Yesterday when discussing China’s unexpected flip-flopping on its decision to order local banks to ignore the latest US sanctions on Chinese, followed days later by a demand that they pause loans to sanctions refiners, we highlighted something remarkable: in the aftermath of the Strait of Hormuz blockade, which throttled the transit of ~10% of global oil and sent physical prices soaring to record highs (especially for Dubai crude), resulting in a windfall for European refiners thanks to soaring gasoline premiums… 

… the reaction in China was a mirror image, as already razor-thin independent refiner (teapot) margins plunged to record negative.

The reason for the margin collapse was China’s domestic fuel policy: it has long been Beijing’s policy to soften price hikes to help shield consumers and avoid social unrest; which while beneficial to end consumers is catastrophic to refiners and processors who are prohibited from passing on rising costs. In other words, Chna’s “energy security” was the dominant theme, and if it meant an entire industry has to suffer huge losses if it continues to purchase oil and process it into various product grades.

Ordered to process as much available inventory as possible, that’s what the refiners have done, and refining rates in Shandong province, China’s hub for smaller refineries known as teapots, ramped up over April to the highest level in almost two years, as processing margins cratered to record negative levels meaning refiners are losing record amounts on every barrel they process. 

“I would not be surprised if the teapots are prioritizing politics over economics with an eye to their long-term survival,” said Erica Downs, a senior research scholar at Columbia University’s Center on Global Energy Policy. “They may be calculating that if they do their part to help China weather the energy crisis, then maybe they will build up some goodwill in Beijing.”

While Downs is right, and teapots are prioritizing politics, they are also certainly keeping an eye on economics to the extent they can avoid Beijing’s wrath, and predictably the logical consequence of this centrally-planned policy to force “independent” refiners (who are not really independent if they have to do whatever Beijing instructs them) to make fuel at record losses to ensure energy security, is for them to slash purchases of Iranian crude.

Sure enough, Chinese crude oil imports have plunged: according to Vortexa, China’s April imports plunged to a multi-year low of just 8.2 million barrels a day, down by about a quarter from a prewar level of around 11.7 million. The 3.5-million barrels a day swing almost matches the total consumption of Japan and is double the amount supplied by the United Arab Emirates pipeline that circumvents Hormuz. 

As Bloomberg’s Javier Blas writes overnight, “simply put, it’s huge, perhaps the second- or third-largest factor rebalancing the oil market today, behind only Saudi Arabia’s own pipeline bypassing the strait and the use of the strategic petroleum reserves of the US and Japan.”

The import drop might make sense if Chinese commercial inventories were falling sharply, or if Beijing had tapped its strategic petroleum reserves. But neither appears to be happening. Instead, commercial stockpiles have continued to increase in recent weeks, according to satellite data (of course, China is well known to manipulate all data and with the bulk of its 1.4 billion in strategic oil reserves located underground, it is impossible to trace flows definitively)

Meanwhile, as imports have collapsed, inventories at sea have piled up: Kpler reports that there are now about 16 million barrels on ships anchored in the Yellow Sea off the Chinese coast, almost 40% higher than the level prior to a US blockade of Iran’s ports in mid-April as oil that was ordered previously remains unused. 

There has been another complication: after the Iran war broke out, Beijing banned exports of refined products, effectively allowing refineries to process less crude to meet domestic demand. But the policy has now been reversed, suggesting the country sees enough fuel availability.

In any case, in recent weeks, Blas writes that amid this collapse in Chinese imports, industry executives have noticed something odd: Chinese state-owned oil companies have been reselling some of their oil cargoes to European and Asian rivals. The behavior suggests surpluses, which is “odd” to say the least during a supply shortage. Where is this excess oil coming from (for the answer, see below).

The shift has not only capped benchmark oil prices, but also helped to trigger a collapse in the premia that traders pay above them to secure physical crude. The immediate outcome has been a very beneficial one: physical barrels that in early April went for $30 above benchmark prices are now changing hands at premiums as low as $1. Talk of discounts has even started to emerge.

