Follow The Risk Via SchiffGold, Tracing the distribution of risk is an important method that is helpful for understanding the trade-offs of any government action. Almost every government action reduces risk for some group and repackages the risk and forces another group to bear it. The government often serves as a hedge against risk, but it is important to understand who the payer is and what the costs are before blindly signing […]

Qatar And Kuwait Restore 70% Of Pre-War Oil Exports Through Hormuz Authored by Tsvetana Paraskova via OilPrice.com, Qatar and Kuwait have managed to boost their crude oil exports from the Strait of Hormuz to 70% of pre-war levels as they followed the United Arab Emirates in shuttling oil through the chokepoint and using ship-to-ship transfers in the Gulf of Oman, anonymous traders told Bloomberg on Thursday. Before the Middle […]

Average 7Y Auction Stops On Screws As Foreign Demand Drops A stellar 2Y auction, a subpart 5Y, and it only makes sense that we end the week with a perfectly average sale of $44BN in 7Y bonds. The last coupon auction of the week priced at a high yield of 4.512%, up from last month’s tailing 4.473%, and on the screws with today’s When Issued 4.512%. Remarkably, this is the 3rd 7Y auction to price on the screws in 2026 alone, […]

Dollar General Jumps On “Traffic-Led Momentum” As $4 Gas Accelerates Consumer Trade-Down Dollar General shares surged 6% in the cash session Thursday morning after stronger customer traffic fueled a second-quarter earnings beat and prompted the discount retailer to raise its full-year outlook. Jefferies analyst Corey Tarlowe wrote in a first take on earnings that “traffic-led momentum drives another beat.” The discount retailer, […]

California Senate Passes Bill To Fine Influencers Over Undisclosed Paid Political Posts Authored by Savannah Hulsey Pointer via The Epoch Times, The California Senate passed a bill on Aug. 24 to fine content creators who make paid political content without disclosing the compensation. The legislation, authored by Democratic Assemblymember Marc Berman, will still need a vote in the state Assembly before it reaches Gov. Gavin […]

Zinc Hits Four-Year High As “Extremely Thin” Physical Supply Fuels Squeeze Zinc futures in London are headed for their largest monthly close since January, with prices hitting four-year highs this week amid tightening physical supplies. London futures for the industrial metal initially gained as much as 1% before reversing course. Zinc fell .8% to $3,861 a ton as of 11:40 a.m. local time, halting a seven-day rally. Despite the […]

“Citizens Want Political Turnaround”: AfD Now Polls At 43% Across Eastern Germany Building on Nomura analyst Andrzej Szczepaniak’s note from earlier this week, which forecasts that right-wing parties are positioned to make electoral gains across Germany, France, Spain, Switzerland, and the UK over the next 18 months, new polling data from Germany further suggest that Alternative for Germany (AfD) is performing exceptionally well as […]

Moscow Warns It Could Target British Military Facilities In Unprecedented Statement From the very start of the Ukraine war, the United Kingdom has consistently been among Kiev’s most open and ardent military supporters, time and again transferring heavy weaponry, including cutting edge long-range missiles like the Storm Shadow. At the start of this week, Britain announced it plans to provide Ukraine with classified technology to […]

RFK Jr. Says Pennsylvania Officials May Have Fabricated Measles Deaths Authored by Zachary Stieber via The Epoch Times, Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. said on Wednesday that officials in Pennsylvania may have made up deaths that they described as associated with measles. Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. at the Hubert Humphrey building in Washington on August 10, 2026. Travis Gillmore/The Epoch […]

Stalemate, Not Checkmate Bas van Geffen, senior macro strategist at Rabobank Stalemate, not checkmate CIA Chief Ratcliffe’s 15-minute dialogue in Moscow was reportedly an elevator pitch warning Russia not to support Iran, and not to attack NATO. Peace talks between Russia and Ukraine are at a dead end, and Ukrainian attacks on Russian economic infrastructure – including refineries and large online retailers – are […]

Viral Sensation Ox Alpha Model Revealed As GLM-5.3-Flash, Running Entirely On Chinese Chips China’s Z.AI (Zhipu) confirmed it’s responsible for the viral – and mysterious – Ox Alpha AI model that swept to the top of online usage charts this weekend, pushing its shares up as much as 12% on Thursday. The Beijing-based company said it intends to price use of the model, now called GLM-5.3-Flash, at $0.15 per million input tokens […]

Democrats Challenge Trump’s Mail-In Voting Order Despite Recent SCOTUS Ruling Twenty-three Democratic attorneys general and the District of Columbia filed suit against the U.S. Postal Service on Wednesday, challenging a rule that limits who can receive an absentee ballot in the mail. They filed the complaint in the U.S. District Court for Massachusetts two days after the Supreme Court allowed President Trump’s executive order […]

Trump Considers New Tariffs On Semiconductors – Reports Raise Alarm Could Doom US Dominance Politico reports Thursday on what could be another significant setback for US data centers and major damper on American AI aspirations. The White House is mulling the possibility of introducing new tariffs on semiconductors and a broader range of technology products, including laptops, servers for data centers and gaming equipment – a move […]

