economics

The world’s largest asset manager, BlackRock, said a portfolio allocation of up to 2% is “reasonable” for investors who wish to hold Bitcoin, in their latest Investment Perspectives report.

They begin the report by noting that “bitcoin cannot be compared to traditional assets,” but from a portfolio construction perspective, Samara Cohen (CIO of ETFs) and her team suggest that the so-called “Magnificent 7” group of mega-cap tech stocks is a useful starting point.

“Those stocks represent single portfolio holdings that account for a comparatively large share of portfolio risk as with bitcoin.

In a traditional portfolio with a mix of 60% stocks and 40% bonds, those seven stocks each account for, on average, about the same share of overall portfolio risk as a 1-2% allocation to bitcoin.

We think that’s a reasonable range for a bitcoin exposure.”

As with gold, bitcoin can be driven by sentiment, narratives and momentum – both up and down.

Why not more, they ask (and answer):

“Going beyond that would sharply increase bitcoin’s share of the overall portfolio risk.”

With approximately $11.5 trillion in assets under management (and manager of the largest spot BTC ETF, iShares Bitcoin Trust (IBIT), which holds net assets of nearly $54 billion), they are worth listening to.

According to BlackRock, investors “need to think about Bitcoin’s expected returns in a different way: it has no underlying cash flows for estimating future returns. What matters: the extent of adoption.”

“Bitcoin may also provide a more diversified source of return,” BlackRock said, adding:

“We see no intrinsic reason why Bitcoin should be correlated with major risk assets over the long term given its value is driven by such distinct drivers.”

Longer term, BTC “could potentially also become less risky – but at that point it might no longer have a structural catalyst for further sizable price increases,” the report said.

Instead, “investors may prefer to use it tactically to hedge against specific risks, similar to gold.”

Launched in January, spot BTC ETFs emerged as 2024’s most popular investment vehicles, breaking $100 billion in net assets in November. 

As CoinTelegraph reports, these surging inflows from institutional investors could cause “demand shocks” in 2025, driving up BTC’s spot price, according to a Dec. 12 report by Sygnum Bank.

“Our analysis shows how even relatively modest allocations from this segment can fundamentally alter the crypto asset ecosystem,” Sygnum said.

The report, dubbed ‘Sizing Bitcoin in portfolios’, was released by BlackRock Investment Institute on Dec. 12.

Submitted by Newsquawk

• ECB policy announcement due Thursday December 12th; rate decision at 13:15GMT/08:15EST, press conference from 13:45GMT/08:45EST
• Expectations are for the ECB to cut the Deposit Rate by 25bps to 3.00%
• The backdrop of the meeting comes amid a highly uncertain growth outlook for the Eurozone

OVERVIEW: The ECB is expected to follow up the October rate cut with another 25bps reduction, its 4th rate cut in a row, disappointing some of those looking for a deeper cut of 50bps on account of ongoing growth concerns. The ECB will most likely maintain a gradual approach to rate cuts with accompanying macro projections potentially set to not fully reflect recent negative events in the Eurozone. If the GC surprises markets by going for 50bps it will be a highly pre-emptive move and a step away from data-dependency. In order to get a consensus for such a move, the doves will need to convince the hawks that this is not a precursor for a move into sub-neutral territory.

PRIOR MEETING: As expected, the ECB opted to cut the Deposit Rate by 25bps. Despite the bank seemingly positioning itself for an unchanged rate in the wake of the September meeting, soft outturns for inflation and survey data forced the hand of the Bank into easing policy. Accordingly, the ECB reaffirmed its data-dependent credentials and reiterated that it will keep policy rates sufficiently restrictive for as long as necessary. The only minor tweak in the policy statement was that the Bank now sees inflation at 2% in the course of 2025 vs. previous guidance of H2 2025. At the follow-up press conference, Lagarde noted that there will be a lot more data available before the December 12th meeting, which suggests that there is not a preset expectation on the GC over what happens at the final meeting of the year. Furthermore, Lagarde stated that she has not opened the door to another rate reduction in December. That being said, she noted that there is no question that policy is currently restrictive. With regards to the decision, the President noted that it was a unanimous one on the GC.

