Month: December 2019

Authored by Sara Carter via SaraACarter.com,

Fired FBI agent Peter Strzok – who played a central role into the now debunked investigation into President Donald Trump’s campaign and Russia – is now arguing that his politically charged anti-Trump text messages are protected under the First Amendment.

This argument is so weak, considering his texts were mainly made on the bureau’s government issued phones, which require FBI agents to use them for  work purposes only.

Strzok, who once was deputy head of the FBI’s counterintelligence office, is suing the Department of Justice for reinstatement into the FBI. He stressed in a new court filing Monday, with the federal district court that “firing an employee for the content of his or her non-public communications is unconstitutional, irrespective of any balancing interests,” which would include damage to the FBI’s reputation and other mitigating factors.

In his claim against the DOJ he argues that he didn’t leak his texts, instead it was the DOJ,  therefore he argues, his texts should be considered private speech. He then argues that he shouldn’t be held to a higher legal standard, using the 1968 Supreme Court case Pickering v. Board of Education. The Pickering case applied to public statements by government employees.

Strzok said he was entitled to “develop a full factual record through discovery.” He said it would be premature to dismiss the case at this early stage.

Strzok’s filing was a response to the DOJ’s motion to dismiss his lawsuit to be reinstated to the FBI by November. The Justice Department slammed Strzok in its motion to dismiss Strzok’s case stating that the embattled former FBI agent admitted to conducting official FBI business on his personal iMessage account and violated FBI regulations in use of his work issued cell phone.

For example, the DOJ included a letter from the Office of Professional Responsibility (OPR) regarding its own investigation of Strzok that stated in part that “the investigation uncovered numerous occasions on which you used your personal email account to conduct FBI business…you claimed your ‘usual practice’ was to double delete the work emails after you sent them. You acknowledged you had been issued an FBI laptop to work from home but claimed you did not know how to properly log on to use the machine.”

Unbelievable that Strzok gave these excuses to OPR, considering he was the top of the bureau’s counterintelligence division.

First of all, Strzok played a central role both in the investigation into the Trump campaign and Hillary Clinton’s use of an unsecured server to send classified emails. His text messages were sent on his government issued phone, which is not his private phone but owned by the government.  Those text messages revealed exactly how biased the FBI agents conducting the investigation felt about their subject: President Trump.

In fact, when his anti-Trump texts were first discovered by Inspector General Michael Horowitz, Strzok was removed in the summer of 2017, from then-Robert Mueller’s Special Counsel investigation. Mueller’s team felt his texts were biased enough to remove Strzok from the investigation and they were right to do so.

Remember these texts messages sent Strzok’s sent on his FBI issued unsecured cell phone to his then lover FBI Attorney Lisa Page.

Strzok called Trump “abysmal” “idiot” and a “disaster” in texts he sent to Page.

At the time, she was working for then FBI Deputy Director Andrew McCabe. McCabe was also fired from the FBI after the DOJ’s Inspector General caught him in a multitude of lies and leaking to the media.

In August 2016, after Page wrote to Strzok that Trump was “not ever going to become president, right? Right?!”

Strzok then responded with “No. No he’s not. We’ll stop it.” Page, who was recently interviewed by Rachael Maddow, couldn’t make a logical explanation for the “We’ll stop it” part of the text and wanted to give the impression that Strzok (let me reiterate: he was central to the investigation into Trump) was making the statement in general terms and that the electorate wouldn’t vote for him. Right!

I really do believe Strzok and Page think Americans are plain dumb and can’t see the forest through the trees.

Further, Strzok was also one of two FBI special agents to interview former National Security Advisor Army Lt. Gen. Michael Flynn, who is now awaiting sentencing on Jan. 28. Remember what former FBI Director James Comey said about sending Strzok and FBI Special Agent Joe Pientka to conduct the surprise interview of Flynn at the White House in Jan. 24, 2017.

Comey had told NBC’s Nicole Wallace that he sent the two FBI agents because he believed he could get away with it.

“I sent them,” said Comey to Wallace. “Something we’ve — I probably wouldn’t have done or maybe gotten away with in a more organized investigation — a more organized administration. In the George W. Bush administration, for example, or the Obama administration.”

