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comex notices//JPMorgan notices filed 0/1

COMEX//NOTICES FILED

EXCHANGE: COMEX
CONTRACT: JANUARY 2022 COMEX 100 GOLD FUTURES
SETTLEMENT: 1,824.600000000 USD
INTENT DATE: 01/05/2022 DELIVERY DATE: 01/07/2022
FIRM ORG FIRM NAME ISSUED STOPPED

624 H BOFA SECURITIES 1
737 C ADVANTAGE 1

TOTAL: 1 1
MONTH TO DATE: 1,164

NUMBER OF NOTICES FILED TODAY FOR JAN. CONTRACT: 1 NOTICE(S) FOR 100 OZ (0.00311 TONNES)

total notices so far: 1164 contracts for 116400 oz (3.6205 tonnes)

SILVER NOTICES:

382 NOTICE(S) FILED TODAY FOR 1,910,000 OZ/

total number of notices filed so far this month 1856 : for 9,780,000 oz

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

GLD

WITH GOLD DOWN 35.30

WITH RESPECT TO GLD WITHDRAWALS: (OVER THE PAST FEW MONTHS): A SMALL CHANGE IN GOLD INVENTORY AT THE GLD/A WITHDRAWAL OF .32 TONNES FROM THE GLD/

GOLD IS “RETURNED” TO THE BANK OF ENGLAND WHEN CALLING IN THEIR LEASES: THE GOLD NEVER LEAVES THE BANK OF ENGLAND IN THE FIRST PLACE. THE BANK IS PROTECTING ITSELF IN CASE OF COMMERCIAL FAILURE

ALSO INVESTORS SWITCHING TO SPROTT PHYSICAL (phys) INSTEAD OF THE FRAUDULENT GLD//

CLOSING INVENTORY: 979.99 TONNES/

Silver//SLV

WITH NO SILVER AROUND AND SILVER DOWN 94 CENTS:/:

A SMALL CHANGES IN SILVER INVENTORY: A WITHDRAWAL OF 226,000 OZ FROM THE SLV//

AT THE SLV//

INVESTORS ARE SWITCHING SLV TO SPROTT’S PSLV

CLOSING INVENTORY SLV/ TONIGHT: 530.612 MILLION OZ

Let us have a look at the data for today

SILVER//OUTLINE

SILVER COMEX OI ROSE BY A GOOD 622 CONTRACTS TO 140,143 AND RESTS FURTHER FROM THE NEW RECORD OF 244,710, SET FEB 25/2020.. WITH THE $0.08 GAIN IN SILVER PRICING AT THE COMEX ON WEDNESDAY. OUR BANKERS WERE UNSUCCESSFUL IN KNOCKING THE PRICE OF SILVER DOWN (IT ROSE BY $0.08) AND WERE UNSUCCESSFUL IN KNOCKING OUT SOME SILVER LONGS AS WE HAD A STRONG GAIN OF 1105 CONTRACTS ON OUR TWO EXCHANGES .

WE MUST HAVE HAD:
I) HUGE BANKER SHORT COVERING AS THEY ARE VERY ANXIOUS TO GET OUT OF DODGE!!/. II)WE ALSO HAD SOME REDDIT RAPTOR BUYING//. iii) A FAIR ISSUANCE OF EXCHANGE FOR PHYSICALS iiii) A HUGE INITIAL SILVER STANDING FOR COMEX SILVER MEASURING AT 10.505 MILLION OZ FOLLOWED BY TODAY’S 1,665,000 OZ QUEUE JUMP V) GOOD SIZED COMEX OI GAIN.

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

THE DIFFERENTIAL FROM PRELIMINARY OI TO FINAL OI SILVER TODAY: CONTRACTS -48

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

TOTAL CONTACTS for 4 days, total contracts: : 1630 contracts or 8.150 million oz OR 2.0375 MILLION OZ PER DAY.

TOTAL NO OF OZ UNDERGOING EFP TO LONDON 1630 CONTRACTS X 5,000 PER CONTRACT:

EQUATES TO: 8.150 MILLION OZ

LAST 8 MONTHS TOTAL EFP CONTRACTS ISSUED IN MILLIONS OF OZ:

MAY 137.83 MILLION

JUNE 149.91 MILLION OZ

JULY 129.445 MILLION OZ

AUGUST: MILLION OZ 140.120

SEPT. 28.230 MILLION OZ//

OCT: 94.595 MILLION OZ

NOV: 131.925 MILLION OZ

DEC: 100.615 MILLION OZ

RESULT: WE HAD A GOOD SIZED INCREASE IN COMEX OI SILVER COMEX CONTRACTS OF 622 WITH OUR 8 CENT GAIN SILVER PRICING AT THE COMEX// WEDNESDAY THE CME NOTIFIED US THAT WE HAD A FAIR SIZED EFP ISSUANCE OF 435 CONTRACTS( 435 CONTRACTS ISSUED FOR MAR AND 0 CONTRACTS ISSUED FOR ALL OTHER MONTHS) WHICH EXITED OUT OF THE SILVER COMEX TO LONDON AS FORWARDS THE DOMINANT FEATURE TODAY:/ AS WELL AS TODAY /HUGE BANKER SHORT COVERING AS THEY GET OUT OF DODGE//// WE HAVE A GOOD INITIAL SILVER OZ STANDING FOR JAN OF 10.505 MILLION OZ FOLLOWED BY TODAY’S 1,665,000 OZ EFP TO QUEUE JUMP//NEW STANDING 12.005 MILLION OZ// .. WE HAD A STRONG SIZED GAIN OF 1057 OI CONTRACTS ON THE TWO EXCHANGES FOR 5.285 MILLION OZ//

WE HAD 382 NOTICES FILED TODAY FOR 1,910,000 OZ

GOLD//OUTLINE

IN GOLD, THE COMEX OPEN INTEREST ROSE BY A STRONG SIZED 8,138 TO 510,865 , AND CLOSER TO OUR NEW RECORD (SET JAN 24/2020) AT 799,541 AND PREVIOUS TO THAT: (SET JAN 6/2020) AT 797,110.

THE DIFFERENTIAL FROM PRELIMINARY OI TO FINAL OI IN GOLD TODAY: -1920 CONTRACTS

THE STRONG SIZED INCREASE IN COMEX OI CAME DESPITE OUR SMALL GAIN IN PRICE OF $10.30//COMEX GOLD TRADING/WEDNESDAY/.AS IN SILVER WE MUST HAVE HAD HUGE BANKER/ALGO SHORT COVERING ACCOMPANYING OUR GOOD SIZED EXCHANGE FOR PHYSICAL ISSUANCE. WE HAD ZERO LONG LIQUIDATION AS THE TOTAL GAIN ON OUR TWO EXCHANGES TOTALLED A GIGANTIC SIZED 13,213 CONTRACTS…

WE ALSO HAD A HUGE INITIAL STANDING IN GOLD TONNAGE FOR JAN AT 3.5614 TONNES FOLLOWED BY TODAY’S 100 OZ EQUEUE. JUMP//NEW STANDING: 3.7200 TONNES

YET ALL OF..THIS HAPPENED WITH OUR GAIN IN PRICE OF $10.30 WITH RESPECT TO TUESDAY’S TRADING

WE HAD A HUGE SIZED GAIN OF 13,213 OI CONTRACTS (41.097PAPER TONNES) ON OUR TWO EXCHANGES

E.F.P. ISSUANCE

THE CME RELEASED THE DATA FOR EFP ISSUANCE AND IT TOTALLED A FAIR SIZED 5075 CONTRACTS:

FOR FEB 5075 ALL OTHER MONTHS ZERO//TOTAL: 5075

The NEW COMEX OI FOR THE GOLD COMPLEX RESTS AT 510,855.

IN ESSENCE WE HAVE A GIGANTIC SIZED INCREASE IN TOTAL CONTRACTS ON THE TWO EXCHANGES OF 13,213, WITH 10,058 CONTRACTS INCREASED AT THE COMEX AND 5075 EFP OI CONTRACTS WHICH NAVIGATED OVER TO LONDON. THUS TOTAL OI GAIN ON THE TWO EXCHANGES OF 13,213 CONTRACTS OR 41.095 TONNES.

CALCULATIONS ON GAIN/LOSS ON OUR TWO EXCHANGES

WE HAD A GOOD SIZED ISSUANCE IN EXCHANGE FOR PHYSICALS (5075) ACCOMPANYING THE STRONG SIZED GAIN IN COMEX OI (8,138): TOTAL GAIN IN THE TWO EXCHANGES 13,213 CONTRACTS. WE NO DOUBT HAD 1) HUGE BANKER SHORT COVERING ,2.) HUGE INITIAL STANDING AT THE GOLD COMEX FOR JAN. AT 3.7262 TONNES//FOLLOWED BY TODAY’S 100 OZ QUEUE. JUMP.//NEW STANDING 3.7200 TONNES 3)ZERO LONG LIQUIDATION,4) STRONG SIZED COMEX OI. GAIN 5) GOOD ISSUANCE OF EXCHANGE FOR PHYSICAL

SPREADING OPERATIONS

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

SPREADING LIQUIDATION HAS NOW COMMENCED AS WE HEAD TOWARDS THE NEW ACTIVE FRONT MONTH OF FEB.WE ARE NOW INTO THE SPREADING OPERATION OF GOLD

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

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

HISTORICAL ACCUMULATION OF EXCHANGE FOR PHYSICALS IN 2021 INCLUDING TODAY

JAN

ACCUMULATION OF EFP’S GOLD AT J.P. MORGAN’S HOUSE OF BRIBES: (EXCHANGE FOR PHYSICAL) FOR THE MONTH OF JAN : 16,041 CONTRACTS OR 1,604,100 oz OR 49.89 TONNES (4 TRADING DAY(S) AND THUS AVERAGING: 4010 EFP CONTRACTS PER TRADING DAY

TO GIVE YOU AN IDEA AS TO THE SIZE OF THESE EFP TRANSFERS : THIS MONTH IN 4 TRADING DAY(S) IN TONNES: 49.89 TONNES

TOTAL ANNUAL GOLD PRODUCTION, 2020, THROUGHOUT THE WORLD EX CHINA EX RUSSIA: 3555 TONNES

THUS EFP TRANSFERS REPRESENTS 49.89/3550 x 100% TONNES 1.551% OF GLOBAL ANNUAL PRODUCTION

ACCUMULATION OF GOLD EFP’S YEAR 2021 TO DATE

JANUARY: 265.26 TONNES (RAPIDLY INCREASING AGAIN)

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

MARCH:. 276.50 TONNES (STRONG AGAIN/

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

MAY: 250.15 TONNES (NOW DRAMATICALLY INCREASING AGAIN)

JUNE: 247.54 TONNES (FINAL)

JULY: 188.73 TONNES FINAL

AUGUST: 217.89 TONNES FINAL ISSUANCE.

SEPT 142.12 TONNES FINAL ISSUANCE ( LOW ISSUANCE)_

OCT: 141.13 TONNES FINAL ISSUANCE (LOW ISSUANCE)

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

DEC. 145.12 TONNES//INITIAL ISSUANCE//

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

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

1.Today, we had the open interest at the comex, in SILVER, ROSE BY A GOOD SIZED 622 CONTRACTS TO 140,143 AND CLOSER TO OUR COMEX RECORD //244,710(SET FEB 25/2020). THE LAST RECORDS WERE SET IN AUG.2018 AT 244,196 WITH A SILVER PRICE OF $14.78/(AUGUST 22/2018)..THE PREVIOUS RECORD TO THAT WAS SET ON APRIL 9/2018 AT 243,411 OPEN INTEREST CONTRACTS WITH THE SILVER PRICE AT THAT DAY: $16.53). AND PREVIOUS TO THAT, THE RECORD WAS ESTABLISHED AT: 234,787 CONTRACTS, SET ON APRIL 21.2017 OVER 4 1/2 YEARS AGO.

EFP ISSUANCE 435 CONTRACTS

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

MAR 435 ALL OTHER MONTHS: ZERO. TOTAL EFP ISSUANCE: 395 CONTRACTS. EFP’S GIVE OUR COMEX LONGS A FIAT BONUS PLUS A DELIVERABLE PRODUCT OVER IN LONDON. IF WE TAKE THE COMEX OI GAIN OF 622 CONTRACTS AND ADD TO THE 435 OI TRANSFERRED TO LONDON THROUGH EFP’S,

WE OBTAIN A STRONG SIZED GAIN OF 1057 OPEN INTEREST CONTRACT FROM OUR TWO EXCHANGES.

THUS IN OUNCES, THE GAIN ON THE TWO EXCHANGES 5.525 MILLION OZ,

OCCURRED WITH OUR $0.08 GAIN IN PRICE.

OUTLINE FOR TODAY’S COMMENTARY

1/COMEX GOLD AND SILVER REPORT

(report Harvey)

2 ) Gold/silver trading overnight Europe,

(Peter Schiff,

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

3. ASIAN AFFAIRS

i)THURSDAY MORNING WEDNESDAY NIGHT

SHANGHAI CLOSED DOWN 9.10 PTS OR 0.25% //Hang Sang CLOSED UP 165.61 PTS OR 0.72% /The Nikkei closed DOWN 844.79 PTS OR 2.88% //Australia’s all ordinaires CLOSED DOWN 2.79% /Chinese yuan (ONSHORE) closed DOWN 6.3792 /Oil UP 79.73 dollars per barrel for WTI and UP TO 81.96 for Brent. Stocks in Europe OPENED ALL RED // ONSHORE YUAN CLOSED DOWN AGAINST THE DOLLAR AT 6.3792. OFFSHORE YUAN CLOSED DOWN ON THE DOLLAR AT 6.3875: /ONSHORE YUAN TRADING ABOVE LEVEL OF OFFSHORE YUAN/ONSHORE YUAN TRADING WEAKER AGAINST USA DOLLAR

A)NORTH KOREA//USA/OUTLINE

b) REPORT ON JAPAN

OUTLINE

3 C CHINA

OUTLINE

4/EUROPEAN AFFAIRS

OUTLINE

5. RUSSIAN AND MIDDLE EASTERN AFFAIRS

OUTLINE

6.Global Issues

OUTLINE

7. OIL ISSUES

OUTLINE

8 EMERGING MARKET ISSUES

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

GOLD

LET US BEGIN:

THE TOTAL COMEX GOLD OPEN INTEREST ROSE BY A STRONG SIZED 8,138 CONTRACTS AND CLOSER TO THE RECORD THAT WAS SET IN JANUARY/2020: {799,541 OI(SET JAN 16/2020)} AND PREVIOUS TO THAT: 797,110 (SET JAN 7/2020). AND THIS STRONG COMEX INCREASE OCCURRED DESPITE OUR RATHER SMALL GAIN OF $10.30 IN GOLD PRICING WEDNESDAY’S COMEX TRADING. WE ALSO HAD A GOOD EFP (5075 CONTRACTS). . THEY WERE PAID HANDSOMELY NOT TO TAKE DELIVERY AT THE COMEX AND SETTLE FOR CASH. LOOKS LIKE OUR BANKERS ARE FINALLY BAILING OUT

WE NORMALLY HAVE WITNESSED EXCHANGE FOR PHYSICALS ISSUED BEING SMALL AS IT JUST TOO COSTLY FOR THEM TO CONTINUE SERVICING THE COSTS OF SERIAL FORWARDS CIRCULATING IN LONDON. HOWEVER, MUCH TO THE ANNOYANCE OF OUR BANKERS, THE COMEX IS THE SCENE OF AN ASSAULT ON GOLD AS LONDONERS, NOT BEING ABLE TO FIND ANY PHYSICAL ON THAT SIDE OF THE POND, EXERCISE THESE CIRCULATING EXCHANGE FOR PHYSICALS IN LONDON AND FORCING DELIVERY OF REAL METAL OVER HERE AS THE OBLIGATION STILL RESTS WITH NEW YORK BANKERS. IT SEEMS THAT ARE BANKERS FRIENDS ARE EXERCISING EFP’S FROM LONDON AND NOW THEY ARE LOATHE TO ISSUE NEW ONES.

EXCHANGE FOR PHYSICAL ISSUANCE

WE ARE NOW MOVING TO THE NON ACTIVE DELIVERY MONTH OF JAN.. THE CME REPORTS THAT THE BANKERS ISSUED A FAIR SIZED TRANSFER THROUGH THE EFP ROUTE AS THESE LONGS RECEIVED A DELIVERABLE LONDON FORWARD TOGETHER WITH A FIAT BONUS.,

THAT IS 5075 EFP CONTRACTS WERE ISSUED: ;: , DEC : 0 & FEB. 5075 & ZERO FOR ALL OTHER MONTHS:

TOTAL EFP ISSUANCE: 5075 CONTRACTS

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

ON A NET BASIS IN OPEN INTEREST WE GAINED THE FOLLOWING TODAY ON OUR TWO EXCHANGES: A GIGANTIC SIZED 13,213 TOTAL CONTRACTS IN THAT 5075 LONGS WERE TRANSFERRED AS FORWARDS TO LONDON AND WE HAD A STRONG SIZED COMEX OI GAIN OF 10,058 CONTRACTS..

// WE HAVE A STRONG AMOUNT OF GOLD TONNAGE STANDING FOR JAN (3.7200),

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

DEC 2021: 112.217 TONNES

NOV. 8.074 TONNES

OCT. 57.707 TONNES

SEPT: 11.9160 TONNES

AUGUST: 80.489 TONNES

JULY: 7.2814 TONNES

JUNE: 72.289 TONNES

MAY 5.77 TONNES

APRIL 95.331 TONNES

MARCH 30.205 TONNES

FEB ’21. 113.424 TONNES

JAN ’21: 6.500 TONNES.

TOTAL SO FAR THIS YEAR (JAN- DEC): 601.213 TONNES

THE BANKERS WERE UNSUCCESSFUL IN LOWERING GOLD’S PRICE //// (IT ROSE $10.30)

AND THEY WERE UNSUCCESSFUL IN FLEECING ANY LONGS AS THE TOTAL GAIN ON THE TWO EXCHANGES REGISTERED 41.095 TONNES, ACCOMPANYING OUR HUGE GOLD TONNAGE STANDING FOR JAN (3.7200 TONNES)…

WE HAD – 1920 CONTRACTS REMOVED FROM COMEX TRADES. THESE WERE REMOVED AFTER TRADING ENDED LAST NIGHT

NET GAIN ON THE TWO EXCHANGES 13,213 CONTRACTS OR 1,321,300 OZ OR 41.095 TONNES

Estimated gold volume today: 266,738 good/raid//

Confirmed volume yesterday: 201,886 contracts fair

/2022 INITIAL STANDINGS FOR JAN COMEX GOLD INITIAL STANDINGS FOR JAN COMEX GOLD

JAN 6/2022

Gold	Ounces
Withdrawals from Dealers* Inventory in oz*	nil oz
Withdrawals from Customer* Inventory in oz*	8033.75 oz JPM
Deposit to the Dealer* Inventory in oz*	nilOZ
Deposits to the Customer* Inventory, in oz*	nil
No of oz served (contracts) today	1 notice(s)100 OZ 0.00311 TONNES
No of oz to be served (notices)	32 contracts 3,200 oz 0.0.0995 TONNES
Total monthly oz gold served (contracts) so far this month	1164 notices 116400 OZ 3.6205 TONNES
Total accumulative withdrawals of gold from the Dealers* inventory this month*	NIL oz
Total accumulative withdrawal of gold from the Customer* inventory this month*	xxx oz

INITIAL STANDINGS FOR JAN ’22 COMEX GOLD

JAN 6

For today:

No dealer deposit 0

No dealer withdrawal 0

0 customer deposit

1 customer withdrawal

i) Out of JPMorgan: 8033.75oz

ADJUSTMENTS 1//BRINKS: 27,306.870 DEALER TO CUSTOMER

2/ JPMORGAN; 9645.300 oz DEALER TO CUSTOMER (30 KILOBARS)

CALCULATIONS FOR THE AMOUNT OF GOLD STANDING FOR JANUARY.

For the front month of JANUARY we have an oi of 33 stand for JANUARY losing 11 contracts. We had 12 notices filed on Wednesday, so we GAINED 1 contract or an additional 100 oz will stand for

gold in this very non active delivery month of January

FEBRUARY LOST 219 CONTRACTS TO 364,684

March added 437 contracts to stand at 872..

We had 1 notice(s) filed today for 100 oz FOR THE JAN 2022 CONTRACT MONTH

Today, 0 notice(s) were issued from J.P.Morgan dealer account and 0 notices were issued from their client or customer account. The total of all issuance by all participants equates to 1 contract(s) of which 0 notices were stopped (received) by j.P. Morgan dealer and 0 notice(s) was (were) stopped/ Received) by J.P.Morgan//customer account and 0 notice(s) received (stopped) by the squid (Goldman Sachs)

To calculate the INITIAL total number of gold ounces standing for the JAN /2021. contract month,

we take the total number of notices filed so far for the month (1164) x 100 oz , to which we add the difference between the open interest for the front month of (JAN: 33 CONTRACTS ) minus the number of notices served upon today 1 x 100 oz per contract equals 119,600 OZ OR 3.7200 TONNES the number of TONNES standing in this NON active month of JAN. (numbers corrected from yesterday)

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

No of notices filed so far (1164) x 100 oz+ (33) OI for the front month minus the number of notices served upon today (1} x 100 oz} which equals 119,500 oz standing OR 3.7200 TONNES in this NON active delivery month of JAN.

We GAINED 1 contract or an additional 100 oz of gold will not stand for metal on this side of the pond.

TOTAL COMEX GOLD STANDING: 3.7200 TONNES (VERY STRONG FOR A JANUARY DELIVERY MONTH)

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

COMEX GOLD INVENTORIES/CLASSIFICATION

NEW PLEDGED GOLD:

206,468.649, oz NOW PLEDGED /HSBC 6.42 TONNES

174,041.813 PLEDGED MANFRA 5.41 TONNES

54,339.114oz PLEDGED JPMorgan no 1 1.690

288,481,604, oz JPM No 2 8.97 TONNES

698,821.330 oz pledged June 12/2020 Brinks/27,96 TONNES

12,244.444 oz International Delaware: 0..3808 tonne

Loomis: 18,615.429 oz

total pledged gold: 1,653,017.372oz 51.42 tonnes

TOTAL REGISTERED AND ELIZ GOLD AT THE COMEX: 33,645,971.381 OZ (1046.53 TONNES)

TOTAL ELIGIBLE GOLD: 16,033,077.840 OZ (497.76 tonnes)

TOTAL OF ALL REGISTERED GOLD: 17,608,893.542 OZ (547.71 tonnes)

REGISTERED GOLD THAT CAN BE SERVED UPON: 15,955,876.0 OZ (REG GOLD- PLEDGED GOLD) 496.29 tonnes

END

JANUARY 2022 CONTRACT MONTHINITIAL STANDING FOR SILVER//JAN

JAN 6

INITIAL STANDING FOR SILVER//DEC

Silver	Ounces
Withdrawals from Dealers* Inventory*	NIL oz
Withdrawals from Customer Inventory	629,043.220 oz jpm CNT
Deposits to the Dealer* Inventory*	nil OZ
Deposits to the Customer Inventory	nil oz
No of oz served today (contracts)	382 CONTRACT(S) 1,910,000 OZ)
No of oz to be served (notices)	445 contracts (2,225,000 oz)
Total monthly oz silver served (contracts)	1956 contracts 9,780,000 oz)
Total accumulative withdrawal of silver from the Dealers* inventory this month*	NIL oz
Total accumulative withdrawal of silver from the Customer* inventory this month*

And now for the wild silver comex results

we had 0 deposits into the dealer

total dealer deposits: nil oz

i) We had 0 dealer withdrawal

total dealer withdrawals: nil oz

We had 0 deposits

JPMorgan has a total silver weight: 184.055 million oz/354.783 million =51.87% of comex

ii) Comex withdrawals: 2

a) out of CNT: 21,654.440 oz

b) out of JPMorgan: 607,388.780 oz

total withdrawal 629.,043.220 oz

we had 0 adjustments

the silver comex is in stress!

