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There Are Three Separate Cases in Federal Court Accusing JPMorgan Chase of a Culture of Fraud
By Pam Martens and Russ Martens
July 19, 2022
JPMorgan Chase is the largest federally-insured bank in the United States. It is also one of the largest trading houses on Wall Street. That’s the Faustian bargain the Clinton administration entered into with Wall Street when it repealed the Glass-Steagall Act in 1999.
According to data from the FDIC, as of June 30 of last year, JPMorgan Chase Bank N.A. had 4,925 branches in 44 U.S. states holding $2.01 trillion in deposits. Many of those deposits belong to mom and pop savers who have no idea that the bank has admitted to five criminal felony counts since 2014 and has a rap sheet that is the envy of the Gambino crime family. (Apparently, a federal judge in New York overseeing a current JPMorgan case is just as naïve about the bank’s criminal history. More on that shortly.)
The bulk of Americans also do not know that neither federal regulators nor Congress nor the Board of Directors of JPMorgan Chase have demanded that the Chairman and CEO of JPMorgan Chase, Jamie Dimon, who has sat at the helm of the bank throughout this crime spree, be sacked. Dimon’s tenure has been propped up by a public relations machine and an obsequious mainstream media. (See here and here.)
Corruption of this magnitude can’t be swept under the rug forever, however. Today, three cases are playing out simultaneously in federal courts. Observed together, which no member of mainstream media is currently doing, they paint an undeniable picture of a bank which, as Senator Bernie Sanders would say, has adopted fraud as a profitable business model.
Let’s start with the case known as U.S. v. Smith playing out in the federal District Court for the Northern District of Illinois in Chicago. (Case number 1:19-cr-00669.) Federal prosecutors from the Justice Department have charged multiple traders on the precious metals desk of JPMorgan Chase with turning the trading desk into a racketeering enterprise from 2008 to 2016. For the first time that veterans on Wall Street can remember, the Justice Department is the using the RICO statute, typically reserved for members of organized crime, to charge JPMorgan’s traders. (The bank settled its own charges in September 2020 and paid $920 million in fines – a mere pittance in terms of the profits that were likely made on these "tens of thousands" of trades over a period of eight years.)
Making the situation extremely dicey for both the indicted traders and the bank’s reputation, federal prosecutors have called to testify two former precious metals traders on that desk who have pleaded guilty to related charges and are cooperating with prosecutors. (A third cooperating witness is expected to testify.) One of those cooperating witnesses, John Edmonds, told jurors that "Our job was to do whatever it takes to make money" and "Everyone at the time did it on the desk and it worked." When asked why he didn’t report the conduct to the compliance officers at the bank, Edmonds responded that "I would have been fired." This certainly suggests that he felt fraud was not just a standard practice at the bank but was an enshrined profit- making strategy.
Another cooperating witness, Corey Flaum, told jurors that the practice of manipulating precious metal prices (spoofing) was done out in the open and was "common practice."
While the indicted traders’ trial is playing out in Chicago, a trader on the precious metals desk who was not indicted for wrongdoing, Donald Turnbull, has brought charges against JPMorgan Chase in federal court in the Southern District of New York. Turnbull alleges that the bank trumped up false charges against him as a pretext to terminate him when it was actually terminating him for cooperating with the Department of Justice’s investigation. Turnbull states in the lawsuit that the indicted traders received better benefits when they were released from employment than he did. Despite a seriously-ill wife, Turnbull alleges in the lawsuit that JPMorgan Chase cancelled his health insurance, did not pay him severance, and took away his unvested stock awards.
Despite the unprecedented crime history of this bank, the Judge overseeing this case, John Koeltl, has been pretty much giving lawyers from Big Law firm, Morgan Lewis, who are representing JPMorgan Chase, everything they ask for.
For example, Judge Koeltl dismissed Turnbull’s first amended complaint on a motion to dismiss by Morgan Lewis on the basis that he found it "implausible" that the bank would retaliate against Turnbull for cooperating with the Justice Department when the bank itself was cooperating with the Justice Department.
Either the Judge is feigning naivete, engaging in willful blindness, or is actually ignorant of how JPMorgan actually "cooperates" with investigators and prosecutors. For example, JPMorgan Chase was smacked with two felony counts by the Justice Department in 2014 for its role in Bernie Madoff’s Ponzi scheme. The bank told its regulators in the U.K. that it believed Madoff was running a Ponzi scheme but failed to "cooperate" as it was required to under law by reporting its concerns to U.S. prosecutors and also failed to report red flags about Madoff’s money laundering to the Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN), a unit of the U.S. Treasury.
Then there was the 300-page report from the Senate’s Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations on how JPMorgan Chase had used more than $100 billion of depositors’ money to gamble in derivatives in London and lose $6.2 billion. The Chair of that Subcommittee at the time, Senator Carl Levin, wrote that the bank "piled on risk, hid losses, disregarded risk limits, manipulated risk models, dodged oversight, and misinformed the public."
If Senator Carl Levin were alive today, he would certainly not find it "implausible" that JPMorgan would retaliate against an employee cooperating with a criminal investigation. In fact, it was Senator Levin who introduced evidence in a hearing in 2014 showing that JPMorgan Chase had rushed to hire a person who had bragged on his resume that he knew how to game electric markets.
Turnbull now has a second amended complaint pending before Judge Koeltl’s court. Bizarrely, JPMorgan’s lawyers from Morgan Lewis asked Koeltl to redact paragraphs 67 through 70 of that complaint because the bank claims that those paragraphs contain information that is subject to attorney-client privilege from an interview it conducted with Turnbull. But what actually happened was that the bank asked Turnbull to come and sit for an interview and explain what he knew about trading on the precious metals desk. He brought his own attorney. How that gives JPMorgan an attorney-client privilege with Turnbull should have raised red flags with a federal judge. It didn’t. The request was granted and paragraphs 67 through 70 are now a big, blacked out blob.
And in a perfect segue way, along comes the federal lawsuit brought by Shaquala Williams against JPMorgan Chase, also in the Southern District of New York under Judge Jed Rakoff. Williams tells the court in her complaint that JPMorgan Chase did not fulfill its promise under a deferred prosecution agreement to cooperate with the Justice Department – something that Judge Koeltl in the Turnbull case finds "implausible" to believe.
Williams is a financial crimes compliance professional with more than a decade of experience at multiple global banks. Part of Williams’ role at JPMorgan Chase was to make sure that the bank was in compliance with a non-prosecution agreement the bank had signed with the Justice Department in 2016.
The Justice Department had charged in 2016 that JPMorgan’s Asia subsidiary had engaged in quid pro quo agreements with Chinese officials to obtain investment- banking business and had falsified internal documents to cover up the activities. The quid pro quo agreements resulted in the bank putting the children of high Chinese government officials on its payroll in order to further its business interests in China.
In exchange for avoiding prosecution, the Justice Department required JPMorgan to create compliance controls around third-party payments. Williams alleges, among numerous other serious charges, that the so-called third- party payment controls were a sham and that when she blew the whistle to her superiors at the bank, the bank retaliated against her by firing her in October 2019.
The case is Shaquala Williams v JPMorgan Chase, Case Number 1:21-cv-09326, which was filed last November. Very conveniently, Morgan Lewis is representing JPMorgan Chase in this case as well as in the Turnbull case.
https://wallstreetonparade.com/2022/07/there-are-three-separate-cases-in-federal-court-accusing-jpmorgan-chase-of-a-culture-of-fraud/
There Are Three Separate Cases in Federal Court Accusing JPMorgan Chase of a Culture of Fraud
By Pam Martens and Russ Martens
July 19, 2022
JPMorgan Chase is the largest federally-insured bank in the United States. It is also one of the largest trading houses on Wall Street. That’s the Faustian bargain the Clinton administration entered into with Wall Street when it repealed the Glass-Steagall Act in 1999.
According to data from the FDIC, as of June 30 of last year, JPMorgan Chase Bank N.A. had 4,925 branches in 44 U.S. states holding $2.01 trillion in deposits. Many of those deposits belong to mom and pop savers who have no idea that the bank has admitted to five criminal felony counts since 2014 and has a rap sheet that is the envy of the Gambino crime family. (Apparently, a federal judge in New York overseeing a current JPMorgan case is just as naïve about the bank’s criminal history. More on that shortly.)
The bulk of Americans also do not know that neither federal regulators nor Congress nor the Board of Directors of JPMorgan Chase have demanded that the Chairman and CEO of JPMorgan Chase, Jamie Dimon, who has sat at the helm of the bank throughout this crime spree, be sacked. Dimon’s tenure has been propped up by a public relations machine and an obsequious mainstream media. (See here and here.)
Corruption of this magnitude can’t be swept under the rug forever, however. Today, three cases are playing out simultaneously in federal courts. Observed together, which no member of mainstream media is currently doing, they paint an undeniable picture of a bank which, as Senator Bernie Sanders would say, has adopted fraud as a profitable business model.
Let’s start with the case known as U.S. v. Smith playing out in the federal District Court for the Northern District of Illinois in Chicago. (Case number 1:19-cr-00669.) Federal prosecutors from the Justice Department have charged multiple traders on the precious metals desk of JPMorgan Chase with turning the trading desk into a racketeering enterprise from 2008 to 2016. For the first time that veterans on Wall Street can remember, the Justice Department is the using the RICO statute, typically reserved for members of organized crime, to charge JPMorgan’s traders. (The bank settled its own charges in September 2020 and paid $920 million in fines – a mere pittance in terms of the profits that were likely made on these "tens of thousands" of trades over a period of eight years.)
Making the situation extremely dicey for both the indicted traders and the bank’s reputation, federal prosecutors have called to testify two former precious metals traders on that desk who have pleaded guilty to related charges and are cooperating with prosecutors. (A third cooperating witness is expected to testify.) One of those cooperating witnesses, John Edmonds, told jurors that "Our job was to do whatever it takes to make money" and "Everyone at the time did it on the desk and it worked." When asked why he didn’t report the conduct to the compliance officers at the bank, Edmonds responded that "I would have been fired." This certainly suggests that he felt fraud was not just a standard practice at the bank but was an enshrined profit- making strategy.
Another cooperating witness, Corey Flaum, told jurors that the practice of manipulating precious metal prices (spoofing) was done out in the open and was "common practice."
While the indicted traders’ trial is playing out in Chicago, a trader on the precious metals desk who was not indicted for wrongdoing, Donald Turnbull, has brought charges against JPMorgan Chase in federal court in the Southern District of New York. Turnbull alleges that the bank trumped up false charges against him as a pretext to terminate him when it was actually terminating him for cooperating with the Department of Justice’s investigation. Turnbull states in the lawsuit that the indicted traders received better benefits when they were released from employment than he did. Despite a seriously-ill wife, Turnbull alleges in the lawsuit that JPMorgan Chase cancelled his health insurance, did not pay him severance, and took away his unvested stock awards.
Despite the unprecedented crime history of this bank, the Judge overseeing this case, John Koeltl, has been pretty much giving lawyers from Big Law firm, Morgan Lewis, who are representing JPMorgan Chase, everything they ask for.
For example, Judge Koeltl dismissed Turnbull’s first amended complaint on a motion to dismiss by Morgan Lewis on the basis that he found it "implausible" that the bank would retaliate against Turnbull for cooperating with the Justice Department when the bank itself was cooperating with the Justice Department.
Either the Judge is feigning naivete, engaging in willful blindness, or is actually ignorant of how JPMorgan actually "cooperates" with investigators and prosecutors. For example, JPMorgan Chase was smacked with two felony counts by the Justice Department in 2014 for its role in Bernie Madoff’s Ponzi scheme. The bank told its regulators in the U.K. that it believed Madoff was running a Ponzi scheme but failed to "cooperate" as it was required to under law by reporting its concerns to U.S. prosecutors and also failed to report red flags about Madoff’s money laundering to the Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN), a unit of the U.S. Treasury.
Then there was the 300-page report from the Senate’s Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations on how JPMorgan Chase had used more than $100 billion of depositors’ money to gamble in derivatives in London and lose $6.2 billion. The Chair of that Subcommittee at the time, Senator Carl Levin, wrote that the bank "piled on risk, hid losses, disregarded risk limits, manipulated risk models, dodged oversight, and misinformed the public."
If Senator Carl Levin were alive today, he would certainly not find it "implausible" that JPMorgan would retaliate against an employee cooperating with a criminal investigation. In fact, it was Senator Levin who introduced evidence in a hearing in 2014 showing that JPMorgan Chase had rushed to hire a person who had bragged on his resume that he knew how to game electric markets.
Turnbull now has a second amended complaint pending before Judge Koeltl’s court. Bizarrely, JPMorgan’s lawyers from Morgan Lewis asked Koeltl to redact paragraphs 67 through 70 of that complaint because the bank claims that those paragraphs contain information that is subject to attorney-client privilege from an interview it conducted with Turnbull. But what actually happened was that the bank asked Turnbull to come and sit for an interview and explain what he knew about trading on the precious metals desk. He brought his own attorney. How that gives JPMorgan an attorney-client privilege with Turnbull should have raised red flags with a federal judge. It didn’t. The request was granted and paragraphs 67 through 70 are now a big, blacked out blob.
And in a perfect segue way, along comes the federal lawsuit brought by Shaquala Williams against JPMorgan Chase, also in the Southern District of New York under Judge Jed Rakoff. Williams tells the court in her complaint that JPMorgan Chase did not fulfill its promise under a deferred prosecution agreement to cooperate with the Justice Department – something that Judge Koeltl in the Turnbull case finds "implausible" to believe.
Williams is a financial crimes compliance professional with more than a decade of experience at multiple global banks. Part of Williams’ role at JPMorgan Chase was to make sure that the bank was in compliance with a non-prosecution agreement the bank had signed with the Justice Department in 2016.
The Justice Department had charged in 2016 that JPMorgan’s Asia subsidiary had engaged in quid pro quo agreements with Chinese officials to obtain investment- banking business and had falsified internal documents to cover up the activities. The quid pro quo agreements resulted in the bank putting the children of high Chinese government officials on its payroll in order to further its business interests in China.
In exchange for avoiding prosecution, the Justice Department required JPMorgan to create compliance controls around third-party payments. Williams alleges, among numerous other serious charges, that the so-called third- party payment controls were a sham and that when she blew the whistle to her superiors at the bank, the bank retaliated against her by firing her in October 2019.
