Mike Norman Economics

I don't see how forcing newly created non-risk assets onto bank balance sheets is going to help correct a real hygiene problem...China’s central bank will inject CNY1.2 trillion (USD170 billion) in tomorrow’s open market operation, the bank said in a notice today. The move aims to provide sufficient liquidity for the financial system during the period of controlling the novel #coronavirus epidemic. pic.twitter.com/KQUUOCkd2i— Yicai Global 第一财经 (@yicaichina) February 2, 2020

Tokyo Electric, or Tepco, has collected nearly 1.2 million tonnes of contaminated water from the cooling pipes used to keep fuel cores from melting since the plant was crippled by an earthquake and tsunami in 2011. The water is stored in huge tanks that crowd the site. The panel under the industry ministry came to the conclusion after narrowing the choice to either releasing the contaminated water into the Pacific Ocean or letting it evaporate - and opted for the former, even though it...

Gee, even plants can hear! [embedded content]

They probably can point to the paper notes as Tier1/Tier1-Quality assets in order to comply with regulations...  and avoid the negative rate payable on Reserve Assets instead... just have to pay for safe storage of the notes...German banks are stuffing vaults with money to help offset the mounting cost of negative interest rates, and some of them are running out of space https://t.co/wyJHoVdV95— Bloomberg Markets (@markets) January 31, 2020

A recent article suggests the period for making BFFS the way you did in your teens and 20s is over – so have I accumulated the right kinds of friends? I made my two best friends at school. The friendships I made as a boy were extremely powerful, and when I look back on them now I can see how in many ways it was like being in love.I was devastated when my both best friends moved far away from me at about roughly the same time to other parts of the country when I was in my early 30's...

Not only can two physically separated particles influence each other, they can influence each other through time Alvin Ash, the guy who makes the spooky physics YouTube videos, did one on AI recently, and he said one day AI machines will become conscious. I replied under his video that it will never happen, and he said how can I be so sure? I then told him why, based on the work of Roger Penrose, but Alvin Ash never replied. Whereabouts in our brains do we see images? Light...

People who appreciate taboo jokes and other forms of black humor show higher levels of intelligence, according to a recent study. Do you find yourself holding back your laughter at tasteless or morbid jokes? An appreciation of black humor could be an indicator of intelligence levels, according to the findings of a new Austrian study published in the journal Cognitive Processing. Psychologist WorldDark Sense of Humor Linked to High Intelligence - Study  

Gold Goats 'N GunsOn Brexit Day the Times They are a’ChangingRay McGovernA MUST READ on Assange The Vineyard of the SakerChina’s virus response has been ‘breathtaking’Pepe Escobar Zero HedgeNow It's 64: Wounded US Troop Count From Iran Attack Still GrowingTyler Durden Zero HedgeHillary Tweets "No One Is Above the Law" Then Refuses To Accept Lawsuit Against HerTyler Durden Zero HedgeTverberg: It Is Easy To Overreact To The Chinese CoronavirusTyler Durden

The world’s largest oil exporter, Saudi Arabia, significantly raised its crude sales to the world’s largest oil importer, China, in 2019, boosting its exports to China by 47 percent and beating Russia for the top Chinese supplier spot for the first time in four years, according to Chinese customs data as carried by Reuters on Friday. While Saudi Arabia restricts production under the OPEC+ deal, it has prioritized shipments to the most prized markets, China and Asia, at the expense of...

Global capitalism, with humanity in tow, is now facing a triple crisis: a deepening structural contradiction of the capitalist mode of production, one manifested as a multi-dimensional crisis of ‘valorisation’ – that is to say, a crisis in the production of ‘surplus-value’, the very lifeblood of the profit system; an acute crisis in international relations stemming from the fact that the global productive forces are bursting the confines of the nation-state system, whose individual units...