Underscoring this point, North Sea oil traders don’t appear as desperate for crude for immediate delivery anymore, compared to the panic buying of late March and early April

While the collapse in refining margins is a clear clue to the plunging oil imports, other questions remain: chief among them how is China importing far less crude than before without running down stocks? In the past, the country clearly bought more oil than it needed, building a huge emergency stockpile. Today, China has nearly 1.4 billion barrels in its reserves according to media reports, well above the 400 million of the US and Japan’s 260 million. As we reported in late 2025, China probably bought one million barrels a day more than it needed last year. By simply stopping beefing up the reserve, China can cut imports a lot without affecting its underlying oil needs.

The shift can explain, perhaps, a third of the import cut. But the rest? Here’s where oil traders speculate with different theories. One argument says that Chinese economic activity is weaker than previously thought, and thus oil consumption growth is also lower. What’s the catalyst for that slowdown? Perhaps the impact of the war on several of China’s clients in the region, including the Philippines, Vietnam and Thailand (just don’t look for validation in Chinese economic “data” – like everything else, it took is centrally planned and Beijing would never confirm its economy is being hit due to the Iran war as that would mean reduced political leverage).

Separately, the increase of electric vehicles, improved public transportation and the option of working from home have made Chinese households better able to cope with higher oil prices.

Unlike most other nations in the region, China hasn’t announced any emergency action to rein in demand, like adopting a four-day work week for government employees or promoting carpooling.

The IEA estimates that Chinese oil demand slipped into a modest year-on-year contraction in both March and April, down by about 110,000 barrels a day to about 17 million barrels. While the drop is impressive when compared with the exuberant growth of the country’s consumption in the past, it isn’t nearly enough to explain why imports have fallen so much.

It is certainly possible that Chinese oil demand has been contracting far more sharply than currently thought, The key, Blas reckons, is the inscrutable petrochemical industry – the sector that has contributed the majority of oil consumption growth over the last five years. In petrochemicals, China is unique. On top of its traditional industry that uses oil and natural gas as feedstock, it has parallel production that relies on coal.

Since the war started in late February, coal-to-chemicals profit margins have improved markedly. The industry had typically operated with plentiful spare capacity, so there’s room for a significant shift to coal from oil as a chemical feedstock. Hard data is scarce but, anecdotally, petrochemicals plants transforming coal into plastics like polyethylene, polypropylene and polyvinyl chloride have been running hard for the last 60 days, in turn reducing consumption of traditional feedstocks such as ethane and naphtha.

So perhaps China has managed to rely far more on coal-to-chemicals than previously thought. Another possible explanation is that it’s running down hard-to-track inventories of semi-finished plastics and other chemicals, making the recent drop in oil consumption in the petrochemical industry an unsustainable one-off unless there is a global recession which collapses end-demand for Chinese plastics exports. 

And then there are the more banal explanations. Although oil traders try to estimate Chinese inventory data with the use of satellite data, it is in fact possible that observers are missing locations and stocks are, in fact, falling. About two months ago, we hinted that Chinese drain of its SPR could more than offset a full Hormuz blockade for a long time. As we said on March 18, “China can avoid any Gulf imports for months and drain its SPR instead.” 

One relevant question: what is China’s pace of SPR drain if any. Recall for the past year Beijing was adding about 500-700K in daily SPR stockpiles; total is said to be ~1.4 billion barrels. China can avoid any Gulf imports for months and drain its SPR instead.

— zerohedge (@zerohedge) March 18, 2026

Sure enough, Blas writes that the oil market has been full of chatter about China quietly tapping its strategic reserves, starting by using underground caverns that no one can see using satellites. Maybe. Time lags may also be playing a role; Chinese domestic oil production has been increasing, too, perhaps helping to plug any gaps.

But, as Blas concludes, “make no mistake, China is rebalancing the oil market today.” The bigger question is for tomorrow when the Strait is (eventually) unblocked: If China can reduce imports so drastically without having to take extreme measures, what does that say about the future of oil consumption there? Nothing positive for oil bulls, that’s for sure. 

An apparent large oil spill spanning dozens of square miles of sea has been spotted off of Iran’s main oil hub of Kharg Island, according to open source satellite imagery and reporting in both the NY Times and Reuters on Friday.

The reports cite images from Copernicus’s Sentinel-1, Sentinel-2, and Sentinel-3 satellites taken from monitoring May 6 through 8 which show a huge grey-and-white slick extending out to the west of Kharg Island.

