Shanghai Gold Benchmark Price

USD oz

AM2035.41

PM2040.08

Historical SGE Fix

SHANGHAI GOLD PREMIUM OVER NY: 60 DOLLARS

Bitcoin morning price:, 41,865 UP 1148 DOLLARS

Bitcoin: afternoon price: $41,100 UP 617 dollars

Platinum price closing $914.95 down $14.05

Palladium price; $964.35 DOWN $15.40

END

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Due to the huge rise in the dollar, we must look at gold and silver in currencies other than the dollar to understand where we are heading

I will now provide gold in Canadian dollars, British pounds and Euros

4: 15 PM ACCESS

*CANADIAN GOLD: $2,690.86 UP $1,20 CDN dollars per oz( * NEW ALL TIME HIGH 2,795.90 CDN DOLLARS PER OZ//DEC 1 272023)

*BRITISH GOLD: 1575,06 DOWN 2.97 pounds per oz// *(NEW ALL TIME HIGH//CLOSING///1655.17 BRITISH POUNDS/OZ) OCT 2/2023

*EURO GOLD: 1833.123 DOWN 7.86 euros per oz //* (ALL TIME CLOSING HIGH: 1903.75 EUROS PER OZ//DEC 1.2023)

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EXCHANGE: COMEX

EXCHANGE: COMEX
CONTRACT: DECEMBER 2023 COMEX 100 GOLD FUTURES
SETTLEMENT: 1,978.000000000 USD
INTENT DATE: 12/11/2023 DELIVERY DATE: 12/13/2023
FIRM ORG FIRM NAME ISSUED STOPPED

363 H WELLS FARGO SEC 15
435 H SCOTIA CAPITAL 3
657 C MORGAN STANLEY 5
661 C JP MORGAN 51 48
686 C STONEX FINANCIA 1
690 C ABN AMRO 1
700 C UBS 2
732 C RBC CAP MARKETS 5
737 C ADVANTAGE 7 7
905 C ADM 1

TOTAL: 73 73
MONTH TO DATE: 12,619

JPMorgan stopped 48/73 contracts.

FOR DEC.:

GOLD: NUMBER OF NOTICES FILED FOR DEC/2023. CONTRACT: 73 NOTICES FOR 7300 OZ or 0.3395 TONNES

total notices so far: 12,619 contracts for 1,261900 oz (39.250 tonnes)

FOR DEC:

SILVER NOTICES 123 NOTICE(S) FILED FOR 615,000 OZ/

total number of notices filed so far this month : 2668 for 13,340,000 oz

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END

BOTH GLD AND SLV ARE FRAUDULENT VEHICLES

GLD

WITH GOLD DOWN $0.60 CENTS//

INVESTORS SWITCHING TO SPROTT PHYSICAL (PHYS) INSTEAD OF THE FRAUDULENT GLD/ : / HUGE CHANGES IN GOLD INVENTORY AT THE GLD: A WITHDRAWAL OF 2.01 TONNES OF GOLD FROM THE GLD/

INVENTORY RESTS AT 878.54 TONNES

SLV//

WITH NO SILVER AROUND AND SILVER DOWN 5 CENTS AT THE SLV// HUGE CHANGES IN SILVER INVENTORY AT THE SLV: A WITHDRAWAL OF 594,000 O FROM THE SLV/

INVESTORS ARE SWITCHING SLV TO SPROTT’S PSLV.

CLOSING INVENTORY: 434.144 MILLION OZ

Let us have a look at the data for today

SILVER//OUTLINE

SILVER COMEX OI FELL BY A GIGANTIC SIZED 2560 CONTRACTS TO 134,249 AND FURTHER FROM THE RECORD HIGH OI OF 244,710, SET FEB 25/2020 AND THIS FAIR SIZED GAIN IN COMEX OI WAS ACCOMPLISHED DESPITE OUR GIGANTIC $0.19 LOSS IN SILVER PRICING AT THE COMEX ON MONDAY. WE HAD A CONSIDERABLE LONG LIQUIDATION AS WELL AS HUGE T.A.S. LIQUIDATION (WITH CONSIDERABLE SHORT COVERING) AT THE COMEX SESSION. WE HAD A MEGA GIGANTIC 1771 T.A.S ISSUANCE AND THESE WILL BE USED FOR MANIPULATION LATER THIS MONTH/AS WELL AS TODAY.

CRAIG HEMKE HAS POINTED OUT THAT THE CROOKS USE THE MID MONTH FOR MANIPULATION AS THEY SELL THEIR BUY SIDE OF THE CALENDAR SPREAD FIRST AND THEN KEEP THE SELL SIDE TO LIQUIDATE AT A LATER DATE. THUS WE HAVE TWO VEHICLES THE CROOKS USE FOR MANIPULATION AND BOTH ARE SPREADERS: 1) AT MONTH’S END/SPREADERS COMEX AND 2/ TAS SPREADERS, MID MONTH. TOTAL TAS ISSUED ON MONDAY NIGHT: 1771 CONTRACTS. DESPITE MANY COMPLAINTS THAT THE CROOKS HAVE VIOLATED POSITION LIMITS DUE TO THE FACT THAT THE TAS ISSUED HAVE A VALUE OF ZERO (AS TO POSITION LIMITS FOR OUR CROOKED BANKERS). THE PROBLEM OF COURSE IS THAT THE CROOKS DO NOT LIQUIDATE THE TAS TOGETHER BUT SELL THE BUY SIDE FIRST AND THEN LIQUIDATE THE SELL SIDE TWO MONTHS HENCE. IT IS OBVIOUS MANIPULATION TO THE HIGHEST DEGREE BUT IT NATURALLY FELL ON DEAF EARS WITH OUR REGULATORS (OCC) WHEN THEY RECEIVED OUR COMPLAINTS. IT THUS LOOKS LIKE THE FED (GOV’T) IS BEHIND ALL OF THESE TRADES.

WE HAVE NOW SET ANOTHER RECORD LOW AT 114,102 CONTRACTS ///JULY 3.2023// OUR BANKERS WITH THE HELP OF SPECULATORS AND HIGH FREQUENCY TRADERS WERE SUCCESSFUL IN KNOCKING THE PRICE OF SILVER DOWN (IT FELL BY $0.19), AND WERE SUCCESSFUL IN KNOCKING SOME SILVER LONGS AS WE HAD A GIGANTIC SIZED LOSS OF 2030 OI CONTRACTS ON OUR TWO EXCHANGES.

WE MUST HAVE HAD:

A STRONG SIZED 530 ISSUANCE OF EXCHANGE FOR PHYSICALS) iiii) AN INITIAL SILVER STANDING FOR COMEX SILVER MEASURING AT 18.755 MILLION OZ (FIRST DAY NOTICE) FOLLOWED BY TODAY’S 10,000 OZ E.F.P. JUMP TO LONDON + 0 CONTRACTS OF EX. FOR RISK FOR 0 MILLION OZ EX. FOR RISK //NEW TOTAL STANDING 18.150 MILLION OZ.+ 4.5 MILLION EX. FOR RISK/PRIOR= NEW TOTAL OF 22.650 MILLION OZ

//NEW STANDING FOR SILVER IS THUS 22.650 MILLION OZ

//HUGE SIZED COMEX OI LOSS/ STRONG SIZED EFP ISSUANCE/VI) MEGA HUGE SIZED NUMBER OF T.A.S. CONTRACT ISSUANCE 1771 CONTRACTS)/

0 SIZED EX.FOR RISK =0 MILLION OZ//NEW TOTAL FOR EX. FOR RISK + 4.5 MILLION OZ.

I AM NOW RECORDING THE DIFFERENTIAL IN OI FROM PRELIMINARY TO FINAL – REMOVED 105 CONTRACTS (the cme will no longer provide preliminary no to be except through a paywall)

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

TOTAL CONTRACTS for 8 days, total 6366 contracts: OR 31.830 MILLION OZ (795 CONTRACTS PER DAY)

TOTAL EFP’S FOR THE MONTH SO FAR: 31.830 MILLION OZ

LAST 23 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

YEAR 2022:

JAN 2022-DEC 2022

JAN 2022// 90.460 MILLION OZ

FEB 2022: 72.39 MILLION OZ//

MARCH 2022: 207.140 MILLION OZ//A NEW RECORD FOR EFP ISSUANCE

APRIL: 114.52 MILLION OZ FINAL//LOW ISSUANCE

MAY: 105.635 MILLION OZ//

JUNE: 94.470 MILLION OZ

JULY : 87.110 MILLION OZ

AUGUST: 65.025 MILLION OZ

SEPT. 74.025 MILLION OZ///FINAL

OCT. 29.017 MILLION OZ FINAL

NOV: 134.290 MILLION OZ//FINAL

DEC, 61.395 MILLION OZ FINAL

TOTALS YR 2022: 1135.767 MILLION OZ (1.1356 BILLION OZ)

JAN 2023/// 53.070 MILLION OZ //FINAL

FEB: 2023: 100.105 MILLION OZ/FINAL//MUCH STRONGER ISSUANCE VS THE LATTER TWO MONTHS.

MARCH 2023: 112.58 MILLION OZ//FINAL//STRONG ISSUANCE

APRIL 118.035 MILLION OZ(SLIGHTLY GREATER THAN THAN LAST MONTH)

MAY 66.120 MILLION OZ/INITIAL (MUCH SMALLER THIS MONTH)

JUNE: 110.395 MILLION OZ//MUCH LARGER THAN LAST MONTH

JULY 85.745 MILLION OZ (SMALLER THAN LAST MONTH)

AUGUST: 171.43 MILLION OZ (THIS MONTH IS GOING TO BE HUGE //2ND HIGHEST ON RECORD

SEPT: 72.705 MILLION OZ (SMALLER THIS MONTH)

OCT: 97.455 MILLION OZ

NOV. 50.050 MILLION OZ

DEC. 21.830 MILLION OZ//THIS IS GOING TO BE A STRONG ISSUANCE OF EFP’S FOR THIS MONTH.

RESULT: WE HAD A GIGANTIC SIZED DECREASE IN COMEX OI SILVER COMEX CONTRACTS OF 2560 CONTRACTS WITH OUR LOSS IN PRICE OF $0.19 IN SILVER PRICING AT THE COMEX//MONDAY.,. THE CME NOTIFIED US THAT WE HAD A STRONG EFP ISSUANCE CONTRACTS: 530 ISSUED FOR FEB AND 0 CONTRACTS ISSUED FOR ALL OTHER MONTHS) WHICH EXITED OUT OF THE SILVER COMEX TO LONDON AS FORWARDS. WE HAVE A GOOD INITIAL SILVER OZ STANDING FOR DEC. OF 18.755 MILLION OZ FOLLOWED BY TODAY’S 10,000 OZ E.F.P. JUMP TO LONDON /NEW TOTAL STANDING 18.150 MILLION OZ//+ 0 MILLION EX. FOR RISK + 4.5 MILLION OZ EXCHANGE FOR RISK/PRIOR//NEW TOTAL 22.650 MILLION OZ.

NEW STANDING 22.650 million OZ /// WE HAVE A HUGE SIZED LOSS OF 2030 OI CONTRACTS ON THE TWO EXCHANGES WITH THE HUGE LOSS IN PRICE. THE TOTAL OF TAS INITIATED CONTRACTS TODAY: A MEGA HUGE SIZED 1771 CONTRACTS//CONSIDERABLE FRONT END OF THE TAS CONTRACTS WERE LIQUIDATED DURING THE MONDAY RAID COMEX SESSION. THE NEW TAS ISSUANCE MONDAY NIGHT (1771) WILL BE PUT INTO “THE BANK” TO BE COLLUSIVELY USED AT A LATER DATE., .

WE HAD 123 NOTICE(S) FILED TODAY FOR 615,000 OZ

THE SILVER COMEX IS NOW BEING ATTACKED FOR METAL BY LONDONERS ET AL.

GOLD//OUTLINE

IN GOLD, THE COMEX OPEN INTEREST FELL BY A STRONG SIZED 6,890 CONTRACTS TO 473,469 AND FURTHER FROM THE RECORD (SET JAN 24/2020) AT 799,733 AND PREVIOUS TO THAT: (SET JAN 6/2020) AT 797,110.

THE DIFFERENTIAL FROM PRELIMINARY OI TO FINAL OI IN GOLD TODAY: -+ ADDED 82 CONTRACTS

WE HAD A STRONG SIZED DECREASE IN COMEX OI ( 6890 CONTRACTS) WITH OUR $21.20 LOSS IN PRICE//MONDAY. WE ALSO HAD A RATHER LIGHT INITIAL STANDING IN GOLD TONNAGE FOR DEC.. AT 44.914 TONNES ON FIRST DAY NOTICE FOLLOWED BY TODAY’S 3200 OZ QUEUE JUMP + 0 ISSUANCE OF EX. FOR RISK CONTRACTS // TOTAL GOLD STANDING FOR DEC SO FAR DECREASES TO 46.254 TONNES // ALL OF..THIS HAPPENED WITH OUR $21.20 LOSS IN PRICE WITH RESPECT TO FRIDAY’S TRADING. WE HAD A FAIR SIZED LOSS OF 2539 OI CONTRACTS (0.7897) PAPER TONNES) ON OUR TWO EXCHANGES.

E.F.P. ISSUANCE

THE CME RELEASED THE DATA FOR EFP ISSUANCE AND IT TOTALED A STRONG SIZED 4351 CONTRACTS:

The NEW COMEX OI FOR THE GOLD COMPLEX RESTS AT 473,387

IN ESSENCE WE HAVE A FAIR SIZED DECREASE IN TOTAL CONTRACTS ON THE TWO EXCHANGES OF 2539 CONTRACTS WITH 4752 CONTRACTS DECREASED AT THE COMEX// AND A STRONG SIZED 4351 EFP OI CONTRACTS WHICH NAVIGATED OVER TO LONDON. THUS TOTAL OI LOSS ON THE TWO EXCHANGES OF 2539 CONTRACTS OR 7,899 TONNES. WE HAD 0 CONTRACTS EXCHANGE FOR RISK FOR 0.0 TONNES/EX FOR RISK PRIOR = 4.634 TOTAL EX. FOR RISK TONNES//NEW TOTAL STANDING 41.720 TONNES + 4.634 TONNES= 46.354 TONNES.. WE HAD THE FOLLOWING TAS CONTRACTS INITIATED (ISSUED): A GIGANTIC 5402 CONTRACTS.

CALCULATIONS ON GAIN/LOSS ON OUR TWO EXCHANGES

WE HAD A STRONG SIZED ISSUANCE IN EXCHANGE FOR PHYSICALS (4351 CONTRACTS) ACCOMPANYING THE STRONG SIZED LOSS IN COMEX OI (6972) //TOTAL LOSS FOR OUR THE TWO EXCHANGES: 2539 CONTRACTS. WE HAVE ( 1) NOW RETURNED TO OUR FORMER FORMAT OF BANKERS GOING LONG AND SPECULATORS GOING SHORT ,2.) FAIR INITIAL STANDING AT THE GOLD COMEX FOR DEC. AT 44.914 TONNES FOLLOWED BY TODAY’S 3200 OZ E.F.P. JUMP TO LONDON + 4.634 TONNES EX. FOR RISK PRIOR//NEW STANDING 46.254 TONNES / / 3) CONSIDERABLE LONG LIQUIDATION AND HUGE TAS LIQUIDATION WITH PROBABLE SHORT LIQUIDATION AT THESE LOWER PRICES 4) STRONG SIZED COMEX OPEN INTEREST LOSS/ 5) STRONG ISSUANCE OF EXCHANGE FOR PHYSICAL PAPER///6: HUGE T.A.S. ISSUANCE: 5402 CONTRACTS

HISTORICAL ACCUMULATION OF EXCHANGE FOR PHYSICALS IN 2023 INCLUDING TODAY

DEC

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

TOTAL EFP CONTRACTS ISSUED: 36,553 CONTRACTS OR 3,655,300 OZ OR 113.695 TONNES IN 8 TRADING DAY(S) AND THUS AVERAGING: 4569 EFP CONTRACTS PER TRADING DAY

TO GIVE YOU AN IDEA AS TO THE SIZE OF THESE EFP TRANSFERS : THIS MONTH IN 8 TRADING DAY(S) IN TONNES 113.695 TONNES

TOTAL ANNUAL GOLD PRODUCTION, 2022, THROUGHOUT THE WORLD EX CHINA EX RUSSIA: 3555 TONNES

THUS EFP TRANSFERS REPRESENTS 113.695/3550 x 100% TONNES 2.81% OF GLOBAL ANNUAL PRODUCTION

ACCUMULATION OF GOLD EFP’S YEAR 2021 TO 2023

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. 175.62 TONNES//FINAL ISSUANCE//

TOTALS: 2,578.08 TONNES/2021

JAN:2022 247.25 TONNES //FINAL

FEB: 196.04 TONNES//FINAL

MARCH/2022: 409.30 TONNES //FINAL( THIS IS NOW A RECORD EFP ISSUANCE FOR MARCH AND FOR ANY MONTH.

APRIL: 169.55 TONNES (FINAL VERY LOW ISSUANCE MONTH)

MAY: 247.44 TONNES FINAL//

JUNE: 238.13 TONNES FINAL

JULY: 378.43 TONNES FINAL

AUGUST: 180.81 TONNES FINAL

SEPT. 193.16 TONNES FINAL

OCT: 177.57 TONNES FINAL ( MUCH SMALLER THAN LAST MONTH)

NOV. 223.98 TONNES//FINAL ( MUCH LARGER THAN PREVIOUS MONTHS//comex running out of physical)

DEC: 185.59 tonnes // FINAL

TOTAL: 2,847,25 TONNES/2022

JAN 2023: 228.49 TONNES FINAL//HUGE AMOUNT OF EFP’S ISSUED THIS MONTH!!

FEB: 151.61 TONNES/FINAL

MARCH: 280.09 TONNES/INITIAL (ANOTHER STRONG MONTH FOR EFP ISSUANCE)

APRIL: 197.42 TONNES

MAY: 236.67 TONNES (A VERY STRONG ISSUANCE FOR THIS MONTH)

JUNE: 172.667 TONNES (WEAKER ISSUANCE THIS MONTH)

JULY: 151.69 TONNES (WEAKER THAN LAST MONTH)

AUGUST: 195.28 TONNES (A STRONGER MONTH)//FINAL

SEPT: 254.709 TONNES (WILL BE LARGER THAN LAST MONTH AND A STRONG MONTH)

OCT. 248.09 TONNES. LIKE SILVER, THIS MONTH IS GOING TO BE A STRONG E.F.P. ISSUANCE.

NOV. 239.16 TONNES//WILL BE STRONG THIS MONTH,

DEC. 113.695 TONNES. THIS MONTH MAY TURN INTO A WHOPPER OF E.F.P. ISSUANCE

SPREADING OPERATIONS

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

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

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

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 (SEPT), 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.”

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.

The crooks also use the spread in the TAS account (trade at settlement). They buy the spot TAS (e.g. June) and sell the future TAS two months out (e.g. August). Then they unload the front month (i.e. unload the buy side first so the price of gold/silver falls. This occurs in the middle of the front delivery month cycle. They unload the sell side of the equation, two months down the road. The crooks violate position limits as the OCC refuse to hear our complaints.

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 GIGANTIC SIZED 2580 CONTRACTS OI TO 134,239 AND FURTHER OUR COMEX HIGH 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 5 YEARS AGO. HOWEVER WE HAVE NOW SET A NEW RECORD LOW OF 114,102 CONTRACTS JULY 3.2023

EFP ISSUANCE 530 CONTRACTS

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

MARCH 530 and ALL OTHER MONTHS: ZERO. TOTAL EFP ISSUANCE: 530 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 2455 CONTRACTS AND ADD TO THE 530 OI TRANSFERRED TO LONDON THROUGH EFP’S,

WE OBTAIN A HUGE SIZED LOSS OF OPEN INTEREST CONTRACTS FROM OUR TWO EXCHANGES OF 2030 CONTRACTS

THUS IN OUNCES, THE LOSS ON THE TWO EXCHANGES TOTAL 9.625 MILLION OZ

OCCURRED WITH OUR HUGE $0.19 LOSS IN PRICE …..

END

OUTLINE FOR TODAY’S COMMENTARY

1a/COMEX GOLD AND SILVER REPORT

(report Harvey)

b, ) Gold/silver trading overnight Europe,//GOLD COMMENTARIES

(Peter Schiff)

c) Commentaries from: Egon von Greyerz///Matthew Piepenburg via GoldSwitzerland.com, Pam and Russ Martens

ii a) Chris Powell of GATA provides to us very important physical commentaries

b. Other gold/silver commentaries

c. Commodity commentaries//

d)/CRYPTOCURRENCIES/BITCOIN ETC

2.ASIAN AFFAIRS//

TUESDAY MORNING/MONDAY NIGHT

SHANGHAI CLOSED UP 12.00 PTS OR 0.40% //Hang Seng CLOSED UP 173.01 PTS OR 1.07% /The Nikkei CLOSED UP 51.90 PTS OR 0.16% //Australia’s all ordinaries CLOSED UP 0.49 % /Chinese yuan (ONSHORE) closed UP AT 7.1677 /OFFSHORE CHINESE YUAN CLOSED UP TO 7.1815 /Oil DOWN TO 70.82 dollars per barrel for WTI and BRENT DOWN AT 75.45/ Stocks in Europe OPENED ALL MIXED// ONSHORE YUAN TRADING ABOVE LEVEL OF OFFSHORE YUAN/ONSHORE YUAN TRADING STRONGER AGAINST US DOLLAR/OFFSHORE STRONGER

a)NORTH KOREA/SOUTH KOREA
outline

b) REPORT ON JAPAN/
OUTLINE

3 CHINA
OUTLINE

4/EUROPEAN AFFAIRS
OUTLINE

5. RUSSIAN AND MIDDLE EASTERN AFFAIRS
OUTLINE

6.Global Issues//COVID ISSUES/VACCINE ISSUES
OUTLINE

7. OIL ISSUES
OUTLINE

8 EMERGING MARKET ISSUES
9. USA

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

GOLD

LET US BEGIN:

THE TOTAL COMEX GOLD OPEN INTEREST FELL BY A STRONG SIZED 6972 CONTRACTS TO 473,469 WITH OUR HUGE LOSS IN PRICE OF $21.20 WITH RESPECT TO MONDAY TRADING. WE MUST HAVE HAD CONSIDERABLE LONG SPEC LIQUIDATIONS IN THE SESSION.

EXCHANGE FOR PHYSICAL ISSUANCE

WE ARE NOW IN THE ACTIVE DELIVERY MONTH OF DEC..… THE CME REPORTS THAT THE BANKERS ISSUED A STRONG SIZED TRANSFER THROUGH THE EFP ROUTE AS THESE LONGS RECEIVED A DELIVERABLE LONDON FORWARD TOGETHER WITH A FIAT BONUS.,

THAT IS 4251 EFP CONTRACTS WERE ISSUED: : FEB 4351 & ZERO FOR ALL OTHER MONTHS:

TOTAL EFP ISSUANCE: 4351 CONTRACTS

ON A NET BASIS IN OPEN INTEREST WE LOST THE FOLLOWING TODAY ON OUR TWO EXCHANGES: A FAIR SIZED TOTAL OF 2539 CONTRACTS IN THAT 4351 LONGS WERE TRANSFERRED AS FORWARDS TO LONDON AND WE HAD A STRONG SIZED LOSS OF 6890 COMEX CONTRACTS..AND THIS FAIR LOSS ON OUR TWO EXCHANGES HAPPENED WITH OUR HUGE LOSS IN PRICE OF $21.20//MONDAY COMEX. AS PER OUR NEWBIE TRADE AT SETTLEMENT (TAS) MANIPULATION OPERATION (WHICH CRAIG HEMKE HAS POINTED OUT HAPPENS DURING MID MONTH IN THE DELIVERY CYCLE), THE CME REPORTS THAT THE TOTAL T.A.S. ISSUANCE FOR MONDAY NIGHT WAS A HUGE SIZED 5402 CONTRACTS. THROUGHOUT THE PAST SEVERAL WEEKS, THE BANKERS SOLD OFF THE LONG SIDE OF THE SPREAD WHICH OF COURSE CONTINUES TO MANIPULATE THE PRICE OF GOLD SOUTHBOUND. (THEY KEEP THE SHORT SIDE OF THE CALENDAR SPREAD WHICH WILL BE LIQUIDATED TWO MONTHS HENCE)//.

// WE HAVE A LIGHT AMOUNT OF GOLD TONNAGE STANDING: DEC (46.254 TONNES) ( ACTIVE MONTH)

HERE ARE THE AMOUNTS THAT STOOD FOR DELIVERY IN THE PRECEDING 12 MONTHS OF 2021-2022:

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 YEAR 2021 (JAN- DEC): 601.213 TONNES

YEAR 2022:

JANUARY 2022 17.79 TONNES

FEB 2022: 59.023 TONNES

MARCH: 36.678 TONNES

APRIL: 85.340 TONNES FINAL.

