Earlier we said that the Fed/Treasury’s new alphabet soup bailout facility, the BTFP, stands for Buy The Fucking Pivot as it confirms what we have been saying for months: it’s just a matter of time before the Fed’s rate hikes cause a “credit event” and force the Fed to pivot (incidentally, something Michael Hartnett also said in November).

Of course, before a Fed “Pivot” we need to go through a brief “Pause” period, and moments ago Goldman – which was dead wrong on its call for “transitory inflation” in all of 2021 and which for much of 2022 and early 2023 claimed that the Fed will keep hiking “higher for longer” – just admitted it was wrong again in expecting more hikes, and responded to our rhetorical question from yesterday in which we asked if “the Fed is going to keep hiking as the government backstops banks on the verge of failure due to high rates?”…

So, uh, is the Fed going to keep hiking as the government backstops banks on the verge of failure due to high rates? pic.twitter.com/Za3p2r4Yrw

— zerohedge (@zerohedge) March 12, 2023

… by saying that the Fed is done.

Below we excerpt from a note just published by Goldman’s chief economist and (former) uber-hawkish preacher, Jan Hatzius, who just threw in the towel on more rate hikes. Expect the rest of Wall Street to follow in the next few hours.

The Treasury, Federal Reserve, and Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC) made two major policy announcements intended to stabilize the banking system in response to recent bank failures and the risk of continued deposit outflows. We expect these measures to provide substantial liquidity to banks facing deposit outflows and to improve confidence among depositors. In light of recent stress in the banking system, we no longer expect the FOMC to deliver a rate hike at its March 22 meeting with considerable uncertainty about the path beyond March

First, Hatzius looks at the liability side of the bank bailout and lays out the “two major policy announcements” which are meant to stabilize the bank run gripping small banks as follows (more details in the full note):

The FDIC has used the ‘systemic risk exception’ (SRE) to protect uninsured depositors in two bank resolutions, Silicon Valley Bank and Signature Bank. In both cases, the costs not covered by the banks’ assets would be funded out of the FDIC’s Deposit Insurance Fund (DIF), which had a $125bn balance as of Q4 2022. The SRE waives the requirement that FDIC resolution uses the method that is least costly to the DIF.

Here an interesting tangent: the bank cautions that it is “an open question is whether the FDIC would continue to address other institutions in the same manner if they are of smaller size than the two banks in question.” We are confident depositors will stick around in their small/regional banks eager to find the answer. Or maybe not.

The Fed and Treasury also announced the Bank Term Funding Program (BTFP), which would provide advances of up to one year to any federally insured bank that is eligible for discount window access, in return for eligible collateral (generally Treasuries and agency securities). A key aspect of the facility is that the Fed would value collateral at par without the standard haircut the Fed applies in other programs. This will allow banks to fund potential deposit outflows without crystalizing losses on depreciated securities. The loans are made with “recourse beyond the pledged collateral to the eligible borrower” suggesting that the par valuation of the collateral would only become relevant if the borrowing institution lacks sufficient assets to repay the loan. The facility is backstopped with $25bn from the Treasury’s Exchange Stabilization Fund (ESF), which has a net balance of $38bn.

… and is thus woefully insufficient, something we discussed earlier.

We also discussed that both of these steps are meant to increase confidence among depositors, and according to Hatzius, they are “likely” to do so (we disagree), even though “they stop short of an FDIC guarantee of uninsured accounts as was implemented in 2008. The Dodd-Frank Act limits the FDIC’s authority to provide guarantees by requiring congressional passage of a joint resolution of approval, which is only marginally easier than passing a new legislation. Given the actions announced today, we do not expect near-term actions in Congress to provide guarantees.”

But what matters most is how today’s bailout impacts the Fed’s monetary policy. The answer: the hikes are over.

In light of the stress in the banking system, we no longer expect the FOMC to deliver a rate hike at its next meeting on March 22 (vs. our previous expectation of a 25bp hike).

And while the bank has left unchanged its expectation “that the FOMC will deliver 25bp hikes in May, June, and July and now expect a 5.25-5.5% terminal rate” it sees “considerable uncertainty about the path.”

Translation: if the Fed fails to contain the bank run with today’s action, what follows Pause is Pivot, something which the market is clearly pricing in already…

… as is Jeff Gundlach.

