Month: June 2017

CNN’s Jim Acosta Fails Again – Totally Shut Down By ICE Director Over Illegal Immigration

Content originally published at iBankCoin.com

During Wednesday’s White House press briefing, Tom Homan – Acting Director of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and U.S. Attorney John Huber were brought in to discuss two upcoming pieces of immigration legislation – only to face CNN’s anchor-socked White House correspondent, Jim Acosta.

Focus on criminals

Director Homan made the point that out of the 66,000 illegals arrested since Trump’s executive orders on immigration enforcement were signed, “73 percent of everyone we have arrested were criminals.” Homan also noted ICE’s emphasis on “breaking up gangs and transnational smuggling organizations” and deporting bad hombres.

CNN level spin

CNN’s Jim Acosta completely re-framed Homan’s message – accusing the Director of  “making it sound as if undocumented immigrants commit more crimes than people who are just native-born Americans” – a comment prepared long before the press briefing as evidenced by Acosta rattling off some Cato Institute study to support his point.

Homan came back with a serious stack of pancakes for ol’ Jim:

DIRECTOR HOMAN:  “I think you’re misinterpreting what I’m saying… Number one, people that enter this country illegally violate the laws of this country.  You can’t want to be a part of this great nation and not respect its laws” adding that once an illegal alien has been given due process, “that final order from a federal judge needs to mean something or this whole system has no integrity.”

Later adding: “Did I say aliens commit more crimes than U.S. citizens?  I didn’t say that.”

Which Acosta promptly turned into: 

(Sure Jim)

Homan then went on to tell Acosta that illegal immigrants should not be comfortable – stating “if you enter this country illegally, you should be concerned that someone is looking for you.”  

Homan: 1

Acosta: 0

Mothers and Babies

Acosta then hit Homan with a hypothetical tear jerker about separating an illegal immigrant mother from her DREAMer children – calling the Trump administration’s adherence to the law “cold and clinical.”

[I]f you look at this from a cold and clinical standpoint, what you’re saying is because the mother crossed the border illegally, committed a crime, that she should be separated from her children.  What do you say to that?  –Abilio James Acosta

Homan responded: “U.S. Citizen’s families get separated every day when a parent gets arrested for a criminal charge. …when someone chooses to enter this country illegally, and they’re here illegally, and they choose to have a child that’s a U.S. Citizen – they put themselves in that position.

If we don’t have border security. If we don’t enforce the laws that’s written in the books, then you’re never going to control the border. Why do you think we’ve got 11 – 12 million [illegal] people in this country now?“

Homan: 2

Acosta: 0

Acosta Down!

CNN’s Acosta tried to go in for the kill, whimpering “So you should arrest the mothers, go after the mothers?” only to be out-SJW’d by another journalist who cut in – asking “if you are an undocumented immigrant in this country right now listening to you that you should be fearful, that you should be concerned, you should be looking over your shoulder that ICE is looking for you?” – A reference to a statement Homan made to congress two weeks ago when he said illegals “should be uncomfortable, should look over your shoulder, and you need to be worried.”

Homan told the journalists that they were “losing the message,” and went on to explain “ICE prioritizes our enforcement efforts on national security threats, public safety threats, those who have been ordered removed by a judge and failed to depart, and those who have been ordered removed, were removed, and reentered the country”

Adding the caveat “However, what I’m saying, during the course of those operations if we find someone here illegally, we’re not going to turn the other way.”

Listen here (full transcript)

  

Follow on Twitter @ZeroPointNow § Subscribe to our YouTube channel

    via http://ift.tt/2sVHMp1 ZeroPointNow

    The two critical requirements of a Perfect Plan B

    [Editor’s Note: You’ll find a video showing you a real life example of a Perfect Plan B at the bottom of this article.]

    Yesterday we talked about how most of Western civilization, including the United States and much of Europe, have long ago departed from the original ideals that made them great.

