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FBI director: iPhones shields pedophiles from cops

NEW YORK (CNNMoney) Apple’s new privacy features protect kidnappers, pedophiles and terrorists, according to FBI director James Comey. In an interview on CBS’ “60 Minutes” on Sunday, Comey said Apple’s encryption standards for iPhones and iPads “put people beyond the law.” Apple (AAPL, Tech30) recently took measures to enhance user privacy. Now, only users have […]

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Dallas Nurse Caught Ebola Because CDC Protocols Are Inadequate

Building Safer Protocols Isn’t Rocket Science … It’s Just Common Sense A nurse in Dallas has caught Ebola even though she was wearing full protective gear. The Centers for Disease Control says she must have broken protocol, or else she couldn’t have caught it.  Maybe she did … or maybe CDC assumptions are overly-optimistic. But […]

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Who Will Save Stocks Now?

The stock market is in a perilous state.
Ever since 2008, anytime stocks began to collapse sharply, “someone” stepped in and put a floor under the market.
In 2010, the S&P 500 staged a death cross, where its 50-DMA broke below its 126-DMA (the half year moving average). Stocks were in a perilous state with the 2008 Crash still in everyone’s short-term memory.
The Fed stepped in, hinting at, then all but promising, and then finally launching QE 2 in July, August, and then November, respectively.
This set off a rally in stocks that lasted until the EU Crisis erupted in full force in 2011. Once again stocks staged a death cross. And once again, the Fed stepped in with promises of action followed by the announcement of Operation Twist in September 2011. Stocks took off and we were back to the races.
Which brings us to 2012. Europe was really going down in flames. Greece, then Portugal, and even Spain were lining up for bailouts. And the bailouts were getting larger by the month with Spain requesting €100 billion in June 2012.
ECB President Mario Draghi promised to do “whatever it takes” to hold the EU together. But the carnage was spilling over even into US markets. So Bernanke’s Fed promised yet another QE program, though this new program would be “open-ended” in June.
Sure enough, Bernanke unveiled QE 3 in September 2012. He then upped the ante, unveiling QE 4 in November 2012.
Stocks took off again, launching one of the sharpest, strongest rallies in history:
Which brings us to today. Stocks once again are in trouble, having taken out their 50-DMA, and the 126-DMA. We’re likely just a few weeks away from another “death cross”… and the Fed is fully committed to ending QE at the end of the month.
Moreover, the ECB is having trouble engaging in QE because Germany is not overly fond of the idea. China just announced that it will not engage in a large scale stimulus program in the near future. And the Bank of Japan has admitted it will likely not announce another massive QE program anytime too soon.
So who will save stocks this time?
If you’ve yet to take action to prepare for the second round of the financial crisis, we offer a FREE investment report Financial Crisis “Round Two” Survival Guide that outlines easy, simple to follow strategies you can use to not only protect your portfolio from a market downturn, but actually produce profits.
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“Non-Official Cover” – Respected German journalist blows whistle on how the CIA controls the media

“I was bribed by billionaires, I was bribed by the Americans to report…not exactly the truth.” – Udo Ulfkotte, former editor of one of Germany’s main daily publications, Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung © Wikimedia Commons Some readers will see this and immediately dismiss it as Russian propaganda since the interview appeared on RT. This would be […]

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Large new study reveals how harmful psychological abuse in childhood can be

Children who are neglected and emotionally abused experience similar, if not worse, psychological problems than those who are sexually or physically abused. Despite this, childhood victims of psychological mistreatment rarely receive treatment and their suffering frequently goes unidentified. Those are the conclusions of a new study of 5,616 youths who had faced different types of […]

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70-90% efficiency: Russia to send Ebola vaccine to W. Africa in 2 months

In two months, Russia is planning to send a new experimental vaccine against Ebola to Africa, according to the country’s health minister. The efficiency of the drug, which is to be tested on the ground, is about 70-90 percent. “Today we are discussing that we will have enough of Triazoverin vaccine in two months so […]

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Russia’s two largest banks plan SWIFT alternative

