocurrency/articles/bitcoin-btc-was-down-45-in-june-notching-its-worst-month-ever/

  37. Is it legal to block the exit door to a burning theater as people are trying to escape with their lives?

    1. Crypto Exchanges in Trouble: Exchanges Halting Withdrawals Amid Market Collapse
      Withdrawal freezes are keeping investors from escaping the collapsing digital asset market
      2h ago · By Brenden Rearick, InvestorPlace Financial News Writer

      – Crypto exchanges in trouble are dishing out pain to investors as they freeze withdrawals from their platforms.
      – At least five exchanges have prevented users from removing their assets from their floors in the last month.
      – The news is yet another sign of an incoming crypto winter.

      Lately, it’s been impossible to avoid the discussion about the state of the cryptocurrency industry. With Bitcoin (BTC-USD) wiping more than 70% of its value since December, projects suffering from hacks and even one network’s complete and utter collapse, the market is welcoming the victory parade of skeptics. Adding insult to injury are the bevy of crypto exchanges in trouble as they freeze withdrawals, preventing users from getting out while they can.

      Indeed, the last couple of months have been a bloodbath for a market in decline. Macroeconomic factors like global sanctions and high oil prices are hitting Wall Street hard. They also add to a list of bearish catalysts for the crypto industry as its biggest assets — Bitcoin and Ethereum (ETH-USD) — struggle to reverse their losses.

      While much of the industry is predicated on the “buy the dip and hold” philosophy, many investors are preferring to take their money elsewhere. In a single week at the end of June, more than $423 million flowed out of the crypto market.

      This outflow is obviously becoming less of a trickle and more of a tidal wave. As such, exchanges are struggling to keep afloat. Investors are watching as some of the world’s biggest crypto trading floors brace themselves for a long crypto winter. Coinbase (NASDAQ:COIN), Gemini, BlockFi and Crypto.com have all rescinded offers to employees or laid off significant portions of their workforces. BlockFi ended up in too large a hole to climb out of; FTX acquired it last week for $240 million.

      But many exchanges aren’t just giving their employees the short end of the stick. Customers, too, are suffering as these companies batten down the hatches.
      …
      https://investorplace.com/2022/07/crypto-exchanges-in-trouble-exchanges-halting-withdrawals-amid-market-collapse/

      1. At least five exchanges have prevented users from removing their assets from their floors in the last month.

        Does this mean they can’t get fiats for their “coins”, or does this mean they can’t get their cryptos out and have to watch helplessly as they plummet in value?

    2. The Wall Street Journal
      Finance
      Celsius Customers Are Losing Hope for Their Locked-Up Crypto
      Three weeks since the crypto lender said it was halting withdrawals, users want answers
      What Happens If a Crypto Platform Goes Bankrupt?
      When cryptocurrency lending platform Celsius froze user accounts amid a plunge in valuations, it sent ripples across the industry and raised questions about what happens to user assets if a crypto platform files for bankruptcy. WSJ’s Vicky Ge Huang explains. Photo illustration: Jordan Kranse
      By Vicky Ge Huang
      July 3, 2022 5:30 am ET

      It has been three weeks since crypto lender Celsius Network LLC took the drastic step of halting customers’ withdrawals. Many people are starting to wonder if they will ever see their money again.
      …
      https://www.wsj.com/articles/celsius-customers-are-losing-hope-for-their-locked-up-crypto-11656840601

      1. There isn’t much point in wondering. It’s gone. Forever. “like it never existed”

        And you should have known that on day 1 but if you’re still holding on to hope now, well, I’ve got a bridge to sell you.

    1. Nearly 7,000 single-family homes available in Las Vegas Valley

      Given how Lake Mead is drying up, it might be a good idea to unload any LV real estate before the taps run dry.

  39. Boo Randy
    July 5, 2022 at 6:36 am

    You’ll freeze in the dark and you’ll like it, Fritz & Helga.

    Russia is set to switch off the gas for work on a key pipeline — and Germany fears the worst

    PUBLISHED TUE, JUL 5 20224:49 AM EDT

    Some fear the Kremlin could use planned maintenance works to turn off the taps for good.

    https://www.cnbc.com/2022/07/05/germany-fears-russian-gas-flows-could-be-about-to-stop-for-good.html

    Turn out the lights, the party’s over

    https://youtu.be/A23snMkbZ1I

    3. And it gets even better: Norwegian oil workers are threatening to strike. One of the few sources of western European hydrocarbons could get shut down.

