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A Shack Isn’t A Veblen Good

A report from the Concord Monitor in New Hampshire. “When it comes to real estate, Rick and Jenn Kelly benefit from their entrepreneurial spirit, hard-work ethic and ability to spot diamonds in the rough – plus their capacity to seize them before anyone else. For the Kellys and others, fixer-uppers are a slumbering gold mine. And they may be the last bastion of affordability in a sizzling real estate market where properties sell fast, typically above the asking price as home prices continue to hit record highs.”

“Real estate agents in the Lakes Region say older homes in need of upgrades and cosmetic improvements are often viewed as land mines or money pits. ‘It’s all got to be in your comfort zone,’ said Kelly, who buys condos to renovate and resell, usually within six months. ‘If a structure is sound and you have a good place in a good location, putting in sweat equity, you’re going to make out good,’ he said. ‘It’s always a good investment if it’s done right. Real estate is an awesome investment if you can get into the game as young as possible. It’s a savings account that you’re living in.'”

The Daytona Beach News Journal in Florida. “‘When is the housing market going to crash?’ was one of the most searched queries on Google in May, Volusia County Property Appraiser Larry Bartlett learned when preparing his presentation to the Volusia County Association for Responsible Development.”

“‘I figured this audience might be interested in what the (Volusia County) Property Appraiser has to say about that,’ Bartlett said at the VCARD breakfast gathering of nearly 100 people. ‘The Property Appraiser doesn’t think things are going to crash, certainly not this year or anytime soon.'”

“Displaying a chart showing the median sale price of existing single-family homes sold in Volusia County each year since 2000, Bartlett noted that it has steadily risen each year over the past decade and ended last year up 106% since 2010. The county saw a similar rise during the so-called real estate ‘bubble years’ of 2004 through 2006. The sudden collapse of the real estate market back then brought on the Great Recession and thousands upon thousands of homes went into foreclosure.”

“‘If you look at this (chart) you could be forgiven for thinking that we’re heading back to a bubble,’ said Bartlett. But he added: ‘I really don’t think so. Circumstances are different now.’ Bartlett said it is clear to him when looking at median sale prices for homes and the steady increase in just property values that ‘residential real estate is the locomotive that is overcoming whatever losses we suffered through the pandemic. Residential real estate values have just shrugged off the pandemic. They are, as you know, going through the roof.'”

“Alisa Rogers, 2021 president of the Daytona Beach Area Association of Realtors, said she was encouraged by Bartlett’s outlook for the local real estate market. ‘Price growth will taper off, but they won’t pop,’ said Rogers. ‘I think things are going to become more steady and not skyrocket like they’ve been.”

“Cliff Colby, a broker associate with Reagan Realty in Ormond Beach, said Bartlett’s talk ‘was super encouraging. I’d been feeling the same way: that it’s not a bubble. What goes up must come down, but we just don’t see that happening anytime soon.’ Colby added, ‘I’m actually having my best year ever this year.'”

From KTNV in Nevada. “A report released Tuesday by Las Vegas Realtors shows local home prices continuing to reach new heights. LVR reported a total of 4,100 existing local homes, condos and townhomes sold during May. By the end of May, LVR reported 2,031 single-family homes listed for sale without any sort of offer. Although down 65.0% from the same time last year, 2021 LVR President Aldo Martinez noted the number of homes listed without offers actually increased for the third straight month. Martinez added that would-be buyers should stay patient and persistent, keeping in mind that an increasing percentage of homes with multiple offers on them end up going back on the market and ‘are then awarded to the second, third and even fourth buyer in line.'”

From King 5 in Washington. “Several pieces of legislation aimed at protecting Seattle renters were approved by the city council Monday. ‘These two bills lay the groundwork for us to create more and better opportunities to democratize wealth, to combat gentrification, and to reverse displacement in our communities,’ said Councilmember Tammy Morales. ‘This is important in a system that is inherently beneficial to one party over another. Tenants spend their lives accumulating wealth for someone else. They spend their lives constantly reminded that their home ‘isn’t actually theirs.’ These bills seek to balance that relationship and to affirm that tenants’ homes are, in fact, theirs.'”

“Small landlords voiced concern that the new policies are making it difficult to operates a small number of rentals. ‘The impact on small mom and pop landlords is huge. And the effect of this kind of legislation is it’s going to push people like us out,’ said MariLyn Yim. Her family owns and lives in a triplex in Seattle and rents the additional two units. Yim argues the policies are aimed at corporate rental companies and small landlords are being left behind.”

From Dirt on New York. “It took about six months and, in the end, she accepted a discounted sale price of $5.3 million on a nearly $5.7 million asking price, Kate Winslet has shed her duplex penthouse condo in Manhattan’s artsy and affluent West Chelsea Arts District. A few quick tabulations on the abacus suggest that with improvement expenses and real estate fees factored in Winslet didn’t make much, if any, profit on the just over 3,000-square-foot urban aerie that she and now ex-husband picked up nearly 17 years ago for $4.995 million.”

From Socket Site in California. “Purchased for $1,419,478 in April of 2016, a price which didn’t include a storage unit in the building which was purchased separately and was included in its most recent sale, the re-sale of the ‘rarely available top floor plaza unit’ #C8H at 333 Beale Street, a 985-square-foot, one-bedroom LUMINA condo with 12-foot ceilings, two full baths, a private balcony, a den and parking, has just closed escrow with a contract price of $1,375,000.”

From KVUE in Texas. “‘We’re anticipating a pretty large wave of foreclosures and evictions, and it’s not clear when it’s going to happen, but you can already feel it occurring,’ said Boone Almanza, a partner at ABDM Lawfirm who deals with real estate cases. ‘There are more foreclosure cases going on. Central Texas may be a little more immune to it than others because of the general economy, but they’re still going to be a lot of those there.'”

From Honolulu Civil Beat in Hawaii. “With the median price of a single-family home on Oahu now almost $1 million dollars, we may be approaching a very dangerous moment in our local economy. There are also many people in Hawaii who not only like the high cost of housing, but hope it will go even higher because they view homes not as places to live but as a form of investment. Many of my friends who are in Hawaii real estate are in full tulip mania now and are telling everyone to buy a house right now, no matter what it takes, ‘because the price can never go down.'”

“While things may seem like a free-for-all right now, with a shack of corrugated tin roofing, termite-infested wood and a strip of dead grass priced at $1 million dollars on Oahu, the market ultimately knows that just because that property is priced at a million doesn’t mean it holds $1 million dollars in value. That should worry all of us.”

“I hate to break it to some of you, but an Oahu shack isn’t a Veblen good, and it is only a question of time before the market reveals this in a very embarrassing and painful way for everyone. It would be better to fix this situation now, while we still can, than to let this runaway train go off the rails and destroy things for everyone.”

