Fed Releases Scenarios For Second Bank Stress Test, May Extend Dividend, Buyback Limits

Moments ago the Fed announced two "hypothetical" scenarios for a second round of bank stress tests which will be held this year and whose results will be unveiled by the end of the year, marking the first time the Fed has examined banks more than once in a single year. The exams will show how lenders would be impacted by unemployment spiking as high as 12.5%, or well above the post Covid-shock level it’s at today. More importantly, the Fed also said that is considering extending the constraints on dividend payments and share buybacks imposed on US banks into the fourth quarter.

The Fed said it will decide whether to prolong the limits, which are scheduled to expire on Sept 30, by the end of September. Naturally, any extension through the end of the year would disappoint banks, as JPMorgan has already indicated it might resume buybacks in the fourth quarter if allowed to by regulators. On the other hand, cynics view the combination of unprecedented 2nd stress test and reappraisal of shareholder friendly activity as a smokescreen that will give the Fed a chance to announce an all clear, and having covered its back, it will then greenlight a return to normal buyback and dividend activity which was limited in June when it restricted banks from increasing their investor payouts above second-quarter levels and banning all buybacks.

In June, following pressure from lawmakers who argued banks shouldn’t be paying dividends during a pandemic, the Fed released the results of its first stress test which found that all large banks were sufficiently capitalized but in light of the heightened economic uncertainty, the Fed required banks to take several actions to preserve their capital levels in the third quarter of this year.

The Fed also said that as part of the second stress test, large banks would be tested against two scenarios featuring severe recessions to assess their resiliency under a range of outcomes. The stress tests will help to ensure "that large banks are able to lend to households and businesses even in a severe recession."

The test will evaluate the resilience of large banks by estimating their loan losses and capital levels—which provide a cushion against losses—under hypothetical recession scenarios over nine quarters into the future.

"The Fed's stress tests earlier this year showed the strength of large banks under many different scenarios," Vice Chair Randal K. Quarles said. "Although the economy has improved materially over the last quarter, uncertainty over the course of the next few quarters remains unusually high, and these two additional tests will provide more information on the resiliency of large banks."

The two hypothetical recessions in the scenarios feature severe global downturns with substantial stress in financial markets. The first scenario—the "severely adverse"—features the unemployment rate peaking at 12.5 percent at the end of 2021 and then declining to about 7.5 percent by the end of the scenario. Gross domestic product declines about 3 percent from the third quarter of 2020 through the fourth quarter of 2021. The scenario also features a sharp slowdown abroad.

https://www.zerohedge.com/markets/fed-releases-scenarios-second-bank-stress-test-may-extend-dividend-buyback-limits

Penn Judge Slashes Bail on Far Left Rioters Charged with Rioting and Arson in Lancaster, Pennsylvania

Judge Bruce Roth set bail this week at $1 million each for Lancaster, Pennsylvania far left rioters.

On Tuesday, Judge Roth hit several protesters in the pocketbook, setting their bail at $1 million each.

Lancaster, Pa., police arrested more than a dozen people and one juvenile after riots broke out about 3 a.m. on Monday, prompting police to fire tear gas to disperse the leftist mobs.

Twelve adults — Jamal Shariff Newman, 24; Barry Jones, 30; Frank Gaston, 43; Yoshua Dwayne Montague, 23; Matthew Modderman, 31; Talia Gessner, 18; Kathryn Patterson, 20; Taylor Enterline, 20; T-Jay Fry, 28; Dylan Davis, 28; Lee Alexander Wise, 29; Jessica Marie Lopez, 32 — face a slew of felony and misdemeanor charges, including arson, riot, institutional vandalism and criminal conspiracy.

But after an outcry from far left radicals and their parents Judge Dennis Reinaker reduced their bail on Thursday.

Reinaker reduced bail to $50,000 or $100,000 depending on the offense.

Politicians and criminal justice advocates alike expressed confusion and anger earlier this week when bail was set at $1 million for protesters facing charges of arson, vandalism and rioting, among others.

Judge Dennis Reinaker on Thursday lowered their bail to $50,000 or $100,000, depending on the individual and what they are accused of. The judge cited public opinion and several of the protesters’ petitions for modification in his decision.

