Since people who read this website are very “financially aware.”
I shouldn’t need to remind you that this is Index option expiration or that tomorrow the equities (underlying stock options) expire. Volatility looms, though in the early preopen today, it was very little different from the Wednesday close:
Even if you’re not an optometrist (or sniper instructor) you should see something is terribly amiss on the far right of this chart. Parses into a question like “WTF is driving things higher?” You might also toss in “There’s still corruption, pedos, crooks, wars breaking out, and scammers in the media” if you insist.
We don’t have all the answers, but here’s a useful ideas to ponder:
- Aggregate Index level previous Options close: 36,044.20
- Aggregate Index Wednesday close: 38,642.14
- Approximate gain between option expirations: 7.2% in a single freaking month!
- Annualized rate of increase at present trajectory: 230%
I have to be straight with you: this is absolute poppycock.
Except, it’s not, really. Because money has to go somewhere. Let’s compare some of the choices are, shall we?
- We could invest in Silver and Gold. But you can’t eat those and they don’t heat the house (at least directly).
- Oil then? With this clown posse in D.C.? Sanctions-crazed buffoons who are lighting up war in the Middle East? Hardly a reliable place in the short-to-intermediate, you think?
- Housing? For (name the new buyers?) all the low-income, government-dependent illegals this incompetent administration has welcomed with open checkbooks (paid for by you)?
- Hot new growth industry of physical goods? Naw, that’s chips and code. Now you’re talking Taiwan (which China is getting, maybe Xi’s told Buyed’em already). Along with South Korea and places like Mayanmar which could be seized by China to keep “order in the Chinese Century.
- Make up imaginary numbers and call them real?
- Invest in Europe? I mean in addition to a developing 1,500-mile war front and the infighting to hornswoggle the next batch of Tax Chattel into the EuroCon? Naw, we’d pass on that, too.
- Put money is Asia? Not without inside pals in the PLA, sorry.
- How about pharmaceuticals? Mean like those f(ck-you-up vaccines that made that industry rich? How are you going to beat that, short of dropping another bioweapon?
- Buy a small Farm? Sure, people got to eat, but corporations and the billionaire’s boys club beat you to it.
The rot (and coming clot) was already clear when, back in 2020, Tom Burgis wrote a book about Kleptopia: How Dirty Money is Conquering the World. Echoed just this week in the release of Seamus Bruner’s new book “Controligarchs: Exposing the Billionaire Class, their Secret Deals, and the Globalist Plot to Dominate Your Life.” Like Bill Gates’ appetite for power and farmland.
If you still believe things are going to get better from here, let me read you in on what happened overnight.
First Cisco guided lower and now Burberry ‘unlikely’ to meet financial goals as luxury goods slowdown hits sales.
Pressure on Pepsi? New York AG James Sues PepsiCo Over Plastic Pollution Along Buffalo River.
And make your own damn coffee: Largest Starbucks strike in history is planned for Thursday. It shows US labor unrest isn’t over yet.
Any surprise I just got this from Challenger, Gray, and Christmas?
CEO EXITS CONTINUE RECORD CLIP
Fewer CEOs Leave Their Posts in October; 1,530 CEOs, Highest YTD On Record
CHICAGO, November 16, 2023 – The number of CEO changes at U.S. companies fell in October as 105 CEOs left their posts in the month. It is down 34% from the 164 CEO changes announced in September, and up 48% from the 71 CEOs who left their posts in the same month last year, according to a report released Thursday by global outplacement and business and executive coaching firm Challenger, Gray & Christmas, Inc.
So far this year, 1,530 CEOs have left their posts, up 47% from the 1,040 CEO changes during the same period in 2022. It is the highest total in the first ten months of the year since the firm began tracking in 2002.
“Take the money and run” in play?
Finance Droppings
Industrial Production and Cap utilization are due from the Fed momentarily.
Import Prices improved:
U.S. import prices declined 0.8 percent in October, after increasing 0.4 percent in September, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reported today. Lower fuel and nonfuel prices contributed to the decrease. Prices for U.S. exports fell 1.1 percent in October following a 0.5-percent rise the previous month.
