SAM662 USAF G5 nw from JBA depart
This is most likely Deputy Sec. of State departing for Japan
>>72599 pb Senior US diplomat Sherman to visit Japan, South Korea, Mongolia
SAM814 USAF C-40B departed JBA west
This AC took a trip to Norfolk Int'l, VA and back to JBA as SAM806 yesterday
>morning
Morning B
morning W
Suga Cabinet approval falls to record low 29.3% in Jiji poll
The public approval rate for Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga’s Cabinet came to 29.3% in July, the lowest level since its launch in September last year, a Jiji Press monthly opinion survey showed Friday.
The figure, down 3.8 percentage points from June, is the first reading below 30% for a Japanese Cabinet since July 2017, when the Cabinet of then-Prime Minister Shinzo Abe was grilled over a favoritism scandal involving school operator Kake Gakuen, headed by a friend of Abe. Prime ministers are said to face danger if their Cabinets approval rates slide below 30%. The disapproval rate rose 5.6 points to 49.8%, the highest level for Suga’s Cabinet, according to the survey, conducted between last Friday and Monday. On July 8, the government decided to declare its fourth COVID-19 state of emergency for Tokyo. Later, its attempt to put “pressure” on bars and restaurants that defy a government request to stop serving alcohol in the emergency areas drew criticism.
The approval rate for the Suga Cabinet hit the lowest level apparently because of continued restrictions on daily lives amid the pandemic and concerns over the Tokyo Olympics, set to kick off on July 23. The previous low for his Cabinet was 32.2%, marked in May, when the government decided to extend its third COVID-19 state of emergency and expand its scope. In the July survey, the proportion of respondents who negatively rated the government’s response to the virus crisis grew 4.0 points to 59.1%, while that of those who supported the response fell 0.5 point to 22.7%. Respondents who answered neither or said they do not know accounted for 18.2%.
Of all respondents, 71.5% said that the pace of the nation’s COVID-19 vaccination program, branded by Suga as the trump card in the fight against the virus, has been slow, far exceeding 17.7% who said the program is steadily moving forward, while 10.8% answered neither or said they do not know.
https://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2021/07/16/national/suga-cabinet-approval-low/
aye
How come Joe Biden's jackboots can go door to door forcing vaccines on people and Biden's Justice Department doesn't want Arizona canvassers to go door to door to see if voters at those addresses are legal or exist?
https://twitter.com/RealPNavarro/status/1416043247227609089
Options Volumes Hit Record, Concentrated In Just Five Stocks
Last August, in the middle of the low-volume summer doldrums, tech names exploded higher for several weeks in a move which stumped traders only for it to be reveled (on this website first) that the action was due to an attempt by SoftBank's brand new public equity trading desk to ramp gamma higher in tech names.
The start of July witnessed an almost identical move, as FAAMG names soared higher driven by a surge in call buying. And, while we doubt SoftBank is behind the latest move the sharp increase in options trading activity to start July - July 2nd recorded the highest day of single stock options trading in history - has driven month-to-date average daily notional traded to all-time-highs.
According to Goldman's Vishal Vivek, strong options trading activity in single stocks, dominated by volumes in AMZN, TSLA, AAPL, NVDA and GOOGL, have driven average daily value traded to an all time high: $534 BN of options have traded on the average day in July (including $348bn in call options), well above the prior year average of $367bn.
As shown in cap #2, otions trading has been concentrated in a handful of stocks, with 64% of all trading this month in just 5 names (AMZN, TSLA, AAPL,NVDA, GOOGL), while 87% in the top 50 underliers. And as has been the case for much of the past year, investors have increasingly focused on trading ultra short-dated options; options with less than 2 weeks to expiry comprise 75% of all trades.
What is notable is that whereas recent bursts of option activity which culminated in the first quarter of 2021 targeted meme stocks, this time the call buyers are going for the FAAMGs themselves. It remains unclear if buyers of call are institutions or retail buyers - it is reasonable that if a big names was behind the ramp it would have leaked by now - it is certainly the case that absent continued option inflows, the push higher in the gigatech "generals" - which have almost single-handedly managed to push stocks to all time highs even as market breadth has collapsed...... will halt and reverse, something we are already seeing in Amazon and Microsoft. Should this reversal accelerate, and if the market's leadership fails to sustain the recent push higher, then all bets are off.
https://www.zerohedge.com/markets/options-volumes-hit-record-concentrated-just-five-stocks