We’re Preparing Sellers, Telling Them People Are Starting Low With Offers And Not To Be Offended
A report from Maui Now in Hawaii. “Closings of condominium sales have dropped by double-digit percentages in the three months since Mayor Richard Bissen announced a proposal to phase out thousands of short-term rentals. Bissen said the downward trend in condo sales volume is a positive indication toward housing affordability for island residents. ‘It makes sense that uncertainty around the TVR phaseout could be impacting the condo resale market,’ he said. ‘This data shows that condo owners, the vast majority of whom are not local owner-occupants, are more interested in selling, and fewer buyers are interested in paying the higher prices of the recent past.'”
The Daily Mail. “Jackson Hole, Wyoming, once a quaint mountain retreat, has transformed into one of America’s wealthiest counties and a playground for the ultra-rich. Sales in the $2-3 million market are currently the most stagnant, the report showed. Some properties are appraising lower than contract prices, forcing sellers to renegotiate, Devon Viehman, a local real estate expert explained. ‘Things that are priced to the market are still selling quickly,’ she said. Viehman suggests that sellers adjust their expectations, as ‘pandemic pricing is done.’ ‘If sellers can get that out of their mind and realize that was just this little blip in time,’ Viehman said.”
Consumer Affairs. “Nearly a third of homes stayed on the market for more than 30 days across the entire U.S. as of July 2024, according to Realtor.com data. At the same time, searches for ‘sell my house’ have shot up nearly 70% in the last month, pointing to a strong desire to move that is often met with extended wait times, Nathan Richardson of Cash For Home told ConsumerAffairs. The longer wait times in Ohio and Massachusetts highlight specific challenges in the states, including high housing costs in Ohio and a glut of homes for sale in Massachusetts, Richardson said. Home sales hit their lowest level in nearly three decades in 2023 and haven’t been much better in 2024. ‘While we’ve experienced a historically hot seller’s market in recent years, that trend is slowly shifting,’ Richardson said.”
The Epoch Times. “The dramatic rise in median home prices in New York City and other busy real estate markets from pre-pandemic levels has driven buyers throughout the country to pursue a range of innovative solutions they might never have considered four or five years ago, brokers and real estate lawyers have told The Epoch Times. Tyler Whitman, a broker at the New York City-based firm The Agency Re and his colleagues also work with sellers, he said, and they counsel sellers not to be taken aback if an offer comes in significantly lower than expected. ‘We’re representing sellers, and we’re preparing them ahead of time, telling them people are starting low with offers and not to be offended. They should respond to all offers. The buyer’s testing the owner, and you can test them back,’ said Whitman.”
WFLA in Florida. “The water level in the Laurel Meadows subdivision of Sarasota County has gone down enough for people to return to their homes and begin the long process of clean up and recovery. Greg Gregory said the reality of it all is just starting to hit him. His wife, Kim, said she’s not sure how they will be able to repair all of the damage to their home. ‘I don’t have the money to fix my home, and so far, we’re not getting any help, none,’ Kim Gregory said. Like many in the neighborhood, they don’t have flood insurance. ‘We need FEMA; why are they not helping us?’ Kim Gregory said.”
The Wall Street Journal on California. “San Francisco’s hospitality business imploded during the pandemic. Now, its hotel owners are drowning in bad debt as never before. In the city’s metropolitan area, the delinquency rate among commercial mortgage-backed security loans for the lodging sector skyrocketed to 41.6% in June from 5.7% in June 2023, according to Trepp. It is the largest increase across the country’s 25 largest metro areas. The city’s two largest hotels, the Hilton Parc 55 and Hilton San Francisco Union Square, combined have lost $1 billion in value, according to the Kroll Bond Rating Agency, which valued them at $553.8 million. Exiting the two hotels ‘meaningfully improved our balance sheet and operating metrics,’ said Tom Baltimore, the firm’s chief executive during a first-quarter earnings call. The San Francisco market, alongside Los Angeles, will ‘probably lag for some time,’ he said.”
“Hannah Lin, a room attendant at the Union Square Hilton, said her hours were dramatically cut at the hotel. With less pay, she’s cut her spending to just basics. She also took up a second job at the Oracle Ballpark. ‘I chose a San Francisco hotel because they have stable schedules,” she said. Now, ‘the only thing we can do is look for side jobs.'”
NBC San Diego in California. “As you drive along streets in the Spring Valley neighborhood of San Diego County there are homeless encampments scattered about. Those encampments are causing concern for many people in the community. ‘Recently we’ve been getting more and more encampments everywhere,’ Spring Valley resident Julia Wolfe said. ‘There’s grown men and people living on our streets like right next to our homes. It’s very loud, it’s aggressive. They hang signs with profanity and vulgarity they block up the sidewalks so in some areas nobody can walk past them anymore. Families can’t go on walks, wheelchairs aren’t accessible and then on top of that, everybody leaves their trash.'”
“Some residents said they’re contemplating relocating because of the encampments near their home. ‘I don’t want to leave but sometimes I think about it. I just want to get away and get to a place where I don’t see this,’ resident Elise Rodriguez said.”
The Philadelphia Inquirer in Pennsylvania. “When Lauren Bruce moved to Hart Lane, in February 2023, she was ready to embrace her new neighborhood. She and her partner shared a vision of starting a community garden on nearby vacant lots. Instead, the couple found themselves in an all-out Kensington turf war. For them, the front line was their front steps, where nearly every day they tried to chase off drug dealers hustling bags of fentanyl. The dealers would tell them defiantly, ‘This is a drug corner’ — and a few times tagged the couple’s car with graffiti, or smeared it with ketchup and mustard.”
“But ground zero sat just 100 feet away. Neighbors knew it as ‘Triple X,’ a fenced-in compound that encompassed two vacant lots and an empty storefront that once housed an adult bookstore and alleged prostitution front, with a fading ‘XXX’ sign above the door. A real-estate speculator, Adam Ehrlich, had bought the empty building in 2020, adding it to a portfolio of more than 125 properties in Kensington, and close to 800 citywide. One day last year, she confronted Ehrlich about the chaos. His reply, Bruce said, echoed what the drug dealers on the block often told her: Kensington is a rough neighborhood. If they couldn’t handle it, they should leave. ‘It’s a rough neighborhood because you’re making it that way,’ Bruce, 40, shot back.”
The Globe and Mail. “For much of the past decade, I spent time going back and forth between the United States and Canada. It used to be the case, especially after the election of Justin Trudeau in 2015, that when returning to Canada I was greeted by good news. The country was imbued with a sense of optimism. Those years seem so long ago. The Canada of 2024 feels like a different country. When I returned to Canada in late 2023, I was shocked by what I saw and heard. It felt as if almost everyone I encountered now, of all ethnicities, backgrounds and ages, were angry.”
“Friends complained about the impossibility of buying a home − homes that had been affordable when their parents came to Canada. Family members worried about car thefts and other crimes. People were making plans to leave − even those who had recently arrived. Nor was this limited to my immediate circle. In conversations at the local YMCA, the coffee shop and around Toronto, there was a genuine, visceral frustration. People felt stifled by the dismal state of the economy and the poor state of housing. They were working harder and, thanks to inflation, making less. The price of food (and everything else) was rising. They worried about their kids’ safety. There was a ceiling on their ambitions. The political leadership of the country had failed them, time and again, and was now unable to address ordinary people’s concerns.”
“Driving through the Greater Toronto Area, I saw how much more congested everything had become. There were too many people with too few places to live. The increasing number of homeless people on the street. The rise in violent crime. The staggering toll of the opioid crisis. The unprecedented wave of international students, many of whom were sold a bill of goods that turned out to be faulty. The hangover from COVID-19 restrictions, almost a form of national PTSD. The pervasive feeling that success is out of reach in Canada, and even if you work hard and are successful, the government will come collecting more than they need − and then proceed to waste it, overspend it or lose it.”
“When the law loses its power to deter crime, either because of prosecutors not moving forward with cases, or because of a general laissez-faire attitude toward violent crime happening in other neighbourhoods, it is the marginalized who are harmed most. Yet, Canadians cannot even read or share news on social-media platforms such as Facebook and Instagram. It is an Orwellian experience − in the literal sense − to see one’s own articles censored and silenced in a country calling itself a democracy. The excesses of superficial progressivism have been laid bare. Cultural virtue-signalling at the expense of substantive economic progress has corroded the values of progressive politics. It was easy to blame Donald Trump when he was president; it’s much harder to deflect criticism now.”
From Reuters. “German commercial property prices fell 7.4% in the second quarter from a year earlier but showed signs of stabilisation, the VDP banking association said on Monday, as the country’s real estate sector grapples with its worst crisis in decades. ‘The situation in the commercial property market remains tense,’ VDP’s Chief Executive Jens Tolckmitt said. German property lender Aareal, which has a big footprint in the United States, last week disclosed a 26% increase in loans for offices that were likely to go unpaid during the second quarter.”