MAY: 20.11 TONNES FINAL

JUNE: 74.933 TONNES FINAL

JULY 29.987 TONNES FINAL

AUGUST:104.979 TONNES//FINAL

SEPT. 38.1158 TONNES

OCT: 77.390 TONNES/ FINAL

NOV 27.110 TONNES/FINAL

Dec. 64.000 tonnes

(TOTAL YEAR 656.076 TONNES)

2023:

JAN/2023: 20.559 tonnes

FEB 2023: 47.744 tonnes

MAR: 19.0637 TONNES

APRIL: 75.676 tonnes

MAY: 19.094 TONNES + 1.244 tonnes of exchange for risk = 20.338

JUNE: 64.354 TONNES

JULY: 10.2861 TONNES

AUGUST: 38.855 TONNES(INCLUDING .6842 EXCHANGE FOR RISK)

SEPT: 15.281 TONNES FINAL

OCT. 35.869 TONNES + 1.665 EXCHANGE FOR RISK =37.0355 tonnes

NOV: 18.7122 TONNES + 16.2505 EX. FOR RISK = 34.9627 TONNES

DEC. 41.620 + 4.634 TONNES OF EXCHANGE FOR RISK = 46.254 TONNES

THE SPECS/HFT WERE SUCCESSFUL IN LOWERING GOLD’S PRICE( IT LOST $21.20) //// AND WERE SUCCESSFUL IN KNOCKING SOME SPECULATOR LONGS AS WE HAD A FAIR SIZED LOSS OF 2529 TOTAL CONTRACTS ON OUR TWO EXCHANGES. WE HAD A HUGE T.A.S. LIQUIDATION ON THE FRONT END OF MONDAY’S TRADING . THE T.A.S. ISSUED ON MONDAY NIGHT, WILL BE “PUT INTO THE BANK” TO BE USED AT A LATER DATE AT THE COLLUSIVE CHOOSING OF OUR BANKERS. WE ALSO EXPERIENCED SOME SPECULATOR SHORT COVERING

WE HAVE LOST A TOTAL OI OF 7.89 PAPER TONNES FROM OUR TWO EXCHANGES, ACCOMPANYING OUR INITIAL GOLD TONNAGE STANDING FOR DEC. (44.914 TONNES) ON FIRST DAY NOTICE, FOLLOWED BY TODAY’S 3200 OZ E.F.P. JUMP TO LONDON (FOR 0.999 TONNES)//NEW TOTAL STANDING FALLS TO 41.620 + 4.634 TONNES EXCHANGE FOR RISK : NEW TOTAL 46.254 TONNES../ ALL OF THIS WAS ACCOMPLISHED WITH OUR LOSS IN PRICE TO THE TUNE OF $21.20

WE HAD ADDED 82 CONTRACTS TO THE COMEX TRADES TO OPEN INTEREST (CROOKS)

NET LOSS ON THE TWO EXCHANGES 2539 CONTRACTS OR 253,900 OZ OR 7.89 TONNES.

Estimated gold volume today:// 150,453 poor

final gold volumes/yesterday 179,192 poor

//speculators have left the gold arena

DEC 12

/ /// THE DEC. 2023 GOLD CONTRACT

Gold	Ounces
Withdrawals from Dealers* Inventory in oz*	nil
Withdrawals from Customer* Inventory in oz*	nil .
Deposit to the Dealer* Inventory in oz*	nil
Deposits to the Customer* Inventory, in oz*	nil oz
No of oz served (contracts) today	73 notice(s) 7300 OZ 0.3514 TONNES
No of oz to be served (notices)	762 contracts 76200 oz 0.2370 TONNES
Total monthly oz gold served (contracts) so far this month	12,619 notices 1,261,900 oz 39.023 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*	x

0 dealer deposit:

total dealer deposits: nil oz

customer deposits: 0

we had 0 customer withdrawals

Adjustments; 0

CALCULATIONS FOR THE AMOUNT OF GOLD STANDING FOR DEC.

For the front month of DECEMBER we have an oi of 835 contracts having LOST 145 contracts. .We had 113

contracts served upon MONDAY, so we LOST or an additional 32 CONTRACTS OR 3200 OZ (0.0995 tonnes) will NOT stand for delivery at the comex as these guys were EFP’d over to London where they will take immediate delivery of gold on a T + 2 basis over there.

JAN. LOST 43 contracts FALLING TO 3259 contracts.

FEB LOST 8500 CONTRACTS FALLING TO 373,865

We had 73 contracts filed for today representing 7300 oz

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 equate to 73 contract(s) of which 0 notices were stopped (received) by j.P. Morgan dealer and 48 notice(s) was (were) stopped ( received) by J.P.Morgan//customer account and 0 notice(s) received (stopped) by the squid (Goldman Sachs)

To calculate the INITIAL total number of gold ounces standing for the DEC. /2023. contract month, we take the total number of notices filed so far for the month (12,519 x 100 oz ), to which we add the difference between the open interest for the front month of DEC. (835 CONTRACTS) minus the number of notices served upon today 73 x 100 oz per contract equals 1,338,100 OZ OR 41.620 TONNES + 4.634 TONNES EX. FOR RISK ISSUED/PRIOR/ (FOR DELIVERY HERE) = 46.254 TONNES.

thus the INITIAL standings for gold for the DEC. contract month: No of notices filed so far (12,619) x 100 oz + (x835) {OI for the front month} minus the number of notices served upon today (73) x 100 oz) which equals 1,338,100 oz standing OR 41.620 TONNES + 4.634 tonnes of ex. for risk = 46.354 TONNES

TOTAL COMEX GOLD STANDING FOR DEC: 46.254 TONNES WHICH IS LIGHT FOR THE BIGGEST ACTIVE DELIVERY MONTH IN THE CALENDAR. THEY PROBABLY KNOW THAT NO REAL GOLD IS PRESENT AT THE COMEX.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

COMEX GOLD INVENTORIES/CLASSIFICATION

NEW PLEDGED GOLD:

241,794.285 oz NOW PLEDGED /HSBC 5.94 TONNES

204,937.290 PLEDGED MANFRA 3.08 TONNES

83,657.582 PLEDGED JPMorgan no 1 1.690 tonnes

265,999.054, oz JPM No 2

1,152,376.639 oz pledged Brinks/

Manfra: 33,758.550 oz

Delaware: 193.721 oz

International Delaware:: 11,188.542 oz

total pledged gold: 1,559,349,955 OZ 48.50 tonnes

TOTAL OF ALL GOLD ELIGIBLE AND REGISTERED GOLD: 20,074,059.747 OZ

TOTAL REGISTERED GOLD 10,267,380.854 (319.358 tonnes).

TOTAL OF ALL ELIGIBLE GOLD: 9,806,668,893 OZ

REGISTERED GOLD THAT CAN BE SERVED UPON: 8,708,031 oz (REG GOLD- PLEDGED GOLD) 270,85 tonnes

END

SILVER/COMEX

DEC 12

//2023// THE DEC 2023 SILVER CONTRACT

Silver	Ounces
Withdrawals from Dealers* Inventory*	NIL oz
Withdrawals from Customer Inventory	681,510.110 oz HSBC JPM .
Deposits to the Dealer* Inventory*	595,848.500 OZ ASAHI oz
Deposits to the Customer Inventory	1,178,878.09 oz CNT Manfra
No of oz served today (contracts)	123 CONTRACT(S) (615,000 OZ)
No of oz to be served (notices)	962 contracts (4,810,000 oz)
Total monthly oz silver served (contracts)	2668 Contracts (13,340,000 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*

i) 1 dealer deposit

1 dealer deposit:

i) Into ASAHI: 595,848.500 oz

total dealer deposit: 595,848.500 oz

i) We had 0 dealer withdrawal

total dealer withdrawals: 0 oz

We had 2 deposits customer account:

Customer deposits: 2

i) Into CNT: 600,043.590 oz

ii) Into Manfra: 578,826.500 oz

total customer deposits: 1,178,870.09 oz

JPMorgan has a total silver weight: 133.234 million oz/268.629 million or 49.62%

Comex withdrawals 2

we had 2 customer withdrawals

i) out of HSBC 80,339.310 oz

ii) Out of JPMorgan: 601,170.800 oz

total withdrawals: 681,510.110 oz

Adjustments; 1 customer to dealer Asahi: 3,035.600 oz

TOTAL REGISTERED SILVER: 45.512 MILLION OZ//.TOTAL REG + ELIGIBLE. 268.629 million oz

CALCULATIONS FOR THE NEW STANDING FOR SILVER FOR DECEMBER:

silver open interest data:

FRONT MONTH OF DEC /2023 OI: 1085 CONTRACTS HAVING LOST 2 CONTRACT(S).

WE HAD 0 CONTRACTS SERVED ON MONDAY, SO WE LOST 2 CONTRACT OR 10,000 OZ WERE

E,F,P, JUMPED TO LONDON WHERE THEY WILL TAKE DELIVERY OF SILVER ON A T + 2 BASIS OVER ON THAT SIDE OF THE POND.

JAN GAINED 22 CONTRACTS UP TO 1960 CONTRACTS

FEB GAINED 174 CONTRACTS TO STAND AT 242

MARCH LOST 3384 CONTRACTS TO 112,150 .

TOTAL NUMBER OF NOTICES FILED FOR TODAY: 123 for 615,000 oz

Comex volumes// est. volume today 54,817,// fair

Comex volume: confirmed yesterday 60,833

To calculate the number of silver ounces that will stand for delivery in DEC. we take the total number of notices filed for the month so far at 2668 x 5,000 oz = 13,340,000 oz

to which we add the difference between the open interest for the front month of DEC. (1085) and the number of notices served upon today 123 x (5000 oz) equals the number of ounces standing.

Thus the standings for silver for the DEC/2023 contract month: 2668 (notices served so far) x 5000 oz + OI for the front month of DEC. (1085) – number of notices served upon today (123 )x 500 oz of silver standing for the DEC contract month equates to 18.150 MILLION OZ. to which we add 0 million oz of exchange for risk today and then add prior exchange for risk of 4.5 million oz. New total standing: 22.65 million oz.

There are 45.512 million oz of registered silver.

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//

BOTH GLD AND SLV ARE MASSIVE FRAUDS!

DEC12/WITH GOLD DOWN $0.60 TODAY: HUGE CHANGES IN GOLD INVENTORY AT THE GLD:. /A WITHDRAWAL OF 2.01 TONNES FROM THE GLD// INVENTORY RESTS AT 878.54 TONNES

DEC11/WITH GOLD DOWN $21.20 TODAY: NO CHANGES IN GOLD INVENTORY AT THE GLD:. // / / // INVENTORY RESTS AT 880.55 TONNES

DEC 8/WITH GOLD DOWN $30,80 TODAY: SMALL CHANGES IN GOLD INVENTORY AT THE GLD:. // / / // A WITHDRAWAL OF .28 TONNES OF GOLD FROM THE GLD/// INVENTORY RESTS AT 880.55 TONNES

DEC 7/WITH GOLD DOWN $.20 TODAY: NO CHANGES IN GOLD INVENTORY AT THE GLD:. // / / // // INVENTORY RESTS AT 880.83 TONNES

DEC 6/WITH GOLD UP $11.70 TODAY:SMALL CHANGES IN GOLD INVENTORY AT THE GLD: A WITHDRAWAL OF 0.29 TONNES OF GOLD FROM THE GLD. // / / // // INVENTORY RESTS AT 880.83 TONNES

DEC 5/WITH GOLD DOWN $5.85 TODAY:HUGE CHANGES IN GOLD INVENTORY AT THE GLD: A DEPOSIT OF 2.30 TONNES OF GOLD FROM THE GLD. // / / // // INVENTORY RESTS AT 881.12 TONNES

DEC 4/WITH GOLD DOWN $43.15 TODAY:HUGE CHANGES IN GOLD INVENTORY AT THE GLD: A DEPOSIT OF 2.31 TONNES OF GOLD FROM THE GLD. // / / // // INVENTORY RESTS AT 878.82 TONNES

DEC 1/WITH GOLD UP $32.05 TODAY:HUGE CHANGES IN GOLD INVENTORY AT THE GLD: A WITHDRAWAL OF 2.02 TONNES OF GOLD FROM THE GLD. // / / // // INVENTORY RESTS AT 876.51 TONNES

NOV 30/WITH GOLD DOWN $8.70 TODAY:HUGE CHANGES IN GOLD INVENTORY AT THE GLD: A WITHDRAWAL OF 2.02 TONNES OF GOLD FROM THE GLD. // / / // // INVENTORY RESTS AT 878.53 TONNES

NOV 29/WITH GOLD UP $7.20 TODAY:HUGE CHANGES IN GOLD INVENTORY AT THE GLD: A WITHDRAWAL OF 1.73 TONNES OF GOLD FROM THE GLD. // / / // // INVENTORY RESTS AT 880.55 TONNES

NOV 28/WITH GOLD UP $26.45 TODAY:NO CHANGES IN GOLD INVENTORY AT THE GLD: // / / // // INVENTORY RESTS AT 882.28 TONNE

NOV 27/WITH GOLD UP $9,85 TODAY:NO CHANGES IN GOLD INVENTORY AT THE GLD: // / / // // INVENTORY RESTS AT 882.28 TONNES

NOV 24/WITH GOLD UP $11.20 TODAY:HUGE CHANGES IN GOLD INVENTORY AT THE GLD: A WITHDRAWAL OF 1.15 TONNES OF GOLD FROM THE GLD// / / // // INVENTORY RESTS AT 882.28 TONNES

NOV 22/WITH GOLD DOWN $8.45 TODAY:NO CHANGES IN GOLD INVENTORY AT THE GLD / / // // INVENTORY RESTS AT 883.43 TONNES

NOV 21/WITH GOLD UP $21.65 TODAY:NO CHANGES IN GOLD INVENTORY AT THE GLD / / // // INVENTORY RESTS AT 883.43 TONNES

NOV 20/WITH GOLD DOWN $4.15 TODAY:HUGE CHANGES IN GOLD INVENTORY AT THE GLD A MAMMOTH DEPOSIT OF 12.98 TONNES INTO THE GLD:/ / // // INVENTORY RESTS AT 883.43 TONNES

NOV 17/WITH GOLD DOWN $1.85 TODAY:NO CHANGES IN GOLD INVENTORY AT THE GLD:/ / // // INVENTORY RESTS AT 870.45 TONNES

NOV 16/WITH GOLD UP $22.70 TODAY:NO CHANGES IN GOLD INVENTORY AT THE GLD:/ / // // INVENTORY RESTS AT 870.45 TONNES

NOV 15/WITH GOLD DOWN $1.00 TODAY:NO CHANGES IN GOLD INVENTORY AT THE GLD:/ / // // INVENTORY RESTS AT 870.45 TONNES

NOV 14/WITH GOLD UP $16.35 TODAY:HUGE CHANGES IN GOLD INVENTORY AT THE GLD:/ / // //A DEPOSIT OF 2.3 TONNES OF GOLD INTO THE GLD// INVENTORY RESTS AT 870.45 TONNES

NOV 13/WITH GOLD UP $12.00 TODAY:SMALL CHANGES IN GOLD INVENTORY AT THE GLD:/ / // //A DEPOSIT OF .87 TONNES OF GOLD INTO THE GLD// INVENTORY RESTS AT 868.15 TONNES

NOV 10/WITH GOLD DOWN $30.70 TODAY:NO CHANGES IN GOLD INVENTORY AT THE GLD:/ / // // INVENTORY RESTS AT 867.28 TONNES

NOV 9/WITH GOLD UP $12.50 TODAY:NO CHANGES IN GOLD INVENTORY AT THE GLD:/ / // // INVENTORY RESTS AT 867.28 TONNES

NOV 8/WITH GOLD DOWN $14.95 TODAY:HUGE CHANGES IN GOLD INVENTORY AT THE GLD:A MASSIVE DEPOSIT OF 4.04 TONNES OF GOLD INTO THE GLD/ / // // INVENTORY RESTS AT 867.28 TONNES

NOV 7/WITH GOLD DOWN $14.70 TODAY:HUGE CHANGES IN GOLD INVENTORY AT THE GLD:A DEPOSIT OF 4.33 TONNES OF GOLD INTO THE GLD/ / // // INVENTORY RESTS AT 863.24 TONNES

NOV 6/WITH GOLD DOWN $9.90 TODAY:HUGE CHANGES IN GOLD INVENTORY AT THE GLD:A DEPOSIT OF 1.73 TONNES OF GOLD INTO THE GLD/ / // // INVENTORY RESTS AT 863.24 TONNES

NOV 3/WITH GOLD UP $5.75 TODAY:NO CHANGES IN GOLD INVENTORY AT THE GLD: / // // INVENTORY RESTS AT 861.51 TONNES

NOV 2/WITH GOLD UP $6.55 TODAY:BIG CHANGES IN GOLD INVENTORY AT THE GLD: A HUGE DEPOSIT OF 2.02 TONNES OF GOLD INTO THE GLD/ // // INVENTORY RESTS AT 861.51 TONNES

NOV 1/WITH GOLD DOWN $6.15 TODAY:NO CHANGES IN GOLD INVENTORY AT THE GLD // // INVENTORY RESTS AT 859.49 TONNES

OCT 31/859.49 TONNES//

OCT 30/WITH GOLD UP $7.80 TODAY:NO CHANGES IN GOLD INVENTORY AT THE GLD // // INVENTORY RESTS AT 861.80 TONNES

OCT 27/WITH GOLD UP $1.20 TODAY:NO CHANGES IN GOLD INVENTORY AT THE GLD // // INVENTORY RESTS AT 861.80 TONNES

OCT 26/WITH GOLD UP $2.90 TODAY:HUGE CHANGES IN GOLD INVENTORY AT THE GLD A DEPOSIT OF 1.73 TONNES OF GOLD INTO THE GLD// // INVENTORY RESTS AT 861.80 TONNES

OCT 25/WITH GOLD UP $9.00 TODAY:NO CHANGES IN GOLD INVENTORY AT THE GLD:/: //: // INVENTORY RESTS AT 860.07 TONNES

GLD INVENTORY: 878.54 TONNES

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

DEC 12/WITH SILVER DOWN 5 CENTS TODAY:BIG CHANGES IN SILVER INVENTORY AT THE SLV/: A WITHDRAWAL OF 594,000 OZ FROM THE SLV////INVENTORY RESTS AT 434.144 MILLION OZ

DEC 11/WITH SILVER DOWN 19 CENTS TODAY:NO CHANGES IN SILVER INVENTORY AT THE SLV/: A ////INVENTORY RESTS AT 434.735 MILLION OZ

DEC 8/WITH SILVER DOWN 80 CENTS TODAY:NO CHANGES IN SILVER INVENTORY AT THE SLV/: A DEPOSIT OF 1.648 MILLION OZ INTO THE SLV////INVENTORY RESTS AT 434.735 MILLION OZ

DEC 7/WITH SILVER DOWN 15 CENTS TODAY:NO CHANGES IN SILVER INVENTORY AT THE SLV/: // //://// //INVENTORY RESTS AT 433.090 MILLION OZ

DEC 6/WITH SILVER DOWN 25 CENTS TODAY:NO CHANGES IN SILVER INVENTORY AT THE SLV/: // //://// //INVENTORY RESTS AT 433.090 MILLION OZ

DEC 5/WITH SILVER DOWN 34 CENTS TODAY:SMALL CHANGES IN SILVER INVENTORY AT THE SLV/: A WITHDRAWAL OF 0.305 MILLION OZ FROM THE SLV// //://// //INVENTORY RESTS AT 433.090 MILLION OZ

DEC 4/WITH SILVER DOWN 90 CENTS TODAY:HUGE CHANGES IN SILVER INVENTORY AT THE SLV/: A WITHDRAWAL OF 0.7333 MILLION OZ FROM THE SLV// //://// //INVENTORY RESTS AT 433.395 MILLION OZ

DEC 1/WITH SILVER UP 15 CENTS TODAY:HUGE CHANGES IN SILVER INVENTORY AT THE SLV/: A WITHDRAWAL OF 1.923 MILLION OZ FROM THE SLV// //://// //INVENTORY RESTS AT 434.128 MILLION OZ

NOV 30/WITH SILVER UP 20 CENTS TODAY:NO CHANGES IN SILVER INVENTORY AT THE SLV/ //://// //INVENTORY RESTS AT 436.051 MILLION OZ

NOV 29/WITH SILVER UP 15 CENTS TODAY:HUGE CHANGES IN SILVER INVENTORY AT THE SLV” A MASSIVE WITHDRAWAL OF 4.122 MILLION OZ FROM THE SLV// //://// //INVENTORY RESTS AT 436.051 MILLION OZ

NOV 28/WITH SILVER UP 64 CENTS TODAY:NO CHANGES IN SILVER INVENTORY AT THE SLV //://// //INVENTORY RESTS AT 440.173 MILLION OZ

NOV 27/WITH SILVER UP 32 CENTS TODAY:HUGE CHANGES IN SILVER INVENTORY AT THE SLV //:////A WITHDRAWAL OF 1,008,000 OZ FROM THE SLV. //INVENTORY RESTS AT 440.173 MILLION OZ

NOV 24/WITH SILVER UP 70 CENTS TODAY:HUGE CHANGES IN SILVER INVENTORY AT THE SLV //:////A WITHDRAWAL OF 549,000 OZ FROM THE SLV. //INVENTORY RESTS AT 441.181 MILLION OZ

NOV 22/WITH SILVER DOWN 21 CENTS TODAY:NO CHANGES IN SILVER INVENTORY AT THE SLV //://// //INVENTORY RESTS AT 441.730 MILLION OZ

NOV 21/WITH SILVER UP 32 CENTS TODAY:HUGE CHANGES IN SILVER INVENTORY AT THE SLV A DEPOSIT OF 2.794 OZ FROM THE SLV//://// //INVENTORY RESTS AT 441.730 MILLION OZ

NOV 20/WITH SILVER DOWN 26 CENTS TODAY:HUGE CHANGES IN SILVER INVENTORY AT THE SLV A WITHDRAWAL OF 1,824,000 OZ FROM THE SLV//://// //INVENTORY RESTS AT 438.936 MILLION OZ

NOV 17/WITH SILVER DOWN 6 CENTS TODAY:HUGE CHANGES IN SILVER INVENTORY AT THE SLV A WITHDRAWAL OF 1,832,000 OZ FROM THE SLV//://// //INVENTORY RESTS AT 437,104 MILLION OZ

NOV 16/WITH SILVER UP 38 CENTS TODAY:SMALL CHANGES IN SILVER INVENTORY AT THE SLV A WITHDRAWAL OF 778,000 OZ FROM THE SLV//://// //INVENTORY RESTS AT 440.768 MILLION OZ

NOV 15/WITH SILVER UP 39 CENTS TODAY:NO CHANGES IN SILVER INVENTORY AT THE SLV://// //INVENTORY RESTS AT 441.587 MILLION OZ

NOV 14/WITH SILVER UP 78 CENTS TODAY:SMALL CHANGES IN SILVER INVENTORY AT THE SLV:A DEPOSIT OF 183,000 OZ INTO THE SLV ////// //INVENTORY RESTS AT 441.587 MILLION OZ

NOV 13/WITH SILVER UP 5 CENTS TODAY:NO CHANGES IN SILVER INVENTORY AT THE SLV: ////// //INVENTORY RESTS AT 441.364 MILLION OZ

NOV 10/WITH SILVER DOWN 59 CENTS TODAY:HUGE CHANGES IN SILVER INVENTORY AT THE SLV: A DEPOSIT OF .733 MILLION OZ INTO THE SLV////// //INVENTORY RESTS AT 441.364 MILLION OZ

NOV 9/WITH SILVER UP 17 CENTS TODAY:NO CHANGES IN SILVER INVENTORY AT THE SLV: //// //INVENTORY RESTS AT 440.631 MILLION OZ

NOV 8/WITH SILVER UP 13 CENTS TODAY:NO CHANGES IN SILVER INVENTORY AT THE SLV: //// //INVENTORY RESTS AT 440.631 MILLION OZ

NOV 7/WITH SILVER DOWN 59 CENTS TODAY:NO CHANGES IN SILVER INVENTORY AT THE SLV: //// //INVENTORY RESTS AT 440.631 MILLION OZ

NOV 6/WITH SILVER DOWN 6 CENTS TODAY:NO CHANGES IN SILVER INVENTORY AT THE SLV: //// //INVENTORY RESTS AT 440.631 MILLION OZ

NOV 3/WITH SILVER UP 41 CENTS TODAY:BIG CHANGES IN SILVER INVENTORY AT THE SLV: A DEPOSIT OF 0.638 MILLION OZ OF SILVER FROM THE SLV///// /// /INVENTORY RESTS AT 440.631 MILLION OZ

NOV 2/WITH SILVER UP 11 CENTS TODAY:BIG CHANGES IN SILVER INVENTORY AT THE SLV: A WITHDRAWAL OF 1.924 OZ OF SILVER FROM THE SLV///// /// /INVENTORY RESTS AT 439.993 MILLION OZ

NOV 1/WITH SILVER DOWN 11 CENTS TODAY:BIG CHANGES IN SILVER INVENTORY AT THE SLV: A WITHDRAWAL OF 916,000 OZ OF SILVER FROM THE SLV///// /// /INVENTORY RESTS AT 441.917 MILLION OZ

OCT 31/442.833 MILLION OZ///INVENTORY

OCT 30/WITH SILVER UP 46 CENTS TODAY:NO CHANGES IN SILVER INVENTORY AT THE SLV: /// /// /INVENTORY RESTS AT 443.750 MILLION OZ

OCT 27/WITH SILVER UP 3 CENTS TODAY:BIG CHANGES IN SILVER INVENTORY AT THE SLV: A WITHDRAWAL OF 641,000 OZ FROM THE SLV/// /// /INVENTORY RESTS AT 443.750 MILLION OZ

OCT 26/WITH SILVER DOWN 14 CENTS TODAY: NO CHANGES IN SILVER INVENTORY AT THE SLV/ /// /INVENTORY RESTS AT 444.391 MILLION OZ

OCT 25/WITH SILVER DOWN 6 CENTS TODAY: NO CHANGES IN SILVER INVENTORY AT THE SLV/ /// /INVENTORY RESTS AT 444.391 MILLION OZ

CLOSING INVENTORY 434.144 MILLION OZ//

PHYSICAL GOLD/SILVER COMMENTARIES

1:Peter Schiff/Mike Maharrey

2,c) Commentaries from: Egon von Greyerz///Matthew Piepenburg via GoldSwitzerland.com, Pam and Russ Martens, John Rubino

3. CHRIS POWELL//GATA GOLD COMMENTARIES:

Central banks are picking up gold as official reserves.