“The slick appears visually consistent with oil,” said Leon Moreland, a researcher at the Conflict and Environment Observatory, to Reuters. He believes it to be covering an area of approximately 45 square km (or nearly 18 sq miles).

Authored by James Howard Kunstler,

The California Death Trip

“History records no pity for parties that choose purity over competence, vengeance over vision, pathology over pragmatism. The long night is not coming. It is here. . . . ”

– LHGrey on X

The Pacific Palisades fire ignited on January 7, 2025, in the very last days of the “Joe Biden” fake presidency.

6,837 total buildings destroyed plus about 1,000 damaged.

The Altadena fire across town in Eaton Canyon was arguably worse: 9,418 buildings destroyed.

A Year After the LA Fires

Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass was in Ghana at the time to attend the inauguration of president John Dramani Mahama, part of a small U.S. presidential delegation sent by the “Biden” administration.

Deputy Mayor for Public Safety, Brian Williams, overseer of the Police and Fire Departments, was on administrative leave at the time due to an alleged bomb threat against City Hall that he reportedly made in September / October 2024. The FBI raided his house that December, and in 2025 he copped a plea deal (guilty) to making threats involving fire and explosives. So, he was out of action during the fires.

There you have the rectified essence of how the Democratic Party operates in America’s biggest state.

Is it not astonishing that Karen Bass is running for reelection? How could she possibly be forgiven?

A large number of people employed in the movie business got burned out of their homes in the fires, and then city and state regulatory nonsense prevented them from rebuilding — on top of insurance company hocus-pocus that left families financially wrecked.

Is it a surprise that the city’s flagship industry is dying now (film production down 32-percent on a five-year average)?

What is LA without Hollywood?

And yet the show-biz celebs are still coming out to pimp for Democratic Party politicians. This is the kind of thing that forces you to conclude that an epic madness burns as hotly through the minds of Californians as the fires that ripped through the canyons in 2025. I know from personal experience as a college theater major that actors can be exceptionally stupid, but that can’t wholly account for what we’re seeing.

Wednesday’s primary debates had these villains on florid display. Because LA’s ranked-choice mayoral primary race styles itself “non-partisan,” candidate Spencer Pratt (a registered Republican) was on-hand for the debate. When the subject of LA’s cataclysmic homelessness came up, drug addicts living (if you can call it that) in wretched, filthy encampments all over the public space of the city, Mayor Bass bragged that she’d significantly reduced the problem, which is obviously and mendaciously untrue. LA City Council member Nithya Raman, who labels herself “progressive,” bragged on putting the homeless into shelters (i.e., motel rooms at $100-K per person per year.)

Spencer Pratt attempted to inject a little reality into the discussion about putting the homeless into homes: “No matter how many beds you give these people, they are on super meth, they are on fentanyl. The DEA [Drug Enforcement Agency] statistic says 93-percent of this is a drug addiction problem. These people do not want a bed — they want fentanyl or super meth.”

Pratt is currently running third in the polls. In ranked-choice voting, the top two winners in the primary will face off in the November election. Currently Bass is polling in the lead and Nithya Raman is running second. If the numbers stay that way, the winner in November could finish Los Angeles off. Blade Runner, here we come.

But there’s still a chance that Spencer Pratt might place well in the June 2 primary just as Golden Tempo shot from dead last to win the Kentucky Derby last week.

The seductions of the Marxist race hustle have worn a little thin, even for Angelenos. Karen Bass looks increasingly ridiculous grinning about her abject failures, which Mr. Pratt lays out relentlessly in plain talk. His reality-testing seems to be getting some minds right, gaining real traction. Nithya Raman has the charisma of a mung bean.

The gubernatorial debate was equally edifying, especially the spectacle of Democratic Candidates Katie Porter’s and billionaire Tom Steyer’s rousing lack of self-awareness. Ms. Porter, renowned for dumping a pot of steaming mashed potatoes over her ex-husband’s head, and for her crotchety way with the (friendly) news media and her own staff, made the astounding statement that “the public servants we have are focused on doing their job, which is not cooperating with the federal immigration authorities.” That’s their job? Hmmmm. Mr. Steyer went further and said he would arrest ICE agents going about their business. You think . . .? (I would think that a Governor Steyer would find himself arrested by the feds for attempting such a stunt.)

