Tech Review | US Imports From Vietnam Surge, While China Declines

Tech Review (TR 2019-06-29)--Domain Mondo's weekly review of tech investing news: Features • 1) Trump Effect: US Imports From Vietnam Surge, While China Declines, 2)  Facebook's Libra Could Disrupt the Remittance Industry, 3) Investing YTD & Investor Notes: China, EU, US, & Zombies,  4) ICYMI Tech News: Apple, Flipkart, iQiyi, Google, Microsoft, Amazon, and more.

1) Trump Effect: US Imports From Vietnam Surge, While China Declines
And it's not just Vietnam that is a winner from the US-China Trade War:

source: statista.com

Editor's note and caveat: "Exports from China are a murky thing. To dodge tariffs, some of it gets transshipped via other countries, such as Vietnam, before the products are shipped to their destinations, such as the US or the EU ..."--Wolfstreet.com.

Nevertheless, in a note this week, Anne Stevenson-Yang, co-founder of J. Capital Research  (domain: jcapitalresearch.com), wrote that China has already entered its “Japanese phase,” marshalling financial resources exclusively to avoid crisis. China's economy is overleveraged, as demonstrated clearly by the Baoshang situation, and China may now be prey to further problems, perhaps even a perfect storm event.

China is again resorting to such tactics as gross overproduction of steel in a desperate attenpt to keep its economy humming, but even that may fail. In order of tonnage of crude steel, ArcelorMittal is first with 96.4 Mt (in 2006, India’s giant Mittal Steel acquired French giant Arcelor; and is now registered in Luxembourg as a mailbox company run from India) and the EU has had tariffs on Chinese steel for years.

Also note:

• Vietnam economy (GDP April-June quarter) grows nearly 7% on trade war tailwinds--Manufacturing exodus from China propels one of fastest boosts in region--nikkei.com.
• India Plans to Offer Incentives to Companies Moving From China--"aim is to become a production base for firms fleeing tariffs."
• Vietnam's Vingroup in deal with Fujitsu unit, Qualcomm to make 5G phones to be manufactured in Hanoi and sold in the U.S. and Europe in 2020.
• A Dark Alley in China’s Credit Market Is Getting Rough--bloomberg.com June 24, 2019.
• As China's Banking System Freezes, SHIBOR Tumbles To Lowest In A Decade--zerohedge.com June 24, 2019.
• Trump Pressured by Congress to Stay Tough on Huawei--bloomberg.com June 24, 2019.
• The U.S. is now playing down expectations for progress from a Trump-Xi meeting during the G20 June 28-29, with the U.S. holding its hard line demands for meaningful Chinese economic reforms, according to Bloomberg.

2) Facebook's Libra Could Disrupt the Remittance Industry

source: statista.com

Money transfers a/ka "remittances" to low- and middle-income countries reached a record high of $529 billion in 2018, according to the World Bank and the world's total remittances in 2018 were $689 billion. “Success will mean that a person working abroad has a fast and simple way to send money to family back home,” says Libra’s white paper, and the UN Sustainable Development Goals aim to reduce the transaction costs of migrant remittances to less than 3 percent and eliminate remittance corridors with costs higher than 5 percent by 2030. Libra could lead the way. See also:  How Libra Cryptocurrency & Blockchain Network Will Work (video).

3) Investing

YTD (Year-to-date): NASDAQ Composite +21% | S&P 500 Index +17%  | DJIA +14%

The DJIA closed at 26,599 on Friday, up 73 points, its best first half since 1999 and best June since 1938. It was also the best June for the S&P 500 since 1955.

US: Economy Breaks Record on Trump’s Watch--bloomberg.com: “If voters went to the ballot box today, it would be the strongest economy in U.S. election history,” said Justin Waring, an investment strategist at UBS in New York. Unemployment is close to a half-century low and inflation is so subdued that some have pronounced it dead. 

Editor's note: this is neither a Bull Market nor a Bear Market, this is Trump's Market.

