PPCC: Pisitófilos Creditófagos. Primavera 2025

[Derby]

https://www.ft.com/content/d7dd7b87-5abc-4ebf-b931-948c314a7e64

The great European disentanglement from US stocks has only just started
Katie Martin

A long rebalancing of investor portfolios is likely to be under way that could be painful for America


European markets are streaking ahead of the US © Benoit Tessier/Reuters

The problem for European investors in disentangling themselves from the US is that, deliberately or otherwise, they are in deep. Portfolios everywhere, retail and institutional, are stuffed to the gills with US stocks.

This can lead you to one of two conclusions: First, that the outperformance in European stocks now under way is fun but ultimately a blip, and therefore the great disentanglement won’t happen. Or second, that we are at the start of a long and painful process for the US. I lean heavily towards the latter.

By now we all know the score: The widespread, almost universal belief among institutional investors that the US would dominate global stocks in 2025 has proven to be badly misplaced. The pro-growth, low-tax, anti-red-tape narrative of Donald Trump’s second presidency has collapsed under its own weight and given way to fears of a recession or stagflation. On-again-off-again trade tariffs and widespread federal jobs cuts are gnawing away at corporate and consumer confidence.

And the depth of the administration’s loathing for supposed allies in Europe has shocked investors there deeply. Fund managers at global investment houses recognise that vice-president JD Vance’s speech in Munich was problematic, but European investors were offended in a way that Americans perhaps have not recognised.

Markets are reacting as you might expect. The dollar is sliding, and European markets are streaking ahead of the US. It’s important to understand just how unusual this is. Germany’s Dax stocks index has outperformed the US S&P 500 in just two of the past 12 years. Analysts at Deutsche Bank point out that at the current pace — and yes, it is still early in the year — this is shaping up to be the best year for outperformance in the Dax in any year since 1960. Similarly, the dollar’s woes are for the history books. It has fallen further by this point in the year only six times since 1969.



Barclays is among those warning against getting overexcited. The rush of money in to Europe-focused funds is substantial, its analysts say, but it will struggle to keep running at this pace. Similarly, Germany’s announcement of fiscal stimulus does point to higher European growth, but Trump’s trade tariffs are likely to pull in the opposite direction — a “tug of war” that means “reports of the end of US exceptionalism may well prove greatly exaggerated”.

What we do know is that European exceptionalism is still a very young investment theme, and US dominance is hard-baked in to the financial system. 

Data from the US Federal Reserve shows that European investors held about $9tn in US stocks at the end of last year — around 17 per cent of the overall value of the US market and not far off the market capitalisation of all the equities in Europe.



This gigantic overallocation to the US has not happened by magic. It has just made financial sense over the long term. Paul Marsh of the London Business School, one of the authors of UBS’s Investment Returns Yearbook — a sacred text for markets nerds — points out that one dollar invested in the US at the start of 1900 was worth $899 by the end of the century in real terms. The same dollar invested in the rest of the world was worth just $119.

The first quarter of the 21st century shows a similar gap. A dollar invested in the US at the start of 2000 was worth $3.28 by the end of 2024, again, after inflation. For the rest of the world, you end up at a rather humdrum $1.63. As a rule, non-US investors who have failed to make a significant allocation to the US have not been doing their jobs properly.

The US has been hard to avoid, in fact. By the end of last year, 10 stocks made up nearly a quarter of the global total of market capitalisation in public equities. Nine of them are from the US. The US makes up 64 per cent of the value of all global stocks, or nearly 73 per cent of developed markets. Any investor tracking a global stocks index such as the MSCI Global may think this is a neutral strategy — a nice, easy way to achieve diversification. It’s not — it’s a nice, easy way to run a massive positive bet on the US. 

“We have argued over time that the merits of the US must be fully discounted,” Marsh said at the launch of his latest yearbook earlier this month. “It’s not that the US will stop being a dominant market or the US will stop being a hugely entrepreneurial country. It’s just that all has to be in the price at some point.”

Investors everywhere are hugely overexposed to the US. That was uncomfortable enough before Trump began his second presidency, and it feels rather more reckless now. It is hard for global investors to shake off more than a century of evidence that buying US assets is simply in the best financial interests of themselves or their clients, but lighter allocations to Trump’s America represent basic risk management at this point.

Trillions of investment dollars can leave the US if the rest of the world chooses to get back towards a neutral position. The question is how easily the rest of the world’s markets can absorb that money. As Trump said in a social media post outlining one of his many sets of trade tariffs: “Have fun!”

[Derby]

https://www.pressreader.com/spain/el-economista/20250329/page/45/textview

Golpe a los fondos: la subida impositiva en Cataluña frena la venta de pisos en alquiler

Saludos.

Esta modificación de la normativa fiscal está generando pánico. Las medidas relativas al impuesto de transmisiones patrimoniales entrarán en vigor en julio, pero la eliminación de la bonificación del 70% para inmobiiliarias para su posterior venta ya está en vigor desde la publicación del decreto. Ha habido un mercado bastante potente para los fondos y servicers de inversores que se dedican a lo que se denomina en inglés "fixer upper": compran, reforman (muchas veces un simple lavado de cara) y venden. Pequeños inversores que acogiéndose a esta bonificación han mantenido su negocio y que ahora van a tener que replanteárselo porque manejan unos márgenes muy ajustados. Muchas de estas viviendas se han destinado a primera compra de vivienda.