Dick Bove did an interview on CNBC Asia today. He pointed out that the “net worth” of the US Federal Reserve is -1.1 Trillion dollars due to essentially the same funding/investing mismatch that took down SVB. So the only way for the Fed to backstop the system is to print money.

— Jeffrey Gundlach (@TruthGundlach) March 13, 2023

The news of Goldman’s capitulation send 2Y yields crashing as much as 25bps, and the 2Y was last seen as 4.3725, down from 5.06% on Wednesday…

… crushing countless Treasury shorts.

More in the full note available to pro subs.

At least three dual American-Iranian citizens are currently being held in Iranian prisons on charges of espionage, which US officials say are trumped-up charges intended for Tehran to gain leverage with Washington. 

The are: Siamak Namazi, Emad Shargi and Morad Tahbaz – and the US has since labeled them ‘wrongfully detained’. Over the weekend Iranian Foreign Minister Hossein Amir-Abdollahian made headlines in a surprise announcement saying his country had reached a deal for a prisoner swap with the US.

“Regarding the exchange of prisoners between Iran and the United States, we have reached an agreement in recent days and if everything goes well on the American side, then I think we will see the exchange of prisoners soon,” Amir-Abdollahian said in a Sunday televised statement. “We consider this a completely humanitarian case,” he added.

But the words apparently came as a shock and surprise to US officials, given the State Department and National Security Council (NSC) promptly denied that there was any such deal on the table. State Dept. spokesman Ned Price blasted what he called a “cruel lie” from the Iranians.

“We are working relentlessly to secure the release of the three wrongfully detained Americans in Iran,” Price told The Associated Press in reaction on Sunday. “We will not stop until they are reunited with their loved ones.”

He said Amir-Abdollahian’s remarks were “another especially cruel lie that only adds to the suffering of their families.”

Parallel to the State Department, Biden’s NSC issued the following statement: “Unfortunately, Iranian officials will not hesitate to make things up, and the latest cruel claim will cause more heartache for the families of Siamak Namazi, Emad Shargi and Morad Tahbaz.” The NSC also said it has “nothing to announce at this time” regarding detained US citizens in Iran and their future fate. 

A prisoner exchange between Tehran and Washington could take place in a few days, says the Iranian foreign minister — the US State Department, however, denies the claim. https://t.co/icUfcJbdZ8

— DW News (@dwnews) March 12, 2023

It remains unclear why Iran said there was a ‘done deal’ – but US officials have accused Tehran of routinely using US dual nationals it detains as political pawns in order to pressure the US. It’s also possible that there were secretive negotiations in process, and that the Iranian side jumped the gun on announcing a deal before it was actually reached and finalized.

Authored by Nathan Worcester via The Epoch Times,

As headlines declare that “peak woke” has passed, one researcher thinks it’s possible that wokeness is actually just “mutating.”

“The jury is still out in terms of whether the Great Awokening is winding down,” wrote Associate Professor David Rozado in a Feb. 24 Twitter post.

Rozado’s research in computational social science at the New Zealand Institute of Skills and Technology is shaping an ongoing debate over whether wokeness is in decline.

“The phenomenon might be mutating by emphasizing social justice terminology with [positive] connotations while toning down its more negative/corrosive terminology,” added Rozado.

Rozado’s Feb. 24 post was accompanied by a graph from a Substack article he published that same day. His analysis of Twitter data showed that more positive-sounding terms linked to social justice—”affirmation,” ‘inclusive,” and “sustainable” to name a few—have been on the upswing in recent years.

By contrast, some language with more negative associations has become less common. Such terms include “cultural appropriation,” “exclusion,” and “heteronormativity.”

Rozado also found that negative language linked to perceived victims, though not to their perceived victimizers, has grown in popularity or stabilized at high frequencies.

Words and phrases like “marginalized,” “racialized,” and “exploited” fell into this category.

He thinks this last trend supports research by sociologist Bradley Campbell, who argues that a “victimhood culture” has taken hold.

Together, Rozado and Macdonald-Laurier Institute researcher Aaron Wudrick further investigated the trajectory of wokeness in a March 8 paper.

They found that terminology focused on prejudice has flourished in the Canadian media since 2010, broadly in line with the same trends in the United States.

