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Having tumbled in early September after its anticipated inclusion in the S&P 500, TSLA shares have regained around half of their loss ahead of tonight’s news.

TSLA shares are surging over 8% higher after hours following a report from S&P that the carmaker will be included in the S&P 500 index…

Tesla Inc. (NASD:TSLA) will be added to the S&P 500 effective prior to the open of trading on Monday, December 21 to coincide with the December quarterly rebalance.

Due to the large size of the addition, S&P Dow Jones Indices is seeking feedback through a consultation to the investment community to determine if Tesla should be added all at once on the rebalance effective date or in two separate tranches ending on the rebalance effective date.

Tesla will replace a S&P 500 company to be named in a separate press release closer to the rebalance effective date.

We do note that TSLA shares are well below their pre-inclusion levels from late-August…

We are sure Elon will be pleased…

With several promising COVID-19 vaccines on the horizon including Moderna and Pfizer, many Americans will soon be faced with the decision of whether or not to get vaccinated.

Harmony Healthcare IT recently surveyed 2,000 Americans from across the country to try and gauge what percentage of Americans would be willing to receive a COVID-19 vaccination.  

Here’s what they found:

• Only 46% of Americans say they would receive a COVID-19 vaccination as soon as it was made available.

• 40% said they would get the vaccine, but prefer to see how effective and safe it is before receiving it. 14% said they would not get the vaccine under any circumstances.

• Top reasons against getting vaccinated: 1. Side effects (67%); 2. Safety and effectiveness (38%); 3. I won’t need a vaccination (21%); 4. Don’t believe in vaccinations (9%); 5. Cost concerns (8%).

• According to respondents, 27% believe they will be able to be vaccinated within 3-6 months of a vaccine being developed and 26% believe it will take 6 months to one year.

• Most respondents (50%) agree that the most vulnerable and susceptible populations should be the first to receive a vaccination (unclear if this includes all members of Congress and all career politicians). According to the CDC, adults of any age with underlying medical conditions such as cancer, COPD (chronic obstructive pulmonary disease), heart disease and severe obesity, among other conditions, are at increased risk of developing severe illness from COVID-19.

• 55% of Americans believe the government should require everyone to get vaccinated although 70% would not receive a vaccine if it isn’t approved by the FDA first.

• 53% believe they will be able to be vaccinated within a year.

• Once vaccinated, a quarter of respondents feel that it will still take between 1-to-2 years before a return to normalcy while 24% believe it will happen sooner (6 months to a year).

The full report can be found here.

Authored by Charles Hugh Smith via OfTwoMinds blog,

Now that the bubble has burst, the hope is that removing the pin will magically restore the burst bubble. Sorry, it doesn’t work that way.

Here’s the fantasy: if we stop the shutdowns, the economy will naturally bounce back to its oh-so wunnerful perfection of Q3 2019. This is a double-dose of magical thinking and denial. The U.S. economy was unraveling in 2019 from 11 long years of Fed-induced over-capacity in almost everything (except integrity, competition, transparency and social cohesion) and the bone-crushing burden of corrupt, greedy cartels that have the nation by the throat.

The reality nobody dares mention is that thanks to 20 years of the Federal Reserve’s easy money, there’s rampant over-capacity everywhere you look: there’s too many cafes, bistros, restaurants, fast-food outlets, hotels, resorts, AirBnBs, unprofitable Tech Unicorns, airline flights, Tech startups, office towers, retail space, malls, absurdly overpriced apartments for rent, storage facilities, delivery services, office sublets, colleges, attorneys, unemployed workers with multiple credentials–the list of too much, too many is endless.

Thanks to the Fed, the most profitable venture was borrowing to increase capacity, then borrow some more to extract the phantom value created by the greater capacity. Nobody cared if the office tower remained mostly empty; the money was made in building it and extracting its “value” via debt, not operating a legitimate enterprise.

This Fed-created house of cards was never sustainable, or healthy, as all the incentives to add capacity were perverse. The illusion that every mall, office tower, retail space, college, apartment building, etc. would be filled was only plausible as long as consumers and zombie corporations were borrowing and spending more than they earned.

That was never sustainable, but rather than look at the systemic set-up of an insanely predatory, fragile debt bubble resting precariously on over-capacity, the status quo is blaming Covid and lockdowns. The problem isn’t the pin, it’s the bubble that was begging to be popped by something, anything.

Recall that bubbles pop on their own, even without a pin. Japan’s debt / stock / real estate bubble popped in 1989 without a pin; prices just stopped going up and then started falling, all by themselves.

The other reality no one dares mention is the stranglehold of corrupt cartels that have long outlived their purpose, and now exist solely to enrich insiders and lenders and the wealthy few who own the student loan debt, mortgages, etc.

The entire higher-education cartel was an unaffordable, unsustainable racket eight years ago when I wrote my book The Nearly Free University. Now the racket is finally unraveling, and the insane over-capacity, insanely high costs and lack of value in the credentials are coming home to roost.

The healthcare system is another example of a sprawling system of cartels that’s long overdue for a reckoning / unraveling. The fortunes being minted bought more than enough political power to keep the corrupt, predatory machine well-greased with federal money, but that doesn’t mean the system is actually providing healthcare effectively or efficiently or in a sustainable fashion.