[Cadavre Exquis]

Barrio de Salamanca, ciudad de vacaciones: vecinos estacionales en pisos que cambian rápido de manos
Refugio de la aristocracia madrileña en otros tiempos es ahora el distrito de Madrid con más porcentaje (21,47%) de viviendas no principales, la mayoría segundas residencias

David Expósito / Lucía Franco · 2025.03.26

Carlos Mazo, educador y desarrollador inmobiliario en el Barrio de Salamanca. David Expósito

Un hombre con un plan. Ese era Carlos Mazo, educador y desarrollador inmobiliario. Una mañana del mes de junio de 2024, envió a uno de sus más jóvenes trabajadores a la Puerta de Alcalá con una única misión: contar ventanas. No valía cualquiera. Las únicas que le interesaban eran aquellas desde las que se pudiera ver el monumento. El motivo es que soñaba con hacerse con todas y cada una de ellas. En total, le informaron, unos 38 pisos cumplían la premisa. “Son las vistas del millón de euros”, asegura Mazo, socio de la promotora Logika European Partners. Hace unas semanas, vendió uno de estos preciados tesoros. “Fue un cliente mexicano. Le dije: ‘Que sepas que estás comprando un piso que no está reformado y que, si lo compraras tres plantas más abajo, te podría costar dos millones menos, y para entrar a vivir”, recuerda. La respuesta fue contundente: “Quiero esa vista”.

Barrio de Salamanca, ciudad de vacaciones. Si alguien quisiera promocionar en televisión este opulento barrio madrileño, este sería el eslogan más ajustado a la realidad. Hoy, lo que un día fue el refugio de la alta aristocracia madrileña es el distrito de la capital donde existe mayor número de segundas residencias, según datos del Instituto Nacional de Estadística (INE). En concreto, de las 79.809 viviendas que hay censadas, el 21,47% —17.142 inmuebles— son lo que la entidad cataloga como “viviendas no principales”, una denominación que incluiría tanto segundas residencias —propiedad de dueños que no residen ahí de forma habitual— como viviendas vacías. Dentro de este enclave exclusivo, el tesoro más preciado se sitúa frente a la Puerta de Alcalá. Allí, la palma se la llevan los ocho bloques que se encuentran circundados por las calles Serrano, Recoletos, Alcalá y Villanueva. De acuerdo con el portal inmobiliario Idealista, hay cerca de 90 pisos a la venta en esta zona. Sin embargo, la mayoría de estas operaciones millonarias se llevan a cabo off the market, es decir, en transacciones invisibles para el gran público. Lo que ocurre en el barrio de Salamanca se queda en el barrio de Salamanca.

Todos los días, desde hace cinco o seis años, algún desconocido se acerca hasta la garita del conserje Óscar Gutiérrez, de 43 años, y le hace la misma pregunta:

—Perdone, ¿es esto Villalar? ¿Hay alguna casa a la venta en el edificio?

La calle Villalar, para estupefacción del propio Gutiérrez, parece ser famosa al otro lado del charco. Esta vía secundaria de 300 metros y 13 números es destino predilecto de millonarios latinoamericanos que han escuchado a sus amigos hablar de ella. Hace apenas una semana, cuenta Gutiérrez, una mujer colombiana de unos 50 años se acercó con sigilo hasta el portal y, después de revisar el aspecto de la entrada y la fachada, preguntó lo que preguntan casi todos. Gutiérrez respondió casi antes de que ella terminara de hablar: “Sí, señora, aquí se venden dos casas, una de ellas en reforma”. Ella tomó nota y prometió llamar. “No entiendo qué ven en esta calle. No sé cómo puede ser tan famosa entre estos nuevos ricos. Todos hablan de Villalar. Antes de llegar a Madrid, lo único que conocen es esta calle del barrio Salamanca”, señala Gutiérrez. Por ejemplo, en su bloque hay varios miembros de una misma familia repartidos entre los 10 inmuebles. “Tienen también a una amiga en el de enfrente y otra al final de la calle. A lo que aspiran es a crear su comunidad aquí”, indica. Los vecinos tradicionales que él conoce de toda la vida están viendo en el repunte de los precios de la vivienda y en estos nuevos inversores una oportunidad de mercado “irrechazable”. “Venden sus casas a precio de oro y se marchan a otras zonas de Madrid como Aravaca, la sierra o la Moraleja”.

Operarios de una reforma trabajando en el Barrio Salamanca. David Expósito

“Es el epicentro de la inversión extranjera latinoamericana. Hay muchísima rotación. Son, digamos, vecinos estacionales. Compran un inmueble para un uso determinado, pero no están aquí todo el tiempo. Algunos lo quieren para sus hijos, que vienen a estudiar. Los picos más altos son ahora en primavera, con las eliminatorias de Champions, y también en Navidad”, manifiesta David De Gea, de 28 años, dueño de la inmobiliaria HousinGo, especializada en viviendas de lujo. “Cuando ya han hecho el uso que tenían pensado, vuelven a vender. Son activos muy líquidos que nunca se devalúan”, apunta. En esto coincide la empresaria colombiana Martha Lucía Pereira, que vende pisos off the market en la zona. “Sin duda, ahora es el sitio más peleado”, afirma Pereira. “El que viene de afuera a comprar en Madrid no compara el precio de la vivienda con otros barrios de la ciudad, sino que lo hace con los precios de París, Londres o Dublín y, en ese ranking, la capital española es todavía el lugar más barato para invertir ahora”, opina Mazo.

