Why the Blanche Nomination Should Be Rejected

Oil Jumps As Trump Says Mulling Restart Of Project Freedom, Which Could Mean New Hormuz Clashes With Iran Summary Trump mulls restarting Project Freedom in Hormuz and says forcibly retrieving 'nuclear dust' is still on the table, oil jumps on headline. Iran Foreign Ministry: "Everything we proposed in the text was reasonable and generous." However, US officials insist on their "unreasonable demands." Saudi Arabia condemns Iran for its latest drone attacks targeting the UAE, Qatar and Kuwait on Sunday. Qatari LNG tanker abruptly U-Turns In Hormuz chokepoint after earlier in weekend an initial one made it...

Surging Services Costs Spark Unexpected Surge In US Producer Prices In January US Producer Prices came in hotter than expected in January, with the headline PPI rising 0.5% MoM (vs +0.3% exp), higher than the revised +0.4% MoM in December. This left Producer Prices up 2.9% YoY (hotter than expected but below December's +3.0%)... Source: Bloomberg Under the hood, we see a surge in Services costs (not tariff related) dominated the rise in PPI (while Energy saw deflation) Final demand services: The index for final demand services advanced 0.8% in January, the largest...

Huge Provocation: Russia-Installed Official In Ukraine Hosts Talks With North Korean Envoy Both Kiev and Washington have been met with a new provocation related to North Korea's role in supporting Russia during the over four-year long Ukraine war, at a moment Russia continues to claim sovereignty over Donetsk, Kherson, Luhansk and Zaporizhzhia oblasts. Ukraine and its Western backers have vehemently rejected Russia's hold on Ukrainian territory, and efforts to annex and politically normalize the occupation. But now, for the first time a Russian-installed official in Kherson is hosting North Korean diplomats in...