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IEA, OPEC Slash Oil Demand Outlook Amid “Headwinds” From Spreading Delta Variant

IEA, OPEC Slash Oil Demand Outlook Amid “Headwinds” From Spreading Delta Variant

The International Energy Agency and Goldman Sachs are both warning that global oil demand is facing headwinds due to the spread of the COVID-19 Delta variant: “Growth for the second half of 2021 has been downgraded more sharply, as new COVID-19 restrictions imposed in several major oil-consuming countries, particularly in Asia, look set to reduce mobility and oil use,” the IEA said in its monthly report.

“We now estimate that demand fell in July as the rapid spread of the COVID-19 Delta variant undermined deliveries in China, Indonesia, and other parts of Asia,” the IEA said. 

Since July, NYMEX West Texas Intermediate (WTI) futures have fallen at least 10% as the Delta variant spreads worldwide. Traders are worried renewed lockdowns and or stricter social distancing measures in China, Europe, and the US may continue to weigh on oil demand and result in lower prices.

The “recent rally has lost steam on concerns that a surge in Covid-19 cases from the Delta variant could derail the recovery just as more barrels hit the market,” the IEA said.

The agency said global oil demand “abruptly reversed course” last month, after surging by 3.8 million barrels a day in June, adding that it lowered consumption estimates for the second half of this year by 550,000 barrels a day.

However, the IEA projects in the last quarter of this year, the global economic recovery should regain steam as world fuel should reach an average of 98.9 million barrels a day.

Similar to IEA’s forecast is a report from Goldman Sachs’ Damien Courvalin, who told clients that “transient demand headwinds” have developed and there is “growing evidence of structural supply tailwinds.”

Courvalin already lowered his emerging market demand expectations last month due to the Delta spread but at the time “omitted” China from the downgrade.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

Are We Facing a Biological War?

This is the Chinese response to the finger-pointing at China being responsible for the leak of COVID-19. What it brings up can be verified. Nonetheless, I continue to believe that all the sources I had were too coincidental that this was neither released by China nor the US Military, but it was deliberately leaked and people strategically positioned themselves just weeks ahead. Bill Gates took a position in BioNTech in September 2019 just 2 months before the release of COVID in China. He backed CVAC which launched in 2020. The SEC went after Elon Musk for just saying he might go public. Gates insists ONLY vaccines will stop COVID and the SEC will not do anything to Gates. Then Klaus Schwab was telling some people a virus was coming based upon information and belief from reliable sources.

Of course, there are others who believe we are headed into a biological war rather than nuclear. Still, others believe that China was deliberately chosen to leak COVID in order to (1) force them to comply with the Great Reset, or (2) create World War III to destroy the infrastructure some hate as the Industrial Revolution and to thin the herd to enable their BUILD-BACK-BETTER agenda much like that which followed World War II. They maintain there is no gain without pain.

 

Where Did The Science Go?


Claude Monet Misty Morning on the Seine 1897
When the covid virustime started, we were told by everyone with a microphone to “follow the science”. But 16 months or so in, we’re not following the science, yet no-one calls us on it. What happened? Where did we lose the thread, where did we lose our heads, where did the science go?

Did we lose it because the vaccine makers got too greedy, or because politicians became too panicky, or because the media realized that scaring the living daylights out of people 24/7 is great for ratings? Or just because we ourselves lost track of what was really going on?

Injecting hundreds of millions of people with substances that have never been properly tested – for which long-established protocols have existed for a long time – is about as unscientific as it gets. Then when you realize there’s no evidence that they keep injectees from being infected or infecting others, but only makes them -hopefully- a little less sick, you might as well stop right there.

From a science point of view, you’re engaging in either a useless enterprise or a giant gamble with people’s health. Both utterly unscientific endeavors, any scientist can tell you that.

Then, when you hear, from the UK government, no less, that only 66% of people can ever be successfully vaccinated and may be protected with the present vaccines, which still leaves out those who don’t want these vaccines, what are you going to think and do?

Shouldn’t you perhaps focus on the fact that over 4 out of 5 people have an immune system that provides them with “adaptive cross-immunity”, meaning they are not at risk of dying or even serious disease? Why would you instead turn to experimental substances that risk putting those immune systems themselves at risk?