This Post Has 156 Comments
  1. ‘The Property Appraiser doesn’t think things are going to crash, certainly not this year or anytime soon’

    Click!

  2. ‘didn’t make much, if any, profit on the just over 3,000-square-foot urban aerie that she and now ex-husband picked up nearly 17 years ago’

    That’s some red hotcakes right there.

    1. SoUtah:
      My neighborhood is being overrun with equity locusts. Anything nice is selling for over a $Million.

      My neighbors sold their house to a guy who was driving down the street and stopped to ask them about properties for sale in the Town as we live in an under-populated area. They were on their daily walk and the house that they live in wasn’t even for sale.

      Somebody bought a spec home under construction, a couple of streets over, and decided that they didn’t like the layout. They put it back on the market, still under construction, and sold it for $100,000.00 more than they were going to pay themselves.

      Unfortunately, the older home owners are cashing in and the newer arrivals aren’t all that sensitive to the local aesthetics, as they now exist, and many just aren’t very “neighborly”.

      I’ve got a friend looking for property in St George and some of the local builders there are setting a base sales price with a period of time (2-3 weeks) that they allow for bids to be placed. They appear to be doing this in an attempt to generate bidding wars between buyers which, according to my buddy, is what is now happening.

      I’m also guessing that the County will be adjusting my neighborhood’s mil rates (up) sometime this year just like they did during the last housing bubble and there are a couple of mothballed developments, near me, that were dropped last bubble crash that may now look viable considering the current sales pricing that is occurring here.

      The Central Banks bast*rds will not allow anyone to escape the madness. My wife & I moved out into the middle of nowhere 18 years ago and the housing bubble insanity is now parked at our front door yet again.

      If the housing bubble is in my little berg then it’s obviously everywhere at this point and I doubt that it is possible to escape to another unaffected location this time around.

      I’ve given up on predictions about crashes but when this thing rolls over I’m going to have some pissed off (and very underwater) zero-equity neighbors.

    2. Realtor math also ignores inflation. I believe she lost money in real dollar terms if seventeen years of inflation is included in the math.

  3. Hawaii has termites! Loved visiting but the locals don’t like tourists which is ironic since they would be eating rats or each other without them.

    1. Reminds me of the local “Native American Indians” (is that the PC term?). They love the revenue from whitey, but hate whitey. Seems some soul searching is in order.

      1. I lived in Hawaii (Oahu) for a few years and the description of that million dollar house with the tin roof is like what some of my friends who are “locals” live in – with their parents, and grandparents and other various family members. It is an apt description of construction of many of those homes.

        Also there are neighborhoods where people are so poor they’ve never been to the other side of the island and you see chickens wander down the street.

        And yeah – Oahu is just a big military base.

  4. ‘Yim argues the policies are aimed at corporate rental companies and small landlords are being left behind’

    There it is again: negotiating with communists.

    1. “‘This is important in a system that is inherently beneficial to one party over another.”

      And how does one get into the party which gets all those inherent benefits? To hear the SJWs tell it, all you need is the right color parents. No studying necessary, no work necessary, no job necessary, no avoidance of crime or drugs necessary, no frugal living necessary. Nope, it all just rains down on you automatically.

      Of course, according to the same SJWs, those with the wrong parents have NO chance at all. They could study hard, work hard, have a job, avoid crime and drugs, and live frugally, they STILL wouldn’t have anything, because all they worked for would disappear, somehow.

      1. So what is the next step in the rigging?

        Will homeowners get notices stating that their house is being confiscated, with the intent of moving a “more deserving family” in and you have 30 days to get your @ss out?

        Maybe an intermediate step will be that foreclosed shacks will not be sold but used as government provided housing?

        1. “Will homeowners get notices stating that their house is being confiscated, with the intent of moving a “more deserving family” in and you have 30 days to get your @ss out?”

          I’ll remind the bolsheviks my relative fought with Pasha Antipov ! STRELINAKOV ! and they better leave me the master bedroom.

        2. Will homeowners get notices stating that their house is being confiscated, with the intent of moving a “more deserving family” in and you have 30 days to get your @ss out?

          I have thought about this. Our resident HBB sailor has said that I have no business living in a house. I would be more suited to a one-bed condo, as best befits my lowly station as a single woman.

          So the idea is not so farfetched to me. In my barrio neighborhood, it won’t be long before the Sons of Astlan are elected to office. At that time I fully expect them to knock on my door and confiscate my three bedrooms because a family of new guests are about to pop out a few meal tickets.

          I can only hope at that point that the Eminent Domain clause is still intact.

          1. Our resident HBB sailor has said that I have no business living in a house.

            Oxy, are you talking about me?

          2. I can only hope at that point that the Eminent Domain clause is still intact.

            “Confiscation” typically means you get bupkis.

          3. That said, word will get out that our mental health complex might decide your child is changing gender. That might scare off some “Nuevos Americanos”

          4. Yeah, that would be you, Blue.

            And yup, Colo, given what I’ve seen of Latin-(x?) family culture, they like their reproductive systems fully operational and would not appreciate any “repairs.”

          5. that would be you

            I don’t actually have an opinion on what you deserve, but I hope you get what you need.

  5. ‘It’s always a good investment if it’s done right. Real estate is an awesome investment if you can get into the game as young as possible. It’s a savings account that you’re living in’

    I read several red hotcakes articles every day but I only post a few. So you got flippers. (They lament the poor renters, yadda). It’s always a good investment? Or only if you get in young cuz it always goes up and it’s too late? I’ve never been to NH. Probably never will. But those shacks in the photos look like sh$t holes.

    1. Heard the same shit in 2005-2007 period. Real estate never really goes down etc. Like it was an accepted thing. And then it happened

      1. It’s fun to recall what happened in 21 months in California:

        May 2007 $597,530
        Feb 2009 $245,230

        1. It will be interesting to watch the FED and .gov this time around. They are doing everything in their power to levitate real estate beyond what workers can afford.

          1. Give everyone a loan and just don’t foreclose? At this point I don’t know what to think anymore.

          2. I think it’s pretty clear what the plan is. Negative interest rates so banks can cannibalize the accounts of depositors and use it to subsidize failing mortgage portfolios and continue the levitation of the assets backing mortgages. This will require moving to a digital currency so there is no way to escape the system. Every deposit and every transaction will provide income to the banks. The banks will literally be reaching into your account every day to extract wealth for redistribution to real estate speculators and dead beat squatters.

          3. If I remember correctly, the bail out legislation from 2006-2007 gave the Fed and Treasury perpetual authority to shore up the banks without consulting Congress. I don’t think there are even any reporting requirements when they do it. So I doubt we will see a foreclosure induced RE collapse. They will just print whatever money the banks need behind closed doors and not word will be said about it in any newspaper or on any news broadcast.

