Written by Econintersect
Early Bird Headlines 07 February 2019
Econintersect: Here are some of the headlines we found to help you start your day. For more headlines see our afternoon feature for GEI members, What We Read Today, published Monday, Wednesday and Friday, which has many more headlines and a number of article discussions to keep you abreast of what we have found interesting.
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​Global
- Stocks in Asia mixed; Softbank shares soar more than 17 percent (CNBC) Stocks in Australia gained while Japan slipped on the day. Shares of Japanese conglomerate Softbank Group surged more than 17%. The U.S. dollar index was higher at 96.421 after seeing lows around 96.0 yesterday. U.S. West Texas Intermediate (WTI) crude futures were at $53.84 per barrel at 0247 GMT, down $0.17 (0.3%) from their last settlement. International Brent crude oil futures were down by $0.26 cents, or 0.4%, at $62.43 per barrel. Spot gold fell 0.2% to $1,303.64 per ounce by 0341 GMT, after touching its lowest since Jan. 29 at $1,302.84. Prices had fallen 0.7% in the previous session in their biggest one-day drop since Jan. 18.
U.S.
- Trump, Democrats clash over probes (The Hill) President Trump and House Democrats on Wednesday opened up a pitched battle over an intensifying set of investigations, the latest sign partisan warfare may extinguish chances of bipartisan cooperation on major issues under divided government.
The public clash came one day after Trump slammed Democrats for “ridiculous partisan investigations” in his State of the Union address. Undeterred, the chairman of the House Intelligence Committee charged ahead with plans for a sweeping investigation into Russia’s election interference and Trump’s finances.
- Mueller hauled before secret FISA court to address FBI abuses in 2002, Congress told (The Hill) Robert Mueller the former FBI director and current special prosecutor in the Russia case, once was hauled before the nation’s secret intelligence court to address a large number of instances in which the FBI cheated on sensitive surveillance warrants, according to evidence gathered by congressional investigators. For most of the past 16 years, Mueller’s closed-door encounter escaped public notice because of the secrecy of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court (FISC).
- Trump administration rolls back payday loan protections, which could affect millions of young people (CNBC) The Trump administration on Wednesday rolled back protections set to make payday loans less risky for borrowers, which could affect millions of young people: Almost 10 million millennials have taken out one of these high-interest, short-term loans in the past two years.
The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, the government agency tasked with regulating financial companies, said it plans to abandon Obama-era payday loan stipulations that would require lenders to ensure borrowers could repay their loans before issuing cash advances.
- Mueller probe filings raise prospect of more indictments (The Hill) Special counsel Robert Mueller’s references to “uncharged individuals” in recent court filings that aim to restrict certain evidence are being read by some as an indication more people could be indicted in his sprawling investigation. Despite rampant speculation that Mueller is close to finalizing his report, the language used in court documents over the past few months offers clues that suggest his probe might ensnare more individuals.
- Fight the Ship (ProPublica) Poor maintenance and insufficient sailor training are key factors in collisions experienced by U.S. Nay warships recently. Here is some of the report about the USS Fitzgerald which lost several sailors in a collision with a mechant vessel:
Shortfalls in training, the lack of personnel and overconfident leadership were deemed contributing factors to the collision. Senior Navy leadership fired several officers involved in the readiness of the 7th Fleet. Aucoin, the 7th Fleet commander, was relieved of command. Adm. Thomas Rowden, the navy’s senior surface warfare officer, was forced to retire and stripped of a rank.
Defense attorneys said Navy officials were scapegoating low-ranking officers and sailors to conceal poor decisions made by senior Navy leadership.
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- As Goes Virginia, So Goes the Democratic Party (The Atlantic) The fate of Virginia’s politicians will offer new indications of where the Democratic Party is right now, and where it is headed.
- Virginia Lt. Governor Justin Fairfax’s Accuser: Consensual Kissing ‘Quickly Turned Into a Sexual Assault’ (The Daily Beast) Vanessa Tyson, the woman who has accused Virginia Lieutenant Governor Justin Fairfax of sexually assaulting her at the 2004 Democratic National Convention, released a statement Wednesday outlining her allegations. The statement, reportedly distributed by the same law firm that represented Christine Blasey Ford, alleged that Tyson met Fairfax on July 26 of that year.