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

The Energy Crisis During the Panic of 1873

Humans are not the only species to get viruses. A real energy crisis hit the United States that began in 1872 and expanded into 1873, which contributed to the Panic of 1873.  This was a flu virus they called distemper that shut down the US economy by infecting horses. It was in 1872 that the US economy was hit by influenza during the autumn which paralyzed the economy and social life. It was the 19th-century version of an energy crisis even before fossil fuels which these global warming fanatics want to return to. Instead of this influenza infecting people, it was a virus that spread among horses and mules. It began in Canada, and with free trade, it spread into the United States and then down into Central America.

 

Before fossil fuels, horses provided essential energy to build and operate cities. The steam engine led to the development of trains, but they were limited to long distances. Horses were the backbone of how cities operated just as cars today once filled the streets of major cities. But the equine flu made exposes just how important horses were to modern civilization. When horses became infected, they stopped working and it revealed just how dependent the entire economy was upon horsepower. The distemper, as they called it, spread infecting virtually every horse, and owners did not understand diseases back then and forced their horses to still work and they were dropping dead in the streets.

The influenza first appeared in Canada during late September in horses pastured outside of Toronto. The flu’s symptoms were cough and fever; ears drooping, they staggered and often dropped in the streets from exhaustion…

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

As coronavirus surges in Hong Kong, mysterious pneumonia hits Kazakhstan – is this a new pandemic?

As coronavirus surges in Hong Kong, mysterious pneumonia hits Kazakhstan – is this a new pandemic?

Image: As coronavirus surges in Hong Kong, mysterious pneumonia hits Kazakhstan – is this a new pandemic?

(Natural News) Even as one of Asia’s major financial hubs braces for a resurgence of Wuhan coronavirus (COVID-19) cases, a potential new threat looms as a deadly new pneumonia has broken out in the center of the continent.

In Hong Kong, authorities have closed schools and tightened social distancing requirements after a new surge of coronavirus cases struck the territory. According to education secretary Kevin Yeung, the decision was taken due to “the exponential growth of confirmed COVID-19 local cases over the past two days.”

While Hong Kong is grappling with its new surge, Chinese officials have also warned that a new, “unknown pneumonia,” has broken out in Kazakhstan – one that apparently has a higher death rate than COVID-19).

Hong Kong experiences its largest outbreak yet

Hong Kong’s latest outbreak of 147 new COVID-19 cases is small compared to outbreaks in the U.S. or Europe. For a territory that has largely kept its infection rate low, however, it represents one of the largest spikes since the pandemic began. (Related: Air travelers hiding coronavirus infections to get into Hong Kong highlight reopening risks.)

In response, Hong Kong’s Education Bureau has ordered the closure of secondary and primary schools as well as kindergartens, starting on Monday. Meanwhile, the Food and Health Bureau announced new social distancing measures for bars and restaurants. The new measures included limiting customers per table to eight and four, respectively.

“As society needs to resume some economic and social activities to a limited extent, it is inevitable that new local cases will appear,” Sophia Chan, secretary for food and health, said.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

The Bottom’s Falling Out

The Bottom’s Falling Out

Imagine you’re standing across the street from a house that’s on the verge of falling apart, a condemned building, an edifice devoured by rot from bottom to top. Now imagine you see a construction crew arriving to repair it, and they start to fix the roof. You would think that’s not much use if the walls, floor and foundation are just one wolf’s huff and puff away from collapse.

Still, that is what the world’s central banks are doing today: they “fix” the top by bailing out banks and allege that somehow that will fix the rest of the edifice too. In that same analogy, while central banks prop up banks, governments try to support the walls, by bailing out businesses. Again, while the floors and foundations keep on rotting away. And when the floors cave in, so of course will the walls, just like the roof.

There may appear to be some logic to all this, but it’s only the “inner logic” of an economic and political ideology that deals exclusively with how things should be, not how they are. Of course it’s nice to have a shiny new roof, and strong walls. But neither have any value if there are no more floors to support them.

This is what is happening today to our economies and societies. The 2008 crisis wasn’t bad enough to expose the failures of the “inner logic” of the system, but the fallout of COVID19 will be. And it’s not the virus that does it all, or the lockdowns, they merely expose a system that’s been rotting for many years without its floors and foundations ever being repaired.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

Weaponizing the Dollar

Weaponizing the Dollar

Saul Leiter Phone call c1957

Don’t worry, we’re still talking virus, just from a slightly different angle. I was going to do something completely different, but then I saw an article at the South China Morning Post (SCMP) today that made me think “I don’t think that’s true”, realizing that at the same time many people would think it is.