    The values of liberty, economic freedom, self-reliance and independence have been replaced by debt, consumption and over-regulation.

    Decades of bungling leadership have completely broken the financial system, and governments and central banks have dug themselves into a hole that is impossible to solve.

    As we noted, though, it’s impossible to predict precisely when, one day, the worst consequences of this economic narcissism will strike.

    It might be weeks, months, or years before anything happens. But rational people don’t ignore the obvious risks to their livelihoods and their families.

    Rational people have a Plan B to ensure that they will always be in a position of strength, no matter what happens (or doesn’t happen) next.

    A Plan B is a personalized insurance policy     that increases your freedom, protects your hard-won assets, helps you make more money and ensures that you are legally saving tens of thousands of dollars in taxes every year.

    But what makes a Plan B perfect?

    In order for a Plan B to be perfect, it has to fulfill two critical requirements:

    1. A perfect Plan B makes sense no matter what happens (or doesn’t happen) next:

    The hallmark of a great Plan B is that the steps you take make sense no matter what happens (or doesn’t happen) next.

    Think of it like wearing a seatbelt. It’s a no-brainer. There are obvious risks on the road… drunk drivers, weather hazards, idiots who text while behind the wheel.

    Wearing a seatbelt goes a long way in reducing the potential consequences of those risks.

    And yet there’s absolutely ZERO downside in wearing a seatbelt.

    No one in the history of the modern automobile has ever arrived safely at his/her destination and been angry for having worn a seatbelt.

    It’s that same characteristic that makes a Plan B great: zero downside. Regardless of who is (or isn’t in office). No matter what happens to the economy. Or whether you ever get sued.

    A Perfect Plan B ensures you aren’t worse off for implementing the strategies. So, even if nothing bad ever happens, you are STILL better off than you were before.

    That’s at the core of everything we do and recommend here at Sovereign Man.

    2. A Perfect Plan B has a strong Defense AND Offense

    No sports team wins a championship with only a good defense. Or solely with a strong offense.

    Champions have both– great offense AND defense.

    Think about defense as safeguarding what you already have. Asset protection. Risk prevention.

    A great defense ensures that everything you have ever worked for or will achieve in your life will be safe… from lawsuits, capital controls, economic hardship, and even a banking or currency crisis.

    Good offense, on the other hand, positions you for gain.

    Because wherever there’s risk, there’s always opportunity. And we see an enormous amount of both.

    Undoubtedly the world is changing, as it always has throughout the history of our species.

    Technology makes things possible that our ancestors could never have imagined.

    We can hop on a flight this evening and wake up tomorrow morning on the other side of the planet.

    We can set up a new company within minutes, domiciled in a tax-advantaged country that’s continents away, then manufacture a new product in another country, staff it with employees in yet another country, and sell our goods to the entire world through websites that reach hundreds of millions of consumers every day.

    We can invest in emerging technologies that have the power to disrupt just about every single industry that has long maintained a chokehold on its consumers– from banking to energy to even government itself.

    We can also make extremely lucrative investments in places that are growing at meteoric rates because they’ve just woken up from decades of civil war and isolation.

    Or even generate strong, safe returns through simple Peer-to-Peer loans… an entire asset class that barely even existed a decade ago.

    All of these trends create tremendous opportunity for anyone with the foresight to look beyond the mainstream.

    Our mission at Sovereign Man is to help you build a phenomenal defense and offense to increase your freedom, protect your hard-won assets, make more money and save tens of thousands of dollars by legally reducing your tax obligation.

    And here is a real life case study of how one of our members built a Perfect Plan B:

    Inside this video you will learn…

    • How to protect yourself from problems in the banking and monetary system
    • How to liberate your retirement structure with a sensible strategy
    • How you can generate exceptional returns by investing in private businesses
    • An example of how to trade overvalued dollars for high-quality, undervalued assets
    • Much more…

    Source

    from Sovereign Man http://ift.tt/2tp7HXl
    via IFTTT

    TrumpCare is Like ObamaCare, but Even Worse (new @ Reason)

    From the way Democrats are talking about Republican reforms to Obamacare, you’d think the Party of Lincoln was going house to house murdering people.

