FEB3

FEB3

 · by harveyorgan · in Uncategorized · Leave a comment ·Edit

GOLD; DOWN $5.55 to $1803.80

SILVER: $22.36  DOWN 35 CENTS

ACCESS MARKET: GOLD: 1807.00.. 

SILVER: $22.65

Bitcoin:  morning price: 36,220 DOWN 1319

Bitcoin: afternoon price: 36,497 DOWN 1042

Platinum price: closing down $4.35 to $1035.25

Palladium price; closing down  $4.10  at $2333.50

END

end

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comex notices//JPMorgan  notices filed  COMEX//NOTICES:EXCHANGE: COMEX  FILED:  158/469

  EXCHANGE: COMEX

CONTRACT: FEBRUARY 2022 COMEX 100 GOLD FUTURES
SETTLEMENT: 1,809.200000000 USD
INTENT DATE: 02/02/2022 DELIVERY DATE: 02/04/2022
FIRM ORG FIRM NAME ISSUED STOPPED

---

118 C MACQUARIE FUT 57
132 C SG AMERICAS 1
332 H STANDARD CHARTE 11
363 H WELLS FARGO SEC 6
435 H SCOTIA CAPITAL 1
624 H BOFA SECURITIES 182
657 C MORGAN STANLEY 2
661 C JP MORGAN 79
661 H JP MORGAN 79
709 C BARCLAYS 46
732 C RBC CAP MARKETS 2
800 C MAREX SPEC 14 2
880 H CITIGROUP 450
905 C ADM 4 2

---

TOTAL: 469 469
MONTH TO DATE: 15,698

NUMBER OF NOTICES FILED TODAY FOR  FEB. CONTRACT: 469 NOTICE(S) FOR 46,900 OZ  (1.4587  TONNES)

total notices so far:  15,698 contracts for 1,569,800 oz (48.827 tonnes)

SILVER NOTICES: 

117 NOTICE(S) FILED TODAY FOR  585,000   OZ/

total number of notices filed so far this month  1139  :  for 5,695,000  oz

GLD

WITH GOLD DOWN $5.55

WITH RESPECT TO GLD WITHDRAWALS:  (OVER THE PAST FEW MONTHS):

A HUGE CHANGE IN GOLD INVENTORY AT THE GLD// A WITHDRAWAL OF 1.45 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: 1016.59 TONNES/

Silver//SLV

WITH NO SILVER AROUND AND SILVER DOWN 35 CENTS:/: NO CHANGES IN SILVER INVENTORY AT THE SLV/

AT THE SLV//

INVESTORS ARE SWITCHING SLV TO SPROTT’S PSLV

CLOSING INVENTORY SLV/ TONIGHT: 539.212 MILLION OZ

Let us have a look at the data for today

SILVER//OUTLINE

SILVER COMEX OI FELL BY A STRONG 1469 CONTRACTS TO 147,671  AND RESTS FURTHER FROM THE NEW RECORD OF 244,710, SET FEB 25/2020 AND DESPITE  THIS STRONG LOSS IN OI, IT WAS ACCOMPANIED WITH OUR GOOD $0.15 GAIN IN SILVER PRICING AT THE COMEX ON WEDNESDAY.  OUR BANKERS WERE UNSUCCESSFUL IN KNOCKING THE PRICE OF SILVER DOWN (IT ROSE BY $0.15) BUT WERE  SUCCESSFUL IN KNOCKING OUT A FEW SILVER LONGS  AS WE HAD A STRONG LOSS OF 1185 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  SMALL ISSUANCE OF EXCHANGE FOR PHYSICALS iiii) A HUGE INITIAL SILVER STANDING FOR COMEX SILVER MEASURING AT 4.110 MILLION OZ FOLLOWED BY TODAY’S 625,000 OZ QUEUE JUMP//NEW STANDING 5.870 MILLION OZ.         V)    STRONG SIZED COMEX OI LOSS.

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

THE DIFFERENTIAL FROM PRELIMINARY OI TO FINAL OI SILVER TODAY: CONTRACTS  -34

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

TOTAL CONTACTS for 3 days, total  contracts: :  1683 contracts or 8.415 million oz  OR2.804 MILLION OZ PER DAY. (561 CONTRACTS PER DAY)

TOTAL NO OF OZ UNDERGOING EFP TO LONDON 1683 CONTRACTS X 5,000 PER CONTRACT:

EQUATES TO: 8.415 MILLION OZ

.

LAST 10 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 

JAN 2022//  90.460 MILLION OZ

FEB 2022:  8.415 MILLION OZ//

SPREADING OPERATIONS

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

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

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 (MAR), 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.”

RESULT: WE HAD A STRONG SIZED DECREASE IN COMEX OI SILVER COMEX CONTRACTS OF 1469 DESPITE OUR  $0.15 GAIN SILVER PRICING AT THE COMEX// WEDNESDAY  THE CME NOTIFIED US THAT WE HAD A  SMALL  SIZED EFP ISSUANCE OF  250 CONTRACTS( 250 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: /HUGE BANKER SHORT COVERING AS THEY GET OUT OF DODGE//// WE HAVE A GOOD INITIAL SILVER OZ STANDING FOR FEB OF 4.1 MILLION OZ FOLLOWED BY TODAY’S 625,000 OZ QUEUE JUMP  //NEW STANDING 5.870, MILLION OZ//  .. WE HAD A STRONG SIZED LOSS OF 1219 OI CONTRACTS ON THE TWO EXCHANGES FOR 6.095 MILLION OZ//

 WE HAD 117 NOTICES FILED TODAY FOR  585,000 OZ

GOLD//OUTLINE

IN GOLD, THE COMEX OPEN INTEREST FELL BY A FAIR SIZED 2982 TO 512,349 AND FURTHER FROM  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: — 55 CONTRACTS

.

THE  FAIR SIZED DECREASE IN COMEX OI CAME DESPITE OUR  GAIN IN PRICE OF $7.95//COMEX GOLD TRADING/WEDNESDAY/.AS IN SILVER WE MUST  HAD   HUGE BANKER/ALGO SHORT COVERING ACCOMPANYING OUR SMALL SIZED EXCHANGE FOR PHYSICAL ISSUANCE. WE HAD SOME LONG LIQUIDATION  AS THE TOTAL LOSS ON OUR TWO EXCHANGES TOTALED  2214 CONTRACTS…

WE ALSO HAD A HUGE INITIAL STANDING IN GOLD TONNAGE FOR FEB AT 64.3 TONNES FOLLOWED BY TODAY’S 98,400 OZ E.F.P. JUMP TO LONDON  //NEW STANDING: 59.511 TONNES      

YET ALL OF..THIS HAPPENED WITH OUR GAIN IN PRICE OF $7.95 WITH RESPECT TO TUESDAY’S TRADING

WE HAD A SMALL SIZED LOSS OF 2214  OI CONTRACTS (6.886 PAPER TONNES) ON OUR TWO EXCHANGES

E.F.P. ISSUANCE

THE CME RELEASED THE DATA FOR EFP ISSUANCE AND IT TOTALLED A SMALL SIZED  768 CONTRACTS:

FOR APRIL 768  ALL OTHER MONTHS ZERO//TOTAL:768 

The NEW COMEX OI FOR THE GOLD COMPLEX RESTS AT 512,349.

IN ESSENCE WE HAVE A SMALL SIZED DECREASE IN TOTAL CONTRACTS ON THE TWO EXCHANGES OF 2214, WITH 2,982 CONTRACTS DECREASED AT THE COMEX AND 768 EFP OI CONTRACTS WHICH NAVIGATED OVER TO LONDON. THUS  TOTAL OI LOSS ON THE TWO EXCHANGES OF 2159 CONTRACTS OR 6.715TONNES.

CALCULATIONS ON GAIN/LOSS ON OUR TWO EXCHANGES

WE HAD A SMALL SIZED ISSUANCE IN EXCHANGE FOR PHYSICALS (768) ACCOMPANYING THE FAIR SIZED LOSS IN COMEX OI (2927,): TOTAL LOSS IN THE TWO EXCHANGES 2159 CONTRACTS. WE NO DOUBT HAD 1) HUGE BANKER SHORT COVERING ,2.) HUGE INITIAL STANDING AT THE GOLD COMEX FOR FEB. AT 64.30 TONNES WHICH FOLLOWS TODAY’S HUGE EFP JUMP TO LONDON OF 98,400 OZ//NEW STANDING 59.511 TONNES//  3)SOME LONG LIQUIDATION ,4)   FAIR SIZED COMEX OI. LOSS 5) SMALL ISSUANCE OF EXCHANGE FOR PHYSICAL

HISTORICAL ACCUMULATION OF EXCHANGE FOR PHYSICALS IN 2022 INCLUDING TODAY

FEB

ACCUMULATION OF EFP’S GOLD AT J.P. MORGAN’S HOUSE OF BRIBES: (EXCHANGE FOR PHYSICAL) FOR THE MONTH OF FEB :

3859 CONTRACTS OR 385,900 oz OR 12.00  TONNES 3 TRADING DAY(S) AND THUS AVERAGING: 1286 EFP CONTRACTS PER TRADING DAY

TO GIVE YOU AN IDEA AS TO THE  SIZE OF THESE EFP TRANSFERS :  THIS MONTH IN 3 TRADING DAY(S) IN  TONNES: 12.00 TONNES

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

THUS EFP TRANSFERS REPRESENTS  12.00/3550 x 100% TONNES  0.330% OF GLOBAL ANNUAL PRODUCTION

ACCUMULATION OF GOLD EFP’S YEAR 2021 TO 2022 

JANUARY/2021: 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//FINAL ISSUANCE// 

JAN:2022   247.25 TONNES //FINAL

FEB:           12.000 TONNES//INITIAL

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, FELL BY A STRONG SIZED 1469 CONTRACTS TO 147,701  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 250 CONTRACTS

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

MAR 250  ALL OTHER MONTHS: ZERO. TOTAL EFP ISSUANCE:  250 CONTRACTS. EFP’S GIVE OUR COMEX LONGS A FIAT BONUS PLUS A DELIVERABLE PRODUCT OVER IN LONDON.  IF WE TAKE THE  COMEX OI LOSS OF 1435 CONTRACTS AND ADD TO THE 250 OI TRANSFERRED TO LONDON THROUGH EFP’S,

WE OBTAIN A STRONG SIZED LOSS OF 1219 OPEN INTEREST CONTRACT FROM OUR TWO EXCHANGES.

THUS IN OUNCES, THE LOSS ON THE TWO EXCHANGES 6.095 MILLION  OZ, 

OCCURRED WITH OUR $0.15 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,

4. Chris Powell of GATA provides to us very important physical commentaries

5. Other gold commentaries

6. Commodity commentaries/cryptocurrencies

3. ASIAN AFFAIRS

i)THURSDAY MORNING// WEDNESDAY  NIGHT

SHANGHAI CLOSED       //Hang Sang CLOSED  /The Nikkei closed  DOWN 299.29 PTS OR 1.06%      //Australia’s all ordinaires CLOSED DOWN 0.34%  /Chinese yuan (ONSHORE) closed HOLIDAY    /Oil DOWN TO 87.01 dollars per barrel for WTI and DOWN TO 88.58 for Brent. Stocks in Europe OPENED  MOSTLY RED EXCEPT SPAIN      //  ONSHORE YUAN CLOSED XX  AGAINST THE DOLLAR AT XXX. OFFSHORE YUAN CLOSED DOWN ON THE DOLLAR AT 6.3637: /ONSHORE YUAN TRADING ABOVE LEVEL OF OFFSHORE YUAN/ONSHORE YUAN AND OFF SHORE 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 FELL BY A FAIR SIZED 2982 CONTRACTS  AND FURTHER FROM 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  COMEX DECREASE OCCURRED DESPITE OUR  GAIN OF $7.95 IN GOLD PRICING WEDNESDAY’S COMEX TRADING. WE ALSO HAD A SMALL SIZED EFP (768 CONTRACTS). . THEY WERE PAID HANDSOMELY  NOT TO TAKE DELIVERY AT THE COMEX AND SETTLE FOR CASH. 

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   ACTIVE DELIVERY MONTH OF FEB..  THE CME REPORTS THAT THE BANKERS ISSUED A SMALL SIZED TRANSFER THROUGH THE EFP ROUTE AS THESE LONGS RECEIVED A DELIVERABLE LONDON FORWARD TOGETHER WITH A FIAT BONUS.,

THAT IS 768 EFP CONTRACTS WERE ISSUED:  ;: ,   & FEB. 0 APRIL: 768 & ZERO FOR ALL OTHER MONTHS:

TOTAL EFP ISSUANCE:  768 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 LOST THE FOLLOWING TODAY ON OUR TWO EXCHANGES: A SMALL SIZED 2214 TOTAL CONTRACTS IN THAT 768 LONGS WERE TRANSFERRED AS FORWARDS TO LONDON AND WE HAD A FAIR SIZED  COMEX OI LOSS OF 2982  CONTRACTS..

// WE HAVE A STRONG AMOUNT OF GOLD TONNAGE STANDING FOR FEB   (59.511),

 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

FEB 2022: 59.511 TONNES

THE BANKERS WERE  UNSUCCESSFUL IN LOWERING GOLD’S PRICE  //// (IT ROSE $7.95) BUT THEY WERE  SUCCESSFUL IN FLEECING SOME LONGS AS WE HAVE  REGISTERED A  LOSS OF 6.876 TONNES OF TOTAL OI, ACCOMPANYING OUR HUGE GOLD TONNAGE STANDING FOR FEB (59.511 TONNES)…

WE HAD  –55 CONTRACTS REMOVED FROM COMEX TRADES. THESE WERE REMOVED AFTER TRADING ENDED LAST NIGHT

NET LOSS ON THE TWO EXCHANGES 2214 CONTRACTS OR 221,400 OZ OR 6.886 TONNES

Estimated gold volume today: 168,787 /// poor

Confirmed volume yesterday: 130,391contracts  poor 

INITIAL STANDINGS FOR FEB ’22 COMEX GOLD //FEB 3

Gold	Ounces
Withdrawals from Dealers Inventory in oz	nil oz
Withdrawals from Customer Inventory in oz	32,247.450 oz Brinks1003 kilobars
Deposit to the Dealer Inventory in oz	nilOZ
Deposits to the Customer Inventory, in oz	96.453 oz Manfra 3 kilobars
No of oz served (contracts) today	469  notice(s )46,900 OZ 1.4587 TONNES
No of oz to be served (notices)	3435 contracts  343,500 oz 10.684 TONNES
Total monthly oz gold served (contracts) so far this month	15,698 notices 1,569,800 OZ 48.827 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

For today:

No dealer deposit 0

No dealer withdrawal 0

1 customer deposit

i) Into Manfra: 96.453 oz (3 kilobars)

total deposit: 96.453 oz oz

1 customer withdrawals

i) Out of Brinks:  32,247.450 oz

total withdrawals:  32,247.450 oz

ADJUSTMENTS: 1//dealer to customer

i) Out of JPMorgan:  25,665.733 oz oz 

CALCULATIONS FOR THE AMOUNT OF GOLD STANDING FOR JANUARY.

For the front month of FEBRUARY we have an oi of 3904 stand for  LOSING 3676 contracts. 

We had 2692 contracts served upon yesterday, so we lost 984 contracts or an additional 98,400 oz will not stand on this side of the pond and

these guys were E.F.P.’d to London where they received a handsome bonus for their effort. Looks like no gold to be found over here.

The month of March saw a loss of 68 contracts and thus the OI standing is 5382.

April saw a loss of 699 contracts up to 396,531.

We had 469 notice(s) filed today for 46900  oz FOR THE FEB 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 158  contract(s) of which 79  notices were stopped (received) by j.P. Morgan dealer and 79 notice(s) was (were) stopped/ Received) by J.P.Morgan//customer account and 5900  notice(s) received (stopped) by the squid  (Goldman Sachs)

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

we take the total number of notices filed so far for the month (15,698) x 100 oz , to which we add the difference between the open interest for the front month of  (FEB: 3904 CONTRACTS ) minus the number of notices served upon today  469 x 100 oz per contract equals 2,011,700 OZ  OR 62.572 TONNES the number of TONNES standing in this  active month of FEB. 

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

No of notices filed so far (15,698) x 100 oz+   (3904)  OI for the front month minus the number of notices served upon today (469} x 100 oz} which equals 2,014,800 oz standing OR 59.511 TONNES in this  active delivery month of FEB.

We lost 984 contracts or an additional 98,400 oz will not stand over here and were EFP’d. to London 

TOTAL COMEX GOLD STANDING:  59.511 TONNES  (HUGE FOR A FEBRUARY DELIVERY MONTH)

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

COMEX GOLD INVENTORIES/CLASSIFICATION

NEW PLEDGED GOLD:

157,392.690, oz NOW PLEDGED /HSBC  4.89 TONNES

125,410.592 PLEDGED  MANFRA 2.90 TONNES

54,339.114oz PLEDGED JPMorgan no 1  1.690

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

898,821.330 oz pledged  Brinks/27,96 TONNES

12,249,333 oz International Delaware:  0..3810 tonne

Loomis: 18,615.429 oz

total pledged gold:  1,553,863.297 oz                                     48.331 tonnes

TOTAL REGISTERED AND ELIZ GOLD AT THE COMEX: 32,759,998.479  OZ (1018.97 TONNES)

TOTAL ELIGIBLE GOLD: 15,437,286.855 OZ (480.16 tonnes)

TOTAL OF ALL REGISTERED GOLD: 17,322,711.624 OZ  (538.81 tonnes)

REGISTERED GOLD THAT CAN BE SERVED UPON: 15,768,848.0 OZ (REG GOLD- PLEDGED GOLD)  490.48 tonnes

END

FEBRUARY 2022 CONTRACT MONTH//SILVER

INITIAL STANDING FOR SILVER//FEB 3

Silver	Ounces
Withdrawals from Dealers Inventory	NIL oz
Withdrawals from Customer Inventory	1,911,188.931  oz Brinks CNT Manfra Delaware JPMorgan
Deposits to the Dealer Inventory	nilOZ
Deposits to the Customer Inventory	603,729.030 oz CNT Delaware
No of oz served today (contracts)	117CONTRACT(S) 585,000  OZ)
No of oz to be served (notices)	35 contracts  (175,000 oz)
Total monthly oz silver served (contracts)	1139 contracts  5,695,000, 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 have 2 deposits

i) Into CNT:  599,836.880 oz

ii) Into Delaware: 3892.5 oz

JPMorgan has a total silver weight: 184.65 million oz/351.801 million =52.47% of comex 

ii) Comex withdrawals: 5

 a)Brinks:  639,180.946 oz

b) CNT;  205,350.025 oz

c)Manfra: 481,359.190 oz

d) Delaware: 2025.87 oz

e)JPMorgan: 583,272.920 oz

total withdrawal 1,911,188.931  oz

we had 4 adjustments: all dealer to customer

Brinks:  14,906.06 oz

ii) CNT: 5029.34 oz

iii))JPMorgan: 45,174.830 oz

iv) Manfra 14,740.470 oz

the silver comex is in stress!

TOTAL REGISTERED SILVER: 81.864 MILLION OZ

TOTAL REG + ELIG. 351.801 MILLION OZ

CALCULATION OF SILVER OZ STANDING FOR FEBRUARY

silver open interest data:

FRONT MONTH OF FEB//2022 OI: 152 CONTRACTS LOSING  283 contracts on the day. We had  408 contracts served upon yesterday.

So we gained 125 contracts or an additional 625,000 oz will stand for silver on this side of the pond.

FOR MARCH WE HAD A loss OF 2203 CONTRACTS UP TO 104,211 CONTRACTS.

APRIL HAD A SMALL GAIN OF 6 CONTRACTS UP TO 21

MAY HAD A  GAIN OF 910 CONTRACTS UP TO 26,889 contracts

 .

TOTAL NUMBER OF NOTICES FILED FOR TODAY: 117 for 585,000 oz

Comex volumes: 59,336// est. volume today//weak

Comex volume: confirmed YESTERDAY: 42,300 contracts (weak)

To calculate the number of silver ounces that will stand for delivery in FEB. we take the total number of notices filed for the month so far at  1139 x 5,000 oz =. 5,695,000 oz 

to which we add the difference between the open interest for the front month of FEB (152) and the number of notices served upon today 117 x (5000 oz) equals the number of ounces standing.

Thus the  standings for silver for the FEB./2021 contract month: 1139 (notices served so far) x 5000 oz + OI for front month of FEB (152)  – number of notices served upon today (117) x 5000 oz of silver standing for the FEB contract month equates 5,870,000 oz. .

We gained 125 CONTRACTS OR 625,000 ADDITIONAL oz of silver will stand at the comex.