(GATA)/Willem Middelkoop

Willem Middelkoop: Central banks and the revival of gold

Submitted by admin on Mon, 2023-12-11 11:33

Section: Daily Dispatches

By Willem Middelkoop
Official Monetary and Financial Issues Forum, London
Monday, December 11, 2023

One of the most significant changes in the world of money has been happening by stealth rather than through any policy announcement. Gold has regained a solid yet unofficial role in the world’s monetary system in a barely noticed, gradual process that cannot now be overlooked.

This is the result of several interlinked reasons. The last few years have seen central banks run into gold, accelerated by declining trust in the dollar following Western countries’ freezing of $300 billion of Russian foreign exchange reserves after the Ukrainian invasion.

The sharp rise in interest rates since the end of 2021 has led to significant losses for worldwide bondholders. This applies not just to commercial banks and asset managers but also, crucially, to many internationally operating central banks that acquired large stocks of government bonds in successive rounds of quantitative easing. This has damaged the validity of government bonds as a core element of central banks’ reserves.

This has had a significant side-effect. Gold-holding central banks in Europe seem likely to resort (either formally or informally) to using their gold revaluation accounts to plug balance sheet losses to be unveiled in coming years. They find this a more palatable option than the alternative — asking their governments to recapitalize them during a budget squeeze. …

… For the remainder of the analysis:

https://www.omfif.org/2023/12/central-banks-and-the-revival-of-gold/

end

HOME » DAILY DISPATCHES

David Lin interviews Rosa Abrantes-Metz on gold market manipulation

Submitted by admin on Mon, 2023-12-11 12:41Section: Daily Dispatches

12:35p ET Monday, December 11, 2023

Dear Friend of GATA and Gold:

Rosa Abrantes-Metz, managing director of international consulting firm BRG, discusses futures market manipulation with independent journalist David Lin, with an emphasis on the long-running manipulation of the gold market by major banks.

The interview is 38 minutes long and can be viewed at YouTube here:

CHRIS POWELL, Secretary/Treasurer
Gold Anti-Trust Action Committee Inc.
CPowell@GATA.org

end

4. OTHER GOLD/SILVER //COMMENTARIES//PODCASTS…

5 a. IMPORTANT COMMENTARIES ON COMMODITIES

END

5 B GLOBAL COMMODITY ISSUES/FOOD IN GENERAL//FREIGHT

END

6.CRYPTOCURRENCY//DIGITAL CURRENCY// COMMENTARIES/

end

1.YOUR EARLY CURRENCY VALUES/GOLD AND SILVER PRICING/ASIAN AND EUROPEAN BOURSE MOVEMENTS/AND INTEREST RATE SETTINGS TUESDAY MORNING.7:30 AM

ONSHORE YUAN: CLOSED UP AT 7.1677

OFFSHORE YUAN: UP TO 7.1815

SHANGHAI CLOSED UP 12.00 PTS OR 0.40%

HANG SENG CLOSED UP 173.01 PTS OR 1.07%

2. Nikkei closed UP 51.80 PTS OR 0.16%

3. Europe stocks SO FAR: ALL MIXED

USA dollar INDEX UP TO 103.35 EURO RISES TO 1.0798 UP 33 BASIS PTS

3b Japan 10 YR bond yield:FALLS TO. +.709 Japan buying 100% of bond issuance)/Japanese YEN vs USA cross now at 146.40/JAPANESE YEN NOW RISING AS WELL AS LONG TERM 10 YR. YIELDS RISING //EVENTUALLY THIS WILL BREAK THE JAPANESE CENTRAL BANK

3c Nikkei now ABOVE 17,000

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

3e Gold UP /JAPANESE Yen UP CHINESE ONSHORE YUAN: UP// OFFSHORE: UP

3f Japan is to buy INFINITE TRILLION YEN worth of BONDS. Japan’s GDP equals 5 trillion USA

Japan to buy 100% of all new Japanese debt and NOW they will have OVER 50% of all Japanese debt.

3g Oil DOWN for WTI and DOWN FOR Brent this morning

3h European bond buying continues to push yields lower on all fronts in the EMU. German 10yr bund DOWN TO +2.2095***/Italian 10 Yr bond yield DOWN to 3.997** /SPAIN 10 YR BOND YIELD DOWN TO 3.230…**

3i Greek 10 year bond yield DOWN TO 3.405

3j Gold at $1992.40 silver at: 23.05 1 am est) SILVER NEXT RESISTANCE LEVEL AT $30.00

3k USA vs Russian rouble;// Russian rouble UP 0 AND 60 /100 roubles/dollar; ROUBLE AT 90.08//

3m oil into the 70 dollar handle for WTI and 75 handle for Brent/

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

JAPAN ON JAN 29.2016 CONTINUES NIRP. THIS MORNING RAISES AMOUNT OF BONDS THAT THEY WILL PURCHASE UP TO .5% ON THE 10 YR BOND///YEN TRADES TO 145,17// 10 YEAR YIELD AFTER FIRST BREAKING .54% LAST YEAR NOW EXCEEDS THAT LEVEL TO 0.709% STILL ON CENTRAL BANK (JAPAN) INTERVENTION

30 SNB (Swiss National Bank) still intervening again in the markets driving down the FRANC. It is not working: USA/SF this 0.8743 as the Swiss Franc is still rising against most currencies. Euro vs SF: 0.9442 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: 4.191 DOWN 5 BASIS PTS…

USA 30 YR BOND YIELD: 4.282 DOWN 5 BASIS PTS/

USA 2 YR BOND YIELD: 4.687 DOWN 4 BASIS PTS

USA DOLLAR VS TURKISH LIRA: 29.04…(TURKEY SET TO BLOW UP FINANCIALLY)

GREAT BRITAIN/10 YEAR YIELD: DOWN 11 BASIS PTS AT 3.9995

end

2.a Overnight: Newsquawk and Zero hedge

Futures Rise Ahead Of Last Inflation Report Of 2023

TUESDAY, DEC 12, 2023 – 08:18 AM

S&P 500 futures were little changed as markets enter the first of the two last big days of 2023, with CPI on deck today and the FOMC decision due tomorrow. As of 7:55am ET, S&P futures were up 0.1% to 4,683, trading in a very tight range overnight as equity traders were reluctant to make big bets ahead of this week’s heavy load of economic data and interest-rate decisions, Nasdaq futures gained 0.3% ahead of the November inflation report; The Bloomberg dollar index slipped 0.3%. Treasuries rose across the curve, with 10-year yields falling four basis points to 4.19%. The latest NY Fed survey showed a decline in year ahead inflation expectations, dovetailing the Univ. of Michigan print on Friday; today is all about the CPI.

In premarket trading, Oracle Corp. fell as much as 9.2% after the software company’s second-quarter revenue disappointed amid slowing cloud sales momentum. Alphabet falls as much as 1.3% as Google lost an antitrust court fight to Fortnite maker Epic Games Inc. The ruling threatens to upend the mobile app economy and could cost the technology giant billions of dollars in revenue. Here are the other notable premarket movers:

Amgen Inc. rises 1.4% after RBC Capital Markets upgraded to outperform from sector perform, giving new credit to the drugmaker’s diversification and catalyst setup into 2024.
C4 Therapeutics surges 38% after signing a license and collaboration agreement with Merck to develop degrader-antibody conjugates to treat cancer.
Gaotu Techedu ADRs soar as much as 8.5%, extending Monday’s gains, after the education firm’s livestream shopping channel gains steam on China’s short-form video platform Douyin.
HubSpot Inc. rises 1.8% after being upgraded to overweight from neutral at Piper Sandler, which sees improved growth prospects for the software company.
Illumina drops 2% as BofA downgrades the DNA-sequencing company to underperform from neutral, saying in a note there’s “no imminent fix” to a lack of growth.
Macy’s shares slip 3% after Citi downgraded the department-store operator to sell from neutral, expressing skepticism that a buyout offer from Arkhouse Management and Brigade Capital Management will actually materialize.
RingCentral shares fall as much as 1.5%, set to extend Monday’s losses, as Jefferies cuts the cloud communications firm to hold from buy after the surprise exit of its CEO Tarek Robbiati.
Seagen gains 3.3% after Pfizer says it has received all required regulatory approvals to close its acquisition of the biotech firm on Dec. 14.
Wyndham shares rise about 2.8% after Choice Hotels starts an exchange offer to buy Wyndham, taking its previous $49.50 in cash and 0.324 shares of Choice common stock per Wyndham share offer directly to Wyndham’s shareholders.

As previewed earlier, CPI data due later this morning is expected to show that price pressures are continuing to subside, with the average of 50 economists expecting a 0.3% increase in core inflation for the month of November, and a 3.1% increase in the CPI from a year ago.

The consumer price index will give Wall Street a sense of whether the disinflation trend is continuing, a day before the last scheduled Federal Reserve decision of 2023. The US central bank is widely expected to hold rates, with most market focus on whether it will try to temper policy easing expectations after investors’ aggressive dovish repricing. And with the Fed expected to keep interest rates unchanged on Wednesday, investors will parse the Summary of Economic Projections, which will be updated for the first time since September, for clues on the rate trajectory next year.

“Central banks will certainly affirm the message this week that they remain data dependant, that they need more confirmation that inflation and core inflation will decelerate further,” said Georgios Leontaris, chief investment officer for Switzerland and EMEA at HSBC Global Private Banking and Wealth. “It’s getting harder to convince markets — and central banks know that — so they will look to maintain that data dependancy mode going forward.”

For those who missed it, here is the JPM Mkt Intel CPI scenario analysis.

Separately, there is a sense of trader exhaustion ahead of the last two big events of the year: as we noted last night, option-straddles imply the S&P 500 will move just 0.67% in either direction Tuesday, almost a third of its realized move in the last inflation day. Meanwhile, the 0.7% expected swing on FOMC Wednesday is about 40% below the actual move in the past 12 rate-decision days, Piper Sandler data show.

As Bloomberg notes, a sense of torpor has descended on stock market since mid-November, and traders expect more of the same this week. But for some on Wall Street, the elevated stretch of calm bespeaks complacency, especially with few positioning for the wider swings ahead. “Option traders are looking for volatility to remain near ‘baseline’ lows over the coming weeks” said Gareth Ryan, managing director at IUR Capital Ltd. “But any hawkish comments by the Fed this week could quickly see a change in that thinking.”

One reason for this surprising complacency: record dealer gamma that has made the market stuck in a range; however this Friday’s record triple witching opex should “unclench” much of this gamma gravity.

There is another reason to be cautious: seasonality. According to BTIG, while December has been a strong month for stocks, in the past 10 years the weakness has concentrated in the week between Dec. 8 and Dec. 14. That said, so far the S&P 500 hasn’t posted a 1% move since mid-November, and if the trend lasts through Friday, the stretch of calm will become the longest since 2021. The S&P 500 Index rose in tandem with the VIX Index on Monday, suggesting investors are now scrambling to buy calls in order to supercharge gains.

Elsewhere, stocks edged higher in Europe, with the Stoxx 50 adding 0.1%. The CAC 40 rises 0.2% and is eyeing a record close. Here are the most notable European movers:

Aixtron shares rise as much as 8.6%, hitting highest since June 2001, after Oddo lifts its price target on the chip-tool company, which it describes as one of the sector’s most overlooked growth stories.
AstraZeneca shares gain as much as 1.7% in London after the pharmaceuticals company agreed to buy Icosavax, a developer of innovative vaccines for respiratory viruses, for as much as $1.1 billion.
Banco BPM shares rise as much as 3.3%, leading gains on the FTSE MIB index, after Italy’s third-largest bank unveiled its strategic plan, with analysts highlighting a higher-than-expected shareholder distribution target.
HMS Networks shares gain as much as 19% in Stockholm trading after entering into a binding agreement to buy Red Lion for a cash consideration of $345m on a cash and debt free basis, the company said in statement after market close on Monday.
BT shares slump as much as 4.3% after UK regulators proposed banning mobile and broadband operators from increasing customers’ prices mid-contract based on inflation measures. Vodafone falls as much as 1.8%.
Genmab shares fall as much as 6.4%, Tuesday’s biggest decliner in the Stoxx 600 Health Care Index, as analysts weighed the Danish cancer treatment company’s presentation of its experimental GEN3014 drug at a hematology conference.
Hargreaves Lansdown, AJ Bell and Abrdn shares sink in London trading after the Financial Conduct Authority wrote to investment platforms regarding its concerns about interest earned on customers’ cash balances.
Pepco shares fall as much as 9.5% in Warsaw trading, the most since Oct. 19, after the department store chain reported FY2022/23 earnings and provided guidance for current fiscal year.
SAP shares fall as much as 1.7% after US peer Oracle reported slowing quarterly sales growth in its cloud computing business. Oracle fell 8.8% in US postmarket trading.
Stocks in Nordic forestry, paper and packaging companies slump after Danske Bank reviewed the sector, downgrading all firms in the sector to hold from buy.

Earlier in the session, Asian stocks rose, led by a recovery in Hong Kong-listed shares amid a report that a key meeting of Chinese economic and political leaders is underway. The MSCI Asia Pacific Index climbed as much as 0.7%, with Alibaba and Tencent among the biggest boosts. The MSCI Asia index has treaded water over the past month ahead of the Federal Reserve’s final scheduled policy decision for 2023 due this week along with those of the European Central Bank and Bank of England. US consumer price index data due later Tuesday will be closely watched for cues on the Fed’s next move.

“Investors are almost certain of a ‘no-change’ decision and have already priced that in — and maybe a little extra — during the November rallies,” Olivier d’Assier, head of applied research for Asia Pacific at Axioma, wrote in a note. Market observers “will focus on the language of the press releases, as well as next week’s meeting minutes.”

A gauge of Chinese stocks listed in Hong Kong was headed for its first gain in four sessions after Reuters reported on the Central Economic Work Conference, where officials are expected to discuss the 2024 growth target and the State Council issued measures on integrated development of domestic and foreign trade, although the mainland index ultimately lagged and was contained beneath the psychological 3,000 level.
Nikkei 225 surged at the open and briefly reclaimed the 33,000 level after a recent dovish BoJ source report although the index then reversed nearly all of its gains as the effects of a firmer currency seeped through.
ASX 200 was led by outperformance in tech but with the upside capped following mixed data in which Westpac Consumer Sentiment improved but NAB Business Confidence printed its worst reading since 2012.
Key gauges also rose Tuesday in South Korea, Singapore and Australia. Thai stocks fell, with the benchmark nearing a technical correction.

In FX, the Bloomberg Dollar Spot Index drops 0.3%, with the greenback lower versus all its G-10 rivals. The Norwegian krone, yen and kiwi are the best performers.

In rates, treasuries advanced ahead of US inflation data, which is expected to show consumer prices were unchanged again in November. US 10-year yields fall 5bps to 4.18%. Gilts rallied after data showed UK wage growth slowed more than expected. UK 10-year yields fall 10bps to 3.98%.

In commodities, oil prices dropped with WTI sliding 0.8% to trade near session lows around $70.7 despite an attack by Houthi rebels of a Norwegian-flagged tanker as fears of a supply glut continue to dominate. Spot gold rises 0.3%. In crypto, bitcoin, +1.7%, finds a firmer footing below the USD 42k mark; Ethereum, +0.4%, posts gains but to a lesser degree.

To the day ahead now, and the main highlight will be the US CPI release for November. Other data releases include UK labour market data, the German ZEW survey for December, and in the US there’s the NFIB’s small business optimism index. Central bank speakers include the ECB’s Villeroy.

Market Snapshot

S&P 500 futures little changed at 4,629.00
MXAP up 0.5% to 161.69
MXAPJ up 0.5% to 502.29
Nikkei up 0.2% to 32,843.70
Topix down 0.2% to 2,353.16
Hang Seng Index up 1.1% to 16,374.50
Shanghai Composite up 0.4% to 3,003.44
Sensex down 0.5% to 69,548.15
Australia S&P/ASX 200 up 0.5% to 7,235.29
Kospi up 0.4% to 2,535.27
STOXX Europe 600 up 0.1% to 474.18
German 10Y yield little changed at 2.23%
Euro up 0.2% to $1.0785
Brent Futures up 0.5% to $76.39/bbl
Gold spot up 0.1% to $1,983.36
U.S. Dollar Index down 0.20% to 103.89

Top Overnight News

China’s senior leaders commenced a meeting on Monday to discuss 2024 economic priorities (media reports have suggested the gov’t would adopt a GDP growth target of ~5% for next year, the same as in 2023). RTRS
The Chinese military is ramping up its ability to disrupt key American infrastructure, including power and water utilities as well as communications and transportation systems, according to U.S. officials and industry security officials. WaPo
Country Garden is set to avoid its first default on yuan bonds after holders of a security agreed not to demand repayment this week, people familiar said. BBG
Japan’s BOJ may not hike rates next week, but such a move is coming relatively soon, and Ueda is keen on preparing markets for it to avoid surprises. RTRS
UK wage growth cools to +7.2% Y/Y in Oct, down 80bp from Sept and inline w/the Street (wages ex-bonus payments cooled to +7.3% from +7.4%). RTRS
Washington is stepping up its face-to-face military advice for Ukraine and pushing Kyiv to pursue a conservative strategy focused on holding existing territory and ramping domestic weapons production capacity, hoping this compels Putin to enter into negotiations toward the end of 2024 or in 2025. NYT
NFLX has been interested in buying PARA (Paramount)’s Paramount movie studio, but conversations have “cooled” (Shari Redstone is “adamant” that the Paramount studio won’t be sold alone – if someone wants it, they will need to acquire the whole company). WSJ
ORCL (-9% pre mkt) reported FQ2 EPS that’s essentially inline at 1.34 (the consensus was modeling 1.33) but overall revenue came in light (FXN revenue growth was 4% vs. the Street’s 4.75% forecast) while the rev guide fell short too. RTRS
Google lost an antitrust battle with Epic Games, threatening an app store duopoly with Apple that generates $200 billion a year. A federal jury said Google wielded monopoly power through anticompetitive conduct. BBG
We expect a 0.27% increase in November core CPI (vs. 0.3% consensus), corresponding to a year-over-year rate of 3.99% (vs. 4.0% consensus). We expect a 0.03% increase in November headline CPI (vs. flat consensus), which corresponds to a year-over-year rate of 3.06% (vs. 3.1% consensus). Our forecast is consistent with a 0.37% increase in CPI core services excluding rent and owners’ equivalent rent and with a 0.16% increase in core PCE in November. (GIR)

A more detailed look at global markets courtesy of Newsquawk

Asi-Pac stocks were mostly positive as the region took impetus from the gains on Wall St where the major indices steadily edged higher in a catalyst-light session ahead of upcoming major risk events. ASX 200 was led by outperformance in tech but with the upside capped following mixed data in which Westpac Consumer Sentiment improved but NAB Business Confidence printed its worst reading since 2012. Nikkei 225 surged at the open and briefly reclaimed the 33,000 level after a recent dovish BoJ source report although the index then reversed nearly all of its gains as the effects of a firmer currency seeped through. Hang Seng and Shanghai Comp were both initially underpinned after China convened the Central Economic Work Conference to discuss the 2024 growth target and the State Council issued measures on integrated development of domestic and foreign trade, although the mainland index ultimately lagged and was contained beneath the psychological 3,000 level. US equity futures (ES unch.) held on to the prior day’s spoils as markets awaited the incoming US inflation data. European equity futures are indicative of a slightly higher open with Euro Stoxx 50 future +0.1% after the cash market closed up 0.4% yesterday.

Top Asian News

China’s government advisers said they would recommend economic growth targets for 2024 ranging from 4.5% to 5.5%, with the majority favouring a target of around 5%, according to Reuters.
US Commerce Secretary Raimondo said the US will take the “strongest possible” action to protect its national security when asked how the Commerce Department will respond to Huawei’s recent chipmaking breakthrough. Furthermore, she said the Biden administration is in discussions with Nvidia (NVDA) about permissible AI chip sales to China but emphasised that it cannot sell its most advanced semiconductors to Chinese firms, according to Reuters.
US judge upheld the ban on state employees and public university faculty using TikTok on state-owned devices or networks.
Country Garden (2007 HK) is set to avoid a Yuan-bond default following most holders of a local note agreeing not to seek repayment this week, via Bloomberg citing sources.

European equities, Eurostoxx50, (-0.1%) are trading on a weaker footing despite posting initial gains; outperformance in the FTSE 100 (+0.2%), propped up by strength in Basic Resources and lower UK wage metrics. European sectors are generally firmer, though the overall breadth of the market is fairly narrow. Basic Resources outperform propped up by broker upgrades for both Rio Tinto (+2.1%) and ArcelorMittal (+2.7%) at JP Morgan; Telecommunications lags hampered by OFCOM proposals. US equity futures are trading on a slightly firmer footing, building on gains seen in the prior session and ahead of US CPI later today; the NQ (+0.2%) extends on yesterday’s outperformance.

Top European News

Catalonia’s President Aragones says they will be pursuing their right to an independence referendum in order to resolve the sovereignty conflict, via FT.
German Engineering Group VDMA: Expects 2024 production to decline by 4% (prev. -2%); 2023 production expects -1% (prev. -2%); expect Q4 2023 to be weak after drop in Q3 production; investment activity could wane in US and probably stay weak in China

The DXY trades on either side of the 104.00 mark but with a softer bias in the run-up to the US CPI metrics.
Sterling fails to benefit from the Dollar’s softness in the wake of the softer-than-expected wage metrics for October ahead of the BoE confab on Thursday.
EUR/USD gains amid the weaker Dollar coupled with EUR/GBP flows whilst the firmer-than-expected ZEW metrics from Germany has little impact on price action, given ZEW caveating the upside as being driven by dovish ECB expectations.
The Yen is the top G10 gainer at the time of writing following yesterday’s hefty losses in the wake of the BoJ sources which suggested the bank sees little need to end negative rates in December.
Antipodeans trade firmer following yesterday’s rebound coupled with firmer base metal prices, whilst RBA Governor Bullock said she does not think the RBA is falling behind on the inflation fight and stressed data dependency.
RBNZ’s annual review of the TWI saw the weighting of yuan cut to 22.6% (prev. 25.6%), while USD weighting increased to 14.5% (prev. 13.8%) and AUD weighting rose to 17.7% (prev. 16.5%).
PBoC set USD/CNY mid-point at 7.1174 vs exp. 7.1772 (prev. 7.1163).

Fixed Income

USTs are firmer having shrugged off Monday’s particularly poor auctions ahead of a 30yr outing today, though for the time being participants are more keenly focused on the November US CPI release.
Pre-Liffe open UK employment data saw Gilts gap-up to 98.79 from Monday’s 97.52 close and has sparked some additional dovishness in market pricing for the BoE across 2024.
Bunds reside around the 135.00 mark within 134.80-135.38 bounds and as such shy of Friday’s 135.46 best with 65 & 81 potential resistance points thereafter.
UK sells GBP 3.75bln 4.50% 2028 Gilt: b/c 2.53x (prev. 2.30x), average yield 4.041% (prev. 4.474%) & tail 0.9bps (prev. 1.0bps)

Crude

Crude is weaker despite overnight reports that a Norwegian-flagged tanker was hit by a missile that was suspected to be fired by Yemen’s Houthi rebels.
WTI Jan is off best levels in a USD 71.27-71.96/bbl parameter while Brent Feb sits between a USD 75.94-76.66/bbl parameter.
Base metals and spot gold are broadly benefitting from the Dollar pullback; XAU tests USD 1990/oz while silver also experiences some modest reprieve.
In APAC hours, Singapore iron ore futures hit a 9-month high with traders citing the revival of Chinese stimulus hopes.