The governor’s race is also a rank-choice contest. So, Republican Steve Hilton was on-hand to break the reality-optional spell that shrouded the stage like a poisonous miasma. After several Democrats made a show of deploring the grotesque homeless druggie encampments from Nob Hill to MacArthur Park, Mr. Hilton said “[They] talk as if we’re in some parallel universe where Democrats haven’t been running the state for the last sixteen years.” He shares the lead in the polls in the large field at 18-percent with Xavier Becerra, who was “Joe Biden’s” Secretary of Health and Human Services, meaning, he presided over the vaxx mandates and lockdowns of the Covid operation.

California is ground zero for the death dance of the Democratic Party. Symptoms are popping up all over the country, of course. Just this week, the FBI raided the headquarters of Virginia State Senator pro tempore L. Louise Lucas (D-Portsmouth) — and also raided the marijuana shop she co-owns next door to her HQ. The SCOTUS decision on Congressional redistricting has thrown many states’ Democratic Party outposts into a fugue of terror as they stand to lose as many as a dozen seats in Congress. DOJ prosecutions are underway against prominent Democrats in Maryland, Virginia, North Carolina, and Florida. Many of their heroes could go to prison. Panic has set in. The Democratic Party as we know it these days is not long for this world.

Toyota expects a sharp decline in profit as rising material and shipping costs tied to the Iran conflict pressure its business, according to Bloomberg. 

The automaker projected operating income of ¥3 trillion for the fiscal year ending March 2027, well below both analyst expectations of ¥4.6 trillion and last year’s ¥3.8 trillion.

The company said supply chain disruptions are driving up costs for aluminum, resins, and other materials, while logistics issues remain unpredictable. Toyota estimates the regional conflict could reduce earnings by about ¥670 billion.

After the forecast was released, shares dropped as much as 3.5%. Analysts noted Toyota may be giving conservative guidance, but future performance will depend heavily on how long the conflict continues.

Julie Boote, an analyst at London-based research firm Pelham Smithers Associates Ltd told Bloomberg: “Toyota did not only miss consensus estimates, but also its own forecast, as auto unit sales came in much weaker than predicted by the automaker. It is still likely that Toyota is once again lowballing its guidance, with earnings upgrades possible during the fiscal year; much depends also on the development of the Iran war.”

Toyota expects vehicle sales to dip slightly this year, though hybrid sales are projected to surpass 5 million units for the first time. The company is also focusing more on after-sales services, which it sees as a major future profit driver.

Despite record annual revenue of ¥50.7 trillion, quarterly operating profit fell 49% due to tariffs and higher shipping expenses.

Meanwhile, Honda just posted an operating loss of 400 billion yen — its first in the company’s history, according to Nikkei. The loss was primarily driven by problems tied to its electric vehicle business and marks the company’s first operating loss since going public in 1957.

This is a major decline from the 1.2 trillion yen operating profit it reported the previous fiscal year. It would also be the second-largest operating loss ever reported by a Japanese automaker, behind Toyota Motor Corporation’s 461 billion yen loss during the 2009 global financial crisis, although accounting differences make direct comparisons imperfect, Nikkei writes.

In March, Honda said it expected an operating loss between 270 billion and 570 billion yen and announced it was canceling three planned EV launches in North America.

The company also projected up to 2.5 trillion yen in EV-related costs over fiscal years 2025–2027, including asset impairment charges and supplier compensation.

Despite these losses, Honda plans to return to operating profitability in the current fiscal year, supported by strong motorcycle sales in Asia, a weaker yen, and a broader turnaround strategy for its North American and Chinese businesses.

Nissan had also trimmed production due to the Iran war earlier in the year. 

President Trump announced Friday that the leaders of Russia and Ukraine have agreed to his request for a three-day ceasefire and a major prisoner swap. He hailed in a Truth Social post that this could be the “beginning of the end” of the long war between them.