RECENT ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENTS: On the inflation front, headline Y/Y CPI rose in November to 2.3% from 2.0%, which was largely expected on account of base effects. Core inflation remained at a stubborn level of 2.7% whilst services inflation ticked marginally lower to 3.9% from 4.0%. The ECB’s Consumer Expectations Survey saw the 12-month inflation forecast rise to 2.5% from 2.4% with the 3yr forecast holding steady at 2.1%. The 5y5y inflation forward has pulled back to 2.00% from the 2.14% seen at the time of the last meeting. On the growth front, Q3 GDP came in at 0.4% Q/Q, whilst the November Eurozone Composite PMI slipped to 48.1 from 50.0 amid heavy pessimism surrounding the French economy. The accompanying release noted “the eurozone’s manufacturing sector is sinking deeper into recession, and now the services sector is starting to struggle after two months of marginal growth.” In the labor market, the unemployment rate remains at a historic low of 6.3%.

RECENT COMMUNICATIONS: Since the prior meeting, President Lagarde has noted that the medium-term economic outlook is uncertain and therefore the Bank is not pre-committing to a particular rate path. Chief Economist Lane said while inflation had fallen close to the ECB’s target of 2%, there is a little bit of distance to go. He added that while data dependence falls down in priority, the new challenge would be assessing the incoming risks on a meeting-by-meeting basis, via FT. The influential Schnabel of Germany has stated that she sees only limited room for additional cuts, adding that the ECB should take a gradual approach and not go to an accommodative stance. In the hawkish camp, Austria’s Holzmann has said that a 25bps rate cut is conceivable in December but not more. Interestingly, the typically centrist Villeroy of France said interest rates should clearly go to the neutral rate and would not exclude going below the neutral rate in the future. He added that negative rates should remain in the ECB’s toolkit. Elsewhere, Italy’s Panetta has said that the ECB should move to a neutral monetary stance, or expansionary if necessary, adding that the ECB is still a long way away from neutral.

RATES/ECONOMIC PROJECTIONS: Expectations are for the ECB to cut the deposit rate by 25bps to 3.0% with markets assigning a circa 82% chance of such an outcome (with an 18% probability for a 50bps rate cut). Despite the weak growth outlook for the Eurozone, which is also complicated by Trump’s return to the White House, developments on the inflation front suggest there is still more work done to return inflation to target. In recent weeks, policymakers have also stressed the need for the Bank to step away from recent data dependency and focus on forward-looking expectations. On which, the accompanying macro projections are likely to be viewed as stale given that the cut-off date did not encapsulate the latest French political woes, whilst as highlighted by ING, “the ECB normally also applies a ‘no policy change’ assumption to its forecasting”. ING expects projections to be little changed vs. September (other than a slight downward revision for growth and inflation in 2025). As such, those on the GC looking for a 50bps cut are unlikely to be supported by the latest forecasts. If the GC surprises markets by going for 50bps it will be a highly pre-emptive move and a step away from data- dependency. In order to get a consensus for such a move, the doves will need to convince the hawks that this is not a precursor for a move into sub-neutral territory. Looking beyond the upcoming meeting, assuming the ECB cuts by 25bps, an additional 125bps of loosening is seen by the end of 2025.

Current forecasts:

• HICP INFLATION: 2024: 2.5%, 2025: 2.2%. 2026: 1.9%
• HICP CORE INFLATION (EX-ENERGY & FOOD): 2024: 2 9%, 2025: 2.3%, 2026: 2.0%
• GDP: 2024: 0.8%, 2025: 1.3%, 2026: 1.5%

* * *

How to trade today’s ECB rate cut?

Here is Bloomberg’s Vassilis Karamanis explaining why “Euro Traders Brace For Risk In Lagarde Guidance”

Options traders see the euro moving by the most since May 2023 on the day of a European Central Bank meeting, even amid market consensus on the policy decision. It’s mostly about forward-guidance expectations and a new FX volatility environment that’s been shaping up since the US elections.

Euro-dollar overnight volatility rises to 16.56%, the fifth highest reading in the past 19 months, pointing to a potentially game-changing moment for investors. Money markets fully price a quarter-point interest rate cut by the ECB later Thursday, assigning next to zero chances of a larger cut.

The updated inflation and growth projections are one part of the uncertainty surrounding the decision. The biggest surprise would of course come from a jumbo rate cut, but it’s mostly down to what President Christine Lagarde will offer to the market in terms of verbal projections.

