Iran Launches Live Fire Drills In Gulf, Flexing Reconstituted Missile Arsenal  Iran’s elite Revolutionary Guards (IRGC) Navy launched ballistic and cruise missiles at mock targets in the Persian Gulf on Friday as part of an announced two-day military drill designed to demonstrate its readiness against external threats, state media indicates, at a time the region is still on edge following the last June 12-day war involving Iran, […]

Supreme Court Allows Texas To Use A Congressional Map Favorable To Republicans In 2026 Via Headline USA, A divided Supreme Court on Thursday came to the rescue of Texas Republicans, allowing next year’s elections to be held under the state’s congressional redistricting plan favorable to the GOP and pushed by President Donald Trump.  With conservative justices in the majority, the court acted on an emergency request […]

According To Democrats, Current Economic Conditions Have Never (Ever) Been Worse Consumer confidence data from the University of Michigan showed an impressive (and surprising) rebound in preliminary December data with the headline print rising from near record lows at 51.0 to 53.3 (well above the 52.0 exp)… Source: Bloomberg This month’s increase was concentrated primarily among younger consumers. Overall, while views of […]

Peace In Our Time? Don’t Count On It By Benjamin Picton, Senior Market Strategist at Rabobank US equities closed mixed on Thursday, despite solid leads from European markets where all of the major indices closed higher. Bond yields were mostly higher with US 10s pushing up 3.5bps to 4.09% and the 2-year yield lifting by almost 4bps to 3.52%. There was notable price action in the Aussie market where 2-year yields rose by 7.5bps to […]

Fed’s Favorite Inflation Indicator Continues To Show No Signs Of Runaway Tariff Costs First things first, this is September data… so horribly lagged/stale… but, it’s all we have, so let’s dive in. The Fed’s favorite inflation indicator – Core PCE – rose 0.2% MoM (as expected), which leave it up 2.8% YoY (as expected), slightly lower than August +2.9%… Source: Bloomberg On an annual basis, the headline PCE rose 2.8%, up […]

Why Netflix Buying Warner Bros Would Be A Disaster For America As we detailed earlier, Netflix and Warner Bros Discovery announced today a $72 billion merger, in a deal intended to consolidate Hollywood into the hands of a streaming giant. “Our mission has always been to entertain the world,” said Ted Sarandos, co-chief executive of Netflix. He added that the combination of the two entertainment giants together “can […]

Court Eases Sentence For Afghan Who ‘Showed Restraint’ After ‘Only’ Stabbing Teacher Six Times Via Remix News, A 29-year-old Afghan migrant has been sentenced to six years in prison for stabbing a 27-year-old teacher at random on the street, in the middle of the day, in the German city of Kirchheim unter Teck. However, despite stabbing his victim four times in the back and twice in the thigh, the fact that the Afghan stopped […]

5x Leverage Is Too Much Says The SEC Wall Street’s financial engineers thought they had found yet another way to turn financial markets into casinos. The gimmick this time is with 3x, 4x, and even 5x leveraged ETFs tied to individual stocks and cryptocurrencies. But, as RealInvestmentAdvice.com reports, the SEC just ruled against these new proposals, apparently drawing the line at 2x leverage as the rules state. “We write […]

Border Encounters Drop To Record Low In November: CBP Authored by Kimberley Hayek via The Epoch Times, U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) reported another drop in border encounters for November, extending a streak of dips under President Donald Trump’s administration, according to preliminary data released in a statement Thursday. The agency recorded 30,367 total encounters nationwide last month, down from October’s […]

S&P Futures Rise, On Pace For 9th Gain In 10 Days Stock futures rise as investors look ahead to Friday’s release of the Fed’s preferred inflation gauge, the core PCE, a reading that may help shape next week’s rate outlook as the BoJ charts its own divergent policy course. As of *;15am ET, S&P 500 futures were 0.2% higher and on pace for the 9th gain in 10 days; Nasdaq 100 futures are +0.3% as Mag 7 names are mostly […]

Economic Confidence Slips To 17-Month Low, Holiday Spending Plans Weaken Authored by Tom Ozimek via The Epoch Times, A new Gallup poll shows that U.S. consumer confidence deteriorated sharply in November, falling to its weakest level in 17 months as households contended with a protracted federal government shutdown, volatile financial markets, cooling job prospects, and renewed inflation anxiety. The gloomier mood—reflected in […]

Netflix To Buy Warner Bros In $72 Billion Deal; Hollywood Goes Into Panic Mode Netflix will acquire Warner Bros., including its film and TV studios, HBO, and HBO Max, in a cash-and-stock transaction valuing WBD at an enterprise value of $82.7 billion (equity value $72 billion), or $27.75 per share. The deal is expected to close in 3Q26, following WBD’s planned spinoff of its Global Networks division into a separate public company […]

