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Recent surveys and research studies by sources from the UN to streetRx.com put the size of the illegal drug market in the U.S. at anywhere from $200 to $750 billion. The market is notoriously hard to track by design, and it is constantly evolving as prices and usage fluctuates; but as ConvergEx’s Nick Colas notes, there’s a plethora of data on the topic: formal surveys by the CDC and user-submitted blog posted on websites like Hightimes.com trace price, usage, and traffic stats for marijuana, powder and crack cocaine, d-methamphetamine, and heroin. Legalized dispensaries now allow us to estimate potential tax revenue from marijuana sales, while incarceration rates for drug offenders reveal the economic impact of the illegal drug trade. In short, while the illegal drug market might be hard to track – if only by virtue of its illegality – Colas points out that we can learn a lot about its size and scope by aggregating these formal and informal data. Most surprising of them all: illicit drug use is no longer the realm of just the youth.

 

Via ConvergEx’s Nick Colas,

The laws of supply and demand exist everywhere, and looking at the most esoteric markets can give you some very useful insights into mainstream topics. There is a lot to learn here about consumer behavior, the social costs of drug law enforcement, and even some surprising demographic data.

Ever wondered how much a particular narcotic or opioid costs in your city? The answer might’ve been hard to find out 20 years ago without some serious hook ups in the shady part of town, but today all you have to do is head to streetrx.com. Type in your drug of choice, and up pops the data: location, price, date, and a 1-5 star rating. You’ve got your standard cocktails on here – oxycodone, heroin, marijuana – and then a few not-so-popular choices like hydrocodone, Exalgo, and Klonopin. Each one of them is going to cost you a pretty penny, depending on where you buy it – but at least you’ll know whether you got a good deal or not.

Streetrx.com and similar, user-run sites like Hightimes.com have made the drug economy more transparent than ever – but it’s still virtually impossible to put a sticker price on it. Academic literature on the topic puts the figure at anywhere from $200 to more than $750 billion, with most estimating around the $400-$500 billion level. But as an illegal activity, illicit drug use is highly under-reported, if at all, so “guesstimates” are the name of the game when it comes to determining the market’s size.

Still, while we might not be able to guess the exact dollar amount the underground drug market rakes in every year, these informal data sources – along with some of the more formal stats tracked by the Center for Disease Control – can tell us quite a bit about the nature of this economy in the US. From price inflation to average user age, the aggregation of this formal and informal data paints a slightly less-fuzzy and, to some degree, larger picture of the market. Here’s the top 10 that we found, in no particular order:

1. Say what you want about the 1960s and 1970s, but the current decade has logged the heaviest drug use per person per year in the history of the United States. 23.9 million Americans aged 12 or older – 9.2% of the entire population – were “current users” (i.e. had used in the past month) of an illicit drug in 2012, the latest data available from the CDC shows. That’s up from 7.1% in 2001, and more than double the rate of 1969’s 4% (according to a 1969 Gallup poll). But the “peace and love” decades aren’t totally free of blame. The youngsters that seemed to have pioneered increasing drug usage in the 60s and 70s are apparently still at it today: 7.2% of those aged 50-54 reported illicit drug use within the past month, compared to 6.6% of those 55-59 and 3.6% of those 60-64. Each of these figures is more than double the respective rates recorded in 2002. Use of illicit drugs among those 12-17, meanwhile, is dropping, while usage in the “young adult” community of 18-25 has been rather stable at around 21.3%.

 

2. The most “Typical” drug user is apparently an 18-25 year old male living in the urban South, based on data from the National Survey on Drug Use and Health. The South is the biggest drug consuming region in the country by sheer numbers with 7.5 million current users, according to the National Survey on Drug Use and Health. But New England and the Pacific West had the highest rates of usage at 11.4% and 12.3% of the total population. The biggest “experimenting” population is also in New England; the number of people reporting that they had used an illicit drug at some point in their lifetime was higher here than anywhere else (55.4%). City dwellers were also the most common drug users: 57.5% of the total “current users” recorded in 2012 lived in metro areas with more than 1 million people, for example, while less than 1% lived in “rural” areas. Males are almost twice as likely to use as females (11.2% versus 6.8%), though the numbers are rising among both genders. And finally, drug usage among ethnic backgrounds vary widely: 9.1% of whites report being current users, compared to 10.7% of blacks, 3.5% of Asians, and 12.1% of American Indians.