Questions include whether the central bank sticks to restrictive-rates language and delivers a modest hawkish surprise, or if officials are comfortable in communicating that a move below neutral levels is on the cards by the summer of 2025. Traders may be also looking for clear guidance on what the ECB has in store in case of a global trade war or should political risks in the euro area’s largest economies spill over to spreads.

Lagarde has been careful in maintaining full flexibility during the press conferences that follow a policy decision, sporadically offering only subtle messaging on the Governing Council’s thinking for the next move. While options pricing points to chances that today’s messaging could be more revealing, high euro hedging costs also reflect the shaping up of expectations for higher volatility next year.

Chances of a global trade war, lingering geopolitical risks and diverging inflation paths for the world’s largest economies — and in turn monetary policy, make the case for long-volatility exposure in the currency space which is seen once again as a strong alpha-generating asset class. Interbank traders say that positioning is now much lighter in the euro, as many desks have trimmed exposure ahead of year-end, and that leaves room for a wide move, even if it all goes according to consensus.

Authored by John & Nisha Whitehead via The Rutherford Institute,

“Rights aren’t rights if someone can take them away. They’re privileges. That’s all we’ve ever had in this country is a ‘Bill of Temporary Privileges.’ And if you read the news, even badly, you know that the list gets shorter and shorter.”

– George Carlin

Disguising its power grabs in the self-righteous fervor of national security, the Deep State has mastered the art of the bait-and-switch.

It works like this: first, the government foments fear about some crisis or threat to national security, then they capitalize on it by seizing greater power and using those powers against the American people.

We’ve seen this play out over and over again.

The government used its so-called War on Terror to transform itself into a police state.

Then the police state used its War on COVID-19 to claim lockdown powers.

All indications are that the government’s promised War on Illegal Immigration will be yet another sleight of hand that allows the powers-that-be to engage in greater power grabs while weakening the Constitution.

Therein lies the danger of the government’s growing addiction to power.

Whatever dangerous practices you allow the government to carry out now—whether it’s in the name of national security or protecting America’s borders or making America healthy again—inevitably, these same practices can and will be used against you when the government decides to set its sights on you.

The slippery slope that starts with illegal immigration has all the makings of a thinly veiled plot to empower the government to become the arbiter of who is deserving of rights and who isn’t.

That quickly, we could find ourselves navigating a world in which the rights enshrined in the Constitution for all persons living in the United States are transformed into privileges enjoyed only by those whom the government chooses to recognize as legitimate.

By persuading the public that non-citizens, particularly illegal immigrants, do not enjoy the same inalienable rights as law-abiding citizens (a fact refuted by the Constitution and every credible legal scholar in the country), the Deep State is leading us down a road in which all rights are transitory.

This is how you establish a hierarchy of rights, contingent on whether you belong to a favored political class.

Be warned.

At such a time as the government is emboldened to flip that switch and appoint itself the ultimate authority on which protected class of individuals gets to enjoy the rights enshrined within the Constitution, the dividing line will not be between legal citizens and illegal immigrants.

It will not even be between Republicans and Democrats.

Rather, the purpose of that line of demarcation will be to distinguish the compliant, obedient, subservient vassal of the American police state (the so-called Loyalists) from everyone else.

We’re almost at that point now.

This is how tyranny rises and freedom falls.

Here are some of the inherent dangers in allowing the government to become the arbiter of who is deserving of rights:

It leads to the erosion of universal rights. The Bill of Rights was designed to protect the fundamental rights of all persons within the United States, regardless of their citizenship status, race, religion, or any other factor. When the government starts making distinctions about who is entitled to these rights, it undermines the universality that makes them so powerful. This creates a slippery slope where rights become privileges, subject to the whims of those in power.

It gives rise to authoritarianism. History is replete with examples of governments that consolidated power by first stripping away the rights of marginalized groups. Once the principle of universal rights is breached, it becomes easier to target other groups deemed “undesirable” or “unworthy.” This paves the way for authoritarianism, where the government dictates who enjoys freedom and who does not.

It creates a two-tiered society. A hierarchy of rights inevitably leads to a two-tiered society, where some individuals enjoy full protection under the law while others are relegated to second-class status. This fosters resentment, division, and social unrest. It also creates a vulnerable population that can be easily exploited and abused.