Investor Notes: 

Public default at Chinese trust company highlights cracks in market https://t.co/0jqIRRpbZa

— ChinaEconomicReview (@chinaeconreview) June 26, 2019

China: signs of a slowdown in China’s property market continue --office vacancies in tech-centric Shenzhen rose to more than 23% for the first half of 2019, a decade high, reported Caixin (domain: caixinglobal.com).

EU: "There is no common Fiscal Policy. Thus the Eurozone stagnates, withers and has utterly lost momentum …" The next ECB president? "Best candidate for the ECB job is going to be a secondary issue to how many other jobs France and Germany get."--Bill Blain. And Brexit? UK looks cheap ... but we still face a few more months of fraxious uncertainty.

US: "... investors, both foreign and domestic, continue to buy Treasuries, no matter the risks associated with them. And the longer they buy Treasuries, the bigger the US debt load becomes, and — ironically — the lower the risk of default."--cfainstitute.org.

Zombies: A report from the Bank for International Settlements found 12% of publicly listed companies around the world can be described as zombie firms:

"The rising number of so-called zombie firms, defined as firms that are unable to cover debt servicing costs from current profits over an extended period, has attracted increasing attention in both academic and policy circles. Using firm-level data on listed firms in 14 advanced economies, we document a ratcheting-up in the prevalence of zombies since the late 1980s. Our analysis suggests that this increase is linked to reduced financial pressure, which in turn seems to reflect in part the effects of lower interest rates. We further find that zombies weigh on economic performance because they are less productive and because their presence lowers investment in and employment at more productive firms."--BIS report, supra.

"Policies created to pull the world out of recession are still in place, but now they are strangling the global economy ... we are in a fat and slow world," wrote Ruchir Sharma in the New York Times, June 15, 2019. What exactly is the problem?

"The trademarks of the fat and slow world: larger corporations, declining competition and fewer start-ups (all of which contribute to wage inequality), ... together undermine and slow economies already hindered by falling growth in the working-age population."--Sharma, supra.

4) ICYMI Tech News:

Tech still drives US markets more than any other sector. If you don't like Tech stocks, it's hard to justify owning the S&P 500. We explain why here: https://t.co/W1RvpTkdHN $SPY $XLK $MSFT $FB $AMZN $AAPL $FB $GOOG $XLY $XLC pic.twitter.com/hUpUc0Qpib

— DataTrek Research (@DataTrekMB) June 28, 2019

Jony Ive Is Leaving Apple--but he's not being replaced, and the design team reporting to operations makes no sense--daringfireball.net.

Walmart Inc’s Indian unit Flipkart said late Thursday it plans to replace nearly 40% of its current fleet of delivery vans with electric vehicles (EVs) by March 2020.

iQiyi (domain: iqiyi.com) China’s version of Netflix, reportedly wants to enter overseas markets including North America and Japan after hitting a milestone of 100 million paying subscribers this month, even though the company has been in a cash-burning fight with Tencent’s video site and Alibaba-backed Youku Tudou in China. See also: China's Alibaba aims to double Tmall Global brands with English portal.

Toyota to invest $2 billion in developing electric vehicles in Indonesia.

Goodbye, Chrome? Google’s web browser has become spy software ... why Firefox is better says Washington Post (owned by Amazon's Jeff Bezos).

Google Drive vs. Microsoft's OneDrive: choosing the right cloud storage and collaboration service.

Bezos Blowback? Will The AWS JEDI Scandal Upset Amazon's Omnipotence?--zerohedge.com.

The Empty Promise of Data Moats--a16z.com: data goes stale over time…

The European Digital Social Innovation Index by Nesta, published for the first time this year, found London came out on top in a ranking of 60 EU cities on indicators such as funding, skills, infrastructure and diversity. The European Digital Social Innovation Index (EDSII) is the first index ranking how different European cities support digital social innovation (DSI) and tech for good to grow and thrive. London had a significant lead over Amsterdam, which came in second place. Copenhagen, Stockholm and Paris rounded out the top five.

Personal Tech: going 'off the grid' this summer? Iridium GO!--turn any smartphone into a satellite phone--you can get access to phone calls, text, and more, 'off-grid' via the Iridium satellite network.