Geopolitics: Middle East

Israel’s army said supplies will not enter Gaza from Israel but will still enter via crossing with Egypt.
Israeli Defence Minister said they are close to the “breaking point” in the campaign in northern Gaza and Gaza City, while he called on Hamas militants and commanders in the field to surrender or be killed. Furthermore, he said Israel has no intention to stay permanently in the Gaza Strip and is open to discussing all alternatives regarding who will control Gaza as long as it is not hostile to Israel, while it is open to a possible agreement with Hezbollah if it includes a safe zone along border and guarantees.
UKMTO received a report of an incident affecting a vessel in the vicinity of Bab Al-Mandab west of Yemen’s Port Mokha where there was a fire onboard a vessel. Furthermore, a US defence official later stated that a land-based cruise missile launched from Houthi-controlled Yemen hit a Norwegian-flagged vessel causing some damage and a fire, while US Navy ship Mason was on scene to render aid and no casualties were reported in the attack.
Hezbollah’s military chief vowed to block all Western ships from passing at the ports of Tyre, Saida and Jounieh until the Shebaa Farms are liberated from Zionist control, according to Houthis TV.
A source in the Yemeni government said they received an US invitation to participate in a military coalition to protect the Red Sea. “We will participate in the military coalition with a formation of naval forces to confront Houthi operations”, Via AJ
Israeli PM Netanyahu says “We are preparing for a possible confrontation with the Palestinian Authority (PA) security services in the West Bank”, according to Sky News Arabia

Geopolitics: Other

Russian Defence Ministry said a Ukrainian-launched tactical ballistic missile was shot down over the Belgorod region in Russia, according to Reuters.
China’s Embassy in the UK said China firmly opposes and strongly condemns the groundless accusation made by the UK and it urges it to respect China’s territorial sovereignty and maritime rights and interests in the South China Sea. This was in response to a UK statement criticising the “unsafe and escalatory tactics deployed by Chinese vessels” against the Philippines, according to Global Times.

US Event Calendar

06:00: Nov. SMALL BUSINESS OPTIMISM 90.7, est. 90.7, prior 90.7
08:30: Nov. CPI MoM, est. 0%, prior 0%
- Nov. CPI YoY, est. 3.1%, prior 3.2%
- Nov. CPI Ex Food and Energy MoM, est. 0.3%, prior 0.2%
- Nov. CPI Ex Food and Energy YoY, est. 4.0%, prior 4.0%
- Nov. Real Avg Hourly Earning YoY, prior 0.8%
- Nov. Real Avg Weekly Earnings YoY, prior 0%, revised -0.1%
14:00: Nov. Monthly Budget Statement, est. -$317b, prior -$248.5b

DB’s Jim Reid concludes the overnight wrap

Markets mostly got the week off to a decent start, with the S&P 500 (+0.39%) closing at a 20-month high and Europe’s STOXX 600 (+0.30%) reaching a 22-month high. Bonds also pared back their earlier losses, with yields on 10yr Treasuries only up +0.8bps yesterday, and this morning they’ve since fallen another -2.1bps to 4.21%. However, from today we now have a packed calendar of macro events that starts this afternoon and continues for the rest of the week. That includes the US CPI release for November and a 30yr Treasury auction today ahead of decisions from the Fed, ECB and BoE over the rest of the week, along with the flash PMIs for December. So several events that will be critical for setting the direction of markets into year-end.

In terms of today’s events, the first highlight is that US CPI release at 13:30 London time. Last month saw a small downside surprise, which led to growing confidence that the Fed were done hiking rates, as core CPI fell back to a two-year low of +4.0%. That helped propel an incredible market rally, and in response we saw the S&P 500 post its strongest daily advance in months. Those inflation readings are critical to the hard/soft landing debate, as a crucial part of the answer is whether inflation can durably get back to target, which would enable the Fed to ease off from a more restrictive policy stance.

For today’s release, our US economists are looking for monthly headline CPI to come in at just +0.07%, supported by another 8% decline in gas prices since October. In turn, that would take the year-on-year rate down to 3.1%. For core CPI, they’re looking for a stronger +0.27% monthly reading, with the year-on-year measure at 4.0%. Moreover, if their forecasts are right, then that would push the 6m annualised rate for core CPI down to 2.8%, marking the first sub-3% reading since March 2021. See the full preview from our US economists here, along with details for how to sign up to their webinar after the release.

The second highlight will be the 30yr US Treasury auction at 18:00 London time. Last month’s 30yr auction drew a yield of 4.769%, which was 5.3bps above the indicated pre-sale level, and only one other 30yr auction in the last decade has had a tail around those levels. That led Treasury yields to soar in the immediate aftermath, rising by over +21bps on the day at one point, before settling up +15.0bps. Clearly things have moved on since then with the massive bond rally, but it’s one to keep an eye on today.

Yesterday’s 3yr and 10yr auctions were slightly on the weaker side, with tails of 1.7bps and 1.4bps above the indicated pre-sale levels, respectively. But despite this seemingly underwhelming outcome, Treasury yields rallied during the latter half of the US session. That meant the 10yr closed near flat (+0.7bps) by the close at 4.23%, having traded +6bps higher intra-day immediately after the auction results. The 2yr yield was down -1.3bps to 4.71%. Over in Europe, 10yr yields were also largely flat yesterday, with those on 10yr bunds (-0.6bps), OATs (-0.3bps) and BTPs (-0.4bps) all posting a modest decline. Meanwhile, gilts struggled, with the 10yr yield up +3.6bps.

That CPI print and 30yr auction will set the stage for tomorrow’s FOMC decision, where there’ll be plenty of focus on the latest dot plot for where officials see rates heading next year. Much of the speculation in recent weeks has been about rate cuts, but that narrative has lost some steam since the broadly positive jobs report on Friday, which showed unemployment falling back to 3.7%, and nonfarm payrolls growing above consensus at +199k. At one point yesterday, futures even pushed back the timing of a fully priced rate cut into the June meeting, although by the end of the session it was back at the May meeting, where it remains this morning. The likelihood of a March cut is still at 50% as well. In light of all the rate cut speculation, I published a report yesterday outlining five hurdles to cuts, thinking about some factors that could lean in a hawkish direction for upcoming decisions (link here).

Whilst bonds were broadly flat yesterday, equities saw a more robust performance, which saw the S&P 500 (+0.39%) advance to a 20-month high. In fact, that gain now means the index is up by more than +20% YTD for the first time this year. That was echoed in Europe too, where the STOXX 600 (+0.30%) hit a 22-month high, and the DAX (+0.21%) hit an all-time high. But despite the overall gains, the tech mega caps saw a significant underperformance, with Magnificent 7 down -1.44%.

Overnight in Asia, the Japanese Yen has recovered somewhat this morning, strengthening +0.48% against the US Dollar. That comes after it was the worst-performing G10 currency yesterday, having weakened by -0.83% following a Bloomberg report saying that BoJ officials saw little need to end their negative interest rate policy next week. Market pricing has continued to dial down the likelihood of a shift as a result, and overnight index swaps are now pricing in just a 9% likelihood of an end to negative interest rates next week, having hit an intraday high of 45% at one point last week.

Elsewhere in Asia, equity markets are broadly higher this morning, although there has been some divergence between different indices. The Hang Seng (+0.66%) is leading the way as it recovers from its one-year low the previous session, whilst the KOSPI (+0.52%) and the Nikkei (+0.06%) have also risen. By contrast, the CSI 300 (-0.12%) and the Shanghai Comp (-0.03%) have both lost ground. Meanwhile, US equity futures have seen modest gains, with those on the S&P 500 (+0.05%) and the NASDAQ 100 (+0.14%) pointing higher .

When it came to data, there were some positive signs on US inflation expectations from the New York Fed’s latest Survey of Consumer Expectations. It showed that 1yr expectations were down to 3.4%, the lowest since April 2021. Otherwise, the 3yr expectation was unchanged at 3.0%, along with the 5yr at 2.7%. Over in Japan, PPI inflation came in a bit stronger than expected in November, with the year-on-year rate at +0.3% (vs. +0.1% expected), although that was still the lowest since February 2021 .

To the day ahead now, and the main highlight will be the US CPI release for November. Other data releases include UK labour market data, the German ZEW survey for December, and in the US there’s the NFIB’s small business optimism index. Central bank speakers include the ECB’s Villeroy.

END

2 B) NOW NEWSQUAWK (EUROPE/REPORT)

European bourses dip in the red, US Futures firmer, DXY weaker & JPY bid; US CPI due – Newsquawk US Market Open

TUESDAY, DEC 12, 2023 – 06:00 AM

European bourses dip into the red despite initial gains & US Futures are firmer ahead of US CPI; the FTSE 100 outperforms post UK-data
Dollar oscillates on either side of the 104.00 mark; Yen is among the G10 outperformers, rebounding from yesterday’s hefty losses
Bonds lift off post-supply low as attention turns to US CPI later today, Gilts gap higher on UK wages
Crude is weaker despite overnight reports that a Norwegian-flagged tanker was hit by a missile that was suspected to be fired by Yemen’s Houthi rebels; base metals are broadly benefitting from the Dollar pullback
Looking ahead, US CPI, Japanese Tankan, Supply from the US

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EUROPEAN TRADE

EQUITIES

European equities, Eurostoxx50, (-0.1%) are trading on a weaker footing despite posting initial gains; outperformance in the FTSE 100 (+0.2%), propped up by strength in Basic Resources and lower UK wage metrics.
European sectors are generally firmer, though the overall breadth of the market is fairly narrow. Basic Resources outperform propped up by broker upgrades for both Rio Tinto (+2.1%) and ArcelorMittal (+2.7%) at JP Morgan; Telecommunications lags hampered by OFCOM proposals.
US equity futures are trading on a slightly firmer footing, building on gains seen in the prior session and ahead of US CPI later today; the NQ (+0.2%) extends on yesterday’s outperformance.
Click here and here for the sessions European pre-market equity newsflow, including earnings.
Click here for more details.

FX

The DXY trades on either side of the 104.00 mark but with a softer bias in the run-up to the US CPI metrics.
Sterling fails to benefit from the Dollar’s softness in the wake of the softer-than-expected wage metrics for October ahead of the BoE confab on Thursday.
EUR/USD gains amid the weaker Dollar coupled with EUR/GBP flows whilst the firmer-than-expected ZEW metrics from Germany has little impact on price action, given ZEW caveating the upside as being driven by dovish ECB expectations.
The Yen is the top G10 gainer at the time of writing following yesterday’s hefty losses in the wake of the BoJ sources which suggested the bank sees little need to end negative rates in December.
Antipodeans trade firmer following yesterday’s rebound coupled with firmer base metal prices, whilst RBA Governor Bullock said she does not think the RBA is falling behind on the inflation fight and stressed data dependency.
RBNZ’s annual review of the TWI saw the weighting of yuan cut to 22.6% (prev. 25.6%), while USD weighting increased to 14.5% (prev. 13.8%) and AUD weighting rose to 17.7% (prev. 16.5%).
PBoC set USD/CNY mid-point at 7.1174 vs exp. 7.1772 (prev. 7.1163).
Click here for more details.
Click here for the Option Expires for the NY Cut.

FIXED INCOME

USTs are firmer having shrugged off Monday’s particularly poor auctions ahead of a 30yr outing today, though for the time being participants are more keenly focused on the November US CPI release.
Pre-Liffe open UK employment data saw Gilts gap-up to 98.79 from Monday’s 97.52 close and has sparked some additional dovishness in market pricing for the BoE across 2024.
Bunds reside around the 135.00 mark within 134.80-135.38 bounds and as such shy of Friday’s 135.46 best with 65 & 81 potential resistance points thereafter.
UK sells GBP 3.75bln 4.50% 2028 Gilt: b/c 2.53x (prev. 2.30x), average yield 4.041% (prev. 4.474%) & tail 0.9bps (prev. 1.0bps)
Click here for more details.

COMMODITIES

Crude is weaker despite overnight reports that a Norwegian-flagged tanker was hit by a missile that was suspected to be fired by Yemen’s Houthi rebels.
WTI Jan is off best levels in a USD 71.27-71.96/bbl parameter while Brent Feb sits between a USD 75.94-76.66/bbl parameter.
Base metals and spot gold are broadly benefitting from the Dollar pullback; XAU tests USD 1990/oz while silver also experiences some modest reprieve.
In APAC hours, Singapore iron ore futures hit a 9-month high with traders citing the revival of Chinese stimulus hopes.
Click here for more details.

NOTABLE EUROPEAN HEADLINES

Catalonia’s President Aragones says they will be pursuing their right to an independence referendum in order to resolve the sovereignty conflict, via FT.
German Engineering Group VDMA: Expects 2024 production to decline by 4% (prev. -2%); 2023 production expects -1% (prev. -2%); expect Q4 2023 to be weak after drop in Q3 production; investment activity could wane in US and probably stay weak in China

DATA RECAP

UK Average Earnings (ex-Bonus) (Oct) 7.3% vs. Exp. 7.4% (Prev. 7.7%, Rev. 7.8%); 3M YY 7.2% vs. Exp. 7.7% (Prev. 7.9%, Rev. 8.0%)
UK Claimant Count Unemployment Change (Nov) 16.0k vs. Exp. 15.0k (Prev. 17.8k, Rev. 8.9k); Employment Change 50k (Prev. 54k)
UK ILO Unemployment Rate (Oct) 4.2% vs. Exp. 4.2% (Prev. 4.2%)
UK HMRC Payrolls Change (Nov) -12k (Prev. 33k)
UK November Food Price Inflation 7.8% (prev. 8.8%), according to Nielsen IQ
German ZEW Economic Sentiment 12.8 vs. Exp. 8.8 (Prev. 9.8); ZEW Current Conditions -77.1 vs. Exp. -76.0 (Prev. -79.8)
EU ZEW Survey Expectations (Dec) 23.0 (Prev. 13.8)
German Wholesale Price Index YY (Nov) -3.6% (Prev. -4.2%); MM (Nov) -0.2% (Prev. -0.7%)
Norwegian GDP Month Mainland (Oct) 0.4% (Prev. 0.3%); GDP Month 2.1% (Prev. -2.3%, Rev. -2.2%)
South African Gold Production YY (Oct) 2.2% (Prev. -0.1%); YY 3.9% vs. Exp. 1.5% (Prev. -1.9%)

NOTABLE US HEADLINES

Choice Hotels (CHH) is reportedly launching a hostile takeover offer for Wyndham Hotels & Resort (WH), according to WSJ sources; Offer unchanged from prior proposal, equates to USD 90/shr (Wyndham closed at USD 79.56/shr)
Click here for the US Early Morning Note.

GEOPOLITICS

ISRAEL/HAMAS/MIDDLE EAST

Israel’s army said supplies will not enter Gaza from Israel but will still enter via crossing with Egypt.
Israeli Defence Minister said they are close to the “breaking point” in the campaign in northern Gaza and Gaza City, while he called on Hamas militants and commanders in the field to surrender or be killed. Furthermore, he said Israel has no intention to stay permanently in the Gaza Strip and is open to discussing all alternatives regarding who will control Gaza as long as it is not hostile to Israel, while it is open to a possible agreement with Hezbollah if it includes a safe zone along border and guarantees.
UKMTO received a report of an incident affecting a vessel in the vicinity of Bab Al-Mandab west of Yemen’s Port Mokha where there was a fire onboard a vessel. Furthermore, a US defence official later stated that a land-based cruise missile launched from Houthi-controlled Yemen hit a Norwegian-flagged vessel causing some damage and a fire, while US Navy ship Mason was on scene to render aid and no casualties were reported in the attack.
Hezbollah’s military chief vowed to block all Western ships from passing at the ports of Tyre, Saida and Jounieh until the Shebaa Farms are liberated from Zionist control, according to Houthis TV.
A source in the Yemeni government said they received a US invitation to participate in a military coalition to protect the Red Sea. “We will participate in the military coalition with a formation of naval forces to confront Houthi operations”, Via AJ
Israeli PM Netanyahu says “We are preparing for a possible confrontation with the Palestinian Authority (PA) security services in the West Bank”, according to Sky News Arabia

OTHER

Russian Defence Ministry said a Ukrainian-launched tactical ballistic missile was shot down over the Belgorod region in Russia, according to Reuters.
China’s Embassy in the UK said China firmly opposes and strongly condemns the groundless accusation made by the UK and it urges it to respect China’s territorial sovereignty and maritime rights and interests in the South China Sea. This was in response to a UK statement criticising the “unsafe and escalatory tactics deployed by Chinese vessels” against the Philippines, according to Global Times.

CRYPTO

Bitcoin, +1.7%, finds a firmer footing below the USD 42k mark; Ethereum, +0.4%, posts gains but to a lesser degree.

APAC TRADE

APAC stocks were mostly positive as the region took impetus from the gains on Wall St where the major indices steadily edged higher in a catalyst-light session ahead of upcoming major risk events.
ASX 200 was led by outperformance in tech but with the upside capped following mixed data in which Westpac Consumer Sentiment improved but NAB Business Confidence printed its worst reading since 2012.
Nikkei 225 surged at the open and briefly reclaimed the 33,000 level after a recent dovish BoJ source report although the index then reversed nearly all of its gains as the effects of a firmer currency seeped through.
Hang Seng and Shanghai Comp were both initially underpinned after China convened the Central Economic Work Conference to discuss the 2024 growth target and the State Council issued measures on integrated development of domestic and foreign trade, although the mainland index ultimately lagged and was contained beneath the psychological 3,000 level.
US equity futures (ES unch.) held on to the prior day’s spoils as markets awaited the incoming US inflation data.
European equity futures are indicative of a slightly higher open with Euro Stoxx 50 future +0.1% after the cash market closed up 0.4% yesterday.

NOTABLE HEADLINES

China’s government advisers said they would recommend economic growth targets for 2024 ranging from 4.5% to 5.5%, with the majority favouring a target of around 5%, according to Reuters.
US Commerce Secretary Raimondo said the US will take the “strongest possible” action to protect its national security when asked how the Commerce Department will respond to Huawei’s recent chipmaking breakthrough. Furthermore, she said the Biden administration is in discussions with Nvidia (NVDA) about permissible AI chip sales to China but emphasised that it cannot sell its most advanced semiconductors to Chinese firms, according to Reuters.
US judge upheld the ban on state employees and public university faculty using TikTok on state-owned devices or networks.
Country Garden (2007 HK) is set to avoid a Yuan-bond default following most holders of a local note agreeing not to seek repayment this week, via Bloomberg citing sources.

DATA RECAP

Japanese Corporate Goods Prices MM (Nov) 0.2% vs. Exp. 0.2% (Prev. -0.4%, Rev. -0.3%); YY 0.3% vs. Exp. 0.1% (Prev. 0.8%, Rev. 0.9%)
Australian Westpac Consumer Confidence Index (Dec) 82.1 (Prev. 79.9); W/W 2.7% (Prev. -2.6%)
Australian NAB Business Confidence (Nov) -9.0 (Prev. -2.0); Business Conditions 9.0 (Prev. 13.0)

TUESDAY MORNING/MONDAY NIGHT

2 d./NORTH KOREA/ SOUTH KOREA/
//

NORTH KOREA/SOUTH KOREA

END

2e) JAPAN

3 CHINA

CHINA//ROBERT H TO US;

Looks like China is developing a serious outbreak of pneumonia. This was due to vaccination which shut off much of citizens’ immune system

China Discounts Visa Entry Fee for 14 Countries Amid Worsening Pneumonia Outbreak | The Epoch Times

So does this start again at another lockdown? Such rubbish as these kind of issues have all been with humanity for ever. The best thing anyone can do is build the immune system

https://www.theepochtimes.com/china/china-discounts-visa-entry-fee-for-14-countries-amid-worsening-pneumonia-outbreak-5544408

end

4.EUROPEAN AFFAIRS//UK /SCANDINAVIAN AFFAIRS

POLAND

Donald Tusk is back as Poland’s Prime Minister

(zerohedge)

Donald Tusk Returns As Polish PM, Vows To “Chase Away The Evil” Of Years Of Right-Populist Rule

TUESDAY, DEC 12, 2023 – 02:45 AM

Donald Tusk is returning to power as Poland’s new prime minister after nearly a decade. He’s now vowing to “chase away the darkness … chase away the evil” of the prior eight years of tumultuous national-conservative rule.

On Monday, Poland’s parliament voted to back his nomination as the next prime minister. It’s being hailed as a major win for pro-EU centrists at a moment Eurocrats in Brussels have feared the growing influence of ‘far right disruptors’ from Hungary to Italy to the Netherlands. His detractors have denounced Tusk as a globalist who will sell out Poland’s national sovereignty, culture, and traditional values.

This came on the heels of earlier Monday former Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki of the nationalist Law and Justice (PiS) party having lost a crucial vote of confidence. The subsequent vote was 248 in favor of Tusk becoming prime minister, with 201 against.

“Thank you, Poland. This is a wonderful day, not for me, but for all those who have deeply believed over these years that things will get even better,” Tusk said. “From tomorrow, we will be able to right the wrongs so that everyone, without exception, can feel at home,” he pledged, and laid out that his three-way alliance (a coalition ranging from from left-wing to moderate conservative) which emerged with a clear mandate in October’s elections would “fix everything together.”

Given that he was European Council president from 2014-2019, following his first stint as Poland’s prime minister from 2007-2014, he’s expected to greatly improve Warsaw’s relations with EU leadership in Brussels.

Political rivals and enemies of PiS have long charged the party during its tenure with eroding judicial independence and waging a propaganda campaign against immigrants and sexual minorities. However, PiS said it has charted an independent, sovereign path of progress putting Poles first and thwarting foreign interference.

Detractors blame years of stormy PiS rule for the European Union freezing tens of billions of Euros of EU funds over so-called rule of law issues. Tusk has vowed to see the funds flowing again.

Wladyslaw Kosiniak-Kamysz, leader of the Polish Peasants’ Party (PSL), one among the pro-Tusk coalition, said of him: “He gave up the comfortable life he could have had after being president of the European Council and came back… to fight for the victory of democracy, decency and justice.”

Poland’s conservative and right-leaning parties see Tusk as a globalist who seeks to open up the borders of Poland, which they fear will further erode Polish culture and identity. Last month, we featured the following analysis:

The liberal-globalist opposition coalition’s victory in last month’s Polish elections, which its Foreign Minister earlier accused Germany of meddling in, will likely result in former Prime Minister and European Council President Donald Tusk’s return to the premiership. In that event, this German-aligned politician could voluntarily subordinate his country to Berlin, thus resulting in Poland ceding its envisaged regional sphere of influence to that country and becoming its largest-ever vassal indefinitely.

Tusk’s plans to improve ties with the de facto German-controlled EU are regarded by conservative-nationalists as a means to that end, particularly due to that body’s efforts to further erode Polish sovereignty. Although he claims to oppose changes to the EU Treaty, some doubt his sincerity and suspect that he slyly wants to prevent large-scale protests over this issue. If these two scenarios come to pass, then Poland’s sovereignty would be further reduced, including in the defense sphere.

Prior to last month’s elections, Germany and Poland were competing to build the EU’s largest military, but the aforesaid sequence of events could result in Warsaw throwing in the towel.

It will be interesting to see what happens with the Ukraine issue, given the recent months of deteriorating Poland-Ukraine relations. Western allies had been alarmed at Warsaw very publicly shifting away from its initial enthusiastic support for Kiev.

Tusk has pledged not only to rapidly restore good relations with the European Union, but to revive strong support for neighboring Ukraine as well to defend against Russia.

He’s expected to give his first major speech back in office as prime minister on Tuesday, after which he’s expected to be formally sworn in by President Andrzej Duda on Wednesday.

END

5 RUSSIA//UKRAINE AND MIDDLE EASTERN AFFAIRS

ISRAEL/HAMAS/TIMES OF ISRAEL

Gallant: Hamas battalions once ‘considered invincible’ now ‘on verge of collapse’

IDF says 500 terror suspects held in past month, some took part in Oct. 7 slaughter; Kerem Shalom crossing to open to ease aid flow as clips show apparent theft, looting of goods

EMANUEL FABIAN and TOI STAFFToday, 3:19 am 2

Defense Minister Yoav Gallant speaks with soldiers near the Gaza border, October 19, 2023. (Chaim Goldberg/Flash90)

Hamas battalions in the Jabaliya and Shejaiya neighborhoods in the northern Gaza Strip were on the verge of collapse Monday, said Defense Minister Yoav Gallant, amid ongoing heavy fighting in and around the terror stronghold of Khan Younis in southern Gaza, and rocket fire on central Israel during the day.

“We have encircled the last strongholds of Hamas in Jabaliya and Shejaiya, the battalions that were considered invincible, that prepared for years to fight us, are on the verge of being dismantled,” Gallant said at a press conference Monday.

He said hundreds of Hamas operatives had surrendered to Israeli troops in recent days, which “shows what is happening” to the terror group.

The military and the Shin Bet said Monday that forces have arrested more than 500 terror operatives in the Gaza Strip in the last month. They have been taken for questioning by the IDF Military Intelligence Directorate’s Unit 504 and the security agency.

According to the joint statement, more than 140 of the operatives were arrested since the ceasefire ended on December 1.

Palestinian suspects are detained by the IDF in the Gaza Strip, in a handout image published by the IDF on December 11, 2023. (Israel Defense Forces)

Some of the operatives were arrested while hiding in civilian buildings, including schools and shelters for civilians, the IDF said, adding that some 350 are members of Hamas, and a further 120 are members of Palestinian Islamic Jihad.

The photos issued by the IDF on Monday showed fully-clothed detainees, unlike other photos coming out of Gaza in recent days showing suspects stripped down to their underwear, sights that caused backlash.

