Bugaluu – News

When western nations rolled out a grand plan to throttle Russian oil imports and impose sanctions on Kremlin energy exports, we – and many others – laughed: after all, we have repeatedly seen how toothless western sanctions are when seeking to contain “rogue regime” oil profits, from Iran (which is pretty much selling oil to China at max capacity) to Venezuela and onward. One year later, our laughter has been well justified, because as the FT reports, “Russia has succeeded in avoiding G7 sanctions on most of its oil exports”, a shift in trade flows that will boost the Kremlin’s revenues as crude rises towards $100 a barrel, and as Russian Urals prices hit $80, the highest level in over a year.

According to the report, almost 75% of all seaborne Russian crude flows traveled without western insurance in August, the only lever used to enforce the G7’s $60-a-barrel oil price cap, according to an analysis of shipping and insurance records by the Financial Times. That is up from about about half this spring, according to data from freight analytics company Kpler and insurance companies. The rise implies that Moscow is becoming more adept at circumventing the cap, allowing it to sell more of its oil at prices closer to international market rates.

More importantly, it means that few if any Russian clients are worried about retaliation by the Biden regime for purchasing Russian oil.

The FT reports that the Kyiv School of Economics (KSE) has estimated that the steady increase in crude prices since July, combined with Russia’s success in reducing the discount on its own oil, means that the country’s oil revenues are likely to be at least $15bn higher for 2023 than they would have been; it is also an indication that for all its talk and posturing the West is content with allowing Putin’s regime to benefit from surging oil prices as the far more draconian alternative of taking all Russian oil off the market, would have sent global oil prices much higher.

Indeed, as the FT admits, while the EU and US have largely barred imports of Russian oil, the G7 price cap was designed to keep Russian oil flowing into global markets: “The aim was to prevent a squeeze on supplies and an economically and politically damaging jump in prices.”

Providing western services such as shipping or insurance is allowed under the price cap as long as Russia’s oil is sold for less than $60 a barrel. Russian oil is now selling for $20 more.

The shift is a double blow for western efforts to restrict Russia’s revenues from oil sales — which make up the biggest part of the Kremlin’s budget — following its full-scale invasion of Ukraine.

Not only is a higher proportion of Russian oil being sold outside the cap, but Moscow’s increasing independence as a seller has coincided with a strong rally in oil prices, which topped $95 a barrel for the first time in 13 months this week.

Worst of all for Western neocons, while Russia’s oil sector is still facing several challenges, including claims of shortages in its domestic refined fuels market and a dip in export volumes overall, the figures still suggest more oil revenues will be flowing into the Kremlin’s war chest.

Ben Hilgenstock, an economist at the KSE, said: “Given these shifts in how Russia ships its oil, it may be very difficult to meaningfully enforce the price cap in future. And that makes it even more regrettable that we did not do more to properly enforce it when we had more leverage.”

Meanwhile, in further weaponization of its commodities (in response to the US weaponization of the US Dollar), Russia this week banned the export of diesel and other fuels, a significant move from one of the biggest global sellers of diesel. The move has raised fears that Russian president Vladimir Putin is trying to disrupt the oil market as he did with natural gas, sparking last year’s energy crisis.

And while the Kremlin is steamrolling western export sanctions, it is Beijing that is allowing Russia to evade import sanctions.

A new study has found that Russia is using Chinese currency for at least a fifth of its imports, illustrating both Moscow’s increasing reliance on Beijing and its efforts to evade western sanctions.

As a reminder, sanctions imposed on Moscow by the EU, US and others as a result of its war against Ukraine have made it increasingly difficult for Russia to get hold of large amounts of western imports. It’s also made it more expensive for it to trade using the dollar, euro or other western currencies, especially after Russia was effectively kicked out of SWIFT and its banks can no longer transact in dollars.

What happened then? Well, by the end of 2022, 20% of Russia’s imports were invoiced in yuan — up from 3% a year previously, according to a research paper published this morning by the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development, the FT reported.

While some of that increase is owing to increased imports from China itself, the use of yuan to settle imports from third countries rose to 5% from just 1% before the war was launched in February 2022.

