Finland Bans Russians From Buying Property As Zelensky Says 'Hatred' For Them Is Justified

On Friday Finland's parliament unanimously approved a government proposal for a complete ban on real estate acquisitions from Russian nationals. The country's leaders are hailing that the resolution was passed.

The Finnish Defense Ministry announced Friday that the measure aims to strengthen national security and that "This decision sends a clear message: we will not allow Finland to be undermined," according to the statement.

Helsinki file image: Getty 

It applies to those from countries which "wage a war of aggression and pose a potential threat to Finland’s national security" - who are now barred from carrying out real estate transactions.

Finland will of course deny that its policies which target Russians are racist or xenophobic based on the following caveat:

The ban would not apply to Russians or other foreigners with a Finnish permanent residence permit or an EU residence permit granted by Helsinki, allowing them to seek approval from Finland’s Defense Ministry for transactions.

The legislation also seeks to prevent Russians from buying property through a third party, in any arrangement which tries to conceal the real buyer's identify.

During the first year of the Russia-Ukraine war, Western countries and institutions waged a cultural 'war' against all things seen as 'Russian' - from cancelling Russian classical music and ballet performances, to boycotting things as simple as Russian tea rooms or restaurants. Even books by the famous author Fyodor Dostoevsky were subject of hysterical denunciations in some corners.

Since then, it's apparently been OK for people to hate an entire nationality or ethnicity based on mere association with the Russian nation or identity. Western 'enlightened liberals' have advanced such an agenda, but also the Ukrainians themselves.

For example, Russian media has highlighted some of President Zelensky's latest comments on all of this as follows:

Ukraine’s Vladimir Zelensky has admitted that his "hatred" of Russians is one of the driving forces propelling him to “keep going” in the conflict against Moscow.

In an interview with the French daily Le Figaro published on Wednesday, Zelensky identified the emotion as one of his three key psychological drivers since the escalation of the conflict in February 2022.

Zelensky said he hated “Russians who killed so many Ukrainian citizens,” adding that he considered such an attitude appropriate in wartime. His other motivations included a sense of national dignity and the desire for his descendants to live “in the free world.”

Of course, the Ukrainian government has also welcomed Finland's move to ban all property purchases by Russians, something which is likely to be mimicked by some other EU and NATO member states.

Trump on Zelensky:

You see the hatred he's got for Putin. It's very tough for me to make a deal with that kind of hate. He's got tremendous hatred. pic.twitter.com/DSaRtZJiaf

— Clash Report (@clashreport) February 28, 2025

Regardless, Washington is pursuing a different track, with ongoing bilateral meetings with Moscow with a goal of restoring diplomatic normalization. A Thursday meeting of delegations in Istanbul was toward this end, as is Special Envoy Steve Witkoff's third visit to Moscow to meet with Putin on Friday.

Tyler Durden Sat, 04/12/2025 - 08:45

The key reports this week are March Retail Sales and Housing Starts.

For manufacturing, the March Industrial Production report, and NY and Philly Fed surveys will be released this week.

Fed Chair Jerome Powell speaks on Wednesday.

----- Monday, April 14th -----
No major economic releases scheduled.

----- Tuesday, April 15th -----
8:30 AM: The New York Fed Empire State manufacturing survey for April. The consensus is for a reading of -10.0, up from -20.0.

----- Wednesday, April 16th -----
7:00 AM ET: The Mortgage Bankers Association (MBA) will release the results for the mortgage purchase applications index.

8:30 AM: Retail sales for March is scheduled to be released.  The consensus is for a 1.3% increase in retail sales. 

This graph shows the year-over-year change in retail sales and food service (ex-gasoline) since 1993. 

9:15 AM: The Fed will release Industrial Production and Capacity Utilization for March.

This graph shows industrial production since 1967.

The consensus is for a 0.3% decrease in Industrial Production, and for Capacity Utilization to decrease to 77.9%.

10:00 AM: The April NAHB homebuilder survey. The consensus is for a reading of 38, down from 39.  Any number below 50 indicates that more builders view sales conditions as poor than good.

1:30 PM: Speech, Fed Chair Jerome Powell, Economic Outlook, At the Economic Club of Chicago, Chicago, Ill.

----- Thursday, April 17th -----
8:30 AM: The initial weekly unemployment claims report will be released. The consensus is for 224 initial claims up from 223 thousand last week.

8:30 AM ET: Housing Starts for March.

This graph shows single and multi-family housing starts since 1968.

The consensus is for 1.410 million SAAR, down from 1.501 million SAAR in February.

8:30 AM: the Philly Fed manufacturing survey for April. The consensus is for a reading of 6.7, down from 12.5.

----- Friday, April 18th -----
All US markets will be closed in observance of Good Friday.

10:00 AM: State Employment and Unemployment (Monthly) for March 2025

Points For Honesty: UK Tech Firm Says "Only Immigrants From India Will Be Considered" In DevOps Want Ad

UK tech firm Avantao Technologies has apologized after posting a job ad stating “only candidates who are immigrants from India will be considered”, according to the Daily Mail.

The listing, for a DevOps engineer role in Ilford, also asked visa-related questions like “What is your native country?” and “Are you seeking sponsorship for employment in the UK?”

The Daily Mail report says that the company claims the ad was a staff training "test" that was mistakenly published. Sure.

“Unfortunately, that has been published, and we are unable to retract it because it was a mistake made by the employee who posted it live and then departed on holiday,” a spokesperson told MailOnline.

“We are very sorry to hear that this has occurred... a mistake is a mistake, and we have taken action against the individual... we genuinely apologise.”

Avantao has offices in Hyderabad, Bangalore, and New Jersey. Chitra Ranjeeth serves as the director of the Ilford branch, which operates out of a shared business center in London alongside various other unrelated businesses.

No one was hired, and the advert expired on March 24.

Tyler Durden Sat, 04/12/2025 - 07:35

JPMorgan Responds To The Fed: There Is A Liquidity Crisis Right Now

Earlier this morning Apollo's Torsten Slok laid out the following three reasons why bond yields are soaring:

1. With the yen, euro, and Canadian dollar strengthening at the same time, this could be foreigners selling US Treasuries.

2. With the VIX at elevated levels around 50, there is a lot of hedging activity going on, and it could, therefore, be risk reduction among large asset managers managing rates, credit, and equities.

3. With almost $1 trillion in the basis trade, it could be an unwinding of the basis trade among levered hedge funds.

We have discussed 2, and especially 3, quite extensively before, and while 1 is certainly realistic we will have to wait for counterparty data from China (and everyone knows how credible Chinese data is) to get confirmation. But, we agree with Slok that selling by foreign powers, especially China, is likely. It certainly is likely on Friday when, as the chart below shows, the move in the swap spread (i.e., basis unwind) is insufficient to explain the move higher in yields, which means at least part of the move can be attributed to China selling.