Strzok, Comey, Page and McCabe, among others involved in the investigation continue to act as if the world owes them something and they play out this crazy narrative in public appearances that stray far from the reality of the evidence that has been compiled against them.

These former senior federal law enforcement officials have been caught lying, leaking to the media, weaponizing the tools of their agency all in an attempt to stop then candidate Trump from becoming president and then to create a false narrative once he did become President.

They are doubling down on all their malfeasance and attempting to find any loop hole or explanation that they can muster to try to change the reality that we all know to be true.

Can you imagine doing this much damage to your company or being this callous with an investigation that effected the lives of the American people and then after being caught acting like you did nothing wrong? Worse, Strzok and the rest of his former FBI cohorts want to play the victim role. It’s actually really disgusting.

Think about this, if the FBI came to your house to question you on anything and you lied, manipulated data, leaked information, tried to explain the unexplainable despite the facts the FBI had against you what do you think would happen?

I can tell you what would happen, the FBI agents would walk you out of the house in handcuffs.

Strzok wasn’t fired because someone accidentally exposed text messages that had nothing to do with his performance on the job, he was fired because he lied and had extraordinary bias against a sitting president he despised. He lied to everyone, including his wife, who by chance discovered his affair with Page after seeing text messages on his phone.

Strzok doesn’t care about anyone but himself. He doesn’t care about the harm he’s done to the FBI and from his lawsuit he doesn’t seem to care about what he’s done to the American people.

It doesn’t seem to matter. He’s doubling down. What he doesn’t realize is that the American people are tired of it and frankly tired of him.

Following September’s (the last data point) modest reacceleration in home prices (the first since March 2018), Case-Shiller’s October data is expected to stabilize at +2.10% YoY.

But instead, the 20-City Composite accelerated significantly – rising 2.23% YoY – the fastest since May…

Source: Bloomberg

Prices rose on an annual basis in 19 of the 20 cities in the composite measure. Phoenix led with a 5.8% increase, followed by a 4.9% gain in Tampa and 4.8% advance for Charlotte. San Francisco was the lone city to post a year-over-year decline.

With mortgage rates having tumbled, and accounting for the lag in Case-Shiller data and sentiment shifts, one might expect house price appreciation to re-accelerate further as next year begins…

Source: Bloomberg

Finally, some food for thought from Alhambra’s Jeffrey Snider, the Fed didn’t cause the housing slump with its “rate hikes.” Just like 244 bps fed funds didn’t put the economy into its downturn.

And if the Fed didn’t break it, then the Fed won’t be able to fix it with a few rate cuts. The bond market has already supplied the equivalent of six of them to the average mortgage rate, and so far the real estate data is more about price sensitivity than that positive swing in payment-related buying power.

The continuing depressiveness of housing suggests that as 2019 draws to a close the downside risks remain for a lot more than this one part of the economy. Despite a double dose of unintentional aid (prices and rates), there must be serious countervailing forces more than balancing those out. Ironically, that’s what the price trends and persistently low interest rates suggest, too.

 

An Kansas City police officer resigned on Monday after he was caught writing “Fucking Pig” on his own coffee cup at a Junction City McDonald’s.

The ex-officer, who remains unidentified, brought the cup to the attention of the manager and was offered a free lunch. That wasn’t good enough for the now unemployed ‘pig,’ as the story somehow wound up making headlines.

After a thorough review of video surveillance, however, the owner of the franchise, Dana Cook, said in a statement to KSNT that “the words were not written by one of our employees. My McDonald’s have the utmost respect for all members of law enforcement and the military and were troubled by the accusation made,” Cook added.

“This was completely and solely fabricated by a Herington police officer no longer employed with the agency,” Herington Police Chief Brian Hornaday told reporters on Monday.

Hornaday said the McDonald’s employees had nothing to do with the hoax and were highly cooperative during the investigation.

The ex-officer, who remained unidentified, is a former military police officer in the Army and had been on the small town’s force for two months. Hornaday said the officer told him that the incident was intended as a joke. –NBC News

“I truly hope the former officer of the Herington Police Department that did this understands the magnitude of the black eye this gives the law enforcement profession from coast to coast,” added the chief.

