John McAfee To Roll Out “Freedom Coin” Cryptocurrency This Fall

Authored by Max Boddy via CoinTelegraph.com,

Crypto enthusiast, bitcoin bull, antivirus software namesake and 2020 United States presidential campaigner John McAfee is releasing his own independent cryptocurrency, according to an official Twitter post on May 29.

image courtesy of CoinTelegraph

According to his website on the announced cryptocurrency, the “McAfee Freedom Coin” will roll out some time this fall. The McAfee Freedom Coin appears to aim for total isolation and independence from traditional currencies, assets and exchanges in an effort to reach “the Holy Grail of cryptocurrency – economic freedom.”

According to McAfee, these are the desired properties of the new cryptocurrency:

“What is needed is a coin disconnected from fiat currencies and from other crypto currencies alike – a coin with zero cash-in value, yet accepted universally… It is not based on any commodity nor is it connected to the value or behavior of any external item or entity. The value of the coin will always be zero in relation to any other currency yet it’s natural market value is free, completely, to grow.”

As previously reported on Cointelegraph, McAfee has said he plans to run for President of the United States in 2020 on a boat in international waters, since he has purportedly been indicted by the U.S. Internal Revenue Service (IRS).

McAfee has reportedly made no secret of his tax evasion, saying that he has not filed taxes for eight years. His presidential campaign is also not a serious bid for the office, but rather a stated attempt to promote cryptocurrencies as a means to securing personal freedom for citizens.

In recent news, McAfee said that he has discovered the identity of the mysterious Bitcoin creator Satoshi Nakamoto, who is purportedly a man living in the U.S. McAfee apparently was planning to out Nakamoto’s identity, but has put his plan on pause per advice from his extradition lawyer:

“The US extradition request to the Bahamas  is imminent. I met with Mario Gray, my extradition lawyer, and it is now clear… that releasing the identity of Satoshi at this time could influence the trial and risk my extradition. I cannot risk that. I’ll wait.”

 

via ZeroHedge News http://bit.ly/2JXQH2U Tyler Durden

Nobody Should Be Placed in Solitary Confinement—Not Even Paul Manafort

A judge has ordered former Trump campaign chair Paul Manafort to be transferred to the infamous Rikers Island Prison in New York City. Manafort could also face time in solitary confinement out of concern for his safety. Manafort’s predicament presents a unique opportunity to have a conversation about a questionable prison tactic.

As previously reported, Manafort was convicted on charges related to tax evasion and fraud. He also ran into trouble for lying to the Department of Justice about fraud, money laundering, and his relationship with a foreign bank.

That hardly fits the bill of a hardened, violent criminal, as would be suggested by the judge’s actions. His supporters are arguing the same. A source close to him said, “He’s not a mob boss,” in response to the news.

Neither was Kalief Browder, who spent three years at Rikers without ever seeing a trial. He was arrested by police after he was accused of stealing a backpack. Officers found nothing on his person and the accusations were later discovered to be dubious. Browder was subjected to violence by the guards and inmates, but experts believe the two years he spent in solitary confinement was the main factor that led to his 2015 suicide at the age of 22, about two years after his release.

Needless to say, there continues to be great hypocrisy in Manafort’s case. Defenders of a harsher criminal justice system for average Americans have pitied Manafort. Others are saying the new development is “karma.”

Scott Hechinger, public defender and policy director at Brooklyn Defender Services, wants those supporting the judge’s decision in Manafort’s case to see how turning a blind eye does a disservice to those like Browder.

“When we support pain, punishment, torture, harshness, pre-trial detention, solitary, guilt until proven innocent for one—no matter how much we might despise them or think they ‘deserve it’—we further entrench an unjust system for all,” he tweeted.

Any personal feelings of Manafort should be set aside to speak out against torture. And those with new thoughts on humanity behind bars should similarly be concerned that this is a reality for tens of thousands of Americans each year.

from Latest – Reason.com http://bit.ly/2MrUjfR
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Supreme Court Rejects SAC Trader’s Final Chance At Overturning Prison Time

The U.S. Supreme Court refused to overturn the insider trading conviction of Mathew Martoma, a former portfolio manager who was caught trading on inside information while employed by SAC Capital. Had the decision been overturned, it would have undermined efforts to “clean up Wall Street”, potentially legalizing insider trading.

According to Bloomberg , the justices let a federal appeals court decision to uphold Martoma’s 2014 conviction stand without comment on Monday. Martoma was previously found to have used illegal tips to make $275 million for SAC on trades in two pharma stocks. He is currently serving a 9 year sentence in a Miami prison following the largest case of insider trading ever to be brought against an individual.