Which brings up an interesting point: we already discussed how China's central bank, the PBOC (which of course is joined at the hip with the CCP) is doing everything in its power to bolster Beijing in its trade war, be it propping up the market by purchasing record amounts of ETFs/stocks, to making sure the yuan doesn't crater, and is actively buying the currency (through intermediary banks) while selling the dollar. And, by extension, China is securing the funds it needs to support the currency by selling US treasuries it holds in its reserve, whether domestically or in Belgium via Euroclear... where it appears total TSY holdings are now where they were just before China devalued the yuan in 2015 and liquidated its US paper to contain the subsequent yuan collapse. Expect a similar collapse if and when China devalues this time as Beijing will again scramble to avoid a much worse liquidation in the yuan.

Why does all of that matter?

Simple: at least on China's side, it is clear that the central bank is doing everything in its power to prop up the government in its trade war with the US and give the impression that China is not getting crushed by the trade war through such primary indicators as the stock market and the currency. We discussed this two days ago in "Beijing Unleashes Record "Plunge Protection" Buying To Prop Up Stocks, Avoid Signaling Weakness In Trade War."

Surprisingly, the Fed has so far refused to even consider doing the same on the US side. Quite the contrary, as NY Fed president John Williams said...

• *FED'S WILLIAMS SAYS CURRENT RATE STANCE REMAINS APPROPRIATE

Which is amusing considering the Fed was "jumbo" cutting last September when financial conditions were massively looser and when forward inflation expectations were much higher than they are now.

So why is the Fed not cutting now? This is also simple: the Fed, which has become extremely political - recall former NY Fed president Bill Dudley penned an op-ed during the peak of the first Trump trade war with China - in which he urged his former Fed colleagues not to stimulate and to crash the economy, in order to destroy Trump (no we aren't joking).

Source: Bloomberg

But an unconditional denial of easing to Trump would be too obvious (especially one which is based on something as flimsy as UMichigan inflation expectations, the very same thing that Fed Chair Powell said during his last FOMC meeting to completely ignore), especially if and when the market went haywire and people start asking questions why the Fed is refusing to move as things start to break (like the basis trade for example).

Which brings us to escape clause: moments ago, the FT published an interview with Boston Fed president Susan Collins in which she said that "The Federal Reserve “would absolutely be prepared” to deploy its firepower to stabilise financial markets should conditions become disorderly, according to one of the central bank’s top officials" adding that the Fed “does have tools to address concerns about market functioning or liquidity should they arise”.

Great.... but - there is of course a but - Collins also said “markets are continuing to function well” and that “we’re not seeing liquidity concerns overall”.

In other words, the Fed has a liquidity put... there is just no liquidity crisis.

Only - even if one ignores the blow up of the basis trade which as we explained previously has soaked up all the market's available liquidity -  there is a liquidity crisis according to JPMorgan.

Below we excerpt from a note published this morning by JPMorgan's Market Intel team, which quotes trader Marissa Gitler, in which she said that liquidity is now gone and that what happens next could be ugly.

While it’s important to take a fundamental stance on the macro environment, the declining liquidity picture is an important piece of the puzzle and it’s worth flagging. To put statistics around it: Top-deck bid-ask for ESM5 and TYM5 are both roughly -80% worse than the 20d market average. These are historically two of the most liquid contracts in global macro markets. The top-deck in UX1 is roughly -95% worse. There appears no recovery this morning either.

De-leveraging and deterioration of macro sentiment has morphed into a situation in which liquidity dynamics are now meaningfully impaired in liquid markets. The lack of liquidity could result in price moves that are outsized relative to the amount of flow that is actually going through. This is in BOTH directions – significant bounces can take place ‘on air’ while it could similarly lead to unruly market outcomes to the downside. This is important context as we head into risk events such as UST auctions, the FOMC Minutes, CPI, and, realistically, just every minute of the trading day now as we are subject to Tariff tape bombs.

She concludes as follows:

Equity turmoil has been fairly transparent via the selloff in indexes globally, but yesterday [April 8] the conversation rapidly flipped from equities back into the fixed income world as UST yields surged meaningfully led by the long end. It’s pretty impossible for anyone to predict where we go from here (myself included), but deterioration of the broader liquidity framework is never a great setup for risk markets.

So while the Fed may ignore warnings by entities - such as this website - that liquidity is gone, imagine a world where there is a full-blown funding crisis, banks are failing and the Fed is blamed for ignoring not just the all too clear signs, but also ignoring a warning from the largest US bank, JPMorgan.

That is not a world that Jerome Powell, no matter how much he wants to listen to Bill Dudley and crush Donald Trump, would want to be in.

More in the full JPMorgan note available to pro subscribers.

Tyler Durden Sat, 04/12/2025 - 07:16

NATO Is A Corpse

Authored by Andrew Latham via RealClearDefense,

NATO is a corpse. All that remains is the grotesque performance art of a diplomatic zombie stumbling from summit to summit, mouthing tired clichés about “shared values” and “burden sharing,” even as its core strategic logic lies rotting beneath the surface. The Atlantic Alliance, once the steel scaffolding of Western security, has become a hollow ritual. Its military readiness is an illusion. Its political cohesion is fraying. Its future, if it has one, lies not in revival—but in reinvention or replacement.

This is not a triumphalist declaration from the Kremlin or Beijing. It is a sober diagnosis, grounded in realism and restraint. And it should be a wake-up call in Washington, Ottawa, Berlin, and beyond.

NATO’s death was not caused by Donald Trump, though he may soon become its undertaker. Nor was it caused by Vladimir Putin’s invasion of Ukraine, though that war has exposed the Alliance’s hollowness in ways no war game or communique ever could. The real cause lies in decades of European free-riding, American strategic drift, and a foundational lie at the heart of the Alliance: the idea that an empire can masquerade as a collective defense pact without consequences.

Let’s start with the numbers. Most NATO members still do not meet the 2 percent of GDP defense spending benchmark, despite years of promises and performative panic. Canada, which has taken freeloading to an art form, has shown no serious intention of meeting its obligations. As I’ve written elsewhere, Trudeau’s empty pledges mask a decaying defense industrial base, a stagnant recruiting system, and an Arctic strategy made of snow and sentiment.

Germany—the economic motor of Europe—still can’t field a combat-ready army for more than a few weeks at a time. The Bundeswehr is a shell. Its special fund is already mostly spent, and its political class remains addicted to strategic ambiguity and military minimalism. France wants “strategic autonomy” but lacks the scale and will to lead Europe alone. Poland, despite its impressive rearmament, cannot carry the continent’s defense burden on its shoulders—certainly not while Berlin dithers and Washington increasingly looks west, not east.

Meanwhile, the United States—still NATO’s military backbone—faces a fiscal cliff, a recruitment crisis, and an overstretched force posture. The era of limitless resources is over. American global primacy has ended. Multipolarity has arrived. The U.S. must now prioritize. And that means making hard choices about where its forces are truly needed—and where others must finally step up or face the consequences.

The war in Ukraine has laid these contradictions bare. NATO as an institution is not fighting the war. The United States is. Some European countries are helping—but most are hedging. NATO has been bypassed in favor of bilateral and ad hoc coalitions. Article 5 hasn’t been tested, and it may never be. The idea that NATO is “more united than ever” is a comforting fiction, trotted out to conceal the fact that the Alliance can no longer mount a serious, conventional defense of Europe without massive and prolonged American escalation.

