Recently, the Japanese government announced that they will be shutting down the remaining 7 nuclear reactors at the Daiichi plant that was hit by a major earthquake and tsunami in 2011. This will bring the total number of nuclear reactors down to 33 (compared to 54 in 2011), only 7 of which are in active operation at any given time. Contrary to popular belief, this is not a good thing. mehr hier
Central banks aim for price stability, and today, prices are largely stable across much of the developed world. Yet central bankers declare themselves unsatisfied. Some policymakers, most notably at the European Central Bank, are even preparing further stimulus measuresaimed at convincing financial markets of their resolve to fight deflation. But such policies overestimate the risk of falling prices. mehr hier
If negative rates become more widespread across the globe, then the financial system needs to be rebuilt on a new set of assumptions. The problem is we do not yet know what those should be or how they would work. mehr hier
“….I’ve had many strange experiences in my decades of covering intelligence affairs. These run from being invited to KGB HQ in Moscow, Chinese intelligence in Beijing, US intelligence in Virginia, Libyan intelligence in Tripoli, South African intelligence, and even Albanian intelligence in Tirana. But none was odder than the day I was invited to lunch in New York City with the by now notorious figure Jeffrey Epstein. The golden boy of Manhattan and Palm Beach society now sits in a grim jail cell accused of having sex with underage girls. He’s been doing this in plain view since the early 1990’s but, until recently, he seemed bullet-proof. weiter gehts hier
Everyone has to start somewhere. While the modern fortunes of people like Jeff Bezos and Bill Gates seem stratospheric in size, even the world’s richest self-made billionaires had to crawl before they could walk. After all, as Visual Capitalist’s Jeff Desjardins writes, the journey to becoming ultra-wealthy hinges on earning that very first $1 million – the initial pillar of wealth that helps provide the security and confidence to go all-in on later ventures and investments. mehr hier
If there is one big takeaway from the recent European Parliamentary elections it is that centrist parties which stand for nothing in particular represent a lot fewer people. From both the ‘left’ and the ‘right’ the center lost ground across Europe. mehr hier
The citizens of the European Union are called to vote this week for the European Parliament. It is not a real parliament, and it lacks prospects for becoming one, since all important decisions are taken by the unelected heads of the European Commission and the European Central Bank, dubbed “the worst-run Central Bank in the world”. mehr hier
“… Western Europe is home to a cluster of developed economies that boost some of the highest standards of living in the world. But that could soon change. Because as Evan Horowitz writes on NBC News’s new “Think” vertical, IQ scores in France, Scandinavia, Britain, Germany and even Australia are beginning to decline. The trend has been well-documented across Western Europe, and could soon carry over to the US as well. Which means the data have confirmed what millions of Americans who have watched cable news or logged on to twitter over the past three years probably already suspected: The world is getting dumber. mehr hier
China’s China Central Television has briefly revealed the country’s new hypersonic aircraft under development. According to the report, the China Aerospace Science and Technology Corporation is currently working on a hypersonic vehicle, which is capable of traveling on the speeds of about 5-20 mach for about 5 hours. mehr hier
Japanese adults are not getting laid, according to a new study which found that around 25% of heterosexual Japanese adults between ages 18 and 39 have never had sex. mehr hier
Business Insider published a piece on April 1st about plans to build Western Europe’s tallest skyscraper…in a small, rural Danish town with just 7,000 residents. After I posted it on Twitter, many of my followers thought it was an April Fool’s joke due to how absurd the idea is. Even I had to do a little research to confirm that it wasn’t a joke, but it is indeed a true story – faszinierend, hier