 

3. Each region has their “drug of choice”. Marijuana seems to have the widest fan base, with current users making up at least 5% of the population in every region, but the Pacific West and New England again have the highest rates of current usage here at 10%. The Northeast, and specifically New England, houses the top users of powder cocaine; the South Atlantic is the hub of crack cocaine and hallucinogen usage, though. The Pacific West is the top culprit for inhalant use – which is also most popular in rural areas – and for un-prescribed psychotherapeutics (tranquilizers, sedatives, etc.). The Midwest finally tops a category with illicit use of pain relievers, though the East South Central region of the South is also high on the list.

 

4. According to the CDC, median prices for 0.1-10 grams of the 5 most common drugs are as follows: Powder cocaine – $150; Crack cocaine – $180; Heroin – $650; Meth – $280; Marijuana – $14. For context, we should note that cocaine and marijuana users typically buy “by the gram”, and these numbers coincide closely with reported prices on drug user blogs. Heroin and meth are more expensive partially because of higher purity, partially because of higher risk, and partially because users here tend to buy “by the hit” – which seems to be less than 1 gram. Interestingly enough, marijuana is actually the only drug that has increased in price (in current dollars) compared to its cost in the 1980s. The CDC’s drug price data shows that, in 2007 dollars, powder cocaine costs have dropped by -87.2% (you would have paid $1,000 for the same amount back in 1982), crack cocaine by -66.5%, Heroin by 93.2%, and Meth by -43.1%. Marijuana has doubled from $6.57 in 1981 to about $14 today.

 

According to Streetrx.com and Hightimes.com, though, prices seem to have been relatively stable over the past 10-15 years or so; $20/gram for marijuana, $80-$100/gram for powder cocaine, $20/20 mg of oxycontin, etc. This would seem to imply that drug prices haven’t inflated or deflated in years; perhaps everyone is just getting their fix on the cheap. Or maybe the government is woefully misinformed. What it probably comes down to, though, is demand and supply: millions more people are smoking marijuana, while total drug production for pot, cocaine, and opioids has stepped up in the past decade. Some prices may be on the rise again in the years to come, however, a
s reports show that some top exporters (Columbia, Peru, Afghanistan) are trying to crack down on production.

 

5. Interestingly enough, prices don’t vary too much between the black market and the brick and mortar dispensary, at least in terms of pot. According to a dispensary we spoke to in Colorado, 1/8 ounce packs of marijuana run around $60; it’s about the same on the street, per streetrx.com. And it’s exactly this street competition that keeps dispensary prices low: street dealers don’t have to pay taxes or building costs to keep profits high. As a result, many of these dispensaries find themselves just breaking even.

 

6. Illegal producers, though, are making a killing on mark-ups. According to research by “Drugs Uncovered” in the UK, heroin can sell for 60x its original price in the end market: cocaine can get up to 18x, and marijuana about 3.5x. Most of the money goes to operations, like worker pay and money laundering fees, but there’s no doubt that the kingpins of these organizations are living large off their markup dime. Which leads us to our next point…

 

7. Although unquantifiable, drug money is undoubtedly spent regularly in the luxury retail space. At least once a month police around the world will make a massive drug bust at a gang or kingpin’s home base and discover a kind of “millionaire lifestyle”: luxury cars, jewelry, alcohol, clothing, etc. Drug suppliers might not be the target audience of these luxury retailers, but they’re certainly providing a chunk of what economists call “Marginal demand”.

 

8. While the drug market might generate large amounts of cash for suppliers, its cost to the state is astronomical. Of the roughly 1.6 million people in prison in 2012, some 330,000 were doing time for drug offenses, and at an average cost of about $25,000 per inmate. All together that’s a whopping $8.2 billion. And, interestingly, according to a 2005 paper “Long-Run Trends in Incarceration of Drug Offenders in the US” by J. Caulkins and S. Chandler, higher arrest rates for drug offenders have actually correlated to higher usage rates. Keeping them in prison doesn’t seem to be stopping the flow of drugs.

 

9. The National Institute on Drug Abuse estimates that illicit drug use costs the U.S. $11 billion in healthcare every year, and $193 billion when accounting for crime costs and lost work productivity. Those abusing prescription narcotics and rotating multiple doctors for scripts are estimated to cost insurers $10,000-$15,000 every year.

 

10. Several studies also indicate that legalization of marijuana (and potentially other illicit drugs) in the US would have a net positive impact on the economy. Not only would state and local governments be able to tax sales – which, according to the Cato Institute, could rake in about $8.7 billion per year – but much of the money that we currently spend on incarceration and enforcement would also be saved. It’s not exactly a budget saver, true, but $8.7 billion is nothing to sneeze at either.

The drug economy is nothing new, but according to most of these data points it is an ever-growing and ever-evolving market. As long as it stays underground, we’re unlikely to get a clear reading of its exact size or value, but based on user-reported data and informed estimates we can try to approximate how much it generates and how much it costs. Perhaps once we have those numbers, we can try to figure out how we approach the drug market and its participants.

via Zero Hedge http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/zerohedge/feed/~3/GguJCOSXT08/story01.htm Tyler Durden

Surprised why FB stock is soaring higher by 15% after hours on results that were a beat but nothing all that spectacular, with $2.02 billion in revenues ($1.91 billion expected), and EPS of $0.25 ($0.19 expected)? Because according to the company, it will soon need to colonize a new planet as it will promptly run out of real, bot-based, imaginary and potential users on planet earth following a ridiculous 25% increase Y/Y in daily active users to 728 million, and a mindblowing 18% increase in Monthly Active Users to 1.19 billion (however look at the charts below to see just where the bulk of the growth comes from).

• Daily active users (DAUs) were 728 million on average for September 2013, an increase of 25% year-over-year.
• Monthly active users (MAUs) were 1.19 billion as of September 30, 2013, an increase of 18% year-over-year.
• Mobile MAUs were 874 million as of September 30, 2013, an increase of 45% year-over-year. Mobile DAUs were 507 million on average for September 2013.

Looking at the financials, of the $2 billion in revenue 90% was from advertising:

• Revenue – Revenue for the third quarter of 2013 totaled $2.02 billion, an increase of 60%, compared with $1.26 billion in the third quarter of 2012.
• Revenue from advertising was $1.80 billion, a 66% increase from the same quarter last year.
• Mobile advertising revenue represented approximately 49% of advertising revenue for the third quarter of 2013.
• Payments and other fees revenue was $218 million for the third quarter of 2013.

… which means that between FaceBook and Twitter, the world’s (but mostly America’s) corporations better have infinite+1 advertising budgets. That, or they better not grasp just what the conversion on every incremental eyeball or click truly is.

Whatever the underlying story, FB has hit escape velocity after hours as any incremental recent shorts just got sledgehammered.

 

Still, before rushing to buy the stock at its all time high, perhaps one should ask if the organic user growth in the US, where the bulk of ad revenue is focused has peaked:

Daily Active Users rose by just 2 million in the US.

 

While Monthly Active Users rose by the smallest quarterly amount in the past 2 years: just 1 million. 

 

And here is why FB users in Asia and Africa are not the same as American users: ARPU.

 

Full investor deck below (pdf):

via Zero Hedge http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/zerohedge/feed/~3/03D5kx4bkVE/story01.htm Tyler Durden

But, but, but… was the common refrain heard across mainstream media – perplexed that i) stocks could close anything but green, and ii) stocks could close green after the FOMC kept the dream alive. Markets broke everywhere (stock and options) and VIX saw flash-smashes a number of times as the great rotation from stocks to levered stocks (i.e. options) continued (in what smells a lot like the ‘what could go wrong’ ‘portfolio insurance’ days of yore). Stocks slid lower into the FOMC, knee-jerked up to VWAP, then skidded to 2-day lows, bounced towards VWAP once again then slumped into the close for the worst day in 3 weeks (down a measly 0.6%). Treasury yields had fallen notably into the FOMC statement and snapped higher after (30Y +4bps on the week). The USD had been rising all week and was smashed higher on the FOMC news (+0.7% on the week). Gold and silver kneejerked lower but bounced back (-0.5% and +0.75% respectively) on the week.

 

VIX went lower post FOMC as it appeared hedgers lifted protection and redced underlying exposure…

 

which is quite clear from this chart…

 

Which provided an artifical lift to stocks that was faded on heavier volume into the close…

 

 

Gold and Silver kneejerked lower but bounced back somewhat…

 

Treasury yields surged higher…

 

and the USD surged (and faded back a little)

 

Credit markets are at 2-week wides – as stocks are just off all-time highs…

 

Charts: Bloomberg

via Zero Hedge http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/zerohedge/feed/~3/TwAeasYIDEQ/story01.htm Tyler Durden

Fukushima Amplifies Japanese Energy Import Dependence

By Ned Pagliarulo at Global Risk Insights, at OilPrice

When Typhoon Wipha flooded Japan with heavy rains last week, the operator of the Fukushima nuclear power plant ordered precautionary measures to prevent leakage of contaminated water. Ever since the March 2011 earthquake and tsunami caused a reactor meltdown at the plant, Fukushima has become a symbol of a Japanese nuclear strategy and energy supply in disarray. As the clean-up from the disaster continues, all fifty of Japan’s nuclear reactors have been taken offline, creating a large shortfall in energy production that Japan has had to fill from abroad.

Growing dependence on imports

According to the U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA), Japan falls far short of providing enough energy for its domestic uses, with only 16% domestic energy production. Not surprisingly, Japan needs to import heavily — it is the world largest importer of liquefied natural gas (LNG). Before the disaster at Fukushima and the following reevaluation of nuclear power in Japan, nuclear sources supplied 13% of Japan’s energy consumption. The EIA notes in another report that “Japan’s electric power utilities have been consuming more natural gas and petroleum to make up for the shortfall in nuclear output…” With this shift, fossil fuel use has jumped 21% in 2012 compared to 2011 levels.

High energy costs in the near term (the IMF forecasts that the spot price for crude will remain above $100/barrel for 2014) pose a problem for Japan’s trade balance. As Japan imports more fossil fuels, its trade deficit widens (Japan ran a surplus before 2011). This hurts its current account, which has shrunk considerably. While the depreciation of the yen would usually helps by making exports competitive, the IMF’s Article 4 consultation with Japan noted that the weaker yen has yet to improve the current account.

Between a rock and a hard place 

The higher energy costs in Japan have not, however, turned consumer opinion back in favor of nuclear power. According to a recent poll, 31% of 1,085 Japanese citizens surveyed said they had not felt any pinch from higher utility bills, and 41% said they felt the effect “a little.” This poses a political challenge for Japan. Japan’s leaders would undoubtedly prefer to be able to rely on domestic nuclear energy production, but restarting nuclear reactors with Fukushima continuing to make headlines is political poison.

That leads to a muddled energy strategy. Former Prime Minister Naoto Kan made a promise to end the use of nuclear power in Japan, but his successor (Yoshihiko Noda) ungracefully retreated from a 2040 goal of phasing out all nuclear power. The current Japanese government finds itself caught between businesses who favor nuclear energy production and citizens who still doubt those reactors can be overseen responsibly. For example, a legal claim filed recently appealed the decision not to indict the former heads of Tokyo Electric Power (which oversaw Fukushima). Furthermore, Junichiro Koizumi, a former prime minister and a political heavyweight, recently declared he had changed his stance on the nuclear issue and now opposes atomic power plants.

Energy costs have also intertwined themselves with “Abenomics,” Prime Minister Shinz? Abe’s new stimulus plan. Ending Japan’s dogged deflation is a primary goal, and the economy shows signs of inflation picking up. However, as covered previously on GRI, much of that inflation has to do with the higher energy costs that have come with increased imports. While Abe is eager to claim that inflation as a success, it needs to be broad-based in a way that can contribute to wage growth and boost the economy further.

Bloomberg’s editorial board recently urged the government to better manage the Fukushima issue to rehabilitate the image of nuclear power in Japan. They also noted that restarting reactors would be critical to Abe’s economic plan. While all the reactors do not need to be brought on at once, Japan’s government needs to build a credible strategy, which instills confidence in the Japanese public. The public needs to be reassured that the government can properly regulate and ensure the safety of nuclear power plants. With a stronger domestic energy supply, utility costs for businesses and consumers would hopefully decline and Japan’s economic fundamentals might improve to help further growth.

****

 

Big opportunities are lining up all over the energy sector right now. And energy investors are facing potential windfalls caused by the massive increases in spending. Click here to see the details on each of these trends now. Free 30-day trial to OilPrice’s Premium Newsletter.

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The most succinct post-mortem summary of the FOMC announcement comes from Citi’s Stephen Englander. It is as follows:

After reading the Fed statement, CitiFX Head G10 Strategist Steven Englander says that he would put tapering odds at:

• 20% December
• 45% January
• 25% march
• 10% Beyond March

Before this meeting his estimates would have been:

• 10% December
• 25% January
• 35% March
• 30% Beyond March

via Zero Hedge http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/zerohedge/feed/~3/mNobqpXdyT4/story01.htm Tyler Durden

Following Tavenner and Sebelius self-sacrifice in the last two days – despite the grossly partisan questioning (and congratulating) – it seems its time for the Presidential pitchman to take the stand once again. We are sure we’ll be told that you can keep your plans (kinda sorta), that it’s not about the website, and just how great it is for a few hand-picked kids with diabetes, moms with cancer, and veterans that the rest of Americans should be happy to pay up for. We will also be keeping an eagle eye open for any feinting…

 

 

Live Stream:

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Submitted by Lance Roberts of STA Wealth Management,

 

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It’s quite simple really, and as the WaPo explains, the NSA “has secretly broken into the main communications links that connect Yahoo and Google data centers around the world, according to documents obtained from former NSA contractor Edward Snowden and interviews with knowledgeable officials. By tapping those links, the agency has positioned itself to collect at will from among hundreds of millions of user accounts, many of them belonging to Americans. The NSA does not keep everything it collects, but it keeps a lot.”

In a nutshell – 181,280,466 new records in 1 month:

According to a top secret accounting dated Jan. 9, 2013, NSA’s acquisitions directorate sends millions of records every day from Yahoo and Google internal networks to data warehouses at the agency’s Fort Meade headquarters. In the preceding 30 days, the report said, field collectors had processed and sent back 181,280,466 new records — ranging from “metadata,” which would indicate who sent or received e-mails and when, to content such as text, audio and video.

 

The NSA’s principal tool to exploit the data links is a project called MUSCULAR, operated jointly with the agency’s British counterpart, GCHQ. From undisclosed interception points, the NSA and GCHQ are copying entire data flows across fiber-optic cables that carry information between the data centers of the Silicon Valley giants.

 

The infiltration is especially striking because the NSA, under a separate program known as PRISM, has front-door access to Google and Yahoo user accounts through a court-approved process.

So, front door for whatever the “court” allows, back door MUSCULAR for everything else.

Visually:

It gets better:

In an NSA presentation slide on “Google Cloud Exploitation,” however, a
sketch shows where the “Public Internet” meets the internal “Google
Cloud” where their data resides. In hand-printed letters, the drawing
notes that encryption is “added and removed here!” The artist adds a smiley face, a cheeky celebration of victory over Google security.

 

Two engineers with close ties to Google exploded in profanity when they saw the drawing. “I hope you publish this,” one of them said.

And a comprehensive schematic:

 

Keith Alexander’s response was simple: it would be illegal for the NSA to break into Google or Yahoo databases. Because the threshold of illegality always stopped the NSA before and because spies never lie…

via Zero Hedge http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/zerohedge/feed/~3/Nk55YrfD4GM/story01.htm Tyler Durden

There are times when things are jinxed from the very moment they have been drafted into blueprints and right up until the moment they are conceived. There are just times when it would be probably better to cut your losses while the chips are down before it all goes downhill and drags you with it. That’s what President Obama should be thinking right now with his Obamacare. At least President Obama will take his name into posterity into the annals of history, but he will be remembered for the kafuffle over the internet sites and the rumpus over the Republican blocking of his healthcare plans for the country. Give up? Would probably be a good idea to give up and get out.

How to Spell Trouble

Yet again there has been another setback in the healthcare program of President Obama with the data center (which enables US citizens that have up until now been largely unable to purchase healthcare insurance to get that coverage) going down yesterday. Online enrolment and purchase of healthcare coverage was stopped in the entire country yesterday and is just another in the long line of setbacks causing trouble and strife (or scornful reproach) for the President.

Healthcare.gov has only been on line since October 1st 2013 and it has been nothing but trouble for the US. It has been stalled constantly by technical problems that have stopped connection to the site. Government contractors will be working to get things back on line but will it be before Kathleen Sebelius, the Health and Human Services Secretary has to testify before the House of Representatives’ Committee (if she actually does)?

Sebelius has been in the hot seat with the Republicans over the rollout of Obamacare and the bungled manner in which things got off to a(worse than bad) start. Sebelius’ spokeswoman Joanne Peters has stated that “We have always indicated to the committee that she intended to testify but that she had a scheduling conflict. We continue to work with them to find a mutually agreeable date in the near future”. Is that newspeak for ‘I can’t do it, please don’t make me go there mommy’? We shall see if she faces the music this time after the bungle, amidst the claims that she should resign over the matter.

Outage

The data center lost connectivity and was unable to connect to federal departments to verify identity and citizenship of people applying for healthcare on line. Only on Saturday Sebelius was espousing the wonders of modern science and the complex calculations that were being done by Healthcare.gov in record time. That’s a case of speaking too soon. Hush my mouth!

Verizon’s spokesman Jeff Nelson said that the problem would be rectified as soon as possible and “engineers have been working with HHS and other technology companies to identify and address the root cause of the issue”.

Will they actually manage to get this done by the deadline of December 15th when people should be enrolled on the scheme by at the very latest? How many of the 7 million citizens in the US that should be enrolling according to President Obama will actually be able to do so? There might be a few champagne corks popping in the Republican side of the House if they don’t manage to get these teething problems (that are turning into downright gum disease by the looks of it) ironed out.

Healthcare.gov has been widely criticized in particular by the contractors since:

• The administration did not carry out enough testing on the system before it was launched.
• The system was unable to deal with bottlenecks that had not been foreseen when millions connected at the same time.
• There were last-minute changes that were requested to the site by the administration.
• Visitors to the site had to set up accounts before they could actually look at insurance possibilities.
• There had been a predicted number of visitors that wasn’t supposed to go beyond 60, 000 per day.
• But, within a week there were 250, 000 people per day visiting the site.
• Between October 1st and October 13th, there was a drop in traffic of 88% according to many due to the fact that the visitors just gave up trying to connect.
• The numbers at their height grew to 2.5 million per day.
• The total cost of Obamacare’s website has already hit $1 billion today.
• Now it will increase even more in a bid to get it back on line.

The data center (managed by Verizon’s Terremark) had a connectivity issue that resulted in a shutdown. The second for Obama: one federal and the other social. Apparently President Obama never does anything by half. But, perhaps doubling his money is a dangerous bet. Healthcare.gov has been plagued since it was set up and is ailing before it has even got a bed somewhere to be admitted to hospital itself. There were also 14 other internet sites that suffered the same problems. The administration issued a statement in which they inferred that they had no idea as to how long the site would be down.

Perhaps President Obama is actually doing this all himself in a bid to save some money. Stop the sites working and curb the numbers that can sign up. Close the sites down and blame it on the techies. That’s always a good answer. The geeks always get given the flak.

Originally posted: Obama’s Obamacare: Double Jinx

 

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In line with what we discussed last night, once cajillionaire Eike Batista’s net wealth has now collapsed to less than -$746.5 Million according to Bloomberg as Veja notes, his “take over the world” company OGX has declared bankruptcy following the breakdown of restructuring talks with bondholders:

• *OGX FILES FOR BANKRUPTCY PROTECTION IN RIO, BATISTA LAWYER SAYS
• *BATISTA’S OGX EXTENDS DECLINE TO 30% AFTER BANKRUPTCY FILING
• *BATISTA LAWYER BERMUDES COMMENTS ON FILING BY PHONE FROM RIO

The filing puts $3.6 billion of bonds into default – the largest corporate debt debacle on record for Latin America.

As of this morning his net worth was already -$745 million..

via Zero Hedge http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/zerohedge/feed/~3/FLvX80D7roI/story01.htm Tyler Durden