Imports
The price index for U.S. imports fell 0.8 percent in October, the first monthly drop since June 2023. The
October decrease was the largest 1-month decline since the index fell 0.8 percent in March 2023. Prices for U.S. imports decreased 2.0 percent for the year ended October 2023.”
Philly Fed Manufacturing is out and it remains weak:
The diffusion index for current general activity increased 3 points but remained negative at -5.9 this month (see Chart). This is the index’s 16th negative reading in the past 18 months. Almost 18 percent of the firms reported decreases in general activity this month (down from 35 percent last month), while 12 percent reported increases (down from 26 percent); 70 percent reported no change (up from 38 percent last month). The index for new orders declined 3 points to 1.3, while the current shipments index more than offset its increase last month, dropping sharply from 10.8 to -17.9.
Preliminary good news: Long Beach container cargo was up in October, and we’ll see how L.A. looks, but a reasonable to good Christmas could be in the offing – we’ll just have to wait and see.
Experience of Unemployment? Which was up a tick in today’s report? 1.3 percent from 1.2 percent last week, State impacts:
Xi and the Houseplant
China is taking over the world. Sending pandas back is a distraction for stupid people. The Chinese ditched (overt) communism only long enough to make some money and develop an economy so as to have an economic leg to stand on for conquest. While at the same time developing the Belt and Road scheme to lock up resources and supply chains. Then set up an alternative economic model called BRICS.
We respectfully refer to the houseplant from the Oval because his gaffes make any international relationships iffy at best. In fact, our favorite dual-passport h0lder (says the web) expresses concern at times, too: Watch Blinken Wince As Biden Calls Xi a Dictator After APEC China Meeting (businessinsider.com).
They are building coal plants, planting more nukes than corn some places, holding us by the supply chain goanies, and we’re sending in this cheap knock-off of our A-game? Can someone please, for God’s sake, tell me how to write the happy ending to this. Because even with a dozen books, a novel, and 20-million words under my belt, I can’t see a plot line to write our way out of this mess!
Especially seeing the neocon handywork paying off in a study of this: This Is the Newest American Military Base Overseas.
World War 3 Travelog, Redux
U.S. three-letter agency controlled media lies aside, the reality at the north end of the 1,500-mile front of WW3 continues to paint a grim future for eastern Europe: Russian advance towards Chasiv Yar unstoppable: VDV swept Ukrainian positions in Bogdanovka- Defeat with lowered hands for the Ukrainians..
Meantime, we’re thinking when this is all over (if not in a flash) that the UKR prez may not want to embark on a future career as a corporate strategist: Massacre of Ukrainian reserves in Avdivka on suicide missions – Ukrainian MP: “It became a second meat grinder – Tragic mistakes Zelensky”.
Next stop on our tour is Turkey, where prez Tayyip Erdogan is polling everyone about jumping in the rack with Iran: Iran Keen to Increase Bilateral Trade with Turkey: Official.
Meanwhile, Turkey’s parliament is meeting about now on whether Turkey should let the Swedes into NATO – which Erdogan (slick poker player he is) holds as leverage to get a better deal from the (arrogant pricks) of the Ure-a-peein-Union. Soon as all the Best Offers are in, he will pick who Turkey goes home with, but our money’s on Russia/Iran because Muslims see Biden-Blinken and You-hoo as the reason Gaza’s now flat.
Syria? You bet, all out for a tour here as More U.S. Precision Strikes in Syria (voa.gov). Not that it makes much difference, since dead is still dead, precision strikes or not.
By the way, see how the Biden cartel is keeping the money flow on to Iran during all the footwork? Biden keeps billions flowing to Iran. Trying to understand how making turning down domestic energy production to bolster mullahs makes sense, but guess I’m not stupid enough to be a staffer.
Lebanon’s our next stop: Republican Warns Hezbollah Could Have ‘Huge’ Drug-Dealing Market in US (newsweek.com)
Now down to Israel/Gaza where urban renewal is underway: Israel search of Gaza’s Shifa Hospital yet to reveal Hamas base | AP News.