It undermines the rule of law. The rule of law is a fundamental principle of a just society. It means that everyone is subject to the same laws and that no one is above the law. When the government selectively applies the law based on arbitrary criteria, it undermines the rule of law and erodes trust in the legal system.

It chills free speech and dissent, i.e., the right to criticize the government. When people fear that their rights are contingent on their political views or social status, they are less likely to speak out against injustice or challenge the government. This chilling effect on dissent stifles free speech and creates a climate of fear and conformity.

It contributes to the loss of moral authority. A nation that claims to champion liberty and justice for all loses its moral authority when it denies those principles to certain groups within its borders. This undermines its standing in the world and diminishes its ability to promote human rights abroad.

Remember, the erosion of inalienable rights often starts subtly, with the government chipping away at the edges of those rights for specific groups.

The pattern is subtle at first, with government officials exploiting fear and prejudice in order to target groups that are already marginalized or perceived as “outsiders.” Incrementally, the net is cast wider and wider, so that by the time the injustice is widespread enough to inspire outrage in the greater populace, it’s too late to resist.

Historic examples abound of how the government has manufactured a blatantly unjust hierarchy of rights in order to diminish certain segments of society. These run the gamut from slavery and the persecution of Native Americans to the Japanese internment camps and segregation.

More recently, we’ve seen this tactic deployed in order to justify policies that run afoul of the Constitution, ranging from immigration policies and mass surveillance programs to SWAT team raids, voting rights, and the erosion of due process.

Clearly, Martin Niemöller’s warning about the widening net that ensnares us all, a warning issued in response to the threat posed by Nazi Germany’s fascist regime, still applies.

“First they came for the socialists, and I did not speak out—because I was not a socialist. Then they came for the trade unionists, and I did not speak out— because I was not a trade unionist. Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out—because I was not a Jew. Then they came for me—and there was no one left to speak for me.”

This is how the slippery slope to all-out persecution starts.

It doesn’t help that growing numbers of American citizens barely know their rights. Consider that only 5% of the U.S. adults surveyed could correctly name all five rights in the First Amendment, 20% could not correctly name any, and less than one in 10 Americans know they have a right to petition the government.

Such civic illiteracy lays the groundwork for all manner of tyrannies to follow. After all, how can you defend your rights if you don’t know what those rights are?

Then again, civic illiteracy among government officials, who are entrusted with upholding and protecting the Constitution, doesn’t appear to be much better.

It was ten years ago on December 15, National Bill of Rights Day, that the U.S. Supreme Court in its 8-1 ruling in Heien v. State of North Carolina gave police in America one more ready excuse to routinely violate the laws of the land, this time under the guise of ignorance.

The Heien case, which started with an improper traffic stop based on a police officer’s ignorance of the law and ended with an unlawful search, seizure and arrest, was supposed to ensure that ignorance of the law did not become a ready excuse for government officials to routinely violate the law.

It failed to do so.

In failing to enforce the Constitution, the Court gave police the go-ahead to justify a laundry list of misconduct, from police shootings of unarmed citizens to SWAT team raids, roadside strip searches, and the tasering of vulnerable individuals with paltry excuses such as “they looked suspicious” and “she wouldn’t obey our orders.”

Ignorance of the law has become an all-too-convenient cover for all manner of abuses by government officials who should know better.

I’m not sure which is worse: government officials who know nothing about the laws they have sworn to uphold, support and defend, or a constitutionally illiterate citizenry so clueless about their rights that they don’t even know when those rights are being violated.

This much I do know, however: for anyone to advocate terminating or suspending the Constitution is tantamount to a declaration of war against the founding principles of our representative government and the rule of law.

If there is one point on which there should be no political parsing, no legal jockeying, and no disagreement, it is this.

Then again, as I make clear in my book Battlefield America: The War on the American People and in its fictional counterpart The Erik Blair Diaries, one could well make the case that the Constitution has already been terminated after years on life support, given the extent to which the safeguards enshrined in the Bill of Rights—adopted 233 years ago as a means of protecting the people against government overreach and abuse—have been steadily chipped away at, undermined, eroded, whittled down, and generally discarded with the support of Congress, the White House, and the courts.