        2. There’s bound to be another 50% off sale some day soon…unless the Fed plans to permanently backstop housing, in which case it may take a while for the next crash to happen, and it will be a lot bigger — more gunshot wound than mere bloodletting.

  6. ‘a total of 4,100 existing local homes, condos and townhomes sold during May. By the end of May, LVR reported 2,031 single-family homes listed for sale without any sort of offer’

    This is interesting cuz it blows the red hotcakes “narrative” out of the water. Adding all the non real estate airboxes, et, together and they sold 4100, but 2000 shacks got no nibbles in a month.

    That just can’t be! We’re told every shack is sold within seconds – no less – that it enters the mind of a loanowner to sell!

    ‘an increasing percentage of homes with multiple offers on them end up going back on the market and ‘are then awarded to the second, third and even fourth buyer in line’

    So Aldo, let me get this straight. The first winnah! bails out, and the second does too, then the third winnah! also gets cold feet?

  7. ‘The Property Appraiser doesn’t think things are going to crash, certainly not this year or anytime soon.’”

    Another film-flam man self-identifies.

  8. “Tenants spend their lives accumulating wealth for someone else.”

    So do those who sign up for my Dotted Line Specials.

    Who is smarter, a tenant who knows he does not own the home in which he lives or the mortgage holder who thinks he does?

    “They spend their lives constantly reminded that their home ‘isn’t actually theirs.’ These bills seek to balance that relationship and to affirm that tenants’ homes are, in fact, theirs.’”

    Bahahahahahaha … go ahead and pass your bill. After the dust settles, bill or not, we shall see just who it is that owns what.

  9. New York Times — Farewell, Millennial Lifestyle Subsidy (6/8/2021):

    “These companies’ investors didn’t set out to bankroll our decadence. They were just trying to get traction for their start-ups, all of which needed to attract customers quickly to establish a dominant market position, elbow out competitors and justify their soaring valuations. So they flooded these companies with cash, which often got passed on to users in the form of artificially low prices and generous incentives.

    Now, users are noticing that for the first time — whether because of disappearing subsidies or merely an end-of-pandemic demand surge — their luxury habits actually carry luxury price tags.

    Some of these companies have been tightening their belts for years. But the pandemic seems to have emptied what was left of the bargain bin. The average Uber and Lyft ride costs 40 percent more than it did a year ago, according to Rakuten Intelligence, and food delivery apps like DoorDash and Grubhub have been steadily increasing their fees over the past year. The average daily rate of an Airbnb rental increased 35 percent in the first quarter of 2021, compared with the same quarter the year before, according to the company’s financial filings.

    Part of what’s happening is that as demand for these services soars, companies that once had to compete for customers are now dealing with an overabundance of them. Uber and Lyft have been struggling with a driver shortage, and Airbnb rates reflect surging demand for summer getaways and a shortage of available listings.”

    https://archive.is/owUfM

    Taxis and hotels are not “tech” companies, LOLZ

    1. “The average Uber and Lyft ride costs 40 percent more than it did a year ago, according to Rakuten Intelligence, and food delivery apps like DoorDash and Grubhub have been steadily increasing their fees over the past year.”

      A family sized Papa Murphy’s pizza with full extra toppings is nearly $30 in my corner of flyover country, and you still have to bake it!

          1. Perfected over years…. and perfected only recently.

            Here we go…. ​14″ round or 10×15″ rectangle, Make your sauce first.

            Start with aglio olio….. 6-8 large cloves garlic, 1/2″ cup of EVOO, teaspoon salt, teaspoon of fine grind pepper. Make sure the oil is hot enough to get the garlic to “fry” but not so hot that it turns brown quickly. Keep the slices on the thicker side.. say >1/8″ thick. My paisans know how to do this well. Drop the garlic, salt, pepper in the oil and let her rip. Don’t burn it now. If the garlic is brown, start over. Garlic has a sweet spot when cooking in oil. It goes from pungent to sweet to burned. Ya want the sweet. Don’t deviate.

            Sauce- Cheapest can of whole tomatos out there. Don’t use San Marzanos or other costly substitutes. SM tomatos are too sweet out of the can and makes a ketchup like sauce. The cheap usually have more water and you need that water in the mixture to develop the sauce. Once the aglio olio is done, drop the tomatos in. Chop the tomatos in the pan while simmering. If the canned tomatos are too thick, your marinara won’t come out right so add water at the beginning… say 1/2″ cup. Let the sauce simmer for a good 30 minutes until the pink scum disappears from the surface. If you did the aglio olio right, the marinara will be sweet but tart. Make sure you crush any big hunks of tomato. Add teaspoon dry basil at the end.

            Sweet italian sausage- Strangely enough, this is tough to find unless you’re in the old italian hoods where there are still pork stores. Name brand stuff is garbage(it doesnt’ cook up well) but if you can find a local brand sausage, it usually has big hunks of fat in it which cooks up nicely, you’re golden. Even if its not italian, you can add the fennel while browning in the pan. A sprinkle of pepper flakes if you prefer fra diavalo. Even if it’s linked, take it out of the case. Same stuff. You need say 4 links. Make sure you add the fennel while browning if it’s not italian. Fat is a must have here.

            Romano- Locatelli is the best brand and it’s everywhere. If not, find a pecorino romano and grind about 1/4″ cup. Set aside.

            Dough- Two options… Go to a good shop and buy 16oz of their dough or some decent supermarkets have bagged dough ready to go. If the shop makes a crappy pizza, obviously you don’t want to use their dough. Good shops exist in some strange places. Phoenix, Tampa and obviously around NY/NJ/CT. I get it at a local supermarket out of convenience. Dough and the resulting crust is the biggest variable. Let the dough rise at room temp until it doubles in size at a minimum. Keep it covered. Sometimes the dough doesn’t rise. Throw it out and get another. As it rises, roll it under itself a couple times and let it rise again. Lots of flour here. I’ve let dough rise for hours. It makes a better crust. Once it’s risen, it’s ready to be shaped. This is the sausage factory part. Flatten it as though you’re playing the piano (hear that Liberace?🤣) with stiff straight fingers then walk away. The gluten makes it want to go back to its original position. Leave it alone for 10 minutes, min and then go back and do the same thing as you’re shaping it in the case of a rectangular pant. You may have to walk away and resume forming the shape 3 times but do it. 10 mins minimum each time. Flour the pan and get it in the pan. If it’s spring back from the edges, walk away for 10 and come back.

            Measure out 8oz marina for a 10×15″ pan and lay it on keeping the sauce all the way to the edges and thinner in the center half. That’s important. People stack everything in the center and it comes out horrible. Watch guys making pizza in a good shop to get a better idea.