On Sunday, both National Security Adviser Tzachi Hanegbi and IDF Spokesman Rear Adm. Daniel Hagari criticized the dissemination of photographs showing arrested terror suspects after they were searched for explosives, and vowed to stop the circulation of such images.

Palestinian men surrender to troops in northern Gaza’s Jabaliya, on December 10, 2023. (Social media; used in accordance with Clause 27a of the Copyright Law)

Speaking on Monday, Gallant said that among those arrested by the IDF were terrorists who participated in the October 7 shock terror onslaught on Israeli communities two months ago.

That Saturday morning, some 3,000 Hamas-led terrorists burst across the border into Israel by land, air and sea, killing some 1,200 people and seizing over 240 hostages of all ages — mostly civilians — under the cover of a deluge of thousands of rockets fired at Israeli towns and cities. Some 1,000 of those terrorists were killed by Israel on October 7 and the following days.

Those captured, said Gallant, “are telling us very interesting things,” apparently alluding to intelligence gleaned from those prisoners.

He encouraged terrorists to surrender. “Whoever surrenders — his life is spared.”

Gallant also threatened Hamas’s Gaza leader Yahya Sinwar, the mastermind of the October 7 onslaught, saying his fate and that of “any other senior commander in Hamas, and the fate of the [low-ranking] terrorist is the same: surrender or die. There is no third option.”

IDF Chief of Staff Lt. Gen. Herzi Halevi (L) and Shin Bet head Ronen Bar hold an assessment with senior officers in southern Gaza’s Khan Younis, December 11, 2023. (Israel Defense Forces)

Earlier Monday, IDF Chief of Staff Lt. Gen. Herzi Halevi and Shin Bet head Ronen Bar held an assessment in southern Gaza’s Khan Younis, as the military pressed on with its ground offensive.

In a video published by the IDF, Halevi said: “We are deepening the achievement in the north of the Gaza Strip, in the south and beneath the ground,” referring to Hamas’s tunnel network in the Strip.

In one instance of Hamas’s use of its tunnel network, reservists from the Jerusalem Brigade foiled an attempted attack on their encampment in Gaza last week, the IDF announced Monday.

Forces of the Jerusalem Brigade’s 9207th Battalion received an intelligence alert of a planned attack by Hamas last Sunday night, the IDF said. The troops cleared their encampment and entered a state of readiness for the expected Hamas attack.

The Air Force then carried out strikes in the area while the ground troops opened fire at the Hamas gunmen who came out of a tunnel. According to the army, amid the gun battle and strikes, an explosive device detonated inside the Hamas tunnel shaft, leading to several secondary blasts.

The IDF later destroyed the tunnel entrance used to carry out the attempted attack, as well as other tunnel infrastructure found in the area.

Also Monday in northern Gaza, Nahal Infantry Brigade troops discovered a Hamas training site inside a mosque in northern Gaza’s Jabaliya.

Footage published by the IDF showed an officer giving a tour of the mosque, revealing on the third floor a room used by Hamas for combat simulation, along with a machine gun, an RPG launcher, a computer and a projector. The IDF said it found equipment used to make explosive devices in an adjacent room.

As international pressure for a ceasefire in Gaza mounts, Gallant added in his comments that the war against Hamas will end once Israel has achieved its goals.

“I take into consideration everything the US asks and says, and take seriously, along with all the members of the cabinet, what America is doing,” Gallant said in response to a question. “We will find a way to help the Americans help us.”

Gallant’s comments echoed US Secretary of State Antony Blinken, who said Saturday that Israel, not the US, will decide when to end the war in Gaza.

“These are decisions for Israel to make,” Blinken told CNN’s Jake Tapper.

Humanitarian aid in Gaza

Israel has been facing heightened criticism for the humanitarian situation and mounting Palestinian death toll in Gaza. Over 18,200 Palestinians have been killed since October 7, according to the Hamas-run health ministry in the Strip, though those figures cannot be independently verified and are believed to include both civilians and terrorists, as well as Palestinians killed by rockets fired from Gaza that fall short.

According to the UN, more than 80% of Gaza’s 2.3 million residents have been displaced since the start of the war, some of them more than once.

While Israel has urged people to seek refuge in the south, there are few safe places for civilians to go as the war continues to expand.

In an effort to ease the crisis, the IDF and COGAT, the military’s liaison to the Palestinians, announced Monday that the Kerem Shalom Crossing would open Tuesday for the examination of aid entering the Gaza Strip from Egypt.

Until now, aid trucks entering Gaza have been examined by Israeli authorities at the more southern Nitzana Crossing between Israel and Egypt, causing delays in the entry of food, water, and medical supplies to the Strip.

Israel has accused the United Nations of not doing enough to process humanitarian aid into Gaza and charged that the world body is responsible for supplies not reaching the Strip at a fast enough pace.

Kerem Shalom will be used to examine the aid trucks in addition to Nitzana, to speed up the process, Israel announced.

No aid will enter Gaza directly from Israel. Rather, all the trucks will be examined in Israel at Kerem Shalom and Nitzana, and then make their way to Egypt’s Rafah border crossing to enter the Palestinian enclave.

Videos from Gaza circulating on social media Monday showed fights breaking out over the limited humanitarian aid entering the territory.

One clip showed an armed gunman atop a truck, as civilians rushed to grab supplies left in the street. Some media reports claimed Hamas stole the truck.

Another video showed residents looting a truck as it moved to its destination.

END

ISRAEL/HAMAS

Evidence from videos and other means has the Health Ministry declare many Israeli hostages deceased.

(Jerusalem Post)

Health min. panel declares Israeli hostages in Gaza deceased, aiding families in legal limbo

The deaths of several Israeli captives have been declared in absentia without any physical evidence.

By JUDY SIEGEL-ITZKOVICH

posts[i].image.ImageName (photo credit: Yossi Aloni / Flash90) — Israeli soldiers at the forensic center in the Shura military base near Ramle, where hundreds of dead bodies arrived since the start of the war with Gaza, October 24, 2023.(photo credit: Yossi Aloni / Flash90)

A three-member Health Ministry medical committee that has been confidential until now has declared that several Israeli hostages are deceased even without any physical evidence being available.

The committee, which was established about two weeks into the Gaza War and which has been deliberating for scores of hours, was established to save pained and anxious families from not knowing what happened to their loved ones and to give them some closure.

Women married to a hostage can now be declared widows by the IDF chief rabbi and Israel’s Chief Rabbinate so they can eventually remarry without being designated as an aguna (“chained woman” whose husband has disappeared or who has left her (and to whom she is still technically married to according to Jewish law).

Prof. Ofer Merin (credit: HERB BISHKO)

It was comprised of the head of the ministry’s general medicine division Dr. Hagar Mizrahi; Prof. Ofer Merin, director-general of Jerusalem’s Shaare Zedek Medical Center (SZMC); and Dr. Chen Kugel, director of the Israel National Center of Forensic Medicine at Abu Kabir.

The physicians have been studying videos and other information from the October 7 massacre and kidnapping by Hamas terrorists in southern Israel for signs of lethal injuries among those abducted and cross-referencing the data with the testimony of hostages who have been freed so far.

“As head of my hospital’s trauma unit for years, commander of the Israel Defense Forces’ field hospital providing urgent medical care in foreign disasters,” the SZMC heart surgeon said, “I have seen thousands of dead bodies in my career. But in these few weeks, I never was involved in such an agonizing situation before. We were exposed to various types of information and had to determine which hostages were deceased without examining or even seeing bodies or body parts. Obviously, if there had been bodies or body parts, we would not have been needed.”

Merin explained that the committee “presented an orderly written protocol according to harm the person suffered, data from witnesses and other sources. Then we reached a conclusion. We didn’t speak to the relatives at all. We understand the two extremes, of life and death. Loss is terrible, but not knowing his or her fate is even worse.”

As an example of the case of a captive whose fate has still not been proven by physical evidence, Merin presents that of Israeli Air Force weapon systems and navigation officer Ron Arad, who in October 1986 was lost on a mission over Lebanon, believed to have been captured by the Shiite terrorist group Amal and later handed over to Hezbollah.

His wife Tami and their infant daughter Yuval suffered terribly for years due to uncertainty if he was alive and they should wait for his return or if they could go on with their lives. They suffered from “ambiguous loss” – the ongoing suffering of the close family, dealing for years with uncertainty.

He was finally classified officially by Israel as missing in action. Seventeen years after his capture, an organization seeking information about him offered a prize of $10 million to anyone supplying information on him, but to no avail. Today, if he were alive, Arad would have been 65 years old. (if you want to mention here the issue of ambiguous loss- the ongoing suffering of the wife, dealing for years with uncertainty)

“We dealt with data we received on some of the captives in Gaza. About half remain there and are still alive or deceased. People who provided us with information did a very important duty that also has military importance,” Merin added.

After the Health Ministry informs families of the committee’s ruling, they decide whether they sit shiva (the seven-day Jewish mourning period).

The ministry decided a few days ago that the committee’s confidentiality would be lifted; the SZMC director-general thought it would be better unpublicized because he “feared that people wouldn’t have understood the great complexity of our work. We are ready to investigate more cases if needed,” he concluded. Go to the full article >>

end

A MUST READ…..(JERUSALEM POST)/SHIN BET C.EO BAR

Israel security chief in letter to the world: ‘Do not interfere’

The letter of the head of the Shin Bet to the UN Secretary-General reflects the frustration among decision-makers in Israel, from the international indifference to what happened on October 7.

By BEN CASPIT/MAARIVDECEMBER 12, 2023 06:14Updated: DECEMBER 12, 2023 06:48

Director of Shin Bet Ronen Bar attends the state ceremony marking 50 years since the Yom Kippur War, held at the military cemetery at Jerusalem's Mount Herzl, on September 26, 2023. (photo credit: Chaim Goldberg/Flash90) — Director of Shin Bet Ronen Bar attends the state ceremony marking 50 years since the Yom Kippur War, held at the military cemetery at Jerusalem’s Mount Herzl, on September 26, 2023.(photo credit: Chaim Goldberg/Flash90)

Last month, Shin Bet (Israel Security Agency) chief Ronan Bar addressed a long and poignant letter to UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres, in which he wrote, among other things “We are determined to complete our mission in Gaza. All those who aspire to see a safer world should refrain from interfering or stopping us.”

He added “The UN Charter states that the goal of the organization is to ‘renew belief in the most basic human rights, in human dignity and the importance of human life, and the equality of rights between men and women.’ Hamas has ruled the Gaza Strip for 17 years and grossly ignores these principles, and the needs of the 2.2 million citizens living in Gaza.”

“During the activities of Hamas on October 7, there was no respect or rights whatsoever. The UN was founded to ensure that ‘never again’, anywhere in the world. But on the day of the massacre in October, it returned in full force. Jews were brutally murdered, just for being Jews. The IDF is an army that operates in accordance with the highest moral principles. We do not act deliberately against civilians.”

“Reality forces us to act in a civilian environment. We are forced to do this by a terrorist organization that acts as a sovereign on the ground and kills civilians, Israelis, and Gazans alike, from the first day it was founded. This is the time to remind you, Mr. Secretary-General, that Yahya Sinwar himself was sentenced to 5 life sentences in Israel for murdering Palestinians, not Jews. Gaza should be freed from Hamas, not from Israel. Hamas is ISIS.”

Ronen Bar continues, writing “Out of respect for the thousands of lives that have already been lost, and in order to save many more lives, please help us remove the rule of evil from the Gaza Strip and restore faith in the most basic human rights, human dignity and the value of human life, as written in the UN Charter. Help us restore the belief in equal rights between men and women, Palestinians, Israelis, Muslims, Christians, Jews, and others. Help us bring back our fathers and mothers, our brothers and sisters, back home.”

Yahya Sinwar leader of the Palestinian Hamas Islamist movement hosts a meeting with members of Palestinian factions, at Hamas President's office in Gaza City, on April 13, 2022. (credit: ATTIA MUHAMMED/FLASH90) — Yahya Sinwar leader of the Palestinian Hamas Islamist movement hosts a meeting with members of Palestinian factions, at Hamas President’s office in Gaza City, on April 13, 2022. (credit: ATTIA MUHAMMED/FLASH90)

“Help us bring our grandparents back home. Help us save our babies and return them to their families, to begin healing our wounds (at the time the letter was sent to the UN Secretary-General, most of the children held by Hamas had not yet been returned. Even now, the 10-month-old baby Kafir Bibs and his brother Ariel, 4 at the hands of Hamas, which claims that they were killed)”.

At the beginning of his letter, Bar mentions that a few months ago he arrived at the UN building for a meeting that was supposed to take place with the Secretary-General, but in light of his absence, it was finally held with his deputy, Dr. Asha-Rose Migiro. Bar wrote to Guterres that in that meeting he described to the Deputy Secretary-General the tense situation in the Middle East, especially around Lebanon, the West Bank, and Gaza. “I emphasized to her,” writes Bar, “the risks of breaking out into a multi-arena conflict, and perhaps even a global one, in light of the great tension between the powers.”Advertisement

“I asked her that the UN strengthen the stabilizing factors in the area and help neutralize the factors that cause instability. Among other things,” Bar writes, “I mentioned the leader of Hamas, Yahya Sanwar, and the need to put pressure on him to order him to return the bodies of our fighters and Israeli civilians in his hands. I emphasized the need to solve the problem of arms smuggling to Gaza, and the problem of the dual use of materials that are transferred from Sinai to Gaza, and you asked for the help of the UN on these issues.”

UN did not answer his requests

“Unfortunately,” concludes Bar, “none of these requests of mine were answered, and what did happen is what we all feared would happen. At this point, Bar harshly criticized the words of the Secretary-General himself: “I heard your statements regarding the recent events in Israel and Gaza, You set up a symmetry between the acts of cruelty and the violation of human rights between Israel and Hamas, and nothing could be further from the truth. Crimes against humanity and war crimes were committed against Israel, Israelis, and other nationalities. Additional war crimes were committed when Hamas shot and injured civilians who tried to leave the northern Gaza Strip, after its warnings. of Israel, and refused to be a human shield in the service of Hamas.”

“War crimes were committed when Hamas used hospitals as combat headquarters and humanitarian aid as a cover for terrorist operations. The attempt to create a moral parallel between the terrorists of Hamas and the defense forces of the IDF is wrong and repulsive on a moral level. There is no way to balance when you compare acts of murder and torture of children and babies to the unfortunate but necessary suffering of civilians who are cynically used by Hamas as human shields. Hamas exploits the citizens of Gaza for its manipulative needs and its public relations.”

“The world,” Bar wrote, “must understand that on October 7 the reality of the free world changed dramatically. We have clear evidence proving that the crimes against humanity, brutally committed by Hamas, were part of its operative plan. On that black Sabbath, the thousands of Hamas terrorists did what their leaders ordered them to do: they raped our wives and daughters, strangled our babies, and burned our houses with entire families inside. They tortured mothers in front of their children, and children in front of their mothers.”

“After them, came hordes of rioters who sowed destruction and death in our quiet communities. The perpetrators of these crimes do not belong to the human race and are not human. This is not a war about ideology or religion, it is a fight between the good and the bad. Israel stands on the first line, as the last line of defense for the defense of the free world, standing between darkness and light, between barbarism and humanity. We are the protective layer between those who mourn death, and those who worship it.”

The extraordinary letter of the head of the Shin Bet to the UN Secretary-General reflects the frustration among decision-makers in Israel, at all levels, from the international indifference to what happened on October 7, in the face of the growing identification with the suffering of the Palestinians in Gaza. The words reached their peak in the statements of the President and the presidents of the leading universities in the USA according to which calling for the genocide of Jews does not constitute a violation of the rules and regulations of their institutions, and the belated and lax condemnation of the United Nations Women’s Organization for the terrorists’ acts of rape, murder and abuse of Israeli women.

In the talks held by Israeli political parties with foreign leaders, diplomats, and public opinion leaders, it was said that Israel has a severe “credibility problem” in the world, which is compounded by a general ignorance regarding the nature of the conflict in the Middle East and manifestations of new and old antisemitism, especially among the younger generation.

END

Qatar, Israel held secret meetings in Europe – Saudi report

A senior diplomatic source revealed that the deal is expected to include children, women, and men, including three senior IDF officers who were captured by Hamas.

By MAARIV ONLINE

posts[i].image.ImageName (photo credit: Jonathan Shaul/Flash90) — KFAR AZA residents call for the release of the hostages, outside Defense Ministry in Tel Aviv yesterday.(photo credit: Jonathan Shaul/Flash90)

Qatar and Israel are holding secret talks in one of the European capitals regarding a potential hostage exchange, as reported on Monday on the Saudi Arabian website Elaph.

A senior diplomatic source revealed that the deal is expected to include children, women, and men, including three senior IDF officers who were captured by Hamas.

The Saudi report states that Israel has committed to release around 300 Palestinian prisoners in exchange, in addition to ten veteran prisoners serving long sentences, including Marwan Barghouti, the leader of the Fatah movement.

The source mentioned that the Israeli delegation consists of Mossad officers, Shin Bet officers, members of the National Security Council, and a representative from the military intelligence branch.

Negotiations in Europe with Qatar

An artist sprays a graffiti for the release of Israelis held hostage by Hamas terrorists in Gaza, in the Jezreel Valley, on October 30, 2023 (credit: Anat Hermony/Flash90)

The Israeli delegation also includes a psychologist and a negotiation expert. Elaph reported that among the delegation members are former Mossad agents who were specially recruited for this mission, with expertise in the field and strong ties to Qatar, including those who maintain commercial relationships with Qatar through foreign companies.

It should be noted that the meetings are taking place in a European capital because previous meetings in Qatar and the recurring visits of the Israeli intelligence chief to Doha have led to significant public criticism in Israel and the government.

The report indicated that the agreement has been reached to keep this negotiation channel open and secret, with the two delegations meeting in different locations each time to obscure and keep the matter away from the spotlight

.Go to the full article >>

END

Houthi attacks direct threat to Israel’s maritime trade – Ashdod port

By REUTERSDECEMBER 12, 2023 15:47

Attacks on commercial vessels by Yemen’s Houthis are a strategic threat to global shipping routes and seaborne traffic to Israel although there has been no direct impact on port activity, Israel’s Port of Ashdod said on Tuesday.

The Iran-backed Houthis said on Tuesday they carried out a military operation against a Norwegian commercial tanker in their latest protest against Israel’s bombardment of Gaza, underlining the risks of a conflict that has shaken the Middle East.

“We emphasize that we are doing everything in order to act fully and to maintain open gateways to Israel despite the challenges of the war,” the port said in a statement.

Israel relies on its maritime trade for imports and its exports. Ashdod in the south and Haifa in the north are the country’s biggest ports.

The smaller port of Ashkelon, which is the closest to Gaza, has shut for the moment due to the war

end

WEST BANK/ISRAEL

Four terrorists killed in Jenin IDF overnight operation

One other person was injured in the attack on Al-Sibat neighborhood in the city of Jenin, WAFA reported.

By JERUSALEM POST STAFF

posts[i].image.ImageName (photo credit: RANEEN SAWAFTA/REUTERS) — An Israeli military vehicle with an Israeli flag on top, manoeuvers on a road during a raid, amid the ongoing conflict between Israel and the Palestinian terror group Hamas, in Jenin,(photo credit: RANEEN SAWAFTA/REUTERS)

Four Palestinians were killed on Tuesday in a drone strike during an Israeli raid on the West Bank city of Jenin, the Palestinian health ministry and the Palestinian official news agency WAFA said.

One other person was injured in the attack on Al-Sibat neighborhood in the city of Jenin, WAFA reported.

Jenin hospital director told the agency the Palestinians were directly targeted.

Israeli security forces operate in the West Bank. December 5, 2023. (credit: IDF)

Israeli forces are encircling three hospitals in the area, WAFA added.

Prior to this attack, the health ministry reported that 275 Palestinians have been killed in the West Bank since the Oct. 7 attack on Israel by Hamas terrorists.Go to the full article >>

END

IDF retrieves bodies of two Israelis taken hostage by Hamas// Two soldiers killed while trying to retrieve the bodies.

Master-Sgt. (res.) Gal Meir Eisenkot and Master-Sgt. (res.) Eyal Meir Berkovich fell during the operation to retrieve the bodies.

By TZVI JOFFREDECEMBER 12, 2023 18:40Updated: DECEMBER 12, 2023 19:04

People gather and light candles to remember the Israeli victims of the October 7 massacre at Dizengoff Square in Tel Aviv, October 12, 2023. (photo credit: Dor Pazuelo/Flash90) — People gather and light candles to remember the Israeli victims of the October 7 massacre at Dizengoff Square in Tel Aviv, October 12, 2023.(photo credit: Dor Pazuelo/Flash90)

The IDF retrieved the bodies of Eden Zechariah and IDF Warrant Officer Ziv Dado, two of the Israelis taken hostage by Hamas on October 7, the IDF Spokesperson’s Unit said on Tuesday.

The bodies were retrieved by soldiers from Unit 504 of the Intelligence Directorate and the 551st Brigade operating in Gaza.https://www.instagram.com/reel/C0wl3gtoTQR/embed/captioned/?cr=1&v=14&wp=540&rd=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.jpost.com&rp=%2Fbreaking-news%2Farticle-777745#%7B%22ci%22%3A0%2C%22os%22%3A950.7000000476837%2C%22ls%22%3A138.10000002384186%2C%22le%22%3A492.5%7D

The bodies underwent an identification procedure by medical officials and military rabbis, together with the Institute of Forensic Medicine and Israel Police.

The Zecharia and Dado families have been informed.

Zecharia was kidnapped from the party in Re’im and Dado was kidnapped while serving as a logistics foreman in the 51st Battalion of the Golani Brigade.

IDF retrieves bodies of Eden Zecharia and soldier Ziv Dado on December 12, 2023. (credit: IDF SPOKESPERSON'S UNIT) — IDF retrieves bodies of Eden Zecharia and soldier Ziv Dado on December 12, 2023. (credit: IDF SPOKESPERSON’S UNIT)

Two soldiers fell in attempt to retrieve hostage bodies

Master-Sgt. (res.) Gal Meir Eisenkot and Master-Sgt. (res.) Eyal Meir Berkovich fell during the operation to retrieve the bodies.Advertisement

“The national mission before our eyes is to locate the missing and return all the hostages home. We are working together with the security agencies, with all the intelligence and operational means to bring all the hostages home,” said the IDF.

“We share in the deep sorrow of the Zechariah family,” said the Hostage and Missing Families Forum. “Eden Zechariah was full of joy of life and loved to spend time at parties. She went to a party in Re’im with her partner Ofek Kimchi who was murdered at the party.”

IDF retrieves bodies of 2 hostages from Gaza: Eden Zacharia and IDF soldier Ziv Dado

end

TUESDAY

We were waiting for this; Biden’s about face due to “indiscriminate bombing’. How on earth are they to get the hostages as well as kill Hamas hiding amongst the civilians?

Biden In Sudden About-Face: Israel ‘Losing Support’ Due To ‘Indiscriminate Bombing’

TUESDAY, DEC 12, 2023 – 12:40 PM

In a sudden about-face, President Biden in a speech on Tuesday began aggressively criticizing Israel and the Netanyahu government for the first time since the Oct.7 Hamas terror attacks.

Calling the Israeli prime minister a “good friend” – Biden said “I believe he has to change” as the government in Israel and the ongoing military campaign which has killed many is “making it very difficult for the world.” He issued the unprecedented words during a Tuesday fundraiser address.

He underscored that while the US stands with Israel and will continue supporting its counter-terror operations, “They’re starting to lose that support’ due to indiscriminate bombing.”

He continued by saying the “world is looking at Israel” – a reference to its increasing isolation on a global stage over the soaring death toll (Palestinian sources have cited a death toll surpassing 17,700) before laying down a rare ultimatum of sorts. Biden said that Netanyahu can’t say “no” to a Palestinian state in the future.

Biden’s words appeared to be in direct response to statements of Netanyahu from Monday. The Israeli leader pledged that his administration would block an US proposed postwar plan to have the Palestinian Authority take over Gaza.

The two leaders are now very openly at odds on strategy concerning the ongoing Gaza operation, ironically after the US has given Israel over $3 billion annually in foreign and defense aid.

“After the great sacrifice of our civilians and our soldiers, I will not allow the entry into Gaza of those who educate for terrorism, support terrorism and finance terrorism,” Netanyahu had said. “I will not allow Israel to repeat the mistake of Oslo,” he had added.

Biden’s words are unexpected to say the least, given it was just last Friday that the United States was the lone “no” vote at a UN National Security Council meeting on a simple resolution calling for ceasefire in Gaza.

So strangely, Biden now says Israel is being “difficult” and is “losing support” – and simultaneously it has remained Washington that’s blocked international efforts at pushing for ceasefire.

Bloomberg observes:

Biden’s comments at a Tuesday fundraiser marked some of his strongest criticism of Netanyahu’s government since the Israel-Hamas war began on Oct 7. The Israeli leader said hours earlier he has a “disagreement” with the US president about the future of the post-conflict Gaza Strip, rejecting Biden’s proposal for a revitalized Palestinian Authority to take control.

Is Biden changing tune because he’s losing his Liberal base, amid strong Trump polling, going into the 2024 election?

developing…

end

Flooding begins:

IDF begins pumping seawater into Hamas tunnels in Gaza -WSJ

In 2015, Egypt flooded tunnels between the Gaza Strip and the Sinai Peninsula with seawater.