“Yuan is being used as a vehicle currency,” said Beata Javorcik, the EBRD’s chief economist and one of the paper’s authors. “Russia is now the third-largest clearing centre for offshore yuan transactions.”

Asking trade partners to invoice them in yuan is just one way Moscow is evading sanctions, alongside tactics such as importing products through middleman countries or exporting its oil on tankers that sail without western insurance.

The EBRD paper makes stark just how much Moscow is avoiding western banks when trying to bypass sanctions: when it comes to sanctioned goods and dual-use equipment, which can be used by civilians but also to make weapons, “the increase in [yuan] invoicing was more pronounced,” the paper found. The research also strikes a warning for any western policymakers who might see the data as a sign that their measures are working.

“Rising geopolitical tensions in general, and the use of trade sanctions in particular, may reduce the attractiveness of the use of the US dollar as a vehicle currency in international trade,” they write. “This, in turn, might lead to a greater fragmentation of global payment systems.”

Yet despite all the signs, in a few years there will still be those who are stunned to learn that the dollar is no longer the world’s reserve currency.

By John Liu and April Ma, Bloomberg Markets Live reporters and strategists

China’s property sector has yet to see the worst of the crisis that has cast a pall over the nation’s economy and helped drive an exodus of global funds from the world’s second-largest stock market.

That’s the view from nine of 15 respondents in an informal Bloomberg News survey of analysts and money managers based in Hong Kong and mainland China. Six of them listed housing woes as the biggest risk for equities for the final quarter of 2023, followed by geopolitical tensions.

The results are a reflection of the worsening malaise in China’s real estate industry, as policymakers appear reluctant to undertake more aggressive stimulus measures lest they may fuel long-term financial risks. Sentiment worsened last week as worries about liquidity and weak housing demand intensified, sending a Bloomberg Intelligence gauge of property stocks to its lowest level in 12 years.

Pessimism over the property sector aside, the informal survey showed investors have otherwise turned optimistic on the overall market given a series of recent policy support measures and inexpensive valuations. Roughly around 70% of the respondents said they plan to add stock positions both onshore and in Hong Kong.

“We are in the worst of this cycle and we are not out of woods yet. It’s going to take a long time for the current property crisis to be over,” said Kenny Wen,  head of investment strategy at KGI Asia Ltd. who participated in the informal poll. “Before the property crisis is properly handled, it’s unlikely for the stock market sentiment to recover meaningfully.”

Investors may be staring at an added level of uncertainty after China Evergrande Group — an indebted real estate conglomerate which sits at the center of the sector’s years-long crisis — said Thursday that its billionaire chairman Hui Ka Yan is suspected of committing crimes. Meantime, Country Garden Holdings Co., formerly China’s biggest developer, continues to fight an uphill battle to avert a public bond default.

The CSI 300 Index benchmark is down 4.7% so far in 2023, on track for an unprecedented third straight year of losses. That’s dragged the gauge’s valuation to 10.8 times its estimated earnings for the next 12 months, almost two points below the five-year average.

The CSI 300 is expected to end the year at 4,100, based on the median forecast of the informal poll, implying a potential gain of about 11% from the latest close. The Hang Seng Index is projected to hit 20,500, indicating upside of around 15%, the results showed.

More than half of the informal survey’s respondents said they see equities as the best investment option at the moment, versus cash or commodities. Nine out of the 15 polled also ruled out the need for state-backed funds to support the market in the fourth quarter.

Overseas investors sold about 37 billion yuan ($5.1 billion) of mainland China stocks on a net basis in September via trading links with Hong Kong. That’s after a record 90 billion yuan selloff last month, which drove their positioning to the lowest since October 2022, when the nation’s reopening from stringent Covid curbs sparked a sharp rebound over the next three months.

The continued selling by foreign funds has driven bets that the worst of outflows may be over. Less than a third of those surveyed expected fund flows via the so-called Stock Connect program to turn negative on a net basis for the year.
“Yuan assets, especially A shares, are currently very cheap and many pockets of the market are oversold,” said Zhu Houzhong, a fund manager at Shanghai Youpu Investment Co. who took part in the informal poll.

Authored by Aldgra Fredly via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

Federal prosecutors have urged the federal judge to impose a gag order on former President Donald Trump in the 2020 election interference case, citing the “prejudicial extrajudicial statements” he made on social media.