Parting Thoughts:

• Tulsi Gabbard is the winner--Drudge instant poll shows Gabbard won the first Democratic debate in landslide.

• Always "ask if the algorithm, which is a model of the world, is working the way it was designed to work. Models represent the market, and models are not reality. As Alfred Korzybski said, “The map is not the territory.”

-- John Poole, Editor, Domain Mondo  

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How China's Economic Slowdown Is Rippling Beyond Its Borders (video)

How China's Economic Slowdown Is Rippling Around the Region

Slower growth in China is affecting everything from smartphone sales to oil exports, and companies and countries in its orbit are beginning to feel the crunch. Wall Street Journal (WSJ.com) video above published Mar 6, 2019.
Tweets by ChinaRealTime

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The Declining Fortunes of China’s Tech Giants Tencent & Alibaba $BABA

The Declining Fortunes of China’s Tech Giants Tencent & Alibaba $BABA

After years of stellar growth, 2018 saw Tencent and Alibaba $BABA cut back down to size. The FT explains what's behind their fall. Financial Times (ft.com) video above published Jan 15, 2019.

Tencent Holdings Ltd

OTCMKTS: TCTZF

Alibaba Group Holding Ltd

$BABA

Chinese exports - looking behind the numbers

The FT's Asia news editor Joe Leahy looks at whether the fall in Chinese exports is down to the trade war with the US or a broader economic slowdown. Financial Times (ft.com) video above published Jan 14, 2019.
Tweets by ftchina

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Tech Review: 1) Huawei CFO Arrested (video), 2) U.S. Oilfield Technology

Tech Review (TR 2018-12-08)--Domain Mondo's weekly review of tech investing news with commentary, analysis and opinion: Features • 1) Huawei CFO Arrested, 2) U.S. Oilfield Technology, 3) Investing: The Week, Notes, 4) ICYMI Tech News: Microsoft, Facebook, Alibaba, Tencent, Tumblr, Ninebot, Google.

1) Huawei CFO Arrested

Fortune.com video above published Dec 6, 2018. Meng Wanzhou, CFO of Chinese telecom giant Huawei (and the daughter of the company's founder) was arrested earlier this week in Canada, is facing a series of fraud charges that could set the stage for her extradition to the U.S., a Canadian prosecutor has revealed.

Huawei arrest heightens US-China trade tensions

Financial Times (ft.com) video above published Dec 6, 2018: Canada has arrested Huawei’s CFO following a US extradition request, reigniting investor concerns over heightened tensions between Washington and Beijing days after Donald Trump and Xi Jinping tried to resolve their trade conflict at the G20 summit.

Arrest shakes Huawei--Global Skepticism of Huawei's Business Grows--nytimes.com: "all around the globe, the walls are going up for Huawei ...  a wider patch of the world appears to be siding with Washington against Chinese technology."

More:

• Japan’s government halts use of Huawei and ZTE products out of security concerns. 
• National Security Adviser John Bolton in an NPR News interview.
• 6 reasons why Huawei gives the U.S. and its allies security concerns. 

Huawei’s Dependence on U.S. Suppliers:

Huawei’s Dependence on U.S. Suppliers https://t.co/BVeyi8viAj

— ChinaEconomicReview (@chinaeconreview) December 7, 2018

2) U.S. Oilfield Technology: 

statista.com

The U.S. Just Became a Net Oil Exporter for the First Time in 75 Years | bloomberg.com Dec 6, 2018: Crude, refined products exports exceed imports in weekly data. Shale boom has boosted U.S. crude oil shipments to a new record.

Large rivals in the race to grow U.S. shale production and profits, include BP ($BP), Exxon Mobil Corp ($XOM), Chevron, Royal Dutch Shell, and Norway’s Equinor. All are expanding drilling and acquisitions, particularly in the Permian Basin of West Texas and New Mexico, the largest U.S. oil field and the center of the shale revolution--How BP found shale profits with 'crystal ball' oilfield technology | reuters.com.