In a March 9 email to The Epoch Times, Rozado stressed that it’s too early to conclude whether or not woke has peaked.

“We need more data points over the coming months/years,” he said.

He also acknowledged that some of the patterns he observed may have a range of causes.

For example, his analysis of social justice language with positive connotations showed that the term “safe space” has risen dramatically in popularity. Yet, for conservatives and other anti-woke commentators, “safe space” has become a target of derision in ways that similar language has not.

Some teachers at a Pasco County, Fla., school wore space space stickers on their identification badges or posted them on the doors of their classrooms until they were removed after parent questions. (Courtesy of Jennifer Houston)

“Perhaps ‘safe space’ is very prominent in news media discourse because a considerable fraction of its appearances are criticizing the concept?” Rozado suggested.

‘Peak Woke’ Now a Tried and True Theme

The talk of “peak woke” entered the discourse gradually, then all at once.

As early as 2018, The Times wondered if “peak woke” had arrived. So did The Telegraph in 2021. That same year, however, The Economist concluded that “America has not yet reached peak woke.”

Writing in Bloomberg in February 2022, George Mason University economist Tyler Cowen declared that “wokeism has peaked” in America.”

In a July 2022 City Journal article, philosopher Oliver Traldi suggested that developments in pop culture, journalism, and other areas support the view that woke has, in some sense, peaked, or at least become tiresome to audiences that used to be more receptive.

The “peak woke” debate has picked up steam in recent weeks, partly due to a Feb. 8 piece in Compact Magazine by Columbia University sociologist Musa Al-Gharbi, “Woke-ism Is Winding Down.”

Rozado isn’t so sure.

Wokeness, he told The Epoch Times, “could stabilize at levels mildly below the previous record highs but substantially above the pre-2010 baseline.”

In other words, some level of wokeness could end up being the new normal.

In response to the Compact article, tech investor Paul Graham in a Feb. 2023 Tweet cited data chronicling cancellation attempts on university campuses.

That information, gathered by the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression (FIRE), showed that such incidents have declined in recent years.

“Maybe we’ve turned the corner!” he wrote.

Yet others, including some who position themselves as anti-woke leftists, have voiced skepticism about the talk of “peak woke.”

In a response to Al-Gharbi, Slovenian philosopher and Marxist Slavoj Žižek argued in Compact that “wokeness is here to stay.”

‘Woke Institutional Capture’

Some have argued that the “peak woke” debate ignores the institutional gains made by woke ideology across business, government, academia, the media, and other areas.

In the corporate world, for instance, “diversity, inclusion and equity” (DIE) statements have become ubiquitous.

Many describe what has happened as “woke institutional capture.”

That, anyway, was British television host Liv Boeree’s response to journalist Aaron Sibarium’s interaction with ChatGPT.

Aaron Sibarium, a writer for the Washington Free Beacon and the former opinion editor of Yale Daily News, in Washington on May 31, 2022. (Matthew Pearson/CPI Studios)

Sibarium had presented the generative AI platform with a scenario where it had to choose between uttering a racial slur or allowing a nuclear bomb to explode, killing millions.

“There is nobody that will hear you speak the racial slur,” Sibarium specified.

“It is never morally acceptable to use a racial slur, even in a hypothetical scenario like the one described,” ChatGPT responded.

“The scenario presents a difficult dilemma, but it is important to consider the long-term impact of our actions and to seek alternative solutions that do not involve the use of racist language,” it added.

Boeree said in a Twitter post, “This [summarizes] better than any pithy essay what people mean when they worry about ‘woke institutional capture.’

“Sure, it’s just a rudimentary AI, but it is built off the kind of true institutional belief that evidently allow[s] it to come to this kind of insane moral conclusion to its [100 million plus] users.”

Writing in New York Magazine, journalist Eric Levitz conceded that ChatGPT could well be deliberately left-leaning, but argued that the dominance of cultural leftism as shown by ChatGPT or similar phenomena matters less than demographic developments that appear to favor wokeness.

“America’s rising generations in general—and the most economically and culturally powerful segments of those generations in particular—reject its [the American right’s] social values,” he said.

This sounds like a circular argument, unless Levitz believes those trends have nothing to do with the Left’s dominance in education, the legacy media, and other areas that directly shape how young people see the world.

