After it emerged last week that Disney pulled a fast one on Florida Governor Ron DeSantis (R) – by enacting a new rule that any changes to the company’s long-held special taxing district in Orlando ‘must be made to benefit Walt Disney world’ – weeks before DeSantis announced a hand-picked board to take over the district, DeSantis on Thursday promised a new round of action against Disney.

Items on the table include looking at taxes on Disney’s hotels, and imposing tolls on roads that serve its theme parks, Politico reports.

The DeSantis administration is also looking at whether they can dismantle the agreement made by the outgoing board – asking his chief inspector general on Monday to conduct a “thorough review and investigation” into actions that “undercut Florida’s legislative process, and defy the will of Floridians.”

“They are not superior to the people of Florida,” DeSantis told a crowd at Hillsdale College. “So come hell or high water we’re going to make sure that policy of Florida carries the day. And so they can keep trying to do things. But ultimately we’re going to win on every single issue involving Disney I can tell you that.”

Disney “tried to pull a fast one on the way out the door,” DeSantis said during a breakfast earlier in the day hosted by the Midland County Republican Party of Michigan. “That story’s not over yet. Buckle up. There’s more coming down the pike,” he added.

The rapid escalation between Disney and DeSantis this week comes in the aftermath of a Central Florida governing board that had been controlled by Disney passing a series of agreements that ensured Disney would keep a large degree of power despite a new law passed in February that created a new board controlled by the governor.

The moves stunned the DeSantis administration and the governor’s hand-picked board, which has since hired lawyers to examine whether it should challenge the legality of the agreements -Politico

Disney CEO Bob Iger told shareholders earlier this week that Florida’s actions were retaliatory, as well as “anti-business” and “anti-Florida.”

Florida’s spat with Disney began after the company opposed a state law which prohibits the instruction of sexual orientation and gender identity until the third grade, and allows for “age appropriate” instruction in older grades. In response, DeSantis and Florida GOP lawmakers eliminated the Reedy Creek Improvement District, the special taxing authority which gave Disney control of the land surrounding its Orlando-area properties. Republican lawmakers in control of the state legislature voted to fire the board overseeing the district and gave DeSantis power to name all five replacements. The move also renamed the district as the Central Florida Tourism Oversight District, and reduced its powers.

Authored by Kate Daugherty via FinanceBuzz.com,

Easter is traditionally a time of regrowth and renewal. These statistics offer insight into how consumers shop for the holiday and their favorite Easter treats.

We may receive compensation from the products and services mentioned in this story, but the opinions are the author’s own. Compensation may impact where offers appear. We have not included all available products or offers. Learn more about how we make money and our editorial policies.

In 2023, Easter is on Sunday, April 9, so there is still time to dye eggs and help the Easter Bunny fill those baskets with delicious treats.

Many families in the U.S. will likely hunt for Easter eggs and sit down to a meal with family and friends. With rising prices and shortages of everything from meat to eggs, this year’s celebration might be a little more subdued but no less memorable.

Check out these Easter facts to help you wow your dinner guests and make a plan to help you spend on the things that matter this year.

Key takeaways

• 72% of people say rising food costs will impact their Easter plans.

• In 2022, about 51% of people planned in-person celebrations, compared to 43% in 2021.

• $2.6 billion worth of Easter candy is sold annually in the U.S. alone.

• 8 in 10 Americans celebrate Easter.

• Americans spent $6.58 billion on Easter food in 2022.

• 90% of U.S. consumers plan to include chocolate and candy in Easter baskets.

• 37% of those surveyed planned to attend Easter church services in person in 2022, up from 28% in 2021.

In this article

72% of people say rising food costs will impact their Easter plans

According to a 2023 survey of 1,000 U.S. adults conducted by our team at FinanceBuzz, inflation and the rising costs of items like eggs and candy are leading people to change their Easter plans. The majority of respondents (72%) said rising costs will impact their Easter plans, including 43% who said they’d be looking for more sales than normal, 16% who said they’d likely cut back on food for their holiday dinner, and 14% who plan on having fewer guests for dinner.

Other modifications to Easter plans include using more coupons (24%), limiting the type and the amount of candy put into Easter baskets (22%), and switching from real eggs to fake or plastic eggs (20%).

Source: FinanceBuzz

Easter is the second biggest candy holiday

Although Halloween is usually the biggest candy holiday overall, Easter is a close second and, according to some reports, occasionally overtakes the spooky season.

The U.S. is estimated to have spent just under $3 billion on Easter candy in 2022, an increase of $1 billion since 2007.

According to the National Retail Federation, in 2022, U.S. adults spent an average of $169.79 on Easter overall, and candy was the top purchase for 90% of respondents.

Food and gifts were second and third, with 88% and 63% of respondents, respectively, saying they planned to purchase those items for Easter. Clothing and decorations were closely linked, with just under half (49% and 48%, respectively) of those surveyed saying they planned to purchase those items.

Source: Statista, National Retail Federation

The majority of candy purchased is chocolate

Candy is a key part of the Easter celebration for people in the U.S., and 70% of the candy purchased for Easter is chocolate. Reese’s milk chocolate peanut butter eggs and Cadbury creme eggs are the two most popular chocolates purchased, followed by chocolate bunnies, which came in third.

