Mexico surpasses China as the biggest US trading partner.

 September  11

Crops where the US is losing dominance:

• Brazil became the biggest corn exporter in 2023.
• The leader in soy exports a decade ago.
• Russia and the European Union have overtaken the US in wheat exports.
• And now Brazil is close to unseating the US to become the world’s biggest cotton exporter.

Inflation correlation? 

Notes Today: 

• Fuel shortage in Russia? Russia's Minister of Agriculture is forced to plead publicly to stop oil/gas exports, warning that food production in the country may soon collapse if fuel shortage continues.

 

• December Corn

• December Wheat

•  November Soybeans

Problem with these notes: some tend to run up against a deeply rooted feature of human cognition - the desire not to think about anything unpleasant…Sorry about that.

Although the market appears healthy, good vibes are  lacking and diverging from reality..

A new history argues that power depends on frightening people

How fear has shaped human affairs

S&P 500 Stocks at 52 week high

Instrument Name	Close	Highest	Symbol
Alphabet Ord Shs Class A	136.38	136.17	GOOGL.O
Constellation Energy	108.64	108.54	CEG.O
Eaton Ord Shs	236.13	234.81	ETN
Eli Lilly Ord Shs	586.46	573.23	LLY
Hess Ord Shs	160.52	160.44	HES
Marathon Petroleum	155.31	150.89	MPC
Phillips 66 Ord Shs	122.23	118.75	PSX
Walmart Ord Shs	163.77	163.47	WMT

Notes Today:

• Climate Change Could Drown China’s Food Security 
• China has a fifth of the world’s population but just 9 percent of its arable land and that bit is increasingly underwater.

• Dubai days are so hot that its beaches now stay open all night, with floodlights (Burning oil) illuminating the sand for beachgoers.
• Phoenix breaks heat record as city hits 110F for the 54th consecutive day..

• For $4,850, You Can Now Bypass TSA Lines at Atlanta’s Airport.
• There is an average of 9,728 planes carrying 1,270,406 passengers in the sky at any given time.

 

Problem with these notes: some tend to run up against a deeply rooted feature of human cognition - the desire not to think about anything unpleasant…Sorry about that.

 

 

Quick Overview is up to date

Notes Today:

• Tech firms’ shares fell further after reports that China had barred “more” employees at government-backed agencies and state companies from using iPhones. (Mini trade war with China – moving right along..)

• Current US Community spread # of Covid

• Not sure why anyone is surprised by Elon's Starlink interference in Ukraine. 
• Ukrainian presidential adviser says deaths of civilians ‘the price of a cocktail of ignorance and big ego’.

• ABC reports that the U.S. is now likely to send ATACMS to Ukraine.

• Hong Kong was hit by its heaviest rainfall since records began, causing widespread flooding.  158mm of rain fell in one hour.

• There's now just a 15% chance of a US recession over the next 12 months, according to Goldman Sachs...

 

Problem with these notes: some tend to run up against a deeply rooted feature of human cognition - the desire not to think about anything unpleasant…Sorry about that.

Notes Today: 

• Texas paid bitcoin miner Riot $31.7 million to shut down during heat wave in August.    

• Utah officials sued over failure to save Great Salt Lake: ‘Trying to avert disaster’. Unless dire action is taken, the lake could decline beyond recognition within five years. 
• Already, the lake has lost 73% of its water and 60% of its surface area.

• ‘Totally devastating’: borrowers on the start of student loan repayment..Republicans forced an end to the pause in student debt repayments during the debt ceiling debate and student loans payments will begin again in October. In a second blow, the supreme court struck down Biden’s forgiveness plan earlier this summer.

• German economy gloomy - industrial orders fell by 11.7% in July

• To help Trump reelection, Saudi Arabia and Russia, the world’s second- and third-largest producers, said they would continue to limit output. Saudi Arabia is constraining supply at around 25% below its declared maximum output.

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• China ordered officials at central government agencies not to use Apple's iPhones and other foreign-branded devices for work or bring them into the office, the Wall Street Journal reported on Wednesday, citing people familiar with the matter. 

•  Mexico supreme court decriminalizes abortion across country

Problem with these notes: some tend to run up against a deeply rooted feature of human cognition - the desire not to think about anything unpleasant…Sorry about that.

According to our Fed model (Aka Dow Trend Earnings) the Dow Jones Industrials are currently overvalued by quite a  bit.

Fear? none!

• To point out the obvious: Rates need to come down and or earnings go up.
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Notes Today:

• Rolling Stones to release details of first album of original songs since 2005

• Heavy Rains Threaten China’s Rice Crop in Latest Weather Worry

 

Problem with these notes: some tend to run up against a deeply rooted feature of human cognition - the desire not to think about anything unpleasant…Sorry about that.

There is no real alternative to the US stock market.

 

S&P 500 stocks at 52 week low (19)

 

S&P 500 stocks at 52 week high (31)

 Quick Overview is up o date

Notes Today: 

• According to a recent study by the European Commission, X—previously Twitter, now owned by Elon Musk—has significantly contributed to the dissemination of Russian disinformation on Ukraine.

• Costco 
• Hotdog: $1.50 including refillable drink. 
• Rotisserie Chicken $5 (117 million sold in 2022, up 10% from 2021)
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• Data from the US labor department showed that the unemployment rate jumped to 3.8% in August and wage gains moderated, suggesting that labor market conditions were weakening. 

• The cost to transport America’s harvest from the Midwest to the rest of the world is soaring as shrinking water levels on the Mississippi River drive up barge freight rates — and the forecast for below-than-average rainfall offers no relief. 

• Bird Flu losses
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Problem with these notes: some tend to run up against a deeply rooted feature of human cognition - the desire not to think about anything unpleasant…Sorry about that.