TOTAL REGISTERED SILVER: 81.578 MILLION OZ

TOTAL REG + ELIG. 354.783 MILLION OZ

TOTAL NO OF CONTRACTS SERVED UPON THIS MONTH: 9019 CONTRACTS FOR 45,095,000 OZ

CALCULATION OF SILVER OZ STANDING FOR DECEMBER

JANUARY LOST1587 CONTRACTS TO STAND AT 514

FEBRUARY GAINED 2 CONTRACTS TO STAND AT 298

MARCH: GAINED 1097 CONTRACTS TO 116,950

NUMBER OF NOTICES FILED TODAY: 13 NOTICES OR 65,000 OZ

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silver open interest data:

FRONT MONTH OF JAN//2022 OI: 827 CONTRACTS GAINING 328 contracts on the day

We had 5 notices filed on Wednesday so we GAINED 333 contracts or 1,665,000 additional oz will stand for delivery in this non active delivery month of January.

FOR FEB WE HAD A GAIN OF 226 CONTRACTS UP TO 586

FOR MARCH WE HAD A LOSS OF 696 CONTRACTS DOWN TO 115,053 CONTRACTS.

TOTAL NUMBER OF NOTICES FILED FOR TODAY: 382 for 1,910,000 oz

Comex volumes: 73,893 good// the raid (est. today)

Comex volume: confirmed YESTERDAY: 45,183 contracts (poor)

To calculate the number of silver ounces that will stand for delivery in JANUARY. we take the total number of notices filed for the month so far at 1956 x 5,000 oz =. 9,780,000 oz

to which we add the difference between the open interest for the front month of JAN (827) and the number of notices served upon today 382 x (5000 oz) equals the number of ounces standing.

Thus the standings for silver for the JAN./2021 contract month: 1956 (notices served so far) x 5000 oz + OI for front month of JAN (827) – number of notices served upon today (382) x 5000 oz of silver standing for the JAN contract month equates 12,005,000 oz. .

We GAINED 333 contracts or an additional 1,665,000 oz will stand for delivery on this side of the pond.

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

END

GLD AND SLV INVENTORY LEVELS:

GLD

JAN 6/WITH GOLD DOWN $35.30//A SMALL CHANGE IN GOLD INVENTORY AT THE GLD//A WITHDRAWAL OF .32 TONNES/INVENTORY RESTS AT 979.99 TONNES

JAN 5/WITH GOLD UP $10.30: NO CHANGES IN GOLD INVENTORY AT THE GLD/INVENTORY RESTS AT 980.31 TONNES

Jan 4/WITH GOLD UP $14.00//A HUGE CHANGE OF 4.65 TONNES OF GOLD INTO THE GLD//INVENTORY RESTS AT 980.31 TONNES

JAN 3/WITH GOLD DOWN $26.70: NO CHANGES IN GOLD INVENTORY AT THE GLD//INVENTORY RESTS AT 975.66 TONNES

DEC 31/WITH GOLD UP $14.05 : NO CHANGES IN GOLD INVENTORY AT THE GLD//INVENTORY RESTS AT 975.66 TONNES

DEC 30/WITH GOLD UP $7.75 NO CHANGES IN GOLD INVENTORY AT THE GLD//INVENTORY RESTS AT 975.66 TONNES

DEC 29/WITH GOLD DOWN $5.00 TODAY:HUGE CHANGES IN GOLD INVENTORY AT THE GLD: A DEPOSIT OF 2.03 TONNES OF GOLD INTO THE GLD////INVENTORY RESTS AT 975.66 TONNES

DEC 28/WITH GOLD UP $2.00 TODAY; NO CHANGES IN GOLD INVENTORY AT THE GLD/INVENTORY RESTS AT 973.63 TONNES

DEC 27/WITH GOLD DOWN $2.05: NO CHANGES IN GOLD INVENTORY AT THE GLD//INVENTORY RESTS AT 973.63 TONNES.

DEC 23/WITH GOLD UP $9.85 TODAY//A HUGE CHANGE IN GOLD INVENTORY AT THE GLD: A WITHDRAWAL OF 4.94 TONNES FROM THE GLD/// INVENTORY RESTS AT 973.63 TONNES

DEC 22/WITH GOLD UP $12.85 TODAY: NO CHANGES IN GOLD INVENTORY AT THE GLD//INVENTORY RESTS AT 978.57 TONNES

DEC 21/WITH GOLD DOWN $7.05 TODAY, NO CHANGES IN GOLD INVENTORY AT THE GLD//INVENTORY RESTS AT 978.57 TONNES

DEC 20/WITH GOLD DOWN $9.65 TODAY; A BIG CHANGES IN GOLD INVENTORY AT THE GLD: A DEPOSIT OF 1.37 TONNES INTO THE GLD///INVENTORY RESTS AT 977.20 TONNES

DEC 17/WITH GOLD UP $7.05 TODAY: NO CHANGES IN GOLD INVENTORY AT THE GLD/INVENTORY RESTS AT 977.20 TONNES

DEC 16/WITH GOLD UP $33.05TODAY; A HUGE CHANGE IN GOLD INVENTORY AT THE GLD: A WITHDRAWAL OF 3.4 TONNES FROM THE GLD////INVENTORY REST AT: 977.20 TONNES

DEC15/WITH GOLD DOWN $7.80 TODAY/ A HUGE CHANGE IN GOLD INVENTORY AT THE GLD: A WITHDRAWAL OF 2.04 TONNES FROM THE GLD////INVENTORY RESTS AT 980.60 TONNES.

DEC 14/WITH GOLD DOWN $18.00 TODAY: NO CHANGES IN GOLD INVENTORY AT THE GLD//INVENTORY RESTS AT 982.64 TONNES

DEC 13/WITH GOLD UP $3.20 TODAY/NO CHANGES IN GOLD INVENTORY AT THE GLD/INVENTORY RESTS AT 982.64 TONNES

DEC 10.WITH GOLD UP $7.30 TODAY: NO CHANGES IN GOLD INVENTORY AT THE GLD//INVENTORY RESTS AT 982.64 TONNES

DEC 9/WITH GOLD DOWN $9.10 TODAY: NO CHANGES IN GOLD INVENTORY AT THE GLD//INVENTORY RESTS AT 982.64.

DEC 8/WITH GOLD UP $5.50 TODAY: NO CHANGES IN GOLD INVENTORY AT THE GLD/INVENTORY RESTS AT 984.38 TONNES

DEC 7/WITH GOLD UP $5.15 TODAY; A HUGE CHANGE IN GOLD INVENTORY AT THE GLD: A WITHDRAWAL OF 1.74 TONNES OF GOLD FROM THE GLD////INVENTORY RESTS AT 984.38 TONNES

DEC 6/WITH GOLD DOWN $3.90 TODAY: NO CHANGES IN GOLD INVENTORY AT THE GLD//INVENTORY RESTS AT 986.17 TONNES//

DEC 3/WITH GOLD UP $20.35 TODAY; A HUGE CHANGE IN GOLD INVENTORY AT THE GLD: A WITHDRAWAL OF 3.85 TONNES FROM THE GLD///INVENTORY RESTS AT 986.17 TONNES

DEC 2/WITH GOLD DOWN $19.80 TODAY; A HUGE CHANGES IN GOLD INVENTORY AT THE GLD: A WITHDRAWAL OF 2.83 TONNES FROM THE GLD///INVENTORY RESTS AT 990.82 TONNES

DEC 1/WITH GOLD UP $7.05 TODAY: NO CHANGES IN GOLD INVENTORY AT THE GLD/INVENTORY RESTS AT 992.85 TONNES

NOV 30/WITH GOLD DOWN $8.70 TODAY; NO CHANGES IN GOLD INVENTORY AT THE GLD//INVENTORY RESTS AT 992.85 TONNES.

CLOSING INVENTORY: 979.99 TONNES

SLV

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

JAN 6/WITH SILVER DOWN 94 CENTS TODAY: A SMALL CHANGES IN SILVER INVENTORY AT THE SLV: A WITHDRAWAL PF 226,000 OZ FROM THE SLV///INVENTORY RESTS AT 530.612 MILLION OZ?/

JAN 5/WITH SILVER UP 8 CENTS TODAY: NO CHANGES IN SILVER INVENTORY AT THE SLV//INVENTORY RESTS AT 530.838 MILLION OZ//

JAN 4/WITH SILVER UP 21 CENTS TODAY: NO CHANGES IN SILVER INVENTORY AT THE SLV//INVENTORY RESTS AT 530.838 MILLION OZ//

JAN 3/WITH SILVER DOWN 45 CENTS TODAY: A HUGE CHANGE IN SILVER INVENTORY AT THE SLV: A WITHDRAWAL OF 2.219 MILLION OZ FROM THE SLV///INVENTORY RESTS AT 530.838 MILLION OZ//

DEC 31/WITH SILVER UP 29 CENTS TODAY: NO CHANGES IN SILVER INVENTORY AT THE SLV//INVENTORY RESTS AT 533.057 MILLION OZ//

DEC30/WITH SILVER UP 14 CENTS TODAY; HUGE CHANGES IN SILVER INVENTORY AT THE SLV: A HUGE WITHDRAWAL OF 4.624 MILLILON OZ FROM THE SLV.//INVENTORY RESTS AT 533.057 MILLION OZ//

DEC 29/WITH SILVER DOWN 22 CENTS TODAY: NO CHANGES IN SILVER INVENTORY AT THE SLV//INVENTORY RESTS AT 537.681 MILLION OZ/

DEC 28/WITH SILVER UP 9 CENTS TODAY; A HUGE CHANGE IN SILVER INVENTORY AT THE SLV: A WITHDRAWAL OF 2.682 MILLION OZ FROM THE SLV//INVENTORY RESTS AT 537.681 MILLION OZ//

DEC 27/WITH SILVER UP 6 CENTS TODAY NO CHANGES IN SILVER INVENTORY AT THE SLV//INVENTORY RESTS AT 537.681

DEC 23/WITH SILVER UP 19 CENTS TODAY:A HUGE CHANGE IN SILVER INVENTORY AT THE SLV: A WITHDRAWAL OF 1.202 MILLION OZ FROM THE SLV///INVENTORY RESTS AT 537.681 MILLION OZ//

DEC 22/WITH SILVER UP 29 CENTS TODAY; A HUGE CHANGES IN SILVER INVENTORY AT THE SLV: A WITHDRAWAL OF 1.202 MILLION OZ FROM THE SLV////INVENTORY RESTS AT 538.883 MILLION OZ/

DEC 21/WITH SILVER UP 19 CENTS: A BIG CHANGE IN SILVER INVENTORY AT THE SLV: A DEPOSIT OF 2.728 MILLION OZ INTO THE SLV///INVENTORY RESTS AT 540.085 MILLION OZ

DEC 20/WITH SILVER DOWN 22 CENTS TODAY: NO CHANGES IN SILVER INVENTORY AT THE SLV//INVENTORY RESTS AT 538.282 MILLION OZ

DEC 17/WITH SILVER UP 9 CENTS TODAY: NO CHANGES IN SILVER INVENTORY AT THE SLV/INVENTORY RESTS AT 538.282 MILLION OZ//

DEC 16/WITH SILVER UP 91 CENTS TODAY; A HUGE CHANGE IN SILVER INVENTORY AT THE SLV// A WITHDRAWAL OF 3.33 MILLION OZ FROM THE SLV//INVENTORY REST AT 538.282 MILLION OZ

DEC 15WITH SILVER DOWN 38 CENTS TODAY; A HUGE CHANGE IN SILVER INVENTORY AT THE SLV/: A WITHDRAWAL OF 2.48 MILLION OZ FROM THE SLV///INVENTORY RESTS AT 541.612 MILLION OZ

DEC 14/WITH SILVER DOWN 38 CENTS TODAY; NO CHANGES IN SILVER INVENTORY AT THE SLV//INVENTORY RESTS AT 543.092 MILLION OZ

DEC 13/WITH SILVER UP 11 CENTS TODAY; A HUGE CHANGES IN SILVER INVENTORY AT THE SLV:A WITHDRAWAL OF 3.561 MILLION OZ FROM THE SLV//INVENTORY RESTS AT 543.092 MILLION OZ//

DEC 10.WITH SILVER UP 19 CENTS TODAY; NO CHANGES IN SILVER INVENTORY AT THE SLV//INVENTORY RESTS AT 546.653 MILLION OZ..

DEC 9/WITH SILVER DOWN 43 CENTS TODAY; A HUGE CHANGE IN SILVER INVENTORY AT THE SLV// A DEPOSIT OF 2.96 MILLION OZ INTO THE SLV///INVENTORY RESTS AT 546.653 MILLION OZ/

DEC 8/WITH SILVER DOWN 7 CENTS TODAY; NO CHANGE IN SILVER INVENTORY AT THE SLV//INVENTORY RESTS AT 543.693 MILLION OZ///

DEC 7/WITH SILVER UP 24 CENTS TODAY: NO CHANGE IN SILVER INVENTORY AT THE SLV//INVENTORY RESTS AT 543.693 MILLION OZ..

DEC 6/WITH SILVER DOWN 25 CENTS TODAY; A HUGE CHANGE IN SILVER INVENTORY AT THE SLV: A WITHDRAWAL OF 1.110 MILLION OZ FROM THE SLV///INVENTORY RESTS AT 543.693 MILLION OZ//

DEC 3/WITH SILVER UP 21 CENTS TODAY; A BIG CHANGE IN SILVER INVENTORY AT THE SLV:A WITHDRAWAL OF 3.199 MILLION OZ FROM THE SLV////INVENTORY RESTS AT 544.803 MILLION OZ//

DEC 2/WITH SILVER DOWN 6 CENTS TODAY: NO CHANGES IN SILVER INVENTORY AT THE SLV//INVENTORY RESTS AT 548.002 MILLION OZ.

DEC 1/WITH SILVER DOWN 44 CENTS TODAY: A SMALL CHANGE IN SILVER INVENTORY AT THE SLV: A WITHDRAWAL OF 740,000 OZ FROM THE SLV////INVENTORY RESTS AT 548.002 MILLION OZ//

NOV 30/WITH SILVER DOWN 3 CENTS TODAY; A SMALL CHANGES IN SILVER INVENTORY AT THE SLV// A WITHDRAWAL OF .555 MILLION OZ FORM THE SLV//INVENTORY RESTS AT 548.742 MILLION OZ///

CLOSING INVENTORY: 530.612 MILLION OZ//

PHYSICAL GOLD/SILVER STORIES

PETER SCHIFF

Heads You Lose; Tails You Lose

THURSDAY, JAN 06, 2022 – 02:20 PM

Via SchiffGold.com,

The Fed has a difficult choice to make.

Will it crash the economy? Or will it crash the dollar?

Whichever way this coin flip turns out — you lose.

Based on the December FOMC minutes, the central bankers at the Federal Reserve are suddenly serious about inflation. They are even talking about balance sheet reduction. This is the prescribed policy to take on rampant inflation. And we certainly have rampant inflation.

If the Fed doesn’t shut off the monetary spigot, inflation will continue to flame out of control. If it goes long enough, it could lurch into hyperinflation and eventually even precipitate a currency crisis that crashes the dollar.

But doing something about inflation comes at a cost. If the central bank actually does what’s necessary to tame inflation, it will almost certainly crash the economy, which is built on easy money, low interest rates, money printing, and debt.

An article published by the Mises Wire highlights “a myriad of detrimental effects to other facets of the economy.”

To start, the aforementioned contractionary monetary policies will presumably slow GDP growth, wage growth, and possibly even job creation over the course of their implementation.”

The Fed knows this. It has already lowered its projected GDP growth forecasts. There are also rumblings of rising unemployment in 2022. And keep in mind, the Fed hasn’t actually done anything yet. The central bankers are almost certainly understating the impacts of their tightening policy on the economy.

Rising interest rates and the end of QE will also put a big squeeze on the federal government.

Furthermore, a rise in the federal funds rate will undisputedly lead to a rise in net interest payments made by the government. In fiscal year 2020, the United States federal government spent $345 billion in net interest payments alone, despite near-zero interest rates. The nonpartisan Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget found that even a 2 percent increase in interest rates would cause net interest payments to rise to a whopping $750 billion, and as mentioned above, by 2024 the federal funds rate is expected to increase by exactly 2 percent. It should also be noted that this study was conducted in March 2021, prior to the passage of the American Rescue Plan and the Bipartisan Infrastructure Bill, which was then followed up with a stark increase in interest rates on newly issued Treasury bills, all of which will cause the $750 billion projection to be an underestimate.”

One also needs to consider how rising interest rates will impact consumer behavior.

The upcoming interest rate increases will pull the prime rate up, thus furthering the burden of credit cardholders paying interest. It would be in the best interest of consumers to pay off their debts in a timely manner in order to avoid further economic strain later on. We should also anticipate a rise in fixed mortgage rates, increasing the cost of taking out loans on the purchase of property as well. While fixed mortgage rates and interest rates don’t have a perfect positive correlation, since 2004 there has been a ~0.74 correlation coefficient, meaning they are still very closely correlated.”
“On top of that, car loan rates are also likely to increase, which may worsen already tense conditions for those looking to purchase a vehicle. Similar to fixed mortgage loans, there is not a perfect positive correlation between interest rates and car loan rates. However, a strong relationship is still maintained, shown by a correlation coefficient of ~0.73. Used car prices have reached all-time highs in 2021, and following the disbursement of stimulus checks, consumption expenditures on durable goods starkly dropped. Buying a vehicle is arguably more difficult than ever, and higher loan rates on cars may discourage such purchases even more.”

In other words, tighter monetary policy will slow down the economy and likely drive it into recession. Depression isn’t out of the question given just how much malinvestment and misallocation there is in the economy today.

So, which will it be? High inflation? Or a crashing economy?

The coin is in the air.

end

LAWRIE WILLIAM//,//Egon von Greyerz///Matthew Piepenburg via GoldSwitzerland.com,James RICKARDS

LAWRIE WILLIAMS: FOMC minutes have negative impact on almost all markets

Precious metals just don’t seem to know which way to turn. After immediate post-Christmas surges, the onset of 2022 has seen a big dip, a partial recovery and now another big dip – and we are only a week into the New Year. On performance so far, 2022 looks likely to be a hugely volatile year, not only for precious metals, but for all markets.

The latest announcement to have a significantly downbeat impact on most markets was the release of the Fed’s minutes on the deliberations at last month’s FOMC meeting. These were interpreted by analysts as suggesting a more ‘hawkish’ approach to the stated Fed position on likely interest rate rises this year. Observers and Fed- followers seem to be of the consensus that the latest discussions suggest that inflation, and its control, is becoming the Fed’s principal priority now that unemployment levels have been coming down nearer to the Fed’s 3.5% target level. This is taken as meaning a more aggressive approach will be taken bhy the Fed to the implementation of U.S. domestic interest rate rises in the current year in terms of more rises than originally anticipated, and possibly steeper ones too.

Although all the precious metals fell back on the release of the FOMC minutes – gold to back below $1,790 and silver to $22 – it was not just the metals that were affected ,with base metals mostly falling in price also, along with equities and bitcoin – with BTC dropping to below $43,000 – well over $20,000 below where it was only a few short months ago. The oil price though bucked the negative trend and roseto $80 a barrel.

The almost across-the-board falls could cause the Fed to think again on its possibly more aggressive interest- rate raising programme given its already-perceived likely negative impact on U.S. economic growth. Furthermore, the enormous surge in Covid infections being seen currently, and its likely economic effects, could also lead to a policy reversal. One of the reasons the Fed has, so far, kept interest rates ultra low, is for fear that raising them might torpedo any signs see so far of U.S. economic growth. If only the supposition that it will raise rates has such an adverse effect on the markets, the reality of so doing might well be seen as a step too far when it actually comes to decision-making time.

Meanwhile tomorrow’s job creation figures may also have a positive, or negative, influence on short-term precious metals prices. If they come in well below expectations of around 410,000 new jobs created in December, that could well see a recovery in precious metals prices. If however they come in at the forecast level, or higher, prices could take another knock. But it should also be borne in mind that December levels will mostly have been recorded before the highly infectious Omicron virus variant had fully impacted the figures.

Regarding the virus, Johns Hopkins University, which is running a continuing assessment of virus figures globally, reported a new record of over 1 million new infections reported in the U.S. on Monday. This is an absolutely massive number but probably also includes delayed cumulative statistics from States which don’t report figures over the preceding weekend. The worldometers.com data which reports actual daily state-by-state infection numbers came in at a little over 500,000 new infections on the same day, but this rose to over 700,000 new cases yesterday – so well on its way to the 1 million per day figure.

Growth in Europe demonstrates well the rising trend. Yesterday France reported over 330,000 new cases and the UK over 190,000. Italy and Spain also reported well over 100,000 new cases each, with overall global cases up around 78% week-on-week. The pandemic looks like remaining with us for some time yet and its progress in the U.S. could thus well impact the Fed’s interest rate decisions going forward.

Despite the negative impact on precious metals prices of the new FOMC minutes, we still feel positive on the gold price in the year ahead, and beyond, If the Fed does indeed take a more aggressive approach in its interest rate policy, this will only be because rising, or out-of- control, inflation is seen as an ongoing problem. But even so, the Fed is unlikely to raise rates fast enough to counter the impact of negative real rates, which tends to focus investor interest on what are seen as stable, and wealth protecting, assets like gold. Some of the inflation drivers may. Indeed, be transitory though and will likely dissipate as the virus pandemic is brought under control. But this will not happen in the short, or even medium, term as the Omicron, and possibly other new virus variants, will continue to have an impact on the economy for many months to come, if not for ever!

06 Jan 2022

END

Important gold commentaries courtesy of GATA/Chris Powell

Brien Lundin: Inflation spooks the Fed but too late to stop gold

Submitted by admin on Wed, 2022-01-05 16:47 Section: Daily Dispatches

By Brien Lundin, Editor
Gold Newsletter / Golden Opportunities
New Orleans, Louisiana
Wednesday, January 4, 2021

Gold rallied over the last couple of days, essentially regaining all that it had lost on Monday’s sell-off. And then the Fed minutes were released.

