China's Uyghur Camps, Inflation in the 70s, and Elon Musk

Tuesday morning news drop

• The faces from China’s Uyghur detention camps Thousands of photographs from the heart of China’s highly secretive system of mass incarceration in Xinjiang, as well as a shoot-to-kill policy for those who try to escape, are among a huge cache of data hacked from police computer servers in the region. (BBC)

• How Did It Happen?: The Great Inflation of the 1970s and Lessons for Today. The pickup in the U.S. inflation rate to its highest rates in forty years has led to renewed attention being given to the Great Inflation of the 1970s. A key conclusion is that the fact that a nonmonetary perspective on inflation is no longer prevalent in policy circles provides grounds for believing that monetary policy in the modern era is well positioned to prevent the recurrence of entrenched high inflation rates of the kind seen in the 1970s. (Federal Reserve)

• When Elon Musk Dreams, His Employees Have Nightmares: Tesla buyers never got the promised software update. The cars still cannot drive themselves without humans. But every year since then, he has repeated different versions of this claim. (New York Times)

• When I First Saw Elon Musk for Who He Really Is The CEO’s mythmaking often obscures an uglier truth. The public is finally reckoning with it. (Slate)

• Like capitalism itself, business journalism is broken. Can it be fixed? Talking to New York Times reporter David Gelles about the implosion of capitalism, the failure of the business press to tell that story, and how it can do better now. (The Ink)

• Might I suggest not listening to famous people about money? If you are mad at Tom Brady about crypto, you should also be mad at Tom Selleck about reverse mortgages. (Vox)

• A Disturbing New Pattern in Mass Shootings: Young Assailants Six of the nine deadliest mass shootings in the United States since 2018 were by people who were 21 or younger, a shift from earlier decades. (New York Times)

• Netflix slips and Hollywood cheers. Maybe it shouldn’t. Netflix is losing subscribers. Does that mean Netflix has a problem or that streaming has a problem? (Vox)

• Norm Macdonald had one last secret ‘Nothing Special,’ filmed just before he died, is the comedian’s final Netflix offering. (Washington Post)

Forced Labour, NIMBYism, Crypto, Real Estate, and the NBA Playoffs

Monday morning news drop

• The forced labour filling our closets: U.S. is coming after it in an unprecedented way Penalties against goods made with forced labour take effect June 21. Businesses warn it will cause chaos (CBC)

• Twilight of the NIMBY Suburban homeowners like Susan Kirsch are often blamed for worsening the nation’s housing crisis. That doesn’t mean she’s giving up her two-decade fight against 20 condos (New York Times)

• A study gave cash and therapy to men at risk of criminal behavior. 10 years later, the results are in. Liberia found a stunningly effective way to reduce violent crimes. Now the US is trying a similar experiment. (Vox)

• About 200 years ago, the world started getting rich. Why? Two economic historians explain what made the Industrial Revolution, and modern life, possible. (Vox)

• The young, rich, anti-capitalist capitalists: “I sometimes joke that there are way more socialists who need a financial adviser than there are socialist financial advisers.” (Vox)

• America’s first modern mass shooting never really ended The 1966 University of Texas Tower shooting remains clouded by myths, including the myth of the “good guy with a gun.” It left too many Americans with only evil to blame — and not our leaders, our policies and ourselves. (Texas Tribune)

• Crypto Just Had Its Lehman Moment. What’s Next? Crypto investors confront hard truths in the wake of the Terra debacle. (Part of the crypto column series.) (Institutional Investor)

• Wealthsimple started as a safe haven for investors — now it’s a major player in crypto trading. Is it putting profits before values? The online investing company was founded to help investors grow their money safely. Now it’s sucking investors into a ‘casino-like game,’ according to one critic, and pulling in millions along the way. (Toronto Star)

• “Worst Housing Affordability” since 1991 (excluding Bubble) In real terms, house prices are now above the previous peak levels. On a price-to-rent basis, the Case-Shiller National index is at a record high, and the Composite 20 index is back to November 2005 levels. By all of the above measures, house prices appear elevated. (Calculated Risk)

• The Real Estate Frenzy is Over: Things are still wild out there, but they’re no longer insane. We used to have 50 bidders for every asking price, now it’s down to just 5. We’re seeing price drops in what were some of the hottest housing markets last year. (Irrelevant Investor)