3) Investing

The Week: NASDAQ Composite -4.9% | S&P 500 Index -4.6% | DJIA -4.5%

Biggest Worry for Traders? They Don't Know Why Stocks Are Moving--bloomberg.com.

Investing Notes:

"History shows that once the Treasury yield curve inverts (10s yield less than 2s) a US recession is likely."--datatrekresearch.com

Editor's note: the above quote is about as helpful as saying, "History shows that when a person is born, they will die."  The data shows there is a considerable lag time from the time of the first 10/2 inversion to the point where a recession manifests itself, sometimes years (look at the chart above or here or here (e.g., 2006 inversion to 2008 recession).

Apple $AAPL: if you had a 5 percent weighting of Apple in 1998 and invested the rest in SPY, $AAPL would have grown to close to 90 percent of your portfolio. If you owned a portfolio of individual stocks, Apple would be closer to 100 percent, as you'd inevitably have losers (two-thirds of individual stocks underperform the market).--SeekingAlpha.com.

Brexit: May’s Brexit Deal Is a Betrayal of Britain, If the U.K. parliament supports her plan, it will never be forgiven.--opinion in bloomberg.com by Mervyn King, former governor of the Bank of England for a decade, beginning in 2003, now a professor at the New York University Stern School of Business.

Next week the Brexit vote is scheduled for December 11, 2018: Editor's note: if you always wanted to invest in the UK or London-listed companies, or own some London real estate, there may be some real opportunities emerging.

"Be fearful when others are greedy and greedy when others are fearful."--Warren Buffett. 

4) ICYMI Tech News:

• Microsoft $MSFT is building a Chromium-powered web browser that will replace Edge on Windows 10--windowscentral.com.

• Facebook $FB CEO Mark Zuckerberg, more ruthless than clueless?--bloomberg.com.

• Alibaba $BABA, Tencent, and more caught up in China's anti-graft crackdown--reuters.com.

• NSFW Tumblr (tumblr.com owned by Verizon $VZ) will permanently ban adult content from its blogging platform beginning December 17, 2018.

• China's Ninebot (ninebot.cn) makes almost all the world's scooters--bloomberg.com. 

• Personal Tech: another failed Google $GOOG $GOOGL chat app experiment, this time Allo which will stop working March 2019.

-- John Poole, Editor, Domain Mondo  

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Trade War Begins: Why China’s Growth Doesn’t Work For America Anymore

President Trump Announces Trade Tariffs On China Imports

BloombergQuint.com video above published Jul 6, 2018.

Trump tariffs on Chinese goods fulfill campaign promise: Peter Navarro

White House Office of Trade and Manufacturing Policy Director Peter Navarro says President Trump has given China every possible avenue to address the theft of U.S. intellectual property. Fox Business video above published Jul 6, 2018.

Trade War Begins: Why China’s Growth Doesn’t Work For America Anymore

No longer does the United States see the Chinese system of economic growth as a tolerable process, says Law Professor Raj Bhala, an expert in International Trade Law, in the video above. Raj Bhala is the inaugural Brenneisen Distinguished Professor, The University of Kansas, School of Law, and Senior Advisor to Dentons U.S. LLP.

According to Bhala, two Trump administration documents detail why Section 301 actions are necessary:

The first is a 215-page investigation report, issued on March 22 by the United States Trade Representative (USTR), summarized in the USTR’s language:

• “China uses joint venture requirements, foreign investment restrictions, and administrative review and licensing processes to force or pressure technology transfers from American companies.”
• “China uses discriminatory licensing processes to transfer technologies from U.S. companies to Chinese companies.”
• “China directs and facilitates investments and acquisitions which generate large-scale technology transfer.”
• “China conducts and supports cyber intrusions into U.S. computer networks to gain access to valuable business information.”

The second is a 35-page report, issued on June 20 by the White House Office of Trade and Manufacturing (embed below), which contends that in addition to protectionist barriers, subsidized overcapacity, and cloud computing restrictions, China seeks to “acquire key technologies and intellectual property from other countries” and “capture the emerging high-technology industries that will drive future economic growth and many advancements in the defense industry.”

