United States

Authored by Michael Snyder via The Economic Collapse blog,

Not even during the worst parts of the last recession did things ever get this bad for the U.S. retail industry. 

The signing of a $350 billion arms deal between the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia and the US might not be enough to convince the Saudis to bring the Aramco IPO – expected to be the biggest public offering in markets history – to New York City.

Via Global Macro Monitor,

The yield curve is flattening like a pancake.  

Tightening cycles tend to do that.

Furthermore, the effective float of 10-year and longer U.S. notes and bonds is relatively small and greatly distorts the bond market signal.   We have written about this several times.

Authored by Simon Black via SovereignMan.com,

This one is almost too ridiculous to believe.

Recently a new bill was introduced on the floor of the US Senate entitled, pleasantly,

“Combating Money Laundering, Terrorist Financing, and Counterfeiting Act of 2017.”

You can probably already guess its contents.

Cash is evil.

 

Bitcoin is evil.

 

With the naval and economic blockade of Qatar extending into the second week, while Qatar's banks and money exchanges are fast running out of dollars, today the wealthy Gulf state defied and accused the Saudi-led alliance of engaging in an "illegal siege" designed to apply political pressure, while rebuffing the Saudi "offer" of food and aid.