United States

It is safe to say that nobody expected the BOJ stunner announced last night, when Kuroda announced that Japan would become the latest country to unleash negative interest rates, for one simple reason: Kuroda himself said Japan would not adopt negative rates just one week ago! However, a few BIS conference calls since then clearly changed the Japanese central banker's mind and as we wrote, and as those who are just waking up are shocked to learn, negative rates are now a reality in Japan.

A U.S. official has confirmed that North Korea may have tested components of a hydrogen bomb on January 6, after reviewing intelligence of the operation.  The unnamed official says there was a partial test of a hydrogen bomb, despite claims to the contrary by Western media outlets. CNN.com reports: Immediately following the test earlier this month, White House Press Secretary Josh Earnest said the initial analysis that have been conducted was “not consistent” with a successful hydrogen bomb test. The U.S.

Submitted by Richard Ebeling via EpicTimes.com,

President Barack Obama delivered his final State of the Union address on January 12, 2016, and devoted most of the time to defending his “legacy” of bigger and more intrusive government, with an emphasis on the other aspects of personal and social life he wished could come under the blanket of more political paternalism, if only there was enough time before he leaves office on January 20, 2017.

Via BusinessCycle.com,

Grand Experiments That Are Too Big To Fail

As the great and the good gathered in Davos to ponder the next big thing, the pummeling of global equity markets brought key assumptions into question. Yet, their collective heads stayed buried in the snow with regard to the big ideas from years past, namely, the three grand economic experiments launched by the U.S., Japan and China following the Global Financial Crisis.

Meet the new Ebola.

Well over a year since the global fears over the Ebola epidemic sent US stocks reeling in late 2014 ahead of an even sharper rebound, today the head of the World Health Organization delivered a very stern warning when she said that the Zika virus, a mosquito-borne pathogen that may cause birth defects when pregnant women are infected, has been “spreading explosively” in South and Central America.