According to Statista, the chocolate market in the U.S. is $49.48 billion, with seasonal chocolate making up about $3.3 billion across all holidays. The annual sales growth of seasonal chocolate is 13.5%.

Source: Dosomething.org, Statista

76% of Americans think the ears of a chocolate bunny should be eaten first

If you eat chocolate bunny ears first, you’re not alone — about three-quarters of Americans do the same. About 90 million chocolate bunnies are sold in the U.S. annually, and $2.6 billion is spent on Easter candy in the U.S. alone. In 2021, Germany produced 214 million chocolate Easter bunnies.

The largest chocolate bunny ever created, according to the Guinness Book of World Records, was made in Brazil in 2017 by the Equipe de Casa de Chocolate at Shopping Uberaba. The bunny weighed 4,245.5 kg. (9,359 lbs.) and was created by nine professionals working eight consecutive days. It was 4.52 meters tall (14.82 feet) and 2.11 meters wide (6.92 feet).

Source: Guinness World Records, Good Housekeeping, Statista

80% of people celebrated Easter in 2022

Although most of the country said they intended to celebrate Easter in 2022, Easter still tends to be less popular than other holidays.

Christmas and Thanksgiving are the most popular holidays in the U.S., with 85% and 84%, respectively, saying that they celebrate the particular holiday. Most people say they spend the Easter holiday cooking a special meal, visiting family and friends, watching TV, and doing an Easter egg hunt.

Eight in ten Americans say they will celebrate Easter, and both men and women are equally as likely to celebrate the holiday (79% of men and 80% of women). The number of people celebrating Easter in 2020 and 2021 decreased compared to previous years due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Source: Statista, National Retail Federation

The largest Easter egg hunt had more than 500,000 eggs

The White House Easter Egg Roll tends to be the most talked about Easter egg hunt in the U.S. The first White House Easter egg roll was held in 1878 by President Rutherford B. Hayes, although some accounts believe the egg roll itself may have started with Abraham Lincoln.

In 2022, an estimated 30,000 people participated in the egg roll celebration, including military families and the crew from the U.S.S. Delaware, a U.S. Naval submarine. The event is so popular that tickets are distributed via a lottery.

The biggest Easter Egg hunt was held in Florida in April 2007 at Adventure Parks Group, LLC. There were 501,000 eggs scattered over the grounds, and 9,753 children (with their parents) took part in the hunt.

Source: Guinness World Records, White House History, Whitehouse.gov

People between the ages of 35 and 44 plan to spend more than other age groups

While it’s likely that most spending is done by parents or people buying things for children, in 2019, people ages 35 to 44 spent $185.37 on their Easter celebrations, second only to the age group of 25 to 34, who paid $189.25. Those aged 18 to 24 spent $146.03 in 2019, and those aged 45-54 paid $148.37. People aged 65+ spent the least, averaging $108.96 per person.

Comparatively, in 2022, the National Retail Federation says people aged 35 to 44 spent more than all other groups, with average spending of $232.65, although that is almost $30 less per person than in 2021.

Men were expected to spend more than women on Easter in 2022 ($189.94 versus $150.64). The per-person average is down about $20 for men from 2021, while women will likely spend the same amount as in 2021.

Source: National Retail Federation, Statista

Peeps are the best-selling non-chocolate Easter candy

Although those neon-colored marshmallows tend to be a love ‘em or hate ‘em Easter item, the holiday just wouldn’t be the same without them. According to Good Housekeeping, Americans eat about 1.5 million Peeps during the Easter season, and the Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, factory that makes Peeps creates about 5.5 million daily.

Despite being so associated with the holiday, 33% of people surveyed by grocery delivery company Instacart said that Peeps are among their least favorite candies. Roughly 25% of those surveyed say they still eat the marshmallow chicks and bunnies for the sake of tradition.

Fun Fact

In 1953, it took 27 hours to make one Peep, according to Good Housekeeping. Today, it takes about six minutes, thanks to a machine called The Depositor, which creates the iconic shape automatically.

Source: PR Newswire, Good Housekeeping, Instacart via Real Simple

More than 16 million jelly beans are eaten during Easter

Jelly beans were first produced in 1930 and quickly became a symbol of the Easter holiday. According to Instacart’s 2022 survey conducted by The Harris Poll, jelly beans were on the top ten list of favorite Easter candies twice. In the number three spot were the Starburst Easter Jelly Beans, the favorite Easter candy in North and South Dakota, North and South Carolina, and Florida.

Brach’s Jelly Bird Eggs were number eight on the list, just ahead of marshmallow Peeps at number nine. According to Real Simple magazine, jelly beans see a 109% sales growth in the two weeks leading up to Easter and are second only to marshmallow treats, which experience a 111% growth over the same time frame.

Source: Good Housekeeping, Instacart via Real Simple

Cooking is the most popular Easter activity

According to a National Retail Federation 2022 survey, the top Easter celebration plan in the U.S. was cooking food to share with family and friends. 56% of the 8,155 people surveyed said they plan to cook a meal, down slightly from 2021 at 59%.

Respondents also said they plan to visit family and friends in person (51%, up from 43% in 2021), watch TV (33%, down from 43% in 2021), plan an Easter egg hunt (32%, slightly up from 2021’s 31%), and go to church in person (37%, up from 2021’s 28%).

