Financial Markets and Economy
Haven Rally Sends Stocks Lower (Wall Street Journal)
Haven assets rallied Thursday, driving the dollar to its lowest level against the yen since 2014.
What Do Share Buybacks Really Tell Us About the Stock Market (A Wealth of Common Sense)
Chief executive officers, who just announced the biggest round of monthly repurchases ever, executed about $550 billion of buybacks last year, according to data compiled by S&P Dow Jones Indices. That compares with a net $85 billion of deposits by customers of mutual and exchange-traded funds, the biggest gap since 2012, data compiled by Bloomberg and Investment Company Institute show.
Bankers hate it when you hold cash (Business Insider)
In an extraordinary turn of events, last week we were contacted by our local bankers.
U.S. Consumer Comfort Slips to Weakest in More Than Three Months (Bloomberg)
Consumer comfort inched lower last week, reaching the weakest point in more than three months as Americans’ views of their personal finances deteriorated.
Why Everyone Is Talking About the Japanese Yen (Wall Street Journal)
Many said the U.S. dollar would rise against the Japanese yen this year. Instead it has fallen, baffling investors and leading to fierce speculation on when it could reverse.
Puerto Rico Has Decided It Doesn't Need to Pay Its Debts (Fortune)
Puerto Rico’s governor on Wednesday signed an emergency bill allowing the government to halt payments on its debt, throwing into doubt broader restructuring plans to stave off a financial collapse of the U.S. territory.
The measure, which earlier passed Puerto Rico’s legislature, lets Governor Alejandro Garcia Padilla declare a moratorium on any debt payment he deems necessary and could alter the structure of the Government Development Bank (GDB), the island’s primary fiscal agent.
Fed's Cautious Approach on April Rate Hike Raises Stakes for June (Bloomberg)
Federal Reserve policy makers last month debated an April interest-rate hike, with several officials leaning against such a move because it would send the wrong signal and others saying it might be warranted.
Weak U.S. earnings expectations set stage for stock gains (Reuters)
When Wall Street's quarterly earnings season kicks in to high gear next week, hundreds of companies will vie for the bragging rights that come from "beating the Street" – showing revenues and profits that are higher than analysts expected.
The Fed Minutes, Annotated: When Will Yellen Raise Rates (Bloomberg)
The Federal Reserve has just published the minutes of its March meeting.
U.S. readies bank rule on shell companies amid 'Panama Papers' fury (Reuters)
The U.S. Treasury Department intends to soon issue a long-delayed rule forcing banks to seek the identities of people behind shell-company account holders, after the "Panama Papers" leak provoked a global uproar over the hiding of wealth via offshore banking devices.
Rising Middle East Natural Gas Demand Boosts U.S. LNG (Forbes)
Although holding just 3% of the global population, the Middle East consumes nearly 15% of the world’s natural gas, or about 15.5 Tcf per year. The Middle East does have over 40% of the world’s proven natural gas reserves, but just two countries, Iran and Qatar, account for 80% of that.
The ‘Incredible Hulk’ chart pattern that’s smashing the dollar (Market Watch)
The dollar took a sharp turn south against the yen on Thursday, but if you’d been watching a popular technical chart, none of this would have come as much of a surprise.
New Reasons to Worry About Europe's Banks (Bloomberg View)
European banks have lost their mojo. A toxic combination of negative interest rates, comatose economies and a regulatory backdrop that might euphemistically be described as challenging is wreaking havoc with bank business models. Their collective market value has dropped by a quarter so far this year.
There's a $2 Trillion GDP Boost in Shrinking the U.S. Gender Gap (Bloomberg)
Improving gender equality would add at least $2.1 trillion to U.S. gross domestic product by 2025, according to a McKinsey Global Institute study, a boost roughly the size of the Texas economy.
U.S. jobless claims fall despite anemic economic growth (Reuters)
The number of Americans filing for unemployment benefits fell more than expected last week, suggesting the labor market continued to strengthen despite tepid economic growth.
Initial claims for state unemployment benefits declined 9,000 to a seasonally adjusted 267,000 for the week ended April 2, the Labor Department said on Thursday.
37% of the government’s total reported assets are student loans (Value Walk)
Hot off the presses, the US government just published its audited financial statements this morning, signed and sealed by Treasury Secretary Jack Lew.
Japan Prints Additional ¥10,000 Bills As People Scramble To Stash Away Cash (Zero Hedge)
Long before negative interest rates shifted from the monetary twilight zone into the mainstream (with some 30% of global government bonds now trading with a subzero yield), one organization wrote a report warning about the dangers of NIRP. The NY Fed. Back in 2012, NY Fed staffers wrote "If Interest Rates Go Negative . . . Or, Be Careful What You Wish For" it warned "if rates go negative, the U.S. Treasury Department’s Bureau of Engraving and Printing will likely be called upon to print a lot more currency as individuals and small businesses substitute cash for at least some of their bank balances."