            Sprinkle half the romano over the sauced dough, again staying mostly at the outer half.

            Lay on 6oz of shredded muzz. Any brand works but weigh 6 oz or your pie will suck.

            Lay on the sausage, staying at the outer half. Paint the crust edges with EVOO.

            In a preheated oven at 550 between 6-8 minutes.

            Once you perfect this, you’ll never buy another pie from a shop again. It took me dozens of tries but each time it got better and now I consistently make great pizza at home. Now this is different than a Bronx lunch. It more of a rustica style pizza but you’ll never taste a better pie than this.

          2. Dough recipe:

            2 1/4 teaspoons (1 package) dry active yeast
            1 teaspoon honey
            1 cup water, 105 to 115 F
            3 cups bread flour (Bob’s Red Mill or King Arthur’s), plus extra for shaping the dough
            1 teaspoon kosher salt
            1 tablespoon extra-virgin olive oil, plus more for seasoning

            Dissolve honey in warm water. Stir in yeast.

            Mix flour, salt and olive oil in bowl, food processor or stand mixer with dough hook. Slowly add yeast/honey mixture. Dough should be completely hydrated but not sticky.

            Allow dough to rise in lightly oiled bowl covered with damp towel until doubled. Split and shape dough into 2 balls. Allow dough balls to rise again covered with damp towel until ready for use.

          3. If you want dough/crust with more texture, replace 1/2 cup of bread flour with semolina flour.

          4. I’ll give that dough a try just once. I have too much time in getting a real pizza dough mixture to waste anymore.

          5. I usually make our dough between 12-1PM and divide between 4-5PM for use at 7PM.

          6. How do you maintain a consistent product by using volumetric measurements? Don’t you weigh?

          7. a real pizza dough mixture

            Not everyone has Italian shops nearby and as you said dough/crust is the biggest variable.

          8. maintain a consistent product

            I’ve made it weekly for more almost a decade and optimized yeast and flour brands. In order of preference: SAF Instant (red) Yeast; Red Star Active Dry Yeast; Fleischmann’s Active Dry Yeast.

            Don’t you weigh?

            I do for anything using sourdough starter and prefer it. I’m quite familiar with the metric system and scales from my lab days. Unfortunately, most US recipes use are stupid system and volumes.

        1. Pizza is cheap from scratch.

          We make it every week. My husband puts Parmesan around the edge. My son won’t eat anything else.

      1. A family sized Papa Murphy’s pizza with full extra toppings is nearly $30

        I haven’t bought one from them for while. I don’t recall paying more than $16 (there’s always a coupon) for a family size with the works.

        1. The “stock” version is mostly bread and cheese. Load on the extra toppings, and it gets pricey. And don’t forget the $3 tip!

      2. I’m seeing price compression here.

        Had dinner Tuesday night at a classic (used to be inexpensive) Mexican restaurant in LA. Combo plate of mostly carbs and two house margaritas were $50 pp (w tax and 20% tip)

        Had dinner Saturday at an “upscale” Mexican place in LA – similar – combo plate full of carbs and 2 house margs were $72 pp (w tax and 20% tip)

        I’m seeing this at many other places where I eat – or used to.

        I know it’s a combination of input prices and labor shortage but at some point the rest of us that work for a living are going to throw up our hands and give up as our money goes less further. I have been a generous tipper throughout this entire ordeal of lockdowns but my patience is wearing super thin.

        1. Find a good taco shop and buy a bottle of ready to drink Jose Cuervo Golden Margarita.

        2. “Combo plate of mostly carbs and two house margaritas were $50 pp (w tax and 20% tip)”

          A chicken enchilada plate with re-fried beans, rice and a scoop of coleslaw salad To Go is $15 pp (w tax and 20% tip). Add beverages, and feeding a family of four cost nearly $80 for take-out! WTF?

          1. Indeed.

            Now that masks are optional and inside seating has re-opened I’ve been watching their parking lot whenever I’m in the area. Fingers crossed!

  10. It would be better to fix this situation now, while we still can, than to let this runaway train go off the rails and destroy things for everyone.”

    The only way to “fix this situation” is to end the Fed.

  11. Article for all the open borders globalist sh*tbags.

    Washington Examiner — Cartels smuggling migrants on Texas highways are growing threat, sheriffs say (6/9/2021):

    “The eastern Texas city of Houston is the initial destination for most immigrants who make it across the U.S.-Mexico border in the Rio Grande Valley and Laredo regions. Sheriffs Justin Marr of Victoria County and A.J. Louderback of Jackson County are accustomed to having their deputies pull over vehicles on the highway that are packed full of people being smuggled to Houston, but the transporters are becoming more vicious.

    “This is an extremely organized criminal platform, and they’re more violent now,” Marr said in an interview. “They’re a lot more aggressive in what they’re doing. They don’t have any regard for life, liberty, or property at all. They don’t care about the people they’re carrying, citizens out on the road, or the deputies trying to apprehend them.”

    “They don’t care if people are flying out of the bed of their truck or if they get run over — push a family off into the road and put them in a ditch. They don’t care. Their goal is to get the job done, get paid, turn around, and go do it again. It’s just all about the money,” Marr added. “That’s where they’re being more aggressive.”

    Recently, Victoria County Sheriff’s Department deputies have pulled over vehicles and approached the driver’s window only for the driver to take off or force the people hidden inside to bail out quickly so the driver can get away, according to Marr. While deputies have always seen their fair share of pursuits, Marr’s team is seeing more smugglers try to get away. Both sheriffs are increasingly seeing crashes in which smuggling vehicles have fled and crashed into trees, sped through miles of fenced-in ranches, or lost control on the highway.

    In Jackson County, the vehicles used to transport people are being stolen faster and more efficiently, Louderback said. Thieves use electronic devices to steal cars and trucks that allow them to do so without physically breaking in. Smuggling organizations will pay, for example, approximately $50,000 for a stolen 2020 Ford F-350, then take out the seats inside except for the driver’s seat and pack it full with people or drugs.

    In one recent incident in Victoria County, a driver led law enforcement through three privately owned ranches before officers found the truck, abandoned. The deputy discovered “blood all over the truck,” an indication that at least one person who had been inside was injured and needed medical attention. The vehicle had taken down small trees in its attempt to outrun authorities and plowed through several ditches at high speeds. Those on board would not have been wearing seat belts, and oftentimes, a dozen to 30 people can be crammed inside a pickup truck or SUV. No one was recovered on the scene.”

    https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/news/houston-area-sheriffs-cartels-smuggling-texas-highways-threat

    If it erodes American national sovereignty and control of its own borders, globalists support it.