“Instinctually Programmed To Lie”: CNN’s Jake Tapper Mislabels D.C. Pipe-Bomb Suspect As “White Man” Leftist CNN anchor Jake Tapper was blasted online as “an NPC programmed to lie” after he falsely identified the accused D.C. pipe-bomber Brian Cole Jr. as “a white man.” “Brian Cole Jr., a 30-year-old white man from the D.C. suburbs, is charged with transporting an explosive device in interstate commerce and with malicious […]

As AI Booms, US Ignores One Threat That Could Turn Off Everything Authored by Richard Porter via RealClearPolitics.com, We are now well past dawn in the age of artificial intelligence: According to a recent survey by Pew Research Center 62% of respondents say they interact with AI a least several times a week. Nearly every company in the U.S. is now urgently evaluating the ways in which AI can be deployed to lower costs, improve […]

Suspected Pirates Swarm Bulk Carrier In Critical Red Sea Maritime Chokepoint This week’s maritime focus, mostly centered on Ukraine’s drone strikes against Russia’s shadow-fleet tankers, has shifted to the Bab el-Mandeb Strait, the critical chokepoint linking the Red Sea and the Gulf of Aden, where reports now indicate a bulk carrier has come under attack. UK Maritime Trade Operations (UKMTO) said it received a report that a bulk […]

6 Reasons Jack Dorsey Is Definitely Satoshi… And 5 Reasons He’s Not Authored by Felix Ng via CoinTelegraph.com, Over the years, we’ve explored some intriguing theories about who (or what) created Bitcoin, ranging from the top government spy agency in America to a time-traveling AI and even the lizard people.  (StarPlatinum) However, some are adamant that the creator of Bitcoin is much more human and has been under our […]

“We Must Protect Volodymyr”: Leaked Call Shows European Leaders Conspiring Against Trump Peace Plan In a development that is not entirely surprising, European leaders are claiming that Washington is looking to “betray” Ukraine and President Zelensky during potential formal peace negotiations with Russia. “There is a possibility that the United States will abandon Ukraine on territorial questions without providing clarity on security […]

The UK Dominates The Most Damaging Tax Havens A new analysis from the Tax Justice Network (TJN) has revealed the United Kingdom to be the biggest enabler of corporate tax dodging in the world. As Statista’s Anna Fleck shows in this infographic, British overseas territories and crown dependencies dominate the top eight roundup of places allowing multinationals to avoid paying tax on their profits. You will find more […]

Washington’s F-35 Sale To Saudi Arabia Might Be Part Of Trump’s Ultimate Plan To Revive IMEC Authored by Andrew Korybko via Substack, This could make it easier for Saudi Arabia to normalize relations with Israel even in the absence of Palestinian independence and thus restore the political viability of this geo-economic megaproject. The announcement that the US will sell F-35s to Saudi Arabia is a monumental development. Israel […]

Zelensky’s Jet Reportedly In Near-Miss With Military Grade Drones In Ireland Various major publications including The Telegraph and Newsweek are reporting claims that military-grade drones threatened Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky’s plane shortly before it landed at Dublin Airport on Monday. The mystery drones reportedly reached the coordinates where the Ukrainian president’s plane had been expected, but Zelensky is said […]

WHO–Gates Unveils Blueprint For Global Digital ID, AI-Driven Surveillance, & Life-Long Vaccine Tracking For Everyone Authored by Jon Fleetwood via Substack, In a document published in the October Bulletin of the World Health Organization and funded by the Gates Foundation, the World Health Organization (WHO) is proposing a globally interoperable digital-identity infrastructure that permanently tracks every individual’s […]

Hawkish Baltic States Lead Europe’s Race Back To The Draft We’ve been documenting new efforts of European countries to drastically ramp up their defense readiness as the proxy war in Ukraine persists with no end in sight. For example, French President Emmanuel Macron last week announced a new avenue of voluntary military service for 18- and 19-year olds with the goal of gradually bolstering both active duty and reserve strength. […]

Nearly 50,000 Ukrainians Have Applied For Asylum In Poland Since August Via Remix News, In the wake of Kyiv’s decision to allow men aged 18-22 to legally leave Ukraine last August, Poland has seen one of the largest waves of young Ukrainians flooding its borders.  From Aug. 26 to Nov. 10, 49,700 Ukrainian citizens have applied for protection status (UKR), linked to a PESEL number, in Poland in recent weeks. As a comparison, […]

Clandestine Campaign To Defund ZeroHedge, The Federalist & Breitbart Traced To Kier Starmer Operation Very early into the COVID-19 pandemic, ZeroHedge suggested that a little-known Chinese lab in Wuhan might know something about the novel coronavirus sweeping the globe. As a result, and as you know, we were subject to an intense demonetization / deplatforming campaign that included getting kicked off of Twitter, PayPal, Facebook […]

China Seeks Long-Term Vulnerabilities In US Energy Systems: House Panelists By Ethan Howland of UtilityDive While there don’t appear to be any specific, imminent cyber or physical threats to the U.S. power grid, China has been seeking vulnerabilities in network systems to be used in future attacks, panelists said during a U.S. House of Representatives hearing Tuesday on threats to the U.S. energy system. Volt Typhoon — a group […]