December 29, 2022 · by harveyorgan · in Uncategorized · Leave a comment·Edit

GOLD PRICE CLOSED: UP $8.35 at $1819.50

SILVER PRICE CLOSED: UP $0.63  to $24.03

Access prices: closes : 4: 15 PM

Gold ACCESS CLOSE 1815.00

Silver ACCESS CLOSE: 23.89

Bitcoin morning price:, 16,634 UP 10 DOLLARS   

Bitcoin: afternoon price: $16,605 DOWN 19 dollars

Platinum price closing  $1057.20 UP $41,85

Palladium price; closing 1810.65  UP 21.90

END

Due to the huge rise in the dollar, we must look at gold and silver in currencies other than the dollar to understand where we are heading

I will now provide gold in Canadian dollars, British pounds and Euros/4: 15 PM ACCESS

CANADIAN GOLD: $2457.43 UP $1.52 CDN dollars per oz

BRITISH GOLD: 1503.85 UP 2.53 pounds per oz

EURO GOLD: 1701.38 UP 2.41  euros per oz

EXCHANGE: COMEX

EXCHANGE: COMEX
CONTRACT: DECEMBER 2022 COMEX 100 GOLD FUTURES
SETTLEMENT: 1,807.900000000 USD
INTENT DATE: 12/28/2022 DELIVERY DATE: 12/30/2022
FIRM ORG FIRM NAME ISSUED STOPPED

---

072 C GOLDMAN 1
661 C JP MORGAN 57
737 C ADVANTAGE 69
905 C ADM 13

---

TOTAL: 70 70

COMEX//NOTICES FILED re JPMorgan  57/70

DONATE

Click here if you wish to send a donation. I sincerely appreciate it as this site takes a lot of preparation.

GOLD: NUMBER OF NOTICES FILED FOR DEC. CONTRACT:   70 NOTICES FOR 7000  OZ  or  .2177 TONNES

total notices so far: 20,750 contracts for 2,075,000 oz (64.5412 tonnes)

 

SILVER NOTICES: 50 NOTICE(S) FILED FOR 250,000 OZ/

 

total number of notices filed so far this month  4705 for 23,525,000  oz

---

---

END

GLD

WITH GOLD UP $8.35

INVESTORS SWITCHING TO SPROTT PHYSICAL  (PHYS) INSTEAD OF THE FRAUDULENT GLD//BIG CHANGES IN GOLD INVENTORY AT THE GLD: /////NO CHANGES IN GLD INVENTORY: /

INVENTORY RESTS AT 918.51 TONNES

Silver//SLV

WITH NO SILVER AROUND AND SILVER UP 63 CENTS

AT THE SLV// :/NO CHANGES IN SILVER INVENTORY AT THE SLV//

INVESTORS ARE SWITCHING SLV TO SPROTT’S PSLV

CLOSING INVENTORY: 509.05 MILLION OZ (THIS IS ALSO A CRIME SCENE@!!!!

Let us have a look at the data for today

SILVER//OUTLINE

SILVER COMEX OI FELL BY A GOOD SIZED 537 CONTRACTS TO 127,837 AND FURTHER FROM  THE  RECORD HIGH OI OF 244,710, SET FEB 25/2020 AND THE LOSS IN COMEX OI WAS ACCOMPLISHED WITH OUR STRONG  $0.46 LOSS IN SILVER PRICING AT THE COMEX ON WEDNESDAY.  OUR SHORTERS/HFT WERE  SUCCESSFUL IN KNOCKING THE PRICE OF SILVER DOWN (IT FELL BY $0.46 BUT WERE UNSUCCESSFUL IN KNOCKING ANY APPRECIABLE  SPEC LONGS, AS WE HAD A TINY LOSS ON OUR TWO EXCHANGES OF 115 CONTRACTS. AS WELL WE HAD 0 EXCHANGE FOR RISK TRANSFER ( 0 CONTRACTS).  WE HAD SOME SPEC SHORT COVERINGS WITH RESPECT TO  THEIR SHORTFALL .  WE ALSO  HAD CONSIDERABLE SHORT ADDITIONS WITH THE HUGE PRICE FALL ON SILVER. // OUR  BANKERS CONTINUE TO BE PURCHASERS OF NET COMEX LONGS. BUT THEY ALSO SUPPLIED THE NECESSARY SHORT CONTRACTS>>> SOME  INCREASE OF NEWBIE SPEC LONGS ADDING TO THEIR POSITIONS CAUSING ADDITIONAL MISERY TO OUR SHORTERS.

WE  MUST HAVE HAD: 
A FAIR  ISSUANCE OF EXCHANGE FOR PHYSICALS iiii) AN  INITIAL SILVER STANDING FOR COMEX SILVER MEASURING AT  23 .24. MILLION OZ FOLLOWED BY TODAY;S QUEUE JUMP   of 175,000  OZ //  V)   FAIR SIZED COMEX OI LOSS/ 

 I AM NOW RECORDING THE DIFFERENTIAL IN OI FROM PRELIMINARY TO FINAL  – 51

HISTORICAL ACCUMULATION OF EXCHANGE FOR PHYSICALS DEC. ACCUMULATION FOR EFP’S SILVER/JPMORGAN’S HOUSE OF BRIBES/STARTING FROM FIRST DAY/MONTH OF DEC: 

TOTAL CONTRACTS for 22 days, total 11,855 contracts:   OR 59.275  MILLION OZ PER DAY. (538 CONTRACTS PER DAY)

TOTAL EFP’S FOR THE MONTH SO FAR: 59.275 MILLION OZ

.

LAST 17 MONTHS TOTAL EFP CONTRACTS ISSUED  IN MILLIONS OF OZ:

MAY 137.83 MILLION

JUNE 149.91 MILLION OZ

JULY 129.445 MILLION OZ

AUGUST: MILLION OZ 140.120 

SEPT. 28.230 MILLION OZ//

OCT:  94.595 MILLION OZ

NOV: 131.925 MILLION OZ

DEC: 100.615 MILLION OZ 

JAN 2022//  90.460 MILLION OZ

FEB 2022:  72.39 MILLION OZ//

MARCH: 207.430  MILLION OZ//A NEW RECORD FOR EFP ISSUANCE 

APRIL: 114.52 MILLION OZ FINAL//LOW ISSUANCE

MAY: 105.635 MILLION OZ//

JUNE: 94.470 MILLION OZ

JULY : 87.110 MILLION OZ 

AUGUST: 65.025 MILLION OZ 

SEPT. 74.025 MILLION OZ///FINAL

OCT.  29.017 MILLION OZ FINAL

NOV: 134.290 MILLION OZ//FINAL

DEC, 59.275 MILLION OZ INITIAL( VERY SMALL)

RESULT: WE HAD A FAIR SIZED DECREASE IN COMEX OI SILVER COMEX CONTRACTS OF 537 DESPITE OUR STRONG $0.46 LOSS IN SILVER PRICING AT THE COMEX// WEDNESDAY.,.  THE CME NOTIFIED US THAT WE HAD A GOOD  SIZED EFP ISSUANCE  CONTRACTS: 422 CONTRACTS ISSUED FOR MAR AND 0 CONTRACTS ISSUED FOR ALL OTHER MONTHS) WHICH  EXITED OUT OF THE SILVER COMEX  TO LONDON  AS FORWARDS./ WE HAVE A GOOD INITIAL SILVER OZ STANDING FOR DEC OF  23.24 MILLION  OZ FOLLOWED BY TODAY:S 175,000 OZ QUEUE JUMP    //NEW STANDING 23.525 MILLION OZ + EFR 11.5 = 35.025 MILLION OZ.  .. WE HAVE A TINY SIZED LOSS OF 115 OI CONTRACTS ON THE TWO EXCHANGES FOR 0.575 MILLION  OZ.. THE SILVER SHORTS ARE NOW TRAPPED AS THEY ARE HAVING CONSIDERABLE DIFFICULTY IN COVERING THOSE SHORTS.

 WE HAD  50  NOTICE(S) FILED TODAY FOR  250,000   OZ

THE SILVER COMEX IS NOW BEING ATTACKED FOR METAL BY LONDONERS ET AL.

GOLD//OUTLINE

IN GOLD, THE COMEX OPEN INTEREST FELL  BY A FAIR SIZED 2303  CONTRACTS  TO 437,837 AND FURTHER FROM  THE RECORD (SET JAN 24/2020) AT 799,541 AND  PREVIOUS TO THAT: (SET JAN 6/2020) AT 797,110.

THE DIFFERENTIAL FROM PRELIMINARY OI TO FINAL OI IN GOLD TODAY: REMOVED 410  CONTRACTS.

.

THE FAIR SIZED DECREASE  IN COMEX OI CAME WITH OUR   $6.80 LOSS IN PRICE. WE ALSO HAD A STRONG INITIAL STANDING IN GOLD TONNAGE FOR DEC. AT 58.86 TONNES ON FIRST DAY NOTICE  FOLLOWED BY TODAY:S 7000 OZ QUEUE. JUMP  //(QUEUE JUMPING = EXERCISING LONDON BASED EFP’S ) (EFP is the transfer of  contracts immediately to London for potential gold deliveries originating from London). NEW STANDING 63.542 TONNES

YET ALL OF..THIS HAPPENED DESPITE OUR $6.30 LOSS IN PRICE  WITH RESPECT TO WEDNESDAY’S TRADING

WE HAD A FAIR SIZED GAIN OF 3003 OI CONTRACTS (9.359 PAPER TONNES) ON OUR TWO EXCHANGES..

E.F.P. ISSUANCE

THE CME RELEASED THE DATA FOR EFP ISSUANCE AND IT TOTALED A GOOD SIZED 5312 CONTRACTS:

The NEW COMEX OI FOR THE GOLD COMPLEX RESTS AT 437,837 

IN ESSENCE WE HAVE A FAIR SIZED INCREASE IN TOTAL CONTRACTS ON THE TWO EXCHANGES OF 3003 CONTRACTS  WITH 2303 CONTRACTS DECREASED AT THE COMEX AND 5312 EFP OI CONTRACTS WHICH NAVIGATED OVER TO LONDON. THUS  TOTAL OI GAIN ON THE TWO EXCHANGES OF 3003 CONTRACTS OR 9.359 TONNES.

CALCULATIONS ON GAIN/LOSS ON OUR TWO EXCHANGES

WE HAD A GOOD SIZED ISSUANCE IN EXCHANGE FOR PHYSICALS (5312 CONTRACTS) ACCOMPANYING THE FAIR SIZED LOSS IN COMEX OI (2303) TOTAL GAIN IN THE TWO EXCHANGES 3003 CONTRACTS. WE NO DOUBT HAD 1) ZERO  SPECULATOR SHORT COVERINGS // CONTINUED GOOD BANKER ADDITIONS BUT THEY ALSO SUPPLIED THE NECESSARY PAPER SHORT.  WE  HAD MAJOR SHORT SPEC ADDITIONS/// // GOOD  NEWBIE SPEC  ADDITIONS  ,2.) STRONG INITIAL STANDING AT THE GOLD COMEX FOR DEC. AT 58.86 TONNES FOLLOWED BY TODAY’S QUEUE. JUMP   of 7000 oz// //NEW STANDING 64.542 TONNES///3) ZERO LONG LIQUIDATION //.,4)   FAIR SIZED COMEX OPEN INTEREST LOSS 5) GOOD ISSUANCE OF EXCHANGE FOR PHYSICAL PAPER/

HISTORICAL ACCUMULATION OF EXCHANGE FOR PHYSICALS IN 2022 INCLUDING TODAY

DEC

ACCUMULATION OF EFP’S GOLD AT J.P. MORGAN’S HOUSE OF BRIBES: (EXCHANGE FOR PHYSICAL) FOR THE MONTH OF DEC :

58,382  CONTRACTS OR 5,838,200 OZ OR 181.59 TONNES 22 TRADING DAY(S) AND THUS AVERAGING: 2653 EFP CONTRACTS PER TRADING DAY

TO GIVE YOU AN IDEA AS TO THE  SIZE OF THESE EFP TRANSFERS :  THIS MONTH IN 22 TRADING DAY(S) IN  TONNES:181.59   TONNES

TOTAL ANNUAL GOLD PRODUCTION, 2021, THROUGHOUT THE WORLD EX CHINA EX RUSSIA: 3555 TONNES

THUS EFP TRANSFERS REPRESENTS  181.59/3550 x 100% TONNES  5.12% OF GLOBAL ANNUAL PRODUCTION

ACCUMULATION OF GOLD EFP’S YEAR 2021 TO 2022 

JANUARY/2021: 265.26 TONNES (RAPIDLY INCREASING AGAIN)

 FEB  :  171.24 TONNES  ( DEFINITELY SLOWING DOWN AGAIN).. 

MARCH:.   276.50 TONNES (STRONG AGAIN/

APRIL:      189..44 TONNES  ( DRAMATICALLY SLOWING DOWN AGAIN//GOLD IN BACKWARDATION)

MAY:        250.15 TONNES  (NOW DRAMATICALLY INCREASING AGAIN)

JUNE:      247.54 TONNES (FINAL)

JULY:        188.73 TONNES FINAL

AUGUST:   217.89 TONNES FINAL ISSUANCE.

SEPT          142.12 TONNES FINAL ISSUANCE ( LOW ISSUANCE)_

OCT:           141.13 TONNES FINAL ISSUANCE (LOW ISSUANCE)

NOV:           312.46 TONNES FINAL ISSUANCE//NEW RECORD!! (INCREASING DRAMATICALLY)//SIGN OF REAL STRESS//SURPASSING THE MARCH 2021 RECORD OF 276.50 TONNES OF EFP

DEC.           175.62 TONNES//FINAL ISSUANCE// 

JAN:2022   247.25 TONNES //FINAL

FEB:           196.04 TONNES//FINAL

MARCH:  409.30 TONNES INITIAL( THIS IS NOW A RECORD EFP ISSUANCE FOR MARCH AND FOR ANY MONTH.

APRIL:  169.55 TONNES (FINAL VERY  LOW ISSUANCE MONTH)

MAY:  247,44 TONNES FINAL// 

JUNE: 238.13 TONNES  FINAL

JULY: 378.43 TONNES FINAL

AUGUST: 180.81 TONNES FINAL

SEPT. 193.16 TONNES FINAL

OCT:  177.57  TONNES FINAL ( MUCH SMALLER THAN LAST MONTH)

NOV.  223.98 TONNES//FINAL ( MUCH LARGER THAN PREVIOUS MONTHS//comex running out of physical)

DEC:  181.59 tonnes Initial// SMALL

SPREADING OPERATIONS

(/NOW SWITCHING TO GOLD) FOR NEWCOMERS, HERE ARE THE DETAILS

SPREADING LIQUIDATION HAS NOW COMMENCED   AS WE HEAD TOWARDS THE  NEW   NON ACTIVE FRONT MONTH OF NOV. WE ARE NOW INTO THE SPREADING OPERATION OF BOTH SILVER AND GOLD (WILL BE SMALL AS SPREADERS DO NOT PAY ATTENTION TO NOVEMBER)

HERE IS A BRIEF SYNOPSIS OF HOW THE CROOKS FLEECE UNSUSPECTING LONGS IN THE SPREADING ENDEAVOUR ;MODUS OPERANDI OF THE CORRUPT BANKERS AS TO HOW THEY HANDLE THEIR SPREAD OPEN INTERESTS:HERE IS HOW THE CROOKS USED SPREADING AS WE ARE NOW INTO THE  NON ACTIVE DELIVERY MONTH OF OCT HEADING TOWARDS THE NON  ACTIVE DELIVERY MONTH OF NOV., FOR BOTH GOLD AND SILVER:

YOU WILL ALSO NOTICE THAT THE COMEX OPEN INTEREST  STARTS TO RISE BUT SO IS THE OPEN INTEREST OF SPREADERS. THE OPEN INTEREST IN WILL CONTINUE TO RISE UNTIL ONE WEEK BEFORE FIRST DAY NOTICE OF AN UPCOMING  ACTIVE DELIVERY MONTH (NOV), AND THAT IS WHEN THE CROOKS SELL THEIR SPREAD POSITIONS BUT NOT AT THE SAME TIME OF THE DAY.  THEY WILL USE THE SELL SIDE OF THE EQUATION TO CREATE THE CASCADE (ALONG WITH THEIR COLLUSIVE FRIENDS) AND THEN COVER ON THE BUY SIDE OF THE SPREAD SITUATION AT THE END  OF THE DAY. THEY DO THIS TO AVOID POSITION LIMIT DETECTION. THE LIQUIDATION OF THE SPREADING FORMATION CONTINUES FOR EXACTLY ONE WEEK AND ENDS ON FIRST DAY NOTICE.”

WHAT IS ALARMING TO ME, ACCORDING TO OUR LONDON EXPERT ANDREW MAGUIRE IS THAT THESE EFP’S ARE BEING TRANSFERRED TO WHAT ARE CALLED SERIAL FORWARD CONTRACT OBLIGATIONS AND THESE CONTRACTS ARE LESS THAN 14 DAYS.  ANYTHING GREATER THAN 14 DAYS, THESE MUST BE RECORDED AND SENT TO THE COMPTROLLER, GREAT BRITAIN TO MONITOR RISK TO THE BANKING SYSTEM.  IF THIS IS INDEED TRUE, THEN THIS IS A MASSIVE CONSPIRACY TO DEFRAUD AS WE NOW WITNESS A MONSTROUS TOTAL EFP’S ISSUANCE AS IT HEADS INTO THE STRATOSPHERE. 

First, here is an outline of what will be discussed tonight:

1.Today, we had the open interest at the comex, in SILVER, FELL BY A GOOD SIZED 537 CONTRACTS OI TO  127,837 AND CLOSER TO OUR COMEX HIGH RECORD //244,710(SET FEB 25/2020).  THE LAST RECORDS WERE SET  IN AUG.2018 AT 244,196 WITH A SILVER PRICE OF $14.78/(AUGUST 22/2018)..THE PREVIOUS RECORD TO THAT WAS SET ON APRIL 9/2018 AT 243,411 OPEN INTEREST CONTRACTS WITH THE SILVER PRICE AT THAT DAY: $16.53). AND PREVIOUS TO THAT, THE RECORD  WAS ESTABLISHED AT: 234,787 CONTRACTS, SET ON APRIL 21.2017 OVER  5 YEARS AGO.  

EFP ISSUANCE 422 CONTRACTS

OUR CUSTOMARY MIGRATION OF COMEX LONGS CONTINUE TO MORPH INTO LONDON FORWARDS  AS OUR BANKERS USED THEIR EMERGENCY PROCEDURE TO ISSUE:

MAR  422 and ALL OTHER MONTHS: ZERO. TOTAL EFP ISSUANCE: 422 CONTRACTS. EFP’S GIVE OUR COMEX LONGS A FIAT BONUS PLUS A DELIVERABLE PRODUCT OVER IN LONDON.  IF WE TAKE THE  COMEX OI LOSS  OF 537  CONTRACTS AND ADD TO THE 422 OI TRANSFERRED TO LONDON THROUGH EFP’S,

WE OBTAIN A TINY LOSS OF 115 OPEN INTEREST CONTRACTS FROM OUR TWO EXCHANGES. 

THUS IN OUNCES, THE LOSS  ON THE TWO EXCHANGES 0.575 MILLION OZ//

OCCURRED WITH OUR 46 CENT LOSS IN PRICE ….. OUR SPEC SHORTS HAVE NOWHERE TO HIDE!

