Social Security Payment Adjustment Predicted To Be 2.8 Percent In 2027, Group Says Authored by Jack Phillips via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours), A seniors group said it is forecasting the cost-of-living adjustment for next year’s Social Security payments to remain steady at 2.8 percent as U.S. officials released the latest consumer inflation data on Wednesday. Blank Social Security checks are run through a printer at the U.S. […]

Solid 30Y Auction Stops Through Despite Drop In Foreign Demand After two mixed coupon auctions this week, including a subpar 3Y and a strong 10Y, moments ago the Treasury concluded the week’s coupon issuance when it sold $22BN in 30Y bonds in another solid auction.  The paper priced at a high yield of 4.871%, above the 4.750% in February and the highest since last July’s 4.889%. It also stopped through the When Issued 4.878% by […]

Bitcoin Has A Golden Opportunity With AI Agents, It’s Time To Build Authored by Matt Carallo via BitcoinMagazine.com, For all of bitcoin’s life, it has been fighting an uphill battle against fiat currencies that mostly do the job of being money. Obviously, fiat has plenty of issues, but when it comes to impacts immediately visible to everyday people in much of the world, bitcoin isn’t 10x better. Some may even conclude that […]

Why Constant Talk Of TACO Is Likely Wrong, With Both Sides Escalating By Michael Every of Rabobank The only way out of this crisis is through We warned 2026 would tell 2025, which revolved around tariffs, ‘Hold my beer’: yesterday, the US launched two new Section 301 trade investigations, and it hardly registered in the headlines even if it could lead to higher, court-immune US tariffs this summer vs China, the EU, India, […]

Foreign Hacker Cracked Into FBI’s Epstein Files In 2023, Was ‘Disgusted’ At Child Sexual Abuse A foreign hacker broke into a server at the FBI’s New York Field Office and ‘compromised files relating to the FBI’s investigation of the late sex offender Jeffrey Epstein’ in 2023, Reuters reports.  U.S. Attorney Geoffrey Berman announces charges against Jeffery Epstein in 2019. Photo: Stephanie Keith/Getty Images According to the […]

Deutsche Bank Dumps After Flagging $30 Billion Exposure To Private Credit Yet another canary in the ever growing coalmine that is private credit appeared this morning as Deustche Bank’s annual report flagged a significant €26 billion ($30 billion) exposure to private credit, an asset class that’s grappling with fund redemptions, scrutiny of underwriting standards and the impact of AI on some borrowers such as software makers. […]

In From The Cold Already: Putin Envoy Met With US Team On Energy Markets Crisis With the globe’s attention focused on the now almost two week long ongoing Iran war, Moscow is busy in the sidelines making strides to improve bilateral relations with the United States, while demonstrating how vital Russia is to global energy markets. Kirill Dmitriev, Putin’s directly appointed special envoy, held a meeting in the US “with the heads of […]

Trump Set To Suspend Jones Act To Help Tame Oil Prices One day after the Trump administration flip-flopped on using the Strategic Petroleum Reserve (SPR) – eventually deciding to release 172 million barrels to try and counter the rising price of oil, they’re now planning to issue temporary waivers for a century-old maritime law, the Jones Act, that requires American-built ships to be used to transport goods between US ports, in […]

Nearly 20% Of House Hunters Looking To Relocate: Report Authored by Naveen Athrappully via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours), In the fourth quarter of 2025, 18.8 percent of house hunters across the United States were looking to relocate to a different part of the country. A house for sale in Washington on May 19, 2025. Madalina Vasiliu/The Epoch Times This was up from 17.9 percent a year back and 15.9 percent five years ago during […]

“The Situation Is Dire”: Half Of Available Global LNG Tankers Are Trapped In The Persian Gulf There are thousands of ships in the global oil tanker fleet, by some estimates nearly as many as 9000 (and that excludes sanctions vessels). Just a fraction of these are either waiting to enter the blockaded straits of hormuz, or to leave it.  By contrast, the global LNG fleet is a tiny fraction, and now most of it is stuck inside the […]

“Please, Please, Please”: Denmark’s Energy Minister Begs Citizens To Stop Driving As Global Energy Shock Spreads Iran launched another round of overnight strikes on tankers and Gulf energy infrastructure, sending Brent crude back above $101/bbl and sparking fears that chaos in the Middle East has triggered what the IEA warned could be the largest-ever supply disruption in the history of the global oil market. “The war in the Middle […]

Tehran Denies Mining Hormuz, But Says War Isn’t Ending Soon Summary: Iran’s top security official to Trump: ‘we will not relent until you are sorry’ Oil pares gains after report that Iran lets some ships cross strait, denies mining Hormuz Bloomberg: Trump admin set to temporarily suspend Jones Act shipping rules to help cool rising oil prices. Ayatollah Mojtaba in first public message says the closure of the Strait […]