    In reality, the GOP isn’t even coming close to following through on its promise to repeal and replace Obamacare. If it did, it might actually save lives, increase quality, and bring prices down.

    Click below for full text, links, and downloadable versions.

    Subscribe at YouTube.

    Like us on Facebook.

    Follow us on Twitter.

    Subscribe to our podcast at iTunes.

    View this article.

    from Hit & Run http://ift.tt/2t5QUpK
    via IFTTT

    RBC Explains The Market’s Sudden Regime Shift

    There's a clear change in the air as growth stocks are pummeled, bond yields spike, and central bankers wax hawkish.

    Here is RBC's head of cross-asset strategy Charlie McElligott to explain what's happening…

    The selloff in USTs & duration / concurrent ‘bear steepening’ is further-set to act as an ‘accelerant’ on both my equities ‘rotation’ call and the unwind of the broad ‘slow-flation’ narrative overshoot and its key trade expressions.

    And just to get this question out of the way: as we have mentioned many times in the past 5 years, equities can handle higher nominal rates to a certain extent before becoming ‘too violent,’ at which point we’d have to become concerned about the potential for risk-parity deleveraging flows across what have been recently ‘low vol’ assets, which has allowed for greater leverage deployment on said ‘risk allocations’ which would then be taken-down.  This could be exacerbated by recent ‘longs’ into USTs tapping, as some faster money late-comers get stung here.  However in the ‘now,’ the recently higher realized vols in rates isn’t bleeding into a gamma repricing yet (Jenny Xiao—“It’s pretty incredible that a 15bps selloff couldn’t muster anything more than a 1 annual bpvol move in gamma”).  And FWIW too, with ‘real rates’ chopping along here and unable to break meaningful higher (= “tighter” financial conditions), I don’t expect this to be a headwind for awhile either.

    Currently, it’s the same ‘higher nominal rates’ catalysts which I’ve been noting that are continuing to push yields around.  Hawkish rhetoric from global central bankers (most recently BoE’s Haldane this morning stating they “need to look seriously at raising rates”) is certainly a large dynamic right now, catching the ‘slow-flation’ crowd–who had recently piled-into duration and flatteners on account of slowing data trajectory and what had been a collapse in inflation expectations / inflation proxies—‘wrong way.’  More ‘higher rates’ right-sizing as the ‘narrative excess’ is corrected.

    Further playing into my hands on the “slow-flation narrative & positioning overshoot” theme at the core of the equities factor-rotation trade I’ve been pushing are two key commodity inflation proxies reversing course:

    Crude ‘capitulatory’ flows from ‘lazy OPEC longs’ seemingly reached peak ‘tap-out’ over the past 3 weeks (with net manager length at 11-month lows and all-time highs in ICE Brent spec shorts)….which allowed for a ‘stabilization’ off the 50dma and pivot ultimately higher.  Now it seems ‘less bad’ inventory data  is helping to fuel a modest squeeze higher, with WTI +7.7% in one week….although there are some notable ‘production decline wins’ worth-noting here too: our Energy equities team is highlighting that the ‘lower 48 states’ production saw the largest drop in 10 months, and has declined twice now this month.

     

    And even more importantly from an ‘inflation expectations’ key price ‘sensitivity’ input, Qingdao Iron Ore pivoted MASSIVELY-HIGHER off the lows mid-month, as the Chinese ‘flinched’ on liquidity (3 weeks of powerful injections via OMOs and MLF beginning late May) began to ‘pay off’ in the form of a 16.8% rally in 10 sessions (and for the broad industrial metals complex as well).  And mind-you…this rally has continued despite the PBoC liquidity withdrawals of the past week, as money market rates in aggregate have moved lower. 