The case is Shaquala Williams v JPMorgan Chase, Case Number 1:21-cv-09326, which was filed last November. Very conveniently, Morgan Lewis is representing JPMorgan Chase in this case as well as in the Turnbull case.
https://wallstreetonparade.com/2022/07/there-are-three-separate-cases-in-federal-court-accusing-jpmorgan-chase-of-a-culture-of-fraud/
8:30a Initial Jobless Claims
Initial Claims - Level 251K actual vs 244K prior
Initial Claims - Change 7K actual vs 9K prior
4-Week Moving Average 240.50K actual vs 235.75K prior
Consensus Outlook
Jobless claims have been moving higher, pointing to easing strength for the labor market. Claims in the July 16 week are expected to come in at 240,000, down slightly from 244,000 in the prior week.
Definition
New unemployment claims are compiled weekly to show the number of individuals who filed for unemployment insurance for the first time. An increasing (decreasing) trend suggests a deteriorating (improving) labor market. The four-week moving average of new claims smooths out weekly volatility.
8:30a Philly Fed Business Outlook
Index -12.3 actual vs -3.3 prior
Consensus Outlook
After June's minus 3.3, the Philadelphia Fed manufacturing index is expected to edge fractionally back over zero to 0.4. The 6-month general outlook index in the June report posted its first negative reading since 2008.
Definition
The general conditions index from this business outlook survey is a diffusion index of manufacturing conditions within the Philadelphia Federal Reserve district. This survey, widely followed as an indicator of manufacturing sector trends, is correlated with the ISM manufacturing index and the index of industrial production.
8:30a Initial Jobless Claims
Initial Claims - Level 251K actual vs 244K prior
Initial Claims - Change 7K actual vs 9K prior
4-Week Moving Average 240.50K actual vs 235.75K prior
Consensus Outlook
Jobless claims have been moving higher, pointing to easing strength for the labor market. Claims in the July 16 week are expected to come in at 240,000, down slightly from 244,000 in the prior week.
Definition
New unemployment claims are compiled weekly to show the number of individuals who filed for unemployment insurance for the first time. An increasing (decreasing) trend suggests a deteriorating (improving) labor market. The four-week moving average of new claims smooths out weekly volatility.
8:30a Philly Fed Business Outlook
Index -12.3 actual vs -3.3 prior
Consensus Outlook
After June's minus 3.3, the Philadelphia Fed manufacturing index is expected to edge fractionally back over zero to 0.4. The 6-month general outlook index in the June report posted its first negative reading since 2008.
Definition
The general conditions index from this business outlook survey is a diffusion index of manufacturing conditions within the Philadelphia Federal Reserve district. This survey, widely followed as an indicator of manufacturing sector trends, is correlated with the ISM manufacturing index and the index of industrial production.
Today's Economic Calendar
8:30 Initial Jobless Claims
8:30 Philly Fed Business Outlook
10:00 Leading Indicators
10:30 EIA Natural Gas Inventory
4:30 PM Fed Balance Sheet
Today's Markets
In Asia, Japan +0.4%. Hong Kong -1.5%. China -1%. India +0.6%.
In Europe, at midday, London -0.4%. Paris +0.4%. Frankfurt -0.4%.
Futures at 6:20, Dow -0.3%. S&P -0.2%. Nasdaq flat. Crude -4.3% to $95.63. Gold -1% to $1682.70. Bitcoin -2.5% to $23,024.
Ten-year Treasury Yield +2 bps to 3.05%
A limerick on global inflation
A plan to destroy every nation
And after they're done
The world will be one
A non-democratic damnation
-The Limerick King
Today's Economic Calendar
8:30 Initial Jobless Claims
8:30 Philly Fed Business Outlook
10:00 Leading Indicators
10:30 EIA Natural Gas Inventory
4:30 PM Fed Balance Sheet
Today's Markets
In Asia, Japan +0.4%. Hong Kong -1.5%. China -1%. India +0.6%.
In Europe, at midday, London -0.4%. Paris +0.4%. Frankfurt -0.4%.
Futures at 6:20, Dow -0.3%. S&P -0.2%. Nasdaq flat. Crude -4.3% to $95.63. Gold -1% to $1682.70. Bitcoin -2.5% to $23,024.
Ten-year Treasury Yield +2 bps to 3.05%
A limerick on global inflation
A plan to destroy every nation
And after they're done
The world will be one
A non-democratic damnation
-The Limerick King
Election Heroes Are Stopping Fraudulent Voting...Right Now
By Jay Valentine
July 20, 2022
The soul of phantom voter fraud is the occasional, non-committed voter. They show up at the last minute, delivering winning margins.
Actually, nobody shows up. Nor does anyone return an absentee ballot.
That magic comes from a wonderful customer service innovation, the Phantom Voter Concierge, who casts the non-committed voters' votes for them.
Let's go there.
Voter rolls are crammed with millions of voters who seldom, occasionally, or never vote.
Democrat-leaning organizations run voter registration drives in edge communities, collecting identities they expect will never vote.
You remember ACORN registering drug addicts on city streets? You might have said, "Why, they will never vote!"
They aren't expected to vote. They are simply voter identity placeholders later used by vote-harvesters.
State-funded groups like ERIC are paid by a dozen state governments, some with clueless Republican governors, to make sure almost nobody is ever taken off voter rolls. ERIC provides institutional cover to this national phantom voter scam.
During early voting, our vote-harvester pals track those who never voted or have not voted yet and vote for them.
In some states, like Wisconsin, leftist groups had access to the online voter rolls — something nobody else had. They could track every voter and vote for all of them if they did not show up in 2020.
Remember the stories in 2020 of people coming out to vote, often for the first time in years, to be told, "Sorry, you already voted"? Your Voter Concierge voted for you! Saved you the gas money to drive to the polls!
There are people voting from Salvation Army Food Banks who registered at that address twelve years ago. Those people are likely dead or living in a tent in Austin now — but still voting.
There are people at the Alabama college dorm, registered since 1984, still active and voting.
In Wisconsin, the Voter Concierges went to cognitive care facilities, where the patients did not recognize their own children. Their Voter Concierge voted them. Now part of a criminal investigation, this is how it's done.
So how bad is the problem?
The Wisconsin voter integrity team did a deep dive, using U.S. government and state databases, and found 225,000 active, current voters who had "issues." Those included addresses that did not exist; locations that could not be a true registration address, like a jail; and scores of others.
Elections are often decided by 1% of the vote. The Wisconsin team identified potential phantom voters easily able to impact an election.
The other half of the scam is sending out absentee ballots to addresses that don't line up.
For instance, there may be an apartment building at 145 Essex Street. The ballot-harvesting industry registers people there, deliberately skipping their apartment number.
Their mail gets returned to — you guessed it, smarty-pants! Those absentee ballots accumulate at the local Post Office.
The Wisconsin voter integrity team, one of the best in the country, found evidence that the Post Office collected those ballots and gave them to the Voter Concierges — to vote. Pretty good USPS customer service!
You might think this would be caught with signature matching. Right! That is why so many states or counties eliminate the signature match — like Maricopa County in Arizona.
If your blood is boiling right now, you just don't get it. This is customer service on a whole new level. The Voter Concierge gets votes counted – even if the voter never casts that vote.
Voter integrity teams are now applying advanced computer technology to thwart the Voter Concierge by deep-cleaning the rolls.
In 2022, the vote-harvesting industry will again flood the zone in swing counties with over 250,000 new registrants from September to November.
Several voter integrity teams, using advanced artificial intelligence technology, can check every registrant, at silicon speed, against over 30 databases, with a billion records, ensuring that the registrant is not living in an R.V. park, a church, or a UPS store, and that his address meets current legal standards.
Sorry, Beto, but registering every itinerant is no longer the key to the Texas Governor's Mansion.
For the first time, phantom voters are being identified before their registrations take effect.
Living in an apartment where you do not designate the apartment number? Sorry, pal — you aren't voting this year. Registering from a church? There had better be enough bathrooms to meet the certificate of occupancy requirements for that county.
More voters showing up in a county than there are eligible citizens? Flagged hourly! Alert issued before the ballots are counted!
As ballots arrive during early voting, artificial intelligence snapshots aggregate voter identities. That guy who voted on day 2 in person, disappeared on snapshot 8, reappeared on snapshot 11 with his ballot changed to absentee...is identified.
Before that ballot is tabulated, it is red-flagged, and the voter integrity team files a protest.
Thirty-five thousand inactive voters, changed to active — then voted, then changed to inactive again? The A.I. systems pick this up with snapshot analysis. That scam is over!
For the first time, voter integrity teams have technology ballot-harvesters cannot outrun.
When Sheriff Clarke and Mike Lindell started supporting these kinds of technologies, after the 2020 election, the focus was voter roll anomalies. Anomalies were abundant.
The battlefield has changed to real-time analysis, driven by artificial intelligence.
The combined knowledge of a dozen gifted voter integrity teams, with 16 months of experience, is built into an artificial intelligence engine, identifying phantom voters before they are registered, before they can illegally vote.
Every time a fake vote is cast by a Voter Concierge, an American is disenfranchised.
Artificial intelligence helps the good guys protect the vote and gives confidence to all Americans that ttheir elections are legit.
Voter integrity teams learned that chasing 2020 voter fraud after the election is too late.
Some leading election integrity teams are stopping phantom voter fraud before it impacts elections.
Cleaning up voter rolls just became an A.I.-driven, real time endeavor.
https://www.americanthinker.com/articles/2022/07/election_heroes_are_stopping_fraudulent_votingright_now.html
Election Heroes Are Stopping Fraudulent Voting...Right Now
By Jay Valentine
July 20, 2022
The soul of phantom voter fraud is the occasional, non-committed voter. They show up at the last minute, delivering winning margins.
Actually, nobody shows up. Nor does anyone return an absentee ballot.
That magic comes from a wonderful customer service innovation, the Phantom Voter Concierge, who casts the non-committed voters' votes for them.
Let's go there.
Voter rolls are crammed with millions of voters who seldom, occasionally, or never vote.
Democrat-leaning organizations run voter registration drives in edge communities, collecting identities they expect will never vote.
You remember ACORN registering drug addicts on city streets? You might have said, "Why, they will never vote!"
They aren't expected to vote. They are simply voter identity placeholders later used by vote-harvesters.
State-funded groups like ERIC are paid by a dozen state governments, some with clueless Republican governors, to make sure almost nobody is ever taken off voter rolls. ERIC provides institutional cover to this national phantom voter scam.
During early voting, our vote-harvester pals track those who never voted or have not voted yet and vote for them.
In some states, like Wisconsin, leftist groups had access to the online voter rolls — something nobody else had. They could track every voter and vote for all of them if they did not show up in 2020.
Remember the stories in 2020 of people coming out to vote, often for the first time in years, to be told, "Sorry, you already voted"? Your Voter Concierge voted for you! Saved you the gas money to drive to the polls!
There are people voting from Salvation Army Food Banks who registered at that address twelve years ago. Those people are likely dead or living in a tent in Austin now — but still voting.
There are people at the Alabama college dorm, registered since 1984, still active and voting.
In Wisconsin, the Voter Concierges went to cognitive care facilities, where the patients did not recognize their own children. Their Voter Concierge voted them. Now part of a criminal investigation, this is how it's done.
So how bad is the problem?
The Wisconsin voter integrity team did a deep dive, using U.S. government and state databases, and found 225,000 active, current voters who had "issues." Those included addresses that did not exist; locations that could not be a true registration address, like a jail; and scores of others.
Elections are often decided by 1% of the vote. The Wisconsin team identified potential phantom voters easily able to impact an election.
The other half of the scam is sending out absentee ballots to addresses that don't line up.
For instance, there may be an apartment building at 145 Essex Street. The ballot-harvesting industry registers people there, deliberately skipping their apartment number.
Their mail gets returned to — you guessed it, smarty-pants! Those absentee ballots accumulate at the local Post Office.
The Wisconsin voter integrity team, one of the best in the country, found evidence that the Post Office collected those ballots and gave them to the Voter Concierges — to vote. Pretty good USPS customer service!
You might think this would be caught with signature matching. Right! That is why so many states or counties eliminate the signature match — like Maricopa County in Arizona.
If your blood is boiling right now, you just don't get it. This is customer service on a whole new level. The Voter Concierge gets votes counted – even if the voter never casts that vote.
Voter integrity teams are now applying advanced computer technology to thwart the Voter Concierge by deep-cleaning the rolls.
In 2022, the vote-harvesting industry will again flood the zone in swing counties with over 250,000 new registrants from September to November.
Several voter integrity teams, using advanced artificial intelligence technology, can check every registrant, at silicon speed, against over 30 databases, with a billion records, ensuring that the registrant is not living in an R.V. park, a church, or a UPS store, and that his address meets current legal standards.
Sorry, Beto, but registering every itinerant is no longer the key to the Texas Governor's Mansion.
For the first time, phantom voters are being identified before their registrations take effect.
Living in an apartment where you do not designate the apartment number? Sorry, pal — you aren't voting this year. Registering from a church? There had better be enough bathrooms to meet the certificate of occupancy requirements for that county.
More voters showing up in a county than there are eligible citizens? Flagged hourly! Alert issued before the ballots are counted!
As ballots arrive during early voting, artificial intelligence snapshots aggregate voter identities. That guy who voted on day 2 in person, disappeared on snapshot 8, reappeared on snapshot 11 with his ballot changed to absentee...is identified.
Before that ballot is tabulated, it is red-flagged, and the voter integrity team files a protest.
Thirty-five thousand inactive voters, changed to active — then voted, then changed to inactive again? The A.I. systems pick this up with snapshot analysis. That scam is over!
For the first time, voter integrity teams have technology ballot-harvesters cannot outrun.
When Sheriff Clarke and Mike Lindell started supporting these kinds of technologies, after the 2020 election, the focus was voter roll anomalies. Anomalies were abundant.
The battlefield has changed to real-time analysis, driven by artificial intelligence.
The combined knowledge of a dozen gifted voter integrity teams, with 16 months of experience, is built into an artificial intelligence engine, identifying phantom voters before they are registered, before they can illegally vote.
Every time a fake vote is cast by a Voter Concierge, an American is disenfranchised.
Artificial intelligence helps the good guys protect the vote and gives confidence to all Americans that ttheir elections are legit.
Voter integrity teams learned that chasing 2020 voter fraud after the election is too late.