OUTLINE FOR TODAY’S COMMENTARY

1/COMEX GOLD AND SILVER REPORT

(report Harvey)

2 ) Gold/silver trading overnight Europe,

(Peter Schiff,

end

3. Egon von Greyerz///Matthew Piepenburg via GoldSwitzerland.com,

4. Chris Powell of GATA provides to us very important physical commentaries

end

5. Other gold/silver commentaries

6. Commodity commentaries//

7/CRYPTOCURRENCIES/BITCOIN ETC

3. ASIAN AFFAIRS

i)THURSDAY MORNING//WEDNESDAY  NIGHT

SHANGHAI CLOSED DOWN 13.70 PTS OR 0.44%   //Hang Sang CLOSED DOWN 157.77 PTS OR 0.79%     /The Nikkei closed DOWN 246.83 OR 0.84%          //Australia’s all ordinaries CLOSED DOWN .89%   /Chinese yuan (ONSHORE) closed UP TO 6.9631//OFFSHORE CHINESE YUAN UP TO 6.9820//    /Oil DOWN TO 78.17 dollars per barrel for WTI and BRENT AT 83.85    / Stocks in Europe OPENED MOSTLY GREEN         ONSHORE YUAN TRADING ABOVE LEVEL OF OFFSHORE YUAN/ONSHORE YUAN  TRADING STRONGER AGAINST US DOLLAR/OFFSHORE STRONGER

a)NORTH KOREA/SOUTH KOREA

outline

b) REPORT ON JAPAN/

OUTLINE

3 C CHINA

OUTLINE

4/EUROPEAN AFFAIRS

OUTLINE

5. RUSSIAN AND MIDDLE EASTERN AFFAIRS

OUTLINE

6.Global Issues//COVID ISSUES/VACCINE ISSUES

OUTLINE

7. OIL ISSUES

OUTLINE

8 EMERGING MARKET ISSUES

 COMEX DATA//AMOUNTS STANDING//VOLUME OF TRADING/INVENTORY MOVEMENTS

GOLD

LET US BEGIN:

THE TOTAL COMEX GOLD OPEN INTEREST FELL BY A FAIR SIZED 2303 CONTRACTS DOWN TO 437,837 with OUR THE LOSS IN PRICE OF $6.80

EXCHANGE FOR PHYSICAL ISSUANCE

WE ARE NOW IN THE -ACTIVE DELIVERY MONTH OF DEC…  THE CME REPORTS THAT THE BANKERS ISSUED A GOOD  SIZED TRANSFER THROUGH THE EFP ROUTE AS THESE LONGS RECEIVED A DELIVERABLE LONDON FORWARD TOGETHER WITH A FIAT BONUS.,

THAT IS 5312 EFP CONTRACTS WERE ISSUED:  ;: ,  . 0 FEB: 5312 & ZERO FOR ALL OTHER MONTHS:

TOTAL EFP ISSUANCE:  5312   CONTRACTS 

WHEN WE HAVE BACKWARDATION,  EFP ISSUANCE IS VERY COSTLY BUT THE REAL PROBLEM IS THE SCARCITY OF METAL AND IT IS FAR BETTER FOR OUR BANKERS TO PAY OFF INDIVIDUALS THAN RISK INVESTORS ESPECIALLY FROM LONDON STANDING FOR DELIVERY. THE LOWER PRICES IN THE FUTURES MARKET IS A MAGNET FOR OUR LONDONERS SEEKING PHYSICAL METAL. BACKWARDATION ALWAYS EQUAL SCARCITY OF METAL!

ON A NET BASIS IN OPEN INTEREST WE GAINED THE FOLLOWING TODAY ON OUR TWO EXCHANGES: A FAIR SIZED  TOTAL OF 3003 CONTRACTS IN THAT 5312 LONGS WERE TRANSFERRED AS FORWARDS TO LONDON AND WE HAD A FAIR SIZED  COMEX OI LOSS OF 2303  CONTRACTS..AND  THIS FAIR SIZED GAIN ON OUR TWO EXCHANGES HAPPENED WITH OUR LOSS  IN PRICE OF $6.80. WE ARE WITNESSING  CONSIDERABLE SPEC SHORTS ADDITIONS TO THEIR SHORTFALL WITH MINOR SPEC SHORT LIQUIDATIONS. BANKERS CONTINUE  AS NET BUYERS OF COMEX GOLD CONTRACTS AS THEY HAVE BEEN NET LONG FOR THE PAST FEW MONTHS.  WE ALSO HAD STRONG  NEWBIE SPECS ADDITIONS 

// WE HAVE A STRONG AMOUNT OF GOLD TONNAGE STANDING DEC  (64.541)

TONNES),

 HERE ARE THE AMOUNTS THAT STOOD FOR DELIVERY IN THE PRECEDING 12 MONTHS OF 2021-2022:

DEC 2021: 112.217 TONNES

NOV.  8.074 TONNES

OCT.    57.707 TONNES

SEPT: 11.9160 TONNES

AUGUST: 80.489 TONNES

JULY: 7.2814 TONNES

JUNE:  72.289 TONNES

MAY 5.77 TONNES

APRIL  95.331 TONNES

MARCH 30.205 TONNES

FEB ’21. 113.424 TONNES

JAN ’21: 6.500 TONNES.

TOTAL  YEAR  2021 (JAN- DEC): 601.213 TONNES

YEAR 2022:

JANUARY 2022  17.79 TONNES

FEB 2022: 59.023 TONNES

MARCH: 36.678 TONNES

APRIL: 85.340 TONNES FINAL.

MAY: 20.11 TONNES FINAL

JUNE: 74.933 TONNES FINAL

JULY 29.987 TONNES FINAL

AUGUST:104.979 TONNES//FINAL

SEPT.  38.1158 TONNES

OCT:  77.390 TONNES/ FINAL

NOV 27.110 TONNES/FINAL (TOTAL SO FAR THIS YEAR 591.535 TONNES)

Dec. 64.541 tonnes

THE SPECS/HFT WERE SUCCESSFUL IN LOWERING GOLD’S PRICE( IT FELL $6.80)  //// BUT WERE ALSO UNSUCCESSFUL IN KNOCKING ANY  SPECULATOR LONGS AS WE HAD A FAIR GAIN OF 3003 CONTRACTS ON OUR TWO EXCHANGES  //    WE HAVE GAINED A TOTAL OI  OF 9.359 PAPER TONNES OF TOTAL OI FROM OUR TWO EXCHANGES, ACCOMPANYING OUR INITIAL  GOLD TONNAGE STANDING FOR DEC. (54.57 TONNES), FOLLOWING OUR QUEUE. JUMP OF 7000 oz//NEW STANDING RISING TO 64.541 TONNES…THIS WAS ACCOMPLISHED DESPITE OUR FALL IN PRICE DUE TO TUNE OF $6.80.  

WE HAD – 410 CONTRACTS  COMEX TRADES REMOVED FROM OPEN INTEREST AFTER TRADING ENDED LAST NIGHT

NET GAIN ON THE TWO EXCHANGES 3003 CONTRACTS OR 300,300 OZ OR 9.359 TONNES

Estimated gold comex today 103,489// awful//

final gold volumes/yesterday  125m991/  awful

FINAL STANDINGS FOR  DECEMBER 2022 COMEX GOLD //DEC 29

Gold	Ounces
Withdrawals from Dealers Inventory in oz	nil
Withdrawals from Customer Inventory in oz	96.45 oz  oz Brinks 3 kilobars .
Deposit to the Dealer Inventory in oz	nil oz
Deposits to the Customer Inventory, in oz	32,472.510  oz Delaware 1010 kilobars
No of oz served (contracts) today	70 notice(s) 7000 OZ 0.2177 TONNES
No of oz to be served (notices)	0 contracts    0 oz 0.000 TONNES
Total monthly oz gold served (contracts) so far this month	20,750  notices 2,075,000 64.542 TONNES
Total accumulative withdrawals of gold from the Dealers inventory this month	NIL oz
Total accumulative withdrawal of gold from the Customer inventory this month	xxx oz

i)Dealer deposits: 0

total dealer deposit:  nil oz

No dealer withdrawals

Customer deposits: 1

i)Into Delaware  32,472.510 oz (1010 kilobars)

total deposits: 32,472.510 oz

 customer withdrawals: 1

i) Out of Brinks  96,45  oz (3 kilobars)

Total withdrawals: 96,45 oz 

total in tonnes: 0.00139  tonnes

Adjustments: 0  

CALCULATIONS FOR THE AMOUNT OF GOLD STANDING FOR DECEMBER.

For the front month of DECEMBER we have an oi of 70 contracts having GAINED 49  contracts 

We had 21 contracts served on WEDNESDAY, so we GAINED 70 contracts or an additional 7000 oz will  stand for gold at the COMEX

JANUARY LOST 163 contracts to stand at 870

February LOST 4855  contacts  to 364,346

We had 70  notice(s) filed today for 7000 oz 

Today, 0 notice(s) were issued from J.P.Morgan dealer account and  0  notices were issued from their client or customer account. The total of all issuance by all participants equate to  70  contract(s) of which 0   notices were stopped (received) by  j.P. Morgan dealer and 59  notice(s) was (were) stopped/ Received) by J.P.Morgan//customer account and 0 notice(s) received (stopped) by the squid  (Goldman Sachs)

To calculate the INITIAL total number of gold ounces standing for the DEC. /2022. contract month, 

we take the total number of notices filed so far for the month (20,750 x 100 oz , to which we add the difference between the open interest for the front month of  (DEC. 70 CONTRACTS)  minus the number of notices served upon today 70 x 100 oz per contract equals 2,075,000 OZ  OR 64.541 TONNES the number of TONNES standing in this    active month of DEC. 

thus the INITIAL standings for gold for the DEC contract month:

No of notices filed so far (20,750 x 100 oz+   (70 OI for the front month minus the number of notices served upon today (70} x 100 oz} which equals 2,075,000 oz standing OR 64.541 TONNES in this  active delivery month of DEC..

TOTAL COMEX GOLD STANDING:  64.541 TONNES  (A POOR STANDING//COMEX RUNNING OUT OF PHYSICAL TO SERVE UPON OUR LONGS.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

COMEX GOLD INVENTORIES/CLASSIFICATION

we had one adjustment of 110,631.591 oz Brinks

NEW PLEDGED GOLD:

241,794.285 oz NOW PLEDGED /HSBC  5.94 TONNES

204,937.290 PLEDGED  MANFRA 3.08 TONNES

83,657.582 PLEDGED JPMorgan no 1  1.690 tonnes

265,999.054, oz  JPM No 2 

1,152,376.639 oz pledged  Brinks/

Manfra:  33,758.550 oz

Delaware: 193.721 oz

International Delaware::  11,188.542 o

total pledged gold:  2,035,631.296 OZ   63,32 tonnes

TOTAL OF ALL GOLD ELIGIBLE AND REGISTERED:  23,179,858.673 OZ  

TOTAL REGISTERED GOLD:11,342,356.837 OZ     (352.79 tonnes)..dropping fast

TOTAL OF ALL ELIGIBLE GOLD: 11,837,501.836 OZ  

REGISTERED GOLD THAT CAN BE SERVED UPON: 9,306,725 OZ (REG GOLD- PLEDGED GOLD) 289.47 tonnes//rapidly declining 

END

SILVER/COMEX

DEC 29//FINAL DEC. SILVER CONTRACT

Silver	Ounces
Withdrawals from Dealers Inventory	NIL oz
Withdrawals from Customer Inventory	280,318.718 oz Brinks Delaware Manfra
Deposits to the Dealer Inventory	nil OZ
Deposits to the Customer Inventory	609,028.900 oz JPMorgan
No of oz served today (contracts)	50 CONTRACT(S)    (250,000 OZ)
No of oz to be served (notices)	0 contracts  (NIL oz)
Total monthly oz silver served (contracts)	4705 contracts  (23,525,000 oz)
Total accumulative withdrawal of silver from the Dealers inventory this month	NIL oz
Total accumulative withdrawal of silver from the Customer inventory this month

i)  0 dealer deposit

total dealer deposits:  nil   oz

i) We had 0 dealer withdrawal

total dealer withdrawals:  oz

We have 1 deposit into the customer account

i) Into JPMorgan: 609,028.900 oz

Total deposits:  609,028.900 oz 

JPMorgan has a total silver weight: 149.313 million oz/299.641 million =49.93% of comex .//dropping fast

  Comex withdrawals: 3

i) Out of Brinks:  261,669.542 oz

ii) Out of Delaware: 13,635.576 oz

iv) Out of manfra: 5,013.600 oz

Total withdrawals; 280,318.718 oz

adjustments: 3..dealer to customer

i) JPMorgan  609,028.900 oz

ii) Brinks  663,782.660 oz oz

iii CNT:  19,327.37 oz

iv) Loomis: 263,612.650 oz

v) Out of Manfra: 61,465.063 oz

the silver comex is in stress!

TOTAL REGISTERED SILVER: 34.869 MILLION OZ (declining rapidly).TOTAL REG + ELIG. 299.641 MILLION OZ (also declining)

CALCULATION OF SILVER OZ STANDING FOR DEC

silver open interest data:

FRONT MONTH OF DEC OI: 50  CONTRACTS HAVING LOST 154  CONTRACT(S.) 

WE HAD  189  NOTICES FILED ON WEDNESDAY. SO WE GAINED 35 CONTRACTS  OR  175,000 oz

AS A  QUEUE JUMP.  WE ALSO HAD 0 CONTRACT EXCHANGE FOR RISK ISSUED FOR ZERO OZ.  

JANUARY SAW A LOSS OF 275  CONTRACTS FALLING TO  929 CONTACTS.

FEB> GAINED 20 CONTRACTS TO 155 CONTRACTS

March LOST 232 contracts DOWN to 113,617 contracts

TOTAL NUMBER OF NOTICES FILED FOR TODAY:  50 for  250,000 oz

Comex volumes// est. volume today  34,814//awful  

Comex volume: confirmed yesterday: 35,650 contracts ( awful)

To calculate the number of silver ounces that will stand for delivery in DEC. we take the total number of notices filed for the month so far at 4705 x  5,000 oz = 23,525,000 oz 

to which we add the difference between the open interest for the front month of DEC(50) and the number of notices served upon today 50 x (5000 oz) equals the number of ounces standing.

Thus the  standings for silver for the DEC./2022 contract month: 4705 (notices served so far) x 5000 oz + OI for front month of DEC (50 – number of notices served upon today (50) x 500 oz of silver standing for the DEC. contract month equates 23.525 million oz.. Also we have another criminal element to our silver oz standing, the use of Exchange for Risk/  Today an addition of 0 EFR contract transfers which are “Exchange for risk” settlements.  I do not want to bore you but needless to say  they are not physical transfers so are criminal in nature. There have been 2300 Exchange for Risk contracts settled during the first 28 days of the month for 11.500 million oz.  Thus total delivery:  35.925 million oz.

the record level of silver open interest is 234,787 contracts set on April 21./2017 with the price on that day at $18.42. The previous record was 224,540 contracts with the price at that time of $20.44

Comex volumes:21,547// est. volume today//   awful

Comex volume: confirmed yesterday: 74,745 contracts ( good)

END

GLD AND SLV INVENTORY LEVELS

DEC 29//WITH GOLD UP $8.35 TODAY:; NO CHANGES IN GOLD INVENTORY AT THE GLD//INVENTORY RESTS AT 918.51 TONNES

DEC 28/WITH GOLD DOWN $6.80 TODAY: HUGE CHANGES IN GOLD INVENTORY AT THE GLD: A MASSIVE DEPOSIT OF 5.50 TONNES INTO THE GLD..//INVENTORY REST S AT 918.51 TONNES

DEC 27/WITH GOLD UP $18.15 TODAY: SMALL CHANGES IN GOLD INVENTORY AT THE GLD: A WITHDRAWAL OF .87 TONNES OF GOLD FROM THE GLD////INVENTORY RESTS AT 913.01 TONNES

DEC 23/WITH GOLD UP $19,15 TODAY: NO CHANGE IN GOLD INVENTORY AT THE GLD//INVENTORY RESTS AT 913.88 TONNES/

DEC 22/WITH GOLD DOWN $29.35 TODAY: NO CHANGE IN GOLD INVENTORY AT THE GLD//INVENTORY RESTS AT 913.88 TONNES

DEC 21/WITH GOLD FLAT TODAY: HUGE CHANGES IN GOLD INVENTORY AT THE GLD: A DEPOSIT OF 1.74 TONNES OF GOLD INTO THE GLD////INVENTORY RESTS AT 913.88 TONNES

DEC 20/WITH GOLD UP $27.05: HUGE CHANGES IN GOLD INVENTORY AT THE GLD: A DEPOSIT OF 1.73 TONNES INTO THE GLD////INVENTORY RESTS AT 912.14 TONNES

DEC 19/WITH GOLD DOWN $2.10: HUGE CHANGES IN GOLD INVENTORY AT THE GLD> A BIG WITHDRAWAL OF 3.47 TONNES FROM THE GLD//INVENTORY RESTS AT 910.41 TONNES

DEC 16/WITH GOLD UP $12.45: HUGE CHANGES IN GOLD INVENTORY AT THE GLD: A DEPOSIT OF 2.32 TONNES INTO THE GLD//INVENTORY RESTS AT 913.88 TONNES

DEC 15//WITH GOLD DOWN $31.00: HUGE CHANGES IN GOLD INVENTORY AT THE GLD: A WITHDRAWAL OF 1.16 TONNES OF GOLD FROM THE GLD////INVENTORY RESTS AT 911.56 TONNES

DEC 14/WITH GOLD DOWN $6.20: BIG CHANGES IN GOLD INVENTORY AT THE GLD: A DEPOSIT OF 2.32 TONNES OF GOLD INTO THE GLD//INVENTORY RESTS AT 912.72 TONNES

DEC 13/WITH GOLD UP $32.75: HUGE CHANGES IN GOLD INVENTORY AT THE GLD: A DEPOSIT OF 2.32 TONNES INTO THE GLD///INVENTORY RESTS AT 910.41

DEC 12/WITH GOLD DOWN $17.60: NO CHANGES IN GOLD INVENTORY AT THE GLD//INVENTORY RESTS AT 908.09 TONNES

DEC 9/WITH GOLD UP $8.90//NO CHANGES IN GOLD INVENTORY AT THE GLD//INVENTORY RESTS AT 908.09 TONNES

Dec 8/WITH GOLD UP $4.05, OVER THE PAST 3 WEEKS WE LOST 2.04 TONNES//INVENTORY RESTS AT 908.09 TONNES

NOV 14/WITH GOLD UP $7.30: HUGE CHANGES IN GOLD INVENTORY AT THE GLD: A WITHDRAWAL OF 1.45 TONNES FROM THE GLD///INVENTORY RESTS AT 910.12 TONNES

NOV 11/WITH GOLD UP $15.25//BIG CHANGES IN GOLD INVENTORY AT THE GLD: A DEPOSIT OF 3.19 TONNES INTO THE GLD////INVENTORY RESTS AT 911.57 TONNES

NOV 10/WITH GOLD UP $40.75: NO CHANGES IN GOLD INVENTORY AT THE GLD//INVENTORY RESTS AT 908.38 TONNES

NOV 9/WITH GOLD DOWN $2.00:  BIG CHANGES IN GOLD INVENTORY AT THE GLD: A DEPOSIT OF 2.89 TONNES INTO THE GLD////INVENTORY RESTS AT 908.38 TONNES

GLD INVENTORY: 918.51  TONNES

Now the SLV Inventory/( vehicle is a fraud as there is no physical metal behind them

DEC 29/ WITH SILVER UP $0.63 TODAY; NO CHANGES IN SILVER INVENTORY AT THE SLV//INVENTORY RESTS AT 509.050 OZ

DEC 28//WITH SILVER DOWN 46 CENTS TODAY: HUGE CHANGES IN SILVER INVENTORY AT THE SLV: A DEPOSIT OF 1.715 MILLION OZ INTO THE SLV///..INVENTORY RESTS AT 509.050 MILLION OZ

DEC 27/WITH SILVER UP 34 CENTS TODAY; SMALL CHANGES IN SILVER INVENTORY AT THE SLV/A WITHDRAWAL OF 550,000 OZ OF SILVER FROM THE SLV////INVENTORY RESTS AT 507.350 MILLION OZ//

DEC 23/WITH SILVER UP 29 CENTS TODAY; NO CHANGES IN SILVER INVENTORY AT THE SLV//INVENTORY REST AT507.900 MILLION O//

DEC 22/WITH SILVER DOWN 53 CENTS TODAY;NO CHANGES IN SILVER INVENTORY AT THE SLV//INVENTORY RESTS AT 507.90 MILLION OZ//

DEC 21/WITH SILVER DOWN 9 CENTS TODAY: HUGE CHANGES IN SILVER INVENTORY AT THE SLV: A WITHDRAWAL OF 2.0 MILLION OZ FROM THE SLV////INVENTORY RESTS AT 507.90 MILLION OZ//

DEC 20/WITH SILVER UP 105 CENTS TODAY: SMALL CHANGES IN SILVER INVENTORY AT THE SLV:: A DEPOSIT OF 700,000 OZ INTO THE SLV///INVENTORY RESTS AT 509.90 MILLION OZ//

DEC 19/WITH SILVER DOWN 13 CENTS: BIG CHANGES IN SILVER INVENTORY AT THE SLV: A DEPOSIT OF 1.05 MILLION OZ INTO THE SLV////INVENTORY RESTS AT 509.20 MILLION OZ//

DEC 16/WITH SILVER UP 2 CENTS; HUGE CHANGES IN SILVER INVENTORY AT THE SLV: A WITHDRAWAL OF 1.85 MILLION OZ FROM THE SLV////INVENTORY RESTS AT 508.15 MILLION OZ//

DEC 15/WITH SILVER DOWN 78 CENTS: HUGE CHANGES IN SILVER INVENTORY AT THE SLV: A WITHDRAWAL OF EXACTLY 2.00 MILLION OZ FROM THE SLV////INVENTORY RESTS AT 510.000 MILLION OZ

DEC 14/WITH SILVER UP 7 CENTS: HUGE CHANGES IN SILVER INVENTORY AT THE SLV: A WITHDRAWAL OF 1.7 MILLION OZ FROM THE SLV////INVENTORY RESTS AT 512.000 MILLION OZ//

DEC 13/WITH SILVER UP 59 CENTS: SMALL CHANGES IN SILVER INVENTORY AT THE SLV: A WITHDRAWAL OF 600,000 OZ FROM THE SLV////INVENTORY RESTS AT 513.900 MILLION OZ//

DEC 12/WITH SILVER DOWN 33 CENTS TODAY; NO CHANGES IN SILVER INVENTORY AT THE SLV//INVENTORY RESTS AT 514.500 MILLION OZ//

DEC 9/WITH SILVER RISING 77 CENTS TODAY: HUGE CHANGES IN SILVER INVENTORY AT THE SLV: A WITHDRAWAL OF 2.2 MILLION OZ FROM THE SLV////INVENTORY RESTS AT 514.500 MILLION OZ.