He specified that the ceasefire would run Saturday through Monday – with Saturday being Victory Day celebrations in Russia. The Kremlin has been increasingly concerned that the major national holiday which commemorates its victory over Nazi Germany 81 years ago in World War II could be marred by drone attacks from Ukraine. There’s no doubt that President Putin is welcoming of such a ceasefire declaration, and backing by Washington.

“I am pleased to announce that there will be a THREE DAY CEASEFIRE (May 9th, 10th, and 11th) in the War between Russia and Ukraine,” Trump wrote. “The Celebration in Russia is for Victory Day but, likewise, in Ukraine, because they were also a big part and factor of World War II.”

This is to include a suspension of all kinetic activity and the exchange of 1,000 prisoners by each country, the US president also said. While direct talks between the warring countries have not been happening, these kinds of prisoner exchanges have actually been somewhat of a constant throughout the over 4-year long war.

The timing is interesting, given that the White House is clearly consumed with the Iran war, the Hormuz Strait crisis, and the expanding economic fallout globally and at home. 

Moscow has meanwhile been threatening to attack Kiev with an unprecedented bombing campaign should V-Day events be disrupted by drone fire out of Ukraine this weekend.

Putin it seems is seeking the opportunity to soften Washington’s stance toward Moscow’s perspective of the Ukraine war. Also, at the moment Trump needs a diplomatic ‘win’ that he can tout to the world, given the Iran situation is sliding into a bit of a quagmire which could have dire consequences for Republicans going into the midterms.

Despite that Iran remains a key regional ally of Russia’s, it remains that Moscow has benefited from both the easing of sanctions on its oil exports at sea, and rising global oil prices – both the result of the Iran war.

Previously, Kremlin leaders have offered a deal where Iran could keep its enriched uranium but hold it on Russian territory, to ensure the continuation of its nuclear energy. This, Moscow has reasoned, could serve as a basis for a grand deal with the US.

Authored by Eric Utter via AmericanThinker.com,

Minnesota Senate Democrats recently voted – unaminously – against removing deceased persons from the state’s voter rolls.

This tracks with the fact that almost 100% of dead people vote for Democrats, making them Democrats’ most loyal voting bloc, even surpassing that of serial killers.

(This may explain why, historically, Democrat gerrymandering seems designed to encompass as many cemeteries as possible. O.K., that is just an unfounded assertion, but it seems likely, does it not?)

The dead — and serial killers — are groups that vote heavily for Democrats? Talk about a symbiotic relationship! The latter provide the former! Genius! Kismet!

This after they also voted — unanimously — against an oversight committee effort to compel Rep. Ilhan Omar to testify after she missed a deadline to provide documents to the committee investigating the Somali fraud rampant in the North Star State.

So the multi-millionaire or poverty-stricken representative (take your pick) from Somalia escapes a subpoena, at least for now.

It is obvious that Democrats in Minnesota are as wedded to fraud as Ilhan once was to her brother. And for the same reason: they will do whatever it takes to attain and retain power, so help them Allah.

They share the same goals as well, at least for now: to fleece law-abiding taxpayers out of as much money as possible, so as to line their own pockets — and the pockets of those who help them attain and retain power.

In a sane country, at a sane moment in time, this would be considered an unethical, unacceptable, unconstitutional, illegal, and treasonous misuse of power, one that spits in the face of a representative democracy. Here today? Meh. Not good, but let’s not fly off the handle like our founders did. Tolerance and empathy, you see.

Democrats want as many illegals in the country as possible, because they vote for Democrats in droves. Why wouldn’t it be the same for dead folks? The more dead people, the more votes Democrats get. And, if the dead are erstwhile denizens of red states and rural areas, so much the better. Presto chango, a Republican has been converted into a Democrat! Remarkable!

This could explain Democrats’ love of abortion, medical assistance in dying, and violent criminals.

Our forefathers would have done whatever it took to counter this orgy of criminality.

Past mafia godfathers would be proud of it.

Today? Democrats like Tim Walz, Gavin Newsom, and J.B. Pritzker might accurately be called “fraudfathers.”

Authored by Steve Watson via modernity.news,

An ancient Indigenous settlement unearthed near Sturgeon Lake in Saskatchewan is challenging long-held views about early human presence in North America.

Dating to around 11,000 years ago and predating Egypt’s Great Pyramid by more than 6,000 years, according to the official timeline, the site provides evidence of long-term habitation rather than temporary camps.