• When Shipping Containers Sink in the Drink We’ve supersized our capacity to ship stuff across the seas. As our global supply chains grow, what can we gather from the junk that washes up on shore? (New Yorker)

• TikTok trends or the pandemic? What’s behind the rise in ADHD diagnoses By 2016, the reported incidence of adult ADHD rose by 123% in the US – increases in stimulant medication prescriptions suggest its rise continues. (The Guardian)

• Three Big Questions About the 2022 NBA Finals Will the Warriors’ elite offense best the Celtics’ elite defense? Will Steph Curry finally have his Finals MVP moment? Here’s a first look at the 2021-22 season’s championship matchup. (The Ringer)

Videos of the Week, Germany and Russian Energy, and Crypto

Friday morning news drop

• We were all wrong’: how Germany got hooked on Russian energy Germany has been forced to admit it was a terrible mistake to become so dependent on Russian oil and gas. So why did it happen? (Guardian)

• Rallies to the Bottom: In the realm of U.S. stock market history there are four major bottoms —1932, 1974, 2003, and 2009. While all of these are unique in their own way, each had at least three rallies of 10% or more on the way down. Its useful to exam how the U.S. stock market has bottomed historically and the false rallies that have occurred along the way. (Of Dollars And Data)

• When Crypto’s Tulipmania Meets The Real Economy Regulators begin to consider how to keep DeFi from becoming the next subprime. (Bloomberg)

• Jack Welch’s questionable legacy: Welch’s legacy ultimately helped destroy General Electric, a former giant of American industrialism. A combination of scandals, terrible deal-making and the financial crisis drove the company into a ditch. Soon, it won’t exist in its current form anymore — current leadership plans on dividing the company into three parts. (Axios)

• Why Boeing’s successful Starliner test is a big deal: Space is playing an increasingly active role in everyday life, whether that’s through the rise of space tourism or satellite internet. That makes this moment an important milestone for competition in the commercial space industry. It’s also a critical step forward for anyone worried that the future of space is already too dependent on a single company, one that’s largely controlled by Elon Musk. (Vox)

• The State Laws That Are Most Effective at Stopping Mass Shootings: With casualties mounting after the shooting in Uvalde, Texas, a health scholar’s research has found that enacting a few state policies can reduce gun violence by a third. (CityLab)

• Where Does the Supply Chain Crisis Stand Now? There are signs the tide may be turning even as challenges continue in some sectors. (Morningstar)

• How Much Punishment Is Enough for the Driver Who Caused the Humboldt Crash? Jaskirat Singh Sidhu readily accepted his lengthy jail sentence but is now fighting his deportation order. What should justice look like after an accident? (Walrus)

Videos of the Week

Dean Tennant - Langford Gravity Zone RAW: NOBL ambassador and Langford Gravity Zone project manager Dean Tennant shows us how Vancouver Island's newest bike park is meant to be ridden.

Gorge Road - Billy Meaclem: Gorge Road is an Absolut work of art and one of the world's best public jump parks. This season it's been looking better than it has in years and riding... well, you'll just have to see Billy Meaclem doing his thing in order to understand! Big thank you to everyone that has been digging there to get this place where it is now. Rider: Billy Meaclem. Video: Josh Birkenhake & Billy Meaclem.

Bruno Hoffmann - Federal 2022: Bruno has been busy filming with Rich Forne to bring you his latest video. Click play to see what Bruno does best.

Vans x The Bloom: The Bloom brought some of the most inspirational women in BMX together for a tour from Northern to Southern California. Vans x The Bloom kicked off on International Women’s Day and included Bloom BMX co-founders Angie Marino (USA) and Beatrice Trang (CAN), along with photographer Naoki Gaman (JPN). The trip was internationally represented with Perris Benegas (USA), Linda Grabner (AUT), Maca Grasset (CHI), and Teresa Fernandez-Miranda (ESP). Over a span of nine days, the crew ventured on a dream-like tour from San Francisco to Huntington Beach, hitting up parks, trails and street along the way.

Dylan Jaeb's "Hi" Part Dylan hops Mainland stacks with flawless form and endless combos. Good to see this kid in the streets!

Jake Anderson's "STOP" Part Jake goes for broke, gets smoked and keeps powering through in his heaviest rip yet. Backup from Koston and the other Mental homies put a bow on it.