ABC News in Australia. “Aaron Webb’s street has a dozen Airbnbs. He and his partner — a teacher at a local school — rent metres near the beach on Queensland’s Sunshine Coast. In June, the region had 13,000 short-term stays but fewer than a thousand homes to rent, according to data from Queensland University and SQM Research. Mr Webb fears they’ll be pushed out when their lease ends. Mr Webb says the houses around him are empty in the off-season, which is hard to see in such a competitive rental market. ‘Politicians need to decide what kind of place they want this to be. Do they want it to be a pure tourist destination like in Europe?’ he says. ‘Or do they really tighten it up, and go ‘hang on a minute, you can’t just have these houses vacant for months of the year when we’ve got people struggling to find places to rent.'”
“Urban geographer and Associate Professor Thomas Sigler says the housing crisis has deeper roots than new platforms to spruik short-term lets. ‘It goes right down to the sort of philosophical underpinnings of home ownership and whether a human being should be allowed to own one or even two or three properties,’ he says. ‘The problem is the financialisation of housing and the fact that we’ve allowed housing to be a speculative financial commodity when in fact it should be a social good like it is in Europe.'”
South China Morning Post. “Hong Kong developers show no sign of slowing down project launches in coming months even as high interest rates continue to dampen demand for new homes and hold prices down, according to analysts. Nearly 10,000 flats in 24 new properties are tipped to launch before year-end, matching the 9,911 units put on offer in 27 projects in the first seven months, according to Midland Realty. Developers were able to sell about 4,800 or a little over 48 per cent of the flats made available to buyers in the January to July period, Midland said. The long-term supply of new flats in Hong Kong also remains robust, with 1,416 private homes completed in June, a five-month high and nearly 17 times higher than the 80 units completed in May.”
“In the next three to four years, as many as 109,000 new flats are expected to flood Hong Kong, according to the housing bureau. ‘Given the current market inventory exceeding 22,000 new units, developers have adopted a strategy of prioritising sales volume over pricing, to sell the properties actively in the market, in order to maintain a balance between market supply and absorption,’ said Sammy Po Siu-ming, CEO of Midland Realty’s residential division for Hong Kong and Macau.”
“The supply glut is one factor keeping home prices in check. Recent launches have been priced lower than comparable flats nearly a decade ago. In May, the average price of a new class A unit, defined as a flat of less than 431 sq ft, in Yau Ma Tei was HK$20,346 (US$2,611) per square foot, a 10.6 per cent decrease from HK$22,768 in 2015, according to a study by JLL. Meanwhile, in Kennedy Town, average per-square-foot prices are down 6 per cent to HK$22,022 from HK$23,424 in 2015.”
“‘Some developers hold a large number of new projects and unfinished units,’ said Derek Chan, head of research at Ricacorp Properties. ‘To remain liquid, some developers do not mind adopting a low-price sales strategy, hoping to achieve the effect of small profits but quick turnover.'”
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‘For them, the front line was their front steps, where nearly every day they tried to chase off drug dealers hustling bags of fentanyl. The dealers would tell them defiantly, ‘This is a drug corner’
This is another well written article from the Inquirer and worth reading in full.
‘The problem is the financialisation of housing and the fact that we’ve allowed housing to be a speculative financial commodity when in fact it should be a social good like it is in Europe’
You know Tom, they do have STR in Europistan.
‘’ it should be a social good like it is in Europe”
It’s only a social good in Ireland for fake refugees destroying their passports and claiming asylum. They get put at the head of the line and the majority of “social good” housing goes to Somalis and Nigerians and the like. In fact, Irish are being evicted from their flats and replaced by African fake refugees. Many of them have lived in the UK for years but have turned their own neighborhoods into such inhabitable $#itholes they are crossing the border in the north, destroying their documents, and trying to claim asylum in Ireland. BTW-if you ever wanted to visit Ireland, do it now because it’s not going to be around much longer. The biblical deluge of fake refugees who get free housing, free healthcare, free food, and free education will be the predominant population in the not too distant future. It’s only a matter of time before they throw the Book of Kells in the Liffey and replace it with a Koran.
People refuse to believe they are being replaced until it’s too late.
The situation in Ireland is probably the worst in Europe right now. There are over 30k NGOs with a combined budget in the billions in Ireland all prosecuting the woke agenda. Every TV network, all the print media, and all the radio stations have been taken over and endlessly stream North Korea style propaganda that anyone opposing the demographic replacement is a dangerous far right racist. Every night busses full of fake refugees roll out of Dublin and dump their passengers on some small unsuspecting rural village. Irish who have been on the waiting housing list for 10 years are being told there is nothing for them while hundreds of thousands of fake refugees who just entered the country and destroyed their documents are walking right into new developments courtesy of the Irish taxpayers. It is a dystopian nightmare.
A colleague who lives and works in Dublin was assaulted by refugees, who sent him to the hospital. He blamed himself, saying he was in the wrong place at the wrong time.
They have accepted that they are being replaced.
This man has a message for your colleague….
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=iUEkhM9GYME&t=37s&pp=2AElkAIB
‘There’s grown men and people living on our streets like right next to our homes. It’s very loud, it’s aggressive. They hang signs with profanity and vulgarity they block up the sidewalks so in some areas nobody can walk past them anymore. Families can’t go on walks, wheelchairs aren’t accessible and then on top of that, everybody leaves their trash’
Weather! Julia. Yer criminalizing poverty.
” Julia. Yer criminalizing poverty.”
Hey Julia
https://youtu.be/LQHzNB3Sqo4?si=UHu5So6wx9QsbzvI
“Some residents said they’re contemplating relocating because of the encampments near their home. ‘I don’t want to leave but sometimes I think about it. I just want to get away and get to a place where I don’t see this,’ resident Elise Rodriguez said.”
Good luck finding a buyer or renter!
FEMA isn’t going to help. dear, because you’re an older retired white couple, with resourses …..look for the city of Sarasota to start condemming houses that aren’t stripped out and fixed real soon….it’s called the 50% rule, if it’s more then 50% destroyed ,it comes down…thankfully the Lots are worth a lot by themselves in that area..
I ask cant they just give the flooded house back to the bank if its a non recourse loan?
Of course they can, they just don’t want to do that. They want “someone else” to make them whole.
You will own nothing.
CNBC — 59% of Americans wrongly think the U.S. is in a recession, report finds (8/12/2024):
“Citing higher costs and difficulty making ends meet, most respondents said they think a recession started roughly 15 months ago, in March 2023, and could last until July 2025, Affirm found.
Economists have wrestled with the growing disconnect between how the economy is doing and how people feel about their financial standing.
Over the last few years “the wealth creation was concentrated amongst homeowners and upper-income brackets,” Chang said, “but you probably have about one-third of the population that’s been left out of that — that’s why there’s such a disconnect.”
Rising rents coupled with high borrowing costs and low wage growth have hit some especially hard. “Lower income households are not keeping up,” Goldman said. “Everything looks great but when you look beneath the surface, the disparity between the wealthy and nonwealthy is widening dramatically.”
https://www.cnbc.com/2024/08/12/59percent-of-americans-think-the-us-is-in-a-recession-report-finds.html
Meanwhile, unsold cars and trux are piling up at stealerships, as few can afford the stratospheric prices. Shacks aren’t selling. Normally hot vacation spots have weak attendance numbers, restaurants are folding, layoffs are growing, etc.
Nah, there isn’t a recession.
After this morning’s safety meeting, during which I ripped my two apprentices new @$$holes about how phone usage on the clock is tanking production, I talked to the site superintendent about how this spring, there were several tower cranes on jobsites in River North near downtown.
Those cranes aren’t there now. Projects have topped out, and new ones aren’t starting up. I told him that 10% of electricians working in Denver now won’t have jobs at the end of this year.
So, in addition to the new trux that aren’t selling, there will soon be a glut of repo’d trux that tradesmen can no longer afford.
Seeing trux priced at 70K+ makes my eyes water. Meanwhile, Stellantis is idling truck lines. NIssan has killed the Titan, and I expect Ford, GM and Toyota to slow down production, possibly with furloughs too.
I can report as an insider in a western city that permits have dropped off a cliff. We’re doing a third of what we were doing at the beginning of the year. And the new permit requests are almost non existent.
It’s gonna be crickets by the end of the year.
I’m curious — how long did it take you to get this far in this career? I mean: from the moment you decided to change your career to be an electrician, to being a journeyman(?) supervisor, how many years of schooling and OJT?
“10% of electricians working in Denver now won’t have jobs at the end of this year.”