Finally, our tour ends in Egypt. Where we see the payoffs to Egypt to look the other way and not engage in war with Israel are spreading. You remember, Israel turned their natural gas flows to Egypt on previously, which gives Egypt some money coming in (which would disappear if they were to take a swipe at Israel). So, this morning we see another kah-ching for Cairo in EU Speeds Up Plan to Bolster Egypt Amid Israel-Gaza Crisis – Bloomberg. Meantime, more of your tax dollars at work as US secretly boosting weapons supplies to Israel. Whee!
Then there’s the lost children of the ‘Merican Left trying to come to terms with how to support Hamas and giving massive support to Israel. Well, we just knew that was going to blow up: Anti-Israel Violent Protest Erupts Outside Democratic Party Headquarters in Washington, DC – Algemeiner.com
From clicks and bricks to mortars and money, statecraft is now simply state terrorism with its makeup on.
And all of us, everywhere, owns it for allowing fools crooks to hold power.
Not Offended Yet?
Keep reading…
It’s all fake: More than $1bn worth of fake handbags, shoes and luxury merchandise seized in US bust. Old reporters notice things, though. Like when the feds don’t say where it came from, gets us to wondering if (you know, Xi in town, right?) they were on a string… Or, if reporters covering this were too dumb to ask origin questions. It does matter, of course.
Free spending republicans, anyone? US Senate passes stopgag order to prevent government shutdown. When blows, at least for a while, any chance of using real leverage. In fairness, though, turning down air traffic during the holiday next week could be ugly, so yeah, I get it. On the other hand, that might have forced the representatives to hang around DC where there is always real work that needs to be done.
Around the Ranch: Electric Fencing?
Here’s a real survivalist idea for defending your place in the Outback someday when the hordes of city people are going zombie-like into rural areas to steal. Which I will specifically NOT articulate lest our legal department sets her hair on fire. See if you can figure it out, though, from reading Taiwan hunter killed by power line day after installation.
Electric fence, huh? Billions of years ago, my parents took us kids (1950’s, right?) down to the banks of the Puyallup River to visit family friend Walter Clark and his family. The men-folk decided to walk down to the river and wouldn’t you know? Along the way I had to take a pee. “Over there” said Pappy, pointing at the woods off to the side of the field. (They grew raspberries. Land was cheap, pre-Boeing). Anyway, I did my business, peeing on a fencepost. Which I hadn’t noticed, had an electric fence line. I aimed at the insulator.
Didn’t kill me, but women in my life have probably wondered “Why are you checking me for wires?”
Speaking crudely: Wednesday saw Ure’s truly get one of the more miserable of home maintenance tasks done: Tightening up the toilet bolts in the guest bathroom.
Not a big deal? Well, yes, one of them broke. So that led to the (no fun at all) one-man job of pulling the toilet, replacing the wax ring, putting in new stainless hardware (which should outlast both of us).
The Revelation from this (miserable effing) job? I figured out (about halfway through it) why I had been postponing the job for several weeks.
Because while I was doing the work, I couldn’t get out of my head the listing in excruciating detail who had taken a poo in that toilet I was “all over” in this project.
Mind you, the toilet was spotlessly clean. We Windex the hell out of everything around here. But the mental playback and imagery damn near drove me to distraction. Leading, in reality, to a double ration of red wine (after re-Windexing the room) and cleaning up – tossing the third pair of nitrile gloves from the project, and so forth.
Just thinking back on it, has me looking forward to a vodka water tonight at cocktail time.
OK, off to commit linguicide for an upcoming Peoplenomics report. Have a great day and just think: Only four more working days until Monday!
Write when you get rich,
George@Ure.net
Wordslinger: “WTF is driving things higher?”
It’s _supposed_ to feel this way, to engender FOMO.
Esplained in 3 words: bear.market.rally (IMO, NFA) …
Dislocations abound. Stand by, Egor
TEF – T-5
Once again your tea leaves are failing you George.
It seems the big boys in the finance game have once again proved to you bleeding bears that they can drive the market wherever they want and when they want it.
Sure all the cyclic rhythms say we should be crashing. But instead, since the public and the press treat the equities markets as the gold standard in chicken entrails, its levitation keeps the illusion of normalcy going for another day.