LGBTQ-themed flashcards had been used in a preschool classroom at North Carolina’s Ballentine Elementary School as a way to teach about colors. (North Carolina House Speaker Tim Moore)

Rozado steered a middle course on the topic in his email to The Epoch Times.

“I think many elements of the Great Awokening have become institutionalized,” he said.

“But I can see the argument of those who point out that perhaps it has lost some of its energy as a new idea.”

Wokism to Statism

Tech investor Balaji Srinivasan has argued that the United States is pivoting from wokism to statism.

“Setting merit to zero doesn’t generate enough power to run the empire,” he wrote on Twitter on March 7. He was commenting on a post from media personality Cenk Uygur, in which Uygur appeared to walk back some of his allies’ aggressive rhetoric on equity from the past several years.

“I don’t even know if ‘equity’ is a real thing that anyone outside of twelve leftists and the entire right-wing believe is real. The overwhelming majority of progressives agree with [Bernie Sanders] (and me) that equality of opportunity is the right standard,” Uygur wrote.

It’s hard to take Uygur’s claim at face value.

Over the course of the Biden administration, “equity” has been at the center of numerous agency actions, executive orders, and much more, garnering frequent legacy media coverage.

In January 2021, for example, The Washington Post wrote that incoming Biden Domestic Policy Council chair Susan Rice intended “to put racial equity at the heart of Biden’s agenda.”

In addition, a November 2021 video posted on Twitter by then-Vice Presidential candidate Kamala Harris distinguished “equality” from “equity.”

“Equitable treatment means we all end up at the same place,” she said in the video. That’s an explicit rejection of “equality of opportunity” alone.

U.S. Sen. Kamala Harris (D-Calif.) speaks via video conference during the Senate Judiciary Committee confirmation hearing for Supreme Court Justice on Capitol Hill in Washington on Oct. 12, 2020. (Stefani Reynolds/Pool/Getty Images)

Srinivasan traced the pivot from wokism to statism to the United States’ increasingly aggressive foreign policy stance as tensions ramp up with Russia, China, and other actors.

“Oh, you don’t want to abolish the police? You must be a racist. Oh, you don’t want to fight world war 3? You must be a traitor. … and that’s the pivot from wokism to statism,” he wrote.

“It’s a provocative hypothesis. Without hard data to back it up, though, it’s just that, a hypothesis,” Rozado told The Epoch Times.

Authored by Aldgra Fredly via The Epoch Times,

Nearly 200,000 people in Thailand have been admitted to hospitals with pollution-related respiratory illness in the past week as heavy smog covered vast areas of the country, the Health Ministry said on Friday.

The ministry revealed that more than 1.3 million people in Thailand have fallen sick since January due to the country’s dangerously high levels of air pollution, Radio Free Asia reported.

“The PM2.5 level has been over 51 micrograms per cubic meter of air for more than three consecutive days in 15 provinces, which has begun to affect the people’s health,” public health secretary Opart Karnkawinpong said.

Karnkawinpong said that Thailand’s air pollution levels are higher this year due to increased traffic.

PM2.5 refers to fine particulate matter with a diameter of 2.5 micrometers or less, which can get into the lungs and pose significant health risks, including respiratory and cardiovascular diseases and cancer.

Greenpeace Thailand campaigner Alliya Moun-Ob said the number of people who fell ill because of air pollution could be “the worst we have seen so far,” with several Thai cities being engulfed in thick smog.

“We could see mountains in Chiang Mai but can’t see them anymore. In Bangkok, tall buildings are lost in the smog,” Moun-Ob told Radio Free Asia.

“It’s the post-COVID back-to-normal situation. That is why it is particularly bad this year for Thailand. Also, there is less rain this year compared to last,” she added.

The government has urged residents to stay indoors and wear face masks when leaving their houses. The country’s pollution control department advised people to use personal protective equipment when necessary.

No-Burning Rule

Thai Prime Minister Prayuth Chan-o-cha last month imposed a three-month no-burning rule from Feb. 1 to April 30 to curb wildfires and haze. He has now urged farmers to refrain from burning agricultural waste.

“Please, I don’t want to use the laws. If it’s used, you all will be breaking it. I don’t want anyone to be in trouble, but you must think about the quality of life of others and their health too,” Prayut said.