And here I thought that we were desperate for trade workers. Are other trades going to be out of work too? Is this limited to Denver?
“how long did it take”
2015-2016 working part time for a licensed Master helping on mostly residential work, while still working full time for Uncle Sugar. 2016 start working for a subcontractor to a large electrical contractor, new construction apartment towers. 2017 leave the sub and hire on direct with main contractor. 2017-2020 three years of night school one night a week, 36 weeks out of the year. Took time off from big construction during CCP Flu to return to working for previous licensed Master, but because this is essentially a one man shop and does not carry workmen’s comp insurance, those hours do not count toward state requirement for licensure. 2021 start working for smaller company almost all commercial. 2022 promoted to foreman without having a license, company van, etc. Later in 2022 pass Journeyman’s exam and get licensed with the state (8,000 hours in the field required, 4,000 of which must be classified as commercial hours, 2 years of school required, I did 3 out of 4 and never went back after CCP Flu).
The 10% who won’t have jobs don’t belong on jobsites now anyway. They’re getting paid 8 hours to effectively do 4 hours of work. Not everybody makes it in this trade…
So, roughly 7 years? Sounds like the equivalent of a master’s degree on full-ride scholarship. Not a bad path to take, especially for someone who starts right out of high school. They could be a master electrician by age 30.
George Herbert Walker Bush era vibes.
Party like it’s 1990!!!
da bear
Genius is 110% mental.
No, 60% know that the data they’re being fed is an absolute lie! If it feels like a recession to the majority, it’s a recession.
“Travel Trends Deteriorating” As Consumer Downturn Worsens.
https://www.zerohedge.com/markets/travel-trends-deteriorating-consumer-downturn-worsens
Consumers are quickly changing their spending habits as the pullback across the leisure and travel industry becomes more pronounced. We first asked this question in early May, “Is Consumer Travel Spending Easing?” – BofA Identifies New Trend As Travel Companies Miss Earnings.
With the Biden-Harris economy losing steam, recession risks are mounting as the labor market cools. Airlines, hotels, short-term rental platforms, and even theme parks are sounding the alarm bells about a consumer downturn.
Evidence of a consumer slowdown is widespread.
Goldman’s Peter Callahan commented on this in a note to clients on Sunday, “Travel trends clearly deteriorating into July/2H (EXPE / ABNB 2H moderation, DIS Parks/Experiences saw a moderation of consumer demand, FOUR calling out restaurant weakness in July) – debate is if they are now ‘de-risked’ into 2H or if the market will need to wait to see if we go ‘below’ trend before normalizing (as many other categories impacted by COVID have done – e.g. e-commerce) ..”
Discretionary downturn signs are everywhere.
Earnings Call Mentions Of “Consumer Downturn” Soar To Highest Level Since Financial Crisis
On Verge Of Credit Shock: Credit Card Debt Posts Biggest Drop Since Covid Crash As Rates Hit Record High
“Suddenly Recession Is On The Tip Of Everyone’s Tongue… Wow, Did That Happen Fast!”
And in individual companies.
Airbnb Shares Plunge On Slowing US Demand As Consumer Downturn Worsens
Disney CFO Admits Lower-Income Consumers Are “Stressed & Shaving Time Off At Parks”
What’s very clear is that pent-up demand for travel during the Covid era has evaporated as consumers struggle with elevated inflation and high interest rates, along with maxed-out credit cards and depleted personal savings in an economic environment that even VP Harris has admitted Bidenomics has failed.
Bloomberg cited new website tracking data from Similarweb, which shows consumer web searches for rooms, flights, and cruises have sharply declined in recent quarters.
[Some charts appear here …]
From Airbnb to United Airlines, Delta Air Lines, Spirit Airlines, Frontier, Walt Disney, and travel platform Expedia Group, management teams of these mega corps have all been warning about a consumer slowdown.
Just last week, Expedia slashed its annual outlook for the second time this year due to worsening consumer softness.
Days ago, Hilton CEO Christopher Nassetta told investors, “The lower sort of half of consumers, maybe even the lower three-quarters, have less disposable income available and less capacity to do anything, including travel.”
Although Bloomberg mentions that “demand for travel isn’t collapsing,” the fact that consumers have been pulling back for months is a very ominous signal that the economy is heading in the wrong direction.
No, no……don’t look behind the curtain. Everything is just dandy!!
No more REVENGEcations?
Who is gonna SAVE the Fontainebleau??????
CNBC — 59% of Americans wrongly think the U.S. is in a recession, report finds (8/12/2024):
1) wrongthink –
Etymology
Compound of wrong + think, probably modeled on earlier crimethink from George Orwell’s “1984”.
2) It’s an election year and the D party is pulling out all of the stops. Watch the election fraud also. Based on what happened in 2020, they’ll use the same bag of tricks (di*ks?). The D party is now the Communist party. Prove me wrong.
3) We may not yet technically be in recession, but everything is far from awesome. Something about asset bubbles deflating and 25%+ inflation since the scamdemic, where the average Joe and Jane didn’t have $500 emergency funds beforehand. Sure the top 10% are doing OK, but that leaves 90% not so much… Central planning and a command and control economy. Don’t expect different outcomes. Venezuela is next step. The beatings will continue until morale improves! Social unrest may be next due to Socialists (read Communists) destroying the social contract and the very fabric of society.
https://i.pinimg.com/originals/01/e7/47/01e7475fbd172a32787fe653b7b7ff65.jpg
https://i.imgflip.com/5hf9mt.jpg
https://x.com/themarketsniper/status/1823240336224752057
TheMarketSniper – MBA, CMT, Trader, Teacher
Nobody Special @JG_Nuke · 23h
The Party told you to reject the evidence of your eyes and ears. It was their final, most essential command.
[- George Orwell, “1984”, Part 1, Chapter 7]
[image here]
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/GUyXWj8XkAEeqcN?format=jpg&name=large
2:09 AM · Aug 13, 2024
Boy did I call it or what?
1984 originally published June 8, 1949.
George Orwell died January 21, 1950.
“[T]owards the end of his life, George Orwell had collaborated with the secret British government propaganda agency, the Information Research Department (IRD).”
George Orwell wasn’t prescient. 1984 was predictive programming. Same as the CIA working with Hollywood.
I guess it’s different in certain areas. In the southeast The roads are packed, All the hotels at the beach are sold out And the airlines are setting records every week. It doesn’t look that slow around here. I wish it would slow down some around here.
“I guess it’s different in certain areas.”
https://www.businessinsider.com/recession-inflation-unemployment-outlook-lazar-economy-inequality-stocks-house-prices-2024-5?op=1
– Signposts along the way.
Economy
Recession will strike this year with 21 states flashing red already, top economist says
Theron Mohamed
May 25, 2024, 5:57 AM EDT
> “Rising unemployment in 21 states points to a recession later this year, Nancy Lazar says.”
> “Piper Sandler’s top economist flagged stark divides between the rich and poor, and big and small.”
> “A recession would probably hit stocks and home values, but inflation and interest rates could fall.”
“Job markets in nearly half of US states are flashing red, signaling a recession will hit by the end of this year, one expert warned.”
“Nancy Lazar, Piper Sandler’s chief global economist, told Business Insider that unemployment has risen significantly in 21 states.”
“Specifically, three-month average unemployment has increased by at least 0.5 percentage points from its low over the last 12 months in all 21 states. The group, which includes California and Illinois and numbered 19 states a few weeks ago, generates more than 40% of US GDP.”
“Lazar said that when joblessness has spiked across that many states in the past, a protracted downturn has followed almost every time. The state-level indicator is based on the “Sahm Rule.””
“”We do think the economy moves into recession in the back half of this year,” she said.”
“Lazar predicted GDP would decline by 1%, unemployment would jump from below 4% to nearly 6%, and there would be even greater pain in vulnerable sectors like commercial real estate.”
I’ve been to Charlotte, Winston-Salem, Raleigh and Emerald Island in the past year and I can’t say it looked all that busy to me. I know you beat that drum a lot, but I had no problem getting into restaurants, booking hotel rooms at the last minute, driving around, etc. There were empty seats on the flights to and from Charlotte.
Could be that everyone is going to the beach (or Las Vegas).
I went to Vegas the past two summers. Before that, the beach.
The “big city vacation” trade might be imploding. DEIsney, too.
da bear
wrongly think
Note to CNBC propagandists: recessions are backdated.
“For much of the past decade, I spent time going back and forth between the United States and Canada. It used to be the case, especially after the election of Justin Trudeau in 2015, that when returning to Canada I was greeted by good news. The country was imbued with a sense of optimism. “
He doesn’t describe just what this good news and optimism was, though I suspect that it was the redistribution of other people’s money. Sure, it works for a while, until it slams into a wall and stops working. It doesn’t occur to this clown that what is happening now is a direct result of all that “good news”.