Source: National Retail Federation

Rising prices may affect the most popular Easter meal

Many Americans will serve ham on their Easter tables, though it cost more in 2022 than in recent years. According to data analytics company NielsenIQ, ham cost 52.9% more in 2022 than in 2021, and spiral-cut ham cost 46.1% more. In general, meat was up 13.6% from 2021 to 2022, and lamb, another popular Easter meat, was up 18.5%.

According to 210 Analytics via IRI Worldwide, rising inflation didn’t stop Americans from spending on meat last year. In April 2022, meat sales reached $6.5 billion, up 7.5% from 2021. In 2022, people in the U.S. bought $252 million worth of ham, up 19.6% from 2021.

Source: NielsenIQ, 210 Analytics via IRI Worldwide

Americans spent $3.44 billion on new clothes for Easter

Wearing new clothes for good luck the rest of the year is an old Easter tradition that some people still embrace. According to Good Housekeeping, wearing your new clothes to church and showing off your style became the basis of the famous Easter Parade. In 2019, U.S. consumers spent an average of $27.29 per person on new Easter clothes. According to the National Retail Federation, that number increased slightly in 2022 to $27.93, or $3.44 billion in total.

Physical shopping became increasingly popular after two years of primarily online shopping due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Only one in three people (about 35%) said they planned to buy Easter supplies online, while 50% said they would shop in person at discount stores. Four in 10, or 41%, said they planned to shop at a department store for Easter clothing and supplies.

Source: Good Housekeeping, Statista, National Retail Federation

Almost half of Americans say dyeing eggs is a popular family activity at Easter

49% of Americans will spend time coloring hard-boiled eggs over Easter and say that egg dyeing is an integral part of the holiday. In a 2022 study conducted by Suzy, Inc. for Signature Brands, 56% of people said they were looking to make family memories, 54% said they were looking for a fun family activity, and 53% said it was a way to spend quality time with family.

81% of respondents said they planned to purchase a kit to help them dye Easter eggs. Sixteen million dye kits and 180 million eggs to dye are purchased yearly, though inflation and recent shortages may reduce that number in 2023.

Purple Easter eggs are the favorite color of 31% of the people surveyed, followed by blue (24%), pink (19%), and green (10%).

Source: PR Newswire, Insider.com

Easter is the fifth largest card-sending holiday in the U.S.

According to greeting card company Hallmark, an estimated 40 million Easter cards are sent annually in the U.S. While that is a lot of cards, it’s nothing compared to Christmas, the largest card-sending holiday, where an estimated 1.3 billion cards are sent out.

Of course, we cannot forget Easter baskets. It’s estimated that as many as 60% of parents send Easter baskets to their adult kids, even after they’ve moved out of the family home. 44% of consumers say chocolate is the best treat to include in an Easter basket, followed by jelly beans at 20%. Candy-coated eggs and marshmallow candy came in third and fourth, with 18% and 15%, respectively, according to the National Confectioners Association.

Source: Hallmark, National Confectioners Association

Outspoken women’s rights activist and former NCAA swimmer Riley Gaines – who first made headlines for speaking out for being snubbed of a trophy in favor of trans swimmer Lia Thomas – was assaulted by a pro-trans crowd at a speech at San Francisco State University Thursday night.

She was “physically assaulted” following a speech she made at a Turning Point USA event, Fox News reported. 

Her husband, Louis Barker, said she had to be barricaded in a room for nearly three hours to protect herself after. 

He said: “She told me she was hit multiple times by a guy in a dress. I was shaking. It made me that mad. It makes me sick to feel so helpless about it. She was under police protection and was still hit by a man wearing a dress.”

She wrote on Twitter after the incident: “The prisoners are running the asylum at SFSU…I was ambushed and physically hit twice by a man. This is proof that women need sex-protected spaces. Still only further assures me I’m doing something right. When they want you silent, speak louder.”

She also posted video of the chaos that ensued after the incident: 

The prisoners are running the asylum at SFSU…I was ambushed and physically hit twice by a man. This is proof that women need sex-protected spaces.

Still only further assures me I’m doing something right. When they want you silent, speak louder. 🗣️ pic.twitter.com/uJW3x9RERf

— Riley Gaines (@Riley_Gaines_) April 7, 2023

Eli Bremer, Gaines’ agent, told Fox News: “Tonight, Riley Gaines spoke at San Francisco State University to share her personal story of competing against a biological male athlete, Lia Thomas, at the Women’s NCAA Swimming Championships last year.”

Bremer continued: “In the past year, her goal in speaking at universities has been to educate her peers about her experience and what the impact of the growing number of biological males in women’s sports will do to the integrity of Title IX. She has been questioned in civil and somewhat uncivil manners about her views many times, and she thoroughly encourages diverse viewpoints and debate on this issue.”

“Instead of a thoughtful discussion tonight at SFSU, Riley was violently accosted, shouted at, physically assaulted, and barricaded in a room by protestors. It is stunning that in America in 2023, it is acceptable for biological male students to violently assault a woman for standing up for women’s rights. This will not stop Riley from boldly educating people of the dangers of biological males in women’s sports. She will continue to speak the truth against the radical left that no longer understands the difference between men and women.”