DEC 8/WITH SILVER RISING 34 CENTS TODAY: OVER THE PAST 3 WEEKS, WE HAVE GAINED A STRONG: 44.777 MILLION OZ/INVENTORY RESTS AT 516.700 MILION OZ.

NOV 14/WITH SILVER UP 41 CENTS TODAY; NO CHANGES IN SILVER INVENTORY AT THE SLV//INVENTORY RESTS AT 471.923 MILLION OZ//

NOV 11/WITH SILVER DOWN 2 CENTS TODAY: SMALL CHANGES IN SILVER INVENTORY AT THE SLV: A WITHDRAWAL OF 553,000 OZ FROM THE SLV///INVENTORY RESTS AT 471.923 MILLION OZ//

NOV 10/WITH SILVER UP 39 CENTS TODAY: SMALL CHANGES IN SILVER INVENTORY AT THE SLV; A DEPOSIT OF 368,000 OZ INTO THE SLV///INVENTORY RESTS AT 472.476 MILLION OZ//

NOV 9/WITH SILVER DOWN 10 CENTS: BIG CHANGES IN SILVER INVENTORY AT THE SLV/; A WITHDRAWAL OF 3.821 MILLION OZ FROM THE SLV//INVENTORY RESTS AT 472.108 MILLION OZ//

CLOSING INVENTORY 509.050 MILLION OZ//

PHYSICAL GOLD/SILVER STORIES

1:Peter Schiff 

Slow Pace Of Balance Sheet Reduction Calls Into Question Fed’s Commitment To Inflation Fight

THURSDAY, DEC 29, 2022 – 10:25 AM

Via SchiffGold.com,

Most people have focused on Federal Reserve interest rate hikes as it battles price inflation. But there is another element in the inflation fight most people ignore – balance sheet reduction.

It isn’t going well.

The December FOMC statement mentioned balance sheet reduction in passing.

The Committee will continue reducing its holdings of Treasury securities and agency debt and agency mortgage-backed securities, as described in the Plans for Reducing the Size of the Federal Reserve’s Balance Sheet that were issued in May.”

The problem with this statement is it isn’t following the plan described in May.

The plan called for $30 billion in US Treasuries and $17.5 billion in mortgage-backed securities to roll off the balance sheet in June, July and August. That would total $45 billion per month. In September, the Fed said it would increase the pace to $95 billion per month.

Given the plan, the Fed balance sheet should have dropped by $560 billion as of the end of December. According to the latest data, as of Dec. 19, the balance sheet had only shrunk by $401 billion.

That means unless there is a significant drop in the last week of the year, balance sheet reduction is nearly $160 billion behind the planned pace.

This raises a question: if the Fed is really committed to slaying inflation, why is it shrinking its balance sheet so slowly?

The question becomes more poignant when you realize that the quantitative tightening plan wasn’t particularly ambitious to begin with. At $95 billion per month, it would take 7.8 years for the Fed to shrink its balance sheet back to pre-pandemic levels.

And that’s how you slay inflation.

Historical Perspective

In the wake of the 2008 financial crisis, the Federal Reserve ran three rounds of quantitative easing, pushing the balance sheet from $8.98 billion to just over $4.5 trillion. The central bank tried to reduce the balance sheet in 2018, but quickly reversed course after the stock market crashed and the economy got wobbly in the fall of that year. At its low point, the balance sheet dipped just below $3.76 trillion.

The Fed had already returned to quantitative easing before the coronavirus, and the balance sheet was back above $4 trillion in October 2019. QE went on steroids during the pandemic, with the balance sheet peaking at $8.965 trillion on April 11, 2022.

In effect, between 2008 and 2022, the Fed injected nearly $8 trillion in money created out of thin air into the economy.

Coupled with artificially low interest rates, all of this money creation predictably drove the price inflation we’re seeing today. The problem is that rate cuts alone won’t unwind inflation. All of the new money created over the last decade-plus needs to be pulled out of the economy.

Since the Fed waded into its inflation fight, the balance sheet has only shrunk by a relatively tepid 4.5%.

This isn’t adequate.

In fact, the Fed’s quantitative tightening hasn’t reduced the money supply at all. While we have seen a few months of monetary contraction, M2 growth for 2022 is currently flatlined at zero. That’s certainly an improvement over the massive money supply expansion we saw during the pandemic, but it isn’t going to put the brakes on price inflation. It will just slow it down, which is exactly what we’re seeing in the CPI data.

But while the slowdown in money creation isn’t enough to bring inflation to the mythical 2% target, it is significant enough to pop a bubble economy addicted to easy money. As SchiffGold’s analyst put it, “The Fed may be confident in their rate hikes and the resiliency of the economy, but they are playing with serious fire. They have put the entire economy at serious risk of a major event as the liquidity has dried up extremely fast.”

[ZH: Perhaps this is the real reason why… US stock market cap is falling almost tick for tick with Reserve balances…]

The bottom line is that while the Fed talks a good game about its commitment to reining in inflation, its actions don’t line up with its rhetoric, especially when it comes to reducing the size of its bloated balance sheet.

And again – this calls into question the Fed’s commitment to fighting inflation. If the central bank truly viewed inflation as “public enemy No. 1” and believed the economy is strong enough to handle tighter monetary policy, why isn’t it aggressively reducing its balance sheet?

end

2 Lawrie Williams//Pam and Russ Martens/Jim Rickards/Mathew Piepenburg/Von Greyerz//Rickards:

END

3. Chris Powell of GATA provides to us very important physical commentaries//

An excellent commentary from Michael Howell of London’s Financial times

(Michael Howell/GATA)

Michael Howell: Is QE returning by stealth?

Submitted by admin on Wed, 2022-12-28 20:16Section: Daily Dispatches

By Michael Howell
Financial Times, London
Wednesday, December 28, 2022

https://www.ft.com/content/64b3d0b6-e0be-4e8c-9b20-c595428267d5

It has been a bleak year for many investors. Global investors have lost $23 trillion of wealth in housing and financial assets so far in 2022, according to my estimates. That is equivalent to 22% of global gross domestic product and uncomfortably exceeds the lesser $18 trillion of losses suffered in the 2008 financial crisis.

Hopefully though, next year will not be so bad for assets, because the cycle of global liquidity is bottoming out. Part of my reasoning is that quantitative easing programs by central banks to support markets are impossible to reverse quickly because the financial sector has become so dependent on easy liquidity. The very act of quantitative tightening creates systemic risks that demand more QE.

We track the fast-moving, global pool of liquidity — the volume of cash and credit shifting around financial markets. The impact of the ebb and flow of this pool, currently about $170 trillion, can be seen in the central bank programs to support markets through the Covid-19 pandemic — quantitative easing. The latter drove another “everything up” bubble through 2020-21. But as soon as policymakers hit the brakes in early 2022 and triggered a near-$10 trillion liquidity drop, asset markets collapsed.

We focus on liquidity because the nature of our financial system has changed. The markets no longer serve as pure capital-raising mechanisms. Rather they are capital-refinancing systems, largely dedicated to rolling over our staggering global debts of well over $300 trillion. This puts a premium on understanding collective balance sheet capacity to finance debt issues over analysis of the cost of capital.

We estimate that for every dollar raised in new finance, seven dollars of existing debts need to be rolled each year. Refinancing crises hit us more and more regularly. Hence the importance of liquidity.

So what now? 

According to our monitoring of liquidity data, we have just passed the point of maximum tightness. The two most important central banks driving the global liquidity cycle are the U.S. Federal Reserve and the People’s Bank of China. Think of the Fed as mainly controlling the tempo of financial markets, given the dominance of the dollar, whereas China’s large economic footprint gives the PBoC huge influence over the world business cycle. 

In short, the stock market’s price-earnings multiple is determined in Washington and its earnings in Beijing.

The Chinese market enjoyed a large jump in liquidity injections in November, led by the start of an easier monetary policy from the PBoC. Contrary to the consensus view, latest data also show the U.S. Federal Reserve adding back liquidity into dollar markets, despite its ongoing QT policy.

Admittedly, the Fed has reduced its holdings of U.S. Treasuries in seven of the past nine weeks as part of QT. But net liquidity provision, benchmarked by moves in the Fed’s “effective” balance sheet, has remarkably risen in six of these weeks. In fact, the Fed added an impressive $157 billion to U.S. money markets through its operations.

Looking ahead, we project a further pickup in global liquidity. China desperately needs to boost its lockdown-hit economy, so expect further policy stimulus in 2023. Two other favorable factors are the lower U.S. dollar and weaker oil prices.

We estimate that each percentage point fall in the dollar increases the take-up of cross-border loans and credit by a similar percentage amount. The U.S. currency is already down a hefty 9% from its recent peak. The fall in oil prices to below $80 a barrel should also help, reducing the amount of credit required to finance transactions.

But there could be more. The U.S. Fed plans to reduce its holdings of Treasury and government agency securities by $95 billion per month. But other items are likely to offset some of, perhaps even, all of this.

First, the $450 billion Treasury General Account, the U.S. government’s deposit account at the Fed, is likely to fall as bills are paid ahead of difficult upcoming debt ceiling negotiations. 

Second, the Fed’s $2.52 trillion “reverse repo” facility for providing short-term investment to parties such as money market funds could drop significantly. This is because there are hints that the Treasury will issue more bills, debt of less than one-year maturity, relative to bonds, which have longer terms.

Third, rising interest rates mean the Fed will pay out more on debt it has issued. This could amount to a whopping $200 billion over 2023. 

The September turmoil in the UK gilt market was a reminder of the risks of financial instability when liquidity is withdrawn. Mindful of such forces, could the Fed be reluctant to push liquidity down too much? 

One could argue that by winding back its portfolio of Treasuries (“official QT”) but allowing effective liquidity provision to rise (“unofficial QE”), the Fed is trying to have its cake and eat it!

Whichever, it surely shows that QT is harder to achieve in practice than in theory. Stealth QE may be back next year and make what looks to be a difficult year feel a tad better.

—–

The writer is managing director at Crossborder Capital and author of “Capital Wars: The Rise of Global Liquidity.”

end

Alasdair Macleod: Gold in 2023

Submitted by admin on Thu, 2022-12-29 11:04 Section: Daily Dispatches

By Alasdair Macleod
GoldMoney, Toronto
Thursday, December 29, 2022

This article is in two parts. In Part 1 it looks at how prospects for gold should be viewed from a monetary and economic perspective, pointing out that it is gold whose purchasing power is stable, and that of fiat currencies which is not.

Consequently, analysts who see gold as an investment producing a return in national currencies have made a fundamental error which will not be repeated in this article.

Part 2 covers geopolitical issues, including the failure of U.S. policies to contain Russia and China, and the consequences for the dollar. 

By analysing recent developments, including how Russia has secured its own currency, the Gulf Cooperation Council’s political migration from a fossil fuel-denying Western alliance to a rapidly industrialising Asia, and China’s plans to replace the petrodollar with a petro-yuan crystalising, we can see that the dollar’s hegemonic role will rapidly become redundant. 
With about $30 trillion tied up in dollars and dollar-denominated financial assets, foreigners are bound to become substantial sellers — even panicking at times.

The implications are very far-reaching. This article limits its scope to big-picture developments in prospect for 2023 but can be regarded as a basis for further debate. …

… For the remainder of the analysis:

https://www.goldmoney.com/research/gold-in-2023?gmrefcode=gata

* * *

GOLD/SILVER

/4.  OTHER PHYSICAL SILVER/GOLD COMMENTARIES

A must read….

The End of Western Rehypothecation- Pozsar Style

BY VBL

THURSDAY, DEC 29, 2022 – 8:58

Housekeeping/PSA:

This was written on December 26th for GoldFix subscribers and was unlocked because it may be too important to keep under wraps. This is parts 2 and 3 of a premium post. Part one was shared with ZeroHedge readers Dec 27th (link at bottom). Last night we read ZeroHedge’s 5800 word analysis and explanation of Pozsar’s Dec 27th missive on rehypothecation. We strongly recommend you read it after this (many GoldFix Founders are also ZH premium subscribers) Then we strongly recommend you subscribe if you want to stay anywhere near the curve as this unfolds more. We can’t sugar coat it. But we’ve been watching this unfold for years, and at some point it will accelerate greatly. That’s when someone will be needed to make sense of the moving parts quickly. We recommend you find someone soon. If not GoldFix or ZH, then someone who speaks your language. It’s no joke.- VBL

TL; DR

Put a fork in rehypothecation as a tool of financial leverage to generate outsized returns by G7 nations using BRICS resources. It’s done.

1. WHAT: is Zoltan’s Gold-mageddon
2. WHY: is it the death of rehypothecation
3. HOW: Will futures markets react
4. WHAT-IF: It can be stopped

 

Intro

Authored by Goldfix

Below is the playbook for the most likely way the end of Western rehypothecation happens. The writing may get a little wonky as we alternate between academic & trading mindsets, and the mechanisms can be debated, but this is largely how it will happen. When it is done, whoever is holding the bag; be it bank, nation, economic model, or citizenry, will almost certainly collapse economically. Perhaps slowly like frogs in pots, or perhaps all at once. 

Anyway..here we go

Pozsar’s Gold-mageddon Math

Here is Pozsar’s hypothetical situation restated. He muses out-loud what would happen if Russia first accepted Oil’s peg at $60. Russia, in his scenario, reciprocates by pegging 1bb oil at 1/2 gram of gold which currently is equivalent to $30. The economics of the Oil/Gold/Dollar triad would look like this (where g=grams; bb=barrels)

1. IF: 1bb= $60 pegged ( If x=y)
2. AND: 1bb = 1/2g pegged (And x=z)
3. WHERE: gold/dollars are not pegged to each other.
4. THEN: 1/2g = $60 given free exchange-ability. (Then y=z)

Why?

This whole thing starts out as: Nations need energy for economic growth. Oil is, on balance, currently the most desirable energy source globally. These nations seek to exchange something for oil their counterparty will accept as a Standard of Trade. A Standard of Trade is something universally accepted for transactions with other parties.

Russia, in Pozsar’s example would be telling the world it will take Gold as payment for Oil, because (and this is key) some other nation will accept that same Gold as payment from Russia to buy stuff too. Gold thus becomes a standardized settlement medium for three economically interdependent nations.

Russia would make the USD and Gold compete as mediums of exchange. You can now buy Oil for either $60 or 0.50gram gold. The MOE you use to buy oil is the one you simultaneously have the most of and the least use for in other economic trade7

The End of Rehypothecation…

There are many ways to envision how this plays out in a free market. The arbitrage trade, the substitution effect, Gresham’s law etc. For this note, as long as buyers have a choice to pay for oil with either $60 or 0.50g gold; be assured that either the price of Gold goes up in dollars or the price of dollars goes down in Gold.

If however, some external force (restraint of trade, sanctions,war etc) prevents the new Y=Z equilibrium from establishing, then ownership of the three resources (Oil, USD, and Gold) as well as any other asset that uses energy as a cost input will rebalance instead. Price fixing (via not permitting Gold swaps for USD) eventually creates scarcity.

Ultimately it all hearkens back to a February post of his about the coming shortage of collateral. Which he was right about.

Back then he said , “A crisis is unfolding. A crisis of commodities. Commodities are collateral, and collateral is money…” –source. He hadn’t spoken of Gold since that February post. But in this current note, he is sounding the collateral alarm again but for Gold.

The 2 for 1 Gold/oil swap is hyperbole even if Zoltan says it isn’t. A move like that all at once would be economic suicide for Russia and likely start WW3. But it is instructive to know the worst case scenario when contemplating a more likely scenario. Zoltan’s scenario is completely reasonable at different price points.

What’s more, it is actually happening. Ghana has a buyer of Gold for Fuel. That buyer in turn must have someone who will exchange Gold for another good they want. Ghana meanwhile doesn’t have to sell CEDI for USD anymore. Gold up, CEDI up, USD down.

We think you will agree, dialing down Zoltan’s Gold-mageddon scenario is not much better for rehypothecated western bank shorts, even at current market prices if things like what just happened with Ghana continue.

Next we move from supply/demand economics to briefly recap the rationale for the rehypothecation of Gold and other assets.

Banking’s Rehypothecation Crisis

If Russia or another country were to finalize its energy dealings with Gold as settlement medium even at current prices… well… that’s a whole lot of dollars people won’t be needing to use, and a whole lot more Gold needed to be on hand. This would happen even if Russia priced oil to be bought using 1 full gram of gold per barrel.

In other words, there would likely be a crisis of good Gold collateral for open futures contracts. Rehypothecation is all about multiple claims on limited collateral. And as we saw in February, Pozsar is all about collateral.

Which brings us back to his recent statement:

[B]anks have been managing their paper gold books with one assumption, which is that [Nation] states would ensure gold wouldn’t come back as a settlement medium.

Remember, he is telling us banks use gold rehypothecation as a profit center predicated on the assumption by governments, gold would never come back as a medium of exchange for settlement between countries8. The monetary market-structure needed to support fiat made sure of it.