History provides chilling examples of how quickly rights can vanish, even in a nation such as ours founded on the principles of freedom. As George Carlin astutely observed:

“If you think you do have rights, next time you’re at the computer, get on the internet, go to Wikipedia. When you get to Wikipedia, in the search field for Wikipedia, I want you to type in ‘Japanese Americans 1942’ and you’ll find out all about your precious … rights. In 1942, there were 110,000 Japanese American citizens in good standing, law-abiding people, who were thrown into internment camps simply because their parents were born in the wrong country. That’s all they did wrong. They had no right to a lawyer, no right to a fair trial, no right to a jury of their peers, no right to due process of any kind. The only right they had: ‘right this way’ into the internment camps. Just when these American citizens needed their rights the most, their government took them away. And rights aren’t rights if someone can take them away.”

Remember you were warned, folks.

At the point that rights become privileges, then the Constitution and the government’s adherence to the rule of law will become optional.

We thought last month’s US budget deficit was bad. Boy, were we wrong.

It is only fitting that the twilight days of the Biden admin would exhibit more of the same fakeness that defined not only all of the past four years, but certainly the fakeness of that Kamala Harris presidential campaign which had a billion dollars a month ago and ended up in failure, broke… and millions in debt. We are talking, of course, about the relentless debt-funded spree that somehow became synonymous with economic success in the US.

According to the latest Treasury data released today, in November – the second month of fiscal 2025 – the US spent a massive $584.2 billion, a 14% increase from the prior year, and a record for the month of November. For those who remember out outrage from a month ago, will also remember that the latest deficit number follows what was also a record government outlay for the month of October.

On a trailing 6 month moving average basis, to smooth out outliers months, the spending hit $586 billion, effectively at an all time high with just the record spending spree during covid pushing government spending higher.

The surge in spending was driven primarily by higher spending on health, defense and Social Security, but mostly a huge $50BN spike on Medicare outlays!

The long-term chart of government spending shows what we all know: DOGE or not DOGE, there is no stopping this train.

The surge in spending was far greater than the much more modest increase in tax revenues: in November, the US government collected $301.8 billion in taxes, up 9.8% from the $274.8 billion last November. As shown in the next chart, while spending continued to grow exponentially, tax receipts have flatlined, and the 6 month average in October was just $380 billion, the same as three years ago!

To be sure, there were some calendar effects in play. Recall that last month we said that October 2023’s tax receipts were unusually higher due to deferred tax receipts that were received that month from companies and individuals affected by disasters including wildfires in California. Taking that into account, the October budget deficit would have been 22% higher (and would offset the freak September surplus which we are convinced was staged to make the last month of fiscal 2024 look abnormally good for the Biden admin). And since some of this calendar effect also nets in November, to avoid the calendar shifts across months we combined the first two months of fiscal 2025.  What we got was this shocker of a chart: 

It shows that in October and November, the US deficit exploded to a staggering $624.2 billion, and even though this included several calendar adjustments – which explains the freak September surplus which as we said was due to calendar effects – the November deficit of $367 billion was $14 billion more than consensus estimates of $353 billion. Worse, combining October and November we find that not only was the combined number of $624 billion some 64% higher than the corresponding period one year ago, but it was also the highest deficit on record for the first two-months of the year (and that includes the spending insanity during the covid crisis).

Putting the deficit in context, the budget deficit in October and November – the first two months of fiscal 2025 – are now officially the worst start a year for the US Treasury on record.

Taking a closer look at what has been the most terrifying trend in the US income statement for some time now, the Treasury’s debt-servicing costs rose once again in November. Gross interest costs totaled $87 billion, up $7 billion from $80 billion in the same month a year before.

And if the November print seems low by recent standards, just wait one month: the December gross interest payment will be an absolute shocker as that’s when the bulk of interest payments take place. For December, expect a number north of $150 billion in interest alone!

And while we wait, this is what a chart of LTM spending across the main categories looks like. Yes, gross interest spending is not only the second largest outlay for the US government, just shy of $1.2 trillion, it’s also the highest it has ever been, and will continue rising, especially if/when the Fed ends its easing cycle prematurely due to rising prices sparking the next meltup…. in US interest payment.

The good news is that for now (certainly until the December explosion), the surge in US interest payments has been delayed. That’s because the weighted average interest rate for total outstanding debt at the end of November was 3.36%, at roughly 15-year highs, but down slightly from the month before, the third monthly decline.

