News and my thoughts from last week (17Feb2025)
SCIENTISTS IDENTIFY WHERE "CITY-KILLING" ASTEROID COULD STRIKE EARTH IN 2032 NASA warns asteroid 2024 YR4 has a 2.1% chance of colliding with Earth on December 22, 2032, with impact projections spanning South America, Africa, and Asia. With a diameter of up to 90 meters (300 feet), the asteroid could unleash an 8-megaton explosion—500 times the Hiroshima bomb—if it strikes a populated area. Scientists are using the James Webb Telescope to refine predictions, but for now, the risk remains. Source: Daily Mail
Putin has invited Xi and Trump to the WW2 victory celebrations in Moscow. Xi has already accepted. Trump will accept too, according to my sources. What a blow to the EU! - X user Alernative NewsIs peace within sight?
Hewlett Packard Enterprise (HPE) warned that Cisco and Huawei would be the beneficiaries if the US government successfully blocked the company's $14 billion play for Juniper Networks. - LightReading
BlackRock paid RMB 1.2 billion to buy Waterfront Place blocks in 2018 One year after BlackRock had attempted to find a buyer for a Shanghai office complex at a 30 percent discount to its acquisition price, the world’s largest asset manager has handed over the the Putuo district buildings to its lender, according to market sources who spoke with Mingtiandi. - Mingtiandi
Image from WolfStreet
Total household debt outstanding inched up by $93 billion in Q4, or by 0.5%, from Q3 to $18.0 trillion, according to the Household Debt and Credit Report from the New York Fed today. Year-over-year, total household debt grew by 3.0%. - Wolfstreet
Red flags raised after debts soar at Sir Jim Ratcliffe’s chemicals empire Ratings agencies downgraded the outlook for Ineos Group to ‘negative’ as tycoon’s sporting interests also hit crisis point - The Guardian
PPI/CPI news
January PPI inflation unexpectedly RISES to 3.5%, above expectations of 3.2%. Core PPI inflation was 3.6%, ABOVE expectations of 3.3%. PPI inflation is now at its highest since February 2023 while CPI jumped +0.5% month-over-month. The "Fed pivot" is over. To make things even worse, December Core PPI inflation was revised HIGHER from 3.5% to 3.7%. This comes after the biggest monthly increase in CPI inflation since August 2023. Inflation is far from gone. - X user The Kobeissi Letter
US ECONOMY HAS: 1) JOBS REVISED DOWN BY ~600K over the past year 2) CORE CPI INFLATION ABOVE 3% FOR 45 MONTHS 3) 694 BIG bankruptcies in 2024, the most in 14 YEARS 4) $838 billion Deficit in the first 4 months of FY 2025 5) $36.2tn DEBT - record - X user Global Markets Investor
Are the world already at war? It is not about physical bullets but conflicts waged in cyberspace. Should we be surprised?
BRICS: India Dumps Billions of US Dollars - Watcher GuruAlibaba becomes China’s new AI darling with US$87 billion rally Behind the rally is optimism about Alibaba’s efforts to develop its own AI services and platform - Business Times Singapore
“Trans-Pacific rates have eased since early January, but with expectations that frontloading ahead of tariffs will continue we may not see the typical post-Lunar New Year pre-peak season demand dip this year,” wrote Judah Levine, head of research for Barcelona, Spain-based Freightos - FreightWaves
Indian oil refiners are restructuring supply chains with new entities and shipping arrangements to continue importing Russian crude amid stricter US sanctions. Despite challenges, efforts are underway to procure Russian oil without disrupting supplies or incurring higher costs. - Economic Times
India and France plan to work together on developing small modular nuclear reactors, India's foreign ministry said after Prime Minister Narendra Modi's visit to the country. - BBC
Computer researchers in China using domestically made graphics processors have achieved a near-tenfold boost in performance over powerful US supercomputers that rely on Nvidia’s cutting-edge hardware, according to a peer-reviewed study. - SCMP
De-dollarization process is reshaping international trade as Russia and India strengthen their financial partnership, with 90% of direct transactions now conducted in national currencies. - Watcher Guru
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