“As a show of faith in our community the Sheriff and some of his command staff will be visiting to have a cup of Coffee Monday morning,” a move we’re sure the employees who were just framed by a cop will just McLove.

Authored by Michael Snyder via TheMostImportantNews.com,

One of the best ways to determine where things are heading is to look back at how much has changed over the past 12 months.

2019 has been one of the most memorable years in our history, and it has certainly set the stage for the critical events of the decade to come. However, not everyone views this moment in our history the same way. For example, one “expert” that is being heavily quoted by the mainstream media is claiming that 2019 was the culmination of “the best decade in human history”. His main argument seems to be that since “the ecological footprint of human activity” appears to be shrinking, the world must be a better place than it was before as a result. And certainly there are many other voices out there that are boldly proclaiming that we have entered a golden new era of peace and prosperity and that the best is yet to come. You can buy that argument if you want, but there are other voices that believe that everything that is wrong with our society is reaching a very dangerous crescendo. For those with that perspective, it appears that we are very close to a societal tipping point and that the years ahead are when we will finally pay the price for decades of exceedingly bad decisions.

So what do you think?

Will the 2020s be the best of times or the worst of times?

As you ponder that question, here are 50 numbers from 2019 that are almost too crazy to believe…

#1 According to a Gallup poll that was just released, Barack Obama and Donald Trump came in tied for “the most admired man in America” this year. They both got 18 percent in the survey, and no other man had more than 2 percent.

#2 At 10 percent, Michelle Obama topped the list in the Gallup poll for “the most admired woman in America” this year.

#3 Global stocks have increased in value by more than 25 trillion dollars over the past 10 years.

#4 In the United States, 84 percent of all stocks are owned by the wealthiest 10 percent of all Americans.

#5 The U.S. government is now more than 23 trillion dollars in debt.

#6 During the Obama and Trump administrations, we have added more than 12 trillion dollars to the national debt.

#7 Over the past 12 months alone, we have added another 1.1 trillion dollars to the national debt.

#8 Every single hour of every single day, we are stealing more than 100 million dollars from future generations of Americans.

#9 According to the IMF, total global debt has now reached the 188 trillion dollar mark.

#10 U.S. corporations are now close to 10 trillion dollars in debt.

#11 Total corporate debt has now reached 47 percent of U.S. GDP. That is the highest level in our history.

#12 Total U.S. household debt is about to cross the 14 trillion dollar mark.

#13 A study that was recently released found that 70 percent of all Americans are struggling financially right now.

#14 The average family in the United States cannot afford to buy a home in 71 percent of the country.

#15 58 million jobs in the United States pay less than $793 a week.

#16 According to the Social Security Administration, 50 percent of all Americans make less than $33,000 a year.

#17 63 percent of the jobs that have been created in the United States since 1990 have been low wage jobs.

#18 Roughly 40 million Americans struggle with food insecurity.

#19 70 percent of Americans “have cried about money”.

#20 A recent survey found that more than two-thirds of all U.S. households “are preparing for a possible recession”.

#21 According to the most recent government figures, 24.6 million Americans have used an illegal drug within the last 30 days.

#22 If you can believe it, 46 percent of all Americans have taken at least one legal pharmaceutical drug within the last 30 days. That is almost half the country.

#23 A New York woman named Alexa Kasdan recently went to see her doctor because she had a cold and a sore throat. Her insurance company was billed $25,865.24 for the visit.

#24 Americans spend more than 140 billion dollars a year treating cancer.

#25 If you are an American woman, there is a 1 in 3 chance that you will get cancer at some point in your life.

#26 If you are an American man, there is a 1 in 2 chance that you will get cancer at some point in your life.

#27 Over the past decade, the suicide rate among young Americans has risen by 56 percent.

#28 The suicide rate for the overall population increased by 41 percent between 1999 and 2016.

#29 One survey has discovered that 15-year-old students in China are almost four full grade levels ahead of 15-year-old students in the United States in mathematics.