However, don’t expect this decline in interest spending to persist because even though the Fed has cut rates twice since September, this has been more than offset by the surge in debt which at last check was now $36.2 trillion, up half a trillion from a month ago, and unless Elon’s Department for Government Efficiency (DOGE) manages to somehow slash trillions in both spending and interest, this is what US debt will look like for the next few years, guaranteeing that interest on said debt will very soon become the single largest spending category for the US government.

It’s either going to work or it’s not. Here is the alternative https://t.co/cHZA2wHnPB pic.twitter.com/LMEI4tISZL

— zerohedge (@zerohedge) November 13, 2024

The mindblowing figures illustrate the monumental challenge for Trump and all those promising to rein in US debt, which has exploded to 120% of GDP after four years of Biden’s “drunken-sailor” spending ways. The last hope for the US is that Trump has tapped Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy to look at ways to cut spending. Alas, these figures show that the bulk of the outlays are in areas that are bound to be a politically challenging to address, in other words, any cuts even remotely close to the $2 trillion suggested by Vivek would lead to a revolt.

It’s also why any attempts to reroute the US from its inevitable collision with the iceberg fiscal devastation will likewise end in ruin.

Dramatic footage has been posted on X, capturing the moment a powerful blast rocked a luxury residential tower in the southern Chinese city of Shenzhen.

Number 1 trend on Weibo now: the terrible explosion that occurred in a residential building in Shenzhen’s Nanshan District today just after 14.30 after which 16 fire trucks and 80 fire rescue workers rushed to the scene. pic.twitter.com/6l3RJlFeN3

— Manya Koetse (@manyapan) December 11, 2024

Reuters reported:

The Shenzhen fire brigade said it had dispatched 16 fire trucks and 80 rescue personnel after receiving a report of the emergency at the compound.

…

According to state media The Beijing News, a preliminary investigation showed that a gas explosion on the 28th floor of the building caused the fire, while the exact cause of the explosion was still being investigated.

According to the Shanghai Morning Post, local officials have not confirmed casualty numbers, which remain unknown. At least one resident of the high-end condo building had fallen off after losing consciousness.

Footage of the aftermath was posted on X, including a shocking image of a person at the edge of their floor, attempting to escape the flames…

😞😞😞 pic.twitter.com/qLyM9eDVQd

— Deepman (@Deepman1024) December 11, 2024

Tragic high-rise explosion this afternoon in Shenzhen in a residential building (China).

At least one person died – a woman who fell down.

At least 4 floors were impacted. This happened in the Nanshan district. I can clearly see that building from my place.

My video in 🧵… pic.twitter.com/51S4EM8FY4

— Daniel Camilo (@DanielOlimac) December 11, 2024

An explosion occurred in an apartment at Phase II of Shenzhen Bay Yuefu in Nanshan District earlier this afternoon, Shenzhen Media Group reported.

The cause of the explosion and any potential injuries remain unclear. Authorities are conducting an emergency investigation into… pic.twitter.com/22FORvcJZG

— Shenzhen Daily (@szdaily1) December 11, 2024

SCMP noted that rescue teams have been evacuating residents throughout the building. 

Website Finder.com cited data from the National Christmas Tree Association showing that 43% of American households are expected to purchase a real tree this holiday season, with the average tree costing around $79.31—around $4 more than in 2023.

2020 marked a critical point in which artificial tree sales surpassed real tree sales for the first time. 

Separately, data from point-of-sale company Square shows that Christmas tree prices typically peak and are most expensive immediately after Black Friday and during the first half of December. Square noted that 50% deals occur in the days leading up to Christmas. 

Square Research Lead Ara Kharazian wrote in a note: “The cheapest time to buy a Christmas tree is right before Christmas. The best time is whichever day maximizes joy in your household.”

Over the past decade, Christmas tree supplies have been squeezed by a supplier bust originating back to the Global Financial Crisis, compounded by continued adverse weather conditions in the country’s top tree-growing regions.

“The root of the tight supply issue goes back to 2008 when an oversupply led growers to scale back planting,” Jill Sidebottom, a National Christmas Tree Association spokesperson, told CBS MoneyWatch.

Sidebottom added that adverse weather conditions, including the 2021 heat dome that destroyed trees across the Pacific Northwest, have exacerbated supply constraints in recent years.