Silas Baxter-Neal's "Burrow" Habitat Part Sowing his home turf, Silas finds new potential in Portland's crust with quick lines and high-impact hammers set to the sounds of Tom Waits. Once a SOTY........

Psychic Migrations: Over a year and a half in the making and featuring a cast of surfing’s most capable and compelling characters, anticipation is peaking for the release of Volcom Stone’s latest feature surf film, Psychic Migrations. Following 2014’s True To This, a surf-skate-snow epic, the forthcoming Psychic Migrations is yet another inspired Veeco Production that builds on more than 20 years and 30 influential films from the world of Volcom. Directed by veteran surf filmmaker Ryan Thomas and shot on location in the West Indies, East Indies, Australia, Polynesia, and the Americas, the film weaves the physical expression of riding a rousing score of waves with a cerebral odyssey through the scapes and textures travelled to find them. Starring: Dusty Payne, Mitch Coleborn, Yago Dora, Nate Tyler, Carlos Muñoz, Ryan Burch, Andrew Doheny, Parker Coffin, Alex Gray, Balaram Stack, Mike Gleason, Miguel Tudela, Joan Duru, Imai Devault, Tom Dosland, Gavin Beschen, Ozzie Wright, and Kelly Slater.

Interest Rates Increase, Investing, and Bike Thefts

Thursday morning news drop

• Bank of Canada raises benchmark interest rate to 1.5%, signals more hikes on the way Decision was widely expected as central bank moves to rein in high inflation (CBC)

• Nobody Likes Index Funds, Except Investors Index funds are being attacked from the Left as soft on corporate managment vestors, from the Right as being “woke” in their support for environmental, social, and governance principles, and from Active managers, by blindly purchasing whatever is in front of them. (Morningstar)

• How the Market Crash Is Forcing Hollywood Giants to Reassess Digital Strategies. The crash marked the end of investors’ irrational exuberance for the content business with an exclamation point — on the same day last week that the TV industry was pitching content strategies to advertisers at upfront presentations in New York and the elite of the world’s movie business were being wowed by Tom Cruise and “Top Gun: Maverick” at the Cannes Film Festival. (Variety)

• Active Managers Are on a Winning Streak. That Won’t Last. Stock pickers are beating the S&P 500 in droves, but it’s a mistake to assume their success will persist. Nearly 70% of the roughly 2,850 actively managed US stock mutual funds with the stated goal of beating the S&P 500 Index have done so this year through last week. That’s a vast improvement from last year, when just 15% of US large-cap stock pickers beat the market. (Bloomberg)

• The Rise and Fall of Wall Street’s Most Controversial Investor Wood’s willingness to make such calls so far ahead of reality — and so out of step with Wall Street’s old guard — has earned her a rockstar reputation among stonks-obsessed retail investors, making her a mascot for buy-the-fucking-dip Robinhood traders, some of whom have dubbed her “Cathie Bae” on Reddit. (New York Magazine)

• The problem of global energy inequity, explained by American refrigerators The average fridge in the US consumes more electricity in a year than an average person in dozens of countries. (Vox)

• Hit Hard by High Energy Costs, Hawaii Looks to the Sun The state is seeking to replace coal and oil with solar energy, aiming to rely extensively on rooftop panels on single-family homes. (New York Times)

• Space Is a Fragile Ecosystem: Thousands of satellites currently orbit the Earth, with commercial internet providers such as SpaceX’s Starlink launching new ones at a dizzying pace. Based on proposals for projects in the future, the authors note, the number could reach more than 100,000 within the decade. Artificial satellites, long a vital part of the space ecosystem, have arguably become an invasive species. (Slate)

• Victoria has a bike theft problem. Here’s how to fix it. From secure lockers to bike valets, and what the City of Victoria is doing (Capital Daily)

Interest Rates, Inflation, Stagflation, Gas Prices and Public Transit

Wednesday morning news drop

• Bank of Canada all but certain to raise lending rates this week — with more hikes to come Central bank rate expected to hit 1.5% on Wednesday — soon it could be twice that (CBC)

• When Can We Say Stagflation? In a series of tweets on Tuesday, the Pershing Square founder argued that the Federal Reserve should lift rates aggressively now to stamp out price pressures to avoid having to hike as many times overall. An observation that would have been more accurate a few month ago. (Bloomberg)