#30 A different survey discovered that one-third of all American teenagers haven’t read a single book in the past year.

#31 According to a recent survey of 2,000 adults, a whopping 88 percent of all Americans believe that the holiday season is the most stressful time of the year.

#32 48 million Americans still have holiday debt from last year.

#33 23 percent of all U.S. children live with a single parent. That is the highest rate in the entire world by a wide margin.

#34 Today, approximately 40 percent of all babies in America are born to unmarried women.

#35 The U.S. fertility rate has fallen 15 percent since 2007 and is now at the lowest level ever recorded.

#36 One very alarming survey found that the average American spends 86 hours a month on a cellphone.

#37 The average person will watch more than 78,000 hours of television programming over the course of a lifetime.

#38 Today, almost half of all homeless people in the entire nation live in the state of California.

#39 Over half of all California voters have considered leaving the state.

#40 According to an American Bar Association survey, only 38 percent of all Americans know that the U.S. Constitution is the highest law in the land.

#41 58 percent of American adults under the age of 35 agree that some version of socialism “would be good for the country”.

#42 Almost one-third of all U.S. Millennials are still living with their parents.

#43 According to the Pew Research Center, only 65 percent of Americans now consider themselves to be Christians. That is the lowest level ever recorded.

#44 The bird population of North America has declined by 3 billion since 1970.

#45 Scientists are telling us that at the current rate of extinction, nearly all insects could be gone “in 100 years”.

#46 African Swine Fever has already killed one out of every four pigs in the world, and many experts believe this crisis is still in the very early stages.

#47 Within the last 365 days, there have been approximately 37,000 earthquakes of at least magnitude 1.5 in the United States.

#48 The upcoming election is a “significant source of stress” for 56 percent of U.S. adults.

#49 A survey that was conducted a couple of months ago found that 67 percent of all Americans believe that we are “on the edge of civil war”.

#50 The final full moon of this decade was on 12/12 at precisely 12:12 AM eastern time. And it turns out that it was also exactly 6,666 days from 9/11.

Global markets and US index futures dipped on the last day of the year after retreating from record highs in the previous session, as a spectacular Wall Street rally which saw the S&P return almost 29% in 2019 fizzled out in the final days of the decade.

Indeed, with a handful of major markets already shuttered and trading volumes dismal, the dominant moves on Tuesday reflected common investor expectations for 2020: caution that the remarkable rally of 2019 is now over and dollar weakness.

The market slide came despite the capitulation of even the staunchest trade hawks in Trump’s circle: on Monday, White House trade adviser Peter Navarro said the Phase 1 China-U.S. trade deal will likely be signed in the next week, hours after South China Morning Post reported that Chinese Vice Premier Liu He would travel to Washington this week. However, for once trade deal optimism failed to boost spirits, and Emini futures completely ignored Navarro’s comments to post their worst day in over four weeks. The benchmark S&P 500 closed Monday at its lowest level since Dec. 20, and the weakness continued on the last day of the year.

Still, despite Monday’s dip, the S&P 500 is still on track for its best year since 2013 and its best December in nine years, driven by a fresh burst of ultra loose monetary policy by the Federal Reserve and other central banks. The question for today is whether the S&P can rise 1.1% to post a 29.6% full year return: that would surpass the S&P’s annual performance of 2013 making it the best year for stocks since 1997.

European stocks were down modestly after paring an early selloff, and the Stoxx 600 was down -0.1% as of 2pm local time with many of the top European markets such as Germany, Switzerland and UK closed.

Earlier in the session, Asian stocks fell on the last trading day of 2019. Shares dropped in Australia and Hong Kong but gained in China. Hong Kong’s Hang Seng Index closed 0.5% lower, led by technology and basic materials stocks. Markets in Indonesia, Japan, the Philippines, South Korea and Thailand were closed for the year-end holiday. Australia, Hong Kong, New Zealand and Singapore closed early Tuesday.