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

FEB 3/WITH GOLD DOWN $5.55: HUGE CHANGES IN GOLD INVENTORY AT THE GLD: A WITHDRAWAL OF 1.45 TONNES FROM THE GLD////INVENTORY RESTS AT 1016.59 TONNES

FEB 2/WITH GOLD UP $7.95//A HUGE CHANGES IN GOLD INVENTORY AT THE GLD: A DEPOSIT OF 3.78 TONES OF GOLD INTO THE GLD////INVENTORY RESTS AT 1018.04 TONNES

FEB 1/WITH GOLD UP $5.40: NO CHANGES IN GOLD INVENTORY AT THE GLD//INVENTORY RESTS AT 1014.26 TONNES

JAN 31/WITH GOLD UP $10.10//NO CHANGE IN GOLD INVENTORY AT THE GLD//INVENTORY RESTS AT 1014.26 TONNES

JAN 28/WITH GOLD DOWN $8.30//NO CHANGE IN GOLD INVENTORY AT THE GLD//INVENTORY RESTS AT 1014.26 TONNES

JAN 27/WITH GOLD DOWN $36.15//ANOTHER HUGE CHANGE IN GOLD INVENTORY AT THE GLD: A DEPOSIT OF 1.16 TONNES INTO THE GLD.//INVENTORY RESTS AT 1014.26 TONNES

JAN 26/WITH GOLD DOWN $21.60 A HUGE CHANGES IN GOLD INVENTORY AT THE GLD: A DEPOSIT OF 4.65 TONNES INTO THE GLD///INVENTORY RESTS AT 1013.10 TONNES

JAN 25/WITH GOLD UP $10.40 TODAY: NO CHANGES IN GOLD INVENTORY AT THE GLD//INVENTORY RESTS AT 1008.45 TONNES

JAN 24/WITH GOLD UP $10.10 TODAY: A HUGE CHANGE IN GOLD INVENTORY AT THE GLD: AN UNBELIEVABLE DEPOSIT OF 27.59 TONNES INTO THE GLD//INVENTORY RESTS AT 1008.45 TONNES

JAN 21/WITH GOLD DOWN $10.80 TODAY: NO CHANGES IN GOLD INVENTORY AT THE GLD//INVENTORY RESTS AT 980.86 TONNES

JAN 20/WITH GOLD UP $.20 TODAY: A SMALL CHANGE IN GOLD INVENTORY AT THE GLD: A WITHDRAWAL OF .58 TONNES FROM THE GLD///INVENTORY RESTS AT 980.86 TONNES

JAN 19/WITH GOLD UP $29.65 TODAY: A HUGE CHANGE IN GOLD INVENTORY AT THE GLD//A DEPOSIT OF 5.27 TONNES INTO THE GLD/INVENTORY RESTS AT 981.44 TONNES

JAN 18/WITH GOLD DOWN $3.25//NO CHANGES IN GOLD INVENTORY AT THE GLD//INVENTORY RESTS AT 976.21 TONNES

JAN 14/ WITH GOLD DOWN $5.25/NO CHANGES IN GOLD INVENTORY AT THE GLD/INVENTORY RESTS AT 976.21 TONNES

JAN 13/WITH GOLD DOWN $5.75: NO CHANGES IN GOLD INVENTORY AT THE GLD//INVENTORY RESTS AT 976.21 TONNES

JAN 12/WITH GOLD UP $8.65//NO CHANGES IN GOLD INVENTORY AT THE GLD//INVENTORY RESTS AT 976.21 TONNES

JAN 11/WITH GOLD UP $19.25/A SMALL CHANGE IN GOLD INVENTORY AT THE GLD: A WITHDRAWAL OF .87 TONNES FROM THE GLD/INVENTORY RESTS AT 976.21 TONNES

JAN 10/WITH GOLD UP $2.00/NO CHANGE IN GOLD INVENTORY AT THE GLD/INVENTORY RESTS AT 977.08 TONNES

JAN 7/WITH GOLD UP $8.15//A SMALL CHANGE IN GOLD INVENTORY AT THE GLD: A WITHDRAWLA OF 1.16 TONNES FROM THE GLD////INVENTORY RESTS AT 978.83 TONNES

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

CLOSING INVENTORY: 1016.59 TONNES

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

SLV

FEB 3/WITH SILVER DOWN 35 CENTS: NO CHANGES IN SILVER INVENTORY AT THE SLV//INVENTORY RESTS AT539.212 MILLION OZ//

FEB 2/WITH SILVER UP 15 CENTS TODAY: A HUGE CHANGE IN SILVER INVENTORY AT THE SLV: A DEPOSIT OF 5.411 MILLION OZ INTO THE SLV.//INVENTORY RESTS AT 539.212 MILLION OZ/

FEB 1/WITH SILVER UP 18 CENTS TODAY: NO CHANGES IN SILVER INVENTORY AT THE SLV//INVENTORY RESTS AT 533.801 MILLION OZ

JAN 31/WITH SILVER UP 7 CENTS TODAY: A HUGE CHANGE IN SILVER INVENTORY AT THE SLV: A WITHDRAWAL OF 1.202 MILLION OZ FORM THE SLV.//INVENTORY RESTS AT 533.801 MILLION OZ//

JAN 28/WITH SILVER DOWN 36 CENTS : NO CHANGE IN SILVER INVENTORY AT THE SLV//INVENTORY RESTS AT 535.003 MILLION OZ//

JAN 27/WITH SILVER DOWN $1.13 TODAY: NO CHANGES IN SILVER INVENTORY AT THE SLV//INVENTORY RESTS AT 535.003 MILLION OZ//

JAN 26/WITH SILVER DOWN 7 CENTS TODAY: NO CHANGES IN SILVER INVENTORY AT THE SLV//INVENTORY RESTS AT 535.003 MILLION OZ//

JAN 25/WITH SILVER UP 10 CENTS TODAY: A HUGE CHANGE IN SILVER INVENTORY AT THE SLV: A DEPOSIT OF 2.311 MILLION OZ INTO THE SLV////INVENTORY RESTS AT 535.003 MILLION OZ/

.JAN 24/WITH SILVER DOWN 48 CENTS TODAY: A MASSIVE CHANGE IN SILVER INVENTORY AT THE SLV: A DEPOSIT OF 4.8 MILLION OZ INTO THE SLV////INVENTORY RESTS AT 532.692 MILLION OZ//.

JAN 21/WITH SILVER DOWN 41 CENTS TODAY: NO CHANGES IN SILVER INVENTORY AT THE SLV//INVENTORY RESTS AT 527.792 MILLION OZ

JAN 20/WITH SILVER UP 52 CENTS TODAY: A BIG CHANGE IN SILVER INVENTORY AT THE SLV: A DEPOSIT OF 1.998 MILLION OZ INTO THE SLV///INVENTORY RESTS AT 527.792 MILLION OZ

JAN 19/WITH SILVER UP 71 CENTS TODAY: A BIG CHANGES IN SILVER INVENTORY AT THE SLV: A DEPOSIT OF 1.942 MILLION OZ INTO THE SLV/INVENTORY RESTS AT 525.804 MILLION OZ

JAN 18/WITH SILVER UP 51 CENTS TODAY: TWO HUGE CHANGES IN SILVER INVENTORY AT THE SLV: 2 WITHDRAWALS OF 1.11 MILLION OZ AND 1.424 MILLION OZ FROM THE SLV////INVENTORY RESTS AT 527.246 MILLION OZ//

JAN 14/WITH SILVER DOWN 21 CENTS: NO CHANGES IN SILVER INVENTORY AT THE SLV//INVENTORY RESTS AT 529.780 MILLION OZ//

JAN 13/WITH SILVER DOWN 2 CENTS: A BIG CHANGE IN SILVER INVENTORY AT THE SLV:A WITHDRAWAL OF 832,000 OZ FROM THE SLV////INVENTORY RESTS AT 529.780 MILLION OZ

JAN 12/WITH SILVER UP 38 CENTS TODAY : NO CHANGES IN SILVER INVENTORY AT THE SLV//INVENTORY RESTS AT 530.612 MILLION OZ//

JAN 11/WITH SILVER  UP 33 CENTS TODAY; NO CHANGES IN SILVER INVENTORY AT THE SLV//INVENTORY RESTS AT 530.612 MILLION OZ/.

JAN 10/WITH SILVER UP 9 CENTS TODAY: NO CHANGES IN SILVER INVENTORY AT THE SLV/INVENTORY RESTS AT 530.612 MILLION OZ//.

JAN 7/WITH SILVER UP 17 CENTS TODAY:NO CHANGES IN SILVER INVENTORY AT THE SLV//INVENTORY RESTS AT 530.612 MILLION OZ//.

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//

CLOSING INVENTORY:  539.212 MILLION OZ

PHYSICAL GOLD/SILVER STORIES

1.PETER SCHIFF

Peter Schiff: The Dollar Is Monopoly Money Supported By A Ponzi Scheme

THURSDAY, FEB 03, 2022 – 11:20 AM

Via SchiffGold.com,

The national debt quietly pushed past $30 trillion on Jan. 31. But that is only the tip of the debt iceberg. The American taxpayer is on the hook for a lot more than that. In his podcast, Peter Schiff said US government borrowing and spending has turned the dollar into monopoly money propped up by a massive Ponzi Scheme.

On top of the federal government’s $30 trillion of debt, you have to add state and local government debt totaling about another $3.2 trillion. That brings the total debt to GDP ratio in the US to 142 percent. Peter called this a “shockingly high number.”

Especially when the GDP is a bunch of fluff like ours. So much of our GDP is service sector. I think only 10%, if that, is from manufacturing. So, we have a very small portion of our GDP related to producing real wealth.”

But that still doesn’t reveal the entire debt story. To really understand the country’s financial health, you also have to include unfunded liabilities. These are payments the government has promised to make in the future, including Social Security and Medicare. That adds another $160 trillion in liabilities to Uncle Sam’s balance sheet.

If you take the unfunded liabilities and add them to the funded debt, you’re at nearly $200 trillion.

As Peter said, this is completely unplayable.

It’s not going to be paid. And so what’s going to happen? Well, it’s going to be defaulted, either honestly or dishonestly.”

The honest way to default is to admit you’re broke and simply not pay.

Of course, it’s not going to do that. No one in Washington is willing to be honest with creditors. So, the other way is through inflation. And that’s what’s going to happen. We are going to inflate the debt away.”

That creates a whole new set of problems. Peter said the realization the US government is simply going to keep inflating will cause a run on the US dollar and US Treasuries.

A lot of people, including proponents of MMT, believe that we don’t really have to worry about credit quality. The US government will never default. Since the US borrows in its own currency, it can print virtually as much money as it needs to. Creditors won’t really be concerned, no matter how much debt the US government runs up.

But they will be concerned because they realize that we can’t repay the debt honestly through taxation because there’s just not enough money available from the taxpayer. When you’ve got the federal government, and the state and local governments, all looking for the same taxpayer, and that guy is broke, how are you going to repay this debt? You can’t. It’s going to be repudiated through inflation.”

Peter said there’s a big difference between getting repaid honestly out of taxation and getting paid dishonestly through inflation.

And if you think it’s going to be the latter, then you want to get out of Dodge.”

Imagine a simple society with one taxpayer, a creditor and the government. The government borrows $100 from the creditor. Now the taxpayer is on the hook for $100. If the government goes ahead and taxes the taxpayer, the creditor gets $100 and everybody is happy. (Except perhaps the taxpayer who is out $100.) Now, the government could decide it doesn’t want to tax the taxpayer. The government needs his vote. So instead, the government prints $100 out of thin air and hands it to the lender. In that case, the taxpayer has $100 and so does the creditor.

But now there’s another problem. The amount of goods and services in the economy hasn’t changed. Prices will double because the government has doubled the money supply.

Now the taxpayer, when he goes to spend his $100, well, he only gets $50 worth of stuff. So, he’s taken a loss. He doesn’t lose as much as if the government had taken his entire $100 and given it to the creditor. But he lost half his money, even though the government took nothing. But now the creditor, when he gets paid $100, he didn’t really get his money back. Because now prices have doubled. He can only buy $50 worth of stuff. Now, he got more money than he would have gotten had the government just defaulted and given him nothing. But because the government didn’t do that, they inflated — he still gets something. But he’s lost half of his purchasing power. That is a real loss. And that loss is going to be factored into the willingness of US creditors to continue to hold US Treasuries.”

Peter said he’s always gotten a big kick out of people who say we don’t have to pay the massive government debt back and claim the government can just keep borrowing indefinitely.

How can that be? If we don’t have to repay it, it’s really not debt. We’re really not borrowing if we don’t have to pay it back. And the thing is — if it’s true that we can borrow money and never pay it back, what kind of idiot is loaning us the money if we’re never going to pay it back? Because the important part about making a loan is getting paid back. That’s what it really boils down to. … The key is to get your money back.”

So, who is going to continue to loan the US money if we tell them right off the bat, “You’re never getting paid back.”?

Apparently, the plan is to pay the current lenders back by borrowing money from new people.

In other words, the reason we can keep on doing this is because it’s a giant Ponzi scheme. But again, if it’s a giant Ponzi scheme, why do people willingly participate? It’s because they don’t realize it’s a Ponzi scheme. They think they’re going to get paid back. When they realize they’re going to be paid back in monopoly money, they’re not going to want to lend. In fact, they’re not going to want to hold on to these Treasuries and the only buyer is going to be the Federal Reserve. And that’s when the printing press is going to overdrive and the dollar is going to fall through the floor.”

In this podcast, Peter also says the stock market is rotating, not crashing, weak economic data will make it harder for the Fed to tighten, the Fed may start blaming rising oil prices on a slowing economy, and 6 more weeks of winter is nothing compared to the crypto winter ahead.

end

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

end

end

3.  Chris Powell of GATA provides to us very important physical commentaries

You will recall that Europe had lots of trouble trying to reach an inflation level of 2%. Now they have overshot their target.

Inflation hits a record 5.1% in January

(London’s Financial Times/GATA)

Eurozone inflation hits record 5.1% in January

Submitted by admin on Wed, 2022-02-02 11:00Section: Daily Dispatches

By Martin Arnold
Financial Times, London
Wednesday, February 2, 2022

Consumer prices in the eurozone rose by a record 5.1% in January from a year earlier, keeping inflation higher than expected and increasing the pressure on the European Central Bank to respond with tighter monetary policy.

Steeper increases in the price of energy and food were only partly offset by slower growth in prices of manufactured goods, which meant annual inflation rose from its previous eurozone record of 5% in December, Eurostat said today. 

That clashed with widespread expectations of a fall in eurozone inflation. Economists polled by Reuters had on average forecast a eurozone inflation rate of 4.4% in January. …

… For the remainder of the report:

https://www.ft.com/content/ef5ce3b5-f8a6-43ca-9a4d-3a507d12dda

end

Bloomberg reports that a huge whale is picking up gold as soon as it falls below $1800.00 and they hide the purchases well

It could only get governments.

(Bloomberg/GATA)

A whale is snapping up gold below $1,800, likely a government

Submitted by admin on Wed, 2022-02-02 21:01Section: Daily Dispatches

By Eddie van der Walt
Bloomberg News
via Yahoo Finance, Sunnyvale, California

https://finance.yahoo.com/news/looks-whale-snapping-gold-bullion-124225535.html

Spot gold is again bobbing along near $1,800 an ounce, as it has been since mid-2020. The stickiness of that level, particularly as fundamentals turned more bearish, suggests there’s a big buyer somewhere in these waters.

Since breaking above the round number in July 2020, the gold price dipped below it 19 times on a closing basis, only to regain its footing. In the past year, the modeled value of gold, based on a regression study that includes the dollar, real rates, and exchanged-traded fund holdings, dropped nearly 10%. Yet the metal’s price only fell around 2%. Clearly, there is a big buyer who considers the metal a long-term hold.

Such whale activity, which shows up neither in ETF holdings nor in futures positioning, would require a substantial buyer, accumulating in size in the London over-the-counter market. Yet vault holdings reported by the London Bullion Market Association, which include both ETF and some central bank-owned metal, show only a fractional increase in the year through December, from 307 million to 309 million troy ounces.

That would suggest that whoever is buying is able to buy in scale, leave little footprint in the market, and then take delivery and store the metal in secure, invisible vaults. 

And that points strongly toward a sovereign buyer.

Central banks normally declare to the International Monetary Fund the amounts of metal they have on their books. But there are precedents where this has been done with some delay. Between 2009 and 2015, China reported no change in holdings, only to reveal that it had bought 53 million ounces of metal over the period.

END

4.OTHER GOLD/SILVER COMMENTARIES

SPECIAL THANKS TO DOUG c FOR SENDING THIS TO US:

https://www.silverdoctors.com/headlines/world-news/there-is-an-urgent-need-to-revalue-the-price-of-silver/

There Is An Urgent Need To Revalue The Price Of Silver

February 3, 2022 866

Even if the price of silver were to increase tenfold, it would not be enough to…

by Cyrille Jubert of CyrilleJubert.com

Open Letter to the Glasgow Financial Alliance for Net Zero (GFANZ).

Gentlemen,

First, rest assured that citizens of our planet are grateful to the United Nations and to each one of the members of your assembly for having decided to do everything possible to advance our society towards green energy. As your Financial Alliance for Net Zero brings together the most powerful financial companies in the G7, you can only succeed in this endeavour, as nothing could resist the combination of the will and energy of today’s brightest decision makers, under the leadership of President Mark Carney.

After the creation of the Alliance in April 2021 and the first working meetings late spring and during summer 2021, you must have noticed that there were bottlenecks, which should make it extremely difficult to achieve your objectives and which could only delay their implementation. Despite this, you have set a schedule with very close deadlines. Under the current market conditions, this objectives seems unrealistic. Even by changing some of the factors in the equation, you will remain in an emergency with time constraints that are difficult to compress..

Weeks and months have passed and we have been waiting for you to break these locks, which still limit your actions and your agenda

To achieve the Net Zero objectives, solar energy is brought to an increasing development by 2040, as IEA already predicted at the end of 2019.

Industrial demand, particularly for photovoltaics, has already increased sharply in 2021, bringing global silver demand to 1 029 Moz for a mining production of only 829 Moz. The World Bank anticipates a doubling of the annual demand for silver for solar PV, which should reach 3 200 tons in 2050, while mining production in 2020 was only 25 000 tons (source: USGS). Depending on the scenarios chosen, the demand for silver for green energies will have to increase by 15 000 tons (Page 96 and chart page 103 of the “Minerals for Climate Action: The Mineral Intensity of the Clean Energy Transition” Report). 

The mining company South32 estimates that this new demand will require 30 Moz each year for the next 20 years, an increase of 55% but probably even 95% to reach the goal of 1.5 degrees Celsius. (Source: stockhead)

Today, silver reserves in the ground are estimated by the USGS at 500 000 tons, i.e. 20 years of production at the current rate, but less if production is accelerated.

The chart below relates very generally to the geological research budgets for non-ferrous metals, i.e. gold, silver, copper, nickel, platinum, aluminium, tin, lead and zinc. Budgets have barely increased in 2021, despite the very strong increases in some of these metals in the last quarter.

With the continued decline in the silver content of the ores, the former pure silver mines had to diversify, because the silver was no longer profitable enough. As a result, the share of world production of silver from copper, zinc, lead and tin mines is steadily increasing.

The new presidents elected in 2021 in Peru and Chile are making mining companies suffer by questioning previous policies. There will be a sharp increase in royalties paid to the states. The project for a new copper mine is blocked to stop destroying the environment. That seems to be the logic of the times. It simply means that metals will always be more expensive to produce and that their prices must go up.

Whether your name is BlackRock or StateStreet, JPM or Bank of America, to justify to your shareholders an investment in geological research and in Junior Explorers, the game must be worth the candle. However, for the moment, few silver mines are able to make a profit, simply because the price of silver is kept too low. In the Financial Alliance for Net Zero, everyone knows it.

Even if the price of silver were to increase tenfold, it would not be enough to bring it back to a normal price, given the monetary creation of recent years and the loss of purchasing power induced in the main currencies. Even at $200, few investors, who hoard to protect themselves from inflation, would agree to contribute their metal to accelerate the World photovoltaic production.

Between the time when geological research is activated, new veins are identified and the mine goes into production, it takes between 10 and 20 years. If you want to meet your 2030 and 2040 objectives, there is an urgent need to massively revalue the price of silver.

While waiting to see the Financial Alliance at work in this direction, please believe, Gentlemen, in the expression of our respectful consideration.

END

5.OTHER COMMODITIES/COTTON

6.CRYPTOCURRENCIES

Steve Brown..

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 XX

OFFSHORE YUAN: 6.3637

HANG SANG CLOSED

2. Nikkei closed DOWN 299.29 PTS OR 1.06%

3. Europe stocks  MOSTLY RED  

USA dollar INDEX UP TO  96.15/Euro FALLS TO 1.1295-

3b Japan 10 YR bond yield: RISES TO. +.180/ !!!!(Japan buying 100% of bond issuance)/Japanese yen vs usa cross now at 114.87/ 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:: 87.01 and Brent: 88.58–

3f Gold DOWN /JAPANESE Yen UP CHINESE YUAN:   ON -SHORE CLOSED XX//  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 DOWN for WTI and DOWN FOR Brent this morning

3i European bond buying continues to push yields lower on all fronts in the EMU. German 10yr bund RISES TO +.0.064%/Italian 10 Yr bond yield RISES to 1.49% /SPAIN 10 YR BOND YIELD RISES TO 0.84%…ITALIAN 10 YR BOND YIELD/GERMAN BUND: 1.43: DANGEROUS FOR THE ITALIAN BANKING SYSTEM

3j Greek 10 year bond yield RISES TO : 1.95

3k Gold at $1801.95 silver at: 22.35   7 am est) SILVER NEXT RESISTANCE LEVEL AT $30.00

3l USA vs Russian rouble;// Russian rouble DOWN 14/100 in roubles/dollar AT 76.35

3m oil into the 87 dollar handle for WTI and 88 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 114.87 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 .9221– as the Swiss Franc is still rising against most currencies. Euro vs SF 1.0418 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: 1.796 UP 2 BASIS PTS

USA 30 YR BOND YIELD: 2.132 UP 2 BASIS PTS

USA DOLLAR VS TURKISH LIRA: 13.57

US Equity Futures Tumble After Tech Rout

THURSDAY, FEB 03, 2022 – 07:43 AM

If Google’s earnings on Tuesday sent futures sharply higher yesterday, then Facebook’s disastrous earnings report late on Wednesday has reversed almost all of the gains – US index futures are sharply lower today led by a plunge in technology stocks after a bout of disappointing earnings reports from Meta, Qualcomm and Spotify boosted concern about the market impact of the Fed tightening. Nasdaq futures tumbled 2.2%, emini S&P futs were down 50 points or 1.1% to 4527 and Dow futures were 0.4% lower.  The dollar strengthened before rate decisions in Europe and the U.K.

Facebook parent Meta Platforms was on pace for its biggest drop ever and slashing its valuation by about $200 billion- the biggest in market history –  after its sales forecast missed estimates amid stagnating user growth and increasing competition from TikTok. Meta shares, which had plunged 22% in late New York trading, continued its losses in Thursday’s premarket session. NVidia Corp. and Qualcomm lost more than 3.8%. Amazon.com Inc., which will post its financial results after U.S. market hours, slid 3.7%. Twitter, Spotify, Snap and Pinterest also fell, while T-Mobile US gained 7.7%.

Investors will now focus on upcoming earnings from Amazon, the last remaining tech giant, while looking past signs of a temporary soft patch in the U.S. job market, according to Ipek Ozkardeskaya, senior analyst at Swissquote.

“There are millions of jobs available in the market, and there is nothing the Fed could do to get people to work,” she wrote in a note. “What people care about is the earnings, and inflation.”

The poorly received earnings reports from the U.S. tech giants are a challenge for dip buyers hoping that corporate performance will ease worries about central bank interest-rate hikes. Markets have swung sharply and stocks are nursing losses this year as officials pare stimulus to curb inflation.

“Volatility is here to stay,” Anna Han, equity strategist at Wells Fargo Securities, said on Bloomberg Television. “Our outlook for 2022 was that we’d see more spikes in volatility. With that choppiness, with that unpredictability, investors are going to express that by compressing multiples.”