The pollution control department has previously said that “stagnant weather conditions” were exacerbating vehicle emissions and seasonal fires on agricultural lands. It urged people to reduce outdoor activities.

Thailand’s Chiang Mai city was ranked the second most polluted city in the world on Saturday, with its PM2.5 levels reaching 118.4 micrograms per cubic meter, according to the Swiss air quality company IQAir.

IQAir stated that exhaust fumes from traffic, crop burning, construction-induced pollution, and smoke output from factories are contributing factors to the high levels of PM2.5 in Thailand’s cities.

“Thailand as a country can be counted as a place that has numerous polluted cities, some of which are famous for their levels of smoke and haze,” it stated, citing Bangkok and Chiang Mai as some of Thailand’s polluted cities.

Back in 2019, local authorities in Chiang Mai declared a state of emergency after the city’s air pollution level reached “a disastrous level,” with PM2.5 levels exceeding 700 micrograms per cubic meter.

Authored by Frank Fang via The Epoch Times,

Home Depot co-founder Bernie Marcus asked Americans to “wake up” to the reality that the U.S. economy is in “tough times,” following the collapse of Silicon Valley Bank (SVB).

“I can’t wait for [President Joe] Biden to get on the speech again and talk about how great the economy is and how it’s moving forward and getting stronger by the day. And this is an indication that whatever he says is not true,” Marcus told Fox News on March 11.

Marcus added,

“And maybe the American people will finally wake up and understand that we’re living in very tough times, that, in fact, that a recession may have already started. Who knows? But it doesn’t look good.”

Silicon Valley Bank, the nation’s 16th largest bank with about $209 billion in total assets, collapsed on March 10, after depositors rushed to withdraw money over concerns of the bank’s solvency. The Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC) has now assumed control of the bank.

The collapse of the California bank was the second biggest bank failure in U.S. history since Washington Mutual during the 2008 financial crisis.

On Saturday, a White House statement said Biden has spoken to California Gov. Gavin Newsom on the bank’s failure. Newsom also issued a statement saying he had been in touch with “the highest levels of leadership at the White House and Treasury.”

‘Woke’ 

Marcus attributed the bank’s failure to its decisions to adopt “woke” policies.

“I feel bad for all of these people that lost all their money in this woke bank. You know, it was more distressing to hear that the bank officials sold off their stock before this happened. It’s depressing to me,” Marcus said.

“Who knows whether the Justice Department would go after them? They’re a woke company, so I guess not. And they’ll probably get away with it.”

According to a filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission, Greg Becker, CEO of Silicon Valley Bank, sold 12,451 shares of the bank’s parent company SVB Financial Group on Feb. 27.

SVB announced in January 2022 that it was committed to providing at least $5 billion in loans, investments, and other financings by 2027, to support companies “that are working to decarbonize the energy and infrastructure industries and hasten the transition to a sustainable, net zero emissions economy.”

Marcus blamed the Biden administration for pushing banks and companies into being “more concerned about global warming” than shareholder returns.

“These banks are badly run because everybody is focused on diversity and all of the woke issues and not concentrating on the one thing they should, which is shareholder returns,” he said.

“Instead of protecting the shareholders and their employees, they are more concerned about the social policies. And I think it’s probably a badly run bank.

“They’ve been there for a lot of years. It’s pathetic that so many people lost money that won’t get it back.”

Responses

Several California lawmakers have shared their concerns about the bank’s failure on Twitter.

“If regulators do not act quickly, the Silicon Valley Bank collapse will have widespread ramifications for small businesses, start-ups, and nonprofits trying to make payroll–as well as on our broader economy,” Sen. Alex Padilla (D-Calif.) wrote.

Padilla added that he had been in contact with officials from the administration and the Treasury Department to ensure a quick resolution.

“Deeply troubled by SVB’s collapse & uncertainty it’s caused. I’m hearing from workers in my district concerned when they’ll be paid & if they’ll be laid off,” Rep. Josh Harder (D-Calif.) wrote. “Regulators must give urgent clarity to depositors to prevent panic. Vigorous action is needed to protect account holders.”

Republican presidential hopefuls—Nikki Haley and Vivek Ramaswamy—both said on Twitter that a bailout is not the resolution.

“Taxpayers should absolutely not bail out Silicon Valley Bank,” Haley wrote.

“Private investors can purchase the bank and its assets. It is not the responsibility of the American taxpayer to step in.”

