PPCC: Pisitófilos Creditófagos. Primavera 2024

[senslev]

https://www.elconfidencial.com/mundo/2024-05-08/polacos-miedo-rusia-invada-pais-comprar-casa-costa-sol_3879468/

[CHOSEN]

Dice asustadísimos "futuro económico imposible " y no puedo evitar acordarme de las arengas de Gustavo Bueno contra el idealismo, y de cómo éste (el idealismo) siempre termina en catástrofe precisamente por ser INCOMPATIBLE con la realidad.

[Derby]

https://www.reuters.com/business/autos-transportation/tesla-autopilot-probe-us-prosecutors-focus-securities-wire-fraud-2024-05-08/

Exclusive: In Tesla Autopilot probe, US prosecutors focus on securities, wire fraud

May 8 (Reuters) - U.S. prosecutors are examining whether Tesla (TSLA.O) committed securities or wire fraud by misleading investors and consumers about its electric vehicles’ self-driving capabilities, three people familiar with the matter told Reuters.

Tesla’s Autopilot and Full Self-Driving systems assist with steering, braking and lane changes - but are not fully autonomous. While Tesla has warned drivers to stay ready to take over driving, the Justice Department is examining other statements by Tesla and Chief Executive Elon Musk suggesting its cars can drive themselves.

U.S. regulators have separately investigated hundreds of crashes, including fatal ones, that have occurred in Teslas with Autopilot engaged, resulting in a mass recall by the automaker.

Reuters exclusively reported the U.S. criminal investigation into Tesla in October 2022, and is now the first to report the specific criminal liability federal prosecutors are examining.

Investigators are exploring whether Tesla committed wire fraud, which involves deception in interstate communications, by misleading consumers about its driver-assistance systems, the sources said. They are also examining whether Tesla committed securities fraud by deceiving investors, two of the sources said.

The Securities and Exchange Commission is also investigating Tesla’s representations about driver-assistance systems to investors, one of the people said. The SEC declined to comment.

Tesla did not respond to a request for comment. Last October, it disclosed in a filing that the Justice Department had asked the company for information about Autopilot and Full Self-Driving.
The Justice Department declined to comment.

The probe, which is not evidence of wrongdoing, could result in criminal charges, civil sanctions, or no action. Prosecutors are far from deciding how to proceed, one of the sources said, in part because they are sifting through voluminous documents Tesla provided in response to subpoenas.

Reuters could not determine the specific statements prosecutors are reviewing as potentially illegal. Musk has aggressively touted the prowess of Tesla’s driver-assistance technology for nearly a decade.

Tesla videos demonstrating the technology that remain archived, on its website, say: “The person in the driver’s seat is only there for legal reasons. He is not doing anything. The car is driving itself.”

A Tesla engineer testified in 2022 in a lawsuit over a fatal crash involving Autopilot that one of the videos, posted in October 2016, intended to show the technology’s potential and did not accurately portray its capabilities at the time. Musk nevertheless posted the video on social media, writing: “Tesla drives itself (no human input at all) thru urban streets to highway streets, then finds a parking spot.”

In a conference call with reporters in 2016, Musk described Autopilot as “probably better” than a human driver. During an October 2022 call, Musk addressed a forthcoming FSD upgrade he said would allow customers to travel “to your work, your friend’s house, to the grocery store without you touching the wheel.”

Musk is increasingly focused on self-driving technology as Tesla's car sales and profit slump. Tesla recently slashed costs through mass layoffs and shelved plans for a long-awaited $25,000 model that had been expected to drive sales growth.

“Going balls to the wall for autonomy is a blindingly obvious move,” the billionaire executive posted on his social-media platform X in mid-April. Tesla shares, down more than 28% so far this year, surged in late April when Musk visited China and made progress toward approvals to sell FSD there.

Musk has repeatedly promised self-driving Teslas for about a decade. "Mere failure to realize a long-term, aspirational goal is not fraud," Tesla lawyers said in a 2022 court filing.

LEGAL CHALLENGES

Prosecutors scrutinizing Tesla’s autonomous-car claims are proceeding with caution, recognizing the legal hurdles they face, the people familiar with the inquiry said.

They will need to demonstrate that Tesla’s claims crossed a line from legal salesmanship to material
and knowingly false statements that unlawfully harmed consumers or investors, three legal experts uninvolved in the probe told Reuters.

U.S. courts previously have ruled that “puffery” or “corporate optimism” regarding product claims do not amount to fraud. In 2008, a federal appeals court ruled that statements of corporate optimism alone do not demonstrate that a company official intentionally misled investors.