Electric vehicle stocks are sliding in premarket trading Thursday amid a broader selloff in tech and growth firms with U.S. stock index futures sinking. Lordstown Motors slides 5.2%, Workhorse falls 3.8%, Rivian slides 3.8%, Nio is 3.6% lower, Tesla drops 3%, Li Auto declines 3%, XPeng loses 2.8% and Nikola slips 1.9%. These stocks have all posted double-digit declines so far this year amid concerns of rising interest rates. Here are some of the biggest U.S. movers today:

• Meta Platforms (FB US) plunges as much as 22% in premarket trading after the Facebook- and Instagram- owner gave a revenue forecast for 1Q that missed estimates amid stagnating user growth. Other social media stocks declining premarket include: Snap (SNAP US) -16%; Pinterest (PINS US) -8.5%; Twitter (TWTR US) -8.1%
• Spotify (SPOT US) falls 9% in premarket trading after the subscription music service’s update, with quarterly growth and margin forecasts slightly missing estimates. However, analysts remain largely positive.
• Semiconductor stocks fall in premarket trading as Qualcomm (QCOM US) slides 3.2% after chip shortages hit results. Areas outside of the company’s phone sales were underwhelming. Advanced Micro Devices -2% (AMD US), Nvidia -3.2% (NVDA US), Micron -2.1% (MU US)
• T-Mobile (TMUS US) shares rise 8% in extended trading after the mobile phone service company gave a full-year outlook for postpaid customer additions that at the midpoint of the range exceeded analysts’ projections.
• Align Technology (ALGN US) falls 2.5% in premarket trading Wednesday after the company’s Invisalign case shipments for the fourth quarter missed analyst estimates.
• Cognizant Technology Solutions (CTSH US) fell 2% in extended trading on Wednesday after the IT services company reported its fourth-quarter results and outlook.

In Europe, tech and industrial companies led declines in the Stoxx Europe 600 Index, which slid as much as 0.9% to just a few points shy of Monday’s opening levels and was close to its 100-day moving average. Tech, industrials and media are the worst-performing sectors; FTSE 100 outperforms, with miners trading well following robust numbers from Shell. Compass Group jumped 8.1% to pre-pandemic levels in London after the catering-services provider reported first-quarter sales that beat estimates. Roche dropped 2.8% after the Swiss drugmaker issued a conservative forecast, saying sales of Covid-19 tests and therapies will likely wane.

The BOE hiked interest rates for the second successive meeting, taking the key rate up 25 basis points to 0.5%. Officials also signaled they would start running down their bond holdings, halting reinvestments on their gilt pile and offloading their corporate-bond portfolio.

The focus in Europe shifted to the European Central Bank’s rate decision. A record regional inflation print is adding pressure on policy makers to act amid concerns they may be too slow in fighting inflation. The pound advanced for a fifth day and traded at $1.3620.

Asian equities snapped a four-day rally after Meta Platforms and Sony posted subdued earnings and prospects, weighing on the region’s technology sector. The MSCI Asia Pacific Index eased 0.3% after gaining as much as 0.1%. Sony and Panasonic were among the biggest drags on the gauge amid concerns over their future earnings. Regional tech shares also took a hit from disappointing forecasts from Facebook’s parent and Spotify, while materials and utilities climbed. Panasonic Falls Most in 3 Months After 3Q Results Disappoint Sony Drops After Disappointing PlayStation Sales and Outlook Spotify Craters After Forecasting Slower Start to New Year *T Nasdaq 100 futures dropped more than 2% intraday while Japan’s benchmarks fell, offsetting gains in South Korean and Singapore gauges, which staged a catch-up rally after reopening from the Lunar New Year holiday. Asia’s stock gauge yesterday advanced for a fourth day as fears of Fed tightening receded. The earnings season has taken center stage, with investors trawling through management commentary for the outlook for supply chains and corporate profits. Bank of England and European Central Bank rate decisions are due later Thursday. “The downside on Wall Street could create headwinds for the Asian tech sector,” and potential hawkish rhetoric from the central banks in Europe may play a critical role in markets, Anderson Alves, a trader at brokerage ActivTrades, wrote in a note. Hong Kong’s stock market is set to reopen on Friday, followed by mainland China and Taiwan on Monday.

Japanese stocks dropped, ending a four-day rally, as a weak forecast from Facebook’s parent sparked a selloff in technology shares. Electronics and machinery makers were the biggest drags on the Topix, which fell 0.9%. Fast Retailing and Tokyo Electron were the largest contributors to a 1.1% loss in the Nikkei 225. The Topix had gained 5.1% over the previous four sessions, its best four-day gain since May 2021.  “We’re seeing a clear divide between firms that are able to continue to grow earnings and those that aren’t,” said Tetsuo Seshimo, a portfolio manager at Saison Asset Management Co. “People are going to be more selective in their stock picks, which means you’ll see some names being sold off.”

Indian stocks also fell, halting the biggest three-day gain in almost a year, dragged by Infosys Ltd.    The benchmark S&P BSE Sensex slipped 1.3% to 58,788.02 in Mumbai, while the NSE Nifty 50 Index dropped 1.2%. All but two of the 19 sub-indexes compiled by BSE Ltd. declined, with a measure of tech stocks snapping a four-day winning streak to fall 2%. Shares climbed more than 4% in the last three sessions as the government’s annual budget earmarked higher spending to restart the investment cycle and support a recovery in businesses disrupted by the pandemic.

Australia’s S&P/ASX 200 index fell 0.1% to 7,078.00, dragged lower by tech shares after disappointing earnings from sector bellwethers in the U.S. Regional tech stocks and futures contracts on the Nasdaq 100 dropped after Facebook parent Meta and streaming service Spotify plunged in late trading on soft outlooks. Read: Australia Braces for Tough Earnings Season as Risks Pile Up In Australia, payments firm Block was among the benchmark’s biggest laggards. Nufarm was the top performer after a 1Q update. In New Zealand, the S&P/NZX 50 index rose 0.4% to 12,335.32.

In rates, Treasury yields jjmped following wider losses in gilts after Bank of England raised rates by 25bp in a 5-4 vote, with four MPC members favoring a 50bp hike. BOE Governor Bailey press conference is ahead at 7:30am ET, and European Central Bank rate decision is expected at 7:45am, followed by President Lagarde press conference at 8:30am.  Treasury yields are cheaper by 1bp-2bp across the curve, 10-year by 2bp near 1.795% vs 6.5bp increase for U.K. 10-year yield; 2- year gilt yield rose as much as 10bp to 1.129% IG dollar issuance slate empty so far; $7.55b of new debt was priced Wednesday, taking weekly total to $19.5b vs $15b-$20b projected. Peripheral spreads widen with short-end Italy lagging. Japanese government bonds yield edged lower after a 30-year debt sale fetched a higher-than-estimated price.

In FX, Bloomberg dollar spot index drifts higher, rallying as the greenback advanced against all of its Group-of-10 peers, with CHF and NOK underperforming, GBP outperforms in G-10. The euro fell below $1.13 as it snapped a four-day advance; the Bund yield curve steepened slightly into the ECB. Gilt yields rise up to 2bps, led by the long end, while the pound inched lower, trimming its gains on the week, amid broad dollar gains and with traders turning their focus to the BOE. The BOE is expected to raise its policy rate as well as take the initial steps toward unwinding some of its 895 billion-pound ($1.2 trillion) stimulus program. The yen dipped amid broad dollar strength; two-year overnight-indexed yen swaps this week breached zero for the first time since 2016 — the year the Bank of Japan introduced its negative interest rate policy. The sometime proxy for investor expectations of future policy rates has risen three basis points this year. Bank of Japan Deputy Governor Masazumi Wakatabe says it’s a mistake if bond yields are rising on speculation that the BOJ might make adjustments to its monetary policy. Australian dollar declined as falling stock indexes spurred risk-off price action. Bonds rose ahead of the Reserve Bank’s quarterly Statement on Monetary Policy Friday. Turkish lira is the weakest in EMFX after Jan. inflation came in at the highest in 20 years.

In commodities, crude futures decline. WTI trades at the bottom of Wednesday’s range, falling 1% near $87.40. Base metals are mixed; LME copper falls 0.7% while LME aluminum gains 0.9%. Spot gold drops ~$4 near $1,803/oz. Spot silver loses 0.9% near $22

Looking at the day ahead now, and the main highlights will be the aforementioned monetary policy decisions from the ECB and the BoE, with press conferences afterwards from President Lagarde and Governor Bailey. Otherwise on the central bank front, there’s also the confirmation hearings at the Senate Banking Committee for the three new nominees for Fed governor. On the data side, there’s the January services and composite PMIs from around the world, and in the US there’s the ISM services index for January, December’s factory orders and the weekly initial jobless claims. Finally, earnings releases today include Amazon, Eli Lilly, Merck & Co., Honeywell and Ford.

Market Snapshot

• S&P 500 futures down 0.9% to 4,535.75
• MXAP down 0.3% to 186.61
• MXAPJ little changed at 609.19
• Nikkei down 1.1% to 27,241.31
• Topix down 0.9% to 1,919.92
• Hang Seng Index up 1.1% to 23,802.26
• Shanghai Composite down 1.0% to 3,361.44
• Sensex down 1.1% to 58,886.60
• Australia S&P/ASX 200 down 0.1% to 7,078.01
• Kospi up 1.7% to 2,707.82
• STOXX Europe 600 down 0.5% to 474.50
• German 10Y yield little changed at 0.04%
• Euro down 0.2% to $1.1288
• Brent Futures down 0.9% to $88.68/bbl
• Gold spot down 0.1% to $1,805.27
• U.S. Dollar Index up 0.23% to 96.16

Top Overnight News from Bloomberg

• Facebook parent Meta Platforms Inc. is set to shed about $200 billion in market value, in what would be one of the biggest one-day market capitalization wipeouts for any company on record
• The fastest inflation in decades is ending the low-rate era, but governments in the euro area have already locked in 461.85 billion euros ($522.5 billion) of funding in a pandemic- driven debt splurge. On top of that, the economic growth rate in Europe has never been this much higher than the average coupon on European sovereign bonds, suggesting the income nations generate from a growing economy will keep the debt burden manageable
• The world’s well of debt with yields below zero has shrunk to the lowest in more than three years as the prospect of imminent interest-rate hikes drives a selloff in bonds
• The U.K.’s cost of living crisis is set to escalate dramatically on Thursday, with millions facing a record increase in energy bills, forcing the government to roll out a multi-billion pound package to ease the burden

A more detailed look at global markets courtesy of Newsquawk

Asian stocks were mostly negative and took their cues from the selling pressure in US equity futures and Meta slump. ASX 200 (-0.1%) was subdued by losses in tech but with downside stemmed by mining stocks and mixed-to-firm data. Nikkei 225 (-1.1%) weakened as Japan mulls a quasi-emergency extension for Tokyo and with earnings in focus. KOSPI (+1.7%) outperformed and played catch up to this week’s gains on return from the Lunar New Year holiday. US equity futures were mostly pressured after almost USD 200bln was wiped off from Meta’s value which weighed on other social media stocks; E-mini S&P -0.9%, E-mini Nasdaq 100 -2.1%.

Top Asian News

• StanChart Zimbabwe Starts Probe After Reports CEO Suspended
• UAE Wealth Funds Behind $10 Billion Israel Plans Scout for Deals
• UAE Intercepts Hostile Drones After Wave of Attacks
• Tokyo Sets New Guidelines for Seeking Virus Emergency

European bourses are pressured, Stoxx 600 -0.7% given the US after-market read across, followed by numerous earnings releases in the pre-market dictating individual movers/sectors. European sectors are predominantly in the red as Tech lags post-Meta, -20.3% in the pre-market, while Healthcare is hit following Roche’s soft guidance.

Top European News

• StanChart Zimbabwe Starts Probe After Reports CEO Suspended
• U.K. Jan. Composite PMI 54.2 vs Flash Reading 53.4
• ABB Expects Minimum $750 Million From E-Mobility IPO: CEO
• Infineon Shares Decline Despite Raised Revenue Guidance

US Event Calendar

• 7:30am: Jan. Challenger Job Cuts YoY, prior -75.3%
• 8:30am: 4Q Unit Labor Costs, est. 1.0%, prior 9.6%; Nonfarm Productivity, est. 3.8%, prior -5.2%
• 8:30am: Jan. Initial Jobless Claims, est. 245,000, prior 260,000; Continuing Claims, est. 1.62m, prior 1.68m
• 9:45am: Jan. Markit US Services PMI, est. 50.9, prior 50.9
  • Jan. Markit US Composite PMI, est. 50.8, prior 50.8
• 10am: Dec. Factory Orders, est. -0.4%, prior 1.6%; Factory Orders Ex Trans, est. 0.4%, prior 0.8%
• 10am: Dec. Durable Goods Orders, est. -0.9%, prior -0.9%; -Less Transportation, prior 0.4%
  • Cap Goods Orders Nondef Ex Air, prior 0%
  • Cap Goods Ship Nondef Ex Air, prior 1.3%
• 10am: Jan. ISM Services Index, est. 59.5, prior 62.0, revised 62.3

DB’s Jim Reid concludes the overnight wrap

With all my injuries of late I can’t help thinking that my future sporting prowess might be more suited to, and also safer, in the metaverse. However even the metaverse isn’t a smooth ride as we found out last night. Indeed it’s rare that I’ll lead on one after hours earnings result but Meta’s (formerly Facebook) earnings miss sent shares down as much as -23.85% in the early hours. For a company that had around $890bn of market cap at yesterday’s close, that would equate to around $200bn of market cap losses, and wiping out the last year of gains. The market cap loss is also bigger than the market cap of Netflix ($202.9bn) at yesterday’s closing prices. This gives a scale of a damage done. The shares were hit hard by a combination of extraordinary expenses associated with building the metaverse, along with what appears to be stagnating growth in the user base. Those were common themes in other earnings releases overnight. Spotify was almost -30% lower in after-hours trading after revealing subscriber growth below analyst expectations, while Qualcomm was nearly -10% lower after hitting snags trying to expand their business. As a result, Nasdaq futures are trading (-2.17%) lower in Asia and the S&P 500 contract is following in sympathy (-0.90%).

Prior to the Meta news things were looking up for equities after a sensational four days. Indeed the S&P 500’s (+0.94% yesterday) advance over the last 4 sessions is +6.07%, which is the biggest 4-day gain since the relief rally following the November 2020 presidential election. For reference, at its recent intraday low at the start of last week, the S&P was down by -11.40% on a YTD basis, but it’s now recovered the bulk of that to only be down -3.71%. Today may put us back into reverse gear for a period of time at least with Amazon the big US earnings release to look forward to.

The S&P 500 climb up to the close was led by communications (+3.09%) following Alphabet’s (+6.43%) strong earnings and stock-split announced after the previous session’s close. The NASDAQ (+0.50%) managed to also advance for the fourth straight day, but by a smaller margin, while the small-cap Russell 2000 underperformed, falling -1.03%. European equities also gained, but lagged behind US indices, with the STOXX 600 advancing +0.45%.

Looking forward and it’s all about central banks today with a likely 25bps rate hike by the Bank of England potentially being overshadowed more by what the ECB doesn’t say today when they also meet. The ECB will be in a slightly difficult spot as it’s a non-forecast meeting so they won’t have any new numbers to present to allow them to methodically adjust their tone (if they indeed wanted to). However the rather large inflation beats seen this week across Europe will make for a difficult press conference if the tone doesn’t somehow become more hawkish. Our chief European economist Mark Wall wrote in a blog post yesterday (link here) that President Lagarde will be under pressure to explain why the ECB continues to expect inflation will fall below target in the medium term. Remember that our economists recently updated their call on ECB liftoff to an initial 25bp hike in December 2022, and in their preview for this meeting (link here) they outline their view that they expect the slow, step-by-step pivot to exit will continue. Will this appease an impatient market though? Expect Lagarde’s press conference to be a box office affair. Could the ECB at some point see a similar kind of attack we saw on front-end pricing in Australia in Q4 last year? There has to be some risk of this. As a minimum remember that in June last year the Fed and market weren’t pricing in a hike until 2024. Now we are debating 3-7 hikes and QT for 2022. So things can change very quickly once momentum builds.

We are entering an interesting week ahead with the central banks meetings today, US payrolls tomorrow and US CPI next Wednesday. Ahead of next Wednesday, the flash CPI estimate for the Euro Area unexpectedly rose to +5.1% in January (vs. +4.4% expected). That’s the highest inflation since the single currency’s formation, and was an unexpected increase from last month’s record as well. Furthermore, core inflation at +2.3% was also stronger than the +1.9% expected, albeit that did come down from the +2.6% reading last month.

Sovereign bond yields reversed an early rally as the inflation numbers came out and edged higher for the most part in Europe yesterday, with those on 10yr bunds (+0.4bps) inching higher to hit their highest level since April 2019. In part that was spurred by the view that the strong inflation data would force an earlier tightening of monetary policy from the ECB over the year ahead, and the euro also strengthened +0.29% in its 4th consecutive move higher. That made a contrast with the US, where diminishing bets that the Fed would hike rates by 50bps at the next meeting helped yields on 10yr Treasuries down -1.2bps to 1.78%. The number of hikes in 2022 got down to 4.625 in early US trading from 5.05 near the US open on Monday before closing at 4.71 (-0.07 hikes on the day), its lowest level in a week.

Onto the BoE. They are set to announce their latest decision at 12:00 London time, and we’ll also get the release of their quarterly Monetary Policy Report. In his preview (link here), our UK economist Sanjay Raja writes that he expects the BoE to follow up their December rate hike with another 25bps increase, taking the Bank Rate to 0.5%. Furthermore, he expects that the MPC should confirm that any APF reinvestments will cease from here on out, resulting in around £38bn falling out of the Bank’s balance sheet this year. That view expecting a rate hike is widely shared, with overnight index swaps just about pricing in a 25bp move at the meeting today, and that’s also the consensus view amongst economists on Bloomberg too.

Asian markets are reacting to the after hours US losses in thin holiday trade this morning. The Nikkei (-1.11%) is trading down, after four consecutive sessions of gains while the Kospi (+2.07%) is in positive territory after trading resumed following a three-day holiday break. Elsewhere, markets in China and Hong Kong remain closed for the Lunar New Year holiday. Meanwhile, Iron ore extended its rally for the third day with futures in Singapore up +2.80% at $143.70 ton on hopes that China’s stepped-up monetary easing will boost demand.

Earlier today, IHS Markit showed that South Korea’s January PMI rose to +52.8 from +51.9 in December as new orders picked up despite persistent supply chain woes. Separately, Japan’s services sector shrank at the fastest pace in five months after the Markit’s final estimate showed that the PMI slumped to 47.1 in January from 52.1 in the previous month.

In other news from the last 24 hours, the OPEC+ group agreed to a further output increase of +400k barrels per day in March, although recently the issue has been that suppliers are struggling to meet their quotas for a number of reasons, which has helped oil prices reach post-2014 highs lately. Oil itself was fairly subdued overall on the day, with Brent crude only up +0.35%, but the strength we’ve been mentioning in other commodities continued apace yesterday, with Bloomberg’s Commodity Spot Index (+1.56%) hitting a fresh all-time high thanks in part to a surge in US natural gas futures (+15.79%) amidst signs of further cold weather ahead. See my CoTD (link here) yesterday that showed that this is the strongest cycle for commodities on record at this stage of a US economic recovery.

Aside from the Euro Area inflation release, there wasn’t much in the way of other data yesterday. That said, we did get the ADP’s report of private payrolls for January, which unexpectedly showed a -301k decline as the Omicron variant took hold (vs. +180k expected). We’ll see tomorrow if that has any read through to what is already expected to be a bad headline payroll print. Current expectations are at +150k but I suspect the whisper number might be lower.

Elsewhere, geopolitical tensions in Eastern Europe remained on the edge after the Pentagon indicated to move some of its Europe-based forces further towards east and deploy additional US based troops to Europe.

To the day ahead now, and the main highlights will be the aforementioned monetary policy decisions from the ECB and the BoE, with press conferences afterwards from President Lagarde and Governor Bailey. Otherwise on the central bank front, there’s also the confirmation hearings at the Senate Banking Committee for the three new nominees for Fed governor. On the data side, there’s the January services and composite PMIs from around the world, and in the US there’s the ISM services index for January, December’s factory orders and the weekly initial jobless claims. Finally, earnings releases today include Amazon, Eli Lilly, Merck & Co., Honeywell and Ford.

3. ASIAN AFFAIRS

i)THURSDAY MORNING// WEDNESDAY  NIGHT

SHANGHAI CLOSED       //Hang Sang CLOSED  /The Nikkei closed  DOWN 299.29 PTS OR 1.06%      //Australia’s all ordinaires CLOSED DOWN 0.34%  /Chinese yuan (ONSHORE) closed HOLIDAY    /Oil DOWN TO 87.01 dollars per barrel for WTI and DOWN TO 88.58 for Brent. Stocks in Europe OPENED  MOSTLY RED EXCEPT SPAIN      //  ONSHORE YUAN CLOSED XX  AGAINST THE DOLLAR AT XXX. OFFSHORE YUAN CLOSED DOWN ON THE DOLLAR AT 6.3637: /ONSHORE YUAN TRADING ABOVE LEVEL OF OFFSHORE YUAN/ONSHORE YUAN AND OFF SHORE TRADING WEAKER AGAINST USA DOLLAR

3 a./NORTH KOREA/ SOUTH KOREA

///NORTH KOREA

3B JAPAN

The true story behind ivermectin and what this drug can do as revealed by pharmaceutical Japanese company Kowa 

(QTR Fringe Finance) 

Has The Red Carpet Been Rolled Out For A Mainstream Pivot On Ivermectin?

WEDNESDAY, FEB 02, 2022 – 11:10 PM

Submitted by QTR’s Fringe Finance

Just yesterday even more ivermectin controversy started: this time around joint nonclinical research being done with the drug by Japanese company Kowa Co Ltd.

Except, instead of the “normal” ivermectin controversy – which consists of arguing over whether or not the drug is “horse paste” despite its discovery being nominated for a Nobel Prize for use in humans, it being including on the World Health Organization’s list of essential medicines and being dosed hundreds of millions of times to human beings by doctors – this week’s controversy was about how Kowa’s research was reported on Tuesday.