Amazingly, the minutes showed that Federal Reserve officials and economists had apparently just discovered the rampant price inflation that everyone else had been talking about for months.

That took away gold’s gains for the day…but I believe the news was actually bullish for gold if we look just a bit further down the road.

You see, the Fed’s discovery that the inflation genie is out of the bottle led it to confirm an accelerated schedule of QE tapering, and the first rate hike as early as this March.

This sent gold falling from its daily highs. But it also sent the U.S. stock market tumbling.

That’s one reason why the Fed won’t be able to get too far down the road of tightening monetary policy: The markets won’t let it. …

… For the remainder of the analysis:

OTHER COMMODITIES/COFFEE

CRYPTOCURRENCIES/

END

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

ONSHORE YUAN: CLOSED DOWN AT 6.3792

OFFSHORE YUAN: 6.3875

HANG SANG CLOSED UP 165.61 PTS OR 0.72%

2. Nikkei closed DOWN 844.29 PTS OR 2.88%

3. Europe stocks ALL RED

USA dollar INDEX DOWN TO 96.15/Euro RISES TO 1.1315-

3b Japan 10 YR bond yield: RISES TO. +.119/ !!!!(Japan buying 100% of bond issuance)/Japanese yen vs usa cross now at 115.77/ THIS IS TROUBLESOME AS BANK OF JAPAN IS RUNNING OUT OF BONDS TO BUY./JAPAN 10 YR YIELD IS NOW TARGETED AT .11%/JAPAN LOSING CONTROL OF THEIR BOND MARKET//

3c Nikkei now ABOVE 17,000

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

3e WTI:: 79.43 and Brent: 81.96-

3f Gold DOWN/JAPANESE Yen UP CHINESE YUAN: ON -SHORE CLOSED DOWN// OFF- SHORE DOWN

3g Japan is to buy the equivalent of 108 billion uSA dollars worth of bond per month or $1.3 trillion. Japan’s GDP equals 5 trillion usa./“HELICOPTER MONEY” OFF THE TABLE FOR NOW /REVERSE OPERATION TWIST ON THE BONDS: PURCHASE OF LONG BONDS AND SELLING THE SHORT END

Japan to buy 100% of all new Japanese debt and by 2018 they will have 25% of all Japanese debt. Fifty percent of Japanese budget financed with debt.

3h Oil UP for WTI and UP FOR Brent this morning

3i European bond buying continues to push yields lower on all fronts in the EMU. German 10yr bund RISES TO -.0.077%/Italian 10 Yr bond yield RISES to 1.31% /SPAIN 10 YR BOND YIELD RISES TO 0.65%…ITALIAN 10 YR BOND YIELD/GERMAN BUND: 1.39: DANGEROUS FOR THE ITALIAN BANKING SYSTEM

3j Greek 10 year bond yield RISES TO : 1.39

3k Gold at $1789.15 silver at: 22.14 7 am est) SILVER NEXT RESISTANCE LEVEL AT $30.00

3l USA vs Russian rouble; Russian rouble DOWN 44/100 in roubles/dollar AT 76.35

3m oil into the 79 dollar handle for WTI and 81 handle for Brent/

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

JAPAN ON JAN 29.2016 INITIATES NIRP. THIS MORNING THEY SIGNAL THEY MAY END NIRP. TODAY THE USA/YEN TRADES TO 115.80 DESTROYING JAPANESE CITIZENS WITH HIGHER FOOD INFLATION

30 SNB (Swiss National Bank) still intervening again in the markets driving down the FRANC. It is not working: USA/SF this morning .9183– as the Swiss Franc is still rising against most currencies. Euro vs SF 1.0392 well above the floor set by the Swiss Finance Minister. Thomas Jordan, chief of the Swiss National Bank continues to purchase euros trying to lower value of the Swiss Franc.

USA 10 YR BOND YIELD: 1.743 UP 4 BASIS PTS

USA 30 YR BOND YIELD: 2.128 UP 3 BASIS PTS

USA DOLLAR VS TURKISH LIRA: 13.76

Futures Steady After Fed-Inspired Rout As Tech, Bitcoin Slide Continues

THURSDAY, JAN 06, 2022 – 08:04 AM

US equity futures were little changed after earlier swings as traders digested hawkish Fed minutes that sparked a global stock rout on Wednesday. As discussed yesterday, minutes from the Fed’s December meeting showed a growing preference for a faster path of rate hikes and a shrinking of the bank’s balance sheet (one which would lead to yet another market crash and even more stimulus). However, while rising rates is terrible news for tech and high duration names, it’s good news for the value sector, and investors bet while the Fed’s faster-than-expected policy tightening (which will lead to faster than expected easing) may crimp highly valued technology stocks it will offer opportunities in other equity sectors, and sure enough with Nasdaq futures bombing again, energy names like Exxon are at 2 year highs. Treasury yields extended a spike, with the 10Y rising to 1.75%, the dollar was unchanged and bitcoin’s plunge continued even though the selling in stocks has subsided. At 730am, Emini S&P futures were down 3 points or -0.06%, Dow futures were up 82 points or 0.2% and Nasdaq futures were down 76 points or 0.5% but off worst levels.

A faster Fed balance sheet normalization could bring curtains down on unprecedented policy accommodation which underwrote asset prices through the worst of the pandemic. The Fed is now at the core of the investment outlook for 2022, overriding continuing concerns such as slowing global growth, China’s regulatory crackdown and supply bottlenecks.

While the prospect of faster tightening hit stocks, with highly-valued technology shares seeing the biggest drops, some investors say equities can withstand the turbulence. “We believe any correction should be relatively short-lived as central banks will be keen to avoid excess volatility,” Julien Lafargue, chief market strategist at Barclays Private Bank, said by email. “2022 is likely to be a more challenging year for equity markets as well as investors’ nerves.”

That pep talk did little to boost megacap tech stocks all of which dropped again in premarket trading, set for another day of declines amid concerns about the impact of higher interest rates and rising bond yields on the sector (Apple -0.4%, Netflix -0.8%, Meta -0.3%). Among sectors, U.S. cryptocurrency-exposed stocks fell in premarket trading as Bitcoin slumped to the lowest level since December’s flash crash. Some small-cap biotech and pharma stocks rose amid positive trial results and broker upgrades. Obseva (OBSV US) +6.8% after positive results for its Phase 3 Edelweiss 3 trial of linzagolix. Magenta Therapeutics (MGTA US) +6.1% after Goldman upgrades to buy. Some other notable premarket movers:

U.S. cryptocurrency-exposed stocks fall in premarket trading as Bitcoin slumps to lowest level since the December flash crash. Riot Blockchain (RIOT US) -1.9%, Marathon Digital (MARA US) -1.7%.
Berkeley Lights (BLI US) declined 29% in U.S. premarket trading hours after its preliminary revenue missed estimates and it announced CEO Eric Hobbs will transition to be president of the Antibody Therapeutics business line.
Carnival’s U.S.-listed shares (CCL US) rise 1.2% in premarket trading even after the London stock fell as Reuters reported that peers Royal Caribbean and Norwegian canceled some sailings.
Sutro Biopharma (STRO US) shares dropped 13% postmarket after the drugmaker reported interim data from a dose-expansion Phase 1 study of STRO-002 on 44 patients with advanced ovarian cancer.
Turtle Beach (HEAR US) fell 4.6% postmarket after the maker of gaming accessories said its preliminary full year 2021 revenue was about $365 million, the low end of its guidance of $365 million to $380 million.
SomaLogic (SLGC US) climbed 16% in extended trading after announcing a worldwide strategic collaboration with Illumina.

European bourses were also in the red, following a weak, tech-led Asia session. Euro Stoxx 50 is down 1.1%, roughly halving opening losses; the Stoxx 600 index declined 0.9% led by a 2.6% drop in technology shares. Tech and media sectors are off 2%. FTSE 100 outperforms peers but remains in negative territory. European luxury were hit amid a broader market selloff, with Hermes, LVMH and Richemont underperforming the benchmark Stoxx 600 Index (Hermes -2.8%, LVMH -2.6%, Moncler -2.5%, Tod’s -2.3%, Burberry -2.1%, Richemont -1.9%, Kering -1.8%, Swatch -1.6%, Hugo Boss -1.2%). The selloff in luxury stocks is related to Wednesday’s U.S. market selloff and the impact of rising bonds yields, which is favoring value stocks, GAM investment manager Swetha Ramachandran writes in an email.

“There will undoubtedly be pockets of volatility surrounding Fed meetings throughout the year, but investors shouldn’t excessively fear the Fed, especially when there continue to be exciting alpha opportunities in markets,” Madison Faller, a global strategist at JPMorgan Private Bank, wrote in an email. “Growth and inflation will be decelerating throughout 2022, but nonetheless remain above historic trend levels. We think this will call for a much lower risk of a Fed-induced material market correction.”

Earlier in the session, a fresh bout of selling hit Asian stocks on Thursday as the risk of accelerated interest-rate hikes by the Federal Reserve sparked a broad decline from industrials to the technology sector. The MSCI Asia Pacific Index extended losses to 1.7%, on track to fall for a second day, as tech and industrial names led the slump. Fed officials warned of a “potentially faster pace of policy rate normalization” in the minutes of its December meeting, a move that investors fear could snuff out a global recovery and hurt corporate earnings. Japan’s benchmark Nikkei 225 slid the most in the region, plunging almost 3%, while measures in Australia and China also fell. Sony Group and Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co. were among the biggest decliners on the regional measure, while a gauge of communication stocks traded at its lowest since June 2020.

“The markets took the Fed minutes as signaling that the March meeting is now live and that the possibility for actually scaling back the balance sheet faster than last time by a significant margin is on the table,” said Ilya Spivak, head of greater Asia at DailyFX. The gloomy start to the year is culling hopes of a turnaround in Asian equities after they underperformed global stocks last year. A deepening Treasury rout has sent 10-year yields to beyond 1.7%, heightening concerns about rising borrowing costs.

Japanese stocks were hit especially hard, with the Nikkei 225 dropping by the most since June 21, as Fast Retailing fell on weak sales and investors sold technology shares amid concerns on higher interest rates. The blue-chip gauge closed 2.9% lower, with Tokyo Electron and Terumo also among the biggest drags. A measure of electronics makers was the largest contributor to a 2.1% loss in the Topix. The S&P 500 slid 1.9% Wednesday, while the Nasdaq 100 shed 3.1% after the Federal Reserve’s meeting minutes signaled faster rate hikes this year. Technology stocks plunged for a second day and the 10-year Treasury yield climbed to 1.71%, the highest since April. “If you compare what the situation is now to what it was like on Dec. 14-15 when the meeting took place, I think the impact of the omicron variant on the U.S. economy is being taken more seriously than back then,” said Tomo Kinoshita, a global market strategist at Invesco Asset Management in Tokyo. “Higher yields mean tech shares are likely to be exposed to selling pressure.”

Elsewhere, in rates fixed income continued to trade heavy. Treasuries extended a selloff over Asia session and broadly held losses into early US, leaving yields cheaper by 3bp to 4bp across the curve vs Wednesday’s close. 10-year yields push toward the top of daily range at around 1.75%, cheaper by 4bps on the day; spreads steady with yields across the curve higher by similar amounts. Session focus remains on IG issuance, where $54b has already been priced this week, while busy data slate and Fed speakers are also scheduled. IG dollar issuance slate includes IADB 5Y SOFR; eleven borrowers priced almost $20b Wednesday, taking weekly total to more than $54b vs $40b projected. Gilts bear steepened, cheaper by 5.5bps across the back end, underperforming bunds and Treasuries by ~1-2bps in 10s.

In FX, the Bloomberg dollar spot index traded flat, fading a brief push through Tuesday’s highs. AUD and NZD recover off the lows but remain the worst performers in G-10.

In commodities, crude futures rallied to best levels for the week. WTI adds over 1.5%, regaining a $79-handle, Brent stalls near $82. Spot gold recovers a late-Asia selloff, still in the red but back near $1,800/oz. Base metals trade poorly with much of the complex down over 1%.

Looking at the day ahead, data releases include German’s preliminary December CPI reading and November’s factory orders, while in the US there’s the weekly initial jobless claims, the ISM services index for December, and the trade balance and factory orders for November. From the UK, there’s also the final December services and composite PMIs. Otherwise, central bank speakers include the Fed’s Daly and Bullard.

Market Snapshot

S&P 500 futures down 0.2% to 4,685.00
STOXX Europe 600 down 1.2% to 488.58
MXAP down 1.4% to 190.95
MXAPJ down 1.0% to 619.64
Nikkei down 2.9% to 28,487.87
Topix down 2.1% to 1,997.01
Hang Seng Index up 0.7% to 23,072.86
Shanghai Composite down 0.3% to 3,586.08
Sensex down 1.0% to 59,644.23
Australia S&P/ASX 200 down 2.7% to 7,358.32
Kospi down 1.1% to 2,920.53
German 10Y yield little changed at -0.06%
Euro little changed at $1.1307
Brent Futures up 0.1% to $80.89/bbl
Gold spot down 0.9% to $1,794.55
U.S. Dollar Index little changed at 96.22

Top Overnight News from Bloomberg

Federal Reserve officials are preparing to move faster than their previous round of tightening to keep a high-inflation and a near-full-employment economy from overheating, leaving behind the gradualism that marked the central bank’s approach in the prior decade
Russia and its allies said they would send troops to help Kazakh President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev quell protests after anti-government demonstrators seized official buildings and a major airport in the biggest challenge to the central Asian country’s leadership in decades
Oil retreated for the first time in four days on the prospect of tightening U.S. monetary policy, and on signs Chinese demand will weaken due to the worst Covid-19 outbreak since the initial flareup in Wuhan
More U.K. businesses than ever before are worried about inflation, and a record number are planning to increase their own prices, according to a survey by the British Chambers of Commerce
Mexico’s plan to halt crude exports by 2023 could curb the size of its giant oil hedge and help boost longer-dated prices
North Korea said it test-fired a “hypersonic” missile on Wednesday for the second time in about four months, as it continues to develop nuclear-capable weapons designed to evade interception by the U.S. and its allies

A more detailed look at global markets courtesy of Newsquawk

Asia-Pac equities succumbed to the downbeat handover from Wall Street, which saw growth and tech stocks among the hardest hit by the hawkishly perceived FOMC minutes – with the Nasdaq closing lower by 3.3%. Markets were spooked by the prospect of an earlier Fed rate lift-off and closer balance sheet runoff trigger date. US equity futures resumed trade relatively flat with a downward bias around the prior day’s lows and drifted lower after the Chinese cash open. Eurozone equity futures experienced more pronounced losses with the DAX and Euro Stoxx 50 Mar’20 contracts down by over 1.5% each after the end of the Tokyo lunch break. In APAC, the ASX 200 (-2.7%) was pressured by its tech sector alongside its gold miners. The Nikkei 225 (-2.9%) also saw outflows from Tech and Electronics, whilst Services and Air Transportation were hit by the domestic COVID situation. The overnight JPY appreciation also provided headwinds for the Japanese exporters in the Index. The KOSPI (-1.0%) traded lower to a lesser extent following yesterday’s underperformance. The Hang Seng (+0.7%) and Shanghai Comp (-0.3%) initially saw milder losses with the PBoC conducting another daily liquidity drain at half the size of the prior day’s operation, whilst Chinese Services PMI also topped expectation with accompanying commentary highlighting lower inflationary pressure. In fixed income, US T-note futures initially clambered off lows amid potential early APAC demand as stocks sentiment remained sour, but this upside faded throughout the session and cash yields went back on the rise – with the US 10yr yield above 1.73% heading into the European open – the highest since March 2021. Meanwhile, the BoJ said it will inject JPY 2tln into the market via temporary bond purchases, a move that came after the Japanese 10yr yield hit 0.105% – levels seen last November – before tracking Treasury yields higher.

Top Asian News

Chinese Developer Shimao Defaults on Loan, Trust Firm Says
Hong Kong Home Minister in Quarantine After Party, HK01 Says
Samsung Co-CEO Expects ‘Good News’ on M&A in Near Future
Climate Mushrooms Into Too-Big-to-Ignore Risk for Supply Chains

European bourses, Stoxx 600 (-1.0%), are lower across the board as the region focuses on the fallout from the hawkishly perceived FOMC minutes which suggested rate lift-off may be warranted sooner or at a faster pace than was earlier anticipated. The handover from the APAC region was also a downbeat one as investors focused on the consequences of tighter monetary policy stateside with the Nikkei 225 (-2.9%) the laggard in the region amid a firmer JPY. US futures are a touch softer with the ES lower by 0.1% whilst the NQ (-0.3%) narrowly lags following yesterday’s session of heavy losses which saw the cash index close lower by 3.3%. Developments in the yield space will likely remain a driver for prices as the US 10yr yield eyes 1.75% to the upside. In a recent note, analysts at Goldman Sachs have suggested increasing rates should be favourable for European equities given the larger share of shorter-duration and rate sensitive sectors in the Stoxx 600. Goldman’s year-end target for the index is at 530 vs. current level of 488 and recommends European banking and energy names. Elsewhere, Berenberg maintains a bullish outlook on the region amid expectations that synchronized global growth will support an extension of the EPS recovery this year. Sectors in Europe are, for the most part, lower with Tech underperforming peers with the Stoxx 600 Tech Index (-2.5%) erasing a bulk of the gains seen since December 20th. Elsewhere, Banking names are faring notably better than peers and have moved notably into positive territory overall (Stoxx 600 Banking Index +1.0%) as the sector remains underpinned by the more favourable yield environment which has brought 0% to the upside into play for the German 10yr yield. In terms of stock specifics, Carrefour (+4.1%) is the clear outperformer in the Stoxx 600 with reports suggesting that PE firms could back a bid for the Co. by Auchan for EUR 23.50/shr. SocGen (+2.6%) is also seen higher on the session after the Co.’s ALD is to purchase LeasePlan for EUR 5bln. To the downside, Dr Martens (-8.6%) sits at the foot of the Stoxx 600 after Pemira offloaded 65mln shares in the Co.

Top European News

U.K. Inflation Builds With Companies Planning 5% Price Increases
U.K. Minister Urges Johnson to Cut Tax as Living Costs Rise
Macron Under Pressure as Daily Covid Cases Soar to Record
Next Raises Profit Forecast as Party Clothes Buoy Sales

In FX,

Having largely shrugged off a bumper ADP print, Markit’s services and composite PMIs, the Buck paid full attention to the account of December’s Fed policy meeting that was clearly more hawkish than the actual event, latest set of SEP dot plots and chair Powell’s press conference. Indeed, FOMC members generally noted that it might necessary to tighten sooner and more aggressively than previously anticipated, while some are of the opinion that QT may start relatively quickly after the end of tapering, so March is live for lift-off as inferred by Waller recently and unwinding the balance sheet could follow shortly after. In response, the Greenback firmed up almost across the board and the index would arguably have been even higher if the Yen continued to track yields in context of UST/JGB differentials instead of risk sentiment that has been rattled by the latest Fed guidance. However, the DXY is holding just above 96.000 and below 96.500 within a 96.393-089 range awaiting two scheduled Fed speakers (Daly and Bullard), US trade data, the services ISM and factory orders.

JPY – As noted above, the Yen is outperforming and maintaining its recovery momentum on risk rather than rate dynamics, with Usd/Jpy retreating through 116.00 again, but not any closer to the semi-psychological 115.50 level that also forms the top of a decent band of option expiries starting from 115.45 (1.1 bn).
AUD/NZD – At the other end of the G10 spectrum, risk-off positioning along with their US peer’s revival has hit the Aussie and Kiwi especially hard, as Aud/Usd strives to keep sight of 0.7150 and Nzd/Usd faces a similar task around the 0.6750 mark, though the latter is benefiting from a turnaround in the Aud/Nzd cross towards 1.0600. In terms of regional news, Fitch affirmed its AA rating for NZ with a positive outlook, while Australia’s final services and composite PMIs were unrevised and Queensland suffered its first COVID related fatality since April last year.
CHF/GBP/CAD/EUR – Also tracking their US rival, albeit to varying degrees and well off overnight or earlier lows amidst some consolidation, retracement and corrective price/yield action in other global bonds to the initial bear-flatting in Treasuries post the aforementioned FOMC minutes. In fact, the Euro has reclaimed 1.1300+ status in wake of supportive Eurozone data including PPI, German industrial orders and state CPIs that infer an upside bias to the consensus for the national reading. Conversely, option expiry interest in Eur/Usd is heavily skewed to the downside today and may drag the pair back down – see 8.09GMT post on the Headline Feed for details. Elsewhere, the Franc is staying afloat of 0.9200, the Pound is meandering between 1.3559-1.3490, but still within striking distance of the 100 DMA (at 1.3555 today) and the Loonie has recouped losses from under 1.2800 ahead of Canadian trade data and with some assistance from an even firmer rebound in crude prices (WTI up to Usd 79.25/brl at best).

In commodities, crude benchmarks are underpinned this morning in-spite of the pressure seen in global equities after the December FOMC minutes; action was has become more pronounced throughout the morning and now sees WTI, for instance, eclipse yesterday’s peak by circa USD 0.50/bbl. The upside in the benchmarks has occurred as a grinding bid since the arrival of European participants, after a softer APAC session given the broader risk aversion. Of note this morning is commentary from Goldman Sachs’ Global Head of Commodities Currie who stated that he is extremely bullish on commodities, believing that the super cycle could continue for decades. Separately, it is worth remaining cognisant of the increasing focus on Kazakhstan/Uzbekistan geopolitics, though overnight reports indicated there was no output disruption yet due to the Kazak fuel protests. Elsewhere, spot gold and silver are pressured but have lifted off of the overnight lows spurred by the FOMC minutes and the ongoing rally in yields experienced globally since. Separately, the likes of copper are under pressure given broader risk sentiment though the LME contact has reclaimed the 9.5k mark.

US Event Calendar

7:30am: Dec. Challenger Job Cuts -75.3% YoY, prior -77.0%
8:30am: Jan. Initial Jobless Claims, est. 195,000, prior 198,000; Continuing Claims, est. 1.68m, prior 1.72m
8:30am: Nov. Trade Balance, est. -$81b, prior -$67.1b
10am: Nov. Durable Goods Orders, est. 2.5%, prior 2.5%; -Less Transportation, prior 0.8%
10am: Nov. Factory Orders Ex Trans, est. 1.1%, prior 1.6%
10am: Nov. Factory Orders, est. 1.5%, prior 1.0%
10am: Nov. Cap Goods Ship Nondef Ex Air, prior 0.3%
10am: Nov. Cap Goods Orders Nondef Ex Air, prior -0.1%
10am: Dec. ISM Services Index, est. 67.0, prior 69.1

DB’s Jim Ried concludes the overnight wrap

The December FOMC minutes last night shattered the early year calm in financial markets as they confirmed a WSJ story 24 hours earlier that Fed officials are considering QT shortly after policy rates are raised. This pushed real yields across the Treasury curve much higher. The jump in yields hit the S&P 500 index and specifically companies exposed to higher discount rates, including big tech names. 10yr treasury yields ended the day +5.8bps higher while the S&P 500 index retreated -1.94%, and the Nasdaq down -3.34%. It comes ahead of a couple of important days for markets this side of the weekend, with the ISM services out later today ahead of tomorrow’s all-important US jobs report, in addition to the flash Euro Area CPI reading tomorrow as well.

