Business

Authored by Zainab Calcuttawala via OilPrice.com,

Tesla is not the only one bringing electric engines to cargo transport.

China just launched its first all-electric cargo ship, which will travel 50 miles at a top speed of 8 miles per hour on a single charge. Though it will be able to carry 2,200 tons of cargo with every haul, that battery capacity is barely enough to fulfill any transatlantic shipments. It will take just two hours to recharge, which is about as much time the vessel needs to unload at a destination.

What a difference a year makes: last December, just as the ECB was about to shock the market with the announcement of its first €20 billion QE tapering, macroeconomic data mattered, especially since the Fed's tightening intertia appeared to truly be data-dependent, if only for a very short period of time.

The Federal Reserve’s tools for achieving its dual mandate
of low inflation and full employment manipulate interest rates and therefore
markets.  This manipulation of rates reverberates
globally. Their manipulation historically had been more light handed and
invisible to most of the public.  However, over the last decade, their impact on
interest rates and yield levels have been the most dramatic in the history of
the Federal Reserve. 

Back in 2005, anyone with a modest amount of startup capital and a dream could become a millionaire flipping houses.  The complete disregard for the underlying risk building up in what was later exposed as one of the biggest pricing bubbles in history resulted in investors dominating a market that had previously been reserved for boring people who actually intended to purchase homes to live in them.

The more Washington lashes out in anger at those who will not bow to the unipolar world order, the more the rest of the world fights back. As the launch of its Yuan/Gold-settled oil futures looms, China is escalating its de-dollarization scheme further by seeking a bilateral rial-yuan agreement with Iran.

As a reminder, nothing lasts forever...

The World Bank's former chief economist wants to replace the US dollar with a single global super-currency, saying it will create a more stable global financial system.