Justice Department officials will likely seek internal Tesla communications as evidence that Musk or others knew they were making false statements, said Daniel Richman, a Columbia Law School professor and former federal prosecutor. That is a challenge, Richman said, but the safety risk involved in overselling self-driving systems also “speaks to the seriousness with which prosecutors, a judge and jury would take the statements.”

FATAL CRASHES

Tesla’s claims about Autopilot and FSD have also drawn scrutiny in regulatory investigations and lawsuits.

Safety regulators and courts have raised concerns in recent months that corporate messaging about the technology - including the brand names Autopilot and Full Self-Driving - have imbued customers with a false sense of security.

In April, the Washington State Patrol arrested a man on suspicion of vehicular homicide after his Tesla, with Autopilot engaged, struck and killed a motorcyclist while the driver looked at his phone, police records show. In a probable-cause statement, a trooper cited the driver’s “admitted inattention to driving, while on autopilot mode ... putting trust in the machine to drive for him.”

In Washington state, a driver remains "responsible for the safe and legal operation of that vehicle" regardless of its technological capabilities, a state patrol spokesperson told Reuters.

The same month, the U.S. National Highway Traffic Safety Administration launched an investigation into whether a Tesla recall of more than 2 million vehicles in December adequately addressed safety issues with Autopilot.

NHTSA declined to comment.

The recall followed a long-running probe opened by regulators after cars with Autopilot engaged repeatedly crashed into vehicles at first-responder emergency scenes. Regulators subsequently examined hundreds of crashes where Autopilot was engaged and identified 14 deaths and 54 injuries.

Tesla disputed NHTSA's findings but agreed to the recall, which employed over-the-air software updates intended to alert inattentive drivers.

The NHTSA investigation found “a critical safety gap between drivers’ expectations” of Tesla’s technology “and the system’s true capabilities,” according to agency records. “This gap led to foreseeable misuse and avoidable crashes.”

[asustadísimos]

[Dada lo metafísica que es toda la Economía, lo que no salga aquí, sencillamente, no existe, en lo que a nuestro asunto se refiere:
BExplora
https://www.bde.es/wbe/es/estadisticas/relacionados/visualizaciones-de-datos/estadisticas-economicas-generales/bexplora-el-mercado-de-vivienda/bexplora-el-mercado-de-vivienda.html
Lo que está claro es que están asustadísimos con la vivienda, en un horizonte de menos actividad general. Quieren que se construya (locomotora), pero el sector, forradísimo, no está por la labor. Se escuda en excusas de mal pagador, muchas de ellas anaracoparasitarias y blandigolpistas. El colmo ha sido que se sepa que la supuesta mejor activo electoral de la oposición tiene el trasero sucio, y mucho, por el asunto.]


[Ayer, día de la toma de posesión de Putin, se cumplieron 25 años del bombardeo de EEUU sobre la embajada de China en Belgrado. Y Xi Jinping se ha encargado personalmente de conmemorarlo: «El pueblo chino valora la paz, pero nunca permitirá que las tragedias históricas se repitan».]


[https://www.project-syndicate.org/commentary/2024-elections-grappling-with-authoritarian-populism-and-other-legacies-of-neoliberalism-by-joseph-e-stiglitz-2024-04/spanish]

[Cadavre Exquis]

https://www.eleconomista.es/opinion/noticias/12803769/05/24/inaceptable-aval-a-las-prejubilaciones.html

https://www.pressreader.com/spain/el-economista/20240508/page/26/textview

La reforma del subsidio de paro de Díaz costará 470 millones al año al Sepe

Camino directo hacia una pensión más alta que la media

Saludos.

[Cadavre Exquis]

https://www.eleconomista.es/economia/noticias/12803932/05/24/de-cos-avisa-que-las-alzas-rapidas-del-smi-y-reducir-la-jornada-danan-el-empleo.html

https://www.eleconomista.es/economia/noticias/12803533/05/24/recortar-las-pensiones-para-sostener-el-sistema-el-banco-de-espana-propone-estudiar-una-rebaja-de-la-tasa-de-sustitucion.html

Saludos.

[Cadavre Exquis]

https://www.eleconomista.es/vivienda-inmobiliario/noticias/12802966/05/24/las-viviendas-avaladas-por-el-ico-no-podran-costar-mas-de-325000-euros-estos-son-los-requisitos-.html

Saludos.

[Derby]

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2024-05-07/rents-set-to-be-last-domino-to-fall-in-global-inflation-battle

Rents Set to Be Last Domino to Fall in Global Inflation Battle

Immigration and housing shortages fuel rents in Australia, UK
Sticky inflation prevents central banks from cutting rates

Surging rents across many developed economies are proving to be a stubborn hurdle for central banks as they struggle to nail down inflation once and for all this tightening cycle.

