Financial Markets and Economy
The US is a big outlier when it comes to income inequality (Business Insider)
It's no secret that the US has an inequality problem.
The markets will crash again and a lot of people will get hurt (Yahoo! Finance)
Nassim Taleb, the man who popularized the “black swan” theory, recently did a Q&A with Yahoo Finance.
U.S. Steel Joins Miners Tapping Stock Market as Metals Recover (Bloomberg)
U.S. Steel Corp. plans to sell shares in a public offering that would generate about $439 million, capitalizing on a tripling of its stock price this year.
OPEC Still Faces the Same Obstacles to Agreeing Oil-Output Limit (Bloomberg)
An informal OPEC meeting next month is unlikely to deliver any agreement to limit production because several members including Iran are still pumping below capacity.
A 'paradox' is plaguing the art market (Business Insider)
Sotheby's made it out of the second quarter with a profit even though the art market remained in turmoil.
U.S. Natural Gas Declines as Cooler Weather Seen for the South (Bloomberg)
Natural gas futures fell as forecasts showed cooler weather in parts of the U.S. after unseasonable warmth drove demand for the fuel to a record.
Hong Kong Property Stocks Are Hottest Since Eve of 1997 Collapse (Bloomberg)
Hong Kong real estate shares haven’t been this hot since the city’s last housing bubble burst almost two decades ago.
Goldman Says Buy Dollar on Fed, Morgan Stanley Says Not So Fast (Bloomberg)
Goldman Sachs Group Inc. is telling clients to buy the dollar as the market underprices the odds of a Federal Reserve interest-rate increase this year. Morgan Stanley says not so fast.
HSBC: The pound is heading to parity with the euro and will sink to $1.10 against the dollar (Business Insider)
HSBC analyst David Bloom and his team believe the Bank of England will cut interest rates down to 0.10% in November, pushing the pound to 1:1 parity with the euro. The pound will fall to just $1.10 with the US dollar by the end of 2017, Bloom believes.
Elon Musk Has Big Hopes for Storage Batteries, but the Market Is Small (Wall Street Journal)
By combining SolarCity Corp. and Tesla Motors Inc., Elon Musk hopes to create an integrated renewable energy company that can sell solar panels as well as the batteries to preserve their power to homes and businesses all over the world.
Buffett Cash Pile Climbs to $72.7 Billion, Setting Record (Bloomberg)
The cash pile at Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway Inc. climbed to a record $72.7 billion as of June 30, helped by Kraft Heinz Co.’s redemption of preferred shares, according to a regulatory filing on Friday. That’s up from $58.3 billion three months earlier and gives the billionaire more resources to pursue deals.
There's one big problem with Netflix (Business Insider)
Netflix has a problem: It's you.
America’s Shrinking Middle Class: A Close Look at Changes Within Metropolitan Areas (Pew Research Center)
The American middle class is losing ground in metropolitan areas across the country, affecting communities from Boston to Seattle and from Dallas to Milwaukee.
Invest Like a Billionaire (If You Are One) (Bloomberg View)
That seems to be the advice coming from the moneyed set these days. Not just one or two cranky billionaires, but many of them; Warren Buffett seems to be a notable exception.
Trump’s Big Economic Policy Address Is Short On Specifics, Other Than Help For Wealthy (Huffington Post)
After spending a week picking a fight with the parents of a fallen soldier, Donald Trump on Monday tried to reinvigorate his campaign with an economic policy speech that lacked detail and didn’t deviate much from his previously described plans.
Fannie, Freddie Could Need as Much as $126 Billion in Crisis (Bloomberg)
Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac could need as much as $125.8 billion in bailout money from taxpayers in a severe economic downturn, according to stress test results released Monday by their regulator.
'Suicide Squad' Shatters Records at the Box Office (The Street)
As expected, the big story this weekend was the debut of "Suicide Squad," which broke the August opening weekend record by over $40 million. However, the Warner Bros. film was very frontloaded over the weekend, which suggests that steep weekend-to-weekend drops may be on the horizon. Elsewhere, "Jason Bourne" struggled to retain its audience, suffering the harshest second weekend decline in the history of the franchise.
Vail Resorts to buy Whistler Blackcomb in $1.1 billion deal (USA Today)
Vail Resorts is hitting the slopes north of the border.
The Colorado-based ski resort operator said on Monday that it has acquired Canadian resort Whistler Blackcomb for approximately $1.1 billion, or roughly C$1.4 billion.
These Are The 10 Most Crowded Trades According To UBS (Zero Hedge)
In this market, where fundamentals long ago ceased to matter, and where positioning remains one of the few remaining sources of alpha, investors have been focusing on lists showing the most over and under-owned stocks.