Reuters initially ran the headline:

“Japan’s Kowa says ivermectin effective against Omicron in phase III trial”.

That headline was incorrect, and Reuters was forced to retract it. They re-ran the story with a title congruent with the facts:

Ivermectin shows ‘antiviral effect’ against COVID, Japanese company says

Both ivermectin advocates and detractors claimed victory on the day.

Advocates claimed victory because it was yet another study – despite being a nonclinical joint study – that showed antiviral effects from the medicine in vitro. Ivermectin is already a well-known antiviral.

Ivermectin skeptics like the Washington Post claimed the article was “botched”, but still were forced to admit the truth: the “actual news” was that ivermectin was found to carry an “antiviral effect” against Omicron and other coronavirus variants in joint non-clinical research.

The facts as put forth in the corrected version of the Reuters article still seemed to be a net positive:

Japanese trading and pharmaceuticals company Kowa Co Ltd on Monday said that anti-parasite drug ivermectin showed an “antiviral effect” against Omicron and other coronavirus variants in joint non-clinical research.

The company, which has been working with Tokyo’s Kitasato University on testing the drug as a potential treatment for COVID-19, did not provide further details

Kowa and Kitasato University appear to be in the midst of a clinical trial studying whether or not ivermectin is effective, though it was difficult to confirm the details due to a language barrier at the source of the information.

A translated version of Kowa’s Japanese PR seems to confirm that ivermectin is in the midst of a clinical trial for Covid. Included in the translated PR were the following lines:

It is expected to be applied as a therapeutic drug (tablet) for all new coronavirus infectious diseases.

In this clinical trial, the dosage and administration already approved as a therapeutic agent for parasitic infections

Although it is different, we are confirming its efficacy and safety in clinical trials.

Kowa confirmed the clinical effect of ivermectin on SARS-CoV-2 and was one of the first to the public.

But, let’s put aside the Kowa study for a second.

What most people don’t know is that this Japanese trial, whether successful or not – whether clinical or nonclinical – would only serve to supplement robust data already available about ivermectin’s effectiveness on Covid-19.

The website c19ivermectin.com keeps a running tally of such studies, and aggregates the data as it comes in.

The website keeps a chronological log of studies, news, theories, of all types of information available about ivermectin that can be aggregated, including meta analyses, dating back to April of 2020. At most recent update, it includes 147 studies, 96 peer reviewed, 77 with results comparing treatment and control groups. (It currently includes the Kowa writeup, but has yet to correct the Reuters headline as of the time of this writing.)

The website also notes that Ivermectin has been officially adopted for early treatment in all or part of 22 countries (39 including non-government medical organizations).

And when the left undoubtedly writes this collection of data off as “anti-vaxx” (a label that is being tossed around with less care for its meaning than ‘white supremacy’ nowadays), remind them that the site also encourages the use of vaccines, stating:

“Vaccines and treatments are both valuable and complementary. All practical, effective, and safe means should be used. Elimination of COVID-19 is a race against viral evolution. No treatment, vaccine, or intervention is 100% available and effective for all current and future variants. Denying the efficacy of any method increases mortality, morbidity, collateral damage, and the risk of endemic status.”

Today’s blog post has been published without a paywall because I believe the content to be far too important to deny to anyone. However, if you have the means and would like to support my work by subscribing, I’d be happy to offer you 22% off for 2022:

Get 22% off forever

I don’t want to rehash the geographic locations that have had success using ivermectin against Covid – with Uttar Pradesh probably being the most obvious – but I do want to point out that it isn’t just this collection of data suggesting there may be efficacy.

People are more than welcome to make up their own minds on what they think about ivermectin. Personally, regardless of whether or not the Japanese study was presented accurately or inaccurately at first by Reuters, it’s still my belief that it’s not going to matter in the future, because history will eventually side with the truth.

And the truth, I believe, is that ivermectin very likely works to treat early stage Covid, as was suggested in Uttar Pradesh and as has been claimed by doctors like Pierre Kory. It may not be a “cure” or “work like magic”, but I believe through rigorous clinical studies in the years to come, it will be found to have had efficacy in early stage Covid.

One thing is for sure: the truth is coming in the form of future data from clinical trials. There’s no getting around the fact that the controversy over ivermectin has led to a deluge of studies and that the results of these will eventually start pouring in.

This leads me to the thought that if the powers that be know that ivermectin will likely show some efficacy, they also know the clock is ticking on how long they can hang on the “horse paste” narrative.

I couldn’t help but think when this Japanese study popped up yesterday that the timing sure would be convenient now for the mainstream media to start a pivot on ivermectin.

Now that Moderna has received official FDA approval for its vaccine and Pfizer is happily seeking Emergency Use Authorization to jab kids as young as 6 months – and now that major drug manufacturers have had their antiviral Covid pills approved – maybe it can finally be time to pump the brakes on the ivermectin hysteria and allow the truth and reason to nudge their way in.

In other words, the fat pigs are finally finished stuffing their gluttonous faces at the trough of the FDA, stocked with newly-printed U.S. dollars. Unable to physically consume anymore, and noticing that all but a few molecules of feed are even left, they can now reluctantly relinquish their positions at the front of the line and waddle away, leaving the rest of the animals a chance to squabble over the remains.

All of the major pharmaceutical companies (and their lobbyists) finally getting the approvals that they want for all of their Covid drugs may roll out the red carpet for us to finally embrace reality and the truth, which I believe is that ivermectin has efficacy.

What we’re seeing now in the media is a massive pivot regarding Covid.

With the emergence of omicron and many geographic locations around the world lifting their Covid restrictions – and most notably politicians understanding they can’t win an election by locking us in our homes, as George Gammon elaborated on for my subscribers the other day – the media pivot on Covid has been pronounced since 2022 began.

And not unlike the pivot we’ve already seen on the lab leak and whether or not vaccines would end the virus, I’m expecting we see a similar pivot on ivermectin.

Of course, I could be wrong. I don’t mind being wrong. I exist on the fringe, as my readers know. In the words of Peter Venkman:

“If I‘m wrong, nothing happens! We go to jail – peacefully, quietly. We‘ll enjoy it!”

But if I’m not…and the narrative on ivermectin does in fact change to wind up as “Duh, of course ivermectin works and we’ve known it all along, it just doesn’t work as well as [insert big pharma drug here]” everybody responsible for suppressing over the last 2 years needs to be held accountable for what, in my opinion, may wind up amounting to crimes against humanity.

At the highest levels, those perpetuating the narrative on Covid and what is and is not an acceptable treatment will need to face consequences. Useless mainstream media automatons like human hot air balloon Brian Stelter and lobotomized mimbo Don Lemon are almost too meaningless to even worry about at this point. Their viewers have already given up on them, and with good reason. Irrelevance is consequence enough.

Look: this is all hypothetical. I’m assuming that the media and the mainstream will embrace ivermectin, which they may never do.

There’s many of us out there that have looked at the facts on our own and understand that the drug likely has efficacy, but that doesn’t make us right.

And I’m sure that, one more time, we can deal with the unpleasant circumstances of being right, but unheard or suppressed – it’s the way of the world when you challenge the global elitist narrative.

But mark my words: if they try to shove it back in our face and act as though we all should’ve known it all along with an arrogance that only central planners can bring to the table – it’s then that I can assure you I will peacefully do my part to ensure that those in power are held accountable.

Disclaimer: This is not a recommendation to seek any type of medical treatment. Always consult your medical professional for any and all Covid-19 questions. I exist on the fringe and I get shit wrong a lot. Do not make decisions based on my blog. The publisher does not guarantee the accuracy or completeness of the information provided in this page. These are not the opinions of any of my employers, partners, or associates. 

Now read:

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2. George Gammon: Covid Is In The “Rearview Mirror” Only Because Politicians Know They “Can’t Win Votes Locking You In A Cage”
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4. Millionaire Book-Writer And Professional Board-Sitter Chelsea Clinton Attacks Substack Authors As “Grifters”
5. Spotify Has Officially Become The Battleground For Big Tech’s Censorship Civil War
6. Waking Up And Derailing The Great Reset
7. Inflation Is The Kryptonite That Will End Our Decades-Long Monetary Policy Ponzi Scheme
8. Why Mainstream Media Is “Being Swallowed” By Joe Rogan: Interview

end

3c CHINA

CHINA/USA

Peter Schweizer in his new book outlines how China is undermining the USA

Fang/Zhang via Epoch Times/and Peter Schweizer

China Is Undermining The US Through Elite Capture: Author

WEDNESDAY, FEB 02, 2022 – 11:50 PM

Authored by Frank Fang and David Zhang via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

The United States is currently traveling down a losing path in its battle against China because the communist regime has co-opted many American elites in Washington, Wall Street, corporate America, and the U.S. tech sector, warned author Peter Schweizer.

Schweizer, who recently released his new book “Red-Handed: How American Elites Get Rich Helping China Win,” said that his book shows how appalling it is that some of the elites have been willing to “kowtow to the regime” just so that they have access to the Chinese market.

“They should be embarrassed,” he added. “They seem to be all too happy to do the bidding for Beijing when it comes to American politics.”

Schweizer made the remarks during a recent interview with EpochTV’s “China Insider” program. He is also the president of U.S.-based think tank Government Accountability Institute.

“I think what’s important for people to keep in mind is that Beijing doesn’t have to lobby for its own interest, because there are so many powerful interests in the United States that will lobby on their behalf,” he said.

The present course will only mean that China will replace the United States as the world’s top superpower, according to Schweizer.

“Unless we start to take radical action, we will lose, there is no question in my mind,” he said. “We will lose because our elites will be happy to sell out, collect their money, and position themselves in elite positions for generations to come.”

That outcome does not necessarily mean that the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) would occupy the United States, he added, but America as people know it will be very different.

“For some people who say, ‘Look, that’s not my concern,’ this should be their concern,” he said. “Life here is going to be heavily influenced by what the regime in Beijing wants.”

Washington

One of the U.S. government officials named in the book is Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.), and how the longtime senator has come to the defense of the CCP while her husband, Richard Blum, reaped profits by inking business deals with Chinese firms with ties to the Chinese regime.

In defending the Chinese regime, Feinstein compared the 1989 Tiananmen Square Massacre—where at least 10,000 people were killed by Chinese tanks and soldiers—to the 1970 Kent State shootings and the 1993 Waco siege in Texas, according to Schweizer’s book.

“I was appalled as anyone by the tanks at [Tiananmen] Square, but three tanks of this government went into Waco and killed 29 children,” Feinstein said during a Senate hearing. “Now those are not analogous; they are different situations. It was wrong of our government, and it was wrong of the Chinese government.”

In 1994, when the U.S. Senate was contemplating rescinding most-favored-nation trading status with China, Feinstein objected and said such a move would be “counterproductive” and would “inflame Beijing’s insecurities.”

The book also explores the relationship between Feinstein and former Chinese leader Jiang Zemin, going back to the days when they were mayors in San Francisco and Shanghai, respectively. The book quotes the Los Angeles Times saying the relationship gave Blum “access to the normally impenetrable Beijing political system.”

In 2000, Kam Kuwata, who was Feinstein’s then-spokesperson, was quoted in SFGate saying that Blum “has a right to do business and he’s never done anything wrong.”

Silicon Valley

“Beijing is very sophisticated in appealing not only to the pocketbooks of these players, but also to their egos,” Schweizer said, pointing to Microsoft founder Bill Gates as an example of the latter.

In 2006, China’s state-run media outlet People’s Daily Online named Gates as one of 50 foreigners shaping “China’s modern development.” According to his book, Gates was the only true technologist on the list.

“He’s a member of something called the Chinese Academy of Engineering (CAE), which sounds sort of friendly and nonpolitical. It’s actually, of course, an organization run by the [Chinese] Communist Party, and its goal is to advise the Chinese government on technology policy,” Schweizer said.

Gates was one of 18 foreigners selected by the CAE to be one of its lifetime members in 2017, according to People’s Daily Online. The media outlet explained that the foreigners would be to “improve CAE’s status in the field of engineering.”

The CAE supports the Chinese regime’s policies. In a 2018 article published on its website, CAE’s party committee stated that it provided “important scientific support” to the regime’s industrial blueprint of “Made in China 2025,” while endorsing its “Military-Civil Fusion” strategy and “Belt and Road” initiative.

In June last year, Microsoft was in the middle of controversy when its search engine Bing yielded no results when users in several countries including the United States entered the query “tank man,” the iconic unidentified man who was pictured standing in front of a line of tanks leaving Tiananmen Square in 1989. Microsoft’s explanation for the empty search result, “accidental human error,” drew criticism from human rights organizations.

The CCP

In short, the Chinese regime doesn’t care if American politicians are Republicans or Democrats, as long as they are willing to do Beijing’s bidding, Schweizer said.

“They don’t mind if American politicians talk about the Uyghurs occasionally, or say we should have a diplomatic boycott,” Schweizer said. “They’re fine with that.”

“As long as you’re helping them on the main tenets of what they want, which is access to American finance and access to American technology, and a few other things.”

Schweizer added: “That is the strategy they’re employing.”

The Commission on the Theft of American Intellectual Property estimated in 2017 (pdf) that the U.S. economy suffers an annual loss of between $225 billion and $600 billion due to China’s intellectual property theft each year.

Last year, FBI Director Christopher Wray said that the agency is opening one new China-related counterintelligence case every 10 hours, and has about 2,500 active investigations across the United States.

“My sense of what people have to understand is, the nature of the Chinese regime is such that it cannot be trusted,” Schweizer said. “And I don’t think it can be trusted in its relationship with us and we need to keep that in mind with everything.”

The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation and Feinstein’s office did not immediately respond to requests for comment. 

END

4/EUROPEAN AFFAIRS

UK/ECB

Wow!! this escalated fast! UK raises rates by .25% to .5% and now officially begins to unwind their QE. Extremely hawkish!

(zerohedge)

Pound Surges After Bank Of England Ends QE, Raises Rates To 0.5% With Four Voting For 50bps Hike

THURSDAY, FEB 03, 2022 – 07:18 AM

The Bank of England has continued its rate liftoff, announcing moments ago that it is hiking rates by 25bps to 0.5% as expected, and has officially begin the unwind of QE. However, in a major hawkish surprise, 4 policymakers – Haskel, Mann, Ramsden and Saunders – voting to hike as much as 0.5% to 0.75%, an increase that has not been seen since the bank gained independence in 1997. All policymakers agreed that further modest tightening would be needed in coming months. The increase marks the first back-to-back hike since 2004.

Stressing its inflation-fighting mandate, the BOE said that “the remit is clear the inflation target applies at all times, reflecting the primacy of price stability in the U.K. monetary policy framework.”

The BOE also signaled the start of a new era for the 895 billion pounds of bond holdings amassed over the past decade under quantitative easing, and unanimously voted to begin the process of shrinking the balance sheet by ceasing to reinvest maturing assets. The BOE will immediately stop reinvesting the proceeds of expired gilts, allowing more than 200 billion pounds to run off by 2025, and announced plans to offload the entire 20 billion pound stock of corporate bonds by the end of 2023:

The Committee voted unanimously for the Bank of England to begin to reduce the stock of UK government bond purchases, financed by the issuance of central bank reserves, by ceasing to reinvest maturing assets. The Committee also voted unanimously for the Bank of England to begin to reduce the stock of sterling non-financial investment-grade corporate bond purchases, financed by the issuance of central bank reserves, by ceasing to reinvest maturing assets and by a programme of corporate bond sales to be completed no earlier than towards the end of 2023 that should unwind fully the stock of corporate bond purchases.

The QE unwind will start in March, when 28 billion pounds of gilts mature. The bank reiterated it will start considering accelerating the process by pursuing active sales once rates hit at least 1%.

Other notable highlights from the announcement:

• Commenting on latest developments, the MPC judged that if the economy develops broadly in line with the February Report central projections some further modest tightening in monetary policy is likely to be appropriate in the coming months.
• The Committee continues to judge that there are two-sided risks around the medium-term inflation outlook primarily from wage developments on the upside and from energy and global tradable goods prices on the downside.
• The Committee will update its assessment on the balance of the risks to medium-term inflation in light of the relevant data as they emerge
• GDP growth was expected to slow to subdued rates main reason for that was the adverse impact of higher global energy and tradable goods prices on UK real aggregate income and spending.
• Inflation is expected to increase further in coming months to close to 6% in February and March, before peaking at around 7.25% in April. This projected peak is around 2% higher than expected in the November Report.
• The projected overshoot of inflation relative to the 2% target mainly reflects global energy and tradable goods prices.
• The further rise in energy futures prices meant that Ofgem’s utility price caps were expected to be substantially higher at the reset in April 2022.
• Core goods CPI inflation is also expected to rise further, due to the impact of global bottlenecks on tradable goods prices.

Looking ahead, the committee said that the extent of any further tightening in monetary policy will depend on the medium-term prospects for inflation: “The MPC judges that, if the economy develops broadly in line with the February Report central projections, some further modest tightening in monetary policy is likely to be appropriate in the coming months. The Committee continues to judge that there are two-sided risks around the medium-term inflation outlook, primarily from wage developments on the upside and from energy and global tradable goods prices on the downside. The Committee will update its assessment on the balance of the risks to medium-term inflation in light of the relevant data as they emerge.”

As noted above, BOE officials also lifted their forecasts for the peak of inflation to 7.25% in April, more than triple the BOE’s 2% target. Inflation had previously been expected to peak around 6%. They also said the labor market remains very tight. They sharply increased their wage-growth forecasting, predicting the underlying pace will hit 4.75% in the coming year. Higher energy prices added further pressure, while cost of living pressures will slow GDP growth.

Here are the bank’s revised forecasts:

• Inflation in one year’s time rises to 5 21% (prev. 3.40%). and at 2.15% in two-years (prev 2 23%), 1.60% in three years’ (prev. 1.95%)
• GDP in 2021 +7.25% (prev. +7%); 2022 +3.75% (prev +5%); 2023 +1 25% (prev +1.5%); 2024 +1% (prev. +1%). based on market rates
• Unemployment rate 4 0% in Q4 2021 (prev. 4 5%); Q4 2022 4.1% (prev 4%); 04 2023 4.6% (prev 4.1%); Q4 2024 4.9% (prev 4.4%)
• Wage growth +4% Y/Y in Q4 2021 (prev 3 5%); Q4 2022 +3.75% Y/Y (prev. +1.25%); Q4 2023 +3% (prev.+2.25%). Q4 2024 +2.25% (prev. 2.75%)

Based on these forecasts, four officials – Dave Ramsden, Michael Saunders, Catherine Mann and Jonathan Haskel – voted to boost rates by 50 basis points, seeing the need to act faster to curb inflation expectations. The majority, including Governor Andrew Bailey, opted for the 25-basis-point rise.

Despite the improved outlook for wages, the BOE warned that real household incomes, after adjusting for inflation and tax rises, will shrink both this year and next. An hour before the BOE’s announcement, the U.K. energy regulator Ofgem said the energy bill for a typical household will rise 54% in April. While the BOE admitted the hike itself can do little to address those immediate price rises, they stressed it was necessary to anchor longer-term stability.

The government is preparing a multi-billion pound package of measures to mitigate the impact of rising energy bills. The measures may also bring down the headline rate of inflation. “The sharp rises in prices of global energy and tradable goods of which the U.K. is a net importer will weigh on real aggregate income and spending. This is something monetary policy is unable to prevent,” the BOE said.

The BOE is leading the way in a global tightening of monetary policy, as institutions move to tackle a rapid acceleration of prices in the aftermath of pandemic lockdowns. The U.S. Federal Reserve is expected to unleash its own rapid tightening cycle this year, and there has been speculation that may include a 50-basis-point hike. The decision also comes with the U.K. in the grip of a cost of living crisis, which will bite harder starting in April when higher taxes and energy prices hit consumers. Despite the improved outlook for wages, the BOE warned that real household incomes, after adjusting for inflation and tax rises, will shrink both this year and next.

In kneejerk response, markets were swept by an immediate hawkish reaction with GPBUSD spiking from 1.3565 to 1.3620 as traders see much more tightening in the months ahead…

… while the UK 10yr rose from 1.27% to 1.34%. In the short-end, expectations have moved forward a 1% Bank Rate to as early as May. The moves have transcended across the channel pressuring EGBs lower, in addition to US Treasuries.

end

/EU

Preview of how Lagarde will act as Euro inflation has never been hotter

(Newsquawk)

ECB Preview: Lagarde In The Hot Seat As Euro Inflation Has Never Been Hotter

WEDNESDAY, FEB 02, 2022 – 10:50 PM

Submitted by Newsquawk

The ECB policy announcement is due Thursday, February 3 with the rate decision at 12:45GMT/07:45EST, and press conference from 13:30GMT/08:30EST. Policy settings are set to be left unchanged after the path of tapering was announced in December. Focus will be on the press conference and how the Bank characterizes the inflation outlook over the short and medium-term, especially after Euro area inflation just hit an unexpected all time high.

OVERVIEW: After a blockbuster release in December which saw the central bank announce a conclusion to PEPP at the end of March and subsequent beefed up APP, the upcoming meeting (not accompanied by economic projections) is set to see policymakers take stock of the Eurozone economic outlook whilst maintaining the current parameters of their policy tools. With the statement of the release set to be relatively unchanged, focus instead will fall on the accompanying press conference and how President Lagarde judges the inflationary outlook. With the Bank moving further away from its transitory inflation stance seen last year, ING judges that the ECB will need to convey its ability to tame inflationary pressures whilst avoiding a rush from “inflation patience” to “inflation panic”, as a move towards the latter could lead to an aggressive hawkish repricing in the market which is already at odds with ECB comms. Accordingly, it is no coincidence that a lot of the commentary in recent weeks has suggested that although the transitory narrative has moved on since last year, policymakers still expect inflation to decline throughout the coming year. It remains to be seen whether or not the ECB will leave the door open to a potential faster tapering of asset purchases under APP should inflation impulses prove to be more durable.