But Gold is coming back as an MOE. That probably makes banks with paper gold risk a little nervous.

Golden Sardines are for Trading Only

Because of the tacit government bargain between nation-states and banks; Bullion dealers were comfortable rehypothecating gold (and silver) due to permanent fiat hegemony. They believed Gold would not be used as a final settlement medium in business ever again. Thus, it would not ever be needed for physical delivery enmasse. Gold had become the proverbial sardines: traded but never eaten9. Yet here we are with Hungarian economists describing the end of banking if gold competes with the USD as settlement medium.

If a crisis like the one Pozsar describes were to occur a death knell would sound for any bank with rehypothecated Gold shorts. Multiple claims on Bullion would come in as available collateral shrank. The price of Gold would skyrocket due to physical demand earmarked to close oil deals10 with Brics producers.

Paper gold contracts would not cut it in a trust-less world. Deferred delivery of gold would be extremely expensive accelerating the dollar’s demise. Ask the Silver producers who got squeezed by Warren Buffet11.

The banks could conceivably be destroyed, if that worst-case were to happen in Gold12.  Somebody wants to actually use their sardines now. What happens when futures sardines are inedible but spot sardines are fine?

LME NICKEL AS EXAMPLE

If this all doesn’t quite hit home yet, think of it this way. Why did LME Nickel blow up its clients? A lack of good collateral and too many open shorts was the reason for us. In essence a short squeeze pure and simple. but a huge one. Rehypothecated shorts got killed. This is what would happen to gold, but much, much worse if permitted to.

A couple commodity firms wouldn’t be panic-buying nickel to cover for a short client if that happened. The world would be demanding its physical gold back. The exchanges would be treated like banks being run on. Shutting them would implode the economy. Leaving them open and making delivery could bankrupt the country. The giant sucking sound would be what Gold remained in the West going East. What would that look like in the futures markets?

Now lets take a look at how the futures markets would digest all this if it happened.

How it Could Manifest if it Actually Happened

The western Gold futures curve would go backwardated. That is unheard of for any length of time in Gold. Money should never backwardate. But that is what happens when governments throttle it and demote it to collectible status. The shit then will truly hit the fan. Bankers understand this.

This is what Mercantilistic behavior as reaction to collapsing global markets causes. A collateral crisis that morphs into natural resource war…

Backwardation in money is economic death for any country continuing to use that asset as money by depletion of that asset, or economic deflation because noone will loan13 money out for term.

True modern (financializable) money cannot backwardate, ever14. The future value of money is money plus money. That job is handled by interest rates. But Gold would backwardate simply because you cannot pay off someone with dollars to defer their delivery of gold. Nobody wants the dollars. They want the gold. This is where the fallacy of the gold/dollar correlation lies. As long as people want Gold priced in dollars, then gold is not money. To the extent something does backwardate, that means it is not fully monetized. If gold bacwardated during this crisis (it would) while still being unmonetized in the west (it wouldn’t be) that would be the death of the global economy, and possibly entail World War 3.

Killing rehypothecation by holding commodities in reserve for use or BRICsCOIN backing use creates scarcity in the West. Some would say artificial.
We would say the financial leverage from decades of fiat and rehypothecation would be unwinding. There would still be plenty of natural resources, but the East would not be letting us leverage them anymore.
The modern standard of living  will get crushed. They will suffer immensely as well. But they know this already.

Finally, what can the west do to ameliorate the effects of the above if it happened.

 

How It Could End: Fix the Money

One solution to Gold backwardation if it persisted would be the immediate 100% remonetizaton of all Gold globally. Confiscation would ensue in varying forms. The Comex and the LBMA would shut down. Force majeure would be declared. If that happened, a global depression could conceivably set-in almost overnight. Mercantilism would go parabolic and whole countries would close as they re-balanced their books.

Will it happen? It is already been happening at a glacial pace since the GFC. One thing that makes it not happen would entail complete separation of East and West trade and involve scarcity on both sides of the wall and a black market that slowly sucked the lifeblood out of the worst run economies.

KILLING OIL

The other way can be an alternative energy source that obviates Oil. Replacing oil means collapse of natural resource rich countries and their hopes for egalitarian currencies. Whoever controls that new energy decides what the money is. If the west cant save the petrodollar from the petroyuan, then it will try to kill oil to save the dollar. That is what renewable energy  is all about at core. Western Financial hegemony ( inside money) over Eastern Marxist Materialistic upstart (outside money)

There are other far more dangerous remedies we imagine. One is an economic race to the bottom hoping Russia/China have a civil war before we do. China does not want a destabilized Nuclear power on its border. 

IT’S ALREADY HAPPENING

We think if you connect the dots of what has happened these last few years between: the implementation of Basel 3, JPM’s Gold risk being broken out, EU Bankers saying they’d reprice Gold if they had to, and Oil for Gold trades going down between Russia, China, and others; you will see a pattern of slow remonetization of Gold as money. May be it was too slow, and that is what has the Brics up in arms now.

This is why, when all is said and done, even if Russia gets blown out of the water, money will never be the same again. The East has made it clear their money is not valued objectively, and until it is, they want their natural resource contributions of the economic pie to have more weight.

The West, in turn, even if it wins this Russian war, will do so while incurring much economic pain. They will compromise to make sure it doesn’t happen again.

OUTRO: GOLD AND SILVER AS MONETARY COLLATERAL WILL HAPPEN

Which is why, even in the best case scenario, money will never be the same again.

Bretton Woods 2 crumbled when the G7 countries seized Russia’s foreign exchange reserves. Keeping money inside financial institutions like the IMF was considered risk free. That is clearly no longer the case. Bretton Woods 3 will have to fix that.

“We are witnessing the birth of Bretton Woods III – a new world (monetary) order centered around commodity-based currencies in the East that will likely weaken the Eurodollar system and also contribute to inflationary forces in the West.” – March 2022

We completely believe after this war is over, money will never be the same regardless of who wins. Compromises will be made on both sides. Gold and Silver being remonetized might just be the booby prize for hell on earth

One final note: This kills democracy too. As fallout from division and acrimony and identitarian politics, the West won’t be able to get its own people to toe a patriotic line (Hi Klaus.) to stand against tyranny. They will increasingly use stimmies and sticks for compliance.  And so tyranny will grow on our side of the wall to get compliance. Therefore as Capitalism with Asiatic principles grows, Capitalism with democratic principles dies.

About the Author: VBL is a 30 year professional trader and expert in derivatives arbitrage and market structure. He is currently Professor of MBA Finance and editor of GoldFix.

Read all three parts Here

END

‘The Role Of Gold May Be Changing’ – Central Banks Panic-Buy Precious Metals In 2022

THURSDAY, DEC 29, 2022 – 03:40 PM

One month ago, we sparked a frenzy across precious metals circles when we reported that a “mystery” buyer had bought some 300 tons of gold, roughly three quarters of what would be a record 399 tons of central bank gold purchases in the third quarter.

Shortly after that, the mystery was solved as the PBOC officially reported an increase in its gold reserves for the first time in more than three years, confirming that the world’s most populous country was indeed the mystery buyer in the bullion market. The gold industry says Chinese buying is almost certainly higher.

Mark Bristow, chief executive of Barrick Gold, the world’s second-largest gold miner, said China had bought tonnes of gold around the high 200s mark, based on his discussions with numerous sources.

As we previously noted, there is definitely a bid below gold as if the historical relationship with real yields held, prices for the precious metal would be considerably lower (or perhaps it’s as simple as gold reflecting expectations of a dramatic easing of central bank policies at some point in the near future that the bankers themselves are loathed to admit)…

And now the mainstream media is recognizing the shift, as The FT reports today, central banks are scooping up gold at the fastest pace since 1967, with analysts pinning China and Russia as big buyers in an indication that some nations are keen to diversify their reserves away from the dollar.

The flight of central banks to gold “would suggest the geopolitical backdrop is one of mistrust, doubt and uncertainty” after the US and its allies froze Russia’s dollar reserves, said Adrian Ash, head of research at BullionVault, a gold marketplace.

Nicky Shiels, metals strategist at MKS PAMP, a precious metals trading company, says western nations’ actions (sanctions and frozen assets) have prompted nations outside the west to ask: 

“Should we have exposure to so many dollars when the US and western governments can confiscate that at any time?”

Carsten Menke, head of next generation research at Julius Baer, reckons the purchases from Russia and China indicate a growing reluctance for countries to rely on the greenback.

“The message these central banks are sending by putting a larger share of their reserves in gold is that they don’t want to be reliant on the US dollar as their main reserve asset,” Menke said.

While central bank buying rarely drives sustainable gold rallies, it can provide an important pillar of support when prices fall. The precious metal has been under pressure this year from the Federal Reserve’s aggressive monetary tightening, though it has held up relatively well against moves in the dollar and Treasury yields.

“As deglobalisation accelerates, the non-G-10 nations are expected to ‘re-commoditize’ and ramp up gold holdings,” said Nicky Shiels.

Some in the industry speculate Middle Eastern governments are using fossil fuel export revenues to buy gold, most likely through sovereign wealth funds.

As Zoltan Pozsar wrote in a must-read note earlier this month, the role of gold may be changing as first Russia, then other countries (China) seek to force out the petrodollar and replace it with petrogold, a move which would finally lead to substantial price upside for the yellow metal which has gone nowhere in the past 2 years.

Zoltan is not alone as Saxo Bank’s Ole S. Hansen suggested in his outrageous projections this year that “2023 is the year that the market finally discovers that inflation is set to remain ablaze for the foreseeable future.”

In 2023, the hardest of currencies receives a further blast of support from three directions.

• First, the geopolitical backdrop of an increasing war economy mentality of self reliance and minimizing holdings of foreign FX reserves, preferring gold.
• Second, the massive investment in new national security priorities, including energy sources, the energy transition, and supply chains.
• Third, rising global liquidity as policy makers move to avoid a debacle in debt markets as a mild real growth recession (certainly not in nominal prices, however!) takes hold.

Gold slices through the double top near USD 2,075 as if it wasn’t there and hurtles to at least USD 3,000 next year. 

And finally, this is not a short-term move, as Bernard Dahdah, senior commodities analyst at Natixis, the French investment bank, said deglobalisation and geopolitical tensions meant the drive by central banks outside of the west to diversify away from the US dollar was “a trend that won’t change for a decade at least”.

5. Commodity commentaries//. 

END

6/CRYPTOCURRENCIES/BITCOIN ETC

END

1. YOUR EARLY CURRENCY/GOLD AND SILVER PRICING/ASIAN AND EUROPEAN BOURSE MOVEMENTS/AND INTEREST RATE SETTINGS//THURSDAY MORNING.7:30 AM

ONSHORE YUAN: UP TO  6.9631

OFFSHORE YUAN: 6.9817

SHANGHAI CLOSED DOWN 13.70 PTS OR  0.44%

HANG SENG CLOSED DOWN 246.83 PR 0.84%  

2. Nikkei closed DOWN  246.83  PTS OR 0.94%

3. Europe stocks   SO FAR:  MOSTLY GREEN

USA dollar INDEX DOWN TO  103.93 Euro RISES TO 106.52 UP 23 BASIS PTS

3b Japan 10 YR bond yield: FALLS TO. +.440!!!(Japan buying 100% of bond issuance)/Japanese yen vs usa cross now at 133.54/JAPANESE YEN RISING AS WELL AS LONG TERM 10  YR. YIELDS RISING //EVENTUALLY THIS WILL BREAK THE JAPANESE CENTRAL BANK.

3c Nikkei now  ABOVE 17,000

3d USA/Yen rate now well ABOVE the important 120 barrier this morning

3e Gold DOWN /JAPANESE Yen DOWN CHINESE YUAN:   DOWN-//  OFF- SHORE: DOWN

3f Japan is to buy the 9 TRILLION YEN’S worth of BONDS. Japan’s GDP equals 5 trillion usa

Japan to buy 100% of all new Japanese debt and NOW they will have OVER 50% of all Japanese debt. 

3g Oil DOWN for WTI and DOWN FOR Brent this morning

3h European bond buying continues to push yields lower on all fronts in the EMU. German 10yr bund UP TO +2.4995%***/Italian 10 Yr bond yield RISES to 4.611%*** /SPAIN 10 YR BOND YIELD RISES TO 3.567…** DANGEROUS//

3i Greek 10 year bond yield RISES TO 4.543//

3j Gold at $1808.05//silver at: 23.92  7 am est) SILVER NEXT RESISTANCE LEVEL AT $30.00

3k USA vs Russian rouble;// Russian rouble UP 0  AND 69/100        roubles/dollar; ROUBLE AT 71.49//

3m oil into the 78 dollar handle for WTI and  83 handle for Brent/

3n Higher foreign deposits out of China sees huge risk of outflows and a currency depreciation. This can spell financial disaster for the rest of the world/

JAPAN ON JAN 29.2016 CONTINUES NIRP. THIS MORNING RAISES AMOUNT OF BONDS THAT THEY WILL PURCHASE UP TO .5% ON THE 10 YR BOND///YEN TRADES TO 133.54 

30 SNB (Swiss National Bank) still intervening again in the markets driving down the FRANC. It is not working: USA/SF this 0.9238– as the Swiss Franc is still rising against most currencies. Euro vs SF 0.9841 well above the floor set by the Swiss Finance Minister. Thomas Jordan, chief of the Swiss National Bank continues to purchase euros trying to lower value of the Swiss Franc.

USA 10 YR BOND YIELD: 3.875% DOWN 1 BASIS PTS…GETTING DANGEROUS

USA 30 YR BOND YIELD: 3.972% DOWN 1 BASIS PTS//

USA DOLLAR VS TURKISH LIRA: 18,72…

GREAT BRITAIN/10 YEAR YIELD: 3.7315 % UP 8 BASIS PTS

end

i.b  Overnight:  Newsquawk and Zero hedge:

 FIRST, ZEROHEDGE (PRE USA OPENING// MORNING

Futures Rebound On Tech Rally Despite China Covid Surge Fears

THURSDAY, DEC 29, 2022 – 08:16 AM

US index futures rebounded on Thursday from another painful selloff the day earlier, as technology shares rallied on the second to last trading day of what’s been a brutal year for financial markets, even as growing concerns over a surge in China’s Covid cases snuffed optimism over the nation’s reopening of its border. At 7:45am S&P futures traded 0.4% higher to 3,823 while Nasdaq 100 futures rose 0.6% to 10,837 following gains for Asian tech stocks earlier amid signs China is easing a regulatory crackdown. Treasuries were steady and the Bloomberg dollar index declined.

In premarket trading, Tesla climbed more than 3% in, with tech giants including Amazon.com Inc. and Netflix Inc. also among the biggest gainers. Tesla rose after Morgan Stanley analyst Adam Jonas said a de-rating in the electric vehicle company’s stock has created an opportunity, and even though Jonas lowered his price target to $250 from $330, he stuck to an overweight rating. Among other EV stocks: Rivian Automotive +2.6%, Lucid Group +2.8%, Hyzon Motors +6.4%, Cenntro Electric Group +8.1%, Mullen Automotive +7.8%. Jonas wrote that his new target reflects “lower pricing and lower valuation of adjacent businesses;” and expects 2023 will be “a ‘reset’ year for the EV market, where the last 2 years of demand exceeding supply will be substantially inverted to supply exceeding demand.”

And speaking of Tesla a quick look at yesterday’s record, blowout put-to-call ratio suggests that much of the recent plunge in TSLA stock may have been due to a surge in 0DTE put buying on TSLA which has helped send the stock tumbling in an illiquid environment as the negative gamma forced dealers to short the stock the more it slumped.

Here are some other notable premarket movers:

• Getaround rises 3.3% as the stock was initiated with an overweight rating and $1.50 PT at Piper Sandler, with the broker saying the platform looks well-positioned to provide its peer- to-peer car-sharing marketplace.
• Gaotu Techedu falls 4.6% in US premarket trading after China said it will tighten oversight of private tutors that offer non-curricular services to primary and middle school students, including rules on fee charges and operating time.
• Keep an eye on Skechers shares after it was started with a neutral rating and $42 PT at Piper Sandler, which says the opportunities and challenges the footwear firm faces look balanced and mean its current valuation is fair.

Global equities have lost a fifth of their value in 2022, almost $20 trillion in market cap, the largest decline since 2008 on an annual basis, and an index of global bonds has slumped 16% amid sticky inflation and rising interest rates.

Thursday’s tech rally was a small ray of light as the year draws to a close with investors again focused on risks arising from the the spread of Covid-19. The US said it would require inbound airline passengers from China to show a negative Covid-19 test prior to entry. In Italy, health officials said they would test arrivals from China after almost half of passengers on two flights from China to Milan were found to have the virus.

Amid fears that China’s aggressive, accelerated reopening may lead to another global wave of covid infections, China’s CDC top epidemiologist Wu Zunyou said that covid outbreaks have peaked in Beijing, Tianjin and Chengdu, though the situation in Shanghai, Chongqing, Anhui, Hubei and Hunan remains serious. He added that the virus is still spreading fast in Henan, Jilin and Fujian provinces, and warned of the disease spreading during Lunar New Year, with many expected to travel around the holiday. Separately, Liang Wannian, China’s senior official overseeing epidemic response, says the country is strengthening the monitoring of the Covid variant and will report to the World Health Organization if it discovers any new variant.

Hong Kong removed limits on gatherings and testing for travelers in a further unwinding of its last major Covid rules, offering a boost to the global economy but sparking concerns it would amplify inflation pressures and prompt US policy makers to maintain tight monetary settings.

“Investors are going into 2023 with a cautious mindset, prepared for more rate hikes, and expecting recessions around the globe.” said Craig Erlam, a senior market analyst at Oanda Europe Ltd. “And then there’s China and its u-turn on Covid prevention. It’s been quite the shift from fighting every case to living with the virus and that creates enormous uncertainty for the start of the year.”

Going back to markets, the Stoxx Europe 600 index erased losses to trade little changed, with gains for technology stocks offsetting declines for retail and consumer-focused shares. The Stoxx 600 index was flat after erasing a drop of 0.6%. The gauge, which is down 12% this year, posted declines earlier in the session, as US and Italy joined an increasing number of nations requiring Covid tests for travelers from China. European airline stocks dropped on, leading the Stoxx 600 Travel & Leisure Index lower, amid concerns over the spread of Covid-19 from China. Long-haul carriers Deutsche Lufthansa -4.1%, IAG -1.7%, Air France-KLM -1.3%.

Investors are worried about any potential emergence of a new variant of the virus which might bring restrictions back onto the table and “hammer growth,” Ipek Ozkardeskaya, senior analyst at Swissquote Bank.

Earlier in the session, Asian stocks declined, heading for their worst annual loss since the 2008 financial crisis, as growing concerns over a surge in China’s Covid cases snuffed optimism over the nation’s reopening of its border.  The MSCI Asia Pacific Index dropped as much as 1.1%, pushing its annual slump to about 20% in the final trading week of 2022. Tech stocks including Alibaba and Samsung Electronics were among the biggest individual drags on the benchmark. South Korea’s Kospi was the worst performer with a near 2% slump, while gauges in Hong Kong also underperformed. 

“Investors are starting to pay more attention to the spreading virus given that the pandemic could set back the pace of economic recovery in 2023,” said Jun Rong Yeap, a market strategist at IG Asia. “Investors may have prematurely priced in that the worst was over.”  Tencent, Asia’s biggest social media and gaming company, was the best performer on the Hang Seng Tech Index after China approved its new game titles in the latest sign Beijing is easing up crackdowns on the sector.  

