When Both Sides Go Quiet Submitted by QTR’s Fringe Finance There is a political instinct that I’ve developed over the last few decade or so: when both parties are shouting, it’s business as usual. When both parties go quiet, pay attention, because something ugly is probably getting passed or covered up, and the American taxpayer is likely footing the bill of consequences. Few public controversies in recent memory have […]

It Begins: Mamdani Plans First NYC Property Tax Hike In Decades To Plug $5 Billion Hole New York City property owners are set to ‘enjoy’ the first property tax hike in more than two decades as part of a proposed solution by Mayor Zohran Mamdani to fill a roughly $5 billion budget gap, Bloomberg reports. “He’s put a pretty extreme option on the table, which is a combination of raising property taxes and taking money from […]

Anthropic–Pentagon Talks Stall Over AI Guardrails Contract renewal talks between Anthropic and the Pentagon have stalled over how its Claude system can be used. The AI firm is seeking stricter limits before extending its agreement, according to a person familiar with the private negotiations and Bloomberg. At the heart of the dispute is control. Anthropic wants firm guardrails to prevent Claude from being used for mass […]

Watch Latest Trans Horror: Dad In Dress Kills Ex-Wife, Child, Self At School Hockey Game For the second time in a week, a transgender person has exploded in a display of spectacular, bloody violence. The latest incident unfolded on Monday in Pawtucket, Rhode Island, where a 56-year-old man reportedly wearing a dress shot four of his family members and a family friend at a high school hockey game. Police say Robert Robert Dorgan […]

Bayer Soars After $10.5 Billion Settlement On Current And Future Roundup Cancer Lawsuits Bayer stock jumped the most in three months after the company announced a $10.5 billion settlement push to settle current and future cancer lawsuits over its Roundup weedkiller. The news was first reported by Bloomberg.  The German chemical giant proposed a $7.5 billion class-action settlement through cases filed in state court in Missouri […]

Investors Overreacting To Starlink’s Threat To Traditional Telcos; Goldman Says Talk of space-based data centers has suddenly become a major conversation on Wall Street. One key driver is Elon Musk’s merger of SpaceX with his AI venture, xAI, aiming to eventually build “orbital data centers” at scale. With a potential IPO later this year, the space industry – first in low-Earth orbit, then on the moon – will be center stage for […]

What Price Will You Pay For What You Need? By Michael Every of Rabobank A Material Shift It was that 2026 rarity of a genuinely ‘quiet day’ on Monday with the US out for Presidents’ Day and much of Asia already on holiday for Lunar New Year. However, despite China staying out for the rest of the week, things are likely to shift to a higher gear from today onwards. The RBA minutes this morning, which explained why rates were […]

SpaceX Enters Secretive Pentagon Contest To Build Voice-Controlled Drone Swarm Tech: Report Last week, we asked whether Anthropic’s AI tool, Claude, played a role in the kill chain during the U.S. Delta Force raid targeting Maduro last month. We’ve also reported on the Department of War’s search for “war unicorn” startups, and what appears to us to be the early innings of the rise of dual-use technologies – from humanoid robots to […]

Trump Calls In FEMA To Respond To Sewage Disaster In Potomac River Authored by Jill McLaughlin via The Epoch Times, President Donald Trump is directing federal emergency teams to respond to a sewage spill on the Potomac River, calling it a “massive ecological disaster” and blaming local leaders for not handling the crisis, which began nearly a month ago. “There is a massive Ecological Disaster unfolding in the Potomac River […]

Hyatt Executive Chairman Thomas Pritzker Resigns Over Epstein Ties Authored by Tom Ozimek via The Epoch Times, Thomas J. Pritzker, the longtime executive chairman of Hyatt Hotels Corporation, announced his retirement effective immediately on Feb. 16, acknowledging what he described as “terrible judgment” in maintaining contact with convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein and his associate Ghislaine Maxwell. Pritzker, 75, said […]

Netflix Grants Warner Bros. One Week Waiver To Reopen Paramount Skydance Deal Talks Warner Bros. Discovery said in a press release that it will temporarily reopen talks with Paramount Skydance after Netflix granted a seven-day waiver, allowing WBD to address “deficiencies that remain unresolved and clarify certain terms of PSKY’s proposed merger agreement.” “Netflix has provided WBD a limited waiver under the terms of WBD’s merger […]

Russia Pounded By Biggest Ukrainian Drone Swarm Since January Ahead Of Geneva Talks Russia’s Defense Ministry on Tuesday is reporting an overnight and early morning attack which marked the largest drone assault from Ukraine since early January. Russian air defenses shot down more than 150 Ukrainian drones in the attack which included hundreds of UAVs sent in total, as officials from both sides are imminently expected meet in […]