Even the so-called Nordic expansion—Sweden and Finland joining NATO—has not changed the equation. It’s a strategic sideshow. Unless Europe can build up a credible, conventional deterrent in the East, without expecting Washington to always bail it out, the Alliance will remain a Potemkin village: flags, acronyms, and summits without substance.

Trump’s likely return to the White House in 2025 should not be viewed as a cataclysm but as an overdue reckoning. He will not end NATO. He will force Europe to decide whether it is willing to pay for its own defense or not. He will not blow up the Alliance. He will make it answer for its contradictions. And that, frankly, is what a serious ally should do.

Some critics will scream that this is the death knell of the “rules-based international order.” But the order they mourn was already breaking down—long before Trump, long before Ukraine, long before Brexit or Crimea. What we are witnessing is not a collapse but a transition: from the illusion of Atlanticism to the reality of multipolarity. And NATO, if it is to matter at all in this new world, must either become a true European-led military alliance with American support—or fade into history like SEATO and CENTO before it.

This doesn’t mean abandoning Europe to Russian domination. It means telling uncomfortable truths. Europe is rich. Europe is populous. Europe is not helpless. The United States can and should support its European allies—but it should not subsidize their illusions indefinitely. A more self-reliant Europe is not a threat to American interests; it is a precondition for strategic focus on the North Pacific, the Arctic, and the Western Hemisphere—where the real contests of the 21st century will be decided.

In my writing here and elsewhere, I have repeatedly argued that Canada must stop pretending it is a global power and start acting like what it is: a North Pacific, Arctic, and North Atlantic state. That means prioritizing regional defense, rebuilding naval and aerospace capabilities, and getting serious about continental defense. NATO is not the vehicle for that anymore—if it ever was. For Canada, continuing to hide behind NATO rhetoric while failing to meet even the most basic obligations is not only cowardly—it is dangerous.

A dead NATO still carries risks. Strategic ambiguity, brittle expectations, and performative deterrence are a recipe for miscalculation. The Alliance’s political leadership must either acknowledge the need for transformation or risk a future crisis that reveals, in real time and in blood, what we already know: that the emperor has no tanks.

The solution is not sentimental nostalgia. It is clear-eyed realism. NATO in its current form is not worth saving. But its core idea—collective defense among likeminded powers—still has value. What’s needed is a reset: a reimagined Euro-Atlantic security framework led by capable European states, with American support but not American dominance. A NATO that deters by capability, not by assumption. A NATO that can say no as well as yes. A NATO, in short, that lives in the real world.

The alternative is strategic decay. A slow slide into irrelevance. More summits, more selfies, more hollow communiqués. Until, one day, NATO doesn’t die with a bang—but with a bureaucratic whimper.

That future is already here. NATO is dead. The only question now is what comes next—and whether we have the courage to build it.

Andrew Latham,Ph.D., a tenured professor at Macalester College in Saint Paul, Minnesota. He is also a Senior Washington Fellow with the Institute for Peace and Diplomacy in Ottawa and a non-resident fellow with Defense Priorities, a think tank in Washington, DC.

Tyler Durden Sat, 04/12/2025 - 07:00

The weekend is here! Pour yourself a mug of Colombia Tolima Los Brasiles Peaberry Organic coffee, grab a seat outside, and get ready for our longer-form weekend reads:

• All the arguments for Trump’s tariffs are wrong and bad: The President’s defenders are flailing. (Noahpinion)

• Nobody Knows (Yet Again): I want to point out that there are no experts on the subject at hand. Economists have analytical tools and theories to apply, but no economist and no tool will produce a conclusion in this instance that we can follow with confidence. There have been no large-scale trade wars in the modern era; thus, the theories are untested. Investors, businesspeople, academics, and government leaders will all give advice, but none of them is much more likely to be right than the average intelligent observer. The things on which everyone will agree are obvious, such as the likelihood of higher prices. The less obvious truths will be harder to discern. (Oaktree Capital)

• Americans Have $35 Trillion in Housing Wealth—and It’s Costing Them: Surging home equity is all the more important in a declining stock market. But it’s come with rising property taxes and higher hurdles for borrowing. (Wall Street Journal)

• Bluesky’s Quest to Build Nontoxic Social Media: X and Facebook are governed by the policies of mercurial billionaires. Bluesky’s C.E.O., Jay Graber, says that she wants to give power back to the user. (New Yorker)

• Americans Buy a Crazy Amount of Cheap Stuff. It’s Costing Us Dearly. Our mountain of clutter remains, even if tariffs bring an end to the era of low-cost goods. (Wall Street Journal)

• Scientists Are Mapping the Boundaries of What Is Knowable and Unknowable: Math and computer science researchers have long known that some questions are fundamentally unanswerable. Now physicists are exploring how physical systems put hard limits on what we can predict. (Wired)

• This Is the Holocaust Story I Said I Wouldn’t Write: For years, my friend’s father asked me to recount his childhood escape from the Nazis. Why did it take me this long? (New York Times)

• As a young man, I fell in love with the US. The country’s soul is still there, despite Trump’s best efforts to destroy it. For many of us, the United States means music, progress, hope. Whatever their president does, plenty of Americans continue to believe in those too. (The Guardian)

• The $200 Million Enigma Who Suddenly Learned How to Score: Ousmane Dembélé was known as an injury-riddled flop with a penchant for spectacular misses. Then, out of nowhere, he turned into one of the most lethal finishers in the game. (Wall Street Journal)

• ‘Jonah Hill keeps his teeth in a safe’: meet Hollywood’s top special-effects dentist: He made the ‘manky British’ set for Austin Powers, droppable ones for Mrs Doubtfire – and fangs for Tom Cruise. Gary Archer on crafting amazing gnashers for stars. (The Guardian)

Be sure to check out our Masters in Business this week with Tony Yoseloff, Managing Partner and Chief Investment Officer at the $35 billion Davidson Kempner. He is Chairman of the New York Public Library’s endowment, sits on the Board of Trustees of Princeton and the Board of Directors of its  endowment, and is Vice Chair of the investment committee at New York-Presbyterian.

