Commentary Most people have heard about cryptocurrency. If you listen to Warren Buffet’s partner Charlie Munger, you would have heard it is a fraud. My own problem with cryptocurrency is it’s all promises with no delivery. No one has built anything useful yet. When you talk to proponents of cryptocurrency, they will regale you with…
Chinese ‘Pig Butchers’ Fatten Up Americans for Financial Slaughter
March 1, 2023
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Business & MarketsBusiness ColumnistsChinese crime syndicatecybercriminalsMetaTrader 4 (MT4)Opinionpig butcheringThinking About ChinaTradingView
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Commentary Perhaps you are familiar with the term “pig butchering,” a new type of criminal activity with all the elements of a romance scam but with an investment opportunity twist. The FBI describes “pig butchering” as “a time-tested, heavily scripted, and contact-intensive process to fatten up the prey before slaughter.” In December, Frank Fisher, public…
The Four-Day Work Week and Bernie
Commentary Some 61 varied British businesses with a total of 2,900 employees over the course of six months recently participated in the largest experiment ever of a four-day work week, effectively providing their workers with a paid day off a week. Conducted by the British think tank Autonomy, two nonprofits, and researchers at Cambridge and…
Climate Activists Set to Take Control of the World Bank
February 28, 2023
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Australia-IndonesiaBusiness & MarketsBusiness ColumnistsChinaChina Development BankChina-Pakistan Economic CorridorDavid Malpassdevelopment bankIMFIndonesiaWorld Bank
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Commentary A change at the World Bank signals change in both U.S. development policy to climate concerns and, possibly, creates a geostrategic risk for the United States. David Malpass, the head of the World Bank, has announced he would leave the office in June, a year before his term was to expire. Malpass, who had been…
Flight From China
February 28, 2023
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Business & MarketsBusiness Columnistsbusiness in chinaChinaChinese wageforeign businessOpinionThinking About China
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Commentary Chinese leader Xi Jinping and others in China’s communist regime frequently associate themselves with the reputation Chinese culture has for patience and taking the long view in human interaction. If that cultural reputation is justified, Beijing’s claims ring false. Little of what China’s leadership does—certainly in the realm of economics—exemplifies either patience or the…
Curious Case of Grayscale and the Big Bitcoin Discount
Commentary Anyone who watched television during 2022 saw the ubiquitous TV commercials for Grayscale, which manages the world biggest Bitcoin investment fund. Those ads touted Bitcoin as “the future” and should be part of a retiree’s portfolio. But investors in Grayscale Bitcoin Trust (GBTC) are facing both a problem and an opportunity. The problem? GBTC…
The Clock Is Ticking
Commentary Recession indicators are becoming more insistent. Yet, the Federal Reserve remains focused on its inflation fight. As noted in “No Landing Scenario,” the Fed maintains a “hawkish” bias despite the markets not listening. As such: • “I wouldn’t rule out supporting a 50 basis-point March hike,” said James Bullard, president of the Federal Reserve…
China’s Economic Prospects Worsen
February 25, 2023
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Business & MarketsBusiness ColumnistsChina’s economyOpinionSecurities and Exchange Commission (SEC)Thinking About ChinaTreasury Secretary Janet YellenXi Jinping
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Commentary Three Chinese tech companies on Feb. 21 lost $33 billion of value in U.S. stock trading. Alibaba Group, JD.com, and PDD Holdings are finding it harder to expand internationally, and so turned to cutthroat competition with each other for domestic markets that will likely demolish their prices and profits. While within the last few…
Inflation Has Returned
Commentary After some encouraging news last summer and fall, many began anticipating a quick end to the economy’s inflation problem. Federal Reserve (Fed) Chair Jerome Powell even suggested that he might not have been so wrong in 2021 when he declared the inflationary pressure “transitory.” The news from January contradicts this optimism. The Labor Department…
Amazon Censors Criticism of China
February 23, 2023
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Amazonbook reviewBusiness & MarketsBusiness ColumnistscensorshipChinese Communist PartycriticalOpinionThinking About China
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Commentary Amazon is concerning a group of authors and publishers highly critical of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP). The company, headquartered in Seattle and Arlington, does extensive business with China, from which it sells vast quantities of imported products in its core markets of the United States, Europe, and Japan. According to EcomCrew, over 63 percent…
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