“homes that had been affordable when their parents came to Canada. ”
the guy gets so close to adding 2+2 together but then blames it on something else.
Like I said yesterday, it’s funny watching an immigrant bellyache that there are too many immigrants.
Americans’ refusal to keep paying higher prices may be dealing a final blow to US inflation spike
https://apnews.com/article/inflation-prices-consumers-economy-spending-federal-reserve-c69408f05baeffac0023ceb76b747999
The great inflation spike of the past three years is nearly spent — and economists credit American consumers for helping slay it.
Some of America’s largest companies, from Amazon to Disney to Yum Brands, say their customers are increasingly seeking cheaper alternative products and services, searching for bargains or just avoiding items they deem too expensive. Consumers aren’t cutting back enough to cause an economic downturn. Rather, economists say, they appear to be returning to pre-pandemic norms, when most companies felt they couldn’t raise prices very much without losing business.
“While inflation is down, prices are still high, and I think consumers have gotten to the point where they’re just not accepting it,” Tom Barkin, president of the Federal Reserve Bank of Richmond, said last week at a conference of business economists. “And that’s what you want: The solution to high prices is high prices.”
A more price-sensitive consumer helps explain why inflation has appeared to be steadily falling toward the Federal Reserve’s 2% target, ending a period of painfully high prices that strained many people’s budgets and darkened their outlooks on the economy. It also assumed a central place in the presidential election, with inflation leading many Americans to turn sour on the Biden-Harris administration’s handling of the economy.
The reluctance of consumers to keep paying more has forced companies to slow their price increases — or even to cut them. The result is a cooling of inflation pressures.
Other factors have also helped tame inflation, including the healing of supply chains, which has boosted the availability of cars, trucks, meats and furniture, among other items, and the high interest rates engineered by the Fed, which slowed sales of homes, cars and appliances and other interest rate-sensitive purchases.
Still, a key question now is whether shoppers will pull back so much as to put the economy at risk. Consumer spending makes up more than two-thirds of economic activity. With evidence emerging that the job market is cooling, a drop in spending could potentially derail the economy. Such fears caused stock prices to plummet a week ago, though markets have since rebounded.
This week, the government will provide updates on both inflation and the health of the American consumer. On Wednesday, it will release the consumer price index for July. It’s expected to show that prices — excluding volatile food and energy costs — rose just 3.2% from a year earlier. That would be down from 3.3% in June and would be the lowest such year-over-year inflation figure since April 2021.
And on Thursday, the government will report last month’s retail sales, which are expected to have climbed a decent 0.3% from June. Such a gain would suggest that while Americans have become vigilant about their money, they are still willing to spend.
Many businesses have noticed.
“We’re seeing lower average selling prices … right now because customers continue to trade down on price when they can,” said Andrew Jassy, CEO of Amazon.
David Gibbs, CEO of Yum Brands, which owns Taco Bell, KFC and Pizza Hut, told investors that a more cost-conscious consumer has slowed its sales, which slipped 1% in the April-June quarter at stores open for at least a year.
“Ensuring we provide consumers affordable options,” Gibbs said, “has been an area of greater focus for us since last year.”
Other companies are cutting prices outright. Dormify, an online retailer that sells dorm supplies, is offering comforters starting at $69, down from $99 a year ago.
According to the Fed’s “Beige Book,” an anecdotal collection of business reports from around the country that is released eight times a year, companies in nearly all 12 Fed districts have described similar experiences.
“Almost every district mentioned retailers discounting items or price-sensitive consumers only purchasing essentials, trading down in quality, buying fewer items or shopping around for the best deals,” the Beige Book said last month.
Most economists say consumers are still spending enough to sustain the economy consistently. Barkin said most of the businesses in his district — which covers Virginia, West Virginia, Maryland and North and South Carolina — report that demand remains solid, at least at the right price.
“The way I’d put it is, consumers are still spending, but they’re choosing,” Barkin said.
In a speech a couple of weeks ago, Jared Bernstein, who leads the Biden administration’s Council of Economic Advisers, mentioned consumer caution as a reason why inflation is nearing the end of a “round trip” back to the Fed’s 2% target level.
Emerging from the pandemic, Bernstein noted, consumers were flush with cash after receiving several rounds of stimulus checks and having slashed their spending on in-person services. Their improved finances “gave certain firms the ability to flex a pricing power that was much less prevalent pre-pandemic.” After COVID, consumers were “less responsive to price increases,” Bernstein said.
As a result, “the old adage that the cure for high prices is high prices (was) temporarily disengaged,” Bernstein said.
So some companies raised prices even more than was needed to cover their higher input costs, thereby boosting their profits. Limited competition in some industries, Bernstein added, made it easier for companies to charge more.
Barkin noted that before the pandemic, inflation remained low as online shopping, which makes price comparisons easy, became increasingly prevalent. Major retailers also held down costs, and increased U.S. oil production brought down gas prices.
“A price increase was so rare,” Barkin said, “that if someone came to you with a 5% or 10% price increase, you almost just threw them out, like, ‘How could you possibly do it?’ ”
That changed in 2021.
“There are labor shortages, Barkin said. “Supply chain shortages. And the price increases are coming to you from everywhere. Your gardener is raising your prices, and you don’t have the capacity to do anything other than accept them.”
The economist Isabella Weber at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst, dubbed this phenomenon “sellers’ inflation” in 2023. In an influential paper, she wrote that “publicly reported supply chain bottlenecks” can “create legitimacy for price hikes” and “create acceptance on the part of consumers to pay higher prices.”
Consumers are no longer so accepting, Barkin said.
“People have a little bit more time to stop and say, ‘How do I feel about paying $9.89 for a 12-pack of Diet Coke when I used to pay $5.99?’ They don’t like it that much, and so people are making choices.”
Barkin said he expects this trend to continue to slow price increases and cool inflation.
“I’m actually pretty optimistic that over the next few months, we’re going to see good readings on the inflation side,” he said. “All the elements of inflation seem to be settling down.”
They make it sound like people are deciding not to spend, when in reality their credit cards are maxing out. Can’t take that fancy vacation when you can’t charge it.
what a unadulterated piece of BS.
Inflation is purely a monetary phenomenon and we certainly continue to deficit spend into the stratosphere.
Besides prices are still going nuts. Grocery store, some little store brand cookies i buy once in a while. Were $1.99 pre 2020, been $2.49 for a long time ($2 at walmart, same thing, different brand packaging). Today $3.29. And it’s in new packaging so it’s probably smaller too (shrinkflation).
Priced a A/C unit or a furnace lately? make sure you’re sitting down.
Utilities continue to go up.
Taxes of course only go up.
Insurance is still insane and going up.
The massive undercounting of inflation is killing them cuz they say it’s at 3% which nobody believes and now they have nowhere to go. It’s AT LEAST 7 to 8% on a best case scenario currently. They could say it’s now down to 6% and people might believe that, but no one believes 3% and lower.
“The massive undercounting of inflation is killing them cuz they say it’s at 3% which nobody believes and now they have nowhere to go. It’s AT LEAST 7 to 8% on a best case scenario currently. They could say it’s now down to 6% and people might believe that, but no one believes 3% and lower.”
“Who you gonna believe, me or your lying eyes?” – Chico Marx, “Duck Soup”, 1933
https://chapwoodindex.com/
https://truflation.com/dashboard?feed=truflation-us-aggregated
https://www.shadowstats.com/
https://www.shadowstats.com/alternate_data/inflation-charts
vs.
BLS:
https://www.bls.gov/cpi/home.htm
BLS = BS 💩 🙃
“Inflation is purely a monetary phenomenon and we certainly continue to deficit spend into the stratosphere.”
– Inflation is theft. It violates the takings clause. Few.
“Fiat money eventually always goes back to its intrinsic value – zero.” – Voltaire
‘We need FEMA; why are they not helping us?’ Kim Gregory said.”
God helps those who help themselves Kim. BTW, it’s Florida and no matter where you live you should really have flood insurance or the cash reserves to fix your house.
…and the stomach to handle it all. I had friends in North Port that went thru this during Ian. Never flooded before, so didn’t have flood insurance (wasn’t required). FEMA helped a bit, but they rebuilt themselves. Fortunately, they are handy and have an army of handy friends.