The shift in sentiment came against the backdrop of continued rises in sovereign bond yields, with those on 10yr treasuries (+5.8bps) climbing for a 4th consecutive session as mentioned, marking the longest run of gains since October. Furthermore, shorter-dated yields rose to fresh post-pandemic highs once again on the hawkish minutes, including those on both 2yr yields (+6.6ps) and 5yr yields (+7.2bps). Real rates have been the clear driver given the shift in monetary policy, with the 10yr real rate up another +11.2bps yesterday, the biggest one-day climb since October, to its highest level since late-June at -0.86%. That said, they’re still some way beneath their closing peak of the last 12 months, having hit -0.585% back in March 2021 when the ‘reflation’ narrative was at its height. In Asia 10yr yields are up another +2bps to 1.726% overnight but driven by breakevens this time.

Diving into the Fed minutes, which adopted the more hawkish tone that had been building on balance sheet policy and QT of late. There was a staff presentation on normalising the balance sheet and signals that those discussions would continue at upcoming meetings as no decisions were made. Nevertheless, the minutes revealed that the Committee was prepared to normalise the size of the balance sheet faster than during the last cycle. In practice, that means QT can begin sooner after the fed funds rate is lifted for the first time and the balance sheet can shrink at a faster pace. While some members flagged there were risks to financial stability of a fast exit, there was a sense of confidence that the new standing repo facility would serve to keep control of money market rates while also supporting Treasury market functioning, and that the larger balance sheet and current state of the economy called for a quicker withdrawal.

There are a few other big questions outstanding, including how many rate hikes would take place before QT begins and how Treasury and MBS holdings would be treated during runoff; some Committee members advocated for MBS holdings to be runoff at a faster rate. How those questions are resolved will be the primary focus of interpreting Fed policy for the next few meetings. Even with outstanding questions, the hawkish shift on QT pushed the entire yield curve a few basis points higher as mentioned, bringing 10yr treasury yields above 1.70% for the first time since October, unsurprisingly driven by real yields. The more aggressive QT stance turned equity markets, with the S&P 500 decreasing -1.94% on the day, most of the declines taking place after the minutes were published. Sectors exposed to higher long-term interest rates, including real estate (-3.22%) and big tech names (FANG -3.29%) were hit hardest.

In the near term, the minutes reiterated prior communications that maximum employment would be reached relatively soon and therefore prompt liftoff, and that the pace of rate hikes may need to be faster. There was a sense that the Committee should convey a strong commitment to address elevated inflation pressures, calling for tighter policy. Right now the market is pricing in 3 full Fed rate hikes in 2022, which is the same as the median FOMC dot, the first time they’ve been aligned that far into the future in a while. The market is pricing the first full hike by the May meeting.

Overnight in Asia benchmarks are all trading lower as the tech rout continues with the Nikkei (-2.24%), CSI (-0.86%), KOSPI (-0.79%), Hang Seng (-0.36%) and Shanghai Composite (-0.16%) all lower. Faster rate hike expectations have spread into Asian markets too. There has even been some chatter on the BoJ changing it’s policy stance and Bloomberg’s WIRP now shows that the BoJ’s policy rate could emerge into positive territory by year end. Futures markets are indicating a weaker start in DM markets with the S&P 500 (-0.37%), Nasdaq (-0.53%) and DAX (-1.71%) contracts all in negative territory.

European trading finished before the minutes release, and saw a continued broad equity acceleration, with the STOXX 600 (+0.07%) at a fresh high of its own, having achieved new closing highs in all 3 trading sessions of 2022 so far. This movement was echoed across the continent, with Germany’s DAX (+0.74%) and France’s CAC 40 (+0.81%) likewise at record highs. The calm before the storm.

Sovereign bond yields were also more subdued in Europe but the US yield rises accelerated around the US close so there will likely be some delayed catch up this morning. Optically 10yr bunds rose around +3.5bps but this was due to a new benchmark. Nevertheless the move takes us to -0.089% and ever closer to the magic zero for the first time since May 2019. It was only 5 days before Xmas that we nudged up against -0.40%.

Staying in Europe, the final December PMIs were fairly resilient relative to the flash prints, in spite of the arrival of the Omicron variant. Indeed, the final Euro Area composite PMI was only down a tenth from the flash reading to 53.3, whilst Germany’s was also only down a tenth to 49.9 and the French reading at 55.8 was revised up two-tenths. This was echoed in the US, where the composite PMI was revised up a tenth to 57 as well.

The relatively strong data helped to bolster risk appetite more broadly, and oil prices continued their run of having advanced every day of 2022 so far. In fact, at one point WTI oil prices (+1.12%) were trading above their pre-Omicron closing level of $78.39/bbl for the first time since news of the variant emerged, although by the end of the session it had pared back those gains slightly to close just shy at $77.85/bbl. In Asia we’re back down around -1% on the overall risk off. Staying on energy, European natural gas futures were up a further +3.13% yesterday, which brings their YTD 2022 performance to a major +30.11% in the space of just 3 days, which is probably one of the strongest you’ll see out there for any asset. Admittedly that’s a bounceback following their significant falls at the end of 2021 however, when they went on a run of 8 successive declines that saw them lose more than half their value.

Markets continue to remain pretty impervious to Omicron for now, even amidst some of the highest global case growth of the entire pandemic. Indeed France saw a humungous 332k cases yesterday. As a benchmark they averaged closer to 15k daily cases in November and fewer than 10k daily cases in October. Elsewhere, Hong Kong moved to tighten restrictions yesterday, with a ban on dining-in after 6pm, the closure of bars and gyms, as well as a ban on flights from 8 countries, including the US and the UK. Elsewhere in London, which is interesting since it’s one of the first places where Omicron spread widely in the developed world, the growth in hospitalisations has continued to slow, with the total numbers in hospital now up by +23% over the last week, which is the slowest rate of growth in 3 weeks now.

Otherwise on the data front, we had the ADP’s report of private payrolls that showed much stronger-than-expected growth of +807k for the month (vs. +410k expected). In the ADP series, that’s the strongest jump since May, and follows up the employment component of the ISM manufacturing hitting an 8-month high the previous day.

To the day ahead now, and data releases include German’s preliminary December CPI reading and November’s factory orders, while in the US there’s the weekly initial jobless claims, the ISM services index for December, and the trade balance and factory orders for November. From the UK, there’s also the final December services and composite PMIs. Otherwise, central bank speakers include the Fed’s Daly and Bullard.

END

3. ASIAN AFFAIRS

i)THURSDAY MORNING WEDNESDAY NIGHT

3 a./NORTH KOREA/ SOUTH KOREA

///SOUTH KOREA

END

3B JAPAN

end

3c CHINA

END

CHINA/

Ningbo is the largest port in the world and it has now ground to a halt due to the worsening outbreak of COVID

(zerohedge)

Ningbo Port Activity Grinds To A Halt As China Outbreak Worsens

WEDNESDAY, JAN 05, 2022 – 07:00 PM

After authorities found more COVID cases in Ningbo, a port city and industrial hub home to one of the world’s largest ports, residents are facing a partial lockdown, and reports claim that movement of essential products has been dramatically slowed as the lockdown measures slow activity at the port.

Beijing has managed to keep reports about the situation mostly under wraps, but reports in Bloomberg and several trade journals have warned that the slowdowns at the port could have wide-ranging ramifications for international commerce.

Right now, lockdowns are affecting Xi’an and Yuzhou along with the Ningbo port, Chinese sources said. In Yuzhou, which has a population of 1.1M, authorities shut down its transport system and all but essential food stores closed overnight.

The strict lockdown measures come as Beijing braces for both the Winter Olympics and the Lunar New Year. With exactly a month to go until the Games start, foreign ministry spokesman Wang Wenbin assured reporters China had “formulated an efficient and highly effective defense system”.

Part of this system will involve thousands of staff and volunteers entering a bubble on Tuesday, which will see them have no physical contact with the outside world in order to limit the spread.

Athletes and members of the press who cover the Games will also enter the bubble on arrival in China, where they will remain for the duration of their stay.

In Yuzhou, situated some some 434 miles south-west of Beijing, officials said that “to curb and quash the epidemic within the shortest amount of time is a high-priority political task” for the local government.

Some people pointed out that the CCP’s lockdown measures might actually be making the situation worse: “People are swapping stuff with others in the same building, because they no longer have enough food to eat,” one man who spoke with Radio Free Asia on the condition of anonymity said.

The news outlet also reported that another man had wanted to trade a smartphone and tablet for rice, according to the BBC.

What Beijing calls its “dynamic zero COVID” strategy combines mass vaccinations with a regime of constant testing, nationwide monitoring of people’s movements, temperature-taking and smartphone apps to prove individuals don’t pose a threat. This hyper-vigilance has left doctors exhausted.

Perhaps this is why the activity at the Ningbo port has slowed: one trade journal covering the business of commerce said that while no COVID cases have been reported at any of the port’s three container terminals, closures at warehouses and the container depot, as well as trucking disruptions, have made it difficult for manufacturers and suppliers to get their goods from the port, or to the port.

END

The City of Xi’an (13 million population) has been completely locked down where citizens are not allowed to leave their homes even for food. Now thousand of cops have been deployed to quell public anger on this lockdown. As expected there is widespread

food shortages

(zerohedge)

Thousands Of Cops Deployed To Quell Public Anger In China’s Locked Down Xi’an Amid Widespread Food Shortages

WEDNESDAY, JAN 05, 2022 – 10:20 PM

Tens of thousands of police officers were deployed to China’s Xi’an where public anger has exploded among the city’s 13 million residents who were left bargaining and bartering for essential foodstuffs amid ongoing food shortages, as the city entered its 13th day of lockdown amid a wave of COVID-19 cases.

As some people took to social media to appeal for assistance as their food supplies ran low, or they were unable to access medical care, others started local trading networks in residential compounds to try to meet each other’s needs through bartering.

“Everything is getting bartered in Xi’an,” a resident of the city told RFA. “People are swapping stuff with others in the same building, because they no longer have enough food to eat.” Another resident said in a video clip that some people were trading cigarettes and iPhones for bags of rice.

“We now have a barter system in our residential compound,” the man says in the clip. “We had a bag of rice, and the neighbor wanted to trade … a smartphone and a tablet.”

“We have six bags of rice in our home but no vegetables.”

According to Radio Free Asia, authorities in the northern Chinese city of Xi’an have called for calm, as many in Xi’an are taking to social media complaining that they were unable to get sufficient food supplies after being ordered to stay in their homes.

To contain any civil unrest, city authorities have deployed around 29,000 police officers to enforce the lockdown, while countless local security guards are preventing people from entering or leaving areas designated high or medium risk. One video clip that made the rounds on social media showed security guards beating a teenager in the lobby of a building because he went out to buy steamed buns.

“I was hungry, so I came out to get some mantou,” the youngster is heard telling the guards, who beat and kick him, knocking his food to the ground. City authorities later said the guards had been punished.

Residents were initially told they would be allowed to send a designated person to buy groceries every other day, but many have since told RFA that the security guards in many areas aren’t allowing anyone to leave.

Those who can make it out to buy supplies are finding that prices have skyrocketed, especially of fresh fruit and vegetables, despite a well publicized effort by the government and volunteers to bring fresh produce into the city in large quantities to hand out to beleaguered residents.

One video clip posted to social media showed a man who said he had paid around 40 yuan for 10 capsicum peppers, the same amount for six tomatoes and 40 yuan for two cabbages.

“The vegetable vendor must be making a fortune,” the man complains, while showing his haul to friends.

State media, which is tightly controlled by the ruling Communist Party, reported on a line of trucks hauling a selection of vegetables, fresh fruit and pork belly into residential households in one part of the city on Dec. 29, delivering fresh food to around 180 households.

But the address given in the news report was tracked down by social media users, who discovered it was a residential compound for employees of the Shaanxi Provincial People’s Congress and the Xi’an municipal government, prompting a public outcry on social media.

A Xi’an resident surnamed Song said the food given to the families of officials looked luxurious compared with what regular people are getting: “They were spoiled for choice when it comes vegetables,” Song said. “Where can regular people find stuff like that?”

“I managed to get one head of Chinese leaves, a zucchini, four bell peppers, three heads of garlic, a piece of ginger, two scallions and three potatoes,” she said.

According to the Shaanxi provincial government, a total of 41,000 police officers have been dispatched to Xi’an to maintain public order, with 29,000 of those deployed to Xi’an, 20,352 of whom are working in residential compounds. Some 4,000 are operating traffic roadblocks, while others are guarding hotels or COVID-19 testing sites.

A Shaanxi scholar who gave the surname Tian said the government’s top priority in times of crisis is always maintaining public order and social stability, rather than looking after the needs of ordinary people.

“They have been building up the stability maintenance system ever since 2004,” Tian said. “They say there are only 40,000 police officers in Xi’an, but actually there are many more [security personnel] who aren’t police, including neighborhood committees and security in charge of buildings.”
“There are also village officials and their teams and so on,” he said.

Commentator Han Dapeng said the lockdown doesn’t appear to be preventing the spread of the Omicron variant of COVID-19, however.

“They used this total lockdown method on Wuhan last year, but Omicron is still going strong,” Han said. “Yet the rates of fatality and severe disease are both very low.”

“I don’t think this Xi’an lockdown is about disease prevention,” he said. “It’s more about controlling the population.”

State news agency Xinhua reported that China had 161 confirmed cases of COVID-19 nationwide on Monday, 101 of which were locally transmitted.

New cases in Xi’an fell to their lowest in a week, health officials said Sunday, as the ruling Chinese Communist Party (CCP) pursues a “zero COVID” approach involving tight border restrictions and swift, targeted lockdowns.

Zhang Canyou of the China Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said that several rounds of testing in Xi’an had showed there are “some positive changes” in case numbers, which have dipped since the lockdown began.

Meanwhile, to contain speculation that Beijing is only enforcing lockdowns “to control the population”, amid the widespread outcry about the draconian lockdown measures, the official local news platform of Xi’an said a hospital’s wrongdoings amid the lockdown led to miscarriage of a pregnant woman and requires the hospital “to compensate and apologize.” And just to make everything better, the hospital’s general manager was suspended and two department heads fired.

Liu Shunzhi, head of the city’s health commission, received a warning from the Communist Party for malpractice in emergency treatment during the Covid outbreak. It wasn’t clear just what the “malpractice” was.

And just like that everything in Xi’an is back to abnormal.

Oh, and then just a few moments ago, this hit: China’s Xian Xianyang International Airport Suspends All International Passenger Flights From Jan 5. Because things are clearly under control.

END

Xi’an authorities block all negative posts on social media as the lockdown backlash grows

(zerohedge)

THURSDAY, JAN 06, 2022 – 07:00 AM

As Beijing struggles with the worsening outbreak in Xi’an, the provincial capital of 13M that has been under lockdown for about 2 weeks now, authorities are finding it increasingly difficult to paper over the popular outcry. So, authorities in the northern Chinese city have banned “negative news” on social media as many residents took to Weibo and other platforms to complain about their present circumstances.

The citywide lockdown, believed to be the most brutal since the original Spring 2020 lockdown in Wuhan, has left many stranded at home without enough food, and without access to medical treatment. Unfortunately, they’ll need to keep their complaints private if they want to avoid angering the powers that be.

“From Jan. 4, people are banned from posting details of the pandemic restrictions or information about the road situation, videos, links, mini-apps or photos of the situation, particularly negative news,” the municipal government said in a mass text message to the city’s 13M residents. “There is background surveillance operating on all WeChat groups, and any negative news will be deleted as soon as it is sent,” the message said. “Please bear this in mind and pass the message on.”

Radio Free Asia reports that the message was triggered by a wave of public dissatisfaction and online complaints as people have been prevented from leaving their homes to buy groceries and basic necessities.

Just like in Wuhan, many have been turned away from hospitals for medical treatment because they come from high or medium-risk areas.

Instead of allowing complaints to fill up social media platforms, the local government in Xi’an is running a high-profile propaganda campaign to remind people of the efforts underway to bring shipments of fresh food to beleaguered residents.

Amusingly, some residents have been pressed into service of this campaign: RFA managed to get its hands on a clip of a family receiving a delivery of food and drink, before being asked to thank the government by the agents who delivered the shipment.

“You should thank the government,” the officer is seen saying. “Thank you, government, for your care, thank you,” replies the resident, having just received a white radish, three potatoes, six carrots and two onions.”

One Xi’an resident said the authorities want to put the people’s complaints “on mute”.

“They want to put us on mute, so that we can’t talk about anything negative regarding the pandemic restrictions,” Feng said.

Another resident complained that the government can silence people, but it can’t fool them.

“It’s pretty clear now what the government is doing,” Ma said. “Now, if people are hungry, they’re not allowed to say so.”
“This isn’t a place fit for humans to live, where they won’t even let sick people seek medical treatment, or give birth — that’s how they treat people in a pandemic,” she said.

Xi’an isn’t alone. Lockdowns are also in place in Henan province’s Yuzhou city and in the central city of Zhengzhou. There are also restrictions on travel in and out of Beijing ahead of the 2022 Winter Olympics on Feb. 4, and lockdowns have also impacted the port at Ningbo, as we reported earlier.

end

Eurasia group states that China’s zero Covid policy will be a top risk of 2022
(zerohedge)

China’s “Zero COVID” Policy Failure Is A Top Risk Of 2022

THURSDAY, JAN 06, 2022 – 04:15 AM

As millions of Chinese brace for another weeks-long lockdown, this time in Xi’an, the analysts over at the Eurasia Group believe that the “failure” of President Xi’s “COVID Zero” policy is one of the biggest policy blunders to look out for in 2022.

As the firm does every year, Eurasia Group on Monday announced its breakdown of the biggest risks for 2022, and coming in at the No. 4 spot is China’s refusal to abandon its “COVID Zero” policies.

For one, China’s inability to contain outbreaks could trigger a supply chain collapse and other global economic disruptions both inside China and abroad.

The Eurasia Group acknowledges that the present view on its “COVID Zero” approach is a major departure from 2020, when China’s zero COVID policy helped it “look incredibly successful in 2020.”

Now, it has become “a fight against a much more transmissible variant with broader lockdowns and vaccines with limited effectiveness.”

While individuals will spend more time in digital spaces this year, both at work and at home, the biggest technology firms are “writing the algorithms that decide what people see and hear, determine their economic and social opportunities and ultimately influence what they think.”

What’s more, China’s population has “virtually no” antibodies protecting it against omicron despite all the jabs and boosters they have received. It’s “exactly the opposite of where President Xi” wants us to to be. Xi wants his country to be in the run-up to his third term, but there’s nothing he can do about it: The initial success of “Zero COVID” and President Xi’s personal attachment to it makes the policy seemingly impossible to change course.

It says that while individuals will spend more time in digital space this year, both at work and at home, the biggest technology firms are “writing the algorithms that decide what people see and hear, determine their economic and social opportunities and ultimately influence what they think.”

Here’s what Eurasia is expecting: China’s policy will fail to contain the pandemic, leading to larger outbreaks, which Beijing will respond to with even more harrowing lockdowns.

We’re already seeing it unfold in Xi’an and Ningbo.

Which city will be the next to face punishing lockdown measures?

end

4/EUROPEAN AFFAIRS

ENGLAND//COVID//VACCINE MANDATE

UK temporarily suspends to PCR test for asymptomatic COVID cases due to the huge influx of the virus.

(Zhou/EpochTimes)

Britain Temporarily Suspends PCR Test For Asymptomatic COVID Cases

THURSDAY, JAN 06, 2022 – 02:00 AM

Authored by Lily Zhou via The Epoch Times,

From Jan. 11, those who test positive for COVID-19 in England with a lateral flow test (LFD) should not validate the result with a PCR test unless they develop symptoms, UK Health Security Agency (UKHSA) said on Wednesday.

It’s expected to ease the pressure on the UK’s PCR testing capacity and shorten the self-isolation period for some.

UKHSA said the temporary suspension is due to the high level of CCP (Chinese Communist Party) virus infections across the UK.

An estimated 3.7 million people in the UK had COVID-19 in the week ending Dec. 31, 2021, up from 2.3 million in the week to Dec. 23, and the highest number since comparable figures began in autumn 2020, the Office for National Statistics said.

“Whilst levels of COVID-19 are high, the vast majority of people with positive LFD results can be confident that they have COVID-19,” UKHSA said in a press release.

Prime Minister Boris Johnson said it’s to ensure the UK’s PCR testing capacity “reaches those who need it most.”

The measure will start one day after 100,000 critical workers in England’s essential services are provided with daily lateral flow tests.

People who test positive for the CCP virus with an LFD but do not develop a new continuous cough, a high temperature, or a loss of, or change in, their normal sense of taste or smell, are told to immediately self-isolate, report the result to the government’s website, and not book a PCR test.

However, those who are eligible for the £500 ($679) Test and Trace Support Payment will still be required to have a confirmatory PCR test result in order to access the fund, and participants of research or surveillance programmes may still be asked to take a PCR test.

Around one million people in England are also expected to receive a PCR test kit by mid-January because they are “at particular risk of becoming seriously ill from COVID-19” and “have been identified by the NHS as being potentially eligible for new treatments.” But the group is asked to use the kit when they have symptoms to enable prioritised laboratory handling.

Professor John Edmunds, a member of the government’s scientific advisory panel, said the confirmatory PCR test is unnecessary because it “not only wastes time but costs a lot of money and uses up laboratory resources that could be better used elsewhere.”

But he said there were also downsides because PCR tests would give researchers “slightly less information” on the different variants in circulation because the swabs can undergo sequencing to determine which strain of coronavirus is present.

Kate Nicholls, from trade body UKHospitality welcomed the news, saying the measure would shorten self-isolation periods for asymptomatic cases and will help allow the economy to keep moving.

Current law requires people to self-isolate for up to 10 days after receiving a positive PCR test, but many asymptomatic people would have started self-isolation following a positive LFD test as the government advised, effectively lengthening the period.

Scotland and Wales will implement the change from Thursday, five days earlier than England.

The Welsh government estimates it will reduce the demand for PCR tests in Wales by between 5 percent and 15 percent.

end

UK//EUCOVID//

UK takes its foot off the throat of the unvaxxed but not Europe: they escalate their attacks

(zerohedge)

As UK Takes Foot Off Throat, European Authoritarians Escalate Attacks On Unvaxx’d

THURSDAY, JAN 06, 2022 – 05:45 AM

COVID cases have continued to climb across Europe, and while UK PM Boris Johnson has stood his ground, saying he won’t revive economy-crushing lockdowns, in Italy, PM Mario Draghi is moving ahead with his plans to make vaccines mandatory for all Italian citizens over the age of 50.

Sources inside Italy’s “control room” virus task force have apparently confirmed the PM’s plan, according to ANSA, the Italian-language newswire.

The recommendations are expected to be approved by a cabinet meeting later Wednesday.

Draghi’s crackdown on the elderly is on par with French President Emmanuel Macron, who said during an interview that he really wanted to “piss off” the unvaccinated.