Now we have multiple Big Tech monopolies bleeding the nation dry, and Big Tech is rushing to flood Washington D.C. with lobbyists and campaign contributions so nobody messes with its parasitic, destructive layers of monopoly.

The entire American economy was a gigantic bubble of corrupt Fed-funded skims, scams, rackets, monopolies and cartels, and it was finally bursting in 2019. The Fed, oh-so protective of its ever-greater and more destructive bubbles, rushed to mask the rot by inflating the greatest bubble of all time: Forget GOAT, Look at GBOAT: The Greatest Bubble Of All Time (November 6, 2020).

Now that the bubble has burst, the hope is that removing the pin will magically restore the burst bubble. Sorry, it doesn’t work that way. The bubble has already burst and cannot be magically made whole and re-inflated.

It was never sustainable or healthy, and its collapse was inevitable. The way forward is obvious: stop the Fed from blowing ever-larger bubbles and eliminate cartels and monopolies. But that will require ending the absurd farce of pay-to-play “democracy” that enables the debt / asset bubbles and cartels / monopolies.

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My recent books:

A Hacker’s Teleology: Sharing the Wealth of Our Shrinking Planet (Kindle $8.95, print $20, audiobook coming soon) Read the first section for free (PDF).

Will You Be Richer or Poorer?: Profit, Power, and AI in a Traumatized World
(Kindle $5, print $10, audiobook) Read the first section for free (PDF).

Pathfinding our Destiny: Preventing the Final Fall of Our Democratic Republic ($5 (Kindle), $10 (print), ( audiobook): Read the first section for free (PDF).

The Adventures of the Consulting Philosopher: The Disappearance of Drake $1.29 (Kindle), $8.95 (print); read the first chapters for free (PDF).

Money and Work Unchained $6.95 (Kindle), $15 (print) Read the first section for free (PDF).

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Become a $1/month patron of my work via patreon.com.

As Senate Democrats regroup after failing to regain control, Rep. Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) is now faced with the challenge of uniting the House amid heated internal debates over the role of socialism and left-wing priorities amid a slimmer majority after losing as many as 10 House seats in the election.

According to Bloomberg, internal turmoil is now boiling into the public sphere, spilling out in interviews, tweets, and leaked details from caucus conference calls.

Pelosi’s cat-herding comes as she mounts a bid to be reelected Speaker, which is all but expected.

Pelosi’s first test comes later this week. House Democrats will hold leadership elections that appear to offer a reprise of the existing team at the top, led by Pelosi, 80, Majority Leader Steny Hoyer, 81, and majority whip James Clyburn, 80. The elections are to be held virtually, with nominating speeches and candidate presentations conducted by video call. Members will use a special phone app to vote, encrypted to keep their choices secret. -Bloomberg

That said, Bloomberg notes that Democratic infighting may intensify due to Pelosi’s commitment to step aside as Speaker after the 2022 midterms, “as various factions begin to make side agreements and collect chits to grab footholds for future leadership rungs.”

“At least two House Democratic centrists have privately solicited feedback from colleagues on backing a challenger to Pelosi as top Democrat and speaker nominee, according to Democratic aides. But so far that has gained little traction and no serious challenger has emerged. One lawmaker often cited as a potential successor to Pelosi, New York Representative Hakeem Jeffries, 50, has said he is running again for caucus chairman. -Bloomberg

Meanwhile, the New York Times illustrated the fierce battle raging behind the scenes between two factions; one blaming the “socialist” label for costing Democrats the Hispanic and immigrant vote, and another which claims that embracing far-left policies such as the Green New Deal is good for business, and drove higher voter turnout for “moderate” Joe Biden. Via Breitbart:

While Mr. Biden rebuilt the Democrats’ Blue Wall — reclaiming the swing states of Wisconsin, Michigan and Pennsylvania — he carried them by a fraction of the margins former President Barack Obama achieved in both the 2008 and 2012 elections. As long as Republicans manage to amass enormous leads with working-class white voters, those states may not be safely Democratic anytime soon.

Just as troubling to the party, Democrats sagged with voters of color, particularly in Hispanic and Asian-American communities where Republicans’ attacks on Democrats as a left-wing party appear to have resonated, denying Mr. Biden a victory in Florida and costing the Democrats congressional seats in that state as well as Texas and California. Indeed, the only House seats Republicans picked up that were not in districts Mr. Trump also carried were in heavily Hispanic or Asian regions.

…

“Defund police, open borders, socialism — it’s killing us,” said Representative Vicente Gonzalez, a Democrat from South Texas who won just over 50 percent of the vote, two years after he nearly captured 60 percent. “I had to fight to explain all that.”

The “average white person,” Mr. Gonzalez added, may associate socialism with Nordic countries, but to Asian and Hispanic migrants it recalls despotic “left-wing regimes.” –NYT

In many large cities, President Trump did far better than expected, while Biden did worse than expected, notes Politico. Biden’s margins appear to have come primarily from suburban areas (and fraud, according to Trump and his supporters).

Interesting, as MSNBC notes, “One of the most surprising trends in the exit polls was that Trump seems to have gained traction with every single demographic of voters, with the exception of white men.”