A reader sent these in:
Central El Paso @Airbnb used as migrant stash house nets 14 arrests including smuggler. Homeland Security Investigations agent says Airbnb stash houses are becoming a new trend.
https://x.com/jjsheedy/status/1822079036291465236
Goldman Sachs Research found no evidence that Hurricane Beryl contributed to the large rise in the unemployment rate seen in July, with a bulk of temporary layoffs coming from California, Michigan, and Wisconsin.
https://x.com/MacroEdgeRes/status/1822766943784366587
Youth unemployment in Canada surged to 14.2% in July – its highest level in over 10 years excluding the pandemic lockdown as a growing number of Canadians struggle to find open positions.
https://x.com/MacroEdgeRes/status/1822674805591536079
Some Sunday thoughts
> Wave 1 inflation created a K/shape in the 2020-2022 years, 2005 was mega opulence galore for a huge number of people (hard to explain just how ‘wealthy’ & large people were living then). The inflation wave was an oil shock that cycle which hit as large rise in U1/2/3/6 was underway. Remains to be seen what policy response will look like this time & important to assess ahead of time.
> Innovation is basically at a standstill in the consumer products market (we’re in this merry go round now of stupid new ‘waters’, seltzers, and deconstruction of single piece goods into multiple pieces you have to buy to drive further revenue growth. Subscription video/TV etc space increasingly saturated. The GenAI thing is absolute nonsense for the Capex spend it’s commanded.
> Real estate activity recession is starting to bite, watching construction employment into the late fourth quarter as active construction is snapping in the wrong way
> AI bubble pretty much on par with tech bubble in terms of % gain.
> American poors are very exposed to job loss & high flying tech ‘product managers’ & bloated middle management have little reason to exist in an economy that can & should be running a lot leaner. Government obviously totally different story on employment front but slowdown in hirings is underway esp at state level. GOP triple crown may result in less govt job postings.
> There’s no structural worker shortage (in next 2-5 years) because the stop gap was 10+ million migrants – obviously a one time thing for this cycle in particular – but results in too many people chasing too few jobs. Skill shortage a different story. We probably see some return home as labor market continues to worsen.
> Manufacturing has remained okay as have heavy truck sales, to this point
> Broad leading economic and employment indicators are very, very soft
> Initial claims lags cuts, unemployment payments are un- survivable in states like Florida so 1099-NEC may be new unemployment
> huge structural issues for CRE (office, etc) to watch
> Employment becoming #1 focus for financial markets and Fed hasn’t been the case for a very, very long time (yes COVID lockdowns) but last economic cycle puts us in 07 or 00. Bad news will be bad, good will be good.
Welcome to the fun house. 🏝️
https://x.com/DonMiami3/status/1822723053748662709
“🇨🇦 Real Estate Insolvencies to Surpass Global Financial Crisis Levels”
The Market’s Breaking Point?
https://x.com/ShaziGoalie/status/1822768145532178474
The number of US bankruptcies currently under Chapter 11 jumps to 2,462, the highest count in 13 years.
A Chapter 11 filing involves court-supervised reorganization and allows a company to stay in business and restructure its finances and operations.
These bankruptcies have more than DOUBLED in just 2 years.
This comes after many companies have struggled to make their debt payments as the Fed raised interest rates to the highest level in 23 years.
Now, markets are pricing in 50 basis point rate cuts as the US economy is on the verge of a recession.
How is this a “soft landing?”
https://x.com/KobeissiLetter/status/1822711419122618368
Giant homebuilder @Lennar —ranked No. 126 on the Fortune 500—is currently promoting a mortgage rate of 1.25% in year 1 in some outskirt Phoenix communities
2.25% in year 2
3.25% in year 3
4.25% “for the balance of the term” after year 3
https://x.com/NewsLambert/status/1822319642452410628
Purchased for $85K.
Lost money every year I owned it.
Sold for $63K.
Before jumping into real estate, make sure you know your numbers. Social media often glamorizes real estate, but I feel it’s important to highlight both the wins and the losses.
https://x.com/Thefrugalgay11/status/1822582901155807339
I work for one of the largest brick manufacturing companies in north America. The youngest and most high tech manufacturing plant in Canada. We were just told that we are cutting production by 50% starting in September. High inventory.
https://x.com/Brickmonkey12/status/1822698688915157376
LL Flooring (formerly Lumber Liquidators), LLC – one of the largest flooring retailers in the United States has filed for bankruptcy
https://x.com/MacroEdgeRes/status/1822834773552717964
Copper Inventories have jumped to the highest level in more than 4 years signaling weak demand in Asia!
https://x.com/Barchart/status/1822791473613468104
LL Flooring (formerly Lumber Liquidators), LLC – one of the largest flooring retailers in the United States has filed for bankruptcy
Sounds like they will be liquidated.
Four men were fatally shot and a woman was hospitalized with gunshot wounds during a spate of weekend violence in the Denver suburb of Commerce City. A person of interest in one of the cases was later found dead of a self-inflicted gunshot, police said Sunday.
Also in the Denver area over the weekend, a person was fatally shot and three others were injured during two separate altercations Sunday in the city of Aurora.
In Denver itself one person was killed and six people injured in a string of weekend shootings and stabbings, police said.
Commerce City Police Department spokesperson Joanna Small described it as “an incredibly violent weekend” for the fast-expanding community of about 70,000 people, which is located just northeast of Denver near the city’s airport.
“We average maybe 5 or 6 homicides a year,” she said. “We’re now talking about four homicides and a person in critical condition in 39 hours … The fact that the crimes are not related is even more baffling, really.”
https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/crime/fatal-weekend-shootings-jolt-growing-denver-area-suburb/ar-AA1oCvYh
Years ago Commerce City wooed the Colorado Rapids soccer team into building their stadium there, in hopes it would gentrify the armpit of a city. It didn’t work.
and yet we all thought that Aurora was the problem child in the Denver area. Who knew?
It’s one of them, but far from the worst.
Upper middle class suburbanites must be wondering when it arrive in their neighborhoods.
A broad basket of commodity prices has been tumbling for months, fuelled by concerns about slower growth in the world’s two largest economies, though so far, the pain has been overshadowed by fears about the equity sector sell-off.
Should the commodity rout drag on, Canadians will have to pay attention, because the country’s resource-heavy stock market and economy will be at the centre of any fallout. Slumping commodity prices will also dampen the prospects for merger activity, which only recently came back to life.
After rising in the first half of the year, the price of copper has dropped 22 per cent from its 2024 high, while the price of Brent crude, the international benchmark, has dropped 15 per cent from its own peak this year. Both pullbacks are sharper than the Nasdaq Composite Index’s 13-per-cent drop.
And it isn’t just those commodities. The current sell-off spans a broad basket of resources, touching everything from wheat and corn to critical minerals such as nickel and lithium.
Some of this correction stems from a narrative change around the transition to electric vehicles. Metals such as copper and lithium are required for EV batteries, and the hype around an electric future implied the world was undersupplied with them. Lately, subdued EV demand has popped that bubble.
But even deeper than that are concerns about the Chinese and American economies. China has been struggling for years, starting with a multiyear lockdown during the COVID-19 pandemic that froze its economy, followed by a tepid rebound once it reopened.
Until recently, investors had been willing to look past China’s troubles because the U.S. economy kept humming, supported by annual deficits worth around US$2-trillion. In the span of a few weeks, that optimism has started fading, spurred by an uptick in unemployment and recent reports about a pullback in consumer spending.
https://www.theglobeandmail.com/business/article-commodity-prices-canada/
The Democratic Party, and its presidential nominee Kamala Harris, should stop touting “border security” and offer a new approach to the immigration debate, one firmly rooted in American values of justice, opportunity and truth-telling.
The contrast with Donald Trump should be easy to sell: The former president is promising to enact the “largest mass deportation” in the nation’s history and issue an executive order denying birthright citizenship to any child born of residents who are in the country without papers. These actions would have a devastating impact on millions of people, many of whom have been in the United States for decades. It would wreak havoc on our economy, which is not just dependent on immigrants with and without papers, but bolstered by them. And it would tarnish beyond repair our moral standing as a human rights leader around the world.
While the Republican Party’s embrace of exclusion is frightening, equally troubling is the Democrats’ embrace of policies that falsely equate border security with more restrictive asylum regulations, including President Biden’s executive order in June that closes the border to asylum applicants when numbers reach certain limits. The hope seems to be that a somewhat less cruel approach than mass deportation will satisfy those sympathetic to immigrants but also pull some would-be MAGAistas away from the xenophobic abyss.
Harris seemed to play into this strategy with her now infamous 2021 remarks telling Guatemalans: “Do not come … If you come to our border, you will be turned back.” Although it may have been more a statement of fact than a threat, it revealed a serious lack of understanding about the forces leading migrants to leave their homes. It also hurt her — and the administration’s — credibility with immigrant communities; a “big blemish,” as a political scientist at UC Irvine told The Times. Her latest talking points — emphasizing drug cartel prosecutions and the border crackdown bill Republicans tanked earlier this year — lean in the same anti-immigrant-tinged direction.
https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/opinion/opinion-what-kamala-harris-needs-to-remember-about-californias-anti-immigrant-past/ar-AA1oBpOy
one firmly rooted in American values of justice, opportunity and truth-telling
That’s a fancy way of saying “open borders”
border crackdown bill Republicans tanked earlier this year
LOL! Border crackdown bill my azzz.
