You know when something receives "bipartisan" support in Washington, it's going to cost taxpayers a lot of money. The only time both parties seem to agree on anything is when both their sets of donors are getting paid enough of your money. The next bipartisan spending spree appears to be the infrastructure bill that Senators have been working on. At the Cato Institute, Randal O'Toole explains that the only people likely to see the benefits of this bonanza spending are the contractors asked to perform the unnecessary work. He writes: The Senate reportedly passed an infrastructure bill last … [Read more...]
Grocery Delivery Still Hard, Even for Amazon
Grocery delivery has stymied many companies, but when Amazon purchased Whole Foods, many people assumed the company could do what others had been incapable of. It turns out, grocery delivery is still difficult, and expensive. Amazon has begun adding delivery fees for Prime members in certain cities. Bloomberg's Matt Day reports: Amazon.com Inc. is tacking on a delivery fee for Prime members who shop at Whole Foods Market in several U.S. cities, an indication that the economics of grocery delivery continue to pose a challenge for even the world’s largest online retailer. Shoppers were … [Read more...]
BlackRock Wants Investors with a “Shared Vision”
Do you share BlackRock CEO Larry Fink's "vision?" BlackRock wants investors committed to a "shared vision to transfer to a low-carbon economy." The company's ESG guru for its iShares subsidiary, Sarah Kjellberg explained how she's implementing this vision to ETF Trends. They reported on the interview: Looking at how investors have integrated climate awareness into their portfolios, Kjellberg explains how BlackRock has integrated climate risks into their capital market assumptions. Kjellberg adds, “while we’re seeing institutions in the world take pretty significant action to address … [Read more...]
REPORT: Hidden Risk in Bond Funds?
A new report suggests there is often hidden risk U.S. bond funds that isn't being represented by their classification. Robin Wigglesworth reports in the Financial Times: Would a rose by any other name smell as sweet? It is a question many bond investors should be asking themselves and the managers of their money. A bombshell paper that has been gradually wending its way through the peer-reviewed academic publishing process has now finally appeared in the latest edition of the venerable Journal of Finance, and deserves a wide airing. Sifting through the individual reported investments of … [Read more...]
Will Businesses Even Want to Move Back to NY?
You have seen what Governor Andrew Cuomo and Mayor Bill DeBlasio have done to New York State and New York City. Cuomo's COVID response, lauded early on, was exposed as a complete debacle. And DeBlasio has allowed crime to skyrocket in the Big Apple. Despite such terrible performance from public officials, New Yorkers are asked to pay some of the nation's highest taxes. Now Governor Cuomo is asking businesses to return to the state. Fox Business reports: New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo is calling for companies to end remote work and bring staff back to the office by Labor Day in order to support … [Read more...]
We Three Kingmakers: These Firms Control Almost Everything
Three firms are gathering enough control over the stock market that if they are aligned on a corporate board decision, there's almost no way to stop them. BlackRock, Vanguard, and State Street now control such a large part of the U.S. stock market, that when voting together they can control nearly any issue. John Rekenthaler explains at Morningstar: In aggregate, the Big Three of Vanguard, BlackRock, and State Street now hold 43% of the fund industry's U.S. equity assets. In addition, each of those companies serves institutional clients through separate accounts and collective investment … [Read more...]
Big Businesses Consolidating Amazon Retailers Leads to Uncertainty
There's a group of big businesses known as "aggregators," that are buying up small Amazon.com stores, and consolidating them. The bigger these aggregators become, the more power they have both in the market for future acquisitions, but also with respect to Amazon itself. Dave Lee explains in the Financial Times (abridged): Reaching the top of Amazon’s listings, even for the most innocuous of products, can translate to millions of dollars of sales. So in the past 18 months, at least 69 start-ups have raised some $7bn to begin buying up successful Amazon sellers, in the hope of building a … [Read more...]
COAL STRIKES: BlackRock the New Kingmaker?
You know that BlackRock's Larry Fink has taken on the role of arbiter of corporate ethics. He's feeding his own EGO. His push to use investor money to sway board decisions on so-called environmental, social, and governance issues (ESG), has had major effects on how corporations are being run. Instead of focusing on returning value to shareholders, CEOs, whose pay is often tied to the company's short-term stock price (not long-term performance), are focused on making sure company stock ends up in BlackRock's latest ESG index fund offering. If it's included, the CEOs can expect a major bump in … [Read more...]
China Eradicates Tutoring Industry to Boost Birth Rate
Chinese authorities are forcing the country's tutoring industry to go non-profit, effectively killing it off. One motivation for doing so is the drive to raise birth rates in the demographically imperiled nation. Bloomberg News reports: China is considering asking companies that offer tutoring on the school curriculum to go non-profit, according to people familiar with the matter, as part of a sweeping set of constraints that could decimate the country’s $100 billion education tech industry. Shares sank. In rules currently being mulled, the platforms will likely no longer be allowed to … [Read more...]
An Inflation Warning from an Unlikely Place
Throughout its history, the IMF has not been known as an institution of inflation hawks. But just recently, the organization has issued an alert on the risk of inflation that could be more than just transitory. Silvia Amaro reports at CNBC: The International Monetary Fund warned Tuesday that there’s a risk inflation will prove to be more than just transitory, pushing central banks to take pre-emptive action. The issue is currently dividing the investment community, which has been busy contemplating whether a recent surge in consumer prices is here to stay. In the U.S., the consumer price … [Read more...]
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