• How inflation became America’s greatest economic problem The last time inflation was this high, the Fed engineered a severe recession. Unfortunately, the problem is much more complex now. Can the off-ramp to spiking inflation go better this time? (Grid)

• Where Does the Supply Chain Crisis Stand Now? There are signs the tide may be turning even as challenges continue in some sectors. (Morningstar)

• Lithium mining: How new production technologies could fuel the global EV revolution. Lithium is the driving force behind electric vehicles, but will supply keep pace with demand? New technologies and sources of supply can fill the gap. (McKinsey)

• This Is Where Dirty Old Cars Go to Die: The electric vehicle revolution is gathering speed—but what happens to all those polluting cars already on the road? (Wired)

• Gas prices have never been higher — but Canadians still aren't jumping on public transit People are driving and traveling again, but public transit use remains sluggish (CBC)

• One Man Helped Credit Suisse Make Billions From Russia Tycoons: A charismatic fixer made the Swiss bank the leading destination for Russia’s wealthiest individuals. Then war and sanctions got in the way. (Bloomberg)

• Mark Zuckerberg Is Blowing Up Instagram to Try and Catch TikTok The CEO of Meta Platforms needs Reels—his short-form video feature—to fund his metaverse, and you can smell his desperation from Beijing. (Bloomberg)

• Would the World Be Better Off Without Philanthropists? Critics say that big-time donors wield too much power over their fellow-citizens and perpetuate social inequality. But don’t cancel Lady Bountiful just yet. (New Yorker)

Guns in America, Interest Rates, and the 2024 Election

Tuesday morning news drop

• 5 facts about guns in America. The country could change the catastrophic status quo without infringing on the Second Amendment. Indeed, many such reforms are immensely popular. But a few dozen Republican Senators continue to stand in the way. In the meantime, the death toll mounts. (Popular Information)

• From Sandy Hook to Buffalo: Ten years of failure on gun control Biden has played a central role in the unsuccessful efforts to enact significant firearms legislation amid thousands of mass shootings. (Washington Post)

• Firearms are now the leading cause of death for U.S. children For more than 60 years, the leading cause of death for Americans age 1 to 19 was car crashes. In 2020, firearms took the lead, researchers reported in the New England Journal of Medicine in late April, citing Centers for Disease Control and Prevention data. (The Week)

• Building on river floodplains has proven costly and devastating to Canadians. A new Globe analysis reveals which cities are most at risk Flooding has condemned some cities to painful cycles of loss and rebuilding. Although multiple levels of government seek to restrict further development on floodplains, some cities continue to allow it (Globe and Mail)

• Bank of Canada all but certain to raise lending rates this week — with more hikes to come Central bank rate expected to hit 1.5% on Wednesday — soon it could be twice that (CBC)

• Giant container ships are ruining everything: We can blame the Big Boat Era for many of our supply chain headaches (Freight Waves)

• The Annihilation of Florida: An Overlooked National Tragedy: An accelerating race to destroy Florida’s wilderness shows what we value and previews our collective future during the climate crisis. (Current Affairs)

• The Republican blueprint to steal the 2024 election The objective is not to rescind the 2020 election — that’s constitutionally impossible. Trump’s and the Republicans’ far more ambitious objective is to execute successfully in 2024 the very same plan they failed to execute in 2020 — and overturn the 2024 election if Trump or his anointed successor loses again. (CNN)

Tainted Vancouver Real Estate, the Stock Market, and Godspell Comedy Legends

Monday morning news drop

• Following a Trail of Tainted Money From China Into Vancouver Real Estate A man accused of paying bribes in one of China's biggest-ever military corruption scandals allegedly funneled at least 114 million Canadian dollars into banks in that country before investing more than CA$32 million in luxury Vancouver real estate. (Toronto Star)

• The Tech Rout Isn’t Just Cyclical—It’s Well-Earned, and Overdue The market collapse isn’t just the inevitable result of macroeconomic forces like high interest rates and inflation. It’s also the best opportunity in more than a decade to reckon with the tech industry’s excess. (Businessweek)

• Bull Market Rhymes There are recurring cycles, ups and downs, but the course of events is essentially the same, with small variations. It has been said that history repeats itself this is perhaps not quite correct it merely rhymes. (Oaktree Capital)