Foreign holdings of US Treasuries are a misty environment for perhaps not just many, but most people. What triggered the SCMP piece is Trump’s threat, if it was ever meant to be one, to default on US dollar-denominated debt owned by China. Which by one estimate consists for about 70% of Treasuries.

And there are entire choirs full of voices willing to tell us that China can simply start dumping the -estimated- $1.2 trillion in Treasuries it holds, and threaten if not end the USD reserve currency status that way, if the US doesn’t “behave”. There’s little doubt that China would want this, but that doesn’t make the idea any more realistic.

What should give that away is, how easy can we make it for you, that it hasn’t done so yet. And now a conflict over the origin of a virus would trigger this? On a side note: if that origin is somewhere in China, even if it’s unintentional, how could Beijing possibly “admit” to it? How could it ever settle the lawsuits that would ensue?

No, the US cannot default on China’s holdings of its Treasuries. That alone would be a larger threat to the reserve currency status than anything anybody else could do, other then nuclear war. But at the same time, China cannot dump its Treasury holdings. because that would hurt … China.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

Backwards into the Future

Backwards into the Future

Joseph-Désiré Court Le Masque 1843

No, I’m still not over the fact that they all initially missed the virus when they should have seen it most of all. The reasons why must be evaluated in every single location, in governments, CDC equivalents and obviously the WHO. A main reason is that they were all focusing on their economy, not the virus, -at least somewhat- ironically damaging their economies in the process.

I’m just afraid that you’re not going to prevent the next time, the next huge and deadly miss, as long as elections are popularity contests ultimately controlled by special interests. But at the same time, we’re past that first moment, which was somewhere in November or December (31st at the latest), and the next major threats loom.

After the Big Miss came the lockdowns, and as I said in Little Managers, that’s the one thing all these politicians may actually be somewhat good at. They stink at initial detection and reaction time, they stink at forward vision, but they can get people to stay home for a bit, and sell them that in the media.

They even get praised for it. Which is understandable, since their role is to set old ladies’ minds at ease, and most people, whatever age they are, have such minds, understandable but unfortunate, because 1) we’re about to leave the lockdowns phase as well and 2) they’re sure to screw up this one as royally as the first detection moment.

It would be good if everyone by now understood why lockdowns become inevitable after, but only after, initial detection has failed and the virus has been allowed to enter a society, if you face a highly contagious and deadly -to humans- virus that you don’t know anything about, but there are plenty people today who claim the lockdowns are what does the damage.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

The UN Is Now Admitting That This Coronavirus Pandemic Could Spark Famines Of “Biblical Proportions”

The UN Is Now Admitting That This Coronavirus Pandemic Could Spark Famines Of “Biblical Proportions”

What the head of the UN’s World Food Program just said should be making front page headlines all over the globe.  Because if what he is claiming is true, we are about to see global food shortages on a scale that is absolutely unprecedented in modern history.  Even before COVID-19 arrived, armies of locusts the size of major cities were voraciously eating crops all across Africa, the Middle East and parts of Asia, and UN officials were loudly warning about what that would mean for global food production.  And now the coronavirus shutdowns that have been implemented all over the planet have brought global trade to a standstill, they are making it more difficult to maintain normal food production operations, and they have forced countless workers to stay home and not earn a living.  All of this adds up to a recipe for a complete and utter nightmare in the months ahead.

David Beasley is the head of the UN’s World Food Program, and on Tuesday he warned that we could actually see famines of “biblical proportions” by the end of this calendar year.  The following comes from ABC News

The coronavirus pandemic could soon double hunger, causing famines of “biblical proportions” around the world by the end of the year, the head of the World Food Programme, David Beasley, told the U.N. Security Council on Tuesday.

Beasley warned that analysis from the World Food Programme, the U.N.’s food-assistance branch, shows that because of the coronavirus, “an additional 130 million people could be pushed to the brink of starvation by the end of 2020. That’s a total of 265 million people.”

He described what we are facing as “a hunger pandemic”, and he insisted that urgent action must be taken in order to avoid a nightmare scenario.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

When viruses shatter limits

When viruses shatter limits

Viruses are invisibly small, cause monumental pandemics, and force us to rethink our taxonomies

All that is left to us, therefore, is to understand what the disaster is producing within us, to pay attention to the explosion of affects it reveals. Therein lie the complexity of the situation and its rare promises. –Sabu Kohso

Stories of viruses are mostly stories of surface breaking, membrane crossing, confinement evading, border shattering, punctuation changing.