As a result of the decision, those who can now be convicted for insider trading include “traders who get an inside tip as a gift from an acquaintance or business associate”, according to white collar crime experts who reviewed the ruling.

Martoma’s lawyers argued that the ruling did not comply with the requirement for proof that the person providing the tip must receive personal benefit in return. Martoma had previously spurned requests to cooperate with the government in its investigation of SAC. 

Martoma’s appeal stated: “It now suffices for the government to prove that the insider intended to benefit the tippee/outsider. That test focuses on the wrong question and radically dilutes the government’s burden.”

Martoma’s failed appeal aside, SAC clearly agreed there was insider trading going on when the fund plead guilty in 2013 and paid a $1.8 billion fine to the U.S. to resolve insider trading claims. As a result, it changed its name to Point72 and for five years only managed founder Steve Cohen’s money. 

The Supreme Court previously ruled in 2016 that people could still wind up in jail, despite the insider providing the tip not trying to make money. In Martoma’s case, the court ruled that since the tipper had an “intent to benefit” the recipient, his benefit was irrelevant. 

The Trump administration had urged the Supreme Court to reject the appeal without a hearing, citing the “intent to benefit” standard. The government said that Martoma received confidential information about a clinical trial from a doctor that the trader had previously paid $70,000 in consulting fees. 

Hopefully Steve Cohen’s alleged hush money which bought Martoma’s allegiance and silence will be worth it (and still there upon his release) to make Martoma’s stay in Federal pound me in the ass prison – worth it.

via ZeroHedge News http://bit.ly/2MD4uhs Tyler Durden

Peso Climbs As AMLO Caves To Trump, Says Mexico Will Crack Down On Immigration

A surfeit of promising trade headlines, combined with Jerome Powell’s suggestion that the central bank would step in to backstop the market by cutting rates if the trade war fallout should worsen, has provoked a parabolic move higher in stocks Tuesday, propelled in part by the biggest short squeeze since the first week of the year.

And although President Trump’s insistence that the first round of tariffs on Mexican imports would go into effect on June 10, made during a press conference with Theresa May, briefly weighed on stocks and the peso, Mexican President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador has responded with some jawboning of his own.

The peso climbed Tuesday morning in New York after AMLO said during a news conference in the Gulf of Mexico port of Veracruz that Mexico could be ready to step up measures to contain migration in order to reach a deal with the White House, Reuters reports.

Peso

A Mexican delegation led by Foreign Minister Marcelo Ebrard will discuss the dispute with US officials in Washington on Wednesday, and Lopez Obrador said he expected “good results.”

“The main thing is to inform about what we’re already doing on the migration issue, and if it’s necessary to reinforce these measures without violating human rights, we could be prepared to reach that deal,” Lopez Obrador said.

In spite of Trump’s comments, Ebrard has said there’s an 80% chance that the country will be able to avoid tariffs. AMLO’s conciliatory comments contrast with reports from yesterday that Mexico might respond with retaliatory tariffs of its own.

Trump’s tariffs arrive at a particularly delicate time for the Mexican economy, which contracted during the first quarter. Mexico’s economy is heavily reliant on trade with the US, and with USMCA in limbo, AMLO has assured the public he has a “plan” to ensure that the tariffs – which could max out at 25% – don’t impoverish the country, though AMLO has said he won’t engage in any trade wars with the US.

via ZeroHedge News http://bit.ly/2WcQz1e Tyler Durden

Steele Cuts Deal; Will Discuss Trump Sex Dossier With DOJ Inspector General 

Former MI6 agent Christopher Steele has finally agreed to meet with US officials to discuss his relationship with the FBI, and the now-infamous dossier of unfounded claims against Donald Trump which he assembled on behalf of the Clinton campaign and the Democratic National Committee. 

The 54-year-old Steele has agreed to meet with investigators from the US Justice Department’s Office of the Inspector General (OIG), according to The Times of London, after a former US official told Politico that the OIG report would “try to deeply undermine” Steele. 

The news marks a 180-shift in Steele’s past refusals to engage with US authorities. In April, Politico reported that Steele would not meet with the OIG to assist them with their investigation, while just last week, Reuters reported that he wouldn’t meet with US attorney John Durham, who was handpicked by AG William Barr to review the origins of the Trump-Russia probe. 

