Business

Via Political Calculations blog,

The city of Philadelphia's controversial soda tax is providing a lot of material for serious scientists to evaluate the effects of arbitrarily imposing a tax on the distribution of a range of naturally and artificially-sweetened beverages. Since we're near the end of the tax's first year of being in effect, we thought we'd focus upon one of the more interesting findings to date.

Consumers are primarily the ones paying the tax

Despite the GOP's tax reform victory, over the past few weeks, Congress once again punted on a formal decision how to keep government funded and what to do with America's debt ceiling and as a result US legislators simply kicked the can on the agreement of raising the nation’s borrowing limit for another few months. However, with the Treasury expected to breach the ceiling as soon as late March, today's $45 billion 3-Month Bill auction was closely watched as it serves as a fresh gauge of investor anxiety about the ongoing impasse.

While the wholesale disappearance of retail traders from stock markets is hardly a novel observation, it has taken on a whole new meaning in Japan, where the lack of carbon-based investors has prompted Deutsche Bank to ask if "Japan's stocks are still traded at all by humans."

The Fed raised rates another 0.25% the week before last.

This marks the 5th rate hike since the Fed embarked on its policy tightening in December 2015 and the fourth rate hike in the last 12 months. The Fed’s latest statement also indicates it plans on raising rates three more times in 2018.

After a quiet overnight session, the price of Brent Crude spiked following news of an explosion at a Libyan crude oil pipeline that feeds the Es Sider sea terminal - home of the largest oil depot in Libya - a source from the Libyan National Army told The Libya Times Tuesday. The blast happened near 30km northwest of Marada, the source said.