In the US, UK, Canada and Australia, rapidly rising housing costs — which have a hefty weighting in consumer price index baskets — are preventing inflation from declining closer to central banks’ targeted levels. The danger is that workers will demand even fatter pay checks to deal with the cost-of-living squeeze, undermining the inflation fight even further.

Surging rents across many developed economies are proving to be a stubborn hurdle for central banks as they struggle to nail down inflation once and for all this tightening cycle.

The upshot: The disinflation momentum seen through most of last year has all but stalled in some developed economies. That’s leading financial markets to either push back bets for interest-rate cuts, as seen in the US, or reinstate odds for further rate hikes, as is the case in Australia.



“Rents, like inflation, are a bit of a lagging indicator of the economic cycle and will be one of the last things to turn down,” said Shane Oliver, chief economist at AMP Ltd. in Sydney. The problem is far from uniform and less of an issue in continental Europe, Oliver said, and worse in countries with rapid immigration programs and building shortages.

Australia meets both those criteria. Reserve Bank Governor Michele Bullock on Tuesday said strong immigration in recent years has “certainly added pressure on the housing market and that’s working its way out in rents.” The RBA, in its quarterly update of economic forecasts released the same day, said rent inflation is expected to “remain high” through at least mid-2026.

The decline in core inflation seen in Australia since early 2023 has come to an “abrupt halt,” in part due to rising rental costs, said Phil Odonaghoe, an economist at Deutsche Bank AG. Data from property consultancy CoreLogic Inc. this week showed Australia’s median rent hit a record high of A$627 ($414) a week in April, climbing 8.5% from a year ago.

“If strength in any segment of the CPI persists for long enough, it risks fueling a rise in inflation expectations that will feed into the CPI more broadly,” he said. “The risks of that happening are far from trivial.”

From a year ago, rent inflation rose 7.7% in the first three months of 2024, remaining around the highest in the 30 years the RBA has been targeting inflation. Excluding housing, Australia’s annual CPI was 3.2% — 0.4 points less than the headline number and within sight of the bank’s 2-3% target.

Soaring rents are a major pain point for UK families as well and a key voter issue ahead of a general election expected later this year.

UK rent prices — up by a fifth since 2022 — are now rising at their fastest pace on record after high mortgage costs forced prospective homebuyers back into the rental market, exacerbating a housing supply shortage stemming from decades of underinvestment. Rents are set to increase by 13% over the next three years, outpacing pay growth, according to an analysis by the Resolution Foundation.

Still, the Bank of England has other fish to fry. Governor Andrew Bailey and his colleagues have turned their focus on pay growth and services inflation, which remain too hot for comfort. If those metrics cool down, together with goods inflation already below 1%, they could counterbalance rising rent costs and bring inflation back to the 2%
target.

“Given the importance of rents in the CPI basket, if they continue to rise at a rate faster than the BOE’s target, they will clearly add to price pressure,”said Tera Allas, director of research and economics at McKinsey in the UK. However, BOE officials “may be more concerned about those items and sectors where inflation is clearly driven by domestic wage or profit pressures, such as hospitality.”

The UK central bank is widely expected by economists to keep rates at a 16-year high of 5.25% on Thursday, with investors watching for clues on whether policymakers see June or August as an opportunity to begin cutting.



Rental costs remain front and center for the Federal Reserve too as officials wait for a window to bring down borrowing costs. Rent accounts for around one-third of the CPI inflation index, making it one of the biggest drivers of prices. Core CPI, which excludes food and energy costs, topped forecasts for a third straight month in March, in part due to gains in rents.

Fed Chair Jerome Powell has said he expects easing rental costs to eventually show up in broader price data, allowing policymakers at some point to lower rates.

“I am confident that as long as market rents remain low, this is going to show up in measured inflation,” Powell told reporters last week after the Fed’s two-day policy meeting. The central bank held rates at a more than two-decade high, while signaling a desire to cut when confident that inflation is under control. Traders are currently betting on at least one 25-basis-point rate cut this year.

Still, Powell may have to wait. Household expectations about the change in the cost of rent have risen sharply from last year, with rental costs expected to increase by 1.5 percentage points to 9.7% for the next year, according to a survey by the New York Fed released Monday.

A shortage of housing stock — in part due to high interest rates — has kept prices elevated.

“Housing is a real problem in the United States due to a huge shortage of affordable housing, and in part because of high interest rates,” Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen told Bloomberg News. “That said, I strongly believe — I think it is highly likely — that shelter costs, which have been pushing up inflation, will come down.”