David De Gea, dueño de la inmobiliaria HousinGo del Barrio Salamanca. David Expósito

Julio A. del Pino, profesor de Sociología en la UNED y autor de la tesis Estructuras residenciales y movilidad más allá de la segunda residencia, interpreta que “el centro de las grandes ciudades como Madrid se están despegando del propio territorio. Los procesos que se dan en el centro ya no tienen que ver con un sistema socio-territorial sino con una forma global de procesos de globalización, que incluye migraciones, segundas residencias, turismo o inversiones inmobiliarias. Los que tienen arraigo a la ciudad viven en los márgenes del centro”. Además, según el profesor, “las segundas residencias en este barrio han pasado del concepto de vivienda de temporada —tu casa de la playa para el verano— a la nueva idea de vivienda múltiple. Son personas que “viven en el mundo” y tienen una casa en cada lugar. Van moviéndose en función de lo que les apetezca”.

Por su parte, Pedro, un importante empresario de 58 años que prefiere no divulgar su nombre real, acaba de obtener la Golden Visa que le permite vivir y trabajar en España siendo mexicano. Lo ha conseguido realizando una inversión bancaria de un millón de euros. “Mi sueño es retirarme en Madrid”, asegura mientras espera un avión de vuelta a Monterrey. Regresará en tres semanas para pasar la Semana Santa. “Tuve que apurarme porque veía que se acababa el plazo y era la única alternativa que tenía”, comenta. Actualmente, está en busca de un piso en la Puerta de Alcalá, y dispone de un presupuesto de otro millón de euros para la compra. “El año pasado contraté a un personal shopper y, desde entonces, he estado explorando diferentes zonas con él, pero a mí lo que más me gusta es estar cerca del Retiro y disfrutar de una terraza donde pueda fumarme un puro”, asegura. Aunque su hija tiene la nacionalidad estadounidense y podría retirarse en EE UU, Pedro confiesa que, desde que llegó a Madrid hace 20 años, se enamoró de la ciudad. “Me encanta su comida, su buen vino y, sobre todo, los toros”, afirma. Su plan es terminar de comprar su piso, preferiblemente en las inmediaciones del Retiro, y seguir yendo y viniendo entre México y Madrid. “Son solo nueve horas de avión, y así puedo tener lo mejor de dos mundos”, concluye.

Dos mujeres consultan pisos a la venta en el Barrio Salamanca. David Expósito

Su personal shopper inmobiliario, Giovanni Giacomini, asegura que en esta zona hay muchas viviendas no principales, ya que la mayoría son herencias y, actualmente, las familias las utilizan para alquilarlas como pisos turísticos. “Además, hay muchos latinos comprando en la zona porque es el lugar que conocen, y prefieren quedarse en una casa cuando vienen una temporada a Europa en lugar de hacerlo en un hotel”. Tomando la expresión del francés, los latinos llaman a este tipo de segundas residencias a las que acuden en momentos concretos del año su pied-à-terre: su pie a tierra, su particular refugio.

Estas tienen una particularidad más: nadie puede entrar ni salir de ellas. Es su segunda residencia, y quieren tenerla disponible siempre, aclara el director del grupo SiEspaña, Alexander Rangel. Ahora, con el comienzo de la primavera, empieza la temporada alta de la llegada de los dueños de estos pisos para disfrutar del vino en las terrazas con vistas a la Puerta de Alcalá y al parque del Retiro, todo a pocos pasos caminando. Un privilegio del que no disfrutan en sus países de origen. “Vienen a Madrid buscando esa sensación de libertad”, dice Rangel.

Saludos.

[pollo]

https://www.pressreader.com/spain/el-economista/20250329/page/45/textview

Golpe a los fondos: la subida impositiva en Cataluña frena la venta de pisos en alquiler

Saludos.

Parece que poco a poco va cundiendo el desamparo.

Es local y en mi opinión, aún poco. Pero es un comienzo.

[asustadísimos]

«ELLOS» SOIS USTEDES».—

Dice Turiel: «A los de nuestra generación nos han robado el futuro».

Y mi coronel, «nos están llevando a la guerra».

Y detrás de los dos se escucha: «El Pisito no nos lo toquéis, que vuestros dineros son basura».

«Nosotros» somos nosotros, ¿no? Nos roban, nos llevan a la guerra, nos quieren tocar El Pisito.

¿Pero quiénes son «ellos»?

¡«Ellos» sois vosotros!, ustedes.

Ustedes, que creéis que ya no sois proletariado, sino 'finísimo y elegantísimo' propietariado.

Ustedes, dunningkrugers.

Ustedes, descendientes de la pata de El Cid.