Archaeologists working with Sturgeon Lake First Nation uncovered stone tools, fire pits, toolmaking materials, and remains of the extinct Bison antiquus. Charcoal layers point to controlled fire management, aligning with oral traditions. The findings suggest a sophisticated society with advanced hunting strategies, including buffalo jumps.

Experts found a Native American settlement older than the pyramids…

North America’s earliest inhabitants formed stable communities far earlier than previously believed.

Archaeologists working near Sturgeon Lake in Saskatchewan have unearthed evidence of a sophisticated… pic.twitter.com/8kh38Cklrf

— Shining Science (@ShiningScience) May 7, 2026

The site, known as Âsowanânihk (“a place to cross” in Cree), lies about five kilometres north of Prince Albert along the North Saskatchewan River. It was first spotted by avocational archaeologist Dave Rondeau through riverbank erosion exposing artifacts.

Rondeau said: “The moment I saw the layers of history peeking through the soil, I felt the weight of generations staring back at me. Now that the evidence has proven my first instincts, this site is shaking up everything we thought we knew and could change the narrative of early Indigenous civilizations in North America.”

Dr. Glenn Stuart of the University of Saskatchewan added: “This discovery challenges the outdated idea that early Indigenous peoples were solely nomadic. The evidence of long-term settlement and land stewardship suggests a deep-rooted presence. It also raises questions about the Bering Strait Theory, supporting oral histories that Indigenous communities have lived here for countless generations.”

Prehistoric settlement discovery in North America older than Egypt’s Great Pyramid rewrites human history https://t.co/PVQjzCRF63

— Daily Mail US (@Daily_MailUS) May 7, 2026

Excavations indicate the location served as a hub for organized activity shortly after the last Ice Age. Researchers compare its importance to iconic global sites like the Great Pyramids, Stonehenge, and Göbekli Tepe.

The discovery includes evidence of bison pounds and kill sites, with hunters targeting massive Bison antiquus weighing up to 4,400 pounds. This points to coordinated community efforts and deep environmental knowledge.

Chief Christine Longjohn of Sturgeon Lake First Nation stated: “This discovery is a powerful reminder that our ancestors were here, building, thriving and shaping the land long before history books acknowledged us. For too long, our voices have been silenced, but this site speaks for us, proving that our roots run deep and unbroken. It carries the footsteps of our ancestors, their struggles, their triumphs, and their wisdom. Every stone, every artifact is a testament to their strength. We are not just reclaiming history, we are reclaiming our rightful place in it.”

The site, on Treaty 6 territory home to the Plains Cree, faces potential threats from logging and industrial activity. The Âsowanânihk Council, involving Elders, youth, educators, and archaeologists from the University of Saskatchewan and University of Calgary, is leading protection and further study efforts. Plans include a cultural interpretive centre.

Carbon dating of charcoal from a hearth places activity at about 10,700 years ago, roughly 1,000 years earlier than prior estimates for organized settlement in the region.

This find adds physical evidence to oral histories describing the area as a cultural and trade center, highlighting sophisticated land stewardship in post-glacial North America.

The discovery underscores ongoing collaboration between Indigenous communities and researchers to preserve and understand this chapter of human history. Further excavations and funding could yield more insights into early societal organization on the continent.

Your support is crucial in helping us defeat mass censorship. Please consider donating via Locals or check out our unique merch. Follow us on X @ModernityNews.

Moderna is out with timely news that it is working on early-stage research on vaccines targeting hantaviruses. The news comes as a Spanish woman has been hospitalized for a suspected infection, while a hantavirus cluster has ravaged a Dutch-flagged cruise ship, with five confirmed and three suspected cases of hantavirus. Three deaths have been reported so far.

Bloomberg reports that Moderna is collaborating with the U.S. Army Medical Research Institute of Infectious Diseases on hantavirus vaccine research and is also working with Korea University College of Medicine’s Vaccine Innovation Center on a potential vaccine.

“These efforts are early-stage and ongoing and reflect Moderna’s broader responsibility to develop countermeasures against emerging infectious diseases,” Moderna said.