US Tungsten Scrap Export Ban Takes Effect As Global Supply Crisis Deepens The Trump administration’s export halt on tungsten scrap and shredded battery material took effect Thursday as the latest effort to retain critical supplies within the US. The measure comes as the US confronts a tungsten-supply crisis marked by limited to nonexistent domestic mine production and years of alarming dependence on China-dominated supply chains, […]

Imagine A ‘Whites Only’ Hike Through The Countryside… Authored by Steve Watson via Modernity News, Picture a “whites only” ramble through the Peak District. The press would treat it as a national emergency. Now take look at what is already happening there, with official blessing. The National Trust has spent years partnering with Muslim Hikers for Ramadan walks and overnight retreats at Ilam Park. The charity’s own channel […]

Jobs ‘AI’pocalypse No! Initial Jobless Claims Hover Near Record Lows The number of Americans filing for unemployment benefits for the first time dropped to 203k last week The first time initial jobless claims hit this level was in May 2022. New York and Illinois saw the largest rise in initial claims while California and New Jersey saw the biggest declines… Continuing jobless claims also dropped, holding below the 1.8 […]

When Wall Street Says Sell, Check Who’s Waiting To Buy  Submitted by QTR’s Fringe Finance Today let me offer up one of my patented periodic reminders to do your own work. As many have already pointed out, there was something almost too neat about Citadel’s timing before the Situational Awareness blowup. In late June, Citadel Securities published a market-structure review warning that U.S. equities had become unusually […]

The Greatest Cover-Up In Economic History: How Washington Hid Its Role In The 2008 Crash Authored by Kevin Villani via Mises Institute, The commentary in a recent Wall Street Journal by Senator Phil Gramm and Representative Jeb Hensarling did the nation an immense service by dismantling the persistent myth that private market greed and financial deregulation caused the 2008 financial crisis. As they rightly pointed out, […]

Futures Jump After Nvidia’s Unprecedented 2028 Guidance Stuns Markets Futures are higher led by Tech as NVDA earnings boost the tape. As of 8:00am ET, S&P futures are 0.5% higher while Nasdaq futures jump 1.1% led by NVDA which is +7.4% in pre-market trading following an unprecedented forecast of 70% revenue growth in 2028, which is boosting Semis (+3%), incl MRVL +5.2% into their print tonight. NVDA helped the market climb a […]

Barack Obama Elementary School Closed Due To Mold And Rodents Most people have never heard of the Barack Obama Elementary School in Richmond, VA, but the story of the school is interesting because it’s a reflection of the political madness the US went through over the course of the past decade.  The school was originally built in 1922 and is over 100 years old.  It was once called J.E.B Stuart Elementary, but in 2018, the […]

Kuwait, Qatar Ramp Up Hormuz Oil Flows As Oman-Iran Talks Ease Supply Fears Brent crude futures fell to an intraday low of $86.22 a barrel early Thursday before recovering above $88 by 0630 ET. The benchmark is down 6.3% this week as traders unwind part of the war-risk premium amid growing optimism that renewed diplomatic efforts involving Iran, Oman and Qatar could reduce the threat of drone attacks on tankers in the critical […]

The $150 Trillion Global Economy In 2030 The world economy is projected to exceed $150 trillion by 2030, with significant growth coming from emerging markets in Asia. This visualization, via Visual Capitalist’s Gabriel Cohen shows countries’ projected nominal gross domestic product (GDP) in 2030, based on forecasts from the International Monetary Fund’s World Economic Outlook. The World’s Largest Economies in 2030 The […]

Glacier Wall Collapse May Have Sparked Deadly Flash Flood That Swallowed Nepal-Tibet Border Crossing Summary: Glacier Collapse May Have Sparked Nepal Flash Flood 100 Dead, 300 Missing, according to Nepal’s government (54 Americans among hundreds missing)  Deadly Flash Flood Near Nepal’s Border with Tibet Swallows Entire Border Crossing Experts Say Glacier Collapse Sparked Deadly Flooding Reuters reports that the massive, “Day […]

Global Youth Unemployment And Inactivity Inch Up Again For two years in a row, global unemployment and inactivity among youths aged 15 to 24 has inched up again across world regions. As seen in data by the International Labor Organization, the coronavirus pandemic caused these rates to go up in 2020, but the situation improved again gradually, in 2022 and 2023 falling below pre-pandemic levels. But, as Statista’s Katharina […]

BBC Unleashes El Niño Apocalypse Fearmongering Authored by Guy de la Bédoyère via The Daily Sceptic, Friday, August 21st 2026 was a slow news day. You could tell because the BBC’s Radio 4 6 O’Clock News led with the vacuous revelation Harry and Meghan are coming back to the UK. Slightly less uninteresting was the second story, the disastrous case against the Mail and how Harry and his fellow litigants are going to have to pay […]