La historia tiene leyes objetivas. Y una de ellas es que la UE, para seguir adelante hasta completar el Eje Finisterre-Vladivostok, ha de pasar de la defensiva a la ofensiva. Y el primer paso es la libertad: liberarse de la opresión anglo.

¡Vivan el Dinero unioneuropeo y el Capital euroasiático!

Suben los 'hactibos'. Suben los 'mercaos'.
La X es la cancelación de la metafísica bicurvista ofertademandista.
El tricornio, lo realmente existente: Producción = Renta = Gasto.

Comprar caro es de tontivano. ¿Para qué estar en algo que se va a devaluar respecto de nuestra moneda?, como el dólar o el ladrillo.

No lo duden. Si el turco o el bereber ataca a la cristiandad, habrá apoyo de las rusias.

En nuestra mano está desactivar los caballos de Troya anglo.

Un servidor, para empezar, ha avisado a su familia bostoniana que ya nunca más cruzará el charco. Ni bodas ni bautizos ni funerales ni Nantucket ni arte. ¡Sanseacabó! Y los tartanes que quiere mi mujer para tapizar, por internet. Nada de Edimburgo.

[asustadísimos]

[Decir que hay extraterrestres salvadores es un clásico de las estafas.]

[pollo]

https://www.ft.com/content/d2b37f08-2ca4-4a80-9a68-0821cbccbb6a

‘Almost comical’: the Trump team’s first national security crisis

The use of a group chat to discuss military attacks has called into question the competency of senior officials, despite their brazen defiance


JD Vance, Pete Hegseth and Mike Waltz used a Signal chat to discuss plans for a military attack on Houthis in Yemen © FT montage/Bloomberg/Getty

When Jeffrey Goldberg, editor-in-chief of The Atlantic magazine, found himself included in a Trump administration group chat to discuss attacking Yemen, his first reaction was to assume it was a hoax.

It was inconceivable, he imagined, for senior US officials to be using a messaging app on their phones to discuss military plans — let alone to invite a journalist into the conversation.

“[I was] 100 per cent convinced it’s a fake,” Goldberg told the Bulwark podcast about his initial response. “100 per cent. Because that doesn’t happen, somebody’s setting me up.”

On Saturday March 15, while Goldberg was in the parking lot at a Safeway, he saw on his phone that defence secretary Pete Hegseth had sent detailed plans of an upcoming US attack. (“We are a GO for mission launch,” he wrote.) It was at that moment the journalist realised the Signal messaging group might be real after all — and constituted a breathtaking breach of national security. After all, this was the sort of information “really four or five humans should know”.

“Signalgate”, as the scandal has become known, has turned into the first big crisis of Donald Trump’s second presidential term — just over two months in.

It has been revealing for two reasons. The episode has called into question the competence of some of his most senior officials, not just Hegseth, a former weekend Fox News host, but also Mike Waltz, the national security adviser who appears to have been the person who included Goldberg in the group chat.


Excerpts from the Signal chat involving senior US officials

Critics say such scandals were inevitable given the thin resumes of many of Trump’s senior officials when they came into the administration.

“The warnings were clear that . . . many . . . were not up to the job, they didn’t have the necessary experience,” says Julian Zelizer, a professor of political history at Princeton University. “And here you just watch and you can see in real time as they did something which was extraordinarily dangerous and, on some level, reckless.”

Democrats have been quick to make the same charge. “This is what happens when you have Fox News personalities cosplaying as government officials,” says Jon Ossoff, the Democratic senator for Georgia. “Honestly it would be funny, except that it is deadly serious. They’re talking about the execution of lethal military operations.”

Just as striking as the massive security breach has been the Trump administration’s reaction — brazen defiance and a refusal to apologise or even acknowledge the vulnerabilities highlighted by the fiasco.

Indeed, the affair has revealed in the starkest terms possible how different this presidency is from Trump’s first term. During his initial stint in the White House the former reality TV star relied on experienced national security hands like former generals Jim Mattis, John Kelly and HR McMaster — the so-called adults in the room who pushed back against his more outlandish ideas.

This time, the guardrails are gone and even Trump’s most eccentric proposals — turning Gaza into the “Riviera of the Middle East”, taking over the Panama Canal, incorporating Canada and Greenland — have all been supported uncritically by the rest of the cabinet.


Military veterans and family members of active troops call for the resignation of Pete Hegseth this week. But the defence secretary and others on the Signal group have refused to apologise © Scott Olson/Getty Images

The result is an administration stacked with people who critics say were chosen less for their qualifications or suitability for the role and more for their loyalty to the commander-in-chief, their commitment to his nationalist agenda — and how they come across on TV.

“This administration is Trumpier,” says Kyle Kondik, a non-partisan analyst at the University of Virginia Center for Politics. “The people in the key jobs around Trump are more like him and closer to him than . . . the first time around.”

Faced with such a humiliating story as Signalgate, the Trump administration’s communications strategy has been clear — attack.

Hegseth called Goldberg a “deceitful and highly discredited so-called journalist who’s made a profession of peddling hoaxes, time and time again”. Fighting to save his job, Waltz took the same approach, describing the Atlantic editor as “the bottom scum of journalists”.

Officials initially downplayed the incident, denying flat out that the texts contained any classified information, or that the officials were even discussing plans for an attack on Houthi targets in Yemen.