How Does the Stock Market Bottom

Source: Batnick

Sign up for our reads-only mailing list here.

~~~

To learn how these reads are assembled each day, please see this.

The post 10 Weekend Reads appeared first on The Big Picture.

Escobar: Russia–Iran–China - All For One, And One For All?

Authored by Pepe Escobar via The Cradle,

Russia and Iran are at the forefront of the multi-layered Eurasia integration process – the most crucial geopolitical development of the young 21st century. 

Both are top members of BRICS+ and the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO). Both are seriously implicated as Global Majority leaders to build a multi-nodal, multipolar world. And both have signed, in late January in Moscow, a detailed, comprehensive strategic partnership. 

The second administration of US President Donald Trump, starting with the “maximum pressure” antics employed by the bombastic Circus Ringmaster himself, seems to ignore these imperatives.       

It was up to the Russian Foreign Ministry to re-introduce rationality in what was fast becoming an out of control shouting match: essentially Moscow, alongside its partner Tehran, simply will not accept outside threats of bombing Iran’s nuclear and energy infrastructure, while insisting on the search for viable negotiated solutions for the Islamic Republic's nuclear program. 

And then, just like lightning, the Washington narrative changed. US Special Envoy for Middle East Affairs, Steven Witkoff – not exactly a Metternich, and previously a “maximum pressure” hardliner – started talking about the need for “confidence-building” and even “resolving disagreements,” implying Washington began “seriously considering,” according to the proverbial “officials,” indirect nuclear talks.

These implications turned to reality on Monday afternoon when Trump allegedly blindsided the visiting Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu with the announcement of a “very big meeting” with Iranian officials in the next few days. Tehran later confirmed the news, with Iran's Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi saying he would engage in indirect nuclear negotiations with Witkoff in Oman on Saturday.

It’s as if Trump had at least listened to the arguments exposed by the Islamic Republic's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. But then again, he can change his mind in a Trump New York minute. 

The finer points of the Russia–Iran–China axis

Essential background to decipher the “Will Russia help Iran” conundrum can be found in these all-too-diplomatic exchanges at the Valdai Club in Moscow.

The key points were made by Alexander Maryasov, Russia’s ambassador to Iran from 2001 to 2005. Maryasov argues that the Russia–Iran treaty is not only a symbolic milestone, but “serves as a roadmap for advancing our cooperation across virtually all domains.” It is more of “a bilateral relations document” – not a defense treaty.  

The treaty was extensively discussed – then approved – as a counter-point to “the intensified military-political and economic pressure exerted by western nations on both Russia and Iran.”

The main rationale was how to fight against the sanctions tsunami. 

Yet even if it does not constitute a military alliance, the treaty details mutually agreed moves if there is an attack or threats to either nation’s national security – as in Trump’s careless bombing threats against Iran. The treaty also defines the vast scope of military-technical and defense cooperation, including, crucially, regular intel talk. 

Maryasov identified the key security points as the Caspian, the South Caucasus, Central Asia, and last but not least, West Asia, including the breadth and reach of the Axis of Resistance.  

The official Moscow position on the Axis of Resistance is an extremely delicate affair. For instance, let’s look at Yemen. Moscow does not officially recognize the Yemeni resistance government embodied by Ansarallah and with its HQ in the capital Sanaa; rather, it recognizes, just like Washington, a puppet government in Aden, which is in fact housed in a five-star hotel in Riyadh, sponsored by Saudi Arabia. 

Last summer two different Yemeni delegations were visiting Moscow. As I witnessed it, the Sanaa delegation faced tremendous bureaucratic problems to clinch official meetings. 

There is, of course, sympathy for Ansarallah across Moscow intel and military circles. But as confirmed in Sanaa with a member of the High Political Council, these contacts occur via “privileged channels,” and not institutionally. 

The same applies to Lebanon's Hezbollah, which was a key Russian ally in routing ISIS and other Islamist extremist groups during the Syrian war. When it comes to Syria, the only thing that really matters for official Moscow, after the Al-Qaeda-linked extremists took power in Damascus last December, is to preserve the Russian bases in Tartous and Hmeimim. 

There’s no question that the Syrian debacle was an extremely serious setback for both Moscow and Tehran, further aggravated by Trump's non-stop escalation over Iran’s nuclear program and his “maximum pressure” obsession. 

The nature of the Russia–Iran treaty differs substantially from that of Russia–China. For Beijing, the partnership with Moscow is so solid, it develops so dynamically, that they don’t even need a treaty: they have a “comprehensive strategic partnership.” 

Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi, in his recent visit to Russia, after coining a pearl – “those who live in the 21st century but think in Cold War blocs and zero-sum games cannot keep up with the times” – neatly summarized Sino–Russian relations in three vectors: The two Asian giants are “forever friends and never enemies;” Equality and mutually beneficial cooperation; Non-alignment with blocs; Non-confrontation, and non-targeting of third parties. So even as we have a Russia–Iran treaty, between China and Russia, and China and Iran, we have essentially close partnerships.

Witness, for instance, the fifth annual joint Russia–Iran–China naval exercises that took place in the Gulf of Oman in March. This trilateral synergy is not new; it has been under development for years.

But it's lazy to characterize this improved RIC Primakov triangle (Russia–Iran–China instead of Russia–India–China) as an alliance. The only “alliance” that exists today on the geopolitical chessboard is NATO – a warmongering outfit composed of intimidated vassals corralled together by the Empire of Chaos. 

Cue to yet another hard-to-resist Wang Yi jade pearl: “The US is sick but forces others to take the medicine.” Takeaways: Russia is not switching sides; China won’t be encircled; and Iran will be defended. 

When the new Primakov triangle meets in Beijing 

At the Valdai discussion, Daniyal Meshkin Ranjbar, assistant professor in the Department of Theory and History of International Relations at the Moscow-based RUDN University, made a crucial point: “For the first time in history, the diplomatic outlooks of Russia and Iran converge." He's referring to the obvious parallels between official policies: Russia’s “pivot to the east” and Iran’s “look east” policies. 

All those interconnections plainly escape the new administration in Washington, as well as bombastic Trump–Netanyahu rhetoric that has zero basis in reality – even the US National Security Council admitted that Iran is not working on a nuclear bomb.

And that brings us to the Big Picture.  

The Circus Ringmaster – at least until he changes his mind again – is essentially working on a triangulation deal, allegedly offering Russia a transportation framework, access to grain exports in the Black Sea, and Russian banks off the sanction list of SWIFT so he may execute his “pivot” to then attack Iran (deadline to Tehran included). 

And if Russia defends Iran, no deal. 

That’s as mendacious as Mafia-style “offer you can’t refuse” maximum pressure can get. Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergey Ryabkov – an exceptionally able diplomat – destroyed the whole rationale: “Russia cannot accept US proposals to end the war in Ukraine in their current form because they do not solve the problems Moscow considers the cause of the conflict.” Even as Moscow “takes the models and solutions proposed by the Americans very seriously.”

As the Russian angle of Trump’s triangulation falters, Tehran is not merely watching the river flow. How Iran adapted for decades to a sanctions tsunami is now firm knowledge deeply shared with Moscow, part of their deepening cooperation enshrined in the treaty. 

For all of Trump’s volatility, non-Zionist-contaminated voices across the Beltway are slowly but surely imprinting the rational view that a war on Iran is absolutely suicidal for the Empire itself. So the odds resurface that Trump 2.0 verbal barrages may be paving the way for a temporary deal that will be spun to death – after all, this is always a battle of narratives – as a diplomatic victory.