Democratic talking point; and such media analysis works on low information American voters, particularly those who are educated (piece of paper says so) and love virtue signalling among their “elite” peers.
particularly those who are educated (piece of paper says so) and love virtue signalling among their “elite” peers.
You absolutely nailed this. Exactly what I see/interact with frequently. “Educated” people with no clue, who think they are part of the Elite because they are “educated.” They will vote blue no matter who.
It would wreak havoc on our economy, which is not just dependent on immigrants with and without papers, but bolstered by them. ”
What BS
The highway headed into Price, Utah, has more roadkill on it than moving cars. Through the windy canyons, there is an abandoned, sunken ghost town and periods of time without cellphone reception. Highway 6 may seem out-of-sight and out-of-mind to northern city slickers, but it is one of the routes drug traffickers take to distribute fentanyl and heroin to dealers across the state.
With a population of just over 8,000 residents, this rural city has seen the devastation of opioid addiction and fentanyl use firsthand. Many residents work blue-collar jobs with a higher potential for on-the-job injuries and the county’s poverty rate exceeds what is typically seen on the Wasatch Front.
The rate of opioid-related deaths in Carbon County and its two neighboring counties, Grand and Emery, overwhelmingly exceeds the state’s death rate. Utah’s overall rate is 18.3 deaths per 100,000 people, but these counties on the highway from Mexico to Salt Lake City see a death rate of 42.7 per 100,000 people, according to the most recent data on the Utah Department of Health and Human Services from 2021. The rate of opioid prescriptions? It is also higher.
“They need to get the precursor chemicals from somewhere and they don’t produce those in Mexico,” said Gillespie. “So, they have to get them from China, and to a lesser extent India.” Since those precursor chemicals have legitimate uses, it makes it difficult to monitor.
The chemicals are mislabeled when they are shipped from China to Mexico, and the cartels will acquire them at ports along the western seaboard, said Gillespie. The fentanyl drug market is decentralized because it does not take much equipment to make the drug.
“It’s all through extortion and violence. There is no retirement plan,” said Gillespie. People who make fentanyl often die due to exposure or are killed by the cartel, Gillespie explained.
With the prices so low, the availability of pills so high and 7 in 10 fentanyl pills containing a lethal dose, the influx of fentanyl has created a crisis in Utah and across the country. But what these three agents said the public does not understand is the cruelty that exists top to bottom.
Gillespie has listened to wiretaps of cartel members laughing about overdose deaths because for the cartel members, it means the demand for the product increases.
“I think that’s what people don’t realize is that the cartels, they don’t care. They don’t care about killing our kids,” said Scott. “They don’t care about more and more people developing substance use disorders.”
https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/crime/the-rural-utah-community-at-the-crossroads-of-the-fentanyl-epidemic/ar-AA1oAEM8
Gillespie has listened to wiretaps of cartel members laughing about overdose deaths because for the cartel members, it means the demand for the product increases.
Hmmm … as far as I know, dead people don’t buy drugs.
Nobody said they were smart.
I lived in Price for a year when I was nine. No drugs around then but even as a kid I found the area to be pretty uninspiring. I’m not surprised that people living there were drawn to various illegal narcotics once they became available.
George Soros turns 94 on Aug. 12. The left-wing billionaire, enemy No. 1 of the Republican Party, is losing on many fronts.
His vision was a test trial in progressivism. One laboratory was the self-styled racial justice riots of 2020. It looks, nowadays, like a failed social experiment.
The historic financial nightmare of Black Lives Matter and its pro-defund-the-police movement allies raked in checks from Soros’s Open Society Foundations network. Soros boosted domestic and foreign anti-Israel groups despite their lobbying for the dismantling of the Jewish state and ties to terrorists. Soros-backed open borders groups likely flouted federal law amid growing support for solutions to the migrant crisis the Biden-Harris administration ignored for years.
The Soros vision is one of unrelenting chaos.
Soros helped install more than 70 prosecutors with no less than $40 million in funds. But many of them are getting ousted or leaving office amid a backlash against soft-on-crime policies. Soros’s Open Society Foundations dumped money into a think tank driving the push for hard drug decriminalization. Yet Oregon Democrats rolled back a Soros-linked, pro-drug law as overdoses and homelessness spiraled out of control.
A wellness check may be in order for the minds behind this $25 billion empire.
Soros’s Open Society Foundations is a sprawling grantmaking network that disburses over $1 billion to left-wing causes as its founder bankrolls the Democratic Party. Democratic lawmakers are often later forced to distance themselves from their policy wish list items. But this comes only after pressure boils over into the public eye. Even liberal cities dealing with skyrocketing crime eventually want civil society restored.
New York Times columnist Charles Blow said the quiet part out loud in 2022: “Defund the police is dead,” conceding “not that it was ever wildly popular.” This came after Soros, as Joe Schoffstall reported that year, dropped tens of millions of dollars into the coffers of anti-police groups “used by progressive activists aiming to dismantle law enforcement, and even funding databases to track donations to police department foundations and unions.”
It’s Groundhog Day for Soros. The man who “broke the Bank of England” has developed a rather remarkable ability to affix his name endlessly to organizations and figures producing a conveyor belt of baggage for Democrats. In the telling of one longtime liberal consultant at Soros-funded criminal justice groups, Open Society Foundations staffers are more focused on identity politics than “pragmatic and research-based approaches” to their work.
These DEI-hungry soldiers, key cogs in the machine ensuring things run according to the politically correct plan, have descended “into a reflexive, slogan-driven approach without substance or strategy, the consultant, speaking on the condition of anonymity due to their relationships at Open Society Foundations and other left-of-center philanthropies, told the Washington Examiner.
“Anyone working with a broad array of left-leaning groups is continuously confronted with internal left-leaning purity tests based on progressive rhetoric with no universally agreed-upon meaning or clear systematic approach to meeting ill-defined values,” the liberal consultant said.
Purportedly woke philanthropist foes of the Right include Bill Gates, Mark Zuckerberg, Pierre Omidyar, Reid Hoffman, Hansjörg Wyss, Tom Steyer, Michael Bloomberg, and John Arnold. Pick your eccentric billionaire villain or, as author Seamus Bruner put it in his book last year, “controligarch.”
Maybe it was always supposed to be this way. After all, Open Society Foundations, like its ideological allies at the California-based Tides Foundation and Arabella Advisors dark money network, is a crucial incubator of the progressive movement. For Soros to spread the holy gospel of social justice, money must be burned and experimented with like a mad scientist to fulfill the long march through the institutions.
How that long march persists will depend on many factors. There is a new sheriff in town.
https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/opinion/the-kingmaker-of-chaos-george-soros-s-failed-experiments-threaten-his-kingdom/ar-AA1ovOrY
Important to understand is that there is not one single new or original idea in Klaus Schwab’s so-called Great Reset agenda for the world. Nor is his Fourth Industrial Revolution agenda his or his claim to having invented the notion of Stakeholder Capitalism a product of Schwab. Klaus Schwab is little more than a slick PR agent for a global technocratic agenda, a corporatist unity of corporate power with government, including the UN, an agenda whose origins go back to the beginning of the 1970s, and even earlier. The Davos Great reset is merely an updated blueprint for a global dystopian dictatorship under UN control that has been decades in development. The key actors were David Rockefeller and his protégé, Maurice Strong.
At the end of the 1960s and into the early 1970s, the international circles directly tied to David Rockefeller launched a dazzling array of elite organizations and think tanks. These included The Club of Rome; the 1001: A Nature Trust, tied to the World Wildlife Fund (WWF); the Stockholm United Nations Earth Day conference; the MIT-authored study, Limits to Growth; and David Rockefeller’s Trilateral Commission.
In 1968 David Rockefeller founded a neo-Malthusian think tank, The Club of Rome, along with Aurelio Peccei and Alexander King. Aurelio Peccei, was a senior manager of the Fiat car company, owned by the powerful Italian Agnelli family. Fiat’s Gianni Agnelli was an intimate friend of David Rockefeller and a member of the International Advisory Committee of Rockefeller’s Chase Manhattan Bank. Agnelli and David Rockefeller had been close friends since 1957. Agnelli became a founding member of David Rockefeller’s Trilateral Commission in 1973. Alexander King, head of the OECD Science Program was also a consultant to NATO. That was the beginning of what would become the neo-Malthusian “people pollute” movement.
