Financial Markets and Economy
Joseph Stiglitz Says Standard Economics Is Wrong. Inequality and Unearned Income Kills the Economy (Evonomics)
In the middle of the twentieth century, it came to be believed that ‘a rising tide lifts all boats’: economic growth would bring increasing wealth and higher living standards to all sections of society.
S&P 500: Nothing Has Changed (Nikhil Gupta, Seeking Alpha)
S&P 500 (NYSEARCA: SPY) slid 2.45 percent to 2127.81, Dow Jones (NYSEARCA: DIA) lost 2.13 percent to 18,085.45 and NASDAQ ( QQQ) tumbled the most, with 2.54 percent in losses to end a forgetful Friday at 5125.91.
S&P 500 Tanks – The Sky is Falling? (Value Walk)
Investors reacted like the sky was falling on Friday. Commentators mostly blamed the -400 point decline in the Dow on heightened probabilities for a September rate hike by Janet Yellen and her fellow Federal Reserve colleagues.
How To Do Investment Property Analysis (Mashvisor, Medium)
Buying an investment property and joining the world of real estate is exciting! Finding the best property is the catch. There are two types of data to look at when doing an investment property analysis: quantitative and qualitative.
Speculative Trading on U.S. Markets Is at a Dangerous High (Money Morning)
Speculative trading on so-called long contracts, or long-term bets that the markets will rise, has reached a startling high this year.
Treasurys are getting crushed (Business Insider)
US Treasurys are under significant pressure for a second consecutive day. Friday's selling has yields up 7 to 8 basis points at the long end of the curve with the 10-year yield now at 1.666%, its highest since late June. When bond prices go fall, yields rise.
The ECB keeps digging itself a deeper hole (Mauldin Economics)
ECB President Mario Draghi famously pledged to do “whatever it takes” to restore eurozone growth. His attempts to fulfill that promise have led to NIRP and other bizarre policies like the central bank’s massive asset purchases.
Negative Interest Rates and the War on Cash (3) (The Automatic Earth)
Nicole Foss: Bitcoin and other electronic platforms have paved the way psychologically for a shift away from cash, although they have done so by emphasising decentralisation and anonymity rather than the much greater central control which would be inherent in a mainstream electronic currency.
Wall Street Sell-off: A Scary Chart For Investors (Forbes)
One day’s chart doesn’t say much about Wall Street’s direction. But there’s something scary in Friday’s sell-off chart: The sell-off extended across several asset categories and commodities.
Wholesale Sales Tumble Most Since January, Inventories Ratio Deep In Recessionary Territory (Zero Hedge)
Wholesales sales slumped 0.4% MoM in July – the biggest drop since January. Inventories were unchanged MoM, driving the inventories-to-sales ratio back up to 1.34x.
Biggest Oil Traders See Another Year of Pain as Glut Endures (Bloomberg)
The largest oil traders are anticipating little relief to what has become the worst market slump in a generation.
Large Scale Central Bank Asset Purchases, With A Twist (Includes Bonds Bought by Reserve Managers) (Council Foreign Relations)
I got my start, so to speak, tracking global reserve growth and then trying to map global reserve flows to the TIC data. So I have long thought that large scale central bank purchases of U.S. Treasuries and Agencies, and German bunds, and JGBs didn’t start with large scale asset purchase programs (the academic name for “QE”) by the Fed, the ECB and the BoJ.
10 Sunday Reads (Ritholtz)
My easy like Sunday morning reads:
Why the Silver Spot Price Will Hit $22 by the End of 2016 (Money Morning)
The silver spot price is down 1.6% in afternoon trading today (Friday) as September interest rate hike talks have gathered momentum. Despite today's slip, we still see the silver spot price hitting $22 by the end of 2016.
Companies
CVS: Thanks Mylan! Investors Should Seize The Opportunity To Buy CVS At Significant Discount (Bryan Boulden, Seeking Alpha)
CVS Healthcare (NYSE:CVS) has managed to build, both organically and through major acquisitions, one of the best positioned businesses in the Healthcare Industry.
Wells Fargo Scam Proves Banks Are Rotten to the Core, Time to Opt for Bitcoin (The Cointelegraph)
The Los Angeles City Attorney and Consumer Financial Protection Bureau fined Wells Fargo US$185 million for creating fake bank accounts to meet their sales targets. The incident presented a convincing case for Bitcoin and its ability to grant users complete control over their money.
MORGAN STANLEY: 5 ways Bill Ackman could stir things up at Chipotle (Business Insider)
Pershing Square announced on Tuesday that it bought a 9.9% stake in Chipotle, and is seeking talks with the company.