    1. The globalists could do nothing without the active complicity of their Republicrat duopoly enablers and stooges.

    2. control of its own borders

      My half-brother is a state trooper in Corpus Christi. He was sent to help CBP on the border recently for a week. He rounded up immigrants, turned them over to CBP, who then released them into the interior. So much for serving his country as a Marine and now a LEO.

  12. This is a pearl clutching article.

    Washington Post — Don’t call it an ‘insurrection’: GOP moves to excise a word it once used for Jan. 6 (6/8/2021):

    “McConnell has weighed in on this. On Jan. 6, he labeled what happened that day a “failed insurrection.” On Feb. 13, he delivered one of the biggest rhetorical rebukes to Trump’s Jan. 6-related actions of any member of Congress (while voting against Trump’s impeachment conviction on procedural grounds).

    But even in those latter remarks, he didn’t use the i-word. And given the report released Tuesday and its conspicuous avoidance of that word, it seems fair to ask whether he and others still regards the Capitol riot as such. He instead punted — signaling, not for the first time, that he would rather not continue to litigate these things, despite his dire past comments about the severity of what transpired that day.

    His comments and the new Jan. 6 report’s avoidance of that word are the culmination of a long process building toward this moment.”

    https://archive.is/iN8yB

    Real Journalists have anointed themselves the Language Police.

    The 2020 election was stolen, there are over 80 million of us, and we don’t believe your lies. And more importantly, you don’t get to make any money from us. Your dead tree business model is over, and using the Archive website denies you revenue.

    1. “using the Archive website denies you revenue”

      Not buying from Amazon would likely make a bigger dent.

      1. I have purchased one item from Amazon in the past 3 years, completely out of necessity. I dropped them like a bad habit long ago, including “Prime.”

  13. American corporations and the globalist oligarchs who own them have decreed that the only acceptable white male employees are those who are self-loathing and who will meekly accept being systematically marginalized and discriminated against when it comes to hiring and promotions.

    Lockheed Martin defends employees attending training to address White culture

    https://www.foxbusiness.com/lifestyle/lockheed-martin-white-culture

    Aerospace and defense company Lockheed Martin acknowledged that thousands of its employees have gone through training courses to bring awareness to White male culture, including a three-day “White Men’s Caucus” in 2020 attended by 13 employees.

    The company sent responses to Arkansas Republican Sen. Tom Cotton, who heard about the training sessions for white employees and requested additional information.

  14. New York Times — After a Year of Protests, Portland Is Ready to Move On. But Where? (6/9/2021):

    “The demonstrations that swept the country after George Floyd’s death lived on for much of the year in Portland, a city now engaged in finger-pointing and a debate over what comes next.”

    https://archive.is/6e4vA

    What comes next? A property tax and sales tax revenue death spiral, that’s what comes next.

    Real Journalists are liars.

    We remember the looting, the carjacking, the arson that you report on as “fiery, but mostly peaceful” protests.

    We know that any tax revenue dollars given to a Democrat Party sh*thole city will only be used to prosecute taxpayers who try to escape or defend themselves from the feral mobs of vibrants.

    And we react accordingly, by withholding business income and tax revenue from your sh*tholes.

    Will the last taxpayer leaving Portland please turn out the lights.

    1. After a Year of Protests, Portland Is Ready to Move On. But Where?

      Where else? Forward, Soviet!

  15. Why I Stopped Hiring Ivy League Graduates – WSJ
    “Even those who aren’t woke seem damaged by the experience, and they’re deprived of role models.”
    https://archive.is/izXkb

    A decent summation of our “safe place, thin skinned, wokeness.”

    1. “The biggest liability that comes with hiring graduates from places like Haverford and Harvard is that they have been socialized to panic over pseudocrises. Talk of systemic racism and fixation on pronouns inculcate in young people an apocalyptic urgency, a mentality that often disrupts the workplace and encourages navel-gazing about “diversity,” “inclusion” and other ill-defined notions that are far removed from the main work of my organization”

      Millennials are garbage.

      1. “…encourages navel-gazing…”

        Timothy Leary was fond of “contemplating his navel” while under the influence of psychedelic drugs.

  16. “from the Concord Monitor in New Hampshire. “When it comes to real estate, Rick and Jenn Kelly benefit from their entrepreneurial spirit,”

    Falling housing prices awakens my entrepreneurial spirit too.

    Andover, NH Housing Prices Crater 19% YOY As Housing Everywhere Drops Like A Rock

    https://www.movoto.com/andover-nh/market-trends/

  17. CNBC — Mortgage rates drop, but not enough for priced-out homebuyers (6/9/2021):

    “Insert scripted Realtorbabble here.”

    https://www.cnbc.com/2021/06/09/mortgage-rates-drop-but-not-enough-for-priced-out-homebuyers.html

    You’re not a buyer, you’re a borrower. And any cash out refi is by definition, sub-prime.

    “Buyers are exhausted. They have nothing left to give” — some more Realtorbabble posted on a recent HBB thread.

    None of these article mention, not even once, the ratio of median household incomes to used shack sale prices. 6:1, 8:1, 10:1, they never never report this.

    1. The would be buyers understand that at current prices they cannot afford to buy. It’s that simple.

    2. Mortgage rates drop

      Yet CPI is the highest in over 30 years. Welcome to Clown World, brought to you by Jerome Hyperinflationcuck Powell.

      1. If there is going to be price inflation, with some wage inflation and mortgage rates remain low, I could see people buying a shack they can’t afford.

  18. Bahahahaha … bankers rule, others drool …

    UK pushes for financial services to be exempt from G7 global tax plan

    (snip snip snip)

    “British finance minister Rishi Sunak is pushing for financial services firms to be exempt from a new global tax system which was agreed last week by the Group of Seven (G7) economies, sources familiar with the negotiations said.”

    “G7 finance ministers on Saturday announced that they had agreed on a system to make multinationals pay more tax in countries where they operate, alongside a minimum global corporate tax rate of at least 15%.”

    “A spokesperson for UK Finance, an industry group, said the taxation system should seek to ensure the UK remained an attractive place to do business and enabled the banking and finance sector to support the economic recovery.”

    Bahahahahaha … IOW banks are necessary to “support the economic recovery” thus they should receive a hefty tax break. Non-banking pukes, many of those who do actual work, should be the ones who pay the taxes.

    It’s time for me to sing a song:

    🎼 I like it, 🎵

    🎼 I love it, 🎵

    🎼 I want some more of it. 🎶

    https://www.reuters.com/article/g7-britain-sunak/update-3-uk-pushes-for-financial-services-to-be-exempt-from-g7-global-tax-plan-idUSL2N2NR0G0

  19. This is a globalist narrative.

    City-Journal — When the State Comes for Your Kids (6/8/2021):

    https://www.city-journal.org/transgender-identifying-adolescents-threats-to-parental-rights

    Note that the author Abigail Shirer had her book banned from Target, and Joe Rogan got screeched at by the blue hair snowflakes at Spotify for having her as a guest.