Japanese stocks declined for a second day, following US peers lower as investors continued to worry about the spread of Covid-19 on China’s reopening. The Topix Index fell 0.7% to 1,895.27 as of 3 p.m. Tokyo time, while the Nikkei declined 0.9% to 26,093.67. Out of 2,162 stocks in the index, 1,231 rose and 833 fell, while 98 were unchanged. “The rise in Covid-19 infections in China could cause supply chain problems in the short term, which could lead to inflationary concerns,” said Tomo Kinoshita, a global market strategist at Invesco Asset Management. “Japanese stocks declined less than the US or Europe as China’s reopening has some positive effects on Japanese companies that are exporters.”

Australian stocks dropped to a seven-week low; the S&P/ASX 200 index falling 0.9% to close at 7,020.10, marking a third straight session of declines. The benchmark settled at its lowest since Nov. 10. Energy stocks led sector losses on weaker oil prices. Real estate shares trading ex-dividend also weighed. In New Zealand, the S&P/NZX 50 index was little changed at 11,538.45

In FX, the US dollar fell against most Group-of-10 currencies while Treasuries rallied as investors monitored the spread of Covid-19 within and from China. The Japanese yen bounced after two days of losses. US employment data in focus later. The yen led Group-of-10 currency gains after performing the worst on Tuesday and Wednesday. USD/JPY fell as much as 0.7% to 133.47, the biggest drop in more than a week. Swiss franc is the other outperformer amid concern over the spread of coronavirus, with the US and Italy among countries requiring Covid tests for travelers from China. The Bloomberg Dollar Spot Index declined 0.3%, with the greenback only higher against some risk-sensitive currencies including the Australian dollar and Norway’s krone. Traders will be watching data on US initial jobless claims later Thursday for more clues on the Federal Reserve’s policy path.

In rates, Treasury yields were mixed in early US trading with the curve modestly flatter as the short end cheapens by ~1bp. The 10-year TSY is lower by 1bp at 3.873%, but remains near the highest since mid-November and just above 50-DMA level; most euro-zone 10-year yields are higher ~1.5bp on the day; UK yields are leading the way higher with 10-year up 4bps. Treasury market was firmer overnight until a selloff in UK gilts dented global bond market sentiment. Final coupon auction cycle of the year concludes with $35b 7-year note sale at 1pm New York time; Wednesday’s 5-year saw a modest tail, after cheapening from session highs.  

Elsewhere in markets, oil dipped amid thin liquidity as investors weighed the fallout from a Russian ban on exports to buyers that adhere to a price cap.

Looking at today’s calendar, it’s a thin docket with just initial (exp. 225K) and continuing claims (exp. 1.690MM) on deck.

Market Snapshot

• S&P 500 futures up 0.3% to 3,820.00
• STOXX Europe 600 little changed at 427.43
• MXAP down 0.6% to 154.83
• MXAPJ down 0.7% to 503.83
• Nikkei down 0.9% to 26,093.67
• Topix down 0.7% to 1,895.27
• Hang Seng Index down 0.8% to 19,741.14
• Shanghai Composite down 0.4% to 3,073.70
• Sensex up 0.3% to 61,097.06
• Australia S&P/ASX 200 down 0.9% to 7,020.06
• Kospi down 1.9% to 2,236.40
• Brent Futures down 2.0% to $81.59/bbl
• Gold spot up 0.3% to $1,810.19
• U.S. Dollar Index down 0.22% to 104.23
• German 10Y yield little changed at 2.48%
• Euro up 0.3% to $1.0639
• Brent Futures down 2.0% to $81.59/bbl

Top Overnight News from Bloomberg

• The US and Italy joined an increasing number of nations requiring Covid tests for travelers from China, with concerns mounting over the risk of any new variants emerging from the surge in infections in the country of 1.4 billion
• Covid outbreaks have peaked in Beijing, Tianjin and Chengdu, though the situation in Shanghai, Chongqing, Anhui, Hubei and Hunan remains serious, China’s CDC top epidemiologist Wu Zunyou says in a briefing
• Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said Moscow won’t enter into negotiations with Ukraine to end the war, even after suffering a series of battlefield setbacks
• Goldman Sachs Group Inc. is working on a fresh round of job cuts that will be unveiled in a matter of weeks, Chief Executive Officer David Solomon said in his traditional year-end message to staff
• The Bank of Japan announced two additional rounds of unscheduled bond-purchase operations, fighting back against traders betting it will further relax its yield-curve control policy

US Event Calendar

• 08:30: Dec. Continuing Claims, est. 1.69m, prior 1.67m
• 08:30: Dec. Initial Jobless Claims, est. 225,000, prior 216,000

AND NOW NEWSQUAWK (EUROPE/REPORT)

off this week

1.c THURSDAY/  WEDNESDAY  NIGHT

SHANGHAI CLOSED DOWN 13.70 PTS OR 0.44%   //Hang Sang CLOSED DOWN 157.77 PTS OR 0.79%     /The Nikkei closed DOWN 246.83 OR 0.84%          //Australia’s all ordinaries CLOSED DOWN .89%   /Chinese yuan (ONSHORE) closed UP TO 6.9631//OFFSHORE CHINESE YUAN UP TO 6.9820//    /Oil DOWN TO 78.17 dollars per barrel for WTI and BRENT AT 83.85    / Stocks in Europe OPENED MOSTLY GREEN         ONSHORE YUAN TRADING ABOVE LEVEL OF OFFSHORE YUAN/ONSHORE YUAN  TRADING STRONGER AGAINST US DOLLAR/OFFSHORE STRONGER

2 a./NORTH KOREA/ SOUTH KOREA/

///NORTH KOREA/SOUTH KOREA

end

2B JAPAN

end

3c CHINA /

CHINA/ECONOMY

China’s employment outlook and income confidence hits record lows

(zerohedge)

China’s Employment Outlook & Income Confidence Hit Record Lows

WEDNESDAY, DEC 28, 2022 – 10:25 PM

As the economic slump grew deeper this year, Chinese people’s trust in the labor market, their wages, and their interest in purchasing homes all plummeted to record low levels, a recent survey shows. 

As Hannah Ng reports at The Epoch Times, The People’s Bank of China’s Employment Sentiment Index, representing residents’ prospects for jobs, fell to 33.1 in the fourth quarter of 2022, down from 35.4 in the prior quarter, according to Bloomberg.

It is the lowest figure since the data began to be collected back in 2010. Figures under 50 signify a contraction in the industry.

Meanwhile, the Income Confidence Index—signifying the outlook for income in the next three months, saw a decline to 44.4 compared to 47 in the third quarter. 

The number indicates the lowest number since 2001, according to the quarterly survey of 20,000 depositors nationwide, released on Dec 27.

The survey results were among the first indicators of business sentiment in the world’s second-largest economy after China’s sudden relaxation of strict pandemic containment measures on Dec. 7 triggered a still-growing wave of COVID-19 cases.

Record-Low Business Confidence

The bleak sentiments of China’s residents came as the country’s private sector—its biggest source of employment—has been plagued by business interruptions due to COVID-19 policies and financing difficulties.

China’s stringent zero-COVID measures disrupted business and confined millions of people to their homes for weeks and sometimes months at a time.

China’s Business Confidence index fell to 48.1 in December from 51.8 in November, according to the World Economics’ survey of sales managers at over 2,300 companies, conducted Dec. 1–16. 

The figure was the lowest since the data began to be documented in 2013.

The study found that the manufacturing and service sectors’ sales managers’ indices both fell below 50 in December, indicating a substantial decline in company activity.

“The percentage of companies that claim to be currently negatively impacted by COVID has risen to a survey high, with more than half of all respondents now suggesting their operations are being harmed in one way or another,” the study reads.

“Many small businesses have run out of liquidity, especially restaurants, gyms, hotels, and other city services,” said Dan Wang, chief economist at Hang Seng Bank China.

Housing Market Confidence Declines

Housing market confidence also continued its downward trend in the last quarter of 2022, survey data showed, despite Beijing’s economic stimulus measures.

Only 14 percent of respondents to the central bank survey anticipated an increase in property prices in the following quarter. That represents a new low in the data, which goes back to 2010. 

Only 16 percent of respondents stated they intended to buy a property in the following three months, compared to 17.1 percent in the previous quarter. According to the study, nearly 62 percent, up from 58 percent, claimed they were saving more money.

Ongoing Real Estate Crisis

The low expectations for the property market persisted despite recent stimulus measures launched by Beijing to boost the sector.

On the real estate front, the CCP introduced a slew of policy-loosening measures to support developers.

In November, China’s six largest state-owned banks came out to offer more than 925 billion yuan ($130 billion) in credit support to property developers. The move was an attempt to stop the spread of financial troubles, amidst a continued liquidity crunch in the country’s property sector. China Vanke Co., Midea Real Estate Holding, Country Garden Holding, and China Overseas Land and Investment were some of the developer beneficiaries.

China’s central bank and its banking regulator released a joint policy document on Nov. 24, outlining ways the country’s financial institutions should set expectations on real estate transactions, including down payment ratios and interest rate boundaries to support the real estate sector.

However, these support measures are unlikely to alter the negative trajectory of China’s real estate market.

In 2021, China witnessed the defaults of some giant property names including China Evergrande Group, Sunac China Holdings, and China Resources Land.

Chinese developers left millions of presold housing units unfinished due to liquidity problems. As a result, many Chinese banks are facing a mortgage payment halt or “mortgage strike”—where homebuyers refuse to pay mortgages unless the developers resume construction.

S&P Global estimated that 2.4 trillion yuan (about $355 billion) of mortgages could be at risk of being unpaid. That amounts to around 6.5 percent of all outstanding mortgages.

The rating agency also projects that home sales in China could drop as much as 33 percent this year amid the mortgage strike, further squeezing the liquidity of distressed developers and leading to more defaults, Bloomberg reported.

END

4/EUROPEAN AFFAIRS/UK AFFAIRS//

UK

Huge number of crimes unsolved in England. Not a way to run a country!

(Chris Summers/EpochTimes)

British Police Have Failed To Solve 1,145,254 Thefts & Burglaries: Labour

THURSDAY, DEC 29, 2022 – 04:15 AM

Authored by Chris Summers via The Epoch Times,

Police forces in England and Wales were unable to solve 1,145,254 thefts and burglaries in the year ending in June 2022, according to an analysis by the Labour Party.

The shadow home secretary, Yvette Cooper, said domestic burglaries cost victims an average of £1,400 and helped to drive up insurance premiums for everyone.

She told The Telegraph: “This is disgraceful. Theft and burglary are awful crimes and should be properly investigated, not just left for the victims to make an insurance claim.”

‘No Plan’

Criticising Home Secretary Suella Braverman, Cooper said: “The Home Secretary has no plan to turn this around.”

But the former leader of the Conservative Party, Sir Iain Duncan Smith, said: “Our constituents are complaining endlessly that nobody turns up to deal with burglaries—they just say here’s your crime number, claim your insurance.

“The problem is that the leadership of the police have succumbed to politically correct bullying on this to the extent that the last thing on their priority list seems to be dealing with crime,” he added.

Home Secretary Suella Braverman making a statement to MPs in the House of Commons, London, on Dec. 14, 2022. (House of Commons/PA Media)

Duncan Smith said the police were “overstretched” and were, “increasingly having to take on jobs that social services should be doing.”

He added: “The police service should be the police force and should be there to enforce the law. People want them to investigate crime.”

In the 12 months between July 2021 and June 2022 police forces in England and Wales closed their investigations into 1,145,254 thefts and burglaries, usually because they were unable to find any evidence to charge a suspect.

That amounts to 3,000 crimes every day.

Police forces have been criticised in the past for failing to send officers to do even rudimentary investigations following house burglaries.

According to the National Police Chiefs Council (NPCC), while some UK police forces already have a policy of attending all home burglaries, others only attend “where it has been established that there are evidential lines of enquiry or where victims are vulnerable or elderly.”

Earlier this year the Metropolitan Police Commissioner, Sir Mark Rowley, told the BBC the proportion of reported burglaries attended by an officer from the force had fallen to 50 percent.

In October, the chairman of the NPCC, Martin Hewitt, promised officers would start attending every residential burglary in an attempt to restore public confidence in the police.

A CCTV still from a robbery in Keston, UK, in an undated photo. (Metropolitan Police)

Hewitt’s comments followed a speech by Braverman in which she urged police forces to focus on fighting real crimes rather than making “symbolic gestures.”

In an open letter dated Sept. 23, Braverman said she expected the police to cut homicide, serious violence, and neighbourhood crime by 20 percent.

In her Conservative Party conference speech on Oct. 4, Braverman praised forces which were already promising to visit the scene of every burglary and said, “The law-abiding majority expect every force to investigate every neighbourhood crime—and so do I.”

Crime and policing is expected to be a major issue during the next general election, which could come as early as next year but is more likely to take place in 2024.

The leader of the opposition Labour Party, Sir Keir Starmer, is a former Director of Public Prosecutions.

Rishi Sunak took over as prime minister in October.

The pair went to head during the summer’s Conservative Party leadership campaign, during which Sunak promised to push back on “woke” policing, saying: “Police forces must be fully focused on fighting actual crime in people’s neighbourhoods, and not policing bad jokes on Twitter.”

The proportion of crimes in England and Wales that end with a charge or court summons has fallen since 2015, reaching 5.6 percent in the year to March 2022, down from 7.1 percent the previous year, and comparing unfavourably with a rate of 15 percent seven years ago.

Two million criminal investigations in the last year led to no suspect being identified, including 300,000 violent crimes.

Among the crimes which have not been solved is the murder of Kennie Carter, 16, who was stabbed to death in Stretford in January 2022, shortly after a game between Manchester United and West Ham at nearby Old Trafford. Ten teenagers have been arrested but nobody has been charged.

A spokesman for the Home Office told the Telegraph: “As the Home Secretary has made clear, we welcome the commitment for police attendance at home burglaries. We continue to support the police, including through record investment and the recruitment of 20,000 additional officers by March 2023.”

END

5.UKRAINE RUSSIA//

UKRAINE/RUSSIA/USA

A good read…

Pepe Escobar…

Escobar: Let The Patriot Games Begin

THURSDAY, DEC 29, 2022 – 02:00 AM

Authored by Pepe Escobar,

Little did we know that by 2023 the raging would go beyond paroxysm…

It’s idle to dwell on the cringe-worthy visit of the Kiev clown to Crash Test Dummy at the White House, coupled with a “Churchillian” speech at the War Party dominions in Capitol Hill. History will ridicule this Hollywood soap for centuries ahead.

Way more juice is provided by the latest War Party P.R. show, sponsored by Raytheon Productions. After all Lloyd Austin, the current Pentagon head, is a former Raytheon weapons peddler.

After much fanfare, it was established that the Pentagon will provide not a collection, but a single Patriot battery to Kiev – either with four or eight missile launchers, and either the PAC 2 or PAC 3 version.

A Patriot battery comes with radar, lots of computers, power generating equipment, and an “engagement control station”.

Instead of training Ukrainians at a U.S. Army base in Grafenwoehr, in Germany, the Pentagon is mulling the possibility of training them at a U.S. base, most certainly Fort Sill in Oklahoma, where most instructors actually live, side by side with their integrated training simulators. Up to 90 military are required to operate and maintain a single Patriot battery.

Considering the extensive training required to operate such a costly ($1 billion) and complex system, if they are on the ground during the first semester of 2023 this will mean, ominously, that the operators may be American, or at least NATO mercenaries.

The implied consequences are self-evident. Especially when the Russian Ministry of Defense has already pointed out that the Patriot will be considered a legitimate target.

So assuming all of the above will happen in practice sometime in 2023, it will be a blast to compare the Patriot performance in Ukraine with the Patriots at work in the lands of Arabia – which were routinely dribbled like Messi on an average match by Iranian and Houthi missiles. The Houthis always had a ball targeting Saudi oil installations.

What may change it that unlike in the Arab peninsula, all the collective West’s intel, recon and satellite firepower is in a state of alert in Ukraine 24/7.

The inestimable Andrei Martyanov has already came up with the essential breakdown of all Patriot essentials. Let’s focus on a few intriguing details.

A single Patriot battery will exercise less than zero impact on the Ukrainian battlefield. This battery would in thesis cover the most strategic Ukrainian installations: a very limited area, as in a small military base. That has nothing to do with protecting Kiev.

What’s way more significant, conceptually, is that this Patriot deployment, in connection with other air defense systems such as NASAMS, IRIS-T and the possible transfer of the SAMP-T, proves once again that Ukraine is under a de facto NATO multi-level air defense system. The Patriot is completely integrated with NATINADS, NATO’s air defense system.

Translation, if needed: this keeps evolving, fast, into NATO vs. Russia Total War.

Nice little system you got here

All eyes will be on escalation. The Americans may start with a single Patriot just to test the system under a serious missile attack (assuming the Russians don’t destroy it right away. Remember: “legitimate target”).

It’s fair to consider the Russian General Staff may be already plotting how to instantly go for the kill. The P.R. value, for Moscow, of turning the American P.R. op on its head would be invaluable.

President Putin was barely containing his glee when talking to the Kremlin pool earlier this week: “The Patriot system is not as effective as our S-300 (…) There will always be a countermeasure.”

Then there’s the nagging question of “why now?” The real motive of this “emergency” – sort of – Patriot delivery may have to do with serious problems with the American/NATO systems already on the ground.

The HAWK is woefully incapable of intercepting modern cruise missiles. The IRIS-T is quite raw – and needs non-stop supervision by repair teams from Germany. The NASAMS is also anti-missile impaired. In sum: “inadequate” does not even begin to describe them all.

And all that is happening simultaneously with the depletion of Soviet-era complexes – as well as the anti-aircraft guided missiles that supplied them.

Another key issue is who’s gonna pay for this P.R. op.

The current modified version of Patriot launchers costs roughly $10 million. A single missile costs a whopping $4 million. Russia already spends de facto pocket money on drones – and will spend even more. Firing a $4 million missile at a drone worth at best $50,000 does not even qualify as a joke.

So what is this for? Once again: Empire Escalating, mindlessly, with no end in sight. Putin and his circle, in over two decades, have tried absolutely everything to integrate Russia to the West. Russia was rebuffed every step of the way. Now this strategy has been declared null and void – ever since the American non-response response a year ago to the official Russian letters requesting a serious discussion on “indivisibility of security”. No wonder the Empire is freaking out.

Now both Putin and Russia’s excelling diplomatic corps keep stressing, on the record, that the collective West’s target in using Ukraine is to provoke the disintegration of Russia. So this remains an existential do or die affair. No wonder Russian envoy to the U.S. Anatoly Antonov qualified the state of Russia-U.S. relations as resembling an Ice Age.

Nearly three years ago I christened this decade, right at the start, as the Raging Twenties.

That’s how the Empire made its play, right in the open, when they killed Iran’s Gen Soleimani in a multiple drone attack during an official diplomatic visit to Baghdad.

Little did we know that by 2023 the raging would go beyond paroxysm.

END

UKRAINE/RUSSIA

LVIV , Kiev and other cities plunged into darkness after a massive missile attack

(zerohedge)

Lviv & Kiev Plunged Into Darkness After ‘Massive’ Missile Attack; Ukrainian S-300 Lands In Belarus

https://www.zerohedge.com/geopolitical/lviv-kiev-plunged-darkness-after-massive-missile-attack-ukrainian-s-300-lands-belarus

THURSDAY, DEC 29, 2022 – 08:45 AM

Ukraine has been hit with a “massive” attack of over 120 missiles across the country Thursday, its military and presidency’s office said. “December 29. Massive missiles attack… The enemy is attacking Ukraine from various directions with air and sea-based cruise missiles from strategic aircraft and ships,” Ukraine’s air force said in a public statement. 

It marks the largest barrage of missiles since there was weekend talk from both sides of mutual ‘openness’ in getting to the negotiating table. Ukrainian leadership floated the proposal of UN-brokered talks by the end of February, but its insistence on Russian officials facing a war crimes tribunal first was seen in Moscow as not serious and a non-starter.