While inflation may moderate from here, it’s unlikely that there will be significant cooling, according to Stephen Stanley, chief US economist at Santander US Capital Markets LLC. “If this projection is correct, then the FOMC has its work cut out for it in getting core inflation back to 2%,” he said.

[Cadavre Exquis]

https://twitter.com/KobeissiLetter/status/1787963363714363705

Saludos.

[Derby]

https://www.reuters.com/world/americas/argentina-industrial-output-sinks-21-amid-milei-austerity-worst-since-pandemic-2024-05-08/

Argentina industrial output crashes near pandemic lows as Milei austerity bites

BUENOS AIRES, May 8 (Reuters) - Argentina's industrial output plunged 21.2% in March from a year ago, the INDEC statistics agency said on Wednesday, the worst slide since the depths of the COVID-19 pandemic as libertarian President Javier Milei pushes a tough austerity package.

The new government, which inherited an economic crisis with triple-digit inflation when it took over in December, is caught between stabilizing the South American country's wobbly finances and heading off a deep potential recession.(...)

[Derby]

https://fortune.com/2024/05/08/phantom-debt-buy-now-pay-later-consumer-finances-struggling/

‘Phantom debt’ from ‘buy now, pay later’ schemes is a $700 billion black hole that economists aren’t accounting for

(...)In 2024 alone, Juniper Research estimates, BNPL transactions will total $334 billion, ballooning to $687 billion by 2028, reflecting market growth of 105%.

Consumers are also becoming increasingly dependent on the platforms, with one in five customers using them to buy essential goods.

However, research by U.K. national charity Citizens Advice released in November found that 21% of BNPL customers have either missed or made a late payment, with 10% saying they had been visited by an enforcement agency or bailiffs.

Moreover, nearly a third of BNPL customers who had paid an installment within a month of completing the survey had borrowed the money from another lender—compounding debt with yet more debt.

The Federal Bank of New York has also warned that the people using BNPL services are “disproportionately” financially fragile—as measured by the average likelihood of being able to come up with $2,000 in the next month in case of an emergency.

This “raises questions about the resilience of BNPL lending and its performance following an adverse economic shock,” researchers Felix Aidala, Daniel Mangrum, and Wilbert van der Klaauw added in the September note.(...)

[AbiertoPorDemolicion]

https://www.elconfidencial.com/mundo/2024-05-08/polacos-miedo-rusia-invada-pais-comprar-casa-costa-sol_3879468/

(pero que p. basura se ha convertido la prensa)

un 'plan B' en caso de guerra
Los polacos temen una invasión de Rusia y están lanzándose a comprar casas en la Costa del Sol

Las advertencias de líderes occidentales de una posible escalada entre Rusia y la OTAN en los próximos años ha provocado que los polacos empiecen a comprar casa en zonas como Marbella y Estepona

Titular dos en uno: narrativa otanera + nos los quitan de las manos (aguantar la posición que con la guerra de Ucrania nos vamos a forrar...la pisitofilia siempre gana, incluso en las circunstancias más terribles)

¿Estos también tienen 'plan B'? ¿También se van a lanzar a comprar casas en Marbella?
Israel fuerza el traslado de 100.000 palestinos de Rafah de cara a invasión
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x7LvfALhf4o

¿En que estercolero humano se han convertido las sociedades occidentales? ¿en que momento nos hemos convertido en esto? 

Los niveles de bajeza moral, ruindad, abyección, envilecimiento, mezquindad, ignominia, infamia y sobre todo maldad, al que está llegando la prensa de las mafias politico-mediáticas (en la que ellas mismas y sus palmeros se retratan - pictured within -), ya mueven a risa (por lo patético y distópico que es todo).

[Cadavre Exquis]

https://www.eleconomista.es/opinion/noticias/12805862/05/24/el-creciente-agujero-en-pensiones.html

https://www.eleconomista.es/economia/noticias/12805593/05/24/bruselas-destapa-el-gran-agujero-de-las-pensiones-en-espana-como-pagar-a-un-60-mas-de-pensionistas-con-el-mismo-numero-de-ocupados.html

Saludos.

[Cadavre Exquis]

https://www.pressreader.com/spain/el-economista/20240509/page/2/textview

Financial Times (EEUU) | Suecia recorta las tasas de interés

Les Echos (Francia) | Francia ante el shock inflacionario de Europa

Saludos.

[Cadavre Exquis]

https://www.eleconomista.es/vivienda-inmobiliario/noticias/12805031/05/24/madrid-tendra-un-megacampus-de-oficinas-en-el-centro-la-ciudad-auditorium-zona-wellness-y-pista-de-juegos-.html

Saludos.