Former President Donald Trump appears in court at the Manhattan Criminal Court in New York on April 4, 2023. (Steven Hirsch/Pool/AFP via Getty Images)

The special counsel team filed the request for a gag order against Mr. Trump on Sept. 15 to restrict him from making “intimidating” comments about witnesses, lawyers, and other people involved in the criminal case.

Prosecutors said on Sept. 25 that Mr. Trump continued to wage “a sustained campaign of prejudicial public statements regarding witnesses, the court, the district, and prosecutors” even after the proposed order.

“The defendant should not be permitted to obtain the benefits of his incendiary public statements and then avoid accountability by having others—whose messages he knows will receive markedly less attention than his own—feign retraction,” they said in a court filing (pdf).

“No other criminal defendant would be permitted to issue public statements insinuating that a known witness in his case should be executed; this defendant should not be, either,” it added.

They referred to recent posts on his social media platform, Truth Social, including one on Sept. 22 in which Mr. Trump accused departing Chairman of Joint Chiefs of Staff Mark Milley of committing treason.

In the post, Mr. Trump said that Mr. Milley’s alleged “treasonous act” could have led to “a war between China and the United States.” He also suggested that Mr. Milley should be executed for his alleged conduct.

Prosecutors also mentioned a video posted by Mr. Trump’s spokesman claiming that Mr. Trump had bought a Glock gun in South Carolina. The post was later removed, and the spokesman retracted his remarks, saying that Mr. Trump had only indicated his interest in buying the gun.

Despite the spokesman’s retraction, prosecutors said that Mr. Trump “re-posted a video of the incident” posted by one of his followers with a caption that suggested he had indeed bought the weapon.

“The defendant either purchased a gun in violation of the law and his conditions of release, or seeks to benefit from his supporters’ mistaken belief that he did so,” the prosecutors stated.

“The prosecution would silence President Trump, amid a political campaign where his right to criticize the government is at its zenith, all to avoid a public rebuke of this prosecution,” his lawyers wrote (pdf) on Sept. 25.

“However, above all else, the First Amendment means that government has no power to restrict expression because of its message, its ideas, its subject matter, or its content.

“The prosecution may not like President’s Trump’s entirely valid criticisms, but neither it nor this Court are the filter for what the public may hear,” they added.

Mr. Trump’s lawyers argued that the proposed gag order was “sweepingly broad” and that “many of its terms are undefined.”

If the order is granted, Mr. Trump would be forced to dramatically limit the type of comments he makes about the case even as he seeks to turn his criminal woes — the Washington prosecution is one of four that he currently faces — to his political advantage while running to reclaim the White House in 2024.

His attorneys filed court papers on Sept. 27 saying that more time is required to deal with procedures for reviewing classified information in the federal case in which the former president is accused of trying to overturn the 2020 election.

Jack Phillips and The Associated Press contributed to this report.

Morgan Stanley US equity strategist Michelle Weaver joins a growing number of Wall Street analysts warning about deteriorating conditions for consumers. Weaver wrote in a recent note to clients that travel companies exposed to “lower-income consumers” are beginning to experience “demand weakness.” 

Weaver’s note, published on Sept. 21, follows JPMorgan consumer trader Brian Heavey’s truth bomb on Sept. 20 when he turned extraordinarily negative on the US consumer. Since then, Mike Wilson, Morgan Stanley’s chief investment officer, penned a note about the ‘consumer falling off a cliff.’ 

“A significant proportion of US Consumers have drawn down their Covid era excess savings and our US Economics team estimates that lower-income households have fully exhausted their excess savings, while middle- and higher-income households are less willing to spend their excess savings on consumption,” Weaver told clients. 

Her note was published after the Fed’s latest beige book that warned: “Some Districts highlighted reports suggesting consumers may have exhausted their savings and are relying more on borrowing to support spending.” And a period when credit card growth wanes, and the consumer has never been in worse shape. 

Also, the three-year pause in student loan payments has expired, as some 28 million borrowers are imminently facing a restart in payments. This will add a $15.8 billion monthly headwind – or $190 billion per year – to US consumer spending. 

