Here's a statement of the obvious: The opinions expressed here are those of the participants, not those of the Mutual Fund Observer. We cannot vouch for the accuracy or appropriateness of any of it, though we do encourage civility and good humor.
It was not a good week for free-market capitalism!
The Trump administration is pursuing investments in quantum-computing companies.
The government would become a shareholder in exchange for helping fund promising technology companies.
Potential targ…
It was not a good week for hundreds of thousands of civilian federal workers!
President Trump plans to pay federal immigration agents, FBI special agents, U.S. Border Patrol officers,
and active-duty military personnel during the government shutdown…
It was not a good week for U.S. cattle ranchers!
President Trump's administration plans to quadruple Argentinian beef imports.
Lowering U.S. beef prices was the stated goal for the large increase in imports.
"But hiking imports has angered U.S. ran…
"Note: The govt. plans to grant back pay to the workers Trump didn’t fire.
We’ll see how that goes."
This is how things normally work during government shutdowns.
Earlier this month, Trump warned that certain government employees may not receive ba…
"But, from the included graphic it appeared that employers pick up about 60-70% of the premium on average."
I recently read (or saw) that premiums for ACA insurance and private healthcare insurance were similar.
Employer subsidies accounted for the…
"Millions of Americans are bracing themselves for a significant hike in their 2026 health insurance premiums
without the subsidies at the center of the government shutdown battle.
It comes as insurance costs are rising significantly throughout the c…
From Heather Cox Richardson's Letters from an American newsletter.
“It’s not his house. It’s your house [emphasis added]. And he’s destroying it.”
Yesterday, former first lady Hillary Rodham Clinton cut to the heart of President Donald J. Trump’s
…
From Heather Cox Richardson's Letters from an American newsletter.
Today the Pentagon announced a new press corps to cover Hegseth and the Defense Department
after the traditional pool turned in their press badges rather than agree to publish only …
"In trying to access the "Discussions" page I just received an "Unable to complete this request at this time... please try again later" error message.
The second attempt went OK.
I've also experienced the same issue intermittently starting several …
He is tearing down democracy and tearing down govt institutions.
The demolition of the White House is somewhat symbolic of the mass destruction
that he has "championed".
I agree.
From Markets A.M. newsletter by Spencer Jakab.
On this day in 1929, Yale professor Irving Fisher, one of the nation’s foremost economists, said:
“The breaks of the past few days have driven stocks down to hard rock.
I believe that we will have a ra…
From Markets A.M. newsletter by Spencer Jakab.
On this day in 1929, William Peter Hamilton, editor of The Wall Street Journal
and one of the leading advocates of the "Dow Theory" of technical analysis,
correctly predicted the coming demise of the b…
From Heather Cox Richardson's Letters from an American newsletter published this evening.
Although the U.S. government has been shut down now for 20 days, leaving vital public servants without pay, work on Trump’s 90,000-square-foot ballroom has co…
From Heather Cox Richardson's Letters from an American newsletter published this evening.
Although the U.S. government has been shut down now for 20 days, leaving vital public servants without pay, work on Trump’s 90,000-square-foot ballroom has co…
The following U.S. Code seems to contradict Mr. Scharf's statement above.
40 U.S. Code § 8711 - National Capital Planning Commission
(a) Establishment and Purpose.—
The National Capital Planning Commission is the central federal planning agency
fo…
Karoline Leavitt, the White House press secretary, said “Nothing will be torn down,”
when she announced this project in July.
Like seemingly everyone in the Trump administration, Ms. Leavitt is a habitual liar.
The White House has proceeded with the…
"That's why I never update anything unless forced to, and then kicking and screaming every inch of the way.
If it works don't f___ with it !!"
This is a very good philosophy.
I would make an exception for security vulnerabilities.
Interesting to find out via this outage that most customers (including large ones) do not use the disaster recovery features of DynamoDB. Maybe this is AWS nudging them to do so :)
It appears that many customers did not implement the redundancy need…
DNS resolution issues impacting the DynamoDB API endpoint were the root cause for this outage.
DynamoDB is a centralized database service that many internet-based services
use to store key data, track user information, and manage operations.
Althoug…
A non-partisan law journal analyzed hundreds of suits filed against the administration.
In 35 cases, judges appointed by Democrats and Republicans specifically stated
that the government provided false information — including sworn declarations.
• …
From Markets A.M. newsletter by Spencer Jakab.
"On this day in 1803, the U.S. Senate ratified the Louisiana Purchase Treaty,
under which the U.S. paid France less than 3 cents an acre for 828,000 square miles of territory."
This land included the …
I think anything published by Zero Hedge needs to be fact checked.
Factual reporting on the ZeroHedge website is rated low by Media Bias Fact Check.
https://mediabiasfactcheck.com/zero-hedge/
Went to the Seattle No Kings rally earlier today.
Organizers reported preliminary counts of nearly 90,000 people in attendance.
March was peaceful with people of all ages participating.
Many creative signs and costumes.
I would characterize the even…
From Heather Cox Richardson's Letters from an American.
"The Antideficiency Act, a law that has evolved over time since 1870, prohibits the government from spending money that Congress has not appropriated for that purpose, or agreeing to contracts…
Organizers expect the number of participants to far exceed the 5 million
demonstrators who turned out for June's "No Kings" day.
Get out there if you can...
From Markets A.M. newsletter by Spencer Jakab.
On this day in 1878, Thomas Alva Edison, backed by J.P. Morgan,
established the Edison Electric Light Co. to commercialize his month-old incandescent light.
The Week in Charts (10/15/25)
The State of the Markets, including...
00:00 Intro
00:27 Stocks
13:09 Bonds/Fed
21:34 Real Estate/Housing
27:53 Commodities
33:56 Currencies
35:36 Crypto
36:51 Intermarket
41:54 Economy
Video
Blog
From Markets A.M. newsletter by Spencer Jakab.
On this day in 1929, with stocks down sharply from their September peak,
the head of one of the nation's largest brokers reassured anxious investors.
"The markets generally are now in a healthy conditi…
"But, it is Another Good Week for Heaven!
trump acknowledged to a reporters question that he is fairly certain that he is not going to Heaven."
Of course Trump will never, ever go to heaven.
I sure wish the process of sending him straight to hell …
From Markets A.M. newsletter by Spencer Jakab.
On this day in 1989, Friday the 13th, Wall Street took an unlucky pounding.
The proposed leveraged buyout of United Airlines hit a funding snag
and the Dow plunged almost 7%.
It was the end of the 1980…
I could access the primary M* website and Portfolio Manager as of 23:23 PT on 10/12.
Yesterday there were some Portfolio Manager quirks — webpages sometimes would not display/refresh.
"My family received our flu and COVID shots this weekend.
We live in Western state where our insurance policy cover all vaccination;
no approval from physicians is required."
I also live in a western state (WA) and received my flu and COVID-19 shot…
Raoul Peck, director and producer of a new documentary called "Orwell: 2+2=5”,
discusses actions totalitarian/authoritarian regimes often implement to control their populations.
For anyone paying attention — and not indoctrinated by the MAGA bullshi…
This is shameful and unacceptable.
What the hell is Robert F. Kennedy Jr. doing to protect U.S. residents from this scourge?
The HHS Secretary is incompetent and unqualified — he needs to resign his position.