As reported last night, the latest data from China showed manufacturing activity expanded for a second straight month in December, even as Services missed badly. The manufacturing PMI was flat at 50.2 (better than the expected 50.1) and non-manufacturing PMI lower at 53.5 (from 54.4) and below expectations of 54.2. New non-manufacturing orders slowed as prices (selling and buying fell), pushing employment further into contraction (48.3). The data aligns with other early signs of stabilization in the Asian economy, including last week’s figures that showed profits at China’s industrial firms grew at the fastest pace in eight months in November.

While trading in stocks remained subdued on the last day of the year, the same can not be said for currencies, where the dollar’s recent hammering accelerated. The Bloomberg Dollar index dropped to its lowest level since March, taking its losing streak to four days. As a result, the euro, the pound and a handful of trade-sensitive currencies rallied as the dollar slid to a six-month low on Tuesday, with investors confident that global growth prospects are improving and U.S.-China trade relations significantly better. The pound led G-10 gains to head for its best quarter since 2009; the Canadian dollar is the best G-10 performer this year.

After staying strong for much of 2019 thanks to the relative outperformance of the U.S. economy and investors’ preference for a safe-haven currency amid the trade dispute between Washington and Beijing, the dollar’s gains for the year have shrivelled in December. The buoyant end-of-year sentiment enocouraged investors to buy up currencies linked to trade and global growth, sending many such as the Australian dollar, Chinese yuan and Scandinavian crowns to multi-month or multi-week highs against the greenback.

The Taiwan dollar strengthened past 30 versus the greenback for the first time in 18 months. Meanwhile, as the dollar slumped, China’s yuan jumped offshore after Peter Navarro said Monday that a preliminary trade deal with Beijing is completed.

Analysts did not attribute the moves to any specific new developments: “I can’t see much reason for the movement in the FX market except end-year position squaring, or just being careful and cutting positions ahead of the New Year’s holiday and the start of 2020. As a result I wouldn’t draw any big conclusions from it,” said Marshal Gittler, currency analyst at ACLS Global.

As Bloomberg writes this morning, investors are sifting through outlooks for 2020 as a weakening dollar, stabilizing global economy and easing of U.S.-China trade tensions all set a different scene from just a few months ago. The lull across markets on Tuesday draws a line under a year of spectacular returns for many asset classes.

“Politics has to remain front and center for investors” in 2020, wrote JPM Asset Management strategist Hannah Anderson. “The U.S.-China trade war is far from resolved. Returns will depend on just how tolerant investors can be of their fears in a low growth world.”

In rates, the 10-year Treasury followed the dollar and also drifted lower, though it is on track to end the year yielding about 1.89%, down around 80 basis points from where it began; U.K. gilts steadied after Monday’s sell-off.

Meanwhile, West Texas oil futures declined following a report that Iran detained a fuel tanker. Gold rose, headed for its biggest annual advance since 2010.

Looking ahead, economic data include home prices, consumer confidence. Most global markets will be closed on Jan. 1. U.S. fixed-income markets also close early at 2 p.m. EST Tuesday.

Market Snapshot

• S&P 500 futures up 0.1% to 3,226.00
• STOXX Europe 600 down 0.04% to 416.00
• MXAP down 0.2% to 170.78
• MXAPJ down 0.4% to 553.12
• Nikkei down 0.8% to 23,656.62
• Topix down 0.7% to 1,721.36
• Hang Seng Index down 0.5% to 28,189.75
• Shanghai Composite up 0.3% to 3,050.12
• Sensex down 0.6% to 41,296.86
• Australia S&P/ASX 200 down 1.8% to 6,684.10
• Kospi down 0.3% to 2,197.67
• German 10Y yield rose 7.1 bps to -0.185%
• Euro up 0.1% to $1.1214
• Brent Futures up 0.1% to $66.74/bbl
• Italian 10Y yield rose 3.8 bps to 1.241%
• Spanish 10Y yield rose 5.9 bps to 0.468%
• Brent Futures up 0.1% to $66.74/bbl
• Gold spot up 0.5% to $1,523.39
• U.S. Dollar Index down 0.1% to 96.61