Some leading election integrity teams are stopping phantom voter fraud before it impacts elections.
Cleaning up voter rolls just became an A.I.-driven, real time endeavor.
https://www.americanthinker.com/articles/2022/07/election_heroes_are_stopping_fraudulent_votingright_now.html
2023 Will Be Year from Hell – Martin Armstrong
By Greg Hunter
On July 19, 2022
Legendary financial and geopolitical cycle analyst Martin Armstrong says the time to prepare is now for what is coming in 2023. Armstrong’s Socrates computer program is predicting “2023 will be the year from Hell.” Armstrong explains, “Our computer is predicting a ‘war cycle’ that hits in 2023, but that is also civil unrest. So, you are looking at revolutions and etc. because of inflation. Our projection on oil is that it is going to go up dramatically into 2023. It’s going to be the same thing, I think, for gasoline prices. This is just not over yet. The euro looks like death warmed over. . . . Our computer is projecting the continued decline of the euro and rising commodity prices. With these sanctions on Russia, you just had the leader of Hungary say Europe is committing suicide. The sanctions are hurting Europe more than they are hurting Russia. This is like a shot to the lung. They can’t even breath at this stage.”
Armstrong says you are not going to have to wait until next year to see extreme stress in the financial system. Armstrong is seeing financial upheavals coming in the August and September time frame. So, the economic pain is already here and getting worse, especially in Europe. Armstrong says, “I think you are going to see this come to a head. . . . It’s definitely tanking more anyway. . . . What makes things even worse for the world is the dollar going up and not down. This is because you had all these emerging markets issue debt in dollars. . . . They were borrowing in dollars because it was a cheaper interest rate, and they had no concept of the foreign exchange risk. . . . This happened in Australia. The currency swings, and, now, suddenly you owe 20% more. . . . You had the same thing with all these emerging markets. . . . Now, the dollar is going up and you are seeing bank runs.”
Armstrong says not only is the euro dramatically declining, but the euro bonds are being shunned by U.S. banks. This is another bad financial sign for the EU. Armstrong says, “All these things are a real crisis. I can tell you that speaking to the top three banks in New York City, they refuse to accept any European sovereign debt as collateral—period. That is what started the whole repo crisis in 2019.”
So, we are entering into a debt crisis with the EU financial system in the crosshairs. Armstrong says, “This is why they are pushing for war. . . . They think they can create a new monetary system, and to do so, they need war. They think they can keep it just conventional. Then the United Nations can emerge as the white knight and the peacemaker. Therefore, we get another Bretton Woods. You can redesign all the currencies, and when you do that, you wipe out all the debt. That is what is on the agenda. . . . There is no way they can get out of this other than default. If they default, they are worried about millions of people storming the parliaments of Europe. . . .This is really a tremendous financial crisis that we are facing. They have been borrowing year after year since WWII with zero intention of paying anything back.”
There is much more in the nearly 40-minute interview.
Join Greg Hunter of USAWatchdog.com on Rumble as he goes One-on-One with Martin Armstrong, cycle expert and author of the upcoming new book “Manufacturing World III,”
https://rumble.com/v1cvw9r-2023-will-be-year-from-hell-martin-armstrong.html
After the Interview:
There is some free information, analysis and articles on ArmstrongEconomics.com.
https://usawatchdog.com/2023-will-be-year-from-hell-martin-armstrong/
2023 Will Be Year from Hell – Martin Armstrong
By Greg Hunter
On July 19, 2022
Legendary financial and geopolitical cycle analyst Martin Armstrong says the time to prepare is now for what is coming in 2023. Armstrong’s Socrates computer program is predicting “2023 will be the year from Hell.” Armstrong explains, “Our computer is predicting a ‘war cycle’ that hits in 2023, but that is also civil unrest. So, you are looking at revolutions and etc. because of inflation. Our projection on oil is that it is going to go up dramatically into 2023. It’s going to be the same thing, I think, for gasoline prices. This is just not over yet. The euro looks like death warmed over. . . . Our computer is projecting the continued decline of the euro and rising commodity prices. With these sanctions on Russia, you just had the leader of Hungary say Europe is committing suicide. The sanctions are hurting Europe more than they are hurting Russia. This is like a shot to the lung. They can’t even breath at this stage.”
Armstrong says you are not going to have to wait until next year to see extreme stress in the financial system. Armstrong is seeing financial upheavals coming in the August and September time frame. So, the economic pain is already here and getting worse, especially in Europe. Armstrong says, “I think you are going to see this come to a head. . . . It’s definitely tanking more anyway. . . . What makes things even worse for the world is the dollar going up and not down. This is because you had all these emerging markets issue debt in dollars. . . . They were borrowing in dollars because it was a cheaper interest rate, and they had no concept of the foreign exchange risk. . . . This happened in Australia. The currency swings, and, now, suddenly you owe 20% more. . . . You had the same thing with all these emerging markets. . . . Now, the dollar is going up and you are seeing bank runs.”
Armstrong says not only is the euro dramatically declining, but the euro bonds are being shunned by U.S. banks. This is another bad financial sign for the EU. Armstrong says, “All these things are a real crisis. I can tell you that speaking to the top three banks in New York City, they refuse to accept any European sovereign debt as collateral—period. That is what started the whole repo crisis in 2019.”
So, we are entering into a debt crisis with the EU financial system in the crosshairs. Armstrong says, “This is why they are pushing for war. . . . They think they can create a new monetary system, and to do so, they need war. They think they can keep it just conventional. Then the United Nations can emerge as the white knight and the peacemaker. Therefore, we get another Bretton Woods. You can redesign all the currencies, and when you do that, you wipe out all the debt. That is what is on the agenda. . . . There is no way they can get out of this other than default. If they default, they are worried about millions of people storming the parliaments of Europe. . . .This is really a tremendous financial crisis that we are facing. They have been borrowing year after year since WWII with zero intention of paying anything back.”
There is much more in the nearly 40-minute interview.
Join Greg Hunter of USAWatchdog.com on Rumble as he goes One-on-One with Martin Armstrong, cycle expert and author of the upcoming new book “Manufacturing World III,”
https://rumble.com/v1cvw9r-2023-will-be-year-from-hell-martin-armstrong.html
After the Interview:
There is some free information, analysis and articles on ArmstrongEconomics.com.
https://usawatchdog.com/2023-will-be-year-from-hell-martin-armstrong/
Ronan Manly: Why is a criminal organization allowed to dominate the gold industry?
By Ronan Manly
Bullion Star, Singapore
Wednesday, July 20, 2022
With a group of former JP Morgan precious metals traders
currently on criminal trial in front of a federal jury in
Chicago, accused of engaging in a racketeering conspiracy
involving precious metals price manipulation, commodities fraud,
and trade spoofing, while another group of their colleagues has
already pleaded guilty, now is a good time to ask how the bank JP
Morgan is still considered fit and proper to not only continue to
trade in the precious metals markets but also to continue to
dominate the entire precious metals industry in London,
Singapore, and New York, with the support of the London Bullion
Market Association, the Singapore Bullion Market Association, and
the CME Group, operator of the Comex and NYMex.
While JP Morgan made a deferred prosecution deal with the U.S.
Department of Justice and Commodity Futures Trade Commission in
2020 and admitted wrongdoing for the criminal conduct of numerous
JP Morgan traders and sales personnel on the bank's precious
metals desks in London, Singapore, and New York, while paying
$920 million in the form of a criminal monetary penalty, criminal
disgorgement, and victim compensation in relation to this
criminal precious metals scheme, the LBMA, SBMA, and CME Group,
as you will see below, continue not only to welcome the proven
criminal bank JP Morgan but to allow it to operate at the highest
levels of each organisation. ...
... For the remainder of the commentary:
https://www.bullionstar.com/blogs/ronan-manly/despite-manipulating-precious-metals-prices-jp-morgan-is-still-at-the-heart-of-the-lbma-sbma-and-comex/
Ronan Manly: Why is a criminal organization allowed to dominate the gold industry?
By Ronan Manly
Bullion Star, Singapore
Wednesday, July 20, 2022
With a group of former JP Morgan precious metals traders
currently on criminal trial in front of a federal jury in
Chicago, accused of engaging in a racketeering conspiracy
involving precious metals price manipulation, commodities fraud,
and trade spoofing, while another group of their colleagues has
already pleaded guilty, now is a good time to ask how the bank JP
Morgan is still considered fit and proper to not only continue to
trade in the precious metals markets but also to continue to
dominate the entire precious metals industry in London,
Singapore, and New York, with the support of the London Bullion
Market Association, the Singapore Bullion Market Association, and
the CME Group, operator of the Comex and NYMex.
While JP Morgan made a deferred prosecution deal with the U.S.
Department of Justice and Commodity Futures Trade Commission in
2020 and admitted wrongdoing for the criminal conduct of numerous
JP Morgan traders and sales personnel on the bank's precious
metals desks in London, Singapore, and New York, while paying
$920 million in the form of a criminal monetary penalty, criminal
disgorgement, and victim compensation in relation to this
criminal precious metals scheme, the LBMA, SBMA, and CME Group,
as you will see below, continue not only to welcome the proven
criminal bank JP Morgan but to allow it to operate at the highest
levels of each organisation. ...
... For the remainder of the commentary:
https://www.bullionstar.com/blogs/ronan-manly/despite-manipulating-precious-metals-prices-jp-morgan-is-still-at-the-heart-of-the-lbma-sbma-and-comex/
California's Farmland Rapidly Turns To Dust Amid Water Crisis
By Tyler Durden
Monday, Jul 18, 2022 - 06:55 PM
As much of the Western US suffers from a historic drought, all eyes have shifted to Californian farmers as hundreds of thousands of acres become fallow in a state responsible for a tremendous amount of US food production.
Unprecedented cuts to water supplies are jeopardizing the future of growing for many farmers. Drought conditions are worsening, making it harder for farmers to irrigate crops.
As fields dry up and farm production drops, Josue Medellin-Azuara, an associate professor at the University of California Merced, told Bloomberg that 800,000 acres of farmland could be unworked this year, more than double the acreage last year.
Medellin-Azuara said the figure is preliminary as satellite imaging of California cropland continues to be examined. He anticipates official estimates by the end of this month or early August.
Just like that, multi-year, multi-decade investments in farm production have been wiped out over new water restrictions. Much of the fallow land is in California's Central Valley, which produces more than half of the fruits, vegetables, and nuts grown in the US.
Farmers that remain in operation are seeing sharp reductions in surface water rights due to low snowmelt and dwindling storage from last year.
"What's really concerning is for the first time we are fallowing at least 250,000 acres in the Sacramento Valley ... those are the most senior water rights holders," Karen Ross, secretary of the California Department of Food and Agriculture, said in an interview.
Medellin-Azuara said the new water restrictions are a complicated issue:
Last year, some California farmers were stunned to find their so-called senior water rights restricted. Water laws in the state are governed by a complex system that dates back to the Gold Rush era. Senior rights holders -- which include companies, growers and cities with claims that were acquired before 1914, and landowners whose property borders a river -- are the last to see their supplies curtailed. -Bloomberg
California's most productive agricultural region is turning into dust, which should concern every American.
As a reminder, California produces a quarter of the nation's food -- shrinking crop output is more alarming news that reveals food inflation is becoming structural and won't abate anytime soon.
https://www.zerohedge.com/commodities/californias-farmland-rapidly-turns-dust-amid-water-crisis
California's Farmland Rapidly Turns To Dust Amid Water Crisis
By Tyler Durden
Monday, Jul 18, 2022 - 06:55 PM
As much of the Western US suffers from a historic drought, all eyes have shifted to Californian farmers as hundreds of thousands of acres become fallow in a state responsible for a tremendous amount of US food production.
Unprecedented cuts to water supplies are jeopardizing the future of growing for many farmers. Drought conditions are worsening, making it harder for farmers to irrigate crops.
As fields dry up and farm production drops, Josue Medellin-Azuara, an associate professor at the University of California Merced, told Bloomberg that 800,000 acres of farmland could be unworked this year, more than double the acreage last year.
Medellin-Azuara said the figure is preliminary as satellite imaging of California cropland continues to be examined. He anticipates official estimates by the end of this month or early August.
Just like that, multi-year, multi-decade investments in farm production have been wiped out over new water restrictions. Much of the fallow land is in California's Central Valley, which produces more than half of the fruits, vegetables, and nuts grown in the US.
Farmers that remain in operation are seeing sharp reductions in surface water rights due to low snowmelt and dwindling storage from last year.
"What's really concerning is for the first time we are fallowing at least 250,000 acres in the Sacramento Valley ... those are the most senior water rights holders," Karen Ross, secretary of the California Department of Food and Agriculture, said in an interview.
Medellin-Azuara said the new water restrictions are a complicated issue:
Last year, some California farmers were stunned to find their so-called senior water rights restricted. Water laws in the state are governed by a complex system that dates back to the Gold Rush era. Senior rights holders -- which include companies, growers and cities with claims that were acquired before 1914, and landowners whose property borders a river -- are the last to see their supplies curtailed. -Bloomberg
California's most productive agricultural region is turning into dust, which should concern every American.
As a reminder, California produces a quarter of the nation's food -- shrinking crop output is more alarming news that reveals food inflation is becoming structural and won't abate anytime soon.
https://www.zerohedge.com/commodities/californias-farmland-rapidly-turns-dust-amid-water-crisis
10:00a Existing Home Sales
Annual Rate 5.41 M 5.395 M 5.150 M to 5.500 M 5.12 M
Month over Month -5.4% actual vs -3.4% prior month
Year over Year -14.2% actual vs -8.6% prior year
Consensus Outlook
Existing home sales have been slowing, to a 5.41 million annualized rate in May, with a marginal decline to 5.395 million the consensus for June.
Definition
Existing home sales tally the number of previously constructed homes, condominiums and co-ops in which a sale closed during the month. Existing homes (also known as home resales) account for a larger share of the market than new homes and indicate housing market trends.
10:30a EIA Petroleum Inventories
Crude Oil Inventories - W/W -0.4M barrels actual vs 3.3Mbarrels prior
Gasoline Inventories - W/W 3.5M barrels actual vs 5.8M barrels prior
Distillate Inventories - W/W -1.3M Barrels actual vs 2.7M barrels prior
Definition
The Energy Information Administration (EIA) provides weekly information on petroleum inventories in the U.S., whether produced here or abroad. The level of inventories helps determine prices for petroleum products.