• They spent a fortune on pictures of apes and cats. Do they regret it? The market for digital collectibles is in flux, leading investors to consider what the artwork is really worth. (Washington Post)

• Big U.S. Cities Lost More Residents as Covid-19 Pandemic Stretched On San Francisco and Chicago population totals are near 2010 levels. (Wall Street Journal)

• Trump Is Telling Allies His Record on Abortion Could Hurt His 2024 Chances Trump fears that by laying the groundwork to overturn Roe v. Wade, he has enraged ‘suburban women’ and given his enemies an opening, sources tell Rolling Stone. (Rolling Stone)

• How America Sold Out Little League Baseball The privatization of American youth sports over the past 40 years is one of those revolutions of late-stage capitalism that should shock us more than it does. We have commodified the play of millions of children into a $19.2 billion business, weakening volunteer-based programs that promise affordable sports for all children. It is a trend mirrored by our schools, hospitals and military. Once-proud public institutions are being privatized, with many unintended consequences. (America)

• Crypto’s Future Is Even More Exciting, and Maybe More Volatile, Than Its Present: Yet despite its vast technological and financial potential, the crypto industry is finding it tough to break into the mainstream, as investors retrench into safer assets while regulators bear down with more rules. (Barron’s)

• How Capitalism Drives Cancel Culture: Beware splashy corporate gestures when they leave existing power structures intact (The Atlantic)

• The Government Finally Figured Out What Hackers Are the Good Guys The more interesting—and potentially more important—elements of the new charging policy are the ones that focus on security research and what it means to exceed authorized access. (Slate)

• This Old Man: Life in the nineties: I’m ninety-three, and I’m feeling great. Well, pretty great, unless I’ve forgotten to take a couple of Tylenols in the past four or five hours, in which case I’ve begun to feel some jagged little pains shooting down my left forearm and into the base of the thumb. Shingles, in 1996, with resultant nerve damage. (New Yorker)

• They all starred in ‘Godspell.’ Then they became comedy legends. An oral history of the improbable 1972 Toronto production, featuring Martin Short, Eugene Levy, Gilda Radner, Andrea Martin, Victor Garber and Paul Shaffer. (Washington Post)

Day Trading Dreamers and Pickleball the Fastest Growing Sport in America

Thursday morning news drop

• How to Not Panic: Studying history, we come to realize that a lot of what we experience isn’t as unique as we think it is. The U.S. stock market typically declines by at least: 10% every other year 30% every 4-5 years 50%+ once a generation (Of Dollars And Data)

• The bull market minted millions of day traders. They’re in for a rough ride In early 2021, in the midst of speculative stock market euphoria, a pair of day traders went viral on TikTok with a video explaining their winning strategy. “I see a stock going up and I buy it. And I just watch it until it stops going up, and I sell it,” says the user known as Chad. “I do it over and over and it pays for our whole lifestyle.” (CNN)

• Earnings Math Catches Up With the Tech Highflyers The sector’s stock selloff signals investors have finally realized that future growth can’t justify ludicrous valuations. (Bloomberg)

• ‘The haves and have-yachts’: on the trail of London’s super-rich We join sociologist Caroline Knowles on a walk across the economic and class divide of the capital to discover how extreme wealth has reshaped our streets. (The Guardian)

• Oil Windfall Brings Free College and Day Care to One of the Poorest States New Mexico this year became the first US state to offer free college to its residents and free child care to most families, all on the back of soaring revenue from royalties and taxes on oil and gas production, which are booming on its patch of the Permian Basin. The state now ranks behind only Texas in energy production. (Businessweek)

• Spies’ night eyes: Once-restricted tech is helping spot Russian troops, Chinese missile sites and raging wildfires Satellites equipped with regular cameras can’t snap shots of most of the planet most of the time: ~70% of the globe is shrouded in clouds, and at any given time about half of the planet also happens to be dark. That’s where a newer kind of satellite comes in. Instead of using cameras to detect visible light, they rely on a technology called synthetic aperture radar (SAR) that beams microwaves at Earth. These microwaves shoot through clouds and don’t know the difference between day and night. (Grid)

