Australia’s Central Bank Would Like To Weaken Its Currency

Overnight the Reserve Bank of Australia (Australia’s central bank) cut benchmark interest rates by 25 basis points to 2.75%. The full statement from Governor Glenn Stevens is here. In a note, Nomura economist Charles St. Arnaud flags one particularly interesting line that will get the “currency wars” crowd buzzing.: The accompanying statement was not overly […]

What Would War Between Israel And Syria Do To The Already Fragile Global Economy?

War is a horrible thing. Just ask anyone that has ever been in the middle of it. And in this day and age governments around the world possess weapons of such incalculable power that war should be unthinkable. In future wars, we could literally see millions of people killed on a single day. Nobody should […]

The surprising reason why Obama favors natural-gas exports

For the past year, there’s been a simmering debate in Washington over whether the Department of Energy should approve more terminals to export liquefied natural gas. The country, after all, is newly awash in shale gas. Should we sell it abroad or keep it all for ourselves? Now here’s the latest twist: The Financial Times […]

U.S. and Israel Prepare for Summer Attack On Iran

The U.S. has designed a bunker buster penetrator bomb that will take out Iran’s Fordow nuclear enrichment complex, a target previously considered too fortified for conventional weapons. The new weapon, which cost hundreds of millions of dollars to produce, is considered critical to an effort by the United States to convince Israel that the U.S. […]

Israel Targeted Iranian Missiles in Syrian Attack

The airstrike that Israeli warplanes carried out in Syria overnight on Thursday was directed at a shipment of advanced surface-to-surface missiles from Iran that Israel believed was intended for Hezbollah, the militant Lebanese organization, American officials said Saturday. It was the second time in four months that Israel has carried out an attack in Syria […]

Israel confirms Syria strike

An Israeli airstrike against Syria was targeting a shipment of advanced missiles bound for the Lebanese militant group Hezbollah, Israeli officials confirmed Saturday. It was the second Israeli strike this year against Syria and the latest salvo in its long-running effort to disrupt Hezbollah’s quest to build an arsenal capable of defending against Israel’s air […]

If The Economy Is So Fragile That Government Can’t Allow Failure Then We Are Indeed Close To Collapse

Following today’s flashback to the most euphoric and irrationally exuberant days of market peaks (and bubbles) gone by, driven entirely by the now constant central-planner dilution of current and future wealth, these selected excerpts from Seth Klarman’s latest letter to investors is just the cold water of common sense everyone needs: From Seth Klarman of […]

Possible US Budget Fix: Sell Our Strategic Oil

The U.S. economy is awash in fossil fuel production, which coincides with a stalemate over how to stanch the government’s flood of budgetary red ink. It also raises a tantalizing question for a few observers: whether the U.S. should liquidate some of its Strategic Petroleum Reserve and apply the proceeds to help close the deficit. […]

The U.S. Is Supporting the Most Violent Muslim Terrorists In Order to Wage War for Oil

The Government – Which Has Taken Away Our Liberties and Destroyed Our Prosperity to Fight An Endless War On Terror – Has Been Arming, Funding and Otherwise Backing the Very Terrorists Who Are Carrying Out Most of the Attacks Sunni Muslims commit more terrorist acts worldwide than any other group.  For example, the National Counterterrorism […]

EU Lifts Oil Embargo on Syria – Buys Directly from Al Qaeda

It was recently reported that the European Union would be lifting its oil embargo on Syria, in an effort to help fund what it calls “rebels” operating there. In the Associated Press article, “EU lifts Syria oil embargo to bolster rebels,” it states: The European Union on Monday lifted its oil embargo on Syria to […]

The Politics of Oil In Scotland

On 18th September 2014 the Scottish People will have a referendum on their future within the United Kingdom where they will be asked the simple question: Should Scotland be an Independent Country? Yes or No. Should the people say yes then this will not only have far reaching political and socio-economic consequences for Scotland and […]

Saudi-US relations to withstand North American oil boom

Experts say Asia and Iran are the keys to maintaining a strong – but evolving – U.S.-Saudi Arabia energy relationship. Saudi Oil Minister Ali al-Naimi is expected to share his optimistic view on the future of Asian oil demand on Tuesday when he gives a major energy speech, billed as the first in the United […]

Iran: Double, double, oil and trouble

Exporters shun Iranian deals, with foreign banks wary of financing trade for fear of reputational damage, making staples like cooking oil unaffordable. Iran is having to pay a premium for basic foodstuffs such as cooking oil, highlighting the increasing strain on Tehran from Western sanctions aimed at its disputed nuclear program, even though the sanctions […]

Former CIA Director: The Grid Is Vulnerable To Attack

The electric power grid in the United States is vulnerable to attacks that have already begun, former CIA Director R. James Woolsey said in Chicago Thursday night, and America needs distributed generation as backup—primarily in the form of natural-gas cogeneration and solar power. On another energy-security front, Woolsey called on automakers to produce fuel-flex cars […]

US congressmen favour export of natural gas to India

Top American lawmakers have strongly favoured export of US natural gas to India, in the absence of which, they said, the energy starved nation might be forced to join the Iran-Pakistan gas pipeline. During a Congressional hearing on export of US natural gas, the lawmakers argued that it is in the national security interest of […]