PRIOR MEETING: As expected, policymakers opted to stand pat on rates. As had been signaled by the ECB, purchases under PEPP will cease at the end of March 2022. Reinvestments were extended until 2024 and purchases under PEPP could also be resumed, if necessary, to counter negative shocks related to the pandemic. On APP, as of Q2 2022, monthly purchases will be beefed up to EUR 40bln from EUR 20bln and then subsequently lowered to EUR 30bln in Q3 and back down to EUR 20bln in Q4 “for as long as necessary to reinforce the accommodative impact of its policy rates”. Elsewhere, policymakers opted to maintain the linkage between APP and rate increases whereby the Governing Council expects net purchases to end shortly before it starts raising the key ECB interest rates. At the press conference, President Lagarde noted that although there are near-term headwinds, activity in the Eurozone is expected to pick up strongly in 2022. On inflation, Lagarde stated that in the medium-term, inflation is expected to come in below target. This was reflected in the subsequent staff economic projections which penciled in 2023 and 2024 inflation at 1.8%. In the near-term, 2021 was upgraded to 2.6% from 2.4% and 2022 to 3.2% from 1.7%. In terms of the policy decisions made, Lagarde revealed that more than one member did not agree on the parameters, but there was a very large majority. On rates, the President continued to reaffirm that rates are unlikely to rise in 2022. Following the press conference, ECB sources revealed that it was the Austrian, Belgian and German governors who disagreed with parts of the ECB’s decision. The hawks were reportedly unhappy with extending the PEPP reinvestment to 2024 and not setting an APP end-date. They also disagreed on the inflation outlook and some stressed risks were to the upside.

RECENT DATA: December CPI rose to 5.0% from 4.9%, whilst the core (ex-food & energy) ticked higher to 2.7% from 2.6%. The January headline metric is seen cooling to 4.4% from 5.0% with the core rate seen moving to the 2% mark. Q4 GDP slowed to 0.3% from the 2.2% growth seen in Q3 as the impact of Omicron and supply chain woes hampered growth. Timelier survey data from IHS Markit saw the EZ-wide Composite PMI slow to 52.4 from 53.3 with IHS noting “The Omicron wave has led to yet another steep drop in spending on many consumer-facing services at the start of the year, with tourism, travel and recreation especially hard hit”. On the employment front, the EZ-wide unemployment rate fell from 7.1% to 7.0% in December vs. a COVID peak of 8.4% in October 2020.

RECENT COMMUNICATIONS: Since the prior meeting, a speech on January 8th by Germany’s Schnabel drew a lot of attention by noting that the green transition poses upside risks to medium-term inflation and suggesting that rising energy prices could require the ECB to act on policy. Schnabel added there have not been signs so far of broader second round effects from higher inflation. Elsewhere, President Lagarde on several occasions has remarked that the ECB does not see inflation spiraling out of control and that supply bottlenecks will stabilize throughout the course of the year. Chief Economist Lane also envisages a decline in inflation in 2022 whilst flagging expectations that inflation will move below the target in 2023 and 2024, adding that he is not seeing behavior that would indicate above-target inflation in the medium-term. Weidmann’s replacement Nagel commented on the inflation outlook noting that risks are skewed to the upside and the price surge is not entirely as a result of temporary factors. At the more hawkish end of the spectrum, Latvia’s Kazaks suggested on January 5th that the ECB is ready to raise rates and cut stimulus if necessary, adding the ECB will take action if the inflation outlook picks up and an early 2023 rate hike is a possible scenario. Interestingly, Simkus of Lithuania said that Russian-related tensions are a bigger cause for uncertainty than Omicron.

BALANCE SHEET: In December, the ECB announced that purchases under PEPP will cease at the end of March 2022. Reinvestments were extended until 2024 and purchases under PEPP could also be resumed, if necessary, to counter negative shocks related to the pandemic. On APP, as of Q2 2022, monthly purchases will be beefed up to EUR 40bln from EUR 20bln and then subsequently lowered to EUR 30bln in Q3 and back down to EUR 20bln in Q4 “for as long as necessary to reinforce the accommodative impact of its policy rates”. Despite ongoing inflation angst in the Eurozone, there has been no indication from policymakers that the current plan is set to change. As it stands, UBS expects purchases under APP to conclude in Q1 2023. Although it will likely not be a feature for the upcoming meeting, there are clearly risks of an earlier than envisaged taper with policymakers likely to find the justification for continuing with asset purchases at current inflation levels a difficult one. Interestingly, in a recent research piece, ING found that EUR 187bln reduction in the ECB’s portfolio would impact 10Y Italian yields as much as a 25bp hike. At the other end of the spectrum, ING finds that German government bonds would care a lot more about a 25bp increase in the ECB’s deposit rate. So-much-so that quantitative tightening would largely be irrelevant in comparison.

RATES/TIERING/TLTRO: The ECB is expected to stand pat on rates with the deposit, main refi and marginal lending rates to be held at -0.5%, 0.0% and 0.25% respectively with policymakers at pains to communicate that 2022 is unlikely to see a move on rates by the Bank despite markets pricing in a 10bps hike to the deposit rate by November. As it stands, the ECB’s current forward guidance reads that policymakers expect APP “to end shortly before it starts raising the key ECB interest rates”. Some desks are of the view that the inclusion of the word “shortly” is too restrictive and in the event that the GC has fulfilled its inflation objective, removing the word “shortly” could allow a quicker conclusion to asset purchases without having to commit to a subsequent rate hike. However, it is doubtful whether such a development will take place at the upcoming meeting. In terms of the rate path, RBC see a first 10bp deposit rate hike in March 2023, followed by a 15bp rate hike in September. RBC assumes that the ECB would indicate at that point that they could also start lifting rates by 25bps at a later stage in 2024. Elsewhere, policymakers will need to make a decision on the future of its TLRO programme. UBS expects this to be more of a factor for its March or April meeting with the Bank of the view that “the ECB will offer another series of TLTRO auctions as of/after June, albeit on somewhat less attractive terms, with the TLTRO pricing rising from as low as 50bp below the depo rate to in line with the depo rate.”. On tiering, the current multiplier will likely be hiked from the current level of six at some point, however, this will likely not be a feature of the upcoming meeting.

PRESS CONFERENCE: With the statement of the release set to be relatively unchanged, focus instead will fall on the accompanying press conference which will offer President Lagarde an opportunity to take stock of recent economic developments. More specifically, markets will be eyeing how Lagarde judges the inflationary outlook. With the Bank moving further away from its transitory inflation stance seen last year, ING judges that the ECB will need to convey its ability to tame inflationary pressures whilst avoiding a rush from “inflation patience” to “inflation panic”, as a move towards the latter could lead to an aggressive hawkish repricing by the market which is already at odds with ECB comms. As it stands, markets fully price in a 10bps hike to the deposit rate by the October meeting, whilst ECB officials have been at pains to state that a hike is unlikely to take place until 2023. Lagarde will likely continue to suggest that this remains the plan, perhaps of greater interest will be whether or not she hints that asset purchases could be wound down at a faster rate than currently envisaged. ING suggests that doing this could help policymakers address the overall balancing act facing the ECB. From a more medium-term perspective, market participants will be cognizant of upside risks to the inflation outlook in lieu of recent comments from Germany’s Schnabel who cautioned that the green transition poses upside risks to medium-term inflation.

SocGen raises two questions that it is looking to be addressed by the ECB on the inflation outlook:

• 1) will core inflation be more closely anchored to the target than in the past?
• 2) how far away is a neutral policy stance?

SocGen suggests that the answer to these questions will be “contingent on the policymakers’ confidence that a shift has occurred, making tight labor markets generate higher wage growth”. SocGen does not believe that there will be sufficient evidence of this before the autumn.

Elsewhere, some elements of the Q&A will likely center on how the potential Ukraine-Russia conflict could impact the ECB’s near-term price outlook, however, Lagarde will likely try and play down these potential impulses given that there is great uncertainty over how the situation will play out.

Finally, here is the familiar ECB cheat sheet from ING

END

Unlike the UK, no rate hikes as they maintain their path unveiled in December.

(zerohedge)

ECB Reiterates Pledge To Withdraw Stimulus Gradually Despite Record Inflation

THURSDAY, FEB 03, 2022 – 08:04 AM

Unlike the hawkish shock from the BOE earlier today, when the central bank was one vote away from an unprecedented 50bps rate hike (and even so, its 25bps hike was the first back to back rate increase since 2004), moments ago the ECB did not surprise and in keeping with most expectations as discussed in our preview, it maintained the path unveiled during its far more jarring December meeting.

Despite inflation unexpectedly hitting a record high yesterday, which fed market expectations for a first interest-rate hike in more than a decade this year, the ECB renewed its pledge to withdraw pandemic stimulus only gradually.  The Governing Council on Thursday reiterated that it will slow bond-buying across 2022 and end asset purchases entirely before raising borrowing costs.

While the central bank keeping rates unchanged – the deposit and main refinancing rates remained at -0.5% and 0%, respectively, as expected – the ECB…

• Renewed its pledge to slow asset purchases over the course of the year.
• Confirmed net buying under pandemic program will end in March,
• Confirmed the plan to boost APP pace to €40BN in 2Q, and €30BN in 3Q
• Repeated that Interest rates won’t rise until projections show inflation sustainably at 2% and underlying price pressures are consistent with that goal
• Repeated that special conditions on long-term loans to banks will end in June

This is what the ECB’s QT will look like:

Indeed, a look at the redline shows that there were virtually no changes between the Dec 16 and the Feb 3 statements:

Perhaps the most notable change above was that the ECB dropped “in either direction” after the sentence: “The Governing Council stands ready to adjust all of its instruments, as appropriate, to ensure that inflation stabilises at its 2% target over the medium term.”

Affirming its gradual plan underscores the growing divergence with the more aggressive monetary-policy tightening under way in the U.S. and the U.K. Earlier on Thursday, the Bank of England lifted rates by a quarter point for a second straight meeting, in a close-run decision where four officials had sought an even bigger increase.

The ECB position also signals that policy makers in Frankfurt are sticking to their guns on elevated inflation abating once energy costs and supply-chain snarls ease. Prices jumped 5.1% last month — more than double the 2% target.

Despite the ECB’s dovish insistence, the market is saying that the central bank is wrong: while ECB President Christine Lagarde insists a rate hike is unlikely this year, money markets predict a 10 basis-point increase from the ECB by September and on Wednesday briefly brought that forward to July. They now see almost 30 basis points of tightening by year end. The euro declined and German bonds pared losses after the decision.

The focus for investors will be whether Lagarde reveals any signs of hawkishness at her news conference at 2:30 p.m. in Frankfurt.

According to Bloomberg, a key question for the ECB chief is how the ECB’s latest projections stand up in light of this week’s data shock. Just two months ago, officials predicted inflation would return to 1.8% in 2023 and 2024. Any upward revision could mean the conditions for a rate hike are close to being met and may force policy makers to rethink their plans. New ECB projections are due in March.

During her press conference, Lagarde will need to strike a delicate balance between holding market expectations at bay while refraining from promises that may need to be walked back later. She’ll also need to address sources of heightened uncertainty. Record Covid-19 infections and persistent shortages of manufacturing components continue to provide headwinds, while an escalation in the standoff between the West and Russia over Ukraine risks holding back the recovery and stoking prices if energy supplies are hampered.

The euro-area economy isn’t starting 2022 on a strong footing, expanding by just 0.3% in the final quarter of last year. Germany, meanwhile, is on the brink of a second recession since the pandemic began after a surprisingly sharp contraction.

end

Press conference indicates a Q4 rate hike which causes the Euro/USA is rise!

(zerohedge)

ECB Prepares For “March Policy Recalibration”, Q4 Rate Hike As DB Says “ECB Pivot Is Here… Buy EURUSD”

THURSDAY, FEB 03, 2022 – 10:27 AM

With markets still in shock over Lagarde hawkish presser, and Italian bonds at yields that scream a new fiscal crisis is just around the corner, the trial balloons have started dropping with Bloomberg reporting moments ago that ECB policy makers “can imagine recalibrating their outlined policy path in March,” according to unnamed hawkish sources who could barely wait for the end of Lagarde conference before dialing Bloomberg.

According to the report, the Governing Council agreed at Thursday meeting that “it’s sensible not to exclude a rate hike this year” and that “an end of bond-buying under the APP in the third quarter is possible.” This means that the ECB is now open to a rate hike in Q4 – since Lagarde said bond buying will have to end first before rate hikes begin – which however still puts it well behind the curve as the market now prices about two rate hikes by September.

Meanwhile, in its own “sources” report, Reuters confirms the Bloomberg report that ECB policymakers “see policy change at March meeting if inflation doesn’t ease”, adding that that a “sizable minority” of ECB policymakers wanted to change policy at today’s meeting, and also notes that ECB policymakers see faster tapering of APP purchases as “first port of call to fight high inflation.”

As a reminder, Lagarde refused to repeat at her press conference that a rate increase was “very unlikely” this year, highlighting more persistent-than-expected inflation pressures in the 19-nation bloc.

Separately, in a note published moments ago, Deutsche Bank’s FX strategist George Saravelos has flipped on his bearish Euro view and writes that the ECB pivot has arrived and that it is now time to buy EURUSD. Here are the key highlights:

Throughout the last few months, our framework on EUR/USD has been critically dependent on the relative policy stance and gap between the Fed and ECB. Our bearish bias has been based on the assumption that the ECB would have not been willing to signal a shift in policy bias until later in the year. President Lagarde in today’s press conference has clearly signaled a pivot from slow-moving  calendar-based guidance to something far more active. This suspension of guidance is a  critical development for the FX market.

Effectively, it is validating the liberation of the European interest rate curve this year and turning the ECB in to a live central bank. We would note that the two largest moves in FX markets over the last twelve months have been driven by the hawkish FOMC pivots in both June and January.

We would see this as an equivalent pivot for Europe. The shift has been the signal we have been looking for a pivot our view on the euro. We therefore close out our FX Blueprint short recommendation at close to flat and now enter a long EUR/USD position. Our FX forecasts were premised on a euro decline in the first half of the year with a rise thereafter. We will reassess this profile in coming days

END

ITALY/VACCINE MANDATE

Life in Italy under their stupid and strict vaccine mandates

(Mises)

Italy’s COVID Despotism Just Got Worse

THURSDAY, FEB 03, 2022 – 03:30 AM

Authored by Matteo Salonia via The Mises Institute,

The news from Italy has started to sound like good incipits for a dystopian fantasy novel or like a déjà vu recalling the Soviet Union. A couple of weeks ago, a new decree of the Draghi government established yet more rules restricting the lives of people who have not been injected with the latest vaccine booster and who therefore cannot show the latest version of the Green Pass. These second-class citizens, who have already been stripped of their right to move, work, and participate in a great number of social activities, are now forbidden from entering post offices to withdraw their pension, and they are to be allowed access to supermarkets only to buy “goods of primary necessity.” In other words, the Italian government decides what kind of food and what other goods (if any) these people will be able to purchase. It is unclear how exactly the government intends to enforce this new decree: Will we see policemen putting their hands into shoppers’ bags? Will bread be considered a “primary” good while shaving foam and candies will be seized? There is no limit to the madness. And a recent note from the executive to clarify the situation only made things worse: the state now decrees that the unvaccinated can actually also buy nonprimary goods in the few shops they are allowed to enter. For the time being. In other words, Italy is now a society where your sphere of action goes only as far as the prime minister’s website explicitly and graciously allows. Heading out for a stroll at the park? You better check the latest blog post from Mario Draghi to see if he explicitly grants you this freedom!

How did it come to this?

Among Western countries, Italy has been one of those experiencing the most systematic denial of basic civil rights over the past two years. Coalition governments led first by Giuseppe Conte and then by Mario Draghi have empowered an unelected committee of “experts” called the Comitato Tecnico Scientifico, which has in turn empowered the governments by assigning a scientific aura to every decree, every action, and every word coming from the executive. This has resulted in an endless series of lockdown measures that for long periods have erased freedom of movement, the right to work, property rights over businesses and shops, freedom to assemble, freedom to worship, and even the distinction of jurisdictional spheres between church and political authority (with state bureaucrats closing churches and then handing out petty instructions on what rites could be carried out, how liturgies should be curtailed, and how many people if any could be present at masses and funerals). In the meantime, the legislative branch has been humbled, and government by urgent decrees from the executive has become the norm. The very constitutional structure of the country has been bent, and a new concept called “stato di emergenza” (state of emergency) has been invented out of thin air, even though it is nowhere to be found in Italy’s republican constitution.

If we were not living in the age of CNN, fake news, and outrageous subsidies handed out by politicians to newspapers and the media, one could legitimately wonder where the journalists were while all this was going on? In fact, journalists in Italy are among the main culprits of the current dystopian reality, since they have given platforms to “experts” who agreed with lockdowns and other measures that expanded government control over all aspects of life, while at the same time they ferociously mocked and ostracized doctors and scientists who dared to question the logic of outdoor mask mandates and curfews for restaurants. Anybody who dared to point out the disastrous consequences of a prolonged lockdown on mental health and on people suffering from other pathologies, or the link between the economy and public health, was accused of being a “covid denier.” This is a pattern that surely readers recognize, as they have seen it in the US and many other countries over the past two years. The fact that virtually every opinion labelled by the media as “conspiracy theory” has turned out to be true just three or four months later has done nothing to shake the arrogance of the corrupt mass media, who are entrenched in their monopoly over the news cycle, thanks to their access to state funding and political favors. And this is true in Italy as virtually everywhere else.

Giuseppe Conte’s administration was followed by another government coalition led by Prime Minister Draghi, not thanks to free elections but through a move by the president of the republic, Sergio Mattarella. In a solemn speech on February 2021, the head of state explained to the country that it was inopportune to have an election in the midst of a pandemic—even though during the same period Romania and Portugal had elections and their rate of infection was not altered. Instead, Mattarella entrusted the government to Draghi, claiming that this would be a nonpartisan, “technical government” simply charged with the tasks of obtaining funds from the EU and overseeing the vaccination campaign. Obviously, the idea of a “technical,” neutral government is absurd, since every modern state expropriates, inflates, and moves wealth from some social groups to others.

I will not get into the many lies spewed by Draghi and his ministers about the effectiveness of the vaccines, nor into the series of grotesque restrictions progressively imposed on the unvaccinated. Suffice it to say that, once again, the media was complicit, as for months it covered any failure by the Draghi administration with wild accusations against the “no-vax.” Just like those accused of being “covid deniers” never denied the existence of covid, those who are now labelled as “no-vax” have in most cases nothing against vaccines per se. Many of them simply explain that whether to take the vaccine or not should be a decision freely made by each person, considering their age, clinical history, and other factors; and they correctly note the superiority of natural immunity over vaccinated immunity. But these are unimportant details for journalists, who at the year-end press conference put up a show worthy of a banana republic by greeting Draghi with cheers and a long applause rather than with probing questions. Interestingly, the change at the helm from Conte to Draghi has had the effect of showing the true colors of Italian liberals, who are in fact ill-disguised statists.

Even Amnesty International has expressed concern about the discrimination against unvaccinated people in Italy, while Italian liberals and leftists cheer Draghi on. The only coherent, courageous opposition to Draghi is coming from the fringes and from unlikely allies like Marxist professor Ugo Mattei and libertarian professor Carlo Lottieri (a friend of the Mises Institute). Mattei has tirelessly denounced the unconstitutional nature of the “state of emergency” as well as the cowardly blackmailing of workers forced to decide between taking the vaccine or losing their job. Lottieri has led the small movement of resistance among university professors fighting discrimination against unvaccinated students and explaining how the pandemic has been an excuse for modern states to take one step further in their control over the body and mind of each individual. 

The measures to which Italian people have been subjected in these two long years of unchecked statism and shameless propaganda have not only been unjust: they have also been utterly useless in fighting the pandemic. Italy has seen exactly the same trajectories and timeframes in the different waves of the virus as those experienced by countries like Sweden or even the UK, where liberties and the economy have not been trampled—or at least have not been trampled to the same extent! The failure of streams of government decrees is not a surprise for those who, having read Ludwig von Mises and F.A. Hayek, know very well that human societies are complex and that we should be humble when devising solutions from the top. Central planning—whether for the economy or for healthcare—is destined to fail. On the other hand, central planning serves a political class and crony corporations ceaselessly attempting to micromanage our lives.

end

Insanity!! hospitals in Germany, the UK and Israel refuse life saving transplant to a 3 yr old because parents were unvaccinated.

Finally a Greek hospital accepted the case.

(zerohedge)

Hospitals In Germany, UK & Israel Refuse Life-Saving Transplant To 3-Year-Old Because Parents Were Unvaccinated

THURSDAY, FEB 03, 2022 – 05:45 AM

We have heard of cases where adult patients in the US have been denied a life-saving heart transplant because they hadn’t been vaccinated. But have you ever heard of a child being refused because their parents had been vaccinated?

Well, now we have: Politico EU reports that a 3-year-old Cypriot boy was denied a heart transplant by a hospital in Germany allegedly because his parents weren’t “fully vaccinated”.

And it wasn’t just Germany. The boy was turned away by hospitals in the UK and Israel for the same reason. Finally, a Greek hospital was found to do the transplant, but the story is going viral anyway as the latest example of COVID restrictions run amok.

The Cypriot health ministry had made the arrangements for the boy to be treated in Germany, but it was left scrambling after the hospital advised that it wouldn’t accept the patient because his parents hadn’t been fully vaccinated. Even though the boy’s parents were quickly given their first dose in an effort to save their sons life, they were informed that it didn’t matter, since it would take six weeks for them to become “fully vaccinated”.

But the Cypriots wouldn’t take no for an answer, and asked if the child could be accompanied by a guardian. Still, the answer was “no”.

The European Commission confirmed to Politico that there are no policies in place in the EU that would prevent an child from receiving a life-saving operation for this reason. But then again, local hospitals and jurisdictions can create restrictions and requirements of their own. It appears that is the case here.

“Health policies – including vaccination policies — and their concrete implementation are the responsibility of the member states, not the Commission,” said a spokesperson for the European Commission’s health department.

The boy’s father expressed his bewilderment to Politico.

“I know that unvaccinated patients are admitted to hospitals in Germany,” said the boy’s father, Alexey Matveev, a Russian national living in Cyprus. “I didn’t know that I had to be vaccinated for my child being to be operated on in that hospital. If I knew it of course I would have done it … I am healthy and did not want to be vaccinated. I find it inappropriate for someone who is healthy to be vaccinated.”

Eventually, treatment was arranged for the boy in Cyprus.

But is it finally safe to say that these vaccination requirements are starting to seem a little inhumane?