This was the initial speech that catapulted Gaines to prominence:

Please write and show your support for @Riley_Gaines_ who was violently attacked by a biological male tran-activist after a speech @SFSU

Riley, a champion NCAA swimmer, has the courage to speak out against competing with biological males like Leah Thomas. pic.twitter.com/YZIFOj1N1g

— Larry Mendte Show (@LarryMendteShow) April 7, 2023

By Kelly Gooch of Becker’s Hosptial Review

Healthcare announced the third-most job cuts out of 30 industries and sectors measured in the first quarter of 2023, according to one new analysis.

The finding comes from an April 6 report from Challenger, Gray & Christmas, an executive coaching firm that examines job cuts by U.S.-based employers.

Healthcare, which includes hospitals and healthcare products manufacturers, has announced 22,950 cuts in the first three months of 2023. That’s a 65 percent increase from the 13,923 cuts announced in the first quarter of 2022. 

All U.S.-based employers tracked by Challenger, Gray & Christmas announced a combined 270,416 cuts in the first quarter of 2023, up 396 percent from the 55,696 cuts announced in the same period one year prior. It is the highest first-quarter total recorded by the firm since 2020.

“We know companies are approaching 2023 with caution, though the economy is still creating jobs,” Andrew Challenger, senior vice president of Challenger, Gray & Christmas, said in the report. “With rate hikes continuing and companies’ [reining] in costs, the large-scale layoffs we are seeing will likely continue.”

In a major faux pax in US-Israeli relations, former Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak acknowledged the existence of the country’s nuclear weapon arsenal via Twitter — then deleted the tweet, presumably after realizing he’d violated the long-standing US-Israeli practice of pretending that arsenal doesn’t exist. 

Barak’s Tuesday tweet addressed growing worries about the growing presence of ultra-nationalist and ultra-religious factions in Israel’s government. Finance minister Bezalel Smotrich and his Religious Zionism party, for example, openly aspire to turn Israel into a theocracy. 

Barak wrote: 

“In conversations between Israelis and Western diplomatic officials, there are deep concerns raised of the possibility that if the coup in Israel succeeds, a messianic dictatorship — that possesses nuclear weapons and fanatically wishes for a confrontation with Islam centered on the Temple Mount — will be established in the heart of the Middle East.”  

Thanks in part to a former nuclear technician’s 1986 revelations, Israel is widely known to have a nuclear arsenal, with one estimate sizing it at 90 warheads. However, it’s never joined the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT). It’s just one of only five countries in the world that haven’t done so, along with North Korea, India, Pakistan and South Sudan. 

Whether intentional or not, Ehud Barak just committed an act of negligence of stratospheric proportions. He ought to be indicted immediately.

— Arsen Ostrovsky (@Ostrov_A) April 4, 2023

That combination of facts means every dollar of US aid to Israel breaks American law. As Brian McGlinchey explains at Stark Realities:

“U.S. aid to Israel [is] illegal under the Symington Amendment of 1976, which bars economic and military assistance to countries that acquire nuclear reprocessing technology without submitting to international safeguards and inspections.”

Israel has never officially acknowledged its nuclear power, and the United States government caters to Israel’s policy of so-called “nuclear ambiguity.” However, there have been several occasions where US documents or officials have acknowledged the fact, typically either under pointed questioning or in communications they thought would be kept secret. 

For example, in a 2015 email to Secretary of State Hillary Clinton that was published by Wikileaks, an assistant secretary of state said, “What Israeli military leaders really worry about—but cannot talk about—is losing their nuclear monopoly.”

Only rarely does the Washington press corps confront US officials about their ongoing conspiracy to break American law where billions of dollars of annual aid to Israel are concerned. Journalist Sam Husseini is a welcome and repeat exception to that sad pattern. In February, he treated us to this grilling of State Department spokesman Ned Price: 

By John Paul Hampstead of Freightwaves

Well aware of the storm clouds brewing on the macroeconomic horizon, Walmart is doubling down on its supply chain-led transformation into an omnichannel retailer with an integrated, flexible and intelligent distribution and fulfillment network. For Walmart, leveraging its supply chain to unlock new margin gains is integral to “Everyday Low Cost,” which enables “Everyday Low Prices.” 

Walmart doesn’t expect to grow fast in 2023. For the year ending Dec. 31, 2022, (Walmart’s fiscal year 2023), Walmart’s U.S. comparable sales grew 6.6% year over year (y/y) and 13% against a two-year stack. But the annual guidance reiterated at Tuesday’s Investment Community meeting in Tampa, Florida, has U.S. comp sales growing just 2 to 2.5% this year. In other words, Walmart expects significantly slower growth this year, though CEO Doug McMillon recommitted to management’s 4% annual sales growth target over the next five years.

Revenue headwinds are due to the stress that inflation is putting on the American consumer, stress that Walmart management has observed and commented upon. Higher-income shoppers are choosing to go to Walmart; general merchandise sales gave way to daily essential “consumables”; and in grocery, private label growth beat out the name brands. 

Walmart management believes there are (at least) two big ways that supply chain investments can address the overall business environment. First, for Walmart, supply chain has always been a place of experimentation, where small investments that have proven to generate operating leverage can then be scaled. Second, e-commerce is the fastest part of Walmart’s business — growing 17% y/y in the fourth quarter — and connecting all of its inventory and rationalizing its network helps power that growth.

But connecting all of its available products to an e-commerce application and building intelligent fulfillment for hundreds of thousands of SKUs wasn’t easy. In his supply chain-focused Investment Community meeting presentation, Walmart U.S. CEO and President John Furner explained the evolution of the company’s supply chains.