    1. “it’s not about race” says the liberal woman who has said every aspect of society (down to freeways and smog) is about race for the last 5 years.

      1. And Chief Hothead- wow. If you put 5 different liberals in a room, how long until they all realize they all hate each other?

  42. Another day, another cryptocurrency firm bites the dust…

    This situation is becoming highly reminiscent of the vaporization of the nonbank subprime lending sector in 2007 as the warmup act to the main CR8R events of 2008.

    1. The Financial Times
      Voyager Digital
      Voyager Digital files for bankruptcy protection as crypto crisis deepens
      Digital asset lender has more than 100,000 creditors and billions of dollars in liabilities, US court filings show
      The Voyager Digital app on an iPhone screen
      Toronto-listed Voyager Digital had suffered losses of more than $650mn on a loan to Three Arrows Capital, a collapsed cryptocurrency investor
      Joshua Oliver in London
      3 hours ago

      Voyager Digital has filed for US bankruptcy protection, the latest casualty of the sharp downturn in cryptocurrency prices that has triggered a crisis in the digital assets market.

      The Toronto-listed broker and lender filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy late on Tuesday in federal court in New York after suffering losses of more than $650mn on a loan to Three Arrows Capital, the failed crypto investor.

      The collapse of Voyager came less than a week after it suspended trading and prevented customers from withdrawing funds.

      Singapore-based Three Arrows, which was known for its aggressive bets that crypto prices would rise, had borrowed heavily from big industry players to amp up its market wagers, leaving it severely underwater as the prices of digital tokens fell. Prices of leading cryptocurrencies have tumbled about 70 per cent from their peak late last year.

      The company fell into bankruptcy in spite of a rescue loan last month from Alameda Research, the trading firm controlled by FTX founder Sam Bankman-Fried. Voyager had drawn down the maximum $75mn permitted in a single 30-day period, making Alameda its largest unsecured creditor, the bankruptcy filings showed.

      Voyager’s collapse will be more widely felt since the company had a large customer base among do-it-yourself crypto investors. At the end of March, its liabilities amounted to $5.7bn. The Chapter 11 petition seeks to provide Voyager with protection from legal claims while it pursues a restructuring.

      The company said in the filing that it has more than 100,000 creditors and liabilities of between $1bn and $10bn. It owes nearly $1mn to Google, the filings showed, with the rest of its largest unsecured creditors being customers.

      Voyager said it had $110mn of cash and “owned crypto assets” on hand, plus $1.3bn in crypto assets on its platform.

      Subject to court approval, it hopes to repay customers with “a combination” of crypto assets, proceeds from Three Arrows’ bankruptcy, shares in the company when it re-emerges from insolvency and “Voyager tokens”.

      The company said it also holds $350mn of customers’ cash in US dollar deposits in an omnibus account at Metropolitan Commercial Bank in New York. Clients would be paid back after “a reconciliation and fraud prevention process,” it said.
      …

    2. One of the largest crypto miners sold most of its Bitcoin holdings as market turmoil leads to big pain for major companies
      By Taylor Locke
      July 5, 2022 11:59 AM PDT
      Artistic depiction of the value of Bitcoin about to take a plunge.

      One of the largest cryptocurrency mining companies is feeling the heat of the latest market downturn.

      Core Scientific sold most of its Bitcoin holdings in June, the company said on Tuesday in a monthly update. It traded 7,202 Bitcoins for about $167 million, and now holds 1,959 Bitcoins and $132 million in cash on its balance sheet.

      Proceeds from its Bitcoin sales were used for payments for ASIC servers, which are typically used to mine cryptocurrency; investments in data center capacity; and scheduled repayment of debt, according to Core Scientific.

      The company says it will continue to sell its mined Bitcoins to pay operating expenses and maintain liquidity, among other things.

      The announcement is just the latest sign that major crypto players are taking drastic actions to try to survive a struggling market. The second quarter of 2022 was rough for the entire sector, with June being particularly damaging. Forced selling and liquidations caused a stir across the industry, and as the price of Bitcoin plunged, it also took a toll on miners.
      …
      https://fortune.com/2022/07/05/core-scientific-top-crypto-miner-sold-most-of-its-bitcoin/

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