    Take a look at said ‘easing’ of tighter financing conditions as per overnight SHIBOR over the past week alone…it’s like a steroid-shot for the global commodities complex: 

    Bloomberg Global Commodities Index and Overnight SHIBOR:

    Overnight SHIBOR and Qingdao Iron Ore:

    In turn, look at the counter-trend move across inflation proxies—pivoting HIGHER / WIDER for the first time in months–everything from US 5y5y inflation fwds to breakevens to the aforementioned iron ore and crude:

    It’s still the same story we’ve been grinding over for the past three years:

    …the entire global macro trade continues to hinge on the perceived ‘binary’ direction of ‘inflation’ (‘reflation’ vs ‘disinflation’ debate)

    …which then dictates everything from the rates ‘flatteners vs steepeners’ trade to US equities factor rotations (‘value’ and ‘size’ factors vs ‘momentum,’ ‘growth,’ ‘quality,’ and ‘anti-beta’) to CCCs vs high-grade in credit. 

    Why?  Because every asset class in the post-GFC era now possesses a heightened sensitivity to ‘interest rates’ on account of ZIRP & QE monpol.

    via http://ift.tt/2tppSfo Tyler Durden

    Fox Hosts for Legalizing Heroin

    Not a fan. ||| FoxLike a lot of 78-year-old white men, my father was watching Fox News Monday, and decided to click the next channel over to catch the rapid-fire libertarian stylings of our friend Kennedy. There, in a segment interviewing Wall Street Journal U.S. News Editor Glenn Hall about a recent story on drug smugglers increasingly sending their product through the mail, the eponymous host of the fast-growing show (up 35 percent in overall ratings in the second quarter this year) pivoted immediately to the underlying policy:

    KENNEDY: So, this is obviously sad and tragic, the fact that opioid overdoses have increased in recent years. But I don’t think the problem is that FedEx and UPS and the postal service need more screening tools. I think the problem is that heroin is illegal. And so people go to nefarious means in order to get a drug they would get anyway. […]

    If you legalize these things and people have access to them and may know what’s in them, do you think knowing the ingredients in a drug you’re taking increases or decreases the chance that you will overdose on it?

    HALL: Well, I don’t know the answer to that question exactly.

    KENNEDY: It decreases the chance because you know what’s in there, so you know exactly what you put in your body.

    Always here to help! ||| Matt WelchThis isn’t Kennedy’s first time making the on-air case for heroin legalization—back in March 2013, when then-host John Stossel talked about how he once struggled with legalizing hard drugs, but then concluded that owning one’s body is a “powerful” counter-argument, the non-drug-using former MTV VJ replied “amen,” and added: “having drugs be illegal is downright deadly. It’s dangerous. And, you know, Ron Paul always made a good point, which was, let’s say heroin was made legal right now, like who really wants to go out and jack their vein with heroin?” And in September of last year, when our own Katherine Mangu-Ward reacted to a story about elephant tranquilizers getting cut into smack by saying “this is why we want to legalize heroin now because it would save lives,” Kennedy replied “Yes, absolutely. But instead, the problem here is, you know, not that legislators and…city council members are going to wake up and smell the cat food and realize that prohibition is directly leading to death.”

    But Monday’s blunt comment was not some response to a how-far-would-you-go libertarian dare, or a legalize-bazookas type of thought experiment, but rather a deliberate insertion of anti-prohibition policy argument into a story that the Bill O’Reillys of the world would surely treat as reason for another crackdown on opioids. As such, I flagged the occasion on Twitter:

    One guy responded that Greg Gutfeld and his former Red Eye-mate Andy Levy (who leaves Fox tomorrow, BTW) were pro-legalization, to which I added Kat Timpf, co-host of The Specialists, though with the caveat that I didn’t know if they all went as far as heroin. Yesterday, Timpf cleared that up:

    Gutfeld, meanwhile, has made the conservative case for hard-drug legalization multiple times on air, including in November 2013, when The Five co-host said, “I believe heroin could be legalized if done in a delivery system which makes it more like a cigarette.”