 

 

 

China's Slowing Growth Trend

• Parts of the economy are booming: electric vehicles, solar and wind power, and batteries.

Global Fossil Fuel Subsidies

Bob Henson

For a swarm of cities across the US South, August will be the hottest month in living memory & more than a century of recordkeeping. These cities look like shoo-ins: Miami, Tampa, Mobile, Montgomery, Baton Rouge, New Orleans, Houston, San Antonio, and more.

 

Quick Overview is up to date

Notes Today: 

• X  Plans to Collect User Biometric Data, Job and School
  History.👎👎 Musk 👎👎
• X, the social network that used to be known as Twitter, updated its privacy policy to include a new kind of user data it plans to collect: biometric.
• X Twitter this week confirmed it’s lifting its ban on paid political ads.

• Berkshire Bet on Mild Florida Hurricanes This Year. It Might Be Paying Off.

• Bad news is good news. GDP was revised down to 2.1% from 2.4%, while the ADP report showed the fewest job gains in five months – market up. 

• The Environmental Protection Agency removed federal protections for a majority of the country's wetlands on Tuesday to comply with a recent U.S. Supreme Court ruling.

 Why Europe is a magnet for more Americans

 

Problem with these notes: some tend to run up against a deeply rooted feature of human cognition - the desire not to think about anything unpleasant…Sorry about that.

 Global Liquidity

• Liquidity matters !

S&P 500 Operating profit margins

Notes Today:

•  Shares in Evergrande, a heavily indebted Chinese property developer, plunged by nearly 90% after they again began trading in Hong Kong.
• The mood is the worst it has been in decades!

• Market value of Chinese property giant, Evergrande.
• 2017: $50 billion
• Now: $0.4 billion

• PFTour: 49.7 Bushels per acre Soybeans. 6 to 10 day hot&dry.

• Powell, chairman of the Federal Reserve, cautioned that inflation was still too high and said that America’s central bank would be prepared to raise interest rates again if appropriate”. 

• Chinas increasingly worrisome debt dynamics have left it with little choice but to shift away from the current unsustainable growth model. 

• Poll: 78% of Respondents want Congress to impose a code of ethics for the U.S. Supreme Court. 

Problem with these notes: some tend to run up against a deeply rooted feature of human cognition - the desire not to think about anything unpleasant…Sorry about that.

 

 Quick Overview is up to date

 Quick Overview is up to date

Notes Today: 

• Judge Luttig: every US official is "obligated" under the 14th Amendment "to determine whether Donald Trump qualifies to be put on the ballot." If a state or local official finds he is disqualified, he says, "it will quickly move to the Supreme Court."

• 14th sec 3: No person shall be a Senator or Representative in Congress, or elector of President and Vice-President, or hold any office, civil or military, under the United States, or under any State, who, having previously taken an oath, as a member of Congress, or as an officer of the United States, or as a member of any State legislature, or as an executive or judicial officer of any State, to support the Constitution of the United States, shall have engaged in insurrection or rebellion against the same, or given aid or comfort to the enemies thereof. But Congress may by a vote of two-thirds of each House, remove such disability.

• China began military exercises in the seas and skies around Taiwan as a stern warning to separatists and foreign forces”. 

• Confidence in the world’s second-largest economy (China) is slumping as authorities frantically step-up efforts to bolster financial markets. 

• Japan’s overall economy, expanded 5.3% in the past decade, far less than the U.S.’s 23% growth and mainland China’s 83%. 

• At a summit hosted by President Joe Biden at Camp David, America, Japan, and South Korea agreed to step up military co-operation. 

• A state of emergency was declared in British Columbia, Canada, where a wildfire has forced the evacuation of more than 5,000 people. A separate blaze in the neighboring Northwest Territories has displaced some 22,000. 

• Musk seems determined to make X (Twitter) the least safe and least equitable social media platform. He had a few decent ideas, (along with Gov. subsidies) and he thinks that means he now has an endless supply of them. Reality has shown that he does not. 

• US Savings rate:
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• Problem with these notes: some tend to run up against a deeply rooted feature of human cognition - the desire not to think about anything unpleasant…Sorry about that.

 

 

 

Notes Today:

• University of West Virginia trustees are eliminating foreign languages, 20 graduate programs, and much more, going in exactly the wrong direction in our increasingly complex world.

• The crypto dude Sam Bankman-Fried is going to jail for witness tampering.

• The average monthly payment for a new car in the US hit a record $736 last month - up 28% over the last 3 years. 

• New car loan rates went from 4% to 8% while used car loan rates are at 12%+. 
• The average weight of a new vehicle sold in the US last year was a whopping 4,329 pounds.
• That’s over 1,000 pounds higher than the average in 1980

• Chinese-owned Smithfield is PERMANENTLY closing 39 hog farms in Missouri. 

• The world’s largest agriculture producers are pushing back against new EU rules that require proof that crops weren’t grown on deforested land, which producers say will add to the cost of making food. 

• DeSantis’s Florida approves Climate-Denial videos in schools 

• Berkshire Hathaway is posting new all-time high. 
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• Texas Gov Abbott has installed circular saws between the Rio Grande border buoys to maim or kill anyone who attempts to climb over. Two bodies have already been found trapped in the floating barrier. (@LaikenJordahl )

• Can you run for president while in prison? Yep. 

• By analyzing how people moved while wearing virtual reality headsets, researchers said, a machine learning model accurately predicted their height, weight, age, marital status and more the majority of the time. The work exposes how artificial intelligence could be used to guess personal data, without users having to directly reveal it.

 

Problem with these notes: some tend to run up against a deeply rooted feature of human cognition - the desire not to think about anything unpleasant…Sorry about that.