Moderna said its work on hantavirus vaccines began before the cruise ship Hondius reported an outbreak while anchored off the coast of Cape Verde, on the west coast of Africa, last week.

Anais Legand, a technical officer at the World Health Organization (WHO), provided an update earlier today stating that all remaining passengers on the Hondius have left the ship without symptoms.

“They will be asked to take their temperature every single day for 42 days. They will be asked to check every day for other symptoms like feeling unwell or a headache,” Legand said, adding, “They will be provided with someone to contact. If they’re not feeling well, it’s up to the national authorities where people will go next.”

WHO Emergencies Communications Lead Nyka Alexander stated in a livestreamed update earlier that “the risk to the public remains low.”

Hantaviruses are zoonotic viruses that naturally infect rodents and can occasionally spread to people.

Here’s what you need to know about #hantavirus: What they are, how they spread, the symptoms, and how to prevent infection pic.twitter.com/pduUjlwl2j

— World Health Organization (WHO) (@WHO) May 8, 2026

Nevertheless, the news sent Moderna shares higher around noon. Shares had already been rising after the company reported that its mRNA flu vaccine outperformed in a late-stage study, likely driving early market activity. Shares are up 18%.

President Trump told an ABC News reporter on Thursday that “It’s very much, we hope, under control.” 

HANTAVIRUS UPDATE: President Trump is monitoring the hantavirus outbreak linked to the cruise ship that has already resulted in three deaths.

Spain is preparing for the vessel’s arrival as officials track about 40 people, including Americans, who left the ship before the… pic.twitter.com/pPoppLn8N8

— Breaking911 (@Breaking911) May 8, 2026

Polymarket:

It is only a matter of time before other struggling biotech companies announce that they, too, are developing vaccines to prevent the next potential pandemic. This follows the Covid playbook.

Nearly seven weeks after OnlyFans owner and billionaire Leonid Radvinsky died, and after months of reports that the sex-worker streaming platform was exploring a stake sale, the Financial Times reported Friday morning that San Francisco-based Architect Capital is preparing to buy a minority stake in the company.

Australian billionaire James Packer, best known as the former head of the Packer family’s media and casino empire, is expected to be among a group of investors lined up to support Architect Capital’s deal to acquire a 15% stake in OnlyFans at a $3.1 billion valuation, according to FT’s sources.

The deal would leave control of OnlyFans with the family trust headed by Katie Chudnovsky, widow of late owner Leonid, who acquired OnlyFans in 2018 via Fenix International.

Leonid died in March at 43. He was apparently battling cancer for several years. 

Top OnlyFans creator pornstar Sophie Rain mourned the death of Leonid, saying back in March how he “built something that changed my entire life. Like, I grew up on food stamps and now I can take care of my whole family because of a platform he created. I will never forget that.” 

Radvinsky studied economics at Northwestern University and by 2018 had bought a majority stake in OnlyFans and helped transform the video content platform into an adult-content subscription business powerhouse that reshaped how sex workers monetize their bodies. 

OnlyFans was founded in 2016 and exploded in popularity during the Covid pandemic. Some of the latest data from 2024 showed the website had 4.6 million creators, 377 million fans, and $1.4 billion in revenue.

As we’ve previously noted, Americans spent an estimated $2.6 billion on OnlyFans subscriptions in 2025.

OnlyFans is bringing in outside capital without giving up control while leaving Radvinsky’s wife in charge. This may suggest the family trust is cashing out some value while simultaneously creating a pathway for broader monetization.

On the surface today’s jobs report was very strong: headline payrolls came in nearly double the expected (115K vs 65K), with unemployment flat just so Trump’s chief economist Kevin Hassett could push bullish taking points in today’s TV circuit such as this one.

• *HASSETT: ‘RIP-ROARING’ JOBS MARKET

Unfortunately, below the surface this was the ugliest jobs report in years, and one could say even more cooked than last month’s laughable surge in jobs (which was revised from 178K to 185K).

Here’s why.

First, while the Establishment survey showed an impressive 115K jump in jobs when virtually everyone was expecting a big drop, looking at the composition reveals two things: the biggest contributor was semi-government jobs from the Education and Health services category which added 46K, and has been the biggest, and only consistent source of jobs growth this decade.