“When Walmart started, customers came to stores, and they bought general merchandise and consumables,” Furner said. “So we built an ambient supply chain that served stores. As our store footprint grew, that network grew. When we added grocery and supercenters, we built a perishable supply chain — with buildings to handle cold and frozen items. That one also serviced stores. Then came e-commerce. So we built another fulfillment network and partnered with carriers to move products from FCs to customers’ homes. And we layered in pickup and delivery too — from our stores. 

“We got by serving customers with these resources … but they weren’t connected. They operated in parallel, and they weren’t flexible. They were each effective at completing the task they were built to perform. Now that’s changing. We’ve reengineered our supply chain networks to connect all the assets we have,” Furner said. 

Freight market down cycles, when transportation capacity is loose, rates are low and shippers have pricing power, are natural times for shippers to think beyond the day-to-day struggle to control costs and maintain service. Trucking capacity is exceptionally loose in the United States now, as carriers are rejecting just 3.1% of the shipments tendered to them by shippers.

Having realized savings on rates and cleaned up their routing guides, now major shippers are embracing expansive supply chain reorganizations, taking advantage of the first real breather many of them have gotten since the pandemic struck in March 2020. For Walmart, that means improving visibility, connectivity and optimization across supply chains that had been operating in relative siloes, both for the purposes of improving customer experience and driving sales higher, but also for gaining internal efficiencies. 

Furner went on to give specific examples of how Walmart was connecting these four previously disparate supply chains, starting with building an integrated digital catalog that had visibility into all inventory and connecting digital profiles of customer intent across multiple inventory systems to optimize the separate physical supply chains as if they were one. New organizational structures were put into place to oversee this supply chain reengineering: Now Supply Chain and Stores both report up to the End to End team led by Chris Nicholas, the Walmart U.S. chief operating officer.

CEO McMillan said at the Investment Community day that Walmart is best described as a “people-led, tech-powered omnichannel retailer dedicated to helping people save money and live better.”

This renewed focus on driving efficiency out of existing assets, inventory optimization and network velocity may have already started paying off. In the fourth quarter of 2022, Walmart’s U.S. comp sales were up 8.3%, while its consolidated operating expenses as a percentage of sales dropped by 44 basis points. Meanwhile, Amazon’s net product sales were down 1.2% y/y to $70.53 billion, while cost of sales and fulfillment expenses were both up, 3.3% and 2.9%, respectively. 

In fact, Amazon’s net product sales have been flat for three years:

Walmart’s outperformance has been in part due to a changing mindset, which has once again placed ambitious supply chain initiatives at the center of the company. During his Investment Community day presentation, Furner sounded as much like a full-service third-party logistics provider as he did a retailer.

“We’re now able to fulfill customer needs with a flexible, connected omnichannel network, enabled by data,” Furner said. “We know what we own, where it is, and what we’re actually doing is using data to optimize how much inventory we buy and where we place it. In many cases, we don’t need to build a new facility. We’re able to use the existing assets we have more flexibly and efficiently for new ways of working. And importantly, we’re able to consolidate an order as early as possible — even offshore — and deconsolidate it as late as possible — even in the customer’s driveway. That serves customers with the flexibility they want. It creates density across first, middle and last mile.”

In other words, Walmart is demonstrating that data integrations across its inventory systems and separate physical supply chains — ambient, perishable and e-commerce — can improve more than just the customer experience. Inventory visibility at the SKU level that’s appropriately connected across the organization also generates substantial operating leverage. That technology allows Walmart to consolidate earlier and deconsolidate later in order to drive density along core lanes and better utilize its facilities and carrier network. In some cases, Furner said, the efficiencies were significant enough that new facility construction could be avoided.

A woman suing JPMorgan over its ties to Jeffrey Epstein has accused the bank’s former head of private banking, Jes Staley, of using “aggressive force in his sexual assault of her,” according to a Thursday court filing by ‘Jane Doe’ asking a Manhattan federal judge to separate JPMorgan’s March lawsuit against Staley from her case, and a similar case brought by the US Virgin Islands.

Both suits allege JPMorgan knowingly benefited from Epstein’s sex-trafficking operation, Bloomberg reports.

Doe’s legal team is accusing JPMorgan of exploiting the sexual assault claim against Staley in order to force her to provide “intrusive discovery” in the course of litigation, and possibly be subject to a deposition by Staley himself (what?).

“The effect of adding him to the suit is to force her to share private medical records and her most intimate communications with one of her abusers,” wrote Doe’s lawyer, Brad Edwards. “It also sends a message to other victims that (JPMorgan) will exploit all vulnerabilities of each victim who dares come forward to hold the bank accountable.“

Doe wants the suits to be separated so that JPMorgan can’t force “her sexual abuser” back into her life, according to the report.

The bank opposes separating the cases.

“Jane Doe herself has directly accused him of horrific sexual misconduct and, if true, he must be held accountable,” a bank spokesman said, referring to Staley. “He’s inextricably linked to these cases – it makes no sense to separate him.”

Staley also asked US District Judge Jed Rakoff to separate his suit, but for different reasons – calling his relationship with Epstein “baseless but serious.” He says he needs more time to prepare his defense.

Staley’s lawyer, Brendan Sullivan, says he needs to go through tens of thousands of pages of discovery.