Bets can be made that the only leader on the planet capable of making Trump understand reality is Russian President Vladimir Putin, in their next phone call.  After all, it is the Circus Ringmaster himself who created the revamped “nuclear Iran” drama. RIC – or the revamped Primakov triangle – duly addressed it, together, in a crucial, discreet, not-publicized recent meeting in Beijing, as confirmed by diplomatic sources. 

Essentially, the RIC has developed a “nuclear Iran” road map. These are the highlights: 

• Dialogue. No escalation. No “maximum pressure”. Step-by-step moves. Build mutual confidence.
• As Iran re-emphasizes its veto on developing nuclear weapons, the much-debated “international community”, actually the UN Security Council, recognizes, again, Iran’s right to peaceful nuclear energy under the NPT.
• Back to the JCPOA – and reboot it. To get Trump back on board, the reboot will be an extremely hard sell. 

This roadmap was ratified during a second round of RIC trilateral talks in Moscow on Tuesday, where senior officials from the allied nations discussed collaborative efforts to address the challenges faced by Iran.

That summit in Moscow

As it stands, the road map is just that: a map. The breathless Zionist axis from Washington to Tel Aviv will continue to insist that Iran, if attacked, will not be supported by Russia, and extra, non-stop “maximum pressure” will force Tehran to eventually fold and abandon its support to the Axis of Resistance. 

All that, once again, eschews reality. For Moscow, Iran is an absolutely key geopolitical priority; beyond Iran, to the east, is Central Asia. The Zionist obsessive fantasy of regime change in Tehran masks NATO's then penetrating into Central Asia, building military bases, and at the same time blocking several strategically crucial Chinese Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) projects. Iran is as essential to China’s long-term foreign policy as it is to Russia’s. 

It's not by accident that Russia and China will meet at the presidential level – Vladimir Putin and Xi Jinping – at a summit in Moscow around 9 May, Victory Day in the Great Patriotic War. They will be analyzing in detail the next stage of “changes that we have not seen in 100 years,” as formulated by Xi to Putin in their groundbreaking 2023 summer in Moscow. 

They, of course, will be discussing how the Circus Ringmaster dreams of closing down one Forever War just to start another: the specter of a US–Israel attack on their strategic partner Iran – complete with the counterpunch of blocking the Strait of Hormuz (transit for 24 million barrels of oil a day); a barrel of oil skyrocketing to $200 and even more; and the collapse of the humongous $730 trillion pile of derivatives in the global economy.

No, President Circus Ringmaster: You don't have the cards.    

*  *  *

Views expressed in this article are opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of ZeroHedge.

Tyler Durden Fri, 04/11/2025 - 23:25

These Are Most Common Types Of Fraud In America

Americans are losing more money to scams than ever before. The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) estimates that Americans lost $12.5 billion to fraud schemes in 2024, up $2.5 billion from the previous year.

In 2023, consumers around the world lost almost half a trillion dollars to scams.

While certain scams were much more commonly reported, other types led to bigger financial losses for consumers.

This visualization, via Visual Capitalist's Kayla Zhu, shows the 10 most common types of fraud in the U.S. by the number of reports made to the FTC in 2024, and the total dollar value lost from each type of fraud.

Data comes from the FTC and is updated as of March 2025.

What Type of Fraud is the Most Common?

Below, we show the top 10 most commonly reported fraud types to the FTC, the total dollar value lost from each type of fraud, and the median loss per incident.

Imposter scams—where fraudsters pose as government officials, friends, coworkers, or other trusted parties to steal money or personal information—were the most frequently reported type of fraud in the U.S. last year, with over 840,000 cases filed with the FTC.

This cost consumers almost $3 billion in losses last year.

However, while imposter scams were the most common, investment-related scams led to the biggest financial losses, costing Americans a total of $5.7 billion. The median loss per victim exceeded $9,000.

According to the FTC, scams through email made up the highest number of reports while scams through social media had the highest losses.

Text message scams are also common, making up 22% of all fraud reports to the FTC in 2022.

Types of Fraud

A full list of all fraud types can be found on the FTC website.

• Imposter scams: Someone pretends to be a trusted person to get consumer to send money/give personal information

• Online shopping/negative reviews: Undisclosed costs, failure to deliver on time, non-delivery, business preventing honest reviews

• Business/job opportunities: Fraudulent franchise opportunities, multi-level marketing schemes, job scams

• Investment related: Fraudulent investment opportunities in day trading, gold, art, other products

• Internet services: Problems with website content, difficulty canceling online account, issues with payment service, undisclosed charges

• Prizes, sweepstakes and lotteries: Promotions for free prizes for a fee, foreign lotteries offered through phone or e-mail

• Telephone and mobile services: Unauthorized charges, problems with mobile applications

• Health care: Fraudulent, misleading or deceptive claims for treatments or products

• Travel, vacations, timeshare plans: Deceptive offers for free or low-cost vacations, misleading time share offers

• Mortgage foreclosure relief, debt management: Lenders/brokers making false promises to save consumers’ homes from foreclosure, credit organizations charging excessive fees

To learn more about common scams, check out this graphic that visualizes companies are impersonated most often in online scams.

Tyler Durden Fri, 04/11/2025 - 23:00

The Sahel: Emerging Center Of Global Islamism

Authored by Nils Haug via The Gatestone Institute,

The center of world terrorist activity and violent death is no longer the Middle East. The "Sahel region of Africa is now the 'epicentre of global terrorism,'" responsible for "over half of all terrorism-related deaths" worldwide, according to the respected Global Terrorism Index.

The sub-Saharan Sahel is largely unknown to much of the world. It can be described as the large, mostly flat, strip, nearly 600 miles wide, located between the savannahs of Sudan to the south and the Sahara desert to the north.

During the last ten years or so, according to the Royal United Services Institute, the world's oldest defense and security think tank, headquartered in London, the Sahel has undergone a "significant surge in jihadist violence. Armed actors take advantage of porous borders, fragile states, and local grievances to extend their operational reach,"

Global Terrorism Index 2025, published by the Institute for Economics & Peace, reveals that the primary instigator of global terrorism during 2024 was the Islamic State (ISIS) and associated groups -- such as al Qaeda, Jamaat Nusrat Al-Islam wal Muslimeen, Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan, and al- Shabaab -- together responsible for more than 7,500 deaths.

Although the West is experiencing escalating terrorism in countries such as Sweden, Australia, Finland, the Netherlands, Denmark, Germany and Switzerland, the Sahel region evidently remains the "global epicentre of terrorism, accounting for over half of all terrorism-related deaths in 2024." 

Here, conflict deaths exceeded 25,000 for the first time, of which nearly 4,000 were directly connected to terrorism.

A perturbing factor is that in Europe, "one in five persons arrested for terrorism is legally classified as a child." This is understandable, as children in Islamist-jihadist communities are exposed to Jew-hatred and the desire for an Islamist caliphate from a very tender age. The same statistics would apply to terrorist actors in the Sahel, as the ideology of martyrdom and sacrifice is ubiquitous to jihadism.

Susceptible countries in the region include Senegal, Sudan, Niger, Burkina Faso and Mali. Unsurprisingly, the region's rich mineral resources – with Niger the world's seventh-biggest producer of uranium -- also attract attention. China and Russia are increasingly represented, while Western nations withdraw from Africa due to growing anti-Western attitudes. Specifically, the US base in Niger in August 2024 and France's base in Chad closed in December 2024.

The consequence is, of course, that with the West's retreat, ISIS has free rein to action their visions of global influence. 

They are present in 22 countries at present and, as the report points out: "Despite counterterrorism efforts, the group's ability to coordinate, inspire, and execute attacks highlights its resilience and evolving operational strategies." In the remoteness of the Sahel, ISIS finds an accommodating environment to consolidate and establish a central base.