    The destruction of the nuclear family and the blurring of gender identity is rooted in Marxism.

    This is who globalists are, and this is what they do. They want to take away your children and mutilate them, and silence or defame you for resisting.

    1. I can only imagine how we are perceived in other countries. I know that Clown World is spreading, but this kind of policy has to make us a pariah.

  20. Why a Judge Has Georgia Vote Fraud on His Mind: ‘Pristine’ Biden Ballots That Looked Xeroxed (6/8/2021):

    “When Fulton County, Ga., poll manager Suzi Voyles sorted through a large stack of mail-in ballots last November, she noticed an alarmingly odd pattern of uniformity in the markings for Joseph R. Biden. One after another, the absentee votes contained perfectly filled-in ovals for Biden — except that each of the darkened bubbles featured an identical white void inside them in the shape of a tiny crescent, indicating they’d been marked with toner ink instead of a pen or pencil.

    Adding to suspicions, she noticed that all of the ballots were printed on different stock paper than the others she handled as part of a statewide hand recount of the razor-thin Nov. 3 presidential election. And none was folded or creased, as she typically observed in mail-in ballots that had been removed from envelopes.

    In short, the Biden votes looked like they’d been duplicated by a copying machine.

    “All of them were strangely pristine,” said Voyles, who said she’d never seen anything like it in her 20 years monitoring elections in Fulton County, which includes much of Atlanta.

    https://www.realclearinvestigations.com/articles/2021/06/08/why_a_judge_has_georgia_vote_fraud_on_his_mind_pristine_biden_ballots_that_look_xeroxed_779795.html

    The 2020 election was stolen.

    1. No doubt about it. LOL Biden getting 81 million votes. Like 50 people watching him on youtube. What garbage

      1. Yeah viruses randomly pick up segments with AIDS in them. Fauci should be in jail

    2. A dementia-addled career grifter and a greedy career caulk gobbler received 81 million votes, according to the media. If you believe that, well, “Here’s your sign.”

  21. In addition to refamiliarizing oneself with seigniorage and inflation-as-a-stealth-tax, it’s worth a moment to reconsider the “Minksy Moment”:

    1) http://www.investopedia.com/terms/m/minskymoment.asp
    ” A Minsky Moment is based on the idea that periods of bullish speculation, if they last long enough, will eventually lead to crisis, and the longer the speculation occurs, the more severe the crisis will be. Hyman Minsky’s main claim to economic theory fame was centered around the concept of the inherent instability of markets, especially bull markets. He felt that extended bull markets always end in epic collapses.

    Minsky postulated that an abnormally long bullish economic growth cycle will spur an asymmetric rise in market speculation that will, eventually, result in market instability and collapse. A Minsky Moment crisis follows a prolonged period of bullish speculation, which is also associated with high amounts of debt taken on by both retail and institutional investors. ”

    2) http://www.google.com/search?q=minsky+moment

    3) http://www.economist.com/schools-brief/2016/07/30/minskys-moment
    “In a speech in 2009, before she became head of the Federal Reserve, Janet Yellen said Minsky’s work had “become required reading”. In a 2013 speech, made while he was governor of the Bank of England, Mervyn King agreed with Minsky’s view that stability in credit markets leads to exuberance and eventually to instability. Mark Carney, Lord King’s successor, has referred to Minsky moments on at least two occasions.”

    1. We should have had a Minsky Moment long ago. I have never seen such rampant speculation for so long. And everything keeps getting a bid, no matter how many times it tries to fall.

      1. “The market can stay irrational longer than you can stay solvent.” – John Maynard Keynes

        The housing market is different because you have this giant whale buyer firehosing money to be lent into it (the Fed) while also lower the cost of that debt (interest rates).

        I said a long time ago, “they’ll keep doing this (QE, market juicing, bailouts) till they are forced to stop.” They are the FIRE-gov complex, the tool and frontman of which is the Fed.

        An infinite money printer is a big bazooka. And the only thing that can make it stop is being about to break the currency, because that’s not in the interest of FIRE-gov.

        With the housing market, it’s like the buyer will “pay any price, bear any burden” to paraphrase JFK. Until… he’s tapped out. Until debt service at these low levels becomes too much to bear for these income levels. Even if RE only ever goes up… still gotta eat, buy clothes for the kids.

        1. Until debt service at these low levels becomes too much to bear for these income levels.

          And interestingly, they want broad-based inflation to lower the value of the currency to reduce the value of the debt.

          One problem is, however, that flooding the zone with liquidity means those best able to capture that liquidity will be the ones to do so. Imagine raining down money on a group of people, some of whom are NFL linemen, some are skinny average types, and some are decrepit. The linemen will get the most money as they fight for the dollars. Those linemen are the equivalent of the already wealthy.

          I think flooding the zone with liquidity and then having it hoovered up by the already wealth may lead to stagflationary outcomes, the top 10 percent getting outsize gains while the rest simply face higher costs.

          OTOH, perhaps it’s a feature, not a bug. Like housing “affordability initiatives” which involve pumping yet more money into the market and assiduously pretending that doesn’t drive up costs yet more.

          1. Like housing “affordability initiatives” which involve pumping yet more money into the market and assiduously pretending that doesn’t drive up costs yet more.

            I saw an article moaning about something has to be done to create more affordable housing, while never mentioning why housing is unaffordable to begin with.

            So well paid committees are formed and they “study” the problem for an eternity, then team up with a charity to build a handful of shacks to rent out.

            Lather, rinse, repeat.

        2. Until debt service at these low levels becomes too much to bear for these income levels.

          I feel like it’s a bug headed for a windshield.

          On the other hand, I’ve felt that way for 10+ years. Been wrong for that long too, and having seen the lengths the FIRE-gov complex will go, since the bailout of the GSEs, I feel like anything’s possible. Low interest rates are the common factor which have boosted housing around the world, I think.

          You have the infinite printing press on one hand, and buyer demand on the other. Everyone needs a place to live, rent, house, other. They also gotta eat and raise their kids and have a smidgen of fun.

          Only thing gonna stop the bazooka is currency breakage and/or populism – voting out pols in large numbers. Interesting times.

        3. I said a long time ago, “they’ll keep doing this (QE, market juicing, bailouts) till they are forced to stop.”

          They won’t stop until inflation becomes unbearable. And maybe not even then.

    2. “A Minsky Moment crisis follows a prolonged period of bullish speculation, which is also associated with high amounts of debt taken on by both retail and institutional investors.”