Oil Declines As Iran Says ‘Understanding’ Reached In US Nuclear Negotiation The second round of indirect negotiations between the United States and Iran concluded in Geneva, Iran’s semi-official Students’ News Agency (ISNA) reported Tuesady. Delegations from both sides left the venue following the talks, however, the Iranian side says it’s ready to stay in Switzerland for days or even weeks if needed, in order to reach a deal and […]

Nuclear Reactor Transported By Air For First Time In 60 Years In coordination with the Department of War and the Department of Energy, Valar Atomics has transported their high-temperature gas-cooled reactor from California to Utah via C-17.  The event marks a major turning point for the nuclear industry, as reactor developers had been seen until this point as just another group of boring construction teams and quiet operators. But […]

Futures Fall As AI Selloff Resumes US equity futures woke up after President’s Day and chose to resume their selloff (after a modest bounce on Monday’s holiday failed to hold) dragged by Tech, as the risk-off moves on AI disruption fears continue. As of 8:15am ET, S&P 500 futures were down 0.5% with Nasdaq 100 contracts falling 1.0%. In premarket trading, all Mag 7 stocks are lower and Semis are being pressured with AVGO / NVDA […]

When Cash Disappears, So Does Something Else Authored by Mollie Engelhart via The Epoch Times, Last Sunday, I held a book signing at Pearl in San Antonio, the kind of place magazines love to feature. Old brick buildings have been transformed into beautiful restaurants, boutiques, apartments, and bookstores. It feels curated yet charming, historic yet modern, a vision of how we’re told that cities should look and feel. My […]

BHP’s Copper Pivot Pays Off With Surprise Dividend Bump, Record-High Stock Price Shares of BHP Group, the world’s largest miner, jumped to a record high in Australia after it posted earnings at the top end of Wall Street expectations. The miner’s pivot into copper, aided by a surging rally in industrial metals, offset softer conditions in its iron ore unit. BHP chief executive Mike Henry reaffirmed to investors earlier on a call […]

The Obama Administration’s Prostitution Scandal And The Ruemmler-Epstein Connection Remember Obama’s 2012 Colombian prostitution scandal? Turns out, Jeffrey Epstein was involved… Newly released Department of Justice documents from the Epstein files have exposed a previously unknown connection between a 2012 White House advance-team scandal in Cartagena, Colombia, and Kathryn Ruemmler – the former Obama White House counsel who […]

Italy Beckons The Rich: How Flat Taxes And Lifestyle Are Luring Global Millionaires Submitted by Thomas Kolbe Think of Italy, and wanderlust awakens immediately. Last year, over 140 million visitors experienced the beauty of the Amalfi Coast, enjoyed time at Lake Garda, in South Tyrol, Tuscany, or on the beaches of Sicily. Italy is a land of dreams with a rich cultural history, attracting those who want to experience the dolce vita […]

Civil Rights Leader Rev. Jesse Jackson Dead At 84 The Rev. Jesse Jackson, the longtime civil rights activist and two-time presidential candidate, died on Tuesday at the age of 84, according to NBC News. Jackson’s family released this statement: “Our father was a servant leader, not only to our family, but to the oppressed, the voiceless, and the overlooked around the world. We shared him with the world, and in return, the world […]

In Defense Of Sir Jim Ratcliffe Authored by Charles Johnson via TheCritic.co.uk, Far more energy has gone into condemning his phrasing than confronting the questions he raised… Sir Jim Ratcliffe’s statement that Britain has been “colonised by immigrants” has sparked a fierce reaction. From Starmer to Bluesky, to the Athletic and all the football social media pundits in between, the co-owner of  Manchester United has […]

Asians More Optimistic Than Most For Their Countries’ Future A recent Ipsos survey of 25,000 people across 30 countries shows Asians are on average more optimistic for the future of their countries than people from the rest of the world. When asked whether they believe things in their country are headed in the right direction or off on the wrong track, 82 percent of respondents in Singapore said they think the city-state is […]

Germany’s Climate Policy Has Moved From Politics To The Courts… And The Economy Is Paying The Price Submitted by Thomas Kolbe Germany is the political engine of the Green Deal, yet it continues to fall short of its own CO₂ reduction targets. Now Germany’s Federal Administrative Court in Leipzig has ordered the federal government to tighten its climate targets by the end of March. The ruling follows a lawsuit filed by the […]

Visualizing The World’s Countries By Political System Nearly three-quarters of the world’s population now lives under autocratic rule, according to the V-Dem Institute’s 2024 Regimes of the World report. That’s the highest share since 1978. The map below, via Visual Capitalist’s Bruno Venditti, classifies every country into one of four political systems: closed autocracy, electoral autocracy, electoral democracy, or […]

Impoverishment Of Spaniards Is The Result Of Years Of Interventionist Policies Authored by Daniel Lacalle, Inflation, bloating GDP with public spending and immigration and hidden unemployment are the ingredients of the so-called “economic miracle” of the Sánchez administration. Spain closes 2025 with the consumer price index (CPI) rate above the euro area average and higher than all the large economies in Europe. […]