IT spending could be a casualty of economic uncertainty: Gartner (Reuters)
Worldwide spending on information technology could become one of the casualties of global economic uncertainty this year, according to research firm Gartner Inc.
Politics
Bernie Sanders's Successful Insurgency (The Atlantic)
Bernie Sanders’s resounding victory in Tuesday’s Wisconsin primary cements his status as one of the Democratic Party’s most successful insurgents ever, even as it leaves him still facing a steep uphill climb to overtake Hillary Clinton for the presidential nomination.
But his is not a problem for most hoity-toities, for they don’t deal with the great unwashed. But cluelessness about the masses can become a major occupational hazard for political elites — including campaign operatives, candidates, pundits, and the big-money donor class. And while this is a problem for the establishments of both major political parties, today’s Republican establishment now finds that it is so out of touch with regular voters that it now faces a howling, Category-5 hurricane that’s threatening to implode the Grand Old Party.
Clinton camp asks Sanders: Break up big banks? How? (Reuters)
Hillary Clinton's campaign, stung by a string of losses, is testing a new line of attack against rival Bernie Sanders before New York's Democratic primary: sharply question his credentials and ability to implement a campaign pledge to break up big banks.
Meanwhile, a new opinion poll released Thursday showed national support for Sanders and Clinton nearly evenly divided, with 46 percent backing Clinton and 47 percent behind Sanders.
The Ted Cruz purity test: A Cruz nomination could be apocalyptic for the right (Salon)
There’s a popular strain of thought weaving through the American right that treats conservatism as an infallible good, a sort of deity to be faithfully served. If, as a politician, you are true to conservatism in the purest way possible, then you will know nothing but policy success and electoral triumph. But if your policy goes sour or you lose an election, it’s not because conservatism was rejected – it was because you failed conservatism.
Technology
9 Tricks That Will Change How You Use Your iPhone (Time)
Forget hammers and screwdrivers — iPhones are the most important tool of our times. But do you wield yours like a pro, or do your thumbs fumble its screen like an amateur?
From apps that dash off reminders with a simple tap, to settings that make your battery stretch well into the night, these nine tips can help you get the most out of your iPhone.
Self-driving truck convoy completes its first major journey across Europe (The Verge)
This morning, a fleet of self-driving trucks arrived in the Dutch port of Maasvlakte, completing a cross-continent journey that organizers say demonstrates the future of transport in Europe. The experiment is known as the European Truck Platooning Challenge, and involved trucks from six different manufacturers traveling in miniature convoys.
Ocean farmers are using technology to start an economic revolution and save humanity (Quartz)
I’m a fisherman who dropped out of high school in 1986 at the age of 14. Over my lifetime, I’ve spent many nights in jail. I’m an epileptic. I’m asthmatic. I don’t even know how to swim. This is my story. It’s a story of ecological redemption.
I was born and raised in Petty Harbour, Newfoundland, a little fishing village with 14 salt-box houses painted in greens, blues, and reds so that fishermen could find their way home in the fog.
Health and Life Sciences
Obama Administration to Transfer Ebola Funds to Zika Fight (NY Times)
Officials said that in an effort to contain the Zika virus, they would move a total of $589 million, most of which was originally intended to protect against Ebola.
How A Painkiller Designed To Deter Abuse Helped Spark An HIV Outbreak (NPR)
When Kevin Polly first started abusing Opana ER, a potent prescription opioid painkiller, he took pills — or fractions of pills — and crushed them into a fine powder, then snorted it.
When Opana pills are swallowed, they release their painkilling ingredient over 12 hours. If the pills were crushed and snorted, though, the drug was released in a single dose.
Life on the Home Planet
Here's How Much of Our Resources We Burn On Food No One Eats (Gizmodo)
Whether you’re counting by calories, pounds, or dollars, the world is wasting a huge amount of food. But there’s also another way to measure it: The quantity of resources we burn up for nothing at all.
The UN estimates that growing our food accounts for about 5 billion (and climbing) tons a year of carbon emissions; that’s about one fifth of the global carbon emissions.
The World Is Getting Fatter and No One Knows How to Stop It (Bloomberg)
Humanity is putting on weight. Across the globe, in wealthy countries and developing nations, among children and adults, an increasing number of people are overweight or obese. Today, nearly 40 percent of the world’s adults fall into one of those categories, according to new estimates by a global network of researchers called the NCD Risk Factor Collaboration.