Top Overnight News from Bloomberg

• China’s manufacturing output continued to expand in December, adding to evidence that the economy is stabilizing. The manufacturing purchasing managers’ index remained at 50.2, according to data released Tuesday
• Chinese President Xi Jinping is expected to deliver his annual New Year’s Eve address amid mounting pressure at home and abroad on issues from economic slowdown to protests against Beijing’s rule in Hong Kong and a looming “phase one” trade deal with the U.S.
• As Japan enters a six-day New Year break, a sense of anxiety over the possibility of another flash crash is gripping currency traders. The Financial Futures Association of Japan has already warned of market instability as the holidays create a liquidity vacuum
• European gas and power prices extended declines after a last-gasp Russia-Ukraine accord on natural gas flows averted a winter supply crisis
• Carlos Ghosn, the former head of Nissan Motor Co. and Renault SA facing trial in Japan for financial crimes, fled to Lebanon to escape what he described as a “rigged Japanese justice system.” Lebanon, where he grew up and has citizenship, has no extradition agreement with Japan

Top Asian News

• India Curbs Year-End Spending by Ministries Amid Fiscal Worries
• Billionaire Hinduja Brothers Said to Prepare Bid For Jet Air
• China Set to Approve Local GMO Corn to Boost Food Security
• Acme International Slumps 80% Within an Hour in Hong Kong

Top European News

• French Strikes May Be Starting to Fade as Train Crews Return
• Italy Bank Rescues Keep Coming With Bailout Set for Bari Lender
• European Gas Prices Fall as Ukraine, Russia Deal Averts Crisis
• Turkish Stocks Extend Winning Streak to End Best Year Since 2017

In currencies, the Bloomberg Dollar Spot Index declined 0.3%. The British pound increased 0.7%. The euro advanced 0.3% to $1.123. The Japanese yen gained 0.3% to 108.53 per dollar. The offshore yuan climbed 0.3% to 6.965 per dollar.

In commodities, West Texas Intermediate crude declined 0.7% to $61.24 a barrel. Gold increased 0.6% to $1,523.70 an ounce.

 

Authored by Wolf Richter via WolfStreet.com,

The setup is just too juicy.

In my decades of looking at the stock market, there has never been a better setup. Exuberance is pandemic and sky-high. And even after today’s dip, the S&P 500 is up nearly 29% for the year, and the Nasdaq 35%, despite lackluster growth in the global economy, where many of the S&P 500 companies are getting the majority of their revenues.

Mega-weight in the indices, Apple, is a good example: shares soared 84% in the year, though its revenues ticked up only 2%. This is not a growth story. This is an exuberance story where nothing that happens in reality – such as lacking revenue growth – matters, as we’re now told by enthusiastic crowds everywhere.

Until just a couple of months ago, the touts were out there touting negative interest rates soon to come to the US and thus making stocks the only place to be. Those touts have now been run over by the reality. Now they’re touting QE4 by the Fed, or whatever. And people were looking for any reason to buy.

The unanimity of it all was astounding. I’ve seen this before, but not in this magnitude.

And there is this: As stocks were surging over the past few months, investors with large gains who wanted to sell didn’t sell before year-end in order to defer that income for tax considerations. So there was reduced selling pressure from that group that would have liked to sell, and that will sell after the new year starts.

So I shorted the stock market today, December 30 – me who is on record of saying repeatedly that I would never ever short anything ever again, after the debacle of November 1999 when I shorted the most obviously ridiculous Nasdaq high-fliers a few months too early. They collapsed to near-zero, but not before ripping off my face.

But I changed my mind. The setup is just too perfect. A year ago, on December 22, 2018, as stocks had been plunging, I wrote, Nothing Goes to Hell in a Straight Line, Not Even Stocks. That turned out to be true – practically nothing goes to hell in a straight line. I expected a bounce. I didn’t expect that the bounce would be this huge. But now it’s part of the setup for shorting the market.

• I sold short the SPDR S&P 500 ETF Trust [SPY] the biggest and most liquid ETF tracking the S&P 500 index. It’s up nearly 29% in 2019, from already wildly overvalued levels a year ago, despite the drop it had gone through.
• And I sold short the Nasdaq 100 Invesco QQQ ETF [QQQ], which tracks the NASDAQ 100, the largest most liquid tech-focused ETF. It’s up 42% in 2019.