The two biggest banks in Russia, Sberbank and VTB, are in talks to create an alternative to the SWIFT global system for interbank financial communications, VTB head Andrey Kostin said.
According to Kostin, Russia has two options: either use the system run by the Russian Central Bank or create a new homegrown transaction platform.
“There is an alternative, we can use the Central Bank system that is already in operation, and we may make our own, we are already in discussions with Sberbank,” Kostin told reporters in Washington DC, where he is for the annual fall meetings of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and World Bank.
However, the catch with the Central Bank’s international transaction system is the price.
“It’s expensive, in fact several times more expensive than the SWIFT payment system,” the VTB head said.
“If we create our own interbank system, which isn’t difficult at all and we are in the process of doing, it will be cheaper. And then hold talks with the Central Bank,” Kostin said.
Switching Russia off SWIFT, the Society for Worldwide Interbank Financial Telecommunication, would instantly isolate it from global finance, as happened with Iran in 2012. According to reports, EU leaders, especially in Britain, were discussing the option as a sort of super sanctions to punish Russia for its involvement in the Ukraine crisis. Many US senators have also been pushing to block Russia from SWIFT payments.
SWIFT, the Brussels-based global payments system, said last week that they wouldn’t succumb to political pressure and cut Russian payments and would continue services. The group said that disconnecting Russia violates the company’s mission and that it doesn’t make such unilateral decisions.
However because it’s based in Brussels, it would have to comply with any greater EU ruling.
Last month the SWIFT system transmitted more than 21 million financial messages a day between more than 10,500 financial institutions and corporations in 215 countries.
The Russian National SWIFT Association, or ROSSWIFT for short, is the second biggest worldwide, after the US.

http://rt.com/business/195472-russia-sberbank-vtb-swift/ 

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“Prepare For Runs”, IMF Warns Policymakers Of “Elevated Financial Stability & Liquidity Risks”

The extended period of monetary accommodation and the accompanying search for yield are leading to credit mispricing and asset price pressures, increasing the chance that financial stability risks could derail the recovery.
 [6]
Concerns have shifted to the shadow banking system, especially the growing share of illiquid credit in mutual fund portfolios.
Should asset markets come under stress, an adverse feedback loop between outflows and asset performance could develop, moving markets from a low- to a high-volatility state, with negative implications for emerging market economies.
 [7]
Funds investing in credit instruments have a number of features that could result in elevated financial stability risks.

First is a mismatch in liquidity offered by investment funds with redemption terms that may be inconsistent with the liquidity of underlying assets. Many credit funds hold illiquid credit instruments that trade infrequently in thin secondary markets.

Second is the large amount of assets concentrated in the hands of a few managers. This concentration can result in “brand risk,” given that end-investor allocation decisions are increasingly driven by the perceived brand quality of the asset management firm. Sharp drawdowns in one fund of an asset manager could propagate redemptions across funds for that particular asset manager if its brand reputation is damaged, for example through illiquidity or large losses.

Third is the concentration of decision making across funds of an individual fund manager, which can reduce diversification benefits, increase brand risk, or both.

Fourth is the concentrated holdings of individual issuers, which can exacerbate price adjustments.

Fifth is the rise in retail participation, which can increase the tendency to follow the herd.

These features could exacerbate the feedback loop between negative fund performance and outflows from the sector, leading to further pressure on prices and the risk of runs on funds. These risks could become more prominent in the coming year as the monetary policy tightening cycle begins to gain traction.
 [8]
Such stress might be triggered as part of the exit from unconventional monetary policy or by other sources, including a sharp retrenchment from risk taking due to higher geopolitical risks.
And, as we have discussed numerous times previously, less liquidity is available from traditional liquidity
providers…
 [9]
The IMF is worried…

Policymakers and markets need to prepare for structural higher market volatility. Doing so requires strengthening the system’s ability to absorb sudden portfolio adjustments, as well as addressing structural liquidity weaknesses and vulnerabilities.

Advanced economies with financial markets at risk for runs and fire sales may need to put in place mechanisms to unwind funds should they come under substantial pressure that threatens wider financial stability.

Source: IMF

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