A third document is April 18 testimony to Congress by Pacific Commander Admiral Philip Davidson that the CCP’s military intentions in the South China Sea threaten to “displace the U.S. as the security partner of choice for countries in the Indo-Pacific” and “prevent the United States from intervening in any regional conflict on China’s periphery”.

"… [T]he United States advocates for a free and open Indo-Pacific, supported by regional partners and allies that respect international law, freedom of navigation and overflight, and the free flow of commerce and ideas. ...[I]t is increasingly clear that China wants to shape a world aligned with its own authoritarian model and inconsistent with these principles. Through coercive diplomacy, predatory economic policies, and rapid military expansion, China is undermining the rules-based international order. We must be willing to cooperate with China where we can, while consistently and unapologetically confronting China when it engages in behavior that undermines the international order or harms U.S. interests in the region."

Bhala says that on July 6, 2018, President Trump changed the U.S. narrative on trade with China. He imposed under Section 301 of the Trade Act of 1974, a 25 percent tariff on $35 billion worth of Chinese imports into the United States, effective July 6, with more levies possible, up to $500 billion on Chinese goods, and China immediately counter-retaliated.

According to Bhala, the U.S. will no longer facilitate Chinese economic growth because the U.S. no longer believes Chinese Communist Party (CCP) led planning is good for the U.S. or the world--that the CCP’s economic behavior, not to mention military intentions, erode America’s economic vitality and thereby undermine its national security. Bhala adds:

"The European Union fought most of the rest of the world over bananas throughout the 1980s and 1990s. Canada and the United States have been whacking each other with softwood lumber since 1982 ... The prudent historical inference for businesses to draw is to re-think their models.

• Is there exposure to imports, exports, or foreign direct investment in China?
• What alternative sources of supply exist?
• Are alternative sales markets appealing?
• Are alternative production venues viable?

"Even if, perchance, hostilities cease with a truce or treaty, the re-think will prove useful. That’s because the new narrative is a testament to enduring Chinese-American tensions." Read more by Bhala here.

See also:

• Unsustainable: This is what the US imports from China | weforum.org

• Tariffs are getting real | SoundCloud.com

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IEA Report Forecasts USA Dominating Global Oil Markets Going Forward

World Energy Outlook 2017: A world in transformation

WEO-2017, the International Energy Agency’s flagship publication, finds that over the next two decades the global energy system is being reshaped by major forces: the United States is set to become the undisputed global oil and gas leader; renewables are being deployed rapidly thanks to falling costs; the share of electricity in the energy mix is growing, and China’s new economic strategy takes it on a cleaner growth mode. International Energy Agency (domain: iea.org) video first published Nov 14, 2017. Learn more at http://www.iea.org/weo2017.

The latest report from the IEA.org forecasts an oil market dominated by the United States. See the report at Oil 2018 | iea.org as well as a Bloomberg.com video Mar 5, 2018.

iea.org slides:

See also:

• Record oil output from US, Brazil, Canada and Norway to keep global markets well | iea.org

• Oil reserves | Oil | Statistical Review of World Energy | Energy economics | BP.com: "Global proved oil reserves in 2016 rose by 15 billion barrels (0.9%) to 1707 billion barrels, which would be sufficient to meet 50.6 years of global production at 2016 levels."
• WEO Analysis: A sea change in the global oil trade | iea.org: "The surge in tight oil output from the United States has already triggered major changes in the dynamics of global oil supply and prices. Through a decline in imports and a surge in exports, US tight oil is now having a similarly profound impact on global crude oil trade. Crude oil imports to the United States fell by more than 1.3 million barrels a day (mb/d) between 2010 and 2016, to 7.9 mb/d. At the same time, since the ban on crude oil exports was lifted in late 2015, US exports have skyrocketed to over 1 mb/d in October 2017, and have expanded their range of destinations from a single country, Canada, to more than 30 countries across Latin America, Europe and Asia. Looking to the future, WEO projections in the New Policies Scenario suggest a continued fall in US net crude oil imports, from more than 7 mb/d today to less than 3 mb/d by 2040. Meanwhile, net product exports double from 2 mb/d to almost 4 mb/d over the same period, pushing the overall net oil trade balance of the United States into positive territory by the late-2020s, an astonishing turnaround."
• Momentous Shift in US Natural Gas, with Global Consequences | WolfStreet.com: "The LNG export trade in the US is powered by the huge price differential between natural gas in the US — where a “glut” has crushed prices since 2009 — and what large LNG importers such as Japan and Korea are paying in the global LNG markets."
• In the Oil Patch, Bigger Is No Longer Better | WSJ.com: investors are growing leery of free-spending energy firms, but like the discipline of ConocoPhillips.
• Old Fields Die Hard | WolfStreet.com:"thriftier times have called for a re-strategizing and getting back to basics. This means focusing on existing wells and mature oil fields instead of drilling and prospecting in a short-term effort to get more oil more cheaply and efficiently. It’s all a response to the same issue — low oil prices — but with exactly the opposite approach from OPEC ..."
• Oil Demand: The Price Is Right or the Customer Is Right? | Bloomberg.com: "Research suggests producers can no longer assume global consumers will buy fuel at any price."