“Disproving these false and highly-publicized allegations is of paramount importance to him,” wrote Sullivan, adding “The allegations against him are slanderous, and the potential damages are astronomical.”

“Mr. Staley is accused of aiding and abetting Jeffrey Epstein, one of the most notorious criminals in recent American history.”

JPMorgan sued Staley via a third-party complaint, which would see its claims heard at the same time as those of Doe and the USVI. The bank accused Staley of concealing his inappropriate relationship with the sex offender and said he should be responsible for any damages it may incur from the suits. It is also attempting to claw back tens of millions paid in compensation.

Bloomberg News reported earlier on Thursday that JPMorgan had sent a subpoena to the hedge fund where Staley worked between leaving the US bank in 2013 and becoming chief executive officer of Barclays Plc two years later. -Bloomberg

Perhaps Sullivan can explain a July 2010 email exchange between Staley and Epstein entered into evidence by the US Virgin Islands, in which they discussed Disney princesses?

“That was fun,” Staley allegedly wrote to Epstein. “Say hi to Snow White.”

To which Epstein replied: “[W]hat character would you like next?”

“Beauty and the Beast.”

Epstein also emailed Staley photos of young women in seductive poses, the filing continues.

According to US Virgin Islands Attorney General Acting Attorney General Carol Thomas-Jacobs, the exchange was referring to young women and girls procured by Epstein.

Staley, according to the filing, “visited Epstein’s properties in the Virgin Islands and elsewhere,” and “exchanged hundreds of messages with Epstein from his JPMorgan email account in full view of JPMorgan, including some with photos of young women, discussed Epstein’s provision of services to him during his travel on dates that closely corresponded with Epstein’s payments to the same young woman from his JPMorgan accounts, and discussed young women or girls procured by Epstein using the names of Disney princesses.”

Epstein and Staley exchanged more than 1,200 emails over several years, however up until now their contents had never been disclosed. Staley – who left JPMorgan to become CEO of Barclays two years later, stepped down from the latter in 2021 following a UK Financial Conduct Authority probe into his relationship with the pedophile financier.

In another email from Staley to Epstein in November 2009 while the latter was under house arrest in Palm Beach, Florida following his release on charges of soliciting a minor for prostitution, Staley, while apparently staying on Epstein’s island, wrote: “Presently, I’m in the hot tub with a glass of white wine,” adding “This is an amazing place. Next time, we’re here together. I owe you much. And I deeply appreciate our friendship. I have few so profound.”

The next month, Staley wrote: “I realize the danger in sending this email,” adding “But it was great to be able, today, to give you, in New York City, a long, heartfelt, hug.”

Authored by Simon White, Bloomberg macro strategist,

The Fed could be cutting rates sooner than expected given the historically short period between the last rate hike and the first rate cut.

“Higher for longer” is a neat phrase, but it rarely plays out like that in practice.

Rapid rises in borrowing costs invariably lead to something going wrong, which typically has to be put right by cutting rates.

In fact, the median time between the last Fed hike and the first cut is only four months, while the average time is only six weeks.

Some will say “this time is different” and such caveats should always be noted. But this argument is generally applied incorrectly. One should anchor one’s view with the long-term picture, and then tweak it using today’s information. “This time is different” thinking is an inversion of this, starting with the current outlook and then seeing if agrees with the historical outlook.

In a sign of how quickly things can turn, it wasn’t long ago when the market was pricing in several more Fed rate hikes. Suggesting a pause or an early cut back then was somewhat heretical. But fast-forward to today, in the wake of the SVB failure, and the market barely sees a 50% chance of another hike, while pricing in a cut of more than 25 basis points by September.

Things could change again of course, but there is a lower cost-benefit for the Fed in hiking again while the short-term interest-rate curve (STIR) is so inverted.

As we saw in this cycle, the curve barely responded to the Fed’s hawkish message. Yet with the central bank now close to the end of its rate-hiking cycle, the curve is even less likely to react to another hike. The curve would remain inverted, and become even more so if the market were to deem the hike would do more harm than good to the economy.

Thus another hike would risk only more downside, while the curve would do little to transmit its inflation-cooling effect. So it’s lose-lose situation.

I still lean towards this Fed hiking cycle being over, with the first cut coming as early as June.

What we need to watch now is the latter part of the STIR curve. Once the Fed has stopped hiking, that typically starts to steepen.

We could see come giveback in short-term yields in the coming days as they are very oversold, but the prospect of a renewed upward trend is looking increasingly distant.

An extinction event that kills a large swath of early-stage startups could be in the cards as venture capital funding collapsed by more than half in the first quarter.

According to Bloomberg, new data from research firm PitchBook and the National Venture Capital Association show startups raised only $37 billion from VCs in the first quarter, the lowest in three years.

The first quarter marked the lowest number of deals in five years as VCs reduced the size of their checks to startups. 

“The whole market is taking much more caution toward investment,” said Kyle Stanford, a VC analyst at PitchBook. He warned, “It’s not going to be easy for companies to raise capital even if they’re growing at a pace they set in their last round.”

Before the collapse of Silicon Valley Bank, early and mid-stage startups faced a heightened risk of running into cash crunches due to the Federal Reserve’s aggressive interest rate hiking cycle. The demise of SVB led to even more funding pipelines being severed for startups.