During the 19th century, scientists like Pasteur and others articulated the Germ theory: diseases could be passed on by tiny living things (hence the name microbes, small biota) invisible to the eye. Bacteria, organisms made of a unique cell, were “discovered”. An object, the Pasteur-Chamberland filter, was created to filter out bacteria from water. First dedicated to research, it also became an industrial device in a world now, and forever, scared of microbes and infections. But still, stuff that seemed to be smaller than bacteria, i.e., that could pass through these filters, kept on causing diseases. “Filterable viruses”, later only “viruses” (from poison in Latin), became then known to humans.

Viruses came to our world by crossing a membrane of unglazed, or bisque, porcelain. Here their narration starts—as if they hadn’t been there all along. Kevin Buckland, a storyteller living in Barcelona, teaches us this about the virus: “[its] power is simple: it can change periods into commas. It can un-end sentences. What was sealed and solved, what was packaged and piled, what had already been swept away is now again unfinished; ready to be rewritten.”

These past weeks, our days have been filled with digressions about viruses. For example: are viruses alive? Yes, no, it depends on how you define “alive”… And it depends on who you ask: someone living through the Covid-19 pandemic, or the same person a couple months ago? 

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

Shocking New Study Concludes That The “Best Case Scenario” For A COVID-19 Pandemic Is 15 Million Dead

Shocking New Study Concludes That The “Best Case Scenario” For A COVID-19 Pandemic Is 15 Million Dead

Over the past week, the number of confirmed cases of COVID-19 outside of China more than tripled once again.  Hopefully it is extremely unlikely that such a rapid growth rate will continue, because if it does, there will be more than a million confirmed cases outside of China just a month from now.  I don’t even want to imagine the level of fear that would cause, and needless to say that would be absolutely devastating for the entire global economy.  Of course if we do get to a million confirmed cases, there won’t be any way to keep it from spreading everywhere on the entire globe, and the ultimate death toll could be unimaginable.

According to the WHO, the current death rate for this outbreak is 3.4 percent, and many experts believe that it will continue to go higher.

That means that a whole lot of people will die if this virus cannot be contained somehow.

Researchers at a major university in Australia modeled seven different scenarios for how a COVID-19 pandemic might go, and in the “best-case scenario” the death toll was 15 million

New modeling from The Australian National University looks at seven scenarios of how the COVID-19 outbreak might affect the world’s wealth, ranging from low severity to high severity.

Four of the seven scenarios in the paper examine the impact of COVID-19 spreading outside China, ranging from low to high severity. A seventh scenario examines a global impact in which a mild pandemic occurs each year indefinitely.

But even in the low-severity model — or best-case scenario of the seven, which the paper acknowledged were not definitive — ANU researchers estimate a global GDP loss of $2.4 trillion, with an estimated death toll of 15 million.

A pandemic that kills 15 million people would change everything.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

The Coronavirus Is A Nightmare For The Global Economy

The Coronavirus Is A Nightmare For The Global Economy

Trade is already being crippled. And there’s no relief in sight.

As China has now placed hundreds of millions of its citizens under quarantine, its economy is grinding to a halt.

Workers can’t leave their homes. Factories are idle. Most (if not all) of China’s ports are no longer shipping. International flights are increasingly banned from the country.

When the world’s #2 economy hangs up a big “CLOSED” sign, that’s going to result in a major negative impact on global trade.

As the manufacturing powerhouse to the world, you’ll be challenged to think of ANY industry that won’t experience serious supply chain interruptions and shortages from China’s woes. For instance, did you know China makes the vast majority of our prescription pharmaceuticals?

A MASSIVE hit to the global economy will directly result from the damage the Wuhan coronavirus is currently doing. And it may get worse, a lot worse.

So ignore today’s ridiculous all-time high stock prices. They can’t last in the face of what’s coming.

Coronavirus: What We Can Say Publicly & What We Can’t

Coronavirus: What We Can Say Publicly & What We Can’t

Why the line between the two is so important to us

An Important Note of Gratitude:

Before we dive in, we’d like to extend a huge ‘thank you!’ to everyone who has supported us through the years.  It’s chaotic times like now when Adam and I do what we do best: surfing breaking developments and distilling the key information down into easily-understandable, actionable insights.

But we wouldn’t be able to be here without your ongoing economic support.  Even more important has been your words of personal support and encouragement.  

So thank you everyone, both our dedicated long-time followers, and the many new premium subscribers who have joined over the past two weeks.