In 1971 the Club of Rome published a deeply-flawed report, Limits to Growth, which predicted an end to civilization as we knew it because of rapid population growth, combined with fixed resources such as oil. The report concluded that without substantial changes in resource consumption, “the most probable result will be a rather sudden and uncontrollable decline in both population and industrial capacity.” It was based on bogus computer simulations by a group of MIT computer scientists. It stated the bold prediction, “If the present growth trends in world population, industrialization, pollution, food production, and resource depletion continue unchanged, the limits to growth on this planet will be reached sometime within the next one hundred years.” That was 1971. In 1973 Klaus Schwab in his third annual Davos business leader meeting invited Peccei to Davos to present Limits to Growth to assembled corporate CEOs.
In 1974, the Club of Rome declared boldly, “The Earth has cancer and the cancer is Man.”
http://www.srilankaguardian.org/2024/08/the-dark-origins-of-zero-carbon-hoax.html
The number of registered Republican voters in Florida officially surpassed Democrats by more than 1 million on Sunday, a milestone reflecting political shifts in the Sunshine State and the largest margin for the GOP since the late 1980s.
The newest figures – based on up-to-date numbers from county election supervisors – showed 5.33 million active Republican voters, compared to 4.33 million Democrats – a difference of 1,000,024 voters early Sunday. That means Republicans make up nearly 37% of Florida’s voters, compared to about 29% for Democrats.
Shifting political views across Florida, once considered a battleground swing state, where Republicans now control the governor’s office, both houses in the Legislature, both U.S. Senate offices and 18 of 30 congressional seats. This is notable among Hispanic voters, especially in South Florida, who have newly embraced conservative themes and championed the GOP’s descriptions of Democrats as socialists.
https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/1-million-more-growing-florida-gop-tops-democratic-voters-in-political-milestone/ar-AA1oBEMT
Is the US on track for getting inflation back down to 2%?
US Inflation Broadly Cools
June CPI Key Takeaways
Fed’s Preferred Inflation Gauge
Food Shortages
How Fed Measures Inflation
Rent Obsession
Economics
Finance
Dimon Says He’s Skeptical Inflation Will Return to Fed’s 2% Target
– Inflation pressures haven’t been eliminated, JPMorgan CEO says
– He expects Federal Reserve to lower borrowing costs soon
Jamie DimonPhotographer: Nathan Laine/Bloomberg
By Hannah Levitt
August 7, 2024 at 12:19 PM MDT
JPMorgan Chase & Co. Chief Executive Officer Jamie Dimon said he’s skeptical that inflation will return to the Federal Reserve’s 2% target, citing risks including deficit spending and “remilitarization of the world.”
There’s still a lot of economic uncertainty tied to factors including geopolitics and quantitative tightening, Dimon said Wednesday in a CNBC interview from Kansas City. The central bank will probably cut rates soon, he added, but “I don’t think it matters as much as other people think.”
…
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2024-08-07/dimon-says-he-s-skeptical-inflation-gets-back-to-fed-s-2-target
Could Warren Buffett’s Treasury Hoard Signal Trouble Ahead?
Monday, 12/08/2024 | 05:57 GMT-6 by Louis Parks
– Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway holds more short-term Treasurys than the Fed.
– Buffett’s hoard suggests limited investment opportunities, potential market volatility.
– Strategy highlights Buffett’s focus on safety and readiness for future opportunities.
Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway is holding more short-term Treasurys than the Federal Reserve. Is this a sign of looming market trouble?
When Warren Buffett makes a move, the financial world takes notice. The news that he’s amassed more short-term U.S. Treasury bills than the Federal Reserve—has left many wondering what message the Oracle of Omaha is sending. On the surface, this might seem like just another chapter in Buffett’s storied career of shrewd investments. However, dig a little deeper, and this massive accumulation of Treasurys might be saying more about the current state of the market than anything else.
In a world where investors are perpetually on the lookout for the next big opportunity, Buffett’s decision to park over $120 billion in short-term government debt isn’t just noteworthy—it’s downright cautionary.
…
Former House Speaker says Kamala Harris Not in Charge of her Campaign
Sean Miller | Infowars
August 12th 2024, 9:23 am
Former Speaker of the House Kevin McCarthy said during an interview on the Cats Roundtable with John Catsimatidis that Democrat Presidential frontrunner Kamala Harris is not running her own campaign.
“You’re getting the Obamas shifting from running the White House to now running this campaign,” McCarthy said.
Regarding the Obama-connection, The Gateway Pundit reported on the family’s involvement in removing Joe Biden from the 2024 ticket.
On Sunday, Biden confirmed that he was pushed out by others.
Collin Rugg
@CollinRugg
“But what happened was a number of my Democratic colleagues in the house and Senate thought that I was gonna hurt them in the races.”
9:37 AM · Aug 11, 2024
https://x.com/CollinRugg/status/1822628391360835825
While Harris does not appear to be in charge of her campaign, Biden was obviously not in charge of his when he got removed, not by the voters, but by the political forces in control of him.
It was also reported that Harris’ VP picks were being vetted by former Attorney General and long-term anti-gun-guy Eric Holder.
https://www.infowars.com/posts/former-house-speaker-says-kamala-harris-not-in-charge-of-her-campaign/
‘what happened was a number of my Democratic colleagues in the house and Senate thought that I was gonna hurt them in the races’
That’s what I said when they did the coup. It was about the down ballot.
“That’s what I said”
Yes you did.
Video: ‘I’ll Start Packing my Bags and Head to Poland, Where the Streets are Safe’ — Viral Video Takes Aim at UK Free Speech Clamp Down
by Grzegorz Adamczyk | Remix
August 12th 2024, 7:08 am
Robinson 🇬🇧
@TRobinsonNewEra
F*cking tell them son.
I hope you’ll sing at our next #UniteTheKingdom rally 🇬🇧
7:14 AM · Aug 11, 2024
https://x.com/TRobinsonNewEra/status/1822592379003482229
Ron Paul: Tyranny in the UK – Can it Happen Here?
Ron Paul | Infowars.com
August 12th 2024, 12:27 pm
As the UK descends into tyranny, where just re-Tweeting something the government doesn’t like can land a person a multi-year jail sentence, Americans are wondering, “can it happen here?” After all, we have the guarantees of the First Amendment.
But while we shake our heads at UK authorities jailing people for their social media posts this past week, we should not kid ourselves. The answer is that silencing dissent can happen here and it is happening here.
Here are just three recent examples of how the “deep state” or the permanent government is conspiring to restrict political dialogue in the United States.
https://www.infowars.com/breaking-news/
The US government learned an important – and dangerous – lesson from Covid: all you have to do to crush political dissent is to use the weight of the government to force the “private” sector to do the censoring for you. It is only a half-step away from forbidding us from expressing our thoughts on a virus to sending us to prison for expressing other thoughts the government does not like. And maybe worse.
There will be a reaction in the UK to the brutality of the Starmer regime. We can only hope for their – and our – sake that the reaction will be a newfound determination by the people that no government should have the authority to shut them up or jail them for their political views. To paraphrase Benjamin Franklin, “free speech, if you can keep it.”
This article first appeared at RonPaulInstitute.org.
It is a big step from having Fakebook deleting your posts to having jackbooted thugs arrive at your doorstep. Still, one should be concerned. What happens if the Deep State finally decides to rip up the Constitution and start hauling people they don’t like off to prison? Will patriots fight back? The Europeans, while angry, seem to be limited to protesting. We know how that worked out for the yellow vest movement.
It’s not social media, it’s socialist media.
For HBBers’ back pockets: https://www.avvo.com/residential-lawyer.html
Bank of Canada Seeks Expertise on Pandemic Money Printing
Mark Mitchell – Mortgage Broker London Ontario
4 hours ago
The Bank of Canada has named the experts to evaluate of its review of the effects of pandemic money printing.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pE8OdlIDN88
9:37.