“I am not about pissing off the French people,” Macron told the readers of Le Parisien on Tuesday.
“But as for the non-vaccinated, I really want to piss them off. And we will continue to do this, to the end. This is the strategy.”

Circling back to the situation in Italy, PM Draghi said the so-called ‘Super Green Pass’ would be used to verify that workers have been vaccinated.

The control room is made up of key ministers representing majority parties and public health officials and led by Premier Mario Draghi.

Over in the UK, Boris Johnson said Wednesday that he didn’t see a reason to go into lockdowns, at lest not right away.

As for whether the UK should move toward a lockdown, BoJo noted that lockdowns are not “cost free”, in fact they represent a serious tax on the livelihoods of those who are prevented from working because of them.

BoJo added that his government “doesn’t believe we need to shut down the country again.”

The UK added nearly 200K new cases on Wednesday; prompting NHS workers to insist that there’s still justification for a lockdown.

So far, an estimated 3.7M Britons have been infected with COVID as of the end of December, as the UK deals with the highest number of weekly cases recorded yet.

UK prime minister Boris Johnson has announced a shake-up of the COVID testing regime in England, in what he said was an effort to “ensure our testing capacity reaches those who need it most”.

An estimated 3.7M people in the UK were infected with COVID as of the end of December, the highest number of weekly cases recorded in the pandemic, the Office for National Statistics has found. Infections in the week ending Dec. 31 were up around 60% from the 2.3M infections recorded a week earlier.

How long before Brussels starts berating BoJo for enabling Brits to be the superspreaders across Europe? It appears the latest round of draconian dragnets across the mainland just add to the list of confirmations for why Brexit was worthwhile after all.

end

HOLLAND/COVID/OMICRON

Makes sense: Omicron is spreader faster within vaccinated individuals due to their lack of immunity

(Athrappully/EpochTimes)

Omicron Spreads Faster Than Delta Within Vaccinated Individuals: Danish Study

THURSDAY, JAN 06, 2022 – 05:00 AM

Authored by Naveen Athrappully via The Epoch Times,

A Danish study of nearly 12,000 households has discovered that Omicron spreads faster than Delta among those who are fully vaccinated, and even higher between those who have received booster shots, demonstrating strong evidence of the variant’s immune evasiveness.

The Omicron variant was found to evade the immunity of vaccinated individuals at a much faster pace compared to Delta, and at a higher rate than the unvaccinated, according to the study conducted by researchers at the University of Copenhagen, Statistics Denmark, and Statens Serum Institut.

“Comparing households infected with the Omicron to Delta VOC, we found an 1.17 times higher SAR for unvaccinated, 2.61 times higher for fully vaccinated and 3.66 times higher for booster-vaccinated individuals, demonstrating strong evidence of immune evasiveness of the Omicron VOC,” said the preprint of the study. SAR refers to secondary attack rate.

However, the study also discovered that unvaccinated individuals spread the virus more easily than those who are fully vaccinated, while there was reduced transmission between people who received booster shots.

There were altogether 11,937 households involved in the study, out of which 2,225 already had Omicron. After one to 7 days, the team followed up with the households and found 6,397 secondary infections. The SAR was found to be 31 percent with the Omicron, and 21 percent with the Delta variant.

Omicron has spread to 90 countries worldwide and has become the dominant variant in the United States. However, the strain has proven to cause mild symptoms compared to earlier variants like Delta, and results in fewer hospitalizations.

“The Omicron VOC (variant of concern) has been reported to be three to six times as infectious as previous variants, with a short doubling time, including early estimates from countries with a high vaccination coverage indicating doubling times of 1.8 days (UK), 1.6 days (Denmark), 2.4 days (Scotland) and 2.0 days (United States),” from the study.

The researchers also suggested considering alternate methods for combating the infection. “Our data indicate that the non-pharmaceutical interventions that were used to control the previous variants of SARS-CoV-2 are also likely to be effective against the Omicron VOC.”

Seventy-eight percent of Danish citizens are fully vaccinated with two doses, while almost half have received a booster shot. More than 80 percent have received Pfizer-BioNTech’s vaccine.

The effectiveness of vaccines is reduced to around 40 percent for symptoms and 80 percent for severe disease with the Omicron variant. Numbers were better with booster shots as the effectiveness was reduced only to 86 percent for symptoms and 98 percent respectively for those suffering from severe infection.

The vaccination effectiveness with Pfizer-Biotech for preventing infection with the Omicron variant is only 35 percent, the study found. “The advantage of the Omicron VOC seems to be a combination of high transmissibility and increased immune evading abilities.”

“We therefore suggest that adapted or improved vaccines may be necessary to mitigate the spread of the Omicron VOC.”

The Danish team added that more studies are required to understand the latest COVID-19 variant, as they concluded, “Our results confirm that booster vaccination has the potential to reduce Omicron VOC transmission in households, although vaccination as a strategy for epidemic control is increasingly challenged by the immune evasiveness of the Omicron VOC.”

A preprint of the study was published on Dec. 27, and it has not yet been peer-reviewed.

end

5. RUSSIAN AND MIDDLE EASTERN AFFAIRS

TURKEY/

end

6.Global Issues

CORONAVIRUS/UPDATE/VACCINE MANDATEJanuary 6, 2022

Q&A #010 : Unvaccinated and fearless

Geert Vanden Bossche

Question:

Please ask Geert to address the unvaccinated:
– What do we need to do during the waves?
– Is my unvaccinated child safe with other vaccinated students at school?
– Should we be taking prophylactics?
‍

Answer:

The situation for the unvaccinated is now becoming increasingly difficult because of unjustifiable discrimination. However, I keep saying that the unvaccinated should now less and less worry about their health. Provided they were gradually increasing their contacts, their innate immune system should be well trained by now. Training will only pay off provided you’re in good health and you respect the rules (!) of a healthy lifestyle (which should be well known by now).

So, ‘yes’ even contacts with HEALTHY vaccinees should become less of a problem. It is critical though that people take their supplements (certainly vit C, Zinc) as soon as they don’t feel 100% fit. And keep taking your vitamin D during winter. Regular use of ginger and curcuma are a good idea too! Avoid large and frequent gatherings but make sure your immune system stays trained (so regular contacts are key!).

Last, but not least: mental health is critical, make sure you are in good company and do not fall victim of fear!

END

CANADA

Quebec reimposes a nighttime curfew as infections surge.

Quebec Under Curfew, Unvaxx’d Banned From Buying Booze, Marijuana

WEDNESDAY, JAN 05, 2022 – 11:00 PM

Quebec reimposed a nighttime curfew beginning New Year’s Eve as COVID-19 infections surged. Restaurants in the Canadian province only offer takeout service, while Gyms, bars, and movie theaters have been closed for days.

As the media and government drum up another COVID scare, Quebec Prime Minister Francois Legault wants to punish unvaccinated people for the soaring infections despite 85% of the residents in the province being vaccinated.

This week, Quebec Prime Minister Francois Legault is expected to announce more restrictive measures towards unvaccinated people, such as banning them from purchasing hard liquor and marijuana.

On Tuesday, the Journal de Montreal reported that “there was still some discussion to fine-tune the passport enforcement” at entrances or cash registers to block the unvaccinated from entering liquor and cannabis stores.

Vaccine passports have been required to access non-essential businesses such as theaters, bars and restaurants, casinos, conventions and conferences, places of worship, and sports facilities. If Legault goes ahead with the move, unvaccinated will only be able to purchase beer and wine.

“Time and time again, the government has said it does not intend to force officials to be vaccinated,” the local paper said. However, through indirect ways, it’s making life for the unvaccinated into a living hell, with an end goal to make them eventually concede and get jabbed.

What’s ironic is that the new vaccine requirement at liquor and cannabis stores will only apply to unvaccinated shoppers but not employees.

The fact that authorities in Quebec are using “totalitarian” methods to make the lives of unvaccinated people miserable and instill fear in the overall population as the less severe Omicron variant sweeps across the world is nothing short of disgusting.

The Canadian government has even admitted to launching a psychological operations campaign against their own people to manipulate them into vaccine compliance.

The use of fear by the government and corporate media has definitely been ethically questionable. On Sunday, a convoy of police rolled around Montreal with flashing lights and sirens telling people to go home or get fined for breaking curfew.

What’s happening is a pandemic power grab by elites who use mass formation psychosis to hypnotize the population through fear into being their subservient slaves.

‍end

Dr Bhakdi issues a strong warning not to take the vaccines are they are killing our immune system

Dr Bhakdi and special thanks to Milan for sending this to us:

‍https://rumble.com/vryhmc-professor-bhakdi-they-are-killing-us.html?mref=6zof&mc=dgip3&utm_source=newsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=A+Warrior+Calls&ep=2

END

Dr Paul Craig Roberts…..

The Population Is Being Killed Off with Covid mRNA “Vaccines”

January 6, 2022 | Categories: Articles & Columns | Tags: | Print This Article

The Population Is Being Killed Off with Covid mRNA “Vaccines”

Paul Craig Roberts

A scientific study recently released by British researchers found that for men under forty the risk of myocarditis almost doubled after the first Pfizer jab. The risk doubled again after the second jab, and doubled again after the third jab to eight times the baseline risk. For the Moderna version, the risks were 16 times the baseline risk after the second jab. https://alexberenson.substack.com/p/more-bad-news-on-covid-vaccines-and/comments

Why then are there vaccine mandates? Is this stupidity or a depopulation program? This is a legitimate question.

The adverse effects, or side-effects, of the mRNA “vaccines” that are under-reported to VAERS are not side effects in the traditional sense, such as an allergic response to a vaccine or the effect of a substance in a vaccine on a person sensitive to that substance.

What are being called adverse effects are consequences of the “vaccine” turning the human immune system into a weapon against its own body, as described by Dr. Sucharit Bahkdi and others: https://www.paulcraigroberts.org/2022/01/05/video-dr-sucharit-bhakdi-these-vaccines-are-killing-the-young-and-the-old-they-are-killing-our-children/

What is said to be an immunogen is in fact a pathogen engineered to be distributed throughout the body and to attack heart, lungs, brain, ovaries, and all vital organs. Disabilities and deaths result.

There are valid reasons to suspect that both the virus and the vaccine are engineered pathogens. One is that both were under development for a long time. Another reason is that in order to generate a high level of fear to prepare people to line up for the “protection” of the vaccine, treatment was withheld in order to maximize the death rate, and known cures such as HCQ and Ivermectin were demonized and banned from use. And now the evil Biden regime has seized control of a third treatment–monoclonal antibodies–and is withholding them from patients. https://www.realclearpolitics.com/video/2022/01/03/desantis_biden_admin_has_seized_control_of_monoclonal_antibodies_not_distributing_it_the_way_it_should_be.html

The reason for withholding cures is to drive up the vaccination rate.

Another reason the “pandemic” is suspect is that all independent discussion and evidence is suppressed by the corrupt media and medical establishment. The narrative is controlled, and vaccination is presented as the only alternative even though it is now admitted that the vaccine is ineffective against Covid-19 and its variants. The current rationale for the vaccine was expressed the other day by the incompetent Secretary of Defense who, triple-vaxxed, still caught Covid and explained that the jabs protected him against having a more serious case. So we have a vaccine that doesn’t work against mild cases of the virus but does work against serious cases! Just how does that work?

The medical and scientific evidence is completely clear that the entire Covid narrative is counterfactual and that the authorities know it. Yet they still push, using coercion, for more vaccination.

Vaccination does not protect. It harms. So the only reason to enforce it is to kill people.

The inability of people to distrust “authorities” and the inability of people to inform themselves and to think for themselves guarantees that millions will die from being vaccinated. When you see thousands of independent doctors and medical scientists damning the vaccine only to be ignored by bureaucratic “public health” organizations, you have clear evidence that real authority is not speaking. It is being suppressed.

Anytime debate and information is suppressed, you know that something is being hidden and that a secret agenda is operating.

The orchestrated “Covid pandemic” is a massive crime against humanity. Are we going to allow them to get away with it? Or will there be too few of us left to do anything about it?

Addendum:

An expert pointed out to me that clearly medical authorities do not mind if the vaccine is killing people, and the deaths are consistent with the Bill Gates/World Economic Forum intent to reduce the world population. However, an intermediate goal is to transition to the vaccine passport as in Germany, Austria, Italy, Greece, and with France, Belgium and the Netherlands about to join in the requirement of a digital ID that allows tracking of everyone and every interaction and, thereby, control of the population with rewards and punishments like the Chinese Social Credit System. This allows the controlled populations to be scapegoated for the mayhem caused by depopulation.

This is a reasonable explanation for the emphasis on Covid passports. As it is known and admitted that the vaccine is inefficient as a protection against the virus, and as the virus is dangerous mainly to untreated patients with comorbidities, the passport is pointless for any purpose other than control. The passport provides no protection whatsoever against the spread of the virus and the immune system’s attack on the body’s vital organs.

end

INDIA

India makes the correct decision not allowing Merck’s, Molnupiravir to its National treatment protocol citing safety concerns

(Roberts/EpochTimes)

India Won’t Add Merck’s COVID-19 Pill To National Treatment Protocol, Citing Safety Concerns

THURSDAY, JAN 06, 2022 – 10:34 AM

Authored by Katabella Roberts via The Epoch Times,

India’s top health research body announced on Wednesday that it won’t be adding Merck’s COVID-19 antiviral pill molnupiravir to its national treatment protocol, citing concerns over its safety.

The state-run Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) said it had become aware of “major safety concerns” that prompted the decision, despite India’s drug regulator in December approving the drug for emergency use.

It comes after France in December also canceled its order for the drug, developed by Merck and Ridgeback Biotherapeutics, following disappointing trial data suggesting its drug was markedly less effective than previously thought.

“Molnupiravir has major safety concerns including teratogenicity, mutagenicity, muscle and bone damage. If this drug is given, contraception must be done for three months as the child may have problems,” ICMR Director-General Balram Bhargava told local media on Wednesday.

Bhargava noted that the United States Food and Drug Administration (FDA) issued an emergency use authorization for Merck’s COVID-19 pill based on 1,433 patients with a 3 percent reduction in moderate disease when given in mild cases.

Members of the FDA’s Antimicrobial Drugs Advisory Committee in November voted 13 for and 10 against the emergency use authorization for molnupiravir, agreeing with the idea that the drug’s benefits outweigh its potential risks, including concerns about potential birth defects.

However, “we must remember that this drug has major safety concerns,” Bhargava said, adding that the drug causes teratogenicity, or the ability to cause defects in a developing fetus, mutagenicity, or permanent transmissible changes in the structure of genetic material of cells, cartilage damage, and can also be damaging to muscles.

Moreover, Bhargava said contraception would also have to be given to individuals who take the drug—regardless of whether they are male or female— because “the child born could be problematic with teratogenic influences.”

“The WHO has not included it, the UK has not included it as of now. As of now, the current recommendation stands that it is not part of the national taskforce treatment,” Bhargava said.

However, Bhargava said that experts will continue to discuss the potential use of the treatment in the country, where virus case numbers are currently surging.

Molnupiravir is intended for use at home by adults with mild to moderate COVID-19 who are at high risk of developing severe disease. The drug is taken orally in pill form, twice a day for five days, within five days of symptoms onset.

Both FDA staff scientists and Merck have suggested the drug should not be recommended during pregnancy. Company studies in rats showed that the drug caused birth defects when given at very high doses. FDA staffers concluded the data “suggest that molnupiravir may cause fetal harm when administered to pregnant individuals.”

Merck says that there is “no available human data on the use of molnupiravir in pregnant individuals to evaluate the risk of major birth defects, miscarriage or adverse maternal or fetal outcomes.”

Around 13 Indian companies, including Cipla, Sun Pharma, and BDR, are manufacturing molnupiravir.

Indian multinational pharmaceutical company Dr. Reddy’s Laboratories was set to roll out a generic version of the oral antiviral medication starting from next week at an extremely affordable treatment rate of 1,400 rupees ($18.84), 37 times cheaper than in the United States.

The Epoch Times has contacted Dr. Reddy’s Laboratories and Merck for comment.

end
FROM THE UK TELEGRAPH..A GOOD READ…special thanks to Chris Powell for sending this to us!Why some people keep getting Covid – and others never at all

We all know somebody who seems untouchable while all around them fall ill, but that may be down to more than sheer luck

By Luke Mintz
The Telegraph, London
Thursday, January 6, 2022

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/health-fitness/body/people-keep-getting-covid-others-never/

It’s the question on everyone’s lips. How come I’ve had Covid twice, despite being fully vaccinated? How has my neighbour – who spent the last month isolating with her fully-omicronned children – managed to avoid catching it? Why do some people fall foul of coronavirus again and again, and others remain steadfastly immune? Is it luck, genes, or what?

Yesterday, Sir Keir Starmer tested positive for Covid for the second time in just over two months. It came four weeks after the Labour leader received his third vaccine dose. It is the sixth time Sir Keir will have to self-isolate since the beginning of the pandemic. Few people in Britain have been locked in isolation as many times as Sir Keir.

There are people like Sarah, who in October last year, assumed Covid had finally come for her. The 25-year-old teacher had until that point managed to dodge the virus. But then a colleague at her central London primary school tested positive. Then another, and another. Eventually, the school had to close. Sarah had been in close contact with some of the positive cases, in meetings and in the staff room.

But curiously, her lateral flow tests kept returning negative results. Then, two months later, two of her three flatmates tested positive. Fuelled by the omicron variant, Covid cases were exploding in London among Sarah’s age group during that week, ONS figures show. Every time she checked her phone, her social media was flooded with more positive results from friends. But still, Sarah’s test results remained stubbornly negative.

“I was just waiting to get it; I definitely felt like it was coming for us all,” she remembers.

We all know people like Sarah: the seemingly untouchable Covid “never-getters” who remain standing while everyone around them falls ill. Sebastian tells me he was the only person among his six flatmates not to fall ill last year. Hannah, 37, says she had a close dinner with her Covid-positive mother-in-law, then saw her partner fall ill. All the while, she stayed negative.

On the other side of the coin are those unlucky souls who seem to catch Covid again and again. For a long time, the question of why some caught the virus more than others was written off as a consequence of sheer luck. Whether or not you catch Covid can be explained by something as random as whether you talk to a certain person at a party, or whether you sit near an open window on a bus, virologists say. Testing issues are also a factor; some people are simply better than others at swabbing their nose and throat.

But now, top immunologists suspect it might have a more profound explanation. Researchers in Britain and Brazil are looking at whether some people might possess a natural immunity to the virus. Even before the pandemic began, their immune systems already knew how to fight the virus, it is believed. If their blood and cells are studied carefully, this fortunate few could give scientists crucial insights into the nature of immunity. And they might just hold the key to the holy grail of pandemic research: a universal Covid vaccine, with the ability to knock out any variant.
We tend to think of immunity as something of an absolute – either we’re immune to a virus, or we’re not. But that hides a world of complications, says Danny Altmann, professor of medicine and immunology at Imperial College London. The genes that control our immunity are among the most diverse in the human body, he says, differing hugely from person to person.

When thinking about something like your blood type, he says, “there’s a very limited chequerboard” of gene combinations. But for immunity, “I’m talking about thousands of possibilities on your chequerboard; no two people will ever look the same.”

As a result, we shouldn’t be surprised that some are more prone to catching viruses than others. We can see this happening in real-time in the laboratory. Researchers at Oxford University and Imperial College London are currently carrying out “challenge studies”, where volunteers are deliberately exposed to Covid, usually through a liquid solution sniffed into their nose, then kept in isolation and observed for two weeks.

All volunteers have received the same number of vaccines, and all are exposed to exactly the same quantity of Sars-Cov-2 (the virus that causes Covid), in exactly the same way. And yet, if it’s anything like previous challenge studies, scientists expect volunteers will mount notably different immune responses. Some will see their antibody and T-cells burst into action; others will not.

We can also see this playing out in hospitals. At the beginning of the pandemic, researchers at University College London recruited a large cohort of London-based healthcare staff for their COVIDSortium study. All of the volunteers were probably exposed to Sars-Cov-2 during their jobs. Their test results were monitored thoroughly. At the end of the trial, about 20 per cent of the healthcare staff showed signs of a clear-cut Covid infection, whilst 65 per cent had clearly not been infected.

But most interesting was the remaining 15 per cent. Members of this third group appeared to have experienced low-level “abortive infections”, not picked up on PCR tests. They didn’t have Covid antibodies in their blood, but they had a much higher T-cell count than average, with particularly high levels of the specific T-cell known to combat Covid. Essentially, their T-cells had nipped the virus in the bud before it ever got the chance to set up camp inside their bodies. It looked as though their immune systems already knew how to fight Covid, even though it was still the early days of the pandemic.

“They didn’t completely resist the infection, but they eliminated it so rapidly that it couldn’t be picked up by the standard test,” says Mala Maini, a professor of viral immunology at University College London, and lead author of the study.

Here was clear evidence that some people may be naturally immune to Covid. Prof Altmann, who was not involved in the study, says the results look “convincing”.

But what explains this natural immunity? The most likely theory is that these people’s immune systems have already been exposed to similar viruses, years or decades earlier. Sars-Cov-2 is one of a family of seven human coronaviruses, most of which cause the common cold. All of these viruses look fairly similar. When your T-cells learn how to fight one, they get better at fighting them all, it is thought.

Another, less well-researched answer lies in our genes. Some people might simply be born with an immunity to certain viruses, scientists suspect. This possibility emerged in 2008, when virologists in Kenya found a group of sex workers who had never caught HIV, despite having unprotected sex with numerous positive cases. It turns out their cells lacked a crucial receptor – the same receptor used by HIV particles to break into our cells.

“Big studies are going on now to see if something similar might be happening in some people with Covid, but there’s no clear evidence for that yet,” says Prof Maini.

Indeed, at the University of São Paulo, researchers are recruiting 100 cohabiting couples. In each case, one half of the couple tested positive for symptomatic Covid, whilst the other stayed Covid-free (with blood tests confirming they had no Covid-specific antibodies). All 200 will have their DNA analysed to search for genetic differences.

If it turns out that some people are indeed naturally immune to Covid, it’s wonderful news for them. But it might also help the rest of us, speeding up development of a pan-coronavirus vaccine capable of defeating any variant. The current generation of Covid vaccines were all designed to target the spike protein, on the virus’s outer edge. But the spike protein also changes frequently, each time the virus mutates. This means vaccines are slightly less effective against each new variant.

But natural immunity appears to work differently. In the UCL trial, researchers looked carefully at the blood of those volunteers who seemed to have pre-existing immunity to the virus. Rather than targeting the spike protein, their T-cells were targeting proteins at the centre of the virus. These proteins are much less likely to change from mutation to mutation. In fact, they tend to be found in most coronaviruses, not just Sars-Cov-2. If a vaccine could be built to target these inner proteins, it might just be able to defeat all variants – as well as a range of other coronaviruses.