Russia's Wagner mercenary militia, although rebranded as an "Expeditionary Corps," continues its predatory activities in the area, offering "governments in Africa a 'regime survival package' in exchange for access to strategically important natural resources."

Covertly obtained Russian documents reveal how the group strives to "change mining laws in West Africa, with the ambition of dislodging Western companies from an area of strategic importance." The upshot is accelerating anti-Western sentiment, resulting in the local states seeking to expel hitherto entrenched foreign interests.

A February 20, 2024, report by Jack Watling, Fellow for Land Warfare at the Royal United Services Institute, explains that there "was a meeting in the Kremlin in which it was decided that Wagner's Africa operations would fall directly under the control of Russian military intelligence, the GRU."

Watling concludes, "This is the Russian state coming out of the shadows in its Africa policy." Russia's patent objective is therefore to "seize control of critical resources," and "aggressively pursue the expansion of its partnerships in Africa, with the explicit intent to supplant Western partnerships."

Unlike the West, Russia is not particularly interested in countering terror groups such as ISIS but, instead, focuses on its core objectives concerning "critical resources" and replacing "Western partnership" in the Sahel. With the retreat of Western anti-terror forces, ISIS and associates have freedom to expand their activities, while Russia focuses on eliminating Western influence. The result is a vacuum of experienced Western counter-terror forces, a situation in which jihadist groups thrive.

Fortunately, North African nations, such as Morocco and Algeria, realize the dangers of unchecked jihadism in the Sahel, which reaches towards their southern borders. To give effect to its objectives, Rabat implemented the Morocco Atlantic Initiative, which,

"aims to provide landlocked Sahel countries with access to vital maritime trade routes via Morocco's Atlantic port infrastructure. The plan aims to foster economic regional integration to reduce dependence on unstable transit routes, while fostering Morocco's ties with its southern neighbours to counter instability, terrorism and illicit trafficking in the region in the long term."

Similarly, Algeria, with its common "borders and historical ties to Mali, has always played a pivotal role in the region."

In addition, some Sahel states are taking it upon themselves to counter jihadists in their domain. Recently, an alliance of three prominent Sahel states -- Burkina Faso, Mali and Niger -- "unveiled plans for a unified military force of 5,000 soldiers."

"Each of the three AES armies are expected to contribute troops, tasked with conducting joint operations in areas of intense jihadist activity. In their view, establishing a self-sufficient military partnership is the most dependable way to safeguard sovereignty."

This local move came about as a lack of available Western forces to quell jihadism - an absence brought about by the Sahel nations "severing long-standing military and diplomatic ties with regional allies, France, and other Western powers." In 2024, the three Sahel nations agreed "to tackle security threats jointly."

Although a joint force of 5,000 soldiers is a fair starting point, it is to be noted that the region under discussion covers over 2 million square miles – a vast area. It is anticipated that Russia, China and Turkey, who already provide "bilateral military assistance and equipment" might partner, to some degree, with the Sahel forces to counter terrorism.

Meanwhile, ISIS and al-Qaeda, with associates, extend "greater influence over trans-Saharan networks which will expand their external reach and increase the threat of external plots in North Africa and potentially Europe."

In the result, the Sahel predominantly remains the locale of non-Western actors and local states, acting together for mutual benefit, including the possible control of terrorism. Whether or not efforts by these parties, with some North African countries, will have much impact on jihadism activity in the region remains to be seen. Currently, the significant strategic, political, and economic benefits in the region are reaped by Russia, China and Turkey. The West is nowhere to be seen.

Tyler Durden Fri, 04/11/2025 - 22:35

Water Wars, Begun They Have

Water conflicts are on the rise around the world, according to data from the Pacific Institute.

In the first four years of this decade alone, there have been 785 recorded water conflicts worldwide. 

As Statista's Anna Fleck shows in the chart below, this is already 27 percent higher than the number of conflicts linked to water resources of the entire decade from 2010-2019, when 620 such events were reported in total. 

 

 

You will find more infographics at Statista

The Pacific Institute’s data is categorized based on the use, impact or effect that water has within a conflict and can be subdivided into three main groups. 

• The first is termed “casualty” and describes the loss of water resources or systems due to becoming intentional or incidental targets of violence. 

• The second is defined as a “weapon”, where water resources or systems are used as an instrument or weapon in a violent conflict. 

• The third and final group falls under “trigger”, which covers conflicts that are directly over the control of water. In this case, economic or physical access to water, or the event of water scarcity, have triggered violence.

As this chart clearly illustrates, the frequency of water conflicts is growing exponentially.

Tyler Durden Fri, 04/11/2025 - 22:10

Judge Sides With Trump Admin On Identification Rules For Illegal Immigrants

Authored by Naveen Athrappully via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

A federal judge has allowed the Trump administration to enforce identification requirements for immigrants present in the United States illegally.

In a ruling on Thursday, Judge Trevor Neil McFadden said that a rule by the Department of Homeland Security to require illegal immigrants to comply with statutory registration and fingerprinting may move forward as plaintiffs arguing against it failed to “demonstrate that they have standing to bring this suit.”

The case was filed on March 31 in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia in Washington, with the main plaintiff being the Coalition for Humane Immigrant Rights, along with other immigrant advocacy groups.

On Jan. 20, when President Donald Trump took office for the second time, he issued an executive order, “Protecting the American People Against Invasion,” in which he stated that illegal immigrants must be identified and registered with the federal government.

Following his order, Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem announced on Feb. 25 that the DHS would fully enforce the Immigration and Nationality Act (INA), under which illegal immigrants will be tracked and compelled to leave the country voluntarily.

Criminal penalties will be imposed on those failing to leave the country, failing to register their identities with the federal government and be fingerprinted, or failing to inform authorities of a change in address.

“An alien’s failure to register is a crime that could result in a fine, imprisonment, or both. For decades, this law has been ignored—not anymore,” said the DHS announcement, referring to the Alien Registration Act, which was first enacted by Congress in 1940.

The registration requirement is set to be effective from April 11, 2025.

According to the alien registration requirement, all illegal immigrants 14 years and older who were not registered and fingerprinted when applying for a U.S. visa, and who remain in the United States for 30 days or longer, must apply for registration and fingerprinting.

The INA requires that all “parents and legal guardians of aliens below the age of 14 must ensure that those aliens are registered.”

Registered illegal immigrants over the age of 18 must carry proof of registration with them at all times, according to the rule.

“Failure to comply may result in criminal and civil penalties, up to and including misdemeanor prosecution, the imposition of fines, and incarceration.”

The U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services website states that, as part of enabling the requirement, the government has established a new form—G-325R, Biometric Information (Registration)—and an online process “by which unregistered aliens may register and comply with the law.”

In its lawsuit, the Coalition for Humane Immigrant Rights argued that the DHS rule “reverses the government’s long-standing approach to registration … in a manner that will cause confusion, fear, and significant economic disruption.

“Defendants attempt to rush through these sweeping changes without any meaningful explanation for the change in policy and without the notice, public comment, and careful consideration that Congress requires to avoid exactly these types of harms.”

The plaintiffs requested a stay of the rule.

McFadden ruled that the plaintiffs failed to establish standing on an organizational level and on behalf of the organization’s members.