    What’s striking about all this is that the comments from Kennedy and Timpf come one year to the week that the Libertarian Party nominee for president, a man who previously was most famous for being the first major elected official in the U.S. to favor legalizing marijuana, could not bring himself to fully advocate legalizing heroin at a crucial CNN townhall, despite making some sensible points about the add-on dangers of prohibition.

    I don’t say that as a ding on Gary Johnson; it’s hard out here for an instinctive pragmatist positioning himself as a centrist to stare into the bright lights and sell the more extreme-sounding edges of a minority philosophy to a mass-market audience. But rather, it feels like what was once taboo is now at least debatable (thanks, Ron Paul!), which will hopefully inject at least a little sanity into a policy debate that more often resembles a panic. It’s also a reminder that the most interesting voices over in that building tend to be the most libertarian—a lesson that I hope the post-Roger Ailes management takes closer to heart.

    from Hit & Run http://ift.tt/2t5p3Gf
    via IFTTT

    “Oil Hits The Floor And Is Now Set To Soar”: Citi

    One day after Goldman issued a confused, rambling note in which the bank cuts its 3-month WTI price target by $7.50 from $55 to $47.50 saying “Spot WTI oil prices at $43/bbl are now back to November pre-OPEC deal levels, down from $52/bbl just a month ago and vs. our prior 3-mo $55/bbl forecast. How did it go so wrong?” yet kept a bullish long-term outlook (underscored by a bullish follow up note by Goldman’s commodity head, Jeffrey Currie because Goldman is always hedged) and on the same day that Socgen likewise cut its Q3 and Q4 Brent forecasts by $7.50 to $50 and $52.50 (and 2018 by $6 to $54) on a weaker supply-demand outlook, oil bulls were in urgent need of reassurance.

    So, courtesy of Citi, the one bank that will never stray too far from its bullish bets on crude (perhaps due to its role as OPEC’s impresario to the hedge fund world), and its head technician Tom Fitzpatrick, here is the explanation why oil is now due for a rebound, or as Citi puts it… 

    “Oil hits the floor and is now set to soar!”

    • We believe that WTI Crude has posted a short term bottom. Previous short term bottoms have typically seen strong upside follow through with an average low to high rally of 22% over three weeks. 
    • The present price action on WTI Crude is also very similar to that seen in October/November of last year and in that instance, we saw a rally of nearly 23% in the 3 weeks after the low was posted. 

    • We are very focused on the price action seen in October and November of last year where we fell for 5 weeks from a high of $51.93 to a low of $42.20. This time, we also fell for 5 weeks from a high of $52.00 and hit a low of $42.05 last week.
    • The bounce after the November low saw WTI rally to $51.80 over three weeks and a similar move this time around looks likely to us. Such a move would also be consistent with the rebounds off prior lows.
    • Previous short term bottoms in WTI Crude have been followed by aggressive rebounds in the 3 weeks that follow. On average these rebounds have resulted in a move higher by 22%. If last week’s low is a short term bottom (which is our bias), a bounce like the average one see over the last 18 months would suggest a move up to $51.29, in line with what we would expect to see if we follow the November 2016 bounce highlighted above.

    • Daily momentum has crossed higher from stretched levels and similar turns higher in momentum have corresponded with major bottoms in WTI Crude.
    • In addition, we have now firmly taken out good short term resistance at $43.76 (May low) on a closing basis and we held that level on a retest yesterday.
    • Interim resistance worth keeping an eye on in the short-term comes in around the March lows of $47.

    • It is worth noting that net Managed Money positioning has become significantly cleaner in the last few months and a large increase in shorts has actually been seen (biggest short since the deflation story dominated the narrative in mid-2016)
    • Further price appreciation in Crude could therefore see an unwind of shorts with plenty of room for longs to add to positions.