Reinaker acknowledged the $1 million bail was set on the “spur of the moment,” but said “these are all serious matters we are dealing with,” according to a news release from the Lancaster County District Attorney’s Office.

Bail was originally set by Magisterial District Judge Bruce Roth.

First Deputy District Attorney Travis Anderson was not opposed to modifying bail, but asked that some protesters receive “substantial monetary bail” to be held responsible for their actions, according to the district attorney’s office.

https://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2020/09/penn-judge-slashes-bail-far-left-rioters-charged-rioting-arson-lancaster-pennsylvania/

Facebook Moves To Censor Internal Debate As More Employees Quit In Protest

After a handful of employees quit so they could speak out about Facebook's insufficient internal 'woke'-ness, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg has finally decided how he's going to handle what has been described as an internal rebellion.

The surge of anti-management sentiment within the company was likely provoked by accusations, spread by the mainstream press, about Facebook's alleged role in spreading "Russian" disinformation to help sway the election to President Trump, a narrative that the New Yorker - a publication that's almost revered by American intellectuals - quietly admitted was bs just a few days ago.

https://www.zerohedge.com/technology/facebook-moves-censor-internal-debate-more-employees-quit-protest

This Is Why Inflation Will Rip Everyone's Face Off

This is how market capitalism is supposed to work: consumers decide (for whatever reason) to buy more toilet paper. This increase in demand strips the shelves of TP and pushes the price up as demand exceeds supply.

In response, capital flows to enterprises that ramp up production of TP to meet this new demand / scarcity of supply. Price returns to equilibrium.

Yea for our wunnerful market capitalism … but oops, this isn't what actually happens in our economy. What actually happens is less of a happy story. As correspondent A.P. explained in Our Wile E. Coyote Economy: Nothing But Financial Engineering (June 12, 2020), the real money in the American economy isn't made by increasing production of goods and services or making better quality products; it's made with debt that funds financial trickery like stock buy-backs.

The "business" is just the facade used to justify the corporate bonds, loans, stock buy-backs, etc. Corporate America has perfected this game, and so have Wall Street and SillyCon Valley, which produces one money-losing unicorn after another that IPOs for tens of billions of dollars, all based on the pixie dust of future profits and valuations.

Production is for losers. Financial engineering is for winners. Simply put, capital has no interest in gambling on building factories and training employees. Not only is that risky, it's a low margin endeavor, which makes it of zero interest to capital.

How many billionaires have been minted in America in the past 20 years for building anything? Billionaires become billionaires by either hijacking the human mind's receptors for attention and addiction or by selling corporate bonds and leveraging the debt to skim billions of dollars.

Not only is capital not available to boost production, neither is the expertise or labor. A great many of the people with the hands-on experience needed to build stuff and manage complex production processes have retired or will soon retire, and there isn't a second team ready to take the field.

If production is absolutely necessary, then Corporate America will have it done on the cheap overseas. Sure, the quality is terrible but the American consumer will buy without question; that's why corporations went to all the trouble of establishing a heavily moated monopoly or cartel: the consumers have either no choice or a false choice between members of a cartel offering the same lousy quality and high prices.

But Corporate America's go-to solution to everythingglobalizationis running out of rope, and the cliff beckons.

http://charleshughsmith.blogspot.com/2020/09/this-is-why-inflation-will-rip.html

Former Foreign Exchange Trader Sentenced To Prison For Price Fixing And Bid Rigging

https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/former-foreign-exchange-trader-sentenced-prison-price-fixing-and-bid-rigging

Caution read carefully it's called DRACO from DARPA

New drug could cure nearly any viral infection

Researchers at MIT’s Lincoln Lab have developed technology that may someday cure the common cold, influenza and other ailments.

Most bacterial infections can be treated with antibiotics such as penicillin, discovered decades ago. However, such drugs are useless against viral infections, including influenza, the common cold, and deadly hemorrhagic fevers such as Ebola.

Now, in a development that could transform how viral infections are treated, a team of researchers at MIT’s Lincoln Laboratory has designed a drug that can identify cells that have been infected by any type of virus, then kill those cells to terminate the infection.