Steele, a MI6 Russia specialist for more than two-decades, has worked with the FBI as a confidential source since 2010. According to the report, he will retain the services of a top American attorney if the interview goes ahead, and is only willing to discuss the narrow scope of his dealings with US intelligence. Steele also wanted US officials to seek the approval of the British government. 

Of note, the Steele dossier was referred to as “Crown material” in emails between US intelligence officials.  

That said, a senior source told The Times: “As far as we are aware, no request has been made to HMG [Her Majesty’s government] on this matter. Any decision to co-operate would be a matter for Mr Steele as this relates to issues arising many years after he left government employment.” 

Last year Mr Steele, who runs a corporate intelligence company, was named as the author of memos containing unsubstantiated allegations that the Kremlin held sexually lurid information about Mr Trump.

Mr Steele’s dossier led to an FBI inquiry, which became a two-year investigation presided over by the special counsel Robert Mueller. That found that figures in the Trump campaign team expected to benefit from Kremlin activities but cleared Mr Trump of liaising with Russia. –Times of London

In his dodgy dossier – a collection of 17 memos, some of which used Kremlin sources – Steele claimed that the Trump campaign was part of a “well-developed conspiracy of co-operation” with the Russian government in an attempt to influence the outcome of the 2016 US election. Steele claimed that the Kremlin was blackmailing Trump with a video of him encouraging prostitutes to urinate on a bed once used by former President Obama. 

Steele’s work was commissioned by opposition research firm Fusion GPS, which was in turn paid by lawyers for the Clinton campaign and the DNC. 

via ZeroHedge News http://bit.ly/2HUFMVt Tyler Durden

Paul Manafort Headed To Rikers Island, Where He Faces Solitary Confinement

Former Trump Campaign Manager Paul Manafort is about to be transferred from his comfortable low-security prison camp in Pennsylvania to what is widely regarded as one of the most hellish prisons in the country: The Rikers island jail complex in New York City.

Citing anonymous sources familiar with plans, the New York Times and Fox News reported that Manafort will soon be transferred after Manhattan prosecutors struck a deal with the Feds to hold him in New York while he faces state fraud charges.

Manafort

The transfer was reportedly requested by Manhattan District Attorney Cy Vance Jr.’s Office after a New York grand jury indicted Manafort on several fraud counts, including residential mortgage fraud and faking business records. A New York State judge reportedly ordered the transfer at Vance’s request.

Manafort was sentenced earlier this year to nearly seven years in federal prison on connection with two federal cases. To guard against the possibility that Trump – who has praised Manafort as “brave” (Manafort struck a plea deal last year, but it was later rescinded after prosecutors determined that he had violated the terms) – might pardon Manafort, prosecutors in New York State pursued charges of their own. Manafort, who is 70 years old, will likely be arraigned on the new charges in State Supreme Court in Manhattan later this month. It’s still possible that his lawyers might seek to have him held at a federal jail in New York.

Rikers is a network of nine jails with a total of 7,500 inmates. Typically, the jail hosts inmates in pretrial detention, or those serving a year of less.

Given the prison’s violent reputation, high profile inmates are often held in ‘protective custody’ – that is to say, solitary confinement. It’s expected that Manafort would warrant protective custody, and sources familiar with the innerworkings of the prison said he would likely be held in a former prison hospital.

Here’s more from the New York Times:

A law-enforcement official familiar with the correction department’s practices, speaking on the condition of anonymity to discuss security measures, said Mr. Manafort would most likely be housed in a former prison hospital on the island. That is where most high-profile detainees are held, including police officers, those accused of killing police officers, politicians and celebrities.

A lawyer for Mr. Manafort, Kevin Downing, did not immediately respond to a request for comment. Spokesmen for the Manhattan district attorney’s office and the city’s correction department, which runs the jails on Rikers Island, did not immediately comment.

Federal officials agreed to honor the writ for Manafort under something called the Interstate Agreement on Detainers Act, a federal law that governs transfers of prisoners between states when they are facing unrelated charges in different jurisdictions.

Remember, Manafort was confined to a wheelchair during part of his trial in Virginia, and his lawyers have claimed that he is in consistently poor health.

via ZeroHedge News http://bit.ly/2HUhWsW Tyler Durden

My bank in Denmark just offered me a NEGATIVE rate of interest to borrow money

[Editor’s Note: Today’s note was penned by one of our international contributing editors.]

Yesterday I called my bank in Denmark, Nordea, and couldn’t believe what they told me…

They offered to lend me money at MINUS 0.12% for a ten-year mortgage.

In other words, the bank would PAY ME to take out a loan.

Of course, as a Sovereign Man editor, I’ve written a lot about negative interest rates. But most of these cases were always reserved for big banks or institutions.