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China, EU & Russia Foreign Trade Barriers: Internet, Digital, Domain Names

2017 National Trade Estimate Report | United States Trade Representative | ustr.gov: The 2017 National Trade Estimate Report on Foreign Trade Barriers (NTE) is the 32nd in an annual series that highlights significant foreign barriers to U.S. exports, and is a companion piece to the President’s Trade Policy Agenda published by USTR in March. 

Full Report here (pdf)--excerpts:

Regulation of Domain Names in China:

Web Filtering and Blocking of Websites in China:

EU Right To Be Forgotten: extraterritorial application of domestic law on the Internet, creating significant market uncertainty for businesses worldwide:

Google Tax in Russia:

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MacroView: Gradually and Then Suddenly, How Markets & Companies Fail

Domain Mondo's weekly review of  macro economic and investing news:

MacroView Feature  •  Sometimes you don’t exactly notice how bad things really are. It’s not always as apparent as it would seem.--Sarah Dunn

Gradually and Then Suddenly: In Ernest Hemingway’s The Sun Also Rises, one character asks another how he went bust. The response is a classic: “Two ways, gradually and then suddenly." That's how companies, governments, pension funds, and individuals often fail:

"And it’s how conditions in complex markets shift as well. The underlying circumstances that shape the environment in which you operate can evolve at a snail’s pace, and then shift quickly, either as new actions are introduced, or as the agglomeration of changes reaching a tipping point."--strategy-business.com

Wilbur Ross: U.S. Recession Likely in Next 18 Months:

Video above published on Oct 14, 2016: Billionaire distressed-debt investor Wilbur Ross, chairman of WL Ross & Co., comments on U.S. financial markets and the possibility of a recession. He speaks during an interview with Bloomberg's Matt Miller and Scarlet Fu on "Bloomberg Markets."

Gradually and then suddenly?

•  Goldman Sachs Sees Shock Potential for U.S., European Stocks | Bloomberg.com: "Political risks, exacerbated by a weak economy in Europe and high stock prices in the U.S., make those markets vulnerable to declines in the next three months. The firm projects that the S&P 500 Index and the Stoxx Europe 600 Index will each drop by about 2 percent by December." See also Goldman Tells Clients To Go To Cash As "Growth Shocks" Are Coming | ZeroHedge.com.

•  Next European bank bombshell: DoubleLine’s Jeffrey Gundlach dropped a new name to worry about on the European bank front. He says if “push comes to shove,” the German government will support Deutsche Bank. “But what about Credit Suisse, which has shown a similar decline in stock price? Who’s there to bail them out?”--MarketWatch.com. Italy’s Intesa Sanpaolo is matching Credit Suisse’s year-to-date losses. Spain’s Banco Popular is down 60% year-to-date. Gundlach has also said the ECB’s negative-interest-rate policy is running the risk of bankrupting its lenders, and Deutsche is a poster child for this: “You cannot save your faltering economy by killing your financial system.”

