presidential election

After recent (and in some cases very dramatic) bearish conversions by the likes of JPM, BofA, Citi and UBS, the only bank that steadfastly held a bullish view on stocks during the recent market squeeze higher was Goldman Sachs.

Not any more.

On Thursday, Goldman strategist David Kostin appeared on CNBC, where he too join the bearish crowd and said that based on the threat of margin collapse ("35 out of 53 tech companies had margin declines") and record-high stock valuations this year, it's time to play defense in "a tough market."

With Trump now practically assured of the republican candidacy and the only remaining race being that between Hillary and Bernie, Ralph Nader, a former presidential candidate himself, had some disturbing if accurate words about the democratic primary process. In a story published in US News, Nader said that Hillary Clinton is "going to win by dictatorship" in the Democratic race against Bernie Sanders.

When we explained yesterday the next steps in the Dilma Rousseff impeachment process, we predicted that "Brazil's problems are only just starting" for several reasons, chief among them being that the man who is now Brazil's next active president, Michel Temer, is almost as unpopular as the president he is replacing, and is stained by scandals of his own.

Submitted by Mish Shedlock of MishTalk

Healthcare insurers are already taking it on the chin. Some insurers got out of the healthcare business entirely, others stopped coverage in multiple states due to mounting losses.

What happened is healthy individuals, especially millennials decided to opt out of Obamacare. Those who opted in after having been denied coverage previously were high-cost individuals.

Adding fat to the fire, a federal court ruled today that “cost sharing reductions”  to insurers are unconstitutional payments.

Following today's Brazilian Senate vote, which as reported earlier was expected to vote overwhelmingly to endorse Dilma Rousseff's impeachment and did just that in a 55-22 vote, Rousseff appealed to the public in a televized broadcast and condemned the move to impeach her as a "coup" and a "farce", denying she has committed any crimes.