How Long Have America's Companies Been In Business? [Infographic] (Forbes)
There were approximately 5.4 million companies with paid employees across the United States in 2014, according to U.S. Census Bureau research. How many of those companies boast long and successful histories and how many were created in recent years?
These Technologies May Actually Deliver Elon Musk’s Dream of Changing the World (Bloomberg)
As Tesla founder Elon Musk promises to change the world, starting with a giant battery factory in the Nevada desert, investors from Toronto to Tokyo are quietly developing the next-generation technologies that may actually get him there.
Politics
Why banks and politicians love to make fun of liberal arts degrees (Slate)
This past weekend, Wells Fargo issued a public apology after its marketing campaign for something called Teen Financial Education Day suggested that an interest in the arts—and perhaps a potential career in them—was a childish thing to be put aside.
With Koch Brothers Academy, Conservatives Settle In for Long War (NY Times)
ARLINGTON, Va. — The rise of Donald J. Trump, with his hostility toward free trade and vow to protect entitlements, is a sharp rebuke to the free-market principles long championed by the billionaire brothers Charles G. and David H. Koch.
Newt Gingrich Breaks Into Coughing Fit While Discussing Hillary Clinton’s Coughing Fit (Think Progress)
When former House Speaker Newt Gingrich appeared on Sean Hannity’s talk radio program on Tuesday, the two engaged in a long segment of banter and speculation about Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton’s cough. Then, Gingrich started coughing himself.
Opinion writers throw everything they have against Trump (Columbia Journalism Review)
WHAT DOES IT MEAN TO BE A REPUBLICAN? Variations of the question have been posed ad nauseum over the past year as reality TV star and Twitter personality Donald Trump insulted his way to the party’s presidential nomination.
Technology
Magnetique is the VR’s first 3D, 360-degree comic book (Venture Beat)
Fire up the Bat Signal; we now have VR’s first official 3D, 360 degree comic book.
Oniride today launches the first issue of Magnetique, a new comic series for Gear VR (Oculus Store). This isn’t your traditional book simply digitized like some sort of VR e-reader.
If Machines Can Think, Do They Deserve Civil Rights? (Singularity Hub)
Over the past century, we have made massive strides in the rights revolution. These include rights for women, children, the LGBT community, animals, and so much more. Exploring the future, we must ask ourselves: what next? Will we ever fight for the rights of artificial intelligence? If so, when will this AI rights revolution occur, and what will it look like?
There is no Apple Car — and there never will be (Business Insider)
The rumor mill about the Apple Car grinds on and on and on, and we keep getting little clues about what "Project Titan" may or may not be all about.
Health and Life Sciences
Despite Obamacare Woes, Hospitals Doing Just Fine For Now (Forbes)
The nation’s hospitals continue to enjoy financial stability and improving operations thanks to millions of newly insuredAmericans under the Affordable Care Act, according to new reports.
Animated map of what Earth would look like if all the ice melted (Business Insider)
We learned last year that many of the effects of climate change are irreversible. Sea levels have been rising at a greater rate year after year, and the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change estimates they could rise by another meter or more by the end of this century.
Life on the Home Planet
The U.S. Can’t Afford To Keep Losing Honeybees Like This (Think Progress)
It’s been another rough year for honeybees.
On Tuesday, the Bee Informed Partnership released its annual report on total losses of managed honeybees—those kept by beekeepers—across the country.
Ten Ways 'Proxima b' Is Different From Earth (Starts with a Bang, Forbes)
At the end of August, a scientific team from the European Southern Observatory announced the discovery of Proxima b, the first exoplanet ever discovered around Proxima Centauri, the closest star in the Universe to our Sun.
Amid the horror of 9/11, taking this photograph changed my life (The Guardian)
That obstinate cop on the barricade at Fulton and Broadway probably saved my life. It’s less than a minute before the South Tower of the World Trade Center collapses on the morning of 11 September 2001. I’m a block away trying to get closer, waving my press card in the cop’s face. He stands his ground, barking: “It’s not safe, it’s not safe.”
What Should a Cubs Fan Pay to Realize a Lifelong Dream? (NY Times)
Setting a budget for a ticket to see the Chicago Cubs play a World Series game in Wrigley Field is a complex and, arguably, dangerous exercise.
The Onion review of “Sully” is hilarious (Holy Kaw)
The new movie Sully tells the story of the famous “Miracle on the Hudson,” a flight downed by a flock of geese. The movie focuses on the heroic captain, Sully, but aren’t the filmmakers leaving something out?
Apocalypse Tourism? Cruising the Melting Arctic Ocean (Bloomberg)
On Aug. 16, the Crystal Serenity set out from Seward, Alaska, carrying 1,700 passengers and crew, and escorted by a comparatively minuscule, 1,800-ton icebreaker.