I have spoken out against shorting because the risk-reward relationship is out of whack. If you short individual stocks, the maximum gain if the shares go to zero is 100%, while the maximum loss is theoretically unlimited and can easily exceed the entire value of the bet. And betting against stocks by buying put options leads most investors to pay the premium and watch those options expire worthless.

The only way you can short stocks and make money reliably is if you have a large megaphone that is closely followed by algos, traders, and the entire financial media. You quietly take your short position in a stock and then announce it, and algos and traders react, and the shares plunge. That’s the only reliable way to make shorting work.

My little website isn’t followed by algos and can’t move markets or stocks or anything else, and that’s a good thing. I can say whatever I want, and nothing big happens as a result of it.

Shorting is socially frowned upon. It’s like you’re willfully trying to destroy people’s constitutional right to the pursuit of happiness. Back in 2017, NYSE Group President Tom Farley, famously told Congress, “It feels kind of icky and un-American, betting against a company.”

But I still won’t short individual stocks because they can get too crazy – especially Tesla, one of the most obvious shorts with an enormous amount of short interest outstanding. This in itself is practically a guarantee the stock cannot crash because short sellers become buyers to take profits when the price drops enough, and they put a floor under the shares. And the massive short interest makes TSLA prone to violent short-covering rallies.

This stock is a prime example of how crazy the market is. In the US, there were fewer new vehicles sold in 2019 than in 2000. Similarly, in Europe and in Japan. Even formerly booming markets, such as China and India, have now hit the skids in auto sales. For growth, every automaker needs to take market share away from other automakers – a tough game in a no-growth environment.

Tesla’s revenues fell 7.3% year-over-year in the third quarter, a steeper decline than the revenue declines at other US automakers.

At $412 a share, Tesla is valued at $75 billion. This is over three times 12-month revenues ($24 billion).

GM is valued at $52 billion. This is just 0.36 times 12-month revenues ($144 billion). By this measure of the price-to-sale ratio, Tesla, if it ever becomes profitable on an annual basis, is overvalued by a factor of 10 compared to GM.

GM at this price is still a sell, in my view. As for Tesla, in the optimistic scenario that it makes an annual profit of $1 billion, it’s shares would have to drop to $41 before they’re on the same level of overvalued as GM, and both would still be a sell at those levels.

So Tesla at the current price is one of the most obvious shorts in history. But I wouldn’t short the shares because they’re just too crazy, and because the short is too obvious.

Given how eagerly investors are betting on a big plunge, deeply out-of-the-money Tesla put options carry a big premium. For example, one contract (representing 100 shares) that expires in January 2021, with a strike price of $290, which is about 32% below today’s share price, traded today at $2,625 — another sign that Tesla has become one of the most obvious shorts out there. And that takes them off the table for me.

In terms of my SPY and QQQ short positions: they’re a trade, not a prediction of where the market will be a year from now. They represent my expectations that the market will drop enough to make this worthwhile over the next few months.

If this math is successful, and I cover those shorts with a gain, it doesn’t mean that I turned bullish on the market. On the contrary. In the larger scheme of things, stocks would have to tank a whole bunch more before I’d take a buy-and-hold position in the overall market. Happy New Year!

*  *  *

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A Joe Biden event on Sunday at a New Hampshire Middle School gymnasium was interrupted by two protesters, who assailed ‘quid pro Joe’ with accusations of being a ‘pervert’ and making money in Ukraine.

“You’ve touched kids on video, and women,” shouted one man, adding “We don’t need another old white man running for president – time to have a minority candidate,” to which Biden – who likely didn’t hear the guy, said “I agree with ya man. I agree. Nice talkin’ with you.“

“You don’t touch kids ever again, the man continued. “Don’t touch kids, you pervert!” he continued, to which Biden shook his head.

“Look it up,” the man told the gasping crowd. “Don’t lie to them, ‘creepy uncle biden,’ look it up!“

The man was led out to a smattering of half-hearted applause from the less than energized crowd.