The microscope images above show that DRACO successfully treats viral infections. In the left set of four photos, rhinovirus (the common cold virus) kills untreated human cells (lower left), whereas DRACO has no toxicity in uninfected cells (upper right) and cures an infected cell population (lower right). Similarly, in the right set of four photos, dengue hemorrhagic fever virus kills untreated monkey cells (lower left), whereas DRACO has no toxicity in uninfected cells (upper right) and cures an infected cell population (lower right). | Enlarge image

In a paper published July 27 in the journal PLoS One, the researchers tested their drug against 15 viruses, and found it was effective against all of them — including rhinoviruses that cause the common cold, H1N1 influenza, a stomach virus, a polio virus, dengue fever and several other types of hemorrhagic fever.

The drug works by targeting a type of RNA produced only in cells that have been infected by viruses. “In theory, it should work against all viruses,” says Todd Rider, a senior staff scientist in Lincoln Laboratory’s Chemical, Biological, and Nanoscale Technologies Group who invented the new technology.

Because the technology is so broad-spectrum, it could potentially also be used to combat outbreaks of new viruses, such as the 2003 SARS (severe acute respiratory syndrome) outbreak, Rider says.

Other members of the research team are Lincoln Lab staff members Scott Wick, Christina Zook, Tara Boettcher, Jennifer Pancoast and Benjamin Zusman.

https://news.mit.edu/2011/antiviral-0810

'Very dangerous': Police and FBI investigate power poles cut with chainsaw in Snohomish County

Because of the potential for serious injury and the fact that someone is tampering with the public power supply, the FBI is now assisting in the investigation.

LYNNWOOD, Wash. — Several power poles in Snohomish County have been vandalized with a chainsaw. Now local authorities and the FBI are searching for a suspect and motive.

It started in the middle of the night last Wednesday with a power outage reported near Maple Road and Butternut Road, just outside Lynnwood city limits.

Snohomish County PUD crews quickly discovered it was no run-of-the-mill call.

"It appeared as though the power pole that had fallen had been cut," said PUD spokesman Cayle Thompson. "That was a first for us. That's not something we see very often. That's not something we see at all."

Someone had cut through the pole with a chainsaw, leaving it dangling from high voltage wires overhead, near a substation and in the middle of a neighborhood.

Lynnwood Police Commander Sean Doty said that case is especially unsettling considering the lines carry more than 12,000 volts. They are so powerful, you wouldn't even have to touch them to get electrocuted.

"That could've been a fatal situation for whoever was standing nearby," said Doty. "Just due to the proximity to the substation that's there and the current they're carrying. Very dangerous."

As if that weren't enough, it appears the same person tried to cut down four more poles between the popular Interurban Trail and I-5 near the Alderwood Mall.

"It doesn't take a lot of imagination to understand how dangerous this could've been if those poles had actually come down," said the PUD's Thompson.

Both police and the PUD are increasing patrols along the power lines.

Doty said he is especially concerned because this doesn't appear to be the work of a random vandal.

"It's scary," he said. "The determination that was shown, first being successful one day and then coming back and trying four more, that says to me it's more than just kids vandalizing. It's more serious."

Because of the potential for serious injury and the fact that someone is tampering with the public power supply, the FBI is now assisting in the investigation.

Lynnwood police have no suspects at this point and are still searching for a motive.

"That's being explored," said Doty. "We don't know yet. It could be somebody with a grudge. It could be something else. We just don't know."

Anyone with information should call Lynnwood police at 425-670-5600.

https://www.king5.com/article/news/crime/chainsaw-vandal-cutting-down-power-poles-in-snohomish-county-draws-attention-from-fbi/281-b9c5436c-f19a-418c-979e-f6ef459eca24

Injectable Biochip for SARS-CoV-2 Detection Near FDA Approval

The Silicon Valley company, Profusa,1 in partnership with the U.S. Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA),2 has created an injectable biosensor capable of detecting the presence of an infection in your body.3

In early August 2019, months before COVID-19 became a household word, DARPA granted Profusa additional funding “to develop an early identification system to detect disease outbreaks, biological attacks and pandemics up to three weeks earlier than current methods.”4

As discussed in “Will New COVID Vaccine Make You Transhuman?” we appear to stand at the doorway of a brave new world in which man is increasingly merged with technology and artificial intelligence, and COVID-19 may well be the key that opens that door, in more ways than one.