•  Rail Freight Gets Clocked from all Sides in this Economy | Wolf Street: "Total US freight rail traffic, as measured in carloads and intermodal units, fell 6.1% in the week ended October 8, from the same week last year, the Association of American Railroads reported today. It was down 10% from the same week two years ago." See also: Freight Rail Traffic Plunges: Haunting Pictures of Transportation Recession | Wolf Street.

•  ‘Bulletproof’ Public Pensions | NYTimes.com: "The California Public Employees’ Retirement System, or Calpers, said Loyalton had 30 days to hand over $1.6 million, more than its entire annual budget, to fund the pensions of its four retirees. Otherwise, Loyalton stood to become the first place in California — perhaps in the nation — where a powerful state retirement system cut retirees’ pensions because their town was a deadbeat." See also The state government pension crisis: You will be made to care | Washington Examiner.

•  Sheila Bair called the financial crisis but her new nightmare is student loans: "The problem is much worse," Bair replied. "The percentage of [former] students in distress on their student loans is significantly higher than we saw during the subprime crisis."--Bloomberg.com

•  Chinese Property Owners are in for a Very Rude Awakening, but the Damage Will Reverberate around Globe --WolfStreet.com: "The biggest bubble in history." See also: Wall St. Tumbles After China Trade Report Disappoints | NYTimes.com 13 Oct 2016: "Data showed that China’s exports last month fell 10 percent from a year earlier in dollar terms, compared with a 2.8 percent fall in August."

•  Starbucks held $1.2 billion in customer funds loaded onto Starbucks cards and its app as of Q1 2016, according to MarketWatch.com based on data from S&P Global Market Intelligence. Starbucks holds more money than some banks hold in deposits. But Starbucks doesn't have to worry about the most powerful man in banking, Fed governor Daniel Tarullo, who heads the Fed’s Committee on Bank Supervision. Tarullo took office at the Fed in 2009 at a moment of broad public support for a more aggressive tack and has pressed that advantage ever since. His influence ranges over everything from corporate strategy to how many billions of dollars banks must maintain in capital. Through the stress tests he championed to evaluate how banks might fare in another market shock, the Fed wields control over whether banks can raise the dividends they pay to shareholders--WSJ.com. See also: “All organizations with sales goals are going to be susceptible to falsified sales records,” said Kane, who worked at Wells Fargo in the 1980s and ’90s before founding Kane Bank Services, which focuses on bank sales practices.--LATimes.com

•  Canada’s Big Bet on Fiscal Stimulus Drawing Global Attention: "Trudeau’s move to lean on infrastructure spending to boost growth is regaining currency"--WSJ.com

•  Week ahead: U.S. presidential candidates Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump hold their final debate in Las Vegas on October 19, 2016, 9:00-10:30 pm EDT. The moderator is Fox News anchor Chris Wallace, who will question each nominee. Watch LIVE online here. See also: Glenn Greenwald: WikiLeaks Emails Clearly Show Serious Media Impropriety | Mediaite.com and In the Democratic Echo Chamber, Inconvenient Truths Are Recast as Putin Plots | TheIntercept.com by Glenn Greenwald: "... The tactics they [Democrats] are now embracing will endure past the election, making them worthy of scrutiny. Those tactics now most prominently include dismissing away any facts or documents that reflect negatively on their leaders as fake, and strongly insinuating that anyone who questions or opposes those leaders is a stooge or agent of the Kremlin, tasked with a subversive and dangerously un-American mission on behalf of hostile actors in Moscow. To see how extreme and damaging this behavior has become, let’s just quickly examine two utterly false claims that Democrats over the past four days — led by party-loyal journalists — have disseminated and induced thousands of people, if not more, to believe ..." See also: It’s Official: This Election Is Driving Americans Nuts | Bloomberg.com and Most "news" is misinformation | DomainMondo.com.

One more reading recommendation:
•  "In order for investors to beat the performance of an index fund they must have a view that is different than the crowd and they must be right about that different view."--A Half Dozen Things I’ve Learned from Robert Cialdini’s book “Influence” | 25iq/com

-- John Poole, Editor, Domain Mondo 

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