5. RUSSIAN AND MIDDLE EASTERN AFFAIRS

end

ISIS/SYRIA/USA

USA commandos take out a top ISIS leader in a daring raid but as many as 13 people killed including six children and 4 women. Looks like Biden botched this one

(zerohedge)

US Commandos Take Out Top ISIS Leader In Daring Raid Into Syria’s Idlib

THURSDAY, FEB 03, 2022 – 08:14 AM

A major special forces raid believed part of a mission to kill or capture terrorists happened overnight in al-Qaeda held Idlib province of northwest Syria. Eyewitnesses observed helicopter gunships and jets active in the area of the village of Atmeh near the Turkish border for over two hours, including gunfire on the ground, in what’s being called the biggest such raid since the 2019 killing of Islamic State leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi.

Despite Pentagon spokesman John Kirby hailing the mission as “successful” in an early Thursday statement, citing “no US casualties” – already international reports are saying multiple civilians were killed in what’s already looking like a botched raid.

“U.S. special forces carried out what the Pentagon said was a large-scale counterterrorism raid in northwestern Syria early Thursday. First responders at the scene reported 13 people were killed, including six children and four women,” The Associated Press reports.

“Residents said helicopters flew overhead and U.S. forces clashed with gunmen for more than two hours around a two-story house surrounded by olive trees,” AP detailes. “They described continuous gunfire and explosions that jolted the sleepy village of Atmeh near the Turkish border, an area dotted with camps for internally displaced people from Syria’s civil war.”

Initially there was speculation that it could be connected with last month’s large-scale ISIS prison break from a Kurdish SDF guarded facility in northeast Hasakeh province. It led to over 120 US-backed SDF members killed after two weeks of running battles in the area of the prison, with possibly a few hundred ISIS terrorists having escaped.

As soon as last night’s Idlib operation commenced, it involved overwhelming American firepower, but with reports of resistance from militants on the ground. “A journalist on assignment for The Associated Press and several residents said they saw body parts scattered near the site of the raid, a house in Syria’s rebel-held Idlib province,” AP continues.

Further, some sources suggest that US commandos were after Baghdadi’s successor:

An Iraqi intelligence official in contact with the U.S.-led coalition said Thursday’s target was a high-ranking militant leader whose identity will be released by the White House later in the day. Information suggests he may be al-Baghdadi’s successor, the current IS leader known as Abu Ibrahim al-Hashimi al-Qurayshi, the official added. He spoke on condition of anonymity to divulge sensitive information.

A subsequent White House statement early Thursday confirmed the target was the head of ISIS, namly the aforementioned Abu Ibrahim al-Hashimi al-Qurayshi:

Biden’s statement says the Islamic State commander has been “taken off the battlefield” – presumably killed. But that many civilians were slaughtered in the process will be a major area of scrutiny as the administration attempts to cast this as a “successful mission”. 

It proves further embarrassing for Turkey, given it directly backs the main Islamist factions in Idlib, which has become a terror safe-haven. It must also be recalled that the CIA and allied intelligence services actually helped Islamic fighters – included al-Qaeda in Syria – capture Idlib from Syrian government forces in the first place in 2015. 

Video began emerging in the overnight hours confirming that a major US operation was underway, reportedly involving elite Delta Force commandos…

Local journalists and monitors who reportedly visited the location of the raid observed the following: “The top floor of the house was almost totally destroyed in Thursday’s raid, with the ceiling and walls knocked out.” Some photographs of the aftermath have been published to Al Jazeera.

“Blood could be seen on the walls and floor of the remaining structure, which contained a wrecked bedroom with a child’s wooden crib on the floor,” the AP report notes. “On one damaged wall, a blue plastic children’s swing was still hanging. The kitchen was blackened with fire damage.”

end

 Full text of Putin’s signed article for Xinhua-Xinhua

Inbox

Robert Hryniak	9:43 AM (8 minutes ago)
to

This is worth reading.
I have thought for some time that Russia has decided to turn its’ back on the west. Recent events only support such a decision.
Yes, they will sell to the west but to think that they will waste time on trying to create a more intertwined relationship is not in the cards. Their fortune and future is not in the west. And unless the West rebuilds ( will not happen with the current crowd) i do not know what real growth the west will see. And one can be sure that China more than Russia will act aggressively to limit western growth.
It is clear that Russia has NO intention of invading Ukraine contrary to the DC PR noise. Yes, they will likely arm or fully support the Donbas not be overrun by Ukrainian forces but forget a Russian invasion. While a false flag event cannot be ruled out it is doubtful a real invasion would occur. This does not mean that Russia will not act to defend itself from attack and strike offensively if required. Russia understands too well the money pit the Ukraine has become under US administration and wants no part of fixing it. This clearly does not go over well with delusional bunch in DC.
One must recognize that China cannot afford to see Russia lose to the west and is and will be with Russia side by side. It is less certain that Russia would stand by China in the same way. And China has serious pain coming and needs Russia. Wait until real losses on Chinese investments come home to roost.
Russia will turn the pain level up on Europe inch by inch and it is clear now that with the deal Hungary made which gives them cheap gas until 2036 they are the low cost production country in energy cost in Europe while everyone else has made themselves uncompetitive by their own actions buying at spot prices.
The Middle East is a different story where America has lost the region and everyone knows this and it is a passage of time before China and Russia limit US influence which wanes daily. Did you catch that a Australian naval vessel was rendered inoperative in the Pacific off Tonga? Does that ring a bell with the electronic jamming of Israel of GPS? Clearly who is responsible is a guess but one can narrow that down.
Watch for new announcements after the signing of certain agreements in the coming days.

https://english.news.cn/20220203/c11f134fb822487a83a8361d61d9c1af/c.html

end

6// GLOBAL COVID ISSUES/VACCINE MANDATE ISSUES/

CORONAVIRUS/UPDATE/VACCINE MANDATE

CANADA

Ottawa City Councillor demands the Government seize $7 million raised by Cdn truckers. This was voted down

Ottawa City Councillor Demands Government Seize $7 Million Raised By Canadian Truckers

WEDNESDAY, FEB 02, 2022 – 04:50 PM

GoFundMe famously caved last week under an immense public backlash and decided to release the first tranche of the millions of dollars raised on the platform to support the Canadian truckers and their “Freedom Convoy” which led a massive protest in Ottawa over the weekend to protest Canada’s draconian COVID-related restrictions. The protest seems to have already had some impact on Canadian society, since the Governor of Quebec just yesterday abandoned plans to impose a “health tax” on unvaccinated residents, before whipping out the conciliatory rhetoric about bridge-building.

Unfortunately for the Truckers and their supporters, the Canadian government hasn’t stopped trying to end the protest by any means necessary, including – if they must – seizing money that was lawfully raised in a public setting.

To wit, Mathieu Fleury, the Ottawa City Councillor of Rideau-Vanier Ward, announced support Wednesday for the government to launch a legal challenge to seize the remaining GoFundMe donations that had been collected online. He made the announcement in a tweet from his public account, which was set to private shortly after as it was inundated by a wave of supporters voicing their objections to this latest egregious example of government encroachment on liberty.

“This morning, I have asked the city manager and city solicitor to immediately launch court proceedings targeting the millions of dollars in funds frozen by @GoFundMe so Ottawa taxpayers are not left holding the bag for these protests,” Fleury said via tweet.

He expanded on this notion in the email, which was shared on twitter and a potion of which can be viewed above: “I want to voice my support for the notion of City initiating actions against the GoFundme funds to cover City expenses from incidents from the protests. (Police costs, businesses and residents for clean-up, promotion for our City, and messaging to support downtown residents, and funds for local groups who were victimized over the weekend) Please advise on actions we can and will take.”

Presumably, many of the Canadians who donated to the GoFundMe page also pay taxes. But the notion of the Canadian government seizing money raised by the public to support people fighting for the restoration of their civil liberties almost sounds a little too draconian – even for them.

Judging by the fact that Fleury has essentially gone into digital hiding after publicizing his plans suggests – if the past is any guide – that they are already preparing to walk this back.

Remember, this whole thing was started when the Canadian government imposed new vaccination and quarantine requirements on the truckers that made continuing to do the job virtually impossible for truckers who hadn’t accepted the vaccine. GoFundMe initially shut down the fundraiser on its platform before caving and allowing it to proceed. Now, the government is trying to seize that money for its own ends. Or, as one twitter user put it…

end

This is an excellent read!!

(Cohen/Brownstone)

Trudeau Is Playing With Fire

WEDNESDAY, FEB 02, 2022 – 10:30 PM

Authored by Laura Rosen Cohen via The Brownstone Institute,

Canadian coronavirus lockdown policies have been, and remain, some of the most stringent and restrictive in the entire Western world. It may be a Commonwealth thing, given that Australia and New Zealand have also descended into unrecognizable islands of cruel and capricious public health tyranny. 

In Ontario, citizens are now allowed to eat popcorn at movie theaters that only opened up again earlier this week on Monday at fifty percent capacity, and only because of comprehensive drubbing that the government was subjected to regarding this ridiculous, make-believe public health directive. 

Life in Canada has been tedious, tyrannical, and indescribably punitive. That is why for many months throughout the pandemic, ordinary Americans and pundits alike have been looking north from the land of the free (red states at least) and pretty much sneering at Canadians, bereft as they are of the First and Second Amendments. The polite Canadians, they scoffed, without their guns and their freedom of speech, were a lost cause.

And then one day, Prime Minister Trudeau pushed the nice Canadians a rule too far. 

On January 15th, his minority government enacted a vaccine mandate for Canadian cross-border truckers – 80% of whom are already estimated to be vaccinated. So the truckers said the buck stops here. They quickly organized a grassroots campaign, set up a GoFundMe and sent a 40-mile long convoy to Ottawa, the capital city of Canada. It’s not an anti-vaccine thing, it’s an anti-mandates thing. And though the media would claim it’s a racist thing, the organizers are a Jewish guy named Benjamin Dichter and a Metis woman named Tamara Lich. The mandates for truckers were the straw that broke the Canadians’ back. The Truckers For Freedom Convoy is now camped out in Ottawa, demanding an end to all vaccine mandates, and to restore Canadian freedoms. 

Interestingly, as the 50,000 truck convoy approached Ottawa from Vancouver, Trudeau Tweeted that he would need to self-isolate for five days because he had been in close contact with someone who had tested positive. And as the truckers and their supporters descended upon the city, he was whisked away with his family to an undisclosed location “for security purposes” and then promptly announced that he had tested positive for coronavirus (more isolation).  

With over one million citizens at their capital demonstrating for freedom, and thousands of determined truckers saturating every single road around Parliament Hill, Trudeau offered no olive branch to the protesters. No, he would not meet with them, those racist, misogynists. Those Canadians with “unacceptable views” (like these guys here).

No, instead of calming the waters and speaking with the people, he doubled down and began a series of grotesque verbal attacks on the multiethnic, multicultural demonstrators, with members of Indigenous peoples very highly represented. To add insult to injury, his federal Minister of Transportation concurrently announced that not only would the vaccine and cross border mandates remain, but plans were well underway for the government to implement an interprovincial vaccine mandate especially for truckers. Revenge, served cold. After all he has done for us, the peasants are ingrates! How dare the people not appreciate their Dear Leader? 

Taking a page from the American January 6th playbook, the Canadian mainstream media (largely subsidized by the Canadian taxpayers) has chosen to highlight the lone kooks in the crowd with bad flags (precisely one Confederate and one Nazi) and added additional hatred toward the peaceful, orderly and patriotic protesters. Their American media counterparts are sneering with equal disdain. 

With the Prime Minister still in hiding, whoops, sorry, “isolation,” one would think it would be the opportunity of a lifetime for Conservatives, particularly Her Majesty’s Loyal Leader of the Opposition, to, as Professor Jordan Peterson exhorted, to seize the day and put the screws to the Prime Minister, to rise to the occasion and lead. 

Alas, there would be no Carpe Dieming from the blander than margarine O’Toole. And by flip-flopping at a time of national need, and not reading the political tea leaves has secured his political demise. He’s digging in his heels, but it’s over. The truckers haven’t gotten rid of the mandates yet, but they now have one notably political scalp to their credit: Erin O’Toole, the guy who impossibly lost to Justin Trudeau. 

Government rhetoric against the demonstrators is escalating. The Liberal government and liberal Mayor of Ottawa are urging protesters to leave, but the truckers say they have enough supplies for a two-year campaign and will not be coming home until freedom has been returned and all mandates are canceled. 

The tides are changing in Canada and public opinion appears to be with the convoy. Inspired by the Canadian truckers, American, European and Australian truckers are also starting their own freedom convoys. As unimaginable as it would have seemed just a few weeks ago, Canadians are now seen internationally as a “ray of sunshine” and an inspiration. 

Will Justin Trudeau back down and negotiate? Capitulate? Or will Trudeau’s classless verbal attacks morph into physical retaliation against the mostly working class truckers, their supporters on the ground in Ottawa and the millions of Canadians who also disagree with him and his sweeping mandates and are demanding their freedom? Stay tuned.

end

Canadian Truckers Vow To Continue “Until It’s A Free Nation Again”

THURSDAY, FEB 03, 2022 – 11:40 AM

Overnight, truckers with the Freedom Convoy who have gathered in Coutts, Alberta near the border with Montana managed to refuel and re-supply as supporters continued to contribute to keep the protests going even as the RCMP continue to surround them in a blockade that has disrupted commerce – something the government has tried to blame on the truckers.

But back in Ottawa, where hundreds of protesters remain camped out after this weekend’s Freedom Rally at the seat of Canadian government, locals – and local officials (who have already tried to seize money raised for the truckers on GoFundMe) are growing increasingly anxious, since organizers expect the number of supporters in Ottawa to swell in the coming days as the weekend arrives and with it, another wave of protests.

The movement’s organizers have pledged not to relent until the Canadian government drops some of its more draconian policies, including a quarantine requirement that essentially would make life impossible for unvaccinated truckers.

He conceded the protest would likely grow again this coming weekend and “there may not be a policing solution” to resolve the impasse.

Tamara Lich, a spokeswoman for the protestors, said she and fellow organizers had been surprised by the turnout at first “but we are now well organized and are settling in, until Canada is a free nation again.”

Unfortunately, it seems like local police are insistent on cracking down; they have arrested a handful of demonstrators for a range of charges including carrying a “weapon” to “posting threats on social media”.

Police acknowledged to the BBC that demonstrators have come from “all parts of Canada” and some even from the US.

“Most demonstrators have left,” police chief Peter Sloly said at a Wednesday news conference. “What remains is a highly determined and highly volatile group of unlawful individuals.”

He conceded the protest would likely grow again this coming weekend and “there may not be a policing solution” to resolve the impasse.

As we noted above, some Ottawa officials have suggested trying to cut off the supply of donations financing the truckers. One even proposed suing GoFundMe to block the money raised by supporters from reaching the truckers, whom the council member described as “mercenaries” who are “unlawfully occupying our communities”.

While some locals have complained about the disruptions, one organizer of the Freedom Truckers movement tried to explain that blame for these disruptions lies with the Canadian government.

In a statement, Chris Barber – one of the convoy leaders – said the group understood those frustrations but was also being bullied by politicians and members of the press.

“The responsibility for your inconvenience lies squarely on the shoulders of politicians who prefer to vilify and call us names rather than engage in respectful, serious dialogue,” he said.

But the BBC also parroted MSM lies about the truckers out in Coutts, claiming that they had blocked commercial traffic along the border for five days. The decision to block traffic was made by the RCMP, not the truckers. It also quoted the mayor of the small community in Coutts, who claimed the truckers were responsible for the small community being cut off from gas and groceries for days.

But, again, the truckers aren’t the ones setting up the roadblocks.

Meanwhile, the truckers’ protests have garnered support and inspired others in Europe to try and organize a convoy of their own that will converge on Brussels at an unspecified date.

To end things on a lighter note: supporters of the truckers have been stirring up mischief by calling 911 to inquire about PM Justin Trudeau’s whereabouts. According to a WSJ reporter, local authorities have asked them to kindly desist.

end

Chris Powell	10:44 AM (20 minutes ago)
to me

https://www.theepochtimes.com/fda-document-on-moderna-vaccine-approval-removed-from-agencys-website_4254453.html

Here’s the top of it:

A Food and Drug Administration (FDA) document explaining why the agency approved Moderna’s COVID-19 vaccine was removed from the agency’s website overnight.

The Summary Basis for Regulatory Action gave more details on how regulators reached the approval decision, and included references to an unpublished analysis that found the rates of post-vaccination heart inflammation were higher than any U.S. agency had found before.

After The Epoch Times reviewed the document and sent questions about it to FDA spokespersons, it disappeared from the agency’s website.

“We are aware of the issue and hope to have the document reposted as soon as possible,” a spokesperson told The Epoch Times in an email on Thursday.

Reached by phone and asked for more details about the issue, the spokesperson said: “I reached out to the website people. I don’t really have any more information to tell you.”

The Epoch Times has submitted Freedom of Information Act requests for the document and several unpublished analyses referenced in it, including the FDA meta-analysis that examined data of four health care claims databases and estimated that, among males aged 18 to 25, the rate of myocarditis following Moderna’s primary series was 148 per million males vaccinated.

That figure is higher than other government estimates, including a Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) analysis of reports submitted to the Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System. The analysis found about 10.7 cases per million males aged 18 to 24 who got Moderna’s first shot and 56 cases per million among those who received Moderna’s second shot.

end

Special thanks to Robert H for sending this to us

a must read…

Myocarditis rates are surging in Europe.  I wonder why

(special thanks to Robert H for sending this to us)

Disclose.tv on Twitter: “NOW – #Ottawa City Council: “We need cut off the pipeline of funding to these… mercenaries that are unlawfully protesting and occupying our communities.” https://t.co/9i0j0VuYYi” / Twitter

Inbox

Robert Hryniak	8:53 AM (24 minutes ago)
to

The Canadian Freedom Convoy may not have moved Trudeau. 

Trudeau takes his orders as a good graduate of the World Economic Forum’s young leader program to infiltrate the world to push Schwab’s Marxist agenda. Nevertheless, it has led the way for the world to rebel against the tyranny of lockdowns and mandates deigned to break economies and not as a public safety measure, and people are starting to realize this. 

We now see these COVID political restrictions collapsing in England, Denmark, Finland, South Africa, and even Spain has announced it is degrading COVID to the flu. And the back tracking in Quebec is another sign of retreat from the suppression of personal freedoms. 

And other politicians still do not understand ( listen to this fool in Ottawa ). When the Mayor of Ottawa tried to get the Tow companies to tow the truckers away they all responded with we have Covid and not a single person moved. This is telling us that there is solidarity behind the protest which clearly is causing politicians to be scared of a awakening public who has challenged the status quo.

https://mobile.twitter.com/disclosetv/status/1488957070904864777

As this month rolls by one imagines that many more people will start to question the narrative of politicians who are on the wrong side of public trust. As other countries back away from lockdowns and pointless mandates it is likely that Trudeau will have little choice but to concede to the public as his poll numbers are dropping like a stone. Soon he he will be in Biden territory. Internationally he is already a liability for Canada as a leader as he has lost respect through his actions. 

The Canadian Freedom Convoy has inspired similar events in Europe and in America there are over 130,000 truckers signed up for a Freedom Convoy from California to DC. And it is likely to continue to grow quickly into a much larger event. It is amazing to watch the spark of resistance in Canada grow into a international cause, which demonstrates how people share similar feelings globally and were looking for a means to express their resistance. 

As i have written and said to many people communism does not work because of human nature. Why would anyone willing give their freedom and possessions to the state to be ruled over like a slave? Serfdom went out a long time ago and people will not give up what they have, without a fight. This is what will be evident as spring comes into view and why the agenda of Schwab is so flawed. 

History will likely be kind to the event and momentum of the Canadian Freedom Convoy which was the protest that moved the world. The Canadian Freedom Convoy may not have moved Trudeau. 

Trudeau takes his orders as a good graduate of the World Economic Forum’s young leader program to infiltrate the world to push Schwab’s Marxist agenda. Nevertheless, it has led the way for the world to rebel against the tyranny of lockdowns and mandates deigned to break economies and not as a public safety measure, and people are starting to realize this. 

We now see these COVID political restrictions collapsing in England, Denmark, Finland, South Africa, and even Spain has announced it is degrading COVID to the flu. And the back tracking in Quebec is another sign of retreat from the suppression of personal freedoms. 

And other politicians still do not understand ( listen to this fool in Ottawa ). When the Mayor of Ottawa tried to get the Tow companies to tow the truckers away they all responded with we have Covid and not a single person moved. This is telling us that there is solidarity behind the protest which clearly is causing politicians to be scared of a awakening public who has challenged the status quo.

https://mobile.twitter.com/disclosetv/status/1488957070904864777

As this month rolls by one imagines that many more people will start to question the narrative of politicians who are on the wrong side of public trust. As other countries back away from lockdowns and pointless mandates it is likely that Trudeau will have little choice but to concede to the public as his poll numbers are dropping like a stone. Soon he he will be in Biden territory. Internationally he is already a liability for Canada as a leader as he has lost respect through his actions. 

The Canadian Freedom Convoy has inspired similar events in Europe and in America there are over 130,000 truckers signed up for a Freedom Convoy from California to DC. And it is likely to continue to grow quickly into a much larger event. It is amazing to watch the spark of resistance in Canada grow into a international cause, which demonstrates how people share similar feelings globally and were looking for a means to express their resistance. 

As i have written and said to many people communism does not work because of human nature. Why would anyone willing give their freedom and possessions to the state to be ruled over like a slave? Serfdom went out a long time ago and people will not give up what they have, without a fight. This is what will be evident as spring comes into view and why the agenda of Schwab is so flawed. 

History will likely be kind to the event and momentum of the Canadian Freedom Convoy which was the protest that moved the world. 

END

Why Are Myocarditis Rates Surging in Europe?

Inbox

Robert Hryniak	8:24 PM (2 hours ago)
to

This is huge.

https://www.theepochtimes.com/why-are-myocarditis-rates-surging-in-europe_4250397.html

Cheers
Robert

VACCINE IMPACT

Michael Every

on the major topics of the day

Michael Every…

Rabobank: S-T-A-G-F-L-A-T-I-O-N

THURSDAY, FEB 03, 2022 – 02:00 PM

By Michael Every of Rabobank

Economic data had their own drama for once yesterday. Eurozone inflation was far too high at 5.1% y/y vs. 4.4% expected, while the US ADP employment number was far too low at -301K vs. 180K expected. **S-T-A-G-F-L-A-T-I-O-N**. The only argument is how much stag and how much flation. Time for central bank prestidigitation to explain this is all under control. US stocks were mainly up despite two of the biggest names down big due to wearing rose-tinted headsets and cancel culture – as the White House Press Secretary helpfully piled in. Time for market prestidigitation to ramp things up.