The coalition’s “injuries are highly speculative, sounding in prospective fears about what might happen when the rule takes effect,” he said.

The organization has also failed to demonstrate how a “mere requirement to abide by the law” constitutes a concrete injury.

The plaintiffs argued that this “compelled admission” regarding their members’ immigration status violates the Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination.

In response, McFadden said that the coalition had failed to “demonstrate that any of their members would actually be subject to criminal prosecution based on their answers to Form G-325R.”

Meanwhile, according to the DHS, Immigration and Customs Enforcement made 32,809 arrests in the first 50 days of the Trump administration, a number that almost equaled the total arrests made in fiscal year 2024.

The DHS said in a post on social media platform X on April 9: “Illegal aliens should use the CBP Home app to self-deport and leave the country now. If they don’t, they will face the consequences. This includes a fine of $998 per day for every day that the illegal alien overstayed their final deportation order.”

The Epoch Times reached out to the Coalition for Humane Immigrant Rights for comment.

Tyler Durden Fri, 04/11/2025 - 21:45

Peter Schiff: Printing Money Is Not the Cure for Cononavirus



In his most recent podcast, Peter Schiff talked about coronavirus and the impact that it is having on the markets. Earlier this month, Peter said he thought the virus was just an excuse for stock market woes. At the time he believed the market was poised to fall anyway. But as it turns out, coronavirus has actually helped the US stock market because it has led central banks to pump even more liquidity into the world financial system. All this means more liquidity — central banks easing. In fact, that is exactly what has already happened, except the new easing is taking place, for now, outside the United States, particularly in China.” Although the new money is primarily being created in China, it is flowing into dollars — the dollar index is up — and into US stocks. Last week, US stock markets once again made all-time record highs. In fact, I think but for the coronavirus, the US stock market would still be selling off. But because of the central bank stimulus that has been the result of fears over the coronavirus, that actually benefitted not only the US dollar, but the US stock market.” In the midst of all this, Peter raises a really good question. The primary economic concern is that coronavirus will slow down output and ultimately stunt economic growth. Practically speaking, the world would produce less stuff. If the virus continues to spread, there would be fewer goods and services produced in a market that is hunkered down. Why would the Federal Reserve respond, or why would any central bank respond to that by printing money? How does printing more money solve that problem? It doesn’t. In fact, it actually exacerbates it. But you know, everybody looks at central bankers as if they’ve got the solution to every problem. They don’t. They don’t have the magic wand. They just have a printing press. And all that creates is inflation.” Sometimes the illusion inflation creates can look like a magic wand. Printing money can paper over problems. But none of this is going to fundamentally fix the economy. In fact, if central bankers were really going to do the right thing, the appropriate response would be to drain liquidity from the markets, not supply even more.” Peter explained how the Fed was originally intended to create an “elastic” money supply that would expand or contract along with economic output. Today, the money supply only goes in one direction — that’s up. The economy is strong, print money. The economy is weak, print even more money.” Of course, the asset that’s doing the best right now is gold. The yellow metal pushed above $1,600 yesterday. Gold is up 5.5% on the year in dollar terms and has set record highs in other currencies. Because gold is rising even in an environment where the dollar is strengthening against other fiat currencies, that shows you that there is an underlying weakness in the dollar that is right now not being reflected in the Forex markets, but is being reflected in the gold markets. Because after all, why are people buying gold more aggressively than they’re buying dollars or more aggressively than they’re buying US Treasuries? Because they know that things are not as good for the dollar or the US economy as everybody likes to believe. So, more people are seeking out refuge in a better safe-haven and that is gold.” Peter also talked about the debate between Trump and Obama over who gets credit for the booming economy – which of course, is not booming.

We are living in crazy times. I have a hard time believing that most of the general public is not awake, but in reality, they are. We've never seen anything like this; I mean not even under Obama during the worst part of the Great Recession." Now the Fed is desperately trying to keep interest rates from rising. The problem is that it's a much bigger debt bubble this time around , and the Fed is going to have to blow a lot more air into it to keep it inflated. The difference is this time it's not going to work." It looks like the Fed did another $104.15 billion of Not Q.E. in a single day. The Fed claims it's only temporary. But that is precisely what Bernanke claimed when the Fed started QE1. Milton Freedman once said, "Nothing is so permanent as a temporary government program." The same applies to Q.E., or whatever the Fed wants to pretend it's doing. Except this is not QE4, according to Powell. Right. Pumping so much money out, and they are accusing China of currency manipulation ? Wow! Seriously! Amazing! Dump the U.S. dollar while you still have a chance. Welcome to The Atlantis Report. And it is even worse than that, In addition to the $104.15 billion of "Not Q.E." this past Thursday; the FED added another $56.65 billion in liquidity to financial markets the next day on Friday. That's $160.8 billion in two days!!!! in just 48 hours. That is more than 2 TIMES the highest amount the FED has ever injected on a monthly basis under a Q.E. program (which was $80 billion per month) Since this isn't QE....it will be really scary on what they are going to call Q.E. Will it twice, three times, four times, five times what this injection per month ! It is going to be explosive since it takes about 60 to 90 days for prices to react to this, January should see significant inflation as prices soak up the excess liquidity. The question is, where will the inflation occur first . The spike in the repo rate might have a technical explanation: a misjudgment was made in the Fed's money market operations. Even so, two conclusions can be drawn: managing the money markets is becoming harder, and from now on, banks will be studying each other's creditworthiness to a greater degree than before. Those people, who struggle with the minutiae of money markets, and that includes most professionals, should focus on the causes and not the symptoms. Financial markets have recovered from each downturn since 1980 because interest rates have been cut to new lows. Post-2008, they were cut to near zero or below zero in all major economies. In response to a new financial crisis, they cannot go any lower. Central banks will look for new ways to replicate or broaden Q.E. (At some point, governments will simply see repression as an easier option). Then there is the problem of 'risk-free' assets becoming risky assets. Financial markets assume that the probability of major governments such as the U.S. or U.K. defaulting is zero. These governments are entering the next downturn with debt roughly twice the levels proportionate to GDP that was seen in 2008. The belief that the policy worked was completely predicated on the fact that it was temporary and that it was reversible, that the Fed was going to be able to normalize interest rates and shrink its balance sheet back down to pre-crisis levels. Well, when the balance sheet is five-trillion, six-trillion, seven-trillion when we're back at zero, when we're back in a recession, nobody is going to believe it is temporary. Nobody is going to believe that the Fed has this under control, that they can reverse this policy. And the dollar is going to crash. And when the dollar crashes, it's going to take the bond market with it, and we're going to have stagflation. We're going to have a deep recession with rising interest rates, and this whole thing is going to come imploding down. everything is temporary with the fed including remaining off the gold standard temporary in the Fed's eyes could mean at least 50 years This liquidity problem is a signal that trading desks are loaded up on inventory and can't get rid of it. Repo is done out of a need for cash. If you own all of your securities (i.e., a long-only, no leverage mutual fund) you have no need to "repo" your securities - you're earning interest every night so why would you want to 'repo' your