Experts stress that the science is still in progress. Nobody should “go around feeling Teflon-coated in some way”, Prof Altmann urges. But as we enter our third year of the pandemic, it’s certainly a hopeful signend

Indonesia survey finds 85% of population have COVID-19 antibodies
By Stanley Widianto/Reuters
JAKARTA, Jan 6 (Reuters) – More than 85% of Indonesia’s population has antibodies against COVID-19, a government-commissioned survey showed, but epidemiologists warned it was not clear whether this immunity could help contain a fresh wave of coronavirus infections.The survey, conducted between October and December by researchers at the University of Indonesia, found Indonesians had developed antibodies from a combination of COVID-19 infections and vaccinations.Pandu Riono, an epidemiologist involved in the survey that covered some 22,000 respondents, said the level of immunity could explain why there had not been a significant jump in COVID-19 infections since the middle of 2021.Indonesia’s second wave of infections – driven by the Delta variant – peaked in July and August, with infections plummeting from more than 50,000 a day to just a few hundred a day in recent months.The antibodies may provide some protection against new variants, including the highly contagious Omicron, Pandu said, though adding it would take months for this to become clear.Omicron has infected more than 250 people in Indonesia, but most cases have been imported and a handful of local cases have not so far brought the type of surge recorded in many countries.Pandu said the survey did not negate a need for more people to be vaccinated, even those that had already been infected.”The point is to have the majority of people develop a hybrid immunity to control the pandemic,” he said, referring to the stronger immunity among some people who are vaccinated and have also been infected.Indonesia has only fully vaccinated just over 42% of its population of 270 million people.The survey’s findings were still being examined to assess how different brands of vaccines might contribute to different levels of antibodies, Pandu said.Dicky Budiman, an epidemiologist at Australia’s Griffith University, who was not involved in the survey, said the findings should be treated cautiously since Indonesia’s vaccination rates lagged many countries and there was no guarantee how long antibodies might last.

VACCINE IMPACT

Pro-Vaccine Big Pharma Execs Invite You to D.C. to “Protest Against Vaccine Mandates” – Did You Forget What Happened on Jan. 6th 2021?

January 5, 2022 5:55 pm

One year ago, on January 6, 2021, then President Donald Trump invited his supporters to join him in Washington D.C. for a “Stop the Steal” rally. They were angry that the election was stolen from Trump. One week before the rally, I published an article just after President Trump had signed into law a $2.3 TRILLION “COVID relief” bill robbing Americans at the expense of Wall Street Billionaires, and I wrote: “If you still think Trump is going to save the Republic and you are planning on heading to Washington D.C. on January 6th to show your support of him, you could very well be putting your own life at risk and be taking a suicide trip. Washington D.C. is a cesspool of corruption and Satanic activity, and it could be pure suicidal for American patriots and militia groups to all be there at one time, giving the enemy the opportunity to take out as many of you at one time as they can. Why would you risk that? For Trump?? President Trump is still the President of the United States and the Commander in Chief of the nation’s armed forces. If he wants to start arresting criminals for treason, he doesn’t need my help or your help, at least not in Washington D.C., one of the most corrupt places on the planet. If Americans want to take their country back and drain the swamp, you better start planning on doing it now, without Trump’s help. There is no telling what his handlers are going to tell him to do in the days ahead, and even if he himself does not have nefarious plans in store for citizens and militia groups who may go to Washington D.C. on January 6th, there probably are many others who do.” One year later, it is obvious that I was correct, and that everyone who obeyed Trump and was in Washington D.C. that day made a huge mistake. Even if someone was not part of the rally, or the group that walked into the Capitol Building, but was simply just in the area carrying a cell phone, they ended up on a Government list of potential “terrorists.” Those who entered the Capitol building were setup, and many were arrested, and some are still rotting away in horrible conditions inside prison cells to this day. Even if Trump had no idea ahead of time that this was going to happen, it was still a disastrous decision for all those who foolishly attended the rally, and Trump did nothing afterward to pardon people before he left office, nor has he done anything to free people who were arrested since he left office. Now, Big Pharma-funded Pro-Vaccine professionals want conservatives to go to D.C. again later this month, to “Protest Against COVID-19 Vaccine Mandates.” Should you follow their leadership and head to D.C. to support them?Read More…

END

end

GLOBAL STORIES/

Inflation is shattering the dreams of zoomers and millennials

(Mishtalk)

The Homeownership Dreams Of Zoomers And Millennials Shattered By Prices

THURSDAY, JAN 06, 2022 – 11:52 AM

Authored by Mike Shedlock via MishTalk.com,

Home prices and rent are soaring faster than wages. This shattered home buying plans of generations Y and Z and put them in a rent squeeze as well.

Dreams Change

Things have really changed in three years according to Yardi’s latest Generational Survey on Homeownership Dreams.

Three years ago Yardi found that Gen Z was enthusiastic about the prospect of owning a home, whereas Millennials were pessimistic about their homeownership outlook.

Nearly two years into the COVID-19 pandemic and its economic and societal fallout Yardi has different findings.

Key Takeaways From Latest Survey

Affordability concerns have noticeably risen in the past 3 years, with home prices unaffordable for 66% of renters.
1 in 5 adults living with family say they can’t afford rental costs while 56% of non-owners have nothing saved for down payment.
Gen Z’s expectations for homeownership tempered in last 3 years with increasing concerns around credit scores & job security.
Millennials are still behind homeownership, with 55% of them dissatisfied with their current home – the lowest of any generation.
Nearly 40% of Millennials & Gen Z postponed buying a home due to the pandemic.
Suburbia becomes top option for Gen Z and even formerly city-minded Millennials, while Gen X’s interest in rural living grows

Zoomer Stats

38% Live With Parents
33% Rent
29% are Homeowners

Optimism Shattered

In the previous survey 83% of Zoomers expressed a desire and planned to buy a home within five years of 2018.

Only 29% of adult Zoomer respondents are now homeowners.

Millennials the Most Disgruntled Generation

Millennials remain the most disgruntled generation, with respondents from this generation reporting the lowest levels of satisfaction with their homes (55%), as well as the highest levels of outright dissatisfaction (17%).
For Gen Xers, the home’s state of repairs is the most significant worry with one in five dissatisfied with it, while more than one in five Millennials and Gen Xers are unhappy with the size of their home.
26% of all respondents who were unhappy named the home being too small as the main factor. This was closely followed by insufficient space for work and insufficient space for recreational activities, while one in five named overcrowding as the main factor. Only 3% of our pool of respondents said that their home was too large.

Covid Delays

Just over half (52%) reported no effects on their homeownership plans, while 41% of Millennials and 36% of Gen Z non-owners had to delay buying their own homes. Furthermore, 4% of all non-owners reported losing their homes due to COVID-19, with Millennials most affected at 5%.

Affordability

With the eldest Gen Xers now 56 years old, elder Millennials looking at 41 this year, and the forefront of Gen Z hitting 27 in 2022, homeownership rates among respondents from the three generations stand at 78%, 64% and 29%, respectively.

So, what’s keeping 22% of Gen X, 36% of Millennials and 71% of adult Zoomers out of the housing market?

The main issue is affordability. Of all non-owners who participated in our survey, 53% view today’s housing market as just as inaccessible or even more inaccessible than in 2018, with Millennials most pessimistic. And, for those living with parents or other family members, the outlook is even more stark than it is for renters, with 59% of Millennials who live at home feeling that the prospect of homeownership is now even further removed.

Is Covid Responsible?

No, but it sure didn’t help either.

The real issue is wages have not kept up with prices making saving a nonpayment difficult if not impossible.

My charts show the problem.

Home prices have soared out of site. But rents are rising so fast that Zoomers and Millennials want out.

Home prices have seriously disconnected with rent.

But compounding the problem for Zoomers and Millennials, rent and OER (Owners’ Equivalent Rent) have been rising way faster than the CPI and wages since 2013.

Real Hourly Wages Have Risen Less Than a Penny a Year Since 1973

Earlier today I noted Real Hourly Wages Have Risen Less Than a Penny a Year Since 1973

In real (inflation-adjusted) terms, people are making no more than they did 48 years ago (yellow line).

Nominal wages have soared but have barely kept up with inflation, assuming of course you believe inflation is not understated.

Every Measure of Real Interest Rates Shows the Fed is Out of Control.

My housing-adjusted CPI measure stands at 9.31%.

Try buying a house now on an additional half-penny per hour. It was actually possible factoring in a second wage earner per household until the year 1999 or so.

For details, please see Every Measure of Real Interest Rates Shows the Fed is Out of Control.

Meanwhile most Zoomers have to find a partner, live at home, or have roommates. I will see if I can get Yardi to conduct a survey on roommates.

* * *

end

Michael Every with today’s most important topics

Michael Every.// Stefan Koopman

QT: Not So Cute

THURSDAY, JAN 06, 2022 – 11:11 AM

By Stefan Koopman, senior market strategist at Rabobank

As the Global Daily has highlighted time and again, inflationary shocks are not only a reality check to the strategy of an inflation-targeting central bank, but also to the power of a government. The growing protests in Kazakhstan are a good example: it started over a doubling of LPG prices after the government lifted a price cap, but quickly spilled into much broader discontent. Grievances against the country’s elites have simmered for a long time and, as we have seen during the Arab Spring, exogenous shocks like a surge in global commodity prices can inflame already unstable domestic situations. A state of emergency has now been declared in central Asia’s biggest oil producer. The government officially appealed to the Russian-led CSTO for help in suppressing the uprising, as the risk of another ‘colored revolution’ rises. The timing is rather awkward for Putin. The troops who would be used for such operations are currently positioned near the Ukrainian border, as Russia tries to obtain guarantees that NATO will not expand eastwards.

Even though this clearly could have serious and widespread ramifications, global markets largely dismiss this as an idiosyncratic risk. The focus was, for admittedly understandable reasons, entirely on the FOMC minutes. Even though the relevant meeting was in mid-December, before Covid-19 cases surged over the holidays, the minutes confirmed that the FOMC does not see omicron as a game changer. Instead, the participants noted “their continuing attention to the public’s concern about the sizable increase in the cost of living that had taken place this year and the associated burden on U.S. households, particularly those who had limited scope to pay higher prices for essential goods and services”. In particular on the first anniversary of January 6, it’s difficult to resist thinking this is not entirely unrelated to what is happening in Kazakhstan… although one could question whether raising the mortgage bill in the form of higher rates really is the solution in this case!

The FOMC already doubled the pace of tapering December and signaled that it would hike earlier and more often than previously anticipated. It now also suggests that it may reduce the balance sheet earlier and faster than last time (which was two years after the first rate hike) through quantitative tightening, or QT. Even though there was some speculation that the Fed could put a quicker move to QT on the table –as inflation is higher, the labor market stronger, and the balance sheet larger than last time– it still seems to be coming as a surprise. Please see here for Philip’s commentary on yesterday’s minutes.

Suddenly seeing balance sheet reduction on the horizon therefore spooked investors. This could very well be the FOMC’s intention: talking up early the prospect of balance sheet normalization is an easy way to tighten financial conditions without actually having to rush into this. It has optional value and provides policy makers space to discover when supply constraints start to ease and to what extent this would then lead to a decline in the price (increases) of tradable goods. Treasuries extended their slump, with yields on the 10-year note reaching 1.74%, the highest since last April. Money markets are now pricing in about a 75% chance of a rate hike in March, up more than 10%-points from yesterday, even though Tuesday’s manufacturing ISM suggested that softening inflationary pressures could nudge the FOMC to not rush into its first post-pandemic rate hike. The dollar benefited from the prospect of tighter policy: as of right now, EUR/USD trades at 1.129. This morning, global equities extended yesterday’s selloff, with multiple-dependent tech shares being among the worst performers due to the increase in yields.

There was a much more limited market reaction to the bumper ADP number, earlier on Wednesday. The payroll services provider reported much stronger employment growth than expected, with 807K new jobs in December. The improvement was widespread, with leisure and hospitality the largest contributor with 246K new jobs. In recent months, ADP has been more upbeat than the BLS report although it has never been particularly useful in predicting Friday’s number. That said, the Homebase employment figures, which only have a very short track record, suggest payroll growth may even top a million. If these two data points are anything to go by, and this is a big if, there’s upside risk in tomorrow’s numbers. Finally, it’s also worth noting that the impact of omicron is likely to affect the January data rather than December.

7. OIL ISSUES

8 EMERGING MARKET& AUSTRALIA ISSUES

Australia//// NEW ZEALAND/ SOUTH AFRICA/BRAZIL//COVID/VACCINES/LOCKDOWNS

AUSTRALIA

Political Scandal Erupts As Djokovic Remains In Limbo, His Lawyers Fight To Overturn Australia Entry Ban

THURSDAY, JAN 06, 2022 – 09:45 AM

Novak Djokovic will remain in Australian immigration detention limbo following a court’s decision to adjourn his appeal against a visa cancellation, the Associated Press reported. Lawyers for the tennis star launched an appeal seeking to overturn the federal government decision to deport him after federal officials overruled a state vaccine exemption.

The world’s number one tennis player was denied entry into Australia on Thursday after a storm of protest about a decision to grant him a medical exemption from COVID-19 vaccination requirements to play in the Australian Open.

The player, due to contest the Australian Open this month, offered insufficient proof to enter the country under current pandemic rules, the Australian Border Force said Thursday. However, a court agreed not to deport him before a full hearing scheduled for Monday, leaving the Serbian champion holed up in a quarantine hotel in Melbourne for at least the next 72 hours.

The saga, fuelled by domestic political point-scoring about the country’s handling of a record surge in new COVID-19 infections, has led to an international row, with Serbia’s president claiming his nation’s most celebrated sportsman was being harassed, while Djokovic’s father claimed that “this is a fight for everyone.”

After the decision to deny entry to the tennis star was confirmed, Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison tweeted that Djokovic was subject to the same rules as everyone. “Rules are rules, especially when it comes to our borders. No one is above these rules. Our strong border policies have been critical to Australia having one of the lowest death rates in the world from Covid, we are continuing to be vigilant,” he wrote.

“There are no special cases, rules are rules,” Morrison said at a televised news briefing. “We will continue to make the right decisions when it comes to securing Australian borders in relation to this pandemic.”

Spanish champion Rafael Nadal told reporters in Melbourne that he felt sorry for his rival “but at the same time, he knew the conditions since a lot of months ago. He makes his own decision.”

Djokovic, who has consistently refused to disclose his vaccination status while publicly criticizing mandatory vaccines, kicked off the furore when he said on Instagram on Tuesday he had received a medical exemption to pursue a record-breaking 21st Grand Slam win at the Open starting Jan. 17. The announcement prompted an outcry in Australia, particularly in the tournament host city of Melbourne, which has endured the world’s longest cumulative lockdown to ward off the coronavirus, a lockdown which has clearly failed judging by the exponential increase in Australian covid cases.

As Reuters notes, the move by the Australian government to block Djokovic’s entry has caused ructions between Canberra and Belgrade. Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic said on Twitter he had spoken with Djokovic and accused the Australian government of harassment.

“We’re doing all we can. This persecution is unfair, starting with the Australian prime minister,” he later told Serbian media. “They are acting as if the same set of rules apply to everyone, but they’ve let in others on the same grounds that Novak had applied to.”

Morrison said he was aware that “representations have been made” by the Serbian embassy in Canberra and denied the accusations of harassment.

Djokovic’s father told media in Serbia that his son was ushered into an isolation room under police guard when he touched down at Melbourne’s Tullamarine airport at about 11:30 p.m. (1230 GMT) on Wednesday after a 14-hour flight from Dubai.

His family later held an emotional news conference at Djokovic’s restaurant in central Belgrade, with his nine previous Australian Open trophies on display.

“They are keeping him in captivity. They are stomping all over Novak to stomp all over Serbia and the Serbian people,” said his father Srdjan, who had earlier told local media his son was “the Spartacus of the new world”.

“I have no idea what’s going on. They’re holding my son captive for five hours,” Srdjan Djokovic said in a statement to Russian news agency Sputnik. “This is a fight for the libertarian world, this is not just a fight for Novak, but a fight for the whole world! If they don’t let him go in half an hour, we will gather on the street. This is a fight for everyone.”

His mother, Dijana, added: “They are keeping him as a prisoner, that’s not human and it’s not fair.”

There was also support on the streets of the Serbian capital. “He is the best in the history of that sport and they cannot break him in any other way but this one. But they are not going to break him,” said Belgrade resident Zdravko Cukic.

Earlier on Wednesday, Djokovic’s coach Goran Ivanisevic posted a photo to social media from what appears to be the Melbourne Airport in Australia where Djokovic reportedly was being held, captioning it, “Not the most usual trip Down Under.”

At a hearing in the Federal Circuit and Family Court of Australia on Thursday evening, lawyers for Djokovic and the government agreed the player could remain in the country until at least Monday. Nick Wood, a lawyer for Djokovic, earlier told Judge Anthony Kelly that Tennis Australia had advised they needed to know about his participation in the tournament by Tuesday.

In response, Kelly, who had asked when Djokovic was scheduled to play his first match, said: “If I can say with the respect necessary, the tail won’t be wagging the dog here.”

Djokovic’s fate is tied to a political fight in Australia, characterized by fingerpointing between Morrison’s conservative administration and the left-leaning Victoria state government. The squabbles rumbled on as Australia’s daily COVID-19 infections hit a record high for the fourth consecutive day, with new cases exceeding 72,000, overwhelming hospitals and causing labour shortages. Under Australia’s federal system, states and territories can issue exemptions from vaccination requirements to enter their jurisdictions. However, the federal government controls international borders and can challenge such exemptions.

Djokovic travelled to Australia after receiving an exemption from the Victorian government. That exemption – the reasons for which are not known – supported his federal government-issued visa. On his arrival, however, Federal Border Force officials at the airport said Djokovic was unable to justify the grounds for his exemption.

The Australian task force that sets the exemption parameters lists the risk of serious cardiac illness from inoculation and a COVID-19 infection within the past six months as qualifiers. However, Morrison said on Thursday that Tennis Australia had been advised weeks ago that a recent infection did not meet the criteria for exemption.

Tennis Australia and Victoria government officials said Djokovic had received no preferential treatment.

end

KAZAKHSTAN

Huge increase in fuel and food prices have sparked rioting on the streets in Kazakhstan

(zerohedge)

Dozens Killed As Kazakh Police Battle For Control Of Streets In ‘War Zone’ – Banks Being Looted

THURSDAY, JAN 06, 2022 – 09:05 AM

Security officials in Kazakhstan admitted they’ve killed dozens of anti-government rioters in the large main city of Almaty, after alleging the protesters attempted to storm and take control of several police stations. Authorities have labeled the massive fuel protests which have brought the country to the brink of collapse as fueled by “terrorists” and manipulated by “outside interference”.

Russian troops are en route to help restore order after an urgent decision by the Russian-led regional security bloc Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO). “The CSTO confirmed Russian paratroopers were being dispatched as peacekeepers, with advance units already deployed,” BBC reports Thursday.

Scenes from Almaty and other city streets in Kazakhstan are beginning to resemble a war zone, with state military forces seen in central squares, including armored personnel carriers, the day following embattled President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev vowed the state would not fall, and that he would stay at his post no matter what.

Widely circulating but unverified social media videos show running street battles with security forces, as police appear to be unleashing live fire, and as some unconfirmed footage seems to show rioters breaching police armories to access weapons.

Unverified footage: state sources are alleging rioters have breached and ransacked police stations…

Also as banks are being attacked and looted…

According to BBC citing state sources, “Twelve members of the security forces have been killed and 353 injured in the unrest, sparked by a doubling in the cost of liquefied petroleum gas (LPG).”

Meanwhile Russia is getting increasingly vocal. According to the newswires:

Russian Foreign Ministry says they see events in Kazakhstan as a foreign-inspired attempt to undermine state security using force.

And more mayhem is unfolding as Kazakh troops deploy to city streets amid the martial law ‘state of emergency’ in effect over the whole country:

In addition to Russia the other members of the CSTO expected to send “peacekeeping” forces include Belarus, Tajikistan, Kyrgyzstan and Armenia. Without doubt the move is hugely controversial in the West, with a number of pundits already charging Putin with helping to expand ‘authoritarian’ rule in the Central Asian former Soviet Republic.

Mission is now being deemed ‘counterterrorism’…

Things are likely to escalate before they get calmer, given that with state security services dubbing their mission to halt the unrest as part of “counter-terror” operations, it in effect greenlights the use of major force.

Already in Russian media there are “Reports of firefights in central Almaty as law enforcement authorities are conducting mop up operations to quell the protests.”

Below: unverified video purporting to show weapons being passed out to protesters…

Further one regional analyst observed: “It is not surprising that this is happening in Almaty because that’s where some protesters ransacked at least one gun store.”

As of early Thursday, Russian peacekeeping forces have begun departing, however, there’s nothing so far to suggest that the Kremlin is deploying a very large force – also as it likely has its eyes still focused on the Ukraine crisis 2.0 and NATO eastward expansion…Map source: VOA

developing…

end

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

Euro/USA 1.1315 UP .0005 /EUROPE BOURSES //ALL RED

USA/ YEN 115.80 DOWN 0.333 /NOW TARGETS INTEREST RATE AT .11% AS IT WILL BUY UNLIMITED BONDS TO GETS TO THAT LEVEL…

GBP/USA 1.3537 UP 0.0006

Last night Shanghai COMPOSITE CLOSED DOWN 9.10 OR 0.25%

//Hang Sang CLOSED UP 165.61 PTS OR 0.72%

/AUSTRALIA CLOSED DOWN 2.79% // EUROPEAN BOURSES OPENED ALL RED

Trading from Europe and ASIA

I)EUROPEAN BOURSES ALL RED

2/ CHINESE BOURSES / :Hang SANG CLOSED UP 165.61 OR 0.72%

/SHANGHAI CLOSED DOWN 9.10 PTS OR 0.25%

Australia BOURSE CLOSED DOWN 2.79%

3(Nikkei (Japan) CLOSED DOWN 844.29 PTS OR 2.88%

INDIA’S SENSEX IN THE RED

Gold very early morning trading: 1794.50

silver:$22.17-

USA dollar index early THURSDAY morning: 96.15 DOWN 2 CENT(S) from WEDNESDAY’s close.

This ends early morning numbers THURSDAY MORNING

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And now your closing THURSDAY NUMBERS 1: 00 PM

Portuguese 10 year bond yield: 0.54% UP 3 in basis point(s) yield from YESTERDAY/

JAPANESE BOND YIELD: +0.112% UP 2 AND 3/10 BASIS POINTS from YESTERDAY/JAPAN losing control of its yield curve/

SPANISH 10 YR BOND YIELD: 0.63%// UP 4 in basis points yield from yesterday.

ITALIAN 10 YR BOND YIELD 1.27 UP 3 points in basis points yield from yesterday./

the Italian 10 yr bond yield is trading 64 points higher than Spain.