    Then again, considering that exactly one week ago Citi issued a note titled “Here Comes The V-Shaped Rebound In Oil“, we can see why readers may be skeptical.

    via http://ift.tt/2tosryq Tyler Durden

    FBI Agent Charged With Lying About His Role In Shooting An Activist During Oregon Wildlife Standoff

    A grand jury in Portland, Oregon has charged FBI Agent W Joseph Astarita with three counts of making false statements, alleging that he lied when he claimed he did not fire his weapon during the attempted arrest of LaVoy Finicum, a key figure in the Oregon militia standoff at the Malheur national wildlife refuge in 2016.

    Astarita, who pleaded not guilty in federal court in Portland, was assigned to arrest the leaders of the Oregon standoff in January 2016 when Finicum drove off the road and into a snowbank, before attempting to flee on foot. During the ensuing confrontation, some of which was captured on film, Oregon state police officers shot and killed Finicum, an Arizona rancher, who police say was reaching for his gun. Police later said the shooting was “justified”. 

    Here is the press release from the United States Attorney’s Office:

    The indictment alleges that Astarita knowingly and willfully made false statements to FBI Supervisory Special Agents, knowing that the statements were false and material to the FBI’s decision not to investigate the propriety of an agent-involved shooting. Specifically, Astarita falsely stated he had not fired his weapon during the attempted arrest of Mr. Finicum when he knew he had in fact fired his weapon. Astarita also knowingly engaged in misleading conduct toward Oregon State Police officers by failing to disclose that he had fired two rounds during the attempted arrest.

     

    Astarita was arraigned on June 28, 2017, in Portland. He entered pleas of not guilty to each county and was released pending future appearances.

     

    An indictment is only an accusation of a crime, and a defendant is presumed innocent unless and until proven guilty beyond a reasonable doubt.

    For those who missed it, a portion of Finicum’s confrontation with police was caught on film and clearly shows that the first shots were fired while his hands were up in the air…’ironically’, no pop stars made a “Hands Up, Don’t Shoot” video after this incident.

     

    Last year, we covered the background on the incidents leading up to the Oregon standoff in a post entitled “Now Is The Time To Stand Up”: Armed Activists, Militiamen Seize Federal Wildlife Refuge Office In Oregon.  It all started when Oregon resident Dwight Hammond set fires on land he leased from the government, an effort he said was intended to fight back the intrusion of invasive plant species and prevent wildfires.  Apparently the government did agree and threw Hammond in jail for arson.

    On Saturday, militants seized a remote government outpost following a protest by hundreds of angry citizens.

     

    It all started back in 2001 when Dwight Hammond and his son Steven set fire to leased government land in what they said was an effort to beat back invasive plant species and – ironically – prevent wildfires. They set more fires in 2006 and were later convicted of arson.

     

    Both men served time in prison but a judge eventually determined that their sentences were too light and ordered them back to jail.

     

    Some folks were displeased with the ruling and staged a protest that saw some 300 people march through Burns, a city of around 3,000. The procession made a stop by the Hammond residence and proceeded to make an appearance at the local sheriff’s office as well.

     

    Enter Ammon Bundy.

     

    Fast forward to November and Bundy’s son Ammon was busy trying to come up with a way to keep Dwight Hammond and his son from going back to jail. “Ammon Bundy met with Dwight Hammond and his wife in November, seeking a way to keep the elderly rancher from having to surrender for prison,” The Oregonian writes, adding that “the Hammonds professed through their attorneys that they had no interest in ignoring the order to report for prison.”

     

    But while the Hammonds have apparently come to terms with their fate, Bundy hasn’t and in a brazen move, he and an unspecified number of “outside militants” seized control of the Malheur Wildlife Refuge headquarters, which is a short drive from Burns (where the protest took place).