What don’t you get? This is the US. If people feel they can’t keep themselves fed in the inflationary hell of this moment, it must be because they are failures and morally deficient. The press and the markets keep saying things are wonderful and getting better so their miserable lives get worse.
I admire your attempt to keep waiting for reality to assert itself, and it might were things to get even worse. But for right now the manipulators have shown you how much power they weild. I expect quiet in the markets for a while after this crushing of the bears.
“…they can drive the market wherever they want and when they want it.”
I agree with you.
Vlad’s hypersonic missile appears ready for mating to their ICBM force, presenting a nuke deterrence problem for the West.
But I believe ‘Merica has been quietly preparing for such tech developments to prevent another Pearl Harbor-like surprise attack. One potential way to do so is via the U.S. Space Force’s X-37B mini-shuttle.
https://defensescoop.com/2022/11/15/what-we-know-about-the-pentagons-mysterious-x-37b-spaceplane-and-its-record-setting-mission/
Salient quote from the above article: “The X-37B maintains a flexible launch capability in order to accommodate experimental and mission objectives,” the spokesperson noted.
The platform could potentially serve as a space weapon in the future if that’s what the Pentagon wanted it to do, experts say. Defense officials increasingly view space as a warfighting domain where the United States will have to compete with advanced adversaries such as China.
The last X-37B mission landed a year ago. It’s due for another mission. The last time up she stayed in orbit 2.5 years. The bird’s definitely got wings.
“to prevent another Pearl Harbor-like surprise attack. One potential way to do so is via the U.S. Space Force’s X-37B mini-shuttle.”
then we got….. Bidened ….. what I see is he has dismantled almost everything.I often wonder if he even knows what the truth is or is he more like my mother when she had dementia.. my brother and I were having supper with her.. and she was talking about someone.. my brother leaned over to me and asked.. who’s mom talking about.. I whispered.. YOU. LOL LOL… I believe we are the weakest in history.. being plaid in a chess game with them using the poison pawn trap moves. all for what seems is a few coins some drugs and support over their lifestyle.. a man that has no job history except being a politician at the feed troughs of DC… the best I see that we can expect is the worst depression in modern history.. we are royally screwed..
I wonder if I can still change my name in time to run for president..( None Ofthe Above )… and big daddy yum yum would be a better fit than the lazy crap that they are lining up for us to vote for LOL LOL LOL LOL
https://youtube.com/shorts/Mg_albQOyvA?si=SAbJm2Hu4bC-n0M8
https://youtu.be/NAtunJv6NtE?si=Zo6Cgb6jZ9Z4U4fn
https://youtu.be/wMOkw07mQPM?si=f89riZLNIGETOspe
Meanwhile at the Rantisi hospital, even the days of the week were being listed as Terrorists …
https://themessenger.com/news/israel-hamas-guard-calendar-gaza-translation-error
All the while, I’m over here with earbuds …
https://youtu.be/efLcgUQmyT8?si=p_KGbop4EEETt-dg
Just a note to everyone. Stu has just released the 2024 Compendium over on his site with an added bonus. Lots of reading on the agenda for sure!
USN HT Sr Chief Ure- Hull Tech aka Turd Chaser.
Make great Plumbers once they get out from under uncle schlomo’s thumb.
? Can anyone figure out Who Winken is ?
We got blinken (houseplants’ israhellie handler)
We got Nod – the house plant.
Who is Winken?
Seen GBTC for 2023 ? one of best trades of the year! Discount around 10 % STILL! 10 % G – thats better than NEGATIVE…jus saying.
Buybuybuybuy BTC – betting on SEC decision regards spot ETF – BCN’s official position – SEC bullshits their way to more delay.
* Dont forget old BCN proverb – a rhyme in Time saves Nine
“Belt and Road scheme”
North & South America will never be able to compete with the BRI. BRI is the Nord Stream of goods. NOSO will run out of money trying to project influence.
NOSO must focus on an intercontinental transportation system meandering from Utqia?vik (formerly Barrow), Alaska to Argentina’s Ushuaia. The cards we get are the cards we play.
“Electric Fencing”
When I see the hordes of Pallies hiking it with their bug out bags I think those folks could be Americans hiking it to somewhere after an EMP attack.