That approach barely changed after The Atlantic published an edited transcript of the group chat, in which Hegseth divulged the timing of the strikes before they were launched and even listed the weapons to be deployed — F-18 fighter jets, strike drones and Tomahawk missiles.


Jeffrey Goldberg, The Atlantic editor, initially assumed it was a fake Signal chat when he was added, then realised that it was a breach of national security © Skip Bolen/Getty Images

Some of the texts were “almost comical”, Mark Kelly, a Democratic senator from Arizona, told NPR. “At the end of this text message, the secretary of defence puts ‘we are currently clean on OPSEC’, that is operational security,” he said. “That’s what he said. On an unsecured message app, where this information could have got into the hands of the Russians, or the Iranians, or the Houthis.”

Even after the second Atlantic article, which this time printed the chats near-verbatim, officials continued to play down the affair, a strategy that even some Republican lawmakers found objectionable. “I’m not buying it,” Kevin Cramer, a Republican senator from North Dakota, told reporters. A better approach would, he said, have been to “own it, it happened, and say it will never happen again”.

In a further sign of GOP concern, it emerged on Thursday that the top Republican and Democrat on the Senate armed services committee had asked the Pentagon for an inquiry into the potential “use of unclassified networks to discuss sensitive and classified information, as well as the sharing of such information with those who do not have proper clearance and need to know”.

Mark Warner, vice-chair of the Senate intelligence committee, said that if a military or intelligence officer had exhibited “this kind of behaviour, they would be fired”.

"They’ve learnt from Trump. They’re imitating his tactics; they’re imitating his language as well

Trump administration officials argued that The Atlantic had changed the way it referred to the messages, speaking of “attack plans” instead of the “war plans” in its initial reporting — a distinction Goldberg dismissed as a “semantic game”.

But the hairsplitting appeared to backfire, with even diehard Republicans expressing their annoyance. “Trying to wordsmith the hell outta this Signal debacle is making it worse,” Tomi Lahren, the Fox Nation host wrote on X. “It was bad. And I’m honestly getting sick of the whataboutisms from my own side.”

Trump simply dismissed the scandal as a “witch-hunt” — typical of his tendency to hit back at the media, deny any wrongdoing and question his critics’ motivation.

“One of his defining features is that he never apologises and he never gives an inch on anything,” says Kondik. “And it’s hard to argue that strategy has been bad for him over the years.”

The difference is that he is now surrounded by officials who take the same approach. “They’ve learnt from him,” says Doug Heye, a veteran Republican strategist. “They’re imitating his tactics; they’re imitating his language as well.”

This mimicry was most conspicuous in a press briefing by Karoline Leavitt, the White House press secretary, on Wednesday, when she angrily swatted away repeated questions about Signalgate and denounced a “co-ordinated campaign to try and sow chaos in this White House”.

“This has been the most successful first two months of any administration ever, which is exactly why they’re doing this,” she said.


Karoline Leavitt, the White House press secretary, has dismissed questions about Signalgate, which she says is a campaign to sow chaos in Trump’s successful administration © Francis Chung/Pool/EPA-EFE/Shutterstock

Later she told Fox News the American people should be “grateful” to people like Hegseth and Waltz and “especially to President Trump for putting together such a competent and highly qualified team . . . who are getting things done, moving at Trump-speed to make this world a safer place”.

There’s nothing unusual, of course, about White House officials praising the president — that is their job, after all.

But experts say the Trump team goes much further. “Beyond just the policy line, they almost mimic the affect of President Trump,” says Zelizer at Princeton. “It’s like the Republicans in Congress — they speak the way he speaks, they act with a certain tough demeanour, the way he likes to present himself.”

One of the most striking examples of an official in tune with both Trump’s worldview and language is Steve Witkoff, a New York real estate developer who has known the president since the 1980s and who is now special envoy for the Middle East, while also playing a central role in talks with Russia over Ukraine.

In an interview with the rightwing media personality Tucker Carlson, Witkoff exhibited an almost Trump-like respect and admiration for Vladimir Putin, the Russian president, whom he has met in person twice — calling him “super smart”, “straight up” and “enormously gracious”.

Witkoff, who has no previous experience in diplomacy, said Putin had given him a “beautiful portrait” of Trump, which he then delivered to the president. The Russian leader also told him he had gone to church and prayed for Trump after the attempt on the then Republican presidential candidate’s life last July.


Mike Waltz at a meeting in the White House this week. The national security adviser, who appears to have been the one to add Goldberg to the Signal chat, described The Atlantic editor as ‘the bottom scum of journalists’ © Win McNamee/Getty Images

Repeating what many analysts believe to be Kremlin talking points, Witkoff claimed the “overwhelming majority” of people in the four eastern regions of Ukraine — Donetsk, Luhansk, Kherson and Zaporizhzhia — that were illegally annexed by Russia in 2022 “want to be under Russian rule”. He cited the results of Kremlin-managed referendums that were denounced as shams at the time by the US and EU.

Witkoff also dismissed European plans to send peacekeeping forces to Ukraine as “a posture and a pose” and an attempt “to be like Winston Churchill”.

For some observers, the interview had parallels with the infamous shouting match in the White House last month, when vice-president JD Vance joined Trump in publicly berating Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy for allegedly standing in the way of a peace agreement with Russia.