Meanwhile, PNC Bank’s annual Christmas Price Index, which calculates the cost of “True Love’s” gifts from the classic holiday carol The Twelve Days of Christmas, rose by 5.4% compared to last year.

Data from Bankrate shows persistent inflation and high interest rates are expected to weigh on low/mid-tier consumers this holiday season. According to the financial services company, about one-third of holiday shoppers plan to spend less this year than last year.

Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg – who had a Biden DOJ plant in his legal case against former President Donald Trump – is trying to ensure his hush money case doesn’t vanish into thin air as Trump prepares for his return to the White House.

According to court filings revealed Tuesday, Bragg’s office is fiercely opposed to dismissing the case outright but is open to pausing proceedings while Trump serves his second term as president.

The 82-page legal brief, prosecutors’ most detailed argument yet, stops short of recommending an explicit course of action but outlines several ways to keep the case alive. Among them: delaying sentencing until after Trump leaves office in 2029 or freezing the case while leaving the jury’s guilty verdict intact, The Hill reports.

“The extreme remedy of dismissing the indictment and vacating the jury verdict is not warranted in light of multiple alternative accommodations that would fully address the concerns raised by presidential immunity,” wrote Assistant District Attorney Christopher Conroy.

The filing comes as Trump, now president-elect, wages a legal battle to quash the 34 felony charges stemming from hush money payments to an adult film star. Trump’s lawyers claim his status as president-elect grants him immunity and demands immediate dismissal.

Prosecutors, however, aren’t buying it. They argue that immunity doesn’t apply until Trump is inaugurated, meaning the case could theoretically proceed to sentencing before January 20, 2025 — a prospect Trump has vowed to fight tooth and nail.

Judge Juan Merchan, who presided over Trump’s trial, will now decide the case’s fate, with a ruling expected any day.

A Legal Tightrope

The DA’s office acknowledged the complications of prosecuting a sitting president but stopped short of saying the case should be completely shelved.

Trump was convicted by a Manhattan Jury ‘of his peers’ on 34 counts of falsifying business records, however his reelection to the highest office in the land has put a damper on prosecutors’ plans.

Sentencing was initially scheduled for last month, only to be postponed indefinitely by Judge Merchan, making it increasingly unlikely Trump will face punishment anytime soon.

That would leave open the possibility that Trump could still proceed to sentencing in 2029, after he leaves office.

Alternatively, state prosecutors said the judge could terminate the case without tossing Trump’s conviction, noting a jury verdict removed the presumption of innocence, he was never sentenced and his conviction was “neither affirmed nor reversed” on appeal because of presidential immunity. -The Hill

Trump’s legal team is crying foul, claiming the prosecution disrupts his transition efforts and his ability to govern effectively. “Wrongly continuing proceedings in this failed lawfare case disrupts President Trump’s transition efforts and his preparations to wield the full Article II executive power authorized by the Constitution pursuant to the overwhelming national mandate granted to him by the American people on November 5, 2024,” Trump’s attorneys fumed in a recent filing.

Prosecutors hit back, accusing Trump of using delay tactics to muddy the waters. “Having filed those motions to dismiss and then sought repeated adjournments of sentencing to permit their determination by this Court, it is particularly brazen for defendant to argue that the Supremacy Clause bars the Court from taking any action on the motions defendant himself filed,” Conroy wrote.

After many years of a massive refugee influx into Europe from Middle East wars, especially going to back to the height of the 2015 migrant crisis, several European countries have ordered a halt to processing asylum applications from Syrians. This comes after the fall of Bashar al-Assad’s government in Syria.

The UK, German, and Austria have confirmed they are freezing their applications. Germany alone has taken in some one million Syrians. Other countries halting their process includes Italy, Norway, Greece, the Netherlands, Belgium, and Finland.

Austria has gone the furthest, with country’s interior minister, Gerhard Karner, saying, “I have instructed the ministry to prepare a program of orderly repatriation and deportation to Syria.”

London’s Home Office also confirmed it has “temporarily paused decisions on Syrian asylum claims whilst we assess the current situation.”

“We keep all country guidance relating to asylum claims under constant review so we can respond to emerging issues,” a spokesperson said.