US: Syria chemical weapons case not airtight

White House says US spy agencies’ assessment that Syria used sarin gas was made with “varying degrees of confidence”. The White House said it was continuing to study assessments by US spy agencies that the Syrian government has used chemical weapons and would not set a timetable for corroborating reports. “I’m not going to set a timeline, because the […]

Canada’s Oil Minister, Unmuzzled

The last time your friendly scribe sought an interview with Joe Oliver, Canada’s minister of natural resources, he was turned down flat. It was February last year. Oliver had made a series of impolitic remarks about the efforts to block the Keystone XL oil pipeline, which, if it’s ever built, would import oil from the […]

The USD Reserve Exodus Continues – Australia Diversifies Reserves Into China

As we have discussed numerous times over the past year, there is a quiet movement among the world’s central banks to diversify their reserves away from the pejorative USD. Whether it is direct trade linkages, hording physical precious metals, or simply buying foreign sovereign debt, there is a trend emerging. The latest defection, as BusinessWeek […]

Iran’s Hosseini Discusses Economy, Oil, Rial

Shamseddin Hosseini, Iran’s minister of economic affairs and finance, spoke yesterday with Bloomberg’s Kambiz Foroohar and Peter Green about the country’s economy, oil exports and currency. (This is not a legal transcript. Bloomberg LP cannot guarantee its accuracy.) KAMBIZ FOROOHAR, BLOOMBERG NEWS: How concerned are you about rising inflation in Iran, and what measures are […]

Chuck Hagel Green Lights Israeli Attacks On Syria and Iran

On Tuesday, Secretary of Defense Chuck Hagel did penance for his perceived sins against Israel. The former senator from Nebraska was criticized during his confirmation process by the likes of John McCain for not joining the march to war against Iran. Hagel’s opposition to sanctions against Iran were considered antisemitic. Chuck Hagel talks with Israeli […]

EPA snags Keystone XL pipeline

The politics of oil and ecology have put President Obama between a rock and hard place, as he faces a decision on whether or not to permit construction of a new pipeline. The squeeze just got tighter with a new, negative environmental assessment. The Keystone XL pipeline will give America energy independence, thousands of jobs, […]

Entering a Resource-Shock World

Brace yourself. You may not be able to tell yet, but according to global experts and the U.S. intelligence community, the earth is already shifting under you.  Whether you know it or not, you’re on a new planet, a resource-shock world of a sort humanity has never before experienced. Two nightmare scenarios — a global […]

Obama To Sell $10 Billion In Weapons To Israel, Saudi Arabia And The UAE

11 Plugin Update Having been denied the ability to control guns by the democratically-controlled Senate last Wednesday in the biggest slap to the administration’s face in a long time, Obama decided promptly to put as many guns as he possibly can in the hands of US soldiers and various non-Americans. First, it was the announcement […]

Florida Sues BP Over Gulf Oil Spill

The state of Florida filed a lawsuit Saturday against the oil company BP and the cement contractor Halliburton over the Deepwater Horizon oil spill, becoming the fourth state to seek damages for the 2010 disaster. The suit, among other things, faults BP for not changing the batteries on the rig’s blowout preventer. It also accuses […]

Condoleezza Rice: Russia Really Just a Large Oil, Gas Syndicate

Former Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice received a warm welcome from a receptive audience at TD Ameritrade Institutional’s annual conference in San Diego on Thursday morning. Introduced by Kate Healy, the company’s managing director of institutional marketing, Rice began by noting the difference between working in the public and private sectors. “When I left government, […]

China Deploys Navy Ships to Patrol Islands Disputed with Japan

BEIJING: A day after asking Japan to stop encroaching its territory, Chinese military today for the first time deployed its naval ships to patrol the islands disputed with Tokyo in the East China Sea. This is the first time in recent months China deployed its naval vessels for patrols in the islands waters replacing the […]

How Empires Fall

The imperial tree falls not because the challenges are too great but because the core of the tree has been weakened by the gradual loss of surplus, purpose, institutional effectiveness, intellectual vigor and productive investment. Comparing the American Empire with the Roman Empire in its terminal decline is a popular intellectual parlor game. The comparison […]

Protests held in Bahrain ahead of Formula One

Thousands of Bahrainis have demonstrated near the capital, Manama, urging democratic reforms, part of a series of protests planned by the political opposition ahead of next week’s Formula One Grand Prix. Under the banner “Democracy is our right,” the crowds marched in the Shia area of Aali south of the capital, waving Bahraini flags and chanting […]

OPEC Reacts to US Shale Oil Boom with New Strategy

The first signs are emerging that key Persian Gulf members of the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) are adjusting their strategies to cope with the growing threat that North American shale oil is making to their long-term dominance in global energy markets. The OPEC moves lag behind other international players such as Statoil and […]

Chavez Heir Maduro Wins Venezuela Vote

Nicolas Maduro was elected Venezuela’s president today after pledging to deepen 14 years of the late Hugo Chavez’s socialist revolution that cut poverty by half. The 50-year-old former bus driver received 50.7 percent of the votes, the national electoral council said after about 99 percent of ballots were counted. Henrique Capriles Radonski, who temporarily stepped […]

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