      So long as interest rates remain at or below zero, where is the problem?

      1. True confession: I have never yet witnessed a debt-fueled economic boom that didn’t inadvertently plant the seeds of the next financial crisis.

      2. “A Minsky Moment…”

        In the movie, Margin Call, the big boss John Tuld ambles over to the window muttering something about the proverbial economic music…but he can’t hear a thing!

  22. The 559,000 jobs the U.S. added in May continue to puzzle economists, who predicted 675,000 additions for the month and 1 million additions a month earlier as the economy recovers. They’ve put forth explanations from lack of child care to persistent COVID-related safety concerns. Now, another culprit can be added to the list: Some potential workers are instead staying home trading Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies.
    “They’re pulling back on the hours they’re looking to work based on what’s happening in the crypto market,” Irina Novoselsky, CEO of job site CareerBuilder, told Yahoo Finance Live. “They’re making side money and no longer looking to fill full-time hours.”
    Most cryptocurrencies are well off their highs this year. Bitcoin (BTC-USD), the best-known, hit a record of nearly $64,000 in mid-April before trading in recent days closer to $35,000. That said, it’s still up more than 20% this year. And participation in the asset class is growing, with a recent report finding 21.2 million Americans — 14% of the adult population — own cryptocurrencies.
    Of course, crypto trading — or stock trading, for that matter — isn’t the only factor keeping workers at home. Novoselsky also cited the fact that many schools are still not back to full-time, in-person status, as well as the idea that some people are hanging on to their current jobs while they make plans to move cities, for example.
    Then there are the Americans who have decided they’re never going back to work.
    “There’s a whole generation that has left the workforce early. Pre-COVID, we had a five-generation workforce, and we’re seeing one of the generations close to retirement saying, ‘I’m just not going to participate,'” Novoselsky said.
    Demand for employees has sent job postings on CareerBuilder to an all-time

    1. The 559,000 jobs the U.S. added in May continue to puzzle economists, who predicted 675,000 additions for the month and 1 million additions a month earlier as the economy recovers.

      Some real fockin’ geniuses. Take away the extra UE bennies from .gov and force these lazy aszes to start proving they’re looking for work and you’ll see every Tom, Dick and Harriet out desperately trying to find work.

        1. I hadn’t looked up e-tulips today and your post prompted me to. I was wondering if maybe BitCON had dropped into the $20k range overnight. Nope. Instead, another moonshot of almost 20% in a day. Meanwhile, my savings account is paying .3%.

    2. Now, another culprit can be added to the list: Some potential workers are instead staying home trading Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies.

      I’m sure that tens of millions are speculating with Bitcoin.

  23. There’s now apparently a new rental-car-by-owner site called “Turo” where people are now loading up on new and used cars to rent out just like Airbnb. I wish this whole charade would just melt down already. The tooth is so long it’s scraping the ground.

    1. Perhaps a website we can start called Farley.com where we rent out vans down by the river.

    2. That sounds suspiciously like the Great Reset concept of allowing people to rent out you car — for example while you’re at work, someone can borrow your car from the parking garage. All arranged and paid for by app.

        1. It’s for that reason that both cars I bought were bought new. I know the tired old saw of “you lose $X depreciation the moment you drive it off the lot.” But any used car I looked up was clearly driven hard and put away wet, e.g. 45,000 miles in two years. And who knows what else they were doing.

          I figure that whatever $$ in depreciation I would save by buying used, I would just lose when the car needs repairs prematurely. New cars for me, and Dave Ramsey can suck it.

  24. Declared innocent on the grounds of skin color.

    Man who told police he fatally shot ex-Hardeeville fire chief in 2017 found not guilty

    BY LANA FERGUSON
    MAY 27, 2021

    Throughout Tuesday and Wednesday, 19 witnesses were called, including neighbors who saw or heard the shooting, law enforcement officers involved in the investigation and arrest, and experts who reviewed evidence such as a 9 mm handgun, spent bullets, the autopsy report, footprints at the scene and Dunham’s confession to police.

    THE CLOSING ARGUMENTS
    During closing arguments on Thursday, 14th Circuit Solicitor Duffie Stone wove together a story of a frustrated Dunham searching for a ride when he came across Stevens.

    “… He sees a target,” Stone said. “A 77-year-old man alone with a running truck. What great fortune for Devon Dunham, a vulnerable elderly man by himself.”

    Stone alleged Dunham walked up to Stevens, told him to give him the truck, then unloaded all eight rounds in his 9 mm handgun when Stevens tried to drive away.

    “He shot Mr. Stevens because he was losing his ride,” Stone claimed, adding here’s no argument of the facts because “most of what I told you Devon Dunham told you” in his admission to police.

    Dunham’s defense attorney, Beaufort-based Jeffery Stephens, said Dunham wanted a ride but felt threatened by Stevens, and that’s when he began firing shots.

    He also said Dunham “is not the best communicator,” which may have affected how he explained what happened to Hardeeville officers after his arrest. By the time Dunham admitted to shooting Stevens, he had been handcuffed to a wall in the interview room for six hours and was “sleep deprived,” his attorney said.

    The defense began arguing that race, Dunham being a Black man and Stevens being white, could have played a part in the incident, but Stone objected and the judge agreed to not allow the theory.

    https://www.islandpacket.com/news/local/crime/article251701818.html

    1. I wasn’t expecting this level of anarcho-tyranny in South Carolina. I guess any place with a large population of vibrants is doomed.

  25. Dallas, TX Housing Prices Crater 10% As Lot Prices Plummet

    https://www.movoto.com/tx/75209/market-trends/

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

  26. Thats right. If you disagree with me you disagree with science. See I win. This is the modern day left in this country.

    Dr. Anthony Fauci on Wednesday lashed out at critics calling for his ouster, blasting their “preposterous” and “painfully ridiculous” attacks and defending his record as a leading official battling the coronavirus pandemic.

    “Attacks on me, quite frankly, are attacks on science,” Fauci said in an interview with MSNBC’s Chuck Todd.

    1. @Squatter
      If you disagree with me you disagree with science.

      Fauci has obviously reached the level that he needs someone next to him whispering “what a piece of cr@p you are” to bring him back to earth. I’d do it for free. Having him go to jail would be better.

      Mere mortals with an obligation to serve
      The New Times (Rwanda) ∙ August 29, 2018
      https://www.newtimes.co.rw/opinions/mere-mortals-obligation-serve

    2. Then what about all of the scientists that disagree with you, little Fraud-Chi? The evidence is overwhelming but Fraud-Chi is going on and on like Baghdad Bob. No wait, Bob was more believable than the Chinese and Fraud-Chi.