In geopolitics, El Pais released documents purporting to show the US has offered to allow Russia access to NATO bases in Europe to verify there are no cruise missiles present, the threat of which has been one of the ostensible reasons for current Russian action. Yet President Putin reiterated to the UK that NATO is “unwilling” to address Russia’s concerns. This suggests Moscow is also indulging in prestidigitation – or the trick will be to saw things in half. President Macron and Chancellor Scholz will now separately head to the Kremlin: Putin’s body language at the end of his press conference with the pro-Russia Hungarian leader suggests how those talks will go.

The US is deploying thousands more troops from Germany across eastern Europe as Russia is still rolling equipment and a rising numbers of troops, militia, and infamously violent Chechen militia west: its border with China is currently the least guarded in a century, but for once that is not a threat to it. Informed views are that most of Russia’s elite special forces are still in Kazakhstan: but they can be flown to Crimea – watch that (air)space. Also note that a floating Russian re-gasification plant is being sent to Kaliningrad with enough supply for a month – what is it suspecting might happen to the normal gas supply?

Not a drop in US LNG deliveries, although US Senators just sent a letter to the White House urging it to “take swift action to limit US natural gas exports.” At the same time, the US is scrambling to find new suppliers for LNG ‘just in case’ Europe can’t get gas from Russia: it is asking Japan (which needs LNG itself), India (which needs LNG itself), and….China. This is just after Beijing declared that it backs Russia’s security demands: after all, if these are a global precedent then the US military must massively reduce its Asia footprint too.

China also declared it and Russia are cooperating on building a new sanctions-proof financial infrastructure. Let’s have a quick Q&A between a left-hand sock puppet (representing markets) and a right-hand sock puppet (representing me) on that:

Left hand: Can this work?!

Right hand: We won’t know until it is tested.

Left hand: What if it is tested and works?!

Right hand: As we have stressed, the global economy and markets would be bifurcated.

Left hand: So the US won’t act financially then?! That’s good, right?!

Right hand: As we have stressed, that means that the only tools are military.

Left hand: So the US won’t act militarily then? That’s good, right?!

Right hand: As we have stressed, that means others can do so to get what they want.

Indicatively, North Korea is test-firing more ICBMs, just to show it is still there. Talks without preconditions have not started yet.

In the Middle East, Iran-backed Houthis –whom the US dropped from its terrorist list last year because reasons –sent more attack drones to the UAE, prompting the US Navy to send a warship and jets there. Iran has internally declared a ‘win-win’ deal is achievable on the nuclear issue  –meaning it wins and it wins– as Iranian dissident radio releases a supposedly secret internal report from the Revolutionary Guard warning of rising popular discontent with the regime and fears a “state of explosion”. Participants at this week’s INSS conference on security were scathing about the US nuclear negotiators: the former head of Israeli military intelligence suggested the region will soon need to see a formal defence pact between Israel, the UAE, Saudi Arabia, and the US to counterbalance a soon-to-be rising Iran. Yet the US just allowed pro-Iran/Hamas Qatar to join the Non-NATO Major Ally camp.

Not too far from the Middle East, or China, India announced the capital budget for its navy will leap 44.53% (they do love details) while the air force’s will increase only 4.4% and the army’s drops 12%. This is not a surprise to those who read ‘In Deep Ship’ – but it shows how deep in it we are. At the same time, the US Navy is projected to see real-terms budget cuts and further downsizing.  

Forget about Elon Musk’s “damp sock puppet” trolling, which can be aimed far and wide in the present environment: it’s not so much that the US left hand and right hand don’t know what the other is doing, it’s that none of the digits on either hand seem to know what the others are doing! It really helps to have opposable thumbs to remain global leader. Ask dolphins with brains larger than ours.

7. OIL ISSUES

4,000 Flights Canceled As Powerful Winter Storm Wallops 2,000-Mile Stretch OF US

THURSDAY, FEB 03, 2022 – 12:20 PM

Thousands of flights are canceled on Thursday morning as a powerful winter storm spreads wintery precipitation over a 2,000-mile stretch of the United States. 

The winter storm is expected to create hazardous conditions across Arkansas today with snow, sleet, and ice. Parts of western Tennessee and Kentucky are under ice storm warnings. Illinois is expected to receive heavy snow. As the system pushes east later today, parts of upstate New York and Maine could receive more than a foot of snow by Friday. 

“We’re now in the thick of winter, and this newest storm is poised to hit us with everything in the weather arsenal — heavy snow, sleet and freezing rain,” Gov. Kathy Hochul of New York warned. 

Flight tracking company FlightAware reports 4,110 flights within, into, or out of the US have been canceled as of 0920 ET. Delays within, into, or out of the US stand around 320.

Dallas/Fort Worth International Airport recorded the most cancellations, coming in at 529 flights or about 55% of all flights this morning. Chicago O’Hare International Airport has about 256 flights canceled, and Austin-Bergstrom International Airport (located in Austin, Texas) has about 216 canceled flights. Southwest Airlines and American Airlines had the most cancelations in terms of carriers. 

Thursday appears to be a very active weather day, creating nightmares for thousands of passengers. As the storm advances east, it’s likely to cause even more travel disruptions. 

8 EMERGING MARKET& AUSTRALIA ISSUES

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

AUSTRALIA

END

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

Euro/USA 1.1295 DOWN .0005 /EUROPE BOURSES //MOSTLY RED (EXCEPT SPAIN)  

USA/ YEN 114.87  UP  0.491 /NOW TARGETS INTEREST RATE AT .11% AS IT WILL BUY UNLIMITED BONDS TO GETS TO THAT LEVEL…

GBP/USA 1.3594  UP   0.0038

 Last night Shanghai COMPOSITE CLOSED LUNAR HOLIDAY

 Hang Sang CLOSED//LUNAR HOLIDAY

AUSTRALIA CLOSED DOWN 0.34%   // EUROPEAN BOURSES OPENED MOSTLY RED 

Trading from Europe and ASIA

I) EUROPEAN BOURSES MOSTLY RED   

2/ CHINESE BOURSES / :Hang SANG  CLOSED LUNAR HOLIDAY

/SHANGHAI CLOSED HOLIDAY

Australia BOURSE CLOSED DOWN 0.34%

(Nikkei (Japan) CLOSED DOWN 299.29 PTS OR 1/06%

INDIA’S SENSEX  IN THE RED

Gold very early morning trading: 1802.15

silver:$22.37-

USA dollar index early THURSDAY morning: 96.15  UP 21  CENT(S) from WEDNESDAY’s close.

THIS ENDS THURSDAY MORNING NUMBERS

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

And now your closing THURSDAY NUMBERS 1: 00 PM

Portuguese 10 year bond yield: 0.88%  UP 17  in basis point(s) yield from YESTERDAY/

JAPANESE BOND YIELD: +0.180% down 0 AND 1/10   BASIS POINTS from YESTERDAY/JAPAN losing control of its yield curve/

SPANISH 10 YR BOND YIELD: 0.95%// UP 15   in basis points yield from yesterday.

ITALIAN 10 YR BOND YIELD 1.65 UP 23    points in basis points yield from yesterday./

the Italian 10 yr bond yield is trading 68 points higher than Spain.

GERMAN 10 YR BOND YIELD: RISES TO +0.145% IN BASIS POINTS ON THE DAY//

THE IMPORTANT SPREAD BETWEEN ITALIAN 10 YR BOND AND GERMAN 10 YEAR BOND IS 1.50% 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 1.1428  UP .0124    or 12 basis points

USA/Japan: 114.89 DOWN 0.520 OR YEN UP 52  basis points/

Great Britain/USA 1.3602 UP 38  BASIS POINTS

Canadian dollar UP 10 pts to 1.2676

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

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

THE USA/YUAN OFFSHORE:    (YUAN CLOSED (up)..6.3577

TURKISH LIRA:  13.56  EXTREMELY DANGEROUS LEVEL/DEATH WISH/HYPERINFLATION TO BEGIN.

the 10 yr Japanese bond yield  at +0.180

Your closing 10 yr US bond yield up 5  IN basis points from WEDNESDAY at 1.832% //trading well ABOVE the resistance level of 2.27-2.32%) very problematic

 USA 30 yr bond yield: 2.053 down 3 in basis points 

Your closing USA dollar index, 95.40  DOWN 54   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 54.16 PTS OR 0.71%

German Dax :  CLOSED DOWN 245.30 points or 0.57%

Paris CAC CLOSED DOWN 109.64PTS OR  1.54% 

Spain IBEX CLOSED DOWN 23.80PTS OR 0.27%

Italian MIB: CLOSED DOWN 299.77 PTS OR 1.09%

WTI Oil price 88.95    12: EST

Brent Oil:  89.99  12:00 EST

USA /RUSSIAN /   RUBLE FALLS:   76.61 THE CROSS HIGHER BY  40 RUBLES/DOLLAR (RUBLE LOWER BY 40  BASIS PTS)

GERMAN 10 YR BOND YIELD; +.145

CLOSING NUMBERS: 4 PM

Euro vs USA: 1.1435 UP  .01350   OR 135 BASIS POINTS

British Pound: 1.3594 UP  .0031 or 31 basis pts

USA dollar vs Japanese Yen: 114.92 UP .541

USA dollar vs Canadian dollar: 1.2680 DOWN .0007 (cdn dollar UP71 basis pts)

West Texas intermediate oil: 90.24

Brent: 91.05

USA 10 yr bond yield: 1.824 UP 5 points

USA 30 yr bond yield: 2.148  UP 4  pts

DOW JONES INDUSTRIAL AVERAGE: DOWN 518.17 PTS OR 1.45%

NASDAQ 100 DOWN 638.63 OR 4.22%

VOLATILITY INDEX: 24.60 UP 2.51 PTS (UP 11.36%

GLD/NYSE CLOSING PRICE $168.55 DOWN $0.29 OR 0.17%

SLV/NYSE CLOSING PRICE: $20.68// DOWN $.03 OR 0.12%

end)

USA trading day in Graph Form

Tech Wreck Meta-stasizes To Broader Market; Credit Starts To Crack

THURSDAY, FEB 03, 2022 – 04:01 PM

Today was the worst day for a balanced bond/stock portfolio since Feb 2021 as stocks puked and yields spiked as Risk-Parity funds puked as Zuckerberg’s disaster forced deleveraging and derisking everywhere…

While Facebook’s stock was probably up in the metaverse, in the cold, hard reality in which us plebs live, Meta lost almost $250 billion in market cap today, losing its membership of the ‘four commas’ club and falling to the same market cap as Nvidia…

There was a brief retail-driven BTFD episode at the cash open, but the algos disagreed…

That is more market cap lost than the total market cap of 475 members of the S&P 500 and equivalent to an Adobe, a Disney, a Broadcom, two Blackrocks, two Goldmans, three General Motors, or five Bank of New York Mellons.

Source: Bloomberg

This is  – as far as we can tell – the largest single-day market cap loss for a company... ever. And dwarfs the next 5…

• AAPL lost $179bn on 09/03/20
• MSFT lost $178bn on 03/16/20
• TSLA lost $140bn on 11/09/21
• AMZN lost $130bn on 07/03/21
• GOOGL lost $95bn on 03/16/20

And aside from the day that Jeff Bezos handed over half his wealth to his ex-wife, this has to be the biggest daily net worth loss for a human ever.

All of that amid a total lack of liquidity…

All of which weighed most heavily on Nasdaq obviously but that selling overhang metastasized (see what we did there?) across the broader market (and prompted liquidation selling in other assets). There were barely any bounces and those that did manage anything were hit hard. Selling accelerated at around 1430ET (margin call time).

Worst day for the Nasdaq Since Sept 2020

The S&P and Dow both dropped back below their 100DMAs…

Everything is now red for February (with the late-day purge dragging the Dow down too)…

Credit markets ain’t buying the recent rampage in stocks. HY/IG spreads are at 15-month highs…

Source: Bloomberg

…while VIX decouples lower…

Source: Bloomberg

Treasuries were also dumped today with yields up 4-5bps (but only after spiking even more intraday)…

Source: Bloomberg

The 30Y Yield continues to chop in a relatively wide 10bps range…

Source: Bloomberg

US rate-hike odds rose modestly but Lagarde sent European rate-hike expectations soaring with her surprisingly hawkish sentiment…

Source: Bloomberg

The dollar continued its slide, dumping rather notably today…

Source: Bloomberg

Bitcoin dropped for the 2nd day in a row, unable to hold above $37k…

Source: Bloomberg

Gold was puked at the US equity cash open, back below $1800, but buyers stepped in rapidly and lifted it back above $1800…

Finally, a weak dollar and escalating geopolitical risks sent WTI surging back above $90 today for the first time since Oct 2014…

And that means $3.50 gas at your pump is coming very soon…

Source: Bloomberg

Get back to work Mr.Biden!

I)  MORNING/AFTERNOON TRADING/

Stocks, Bonds, & The Dollar Dump After Lagarde’s Hawkish Comments

THURSDAY, FEB 03, 2022 – 09:11 AM

ECB President Christine Lagarde has finally been forced to admit reality. Specifically, in this morning’s press conference she hawkishly noted that “risk to inflation outlook are tilted to the upside”.

Translation – it’s not transitory anymore.

She added that the board has “unanimous concern” about inflation data.

Finally, Lagarde noted that the ECB is “getting closer to target” in inflation, but added that the ECB “won’t hike rates until net bond purchases have stopped.”

“We are getting much closer to target and this is so because in the medium term, there are factors, drivers of inflation, helping us finally, hopefully reaching that target. That has to do with the labor market, the broad based inflation that we have.”

President Lagarde is clearly unwilling to repeat what she said in her December press conference on rate hikes being “very unlikely” in 2022.

Her response is that she doesn’t make “pledges without conditionalities.”

That triggered a fresh leg lower in US (and European) stocks…

Sent bond yields soaring globally with 30Y UST up 7bps…

And BTPs up 13bps…

And dumped the dollar as EUR strengthened…

The end result is that EU money markets are now pricing in a 10bps rate-hike by the ECB in June, and a 20bps hike in September.

Lagarde ended by ominously stating that inflation might be significantly higher than expected this year… and for a central bank who’s mandate is ‘fix inflation’, that is a problem.

II) USA DATA

Jobless Claims Improve As Omicron Wave Ebbs

THURSDAY, FEB 03, 2022 – 08:35 AM

Initial Jobless Claims slipped lower last week as it appears the ‘omicron wave’ may be wearing off in America’s labor markets.

Source: Bloomberg

Pennsylvania and Michigan saw the biggest weekly rise in claims while Ohio and Kentucky saw the biggest drop…

And the total number of Americans on some form of government dole remains at pre-COVID-lockdown levels…

Source: Bloomberg

Certainly hard to argue the need for anything but tighter monetary policy in this environment.

END

Service sector is 70% of GDP

(zerohedge)

US Services Sector Slumps To 18-Month Lows, Firms Passing Higher Costs On To Customers

THURSDAY, FEB 03, 2022 – 10:05 AM

Following yesterday’ dismal data from Markit/ISM on the manufacturing side of the US economy, analysts expected this morning’s services sector surveys to show further deterioration after last month’s tumble.

• Markit US Services fell from 57.6 in December to 51.2 in January – the lowest since Aug 2020. However, the final print was marginally above the flash print of 50.9.
• PMI Services fell from 62.3 in December to 59.9 in January – the lowest since Feb 2921. However this was above the expected 59.5 print.

All of which syncs with weak economic surprise data…

Source: Bloomberg

It seems the ‘soft’ survey data is once again catching down to the ‘hard’ economic data reality.

Although there were signs that cost pressures eased during January, companies were able to pass on higher costs to clients through the fastest rise in output charges for three months.

So overall, its a quadruple whammy as both Markit and ISM and services and manufacturing all saw weakening growth for the second straight month…

Under the hood, new export orders collapsed…

Interestingly, only Gasoline prices were seen as lower in January…

Shortages are mentioned everywhere… even blood!

The IHS Markit US Composite PMI Output Index posted 51.1 in January, down notably from 57.0 in December. The upturn was the slowest since July 2020 as manufacturers and service providers registered a considerable slowdown in growth momentum.

And this implies zero economic growth…

Commenting on the latest survey results, Chris Williamson, Chief Business Economist at IHS Markit, said:

“The US economy has been hit hard by the Omicron variant at the start of 2022, with growth faltering to the weakest for 18 months to signal a near-stalling of the recovery. All broad sectors of the economy reported business activity to have been adversely affected by the surge in virus cases, though the slowdown was led by the sharpest drop in activity for consumer services recorded since December 2020 as virus-related health protection measures were tightened to the highest since May of last year.

“As well as the demand-dampening effect of the virus, businesses are facing multiple headwinds, including labor shortages, supply chain issues, rising costs and soaring inflation, combined with concerns over the future resilience of demand amid rising interest rates and reduced fiscal support, all of which point to economic growth slowing sharply in the first quarter.”

Finally, on a side note, Markit’s Sector Survey showed growth slowing in every sector (and

The latest survey pointed to renewed declines in business activity in the Consumer Services (47.9) and Technology (48.5) sectors. Consumer service providers widely noted that the Omicron variant had led to shrinking demand and customer cancellations due to COVID-19.

Seems like time to start hiking rates, right?

end

USA economy is in a free fall!

(zerohedge)

December US Factory Orders Tumble Most Since April 2020 COVID Crisis

THURSDAY, FEB 03, 2022 – 10:10 AM

After surging 1.6% MoM in November, analysts expected US Factory Orders to drop 0.4% MoM in January (and the weakness in ISM/PMI data seemed to support that), and they were spot on.

Source: Bloomberg

This is the biggest MoM drop since April 2020, but orders are still up 13.3% YoY.

Ex-Transports, factory orders rose only 0.1% MoM, well below the +0.4% MoM expected.

IIb) USA COVID/VACCINE MANDATE STORIES

Never to late, but this should have been done 2 years ago. Iowa bill would allow Ivermectin use for critically sick patients

(Philips/EpochTimes)

Proposed Bill Would Allow Ivermectin Use For Critically Sick Patients: Iowa Lawmakers

WEDNESDAY, FEB 02, 2022 – 05:10 PM

Authored by Jack Phillips via The Epoch Times,

Lawmakers in Iowa’s state Legislature have advanced a bill that would allow the use of ivermectin for critically sick COVID-19 patients.

Ivermectin has been used for decades to treat parasitic worms in humans, but during the COVID-19 pandemic, some patients and doctors have attested that the drug is effective in relieving symptoms.

The Iowa bill stipulates that COVID-19 patients who are on ventilators should have the ability to use ivermectin. Specifically, it expands the state’s “right to try” law, which allows terminally ill patients to access medicines that have passed under the first phase of the U.S. Food and Drug Administration’s trials.

“I completely support it. I think that we should give patients the right to try,” said Rep. Ann Meyer, a Republican and one of the bill’s cosponsors, told the Des Moines Register in late January.

Rep. Lee Hein, also a Republican, said he sponsored the measure after hearing that two families of critically ill COVID-19 patients had sought ivermectin but hospital policies prevented them from obtaining the medication. Both patients died of COVID-19, he said.

“I don’t know whether any of these drugs work, but I think at that late stage in the game, once you’re on a ventilator, families ought to have at least a glimmer of hope to try something,” Hein told Radio Iowa.

The FDA’s website says that its “currently available data” suggests that the medication isn’t effective at treating or preventing COVID-19. However, the agency courted controversy last year when it issued a Twitter post that suggested the drug is only used for “deworming” horses and other livestock, although it has long authorized ivermectin tablets as a treatment for worms in humans.

The FDA and other agencies, meanwhile, have warned against people taking livestock-grade ivermectin, which doesn’t require a prescription, amid reports of increases in people being admitted to hospitals after taking the livestock version of the drug.

The drug gained more attention after podcaster Joe Rogan confirmed that he took human-grade ivermectin in a bid to curb his COVID-19 symptoms. Ivermectin is also being used across Latin America for COVID-19, including in Peru, Guatemala, Bolivia, and other countries.

In December of last year, the family of an Illinois man, Sun Ng, who developed severe COVID-19 symptoms and was near death, said he recovered after taking ivermectin. It came after a court ordered the hospital to administer the drug to Ng, the family’s attorney told The Epoch Times at the time.

Rep. Meyer, who is a also nurse, said that ivermectin has “been around” for “many years.” The bill, she told Radio Iowa, would allow “off-label” use of the drug for COVID-19 patients who are on life support in hospitals.

Republicans advanced the measure through a subcommittee meeting on Jan. 26.

One Democrat on the subcommittee, Rep. Mary Mascher, voted against advancing the bill.

“There’s a lot of folks in the room who are medical folks,” Mascher said during last week’s hearing. “And I have heard no one in support of the bill.”

end

70% Of Americans Say It’s Time To “Accept COVID And Get On With Our Lives”

THURSDAY, FEB 03, 2022 – 10:20 AM

Authored by Paul Joseph Watson via Summit News,

A new Monmouth poll finds that 70 per cent of Americans think it’s time to live with COVID and get on with our lives.

Rather interestingly, people who have been infected with COVID are more likely to want society to move on from it than those who haven’t.

“Fully 7 in 10 Americans (70%) agree with the sentiment that “it’s time we accept that Covid is here to stay and we just need to get on with our lives” – including 78% of those who report having gotten Covid and 65% of those who say they have not been infected,” according to Monmouth.

The main difference in sentiment is predictably seen in political affiliation, with 89% of Republicans wanting to move on, along with 71% of independents but only 47% of Democrats.

The poll numbers will make problematic reading for those who have turned taking multiple vaccines and vehemently supporting lockdown mandates and mask rules into a high status symbol religion.

However, they may find some succor in the number of Americans who think the pandemic will be under control by the end of the year, which is only 34%, while 28% think a return to normal life will never happen.

That figure has risen from 22% in September and just 6% a year ago who thought normalcy would never resume.

Part of the desire to see the back of the pandemic and for everyone to move on could be linked to the media’s relentless coverage of the issue.

A survey conducted last month by NewsNation/Decision Desk HQ found that just 10 per cent of Americans trust the media when it comes to information about COVID-19.

end

Watch: Johns Hopkins Prof. Slams Media, Own Institution For Hiding Bombshell Study That Found Lockdowns Are Ineffective

THURSDAY, FEB 03, 2022 – 10:40 AM

Authored by Steve Watson via Summit News,

A Johns Hopkins professor slammed his own university and the establishment media for failing to report on a major study that concluded lockdowns have been almost completely ineffective at curbing COVID mortality rates.