By REUTERS, JERUSALEM POST STAFFDECEMBER 12, 2023 21:20Updated: DECEMBER 12, 2023 21:30

A terrorist from the al-Quds Brigades, the military wing of the Palestinian Islamic Jihad, is seen inside a military tunnel in Beit Hanun, in the Gaza Strip. (photo credit: ATTIA MUHAMMED/FLASH90) — A terrorist from the al-Quds Brigades, the military wing of the Palestinian Islamic Jihad, is seen inside a military tunnel in Beit Hanun, in the Gaza Strip.(photo credit: ATTIA MUHAMMED/FLASH90)

The IDF has begun pumping seawater into Hamas’ tunnel complex in Gaza, the Wall Street Journal reported on Tuesday citing unnamed US officials, adding that the process would likely take weeks.

Some Biden administration officials have said the process could help destroy the tunnels, where Israel believes the terrorist group is hiding hostages, fighters and munitions, the Journal reported. Other officials have expressed concerns the seawater would endanger Gaza’s fresh water supply, the newspaper reported.

The flooding process began after the IDF added two pumps to five pumps which had been installed for the purpose of flooding the tunnels last month, the US officials told the Journal. The first five large pumps had been assembled north of the al-Shati refugee camp during the last month, with each one capable of pumping thousands of cubic meters of seawater into the tunnels.

In 2015, Egypt flooded tunnels between the Gaza Strip and the Sinai Peninsula with seawater, sparking complaints that the method damaged the soil in the area.

An Israeli soldier secures a tunnel underneath Al Shifa Hospital in Gaza City, amid the ongoing ground operation of the Israeli army against Hamas, in the northern Gaza Strip, November 22, 2023. (credit: REUTERS/Ronen Zvulun)

Unclear how well the flooding method will work

Due to the nature and structure of the tunnels, it is unclear whether the method will be a cure-all for the tunnel threat, or will be useful, but will remain just one of a series of important tactics.

The process could take weeks and therefore could allow Hamas’s fighters to evacuate, potentially taking the hostages with them. However, it isn’t clear whether Israel would wait until all hostages are returned.

IRAN/HOUTHIS/ISRAEL/USA//Monday afternoon

British navy ship attacked in the Red sea of Iranian proxies, the Houthis. The ship was taken hostage to Yemen. Explosions were heard in Yemen but nobody is claiming responsibility.

(Jerusalem Post)

British Royal Navy confirms attack in the Red Sea, explosions reported inland

These reports come as attacks on shipping in the Red Sea have ramped up, with attacks reported on a near-weekly basis.

By YUVAL BARNEADECEMBER 12, 2023 00:40Updated: DECEMBER 12, 2023 03:59

Armed men watch the "Galaxy Leader" ship that the Houthis took over to the coast of Yemen, December 5, 2023 (photo credit: REUTERS) — Armed men watch the “Galaxy Leader” ship that the Houthis took over to the coast of Yemen, December 5, 2023(photo credit: REUTERS)

United Kingdom Maritime Trade Operations (UKMTO) confirmed via X (formerly Twitter) that there had been an attack in the Bab el-Mandeb on Monday night. UKMTO is a public service operated by the Royal Navy to provide information for security services and merchant vessels.

They reported that there was a fire onboard the vessel and that all crew were safe. US defense officials claimed that a land-based cruise missile fired from Houthi-controlled territory in Yemen was responsible for the damage, as well as confirming that a US Navy ship had arrived to render support.

UKMTO later reported that an organization claiming to be “the Yemeni Navy” ordered the vessel to change course and dock in Yemen.

People dance on the deck of the Galaxy Leader commercial ship, seized by Yemen's Houthis last month, off the coast of al-Salif, Yemen December 5, 2023 (credit: REUTERS/KHALED ABDULLAH) — People dance on the deck of the Galaxy Leader commercial ship, seized by Yemen’s Houthis last month, off the coast of al-Salif, Yemen December 5, 2023 (credit: REUTERS/KHALED ABDULLAH)

These reports come as attacks on shipping in the Red Sea have ramped up, with attacks reported on a near-weekly basis and becoming increasingly frequent.

Both France and the United States have been involved in interceptions in the Red Sea recently. The United States increased its presence in the Red Sea after the Houthis fired missiles toward Israel last month.

After several successful interceptions of Houthi missiles, the Houthis changed tack and began seizing ships, they claim are associated with Israel, often they are carrying Israeli products or are partly owned by an Israeli.

The Houthis announced on December 9 that all ships sailing to Israel are banned from the Red and Arabian Sea.

White House National Security Adviser Jon Finer directly accused Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps of providing weaponry and intelligence to the Houthis.

Iran’s Foreign Minister Hossein Amirabdollahian essentially confirmed Iran’s involvement in the Red Sea attacks, saying that at any moment there could be a “big explosion in the region,” while pointing to the various attacks on US bases and Red Sea shipping.

Explosions heard inland

Local sources report explosions heard inland near Houthi camp in Al-Hawban in the Taiz Governate, as well as the sound of aircraft.

Israel was reported to have struck Houthi targets in Yemen on December 1, by the the Saudi al-Hadath TV, however, senior Houthi officials denied this saying it was caused by the detonation of old munitions.

Al-Hadath reported soon after the explosion was heard in Al-Hawban, that the Joint forces were coordinating with Saudi Arabia to “protect and secure the sea corridor in the Red Sea.”

They also reported that a Saudi Military delegation had been met in Mokha by a member of the Presidential Leadership Council with the purpose of increasing Yemen’s maritime security.

A spokesperson for the internationally recognized Yemeni government said that the Houthis were merely using the Israel-Hamas war as a pretext to spread more chaos at the expense of the people of Yemen.

end

(ZEROHEDGE/SAME STORY AS ABOVE)

Houthi Rebels Hit Norwegian-Flagged Tanker With Anti-Ship Cruise Missile At Key Maritime Chokepoint

TUESDAY, DEC 12, 2023 – 07:45 AM

An anti-ship cruise missile fired by Yemen’s Houthi rebels struck a Norwegian-flagged tanker in the Red Sea near a key maritime chokepoint known as the Bab el-Mandeb Strait, where nearly 10% of all crude traded at sea passes through.

Reuters quoted Houthi military spokesperson Yehia Sarea, who said the tanker – named “Strinda” – was targeted because it was headed to an Israeli terminal, and the crew ignored all warnings.

However, Strinda’s owner, Norway’s Mowinckel Chemical Tankers, said the vessel was bound for the Suez Canal and then on to Italy with a cargo containing vegetable oil and biofuels.

A US official told Reuters that the attack occurred about 60 nautical miles north of Bab al-Mandab Strait, connecting the Red Sea and the Gulf of Aden around 2100 GMT. After the attack, another official said the tanker could move under its own power.

According to the US military’s Central Command, which supervises US forces in the Middle East, the Arleigh Burke-class destroyer USS Mason received a distress call from Strinda and was able to respond:

“There were no US ships in the vicinity at the time of the attack, but the (US Navy destroyer) USS MASON responded to the M/T STRINDA’s mayday call and is currently rendering assistance.”

The Iran-backed militant group has carried out a series of attacks on commercial vessels in the Red Sea (read: here & here). They are specifically targeting any vessel they believe is going to or coming from Israel.

Bloomberg cited sources who said the US and Gulf allies have been discussing potential military action against the militant group for the latest spate of attacks on commercial vessels in the Red Sea.

As for energy markets, Brent crude futures briefly traded above $76 a barrel after Central Command posted on X about the incident on Monday night. Yet Brent gave up all gains and slid back to the $75 handle early Tuesday. Global crude markets are gripped with oversupply fears.

The one maritime route where large amounts of energy, commodities, and manufactured goods pass through to Egypt’s Suez Canal has become the world’s riskiest waters. It remains to be seen if vessels divert from the route and add thousands of miles by sailing around Africa.

END

TIMES OF ISRAEL/Monday evening

When will bird-brain Biden act: another Norwegian owned vessel hit with a missile fired by the Houthis.

(Times of Israel)

Norwegian-owned vessel hit with missile off Yemen coast as threats from Houthis grow

By AP and TOI STAFF

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates — A ship was attacked off the coast of Yemen in the Red Sea, two private intelligence firms said Tuesday.

The attack on the vessel came as threats have increased from Yemen’s Houthi rebels on commercial shipping in the area over the Israel-Hamas war in Gaza. The Houthis did not immediately claim responsibility for the attack, though rebel military spokesperson Brig. Gen. Yahya Saree said an important announcement would be coming from them soon.

The private intelligence firms Ambrey and Dryad Global confirmed the attack happened near the crucial Bab el-Mandeb Strait separating East Africa from the Arabian Peninsula.

US defense officials told Reuters that a land-based cruise missile launched from Houthi-controlled Yemen struck the Norwegian commercial tanker vessel, STRINDA causing a fire and damage but no casualties.

The officials said the US Navy destroyer USS Mason in the Red Sea provided assistance.

The Iranian-backed Houthis have carried out a series of attacks on vessels in the Red Sea and also launched drones and missiles targeting Israel.

In recent days, they have threatened to attack any vessel they believe is either going to or coming from Israel, though there was no immediate apparent link between the Norwegian-owned and operated ship and Israel.

END

UKRAINE/HEZBOLLAH

Hamas & Hezbollah “Easily” Obtain Weapons Through Ukraine’s Black Market, Iran FM Boasts

MONDAY, DEC 11, 2023 – 04:40 PM

Iranian Foreign Minister Hossein Amir Abdollahian has issued some surprising remarks claiming that Lebanon-based Hezbollah and Gaza-based Hamas can procure more weapons anytime they want utilizing the thriving arms black market in Ukraine. He suggested this is already happening while addressing a conference in Doha Monday.

He went so far as to say these groups, which the US has listed as terror organizations, can “easily” and “without much effort” get whatever they need in Ukraine.

The unusual remarks seem by design a jab and provocation aimed at Washington and its Western allies which have poured billions of dollars in defense aid into Ukraine over the last two years. These same NATO countries also tend to be Israel’s biggest funders.

Joining in on trolling the US alliance, Russian state publications in English featured the Iranian top diplomat’s words:

“You see, in the past – I wish to be absolutely frank with you – we used to provide all kinds of support to Hezbollah, Hamas and Islamic Jihad while taking into account [both] international law and the conditions of confronting the occupier (implying Israel – TASS),” Abdollahian said at the Doha Forum, when answering a question about Tehran’s support for these organizations.

That’s when he said: “If you ask me where they can obtain weapons, then one of the black markets where they can get them is Ukraine.” He said this as if suggesting that Tehran doesn’t need to offer as much support to the groups at this point, given the immense and ongoing arms proliferation in Eastern Europe.

Abdollahian continued to describe that “Very easily, without much effort they can get whatever [they need] in Ukraine,” He additionally said that if necessary, Hezbollah and Hamas currently “can produce the necessary weapons” on their own.

The words might also be timed to inject more controversy into US domestic politics as Republicans in Congress have thus far refused to sign off on Biden’s requested $106 billion in defense funds, primarily for the wars in Ukraine and Israel.

Among prime GOP complaints of White House Ukraine policy has been the lack of accountability in terms of tracking weapons and US deliveries to Kiev. Even a Defense Department inspector general report has found that West-supplied weapons have gone to criminal gangs and war profiteers. Some reports have found weapons being proliferated outside the country. Ukraine remains ranked among the top most corrupt states in the world.

“We have fidelity for a short time, but when it enters the fog of war, we have almost zero,” one US intelligence official told CNN in April 2022. “It drops into a big black hole, and you have almost no sense of it at all after a short period of time.” So it is entirely likely that either Hamas or Hezbollah could at some point access such weapons which have gone to the black market in Europe. Very likely this is already a reality, consistent with Abdollahian’s words.

END

Lt Col Richard Hecht

Delivering Results on the Ground

Why Hamas operatives are surrendering to the IDF and what this means for the war effort.

DEC 12

READ IN APP

Something is changing in the Gaza Strip and it’s a sign of things to come.

With every passing day, our troops are uncovering more tunnels, more weapons and more bomb factories hidden by Hamas inside schools, mosques and homes.

Thanks for reading Mission Brief from LTC Richard Hecht (Official IDF Substack)! Subscribe for free to receive new posts and support my work.

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The extent of the terror infrastructure developed by Hamas in Gaza is enormous.

But we’re also making significant progress. We’re destroying the tunnels, confiscating weapons including rockets, taking apart command and control centers and engaging terrorists at close quarters.

Our focus has been on three main areas: Shejaiya and Jabalya in the northern Gaza Strip, and Khan Yunis in the south. In each of these, we’ve made significant progress in dismantling the networks of terrorism built by Hamas which were prepared for exactly this kind of scenario.

And there is something else we’re seeing now, something that started in recent days and is picking up pace: more and more terrorists are voluntarily turning themselves in to the IDF. They’re coming out of their hiding places with their hands in the air and surrendering to our forces.

Those who turn themselves in are transferred to field interrogators from our specialist Unit 504 in the Intelligence Directorate and then to the Shin Bet for further questioning. This gives us access to priceless intelligence information that can direct our forces more accurately, and help us locate more terrorists and terrorist infrastructure inside in Gaza.

It also means that when suspects who are either apprehended or surrender are interrogated and found to have no connection to terrorism, we can release them.

Just to give you a sense – in recent weeks, over 350 Hamas and 120 Islamic Jihad terrorist operatives were apprehended by our forces.

So what does this tell us about the war in broader terms?

Many of the terrorists chose to surrender, realizing the fight was unwinnable. Their spirit is starting to break. They have lost contact with their commanders. The pressure from the IDF’s operations against Hamas is delivering results. This is also reflected in voices we hear from Gazan civilians who are speaking out against Hamas’ leadership for bringing about this terrible situation and then abandoning their people.

Of course, this isn’t the end. But Hamas’ leadership inside the Gaza Strip should take note:

It’s time to release every single one of our hostages and surrender control of Gaza. Your people already are.

Light in the Darkness

Tonight is the sixth night of Hannukah.

While IDF soldiers on the front line are not celebrating the festival with their families this year, the Hannukah lights continue to bring light and joy into the world at this time of darkness.

There were many photos taken of troops celebrating the festival on the front line, but this one really captures the spirit and energy of our soldiers. Happy Hannukah.

end

RUSSIA/UKRAINE/USA

This is nuts!

Robert H

The United States will send a general to Ukraine to control the Armed Forces of Ukraine

More craziness. Ukraine as a proxy is one thing but to have an American in Command of a proxy openly is an escalation which Russia will clearly see as a non starter.
There is a reason why a wider war will come from the Ukraine and it is called American hubris.
As 2024 beckons Russia is already well on the way to escalation across the entire front line having brought on to a war footing its’ economy. This is coincide with certain moves on the monetary front as well. When it comes to dollar and economic hegemony America is already lost in the weeds without a effective military or economic war output machine to back up its’ hubris.
https://avia-pro.net/news/ssha-otpravyat-na-ukrainu-generala-dlya-upravleniya-voyska-vsu

GLOBAL VACCINE/COVID ISSUES

DR PAUL ALEXANDER:

Many, a vast sum of high-risk, vulnerable persons died with COVID due to bacterial infection pneumonia secondary to viral infection, we knew this even from SPANISH FLU; McCullough awakens the sleeping

giant as cause of massive deaths & why? Because corrupted inept IMO malfeasant CRIMINAL medical doctors refused to treat with antibiotics; reason antibiotics were core to EARLY TREATMENT, Platt et al.

DR. PAUL ALEXANDERDEC 11

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‘Bacterial and fungal pulmonary co-infection are under-recognized complications in critically ill patients with COVID-19.’

Courageous Discourse™ with Dr. Peter McCullough & John Leake

Secondary Bacterial Pneumonia Common in Fatal SARS-CoV-2 Infections

By Peter A. McCullough, MD, MPH Inpatient COVID-19 protocol-driven care has been heavily criticized for being nihilistic, use of unsafe and ineffective remdesivir, and cruel in it’s treatment of patients and families. Now a new concern has been brought forward by the National Institutes of Health Autopsy Consortium—secondary bacterial and in some cases…

7 hours ago · 108 likes · 13 comments · Peter McCullough, MD

‘By Peter A. McCullough, MD, MPH

Inpatient COVID-19 protocol-driven care has been heavily criticized for being nihilistic, use of unsafe and ineffective remdesivir, and cruel in it’s treatment of patients and families. Now a new concern has been brought forward by the National Institutes of Health Autopsy Consortium—secondary bacterial and in some cases invasive fungal infections not recognized clinically before death.

How bad are the mRNA technology gene based vaccines? (Malone, Weissman, Bourla, Bancel, Sahin, Karikó et al. inventors & makers); well, REAL BAD! mRNA in nature (our cells) is NOT like mRNA in vaccine

that is key & Weissman lied in Jan 2021 saying mRNA in cells same as in mRNA vaccine, he lied! mRNA? at what costs to humanity? Is methylpseudouridine base change causing 24/7 cell spike production?

DR. PAUL ALEXANDERDEC 11

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https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-023-06800-3

‘In vitro-transcribed (IVT) mRNAs are modalities that can combat human disease, exemplified by their use as vaccines for severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2). IVT mRNAs are transfected into target cells, where they are translated into recombinant protein, and the biological activity or immunogenicity of the encoded protein exerts an intended therapeutic effect¹^,². Modified ribonucleotides are commonly incorporated into therapeutic IVT mRNAs to decrease their innate immunogenicity³^,⁴^,⁵, but their effects on mRNA translation fidelity have not been fully explored. Here we demonstrate that incorporation of N¹-methylpseudouridine into mRNA results in +1 ribosomal frameshifting in vitro and that cellular immunity in mice and humans to +1 frameshifted products from BNT162b2 vaccine mRNA translation occurs after vaccination. The +1 ribosome frameshifting observed is probably a consequence of N¹-methylpseudouridine-induced ribosome stalling during IVT mRNA translation, with frameshifting occurring at ribosome slippery sequences. However, we demonstrate that synonymous targeting of such slippery sequences provides an effective strategy to reduce the production of frameshifted products. Overall, these data increase our understanding of how modified ribonucleotides affect the fidelity of mRNA translation, and although there are no adverse outcomes reported from mistranslation of mRNA-based SARS-CoV-2 vaccines in humans, these data highlight potential off-target effects for future mRNA-based therapeutics and demonstrate the requirement for sequence optimization.’

END

Robert (Bobby) Kennedy Jr., I have always said openly I like him to be Trump’s VP (and if you get heart burn) for sure heading HHS, he is a smart, intellectual, passionate, loves America liberal, I

can support a Bobby Jr. liberal, I appreciate his stance on vaccines & COVID & enough to get my nod; as how he hits Fauci, if Malone was not all over JR’s book, he would QUESTION him for mRNA deaths??

DR. PAUL ALEXANDERDEC 11

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Just maybe Bobby Jr. would ask Malone some real questions on his mRNA invention and the deaths that flowed? Maybe? Don’t just hit Fauci and those types, look among your friends Bobby JR. Those who endorse you. I do like Bobby JR. Or should I just stfu because you pimpers and money-whore COVID Freedom fighters get donor money? from some or all of them….hhhhmmmmm….

I have gained huge respect for Bobby JR. Fundamentally a good American, I cannot say same for many of the Freedom Fighter doctors and scientists. Won’t trust them to take out my trash even. They give me the willies.

You know I won’t name names, I do not KISS and TELL. I was homies with them at some time in the past too, until I decided to tell them to phuck off with their COVID lies and money-whoring ways, thier stealing of donor money for their pockets, I just was not raised to whore…to lie, and deceive…I want to work for my money…the proper way. I want people to get value for their money. I want no money other than to give of my skills and time and help. Those hurt.

ssshhhh, my bad again, I guess its my arthritis fingers, I cannot seem to control them…ssshhhhh, lets not cut off the money train…sssshhhh lets keep licking each other’s assess for money….lets keep the COVID scam going and let us for God’s sake, not zero in on the real malfeasants…no no no…bad for the pocket and Suzie’s condo and summer vacation and paying my mortgage and having COVID **wink wink cough cough sleep around self-enriching parties, dressed-up as ‘conferences’ ** wink wink cough cough….

in all that, I will vote for Bobby Jr. if 45 was not on deck…I will vote for leftist quasi socialist Bobby Jr. (well, his policy stances suggest so) over all those crooked Republicans running on stage and the democrats. Not one got my vote.

You go Bobby JR. Hugs! Try asking Malone the ‘inventor’ some serious important questions, when you get time. And no, we will not step back on retribution and accountability. If it takes 50 years.

END

END

SLAY NEWS

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EVOL NEWS

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NEWS ADDICT

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LATEST REPORTS FOR NEWS JUNKIES

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MICHAEL EVERY/PHIL MAREY/OR OTHER EXECS //RABOBANK

A MUST READ…

“Oil And Water”: America Only Has 178 Flagged Cargo Carriers Vs. China’s 7,362

TUESDAY, DEC 12, 2023 – 11:05 AM

By Michael Every of Rabobank

Oil and Water

Today will be all about US inflation, as the market continues to give itself this year’s and next year’s generous Xmas presents in advance of its projected retreat. However, I am still focusing less on gift-wrapped data, and more on the lumps of coal that point to upside risks to 2024 inflation.

‘COP28’s watered down draft text criticised for omitting fossil fuel ‘phase out’’, screams one headline. “Phase out” was phased out as the COP28 draft text suggests “reducing” use of fossil fuels instead after heavy Middle East oil-producer lobbying, making it COP-OUT28 in the eyes of some. It remains to be seen what this means in terms of the outlook for energy prices.

Meanwhile, in the Middle East, it’s oil and water which matter. Especially as Yemen’s Houthis have officially announced they will attack Israeli vessels and any ships carrying cargo to or from Israel via the Red Sea or Arabian Gulf. Welcome to how the world used to work before British, then US, naval supremacy. This is what a multipolar world is going to look like, if we see one.

We are likely to get a US naval reaction. Combined Task Force 153 Operations was set up in 2022 to stop Red Sea piracy, but will need to be expanded from the US and Egypt: France already helped out last weekend by shooting down Yemeni drones aimed at Israel. Yet it’s still only reactive to attacks on shipping, not proactive at the source. That maintains the risk shipping diverts from Suez round the Cape of Good Hope: if so, global carriers would only be able to make 3-4 Asia-Europe roundtrips per year, not 4-5, a massive structural drop in supply capacity. The Financial Times warns ‘Global pre-Christmas Trade at risk from twin Canal crises’, including the drought in Panama cutting passages there. But it’s far more than just pre-Christmas trade at risk.

Indeed, we are likely to get an Israeli reaction to this Yemeni (slash Iranian) casus belli to stop it at source; and Israel is also close to establishing a fixed deadline for Hezbollah to retreat north of the Litani river, after which it will attack them south of it. In short, key dominoes could yet topple towards a regional escalation impacting both the Suez Canal and energy markets.

There are also other maritime developments of concern. In the South China Sea, China has used water cannons against Filipino vessels resupplying their maritime territory, which Beijing claims as its own: tensions remain high, yet the Philippines’ furious protests were just dismissed by the former editor of China’s Global Times as “blustering” by “an American minion”. This follows a recent dangerous sonar incident between the Chinese and Australian navies, and Chinese PLAN vessels entering a new naval base built in Cambodia, which Beijing had promised would not be for military use. Watch these spaces.

Moreover, the maritime logistics industry says ‘The shift of manufacturing out of China is shaking up shipping’. Indeed, “Container rates have collapsed. Logistics executives foresee a freight recession dragging into 2024… There is one bright spot, though: intra-Asia shipping. As manufacturers seek to diversify their supply chains by shifting certain production segments out of China, there’s been more demand for transporting raw materials and intermediate products within Asia.” The winners: Bangladesh; Cambodia; India; Vietnam. The loser: China. For example, in 2019, Vietnam had 13 direct shipping routes to the US, but in Q3-2023, that was 23. The US and China totals were 56 and 58. Echoing what the BIS showed recently, “Governments and companies are diversifying beyond China, but they won’t be fully substituting the world’s industrial powerhouse anytime soon. One effect is that supply chains are getting longer.” And no less risky – yet.

But that’s not the end of the story, as ‘Shipping giants Maersk and MSC are making different bets on the future of trade’ in a new era of reshoring and friendshoring. Back in January, Maersk and Mediterranean Shipping Co. (MSC), the world’s two largest shipping lines, announced their maritime code-sharing alliance accounting for one third of global capacity, known as 2M, would end in 2025. This may have a flow-through effect to the other two big global groups, the Ocean Alliance and THE Alliance. As experts see it, this “represent different bets on the shape of global trade in the decades to come – and on the forces of economic decoupling that will reroute the international flows of goods.” Maersk is shifting strategy from ships to a one-stop shop for all logistics including air, freight forwarding, trucking, and last-mile delivery, an integrated logistics bet on more reshoring and onshoring from China. By contrast, MSC will increase its fleet to try to capture market share anchored around China’s industry. One of them is going to be wrong.