GERMAN 10 YR BOND YIELD: RISES TO -0.099% IN BASIS POINTS ON THE DAY//

THE IMPORTANT SPREAD BETWEEN ITALIAN 10 YR BOND AND GERMAN 10 YEAR BOND IS 1.37% AND NOW ABOVE THE 3.00% LEVEL WHICH WILL IMPLODE THE ENTIRE ITALIAN BANKING SYSTEM. AT 4% SPREAD THERE WILL BE A HUGE BANK RUN…

END

IMPORTANT CURRENCY CLOSES FOR THURSDAY

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

Euro/USA 1.1306 DOWN .0005 or 5 basis points

USA/Japan: 115.78 DOWN 0.344 OR YEN UP 34 basis points/

Great Britain/USA 1.3535 DOWN 20 BASIS POINTS)

Canadian dollar UP 32 pts to 1.2729

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The USA/Yuan, CNY: closed ON SHORE (CLOSED DOWN)..6.3830

THE USA/YUAN OFFSHORE: (YUAN CLOSED (DOWN)..6.3931

TURKISH LIRA: 13.64 EXTREMELY DANGEROUS LEVEL/DEATH WISH/HYPERINFLATION TO BEGIN.

the 10 yr Japanese bond yield at +0.112

Your closing 10 yr US bond yield UP 4 IN basis points from WEDNESDAY at 1.744% //trading well ABOVE the resistance level of 2.27-2.32%) very problematic

USA 30 yr bond yield: 2.118 UP 2 in basis points

Your closing USA dollar index, 96.18 UP 1 CENT(S) ON THE DAY/1.00 PM/

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

London: CLOSED DOWN 66.50 PTS OR 0.21%

German Dax : CLOSED DOWN 219.72points or 1.35%

Paris CAC CLOSED DOWN 126.71 PTS OR 1.72%

Spain IBEX CLOSED DOWN 0.90 PTS OR .01%

Italian MIB: CLOSED DOWN 506.98 PTS OR 1.80%

WTI Oil price 80.09 12: EST

Brent Oil: 82.44 12:00 EST

USA /RUSSIAN / RUBLE FALLS: 76.58 THE CROSS HIGHER BY 21 RUBLES/DOLLAR (RUBLE LOWER BY 21 BASIS PTS)

GERMAN 10 YR BOND YIELD; -.099

CLOSING NUMBERS: 4 PM

Euro vs USA: 1.1290 DOWN .0020 BASIS PTS OR 20 BASIS POINTS

British Pound: 1.3529 DOWN .0026

USA dollar vs Japanese Yen: 115.86 DOWN .258

USA dollar vs Canadian dollar: 1.2733 DOWN .0027 (cdn dollar UP 27 basis pts)

West Texas intermediate oil: 79.55

Brent: 81.89

USA 10 yr bond yield: 1.728 UP 2 points

USA 30 yr bond yield: 2.082 DOWN2 pts.

USA dollar vs Turkish lira: 13,83

usa dollar vs Russian rouble: 76.32 DOWN 46 basis pts.

DOW JONES INDUSTRIAL AVERAGE: DOWN 179.64 PTS OR 0.47%

NASDAQ 100 DOWN 6.42 OR 0.40%

VOLATILITY INDEX: 19.61 DOWN .12 PTS

GLD/NYSE CLOSING PRICE $166.99 DOWN $2.07 OR 2.38%

SLV/NYSE CLOSING PRICE: $20.51// DOWN $.49 OR 1.22%

USA trading day in Graph Form

US Stocks Erase All 2022 Gains As Fed Rate-Hike Expectations Soar

THURSDAY, JAN 06, 2022 – 04:01 PM

Short-Term Interest-Rates (STIRs) continued their hawkish push higher today after The Fed’s Jim Bullard noted that FOMC could start raising policy rates as soon as March and shrinking the balance sheet will be the next policy step…

The market is now pricing in an 86% chance of a March rate-hike and fully pricing in 3.5 rate-hikes by the end of 2022…

Source: Bloomberg

And as STIRs have ripped, so US Mortgage rates surged to their highest since May 2020…

Source: Bloomberg

Small Caps outperformed on the day as The Dow lagged with Nasdaq and S&P failed to hold unch…

And today’s Dow weakness pushed it top join the rest of the US majors in the red for 2022…

The S&P bounced perfectly at its 50DMA today…

“Most Shorted” Stocks continue to slide, now back at one-year lows…

Source: Bloomberg

Hedge Fund VIP stocks bounced hard after 2 really ugly days…

Source: Bloomberg

The combined market cap of the GAMMA stocks (Google, Amazon, Meta, Microsoft, & Apple) dropped to one-month lows today (down around $700 billion from their peak)…

Source: Bloomberg

Another mixed (but violent) day in bond-land today with the short-end getting monkey-hammered this time and the long-end flat (30Y -1.5bps, 2Y +6bps)…

Source: Bloomberg

This flattened the yield curve dramatically as fears rebuild of a big Fed policy error…

Source: Bloomberg

The dollar chopped around again but ended unch after tagging Tuesday’s highs…

Source: Bloomberg

Cryptos extended yesterday’s big losses but bounced back during the day session…

Source: Bloomberg

WTI Crude topped $80 briefly today – erasing all Omicron and Biden SPR Release losses – before fading back a little…

Gold was clubbed like a baby seal today, back below the $1800 Maginot Line…

Lumber prices are soaring to start the year (highest since June of last year)…

Source: Bloomberg

It has never been this high at this time of year.

Finally, on a random side note, while yesterday was a shock to many, it was a mere fleshwound of a reaction to Fed Minutes when compared to the carnage in Oct/Nov 2008…

And still there are talking-heads today claiming that this 2% drop from All-Time-Highs is enough to prompt Powell to panic and flip-flop already. Simply put, if he did, it would be far worse an outcome in the long-run than if he actually shows the market he has a pair…

And TINA just got punched in the face.

Source: Bloomberg

Treasuries are the ‘cheapest’ to stocks since May 2019.

end

AFTERNOON TRADING/FOMC

II)USA DATA

Initial jobless claims unexpectedly rose last week

Jobless Claims Unexpectedly Rose Last Week Led By Surge In New York

THURSDAY, JAN 06, 2022 – 08:36 AM

After hovering around 200k for a few weeks, last week saw initial jobless claims jump to 207k (195k exp) – one month highs.

Source: Bloomberg

Rather notably, the non-seasonally-adjusted claims data jumped to 315.5k – the biggest weekly jump since August.

New York and Pennsylvania saw the biggest increase in claims…

Continuing claims data also picked up but the total number of Americans on some form of government dole dropped to 1.722mm last week…

That is the lowest since pre-COVID-lockdowns.

end

Service is 70% of USA GDP: it crashes the most in 2 years

(zerohedge)

ISM Services Crashes Most Since April 2020 As Omicron Hits

THURSDAY, JAN 06, 2022 – 10:06 AM

After a drop in Markit’s Services survey and a tumble in ISM and Markit’s Manufacturing surveys, December’s ISM Services Index survey was expected to drop very modestly from the record high spike run it has been on in recent months. However, December’s ISM Services survey plunged to 62.0 from 69.1…

Source: Bloomberg

The 7.1-point decline was the sharpest since April 2020 and may suggest that the omicron variant of the coronavirus is beginning to take a toll on providers of in-person services like travel, dining out and entertainment.

Even so, the services gauge remains well above pre-pandemic levels.

Orders received by service providers dropped 8.2 points to 61.5, the lowest reading since February.

The November orders index was the highest in data back to 1997.

The ISM index of prices paid for materials edged up to 82.5, from 82.3 in November.

The inflation reading for services was at odds with a separate report from the ISM on Tuesday that showed a gauge of prices paid by manufacturers slumped in December to the lowest level in more than a year.

The ISM gauge of business activity, which parallels the group’s factory production measure, fell to a three-month low of 67.6 from a record in November.

Time for The Fed to tighten?

end

USA factory orders surged but before the Omicron hit

(zerohedge)

US Factory Orders Surged In November (Before Omicron Hit)

THURSDAY, JAN 06, 2022 – 10:11 AM

US Factory Orders were expected to accelerate +1.5% MoM in November, up from +1.0% MoM in October.

In fact orders accelerated even faster, rising 1.6% MoM – the biggest rise since May 2021…

Source: Bloomberg

That is the 7th straight monthly rise in orders and remains up 15.5% YoY.

Bear in mind that this data is from before Omicron’s impact hit (which we just saw crush ISM Services).

end

U.S. trade deficit widens sharply in November as imports surgeJan. 6, 2022 at 8:49 a.m. ET

MarketWatch

U.S. on path to set a record trade deficit in 2021

The numbers: The U.S. trade gap widened to $80.2 billion in November from a revised $67.2 billion in the prior month, the Commerce Department said Thursday. The deficit is just shy of the record $81.4 billion set in September.The U.S. is on track to post its biggest annual trade deficit. The final December figures are reported next month.Key details: Imports into the U.S. surged 4.6% to $304.4 billion in November. Companies rushed to retrieve imported goods in time for the holiday shopping season.U.S. exports inched up 0.2% to $224.4 billion.Adjusted for inflation, the real goods deficit widened $13.7 billion to $110.8 billion in November.Big picture: The chief reason for the surge in the deficit is that the U.S. economy rebounded more quickly from the pandemic than other countries. Aided by stimulus money, Americans could afford to buy more imports. And U.S. exports lagged.The economy is still growing steadily and has exceeded pre-pandemic levels, but it faces a fresh challenge from soaring omicron cases in the U.S. and elsewhere. The virus could disrupt global trade again and set back effort to clear up the congestion at West Coast ports.What are they saying? “Looking ahead, we expect the trade deficit to remain historically elevated until pandemic worries ease. Rising covid cases abroad once again threaten to constrain global demand, risking an even wider deficit if export growth slows more than imports,” said Nancy Vanden Houten, economist at Oxford Economics.-END-

IIb) USA COVID/VACCINE MANDATE STORIES

Florida:

If Floridians have no symptoms they are asked to not get tested

(Falkenstern/EpochTimes)

Florida Surgeon General: If You Have No Symptoms, Please Don’t Get Tested

WEDNESDAY, JAN 05, 2022 – 09:20 PM

Authored by Jannis Falkenstern via The Epoch Times,

Florida’s Surgeon General Dr. Joseph Ladapo issued new guidance for COVID-19 tests on Jan. 4 in a bid to reduce the strain on the state’s testing centers.

So many people are using the centers the availability of tests is under pressure.

“We are going to scale back,” Ladapo told reporters at a press conference.
“We’re coming back to something sensible.”

People have been flooding Florida testing sites, leading to long lines, he said.

Instead of restricting testing, however, Ladapo said he would place a new emphasis on “high-value” testing against those of “low-value” in order to give priority to tests that would “likely change outcomes” based on a positive or negative result.

For example, someone who is elderly with pre-existing medical conditions and is having symptoms he regards as high value.

Someone who is otherwise healthy with no pre-existing medical issues and with no symptoms is low value, he explained.

Ladapo said people need to get back to a “sense of normalcy” in society.

“We need to unwind this sort of planning and living one’s life around testing,” Ladapo said.

“It’s really time for people to be living; to make the decisions they want regarding vaccination; to enjoy the fact that many people have natural immunity; and to unwind this preoccupation with only COVID as determining the boundaries and constraints and possibilities of life.
“And we’re going to start that in Florida.”

Ladapo said Omicron is “on the rise” in Florida and cases are “vertically climbing,” but people are being “whipped into a frenzy” over it and there is no need because the variant is “much less violent” than other variants that have spawned from the COVID-19 virus.

“What you’re seeing in cases is actually just a fraction of what’s happening in the community,” he said. “For example, the CDC [Centers for Disease Control and Prevention] estimates that only one in four cases of COVID are diagnosed, that may be an even bigger ratio with Omicron.”

He said that Florida has seen a rapid increase in cases and hospitalizations, but added it is not comparable to the case rise.

“A substantial share, based on the data we have from some of our hospitals of the patients in hospitals with COVID, are there in the hospital with COVID rather than for COVID.”

In other words, people who go to the hospital are there for other reasons and then test positive for COVID-19 because hospitals test everyone who comes for treatment, Ladapo said.

A health care worker use a nasal swab to test Marcelino Soto for COVID-19 at a pop up testing site at the Koinonia Worship Center and Village in Pembroke Park, Fla., on July 22, 2020. (Joe Raedle/Getty Images)

The surgeon general said that federal leadership had “created a monster” in public health.

“What’s happened in the country is that people have forgotten, or abandoned basic public health principles,” he said.
“Instead, they have opted for things that are anti-public health.”

He said anti-public health is “taking away people’s options” and “ability to choose.”

“Anti-health tends to be mandates,” he continued. “Anti-public health is losing touch with sensibility.”

The Surgeon General’s office wants to educate and provide people with the ability to make “better decisions.”

“That’s what public health used to be,” Ladapo said.
“The federal approach has been to mandate and to create division and strife and really politicize this pandemic.”

Getting back to basic principles of public health is important, he said and part of that is prevention such as weight loss, exercise, and vitamin intake.

Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis was present at the press conference and said COVID-19 tests have turned into “a testing industrial company” and are a “cash cow” for people.

“There’s people making huge amounts of money,” he said of the COVID-19 testing companies.

DeSantis urged everyone to live their lives like they did before the pandemic.

end

From my son Lenny; very important!

Its getting worse in Ontario

Check this out, I am tracking this data from Ontario Covid website:

	29-Dec	30-Dec	31-Dec	04-Jan	05-Jan
Unvaxxed ICU	70	73	89	86	109
Vaxxed ICU	35	45	47	54	86

Unvaxxed Hospital	150	182	236	303	417
Vaxxed Hospital	186	399	536	667	1073
Unvaxxed ICU compared to Dec 29		3	19	16	39
Vaxxed ICU compared to Dec 29		10	12	19	51

Unvaxxed Hospital Compared to Dec 29		32	86	153	267
Vaxxed Hospital Compared to Dec 29		213	350	481	887
Unvaxxed ICU % change		4.3%	27.1%	22.9%	55.7%
Vaxxed ICU % change		28.6%	34.3%	54.3%	145.7%

Unvaxxed Hospital % change		21.3%	57.3%	102.0%	178.0%
Vaxxed Hospital % change		114.5%	188.2%	258.6%	476.9%

In the last week a 476% increase in vaxxed admitted to hospital and a 145% increase in vaxxed admitted to ICU. If this trend continues tomorrow there will be more people in the ICU that are vaxxed! Which means more doses for everybody to give 30 more days of protection.

If you are truly interested to know why the above is happening, please please watch this 30 minute video. When you took the vaccine, you should have been informed of this. That is what informed consent is.

If you are not going to watch the video, can you let me know? I read that the left is so far down this rabbit hole, that data doesn’t mattter anymore and there is nothing that can be shown or said that would change their minds.

Hopefully, you still have an open mind.

END

iii) important USA economic stories for you tonight

The narrative is just not working for the Democrats

(RealClearInvestigations)

Comparing Jan 6, George Floyd, And 2017 Inauguration Riots

THURSDAY, JAN 06, 2022 – 08:20 AM

Authored by RealClearInvestigations Editors,

Revised 1/4/2022, originally published 11/9/2021

The one-year anniversary of the Jan. 6 Capitol riot arrives this week with Americans still sharply divided over the afternoon-long episode’s significance and severity as Democrats, hemorrhaging support and facing the loss of Congress in this year’s midterms, sternly present a media spectacle of public events to emphasize what they see as the threat posed to democracy by Donald Trump and his party, as represented by that day.

There is no comparable scrutiny of the nationwide summer 2020 riots over George Floyd’s murder, protests endorsed by many on the left amid a virulent pandemic — although polling has shown that a large majority of Americans support examining the circumstances of both events.

RealClearInvestigations has developed the comparison database below allowing readers to draw their own conclusions — including the all-but-forgotten riot in Washington on Inauguration Day 2017, as protesters challenged Trump’s election and legitimacy.

Highlights:

The summer 2020 riots resulted in some 15 times more injured police officers, 23 times as many arrests, and estimated damages in dollar terms up to 1,300 times more costly than those of the Capitol riot.
Authorities have pursued the largely Trump-supporting Capitol rioters with substantially more vigor than suspected wrongdoers in the earlier two cases, and prosecutors and judges alike have weighed Capitol riot defendants’ political views in adjudicating their cases.
Dozens of accused Capitol rioters have been held in pretrial detention for months, where they have allegedly been mistreated.
In the summer 2020 riots, the vast majority of charges were dismissed, as they were in the Inauguration 2017 unrest. Prosecutors have dropped a single Capitol riot case.

A Resource on Violent Political Unrest, Continually Updated

Click to expand:

Update Log
Dec. 23, 2021
(2021 Capitol Riot updates exclusively)

Refreshed Key Facts & Figures — Arrests, Assault, and Weapons charges with updated Department of Justice data
Provided updated detail on Key Facts & Figures — Arrests regarding nature of charges
Refreshed Key Facts & Figures — Pretrial Detention to incorporate revelations regarding allegedly inhumane treatment of Jan. 6 defendants in D.C. jail
Refreshed Key Facts & Figures — Pretrial Detention Duration data
Refreshed Key Facts & Figures — Case Outcomes with updated Department of Justice data; provided additional detail regarding judges’ treatment of cases and length of sentences handed down
Provided additional detail on Additional Details — Organizations Implicated to reflect further revelations regarding alleged provocateurs engaged in the Capitol breach, lack of ties to “far-right groups or premeditated conspiracies to attack the Capitol” among vast majority of those charged
Provided additional detail on Investigative/Prosecutorial Rigor, noting the federal government’s posture that crimes of Jan. 6 “defy statutorily appropriate comparisons to conduct in other cases that occurred before” that day
Provided updated detail on Alleged Investigative/Prosecutorial Abuses demonstrating political nature of certain prosecutions; federal government’s withholding of footage allegedly demonstrating police misconduct, allegations of mistreatment of and retaliation against at least one prisoner by judge overseeing case; judges’ questioning of leniency in prosecutions and handing down of stiffer sentences than those called for by the federal government
Provided updated detail on Additional Details — Fallout with respect to the Jan. 6 Select Committee’s activities and the responses of those being probed by it, including contempt charges leveled at Steve Bannon and Mark Meadows; lawsuits filed by Meadows, Gen. Mike Flynn, John Eastman and others; attempts to interview sitting congressmen Republican Reps. Scott Perry and Jim Jordan; and former President Donald Trump’s pending litigation concerning withholding documents requested by the committee on executive privilege grounds

Oct. 26, 2021
(2021 Capitol Riot updates exclusively)

Refreshed Key Facts & Figures –Arrests, Assault, and Weapons charges with updated Department of Justice data
Provided additional detail on Key Facts & Figures — Weapons charges, specifically gun-related offenses
Refreshed Key Facts & Figures — Pretrial Detention data
Refreshed Key Facts & Figures — Case Outcomes with updated Department of Justice data
Updated Additional Details — Organizations Implicated to reflect new revelations regarding federal informants in groups implicated in January 6th, a series of investigative reports suggesting additional federal involvement, and the government’s response to such claims
Added additional reference to Additional Details — Dangerous Weapons Encountered
Updated detail on Alleged Investigative/Prosecutorial Abuses, including on withheld video footage, judges’ questions about alleged mistreatment of prisoners and the legitimacy of novel felony charges, the purported heavy-handed use of arrest warrants, and one judge’s questioning of the Department of Justice for being too lenient
Provided updated detail on Additional Details — Fallout with respect to the January 6th Select Committee

END

Chicago is now in chaos as teachers union sutters the schools

(zerohedge)

“This Has Put Us In An Untenable Situation” – Chicago In Chaos As Teachers’ Union Shutters Schools

THURSDAY, JAN 06, 2022 – 12:50 PM

Just the other day, Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot said during an interview with CNBC that her goal is to “never shut down again”, in reference to a lockdown that economically devastated small business owners. During this interview, Lightfoot insisted that schools weren’t a locus of the spread, which of course is in line with the CDC’s own guidance.

“Our schools are not the source of significant spread. The issue is community spread. But we need to keep our kids in schools, which is what we’re going to do in Chicago,” she said, adding that:
…she “will not allow” the union “to take our children hostage.”

She took issue with the union demanding that all educators, students, and volunteers test negative for COVID-19 before returning to school.

“We are not going to rob parents of their right and their obligation to tell us if they want testing or not on their children. It’s not going to happen. It’s morally wrong,” Lightfoot said.

Yet, two days later, millions of parents in the city of Chicago are scrambling Thursday morning as the city’s public schools have once again been shut down by a teacher’s union that’s determined to strike until they get more tests for members who are worried about “safety”, despite the fact that even omicron hasn’t been shown to spread in schools and among children.

As the NYT explains, nowhere in the US is the situation more “acrimonious and unpredictable” than in Chicago. The city retaliated to the Teachers’ Union vote by calling off school altogether, refusing the teachers’ call for remote instruction. The enmity between the teacher’s union and city hall is something that’s been years in the making, according to the NYT. And with violence surging in the city’s streets following its most murderous year in decades, there’s never been a time where leaving children unsupervised could put them more at risk.

One city activist put things perfectly: the city is now in an “untenable situation.”

“If they are in class and Covid is rampaging, that’s a problem. If they are not there and out on the streets, that’s a problem,” said Tamar Manasseh, who leads an anti-violence group in the city, and who said she was looking into ways to help children with nowhere to go during the day. “This has put us in an untenable situation.”

To get a better picture of the situation that Chicago parents are dealing with: parents weren’t informed about the cancellation of school starting Wednesday until 2300 Chicago Time on Tuesday night.

The decision impacts the more than 300K schoolchildren in Chicago, and it’s unclear when classes will resume. Union leaders insist that their members are only asking for basic safety precautions like regular testing for students and proper protocols for quarantining and shutting down schools experiencing an outbreak.

Their attacks on Mayor Lightfoot have grown surprisingly personal, with one top official complaining to a NYT reporter that Lightfoot doesn’t “understand partnership and collaboration.”

Jesse Sharkey, the union president, said an increase of cases in the school system and the onslaught of Omicron, which causes milder illness than other variants but frequent breakthrough infections, had heightened members’ concern. He called for testing all students before classrooms reopened, as well as stepped-up surveillance testing after that. The district had instituted an optional testing plan over winter break, but most of the 150,000 or so mail-in P.C.R. tests given to students were never returned; of the ones that were, a majority produced invalid results.

“If you want to get us back into the schools quicker, provide testing,” he said.

Mr. Sharkey and Stacy Davis Gates, the union’s vice president, also criticized the mayor for her approach to negotiations and for her repeated public criticisms of the union. Members of Ms. Lightfoot’s administration have defended the school system’s efforts to make classrooms safe and have emphasized that children rarely face severe outcomes from Covid-19.

“The mayor wants to fight when we should be working,” Ms. Davis Gates said. “She’s fighting us instead of the virus. I don’t understand it.”
She said the mayor’s “her-way-or-the-highway” leadership style had made matters worse.
“The mayor, bless her heart, she doesn’t understand partnership and collaboration,” Ms. Davis Gates said.

Some activists are blaming Mayor Lightfoot, saying the decision to close schools was made in response to a “political beef”.

But in Chicago, some said they did not believe that the district had adequately adjusted to the incursion of Omicron. Ja’Mal Green, an activist and former mayoral candidate who lives on the South Side, said he held his son out of kindergarten this week because he did not think the district had adequate virus precautions.

Mr. Green praised the union’s actions, and said he worried about the convergence of the pandemic, street violence and educational disruption in the city.