“They’re playing to an audience of one,” says Zelizer of the Trump officials. “It’s a way to protect their jobs and positions of influence. Because he [Trump] has made it very clear that if you don’t do that, there’ll be a cost.”

Los usanos están viendo el producto de los valores que llevan defendiendo y promoviendo en las últimas décadas. Ni más ni menos.

Tener una cultura de mierda (como otras muchas cosas) no tiene efectos aparentes a corto plazo. Pero los plazos se terminan y las consecuencias acaban ocurriendo, como tenemos que recordar día sí y día también aquí.

Esto es aplicable también a la UE, porque ha ido de la mano en esto. Los bicurvistas, apoyados durante décadas en el antivalor del desprecio al intelecto, que viene de la parte más estúpida y complaciente de la clase obrera sublimada en capitalistita (y poco más tarde también de la parte más estúpida de las élites), nos traen este magnífico panorama.

Quizá ya es demasiado tarde: el gobierno de los flipaos, los estafadores y los imbéciles, al servicio de la codicia (veo el mundo como una empresa, y en particular como una empresa usana), porque según la cultura usana los emprendedores y todas sus gilipolleces tienen la prioridad máxima en la escala de valores, no importa ninguna otra característica del sujeto en cuestión. Y entre, pongamos Ford y Musk, no hay color.

Es al tipo de personajes que se admira hoy día.

Y es por esto que la hegemonía de China será imposible de parar. Tienen una dirección y unos valores y aprecian el intelecto (aunque no estemos de acuerdo con ellos en muchas cosas) y nosotros como mucho tenemos ganas de forrarnos caiga quien caiga y de dirigirnos activamente a una distopía creada por gente estúpida que cree que no lo es pero que está al mando.

EE.UU. está condenado a caer por la inmensa inercia que tiene la estupidez imperante* y un sistema de valores (individualismo extremo) que va contra su propia civilización. La UE no lo sé, pero lo veo bastante mal y hay muchas formas de jugar mal las cartas.

* Según la teoría de la estupidez de Cipolla, el individuo más peligroso era el estúpido, y llegó a extrapolar en sus conclusiones que las civilizaciones se iban a la mierda por la proliferación de estúpidos con tendencia a ser bandidos (perjudica a otros para beneficiarse él), que es el perfil predominante en los gobiernos y empresas occidentales, además de su población. Cada vez estoy más sorprendido de la capacidad analítica y predictiva de esta tesina de cachondeo de Cipolla.

[Benzino Napaloni]

EE.UU. está condenado a caer por la inmensa inercia que tiene la estupidez imperante* y un sistema de valores (individualismo extremo) que va contra su propia civilización. La UE no lo sé, pero lo veo bastante mal y hay muchas formas de jugar mal las cartas.

La única esperanza que le veo a la UE (y...) es que el anglo se pegue tal castaña que nos entre el susto y pongamos a tiempo las barbas a remojar.

En la empresa donde estoy (de las grandes en España) ya he visto movimientos así. Pero la Ventana de Overton es muy puñetera, no va a ser fácil cambiar la mentalidad de cuatro décadas.

Y en España va a escocer especialmente devolverle el poder al cerebro.

[senslev]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l9wlcT5IACg

Esta entrevista con David Murrin presenta una teoría compleja y pesimista sobre el estado actual del mundo, argumentando que la Tercera Guerra Mundial ya ha comenzado y que estamos en una fase de declive del "Imperio Occidental Cristiano" liderado por Estados Unidos. Murrin se basa en un modelo de "Ciclos de Imperio" y pulsos de "entropía" para predecir un futuro marcado por conflictos geopolíticos crecientes, crisis económicas severas y un cambio de poder hacia China y su "eje de autocracia". Destaca la inevitabilidad de la guerra como un motor de la "lateralización" y la adaptación humana, y advierte sobre la debilidad de los líderes occidentales para tomar decisiones difíciles. Murrin también aborda temas como la guerra en Ucrania, el potencial conflicto con Irán, las ambiciones chinas en el Pacífico, la vulnerabilidad económica occidental y la importancia de la preparación individual y colectiva.

Temas Principales y Ideas Clave:

1.   El Ciclo de Imperio y el Declive Occidental:

•   Murrin postula un modelo de cinco etapas del "Ciclo de Imperio" basado en la oscilación entre la "linealidad" (estructuras jerárquicas, instituciones) y la "lateralidad" (adaptabilidad, innovación, responsabilidad individual).
•   Argumenta que Estados Unidos es el último de los "imperios occidentales cristianos" de 500 años de dominio y se encuentra en una fase de declive, caracterizada por el predominio de líderes "lineales" incapaces de adaptarse.
•   "at the end of an Empire Cycle Empires really show what they really are America is the last of the Western Christian empires of 500 years of dominance that the power shift is huge these shifts are never voluntary no one gives up their power and wealth freely"
•   Este declive se manifiesta en la impresión de dinero, la falta de productividad real y el surgimiento de potencias rivales.