The industry also notes China’s Cosco needs to decide if it is going to be a Maersk or an MSC. But Quartz thinks perhaps it will be both: “It could pursue more horizontal integration by acquiring more shipping lines, while also becoming more vertically integrated by acquiring ports –as it has done worldwide, including most recently in Germany– as well as partnering with domestic carmakers and port operators.” Something for the Politburo to consider at its annual Central Economic Work Conference discussing 2024’s GDP target and plans (which ends today when nobody had even announced it had started until this morning!) But can you smell the geopolitical tensions of a one-stop logistics shop for Chinese firms in an expanding geography?

Belatedly –and very importantly– the US Navy Secretary Del Toro now aims to reinvigorate US shipping to strengthen its fleet. The Navy now sees what we argued in 2021’s ‘In Deep Ship’: “A thriving maritime industry would mean more trained builders and maintainers the Navy could tap in the event of a crisis; more dry docks and construction facilities the service could leverage; and more investments in innovative tooling, technology and processes to build ships faster and cheaper. And, chiefly, it would mean a larger fleet of American-built ships the military could call into service if a war broke out.”

As the global merchant fleet asks for US protection in the Red Sea –again, why is it provided for free to rivals?– America only has 178 flagged cargo carriers vs. China’s 7,362. In case of war, the US could lean on only another 160 from all sources. Worse, from 1953 to 2016, the number of US shipyards capable of building large military and commercial vessels declined from 30 to six, and their annual output from 60 to seven. In response, Del Toro is calling for US “maritime statecraft” that “encompasses not only naval diplomacy but a national, whole-of-government effort to build comprehensive US and allied maritime power, both commercial and naval.”

Financially, he has floated “construction differential subsidies” to incentivize the private sector to buy ships from US builders, a tool unused since the Reagan era which allows the government to pay up to half the cost difference of a local build if there’s a national security need. The US is also trying to get allied private sectors involved in US small- and medium-sized shipyards. Notably, D.C. is not going to repeal The Jones Act that calls for US-built, -owned and -operated ships to move goods between US ports: rather, they are going to build more US ships to fill the gap, which is how the legislation was always supposed to work.

Of course, this is going to cost a lot of money; and there is a desperate shortage of merchant mariners, and a shortfall of 7,000 in Navy recruitment due to the tight labor market. But if you think being hegemon is expensive, try not being one anymore.

So, this maritime policy shift was logical two years ago: and I suspect in another two, it will be sailing ahead. Contrast that with a WSJ article about Europe’s military incapacity nearly two years into the Ukraine War: the UK still has only 150 deployable tanks and 12 pieces of long-range artillery; France has 90 of the latter, which Russia loses on the field in any month; and Germany’s army has enough ammunition for two days of battle, and can produce all of three tanks a month.

Yes, let’s focus on US CPI today, and on the swings from the BOJ reportedly backpedalling on the need to raise rates, again. However, if you can’t see how this backdrop of ‘oil’ and ‘water’ changes fiscal, monetary, trade, and industrial policy, with flowthroughs to commodities, stocks, bonds, and FX, then, just like oil and water, the real world and your forecasts are sadly immiscible.

END

7//OIL ISSUES//NATURAL GAS ISSUES//ELECTRICAL GRID ISSUES// RENEWABLE ENERGY ISSUES//USA AND GLOBE

8. EMERGING MARKETS//AUSTRALIA NEW ZEALAND ISSUES//

VENEZUELA/

END

YOUR EARLY CURRENCY/GOLD AND SILVER PRICING/ASIAN CLOSING MARKETS AND EUROPEAN BOURSE OPENING AND CLOSING/ INTEREST RATE SETTINGS TUESDAY MORNING 7;30AM//OPENING AND CLOSING

EURO VS USA DOLLAR: 1.0798 UP 0.0033

USA/ YEN 145.17 DOWN 0.865 NOW TARGETS INTEREST RATE AT 1.00% AS IT WILL BUY UNLIMITED BONDS TO GETS TO THAT LEVEL…//YEN STILL FALLS//

GBP/USA 1.2567 UP .0014

USA/CAN DOLLAR: 1.3569 DOWN .0009 (CDN DOLLAR UP 9 BASIS PTS)

Last night Shanghai COMPOSITE CLOSED UP 12.00 PTS OR 0.40%

Hang Seng CLOSED UP 173.01 PTS OR 1.07%

AUSTRALIA CLOSED UP 0.49% // EUROPEAN BOURSE: ALL MIXED

Trading from Europe and ASIA

I) EUROPEAN BOURSES: ALL MIXED

2/ CHINESE BOURSES / :Hang SENG UP 173.01 PTS OR 1.07%

/SHANGHAI CLOSED UP 12.00 PTS OR 0.40%

AUSTRALIA BOURSE CLOSED UP 0.49%

(Nikkei (Japan) CLOSED UP 51.90 PTS OR 0.16%

INDIA’S SENSEX IN THE RED

Gold very early morning trading: 1988.20

silver:$22.96

USA dollar index early TUESDAY morning: 103.38 DOWN 36 BASIS POINTS FROM MONDAY’s CLOSE.

TUESDAY MORNING NUMBERS ENDS

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

And now your closing TUESDAY NUMBERS 11: 30 AM

Portuguese 10 year bond yield: 3.0005% DOWN 6 in basis point(s) yield

JAPANESE BOND YIELD: +0.721% DOWN 4 AND 0//100 BASIS POINTS /JAPAN losing control of its yield curve/

SPANISH 10 YR BOND YIELD: 3.234 DOWN 6 in basis points yield

ITALIAN 10 YR BOND YIELD 3.997 DOWN 6 points in basis points yield ./ THE ECB IS QE’ ING ITALIAN BONDS (BUYING ITALIAN BONDS/SELLING GERMAN BUNDS)

GERMAN 10 YR BOND YIELD: 2.2195 DOWN 5 BASIS PTS

END

IMPORTANT CURRENCY CLOSES FOR TUESDAY

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

Euro/USA 1.0782 UP 0.0016 or 16 basis points

USA/Japan: 144.61 DOWN 0.441 OR YEN UP 44 basis points/

Great Britain/USA 1.2556 UP 0.0003 OR 3 BASIS POINTS //

Canadian dollar DOWN .0022 OR 13 BASIS pts to 1.3599

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

The USA/Yuan, CNY: closed ON SHORE CLOSED (UP) …7.1766

THE USA/YUAN OFFSHORE: (YUAN CLOSED (UP)…. (7.1948)

TURKISH LIRA: 29.05 EXTREMELY DANGEROUS LEVEL/DEATH WATCH/HYPERINFLATION TO BEGIN.//ON DEATH WATCH

the 10 yr Japanese bond yield at +0.721…VERY DANGEROUS

Your closing 10 yr US bond yield DOWN 1 in basis points from FRIDAY at 4.228% //trading well ABOVE the resistance level of 2.27-2.32%) very problematic

USA 30 yr bond yield 4.327 DOWN 1 in basis points ON THE DAY/12.00 PM

USA 2 YR BOND YIELD: 4.727 DOWN 4 BASIS PTS.

Your 12:00 AM bourses for Europe and the Dow along with the USA dollar index closing and interest rates: TUESDAY: CLOSING TIME 12:00 PM

London: CLOSED DOWN 2.11 POINTS or 0.03%

German Dax : CLOSED DOWN 2.69 PTS OR 0.02%

Paris CAC CLOSED DOWN 7.98PTS OR 0.11%

Spain IBEX DOWN 79.30 PTS OR 0.78%

Italian MIB: CLOSED DOWN 84,43 PTS OR 0.28%

WTI Oil price 69.15 12: EST

Brent Oil: 73.61 12:00 EST

USA /RUSSIAN ROUBLE /// AT: 90.09; ROUBLE UP 0 AND 61//100

GERMAN 10 YR BOND YIELD; +2.2195 DOWN 5 BASIS PTS

UK 10 YR YIELD: 3.956 DOWN 12 BASIS PTS

CLOSING NUMBERS: 4 PM

Euro vs USA: 1.0797 UP 0.0033 OR 33 BASIS POINTS

British Pound: 1.2571 UP .0017 or 17 basis pts

BRITISH 10 YR GILT BOND YIELD: 4.021% DOWN 5 BASIS PTS//

JAPAN 10 YR YIELD: 0.716%

USA dollar vs Japanese Yen: 145.51 DOWN .546 //YEN UP 55 BASIS PTS//

USA dollar vs Canadian dollar: 1.3591 UP 0.0013 CDN dollar DOWN 13 basis pts)

West Texas intermediate oil: 68.76

Brent OIL: 73,41

USA 10 yr bond yield DOWN 3 BASIS pts to 4.207%

USA 30 yr bond yield DOWN 2 BASIS PTS to 4.305%

USA 2 YR BOND: UP 1 PTS AT 4.733 %

USA dollar index: 103.39 DOWN 31 BASIS POINTS

USA DOLLAR VS TURKISH LIRA: 29.02 (GETTING QUITE CLOSE TO BLOWING UP/

USA DOLLAR VS RUSSIA//// ROUBLE: 89.99 UP 0 AND 69/100 roubles

GOLD 1980.30 3:30 PM

SILVER: 22.77 3:30 PM

DOW JONES INDUSTRIAL AVERAGE: UP 173.01 .43% PTS OR 0.48%

NASDAQ UP 132.01 PTS OR 0.82%

VOLATILITY INDEX: 12.08 DOWN .55 PTS (4.35)%

GLD: $183.49 DOWN 0.10 OR 0.054%

SLV/ $20.84 DOWN .07 OR 0.33%

end

USA AFFAIRS

TODAY’S TRADING IN GRAPH FORM:

‘All Greed, No Fear’ Ahead Of Fed: VIX Hits 4-Year Low As Crude Carnage Continues

TUESDAY, DEC 12, 2023 – 04:00 PM

The market appears to be calling ‘Powell the Pusillanimous‘ bluff by rallying fearlessly (and selling vol unabashedly) into tomorrow’s FOMC (and Dot-Plots) meeting.

He wouldn’t dare stomp on the massive easing in financial conditions, right?

Source: Bloomberg

Or admit the economy is not doing so great?

Source: Bloomberg

Or admit that the ‘trend’ in CPI is disinflationary? (cough today’s SuperCore CPI bounced back above 4.00%)…

Source: Bloomberg

For now, the market remains of the opinion that every Fed member will be wrong about monetary policy next year – the question is: how many of those Fed ‘dots’ will sheep-like move to the market’s demands, or stay firm ‘higher for longer’ to stamp out inflation for good?

Source: Bloomberg

The disconnect between stocks and commodities in a weaker macro-environment is growing wider and wider as cyclical stocks (growthy) soar while cyclical commodities – Oil – plunge…

Source: Bloomberg

Who’s right? Or are they both right? Oil has priced in the recession and stocks have priced in the post-recession QE.

VIX was clubbed like a baby ‘fear’ seal back to an 11 handle…

…basically its lowest post-COVID close…

Source: Bloomberg

The vol-selling helped fuel more gains in stocks, led by Nasdaq. Everything accelerated higher after 1pmET. The last 30 mins of the day saw some profit-taking which dragged Small Caps into the red…

A solid 30Y auction appeared to trigger a massive buy program in stocks (at around 1pmET)…

Source: Bloomberg

After the massive short-squeeze on Dec 1st, the ‘most shorted’ stocks basket has chopped sideways unable to extend or reverse its trend (helped by the vol-crushing surge in long gamma)…

Source: Bloomberg

Treasuries were mixed today with the long-end outperforming (30Y -2bps, 2Y +2bps). This recoupled the wings (2Y and 30Y) as the belly is outperforming on the week…

Source: Bloomberg

The 30Y yield tested Friday’s lows, ramped almost 10bps on the CPI print and then faded back after the strong auction…

Source: Bloomberg

Despite a little hawkish pullback this week, the trend remains very dovish for next year (with 115bps of rate-cuts priced in)…

Source: Bloomberg

CPI sparked a kneejerk higher in the dollar (briefly into the green on the day) before fading back to red…

Source: Bloomberg

Bitcoin saw resistance at $42,000 once again and faded back today…

Source: Bloomberg

Spot Gold rallied intraday (but was unable to get back up to $2000) before fading back to $1980…

Source: Bloomberg

Oil prices puked again today, with WTI breaking below last week’s lows ($68 handle)…

That is basically the lowest level in the last two years and has historically been a significant support level…

Source: Bloomberg

Finally, as a reminder, the dramatic easing of financial conditions has erased all of The Fed’s rate-hike pressures since June 2022…

Source: Bloomberg

Is that really what The Fed wants?

MORNING TRADING//CPI REPORT

CPI hotter than expected at +.1% month/month but core CPI really hot rising to .3% m/m from .2% m/m

Core CPI Hotter Than Expected As Used-Car Price Rise Offsets Energy Drop

TUESDAY, DEC 12, 2023 – 08:38 AM

Having slowed to unch MoM in October, November’s headline CPI was also expected to be flat MoM, but it printed modestly hotter than expected +0.1% MoM, which dragged the YoY CPI change down to 3.1% (as expected) from 3.2% in October. That is still above June’s 3.1% YoY low print…

Source: Bloomberg

Core CPI accelerated modestly MoM (as expected), rising 0.3% (from +0.2%) with Core CPI YoY flat at 4.0% from October…

Source: Bloomberg

Most problematically for The Fed (and the ‘rate-cut-hypers’) is the fact that Core CPI Services Ex-Shelter (SuperCore) rose 0.5% MoM (hot) and 4.08% YoY (back above the Maginot Line of 4%)…

Source: Bloomberg

Under the hood, Energy declined considerably but Used Car prices rose…

3m and 6m annualized rates are down one-tenth and three-tenths respectively to 3.3% and 2.8%. This is the first time that the 6m measure has been below 3% for since March 2021

On the bright side, real average hourly earnings rose 0.5% YoY in November…

Source: Bloomberg

What happens next?

Goldilocks? Or does this mean Powell will have to push back harder against the exuberance in the market for rate-cuts?

end

TUCKER CARLSON

II USA DATA

SuperCore CPI Jumps Back Above 4.00%; Used-Cars & Shelter Dominate Price-Rises

TUESDAY, DEC 12, 2023 – 08:38 AM

Source: Bloomberg

Core CPI accelerated modestly MoM (as expected), rising 0.3% (from +0.2%) with Core CPI YoY flat at 4.0% from October…

Source: Bloomberg

Most problematically for The Fed (and the ‘rate-cut-hypers’) is the fact that Core CPI Services Ex-Shelter (SuperCore) rose 0.5% MoM (hot) and 4.08% YoY (back above the Maginot Line of 4%)…

Source: Bloomberg

Transportation Services led the unexpected resurgence…

Under the hood, Energy declined considerably but Used Car prices rose…

The shelter index was the largest factor in the monthly increase in the index for all items less food and energy.

The shelter index increased 0.4 percent in November, after rising 0.3 percent the previous month.

The index for rent rose 0.5 percent in November, as did the index for owners’ equivalent rent.

The lodging away from home index decreased 0.9 percent in November.

The slowdown in Shelter/Rent inflation is starting to accelerate…

Shelter inflation: 6.51%, down from 6.72% and lowest since August 2022
Rent inflation: 6.87% down from 7.18%, first sub 7% print since August 2022

But, real-time rent inflation is already far, far lower (suggesting CPI is set to tumble further next year)…

The used cars and trucks index rose 1.6 percent in November, ending a string of five consecutive monthly decreases in that index.

Among the other indexes that rose in November was the index for motor vehicle insurance, which increased 1.0 percent after rising 1.9 percent the preceding month.

The medical care index rose 0.6 percent in November, after rising 0.3 percent in October. The index for physicians’ services increased 0.6 percent over the month, and the index for prescription drugs rose 0.5 percent. The hospital services index rose 0.1 percent in November.

The index for apparel fell 1.3 percent in November, after rising 0.1 percent the previous month.

The index for household furnishings and operations declined 0.4 percent over the month, and the index for communication decreased 0.6 percent in November.

Other indexes which declined in November include recreation, airline fares, and new vehicles.

The shelter index increased 6.5 percent over the last year, accounting for nearly 70 percent of the total increase in the all items less food and energy index.

Other indexes with notable increases over the last year include motor vehicle insurance (+19.2 percent), recreation (+2.5 percent), personal care (+5.2 percent), and new vehicles (+1.3 percent).

3m and 6m annualized rates are down one-tenth and three-tenths respectively to 3.3% and 2.8%. This is the first time that the 6m measure has been below 3% for since March 2021.

The actual index of consumer prices hit a new record high this month – and is up 17.5% since President Biden’s term began (it was up 8% over President Trump’s full four year term)…

Source: Bloomberg

On the bright side, real average hourly earnings rose 0.5% YoY in November…

Source: Bloomberg

Finally, we bring your attention to a chart we posted one year ago, showing the correlation between M2 and CPI, when we predicted that CPI was about to collapse.

One year later we were right, and there is much, much more to go.

So, what happens next?

Goldilocks? Or does this mean Powell will have to push back harder against the exuberance in the market for rate-cuts?

END

III USA ECONOMIC COMMENTARIES

California Has A $68 Billion Budget Deficit With Only $30 Billion In Reserves

TUESDAY, DEC 12, 2023 – 01:40 PM

Authored by Mike Shedlock via MishTalk.com,

The boom-bust cycle in California is back to bust again. Governor Newsom faces some tough economic and political choices.

My, How Things Change

Jan 11, 2023: Cal Matters

As California’s state budget morphs from a $97.5 billion surplus to a multi-billion-dollar deficit, it’s another reminder about the volatility of the state’s revenue system.

Gov. Gavin Newsom’s penchant for braggadocio was in full flower eight months ago when he declared that California had a $97.5 billion budget surplus and boasted that “no other state in American history has ever experienced a surplus as large as this.”

A more subdued Newsom acknowledged that the projected surplus had morphed into a $22.5 billion shortfall. He proposed a $297 billion 2023-24 budget that throttles back some of the additional spending and indirectly borrows billions of dollars to close the gap.

Gotta love the borrowing to close the gap, idea. But why can’t we all borrow our way to to fiscal health?

December 7, 2023: Cal Matters

California’s Legislative Analyst’s Office projects a 2024-25 budget deficit twice as large as 2023-24. It says the state could dip into reserves and cut some one-time spending.

With tax revenues in a free fall comparable to the Great Recession and the dot-com bust, California faces a projected $68 billion budget deficit next year that will require spending cuts and reserve funds to close, state finance officials said today.

The new estimate from the nonpartisan Legislative Analyst’s Office, released as Gov. Gavin Newsom finalizes his January budget proposal, reflects a substantially delayed tax-filing period this fall where collections came in far below what lawmakers expected when they adopted a spending plan over the summer.

Legislative analyst Gabriel Petek cautioned that California is better prepared to respond to the situation than during the economic recession 15 years ago, because it has since built several multibillion-dollar rainy-day funds, though the state is also looking at a structural deficit of about $30 billion annually going forward.

“I go with the word ‘serious.’ A serious budget problem,” Petek said during a briefing with journalists. “I would stop short of calling it a crisis.”

California’s Tax Revenue Falls

Politico reports California’s Budget Deficit Swells to Record $68B as Tax Revenue Falls

The latest deficit figure — calculated by the nonpartisan Legislative Analyst’s Office and released Thursday — far exceeds the $14.3 billion estimate from June. The shortfall, which is the highest in dollar terms but not as a percentage of overall spending, threatens to upend the upcoming legislative year by forcing Gov. Gavin Newsom and lawmakers to make spending cuts on a scale few term-limited elected officials in Sacramento have faced.

“The state remains in a good cash position, and that really wasn’t the case back at the start of the Great Recession,” Legislative Analyst Gabriel Petek told reporters. “We don’t face the same kind of liquidity challenges that we had at that time, and so I would stop short of describing it as a crisis.”

Newsom’s Department of Finance earlier this year warned California would continue to face a revenue downturn due to stock market declines, interest rate hikes and inflation.

A smaller deficit last year forced the governor to make the largest cuts of his tenure after years of massive surpluses. The state avoided deeper reductions by delaying spending and shifting money between the state’s general and special funds.

Did Democrats think near-zero interest rates would last forever, asks the Wall Street Journal. Do they think at all is a better question in my estimation.

The Legislative Analyst blames California’s plunging revenue on the Federal Reserve’s interest-rate increases, which it says have resulted in 80% fewer companies going public in 2022 and 2023 compared with 2021. “Home sales are down by about half, largely because the monthly mortgage to purchase a typical California home has gone from $3,500 to $5,400,” the analyst adds. Tech layoffs have also contributed to lower tax payroll withholding this year.

The real culprit for California’s budget shortfall, as ever, is its progressive tax system and how the politicians exploit it. The top 1% of taxpayers in California pay 50% of state income tax, and the top 0.1% pay a third. During the fat years, the state’s 13.3% top income-tax rate throws off enormous revenue that Sacramento proceeds to spend with new commitments that can’t easily be withdrawn when the lean years arrive.

Democrats don’t prepare for droughts because they assume they can always raise taxes on the wealthy when revenues dry up. That will be harder this time because so many of the wealthy have left the state.

Not a Crisis Yet

Don’t worry, it’s not a crisis yet. But it soon will be.

How long will $30 billion in reserves and budget shenanigans last when the deficit is $68 billion?

How long will the top 1 percent be willing to put up with paying 50 percent of the state income tax?

Newsom says the cutbacks will be “temporary”. Tax hikes are not temporary. Expect more of them.

By the way, Florida has a budget surplus, no state income tax, and it does not have huge smash and grab looting problem or a mass of businesses fleeing the state.

Meanwhile, at the Federal level the picture is even more dire.

When Does US Federal Debt Reach an Unsustainable Level?

An interesting article by Penn Wharton, University of Pennsylvania, says the limit of debt as a percentage of GDP is about 200 percent, When does that happen?

For discussion, please see When Does US Federal Debt Reach an Unsustainable Level?

end

IIIB USA COMMENTARIES RE ISRAEL/HAMAS WAR/ and PERVASIVE ANTISEMITISM

Bad move on the part of Harvard…

Harvard Refuses To Fire Gay, Instead Issues Statement In Her Defense

TUESDAY, DEC 12, 2023 – 09:30 AM

Harvard minority president Claudine Gay., who checks box in the “Diversity checklist”, will keep her job after a week of calls for her ouster, after 700 faculty members signed a petition urging the school’s leadership to overlook her answers last week to Congress regarding antisemitism on campus, as well as allegations that she’s a prolific plagiarist.

“As members of the Harvard Corporation, we today reaffirm our support for President Gay’s continued leadership of Harvard University,” reads a statement from Harvard’s board signed by all members except for Gay. “Our extensive deliberations affirm our confidence that President Gay is the right leader to help our community heal and to address the very serious societal issues we are facing.”

During Tuesday testimony in front of the US House Education and the Workforce Committee, Rep. Elise Stefanik (R-NY), a Harvard grad, asked the presidents of Harvard, Penn, and MIT whether “calling for the genocide of Jews” violates their schools’ code of conduct or constitutes bullying or harassment, referring to calls for “intifada” chanted during several school protests.

Gay, along with the other presidents of said woke colleges, refused to commit to an answer – instead saying that it ‘depends on the context.’

Stefanik responded in a Tuesday post to X, sayig “There have been absolutely no updates to @Harvard’s code of conduct to condemn the calls for genocide of Jews and protect Jewish students on campus,” adding “The only update to Harvard’s code of conduct is to allow plagiarists as president.”

The board also said it had reviewed allegations of plagiarism by Gay in October, and that an independent review “revealed a few instances of inadequate citation.”

On Sunday, journalists Chris Rufo and Chris Brunet posted evidence on X, including portions of Gay’s Ph.D. thesis.

In response, billionaire investor Bill Ackman penned a scathing open letter to Harvard’s governing board of directors, where he reiterated his call for Claudine Gay to be removed.

“In her short tenure as President, Claudine Gay has done more damage to the reputation of Harvard University than any individual in our nearly 500-year history,” the Harvard alumnus wrote on X, adding that Gay had “catalyzed an explosion of antisemitism and hate on campus that is unprecedented in Harvard’s history.”

Besides focusing on Gay’s handling of on-campus antisemitism, Ackman’s letter also accused her of presiding over “discriminatory hiring practices at Harvard.”

“The faculty have been told in no uncertain terms that candidates that do not meet DEI criteria will not be considered for certain faculty positions,” he wrote.

Gay apologized for her statements last week during the House Education and the Workforce Committee hearing, which however did not help her equal at UPenn, Liz Magill, who resigned over the weekend for exactly the same comments. Perhaps Magill wasn’t black enough, or didn’t have sufficiently diverse glasses?

As an aside, according to Bill Ackman – who tends to see everything in a self-reflexive light – he was a factor in Harvard’s decision.

FREIGHT ISSUES/USA

END

VICTOR DAVIS HANSON

end

USA// COVID//VACCINE/

end

SWAMP STORIES

“Lightning Fast” Supreme Court Agrees To Expedite Decision On Whether To Hear Trump 2020 Election Case

MONDAY, DEC 11, 2023 – 01:22 PM

Update (2000ET): That didn’t take long…

After petitioning the US Supreme Court to weigh in on former President Trump’s federal 2020 election case – specifically Trump’s presidential immunity defense, Special Counsel Jack Smith had his answer by end-of-day, after the Supreme Court granted his request to “expedite consideration of the petition.”