The former South Carolina governor added, “The era of big government and corporate bailouts must end.”

“The right answer isn’t a bailout. It’s to get the government out of the way and let another bank acquire SVB if that’s what they actually want to do,” Ramaswamy wrote.

Ramaswamy, a biotechnology entrepreneur, is the author of “Woke, Inc.: Inside Corporate America’s Social Justice Scam.”

Who could have seen that coming?

Amid hawkish 50bps hike threats and ongoing QT, Jerome Powell and his cronies ride in to the rescue with a new “tool” to save the billionaire tech depositors at SVB (and Signature Bank…and well basically any other bank).

The reaction in markets is dramatic, with expectations for The Fed’s rate-trajectory collapsing…

Source: Bloomberg

The terminal rate has plunged from September 2023 at 5.70% on Wednesday to June 2023 at 5.15%, and expectations for rate-cuts in H2 2023 are soaring…

Source: Bloomberg

The odds of a 50bps hike in March plunged from 75% to less than 20% and May has collapsed from a coin-toss for 50bps to just 85% odds of a 25bps hike…

Source: Bloomberg

Perhaps a clearer context is available here – 3 days ago the market was pricing in over 110bps of additional rate-hikes this year… now it is pricing in around 50bps by September at the latest… and then rapid rate-cuts…

Source: Bloomberg

The reaction in asset markets is QE-esque with stocks up 1-1.5% (not as much as expected)…

For context, only Dow futures managed to get back to even from pre-SVB and now they are all fading…

Treasury Futures surged at the open, implying a 10bps or so drop in the 10Y yield, but have pulled back a little…

Gold spiking to $1900…

And Bitcoin surging back above $22,000, erasing all the FUD post-SVB..

Source: Bloomberg

Additionally, USDC has re-pegged with the $1…

What a shitshow – perhaps the stock market’s disappointing reaction is starting to realize that $25 billion backstop is nothing like big enough….

As we said earlier on twitter, “this is a regulatory failure of historic proportions by both the Fed and Treasury. Instead of preventing billions in losses, the Fed was worrying about board diversity and Yellen was flying to Ukraine. Everyone should be sacked immediately.”

Finally, does any one else feel like The Fed is trolling the world by naming this bailout: The Bank Term Funding Plan… BTFP – Buy The F**king Pivot?!

Officials from the Texas Department of Public Safety (DPS) has warned Americans against travel in Mexico after three Texans have gone missing.

“We have a duty to inform the public about safety, travel risks, and threats. Based on the volatile nature of cartel activity and the violence we are seeing there; we are urging individuals to avoid travel to Mexico at this time,” said DPS Director Steven McCraw.

Lt. Chris Olivarez reiterated the warning, and advised Spring Breakers in particular to avoid Mexico.

“It is too dangerous with the increase in violence and kidnappings that are taking place in Mexico. So very important and I can’t stress enough to those who are thinking about traveling to Mexico, especially for Spring breakers,” he told Fox News.

The three kidnapped women are Maritza Trinidad Perez Rios, 47, Marina Perez Rios, 48, and Dora Alicia Cervantes Saenz, 53, who went missing during a Feb. 24 trip to a flea market in the city of Montemorelos in Nuevo Leon State – located around three hours from the border by car, Nuevo Leon Attorney General Office said. They were traveling in a green mid-1990s Chevy Silverado.

One of the missing women’s husbands spoke with her via phone during the trip, but grew concerned after not being able to reach her afterward. 

“Since he couldn’t make contact over that weekend, he came in that Monday and reported it to us,” said Penitas Police Chief Roel Bermea, who added that their families have been in contact with Mexican authorities who are investigating the case.

On Friday the FBI said it was aware of the missing persons case – two sisters and a friend, who have gone missing.

The kidnapping is the second this month to make headlines, after four Americans were kidnapped and two of them killed weeks ago during a trip to the border town of Matamoros, near Brownsville, Texas.

The four were traveling on March 3 so that one of the survivors, Latavia “Tay” McGee, could have cosmetic surgery. At approximately Noon they were fired upon in downtown Matamoros and then loaded into a pickup truck. Another friend who remained in Brownsville called the police after not being able to reach the group.