Understanding all of this, Weaver’s view is that some of the first impacts of a slowdown will be “travel companies exposed to the lower-income consumer showing indications of demand weakness.” 

Here’s more from the note:

Low-Cost Airlines Slowing. A number of major airlines attended Morgan Stanley’s Industrials Conference last week and there was a marked difference in tone between the Ultra Low Cost Carriers (ULCCs) and Legacy Airlines. Two high-utilization ULCCs noted that demand has taken a significant, sharp turn down and these companies now expect pre-tax margins to be significantly lower. These companies may have higher exposure to low-income consumers (though we note that some other ULCC carriers with potential exposure to low-income consumers said that demand was trending in line with expectations). Meanwhile, the legacy carriers were much more positive on the demand environment and their primary concern remains higher fuel costs.

Hotels Are Showing Signs of Demand Weakening.TheGaming&Lodging industry has also been cooling especially in the economy segment of the market. Overall revenue per available room (RevPAR) for US hotels has been tracking at a lower trajectory for 3Q vs 2Q and hotel occupancy is down vs 2019. Economy RevPAR has been consistently down 3-4% yoy since April. While on the high-end, luxury RevPAR was down 4% in April, then flat to -2% through summer and down -3% MTD for September. Economy and luxury hotel demand is driven by leisure, consumer travel rather than business travel. There has also been weakness in the regional casino space over the past 6 months, which is primarily exposed to lower- and middle- income consumers.

Consumers Intend to Shift to Cheaper Modes of Travel. Our most recent AlphaWise Consumer Survey shows that consumers want to keep traveling and 58% of respondents are planning to travel over the next 6 months. Net spending plans for international travel declined from 0% last month to -8% this month, while domestic travel plans without a flight moved higher. This indicates that consumers want to keep traveling but are increasingly looking at taking cheaper trips and are choosing destinations they can drive or take a train to vs having to fly.

She added:

Travel has shown signs of cooling, led by areas exposed to low-income consumers. This problem could broaden out crimping company margins and earnings. We believe there could be more downside ahead and are underweight the Consumer Discretionary sector.

None of this is a surprise, as we’ve already reported in July, “Airline Stocks Hit Turbulence After Alaska Air Signals Slowing Demand,” and last month, “American Airlines Cuts Earnings Forecast As Headwinds Hit Airline Industry.” In mid-July, we said, “Cash-Strapped Consumers Travel By Bus To Destination Hotspots.” 

Still no recovery in airline stocks. 

Meanwhile, last week, Personal Consumption data in the latest GDP revision collapsed in a stunning 9-sigma miss to expectations. 

… and there goes the “strong” Bidenomics economy as “strong” data points only last about a month and then are downgraded. 

Beware of a faltering consumer. 

Authored by Pete McGinnis via RealClearPolitics.com,

Beware, the crisis at the southern border may be much worse than it appears…

Free Apple watches, bus and plane tickets all across the continental United States, and sophisticated lawyers standing by to counsel migrants on how to best navigate border officials’ scrutiny of asylum on the occasions when they are actually required to defend their asylum claims. These benefits being offered to illegal border crossers have left the public shocked, angry, and in many cases, feeling the issue closer to home than ever before. Many cities and states have also been overwhelmed as the consequences of the crisis have migrated well beyond the southern border states. Recently, New York City Mayor Eric Adams made news when he emphatically declared that the now-regular stream of migrants into the Big Apple “will ruin the City!”

It’s not just local budgets and social services that are being squeezed to the breaking point, although those are nothing to sneeze at and will have to be addressed. The increase in crime may be the biggest concern. Violent crime rates are up, and violent incidents are prominent on the nightly news. Less visible are the other criminal enterprises causing ripple effects. Human trafficking has gained more attention as its shocking reality is (very) slowly exposed. The recently released independent film, “The Sound of Freedom,” struck a chord for this very reason – human trafficking is striking too close to home for most Americans’ peace of mind. 

Then there are the drugs. The opioid epidemic has gotten substantially worse in the last few years, with annual overdose deaths, after a slight decline from 2017 through 2019, increasing dramatically in the last several years. As if this isn’t bad enough, the opportunities for smuggling in other illegal contraband have increased as well.