Attorney Steve Vladeck called the response “lightning-fast by the Supreme Court’s standards.”

Vladeck further clarified that “this is *not* the Court agreeing to take up the case now. It is just the Court agreeing to move *very* quickly in deciding *whether* to take up the case at this juncture (i.e., before the court of appeals).”

The Court gave Trump’s team until Dec. 20th to respond.

* * *

Special Counsel Jack Smith has asked the Supreme Court to immediately weigh in on former President Trump’s federal 2020 election case.

In a Monday filing, Smith asked the justices to weigh in on Trump’s immunity defense, by which Trump has cited presidential immunity to try and have the case tossed. The former president is accused of entering multiple criminal conspiracies to change the results of the 2020 US election.

The move comes after Trump appealed an appeals court judge’s rejection of that argument.

As The Reactionary notes;

The setting of Trump’s DC trial for the spring of 2024 – conveniently scheduled one day before the Super Tuesday primaries – was undoubtedly the result of a shared interest between the Special Counsel and the presiding judge, Tanya Chutkan: to convict Donald Trump before the 2024 election. Moreover, given the 11+ million pages of documents involved in this case, the hundreds (if not thousands) of hours of video and audio, and the hundreds of witnesses, the accelerated trial date was a violation of Trump’s Sixth Amendment right to effective assistance of counsel, which includes the opportunity to prepare for trial.

The Special Counsel’s DC case against Trump comprises novel legal theories that have never been tried in American courts, most notably whether Presidential challenges to an election can be criminalized under the United States code. The attorneys for Trump have filed lengthy and well thought-out motions, reasoning that the Constitution and the doctrine of presidential immunity required dismissal of this criminal case. Judge Chutkan denied each one in her desire for a quick trial.

In the Monday filing, Smith cited Trump’s fast-approaching March 4 trial date.

“It is of imperative public importance that respondent’s claims of immunity be resolved by this Court and that respondent’s trial proceed as promptly as possible if his claim of immunity is rejected,” reads the filing.

Smith has also requested that the Supreme Court expedite its decision on whether it will take up the issue, period. If they do, he wants them to prioritize it over all other cases.

“This case presents a fundamental question at the heart of our democracy: whether a former President is absolutely immune from federal prosecution for crimes committed while in office or is constitutionally protected from federal prosecution when he has been impeached but not convicted before the criminal proceedings begin,” reads the filing.

In his Supreme Court brief, Mr. Smith conceded that the trial would most likely have to be paused because of the appeal of the immunity issue. That position reversed the one his prosecutors took over the weekend in court papers, in which they argued that Judge Chutkan should not have to stay the case pending appeal.

Winning the appeal of the immunity decision was only one of Mr. Trump’s goals in challenging the decision. All along, he and his lawyers have had an alterative strategy: to delay the election interference trial for as long as possible. –NY Times

The filing comes after Judge Tanya S. Chutkan – who worked at the law firm which repped Fusion GPS, the company that helped orchestrate the Russia collusion hoax – rejected Trump’s sweeping claims of “absolute immunity” from an election interference indictment because it was based on actions taken while in office.

In her ruling, Chukan condemned attempts to “usurp the reins of government,” and said that nothing in the Constitution or US history supports the notion that a former president is immune.

As the Times further suggests, “If the trial were to be put off until after the 2024 election and Mr. Trump were to win, he could have his attorney general simply dismiss the charges. Holding a trial after the presidential race would also mean that voters would never hear any of the evidence that prosecutors have collected about Mr. Trump’s expansive efforts to reverse the results of the last election before weighing in on whether to re-elect him.”

end

Why not hire the crook Hillary Clinton into the Biden re-election effort

(zerohedge)

Dems Enlist Russia-Hoaxer Hillary Clinton Into Biden Re-Election Effort

TUESDAY, DEC 12, 2023 – 10:10 AM

2016 election denier Hillary Clinton, who was fined by the FEC for lying about funding the Russian “dossier” which underpinned the Trump-Russia collusion hoax, and who destroyed evidence with bleachbit and hammers, ran an illegal server out of her house which contained highly classified documents, has reportedly been enlisted by Democrats to help President Biden with his 2024 campaign.

According to NBC News, the former Secretary of State raised close to $1 million last month at a fundraiser held at her Georgetown home, and her role in Biden’s re-election campaign is expected to grow.

Two weeks before that, Clinton published an op-ed in The Atlantic which pushed for Biden’s approach to the Israel-Hamas war despite progressive Democrats calling for a ceasefire. Two weeks before that, Clinton brushed off a protester asking her to make a statement about President Biden’s “warmongering” Oval Office speech in which he called for $100 billion of funding for Israel, Ukraine, among other things.

In those moments, in an interview on “The View” and in social media posts, the 2016 Democratic presidential nominee is stepping into a role as one of the most prominent and influential surrogates in Biden’s re-election effort. As a former secretary of state, she has the bona fides to provide Biden with a measure of political cover amid a war in the Middle East that has split the Democratic Party.

Clinton is popular with women and key parts of the Democratic base and remains a fundraising draw who can help ensure Biden has the money to get his message out. There is still a two-for-the-price-of-one theme when it comes to her family: Husband Bill Clinton made a cameo at the fundraising event at their Washington home. -NBC News

“I think Joe Biden’s going to need more than a[n] ‘I’m with her T-shirt’ with all of his political problems,” said Fox News commentator Charlie Hurt on “The Big Weekend Show.”

“But, you know you are in deep, deep trouble if you are picking up the bat phone and calling Hillary Clinton to come help you out,” Hurt continued, adding “And I think it was sort of interesting that their thinking is that he needs help among women voters. If you need help among women voters, and you’re a Democrat, and you’re running against Donald Trump, you should just quit because it’s over.“

end

Rumble Hit With “Unprecedented” Cyber Attack After Posting J6 Security Cam Footage

TUESDAY, DEC 12, 2023 – 10:30 AM

Authored by Paul Joseph Watson via Modernity.news,

Free speech video hosting platform Rumble was hit with an “unprecedented” cyber attack shortly after new security camera footage from January 6 was posted on the platform.

Last week it was revealed that the GOP-controlled Committee on House Administration’s Subcommittee on Oversight had created a new Rumble channel to post hours of security footage from Capitol Police taken on January 6, 2021.

“The first few videos were posted to the Rumble channel on Dec. 5. By the next day, the collection grew to 135 clips—each about 10 minutes long. The channel had nearly 700 followers on Dec. 7,” reported the Epoch Times.

Apparently, that upset some people.

Shortly after, Rumble was hit by a massive and seemingly organized attack that left people unable to upload or watch content.

“I can confirm that this attack has been unprecedented and has been happening since this weekend,” Rumble CEO Chris Pavlovski posted on X.

“I also suspect it is political, coming from activists and/or organizations who want to censor our creators, and related to J6 videos being posted on Rumble,” he added.

Rumble was only able to completely restore services last night.

“A major thank you to our cyber security partners and our entire team. This was a massive learning experience that will only make us stronger,” said the company.

“A big thank you to all users and creators who have been incredibly patient with us during this time.”

Censorship takes another L.

* * *

Your support is crucial in helping us defeat mass censorship. Please consider donating via Locals or check out our unique merch.

END

CRAZY!!!

Jack Smith Reveals Plans To Use Trump’s Cellphone Data In Federal Election Trial

TUESDAY, DEC 12, 2023 – 11:45 AM

Authored by Caden Pearson via The Epoch Times,

Special counsel Jack Smith has revealed plans that he may present data analysts to comment on then-President Donald Trump’s White House cellphone and Twitter data in a forthcoming Washington, D.C., trial in the federal election case.

In a court filing on Monday, Mr. Smith outlined the government’s intention to call up to three expert witnesses to testify in the case, in which President Trump is charged with four counts related to his post-election efforts to challenge the process and results of the 2020 election.

The filing provides a glimpse into how prosecutors plan to use the mountains of data obtained under warrant from X, then Twitter, about President Trump’s account, including location data.

“The government has provided its Notice of Expert Witnesses to the defendant,” reads the filing submitted to the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, which outlines each expert’s area of expertise and expected testimony.

The experts will use the data to paint a picture of how President Trump used his phones, including use of the Twitter app, “throughout the post-election period” and on Jan. 6, 2021, after the president’s speech to his supporters at the Ellipse before the breach of the U.S. Capitol, according to the filing.

The experts, referred to as Expert 1, Expert 2, and Expert 3, are anticipated to “aid the jury” in understanding the data, and how it has been visually presented on a map after being extracted from the White House phones of President Trump and another unidentified individual close to him.

The data is expected to be key in “understanding the movements of individuals toward the Capitol area during and after the defendant’s speech at the Ellipse.”

However, the move could be found to fall short of directly implicating President Trump, whose phones were routinely managed by others, including his social media manager, Deputy Chief of Staff Dan Scavino.

In February, a federal judge ordered Twitter to hand over a large volume of President Trump’s account data to Mr. Smith, according to documents unsealed in August. The data included deleted direct messages, other direct messages, draft posts, and information on the locations of users who posted to the account.

Lawyers for Twitter, who tried and failed to resist the court order, described some of the data as “confidential communications” between President Trump and his senior advisers.

The Witnesses

The first witness, described as an expert in the “interpretation and visual representation of geographic location data,” is expected to provide their analysis about the use of ArcGIS (Geographic Information Systems) software to plot on a Google map the movements of Trump supporters from the Ellipse “to an area encompassing the United States Capitol building.”

The second witness is anticipated to describe to jurors the process of determining device location history data collected by Google and provide insights into President Trump’s location data collected under a search warrant and graphically presented by Expert 1.

The third witness, an expert in the analysis of cell phone data, including the use of Twitter and other phone apps, is expected to testify to extracting and processing data from the White House phones of President Trump and another individual (referred to as Individual 1).

This expert’s review also included “analyzing images found on the phones and websites visited,” as well as determining data on the phones’ usage after the 2020 election, and “on and around” Jan. 6, 2021.

Their review also “specifically identified the periods of time during which the defendant’s phone was unlocked and the Twitter application was open on January 6.”

President Trump has filed four motions to dismiss the case. U.S. District Judge Tanya Chutkan rejected several motions, and the defense has since appealed the motion to dismiss based on presidential immunity to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit.

On Dec. 11, Mr. Smith attempted to bypass the district court, asking the U.S. Supreme Court for an expedited ruling. The Supreme Court responded hours later in an order saying that it would consider reviewing the case, giving the defense until Dec. 20 to respond. The case may be sent back to the district court if President Trump’s legal team doesn’t agree on an expedited ruling.

The prosecutors, preempting President Trump’s appeals defense, are asking the Supreme Court “whether a former President is absolutely immune from federal prosecution for crimes committed while in office or is constitutionally protected from federal prosecution when he has been impeached but not convicted before the criminal proceedings begin.”

President Trump had asked the district court to pause proceedings pending an appeal. The trial schedule would be thrown off if the motion is granted.

The trial is currently scheduled to commence on March 4, the day before the Super Tuesday primary elections.

END

THE KING REPORT

The King Report for December 12, 2023 Issue 7137

Independent View of the News

@lisaabramowicz1: The US Treasury is selling $108 billion of 3-year, 10-year and 30-year bonds on Monday and Tuesday, along with $213 billion of shorter-term bills. This year’s Treasury sales are poised to surpass the record set in 2020.  https://twitter.com/lisaabramowicz1/status/1734037398936309926

$50B US 3-year note auction results: 4.490% vs. 4.473% WI (Results appeared at 11:32 ET)
$37B US 10-year note auction results: 4.296% vs. 4.228% WI (Results appeared at 13:01 ET)

USHs declined into both auctions. After the disappointing results of the 10-year auction were released at 13:01 ET, USHs sank to the daily low of 118 9/32 (-23/32). Within one minute, someone, probably dealers and traders that were long from the auctions, juiced USHs to a daily high of 119 5/32 at 14:32 ET.

ESHs (The pit committee finally made March the front month) traded higher during early Nikkei trading on the usual Sunday night buying. However, ESHs commenced a decline at 19:24 ET that ended at 3:51 ET. ESHs bounced from 4653.75 to 4661.75 at 4:23 ET. Another selling spree pushed ESHs to a daily low of 4652.00 at 6:22 ET. After a modest bounce, ESHs then vacillated in a 6-handle range until then broke lower at 9:17 ET.

Traders poured into ESHs and stocks at the 9:30 ET NYSE opening. ESHs hit a daily high of 4669.50 at 10:55 ET. Apparently Old World traders then decided to liquidate for the 11:30 ET European close. ESHs sank to 4656.75 at 11:33 ET. With European traders out of the way, US traders poured back into ESHs, undeterred by the ugly US 3-year note auction.

ESHs hit a new daily high of 4676.25 at 14:13 ET, abetted by the blatant manipulation of USHs. ESHs and stocks then rolled over until the last-hour rally began at 15:02 ET. The rally was labored; but ESHs hit the daily high of 4679.50 at 15:58 ET. ESHS retreated 4 handles into the close.

Positive aspects of previous session
Stocks rallied on the usual Monday and Fed Week buying – and the blatant USH manipulation

Negative aspects of previous session
Fangs were relatively soft all session
Stocks are bubbling up; the DJIA is 547.72 (1.5%) from its all-time high

Ambiguous aspects of previous session
When will US Treasury issuance break the market’s back?

First Hour/Last Hour Action [S&P 500 Index]: 1st Hour from NYSE Open: Up; Last Hour: Up

Pivot Point for S&P 500 Index [above/below indicates daily trend to traders]: 4613.18
Previous session S&P 500 Index High/Low: 4623.71; 4593.39

Hamas Says No Hostage Will Leave Alive Unless Demands Met
“Neither the fascist enemy and its arrogant leadership… nor its supporters… can take their prisoners alive without an exchange and negotiation and meeting the demands of the resistance,” Abu Obeida, spokesman for Hamas’s armed wing, said in a televised broadcast, referring to the release of Palestinian prisoners held by Israel… https://www.barrons.com/news/hamas-says-no-hostage-will-leave-alive-unless-group-s-demands-met-d56e7495

@DavidSaranga: Steven Spielberg has begun collecting video testimonies of the atrocities committed by Hamas terrorists against Israelis on October 7, to add to his USC Shoah Foundation’s collection of Holocaust survivor and witness testimony.
    “I never imagined I would see such unspeakable barbarity against Jews in my lifetime,” Spielberg was quoted as saying by the foundation, which holds the world’s largest video collection of Holocaust survivor and witness testimony.  https://twitter.com/DavidSaranga/status/1734078678957527514

@TuckerCarlson: Ep. 47  Gonzalo Lira is an American citizen who’s been tortured in a Ukrainian prison since July, for the crime of criticizing Zelensky. Biden officials approve of this, because they’d like to apply the same standard here. The media agree. Here’s a statement from Gonzalo Lira’s father: https://t.co/4H2otHhYHi

WaPo: China’s cyber army is invading critical U.S. services
    Hackers affiliated with China’s People’s Liberation Army have burrowed into the computer systems of about two dozen critical entities over the past year, these experts said.  The intrusions are part of a broader effort to develop ways to sow panic and chaos or snarl logistics in the event of a U.S.-China conflict in the Pacific, they said…
    “You’re trying to build tunnels into your enemies’ infrastructure that you can later use to attack. Until then you lie in wait, carry out reconnaissance, figure out if you can move into industrial control systems or more critical companies or targets upstream. And one day, if you get the order from on high, you switch from reconnaissance to attack.”…
    The topic of Chinese cyber intrusions into critical infrastructure was on a proposed list of talking points to raise in Biden’s encounter with Xi, according to people familiar with the matter, but it did not come up in the four-hour meeting.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2023/12/11/china-hacking-hawaii-pacific-taiwan-conflict/

Hasbro Cutting Nearly 20% of Workforce, or 1,100 Jobs, as Weak Sales Trends Persist, Memo Says – WSJ (Holiday sales must not be going well.)

Today – November CPI should impact early trading; 0.0% m/m is expected. Barring an unexpectedly bad CPI report, traders will be aggressive buyers. Stocks usually rally into the FOMC Communique release. Ergo, traders will buy dips and remain gaga for stocks until the FOMC Communique or Powell at his presser punctures the germinating equity bubble.

Expected economic data: Nov CPI 0.0% m/m & 3.1% y/y; Nov NFIB Small Business Optimism 90.7; Nov Budget Statement -$301.1B; Two-day FOMC Meeting begins

ESHs are +1.25; USHs are +2/32; and Feb AU is +7.10 at 20:05 ET.

S&P 500 Index 50-day MA: 4394; 100-day MA: 4423; 150-day MA: 4389; 200-day MA: 4303
DJIA 50-day MA: 34,304; 100-day MA: 34,518; 150-day MA: 34,285; 200-day MA: 33,990
(Green is positive slope; Red is negative slope)

S&P 500 Index – Trender trading model and MACD for key time frames
Monthly: Trender and MACD are positive – a close below 3919.56 triggers a sell signal
Weekly: Trender and MACD are positive – a close below 4315.44 triggers a sell signal
Daily: Trender is positive. MACD is negative – a close below 4538.04 triggers a sell signal
Hourly: Trender and MACD are positive – a close below 4591.42 triggers a sell signal

‘Deep, deep trouble’: Dems reportedly bringing in Hillary Clinton to help with Biden’s re-election https://t.co/HdLN86oYuf

@RonDeSantis: Trump denigrates military service by claiming it is “braver” that he debated Hillary Clinton than what soldiers endure on the battlefield.  Debating isn’t “brave”; it’s the bare minimum any candidate should do. Hiding from debates, on the other hand, is an example of cowardice.
https://twitter.com/RonDeSantis/status/1733959871114948980

@emeriticus: Trump’s threatening Ted Cruz and Josh Hawley because neither has endorsed him for 2024 yet. He is saying he will help Democrats beat them or not lift a finger for them unless they endorse.
The Republicans I respect most now are the ones who refuse to bend the knee to Trump. https://t.co/awwfqt23fD

@RNCResearch: Democrat Senator Chris Murphy bizarrely claims Republicans’ demand to secure the southern border is “one of the most dangerous moments that I’ve ever faced in American politics.” https://t.co/jeGrlhNujz

Al Gore Warns: People Having Access to Non-Mainstream Information “Threatens Democracy”
Al Gore says that people having access to information outside of mainstream media sources is a threat to “democracy” and that social media algorithms “ought to be banned.”…
https://www.zerohedge.com/political/al-gore-warns-people-having-access-non-mainstream-information-threatens-democracy

SNL is excoriated for its ‘tone-deaf’ and ‘shoddy’ takedown of House anti-Semitism hearings… as it’s revealed ex-star PULLED OUT of controversial sketch despite rehearsing https://t.co/QC06lA7q0r

Is Claudine Gay a Plagiarist? – The embattled Harvard president’s dissertation raises troubling questions… First, Gay lifts an entire paragraph nearly verbatim from Lawrence Bobo and Franklin Gilliam’s paper, “Race, Sociopolitical Participation, and Black Empowerment,” while passing it off as her own paraphrase and language….
    Though Gay does provide a reference to the original authors, she uses their verbatim language, with a few trivial synonym substitutions, without providing quotation marks. This constitutes a clear violation of Harvard’s policy, which states: “When you paraphrase, your task is to distill the source’s ideas in your own words. It’s not enough to change a few words here and there and leave the rest; instead, you must completely restate the ideas in the passage in your own words. If your own language is too close to the original, then you are plagiarizing, even if you do provide a citation.”…
https://christopherrufo.com/p/is-claudine-gay-a-plagiarist

GREG HUNTER

as a heads up, I will not be doing a commentary on Friday

However I will provide the preliminary oi numbers late on Thursday night.

SEE YOU ON WEDNESDAY

Shanghai Gold Benchmark Price

GOLD: NUMBER OF NOTICES FILED FOR DEC/2023. CONTRACT: 73 NOTICES FOR 7300 OZ or 0.3395 TONNES

total notices so far: 12,619 contracts for 1,261900 oz (39.250 tonnes)

FOR DEC:

SILVER NOTICES 123 NOTICE(S) FILED FOR 615,000 OZ/

total number of notices filed so far this month : 2668 for 13,340,000 oz

Willem Middelkoop: Central banks and the revival of gold

David Lin interviews Rosa Abrantes-Metz on gold market manipulation

Futures Rise Ahead Of Last Inflation Report Of 2023

European bourses dip in the red, US Futures firmer, DXY weaker & JPY bid; US CPI due – Newsquawk US Market Open

EUROPEAN TRADE

EQUITIES

FX

FIXED INCOME

COMMODITIES

GEOPOLITICS

CRYPTO

APAC TRADE

Donald Tusk Returns As Polish PM, Vows To “Chase Away The Evil” Of Years Of Right-Populist Rule

Gallant: Hamas battalions once ‘considered invincible’ now ‘on verge of collapse’

IDF says 500 terror suspects held in past month, some took part in Oct. 7 slaughter; Kerem Shalom crossing to open to ease aid flow as clips show apparent theft, looting of goods

Humanitarian aid in Gaza

Health min. panel declares Israeli hostages in Gaza deceased, aiding families in legal limbo

The deaths of several Israeli captives have been declared in absentia without any physical evidence.

Israel security chief in letter to the world: ‘Do not interfere’

The letter of the head of the Shin Bet to the UN Secretary-General reflects the frustration among decision-makers in Israel, from the international indifference to what happened on October 7.

UN did not answer his requests

Qatar, Israel held secret meetings in Europe – Saudi report

A senior diplomatic source revealed that the deal is expected to include children, women, and men, including three senior IDF officers who were captured by Hamas.

Negotiations in Europe with Qatar

Houthi attacks direct threat to Israel’s maritime trade – Ashdod port

Four terrorists killed in Jenin IDF overnight operation

One other person was injured in the attack on Al-Sibat neighborhood in the city of Jenin, WAFA reported.

IDF retrieves bodies of two Israelis taken hostage by Hamas// Two soldiers killed while trying to retrieve the bodies.

Master-Sgt. (res.) Gal Meir Eisenkot and Master-Sgt. (res.) Eyal Meir Berkovich fell during the operation to retrieve the bodies.

Two soldiers fell in attempt to retrieve hostage bodies

IDF retrieves bodies of 2 hostages from Gaza: Eden Zacharia and IDF soldier Ziv Dado

Biden In Sudden About-Face: Israel ‘Losing Support’ Due To ‘Indiscriminate Bombing’

IDF begins pumping seawater into Hamas tunnels in Gaza -WSJ

In 2015, Egypt flooded tunnels between the Gaza Strip and the Sinai Peninsula with seawater.

Unclear how well the flooding method will work

British Royal Navy confirms attack in the Red Sea, explosions reported inland

These reports come as attacks on shipping in the Red Sea have ramped up, with attacks reported on a near-weekly basis.

Explosions heard inland

Houthi Rebels Hit Norwegian-Flagged Tanker With Anti-Ship Cruise Missile At Key Maritime Chokepoint

Norwegian-owned vessel hit with missile off Yemen coast as threats from Houthis grow

Hamas & Hezbollah “Easily” Obtain Weapons Through Ukraine’s Black Market, Iran FM Boasts

Delivering Results on the Ground

Why Hamas operatives are surrendering to the IDF and what this means for the war effort.

Light in the Darkness

The United States will send a general to Ukraine to control the Armed Forces of Ukraine

GLOBAL VACCINE/COVID ISSUES

Many, a vast sum of high-risk, vulnerable persons died with COVID due to bacterial infection pneumonia secondary to viral infection, we knew this even from SPANISH FLU; McCullough awakens the sleeping

giant as cause of massive deaths & why? Because corrupted inept IMO malfeasant CRIMINAL medical doctors refused to treat with antibiotics; reason antibiotics were core to EARLY TREATMENT, Platt et al.

‘Bacterial and fungal pulmonary co-infection are under-recognized complications in critically ill patients with COVID-19.’

How bad are the mRNA technology gene based vaccines? (Malone, Weissman, Bourla, Bancel, Sahin, Karikó et al. inventors & makers); well, REAL BAD! mRNA in nature (our cells) is NOT like mRNA in vaccine

that is key & Weissman lied in Jan 2021 saying mRNA in cells same as in mRNA vaccine, he lied! mRNA? at what costs to humanity? Is methylpseudouridine base change causing 24/7 cell spike production?

Robert (Bobby) Kennedy Jr., I have always said openly I like him to be Trump’s VP (and if you get heart burn) for sure heading HHS, he is a smart, intellectual, passionate, loves America liberal, I

can support a Bobby Jr. liberal, I appreciate his stance on vaccines & COVID & enough to get my nod; as how he hits Fauci, if Malone was not all over JR’s book, he would QUESTION him for mRNA deaths??

MICHAEL EVERY/PHIL MAREY/OR OTHER EXECS //RABOBANK

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Oil and Water

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My, How Things Change

California’s Tax Revenue Falls

Not a Crisis Yet

When Does US Federal Debt Reach an Unsustainable Level?

Harvard Refuses To Fire Gay, Instead Issues Statement In Her Defense

“Lightning Fast” Supreme Court Agrees To Expedite Decision On Whether To Hear Trump 2020 Election Case

Dems Enlist Russia-Hoaxer Hillary Clinton Into Biden Re-Election Effort

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Jack Smith Reveals Plans To Use Trump’s Cellphone Data In Federal Election Trial

The Witnesses

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