10:00a Existing Home Sales
Annual Rate 5.41 M 5.395 M 5.150 M to 5.500 M 5.12 M
Month over Month -5.4% actual vs -3.4% prior month
Year over Year -14.2% actual vs -8.6% prior year
Consensus Outlook
Existing home sales have been slowing, to a 5.41 million annualized rate in May, with a marginal decline to 5.395 million the consensus for June.
Definition
Existing home sales tally the number of previously constructed homes, condominiums and co-ops in which a sale closed during the month. Existing homes (also known as home resales) account for a larger share of the market than new homes and indicate housing market trends.
10:30a EIA Petroleum Inventories
Crude Oil Inventories - W/W -0.4M barrels actual vs 3.3Mbarrels prior
Gasoline Inventories - W/W 3.5M barrels actual vs 5.8M barrels prior
Distillate Inventories - W/W -1.3M Barrels actual vs 2.7M barrels prior
Definition
The Energy Information Administration (EIA) provides weekly information on petroleum inventories in the U.S., whether produced here or abroad. The level of inventories helps determine prices for petroleum products.
There Are Three Separate Cases in Federal Court Accusing JPMorgan Chase of a Culture of Fraud
By Pam Martens and Russ Martens
July 19, 2022
JPMorgan Chase is the largest federally-insured bank in the United States. It is also one of the largest trading houses on Wall Street. That’s the Faustian bargain the Clinton administration entered into with Wall Street when it repealed the Glass-Steagall Act in 1999.
According to data from the FDIC, as of June 30 of last year, JPMorgan Chase Bank N.A. had 4,925 branches in 44 U.S. states holding $2.01 trillion in deposits. Many of those deposits belong to mom and pop savers who have no idea that the bank has admitted to five criminal felony counts since 2014 and has a rap sheet that is the envy of the Gambino crime family. (Apparently, a federal judge in New York overseeing a current JPMorgan case is just as naïve about the bank’s criminal history. More on that shortly.)
The bulk of Americans also do not know that neither federal regulators nor Congress nor the Board of Directors of JPMorgan Chase have demanded that the Chairman and CEO of JPMorgan Chase, Jamie Dimon, who has sat at the helm of the bank throughout this crime spree, be sacked. Dimon’s tenure has been propped up by a public relations machine and an obsequious mainstream media. (See here and here.)
Corruption of this magnitude can’t be swept under the rug forever, however. Today, three cases are playing out simultaneously in federal courts. Observed together, which no member of mainstream media is currently doing, they paint an undeniable picture of a bank which, as Senator Bernie Sanders would say, has adopted fraud as a profitable business model.
Let’s start with the case known as U.S. v. Smith playing out in the federal District Court for the Northern District of Illinois in Chicago. (Case number 1:19-cr-00669.) Federal prosecutors from the Justice Department have charged multiple traders on the precious metals desk of JPMorgan Chase with turning the trading desk into a racketeering enterprise from 2008 to 2016. For the first time that veterans on Wall Street can remember, the Justice Department is the using the RICO statute, typically reserved for members of organized crime, to charge JPMorgan’s traders. (The bank settled its own charges in September 2020 and paid $920 million in fines – a mere pittance in terms of the profits that were likely made on these "tens of thousands" of trades over a period of eight years.)
Making the situation extremely dicey for both the indicted traders and the bank’s reputation, federal prosecutors have called to testify two former precious metals traders on that desk who have pleaded guilty to related charges and are cooperating with prosecutors. (A third cooperating witness is expected to testify.) One of those cooperating witnesses, John Edmonds, told jurors that "Our job was to do whatever it takes to make money" and "Everyone at the time did it on the desk and it worked." When asked why he didn’t report the conduct to the compliance officers at the bank, Edmonds responded that "I would have been fired." This certainly suggests that he felt fraud was not just a standard practice at the bank but was an enshrined profit- making strategy.
Another cooperating witness, Corey Flaum, told jurors that the practice of manipulating precious metal prices (spoofing) was done out in the open and was "common practice."
While the indicted traders’ trial is playing out in Chicago, a trader on the precious metals desk who was not indicted for wrongdoing, Donald Turnbull, has brought charges against JPMorgan Chase in federal court in the Southern District of New York. Turnbull alleges that the bank trumped up false charges against him as a pretext to terminate him when it was actually terminating him for cooperating with the Department of Justice’s investigation. Turnbull states in the lawsuit that the indicted traders received better benefits when they were released from employment than he did. Despite a seriously-ill wife, Turnbull alleges in the lawsuit that JPMorgan Chase cancelled his health insurance, did not pay him severance, and took away his unvested stock awards.
Despite the unprecedented crime history of this bank, the Judge overseeing this case, John Koeltl, has been pretty much giving lawyers from Big Law firm, Morgan Lewis, who are representing JPMorgan Chase, everything they ask for.
For example, Judge Koeltl dismissed Turnbull’s first amended complaint on a motion to dismiss by Morgan Lewis on the basis that he found it "implausible" that the bank would retaliate against Turnbull for cooperating with the Justice Department when the bank itself was cooperating with the Justice Department.
Either the Judge is feigning naivete, engaging in willful blindness, or is actually ignorant of how JPMorgan actually "cooperates" with investigators and prosecutors. For example, JPMorgan Chase was smacked with two felony counts by the Justice Department in 2014 for its role in Bernie Madoff’s Ponzi scheme. The bank told its regulators in the U.K. that it believed Madoff was running a Ponzi scheme but failed to "cooperate" as it was required to under law by reporting its concerns to U.S. prosecutors and also failed to report red flags about Madoff’s money laundering to the Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN), a unit of the U.S. Treasury.
Then there was the 300-page report from the Senate’s Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations on how JPMorgan Chase had used more than $100 billion of depositors’ money to gamble in derivatives in London and lose $6.2 billion. The Chair of that Subcommittee at the time, Senator Carl Levin, wrote that the bank "piled on risk, hid losses, disregarded risk limits, manipulated risk models, dodged oversight, and misinformed the public."
If Senator Carl Levin were alive today, he would certainly not find it "implausible" that JPMorgan would retaliate against an employee cooperating with a criminal investigation. In fact, it was Senator Levin who introduced evidence in a hearing in 2014 showing that JPMorgan Chase had rushed to hire a person who had bragged on his resume that he knew how to game electric markets.
Turnbull now has a second amended complaint pending before Judge Koeltl’s court. Bizarrely, JPMorgan’s lawyers from Morgan Lewis asked Koeltl to redact paragraphs 67 through 70 of that complaint because the bank claims that those paragraphs contain information that is subject to attorney-client privilege from an interview it conducted with Turnbull. But what actually happened was that the bank asked Turnbull to come and sit for an interview and explain what he knew about trading on the precious metals desk. He brought his own attorney. How that gives JPMorgan an attorney-client privilege with Turnbull should have raised red flags with a federal judge. It didn’t. The request was granted and paragraphs 67 through 70 are now a big, blacked out blob.
And in a perfect segue way, along comes the federal lawsuit brought by Shaquala Williams against JPMorgan Chase, also in the Southern District of New York under Judge Jed Rakoff. Williams tells the court in her complaint that JPMorgan Chase did not fulfill its promise under a deferred prosecution agreement to cooperate with the Justice Department – something that Judge Koeltl in the Turnbull case finds "implausible" to believe.
Williams is a financial crimes compliance professional with more than a decade of experience at multiple global banks. Part of Williams’ role at JPMorgan Chase was to make sure that the bank was in compliance with a non-prosecution agreement the bank had signed with the Justice Department in 2016.
The Justice Department had charged in 2016 that JPMorgan’s Asia subsidiary had engaged in quid pro quo agreements with Chinese officials to obtain investment- banking business and had falsified internal documents to cover up the activities. The quid pro quo agreements resulted in the bank putting the children of high Chinese government officials on its payroll in order to further its business interests in China.
In exchange for avoiding prosecution, the Justice Department required JPMorgan to create compliance controls around third-party payments. Williams alleges, among numerous other serious charges, that the so-called third- party payment controls were a sham and that when she blew the whistle to her superiors at the bank, the bank retaliated against her by firing her in October 2019.
The case is Shaquala Williams v JPMorgan Chase, Case Number 1:21-cv-09326, which was filed last November. Very conveniently, Morgan Lewis is representing JPMorgan Chase in this case as well as in the Turnbull case.
https://wallstreetonparade.com/2022/07/there-are-three-separate-cases-in-federal-court-accusing-jpmorgan-chase-of-a-culture-of-fraud/
There Are Three Separate Cases in Federal Court Accusing JPMorgan Chase of a Culture of Fraud
By Pam Martens and Russ Martens
July 19, 2022
JPMorgan Chase is the largest federally-insured bank in the United States. It is also one of the largest trading houses on Wall Street. That’s the Faustian bargain the Clinton administration entered into with Wall Street when it repealed the Glass-Steagall Act in 1999.
According to data from the FDIC, as of June 30 of last year, JPMorgan Chase Bank N.A. had 4,925 branches in 44 U.S. states holding $2.01 trillion in deposits. Many of those deposits belong to mom and pop savers who have no idea that the bank has admitted to five criminal felony counts since 2014 and has a rap sheet that is the envy of the Gambino crime family. (Apparently, a federal judge in New York overseeing a current JPMorgan case is just as naïve about the bank’s criminal history. More on that shortly.)
The bulk of Americans also do not know that neither federal regulators nor Congress nor the Board of Directors of JPMorgan Chase have demanded that the Chairman and CEO of JPMorgan Chase, Jamie Dimon, who has sat at the helm of the bank throughout this crime spree, be sacked. Dimon’s tenure has been propped up by a public relations machine and an obsequious mainstream media. (See here and here.)
Corruption of this magnitude can’t be swept under the rug forever, however. Today, three cases are playing out simultaneously in federal courts. Observed together, which no member of mainstream media is currently doing, they paint an undeniable picture of a bank which, as Senator Bernie Sanders would say, has adopted fraud as a profitable business model.
Let’s start with the case known as U.S. v. Smith playing out in the federal District Court for the Northern District of Illinois in Chicago. (Case number 1:19-cr-00669.) Federal prosecutors from the Justice Department have charged multiple traders on the precious metals desk of JPMorgan Chase with turning the trading desk into a racketeering enterprise from 2008 to 2016. For the first time that veterans on Wall Street can remember, the Justice Department is the using the RICO statute, typically reserved for members of organized crime, to charge JPMorgan’s traders. (The bank settled its own charges in September 2020 and paid $920 million in fines – a mere pittance in terms of the profits that were likely made on these "tens of thousands" of trades over a period of eight years.)
Making the situation extremely dicey for both the indicted traders and the bank’s reputation, federal prosecutors have called to testify two former precious metals traders on that desk who have pleaded guilty to related charges and are cooperating with prosecutors. (A third cooperating witness is expected to testify.) One of those cooperating witnesses, John Edmonds, told jurors that "Our job was to do whatever it takes to make money" and "Everyone at the time did it on the desk and it worked." When asked why he didn’t report the conduct to the compliance officers at the bank, Edmonds responded that "I would have been fired." This certainly suggests that he felt fraud was not just a standard practice at the bank but was an enshrined profit- making strategy.
Another cooperating witness, Corey Flaum, told jurors that the practice of manipulating precious metal prices (spoofing) was done out in the open and was "common practice."
While the indicted traders’ trial is playing out in Chicago, a trader on the precious metals desk who was not indicted for wrongdoing, Donald Turnbull, has brought charges against JPMorgan Chase in federal court in the Southern District of New York. Turnbull alleges that the bank trumped up false charges against him as a pretext to terminate him when it was actually terminating him for cooperating with the Department of Justice’s investigation. Turnbull states in the lawsuit that the indicted traders received better benefits when they were released from employment than he did. Despite a seriously-ill wife, Turnbull alleges in the lawsuit that JPMorgan Chase cancelled his health insurance, did not pay him severance, and took away his unvested stock awards.
Despite the unprecedented crime history of this bank, the Judge overseeing this case, John Koeltl, has been pretty much giving lawyers from Big Law firm, Morgan Lewis, who are representing JPMorgan Chase, everything they ask for.
For example, Judge Koeltl dismissed Turnbull’s first amended complaint on a motion to dismiss by Morgan Lewis on the basis that he found it "implausible" that the bank would retaliate against Turnbull for cooperating with the Justice Department when the bank itself was cooperating with the Justice Department.
Either the Judge is feigning naivete, engaging in willful blindness, or is actually ignorant of how JPMorgan actually "cooperates" with investigators and prosecutors. For example, JPMorgan Chase was smacked with two felony counts by the Justice Department in 2014 for its role in Bernie Madoff’s Ponzi scheme. The bank told its regulators in the U.K. that it believed Madoff was running a Ponzi scheme but failed to "cooperate" as it was required to under law by reporting its concerns to U.S. prosecutors and also failed to report red flags about Madoff’s money laundering to the Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN), a unit of the U.S. Treasury.
Then there was the 300-page report from the Senate’s Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations on how JPMorgan Chase had used more than $100 billion of depositors’ money to gamble in derivatives in London and lose $6.2 billion. The Chair of that Subcommittee at the time, Senator Carl Levin, wrote that the bank "piled on risk, hid losses, disregarded risk limits, manipulated risk models, dodged oversight, and misinformed the public."
If Senator Carl Levin were alive today, he would certainly not find it "implausible" that JPMorgan would retaliate against an employee cooperating with a criminal investigation. In fact, it was Senator Levin who introduced evidence in a hearing in 2014 showing that JPMorgan Chase had rushed to hire a person who had bragged on his resume that he knew how to game electric markets.
Turnbull now has a second amended complaint pending before Judge Koeltl’s court. Bizarrely, JPMorgan’s lawyers from Morgan Lewis asked Koeltl to redact paragraphs 67 through 70 of that complaint because the bank claims that those paragraphs contain information that is subject to attorney-client privilege from an interview it conducted with Turnbull. But what actually happened was that the bank asked Turnbull to come and sit for an interview and explain what he knew about trading on the precious metals desk. He brought his own attorney. How that gives JPMorgan an attorney-client privilege with Turnbull should have raised red flags with a federal judge. It didn’t. The request was granted and paragraphs 67 through 70 are now a big, blacked out blob.