German officials have also begun signaling that Syrians should make arrangements to return home. Germany’s interior minister, Nancy Faeser, said on Monday that “Many refugees who have found protection in Germany now finally have hope of returning to their Syrian homeland and rebuilding their country.”

However, many Syrians would have greater fear of the new jihadist groups which took over Damascus, and might seek asylum given an al-Qaeda offshoot (HTS) now controls the country. This is especially true of Syrian Christians, Alawites, and Druze.

There’s no assurance that the situation will get any better in Syria under HTS rule, after the basically overnight collapse of an entire state system and its services. One NGO is speaking sense in terms of the realities on the ground:

“Chaos and violence continue to reign in Syria. Armed groups control large parts of the country and there is neither a stable government nor functioning state structures,” its spokesperson Tareq Alaows said in an email. “Much of the infrastructure has been destroyed and millions of people inside Syria are still displaced. Many cities are considered unsafe and there is no sign of a normalization of living conditions.”

Still, the presence of such large numbers of Syrian and other Middle East refugees has long unleashed a political firestorm in European politics. This is whey European officials are relieved that these massive changes in Syria provide an opportunity to send people back to their homeland.

Authored by Andrew Korybko via substack,

The epic collapse of the Syrian Arab Army (SAA) over the past ten days and Assad’s cowardly flight from Damascus early Sunday morning herald the dawn of a new Syria.

The most immediate risk is that the entire country collapses just like Afghanistan, Iraq, and Libya before it.

That could create a black hole of instability from which innumerable global terrorist threats could emerge. Here’s what has to happen to prevent post-Assad Syria from experiencing that dark future:

1. The Army & The Security Services Must Remain Intact

The three preceding cases of state collapse were characterized by the army and the security services dissolving shortly after their foreign-backed regime change plots succeeded. In Syria’s case, the SAA still exists as an institution even though it’s on the retreat to who knows where, perhaps to the Alawite-majority coast. It’s therefore imperative that it doesn’t fall apart and cooperates with the non-terrorist anti-government opposition (NTAGO) to ensure that everything doesn’t spiral out of control.

2. Political Reform Must Begin Without Delay

Lavrov repeatedly emphasized during his interview at Saturday’s Doha Forum that that the Syrian government and the NTAGO must immediately implement UNSC Resolution 2254 from late 2015, which calls for drastic political reforms such as a new constitution and UN-supervised elections. It was Assad’s refusal to compromise with the NTAGO that ultimately led to this disaster. Prime Minister Jalali will reportedly serve as caretaker leader during the political transition, however, which is a positive sign.

3. The Russian-Written Draft Constitution Must Be Revived

It was assessed late last month that one of “The Five Reasons Why Syria Was Caught By Surprise” is because Assad rejected the Russian-written draft constitution from January 2017’s first Astana Summit, which was constructively critiqued in detail here at the time. With him out of the way, the multiple concessions that this document called for Damascus to make might finally become a reality, and they might even be taken further than its authors initially envisaged given the new circumstances.

4. The Alawite & Kurdish Minorities Must Be Protected

The Alawite coast remains outside the control of Turkish-backed Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) terrorists for now as does the US-backed Kurdish-controlled northeast, both minorities of which must be protected from the jihadists. To that end, the aforesaid document could lay the basis for broad Bosnian-like federalized autonomy that could result in the coast falling under Russia’s “sphere of influence”, as could the northeast if Trump withdraws US forces from there like RFJ Jr. claimed that he plans to do.

5. The Interim Government Must Maintain Russia’s Bases

And finally, Russia can help the interim Syrian government fight against terrorists just like it helped Assad do from 2015 onward, so they must allow it to maintain its bases for that purpose. Their withdrawal would leave the Syrian state defenseless and the Alawite-majority coast at HTS’ mercy. In fact, since Russia’s intervention in Syria was driven by anti-terrorist motives, it might refuse to withdraw on national security pretexts and possibly midwife an independent coastal state to legitimize its continued presence.

Post-Assad Syria is on the brink of all-out collapse that could turn it into the world’s largest hotbed of terrorism if this process isn’t soon averted.

The most effective way to prevent this from happening is following the five pieces of advice from this analysis.

Anything less would greatly raise the chances of the worst-case scenario transpiring, but even in that event, Russia could still mitigate some of the damage if it continues bombing terrorists in Syria and supports the creation of an independent coastal state.