Regardless, at this point, Thursday’s fresh aerial attack effectively slams the door shut on the possibility of talks. According to a blistering statement from Zelensky aide Mykhaylo Podolyak, the missiles were launched:

…by the “evil Russian world” to destroy critical infrastructure & kill civilians en masse. We’re waiting for further proposals from “peacekeepers” about “peaceful settlement”, “security guarantees for Russian Federation” & undesirability of provocations.

Thus with the obvious sarcasm Zelensky’s office has clearly signaled talks at this point are all but an impossibility from its point of view.

The Ukrainian military said missiles reached as far West as Lviv, parts of which were left without electricity Thursday morning. “Ninety percent of the city is without electricity,” Lviv’s mayor said in a social media post. “We are waiting for more information from energy experts. Trams and trolleybuses are not running in the city.”

The capital of Kyiv also saw limited strikes, and is still facing rolling blackouts and even bouts of water shortages. The military said two residences were hit by falling missile debris after an intercept while an industrial area was damaged, as well as a playground. Kharkiv in the east was rocked by major explosions, along with a number of other towns and cities, including the port city of Odesa.

As for Kiev, its mayor Vitaliy Klitschko has estimated 40% of homes are now without power, writing on Telegram: “40 percent of the capital’s consumers are without electricity after the missile attack. In connection with the necessary safety measures used by power workers during an air alert. Power engineers are currently working on restoring the power supply.”

Ukraine’s military claimed to have shot down dozens of inbound Russian missiles, with Ukraine’s top general, Valery Zaluzhny, confirming of the large-scale attack: “This morning, the aggressor launched air and sea-based cruise missiles, anti-aircraft guided missiles to the S-300 ADMS at energy infrastructure facilities of our country.”

Ukraine’s intercept efforts may have also resulted in a missile entering neighboring Belarus, with Belarusian state-run BelTA news agency reporting finding a Ukrainian S-300 missile after falling on its soil.

Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko “was immediately informed,” according to reports. The Belarusian defense ministry says it’s investigating whether its air defense systems had shot down the rocket, or else “the missile flew into Belarus’ territory similarly to a recent incident in Poland.”

Meanwhile, concerning the possibility of peace talks, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov the day prior to the fresh Thursday missile attack said “We are in no hurry” and pledged that Moscow’s military objectives in Ukraine will be achieved through “patience” and “perseverance”. It’s expected that there are more major Russian missile attacks against Ukrainian energy infrastructure on the horizon, already as the national grid is in crisis mode amid freezing temperatures.

END

This Week Reveals Little Hope For Serious Ukraine-Russia Negotiations

THURSDAY, DEC 29, 2022 – 11:34 AM

The Kremlin has clarified its position on being ‘open’ to peace negotiations with Ukraine, after over the weekend Ukraine’s leadership floated a proposal to enter into UN-brokered ceasefire negotiations in February. 

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov on Wednesday said any future “peace plan” must involve formal recognition that the annexed eastern territories have joined the Russian Federation.

“There can be no peace plan for Ukraine that does not take into account today’s realities regarding Russian territory, with the entry of four regions into Russia. Plans that do not take these realities into account cannot be peaceful,” Peskov said.

Last week the Kremlin stated something similar, according to The Associated Press:

…no Ukrainian peace plan can succeed without taking into account “the realities of today that can’t be ignored” — a reference to Moscow’s demand that Ukraine recognize Russia’s sovereignty over the Crimean Peninsula, which was annexed in 2014, as well as other territorial gains.

Ukraine’s position has been to denounce the “sham” referendums Russia held in Kherson, Zaporizhzhia, and the breakaway Donbas republics of Donetsk and Luhansk (DPR and LPR), while vowing its forces will not stop fighting until every inch of Ukraine is “liberated”.

President Zelensky has even in the recent past said that Crimea must be returned from Russian control as well, and there’s been a handful of Ukrainian attacks on the Russian-held peninsula.

Both sides at this point see in the other’s position unrealistic demands. The Kremlin, for example, sees as a completely unserious non-starter the latest Ukraine assertion that the proposed February talks can only happen if Moscow agrees to a “war crimes tribunal” for its officials. This position will only become even more entrenched after Thursday’s massive Russian missile attack across Ukraine, reaching as far West as Lviv…

In addition to dismissing this “war crimes court” demand, the Russian foreign ministry has pointed to the greatly ramped up supply of weapons from Western countries, especially from the United States, which has derailed any legitimate move toward peaceful negotiations.

Fresh analysis in The New York Times says that at this point each side is still seeking a military solution, remaining hardened in their positions: 

As the battle for Ukraine turns into a bloody, mile-by-mile fight in numbing cold, Ukrainian and Russian officials have insisted that they are willing to discuss making peace.

But with a drumbeat of statements in recent days making clear that each side’s demands are flatly unacceptable to the other, there appears to be little hope for serious negotiations in the near future.

The Times then quotes the following analyst:

“This suggests there is not necessarily a push for a negotiated peace or even some sort of negotiations, but still a push for whatever endgame is being sought militarily,” said Marnie Howlett, a lecturer in Russian and Eastern European politics at the University of Oxford.

Lavrov this week said all of Russia’s objectives must be met… “Otherwise,” he said, “the Russian Army will deal with this issue.”

Interestingly, no less than former US Secretary of State Henry Kissinger penned an op-ed this month wherein he called for Ukraine and the West to get serious about territorial concessions in order for the war to end, with the ‘alternative’ being a continued spiral toward nuclear-armed direct confrontation between the US-NATO and Russia.

END

Again Russia’s Engels airbase attacked by Ukraine

(zerohedge)

Russia’s Engels Airbase Attacked For 3rd Time This Month

THURSDAY, DEC 29, 2022 – 02:20 PM

Russia’s Engels airbase has been targeted for a third time this month by Ukraine’s military, resulting in Russian anti-air defenses being activated to take out an inbound projectile. 

Engels airbase is located in the Saratov region and crucially is at a distance of over 600km from the Ukrainian border. “The air defense system has been activated in the Engels district,” regional governor Roman Busargin said of the Thursday incident. 

Busargin described that an “unidentified object” had been destroyed, adding that there is no further threat to civilian safety. He didn’t indicate whether the object was a drone or missile, but it comes after a deadly Monday attack involving a Ukrainian drone. 

No casualties are being reported from the Thursday attack, but Monday’s drone assault left three Russian servicemembers dead, according to state news agencies, after an enemy drone was reportedly intercepted, causing debris came down on bystanders below. 

“On December 26, at around 01:35 Moscow time, a Ukrainian unmanned aerial vehicle was shot down at low altitude while approaching the Engels military airfield in the Saratov region,” the Russian defense ministry said in a prior statement.

Many outside observers doubted Russia’s intercept story, given also local videos seemed to show explosions more consistent with a direct hit.

On Dec.5 Ukraine’s military mounted simultaneous drone assaults on an air base in Ryazan, in western Russia which hosts nuclear-capable strategic bombers, and also Engels base.

That initial Engels strike had constituted the deepest the Ukrainians had ever attacked inside of Russia proper.

Feeling emboldened by a handful of successes, including prior attacks and bombings in Crimea, Ukraine forces will likely try to continue hitting targets inside Russia, also as their capability grows given they have been supplied with ever-longer range rockets from the US and NATO countries.

Russia for its part is continuing to ramp up major missile and drone attacks on Ukraine’s national energy infrastructure. Over 120 missiles launched Thursday has left even Lviv in far western Ukraine in the dark, along with about half the capital city and other places like Kharkiv and Odesa. The Pentagon has indicated that Patriot anti-air batteries could be shipped in as little as six months, even though it typically takes one-year minimum to train personnel on how to operate them.

END

ISRAEL/WEST BANK/PALESTIANS

Should be explosive!

(zerohedge)

Incoming PM Netanyahu Vows West Bank Settlement Expansion A ‘High Priority’

WEDNESDAY, DEC 28, 2022 – 05:45 PM

Incoming Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is busy forming what’s being widely perceived as the most hardline and right-wing government in the country’s history. Netanyahu is set to be formally sworn into office on Thursday, along with his top ministers.

He has already promised to put settlement expansion in the Palestinian West Bank highest on the list of priorities. His Likud party released the new governing coalition’s policy guidelines Wednesday, which opens by vowing to “advance and develop settlement in all parts of the land of Israel – in the Galilee, Negev, Golan Heights, and Judea and Samaria.” 

All of these are the biblical and Israeli-recognized names for broad swathes of the occupied West Bank. The new government is essentially warning it will go ‘gloves-off’ in taking more territory.

Given that the United States and the vast majority of United Nations members oppose an official policy of Israeli West Bank expansion, also given the potential for reigniting explosive conflict in the region, it could see a strained relationship between the Biden administration and the Netanyahu government. 

Already some 500,000 Israelis are part of dozens of Jewish settlements scattered throughout the West Bank, which European leaders especially have long condemned as “illegal”. 

These settler groups frequently clash with local Palestinians – the latter who number about 2.5 million, but who have growing restrictions placed on their freedom of movement as the settlements expand. Israeli troops control checkpoints and Palestinians’ ability to travel depending on the proximity of Jewish settlements.

This leads to frequent clashes and street battles, often with Palestinians hurling rocks and other debris at Israeli security forces. Large-scale settlement under incoming prime minister Netanyahu could unleash another Intifada, observers and human rights activists fear.

Some of the incoming government officials under Netanyahu themselves live in ‘illegal’ settlements, as Al Jazeera explains:

Netanyahu’s new government – the most religious and hardline in Israel’s history – is made up of ultra-Orthodox parties, a far-right ultranationalist religious faction and his Likud party. It is expected to be sworn in on Thursday.

Several of Netanyahu’s key allies, including most of the Religious Zionism party, are ultranationalist West Bank settlers.

Netanyahu was removed from office last year over major accusations of corruption and bribery, the investigation of which is still ongoing. He served as prime minister from 2009 to 2021 – and his now rising to lead an unlikely coalition that finally emerged victorious after multiple failed national election attempts. This of course makes him the longest-serving leader in Israel’s history.

END 

ISRAEL/IRAN

The new national security chief wants preemptive strikes on Iran

(DeCamp/Antiwar.com)

Netanyahu’s Newly Appointed National Security Chief Wants Preemptive Strikes On Iran

WEDNESDAY, DEC 28, 2022 – 10:05 PM

Authored by Dave DeCamp via AntiWar.com,

Incoming Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu this week appointed a major Iran hawk to lead Israel’s National Security Council under the new government.

Tzachi Hanegbi is a veteran Likud lawmaker and a longtime ally of Netanyahu who has repeatedly threatened in recent years that Israel would attack Iran if the US returns to the Iran nuclear deal, known as the JCPOA.

In his most recent threat, Hanegbi said that Netanyahu would order an attack on Iran if the US doesn’t secure a new nuclear deal or doesn’t take military action itself. He told Israel’s Channel 12 in November that in that situation, Netanyahu “will act, in my assessment, to destroy the nuclear facilities in Iran.”

Back in 2020, Hanegbi, who was settlement minister at the time, warned that if President Biden won the election and returned to the JCPOA, it could lead to a war between Israel and Iran. He made a similar threat following Biden’s election.

Netanyahu’s new government will be taking over soon as tensions between the US and Iran are soaring. Since JCPOA negotiations fell apart in September, the US has escalated its sanctions campaign against Iran.

The Pentagon’s recently admitted in its new Nuclear Posture Review that Iran is not trying to build a nuclear weapon, but US and Israeli officials continue to hype up the threat anyway.

The US and ISRAEL recently held joint military exercises over the Mediterranean Sea in November that simulated attacks on Iran.

end

6/GLOBAL ISSUES//COVID ISSUES/VACCINE ISSUES

Vaccine//Covid issues: Injuries

Injuries:

GLOBAL ISSUES

PAUL ALEXANDER

Another win for early treatment Ivermectin (IVM), it blocks hemagglutination: “SARS-CoV-2 Spike Protein Induces Hemagglutination: Implications for COVID-19 Morbidities and Therapeutics and for

Vaccine Adverse Effects”; Boschi et al. “IVM blocked HA when added to RBCs prior to spike protein and reversed HA when added afterward.”

DR. PAUL ALEXANDERDEC 28

SAVE▷  LISTEN

SOURCE:

https://www.mdpi.com/1422-0067/23/24/15480

end

‘Experimental findings for SARS-CoV-2 related to the glycan biochemistry of coronaviruses indicate that attachments from spike protein to glycoconjugates on the surfaces of red blood cells (RBCs), other blood cells and endothelial cells are key to the infectivity and morbidity of COVID-19. To provide further insight into these glycan attachments and their potential clinical relevance, the classic hemagglutination (HA) assay was applied using spike protein from the Wuhan, Alpha, Delta and Omicron B.1.1.529 lineages of SARS-CoV-2 mixed with human RBCs. ‘

The electrostatic potential of the central region of spike protein from these four lineages was studied through molecular modeling simulations. Inhibition of spike protein-induced HA was tested using the macrocyclic lactone ivermectin (IVM), which is indicated to bind strongly to SARS-CoV-2 spike protein glycan sites. The results of these experiments were, first, that spike protein from these four lineages of SARS-CoV-2 induced HA.

Omicron induced HA at a significantly lower threshold concentration of spike protein than the three prior lineages and was much more electropositive on its central spike protein region.

IVM blocked HA when added to RBCs prior to spike protein and reversed HA when added afterward. These results validate and extend prior findings on the role of glycan bindings of viral spike protein in COVID-19. They furthermore suggest therapeutic options using competitive glycan-binding agents such as IVM and may help elucidate rare serious adverse effects (AEs) associated with COVID-19 mRNA vaccines, which use spike protein as the generated antigen.’

end

Fauci: “The duplicitous Dr. Fauci and his backpedaling: Brownstone Institute Lori Weintz”

DR. PAUL ALEXANDERDEC 29

SAVE▷  LISTEN

Alexander COVID News-Dr. Paul Elias Alexander’s Newsletter

‘The Duplicitous Dr. Fauci and His Backpedaling’: Brownstone Institute, LORI WEINTZ

SOURCE: https://brownstone.org/articles/duplicitous-fauci-backpedaling/Alexander COVID News-Dr. Paul Elias Alexander’s Newsletter is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber…

Read more

/SLAY NEWS/

The latest reports from Slay News

WEF Proposes Digital ‘Battery Passport’ to Track EV DriversThe World Economic Forum (WEF) is pushing for “battery passports” to be fitted to electric vehicles (EVs) to track the driver’s impact on “climate change.”READ MORE

South Dakota Governor Kristi Noem: Biden Is ‘Destroying Our Border on Purpose’South Dakota’s Republican Governor Kristi Noem has accused Democrat President Joe Biden of “destroying our border on purpose.”READ MORE

Banning Internal Combustion Vehicles Shows Contempt for Rural AmericaAs government and corporate elites continue to push the world head-first into the “green energy” future, those who rely on fossil fuels are often ignored.READ MORE

Tom Cotton: ‘Pentagon’s Woke Obsessions Could Have Severe Effects on Military Preparedness & Readiness’Republican Senator Tom Cotton reached his limit with Democrat President Joe Biden’s “woke” Pentagon and warned that it “could have severe effects on military preparedness and readiness.”READ MORE

Greg Abbott Checkmates Biden: ‘These Migrants Willingly Chose to Go to D.C’ after Being ‘Released by Federal Government’Texas Gov. Greg Abbott fired back at Democrat President Joe Biden after a White House spokesperson called the busing of migrants to the nation’s capital on Christmas Eve a “dangerous and shameful stunt.” READ MORE

Alcohol-Fueled Family Game of Monopoly Turns Violent, Gunfire Erupts, Player Ends Up in JailAn alcohol-fueled family game of Monopoly saw one of the players end up in real-life jail after the competitive board game took a sinister turn.READ MORE

Whoopi Goldberg Issues Groveling Apology after Backlash, Falls Flat: ‘I’m Still Learning a Lot’“The View” co-host Whoopi Goldberg has issued a groveling apology after facing massive backlash for doubling down on her earlier holocaust slur.READ MORE

Elon Musk Digs Up Dirt on Fauci, Goes Public: ‘The Head of Bioethics at NIH Is His Wife’Twitter boss Elon Musk found some dirt on Dr. Anthony Fauci and went public on his social media platform to devastating effect.READ MORE

Supreme Court Hands GOP Huge Win, Orders Trump’s Title 42 to Remain in Place While Legal Challenges Play OutThe Supreme Court has ordered President Donald Trump’s Title 42 immigration policy to remain in place, handing a major win to the Republicans.READ MORE

Leftist Actor D.L. Hughley: Trump Should Be Charged with ‘Manslaughter’ over Jan 6Leftist actor D.L. Hughley gave up the game and called for President Donald Trump to be hit with “manslaughter” charges over the Jan. 6 riot.READ MORE

Man with Concealed Carry Permit Shoots Armed Robber Dead ⁦in DetroitA tow truck driver with a concealed carry permit shot and killed an armed thug who tried to ambush and rob him on Detroit’s east side.READ MORE

Biden’s America: More Illegal Immigrants Caught in October-November Than in All of 2020New data has highlighted the devastating impact Democrat President Joe Biden’s immigration policies have had on the border crisis.READ MORE

/VACCINE IMPACT

Will the CIA Orchestrate a Nuclear War in 2023?

December 28, 2022 7:00 pm

There are many questions the world is facing as we draw near to 2023. Will the Globalists continue their depopulation plan that started in 2020 with the COVID scam? Will there be a new “pandemic” announced, either as a new variant of COVID-19 or some new virus, or has there been a sufficient number of people who have now become aware of the fraud and criminal actions inflicted upon them through the COVID-19 scam, and the toxic COVID-19 bioweapon shots that have killed and injured so many, so that continuing the “killer virus” story becomes a plan with diminishing returns? One thing we know for certain as 2022 draws to a close, is that the pro-vaccine crowd has suffered tremendous losses as a result of taking the shots. It might be time for a new plan to be implemented to go after the anti-vaxxers, and that plan could very well be a nuclear war. Whatever it is, we can be certain that the CIA will be centrally involved in carrying out these plans, as they have been doing for the past 80 years or so. This past weekend, investigative journalist Jack Murphy, a former member of the special forces serving with the Green Berets and Army Rangers, published an article alleging covert CIA operations inside Russia by using a NATO country’s spy network.

Read More.

Read More..

MICHAEL EVERY/RABOBANK

Michael Every on the day’s most important events:

end

7//OIL ISSUES//NATURAL GAS ISSUES/USA AND GLOBE

Plunging natural gas prices now incentivizes power plants to ditch coal

(zerohedge)

Plunging NatGas Prices Incentivizes Power Plants To Ditch Coal

THURSDAY, DEC 29, 2022 – 02:45 AM

Global coal use jumped to a record high this year because of the sharp increase in natural gas prices. This prompted a wave of fuel switching away from NatGas by utilities for power generation, pushing up demand for price-competitive options, including coal, in many countries.

There are emerging signs across the Western world that ‘gas-to-coal switching’ could be reversed, perhaps only temporarily, as warmer weather is expected across Europe and the US. 

The latest 2-week outlook for the Lower 48 is above-average temperatures for the first half of January. 

Europe is also expected to record warmer temperatures than average for the next two weeks. 

As a result, Henry Hub NatGas prices crashed 12% on Wednesday as cold weather cleared out of the US. This means utilities will become more incentivized to burn NatGas (also more ‘green’) for power generation than coal. 

Even in Europe, NatGas prices are well below the costs for coal. That wasn’t the case several months ago. 

“Cheaper natural gas prices are negative for coal producers, whose product competes against gas for electricity generation,” Bloomberg said. 

Houston-based energy firm Criterion Research said coal-to-gas switching would increase if NatGas prices remained under $7 million British thermal units (MMBtu). 