Eat The Rich: Sanders And Khanna Introduce Federal Billionaires Tax Authored by Jonathan Turley, “Enough is enough.” With those words, Senator Bernie Sanders (I., Vt) launched a push to impose a 5% annual wealth tax on America’s billionaires. With Rep. Ro Khanna (D., Cal.), the legislation, “Make Billionaires Pay Their Fair Share Act,” echoes the growing “eat-the-rich” mantra on the left — seeking to replicate a […]

Fresh US Intel Assessment Says Iran Regime Not Close To Collapse After 2 Weeks At War A fresh report in Reuters says what should already be quite obvious to all: US intelligence has assessed that Iran’s leadership and government are largely in tact and the system does not risk collapse, after two weeks of heavy sustained US-Israeli bombardment and ‘decapitation’ strikes which have killed Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and over forty top […]

Epstein Guard Called To Testify As Oversight Committee Explores Potential Murder Authored by Steve Watson via Modernity.news, House Oversight Chairman James Comer is ramping up the heat on the botched handling of Jeffrey Epstein’s custody, announcing a subpoena for prison guard Tova Noel amid bombshell revelations of suspicious cash deposits and online searches just before the disgraced elitist’s alleged suicide. With fresh […]

US Housing Starts Highest In Over A Year As Mortgage Rates Tumbled In January With mortgage rates tumbling (before the war started) and a top-down push for affordability, Housing Starts printed better than expected for January while the more forward-looking Building Permits disappointed, falling more than expected. Starts rose 7.2k in preliminary January data (far greater than the 4.5% MoM decline expected while Permits plunged […]

Iran May Let Indian Tankers Through Hormuz Strait, Reports Of High-Level Talks First it was China, now an India exception?  Bloomberg reports another major potential exception Tehran could make for Strait of Hormuz oil transit. “India is in talks with Iran to secure the safe passage of more than 20 tankers through the Strait of Hormuz, according to people familiar with the matter,” a Thursday morning report indicates. […]

Once Again, Initial Jobless Claims Refuse To Signal Labor Market Stress Initial jobless claims dipped last week to 213k – basically unchanged since Nov 2021 – continuing to suggest an economy that is not seeing the average joe get canned at anything other than a de minimus rate… Continuing jobless claims also dipped last week, remaining well below the 1.9 million Americans Maginot Line… With ADP’s strong job additions […]

Futures Tumble As Oil Jumps Above $100 On Iran War Chaos US futures are sharply lower, as oil briefly surges back over $100 while markets start to accept the view that the Iran war will not end this week, and possibly any time soon. As of 8:15am ET, S&P and Nasdaq futures are down 0.7% and R2K futures slide more than 1%. Futures dropped more than 1% overnight as Iraq suspended oil terminal activity following an attack on two […]

DHS IG Launched Probe Into $220M Contract For Noem Ads Authored by Susan Crabtree via RealClearInvestigations, The Department of Homeland Security Office of Inspector General has for more than a month been investigating the process in which three businesses received $220 million for an ad campaign encouraging illegal immigrants to self-deport and featuring outgoing Secretary of Homeland Security Kristi Noem, according to sources […]

Carson Block Turns Bearish, Says AI Threatens 15% Of US Knowledge Jobs Carson Block says artificial intelligence has completely changed how he views markets over the past several weeks, according to Bloomberg. In a conversation with Barry Ritholtz at the Future Proof Wealth Management conference in Miami Beach, the founder and chief investment officer of Muddy Waters Capital said his outlook has flipped. “Up until one month ago, […]

US Reportedly Has Just Two Months Of Rare Earths Left The U.S. military’s reliance on Chinese rare-earth minerals is emerging as a strategic vulnerability as Washington’s conflict with Iran unfolds and President Donald Trump prepares for a closely watched visit to Beijing later this month. Blocks with symbols and atomic numbers of Rare Earth Elements (REE) are placed on a Chinese flag in this illustration taken January 21, 2026. […]

They’re Replacing Winston Churchill With A Hedgehog Authored by Steve Watson via Modernity.news, In a stunning betrayal, the Bank of England has announced plans to scrub Winston Churchill and other iconic British figures from the nation’s banknotes, ludicrously swapping them out for images of wildlife like hedgehogs, badgers, and otters.  This comes after a so-called public consultation where nature themes supposedly won out, […]

Coffee King Howard Schultz Flees To Florida Hours After Washington Wealth Tax Passes House Yet another rich guy is fleeing their Democrat-controlled state over a new wealth tax. Former Starbucks CEO Howard Schultz, a huge liberal himself, announced that he’s moving from Washington state to Miami, Florida – hours after state lawmakers advanced a tax bill targeting residents earning over $1 million per year.  Schultz, 72, who […]

Oil Soars As 2 Oil Tankers Explode In Persian Gulf, Iraq’s Oil Ports Stop Operations  Top headlines of conflict  Oil prices surge as two oil tankers are attacked and explode in Iraqi waters, forcing Iraq to stop operations at its oil ports and sending oil toward $100/bbl. ‘Largest wave of missiles since hostilities began’ launched into northern Israel by Hezbollah The US Navy said it was ‘too dangerous’ to escort […]