But even more remarkable was the surge in courier and messenger jobs, which soared by 38K in April, reversing the 52K drop last month. Was there a Doordash or Uber hiring binge that we missed last month? We thought they were mostly laying off their thousands of illegal alien workers… 

In other words, just two job categories accounted for almost all the job gains in April. As for the beating heart of the US economy, manufacturing jobs, they tumbled to -2,000 after surging 15,000 in March, the first negative print of 2026. Manufacturing jobs are now down 73K over the past year. Chemicals, Wood, and Machinery manufacturing are the biggest losers, but few subsectors are doing well

But what is even more concerning, is that the entire base of the monthly print was put in doubt after the BLS reported that in April, the Birth/Death adjustment “added” 391K jobs, which as we have explained repeatedly are not actual jobs but a baseline for model assumptions what the number of jobs in a given month “should” be. One would think after all the huge negative revisions to jobs under Biden as a result of flawed BIrth/Death assumptions the BLS would have learned its lesson. One would be wrong. 

But stepping away from the Establishment survey, things are even uglier in the much more accurate Household Survey. It is here that we find that contrary to the abovementioned payrolls increase, the number of employed workers actually declined by 226K in April. Worse, this wasn’t a one off: as shown below, the number of employed workers has been declining every month this year, and is now down an average of 343K jobs every month of 2026 after hitting a record high in Dec 2025!

Unfortunately, this means that we are once again witnessing the infamous divergence between the Household And Establishment surveys, as the number of employed workers has been declining and is now the lowest since December 2024 ot 162.622 million, the number of payrolls (tracked by the Establishment survey) is now at an all time high of 158.735 million, a number which is clearly not supported by the data.

This divergence is also why the unemployment rate remained at 4.3%: even though employment shrank by 226K to 162.622 million, the unemployment rate did not rise because people left the labor force.

There was more rot under the surface, as the number of full-time jobs in April plunged by 424K, while part-time jobs surged by 123K.

The drop in full-time jobs dragged the total number of full-time workers to levels last seen in December 2024. In other words both total employment and full-time jobs are back to where they were when Trump was elected.

But while all of the above is just the usual statistical gimmicks we have exposed every year for nearly two decades, there was something much more ominous in today’s report: AI is finally coming for your job… if you are a programmer that is. 

While the total number of jobs in April rose, on the abovementioned low quality Health and education and courrier (?) jobs, information jobs dropped again, sliding by 13K, having slid again… and again… and again. In fact, as shown in the next chart, Information jobs have now been negative every month since 2024!

Don’t expect that to change any time soon as the impact of AI “jobs outsourcing” is now here: as Goldman Delta One head Rich Privorotsky noted, we are seeing a flood of tech layoffs among which Cloudflare laying off 20%, Paypall firing 20%, Upwork 25%, Bill Holdings 30%, Coinbase 14%, Meta 10%, Microsoft 7%… and Google saying 75% of new code is now AI-generated (and about to layoff double digits too). This excludes the bloodbath across the crypto sector where the crypto winter coupled with AI has led to especially brutal mass layoffs.

Tech companies announced 33,361 job cuts in April, according to data from outplacement firm Challenger, Gray & Christmas Inc. So far this year, the industry has planned 85,411 cuts, up 33% from the same period in 2025.

“Technology companies continue to announce large-scale cuts and are leading all industries in layoff announcements,” said Andy Challenger, the company’s chief revenue officer. “Regardless of whether individual jobs are being replaced by AI, the money for those roles is.”

According to Layoffs.FYI, Q1 has seen the most tech related layoffs since the tech recession of 2022.

As Goldman’s Privorotsky puts it, “this phase has been the capex boom to enable what eventually becomes a far more radical labor adjustment cycle.” Which means workers are laid off to make space for capex spending and the occasional stock buyback. 

As he concludes, that may ultimately be what the market believes a future Fed reaction function will revolve around…AI-driven productivity disinflation eventually allowing a much deeper cutting cycle. In short, the Universal Basic Income that we predicted over two years ago is coming to pay for welfare for the tens of millions soon to be laid off due to AI, is now on its way.

Market pricing so much AI success, it will need to leave about 100 million people without a job.

Bring on the UBI

— zerohedge (@zerohedge) January 24, 2024