As natural gas prices weaken at the onset of 2023, we revisited the last few years of data for the United States thermal stack, which includes coal and gas generation. Throughout 2022, natural gas managed to hold 60-70% of the thermal stack while Henry Hub futures remained above $7.00. However, when prices were in the $5-7 range, natural gas was able to post a few days in the 70-75% range. 

With that in mind, if we see prices remain below $5 throughout much of 2023 and natural gas supply within the US continues to hold onto its 100+ Bcf strength, we could continue to see coal burns pushed out of the stack in favor of higher natural gas usage.

Energy traders are dumping coal stocks in anticipation of the switching. The Russell 3000 Coal Subsector Index plunged 10% on Wednesday. 

Major coal companies were also dumped. Peabody Energy fell 11%, Alpha Metallurgical Resources -8.8%, Ramaco Resources -8.3%, Arch Resources -8%, and Warrior Met Coal -8%. 

For now, declining NatGas prices means a reduction in coal burns and a transition back to higher burn rates for NatGas. Falling NatGas prices indicate lower electricity prices across the board, a relief desperately needed for many folks across the West.

END

8.EMERGING MARKETS ISSUES//AUSTRALIA ISSUES.

BRAZIL

There was wide spread cheating in the Brazilian elections. Lula is set for inaugaration this Sunday.

Expect fireworks

(Zerohedge)

Brazil Ramps Up Security For Lula Inauguration After Foiled Bomb Plot

WEDNESDAY, DEC 28, 2022 – 07:05 PM

Brazilian President-elect Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva is set to be inaugurated on Sunday, weeks after a close upset victory over ultra-conservative incumbent Jair Bolsonaro in what was the most consequential election in Brazil in decades.

Bolsonaro’s supporters alleged widespread election fraud, leading to sporadic protests and clashes with police since October, which two weeks ago escalated into an attack on the headquarters of the federal police in Brasilia. Fierce protests urging an investigation into alleged election irregularities are still ongoing.

And over the weekend police foiled a bomb plot, reportedly intended to disrupt the Lula inauguration, and which is now driving fears that there could be an attack on the Sunday events in the capital which is expected to have a massive turnout. 

The suspect now in custody has been identified as 54-year-old gas station manager George Washington de Oliveira Sousa. He has reportedly confessed to planting explosive devices not far from where Lula is staying.

According to CNN: 

The man arrested for being involved in a bombing attempt at Brasilia International Airport over the weekend said in a written statement to police that he intended to “create chaos” so a “siege state in the country” would be installed to prevent former President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva from taking office again in January.

The media is blaming a group of “pro-Bolsonaro election deniers” and is making connections to Jan.6 in America.

“On December 24, Brasilia police said they had foiled a bomb plot, arresting a man with ties to a group of pro-Bolsonaro election deniers camped outside the army headquarters, who have been urging the military to overturn Lula’s victory,” Reuters reported Tuesday.

Following the bomb incident and arrest, which has dominated headlines since the weekend, federal police are reportedly taking extra security precautions to protect against some kind of potential ‘terror’ event.

Brazil’s incoming justice minister Flávio Dino has vowed on Twitter to implement measures that ensure everyone’s safety on inauguration day. “All procedures will be reassessed, with a view to strengthening security,” Dino aid. “And the fight against terrorists and rioters will be intensified. Democracy has won and will win.”

While Bolsonaro has not openly or explicitly contested that Lula will be next president, Bolsonaro himself has yet to publicly concede defeat to Lula. A late November attempt by Bolsonaro’s team to appeal to the courts while alleging a fraudulent election was immediately tossed out.

END

Your early  currency/gold and silver pricing/Asian and European bourse movements/ and interest rate settings THURSDAY morning 7:30 AM

EURO VS USA DOLLAR:1.0652  UP .0023 

USA/ YEN 133.54 DOWN  0.492/NOW TARGETS INTEREST RATE AT .50% AS IT WILL BUY UNLIMITED BONDS TO GETS TO THAT LEVEL…//YEN  RISES//

GBP/USA 1.2031 UP   0.0004

 Last night Shanghai COMPOSITE CLOSED DOWN 13.70 PTS OR 0.44% 

 Hang Sang CLOSED DOWN 157.77 POINTS OR 0.79% 

AUSTRALIA CLOSED DOWN .89%  // EUROPEAN BOURSE: MOSTLY GREEN EXCEPT ENGLAND 

Trading from Europe and ASIA

I) EUROPEAN BOURSES  MOSTLY  GREEN EXCEPT ENGLAND

2/ CHINESE BOURSES / :Hang SANG CLOSED DOWN 157.77 PTS OR .79% 

/SHANGHAI CLOSED DOWN 13.74 PTS OR 0.44%

AUSTRALIA BOURSE CLOSED DOWN .89% 

(Nikkei (Japan) CLOSED DOWN 246.83 PTS  OR .94%

INDIA’S SENSEX  IN THE GREEN

Gold very early morning trading: 1807.25

silver:$23.85

USA dollar index early THURSDAY morning: 103.93 DOWN 26  BASIS POINTS from WEDNESDAY’s close.

 THURSDAY  MORNING NUMBERS ENDS

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

And now your closing THURSDAY NUMBERS 1: 00 PM

Portuguese 10 year bond yield: 3.441% DOWN 5  in basis point(s) yield

JAPANESE BOND YIELD: +0.440% DOWN 0 AND 6/100   BASIS POINTS /JAPAN losing control of its yield curve/

SPANISH 10 YR BOND YIELD: 3.516%// DOWN 5 in basis points yield 

ITALIAN 10 YR BOND YIELD 4.527 DOWN 9   points in basis points yield ./ THE ECB IS QE ITALIAN BONDS (BUYING ITALIAN BONDS/SELLING GERMAN BUNDS)

GERMAN 10 YR BOND YIELD: FALLS TO +2.448%  DOWN 5 BASIS PTS 

END

IMPORTANT CURRENCY CLOSES FOR THURSDAY  

Closing currency crosses for day /USA DOLLAR INDEX/USA 10 YR BOND YIELD/1:00 PM

Euro/USA 1.0668 UP 41  or 41 basis points//

USA/Japan: 133.19 DOWN .834 OR YEN UP 83  basis points/

Great Britain/USA 1.2067 UP .0039 OR  39 BASIS POINTS //

Canadian dollar  UP .0050 OR 50 BASIS pts  to 1.3550

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

The USA/Yuan,  CNY: closed    ON SHORE  (CLOSED ..(UP) AT 6.9641

THE USA/YUAN OFFSHORE:    (YUAN CLOSED (UP)…. 6.9779

TURKISH LIRA:  18.71  EXTREMELY DANGEROUS LEVEL/DEATH WISH/HYPERINFLATION TO BEGIN.

the 10 yr Japanese bond yield  at +0.440

Your closing 10 yr US bond yield DOWN 5 IN basis points from WEDNESDAY at  3.837% //trading well ABOVE the resistance level of 2.27-2.32%) very problematic

 USA 30 yr bond yield   3.923  DOWN 5 in basis points 

Your closing USA dollar index, 103.72 DOWN 0.46  BASIS PTS   ON THE DAY/1.00 PM/

Your closing bourses for Europe and the Dow along with the USA dollar index closing and interest rates  THURSDAY: 12:00 PM

London: CLOSED UP 11.26 PTS OR  0.15%

German Dax :  CLOSED UP 132.23  POINTS OR 0.95%

Paris CAC CLOSED UP 62.28  PTS OR 0.96% 

Spain IBEX CLOSED UP 59.50 OR  0.72%

Italian MIB: CLOSED UP 267.10PTS OR  1.12%

WTI Oil price 77.99   12: EST

Brent Oil:  83.01  12:00 EST

USA /RUSSIAN ///   DOWN TO:  72.17/ ROUBLE UP 0 AND 2/100       RUBLES/DOLLAR

GERMAN 10 YR BOND YIELD; +2.448

UK 10 YR YIELD: 3.698  UP 4 BASIS PTS.

CLOSING NUMBERS: 4 PM

Euro vs USA: 1.0667  UP .0038    OR 38 BASIS POINTS

British Pound: 1.2061 UP   .0033  or  33 basis pts

BRITISH 10 YR GILT BOND YIELD:  3.693% UP 2 BASIS PTS

USA dollar vs Japanese Yen: 132.97    DOWN 1.057/YEN UP 106 BASIS PTS//

USA dollar vs Canadian dollar: 1.3548 DOWN .0053 (CDN dollar, UP 53 basis pts)

West Texas intermediate oil: 78.53

Brent OIL:  83.56

USA 10 yr bond yield DOWN 5 BASIS pts to 3.839%

USA 30 yr bond yield DOWN 5  BASIS PTS to 3.928%

USA dollar index:103.67 DOWN 51  BASIS POINTS

USA DOLLAR VS TURKISH LIRA: 18.71

USA DOLLAR VS RUSSIA//// ROUBLE:  72.17  UP 0 AND  1/100 roubles

DOW JONES INDUSTRIAL AVERAGE: UP 345,09 PTS OR 1.05% 

NASDAQ 100 UP 271.70 PTS OR 2.54%

VOLATILITY INDEX: 21.43 DOWN 0.71 PTS (3.21)%

GLD: $168.85 UP 0.94 OR 0.56%

SLV/ $21.97 UP $0.37 OR 1.71%

end)

USA trading day in Graph Form

Stocks, Bonds, Gold Rally Into Dismal Year-End

THURSDAY, DEC 29, 2022 – 04:01 PM

As markets head for the worst December ever, an ugly jobless claims print helped spur an illiquid market meltup today in stocks, a rally in bonds, dollar weakness, and and bid for bitcoin and bullion.

After 2 straight down days, US equity markets soared back into the green post-Xmas today (apart from Nasdaq)…

Today’s melt-up sparked the biggest market gains (Nasdaq and Small Caps up 2.5%) since Powell’s misinterpreted ‘dovish’ speech on November 30th…

With the S&P bursting through the critical 3835 pin level from the huge JPMorgan Collar (that expires/rolls tomorrow)…

After 7 straight down days TSLA shares soared by the most since November today (for the second day), up 14% from yesterday’s lows…

As we suspect the 0-DTE traders in TSLA abandoned the put side today (after smashing records this week)…

Source: Bloomberg

Treasuries were mixed today with the long-end notably outperforming (2Y +2bps, 30Y-5bps)…

Source: Bloomberg

The dollar tumbled back to post-CPI lows today…

Source: Bloomberg

Bitcoin bounced back a little after touching $16,500…

Source: Bloomberg

Gold rallied on the day, with futs back above $1825…

Oil ended the day lower amid extremely low liquidity in WTI futs…

NatGas prices are tumbling and while European NG has made all the headlines, we note that on an oil barrel equivalent basis it is still twice the price of US NG or oil…

Source: Bloomberg

Finally, the recent ugliness has a silver-lining in that financial conditions have tightened significantly, heading back towards the ‘reality’ of monetary policy…

Source: Bloomberg

So maybe Powell got his Christmas wish after all.

END

EARLY MORNING TRADING//

EARLY AFTERNOON TRADING

ii) USA DATA

The data certainly suggests the USA is in a recession

(zerohedge)

Continuing Jobless Claims Near 11-Month Highs

THURSDAY, DEC 29, 2022 – 08:37 AM

The number of Americans filing for jobless claims for the first rose last week from 216k to 225k (in line with exp), with the non-seaonally-adjusted pace of initial claims trending notably higher…

…but it is the ongoing rise in continuing jobless claims that should be a worry for Americans (and ‘cheer’ for The Fed?).

1.710 million Americans are filing for jobless claims on a continuing basis – the most since early February…

This is the largest rise in continuing claims since the peak of the COVID lockdowns in June 2020.

So the labor is still “tight”?

The 11 straight weeks of increasing continuing claims suggests that Americans who are losing their job are having more trouble finding a new one.

Perhaps the Establishment survey is completely decoupled from reality…

Source: Bloomberg

With claims and the household survey both signaling weakness in American jobs… ‘great news’ for The Fed?!

III) USA ECONOMIC STORIES.

This will be really good as it will expose the crimes of censorship with respect to COVID/Vaccine rollout

(Smith/EpochTimes)

Elon Musk Announces New Twitter Policy To Allow Scientific Debate

WEDNESDAY, DEC 28, 2022 – 07:25 PM

Authored by Chase Smith via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

Twitter CEO Elon Musk said in a tweet Wednesday he is enacting a new Twitter Policy related to post on the platform about science.

“New Twitter policy is to follow the science, which necessarily includes reasoned questioning of the science,” Musk wrote.

No further details of the plan had been released, but The Epoch Times reached out to Twitter for comment.

In a follow-up tweet below his original policy announcement, Musk said “Anyone who says that questioning them is questioning science itself cannot be regarded as a scientist.”

Musk has released a trove of information since taking over the company regarding Twitter’s suppression of certain information related to COVID-19.

Musk said Twitter employees had a private group on Slack that was a “fan club” of White House chief medical adviser Dr. Anthony Fauci, The Epoch Times reported. The employees “had an internal Slack channel unironically called ‘Fauci Fan Club,’” Musk wrote.

Musk’s post noted that the Fauci Fan Club was set up despite outstanding “glaring issues” regarding Fauci, including the question of whether the White House adviser was untruthful when he denied that U.S. federal money was used to fund risky “gain-of-function” research at a Chinese lab at the center of speculation about the origins of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Alleged Twitter Suppression of Scientific Debate

Musk revealed in the Twitter Files—a collection of internal emails and communications made public by Musk—the company suppressed early treatment options for COVID-19, and vaccine safety concerns, Dr. Peter McCullough said in an interview on Newsmakers by NTD and The Epoch Times on Dec. 14.

“Twitter had become an incredibly biased and censored platform, where the public knew they weren’t getting a fair, balanced set of information on a whole variety of developments—including the early treatment of SARS-COV2 infection and a balanced view of safety and efficacy of the vaccines,” McCullough said.

McCullough said he believed he was censored and finally suspended for sharing scientific “abstracts and manuscripts,” which he believed didn’t fit the accepted political view. McCullough said he wasn’t the only doctor targeted by the company’s censorship.

Musk lifted the suspensions of McCullough and mRNA vaccine technology contributor Dr. Robert Malone—suspended from Twitter in 2021 after criticizing the effectiveness of the mRNA vaccines—after completing his Twitter purchase.

McCullough said when sites like Twitter posted COVID-19 warnings or labels a post “misinformation,” it amounted to government censorship and control.

“Facebook, Instagram, and the other platforms. … Anytime a message is posted, and it says, ‘See the COVID information center,’ or it labels it ‘COVID misinformation,’ that actually indicates that there’s government interference. There’s government censorship going on,” McCullough asserted.

Musk’s latest policy announcement about questioning science while also following it mirrors what McCullough said about advertisements on Twitter regarding vaccine efficacy and safety.

“So, when Americans were seeing advertisements that said ‘safe and effective,’ of course, immediately, we were jumping and making the case based on the peer-reviewed literature that that’s not correct.”

Read more here…

end

Chaos continues for Southwest as they cancel thousands of more flights..an operational meltdown!

(zerohedge)

Southwest Cancels Thousands Of More Flights As Operational ‘Meltdown’ Continues

THURSDAY, DEC 29, 2022 – 09:25 AM

Six days after a powerful winter storm wreaked havoc on Christmas holiday travel across the US, most major carriers have normalized operations after a few days of widespread cancelations and delays. But at Southwest, it’s a very different story. 

More than 2,300 flights, or 58% of its planned flights on Thursday, had been canceled, according to FlightAware. And the airline said Wednesday that it would only fly one-third of scheduled flights through the end of the week to normalize operations. 

FlightAware said the budget airline scrapped more than 15,000 flights over the past week. The company issued another apology Wednesday for one of the worst operational mishaps in its five decades of existence. 

On Tuesday, CEO Robert Jordan said Southwest would operate a reduced schedule to get “back on track before next week.” He blamed the winter storm for causing disruptions in the airline’s “highly complex” network. 

Another Southwest executive issued a video apology Wednesday. Ryan Green, Southwest’s chief commercial officer, pledged “to do everything we can and to work day and night to repair our relationship” with customers.

We shared a leaked memo from the airline that warned of a “state of operational emergency” at its Denver Airport hub after “an unusually high number” of employee absences ahead of Christmas. 

A combination of factors from staffing shortages, the winter storm, an antiquated crew-scheduling system, and a network designed that allowed cancellations in one region to spread throughout all other airports led to the travel mess. 

“Historically, Southwest underinvested in IT, in technology, and this has come back in the past to hurt them,” Cowen analyst Helane Becker told Bloomberg TV on Wednesday. 

Becker said, “People have a right to be really angry and annoyed. They should have invested years ago in these systems, and they just didn’t.” 

Southwest shares have slid 20% this month. 

The Cowen analyst expects the airline will take an earnings hit “in the hundreds of millions of dollars range” because of the operational blunder. 

Still, the chaos is not over for Southwest.

end

Just look and see what the citizens of El Paso Texas did to prevent migrants from coming in:

(Showalter/AmericanThinker.com)

Funny What Even A Flimsy Border Fence Can Do…

https://mail.google.com/mail/u/0/#inbox?compose=GTvVlcSGMGCVDSFnzRvZnzZnnZxGpghfmWwsQDqCWBMsQdrSLGjlHTjzCClwqMXtMSSpcmjRrQxGX

WEDNESDAY, DEC 28, 2022 – 09:25 PM

Authored by Monica Showalter via AmericanThinker.com,

Well, here we have it.

At a time when Joe Biden and his trusty sidekick, Homeland Security secretary  Alejandro Mayorkas, claim there’s nothing they can do about the border surge as they wave illegal aliens through, illegal border crossings in the El Paso area have … gone to almost zero.

According to Border Report:

EL PASO, Texas (Border Report) – Migrant crossings have plummeted in a mile-long stretch of Downtown El Paso where the Texas Army National Guard has set up concertina wire and portable fencing along the Rio Grande.

The guard began setting up the barrier last week at a gap in the border wall west of the Paso del Norte port of entry. In the space of eight days, the barbed wire has nearly reached a second port of entry and chain-link fence anchored by sandbags extends even farther. The result is that asylum seekers can no longer walk across ankle-deep water in the Rio Grande and turn themselves in to waiting Border Patrol agents in that area.

“The difference is vast,” said 1st Sgt. Suzanne Ringle. “The 19th, the 20th and the 21st we had large groups of families and individuals who were wanting to come across. Now, it’s almost a ghost town out there.”

She attributed that to the “visual deterrent” of the barbwire, parked Humvees and soldiers patrolling the area with their semi-automatic rifles. As of Tuesday, 600 guard members were in El Paso on border security duty associated with Texas Gov. Greg Abbott’s Operation Lone Star.

So that’s all it takes?

It makes sense that it does.

Put a fence up, even an ugly, flimsy one, redolent of a communist regime, complete with a few guys with guns and patrol cars out there and they won’t come. 

So much for all the arguments that “walls don’t work” because migrants will find ways to scale,catapult, or tunnel under the walls. Yes, there are a few cases of this, but the big mass surges suddenly end.

There have been arguments that big, high-tech, and impressive walls are what it takes, but these ideas have been thwarted by open-borders leftists, screaming about wildlife and illegal alien “rights.” President Trump’s border wall was largely thwarted that way, and Arizona’s effort to set up stacked boxcars as an impenetrable wall met their fates this way, too.

But barbed wire and chain link fences work, too, a hell of a lot better than a naked, open, inviting border space, sometimes with only a puddly river to cross. It’s makeshift and it’s ugly, sure, but the obstructions of open-border leftists and their leftwing lawyers and roundheel judges are why we can’t have nice things. So now we get crappy, unsightly things, like razor-wire rolls and chain link fences, along with a few guards with guns and it works just as well.

The left has had a grand old time running circles around the larger, and more permanent fencing projects, but it’s a lot harder for them to challenge tiny, temporary, barriers and make an issue of them.