Lights out and we hear helicopters flying over with booming loud speakers indicating,
“There has been a national emergency. Walk/bike to the closest Interstate then continue South.”
Transport from Panama(anywhere in south¢ral america) to US border is FREE nowadaze.
Air conditioned luxury buses at houseplant administrations expense = Youse tax donkeys.
Advise youse all know or learn Spanish language prior to availing Ureselves of the free transportation services down there.. Free is Free – plus they give you all kinds of goodies for Ure arduous luxury bus trip to us border.
Comunanda will be be along shortly with their version of Free transportation of illegals across great brown north.
Progressives – you cant live em, but sure as shit can shoot em!
LOL. Can’t see a good ending to this? Give Xi a grand tour of China Town before he leaves and see how that goes. At least he’ll fully understand the insults without an interpreter. He’ll, no doubt, need a “taste tester” for any handouts, however.
Ugh, toilets. Thanks for the reminder the boss wants the 2 in the house replaced before Turkey day. Replacing them is not only a gross but disgusting job. Problem is along with replacement removal and installing new tile floors is involved so not happening on her time schedule.
Guess I wont be checking her for wires for a while.
Stay safe. 73.
Now THAT was funny!
they make great planters to for flowers… positioned right they make any yard gorgeous
then as seating.. yes.. two of them my god your in luck… you can make a beautiful lawn bench..measure the inside of the bowl.. this is for the timber used to anchor the seat.. then put a two by four on it and screw that down that is seventeen inches long and make sure it is positioned on it so that the end of one side of that two by four will just touch the tank.. set that in the bowl.. of each.. then in the center of the tank take a mason bit and drill two holes be careful not to put to much pressure on the bit to break the tank.. now from the inside of the tank screw two pieces of two by four onto the tank.. again don’t put to much pressure on it.. now set the two toilets approximately five feet apart.. and screw on the two by fours to just fit over the edge of the bottom and the top.. sand stain and enjoy your new garden bench.. phew that would look so great in the yard.. if you want to get really creative.. you can hook the water flapper.. the lever so that when you push down on it.. it will turn on or off a radio or light.. speakers can be positioned in the tanks.. keeping them dry.. there is so much you can do with that valuable resource.. LOL LOL
Of course I am just kidding.. LOL LOL LOL
all kidding aside.. I knew a guy that built CASKETS..
so he would bring home all kinds of caskets.. to use as planters.. LOL LOL in his dining room he had two big caskets.. and and drawer chest between..He took the handles the top off made the chest in between so it could be anchored via the handle holes.. put the handles and everything inside the liner.. then bagged the liners and handles up and put them on a shelf in his garage..put a slip over frame on the lip of the now china hutch and shelves inside and glass doors on it.. it was beautiful lights in it to display the china his wife had.. and he said.. double duty when he died he already has his casket LOL he was the only one I ever knew that had walnut flower boxes LOL LOL LOL.
“WTF is driving things higher?”
What IS ‘ALEXY’S opinion, if any?
Somewhere a very large player has failed that’s what has/is occurring and it’s obvious by the size of the response that they are scared shitless ………
I know I’ve had too much coffee when I have to read the article you referenced – “More than $1bn worth of fake handbags, shoes and luxury merchandise seized in US bust.” at least 3 times to make sense out of it. The first read through I had to ask “Dang, just how big WAS that bust and who was it a likeness of?” Reminded me of the fake Mesopotamian half man, half lion statues in one of my favorite movies “True Lies”. Guess it’s time to go outside and play.
Also, instead of red wine after bathroom job like that I’d recommend Everclear both as a hand cleaner and mouthwash.