“The mayor really has a political beef with the union and doesn’t want to come to any type of compromise because she wants to beat them over the head for the strikes and the things that have happened in the past,” said Mr. Green, who has frequently criticized Ms. Lightfoot.

One would think that failing to keep the schools open is a basic failure for a mayor.

The mayor has received backing from the White House, which said earlier Wednesday that all schools should remain open, including in Chicago, but the union has thus far stood firm on its demands.

END

Royal Caribbean Shares Fall After Hindenburg Research Discloses Short Position

THURSDAY, JAN 06, 2022 – 03:40 PM

Shares of Royal Caribbean are under pressure after noted short-seller Hindenburg Research announced in a series of Tweets that it was shorting the cruise line.

In a series of tweets, Hindenburg said that RCL was one of the most dislocated “re-opening” stocks on the market today and said that the outlook for the cruise industry “is far more grim than other hospitality and leisure” industries.

Hindenburg pointed out the company’s ballooning liabilities and share count, saying the company’s current debt would be “extremely difficult to service, almost necessitating extensive dilution of existing shareholders”.

The firm also pointed to increased fuel costs, vaccination mandates and the CDC’s Conditional Sailing Order as headwinds.https://platform.twitter.com/embed/Tweet.html?dnt=false&embedId=twitter-widget-0&features=eyJ0ZndfZXhwZXJpbWVudHNfY29va2llX2V4cGlyYXRpb24iOnsiYnVja2V0IjoxMjA5NjAwLCJ2ZXJzaW9uIjpudWxsfSwidGZ3X2hvcml6b25fdHdlZXRfZW1iZWRfOTU1NSI6eyJidWNrZXQiOiJodGUiLCJ2ZXJzaW9uIjpudWxsfSwidGZ3X3NwYWNlX2NhcmQiOnsiYnVja2V0Ijoib2ZmIiwidmVyc2lvbiI6bnVsbH19&frame=false&hideCard=false&hideThread=false&id=1479166991487410182&lang=en&origin=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.zerohedge.com%2Fmarkets%2Froyal-caribbean-shares-fall-after-hindenburg-research-says-theyre-short&sessionId=d30ee4ba915e82bae67e4f82bdd2ed069ed44925&siteScreenName=zerohedge&theme=light&widgetsVersion=9fd78d5%3A1638479056965&width=550px

As far as low hanging fruit for short sellers as part of the post-Covid re-open trade, Royal Caribbean may be at the top of the list since it returned 3% in 2021, while Carnival and Norwegian Cruise Line Holdings fell 7.1% ad 18% respectively, according to Bloomberg.

The stock traded down more than 3% following the report before recovering some losses.

iii)b USA inflation commentaries//LOG JAMS//SWAMP STORIES //

iv)swamp stories

Watch: CNN Medical Ethics ‘Expert’ Calls For Denying Health Insurance To Unvaccinated “Jerks”

THURSDAY, JAN 06, 2022 – 03:01 PM

Authored by Steve Watson via Summit News,

This is CNN. The network wheeled out professor of bioethics Arthur Caplan Wednesday who called for a raft of extreme actions to be taken against the unvaccinated, including denying them the right to buy affordable medical insurance, and increasing hospital bills.

Caplan declared that the time has come to “shame and blame” the unvaccinated and “penalize” them for not taking COVID shots.

“We’re fighting a war and need all hands on deck. I don’t want to reject those who still haven’t done the right thing. I’ll condemn them. I’ll shame them. I’ll blame them, but I don’t want to exclude them,” Caplan stated, adding “we can’t write them off. We can penalize them more.”

“We can say you will have to pay more on your hospital bill. You can’t get life insurance or disability insurance at affordable rates if you aren’t vaccinated,” the medical ethics ‘expert’ proclaimed.

“Those companies should not treat us as equals in terms of what the financial burdens are that the disease imposes,” he continued.

Caplan also stated that the strategy should be to “shift the moral ground” against those who cite “autonomy, and liberty” as a reason for choosing not to take vaccines.

“We’ve got to start praising people who do the right thing (by getting vaccinated). Not saying, well, there’s a tradeoff of values. Some people are going to help their neighbor[,] orient toward the community, try to protect one another. And then there are going to be jerks who aren’t going to do that.”

CNN anchor John Berman responded, “It’s the unvaccinated who aren’t wearing masks. It’s the unvaccinated who aren’t social distancing. It’s the unvaccinated going to crowded indoor events.”

“So there’s this bizarre irony where the ones who are behaving are the ones being told to behave 10 times more so,” the host further complained.

Watch:https://platform.twitter.com/embed/Tweet.html?dnt=false&embedId=twitter-widget-0&features=eyJ0ZndfZXhwZXJpbWVudHNfY29va2llX2V4cGlyYXRpb24iOnsiYnVja2V0IjoxMjA5NjAwLCJ2ZXJzaW9uIjpudWxsfSwidGZ3X2hvcml6b25fdHdlZXRfZW1iZWRfOTU1NSI6eyJidWNrZXQiOiJodGUiLCJ2ZXJzaW9uIjpudWxsfSwidGZ3X3NwYWNlX2NhcmQiOnsiYnVja2V0Ijoib2ZmIiwidmVyc2lvbiI6bnVsbH19&frame=false&hideCard=false&hideThread=false&id=1478715090161569802&lang=en&origin=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.zerohedge.com%2Fpolitical%2Fwatch-cnn-medical-ethics-expert-calls-denying-health-insurance-unvaccinated-jerks&sessionId=0423338b2b7be9ea66740a9f27db6b3b59ef67b8&siteScreenName=zerohedge&theme=light&widgetsVersion=9fd78d5%3A1638479056965&width=550px

The comments dovetail with those of a leftist reporter who asked White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki Wednesday “Why hasn’t the president focused more on scolding the unvaccinated?”

The discussion arose after comments made by French President Emmanuel Macron, who vowed to “piss off” unvaccinated “non-citizens” as much as possible by limiting their freedoms and coercing them into taking shots.

Of course, all of this ‘punish the unvaccinated’ rhetoric completely ignores the fact that the vaccinated are also spreading the virus, particularly the newest varient, as noted by former White House COVID task force czar Brett Giroir.

“I think it’s a disservice to say it’s just … the unvaccinated because it’s telling the vaccinated that you don’t have a problem, you’re not subject to Omicron and that’s false,” Giroir stated.

He continued, “It’s not only incorrect information, I think it’s doing a disservice to public health by blaming it on the unvaccinated people.”

“This is a problem we all have to face … vaccinated unvaccinated, we need to get our booster, we need to have plans that if we do get sick, particularly in a high-risk group, that we can get antibodies or we can get those oral antiviral therapies.”

Watch:

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/embed/video/2582951.html

* * *

END

KING REPORT/SWAMP STORIES

Omicron evades immunity better than Delta, Danish study finds
The Omicron coronavirus variant is better at circumventing vaccinated peoples’ immunity than the Delta variant, according to a Danish study published last week, helping explain why Omicron is spreading more rapidly… (Ergo, The Big Guy is fibbing about “pandemic of the unvaccinated”.)
Investigating nearly 12,000 Danish households in mid-December, the scientists found that Omicron was 2.7 to 3.7 times more infectious than the Delta variant among vaccinated Danes…
https://www.reuters.com/business/healthcare-pharmaceuticals/omicron-evades-immunity-better-than-delta-danish-study-finds-2022-01-03/

@DrEliDavid: Another Israeli expert who strongly supported Covid passports admits: “vaccinated and unvaccinated have the same likelihood of getting infected by Omicron.“
https://twitter.com/AviDascalu/status/1478743020732391433

Ex-White House testing czar criticizes Biden’s ‘incorrect’ claim it is still the ‘pandemic of the unvaccinated’ because it suggests the vaccinated are protected from Omicron
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-10372093/Ex-White-House-testing-czar-says-Biden-wrong-call-pandemic-unvaccinated.html

French president draws fire with vow to make life “miserable” for COVID vaccine refusers
https://www.cbsnews.com/news/macron-covid-vaccine-france-emmerder-life-miserable-for-unvaccinated/

Stanford prof of medicine @DrJBhattacharya: Pres. Biden got several things wrong in this clip:
1. This is not just an epidemic of the unvaccinated.
2. The most important step to protect kids is to let them live normal lives
https://twitter.com/greg_price11/status/1478445711066898434

Immune system T-cells can fight omicron COVID-19 variant, study suggests
https://www.foxnews.com/health/immune-system-t-cells-omicron-covid-19-variant-study

The ADP Employment Change for December is 807k; 410k was consensus. The Markit US Services PMI for December rose 0.1 to 57.6; unchanged was expected. The Composite PMI Output Index increased 0.1 to 57.0 in December from 57.2 in November.

IHS Markit US Services PMI™

Demand conditions strengthen in December, but labor shortages exacerbate cost pressures
Rate of cost inflation accelerates to series record high

https://www.markiteconomics.com/Public/Home/PressRelease/407ef6783b8047b0af4ac0ff226d736e
Fed Minutes Flag Chance of Earlier Hikes, Balance Sheet Rundown – BBG
“Participants generally noted that, given their individual outlooks for the economy, the labor market, and inflation, it may become warranted to increase the federal funds rate sooner or at a faster pace than participants had earlier anticipated,” …“Some participants also noted that it could be appropriate to begin to reduce the size of the Federal Reserve’s balance sheet relatively soon after beginning to raise the federal funds rate,”… https://news.yahoo.com/fed-minutes-flag-chance-earlier-190641270.html

The Fed Fund futures market now sees an 80% chance of a rate hike in March. Bitcoin tumbled 5.3%.

After a modest bounce ahead of the final hour of trading, ESHs and stocks sank anew. At 15:08 ET, ESHs were 81 handles below the session high. Nasdaq registered a 3% loss. The usual suspects tried to affect the usual last-hour rally. Sellers stymied buyers; ESHs traded in a tight range until ESHs and stocks broke to new session lows with 15 minutes remaining.

Positive aspects of previous session
ESH rally into and beyond European open and after NYSE open; bonds rallied modestly in the morning
Psaki: Biden has no ‘time to think’ despite frequent trips home
White House press secretary Jen Psaki said Wednesday that President Biden thinks he needs more downtime — despite the fact that he’s spent more than a quarter of his days in office at one of his Delaware homes… Biden’s exchanges with reporters often are brief and he has given far fewer interviews than his six most recent predecessors…
https://nypost.com/2022/01/05/psaki-biden-claims-he-has-no-free-time-despite-trips-home/

NFL explores Super Bowl move from Los Angeles to Cowboys’ AT&T Stadium (Over Covid bans)
https://nypost.com/2022/01/05/nfl-super-bowl-contingency-would-move-game-to-att-stadium/

GOP Rep. @Jim_Jordan: The CDC and NIH employee roughly 33,000 people. They have a nearly 5-billion-dollar budget. But can’t tell us the effectiveness of natural immunity?

At Least 100 House Members Are Invested in Fossil Fuels
Reps among the top oil and gas investors in Congress bought more shares in pipeline companies as the House moved to pass the bipartisan infrastructure bill.
https://readsludge.com/2021/12/29/at-least-100-house-members-are-invested-in-fossil-fuels/

Bloomberg Quicktake @Quicktake: Inflation is taking aim at Little Caesars’s iconic HOT-N-READY pizza, forcing the company to bump up the price from $5 to $5.55

Kazakh president removes ex-leader from post amid worst unrest in a decade
Though the unrest was triggered by a fuel price rise, there were signs of broader political demands…Kazakhstan is a close ally of Russia…Kazakhstan has been grappling with rising price pressures. Inflation was closing in on 9% year-on-year late last year – its highest level in more than five years – forcing the central bank to raise interest rates to 9.75%.
https://www.cnbc.com/2022/01/05/kazakh-president-removes-ex-leader-from-post-amid-worst-unrest-in-a-decade.html

Kazakhstan government resigns as protesters storm capital
https://thehill.com/policy/international/588318-kazakhstan-government-resigns-as-demonstrators-set-fire-to-capital

@albertedwards99: While the cheerleaders in bubble vision still applaud the record highs in equity prices that are a direct result of the years of QE, they don’t recognise the downside of CBs monetary diarrhea until violent revolutions break out as a result of soaring food and energy prices.

@TommyThornton: From Goldman Sachs’s prime brokerage – “On a 4-day cumulative basis, the $ net selling from Dec 30th – Jan 4th in US Info Tech stocks was the largest on our record (more than 10 years)”. I believe this record will be broken several times in 2022.There’s a lot of reason to be hopeful in 2020′: Biden gets the YEAR wrong during official White House COVID briefing (US MSM mum on The Big Guy’s latest lapse)
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-10370419/Theres-lot-reason-hopeful-2020-Biden-gets-YEAR-wrong-COVID-briefing.html

@ClayTravis: 77% of Chicago teachers voted to refuse to return to work because of covid & the mayor canceled school today for all kids because teachers won’t show up. This is shameful & embarrassing.
https://www.outkick.com/extended-vacation-chicagos-teacher-union-refuses-in-person-work/

@RepJimBanks: Joe Biden sold his nearly $2 trillion American Rescue Plan and vaccine mandates on the promise it would keep schools open.  Now that the Chicago Teachers Union has gone on strike, will Joe Biden stand up and denounce their decision or continue to keep our children out of schools?

Biden: My American Rescue Plan will deliver much-needed support to our nation’s schools to help them reopen and operate safely.  https://twitter.com/RepJimBanks/status/1478768524105601027/photo/1

Schools Got $130B To Re-Open. Some Of It Went To CRT. Now Many Are Closed.
They got the money. Yet this month, schools in numerous districts will be closed, citing an inability to deal with the Omicron variant, despite receiving money that could have gone towards mitigation, protection, and preventative measures…In August, the Department of Education published strategies for using the money. “Rebuilding from COVID-19 is an opportunity,” the document said, for a “culture shift” and the “establishment of equitable practices… One example of how a district is using a performance assessment in a culturally and linguistically responsive way is the Chicago Public School’s Curriculum Equity Initiative.”…https://www.dailywire.com/news/schools-got-130b-to-re-open-some-of-it-went-to-crt-now-many-are-closed

Politicians seem to double-down on overstatement as a way of keeping people in fear of things like the omicron variant, Brit Hume said Tuesday on “Fox News Primetime.”…
     He pointed to Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-NY, vacationing in Miami with boyfriend Riley Roberts while simultaneously attempting to dunk on Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis’s governance and removing herself from the more restrictive state of New York she represents.
     “Don’t listen to what they say. Watch what they do,” Jones said. “Like AOC prancing around the free state of Florida without a mask. She knows this is all overblown.”…
https://www.foxnews.com/media/brit-hume-partisan-political-exaggerations-pandemic

‘Masks everywhere. Vacation cancelled.’ But not for Eric Swalwell! Democratic congressman follows in AOC’s footsteps and goes maskless at posh Miami hotel in mandate-free Florida, days after blaming GOP for ‘prolonging’ the pandemic (US MSM mum, of course)
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-10372009/Eric-Swalwell-seen-maskless-Miami-blaming-GOP-prolonging-pandemic.html

@SKMorefield: Florida Surgeon General Dr. Joseph Lapado: “This idea that you could stop this with vaccines was unrealistic … There’s a mismatch between the policies and reality, and more people need to wake up to that and stop participating in this really dystopian view of public health.”
https://twitter.com/SKMorefield/status/1478565238496714759

Whoopi Goldberg stunned by testing positive for COVID: ‘I’ve done everything I was supposed to do’ – she was fully vaccinated, had received the vaccine booster shot…
https://www.foxnews.com/media/whoopi-goldberg-stunned-testing-positive-covid?s=02

Liberals slammed for blaming Virginia I-95 mess on Governor-elect Youngkin
Youngkin won’t be sworn in until Jan. 15, leaving the highway mess in the hands of lame duck Democrat Ralph Northam…  https://nypost.com/2022/01/05/liberals-slammed-for-blaming-virginia-i-95-mess-on-youngkin/

@ColumbiaBugle: Tucker Carlson: “If @GOPLeader (McCarthy) can’t even defend [Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene], he’s not going to defend the country. You defend your people, that’s what leadership is and if you’re unwilling to defend your people, you’re not worthy of leadership.”https://t.co/fseOE33uj8

@XStrategiesLLC: Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene discusses being banned from Twitter: “When a private company declares war on a sitting member of Congress and sitting president who happened to be both from the Republican Party, it’s up to our leadership to do something about it.” https://t.co/sY7C3OdZ9l

CNN’s @MZanona: GOP conference call: Republican leaders also told members that they should be defending Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, who was recently banned from Twitter. Their message: if they can kick off one member, they can come for other Republicans, one-by-one.

@January6thCmte: The Committee is seeking information from Sean Hannity.Chair Bennie G Thompson and Vice Chair @RepLizCheney request Hannity answer questions about matters including communications between Hannity and the former President, Mark Meadows, and others in the days surrounding Jan 6th.
    Ex-Chief Counsel for Nominations, Senate Committee on the Judiciary @mrddmia: Does this mean communications between MSNBC and CNN and the Obama and Biden White Houses are fair game when Republicans take back Congress next year?

CBS: Capitol Police intelligence official says she sounded alarm about potential violence days before January 6 riot (It was a setup!)  https://www.cbsnews.com/news/capitol-police-intelligence-official-julie-farnam-january-6-riot/

Biden FBI Joins Pelosi in Blocking GOP From Investigating January 6
The FBI told Indiana Republican Rep. Jim Banks it would not provide Republicans the same information provided to House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s hand-picked committee consisting only of Democrat-appointed members… (“Back in the USSR. You don’t know how lucky you are!”)
https://thefederalist.com/2021/10/27/exclusive-biden-fbi-joins-pelosi-in-blocking-gop-from-investigating-january-6/

House Republicans Demand Nancy Pelosi Answer for ‘Failures’ to Secure Capitol on January 6
“The American people deserve to know what the mainstream media refuses to cover: The fact that the only office that is off-limits to this partisan sham investigation is Speaker Pelosi’s office,” Stefanik continued. “This is a political weapon, and it’s used to cover up for Nancy Pelosi’s failures.”…
https://www.breitbart.com/politics/2022/01/04/cover-up-house-republicans-demand-nancy-pelosi-answer-for-failures-to-secure-capitol-on-january-6/

Rep. Andy Biggs Demands Hearing over J6 Political Prisoners’ ‘Egregious’ Mistreatment
https://www.breitbart.com/politics/2022/01/04/exclusive-rep-andy-biggs-demands-hearing-over-j6-political-prisoners-egregious-mistreatment/

Biden’s Jan. 6 Speech to Lay ‘Singular Responsibility’ on Trump (He stupidly aided setup!) – BBG

@JesseKellyDC: PRO TIP: All the January 6th stuff this week is a distraction technique because the communists are under water on every single issue that matters to Americans. They’re trying to turn your head away from real problems.

January 6 committee is considering televised prime time ‘Watergate-style’ hearings to make it a ‘daily spectacle’ and wants to speak to Mike Pence directly…
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-10371489/January-6-committee-considering-prime-time-Watergate-style-hearings.html

Ex-DNI @RichardGrenell: There is a huge disconnect with those of you in DC. You live in a bubble. The rest of America doesn’t believe J6 was an insurrection, thinks IDs to vote is a no-brainer, thinks schools should be open, the border should be closed and that Joe Biden is physically unstable.

I will see you on FRIDAY night/

end

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NUMBER OF NOTICES FILED TODAY FOR JAN. CONTRACT: 1 NOTICE(S) FOR 100 OZ (0.00311 TONNES)

total notices so far: 1164 contracts for 116400 oz (3.6205 tonnes)

382 NOTICE(S) FILED TODAY FOR 1,910,000 OZ/

1/COMEX GOLD AND SILVER REPORT

3. ASIAN AFFAIRS

b) REPORT ON JAPAN

3 C CHINA

4/EUROPEAN AFFAIRS

5. RUSSIAN AND MIDDLE EASTERN AFFAIRS

6.Global Issues

7. OIL ISSUES

8 EMERGING MARKET ISSUES

Heads You Lose; Tails You Lose

Brien Lundin: Inflation spooks the Fed but too late to stop gold

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

Futures Steady After Fed-Inspired Rout As Tech, Bitcoin Slide Continues

3 a./NORTH KOREA/ SOUTH KOREA

3c CHINA

Ningbo Port Activity Grinds To A Halt As China Outbreak Worsens

Thousands Of Cops Deployed To Quell Public Anger In China’s Locked Down Xi’an Amid Widespread Food Shortages

Xi’an Authorities Block All “Negative” Posts On Social Media As Lockdown Backlash Grows

China’s “Zero COVID” Policy Failure Is A Top Risk Of 2022

4/EUROPEAN AFFAIRS

Britain Temporarily Suspends PCR Test For Asymptomatic COVID Cases

As UK Takes Foot Off Throat, European Authoritarians Escalate Attacks On Unvaxx’d

Omicron Spreads Faster Than Delta Within Vaccinated Individuals: Danish Study

5. RUSSIAN AND MIDDLE EASTERN AFFAIRS

6.Global Issues

Q&A #010 : Unvaccinated and fearless

Quebec Under Curfew, Unvaxx’d Banned From Buying Booze, Marijuana

The Population Is Being Killed Off with Covid mRNA “Vaccines”

India Won’t Add Merck’s COVID-19 Pill To National Treatment Protocol, Citing Safety Concerns

Pro-Vaccine Big Pharma Execs Invite You to D.C. to “Protest Against Vaccine Mandates” – Did You Forget What Happened on Jan. 6th 2021?

January 5, 2022 5:55 pm

The Homeownership Dreams Of Zoomers And Millennials Shattered By Prices

Dreams Change

Key Takeaways From Latest Survey

Zoomer Stats

Optimism Shattered

Millennials the Most Disgruntled Generation

Covid Delays

Affordability

Is Covid Responsible?

Real Hourly Wages Have Risen Less Than a Penny a Year Since 1973

Every Measure of Real Interest Rates Shows the Fed is Out of Control.

QT: Not So Cute

7. OIL ISSUES

8 EMERGING MARKET& AUSTRALIA ISSUES

Political Scandal Erupts As Djokovic Remains In Limbo, His Lawyers Fight To Overturn Australia Entry Ban

Dozens Killed As Kazakh Police Battle For Control Of Streets In ‘War Zone’ – Banks Being Looted

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

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

USA trading day in Graph Form

US Stocks Erase All 2022 Gains As Fed Rate-Hike Expectations Soar

Jobless Claims Unexpectedly Rose Last Week Led By Surge In New York

ISM Services Crashes Most Since April 2020 As Omicron Hits

US Factory Orders Surged In November (Before Omicron Hit)

Florida Surgeon General: If You Have No Symptoms, Please Don’t Get Tested

Its getting worse in Ontario

Comparing Jan 6, George Floyd, And 2017 Inauguration Riots

A Resource on Violent Political Unrest, Continually Updated

“This Has Put Us In An Untenable Situation” – Chicago In Chaos As Teachers’ Union Shutters Schools

Royal Caribbean Shares Fall After Hindenburg Research Discloses Short Position

Watch: CNN Medical Ethics ‘Expert’ Calls For Denying Health Insurance To Unvaccinated “Jerks”

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