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- Tucker Carlson Frets Stacey Abrams Wants to ‘Overthrow’ White Men (The Daily Beast) Fox News host Tucker Carlson went after rising Democratic star Stacey Abrams on Wednesday evening, painting her as a demagogue looking to marginalize white men. Abrams, the former Georgia House Minority Leader who lost last year’s hotly contested gubernatorial race, delivered the Democratic Party’s response to President Trump’s State of the Union on Tuesday evening.
EU
- EZ Recession Risks (Twitter)
UK
- Parliament beware: the backstop and the EU Political Declaration are a double trap (The Telegraph) Ambrose Evans-Pritchard writes:
Be very wary of any EU codicil, protocol, or soft law memorandum offering assurances on the Irish backstop.
Either it safeguards the UK’s sovereign prerogatives and free agency, or it locks the country into a perpetual legal arrangement as a regulatory captive without voting rights. It is one or the other. No fuzzy compromise on this legal point can exist.
- How EU Leaders Can Prevent a No-Deal Brexit (Project Syndicate) Anatole Kaletsky says that the EU can defang Theresa May by simply delaying the March 29 deadline.
British Prime Minister Theresa May’s strategy of threatening a no-deal Brexit requires a hard deadline that forces her opponents to capitulate. Without that, “running down the clock” becomes “kicking the can down the road,” which more accurately reflects May’s paradoxical combination of robotic inflexibility and exasperating indecisiveness.
In every successful hostage negotiation, the first crucial step to a breakthrough is to remove the deadline. European leaders should take that step now.
Germany​
- German industrial output falls, raising risk of recession (Reuters) German industrial output unexpectedly fell in December for the fourth consecutive month, data showed on Thursday, sending another signal that growth in Europe’s biggest economy is weakening. Data from the Federal Statistics Office showed industrial output was down by 0.4%, confounding a Reuters forecast for an increase of 0.7%.
Russia
- Russia: we would be open to U.S. proposals for new nuclear pact (Reuters) Russia would be prepared to consider new proposals from the United States to replace a suspended Cold War-era nuclear pact with a broader treaty that includes more countries, Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov said on Thursday.
Russia suspended the Intermediate-range Nuclear Forces (INF) treaty at the weekend after Washington announced it would withdraw in six months unless Russia ends what it says are violations of the pact, allegations rejected by Moscow.
India
- India unexpectedly cuts key rate, changes stance to neutral (Reuters) India’s central bank on Thursday unexpectedly lowered interest rates and, as anticipated, shifted its stance to “neutral” to boost a slowing economy after a sharp slide in the inflation rate.
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North Korea
- What Trump can – and can’t – offer Kim will define the success of the upcoming US-North Korea summit (CNBC)
- The ball is in Washington’s court to speed up North Korea’s denuclearization, according to political analysts.
- When U.S. President Donald Trump meets Kim Jong Un in Vietnam later this month, he could offer to roll back some U.S. sanctions and reduce the size of the U.S. military presence in South Korea, analysts at Eurasia Group suggested.
- Trump can also offer Pyongyang talks with the International Monetary Fund, World Bank and the World Trade Organization, said Robert A. Manning of the Atlantic Council.
China
- How U.S. ethanol reaches China tariff-free (Reuters) In a striking example of how global commodity markets respond to government policies blocking free trade, tons of U.S. ethanol legally enter China tariff free after it gets blended with at least 40 percent Asian produced fuel.
Mexico
- Mexico’s Cash Cow: Remittances from the US & Other Countries Surge to New Record (Wolf Street) The total amount Mexico received in “remittances” – transfers of money by workers of Mexican descent mostly in the US but also other countries to individuals in Mexico – surged by 10.5% in 2018 to $33.4 billion, the highest figure registered since records began, back in 1995, and beating the prior records set in 2016 and 2017.
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