Experts speculate that the drug cartels have collaborated with hostile actors, including Chinese Communists, to further take advantage of what they (rightly) view as a U.S. government intent on not enforcing the laws at our southern border. Notably, illicit tobacco and vaping products appear to have become a prime fundraising target for the burgeoning Chinese drug cartel alliance. While teenage vaping and flavored tobacco products have become a major concern for federal regulators, it is projected that most vaping products being sold are illegal and that 90% of the vaping products originate in China. Ironically, the reaction of federal authorities and policymakers has been to propose more prohibitions on legal products – overwhelmingly used by adults and lifetime smokers to transition away from cigarettes – rather than addressing the source of the problem: the flood of illegal products through our open border. It’s another example of the dangers that come from a dysfunctional government.

To elaborate, federal tobacco regulators appear set on using the robust cartel-supported black market in vaping products aimed at kids to further their long-time prohibitionist agenda (and one of Michael Bloomberg’s favorite pet projects). These regulatory efforts have been bolstered by user-fee supported special interest groups who fund splashy ad campaigns highlighting teen vaping use as the basis for their actions. Yet, the regulatory agenda seeks to outlaw a whole host of products used by adults, for which abolition seems certain to offer an even greater market opportunity for the Chinese drug cartel alliance and likely to increase access to illicit products by youth.

This may be a shocking observation to some, but this example and others indicate that senior government officials may see the lawlessness stemming from the border as a feature rather than a bug. Take Claire Trickler-McNulty, the Biden administration’s assistant director of Immigration and Customs Enforcement. Officials like Ms. Trickler-McNulty appear set on turning law enforcement agencies into social services organizations. Before joining the Biden administration, Trickler-McNulty worked for an organization that advocated for the abolition of the agency she now helps lead – in the spirit of the “defund the police” movement. Unsurprisingly, the overrun southern border has given her social service aspirations lots of prospective “clients” seeking federal assistance.

While Trickler-McNulty has faced criticism for the so-called transition from a traditional law enforcement focus, she appears unfazed. The same could also be said of her former employer, Kids in Need of Defense, a major recipient of George Soros’s Open Society Foundation that has also benefited handsomely from its influential role in the Biden administration’s open border policy with a $13 million contract.

The ways in which American families and businesses are being harmed by the open border policies could fill volumes. But it’s clear that state budgets, neighborhood safety, and our children’s futures are all being endangered while the drug cartels and our most powerful foreign adversaries become enriched and empowered. Instead of using these tragedies to advance the special interest agendas of Michael Bloomberg and George Soros, perhaps we could all agree that the American chapter on human trafficking, opioids, and open borders should be relegated to the history books.

Pete McGinnis is director of communications at the Functional Government Initiative.

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau is taking Canada down a dangerous path of censorship to regulate streaming services and social media platforms. The next regulation phase comes as some podcasters will soon have to register with the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission.

The Online Streaming Act, formerly Bill C-11, goes into effect on Nov. 28, meaning any online streaming service that operates in Canada and generates revenue of more than $10 million in a given year will have to register with CRTC. 

The Canadian government pitches the new rule as a “modern broadcasting framework that can adapt to changing circumstances. To do that, we need broad engagement and robust public records.” It requires those podcasters to register with CRTC ‘only once’ and “collects basic information” from them, such as:

“First, the CRTC is setting out which online streaming services need to provide information about their activities in Canada.”

So what’s with the government creating a database of prominent podcasters?

One potential reason could be for the Liberal government to censor unapproved government narratives quickly. Having a registry of podcasters and the type of content they create makes it much easier for those in the government’s censorship department. 

 “The CRTC now wants to regulate podcasts,” Toronto Sun’s Brian Lilley posted on X, adding, “Here is my simple message to them. Go to hell.” 

The CRTC now wants to regulate podcasts.
Here is my simple message to them.
Go to hell. https://t.co/NE4SbIJIPw

— Brian Lilley (@brianlilley) September 29, 2023

On Sunday morning, Elon Musk chimed in on the conversation, responding to X account Wall Street Silver: “Regulate podcasts!?” 

Regulate podcasts!?

— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) October 1, 2023

While Trudeau has called everyone under the sun a ‘Nazi,’ from a Jewish member of parliament named Melissa Lantsman to “Freedom Convoy” trucker protesters, the radical leftist prime minister recently applauded a literal Waffen-SS Nazi with Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky in Canada’s Parliament. 

Zelenskyy, Trudeau Honor Actual 3rd Reich Nazi With Standing Ovation https://t.co/QCnuuo1HNa

— zerohedge (@zerohedge) September 24, 2023

Trudeau immediately blamed “Russian disinformation” for applauding the Nazi. 

Such a funny guy, Justin Trudeau. Totally brazen, and any and all conversation about the incident with the Ukrainian veteran who fought on the wrong side of history whom he celebrated is now “Russian disinformation.” Russian disinformation is anything that makes western leaders… pic.twitter.com/UPk3Hqy0iQ

— Ian Miles Cheong (@stillgray) September 25, 2023

Even though Trudeau eventually apologized for applauding the Nazi, his attempt to distort reality is another sign that the government routinely engages in mass censorship campaigns and further wants to regulate what podcasters have to say. 

Remember, building a registry makes the job much easier for the government. 

By Mish Shedlock of Mishtalk

Let’s count the ways…

Key Ideas

Voters are now more likely to see the Republican Party as capable of governing, tackling big issues and keeping the country safe compared with the Democratic Party.
By a 9-point margin, voters also see the Democratic Party as more ideologically extreme than the GOP.
The trends against the Democratic Party are largely driven by worsening perceptions among its own voter base, which suggests that the party will have to rely more than ever on negative partisanship to keep control of the White House.

Those are not my thoughts. That’s what the latest Morning Consult poll shows.

In a significant reversal from the last presidential election year, U.S. voters are now more likely to see the Republican Party as capable of governing, keeping the country safe and tackling the big issues compared with the Democratic Party. These crossing trend lines provide a stark contrast from the lead-up to 2020, when Morning Consult surveys showed public opinion on the same questions was more static.

Both parties are also trending in different directions on two other characteristics that voters favored Democrats on in 2020. Voters have become less likely to see the GOP as stale, and more likely to say this descriptor fits the Democratic Party. And over that same time frame, voters increasingly say the GOP is responsible.

It’s not just that some voters have lost faith in the Democratic Party’s stewardship of the country — they also see the party as moving asymmetrically away from ideological moderation.

By an almost double-digit margin, voters are now more likely to say the Democratic Party is “too liberal” than they are to say the GOP is “too conservative.” That’s another big change from 2020, when roughly equivalent shares viewed both parties as too ideologically extreme.

Claim Everything is Working

Bidenomics In a Nutshell

1: Hand out free money via unwarranted subsidies to ease the pain of stupid regulations

2: Stoke massive inflation in the process

3: Brag that it is working.https://t.co/Fn5hxUlUln https://t.co/TsmuNV6HBQ

— Mike “Mish” Shedlock (@MishGEA) September 28, 2023

People elected Biden (barely) for two reasons. The first being he wasn’t Trump. The second being they expected him to be a moderate.

Then instead of bringing the nation together as promised, Biden morphed into the Progressive’s dream candidate stoking inflation with every decision.

Voters are upset. They want action on the border. They want better schools. They are fearful of inflation.

They don’t want to give up their gas stove. They don’t want to be forced into a high-priced EV when the infrastructure isn’t ready.

They did not expect Biden to be like Trump.

Biden is telling people how great the Bidenomics economy is, how he’s providing the most jobs, that he is best this and the best that, and the economy is humming, and he is bringing inflation down at the fastest pace in history.

Whatever. It seems so hollow because it is hollow. And voters see right through it.

Other than being much more polite in his delivery, Biden may as well have said, “I built a wall and Mexico paid for it”.

Somehow it seems harder to lie and get away with it when you are in power than when you aren’t.

Bidenomics In a Nutshell

Hand out free money via unwarranted subsidies to ease the pain of stupid regulations
Stoke massive inflation in the process
Brag that it is working.

Here’s the deal. You can run against Trump once and win if your key message is “I’m not Trump.”

But can you do it twice with nothing more than inflation and a more polite delivery to back it up?