That no longer seems to be the case…

Now, negative interest rates ARE the norm. Thousands, if not tens of thousands of Danes will go out and take out mortgages that will pay them every month.

This is completely mind-boggling to me. But it just highlights how broken the financial system really is.

Everything about this is in complete violation of the law of prosperity Simon Black’s been writing about for years: produce more than you consume and invest the difference.

Now, institutions and governments are incentivizing people to consume, instead of save. In fact, they’re paying people to go into debt.

That is not how prosperity is created. Instead of encouraging people to invest their surplus capital in productive investments, people are penalized for saving in the first place.

It’s like everything has been turned upside down.

Some of the most popular investments on the planet are the ones that burn the most cash (Tesla, Netflix, Uber, etc.)

Insolvent governments in Europe are able to borrow at negative yields, with no afterthought whatsoever as to the consequences.

And bankrupt governments like Argentina are able to borrow for 100 YEARS and pay next to nothing for it (even though Argentina went bankrupt twice in the last thirty years alone).

None of this makes any sense.

Here in Europe, bank deposits yield close to 0%.

In 2016, the Swiss government even asked its citizens to delay their tax payments as long as possible, because the government didn’t want to pay negative interest rates on those balances.

And in the United States, banks rob their customers blind time and time again by lying, stealing and deceiving them.

It’s extraordinary to me that these are the options we have with our money today.

Luckily, it isn’t all doom and gloom.

As my friend Simon says it: the world is a big place… and sometimes, we can make this insanity play to our advantage.

Just in the same way that I can get paid to borrow money…

And that bankrupt governments can borrow at negative yields….

And that companies losing BILLIONS each year with no end in sight can be some of the most popular investments in the world…

It also works the other way around.

Occasionally, we can find extremely well-managed businesses that are profitable, have a pristine balance sheet and pay generous dividends to their shareholders, that are selling for rock-bottom prices.

Our in-house Chief Investment Officer, Tim Staermose, editor of the 4th Pillar, spends his time scouring the corners of global stock markets for these opportunities.

One example he found was a boring Japanese company called Kitagawa Industries.

It had $151 million of cash in its bank account… Yet the value of ALL its shares was just $114 million– 24% lower than its net cash balance.

In other words, you could have theoretically bought every single share of Kitagawa for $114 million, put the entire $151 million bank balance in your pocket, shut the company down, and walked away with a tidy $37 million profit.

Make no mistake, this wasn’t some hot cash-burning start-up. It was a mature, profitable business with a long and successful operating history.

There was absolutely no good reason for it to be selling at such a large discount and no rational shareholder would ever agree to a deal like that.

But markets aren’t rational… so Tim recommended members of our flagship investment service, the 4th Pillar,  buy the shares.

And sure enough, less than one-and-a-half years later, a competitor recognized the opportunity and took over the entire company– generating a 249% return for our members in just 17 months.

As you can see, there are always pockets of value where you can make the insanity of the financial system work for your benefit. It just takes patience and willingness to do the hard work to find them.

For over eight years, Tim has been putting in the hard work for our members.

In fact, he just published his 100th 4th Pillar issue where he shared his latest thoughts on ten more deeply undervalued opportunities – just like Kitagawa Industries – that are trading at BUY levels right now.

You can click here to download a redacted preview of one of these opportunities. Inside, Tim shares the details of a company so awash with cash that it’s paying an astronomical dividend.

And to celebrate our 100th issue we’re offering a rare 50% discount for the next few days. Click here to learn more about the 4th Pillar and Tim’s latest opportunities.

Source

from Sovereign Man http://bit.ly/2XqqfCj
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Today’s Buying-Panic Is Being Driven By The Biggest Short-Squeeze In 5 Months

While this is unlikely to come as much of a surprise to any trade who can fog a mirror, today’s panic-buying bounce in stocks is being driven by the biggest short-squeeze since the first week of 2019…

We wonder if this will stop once the Nasdaq makes it back to even?

If there is any fundamental/news catalyst for the squeeze today, it is this – CNBC reports that Mexico’s president on Saturday hinted his country could tighten migration controls to defuse U.S. President Donald Trump’s threat to impose tariffs on Mexican goods, and AMLO expressed optimism today on negotiations with the U.S., and Mexican Foreign Minister Marcelo Ebrard said there’s an 80% chance that the country will be able to avoid tariffs.   Which, of course, would be a huge victory for Trump.

via ZeroHedge News http://bit.ly/2JVyTFH Tyler Durden