     

    Of course, the standoff ultimately ended with multiple arrests and the death of LaVoy Finicum.

    via http://ift.tt/2u31FJy Tyler Durden

    White House Press Secretary Defends Trump’s Attack on Morning Joe: ‘The President Will Not Be Bullied’

    Content originally published at iBankCoin.com

    I know, the Nasdaq is down 100 and tech stocks are engulfed in flames. But how do you expect me to sit here and ignore this story? As a person who lives to ‘stir the pot’, this is the best timeline for me. All I have to do it sit back and watch the President of the United States talk shit all day, providing me with endless ways to trigger those opposed to him.

    Just to recap today’s impeachable offense.

    Trump tweeted to Joe Scarborough ( a never Trumper), and his soon to be wife Mika Brzezinski, these insane comments.

    The response by Never Trumpers and the Hillbot brigade has been sheer unhinged outrage.

    Here’s the statement by MSNBC.

    Sen. Sasse

    Sen. Graham

    Sen. Collins

    Here was Paul Ryan’s response.

    And finally, White House Press Secretary, Sara Huckabee Sanders, defended Trump’s tweets, saying “the President will not be bullied.’

    via http://ift.tt/2u3bQhh The_Real_Fly

    Financials Give Up Stress-Test Gains As FANGs Falter

    Well that escalated quickly…

    As Bloomberg notes, today’s selling is nearly as broad as yesterday’s buying.

    Investors can’t ditch technology and consumer-oriented stocks fast enough. Yield-sensitive sectors –utilities, REITs — are getting hit with sell tickets too as bonds sell off (10-year Treasury yield is up as much as 15.8 bps in just three days, breaking the key 2.25% level). Wall Street is mostly risk off, worried that central bankers worldwide are threatening to pull away the punch bowl just as inflation picks up in Germany ahead of key PCE data for the U.S. tomorrow.

     

    Tech’s weakness is extending a global retreat for the sector. TECHNOLOGY It’s hard to pin the broad drop in the sector on any specific news. Rather than any change in corporate fortunes, the reason may just be rotation, out of social/computer companies and into banks. The losses are broad.

    Financials opened exuberantly but it appears "sell the news" is the plan…

     

    As the Big Banks all roll over…

     

    We're gonna need moar buybacks.

    via http://ift.tt/2sr67iW Tyler Durden

    Bill Ackman Joins Twitter

    After years of purportedly cultivating relationships with journalists to burnish his image in the press, Pershing Square Capital Founder Bill Ackman has created a twitter account, presumably to cut out the middleman and speak directly to the people, after eating a series of embarrassing losses from bad bets on Valeant pharmaceuticals and Herbalife Inc.

    Ackman confirmed to Bloomberg that the account, which bears the handle @BillAckman1, is, in fact, genuine. Unfortunately, his reluctance to join the service – which was launched 10 years ago – at an earlier date left him unable to secure a handle using just his own name: That handle, apparently, belongs to an imposter.

     

    Ackman’s fund ate a $3 billion loss in March when it announced it had liquidated its entire stake in Valeant Pharmaceuticals and has effectively resigned from the board, saying he won't stand for re-election. In a statement, Ackman said "it was time to get out of the position, investment required disproportionately large amount of time and resources."

    Ackman hasn’t yet tweeted, nor has he added profile picture.

    Here’s a breakdown of the accounts Ackman is following, via BBG:

    • Ackman was following 46 accounts on Thursday morning, including President Donald Trump’s @Potus and @realDonaldTrump accounts, and Lin-Manuel Miranda, the creator of the hit Broadway musical “Hamilton”
    • Following Anthony Scaramucci, PIMCO, GS CEO Lloyd Blankfein
    • Also following Larry Summers, Mohamed El-Erian, Ben Bernanke
    • Follows French President Emmanuel Macron, ex-U.K. Prime Minister David Cameron
    • Follows Jeff Bezos, Elon Musk, Tim Cook
    • Also follows tennis stars Roger Federer and Frances Tiafoe

    Which begs the question: Where’s our follow-back, Bill?
     

    via http://ift.tt/2slGOUl Tyler Durden