At another point, another man in the back shouts at Biden, “Excuse me mister Biden. How much money did you make in Ukraine?” to which (after an angry New Hampshire Democrat shouted to the protester “Is that all you got pal?”) Biden shot back “Wait, wait, wait, wait wait. I released 21 years of my tax returns. Your guy hasn’t released one, what’s he hiding?”

Watch:

WATCH: Another man in the back of the room shouts at Biden, asking how much he made in Ukraine.
Biden fired back: “I’ve released 21 years of my tax returns, how many has yours? What’s he hiding?”
A few minutes after this exchange, someone in the crowd behind Biden collapsed.
2/2 pic.twitter.com/rJIBK49uGJ

— Allie Raffa (@AllieRaffa) December 30, 2019

Another angle:

Protestor at a Biden event in NH:

“Don’t touch kids, you pervert!”

“The truth is going to come out, buddy!” pic.twitter.com/r1UHCsmvna

— ALX 🇺🇸 (@alx) December 30, 2019

On the bright side, Joe was able to avoid calling either of them fat or ‘damn liars.’

Thousands of Iraqi protestors attacked various parts of the US embassy in Baghdad on Tuesday after US airstrikes killed dozens of Iran-backed Iraqi militia over the weekend. The attack on the embassy has been widely documented on Twitter with videos and pictures showing the destruction.

Protestors are currently breaking into the #US Embassy in #Baghdad, #Iraq. Kata’ib #Hezbollah supporters have managed to break through the first security gate (photo via @thestevennabil) flags can be seen. pic.twitter.com/mIpTn70wF9

— Aurora Intel (@AuroraIntel) December 31, 2019

One freelance journalist recorded the moment when the angry mob chanted, “No, no to America, no, no to Israel” outside of the embassy in Baghdad’s Green Zone.

“No, no to America, no, no to Israel.” outside the #US #Embassy in Baghdad’s Green Zone. #Iraq pic.twitter.com/umvzhRL0Mn

— Sinan Salaheddin Mahmoud (@sinansm) December 31, 2019

The Times of Israel’s Mina Bai tweeted a video of what appears to be part of the embassy on fire.

BREAKING: footages of Iran backed Shii militia setting firing to #US embassy wall in #Iraq pic.twitter.com/hv6E1ipqls

— mina bai (@bai_mina) December 31, 2019

More videos show protestors are burning the outer walls of the embassy.

#Iraq Protestors are burning the outer walls of the #US Embassy in Baghdad.pic.twitter.com/Cl6lt5bp5M

— nonouzi (@Gerrrty) December 31, 2019

It appears thousands of protestors are currently outside the embassy chanting anti-American slogans, throwing objects over the embassy wall, and burning things at the main gate.

Green Zone Outside US Embassy #Baghdad #Iraq #IraqProtests pic.twitter.com/LAnnndDPaY

— DoC© (@DocPakistan) December 31, 2019

Protestors are attempting to storm the main gate of the embassy.

🚨 #BREAKING: Footage showing protesters storming the main gate of the US Embassy in #Bagdad‘s #GreenZone. #Iraq #MENA #MiddleEast pic.twitter.com/cpztLt3rDJ

— ISCR Intel. (@ISCR_com) December 31, 2019

Demonstrators took a video of the embassy’s security forces behind bulletproof glass.
 

The man here asks the protesters to step back. From outside the #US #Embassy in Baghdad’s Green Zone. #Iraq pic.twitter.com/hSvaLFJ3Tk

— Sinan Salaheddin Mahmoud (@sinansm) December 31, 2019

The US airstrike on Sunday on Hezbollah bases in Iraq and Syria were in response to attacks on US troops in the region.

ABC News said there had been no reports of any embassy staff hurt in the current rampage.

All security forces have been withdrawn to the inner areas of the embassy with US troops on top of the main embassy building with assault rifles pointed at protestors.

Reuters noted that the US ambassador and other staff members have been evacuated from the embassy. One official said few embassy protection staff remained as the risk of the compound being overrun was high.

Seven armored vehicles with 30 Iraqi troops arrived outside the embassy to assist US forces.

The White House, Pentagon, and the State Department have been silent on Tuesday morning about the embassy breach.