For months, we’ve outlined VC funding was sliding and the coming hell startups would face as a result:

• Fundraising By Venture-Capital Firms Tumbles To Near Decade Low Amid’ Tech-Wreck’
• VC Funds See “Mass Extinction Event” For Startups In 2023: “It Will Make The Financial Crisis Look Quaint”

Even Substack faced funding woes and turned to its users: 

• Substack Asks Writers For Money As VC Funding Freezes

PitchBook’s Stanford warned the sharp slowdown in VC funding could soon hit later-stage startups and mature companies in the second half of this year, and even the ones who’ve been reducing headcount and cutting costs. 

“Companies are trying to lengthen their runways,” he said, adding VCs might not be able to support all the early-stage startups that burn cash. 

This suggests that a wave of startups is on the brink of closing up shop. Andrea Lamari, the general partner at Manhattan Venture Partners, said, “There has not been this level of uncertainty in nearly a decade surrounding what the macro environment impact will be on startups.” She warned, “It’s as if everyone’s waiting for the next shoe to drop.” 

Authored by Matthew Piepenburg via GoldSwitzerland.com,

As we warned throughout 2022, the Fed’s overly rapid and overly steep rate hikes would only “work” until things began breaking, and, well…things have clearly begun to break, including the petrodollar.

Even prior to the recent headlines regarding US regional banks, “credit event” stressors were already tipping like dominoes around the world, from the 2019 repo crisis and the 2020 bond spiral to the 2022 gilt implosion.

Then came SVB et al in 2023, and, of course, the forewarned disaster at Credit Suisse…

But as we also warned literally from day 1 of the sanctions against Putin, the oh-so-critical petrodollar would be among the next dominoes to tip, and tipping is precisely what we see.

As argued below, petrodollar shifts are yet another headwind for USTs and USDs, but an obvious tailwind for gold.

But before we dig into this historical tipping point, it’s important to see the forensic cause of all that is breaking…

The Bond Market, Of Course…

We can’t repeat this point enough: The bond market is the thing.

And toward this end, the signs of generational and global shifts in global trade, currency settlements and political instability is directly tied to broken sovereign credits reeling under the pressure of artificial rate hikes.

Less Credit, Less Growth, More Volatility

In the wake of recent bank failures and now carefully muted headlines, credit is tightening behind the curtains, and that’s a bad sign.

Even the safer companies in the US with “investment grade” credit status aren’t issuing bonds into a credit market that has seen volatility on the short end of the UST market which looks more like a crypto-coin trade than a “risk-free-return” UST.

The recent gyrations in the 2-year UST and futures market surpassed vol levels seen in 1987, 9-11, or even the GFC of 2008, but I’m betting those details didn’t make the headlines of the financial media with much attention to detail…

As the WSJ recently noted, however, March issuance of bonds by even the highest rated companies came in at just under $60B, significantly below the five-year average of $180B for the same month.

And as for the junkier companies and their junkier bonds, well…their luck, as well the demand for their IOUs, has all but dried up.

March saw US zombie/junk borrowers (who live off “extend-and-pretend” low rates and yield-desperate investors [suckers]) issuing only $5B in bonds, compared to a five-year average of over $24B for the same month.

Hmmm.

Uh-oh?

Stated simply, easy, cheap and freely available credit, which has been the fun but toxic wind beneath the otherwise broken wings of the so-called post-08 “recovery” (bubble), is ending/breaking, which means hope for any vestige of US economic growth is now all but an open joke.

Small banks, which will be falling off the vine one by one in the coming months as depositors openly move toward the larger banks and money markets, means that credit, and hence hope, for small businesses in the US will be harder to get than an honest voice in Congress.

Needless to say, none of these open signals of tightening credit bode well for Main Street in particular or economic growth in general.

The Fed’s Generational Sucker-Punch

The Fed may have given the top 10% of the US 90% of all the bubble wealth which came from their post-08 rate repression…

… but now that same centralized (and rate-hiked) bank is giving the ignored 50% of small business owners and average Joes on Main Street the sucker-punch of a generation.

The recession in which we likely already find ourselves will nevertheless (and soon) become more and more undeniable, and yes dis-inflationary, within an over-all inflationary backdrop.

In the near-term, moreover, such slowing growth and tightening credit will also be a tailwind for the USD.

But those dis-inflationary winds and rising dollars won’t last for long in my opinion.

Why?

Here are six simple reasons…

Why Dis-Inflationary Forces and a Rising USD Will Indeed be “Transitory”

Of course, I hate using a word like “transitory” … but here are six reasons a strong USD and near-term dis-inflationary forces likely won’t last for long.

With:

1) Uncle Sam running twin deficits while…

2) the US stares down the barrel of $33+T in year-end debt levels and…

3) declining tax receipts (down 10% y/y) with…

4) true-interest expense on outstanding US sovereign debt at 118% of tax receipts—and all within the setting of…

5) openly tightening credit while facing…

6) a de-dollarizing world with less rather than more interest in American IOUs/USTs…

… the US will hit that fork in the road where it must print money to survive.

In short: A Pivot Will Come

Why?

Because, when forced to choose between imploding credit markets or a dying currency, the central planners will sacrifice the dollar, not the market(s).

As warned many times, the currency is always the last bubble to pop in a broken financial system.