half million .. phew.. Wow… that is a lot of bags LOL LOL I bought MP3 Players for the kids.. the same unit sold in a nearby town for a hundred a piece.. I bought them for a penny a piece… consider the dishwasher.. if the dishwasher is sold to a marketer for five dollars a piece in bulk. and the shipping.. It has to be way under a hundred dollars with shipping for them to make any money whatsoever because the cost of shipping in the USA goes according to our wage guidelines…. like a Cpap.. a cpap you can get for a couple hundred dollars in china or russia with shipping.. the cost of that same unit is close to a thoudand here.. or more.. and they put everything in it.. its why our televisions are cheap and the vast majority of our industry comes from someplace else everybody makes coin along the road this thing traveled.. otherwise they wouldn’t be in business.. I remember reading a story about an automotive industry in Mexico.. the employees wanted forty dollars a week making parts for the automobile industry.. the news report said the auto industry was not going to be held up for that kind of money if they insisted on robbing them of profit then.. they would open a plant and get them made up someplace else.. so they opened a few plants in Brazil and China.. and we the taxpayers paid for their construction during the recession with the bailout money and then closed more plants here in the USA.. I knew a gentleman that made the pattern for a popular pair of pants that sold in the mid eighties for almost a hundred dollars a pair.. he took the company to court because they were outsourcing production from the plant he made it for them to be made in the USA.. and they were getting them made at a nickel a pair.. shipping and delivered..He won the court and the company quit selling the popular pair of jeans.. so fake designer bags.. wow a few million of them I am sure a whole warehouse full.. LOL LOL
I buy two liter soda bottle blanks for my little bug catchers..
https://www.amazon.com/Steve-Spanglers-Baby-Bottles-Tubes/dp/B071KZ8XH3/ref=sr_1_3?
here they are a dollar a piece.. for an injection mold … simple easy to do.. they heat up the blank to something like two hundred fifty degrees then blow air into it.. let it cool pop the top on it and it is done.. But those same blanks if you want to buy them is something like fifty thousand of them for a hundred dollars with free shipping.. less if you buy more than that.. similar to aluminum cans.. for pops etc.. I like the plastic soda bottles for bottled water.. it is clear..
https://hammont.com/products/clear-pet-bottle-with-aluminum-cap-12-oz-200-case-0-39-ea?customer_posted=true#cc-popup
https://www.alibaba.com/product-detail/-202-500ML-Plastic-Easy-Open_1600865732353.html?
that one they are a penny a piece… trust me.. the cost of them are even less than that.. but you have to have a warehouse full of them..
they make reusable retort bags.. I inquired and minimum order was .. fifty thousand bags.. LOL LOL LOL LOL LOL guess I will continue with the toss aways LOL LOL
you can get brown plastic beverage cans to.. but the clear.. put a slice of lemon in it and seal it up.. you have infused your water with the fruit.. and like the rest depending on what you buy the price is super cheap.. you just need a huge warehouse to put it all in.. Which is why I believe we are sunk.. our industry has gone there.. even the industry that assembles here in the USA.. they get all of it from there..
Hot Off The Press!
“I have wrapped up Nostradamus and the Third Age of Mars 2024. This book is the latest and my last book on prophecy and World War III.”
https://theageofdesolation.com/nostradamus/2023/11/16/the-eve-of-the-eschaton/
Did anybody out there find a print place that will take the Pdf book and actually make it into a bookshelf book for a short run of 1 to 10 copies?
I would gladly pay a LOT MORE money for a hard copy if Stu can offer that via a printing service (and give Stu a nice add on to the ridiculously low price he charges … based upon short run college text books kids I know have recently bought $120 to $140/copy would imo be more than reasonable). I would like to actually have this book on the bookshelf, or in my backpack as I am scrambling out of the city for parts unknown if it comes to that and I am willing to pay for that
boy do I agree with you on that.. I would love to have hard copies of stu’s hard work.. I have to run buy his new book.. it has to be a doosie..
Me three….
Bill Holter says this movie will show how
it might all end.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q9d30RBJkf0
George,
A distribution day is a term related to distribution stock in the sense that heavy institutional selling of shares is taking place. A distribution day, technically speaking, occurs when major market indexes fall 0.2% or more on volume that is higher than the previous trading day.
What drives assets higher? Saturated trading population nadir selling. What drives asset valuation lower? Saturated trading population peak buying. Keep your old day-trading parameters. The 13 March 2023 52/121 of 130 day had as its final sequence: a 4-phase 26 Sept 7/18/14/10 day final fractal sequence vice a 26 Sept 7/18/18 day final 3-phase fractal decay series. The 4-phase fractal series ends on 29 November 2023.