      What a about Joe Isuzu?

    3. You do indeed have a talent.

      What you now need is an agent, somebody like myself who will suck out ten percent of everything you earn. (Ten percent of gross earnings, of course.)

  27. Veblen good

    A Veblen good is a type of luxury good for which the demand for a good increases as the price increases, in apparent contradiction of the law of demand, resulting in an upward-sloping demand curve. The higher prices of Veblen goods may make them desirable as a status symbol in the practices of conspicuous consumption and conspicuous leisure. A product may be a Veblen good because it is a positional good, something few others can own.

    https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Veblen_good

  28. “It took about six months and, in the end, she accepted a discounted sale price of $5.3 million on a nearly $5.7 million asking price, Kate Winslet has shed her duplex penthouse condo in Manhattan’s artsy and affluent West Chelsea Arts District. A few quick tabulations on the abacus show…

    that she and now ex-husband picked up nearly 17 years ago for $4.995 million.”

    My abacus includes an inflation adjustment:

    April 2021 CPI 266.832
    April 2004 CPI 187.400

    Purchase price inflation adjusted to 2021 dollars:

    $4.995 million ×
    266.832 / 187.400 = $7.112 million

    Loss in real dollar terms is
    $5.3 million – $7.112 million = $1.812 million, before adding HODLing costs to the loss.

  29. Should cryptocurrencies be more regulated, or would it be best for governments to stay out of the way of financial innovation?

    It’s an interesting debate!

    1. The Financial Times
      US financial regulation
      US financial regulator warns against strict cryptocurrency rules
      Commissioner says SEC should ‘gamify our communications with investors’
      Hester Peirce is one of two Republicans among five commissioners at the US Securities and Exchange Commission
      Kiran Stacey in Washington
      June 8 2021

      A senior US financial regulator has spoken out against attempts by her colleagues to regulate cryptocurrencies more strictly, warning that doing so runs the risk of discouraging investors.

      Hester Peirce, one of two Republicans among the five commissioners at the Securities and Exchange Commission, told the Financial Times she was worried about the push by several US regulators to play a more active role in the $1.5tn cryptocurrency market.

      Her comments expose a split at the top of the SEC just as Gary Gensler, its chair, spearheads an effort to bring the fast-growing cryptocurrency market more in line with other types of financial assets.

      “I am concerned that the initial reaction of a regulator is always to say ‘I want to grab hold of this and make it like the markets I already regulate’,” Peirce said in an interview. “I am not sure that’s going to be great for innovation.”

      Peirce previously researched financial regulation at the Mercatus Center, a free-market think-tank, and had worked as a lawyer on the SEC staff. She joined the SEC in 2018 after being appointed by former president Donald Trump.

      Trump cast doubt on bitcoin in an interview on Monday. “My opinion is . . . the currency of this world should be the dollar,” he told Fox Business Network. “And I don’t think we should have all of the bitcoins of the world out there. I think they should regulate them very, very high.”

      US regulators have become increasingly concerned about cryptocurrencies after wild swings in some of the world’s most commonly traded digital assets. This year bitcoin has soared from just under $30,000 to over $60,000, before crashing back to about $33,000, prompting senior government officials to call for greater investor protections.

    2. Is burning cow dung to mine craptocurrency a good example of the kind of financial innovation we should strive to achieve?

      1. How cow poo is powering crypto mining
        By Chris Vallance
        BBC News
        Published
        1 day ago
        Cryptohunter
        Crypto-mining farmer Philip Hughes (centre) and Josh Riddett, with one of their bovine colleagues

        At Philip Hughes farm, near the Berwyn mountain range, not far from the Snowdonia National Park, in Denbighshire, cattle chew the lush valley pastures and flocks of sheep clothe the hills.

        In a green shipping container next to a large domed tank, a very different kind of farm also thrives in this idyllic landscape – a cryptocurrency farm.

        Philip Hughes’s family have farmed the land for generations – but now he is turning his hand to mining, using powerful computers powered by renewable energy to generate new cryptocurrency.

        And that energy is derived, as Philip puts it, from “cow muck”.

    3. The Financial Times
      Cryptocurrencies
      State Street sets up digital unit to capitalise on crypto craze
      US custody bank declares ‘tipping point’ for market as clients increase exposure
      The creation of State Street’s new division for digital finance follows similar moves in recent months by competitors including Bank of New York Mellon, Northern Trust and Standard Chartered
      Gary Silverman in New York yesterday

      State Street, a US custody bank that oversees more than $40tn in assets, is setting up a new digital division, reflecting the pressure on financial services companies to help clients trade cryptocurrencies even as regulators work out rules for the sector.

      The move came only weeks after the Boston-based bank was appointed by Iconic Funds to serve as the administrator of a bitcoin-backed exchange-traded note listed on the Frankfurt Stock Exchange.

      Nadine Chakar, who will head State Street Digital, told the Financial Times that the bank was seeking to keep up with customers who had increased their crypto exposure by 300 per cent in the past two to three months.

    4. The Financial Times
      FT Trading Room Cryptocurrencies
      Global banking regulator urges toughest capital rules for crypto
      Basel committee report comes as authorities step up plans to regulate the fast-emerging sector
      A bitcoin mural
      Institutions should have to hold the highest level of capital against crypto assets such as bitcoin, the Basel Committee on Banking Supervision said in a report
      Philip Stafford in London
      35 minutes ago

      Global regulators are calling for cryptocurrencies to carry the toughest bank capital rules of any asset, arguing that requirements for holding bitcoin and similar tokens should be far higher than those for conventional stocks and bonds.

      Banks with exposure to volatile cryptocurrencies should face stricter capital requirements to reflect the higher risks, said the Basel Committee on Banking Supervision, the world’s most powerful banking standards-setter.

      Its intervention came in a report released on Thursday as policymakers around the world step up plans to regulate the fast-emerging market.

      1. Seems like the regulatory boom is about to drop on the cryptocurrency HODLers.

        Got popcorn?

  30. Is the plan to use higher than anticipated inflation to magically shrink the mountains of debt?

    1. Market Insider
      Hot inflation may have become scorching in May and is expected to hit a 28-year high
      Published Wed, Jun 9 2021
      6:17 PM EDT
      Updated Moments Ago
      Patti Domm
      Key Points
      — Economists expect core consumer inflation, excluding food and energy, jumped 3.5%, the highest level since 1993.
      — The consumer price index is reported at 8:30 a.m. ET Thursday, and is expected to show headline inflation rose a sizzling 4.7%, the fastest pace since 2008.
      — Investors are watching the data to see if it looks like inflation could be hotter and more persistent than the Fed expects it to be.

  31. The problem is that billions have been brainwashed into choosing safety over freedom. In the end they get neither.

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