And in a perfect segue way, along comes the federal lawsuit brought by Shaquala Williams against JPMorgan Chase, also in the Southern District of New York under Judge Jed Rakoff. Williams tells the court in her complaint that JPMorgan Chase did not fulfill its promise under a deferred prosecution agreement to cooperate with the Justice Department – something that Judge Koeltl in the Turnbull case finds "implausible" to believe.
Williams is a financial crimes compliance professional with more than a decade of experience at multiple global banks. Part of Williams’ role at JPMorgan Chase was to make sure that the bank was in compliance with a non-prosecution agreement the bank had signed with the Justice Department in 2016.
The Justice Department had charged in 2016 that JPMorgan’s Asia subsidiary had engaged in quid pro quo agreements with Chinese officials to obtain investment- banking business and had falsified internal documents to cover up the activities. The quid pro quo agreements resulted in the bank putting the children of high Chinese government officials on its payroll in order to further its business interests in China.
In exchange for avoiding prosecution, the Justice Department required JPMorgan to create compliance controls around third-party payments. Williams alleges, among numerous other serious charges, that the so-called third- party payment controls were a sham and that when she blew the whistle to her superiors at the bank, the bank retaliated against her by firing her in October 2019.
The case is Shaquala Williams v JPMorgan Chase, Case Number 1:21-cv-09326, which was filed last November. Very conveniently, Morgan Lewis is representing JPMorgan Chase in this case as well as in the Turnbull case.
https://wallstreetonparade.com/2022/07/there-are-three-separate-cases-in-federal-court-accusing-jpmorgan-chase-of-a-culture-of-fraud/
Kunstler: The Last Days of “Joe Biden”
By James Howard Kunstler
July 18, 2022
It’s like our country is trapped on one of those swirling carnival rides beloved of the county fairs… only, the felonious mutt who runs the ride has nodded off in a fentanyl delirium with the motor running at maximum speed… and the children-of-all-ages locked in the pods of this infernal machine shriek and vomit with each sickening rotation… as the half-century-old swing arms groan and wobble from metal fatigue on their squealing pivots… and suddenly comes a deafening crunch of gnashed gears, the smell of burning oil, and the pathetic whimpering of nearly dead.
That’s us. Some terrible midsummer accident-of-state has befallen the USA Carnival, and most are too dazed to know it. Whose idea was it to send the wind-up doll president called “Joe Biden” to Saudi Arabia? I can just imagine what went on in the chamber in private with “JB” and MBS (Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman), virtual autocrat of the oil-soaked desert land. The American visitor muttered something about wanting an ice-cream cone before dropping into a catatonic thousand-yard stare.
“How does this thing work?” MBS asks his chief vizier, the foreign minister (in Arabic, of course), gesticulating disdainfully at the ghostly figure sunk in the plush camel-hair armchair yards away. “Joe Biden” sits motionless. Someone has forgotten to rewind him, some “aide” who carries the president’s Adderall. Foreign Minister Faisal bin Farhan Al-Saud tells the boss, “We’ll make up some camel-dung for release to CNN and friends. They’ll fall for anything.”
It’s like a crime scene where the forensic experts have entered. The Saudi leader and his entourage only hang around the room for three minutes until the US State Department shoots enough photos to prove that “JB” was there and not stuffed in the basement of his Delaware beach house for the weekend, as usual. The American news media gets briefed: Saudi Arabia graciously agrees to bump up its oil production somewhere in the 2025-2027 time-frame — a triumph for US diplomacy, the networks are informed. Air Force One wings home through clouds of despair. The White House team members spend the flight updating their resumés.
I think we have witnessed “Joe Biden’s” final appearance at any world-stage event. He can do no more for the Party of Chaos. It has done what it can to wreck the joint with him as the pretend head-of-state. The Ukraine gambit is a bust, a foolish miscalculation that was obvious from the start. All it accomplished was to reveal the pitiful dependence of our European allies on Russian oil and gas, leaving their economies good and truly scuppered without it. The Russians end up with control of the Black Sea and probably the Ukraine bread-basket as well. So, now, Europe will starve and freeze.
Did they really want to commit suicide like that? Do the populations of Germany, France, Italy, the Netherlands, Spain, and the rest just aim to roll into oblivion? Probably not. Rather, we are entering the season of upended governments. The Schwabenklausian stooges implanted everywhere will be overthrown, NATO and the Euro Union will dissolve in impotent ignominy, and the various countries involved will have to renegotiate their destinies, forgoing US advice and coercion. They might even become adversaries of the USA, not allies. Did you forget we fought two wars against Germany not so long ago? And all those countries have been fighting each other since the Bronze Age, too.
History never stops reminding us what a prankster it is. A strange and terrible inversion has occurred in this Fourth Turning. Somehow, Mr. Putin’s Russia is left to represent what remains of international rule-of-law while the western democracies sink deeper into a morass of deranged despotism. Anyway, they are too busy conducting war against their own people to even pretend to assist their Ukrainian proxies. “Joe Biden” crammed nearly $60-billion into the Ukraine money laundering machine since February, which will just spew hallucinated capital back out into increasingly disordered financial markets. Look: the indexes are up world-wide this morning. Why? Because global business is so good? I don’t think so.
Moving toward autumn, what we have to look forward to is the blatant desperation of the claque behind “Joe Biden.” Their propaganda machine is going all-out on climate change and renewed Covid hysteria. There are always heat-waves in midsummer. CNN acts shocked that it’s over 100-degrees in Texas. Really? Never seen that before? Meanwhile, behind the news about emerging Omicron sub-variants, the vaccine injuries and deaths mount and the CDC pretends not to notice. They are just lying as usual. You’re used to it. You pretend it’s to be expected. You’ve forgotten that it wasn’t always so. Soon, it will matter.
https://kunstler.com/clusterfuck-nation/the-last-days-of-joe-biden/
Kunstler: The Last Days of “Joe Biden”
By James Howard Kunstler
July 18, 2022
It’s like our country is trapped on one of those swirling carnival rides beloved of the county fairs… only, the felonious mutt who runs the ride has nodded off in a fentanyl delirium with the motor running at maximum speed… and the children-of-all-ages locked in the pods of this infernal machine shriek and vomit with each sickening rotation… as the half-century-old swing arms groan and wobble from metal fatigue on their squealing pivots… and suddenly comes a deafening crunch of gnashed gears, the smell of burning oil, and the pathetic whimpering of nearly dead.
That’s us. Some terrible midsummer accident-of-state has befallen the USA Carnival, and most are too dazed to know it. Whose idea was it to send the wind-up doll president called “Joe Biden” to Saudi Arabia? I can just imagine what went on in the chamber in private with “JB” and MBS (Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman), virtual autocrat of the oil-soaked desert land. The American visitor muttered something about wanting an ice-cream cone before dropping into a catatonic thousand-yard stare.
“How does this thing work?” MBS asks his chief vizier, the foreign minister (in Arabic, of course), gesticulating disdainfully at the ghostly figure sunk in the plush camel-hair armchair yards away. “Joe Biden” sits motionless. Someone has forgotten to rewind him, some “aide” who carries the president’s Adderall. Foreign Minister Faisal bin Farhan Al-Saud tells the boss, “We’ll make up some camel-dung for release to CNN and friends. They’ll fall for anything.”
It’s like a crime scene where the forensic experts have entered. The Saudi leader and his entourage only hang around the room for three minutes until the US State Department shoots enough photos to prove that “JB” was there and not stuffed in the basement of his Delaware beach house for the weekend, as usual. The American news media gets briefed: Saudi Arabia graciously agrees to bump up its oil production somewhere in the 2025-2027 time-frame — a triumph for US diplomacy, the networks are informed. Air Force One wings home through clouds of despair. The White House team members spend the flight updating their resumés.
I think we have witnessed “Joe Biden’s” final appearance at any world-stage event. He can do no more for the Party of Chaos. It has done what it can to wreck the joint with him as the pretend head-of-state. The Ukraine gambit is a bust, a foolish miscalculation that was obvious from the start. All it accomplished was to reveal the pitiful dependence of our European allies on Russian oil and gas, leaving their economies good and truly scuppered without it. The Russians end up with control of the Black Sea and probably the Ukraine bread-basket as well. So, now, Europe will starve and freeze.
Did they really want to commit suicide like that? Do the populations of Germany, France, Italy, the Netherlands, Spain, and the rest just aim to roll into oblivion? Probably not. Rather, we are entering the season of upended governments. The Schwabenklausian stooges implanted everywhere will be overthrown, NATO and the Euro Union will dissolve in impotent ignominy, and the various countries involved will have to renegotiate their destinies, forgoing US advice and coercion. They might even become adversaries of the USA, not allies. Did you forget we fought two wars against Germany not so long ago? And all those countries have been fighting each other since the Bronze Age, too.
History never stops reminding us what a prankster it is. A strange and terrible inversion has occurred in this Fourth Turning. Somehow, Mr. Putin’s Russia is left to represent what remains of international rule-of-law while the western democracies sink deeper into a morass of deranged despotism. Anyway, they are too busy conducting war against their own people to even pretend to assist their Ukrainian proxies. “Joe Biden” crammed nearly $60-billion into the Ukraine money laundering machine since February, which will just spew hallucinated capital back out into increasingly disordered financial markets. Look: the indexes are up world-wide this morning. Why? Because global business is so good? I don’t think so.
Moving toward autumn, what we have to look forward to is the blatant desperation of the claque behind “Joe Biden.” Their propaganda machine is going all-out on climate change and renewed Covid hysteria. There are always heat-waves in midsummer. CNN acts shocked that it’s over 100-degrees in Texas. Really? Never seen that before? Meanwhile, behind the news about emerging Omicron sub-variants, the vaccine injuries and deaths mount and the CDC pretends not to notice. They are just lying as usual. You’re used to it. You pretend it’s to be expected. You’ve forgotten that it wasn’t always so. Soon, it will matter.
https://kunstler.com/clusterfuck-nation/the-last-days-of-joe-biden/
7:00a MBA Mortgage Applications
Composite Index - W/W -6.3% actual vs -1.7% prior
Purchase Index - W/W -7.3% actual vs -3.6% prior
Refinance Index - W/W -4.3% actual vs 2.2% prior
Definition
The Mortgage Bankers' Association compiles various mortgage loan indexes.
The purchase applications index measures applications at mortgage lenders.
This is a leading indicator for single-family home sales and housing construction.
7:00a MBA Mortgage Applications
Composite Index - W/W -6.3% actual vs -1.7% prior
Purchase Index - W/W -7.3% actual vs -3.6% prior
Refinance Index - W/W -4.3% actual vs 2.2% prior
Definition
The Mortgage Bankers' Association compiles various mortgage loan indexes.
The purchase applications index measures applications at mortgage lenders.
This is a leading indicator for single-family home sales and housing construction.
Today's Economic Calendar
7:00 MBA Mortgage Applications
10:00 Existing Home Sales
10:30 EIA Petroleum Inventories
1:00 PM Results of $14B, 20-Year Bond Auction
Today's Markets
In Asia, Japan +2.7%. Hong Kong +1.1%. China +0.8%. India +1.2%.
In Europe, at midday, London -0.2%. Paris -0.3%. Frankfurt -0.3%.
Futures at 6:20, Dow +0.2%. S&P +0.2%. Nasdaq +0.3%. Crude -1.6% to $99.09. Gold flat at $1710.60. Bitcoin +8.1% to $23,628.
Ten-year Treasury Yield -4 bps to 2.98%
Who’d have thought there would come such a time
When the butchering of babies was no crime?
Now another miscarriage:
Homosexual “marriage,”
Legalized by a panel of nine.
- The Limerick KIng
Today's Economic Calendar
7:00 MBA Mortgage Applications
10:00 Existing Home Sales
10:30 EIA Petroleum Inventories
1:00 PM Results of $14B, 20-Year Bond Auction
Today's Markets
In Asia, Japan +2.7%. Hong Kong +1.1%. China +0.8%. India +1.2%.
In Europe, at midday, London -0.2%. Paris -0.3%. Frankfurt -0.3%.
Futures at 6:20, Dow +0.2%. S&P +0.2%. Nasdaq +0.3%. Crude -1.6% to $99.09. Gold flat at $1710.60. Bitcoin +8.1% to $23,628.
Ten-year Treasury Yield -4 bps to 2.98%
Who’d have thought there would come such a time
When the butchering of babies was no crime?
Now another miscarriage:
Homosexual “marriage,”
Legalized by a panel of nine.
- The Limerick KIng
There Are Three Separate Cases in Federal Court Accusing JPMorgan Chase of a Culture of Fraud
By Pam Martens and Russ Martens
July 19, 2022
JPMorgan Chase is the largest federally-insured bank in the United States. It is also one of the largest trading houses on Wall Street. That’s the Faustian bargain the Clinton administration entered into with Wall Street when it repealed the Glass-Steagall Act in 1999.
According to data from the FDIC, as of June 30 of last year, JPMorgan Chase Bank N.A. had 4,925 branches in 44 U.S. states holding $2.01 trillion in deposits. Many of those deposits belong to mom and pop savers who have no idea that the bank has admitted to five criminal felony counts since 2014 and has a rap sheet that is the envy of the Gambino crime family. (Apparently, a federal judge in New York overseeing a current JPMorgan case is just as naïve about the bank’s criminal history. More on that shortly.)
The bulk of Americans also do not know that neither federal regulators nor Congress nor the Board of Directors of JPMorgan Chase have demanded that the Chairman and CEO of JPMorgan Chase, Jamie Dimon, who has sat at the helm of the bank throughout this crime spree, be sacked. Dimon’s tenure has been propped up by a public relations machine and an obsequious mainstream media. (See here and here.)
Corruption of this magnitude can’t be swept under the rug forever, however. Today, three cases are playing out simultaneously in federal courts. Observed together, which no member of mainstream media is currently doing, they paint an undeniable picture of a bank which, as Senator Bernie Sanders would say, has adopted fraud as a profitable business model.
Let’s start with the case known as U.S. v. Smith playing out in the federal District Court for the Northern District of Illinois in Chicago. (Case number 1:19-cr-00669.) Federal prosecutors from the Justice Department have charged multiple traders on the precious metals desk of JPMorgan Chase with turning the trading desk into a racketeering enterprise from 2008 to 2016. For the first time that veterans on Wall Street can remember, the Justice Department is the using the RICO statute, typically reserved for members of organized crime, to charge JPMorgan’s traders. (The bank settled its own charges in September 2020 and paid $920 million in fines – a mere pittance in terms of the profits that were likely made on these "tens of thousands" of trades over a period of eight years.)