Why did the 14 day Subfractal (3) peak rise so high? The nadir on 27 October 2023 was extremely oversold from the 8 November 2021 high’s secondary high on 31 July 2023.
Look for a distribution day today on the way to a 29 November 2023 nonlinear low.
as expected, yet another “fractal” update … not holding my breath for this one either … these seem to never happen as predicted, and they change every week …… good luck
Elliott waves are the composite sum of all economic knee jerks, and they have ruled the markets in the current bear market rally, just not necessarily in the direction of Ure sentiment. Bear market rallies are among the most intense of all economic phenomena, and with the bulls charging through the streets in broad daylight, the probability of a wave 3 rout begins to increase exponentially. Knee jerks and Elliott waves are in season. Ure sentiment may or may not be. Sentiment of paying customers counts; bystanders not so much.
Inflation stats have stalled, and MH is extending their sale on #10 cans. Deflation is in the air, even as the early Claus rally has erupted. Mixed signals tend to get resolved with sudden moves in unforeseen directions. Blame the butterflies, not the talking heads.
Also.., I am beginning to have some doubts of a major recession happening. We could, with little effort enter into a minor recession – but we will spend out way right out of it in four to six months – Americans are a greedy lot and they will keep buying stuff they don’t need. Too many people currently working.., inflation has started to ease.., Bond Mania looks to have run it current course.., lots of ‘bad’ still out there, yes., but it is looking less and less likely for a deep, crippling recession to take hold.
This “thought” does not include radio-active fall-out as a prime financial motivator., nor multiple terrorists strikes in the good ole, U.S. of A.
As of last night, my numbers don’t show it., so maybe., possibly – it will take some “off-continent” influence to trigger a major recession.
Commercial Real Estate STILL had not been written down to anything close to it’s real values. Everybody is trying to paper over their losses, hiding them to the full extent that FASB rules allow, and then some … but eventually somebody is going to be forced to recognize those losses.
When that happens will that take down any of the BIG players … or are they now well enough capitalized that they can continue to “paper over” the losses hoping values come back up in the future?
(in the 30’s it took a full decade+ for most of the commercial real estate values to get back up to 75% of their previous level – and that was only because WW2 started in Europe and business activity here took off like a rocket to supply Europe’s needs).
More than one entity out there is currently insolvent wrt their Commercial Real Estate holdings, we just don’t know who they are yet …. “We Work” is just the canary in the paper mine this time around.
you are freaky and i like you alot keep being you its interesting
been with you a while my opinion has a little weight
I appreciate that, thank you very much!
Isn’t the first “Blow of Steel” suppose to happen right about now ?
This whole sh*t show blows! But I do believe we are pretty darn close to Stu’s “Blow of Steel”
What was the ‘Blow of Steel’?
Musk’s rocket could blow-up. A rocket ship failure was supposed to be a marker but I forgot what the event would be marking.
Here’s one that was going around the other day. Some moving parts. “A meteor hit Earth and soon after the destruction of Gaza began.”
“OSIRIS-REx is the first U.S. mission to collect a sample from an asteroid. It returned to Earth on Sept. 24, 2023, to drop off material from asteroid Bennu. The spacecraft didn’t land, but continued on to a new mission, OSIRIS-APEX, to explore asteroid Apophis. ”
“The spacecraft delivered the sample to Earth on Sept. 24, 2023. It released the capsule holding pieces of Bennu over Earth’s atmosphere. ”
https://science.nasa.gov/mission/osiris-rex/
Would the piece of Bennu that was dropped off to Earth be considered a meteor? The returning Bennu sample capsule did glow.
meteor
a small body of matter from outer space that enters the earth’s atmosphere, becoming incandescent as a result of friction and appearing as a streak of light.
OSIRIS-REx Sample Return: Animations
“streak of light” animation
https://svs.gsfc.nasa.gov/20381/
So if technically Earth was hit by a meteor perhaps the event connects to an Illuminati game card which states a city can be completely destroyed.
https://d1rw89lz12ur5s.cloudfront.net/photo/categoryonegames/file/1e3d9004711a4ecaa631b8d278537fec/IMG_20220519_0159.jpg
2024 Third age mars book is now available
George…..