Chimera Investment Corp: A Potential High-Yield Ticking Time Bomb (Seeking Alpha)
So far in 2016 greatly decreased rate-hike expectations and a desperate hunt for yield have been a boon to REITs, especially mREITs such as Chimera Investment Corp, American Capital Agency, and Annaly Capital Management.
2016 Country Stock Market Performance (Bespoke)
Below is a list highlighting the year-to-date percentage change (in local currency) for the main stock market indices of 76 countries around the world.
Oil Spikes (Again) On Another Idiotic OPEC Headline From Venezuela (Zero Hedge)
This "VENEZUELA SEEKS OPEC, NON-OPEC PRODUCERS MTING: DEL PINO" – cause this…
Gold Daily and Silver Weekly Charts – Marking Time In a Dollar World (Jesse's Cafe Americain)
It certainly seems as though some entities with real clout have had the markets in a virtual lockdown since Brexit.
Politics
How Trump's Economic Vision Measures Up (Bloomberg)
Donald Trump fleshed out his economic agenda with a speech in Detroit on Monday. The Republican presidential nominee said he'd roll out more details in the coming weeks. We look at some of Trump's main promises so far, and how his strategy compares with both the current situation and the ideas from Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton.
Here’s how badly Trump lost his battle with the Khans (The Washington Post)
Donald Trump's response to criticisms from the Muslim American parents of a fallen Army captain last week was widely rejected by Republicans and Democrats and, according to a new poll, was overwhelmingly unpopular with the broader public.
“None of us will vote for Donald Trump,” a letter signed by 50 of the right’s top national security officials read. Dozens of top aides and cabinet members for President George W. Bush issued the letter Monday to warn against the Republican presidential nominee as a “risk” to America’s national security.
Most Americans Say Government Doesn’t Do Enough to Help Middle Class (Pew Research Center)
At a time when the middle class in the United States is losing ground, most Americans say the federal government provides too little help to this segment of society. And as voters begin casting the first ballots in the 2016 presidential election, neither political party is widely viewed as supportive of the middle class in this country.
Technology
Tomorrow's drones will be faster, stealthier, and more deadly (Scout Warrior)
The drones of tomorrow will be stealthier, faster, more computerized, equipped for electronic warfare, more lethal, more autonomous and, in some cases, able to deploy as swarming groups of mini-drones, according to the Air Force’s Chief Scientist.
How Qualcomm Flaws Left 900 Million Android Devices Vulnerable to Spies (Fortune)
Security researchers have found a series of security holes in almost a billion Android devices that use chipsets from Qualcomm.
The Check Point researchers said in a blog post on Sunday that attackers could use the flaws to gain root access to the device, which would mean gaining control over the phone or tablet and the data on it—a spy’s dream.
Apple Is Developing Wireless Earbuds With Custom Low-Power Bluetooth Chip (Forbes)
Apple has spent the last few years developing a custom Bluetooth radio chip for wireless earbuds, according to a source with knowledge of the project. It’s possible the Bluetooth device will launch in September with the first iPhone without a headphone jack (likely called iPhone 7). If Apple succeeds, the wireless earbuds will fix a problem that has plagued Bluetooth headphones: limited battery life. The source couldn’t confirm when the product will launch.
Health and Life Sciences
More and more women are now dying in childbirth, but only in America (Vox)
More women are dying in childbirth in the US than in any other developed country. And experts say the problem is likely to keep getting worse.
You can see how alarming the issue is in this chart.
These parts of your brain aren’t confused by physics (Futurity)
No matter how you did in high school science, you’re a master of the laws of physics, able to predict intuitively how objects in the world will behave.
Cognitive scientists have now found the source of that intuitive understanding, what they call the brain’s “physics engine,” which allows humans to judge where to catch a fly ball or when to cross the street safely.
Life on the Home Planet
What abandoned Olympic venues from around the world look like today (Business Insider)
Cities around the world are starting to question if hosting the Olympics is worth it.
Most cities simply do not have the infrastructure required to withstand the two-week influx of athletes, coaches, fans, and media members. The money required to build state-of-the-art athletic facilities is skyrocketing, and academic research suggests spending billions on a two-week event is not a wise investment.
China Isn't a Threat to World Order (Bloomberg View)
A bit of China-bashing is inevitable in any U.S. election year. Over the past month, though, after China roundly dismissed an arbitration ruling that rejected its claims in the South China Sea, a chorus of voices has angrily denounced the country as an international outlaw.