2.   La Tercera Guerra Mundial ya ha Comenzado:

•   Murrin sostiene que la Tercera Guerra Mundial no es un evento futuro, sino un proceso que ya se está desarrollando, iniciado alrededor de 2022.
•   La guerra en Ucrania y la creciente inestabilidad en el Medio Oriente son consideradas las primeras fases de este conflicto global.
•   "we are using Wars to socially evolve but it doesn't end until one side dominates and all we know is this war has started"

3.   China como Potencia Ascendente y Desafío Hegemónico:

•   China es identificada como la principal potencia que desafía el orden occidental. Murrin la describe como la segunda "súper potencia asiática" (Japón fue la primera).
•   China ha estado construyendo una "economía de guerra" y se está preparando activamente para un conflicto, con el objetivo de "heredar el mundo".
•   "The Chinese plan to inherit the world China committed itself to building a wartime economy it's built a fortress economy and they have set themselves up to go to war their whole country is on a war footing"
•   Su objetivo estratégico inicial en un conflicto sería tomar Taiwán y expandirse hacia Australia y Nueva Zelanda para negar el acceso de Estados Unidos al Pacífico.

4.   El Papel de Rusia y la Fractura de la OTAN:

•   Putin está "comprometido con la guerra" y su objetivo fundamental es "romper la OTAN".
•   Murrin cree que la influencia de Trump está siendo utilizada por Putin para socavar la unidad de la OTAN.
•   "Putin is committed to war the fundamental goal is to break NATO that wedge is being driven right the way through to crack it"
•   Considera improbable que se pueda separar a Putin de su alianza con China.

5.   Potenciales Puntos de Ignición y Escenarios de Conflicto:

•   Ucrania: Murrin anticipa una posible rendición forzada de Ucrania bajo la presión de Trump, con Europa tratando de movilizarse en su defensa, aunque con limitaciones en su capacidad militar sin el apoyo estadounidense.
•   Irán: Predice un inminente bombardeo de Irán por parte de Estados Unidos e Israel debido a su programa nuclear. Esto podría llevar a Irán a intentar bloquear el Golfo Pérsico.
•   Taiwán: Una invasión china de Taiwán es vista como una alta probabilidad, lo que podría desencadenar un conflicto directo con Japón y Estados Unidos.

6.   La Vulnerabilidad Económica Occidental:

•   Murrin advierte sobre una inminente "crisis económica como nunca hemos visto".
•   La impresión de dinero, las políticas proteccionistas (aranceles) y la falta de adaptación económica debilitarán a Estados Unidos y al mundo occidental.
•   "the dollar is really in trouble tariffs do not strengthen currencies they do not strengthen economies tariffs are destructive and highly inflationary there's a lot of economic trauma to come and people will become poorer and America's ene will become embolden act throughout this whole process"
•   Predice la caída del dólar, el aumento de las tasas de interés y el colapso de los mercados de valores.

7.   La Guerra como Motor de Evolución y "Lateralización":

•   Murrin argumenta que las guerras son un mecanismo de "evolución social" que fuerza la "lateralización" y la adaptación humana, manteniendo a la sociedad "anti-entrópica".
•   "we are using Wars to basically ensure that humans remain anti-entropic and adaptable we are using Wars to socially evolve"

8.   La Amenaza de Armas No Convencionales:

•   Si bien cree que China no tiene interés en destruir el mundo con armas nucleares, Murrin advierte que la mayor amenaza nuclear surge cuando las potencias occidentales se dan cuenta de que están perdiendo y podrían optar por una estrategia de "destruir todo o aceptar la sumisión".
•   También sugiere que la pandemia de COVID-19 pudo haber sido un arma biológica china para debilitar económicamente a Occidente.

9.   La Importancia de la Preparación Individual y Colectiva:

•   Murrin enfatiza la necesidad de que los individuos se preparen ("prepping") como una manifestación de la "lateralidad" y la autoconfianza.
•   Distingue entre una preparación impulsada por el pánico y una planificación más estratégica y a largo plazo.
•   Aboga por la formación de colectivos con ideas afines y por exigir a los líderes políticos una respuesta más robusta a las amenazas actuales.
•   "I think it's critical everyone become resilient and that essentially we take responsibility for what it's like if you could go to Ukrainian and say what would you have done before the war broke out I bet you would have said I would have stockpiled prepared and I'd like to have you know done certain things which would have endured me through this process"

10. El Comportamiento de Trump y su Relación con Putin:

•   Murrin describe a Trump como un líder "lineal" inadecuado para la situación actual y sugiere que podría estar bajo la influencia de Putin.
•   Analiza acciones de Trump como el cierre de fuentes de inteligencia a Ucrania como evidencia de una posible coordinación con Rusia.
•   Cree que la estrategia de Trump favorece una rendición de Ucrania y beneficia los intereses de Putin.

11.   Predicciones Macroeconómicas:

•   Además de la caída del dólar y el colapso del mercado de valores, Murrin predice un aumento significativo de las tasas de interés.
•   Aconseja invertir en metales preciosos y en empresas relacionadas con una economía de guerra (botas, ropa de abrigo, etc.).
•   Advierte sobre la posibilidad de confiscación de oro por parte de los gobiernos en tiempos de conflicto.