As we reported yesterday, the study was authored by multiple eminent researchers at the University and concluded that  lockdowns “are ill-founded and should be rejected as a pandemic policy instrument.”

The authors wrote that “While this meta-analysis concludes that lockdowns have had little to no public health effects, they have imposed enormous economic and social costs where they have been adopted.”

Appearing on Tucker Carlson’s show Wednesday, Johns Hopkins professor of surgery Dr. Martin Makary blasted the college, noting “Johns Hopkins itself did not even put out a press release about this study, and if you look at the media coverage, it’s one of the biggest stories in the world today, and yet certain media outlets have not even covered it.”

Makary urged that the reason for hiding the study is that “people may already have their own narrative written” about the effectiveness of lockdowns.

The professor dug down into the study and noted that it found that the number of lives saved by the lockdowns is infinitesimal compared to those lost through missed cancer diagnosis and treatment alone.

“It was 124,000 excess deaths in year one. So, over two years, it was about a quarter million people who died,” Makary noted.

He added, “I think the public is hungry for honesty and basic humility from public health officials.”

Watch: see zerohedge

Makary also appeared on Fox Business to discuss the study:

Senator Rand Paul also referred to the new Johns Hopkins study in an appearance Wednesday, noting “I hope we’ll learn from this the study. There was no correlation between any of the mandates the government put in place and any change in the incidence of the disease.”

Paul reminded viewers that Anthony Fauci has repeatedly claimed that lockdowns have saved millions of lives.  

“It’s become so politicized that I don’t think Dr. Fauci will ever apologize or admit to the country, but we need to have people like him removed from office because they’ve been so wrong on so much policy,” Paul urged.

Watch: zerohedge

Other Republicans commented on the Johns Hopkins study Wednesday.

Sen. Roger Marshall, R-Kansas told reporters “Bad judgment and poor leadership from our nation’s health agencies have caused most Americans to live with an unhealthy fear of COVID-19. There is no doubt, we need a new approach to COVID as we must learn to live with it.”

Marshall echoed Paul, stating “That new approach should not include Dr. Fauci – American’s don’t trust him and he has lost his reputation. We must stop the obsession with COVID, stop living in fear and move forward.”

The latest developments come on the heels of 70 per cent of Americans asserting that it’s time to live with COVID and get on with our lives.

end

Trump: we must end the mandates! end

EXCLUSIVE: Donald Trump: ‘We Have to End the Mandates’

Inbox

Robert Hryniak	9:08 AM (0 minutes ago)
to

He has read the tea leaves.
In Saskatchewan they are ending all mandates.

https://www.theepochtimes.com/exclusive-donald-trump-we-have-to-end-the-mandates_4252590.html

iii)B USA inflation commentaries//LOG JAMS//

A good read

(courtesy Michael Snyder)

Geology Insider Explains Why The Global Energy Crisis Is Going To Get Much, Much Worse

THURSDAY, FEB 03, 2022 – 06:30 AM

Authored by Michael Snyder via The Economic Collapse blog,

It is becoming clear that we are in far more trouble than we are being told.  In recent months, all forms of traditional energy have become significantly more expensive, and this is fueling price increases all over the planet.  This new global energy crisis is directly responsible for the astounding rise in fertilizer prices, it has resulted in a tremendous amount of pain at the pump for millions of average Americans, and since virtually everything that we buy has to be transported it is a major contributing factor to the “inflation boom” that we are currently witnessing.  Unfortunately, this is just the beginning.

I was recently contacted by a geologist that worked in the oil industry for more than a decade.

He patiently explained to me why things aren’t going to be getting any better.

I asked him if I could share some of what he sent to me with all of you, and he agreed.  After reading this, I think that you will agree that it is quite a sobering assessment of the current state of affairs…

I am a geologist who has worked in the oil industry for over ten years. I was just coming out of school in time for the shale revolution and worked in Denver on the Bakken play in North Dakota, and then I worked the Permian out of Midland. These were the two major shale plays, so I have firsthand knowledge. I now teach environmental science for high-schoolers in Amman, Jordan.

Anyway, back in 2015 I was starting to see reports coming out from analysts that the shale industry would run out of new places to drill shale oil wells in the Permian in 2021. These reports weren’t telling me anything new, just giving me a likely date. You see, shale drilling is drilling in poor rock quality. Prior to shale, we didn’t have to frac wells because the rock quality was great, but we drilled all that good rock up. So, it is really scraping the bottom of the barrel now and way back then, there was a recognition that it wouldn’t last forever. Oil is a limited resource. For a time, it was barely economic to drill shale wells because the margins of drilling in such poor rock was slightly better than what you could make on interest due to quantitative easing policy. Most of the shale companies however, were simply Ponzi schemes and the shale industry lost billions as a whole. But the result of this loss of capital was record production. Needless to say, Wall Street figured it out eventually that they were not making money and so the industry has been capital starved. That is one problem, the other is that there really aren’t many more drilling locations. All the good places have been drilled up which is why you don’t see a rush of shale companies returning to drilling even though oil prices are rising fast. This lack of investment will continue to push oil prices higher.

So much of America’s oil production now comes from shale wells. The problem with shale wells is that the oil production declines much faster than wells drilled in what we call “conventional” rock. Conventional oil production has been on the decline for a long time and shale as helped make up for production. The problem is, that now that drilling new wells slows, the rate of decline in oil production will be much steeper. Around the world, many countries that have not invested in shale (because it is sub-economic) have had their conventional resources continue to decline. Venezuela was a major oil exporter, so were Columbia and Mexico. Expect Saudi Arabia to not be far behind. They have been lying for years about just how much oil they really have left.

As you keep pointing out, add wars or natural disasters to this and we are in really big trouble. Oil is the number one resource upon which the entire global economy is built. High oil prices lead directly to bread riots and collapse of governments (think the Arab Spring). Politicians need cheap oil but we won’t be seeing it again. Some people in the industry keep thinking new technology will save us and help us develop new oil plays. They couldn’t be more wrong. The technology for frac’ing was first developed in the 60’s. I can tell you that there is no new technology being developed right now in the oil industry that will save us. Physics and geology are against us on this one, even if we could develop some technology. Wind & solar won’t save us either, it would require a larger investment of materials and energy than we have.

There is no way we are getting out of this.

What this means is that you are going to be paying much more to heat your homes.

And it means that you are also going to be paying much more to fill up your vehicle at the gas station.

Needless to say, you will be paying a lot more for food too.

In fact, food prices are already starting to go bananas.  Last week, Kraft Heinz announced that it will soon be raising prices on many of their most popular products by as much as 30 percent…

Kraft Heinz (KHC) said in a recent letter to its customers that it will raise prices in March on dozens of products, including Oscar Mayer cold cuts, hot dogs, sausages, bacon, Velveeta cheese, Maxwell House coffee, TGIF frozen chicken wings, Kool-Aid and Capri Sun drinks.

The increases range from 6.6% on 12oz Velveeta Fresh Packs to 30% on a three-pack of Oscar Mayer turkey bacon. Most cold cuts and beef hot dogs will go up around 10% and coffee around 5%. Some Kool-Aid and Capri Sun drink packs will increase by about 20%.

Of course Kraft Heinz is definitely not alone.

As our colleagues over at Zero Hedge have aptly pointed out, other major food companies will soon be jacking up prices as well…

Kraft Heinz is just the latest consumer manufacturer to announce plans to boost prices early in the year. Last week, P&G said that it would raise prices on Tide and Gain laundry detergents, Downy fabric softener and Bounce dryer sheets by an average of about 8% in February. Conagra, which makes such brands as Slim Jim, Marie Callender’s and Birds Eye, has said it plans to raise prices later this year.

For a long time, I have been specifically warning that food prices would go completely nuts, and now it is starting to happen right in front of our eyes.

And according to a new Gallup survey that was just released, a whopping 79 percent of all Americans expect even more inflation in the months ahead…

Gallup highlighted that the 79% surveyed in their Jan. 3-16 poll, who said they expected inflation to rise, was the highest they’ve measured in the two decades they’ve been asking the question.

“In the past, Americans have always been more likely to say inflation will increase rather than decrease, but the current expectation is higher than usual — in fact, it is the highest Gallup has measured in its trend,” the polling organization wrote in its release.

The “experts” at the Federal Reserve thought that they could absolutely flood our financial system with money without any severe consequences.

Similarly, our politicians in Washington thought that they could borrow and spend trillions upon trillions of dollars without wrecking our currency.

They were both wrong, and now the American people are going to be absolutely shocked by the level of economic pain that we will soon be enduring.

*  *  *

iv)swamp stories

California dept of Justice sends a sorching demand letter to BLM and demanding to know the wherabouts of missing money

(zerohedge)

BLM Has 60 Days To Come Clean About Financials After California DOJ Sends Scorching Demand Letter

WEDNESDAY, FEB 02, 2022 – 06:50 PM

The leaders of Black Lives Matter have 60 days to produce information about the charity’s $60 million bankroll, according to a letter from the California DOJ to the activist organization obtained by the Washington Examiner.

And as the Examiner notes, the letter comes just days after they uncovered that BLM has no known leader in charge of its giant war chest since its co-founder resigned in May – and that the Los Angeles address they list on their tax filings is wrong.

“The organization BLACK LIVES MATTER GLOBAL NETWORK FOUNDATION, INC. is delinquent with The Registry of Charitable Trusts for failing to submit required annual report(s),” reads the letter from California AG Rob Bonta.

BLM is also prohibited from “soliciting or disbursing charitable funds” in California until it submits its 2020 Form 990 and other financial records to the state, the California DOJ informed the charity Monday. The letter added that the Black Lives Matter Global Network Foundation, the legal entity that represents the national BLM movement, faces fines for “each month or partial month for which the report(s) are delinquent.”

“Charitable assets cannot be used to pay these avoidable costs,” the California DOJ warned BLM. “Accordingly, directors, trustees, officers and return preparers responsible for failure to timely file the above-described report(s) are personally liable for payment of all penalties, interest and other costs incurred to restore exempt status.” -Washington Examiner

If they fail to come clean, California may revoke BLM tax-exempt status and impose fees, in addition to holding directors personally liable.

Meanwhile, the state of Washington ordered BLM to “immediately cease” fundraising in the far-left state until they similarly come clean about their finances. 

In February of last year, BLM reported that it had closed out 2020 with $60 million in its bank accounts, however the charity refuses to say who’s been in control of its funds for the last eight months.

In May, BLM co-founder Patrisse Cullors resigned amid a controversy over a homebuying spree. While Cullors co-founded BLM with Alicia Garza and Opal Tometi in the wake of George Zimmerman’s not guilty verdict in the Trayvon Martin death, she was the only one who remained with the foundation that took in $90 million last year, in the wake of George Floyd’s death while in police custody.  

Cullors, a self-proclaimed Marxist – was branded a “fraud” after buying a $1.4 million home in a posh California neighborhood that’s 88% white.

Various BLM chapters have been complaining about the organization’s lack of transparently as well. 

In a December 2020 statement, the local chapters said:

“Since the establishment of [Black Lives Matter Global Network Foundation], our chapters have consistently raised concerns about financial transparency, decision making, and accountability … we believe public accountability has become necessary.”

The local chapters also said the Black Lives Matter Global Network Foundation appointed Cullors as its executive director against their wishes and without their knowledge, rendering her leadership illegitimate.

“We, the undersigned chapters, believe that all of these events occurred without democracy, and assert that it was without the knowledge of the majority of Black Lives Matters chapters across the country and world,” the statement read.

“Patrisse Cullors … became Executive Director against the will of most chapters and without their knowledge.”

And now, they have 60 days to come clean or face consequences in the state of California.

end

BLM Suspends Fundraising As States Question Financial Transparency

THURSDAY, FEB 03, 2022 – 01:20 PM

Authored by Isabel van Brugen via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

The national arm of Black Lives Matter (BLM) on Feb. 2 shut down all of its online fundraising streams, shortly after California’s Department of Justice threatened to hold the organization to account over its “lack of financial transparency,” which includes at least $60 million in undisclosed donations.

California and Washington states had recently prohibited BLM from collecting donations due to transparency issues, but it did not comply with those orders, the Washington Examiner reported.

The news outlet found last week that the charity appeared to have no known leader in charge of its $60 million bankroll since BLM co-founder Patrisse Cullors resigned in May 2021. Cullors had been at the helm of the Black Lives Matter Global Network Foundation (BLMGNF), the legal entity that represents the national BLM movement, for nearly six years.

“We take these matters seriously and have taken immediate action,” a spokesperson for BLMGNF told the Washington Examiner. “We have immediately engaged compliance counsel to address any issues related to state fundraising compliance. In the interim, we have shut down online fundraising as we work quickly to ensure we are meeting all compliance requirements.”

California’s Department of Justice issued a formal delinquency notice to the group on Monday.

“The organization BLACK LIVES MATTER GLOBAL NETWORK FOUNDATION, INC. is delinquent with The Registry of Charitable Trusts for failing to submit required annual report(s),” a letter from the state’s Attorney General Rob Bonta said.

“An organization that is delinquent, suspended or revoked is not in good standing and is prohibited from engaging in conduct for which registration is required, including soliciting or disbursing charitable funds,” the letter added.

The state gave BLM 60 days to file tax and charity documents for 2020.

“Accordingly, directors, trustees, officers and return preparers responsible for failure to timely file the above-described report(s) are personally liable for payment of all penalties, interest and other costs incurred to restore exempt status,” the letter said.

The Epoch Times has contacted the California Department of Justice and BLM for comment.

Shortly before the organization cut off its online fundraising streams, Indiana Attorney General Todd Rokita described Black Lives Matter as a falling “house of cards” and compared it to an “illegal enterprise.”

“It appears that the house of cards may be falling, and this happens eventually with nearly every scam, scheme, or illegal enterprise,” Rokita, a Republican, told the Washington Examiner.

“I see patterns that scams kind of universally take: failure to provide board members, failure to provide even executive directors, failure to make your filings available. It all leads to suspicion.”

It wasn’t immediately clear whether BLM is being probed by Rokita’s office, however Rokita told the news outlet that BLM’s undisclosed finances “certainly cause us to be concerned.”

KING REPORT/SWAMP STORIES

Companies unexpectedly cut 301,000 jobs in January as omicron slams labor market, ADP says

• This was the first reported net job less since December 2020…
• The pandemic-sensitive leisure and hospitality industry was the hardest hit, losing 154,000 jobs…

https://www.cnbc.com/2022/02/02/adp-jobs-report-january-2022.html
 
David Rosenberg @EconguyRosie: ADP shows payrolls down 301k and the pundits are “looking through” the data as solely omicron-induced… the impact on inflation is deemed permanent, but one can safely use the word “transitory” to describe the economic impact without ridicule. Give me a break.
 
@NorthmanTrader: US debt levels in Q1: 2000: $6T; 2005: $8T; 2010: $13T; 2015: $18T; 2020: $23T;
2022: $30T
 
@BP_Rising: Last month Nasdaq had its worst breadth EVER. Note where it was around October 2008 and March 2020 crashes. This should keep chasing Serfs up at night.
https://twitter.com/BP_Rising/status/1488685787961081858
 
U.S. trade official says China failed to meet ‘Phase 1’ commitments
In the deal signed by former President Donald Trump in January 2020, China pledged to increase purchases of U.S. farm and manufactured goods, energy and services by $200 billion above 2017 levels during 2020 and 2021.  Through November, China had met only about 60% of that goal, according to trade data compiled by Peterson Institute for International Economics senior fellow Chad Bown…
https://www.reuters.com/world/us/us-trade-official-says-china-failed-meet-phase-1-commitments-2022-02-01/
 
PayPal shares dive 25% after company blames inflation for weak guidance
PayPal also missed user growth targets due in part to 4.5 million “illegitimate” accounts that joined the platform, which “affected our ability to achieve our guidance in the quarter,” CFO John Rainey said. The company also walked back its user growth goals, which Rainey said was a “choice” to focus on “sustainable growth and driving engagement.”…
    We see a large pull-back in spending, particularly by lower-income consumers’…
https://www.cnbc.com/2022/02/02/paypal-stock-falls-after-company-blames-inflation-for-weak-guidance.html
 
PayPal suffered its largest ever decline.  Perhaps it is not wise to upset a large chunk of your customers by banning accounts for their political beliefs.
 
Forget using PayPal if your views run afoul of this left-wing group
https://nypost.com/2021/07/29/forget-using-paypal-if-your-views-run-afoul-of-this-left-wing-group/
 
Legal Censorship: PayPal Makes a Habit of Deciding What Users Can Read
https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2012/02/legal-censorship-paypal-makes-habit-deciding-what-users-can-read
 
PayPal Shuts Down Long-Time Tor Supporter with No Recourse
Larry Brandt, a long-time supporter of internet freedom, used his nearly 20-year-old PayPal account to put his money where his mouth is. His primary use of the payment system was to fund servers to run Tor nodes, routing internet traffic in order to safeguard privacy and avoid country-level censorship. Now Brandt’s PayPal account has been shut down, leaving many questions unanswered and showing how financial censorship can hurt the cause of internet freedom around the world…
https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2021/06/paypal-shuts-down-long-time-tor-supporter-no-recourse

Fox’s @ChadPergram: Fox confirms that Sen. Ben Ray Lujan (D-NM) is expected to be out 4-6 weeks after suffering stroke. There is no remote voting in the Senate. So, this could put on ice any 50-50 measure in a divided Senate.  It also means that any effort to rekindle Build Back Better is dead until at least the middle of March. Not that it was going anywhere quickly.  We are told that a floor vote on a Supreme Court Justice could come in the spring sometime.
 
Johns Hopkins researchers: Lockdowns had ‘little to no effect’ on COVID-19 deaths but ‘imposed enormous economic and social costs’  https://www.theblaze.com/news/johns-hopkins-researchers-lockdowns-did-not-work
 
Classified State Department email declared Hunter Biden ‘undercut’ U.S. efforts in Ukraine
Withheld from public for five years, memo conflicts with Democrats’ official narrative that president’s son had no impact on U.S. anti-corruption efforts in Ukraine.
    The email, obtained by Just the News, was written on Nov. 22, 2016 by former U.S. embassy official George Kent, one of the Democrats’ star witnesses in their first effort to impeach former President Donald Trump… Contrary to federal law, the State Department failed to acknowledge the existence of the document to the court or to Just the News in its multiple Freedom of Information Act lawsuits against the State Department seeking records on Hunter and Joe Biden’s dealings in Ukraine.
    Most importantly, the email’s stark message directly conflicts with the narrative the mainstream media, State Department witnesses and Democratic congressmen gave the public two years ago, when they insisted Hunter Biden’s lucrative job with the allegedly corrupt Ukrainian gas company Burisma Holdings — while creating the appearance of a conflict of interest — had no impact on U.S. efforts to fight corruption in that country…
   The email chain also showed that State officials were acutely aware that Hunter Biden had an affiliation with an American business partner also accused — and eventually convicted of — corruption.
https://justthenews.com/accountability/russia-and-ukraine-scandals/classified-state-department-email-declared-hunter-biden
 
@TomFitton: Remember, they impeached Trump to protect Biden on Ukraine/Burisma (and China). And now, with the announced deployment of thousands of US troops to Europe, Biden’s corruption issues have helped lead to one of the most dangerous confrontations with Russia in 60 years.
 
Yesterday, The Big Guy went creepy whisperer again.
https://twitter.com/realJoelFischer/status/1488957352573288449
 
White House backs away from calling Russian Ukraine invasion ‘imminent’
White House’s Jen Psaki says ‘it sent a message that we weren’t intending to send’
https://www.foxnews.com/politics/white-house-backs-away-calling-russian-ukraine-invasion-imminent
    @JackPosobiec: So why did her boss just deploy thousands of troops to Eastern Europe?
 
@bespokeinvest: The # of companies raising guidance has plummeted this season.  Just 55 so far vs. 165 at this point last earnings season

.

(VIDEO) Ballot box surveillance video: ‘One mule made 53 trips to 20 dropboxes’ Highly respected Dinesh D’Souza, working together with Catherine Engelbrecht of True the Vote, just released a trailer to their new movie, “2,000 Mules,” that shows the world exactly how the 2020 Presidential Election was Rigged and Stolen… It was, perhaps, the least secure in history. The ballot box was stuffed, and stuffed like never before—and it’s all on video. Ballots were trafficked and sold in a massive operation in each Swing State. The evidence is so damning, what will the cowards who sat and did nothing about the stolen election say now?… https://sharylattkisson.com/2022/01/video-ballot-box-surveillance-video-one-mule-made-53-trips-to-20-dropboxes/   3 Babbitt Shooting Witnesses Removed from FBI Most-Wanted List (No explanation given!) https://www.theepochtimes.com/3-babbitt-shooting-witnesses-removed-from-fbi-most-wanted-list_4250599.html?utm_source=partner&utm_campaign=ZeroHedge   @greg_price11: So Jeff Zucker’s alleged paramour at CNN was Allison Gollust, CNN’s executive vice president. Her job before that? Gov. Andrew Cuomo’s comms director. This article suggests their relationship is why CNN protected the Cuomos for so long.   CNN Bosses Jeff Zucker & Allison Gollust Left Their Marriages After Alleged Romantic Affair, ‘Cozy Arrangement’ Dragged into Chris Cuomo Scandal https://radaronline.com/p/cnn-bosses-jeff-zucker-allison-gollust-left-marriages-affair-chris-cuomo-scandal/   GOP Rep @laurenboebert: It had been a few weeks since someone at CNN resigned over some sexual deviancy, but Jeff Zucker came through today and made sure we didn’t forget what a band of sick perverts that entire news channel is.   ‘Squad’ Dems spent over $325K on private security last year, despite defund police rhetoric Rep. Bush, who spent about $200K on private security in 2021, said defunding the police ‘has to happen’ https://www.foxnews.com/politics/squad-dems-spent-over-300k-on-private-security-last-year-despite-defund-police-rhetoric   Dem Rep. Ilhan Omar Received Thousands in Campaign Donations from Restaurant FBI Believes Stole Millions Earmarked for Starving Children   https://djhjmedia.com/rich/ilhan-omar-received-thousands-in-campaign-donations-from-restaurant-fbi-believes-stole-millions-earmarked-for-starving-children/   @pruett_collin: Whoopi Goldberg shouldn’t be penalized for having an Ivy-league graduate level understanding of history

Well that is all for today, I will see you tomorrow night

end