08Feb2019 Midday Update: Wall Street Stocks Slump Toward Worst Week Since December, DOW Down Over 150 Points, WTI Steady At 52.59, Gold At 1315

Here is the current market situation from CNN Money

North and South American markets are mixed. The Bovespa is higher by 0.16%, while the IPC is leading the S&P 500 lower. They are down 0.83% and 0.50% respectively.

U.S. Steel wins tax breaks from one of America’s poorest cities

United States Steel Corporation founded Gary, Indiana in 1906 – naming it after co-founder Elbert Henry Gary – and the city’s fortunes have been closely tied to the company ever since.

Trump official slams cartels as lawmakers push anti-OPEC bill

A senior Trump administration official said on Friday that U.S. national security depends on affordable energy, and slammed cartels when asked if President Donald Trump would support a bill targeting the OPEC production group’s oil supply cuts.

Amazon reconsiders New York headquarters over local opposition: Washington Post

Amazon.com is reconsidering locating part of its new headquarters in New York because of local opposition, the Washington Post reported on Friday, citing two people familiar with the global retailer’s thinking.

German banks maneuver in Washington to temper Russia sanction risk

German banks are seeking to blunt any fresh U.S. sanctions against Russia so they can continue existing business with Russian clients, according to an internal briefing paper prepared by a financial industry lobby group.

GM Oshawa, Canada plant production could be hurt by Lear strike

Production at General Motors’ Oshawa assembly plant in Canada has not yet been affected by a strike at nearby Lear Corp, which supplies it with seats, but that will change if the job action stretches on, the company said on Friday.

Staff wanted: pensioners welcome, but anyone, really

Zsuzsanna Czeizel told herself she’d never work again after she retired in 2012. But since October, she’s held a job — scanning boxes of sweets in a large warehouse near Budapest.

National Enquirer owner defends reporting on Amazon’s Bezos

The owner of U.S. tabloid newspaper the National Enquirer pushed back on Friday against accusations of “extortion and blackmail” from Amazon.com Inc chief Jeff Bezos, saying its reporting on an extramarital affair involving the world’s richest man was lawful and it would investigate his claims.

Wall Street down for third day on lingering trade worries

U.S. stocks fell for the third straight day on Friday, as skepticism over the United States and China reaching a trade deal before a looming deadline added to concerns over slowing global growth.

Barclays to shift some credit and equity derivatives sales jobs to Paris: sources

Barclays is shifting some jobs in its London-based credit and equity derivatives sales teams to Paris as it reorganizes its operations ahead of Brexit, two sources familiar with the matter said.

Maduro Invokes Vietnam In Open Letter; Warns America Will “Send Their Sons To Die In An Absurd War”

Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro has penned an open letter to the people of the United States, warning that Washington is “willing to send their sons and daughters to die in an absurd war,” and that Venezuelan patriots “shall defend our homeland with all the pieces of our soul.”

Maduro posted an image of the letter to Twitter, which he said would be delivered to the White House “to demand respect for our unwaivable right to peace.”

Comparto la “Carta Abierta al Pueblo de los EE.UU.”, que está siendo firmada por el pueblo libre de Venezuela y el mundo. Vamos a entregarla en la Casa Blanca para exigir el respeto a nuestro derecho irrenunciable a la Paz. pic.twitter.com/o4VHdZpxQh

— Nicolás Maduro (@NicolasMaduro) February 8, 2019

Slamming US President Trump’s aggressive statements “disrupting noble dialogue initi …

Cryptos Suddenly Surge – Litecoin Up 30%, Bitcoin Tops $3700

Cryptocurrencies have suddenly and dramatically surged in the last few hours with Litecoin leading (up over 30%)…

There is no clear catalyst for the sudden shock, but as The Independent reports, the latest rise follows news that bitcoin’s hashrate – the amount of power its network consumes to process transactions and generate new units of cryptocurrency – is at its highest level since November 2018. This can be an indicator of subsequent price gains, though there are many factors that determine a cryptocurrency’s value.

Bitcoin spiked back above $3700…

But it was Litecoin (silver to Bitcoin’s gold) that outperformed

Jakobsen: Data Shows There Is “Zero Confidence In The Real Economy”

Authored by Steen Jakobsen, Chief Economist & CIO, Saxo Bank,

The Non-Rebound

As we predicted, policymakers rushed to the aid of late-2018’s faltering markets with more of the same: credit and a QT pause. Clearly, a new narrative is needed, and we think it’s time to re-evaluate risk.

You will all recall how forcefully we argued that the world was coming to a standstill in 2018 based on our core macro view, which we termed ‘the Four Horsemen’:

Quantity of money collapsing

Price of money rising

The price of energy = a tax on consumption

Anti-globalisation = reduced global trade volumes

Then in December, we moved to our new theme of ‘Global Policy panic’.

The Global Policy Panic argument held that, in a world with no business cycle and just a credit cycle in its place, a slowdown or an equity market selloff would be met with more credit and a pause from the Federal Reserve.

This has now come to pass, and January of this year saw a market return in excess of the weighted yearly return normally expected for an entire year!

A new impulse and a new narrative are clearly needed…

(The China-US trade deal will go ahead, but only on the level of a framework… or rhetoric, really.)

What you should be concerned about as you move to manage/protect your portfolio is summed up in these two charts from today’s edition of the Wall Street Journal’s Daily Shot:

Amazon Reconsidering NY Headquarters Site “Following A Wave Of Opposition”

All of those real estate speculators who snatched up Queens real estate late last year are about to be very unhappy.

In what some might describe as a “dick move”, Amazon is reportedly reconsidering its plans to open a sprawling new corporate headquarters in the Long Island City neighborhood of Queens after New York State lawmakers who are opposed to the lucrative package of “performance based incentives” threatened to sabotage the deal, according to a report in the Washington Post.

The report adds to the pressure on Gov. Andrew Cuomo to put a stop to a lawmakers’ nomination to a state board that could give him authority to unilaterally kill the incentives package.

Since the final package of state and city incentives isn’t expected to be approved until 2020, Amazon executives are reportedly questioning whether it’s worth the risk for the company to hope that restive lawmakers don’t kill the deal.

Amazon.com is reconsidering its plan to bring 25,000 jobs to a new campus in New York City following a wave of opposition from local politicians, according to two people familiar with the company’s thinking.

The company has not leased or purchased office space for the project, making it easy to withdraw its commitment. Unlike in Virginia — where elected leaders quickly passed an incentive package for a separate headquarters facility – final approval from New York state is not expected until 2020.

Tennessee officials have also embraced Amazon’s plans to bring 5,000 jobs to Nashville, which this weekapproved $15.2 million in road, sewer and other improvements related to that project.

Amazon executives have had internal discussions recently to r …

01 February 2019 ECRI’s WLI Growth Rate Index Improves But Remains In Contraction

Written by Steven Hansen

ECRI’s WLI Growth Index which forecasts economic growth six months forward improved but remains in contraction. ECRI also released their lagging index and inflation index.

The Tell: Stock market bulls are now facing their most important test of the new year, says analyst

The recent weakness that halted a 2019 rally for U.S. equity benchmarks, leaving them on track Friday for a three-day losing streak, may represent the most crucial test for the bulls so far this year, according to one market technician.

Market Snapshot: Stock market on track for year’s longest skid as trade worries persist

U.S. stocks fall Friday, putting major indexes on track for their longest losing streak of the year, as lingering fears over U.S-China trade relations and sluggish global growth weighed on investors’ confidence.

In One Chart: School strikes lead to highest number of work stoppages in 11 years

There was the highest number of “major” work stoppages in 11 years in 2018, according to data released Friday.