Making the situation extremely dicey for both the indicted traders and the bank’s reputation, federal prosecutors have called to testify two former precious metals traders on that desk who have pleaded guilty to related charges and are cooperating with prosecutors. (A third cooperating witness is expected to testify.) One of those cooperating witnesses, John Edmonds, told jurors that "Our job was to do whatever it takes to make money" and "Everyone at the time did it on the desk and it worked." When asked why he didn’t report the conduct to the compliance officers at the bank, Edmonds responded that "I would have been fired." This certainly suggests that he felt fraud was not just a standard practice at the bank but was an enshrined profit- making strategy.
Another cooperating witness, Corey Flaum, told jurors that the practice of manipulating precious metal prices (spoofing) was done out in the open and was "common practice."
While the indicted traders’ trial is playing out in Chicago, a trader on the precious metals desk who was not indicted for wrongdoing, Donald Turnbull, has brought charges against JPMorgan Chase in federal court in the Southern District of New York. Turnbull alleges that the bank trumped up false charges against him as a pretext to terminate him when it was actually terminating him for cooperating with the Department of Justice’s investigation. Turnbull states in the lawsuit that the indicted traders received better benefits when they were released from employment than he did. Despite a seriously-ill wife, Turnbull alleges in the lawsuit that JPMorgan Chase cancelled his health insurance, did not pay him severance, and took away his unvested stock awards.
Despite the unprecedented crime history of this bank, the Judge overseeing this case, John Koeltl, has been pretty much giving lawyers from Big Law firm, Morgan Lewis, who are representing JPMorgan Chase, everything they ask for.
For example, Judge Koeltl dismissed Turnbull’s first amended complaint on a motion to dismiss by Morgan Lewis on the basis that he found it "implausible" that the bank would retaliate against Turnbull for cooperating with the Justice Department when the bank itself was cooperating with the Justice Department.
Either the Judge is feigning naivete, engaging in willful blindness, or is actually ignorant of how JPMorgan actually "cooperates" with investigators and prosecutors. For example, JPMorgan Chase was smacked with two felony counts by the Justice Department in 2014 for its role in Bernie Madoff’s Ponzi scheme. The bank told its regulators in the U.K. that it believed Madoff was running a Ponzi scheme but failed to "cooperate" as it was required to under law by reporting its concerns to U.S. prosecutors and also failed to report red flags about Madoff’s money laundering to the Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN), a unit of the U.S. Treasury.
Then there was the 300-page report from the Senate’s Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations on how JPMorgan Chase had used more than $100 billion of depositors’ money to gamble in derivatives in London and lose $6.2 billion. The Chair of that Subcommittee at the time, Senator Carl Levin, wrote that the bank "piled on risk, hid losses, disregarded risk limits, manipulated risk models, dodged oversight, and misinformed the public."
If Senator Carl Levin were alive today, he would certainly not find it "implausible" that JPMorgan would retaliate against an employee cooperating with a criminal investigation. In fact, it was Senator Levin who introduced evidence in a hearing in 2014 showing that JPMorgan Chase had rushed to hire a person who had bragged on his resume that he knew how to game electric markets.
Turnbull now has a second amended complaint pending before Judge Koeltl’s court. Bizarrely, JPMorgan’s lawyers from Morgan Lewis asked Koeltl to redact paragraphs 67 through 70 of that complaint because the bank claims that those paragraphs contain information that is subject to attorney-client privilege from an interview it conducted with Turnbull. But what actually happened was that the bank asked Turnbull to come and sit for an interview and explain what he knew about trading on the precious metals desk. He brought his own attorney. How that gives JPMorgan an attorney-client privilege with Turnbull should have raised red flags with a federal judge. It didn’t. The request was granted and paragraphs 67 through 70 are now a big, blacked out blob.
And in a perfect segue way, along comes the federal lawsuit brought by Shaquala Williams against JPMorgan Chase, also in the Southern District of New York under Judge Jed Rakoff. Williams tells the court in her complaint that JPMorgan Chase did not fulfill its promise under a deferred prosecution agreement to cooperate with the Justice Department – something that Judge Koeltl in the Turnbull case finds "implausible" to believe.
Williams is a financial crimes compliance professional with more than a decade of experience at multiple global banks. Part of Williams’ role at JPMorgan Chase was to make sure that the bank was in compliance with a non-prosecution agreement the bank had signed with the Justice Department in 2016.
The Justice Department had charged in 2016 that JPMorgan’s Asia subsidiary had engaged in quid pro quo agreements with Chinese officials to obtain investment- banking business and had falsified internal documents to cover up the activities. The quid pro quo agreements resulted in the bank putting the children of high Chinese government officials on its payroll in order to further its business interests in China.
In exchange for avoiding prosecution, the Justice Department required JPMorgan to create compliance controls around third-party payments. Williams alleges, among numerous other serious charges, that the so-called third- party payment controls were a sham and that when she blew the whistle to her superiors at the bank, the bank retaliated against her by firing her in October 2019.
The case is Shaquala Williams v JPMorgan Chase, Case Number 1:21-cv-09326, which was filed last November. Very conveniently, Morgan Lewis is representing JPMorgan Chase in this case as well as in the Turnbull case.
https://wallstreetonparade.com/2022/07/there-are-three-separate-cases-in-federal-court-accusing-jpmorgan-chase-of-a-culture-of-fraud/
There Are Three Separate Cases in Federal Court Accusing JPMorgan Chase of a Culture of Fraud
By Pam Martens and Russ Martens
July 19, 2022
JPMorgan Chase is the largest federally-insured bank in the United States. It is also one of the largest trading houses on Wall Street. That’s the Faustian bargain the Clinton administration entered into with Wall Street when it repealed the Glass-Steagall Act in 1999.
According to data from the FDIC, as of June 30 of last year, JPMorgan Chase Bank N.A. had 4,925 branches in 44 U.S. states holding $2.01 trillion in deposits. Many of those deposits belong to mom and pop savers who have no idea that the bank has admitted to five criminal felony counts since 2014 and has a rap sheet that is the envy of the Gambino crime family. (Apparently, a federal judge in New York overseeing a current JPMorgan case is just as naïve about the bank’s criminal history. More on that shortly.)
The bulk of Americans also do not know that neither federal regulators nor Congress nor the Board of Directors of JPMorgan Chase have demanded that the Chairman and CEO of JPMorgan Chase, Jamie Dimon, who has sat at the helm of the bank throughout this crime spree, be sacked. Dimon’s tenure has been propped up by a public relations machine and an obsequious mainstream media. (See here and here.)
Corruption of this magnitude can’t be swept under the rug forever, however. Today, three cases are playing out simultaneously in federal courts. Observed together, which no member of mainstream media is currently doing, they paint an undeniable picture of a bank which, as Senator Bernie Sanders would say, has adopted fraud as a profitable business model.
Let’s start with the case known as U.S. v. Smith playing out in the federal District Court for the Northern District of Illinois in Chicago. (Case number 1:19-cr-00669.) Federal prosecutors from the Justice Department have charged multiple traders on the precious metals desk of JPMorgan Chase with turning the trading desk into a racketeering enterprise from 2008 to 2016. For the first time that veterans on Wall Street can remember, the Justice Department is the using the RICO statute, typically reserved for members of organized crime, to charge JPMorgan’s traders. (The bank settled its own charges in September 2020 and paid $920 million in fines – a mere pittance in terms of the profits that were likely made on these "tens of thousands" of trades over a period of eight years.)
Making the situation extremely dicey for both the indicted traders and the bank’s reputation, federal prosecutors have called to testify two former precious metals traders on that desk who have pleaded guilty to related charges and are cooperating with prosecutors. (A third cooperating witness is expected to testify.) One of those cooperating witnesses, John Edmonds, told jurors that "Our job was to do whatever it takes to make money" and "Everyone at the time did it on the desk and it worked." When asked why he didn’t report the conduct to the compliance officers at the bank, Edmonds responded that "I would have been fired." This certainly suggests that he felt fraud was not just a standard practice at the bank but was an enshrined profit- making strategy.
Another cooperating witness, Corey Flaum, told jurors that the practice of manipulating precious metal prices (spoofing) was done out in the open and was "common practice."
While the indicted traders’ trial is playing out in Chicago, a trader on the precious metals desk who was not indicted for wrongdoing, Donald Turnbull, has brought charges against JPMorgan Chase in federal court in the Southern District of New York. Turnbull alleges that the bank trumped up false charges against him as a pretext to terminate him when it was actually terminating him for cooperating with the Department of Justice’s investigation. Turnbull states in the lawsuit that the indicted traders received better benefits when they were released from employment than he did. Despite a seriously-ill wife, Turnbull alleges in the lawsuit that JPMorgan Chase cancelled his health insurance, did not pay him severance, and took away his unvested stock awards.
Despite the unprecedented crime history of this bank, the Judge overseeing this case, John Koeltl, has been pretty much giving lawyers from Big Law firm, Morgan Lewis, who are representing JPMorgan Chase, everything they ask for.
For example, Judge Koeltl dismissed Turnbull’s first amended complaint on a motion to dismiss by Morgan Lewis on the basis that he found it "implausible" that the bank would retaliate against Turnbull for cooperating with the Justice Department when the bank itself was cooperating with the Justice Department.
Either the Judge is feigning naivete, engaging in willful blindness, or is actually ignorant of how JPMorgan actually "cooperates" with investigators and prosecutors. For example, JPMorgan Chase was smacked with two felony counts by the Justice Department in 2014 for its role in Bernie Madoff’s Ponzi scheme. The bank told its regulators in the U.K. that it believed Madoff was running a Ponzi scheme but failed to "cooperate" as it was required to under law by reporting its concerns to U.S. prosecutors and also failed to report red flags about Madoff’s money laundering to the Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN), a unit of the U.S. Treasury.
Then there was the 300-page report from the Senate’s Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations on how JPMorgan Chase had used more than $100 billion of depositors’ money to gamble in derivatives in London and lose $6.2 billion. The Chair of that Subcommittee at the time, Senator Carl Levin, wrote that the bank "piled on risk, hid losses, disregarded risk limits, manipulated risk models, dodged oversight, and misinformed the public."
If Senator Carl Levin were alive today, he would certainly not find it "implausible" that JPMorgan would retaliate against an employee cooperating with a criminal investigation. In fact, it was Senator Levin who introduced evidence in a hearing in 2014 showing that JPMorgan Chase had rushed to hire a person who had bragged on his resume that he knew how to game electric markets.
Turnbull now has a second amended complaint pending before Judge Koeltl’s court. Bizarrely, JPMorgan’s lawyers from Morgan Lewis asked Koeltl to redact paragraphs 67 through 70 of that complaint because the bank claims that those paragraphs contain information that is subject to attorney-client privilege from an interview it conducted with Turnbull. But what actually happened was that the bank asked Turnbull to come and sit for an interview and explain what he knew about trading on the precious metals desk. He brought his own attorney. How that gives JPMorgan an attorney-client privilege with Turnbull should have raised red flags with a federal judge. It didn’t. The request was granted and paragraphs 67 through 70 are now a big, blacked out blob.
And in a perfect segue way, along comes the federal lawsuit brought by Shaquala Williams against JPMorgan Chase, also in the Southern District of New York under Judge Jed Rakoff. Williams tells the court in her complaint that JPMorgan Chase did not fulfill its promise under a deferred prosecution agreement to cooperate with the Justice Department – something that Judge Koeltl in the Turnbull case finds "implausible" to believe.
Williams is a financial crimes compliance professional with more than a decade of experience at multiple global banks. Part of Williams’ role at JPMorgan Chase was to make sure that the bank was in compliance with a non-prosecution agreement the bank had signed with the Justice Department in 2016.
The Justice Department had charged in 2016 that JPMorgan’s Asia subsidiary had engaged in quid pro quo agreements with Chinese officials to obtain investment- banking business and had falsified internal documents to cover up the activities. The quid pro quo agreements resulted in the bank putting the children of high Chinese government officials on its payroll in order to further its business interests in China.
In exchange for avoiding prosecution, the Justice Department required JPMorgan to create compliance controls around third-party payments. Williams alleges, among numerous other serious charges, that the so-called third- party payment controls were a sham and that when she blew the whistle to her superiors at the bank, the bank retaliated against her by firing her in October 2019.
The case is Shaquala Williams v JPMorgan Chase, Case Number 1:21-cv-09326, which was filed last November. Very conveniently, Morgan Lewis is representing JPMorgan Chase in this case as well as in the Turnbull case.
https://wallstreetonparade.com/2022/07/there-are-three-separate-cases-in-federal-court-accusing-jpmorgan-chase-of-a-culture-of-fraud/
Kunstler: The Last Days of “Joe Biden”
By James Howard Kunstler
July 18, 2022
It’s like our country is trapped on one of those swirling carnival rides beloved of the county fairs… only, the felonious mutt who runs the ride has nodded off in a fentanyl delirium with the motor running at maximum speed… and the children-of-all-ages locked in the pods of this infernal machine shriek and vomit with each sickening rotation… as the half-century-old swing arms groan and wobble from metal fatigue on their squealing pivots… and suddenly comes a deafening crunch of gnashed gears, the smell of burning oil, and the pathetic whimpering of nearly dead.
That’s us. Some terrible midsummer accident-of-state has befallen the USA Carnival, and most are too dazed to know it. Whose idea was it to send the wind-up doll president called “Joe Biden” to Saudi Arabia? I can just imagine what went on in the chamber in private with “JB” and MBS (Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman), virtual autocrat of the oil-soaked desert land. The American visitor muttered something about wanting an ice-cream cone before dropping into a catatonic thousand-yard stare.
“How does this thing work?” MBS asks his chief vizier, the foreign minister (in Arabic, of course), gesticulating disdainfully at the ghostly figure sunk in the plush camel-hair armchair yards away. “Joe Biden” sits motionless. Someone has forgotten to rewind him, some “aide” who carries the president’s Adderall. Foreign Minister Faisal bin Farhan Al-Saud tells the boss, “We’ll make up some camel-dung for release to CNN and friends. They’ll fall for anything.”
It’s like a crime scene where the forensic experts have entered. The Saudi leader and his entourage only hang around the room for three minutes until the US State Department shoots enough photos to prove that “JB” was there and not stuffed in the basement of his Delaware beach house for the weekend, as usual. The American news media gets briefed: Saudi Arabia graciously agrees to bump up its oil production somewhere in the 2025-2027 time-frame — a triumph for US diplomacy, the networks are informed. Air Force One wings home through clouds of despair. The White House team members spend the flight updating their resumés.
