Exactly one year ago, in its Global Financial Stability report, the IMF issued a stark warning when looking at the soaring level of private sector debt: it found that more than 20% of US corporations are at risk of defaults once interest rates rise, and calculated that the combined assets of firms threatened by default – those who earnings do not cover their interest expense – could reach almost $4 trillion.
An island-wide blackout has hit Puerto Rico, which is struggling with an increasingly unstable power grid nearly seven months after Hurricane Maria hit the U.S. territory.
Electric Power Authority spokeswoman Yohari Molina tells The Associated Press that crews are investigating the cause. Officials said Wednesday it could take 24 to 36 hours to fully restore power.
It’s the first time since Category 4 storm hit on Sept. 20 that Puerto Rico has experienced a full island-wide blackout.
Some 40,000 power customers were still without normal electricity service as a result of the hurricane.
The writing is on the wall and major financial institutions across the world are warning about the economic disaster to come. Unabated money printing, tariff trade wars, rising interest rates and retail slowdowns point to one result, and it’s going to be brutal.
Some of the western diplomats involved in the meetings with Fu Ziying, who is also a vice-commerce minister, have viewed the approaches as a sign of how anxious Beijing is getting about the expanding conflict with Washington, the sources said.
U.S. President Donald Trump has threatened to impose tariffs on $150 billion in Chinese imports to the U.S. to punish China for what U.S. government officials regard as its predatory industrial policies and abuse of U.S. intellectual property. Beijing has vowed to retaliate.
At the end of December 2017, the United States’ trade deficit increased to its highest level since 2008. This was due to a steady rise in imports that was in turn fueled by strong domestic demand. Last year, the U.S. imported a whopping $2.34 trillion worth of foreign goods, up almost 7% from $2.19 trillion the previous year.
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A Southwest flight was en route from LaGuardia Airport in New York City to Dallas Love Field when it was diverted to Philadelphia International Airport Tuesday.
Photos posted to social media showed the engine was damaged.
There have been several mid-level earthquakes strike northwest of Helena, Montana. The quakes are fairly shallow and are concentrated in the mountainous region. You can find updated info at the links below.
A pair of amateur archaeologists found a treasure trove on a Baltic island that is believed to have belonged to a Danish king from more than 1,000 years ago. René Schön and 13-year-old Luca Malaschnitschenko were rummaging around with metal detectors on the German island of Ruegen in the Baltic Sea when they happened upon the ancient treasure in January. But experts kept the find secret until last week. “This was the [biggest] discovery of my life,” Schön, a hobby archaeologist, told German news agency DPA. The find includes silver coins, rings, pearls, bracelets and a Thor’s hammer from the era of 10th century Danish King Harald Bluetooth.
Russian President Vladimir Putin warned on Sunday that further Western attacks on Syria would bring chaos to world affairs, as Washington prepared to increase pressure on Russia with new economic sanctions.
In a telephone conversation with his Iranian counterpart Hassan Rouhani, Putin and Rouhani agreed that the Western strikes had damaged the chances of achieving a political resolution in the seven-year Syria conflict, according to a Kremlin statement.
There is just too much economic confusion in the latest tweet from Trump to even begin to explain it, so we will just point out that moments ago Trump, in this case definitely not under the advice of Larry Kudlow, accused China and Russia of “playing the currency devaluation game”, at a time of rising interest rates, which Trump slammed as “not acceptable.”
While it’s becoming increasingly clear that the US and China aren’t trying to work out a “deal” on trade like Larry Kudlow and other members of the Trump administration have suggested – only to meet with denials from the Chinese – the White House isn’t letting up on the pressure, Reuters reported.
To wit, the Trump administration has banned American companies from selling components to Chinese telecom-equipment manufacturer Zhongxing Telecommunications Equipment (ZTE) Corp. after accusing the company of lying during a settlement negotiation, according to Bloomberg.
Specifically, the Department of Commerce determined that ZTE had made false statements to the Bureau of Industry and Security during 2016 settlement negotiations and during its 2017 probationary period.
The company pleaded guilty last year in federal court in Texas for conspiring to violate US sanctions by illegally shipping US goods and technology to Iran.
ZTE paid nearly $900 million in fines and penalties, and an additional $300 million that could be imposed in the future.
The company had promised, as part of the settlement, to fire four senior employees and punish 35 others by either reducing bonuses or reprimanding them, Commerce Department officials told Reuters.
More than 200 million eggs from a North Carolina farm have been recalled because of bacterial contamination.
A notice posted on the Food & Drug Administration website Friday says the eggs shipped to restaurants and grocery stores in nine states may be tainted with salmonella. The bacteria causes nausea, diarrhea and, in rare cases, death. Twenty-two illnesses have been reported.
The eggs were distributed from a farm in eastern North Carolina’s Hyde County by Indiana-based Rose Acre Farms.
The notice says the recalled eggs include varieties sold in Food Lion and Walmart stores, and served at Waffle House restaurants.
Chicago’s drinking water is full of toxic lead, a new study from the Chicago Tribune finds. Out of roughly 2,700 homes tested, 70 percent had high lead levels in the tap water.
Last year, nearly $4 trillion of U.S. economic productivity was the result of international trade.
However, as Visual Capitalist’s Jeff Desjardins notes, with talk of a trade war heating up once again (Russia and China), , there is a real possibility that the global trade landscape could shift dramatically over the coming months and years.
Any such shifts wouldn’t likely impact the country in a uniform and evenly distributed fashion – instead, any impending trade war would pose the largest direct risk to states that are dependent on buying and selling goods on international markets.
Not all US lawmakers have welcomed the “illegal” strike on Syria ordered by President Donald Trump that was allegedly in retaliation for a staged chemical attack in the suburb of Damascus last week.
Without having the mandate from the United Nations, Washington and two of its European allies have launched strikes against Syrian targets, seeking to retaliate against President Bashar Assad for a suspected chemical attack near Damascus on April 7, which, according to unconfirmed reports, killed dozens of people.
Billionaire venture capitalist Tim Draper has gathered enough votes to trigger a referendum on splitting California into three separate states.
Draper’s CAL 3 campaign has gathered 600,000 signatures supporting the split since he proposed the initiative last August. He told the Telegraph that 600,000 signatures was a “milestone” and sent a message that people across California would “create a brighter future for everyone.”
Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen has told Mexican authorities that National Guard troops deployed on the border would not be armed or participate in immigration or customs duties, according to the Mexican Foreign Ministry.
Just days after the US deployed its Truman Carrier Strike Group (and 7 warships) to The Mediterranean, The Pentagon reports that
the guided-missile destroyer USS Winston Churchill entered the Navy’s area of operations that includes the Mediterranean as tensions remains high over a possible military strike against Syria.
California Senator Richard Pan, the infamous fascist who forced a mandatory vaccination law through in order to rake in money from big pharma, has decided there should no longer be free speech for anyone other than the government. Pan’s new bill proposes to require “online fact checkers” to verify content before anything can be posted on the internet.
This is scary. These infections can be fatal in up to half of patients. And the Centers for Disease Control has just identified more than 220 strains of what they call “nightmare bacteria” that can kill up to 50 percent of the people who catch them. My mom had lung surgery and almost died from a bacterial attack a few months later!
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