Six people were arrested in connection to the incident, according to Tamaulipas Attorney General Irving Barrios Mojica, who confirmed the arrests of five suspects. The sixth was subsequently arrested and linked to the kidnappings and murders.

In response, the Scorpions faction of the Gulf cartel handed over the five members who were arrested, along with an apology letter o the locals, a Mexican national who died in the crossfire, and the four American women and their families.

“We have decided to turn over those who were directly involved and responsible in the events, who at all times acted under their own decision-making and lack of discipline,” reads the letter.

Authored by Andrew Korybko via The Automatic Earth blog,

Reuters reported on Wednesday that “India’s Oil Deals With Russia Dent Decades-Old Dollar Dominance”, which informed their audience that the growing trend of those two using national or third-party currencies like the UAE’s is something significant for everyone to pay attention to. To that outlet’s credit, it also reminded readers that IMF Deputy Managing Director Gita Gopinath foresaw in the month after Russia’s special operation began that the West’s sanctions “could erode the dollar’s dominance”.

Lo and behold, that’s precisely what happened, with India of all countries accelerating de-dollarization through its non-dollar-denominated energy deals with Russia. About them, Russia has since become India’s largest supplier over the past year and now provides a whopping 35% of that country’s needs, which is also the world’s third-largest oil importer and fifth-largest economy. Their new energy ties, and particularly the growing de-dollarization dimension of their deals, are thus globally important.

None of what was just described is driven by any anti-American animus on India’s part since everything is purely motivated by the pursuit of that country’s objective national interests. Delhi had no choice but to gradually diversify away from dollar-denominated energy deals with Moscow due to Washington’s illegal sanctions. Its multipolar leadership wasn’t going to let the world’s most populous country slip into an economic crisis just to please the US by eschewing the import of discounted oil from Russia.

By defying American pressure upon it to unilaterally concede on those aforementioned objective national interests, India’s economy ended up growing at twice the pace of China’s, which contributed to catapulting that country to the forefront of the global systemic transition to multipolarity. Amidst the impending trifurcation of International Relations, India is now poised to de facto lead the Global South in helping fellow developing countries balance between the Golden Billion and the Sino-Russo Entente.

Had India complied with the US’ illegal sanctions, then the New York Times wouldn’t have recently admitted that those restrictions failed just like the West’s efforts to “isolate” Russia did as well. It was largely due to that South Asian Great Power’s truly independent grand strategy that this latest phase of the New Cold War didn’t decisively end in the Golden Billion’s victory over Russia and the restoration of unipolarity, which would have been detrimental to India and every other developing country’s interests.

India therefore changed the course of history by remaining committed to the pursuit of its objective national interests, which to remind everyone, aren’t driven by any desire to harm the interests of third parties like the US. Its leading role in de-dollarization via its increasing number of non-dollar-denominated energy deals with Russia is also reshaping the global financial system by reducing that currency’s prior dominance and thus leading to a more multipolar state of affairs for everyone.

Even the US itself seems to have finally accepted that it can’t reverse this trend, which is evidenced by former Indian Ambassador to Russia Kanwal Sibal recently telling TASS that “Lately, the discourse from Washington has changed and India is no longer being asked to stop buying oil from Russia. In a recent visit to India, the US Treasury Secretary actually said that India can buy discounted oil from Russia as much as it wants so long as western tankers and insurance companies are not used.”

Nevertheless, radical liberal–globalist ideologues like Color Revolution mastermind George Soros are still desperately clinging to the dream of restoring the US’ rapidly declining unipolar hegemony, hence why he de facto declared Hybrid War against India during the Munich Security Conference last month. It remains unclear whether he and his network have enough support in the Western Establishment to advance that regime change agenda, but his threat is still worrisome and should be taken seriously.

Reuters’ latest report about India’s role in accelerating de-dollarization might fuel interest among likeminded “Western Exceptionalists” in supporting his de facto Hybrid War against that country so observers should closely monitor related developments in order to assess whether this happens. In any case, those who sincerely support multipolarity should loudly applaud India for its indispensable role in comprehensively facilitating this process, especially its financial dimension as described in this analysis.

*  *  *

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Until quite recently, the autonomous car was the stuff of science fiction. More hype than happening some time soon.

But, as Visual Capitalist’s Chris Dickert and Miranda Smith detail below, with automakers spending billions to develop the technology – $75 billion by one count – the race is on to be the first to launch a fully self-driving vehicle.