• What People Misunderstand About Red-Pilling: I’ve been doing fieldwork in far-right online communities since 2016. I hang out on white supremacist Telegram channels, comb through QAnon threads on 8kun (formerly known as 8chan), and watch TikToks that claim COVID-19 is a globalist plot. Like most people who work with far-right content, I find it emotionally draining and unpleasant. But I’m also convinced that the mainstream acceptability of extremely racist and conspiratorial beliefs is a threat to American democracy. (Slate)

• ‘Pickleball Is the Wild, Wild West’: Inside the Fight Over the Fastest-Growing Sport in America There are: Too many leagues. Too many federations. Battling billionaires. Bad behavior. And the growth of a booming sport is on the line. (Sports Illustrated)

Investing in China, the NBA and China, and the Crypto Collapse

Tuesday morning news drop

• NBA owners, mum on China relationship, have more than $10 billion invested there ESPN examined the investments of 40 principal owners and found that they collectively have more than $10 billion tied up in China. The owners’ myriad ties to the world’s second-largest economy leave their businesses vulnerable if they get on the wrong side of the Chinese government or the public there, according to the analysis. (ESPN)

• As Global Markets Shudder, Investor Sentiment About China Ranges from Exuberant to Highly Cautious: “It’s important to distinguish between what’s happened with Russia and what might happen with China,” said Andy Rothman, chief investment strategist at Matthews International. (Institutional Investor)

• The Math Prodigy Whose Hack Upended DeFi Won’t Give Back His Millions An 18-year-old graduate student exploited a weakness in Indexed Finance’s code and opened a legal conundrum that’s still rocking the blockchain community. Then he disappeared. (Bloomberg)

• A $60 Billion Crypto Collapse Reveals a New Kind of Bank Run: Terra’s coins were supposed to be the future of money. But they relied on confidence—which can vanish in an instant. (Bloomberg)

• How much longer can Google own the internet? The synonym for search finds itself in big antitrust trouble. (Recode)

• The Age of Extinction Is Here — Some of Us Just Don’t Know It Yet We’re Crossing the Threshold of Survivability — And There’s No Going Back (Eumondia)

• The European country where “replacement theory” reigns supreme How Hungary turned replacement theory into state ideology. (Vox)

• How North Korea Went from ‘Zero COVID’ to 1.2 Million Cases in 72 Hours This time last week, North Korea was still claiming to be one of three COVID-free countries worldwide. Now it’s facing a public health catastrophe. (Vice)

• The air conditioning paradox How do we cool people without heating up the planet? (Vox)

• Are luxury sneakers getting too expensive? Is it work paying $2,000 for a sneaker that only cost a few dollars to make? (High Snobiety)

Credit Scores, Stock Market Pains, and Covid in China

Wednesday morning news drop

• How Credit Scores Can Run—and Ruin—Our Lives You can have a great credit history and still see your score plummet. How did the rating system become so powerful? (CBC)

• Market Pain Isn’t Over, but You Will Get Through This Head-spinning volatility in financial markets isn’t all that puzzling when you consider the problems the Federal Reserve is grappling with, our columnist says. (New York Times)

• Was the 1966-1982 Stock Market Really That Bad? This long, drawn out sideways market is one of the ultimate devil’s advocate positions for those that like to argue against stocks being a solid long-term investment. Although this was technically a sideways market we need to put some context around this time frame. (A Wealth of Common Sense)

• Japan’s living standards are too low: A lot of hard work with not nearly enough to show for it: But underneath the gloss of that fantasy-land exterior, Japan as a whole is not exactly thriving. For decades, the country’s real wages have drifted downward. (Noahpinion)

• “Covid Zero” is Crushing China Production and consumption both cratered in April. The impact on the rest of the world is uncertain. (The Overshoot)

• Travel Tips From the Man Who’s Visited Every Country on Earth—and Space Pack a sheet, leave the wedding ring at home, and skip the street food. (Pursuits)

• “Free Speech” Ought to Mean More than Mocking Trans People Elon Musk, social media content moderation, and a culture of free speech. (The Bulwark)

• ‘Redemption is a powerful concept’: Hayden Christensen on Star Wars and daring to return as Darth Vader: When he first portrayed Darth Vader in the much-panned Star Wars prequels 20 years ago, fans vented their anger at him. So why is he risking more in a new TV series? He talks about George Lucas, the pressures of fame and his love of bulldozers (The Guardian)