I think we have witnessed “Joe Biden’s” final appearance at any world-stage event. He can do no more for the Party of Chaos. It has done what it can to wreck the joint with him as the pretend head-of-state. The Ukraine gambit is a bust, a foolish miscalculation that was obvious from the start. All it accomplished was to reveal the pitiful dependence of our European allies on Russian oil and gas, leaving their economies good and truly scuppered without it. The Russians end up with control of the Black Sea and probably the Ukraine bread-basket as well. So, now, Europe will starve and freeze.
Did they really want to commit suicide like that? Do the populations of Germany, France, Italy, the Netherlands, Spain, and the rest just aim to roll into oblivion? Probably not. Rather, we are entering the season of upended governments. The Schwabenklausian stooges implanted everywhere will be overthrown, NATO and the Euro Union will dissolve in impotent ignominy, and the various countries involved will have to renegotiate their destinies, forgoing US advice and coercion. They might even become adversaries of the USA, not allies. Did you forget we fought two wars against Germany not so long ago? And all those countries have been fighting each other since the Bronze Age, too.
History never stops reminding us what a prankster it is. A strange and terrible inversion has occurred in this Fourth Turning. Somehow, Mr. Putin’s Russia is left to represent what remains of international rule-of-law while the western democracies sink deeper into a morass of deranged despotism. Anyway, they are too busy conducting war against their own people to even pretend to assist their Ukrainian proxies. “Joe Biden” crammed nearly $60-billion into the Ukraine money laundering machine since February, which will just spew hallucinated capital back out into increasingly disordered financial markets. Look: the indexes are up world-wide this morning. Why? Because global business is so good? I don’t think so.
Moving toward autumn, what we have to look forward to is the blatant desperation of the claque behind “Joe Biden.” Their propaganda machine is going all-out on climate change and renewed Covid hysteria. There are always heat-waves in midsummer. CNN acts shocked that it’s over 100-degrees in Texas. Really? Never seen that before? Meanwhile, behind the news about emerging Omicron sub-variants, the vaccine injuries and deaths mount and the CDC pretends not to notice. They are just lying as usual. You’re used to it. You pretend it’s to be expected. You’ve forgotten that it wasn’t always so. Soon, it will matter.
https://kunstler.com/clusterfuck-nation/the-last-days-of-joe-biden/
Kunstler: The Last Days of “Joe Biden”
By James Howard Kunstler
July 18, 2022
It’s like our country is trapped on one of those swirling carnival rides beloved of the county fairs… only, the felonious mutt who runs the ride has nodded off in a fentanyl delirium with the motor running at maximum speed… and the children-of-all-ages locked in the pods of this infernal machine shriek and vomit with each sickening rotation… as the half-century-old swing arms groan and wobble from metal fatigue on their squealing pivots… and suddenly comes a deafening crunch of gnashed gears, the smell of burning oil, and the pathetic whimpering of nearly dead.
That’s us. Some terrible midsummer accident-of-state has befallen the USA Carnival, and most are too dazed to know it. Whose idea was it to send the wind-up doll president called “Joe Biden” to Saudi Arabia? I can just imagine what went on in the chamber in private with “JB” and MBS (Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman), virtual autocrat of the oil-soaked desert land. The American visitor muttered something about wanting an ice-cream cone before dropping into a catatonic thousand-yard stare.
“How does this thing work?” MBS asks his chief vizier, the foreign minister (in Arabic, of course), gesticulating disdainfully at the ghostly figure sunk in the plush camel-hair armchair yards away. “Joe Biden” sits motionless. Someone has forgotten to rewind him, some “aide” who carries the president’s Adderall. Foreign Minister Faisal bin Farhan Al-Saud tells the boss, “We’ll make up some camel-dung for release to CNN and friends. They’ll fall for anything.”
It’s like a crime scene where the forensic experts have entered. The Saudi leader and his entourage only hang around the room for three minutes until the US State Department shoots enough photos to prove that “JB” was there and not stuffed in the basement of his Delaware beach house for the weekend, as usual. The American news media gets briefed: Saudi Arabia graciously agrees to bump up its oil production somewhere in the 2025-2027 time-frame — a triumph for US diplomacy, the networks are informed. Air Force One wings home through clouds of despair. The White House team members spend the flight updating their resumés.
I think we have witnessed “Joe Biden’s” final appearance at any world-stage event. He can do no more for the Party of Chaos. It has done what it can to wreck the joint with him as the pretend head-of-state. The Ukraine gambit is a bust, a foolish miscalculation that was obvious from the start. All it accomplished was to reveal the pitiful dependence of our European allies on Russian oil and gas, leaving their economies good and truly scuppered without it. The Russians end up with control of the Black Sea and probably the Ukraine bread-basket as well. So, now, Europe will starve and freeze.
Did they really want to commit suicide like that? Do the populations of Germany, France, Italy, the Netherlands, Spain, and the rest just aim to roll into oblivion? Probably not. Rather, we are entering the season of upended governments. The Schwabenklausian stooges implanted everywhere will be overthrown, NATO and the Euro Union will dissolve in impotent ignominy, and the various countries involved will have to renegotiate their destinies, forgoing US advice and coercion. They might even become adversaries of the USA, not allies. Did you forget we fought two wars against Germany not so long ago? And all those countries have been fighting each other since the Bronze Age, too.
History never stops reminding us what a prankster it is. A strange and terrible inversion has occurred in this Fourth Turning. Somehow, Mr. Putin’s Russia is left to represent what remains of international rule-of-law while the western democracies sink deeper into a morass of deranged despotism. Anyway, they are too busy conducting war against their own people to even pretend to assist their Ukrainian proxies. “Joe Biden” crammed nearly $60-billion into the Ukraine money laundering machine since February, which will just spew hallucinated capital back out into increasingly disordered financial markets. Look: the indexes are up world-wide this morning. Why? Because global business is so good? I don’t think so.
Moving toward autumn, what we have to look forward to is the blatant desperation of the claque behind “Joe Biden.” Their propaganda machine is going all-out on climate change and renewed Covid hysteria. There are always heat-waves in midsummer. CNN acts shocked that it’s over 100-degrees in Texas. Really? Never seen that before? Meanwhile, behind the news about emerging Omicron sub-variants, the vaccine injuries and deaths mount and the CDC pretends not to notice. They are just lying as usual. You’re used to it. You pretend it’s to be expected. You’ve forgotten that it wasn’t always so. Soon, it will matter.
https://kunstler.com/clusterfuck-nation/the-last-days-of-joe-biden/
40 Million in US West Without Water in 2023 – Dane Wigington
By Greg Hunter
On July 16, 2022
Climate engineering researcher Dane Wigington says the extreme drought conditions in the U.S. are caused by man-made weather modification called geoengineering. It’s not some naturally occurring event, but an “engineered drought catastrophe.” Wigington says after decades of climate engineering, things are getting so bad that millions in the Southwestern United States will be without water sometime in 2023. Wigington explains, “The mainstream media and official sources are doing their best to sweep it under the rug. We are talking about 40 million people that will be impacted by the drying out of the Colorado River basin and tributaries.”
Los Angeles, San Diego, Phoenix, Tucson and Las Vegas are the few of the cities that are already struggling with severe water conservation restrictions. Wigington says, “Drought caused by man-made weather modification is not coming, it’s here now and will only get worse from here on out. . . . There is no speculation, no hypothesis or conjecture in any of this. Climate engineering is the primary cause for the protracted drought, and not just in the U.S. but in many other parts of the world. It also causes a deluge scenario, and all of it is crushing crops. We can speculate to the motives and agendas behind those who run these operations, but the fact that climate engineering is the primary causal factor for the western drought is inarguable.”
When will this all take place? Wigington’s data says, “When Lake Mead reaches the ‘dead-pool’ status, and we are not there yet, the estimations are the dead-pool might be early next year. Prior to that, right now, we are talking about extreme water rationing. That means the crops are being cut off now. It’s not coming, it’s happening now. . . . Water for irrigation is long since gone, and there will be no electrical power generation. . . . The evaporation levels are far higher than what has been disclosed. That means lake levels will drop far faster than even the worst-case official predictions right now. This is a runaway train of total cataclysm, and those in power are preventing anyone from even discussing this issue down to the point that there is an illegal federal gag order on the nation’s weathermen at the National Weather Service and NOAA.”
According to Wigington, one city will be spared from drying out for a while, and that is Las Vegas. There is a tunnel 600 feet below the surface of Lake Mead that will take water to Sin City long after the lake becomes a dead-pool and the Colorado River stops flowing. Wigington says, “This was an extraordinary engineering project. The only one of its type in many ways. . . . They had to have a specially designed tunnel boring machine for the 24-foot-wide tunnel that is designed to suck every last drop of water out of Lake Mead.” The project cost $1.5 billion.
Wigington says what is happening is being hidden for as long as possible, but what needs to happen now is to immediately stop man-made weather modification. Wigington says, “They can and are using this as a weapon to control food production and control populations in various regions. . . . This is a fight for life. People think if they get their shots and wear their masks that their life will go back to normal. It’s not going to happen. . . . Climate engineering is stopping the planet from recovering. . . It’s a weapon. . . . We have to stop it or we are done.”
There is much more in the 43-minute interview.
Join Greg Hunter of USAWatchdog.com on Rumble as he goes One-on-One with climate researcher Dane Wigington, founder of GeoEngineeringWatch.org.
https://rumble.com/v1cirlx-40-million-in-us-west-without-water-in-2023-dane-wigington.html
After the Interview:
There is vast and totally free data and scientific information on GeoEngineeringWatch.org.
To see “Drilling Under Lake Mead to Drain the Last Drop,” click here.
To see the popular movie called “The Dimming,” click here.
Fresh updated Geoengineering news can be found on the right-hand side of the site called “Global Alert News.” Click here for the latest newscast.
https://usawatchdog.com/40-million-in-us-west-without-water-in-2023-dane-wigington/
40 Million in US West Without Water in 2023 – Dane Wigington
By Greg Hunter
On July 16, 2022
Climate engineering researcher Dane Wigington says the extreme drought conditions in the U.S. are caused by man-made weather modification called geoengineering. It’s not some naturally occurring event, but an “engineered drought catastrophe.” Wigington says after decades of climate engineering, things are getting so bad that millions in the Southwestern United States will be without water sometime in 2023. Wigington explains, “The mainstream media and official sources are doing their best to sweep it under the rug. We are talking about 40 million people that will be impacted by the drying out of the Colorado River basin and tributaries.”
Los Angeles, San Diego, Phoenix, Tucson and Las Vegas are the few of the cities that are already struggling with severe water conservation restrictions. Wigington says, “Drought caused by man-made weather modification is not coming, it’s here now and will only get worse from here on out. . . . There is no speculation, no hypothesis or conjecture in any of this. Climate engineering is the primary cause for the protracted drought, and not just in the U.S. but in many other parts of the world. It also causes a deluge scenario, and all of it is crushing crops. We can speculate to the motives and agendas behind those who run these operations, but the fact that climate engineering is the primary causal factor for the western drought is inarguable.”
When will this all take place? Wigington’s data says, “When Lake Mead reaches the ‘dead-pool’ status, and we are not there yet, the estimations are the dead-pool might be early next year. Prior to that, right now, we are talking about extreme water rationing. That means the crops are being cut off now. It’s not coming, it’s happening now. . . . Water for irrigation is long since gone, and there will be no electrical power generation. . . . The evaporation levels are far higher than what has been disclosed. That means lake levels will drop far faster than even the worst-case official predictions right now. This is a runaway train of total cataclysm, and those in power are preventing anyone from even discussing this issue down to the point that there is an illegal federal gag order on the nation’s weathermen at the National Weather Service and NOAA.”
According to Wigington, one city will be spared from drying out for a while, and that is Las Vegas. There is a tunnel 600 feet below the surface of Lake Mead that will take water to Sin City long after the lake becomes a dead-pool and the Colorado River stops flowing. Wigington says, “This was an extraordinary engineering project. The only one of its type in many ways. . . . They had to have a specially designed tunnel boring machine for the 24-foot-wide tunnel that is designed to suck every last drop of water out of Lake Mead.” The project cost $1.5 billion.
Wigington says what is happening is being hidden for as long as possible, but what needs to happen now is to immediately stop man-made weather modification. Wigington says, “They can and are using this as a weapon to control food production and control populations in various regions. . . . This is a fight for life. People think if they get their shots and wear their masks that their life will go back to normal. It’s not going to happen. . . . Climate engineering is stopping the planet from recovering. . . It’s a weapon. . . . We have to stop it or we are done.”
There is much more in the 43-minute interview.
Join Greg Hunter of USAWatchdog.com on Rumble as he goes One-on-One with climate researcher Dane Wigington, founder of GeoEngineeringWatch.org.
https://rumble.com/v1cirlx-40-million-in-us-west-without-water-in-2023-dane-wigington.html
After the Interview:
There is vast and totally free data and scientific information on GeoEngineeringWatch.org.
To see “Drilling Under Lake Mead to Drain the Last Drop,” click here.
To see the popular movie called “The Dimming,” click here.
Fresh updated Geoengineering news can be found on the right-hand side of the site called “Global Alert News.” Click here for the latest newscast.
https://usawatchdog.com/40-million-in-us-west-without-water-in-2023-dane-wigington/
8:30a Housing Starts and Permits
Starts - Annual Rate 1.559M actual vs 1.591M (rev) prior
Permits - Annual Rate 1.685M actual vs 1.695M (rev) prior
Consensus Outlook
Housing starts and permits have been slowing and slowing sharply, falling to respective annual rates of 1.549 and 1.695 million in May, both of which were well below low estimates. June's expectations are a rebound for starts to 1.588 million but a further decline for permits to 1.666 million.
Definition
A housing start is registered at the start of construction of a new building intended primarily as a residential building. The start of construction is defined as the beginning of excavation of the foundation for the building.
8:30a Housing Starts and Permits
Starts - Annual Rate 1.559M actual vs 1.591M (rev) prior
Permits - Annual Rate 1.685M actual vs 1.695M (rev) prior
Consensus Outlook
Housing starts and permits have been slowing and slowing sharply, falling to respective annual rates of 1.549 and 1.695 million in May, both of which were well below low estimates. June's expectations are a rebound for starts to 1.588 million but a further decline for permits to 1.666 million.