And that, folks, is precisely when the inflationary forces of magical mouse-clicked trillions will surpass the dis-inflationary forces (above) of a broken economy and an increasingly loan-less banking system—all of which we can thank each and every central banker since patient-zero Alan Greenspan took a chair at the Eccles Building.

All Roads Lead to Gold…

All of this, of course, leads us to my favorite topic and asset: Physical gold.

Needless to say, my colleague, Egon von Greyerz, and I have always had a lot to say about this so-called “barbarous relic.”

Many, of course, will just chalk such conviction to the good-ole “gold bug” retort, but those who understand the math and history of money in general or broken credit cycles in particular are a bit more than just “gold bugs” …

And as for gold’s inevitable direction, we know it will trend north for the undeniable reason that currencies, ever since Nixon welched on the Bretton Woods gold standard, have been steadily trending south.

It’s really that simple.

The OPEC Factor… History Rhyming, Gold Shining

But notwithstanding our consistent and common-sense arguments, let’s look at the petrodollar shifts of late.

Toward this end, folks like Chris Rutherglen and Luke Gromen have done an exceptional job in reminding us of the history as well as critical importance of gold, oil and credit markets.

History Rhyming

As I’ve presented elsewhere, history (borrowing from Mark Twain) may not repeat itself, but it certainly rhymes.

And toward this end, Rutherglen and Gromen have shown the poetry of rhyming patterns in the context of the ever-changing petrodollar politics, which, modestly, we too foresaw over a year ago.

As we warned from literally day-1 of the western sanctions against Putin, the end result would be disastrous for the West in general and the USD in particular.

And nowhere was this US Dollar prognosis truer than with regard to the petrodollar—i.e., those good ol’ days when nearly every oil purchase was linked to the USD.

However, and as Gromen and Rutherglen suggest, that oil-USD linkage was never a sure thing in the 70’s, and will be even less of a sure thing in the years ahead.

And this, folks, will have a massive impact on gold in the years ahead.

How so?

Let’s dig in.

Gold and Oil—Ready to Link?

Although still in diapers when Nixon closed the gold window in 71, and still watching Saturday morning cartoons when gold soared from $175/ounce in 1975 to over $800/ounce less than five years later…

… I am at least old enough now to glean a few historical lessons and patterns which may point toward similar and rising gold valuations tomorrow.

Gold, as Gromen and Rutherglen remind, was ripping in the late 70’s largely because it was not yet a foregone conclusion that oil would be pegged to USDs.

In that bygone era of disco, ABBA, wide neckties and checkered suits, neither OPEC nor Europe was against the idea of settling oil transactions in gold rather than USTs.

This was because those very same USTs (thanks to Nixon’s welch) were not very well…loved, trusted or valued in the 70’s.

(See where I’m going [rhyming] with this?)

Fortunately, Paul Volcker was able to seduce the oil nations into trusting Uncle Sam’s fiat money by cranking (and I do mean cranking) interest rates to the moon to restore faith in the UST and hence give OPEC the confidence to sell oil in dollars rather than settle in gold.

Specifically, Volcker took rates to 15+%, a move which placed real rates on that all-important 10Y UST at +8%.

Such hawkish policy was thus a game changer for making the petrodollar a reality and hence the USD the world’s reserve energy asset (and bully) for a generation to come.

Powell Ain’t No Volcker

Unfortunately, and thanks to Uncle Sam’s embarrassing bar tab (i.e., debt levels), those days, and those USDs and USTs, have fallen from grace, and hence are slowly falling off the radar of OPEC.

For this, we can also thank an openly cornered Powell’s so-called war on inflation, which has, among so many other backfired fiascos, led to a slow and steady process of de-dollarization and declining faith in that oh-so-important global IOU otherwise known as the UST.

The Oil Nations Aren’t Stupid

The OPEC folks know that Uncle Sam’s IOU’s aren’t what they used to be.

Unlike Volcker, however, Powell can’t get the 10Y UST to an 8% real (i.e., inflation-adjusted) rate.

Even his so-called “hawkish” nominal rates of 5% have crushed credit markets, Treasuries and nearly everything else in its path.

 And if Powell even dreamed of pushing rates to 15% ala Volcker to seduce OPEC, he would literally murder the entire US economy with a double-digit rate hike against a $31T public debt pile.

In short, there is simply no way to compare Volcker’s options in the 70’s to Powell’s debt reality in 2023.

This means the Fed can’t do what will be needed this time around to prevent OPEC from looking outside the USD or UST and hence inside the gold markets as a primary asset to settle its energy transactions.

The days of the mighty petrodollar, as I warned (in two languages) over year ago here, here and here, are slowly but steadily coming to end.

Think about that a second.

Or better yet, look at it for a second—with kudos again, to Gromen and Rutherglen.

Something to Think About

Boiled down to simple math, if the 2020’s rhyme with the 1970’s, which is clearly plausible, and gold becomes a primary (or even secondary) settlement asset in the energy market, this factor alone would place gold near $9000 an ounce by 2027 or 2028.

Again, something to think about, no?

In the interim, I’d hate to be in Powell’s shoes.

We’ll have to see if he’ll try to save the petrodollar by destroying the US economy or, who knows, even something worse…

Perhaps his neocon neighbors in DC will distract us with more war games?

We can only wait and see as the US runs out of good options and is left with only the bad (and desperate) ones, a pattern which Hemingway, rather than Twain, made perfectly clear and is worth repeating: