Emmanuel Macron's party went down in flames in round two of French Parliamentary elections. Democratic Shock  Reuters reports Macron Loses Absolute Majority in Parliament in 'Democratic Shock'. French President Emmanuel Macron and his allies on Sunday lost their absolute majority in the National Assembly and with it control of the reform agenda, a crushing outcome for the newly re-elected president. Finance Minister Bruno Le Maire called the outcome a "democratic s ...read more

Isaac Nuriani    | Jun 24, 2022 The Federal Reserve has finally decided to take action against inflation. The question is, will the landing from inflation be “hard” or “soft”? Listen to the Article Digest Your browser does not support the audio element. You may have heard that Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen recently admitted she was wrong in her projections last year that inflation would be both mild and temporary.[1] It’s a big deal, in my view, that the ...read more

It’s still supply-chain chaos for retailers, but different retailers face different kinds of chaos. By Wolf Richter for WOLF STREET. There are now stories out there about retailers suddenly being “overstocked,” and the shortages having turned into gluts, and suddenly folks are already seeing that the supply chains got fixed miraculously or whatever. But overall inventories at retailers remain very low, and at the biggest category of retailers – auto dealers – inventories are desp ...read more

Consumers throw in the towel. Recession is imminent. Balance of Trade data from Commerce Department, chart by Mish The U.S. Census Bureau and the U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis announced today that the Goods and Services Deficit was $87.1 billion in April, down $20.6 billion from $107.7 billion in March, revised.  Goods and Services Details  April exports were $252.6 billion, $8.5 billion more than March exports.  April imports were $339.7 billion, $12.1 bill ...read more

June 22, 2022 - According to White House statements, the "United States, with the G7 and the European Union, will continue to impose severe and immediate economic costs on the Putin regime for its atrocities in Ukraine, including in Bucha." As one part of this effort, in a statement by the White House on April 6, 2022, "devastating economic measures to ban new investment in Russia and impose the most severe financial sanctions on Russia's largest bank and several of its most critical state-owne ...read more

A Blue period for consumer electronics? — Prussian blue binds with gold- and platinum-group metals thanks to jungle-gym structure. Jennifer Ouellette - Jun 20, 2022 6:53 pm UTC Enlarge / A new method helps recover gold from e-waste at a higher rate than it can be extracted from fresh ore. Reiko Matsushita/Shinta Watanabe Gold and certain other precious metals are key ingredients in computer chips, including those used in consumer electronics such as smart phones. But it can ...read more