The success of this old and tried border solution raises questions as to why this wasn’t done earlier, back when President Trump was trying to get his wall built. Hindsight, of course, is easy for us now, but it’s sad that this idea didn’t come up earlier, even as a temporary solution while the bigger battles over the wall construction were going on. While Trump was valiantly battling leftists in the courts over his wall’s construction and funding, the barbed wire fence solution sat right there, seemingly unused. The barbed wire fence apparently could have been dragged through national parks, national wildlife refuges, and perhaps even private lands, with minimal disruption and no big symbolic images such as the border wall for the left to rally round in outrage. Those were some of the obstacles he endured in his battle to get the border wall built.

A lousy barbed wire fence worked just as well, and could be thrown up quickly, cheaply, and with immediate effects, all of which was in the thinking of that master-problem-solver, Texas Gov. Greg Abbott, who deserves kudos for this simple and effective idea. Abbott has a lot of those.

It works because I know it works.

I’ll share a personal story: My mother has an ambitious kitten whose great goal is to romp around in the canyon behind her house, which is filled with packs of hungry, pet-eating, coyotes. City officials do nothing about the problem and the den is proliferating. Once in awhile, I hear a gun go off at night and with no cops called, it’s almost certainly someone taking out a coyote and everyone else in the neighborhood just keeping quiet. Since kittens don’t belong in canyons, I found that the solution for her issue is to block the hell out of the flimsy fence she has, with flower pots, old boards, dirt, nearby jumping points, anything that will keep the kitten inside his yard and out of the canyon. Rather than wait for a coyote to come, the blocked fence is the one thing that keeps the kitten inside. Focus on the fence openings, I’ve told her, not on taking the kitten back to the shelter, as she frets every time the kitten gets out. We are still working on the fence openings, but when a known one is blocked off, the kitten stays in. When he discovers another, it’s back to the drawing board, but one day, we will have the entire fence turned into a kitten-coyote barrier. We will get there.

So will the people of Texas, with guys like Gov. Abbott around.

The lesson here is that even a bad fence works wonders to deter the tens of thousands of unvetted illegal aliens from crossing in, so let’s see more of them.

end

The switch to electric garbage trucks falter badly after trucks conked out plowing snow after just 4 hours

(zerohedge)

NYC Electric Garbage Truck Plans Hit Wall After Trucks “Conked Out” Plowing Snow After Just Four Hours

WEDNESDAY, DEC 28, 2022 – 09:05 PM

In a move that absolutely nobody could have seen coming, New York City is scrapping its brilliant idea for electric garbage trucks after finding out the truck simply “aren’t powerful enough to plow snow”.

The pipe dream of converting the city’s 6,000 garbage trucks from gas to electric in order to try and limit carbon emissions (because there’s no other problems that need to be dealt with in New York City right now) is “clashing with the limits of electric-powered vehicles,” Gothamist wrote this week.

The city’s current trucks run on diesel and can be fitted with plows in the winter. 

Despite the shortcomings, the city Department of Sanitation’ has already ordered seven electric rear loader garbage trucks, custom-made by Mack, the report says. Those trucks cost an astonishing $523,000 each and are to be delivered this spring. 

Sanitation Commissioner Jessica Tisch told the NYC city council earlier this month: “We found that they could not plow the snow effectively – they basically conked out after four hours. We need them to go 12 hours. Given the current state of the technology, I don’t see today a path forward to fully electrifying the rear loader portion of the fleet by 2040.”

“We can’t really make significant progress in converting our rear loader fleet until the snow challenges are addressed,” she continued.

Many other cities don’t use their garbage trucks to plow snow, the report notes. Places that get a lot of snow, like Denver, have their own committed light duty trucks outfitted with plows, which operate more efficiently. 

New York City, however, has committed to plowing each street and doing so by putting the city’s 2,100 trucks to work to clear the “equivalent of 19,000 miles of street lanes”. 

In addition to…well, not being able to get the job done, charging has also been a holdup with electric trucks, Tisch said: “..this charging infrastructure requires additional space and often new electrical utility connections that can require substantial capital investments.”

Harry Nespoli, the president of Teamsters Local 831 union representing sanitation workers also isn’t sold on the idea: “How much power do they have? Can they run 12-hour shifts without a charge? I don’t know.”

Sanitation spokesperson Vincent Gragnani concluded: “​​With current technology, full electrification isn’t possible now for some parts of our fleet, but we are monitoring closely and really hope it will be.”

Let us know how that turns out, Vinny.

end

Red states like Texas and Florida are witnessing massive migration of citizens. New York, California and Illinois are seeing a massive migration out of their states.

(zerohedge)

Red States Texas, Florida Crush Blue New York, California, & Illinois When It Comes To 2022 Population Growth

WEDNESDAY, DEC 28, 2022 – 06:45 PM

Authored by Ted Dabrowski and John Klingner via Wirepoints.org,

The difference couldn’t be more stark between the biggest states in the nation.

The red states of Texas and Florida grew their populations by more than 400,000 in 2022. Their pro-growth, pro-business, pro-taxpayer policies remain a magnet for both Americans and foreigners alike. In contrast, blue states New York, California and Illinois each had their populations fall by 100,000 or more in 2022. Americans continue to flee those same three states, year after year.

These findings are based on a Wirepoints’ analysis of the latest 2022 population estimates provided by the U.S. Census Bureau on December 22. The bureau performs a population estimate each year in addition to its full decennial census count at the end of each decade.

This redistribution of people among the nation’s biggest states matters for a host of reasons. Florida and Texas are winning the battle for people and their wealth, and that’s key to future growth and prosperity. It’s also key to expanding political influence. Florida and Texas both gained representation in Congress as a result of the 2020 Census, while California, Illinois and New York all lost. And the outflow of people from the blue states may be, in part, a rejection of the draconian pandemic policies those states enforced on their populations.

Changes in population also help reveal Americans’ policy preferences. The fact that the nation’s largest blue states are shrinking and red states are growing matters because three of those state’s governors, Illinois’ Pritzker, California’s Newsom and Florida’s DeSantis, may vie for the presidency.

Growing, shrinking states

Texas and Florida shared the title for the fastest-growing state in 2022. Texas won in terms of sheer numbers, growing its population by 470,708. With a 2022 population of 30,029,572, Texas is now the second state in the nation to have a population above 30 million.

Florida was the nation’s runner-up, with an increase of 416,754. Arizona, North Carolina and Georgia rounded out the top five with population gains of 133,088, 124,847, and 94,320 respectively. 

New York, like last year, was the nation’s big loser with a population decline of 180,341 in 2022. California was next with a loss of 113,649 people. Illinois, Pennsylvania and Louisiana rounded out the top five losers with population declines of 104,437, 40,051 and 36,857 respectively.

Florida was the nation’s biggest winner on a percentage basis.

The Sunshine State’s population grew by 1.9% in 2022. Idaho was the runner-up, with a population increase of 1.8%. Next was South Carolina with a 1.7% increase, Texas up 1.6% and South Dakota with a 1.5% increase.

In contrast, New York was again the big loser with a population decline of 0.9% and Illinois came in second with a population loss of more than 0.8%. Rounding out the bottom five losers were Louisiana with a loss of 0.8%, West Virginia with 0.6% and Hawaii with a 0.5% decline.

Domestic migration causes growth, declines

The single biggest source for population changes among the 50 states continues to be domestic migration – the natural movement of Americans between states. Net domestic migration is the number of people who move into a state minus those who move out.

Neither natural increase (births minus deaths) nor international migration come close to the same impact as net domestic migration. 

Florida remained the most popular destination in 2022, with a net 319,000 people deciding to make the Sunshine state their home. Texas was next, with a net migration of nearly 231,000 Americans.

On the flip side, a net 343,000 people decided they couldn’t stomach California anymore – the worst level of out-migration in the country. New York and Illinois were the runners-up, with losses of nearly 300,000 and 142,000 people, respectively.

Demographic differences

There is an interesting amount of variety in why certain states grew or shrank in 2022.

Texas, for example, grew the most in the nation due to positive numbers in every demographic component. Births outpaced deaths, creating a significant net natural increase (+118,159). That, coupled with international (+118,614) and domestic (+230,961) in-migration, is what allowed Texas to grow so much.

Florida, on the other hand, had deaths outnumber births in 2020, resulting in a negative natural increase (-40,216). But the state more than made up for that decline with the nation’s largest net domestic migration (+318,855) and the 2nd-largest international migration (+125,629).

On the flip side, neither California’s positive net natural increase (+106,155) nor its best-in-nation international migration (+125,715) made up for its worst-in-nation domestic out-migration (-343,230).

In Illinois, a positive net natural increase and net international migration were able to mask the state’s constant, growing domestic out-migration for years. No longer. The state’s tiny natural increase (+4,866), low levels of international migration (+31,529) and record domestic out-migration (-141,656) led to a record population decline of 104,000 in 2022.

Another round of winners and losers

Voting at the ballot box is certainly a way to bring about change. But as the numbers above show, so, too, is voting with your feet. 

Texas and Florida didn’t just win the war for people and their wealth in 2022, their victories have been going on for a decade and more. Texas and Florida were ranked 1 and 2 in population growth over the 2010-2020 period, with increases of 4 million and 2.8 million, respectively. That’s a growth of about 15% each. Structurally, that gives these states a huge advantage in the battle over both investment and political influence.

In contrast, states like Illinois are seeing their populations shrink. Every person that leaves is another blow to those states’ future prosperity.

You can’t help but wonder what impact these population numbers will have on the next presidential election – and what they mean for the prospects of the governors who end up running.

Read more from Wirepoints:

• New 2022 Census data: Illinois’ population down another 104K nation’s 3rd-worst drop
• DeSantis’s Florida blows away entire country in competition for people and their wealth
• $535 billion over two decades: Understanding the full impact of Illinois’ lost taxpayers and the income they took with them
• New 2020 IRS migration data reveals Florida is the biggest winner, New York is the biggest loser, in the competition for people and their wealth – A Wirepoints 50-state survey

Appendix.

end

end

USA ECONOMIC ISSUES// SUPPLY ISSUES//DERIVATIVES

The “Mega-Bubbles” Have Started To Burst, And That Could Mean Unprecedented Financial Chaos Is Ahead

THURSDAY, DEC 29, 2022 – 04:20 PM

Authored by Michael Snyder via The Economic Collapse blog,

The Federal Reserve giveth, and the Federal Reserve taketh away.  In a desperate attempt to help the U.S. economy recover from the horrific economic crisis of 2008 and 2009, the Federal Reserve pushed interest rates all the way to the floor and kept them at or near the floor until 2022.  During that same time period, the Fed also created trillions of dollars out of thin air and pumped it into the financial system.  All of this new money had to go somewhere, and it created colossal financial bubbles that were unlike anything we had ever seen before.  There were a few voices that were warning that all of this foolishness would end very badly, but those voices were mostly drowned out by those that were super happy that asset values were absolutely exploding.  The Fed had essentially created the ultimate “get rich quick scheme”, and countless Americans were more than happy to take advantage of it.

But in 2022 inflation started to become exceedingly painful, and the Federal Reserve went into panic mode.  The flow of free money stopped, and the Federal Reserve began to aggressively hike interest rates.

Everyone knew that this sudden change of course by the Fed would crash the housing market, and that is precisely what is happening.  In fact, even the Wall Street Journal is now admitting that we are facing “a housing slump as severe, by some metrics, as that of 2007-09”…

The Federal Reserve’s interest rate increases have brought on a housing slump as severe, by some metrics, as that of 2007-09, inflicting pain on prospective buyers, homeowners, builders and other industries linked to real estate.

For the Fed, this is a feature, not a bug: Slumping housing could help deliver the lower economic activity and inflation that the Fed wants in the coming year.

Home sales have been falling month after month, and it is being projected that they could soon fall below the levels that we witnessed during the last housing crash…

Sales of existing homes fell in November for a record 10th straight month. Economists at Fannie Mae and Goldman Sachs forecast they will drop below 4 million in 2023, lower than during the 2006-11 housing bust.

On Wednesday, we got some more bad news.

Pending home sales are one of the best leading indicators for where the housing market is going next, and at this point pending home sales have dropped to the lowest level ever recorded…

Contracts to buy U.S. previously owned homes fell far more than expected in November, diving for a sixth straight month in the latest indication of the hefty toll the Federal Reserve’s interest rate hikes are taking on the housing market as the central bank seeks to curb inflation.

The National Association of Realtors (NAR) said on Wednesday its Pending Home Sales Index, based on signed contracts, fell 4% to 73.9 last month from October’s downwardly revised 77.0. November’s was the lowest reading — aside from the short-lived drop in the early months of the pandemic — since NAR launched the index in 2001.

With interest rates so high, very few people want to buy homes right now.

So home prices are going to have to come down.

A lot.

In fact, George Gammon has demonstrated that we will need a crash in housing prices even larger than we witnessed during the last housing crash just to get back to the long-term trend line.

Do you think that our system will be able to handle a housing crash of that magnitude?

Of course not.

Meanwhile, the absurd cryptocurrency bubble that was created by the Fed’s easy money policies has already imploded.

I really like how Wolf Richter described what we have been witnessing over the past year in one of his most recent articles…

And then come the copycats since anyone can issue a crypto currency. Suddenly there were a dozen of them, and then there were 100 of them then a 1,000, and suddenly 10,000 cryptos, and now there are over 22,000 cryptos, and everyone and their dog is creating them, and trading them, and lending them, and using them as collateral, and all kinds of businesses sprang up around this scheme, crypto miners, crypto exchanges, crypto lending platforms, and some of them went public via IPO or via merger with a SPAC.

And the market capitalization of these cryptos reached $3 trillion, trillion with a T, about a year ago, and then when the Fed started raising its interest rates and started doing QT, the whole thing just blows up. Companies go like POOF, and the money is gone, and whatever is left is stuck in bankruptcy courts globally possibly for years. Cryptos themselves have imploded. Many have gone to essentially zero and have been abandoned for dead. The granddaddy, bitcoin, has plunged by something like 73% from the peak. The whole crypto market is also down about 73%.

More than two trillion dollars of “crypto wealth” has already been wiped out.

Less than a trillion is left.

But the party was fun while it lasted, right?

Sadly, all of the bubbles are starting to burst, and 2023 is going to be a really painful year.

Normally, major economic downturns take just about everyone by surprise.  But this time around, almost everyone can feel that really bad times are coming.  The following is what Mark Zandi of Moody’s Analytics recently had to say about this…

“Usually recessions sneak up on us. CEOs never talk about recessions,” said Zandi. “Now it seems CEOs are falling over themselves to say we’re falling into a recession. … Every person on TV says recession. Every economist says recession. I’ve never seen anything like it.”

He is right.

We’ve never seen anything like this before, and that is because the coming crisis is going to be really bad.

Many among the elite can sense that what is approaching will be truly nightmarish, and so they have been feverishly preparing for the worst…

Though a recent poll found that four-in-ten Americans believe we are ‘living in the end of times,’ it’s not just the everyman who is fearing the apocalypse these days – billionaires have been prepping themselves for the apocalypse with elaborate doomsday bunkers for years.

As the world still reels from the scars of the COVID-19 pandemic, climate change-driven storms lash American coastlines and flood inland cities, and Russian President Vladimir Putin continues to talk of using nuclear weapons to devastate Ukraine, a Pew Research Center survey of more than US 10,000 adults found that 39 percent called these the ‘end times.’

The world’s wealthiest are among those cautious of a coming calamity, including billionaire PayPal founder Peter Thiel and Silicon Valley entrepreneur Sam Altman, who have famously laid down routes in remote New Zealand with the express purpose of riding out the end of days.

Yes, things will soon get really crazy as global events spiral completely out of control.

But that doesn’t mean that you should curl up into a fetal position and throw a pity party for yourself.

When I was growing up, I was told that when the going gets tough, the tough get going.

So get prepared for some really rough years ahead.

The clock is ticking, and just about everything that can be shaken will be shaken in 2023 and beyond.

*  *  *

It is finally here! Michael’s new book entitled “End Times” is now available in paperback and for the Kindle on Amazon.

end

Times Square Crowne Plaza Hotel Goes Bankrupt

THURSDAY, DEC 29, 2022 – 04:40 PM

Is this the first major commercial real estate domino to fall in the aftermath of covid’s “work from home” revolution?

The corporate owners that operate the recently reopened Crowne Plaza Hotel in Times Square filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection Wednesday in an effort to resuscitate the ailing and lawsuit-plagued business, Bloomberg and TheRealDeal reported. •   The owners – ultimately owned by affiliates of Vornado Realty Trust – will try to sell themselves out of of bankruptcy, or will repay creditors with reorganized equity, they disclosed in court papers (The case is Times Square JV LLC, 22-11715,U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the Southern District of New York).

The building, located at 1601 Broadway, has struggled for years under a “burdensome” licensing deal with InterContinental Hotels Group for use of its Crowne Plaza brand and on a complex ownership structure; additionally Covid-19 forced the hotel to close until November of this year, court papers stated,

According to TRD, Andrew Penson’s Argent Ventures wants to reorganize the finances of the hotel, having gained control of the 46-story tower in the heart of Times Square by vanquishing office giant SL Green in court and replacing Vornado Realty Trust.  Penson had “elbowed his way” into the marquee property by buying the mezzanine debt on which Vornado had defaulted at a steep discount.

The total debt is $526 million and covers the 795-room hotel, 196,300 square feet of office space and 17,800 square feet of retail, according to bankruptcy filings. Almost all of that, or $519 million, is owed to senior and mezzanine lenders. Some $418 million in senior debt has been delinquent since April 2020, or nearly three years. 

The hotel, which occupies floors 15 through 46, closed in March 2020 when Covid arrived. It only reopened last month, way to late to save the financials. While tourism to New York City has rebounded substantially, the pandemic’s effects linger in the hospitality industry, which still employs fewer people than it did in 2019.

Meanwhile, as part of the “work from home” office crisis, some 88,000 square feet, or 45% , of the office space at 1601 Broadway remains vacant. The hotel paid $7.5 million in severance to laid-off hotel workers, plus another $5.2 million in severance — required by an 11th-hour de Blasio administration law — which Argent, Vornado and hotel operator Highgate Hotels agreed to divide evenly.

“Portions of the Debtors’ Signage Component have remained vacant for months and others continue to display advertisements for parties that are not paying monthly rent,” Richard J. Shinder, president of the bankrupt entities, said in court papers.

In its bankruptcy filing, Argent said “the operating costs associated with servicing meeting spaces and providing food and beverage exceeded the revenues from such activities.” It added that “the complex ownership arrangements of the land underlying the premises (namely the Walber fee parcel and the Riese fee parcel) also created uncertainty and financial strain.”

The Walber family had sold its ownership stake to office landlord SL Green in August 2021 for $121 million, but a judge ruled that the sale violated Argent’s ownership right to the property. Argent then bought the Walber family’s portion of the property — an 11,000-square-foot parcel — for the same $121 million in May.

The legal battle with SL Green was “expensive, time consuming and made it difficult, if not impossible, to reopen the hotel,” the bankruptcy filing said.

Argent bought the final fee parcel beneath the hotel on Wednesday. Vornado, the ultimate equity owner of the property, did not immediately return a request for comment.

Office tenants at 1601 Broadway include the Association for Computing Machinery, American Management Association and Open Jar Studios, with monthly rent totaling about $500,000. Retail rents, including Krispy Kreme’s, total about $635,000 per month.

SWAMP STORIES

Biden Says Ending Title 42 “Long Overdue” After Supreme Court Decision

WEDNESDAY, DEC 28, 2022 – 05:05 PM

In response to a recent 5-4 Supreme Court decision to keep the Title 42 illegal immigration law in place, Joe Biden begrudgingly stated that while the federal government is required to continue enforcing them, the removal of covid-based restrictions is ‘long overdue’.&nbs