Day-in, day-out, asset-gatherers and commision-rakers remind hapless investors that all is well in stock markets because "there is a coordinated global economic recovery" going on... "that hasn't happened for years." As you might imagine... that is not exactly true when one looks at the hard data.
As global growth expectations slipped throughout 2015 and into Q1 2016, so global stocks (and bond yields) also declined.
The past two weeks have been quite a rollercoaster for bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies. In loose chronological order, we have seen:
We've frequently argued that public pensions in the U.S. are nothing more than elaborate ponzi schemes being propped up by unrealistic accounting assumptions that make them seem more healthy than they actually are. As it turns out, the State Budget Director of Kentucky, John Chilton, is coming around to our way of thinking.
When Equifax first disclosed the shocking news on September 7 that its servers and some 143 million private account had been hacked, leaking everything from names, to addresses, to social security numbers, it stated in its press release that it had "learned of the incident on July 29, 2017" adding that "at which point it reported the intrusion to law enforcement and contracted a cybersecurity firm to conduct a forensic review: based on the company’s investigation, the unauthorized access occurred from mid-May through July 2017."
In 2009, U.S. Shipping Partners LP accomplished what we believe was a completely unprecedented feat when they managed to confirm a bankruptcy plan of reorganization in the Southern District of New York that encumbered the new company with more debt than their investment bankers said the company was even worth.