It’s Time…

If you’ve been watching our Youtube video series on the Wuhan Coronavirus (2019nCoV) pandemic, you know that it’s time to prepare.

Yes, we can always hope that the latest unconfirmed potential treatment marks an actual turning point (i.e. treating patients with HIV protease inhibitor drugs) . But it’s much better to be safe than sorry.

You’re probably reading this because you tend to think critically, and you trust your own judgment.  Weirdly, that sets you apart from the masses.

And so here you are.  Not because you’re weird, but because it’s weird that common sense and prudent caution are so uncommon.

For a whole host of reasons that extend well beyond this emerging pandemic, we think being prepared is a selfless and prudent thing to do.  Everyone should seek to be as resilient as possible. Our book Prosper!covers this in much greater detail. It encourages readers to build capital.

Yes, build up your financial capital. But don’t ignore social, knowledge, time, material, living, cultural and emotional capital.  If you have depth in each of these, you will be truly wealthy, happy and fulfilled — no matter what the universe throws your way.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

VIDEO: The Risk Of A True Pandemic Is Higher Than We’re Being Told

VIDEO: The Risk Of A True Pandemic Is Higher Than We’re Being Told

Exactly what’s going on & how worried should we be?

OK, there’s a LOT of uncertainty and confusing/conflicting information currently circulating right now about the new coronavirus outbreak that has suddenly erupted out of Wuhan, China.

What’s really going on? What exactly is the ‘coronavirus’?

And most important: How worried do we need to be?

Given the poor communication so far by government health organizations and the media, the severity of the situation and the risk to public health, Chris Martenson filmed this important explanatory video hours ago.

Dr. Martenson’s PhD is in the field of pathogenic biology, so he understands the nature of this virus more than your average scientist.

In the video below, Chris explains the virus in layman’s terms, why the contagion we’re seeing is likely to spread substantially from here, and why the actions being taken so far by public health officials to contain the threat are woefully insufficient.

It’s important, maybe soon critical, to be well-informed on this outbreak. The ten minutes you spend watching this video may be the most important thing you do today:

After viewing, be sure to take prudent steps to secure the safety of your family’s health. Most measures are straightforward and inexpensive — there’s a huge upside to preparing now and a huge downside to delaying, so get busy.

Those interested can continue to follow our updated coverage on the coronavirus here.

Hopefully, authorities manage to contain this outbreak faster than it currently appears they will. But don’t bet your life on it.

Mystery Chinese Virus Has Likely Infected Over 1,700 As It Sweeps Across China And Japan

Mystery Chinese Virus Has Likely Infected Over 1,700 As It Sweeps Across China And Japan

While there have been more than 60 confirmed cases of a new mystery virus emerging from Wuhan, China, UK experts estimate that closer to 1,700 have been sickened with the SARS-like pneumonia, according to the BBC.

“I am substantially more concerned than I was a week ago,” disease specialist Prof Neil Ferguson told the outlet.

The work was conducted by the MRC Centre for Global Infectious Disease Analysis at Imperial College London, which advises bodies including the UK government and the World Health Organization (WHO). –BBC

The estimate was calculated by the Imperial College of London based on the following assumptions: 

  • Wuhan International Airport has a catchment population of 19 million individuals [1].
  • There is a mean 10-day delay between infection and detection, comprising a 5-6 day incubation period [8,9]  and a 4-5 day delay from symptom onset to detection/hospitalisation of a case (the cases detected in Thailand and Japan were hospitalised 3 and 7 days after onset, respectively) [4,10].
  • Total volume of international travel from Wuhan over the last two months has been 3,301 passengers per day. This estimate is derived from the 3,418 foreign passengers per day in the top 20 country destinations based on 2018 IATA data [11], and uses 2016 IATA data held by Imperial College to correct for the travel surge at Chinese New Year present in the latter data (which has not happened yet this year) and for travel to countries outside the top 20 destination list.

According to the report, “It is likely that the Wuhan outbreak of a novel coronavirus has caused substantially more cases of moderate or severe respiratory illness than currently reported. The estimates presented here suggest surveillance should be expanded to include all hospitalised cases of pneumonia or severe respiratory disease in the Wuhan area and other well-connected Chinese cities. This analysis does not directly address transmission routes, but past experience with SARS and MERS-CoV outbreaks of similar scale suggests currently self-sustaining human-to-human transmission should not be ruled out.”

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

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