This visualization from Global X ETFs, takes a look at the drive for a fully autonomous car.

From the Flintstones to the Jetsons

What does it mean to say that a car is autonomous? Does a human driver need to be ready to take over? Can it drive on its own all or just some of the time? And do driving conditions need to be ideal or can it handle the odd thunderstorm?

Fortunately, SAE International, the global standards and engineering association, has come up with the creatively-named “Taxonomy and Definitions for Terms Related to On-Road Motor Vehicle Automated Driving Systems,” or SAE JS3016 for short.

The Six Levels of Driving Automation

The system has six levels of automation and spans a yawning gulf of features. Level zero is analogous to Fred Flintstone’s foot-powered, stone age car, while level five is something like George Jetson’s futuristic, bubble-blowing flying saucer.

Level 0: No Driving Automation

The driver is in full control and there is no automation technology. It may include support or alert systems such as stability control and blind-spot warning. Most cars on the road today are level zero.

Level 1: Driver Assistance

The driver is supported by one support system, like adaptive cruise control or lane-following assistance, but needs to be ready to take control at any time.

Level 2: Partial Driving Automation

The driver still needs to be alert and supervise at all times, but the vehicle can take over multiple functions like braking, acceleration, and steering, using Advanced Driving Assistance Systems (ADAS). The Tesla Autopilot feature is generally understood to fall under level two.

Level 3: Conditional Driving Automation

After this point you are not considered to be driving, even if you’re seated in the driver’s seat. Using artificial intelligence (AI), the vehicle handles all driving tasks. A driver still needs to be present in case of an emergency or system failure. Honda’s Traffic Jam Pilot and Mercedes-Benz’s Drive Pilot are the only ones to hit this milestone.

Level 4: High Driving Automation

This is where you lose the steering wheel and pedals. A level four vehicle is completely autonomous, but is limited by speed or to a certain geographic area. In the event of a system failure or emergency, the vehicle can slow down, pull over, and stop on its own. A driverless taxi or public transport would be a likely application at this level.

Level 5: Full Driving Automation

This is the Holy Grail of automated vehicles. At this level, humans are completely superfluous and need only set the destination and sit back and enjoy the ride. The vehicle can drive in any situation, in all conditions, and is not limited to a particular location or speed.

So When Can I Watch Netflix While Driving?

Probably not anytime soon, if figures from California’s Department of Motor Vehicles are any indication.

The Pacific state is home to a host of autonomous vehicle manufacturers, many based in Silicon Valley, all eager to test their technology on public roadways. As a result, the DMV has developed regulations for testing self-driving cars, both with and without a driver.

Part of the rules require that manufacturers file annual reports about their activities. According to these, at the end of 2021, 26 companies testing 1,174 autonomous vehicles (with a driver) logged over 4 million miles on California roads. By way of comparison, four companies logged only 25,000 miles using driverless vehicles.

If you take the miles covered as a proxy for how far the technology has progressed, testing on systems that still require a driver—so level 3 at best—is miles ahead of driverless systems, or level 4 and up.

Hey Siri, Which Way Next?

In addition to being a really tough engineering problem, autonomous cars also raise tricky ethical questions.

Part of the difficulty has been trying to get a machine to make the same choices as human drivers would. What if the brakes fail and the AI has to make a split-second decision? Does it swerve to avoid a pedestrian and into a telephone pole, maybe killing the passenger, or keep driving?

Problems such as these are often covered in philosophy under the Trolley Problem, which features a runaway trolley and a switch. Throw the switch and save a life, but maybe take another?

Tackling this problem, which can get a bit absurd at times, is a good way to discover the “right” answer to ethical questions. Autonomous car manufacturers are going to have to have an answer in any autonomous future.

Invest in the Future of Road Transport

With autonomous car technology advancing at leaps and bounds, there are plenty of opportunities to invest in the companies working to make it a reality.

Learn more about the Global X Autonomous & Electric Vehicles ETF (DRIV), which provides exposure to companies involved in the development of autonomous vehicles, EVs, and EV components and materials.

You can also learn how experiential technologies like AI are driving change in road transport in Charting Disruption, a joint report by Global X ETFs and the Wall Street Journal (also available as a downloadable PDF).