For starters, many of the COVID-19 vaccines currently being fast-tracked are not conventional vaccines. Their design is aimed at manipulating your own biology, essentially creating genetically modified humans.

Combined with hydrogel biosensors — which do not suffer from rejection as foreign bodies like earlier implants, instead becoming one with your own tissue5 — we may also find ourselves permanently connected to the internet-based cloud, for better or worse.

Hydrogel Chip Will Connect You to the Internet

Hydrogel is a DARPA invention that involves nanotechnology and nanobots. This “bioelectronic interface” is part of the COVID-19 mRNA vaccines’ delivery system.

The biochip being developed by Profusa is similar to the proposed COVID-19 mRNA vaccines in that it utilizes hydrogel. The implant is the size of a grain of rice, and connects to an online database that will keep track of changes in your biochemistry and a wide range of biometrics, such as heart and respiratory rate and much more.

Nanotechnology could theoretically be used to make mind-control systems, invisible and mobile eavesdropping devices, or unimaginably horrific tools of torture. ~ Adam Keiper

A September 2019 paper6 describes how the injectable sensor can help improve monitoring for peripheral artery disease. However, while it might be convenient, this kind of technology will also have immediate ramifications for our privacy. Who will collect and have access to all this data? Who will be responsible for protecting it? How will it be used, and when? As noted in a SteemKR article discussing the implants:7

“Along with the advent of in-body nanotechnology, and sensors which tie the human body to an artificial intelligence platform, the possibilities for misuse by totalitarian governments has not been lost on technology watchdogs. With advanced biosensors, artificial intelligence may be able to read the subject’s every mood and activity, heart rate, respiratory rate, body temperature, even sexual activity.”

How the Biosensor Works

In a March 3, 2020, article, Defense One explains the basics of how the biosensor works:8

“The sensor has two parts. One is a 3mm string of hydrogel, a material whose network of polymer chains is used in some contact lenses and other implants. Inserted under the skin with a syringe, the string includes a specially engineered molecule that sends a fluorescent signal outside of the body when the body begins to fight an infection.

The other part is an electronic component attached to the skin. It sends light through the skin, detects the fluorescent signal and generates another signal that the wearer can send to a doctor, website, etc. It’s like a blood lab on the skin that can pick up the body’s response to illness before the presence of other symptoms, like coughing.”

So, to recap, the technology consists of three components:9 the implanted sensor, a reader placed on the surface of the skin, and the software that allows the reader to send the collected data via Bluetooth to your phone or tablet, which in turn can be connected to other online sources such as your doctor’s website.

More

https://www.lewrockwell.com/2020/09/joseph-mercola/injectable-biochip-for-sars-cov-2-detection-near-fda-approval/

Objective:Health: - Health News Censorship on the Rise

Censorship on social media is nothing new, but it seems like the major platforms are having a field day with it lately. It's usually in the realm of politics, but recently a few notable alternative health sites and personalities have been censored.

Green Med Info, a truly great site which documents published, peer-reviewed studies on the evidence for natural and alternative medicines, was recently given the boot from Instagram and Linked-In (to which everyone replied, "Linked-In?"). Dr. Mercola has had multiple videos recently banned from YouTube and controversial carnivore advocate Mikhaila Peterson has been demonetized on the platform. Also, during the Joe Rogan podcast's recent switch to Spotify, Mikhaila's interview was among the many that were conspicuously absent.

Is there another purge coming? What is so dangerous about this health information that we need to be prevented from accessing it? Join us for a rousing discussion about social media censorship of alternative health.

https://www.sott.net/article/441450-Objective-Health-Health-News-Censorship-on-the-Rise

Why Speaking English May Spread More Coronavirus Than Other Languages

https://www.forbes.com/sites/alisonescalante/2020/09/08/why-speaking-english-may-spread-more-coronavirus-than-other-languages/#75feb93f6eea

Full retard

>>10686488

don't eat/ingest their poison don't get sick