Since I have always heard that the market will always try to make major moves with the least amount of investors/players, is it not possible that this latest surprise large rally is exactly intended to shake off the bears prior to a plunge down. Taking into account how crazy and upside down this country has turned, (mad actually), I am inclined to exclaim “The Emperor, and Lady Liberty have no clothes”.
re: reports from the front
feat. turf wars spreading
Folks,
The CBC brings word that Canada’s PM has been “shouted out” of a Vancouver, BC restaurant by pro-Palestinian protesters. Mother Corp. pictured the happy green exterior sign of “The Happy Valley Turf Club”, ahem, ‘restaurant’. The venue was previously home to the speakeasy, “Prohibition”. Beneath the current English restaurant signage, punters can rest easy in the Chinese calligraphy beneath promising a “Happy Valley Betting Store”.
The latest on yesterday’s race 1 on a 1200m turf distance from Happy Valley, Hong Kong advises favorite Valhalla comfortably paced to a win. Noir Rider placed second. HZ Tourbillon (Whirlwind) was last.
Place your bets! (This is not investment advice.)
Looks like a rev https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U8narVJyrO8erse crash is in the making.
Dave Smith reviews the candidates:
https://youtu.be/XGK1SXNMG44?t=1129
Truer words …
Looks like the ammo situation in the U.S. could be going critical soon –
The Largest Civilian Ammo Producer Just Shut Down Production!!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AOlxwjHdY0w
“The Largest Civilian Ammo Company SOLD all of it’s ammo production facilities and the new owner JUST SHUT DOWN CIVILIAN AMMO PRODUCTION!!”
And with Pocahontas (Liz Warren) and a partner pushing a bill to require anyone buying bulk ammo to have a license AND provide a record of anyone they transfer the ammo to means we’re going to be going through a rough time as gun owners in the very near future.
Toilets… a real gagger of a job. No matter how much you clean the porcelain, once you get it off the floor there is that stinking hole! I spray several quarts of ‘Simple Green’ down the stink hole to at least ‘modify’ the odor a little bit. I have ‘flipper installed’ uneven tiles in my two bathrooms, which resulted in only half the wax ring sealing. Ask how I found that out! I found a rubber product called ‘Better Than Wax’ (Marketing genius!) with a bit of a tubular extension into the hole, with neoprene sponge sealing around the edge. It didn’t care about the 1/4 inch offset of the tiles around the rim. Works like a well sealed…charm.
Stories are legend about the farm boy telling his city slicker cousin to pee on the electric fence. As youths, my ‘mad scientists’ best friend and I were playing around with a spark coil on his dad’s workbench in the basement. At one end was a giant vise, with the vice handle hanging well below belt level. Well… you guessed it. The loosely attached spark wire fell against the vice while my friend was standing too close in front of it. I saw a blue bolt fly six inches from the vice handle and landed right between his legs with a loud ‘crack’. He fell to the floor clutching his gonads and looking decidedly blue in the face for awhile. His first words to me were a gasping “Pull the plug on that thing!”
Well, we’re moving up in the World out here in the sticks. The school authorities just let it be known today that back in October they investigated a kid new to the school this year for possibly having a hit list of students and faculty here in the Junior High. Investigators have ransacked the classrooms and the kid’s home to see if they could find anything but apparently nothing was found. The kid has only been here for a few months and already he’s having issues. The principal will have a public meeting on Friday to talk about it. The kid was sent off for a psych exam and, I think, is back in school. I’m sure everyone was glad to see him back and things will be just hunky-dory from now on.
… (/sarc)
With all the new people coming in from all over so suddenly I’ve wondered when something like this would come up. There was simply no way we could keep this away for forever.
From the text of the X tweet:
“In what world would votes ever go down in an election? This video shows 350,000 in-person votes being removed from the Republican Supreme Court Candidate in Pennsylvania”
“The candidate ended up losing the race by 200k votes but no one has given any explanation as to how votes just go down in a crucial election like this. This is exactly what happened to Trump in Pennsylvania as well”
“This video was released by Pennsylvania election integrity group @Auditthevotepa”
https://twitter.com/BehizyTweets/status/1724514830831305097