Definition
A housing start is registered at the start of construction of a new building intended primarily as a residential building. The start of construction is defined as the beginning of excavation of the foundation for the building.
Today's Economic Calendar
8:30 Housing Starts and Permits
Today's Markets
In Asia, Japan +0.7%. Hong Kong -0.9%. China flat. India +0.5%.
In Europe, at midday, London +0.3%. Paris -0.1%. Frankfurt flat.
Futures at 6:20, Dow +0.6%. S&P +0.7%. Nasdaq +0.7%. Crude -0.3% to $99.13. Gold +0.1% to $1712.40. Bitcoin -1.5% to $21,895.
Ten-year Treasury Yield +3 bps to 2.99%
The world will be slaughtered like sheep
We're herded with nary a peep
Both silent and dumb
Destruction will come
With most of the herd still asleep
-The Limerick King
Today's Economic Calendar
8:30 Housing Starts and Permits
Today's Markets
In Asia, Japan +0.7%. Hong Kong -0.9%. China flat. India +0.5%.
In Europe, at midday, London +0.3%. Paris -0.1%. Frankfurt flat.
Futures at 6:20, Dow +0.6%. S&P +0.7%. Nasdaq +0.7%. Crude -0.3% to $99.13. Gold +0.1% to $1712.40. Bitcoin -1.5% to $21,895.
Ten-year Treasury Yield +3 bps to 2.99%
The world will be slaughtered like sheep
We're herded with nary a peep
Both silent and dumb
Destruction will come
With most of the herd still asleep
-The Limerick King
Kunstler: The Last Days of “Joe Biden”
By James Howard Kunstler
July 18, 2022
It’s like our country is trapped on one of those swirling carnival rides beloved of the county fairs… only, the felonious mutt who runs the ride has nodded off in a fentanyl delirium with the motor running at maximum speed… and the children-of-all-ages locked in the pods of this infernal machine shriek and vomit with each sickening rotation… as the half-century-old swing arms groan and wobble from metal fatigue on their squealing pivots… and suddenly comes a deafening crunch of gnashed gears, the smell of burning oil, and the pathetic whimpering of nearly dead.
That’s us. Some terrible midsummer accident-of-state has befallen the USA Carnival, and most are too dazed to know it. Whose idea was it to send the wind-up doll president called “Joe Biden” to Saudi Arabia? I can just imagine what went on in the chamber in private with “JB” and MBS (Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman), virtual autocrat of the oil-soaked desert land. The American visitor muttered something about wanting an ice-cream cone before dropping into a catatonic thousand-yard stare.
“How does this thing work?” MBS asks his chief vizier, the foreign minister (in Arabic, of course), gesticulating disdainfully at the ghostly figure sunk in the plush camel-hair armchair yards away. “Joe Biden” sits motionless. Someone has forgotten to rewind him, some “aide” who carries the president’s Adderall. Foreign Minister Faisal bin Farhan Al-Saud tells the boss, “We’ll make up some camel-dung for release to CNN and friends. They’ll fall for anything.”
It’s like a crime scene where the forensic experts have entered. The Saudi leader and his entourage only hang around the room for three minutes until the US State Department shoots enough photos to prove that “JB” was there and not stuffed in the basement of his Delaware beach house for the weekend, as usual. The American news media gets briefed: Saudi Arabia graciously agrees to bump up its oil production somewhere in the 2025-2027 time-frame — a triumph for US diplomacy, the networks are informed. Air Force One wings home through clouds of despair. The White House team members spend the flight updating their resumés.
I think we have witnessed “Joe Biden’s” final appearance at any world-stage event. He can do no more for the Party of Chaos. It has done what it can to wreck the joint with him as the pretend head-of-state. The Ukraine gambit is a bust, a foolish miscalculation that was obvious from the start. All it accomplished was to reveal the pitiful dependence of our European allies on Russian oil and gas, leaving their economies good and truly scuppered without it. The Russians end up with control of the Black Sea and probably the Ukraine bread-basket as well. So, now, Europe will starve and freeze.
Did they really want to commit suicide like that? Do the populations of Germany, France, Italy, the Netherlands, Spain, and the rest just aim to roll into oblivion? Probably not. Rather, we are entering the season of upended governments. The Schwabenklausian stooges implanted everywhere will be overthrown, NATO and the Euro Union will dissolve in impotent ignominy, and the various countries involved will have to renegotiate their destinies, forgoing US advice and coercion. They might even become adversaries of the USA, not allies. Did you forget we fought two wars against Germany not so long ago? And all those countries have been fighting each other since the Bronze Age, too.
History never stops reminding us what a prankster it is. A strange and terrible inversion has occurred in this Fourth Turning. Somehow, Mr. Putin’s Russia is left to represent what remains of international rule-of-law while the western democracies sink deeper into a morass of deranged despotism. Anyway, they are too busy conducting war against their own people to even pretend to assist their Ukrainian proxies. “Joe Biden” crammed nearly $60-billion into the Ukraine money laundering machine since February, which will just spew hallucinated capital back out into increasingly disordered financial markets. Look: the indexes are up world-wide this morning. Why? Because global business is so good? I don’t think so.
Moving toward autumn, what we have to look forward to is the blatant desperation of the claque behind “Joe Biden.” Their propaganda machine is going all-out on climate change and renewed Covid hysteria. There are always heat-waves in midsummer. CNN acts shocked that it’s over 100-degrees in Texas. Really? Never seen that before? Meanwhile, behind the news about emerging Omicron sub-variants, the vaccine injuries and deaths mount and the CDC pretends not to notice. They are just lying as usual. You’re used to it. You pretend it’s to be expected. You’ve forgotten that it wasn’t always so. Soon, it will matter.
https://kunstler.com/clusterfuck-nation/the-last-days-of-joe-biden/
Kunstler: The Last Days of “Joe Biden”
By James Howard Kunstler
July 18, 2022
It’s like our country is trapped on one of those swirling carnival rides beloved of the county fairs… only, the felonious mutt who runs the ride has nodded off in a fentanyl delirium with the motor running at maximum speed… and the children-of-all-ages locked in the pods of this infernal machine shriek and vomit with each sickening rotation… as the half-century-old swing arms groan and wobble from metal fatigue on their squealing pivots… and suddenly comes a deafening crunch of gnashed gears, the smell of burning oil, and the pathetic whimpering of nearly dead.
That’s us. Some terrible midsummer accident-of-state has befallen the USA Carnival, and most are too dazed to know it. Whose idea was it to send the wind-up doll president called “Joe Biden” to Saudi Arabia? I can just imagine what went on in the chamber in private with “JB” and MBS (Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman), virtual autocrat of the oil-soaked desert land. The American visitor muttered something about wanting an ice-cream cone before dropping into a catatonic thousand-yard stare.
“How does this thing work?” MBS asks his chief vizier, the foreign minister (in Arabic, of course), gesticulating disdainfully at the ghostly figure sunk in the plush camel-hair armchair yards away. “Joe Biden” sits motionless. Someone has forgotten to rewind him, some “aide” who carries the president’s Adderall. Foreign Minister Faisal bin Farhan Al-Saud tells the boss, “We’ll make up some camel-dung for release to CNN and friends. They’ll fall for anything.”
It’s like a crime scene where the forensic experts have entered. The Saudi leader and his entourage only hang around the room for three minutes until the US State Department shoots enough photos to prove that “JB” was there and not stuffed in the basement of his Delaware beach house for the weekend, as usual. The American news media gets briefed: Saudi Arabia graciously agrees to bump up its oil production somewhere in the 2025-2027 time-frame — a triumph for US diplomacy, the networks are informed. Air Force One wings home through clouds of despair. The White House team members spend the flight updating their resumés.
I think we have witnessed “Joe Biden’s” final appearance at any world-stage event. He can do no more for the Party of Chaos. It has done what it can to wreck the joint with him as the pretend head-of-state. The Ukraine gambit is a bust, a foolish miscalculation that was obvious from the start. All it accomplished was to reveal the pitiful dependence of our European allies on Russian oil and gas, leaving their economies good and truly scuppered without it. The Russians end up with control of the Black Sea and probably the Ukraine bread-basket as well. So, now, Europe will starve and freeze.
Did they really want to commit suicide like that? Do the populations of Germany, France, Italy, the Netherlands, Spain, and the rest just aim to roll into oblivion? Probably not. Rather, we are entering the season of upended governments. The Schwabenklausian stooges implanted everywhere will be overthrown, NATO and the Euro Union will dissolve in impotent ignominy, and the various countries involved will have to renegotiate their destinies, forgoing US advice and coercion. They might even become adversaries of the USA, not allies. Did you forget we fought two wars against Germany not so long ago? And all those countries have been fighting each other since the Bronze Age, too.
History never stops reminding us what a prankster it is. A strange and terrible inversion has occurred in this Fourth Turning. Somehow, Mr. Putin’s Russia is left to represent what remains of international rule-of-law while the western democracies sink deeper into a morass of deranged despotism. Anyway, they are too busy conducting war against their own people to even pretend to assist their Ukrainian proxies. “Joe Biden” crammed nearly $60-billion into the Ukraine money laundering machine since February, which will just spew hallucinated capital back out into increasingly disordered financial markets. Look: the indexes are up world-wide this morning. Why? Because global business is so good? I don’t think so.
Moving toward autumn, what we have to look forward to is the blatant desperation of the claque behind “Joe Biden.” Their propaganda machine is going all-out on climate change and renewed Covid hysteria. There are always heat-waves in midsummer. CNN acts shocked that it’s over 100-degrees in Texas. Really? Never seen that before? Meanwhile, behind the news about emerging Omicron sub-variants, the vaccine injuries and deaths mount and the CDC pretends not to notice. They are just lying as usual. You’re used to it. You pretend it’s to be expected. You’ve forgotten that it wasn’t always so. Soon, it will matter.
https://kunstler.com/clusterfuck-nation/the-last-days-of-joe-biden/
10:00a NAHB Housing Market Index
Index 55 actual vs 67 prior
Consensus Outlook
The housing market index has missed Econoday's consensus each and every report so far this year including June's 2-point loss to 67. July's consensus is 66.
Definition
The National Association of Home Builders produces a housing market index based on a survey in which respondents from this organization are asked to rate the general economy and housing market conditions. The housing market index is a weighted average of separate diffusion indexes: present sales of new homes, sales of new homes expected in the next six months, and traffic of prospective buyers in new homes.
10:00a NAHB Housing Market Index
Index 55 actual vs 67 prior
Consensus Outlook
The housing market index has missed Econoday's consensus each and every report so far this year including June's 2-point loss to 67. July's consensus is 66.
Definition
The National Association of Home Builders produces a housing market index based on a survey in which respondents from this organization are asked to rate the general economy and housing market conditions. The housing market index is a weighted average of separate diffusion indexes: present sales of new homes, sales of new homes expected in the next six months, and traffic of prospective buyers in new homes.
40 Million in US West Without Water in 2023 – Dane Wigington
By Greg Hunter
On July 16, 2022
Climate engineering researcher Dane Wigington says the extreme drought conditions in the U.S. are caused by man-made weather modification called geoengineering. It’s not some naturally occurring event, but an “engineered drought catastrophe.” Wigington says after decades of climate engineering, things are getting so bad that millions in the Southwestern United States will be without water sometime in 2023. Wigington explains, “The mainstream media and official sources are doing their best to sweep it under the rug. We are talking about 40 million people that will be impacted by the drying out of the Colorado River basin and tributaries.”
Los Angeles, San Diego, Phoenix, Tucson and Las Vegas are the few of the cities that are already struggling with severe water conservation restrictions. Wigington says, “Drought caused by man-made weather modification is not coming, it’s here now and will only get worse from here on out. . . . There is no speculation, no hypothesis or conjecture in any of this. Climate engineering is the primary cause for the protracted drought, and not just in the U.S. but in many other parts of the world. It also causes a deluge scenario, and all of it is crushing crops. We can speculate to the motives and agendas behind those who run these operations, but the fact that climate engineering is the primary causal factor for the western drought is inarguable.”
When will this all take place? Wigington’s data says, “When Lake Mead reaches the ‘dead-pool’ status, and we are not there yet, the estimations are the dead-pool might be early next year. Prior to that, right now, we are talking about extreme water rationing. That means the crops are being cut off now. It’s not coming, it’s happening now. . . . Water for irrigation is long since gone, and there will be no electrical power generation. . . . The evaporation levels are far higher than what has been disclosed. That means lake levels will drop far faster than even the worst-case official predictions right now. This is a runaway train of total cataclysm, and those in power are preventing anyone from even discussing this issue down to the point that there is an illegal federal gag order on the nation’s weathermen at the National Weather Service and NOAA.”
According to Wigington, one city will be spared from drying out for a while, and that is Las Vegas. There is a tunnel 600 feet below the surface of Lake Mead that will take water to Sin City long after the lake becomes a dead-pool and the Colorado River stops flowing. Wigington says, “This was an extraordinary engineering project. The only one of its type in many ways. . . . They had to have a specially designed tunnel boring machine for the 24-foot-wide tunnel that is designed to suck every last drop of water out of Lake Mead.” The project cost $1.5 billion.
Wigington says what is happening is being hidden for as long as possible, but what needs to happen now is to immediately stop man-made weather modification. Wigington says, “They can and are using this as a weapon to control food production and control populations in various regions. . . . This is a fight for life. People think if they get their shots and wear their masks that their life will go back to normal. It’s not going to happen. . . . Climate engineering is stopping the planet from recovering. . . It’s a weapon. . . . We have to stop it or we are done.”
There is much more in the 43-minute interview.
Join Greg Hunter of USAWatchdog.com on Rumble as he goes One-on-One with climate researcher Dane Wigington, founder of GeoEngineeringWatch.org.
https://rumble.com/v1cirlx-40-million-in-us-west-without-water-in-2023-dane-wigington.html
After the Interview:
There is vast and totally free data and scientific information on GeoEngineeringWatch.org.
To see “Drilling Under Lake Mead to Drain the Last Drop,” click here.
To see the popular movie called “The Dimming,” click here.
Fresh updated Geoengineering news can be found on the right-hand side of the site called “Global Alert News.” Click here for the latest newscast.
https://usawatchdog.com/40-million-in-us-west-without-water-in-2023-dane-wigington/