securities where you are paying interest for that overnight loan (securities lending is another animal). So, it is those that 'lever-up' and need the cash for settlement purposes on securities they've bought with borrowed money that needs to utilize the repo desk. With this in mind, as we continue to see this need to obtain cash (again, needed to settle other securities purchases), it shows these firms don't have the capital to add more inventory to, what appears to be, a bloated inventory. Now comes the fun part: the Treasury is about to auction 3's, 10's, and 30-year bonds. If I am correct (again, I could be wrong), the Fed realizes securities firms don't have the shelf space to take down a good portion of these auctions. If there isn't enough retail/institutional demand, it will lead to not only a crappy sale but major concerns to the street that there is now no backstop, at all, to any sell-off. At which point, everyone will want to be the first one through the door and sell immediately, but to whom? If there isn't enough liquidity in the repo market to finance their positions, the firms would be unable to increase their inventory. We all saw repo shut down on the 2008 crisis. Wall St runs on money. . OVERNIGHT money. They lever up to inventory securities for trading. If they can't get overnight money, they can't purchase securities. And if they can't unload what they have, it means the buy-side isn't taking on more either. Accounts settle overnight. This includes things like payrolls and bill pay settlements. If a bank doesn't have enough cash to payout what its customers need to pay out, it borrows. At least one and probably more than one banks are insolvent. That's what's going on. First, it can't be one or two banks that are short. They'd simply call around until they found someone to lend. But they did that, and even at markedly elevated rates, still, NO ONE would lend them the money. That tells me that it's not a problem of a couple of borrowers, it's a problem of no lenders. And that means that there's no bank in the world left with any real liquidity. They are ALL maxed out. But as bad as that is, and that alone could be catastrophic, what it really signals is even worse. The lending rates are just the flip side of the coin of the value of the assets lent against. If the rates go up, the value goes down. And with rates spiking to 10%, how far does the value fall? Enormously! And if banks had to actually mark down the value of the assets to reflect 10% interest rates, then my god, every bank in the world is insolvent overnight. Everyone's capital ratios are in the toilet, and they'd have to liquidate. We're talking about the simultaneous insolvency of every bank on the planet. Bank runs. No money in ATMs, Branches closed. Safe deposit boxes confiscated. The whole nine yards, It's actually here. The scenario has tended to guide toward for years and years is actually happening RIGHT NOW! And people are still trying to say it's under control. Every bank in the world is currently insolvent. The only thing keeping it going is printing billions of dollars every day. Financial Armageddon isn't some far off future risk. It's here. Prepare accordingly. This fiat system has reached the end of the line, and it's not correct that fiat currencies fail by design. The problem is corruption and manipulation. It is corruption and cheating that erodes trust and faith until the entire system becomes a gigantic fraud. Banks and governments everywhere ARE the problem and simply have to be removed. They have lost all trust and respect, and all they have left is war and mayhem. As long as we continue to have a majority of braindead asleep imbeciles following orders from these psychopaths, nothing will change. Fiat currency is not just thievery. Fiat currency is SLAVERY. Ultimately the most harmful effect of using debt of undefined value as money (i.e., fiat currencies) is the de facto legalization of a caste system based on voluntary slavery. The bankers have a charter, or the legal *right*, to create money out of nothing. You, you don't. Therefore you and the bankers do not have the same standing before the law. The law of the land says that you will go to jail if you do the same thing (creating money out of thin air) that the banker does in full legality. You and the banker are not equal before the law. ALL the countries of the world; Islamic or secular, Jewish or Arab, democracy or dictatorship; all of them place the bankers ABOVE you. And all of you accept that only whining about fiat money going down in exchange value over time (price inflation which is not the same as monetary inflation). Actually, price inflation itself is mainly due to the greed and stupidity of the bankers who could keep fiat money's exchange value reasonably stable, only if they wanted to. Witness the crash of silver and gold prices which the bankers of the world; Russian, American, Chinese, Jewish, Indian, Arab, all of them collaborated to engineer through the suppression and stagnation of precious metals' prices to levels around the metals' production costs, or what it costs to dig gold and silver out of the ground. The bankers of the world could also collaborate to keep nominal prices steady (as they do in the case of the suppression of precious metals prices). After all, the ability to create fiat money and force its usage is a far more excellent source of power and wealth than that which is afforded simply by stealing it through inflation. The bankers' greed and stupidity blind them to this fact. They want it all, and they want it now. In conclusion, The bankers can create money out of nothing and buy your goods and services with this worthless fiat money, effectively for free. You, you can't. You, you have to lead miserable existences for the most of you and WORK in order to obtain that effectively nonexistent, worthless credit money (whose purchasing/exchange value is not even DEFINED thus rendering all contracts based on the null and void!) that the banker effortlessly creates out of thin air with a few strokes of the computer keyboard, and which he doesn't even bother to print on paper anymore, electing to keep it in its pure quantum uncertain form instead, as electrons whizzing about inside computer chips which will become mute and turn silent refusing to tell you how many fiat dollars or euros there are in which account, in the absence of electricity. No electricity, no fiat, nor crypto money. It would appear that trust is deteriorating as it did when Lehman blew up . Something really big happened that set off this chain reaction in the repo markets. Whatever that something is, we aren't be informed. They're trying to cover it up, paper it over with conjured cash injections, play it cool in front of the cameras while sweating profusely under the 5 thousands dollar suits. I'm guessing that the final high-speed plunge into global economic collapse has begun. All we see here is the ripples and whitewater churning the surface, but beneath the surface, there is an enormous beast thrashing desperately in its death throws. Now is probably the time to start tying up loose ends with the long-running prep projects, just saying. In other words, prepare accordingly, and Get your money out of the banks. I don't care if you don't believe me about Bitcoin. Get your money out of the banks. Don't keep any more money in a bank than you need to pay your bills and can afford to lose.











The Financial Armageddon Economic Collapse Blog tracks trends and forecasts , futurists , visionaries , free investigative journalists , researchers , Whistelblowers , truthers and many more













The Financial Armageddon Economic Collapse Blog tracks trends and forecasts , futurists , visionaries , free investigative journalists , researchers , Whistelblowers , truthers and many more

The FBI released a summary of its file from the Hillary Clinton email investigation on Friday, showing details of Clinton's explanation of her use of a private email server to handle classified communications. The release comes nearly two months after FBI Director James Comey announced that although Clinton's handling of classified information was "extremely careless," it did not rise to the level of a prosecutable offense. Attorney General Loretta Lynch announced the next day that she would not pursue charges in the matter. "We are making these materials available to the public in the interest of transparency and in response to numerous Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests," the FBI noted in a statement sent to reporters with links to the documents. The documents include notes from Clinton's July 2 interview with agents, as well as a "factual summary of the FBI's investigation into this matter," according to the FBI release. Throughout her interview with agents, Clinton repeatedly said she relied on the career professionals she worked with to handle classified information correctly. The agents asked about a series of specific emails, and in each case Clinton said she wasn't worried about the particular material being discussed on a nonclassified channel.