Links:
Bank of Canada engages experts to assess internal review of exceptional policy actions during pandemic:
https://www.bankofcanada.ca/2024/08/b…
Bank of Canada Defends Bond Buying, Guidance During Pandemic:
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articl…
Exceptional policies for an exceptional time: From quantitative easing to quantitative tightening:
https://www.bankofcanada.ca/2024/06/e…
Bank of Canada assets and liabilities: Weekly (formerly B2):
https://www.bankofcanada.ca/rates/ban…
Monetary aggregates:
https://www.bankofcanada.ca/rates/ind…
Inflation rises again, to new 39-year high of 8.1%:
https://www.cbc.ca/news/business/cana…
Trevor Tombe:
https://www.trevortombe.com/
The Rise (and Fall?) of Inflation in Canada: A Detailed Analysis of Its Post-Pandemic Experience:
https://www.utpjournals.press/doi/pdf…
Trevor Tombe: Printing more and more money isn’t the Bank of Canada’s only option:
https://thehub.ca/2023/01/24/trevor-t…
Understanding quantitative easing:
https://www.bankofcanada.ca/2022/06/u…
Pablo Hernández de Cos: https://www.bde.es/investigador/en/me…
Bank of Spain governor pushes back on inflation warnings:
https://www.politico.eu/article/bank-…
The ECB’s monetary policy normalisation: a roadmap:
https://www.bis.org/review/r221117c.pdf
Spain Inflation Rate (I:SIRNMTH0):
https://ycharts.com/indicators/spain_…
Kristin J. Forbes:
https://mitmgmtfaculty.mit.edu/kjforbes/
Monetary Policy Responses to the Post-Pandemic Inflation:
https://cepr.org/system/files/publica…
Monetary policy responses to the post-pandemic inflation: Challenges and lessons for the future:
https://cepr.org/voxeu/columns/moneta…
What Caused the U.S. Pandemic-Era Inflation?:
https://www.brookings.edu/wp-content/…
Who Is Ben Bernanke? Why Is He Important?:
https://www.investopedia.com/terms/b/…
Clipped Roman Coins and Shrunken Coke Cans:
https://www.huffpost.com/entry/clippe…
Quantitative easing generates more inflation than conventional monetary policy:
https://cepr.org/voxeu/columns/quanti…
How the Fed Bond Binge Predictably Stoked Inflation:
https://www.cfr.org/blog/how-fed-bond…
Bank of Canada names experts to review of pandemic policies:
https://financialpost.com/news/bank-o…
Bank of Canada plans to keep interest rate near zero until 2023:
https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/bank-o…
BOC Governor Says Canada Will Lean On Real Estate Because “We Need The Growth”:
https://betterdwelling.com/boc-govern…
Inflation rises again, to new 39-year high of 8.1%:
https://www.cbc.ca/news/business/cana…
The links are all broken.
Inflation rises again, to new 39-year high of 8.1%:
Meaning that it’s more like 20%, which is in line with all the wailing and gnashing of teeth that can be heard across our northern border. But we must not forget, Canadians were “excited and full of hope” when Li’l Fidel became PM in 2015. Fast forward to today and they don’t know from where their next meal is coming.
The Canadian’s Tim Horton donut runs may be in danger? most Canadians eat at Tim Horton’s several times a day, they not cheap, but they are good, real good ,both the food and the service, (Something like a turbo-charged Chic Fil A….
Naw, they won’t skip that,though they may let that 3K house payment slip back….
most Canadians eat at Tim Horton’s several times a day
There would have to be one at every intersection, which there isn’t.
Once a week is probably closer, and most of it is just a coffee.
‘Things that are priced to the market are still selling quickly,’ she said. Viehman suggests that sellers adjust their expectations, as ‘pandemic pricing is done…If sellers can get that out of their mind and realize that was just this little blip in time’
Keep talking them down outta that tree Devon. Gaslighting, I like it!
‘I don’t have the money to fix my home, and so far, we’re not getting any help, none’…Like many in the neighborhood, they don’t have flood insurance. ‘We need FEMA; why are they not helping us?’
I feel yer pain Kim. But in a few days you’ll realize, you are the winnah! here.
‘Now, its hotel owners are drowning in bad debt as never before. In the city’s metropolitan area, the delinquency rate among commercial mortgage-backed security loans for the lodging sector skyrocketed to 41.6% in June from 5.7% in June 2023, according to Trepp. It is the largest increase across the country’s 25 largest metro areas’
It’s easy to destroy things that took centuries to build.
It’s easy to destroy things that took centuries to build.
Yes it is. What did it take Venezuela to go from richest country in SA to the poorest country? 18 years? (1999- 2017?)
‘Hong Kong developers show no sign of slowing down project launches in coming months even as high interest rates continue to dampen demand for new homes and hold prices down…‘Given the current market inventory exceeding 22,000 new units, developers have adopted a strategy of prioritising sales volume over pricing, to sell the properties actively in the market, in order to maintain a balance between market supply and absorption’
This is an island. There has been no shortage of housing, and there never will be, even in the most expensive residential market on the planet.
‘The supply glut is one factor keeping home prices in check. Recent launches have been priced lower than comparable flats nearly a decade ago. In May, the average price of a new class A unit, defined as a flat of less than 431 sq ft, in Yau Ma Tei was HK$20,346 (US$2,611) per square foot, a 10.6 per cent decrease from HK$22,768 in 2015’
That’s a lot of bubble years gone poof.
‘You Have No Shame’: Thomas Massie Unleashes On Panel For ‘Trying To Get Crap Made Over In China’
Forbes Breaking News
5 hours ago
Prior to the Congressional recess, during a House Judiciary Committee hearing, Rep. Thomas Massie (R-KY) questioned witnesses about public interest in deciding patent disputes.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V_Dub7P_PjI
5:36.
NYC migrants — including one charged in sex assault 4 months ago — raped woman at knifepoint, beat her boyfriend: sources
By Joe Marino, Jennie Taer and Jorge Fitz-Gibbon
Published Aug. 12, 2024
Two migrants were arrested for a knifepoint rape in Coney Island – including one who was released from jail less than two months ago after sexually assaulting a different woman at a city-funded shelter, authorities said Monday.
Daniel Davon-Bonilla, 24, of Nicaragua, allegedly grabbed a 46-year-old woman and threw her to the ground before raping her while holding a knife to her throat Sunday around 9 p.m. under the Riegelmann Boardwalk, cops and the sources said.
His alleged accomplice, identified as Mexican migrant Leovando Moreno, 37, is accused of striking the woman’s 34-year-old boyfriend with a pipe when he tried to stop the vicious assault, the sources said.
https://nypost.com/2024/08/12/us-news/nyc-migrants-allegedly-raped-woman-at-knifepoint-in-coney-island/#:~:text=Two%20migrants%20were%20arrested%20for,funded%20shelter%2C%20authorities%20said%20Monday.
Lots of earthquakes in CA these past few days a bad omen
How big? If not more than 5 on the Richter Scale, then who cares?
I was just a puppy when this brother and sister team was popular but to this day i believe she had the prettiest voice I ever herd. She developed anorexia and died at the age of 32. Sad
Carpenters – Close To You
https://youtu.be/-8PaYxWdKK0?si=tXEPTJOPfgfGxZqN
Close To You
My senior year in HS. My then GF adopted this as “our” song.
Amazing how certain songs can snap you back to different parts of our lives to the point where you can see it and feel it as if it just happened no matter how long ago it was.
Would you invest ten percent of your wealth in an asset that could get flushed down the toilet tomorrow?
They don’t call it craptocurrency for nothing…
Mark Cuban Says To Get Rich, Invest 10% Of Savings In High-Risk Investments – But If It’s Bitcoin, ‘Throw a Hail Mary’ And Pretend It’s Gone
by Jeannine Mancini, Benzinga Staff Writer
August 12, 2024 12:10 PM | 4 min read
Mark Cuban, the billionaire entrepreneur, once shared his “9 Rules To Get Rich” in a Vanity Fair video posted to YouTube in 2018.
One rule that stands out is his advice to allocate up to 10% of your savings to high-risk investments. If you’re feeling adventurous, he suggests investing in Bitcoin or Ethereum. But he offers a critical caveat: if you choose to make this move, you should mentally prepare as if you already lost the money.
…
https://www.benzinga.com/personal-finance/24/08/40318568/mark-cuban-says-to-get-rich-invest-10-of-savings-in-high-risk-investments-but-if-its-bitcoin-thr
On Wall Street bearish investors are out of favor—but there’s mounting evidence they are right about the stock market outlook
BY Shawn Tully
July 7, 2024 at 4:00 AM MDT
Bear territory: It’s not popular to suggest that the market is overvalued, but history tells us it probably is.
Getty Images
In late May, JP Morgan’s Marko Kolanovic defended his stubborn, negative stance on the U.S. stocks, asserting that the S&P 500 was substantially overvalued, and predicted that the big cap index would end the year at 4200, down 24% from its level at the time. By then, Kolanovic was the last bearish market strategist at a major Wall Street bank; all the others, even the previously dour ones, were predicting more gains by year end on the view that the fabulous resurgence that started in early 2023 would just keep rolling.
Kolanovic had also been wrong in 2022 when he foresaw great things for equities, and the markets tanked. It appears that missing by a wide margin on back-to-back forecasts, over two-and-a-half years, cost him his job. But does this mean his analysis of the market’s fundamentals was wrong? Not at all.
…
https://fortune.com/2024/07/07/stock-market-valuation-outlook-spx-historial-earnings/