Citas Directas Notables:

•   "World War III is already happening this is a house of cars and it is in the process of collapsing right now you're going to see an economic crash the likes of which we've never seen"
•   "America under the Biden regime Uber linear Uber stuck and broken a system like that can't regenerate itself it's trying through Trump but for various reasons it's chosen elateral leadership that doesn't serve the people only serves himself so there's a pitfall whereas if you chose the linear leadership they would have served the people but they wable to serve them well a real devil's Choice which is often what happens in Decline"
•   "these shifts are never voluntary no one gives up their power and wealth freely"
•   "China committed itself to building a wartime economy it's built a fortress economy and they have set themselves up to go to war their whole country is on a war footing"
•   "Putin is committed to war he is committed also to using his levers through Trump to separate America from NATO"
•   "Trump is going to have to bomb Iran they are making a nuclear breakout they've got at least seven units Atomic units able to make a bomb"
•   "tariffs do not strengthen currencies they do not strengthen economies tariffs are destructive and highly inflationary"
•   "the level of delusion that America's going through is 10 times bigger than Britain in 1914"
•   "the Chinese plan to inherit the world they don't plan to inherit ashes"
•   "I'm not convinced our Western needers are strong enough nowadays to take very hard decisions"

Conclusión:

La entrevista con David Murrin presenta una perspectiva sombría y provocadora sobre el futuro, basada en una teoría cíclica de la historia y la entropía. Advierte sobre la inevitabilidad de una Tercera Guerra Mundial en curso, un cambio de poder hacia China y una profunda crisis económica en Occidente. Murrin enfatiza la importancia de comprender la dinámica subyacente de los conflictos y la necesidad de preparación y acción colectiva para mitigar los riesgos. Su análisis, aunque complejo y pesimista, invita a la reflexión profunda sobre el estado actual del mundo y los desafíos que se avecinan.

[Derby]

https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/italy-curbs-citizenship-rules-end-tenuous-descendant-claims-2025-03-28/

Italy curbs citizenship rules to end tenuous descendant claims


G7 Foreign Ministers' meeting in Charlevoix Italian Foreign Minister Antonio Tajani speaks to the media on the day of the G7 Foreign Ministers meeting in La Malbaie, Charlevoix, Quebec, Canada March 14, 2025. REUTERS/Mathieu Belanger/File Photo Purchase Licensing Rights

Summary

*Italy had lenient rules on ancestry-based citizenship
*Government says system was abused, imposes restrictions
*Move aims at freeing up swamped consulates

ROME, March 28 (Reuters) - Italy's government tightened its citizenship laws on Friday, preventing people from delving deep back into their family history to try to claim a much sought-after Italian passport.

Under existing rules, anyone who can prove they had an Italian ancestor who was alive after March 17, 1861, when the Kingdom of Italy was created, can seek citizenship.

However, Foreign Minister Antonio Tajani said the system was being abused, with would-be Italians swamping consulates abroad for requests for passports, which provide visa-free entry to more countries than almost any other nationality.

Between 2014 and 2024, the number of Italians living abroad rose by 40%, from 4.6 million to 6.4 million, many registering thanks to their newfound nationality. In Argentina alone, citizenship recognitions jumped to 30,000 in 2024 from 20,000 in 2023, while Brazil saw a rise to 20,000 from 14,000.

Tajani said companies were making a fortune by helping people track down their long-forgotten ancestors and seek birth certificates needed for applications - clogging up municipal offices with their demands for documentation.

"We are striking down very hard against those who want to make money from the opportunity of becoming an Italian citizen," Tajani said, adding that in future, nationality requests would be handled directly in Rome to free up overburdened consulates.

Italy has a population of around 59 million, which has been shrinking for the past decade. The foreign ministry has estimated that under the old rules, 60 to 80 million people worldwide were eligible for citizenship.

Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni has previously suggested that Italy could overcome its demographic decline by seeking Christians of Italian ancestry from nations like Venezuela.

Critics of ancestry-based citizenship say it is grossly unfair, offering nationality to people who had no meaningful connection with Italy.

By contrast, the children of migrants born and raised in Italy who speak Italian fluently, have to wait until they are 18 before being able to apply for a passport.

[sudden and sharp]

 

[Derby]

https://www.marketwatch.com/story/23andmes-failure-shows-how-risky-it-can-be-to-invest-in-a-spac-5bba2d7e

23andMe’s failure shows how risky it can be to invest in a SPAC

Mergers with SPACs have been a way for companies to get public-market listings without the heavy scrutiny of the IPO process.

23andMe is going bankrupt — underscoring the great risks of investing in many of the companies that have gone public via mergers with special-purpose acquisition corporations.

When companies opt for traditional initial public offerings, they host roadshows with prospective investors who laser in on their financials. Since executives expect that sort of grilling, they typically wait until they have more mature businesses before moving forward with an IPO.

But mergers with SPACs have been a way for companies to get public-market listings without subjecting themselves to the heavy scrutiny of the IPO process. A private company will opt to merge with an already listed blank-check company, whose mission is to make acquisitions. Then the SPAC converts its ticker symbol and name over to one matching the name of the acquired business. This process in the past initially tended to attract higher risk, early stage companies because there were fewer regulatory requirements and disclosure rules were not as stringent.

A few months later, when 23andMe addressed investors on its earnings call for the June quarter, it had $770 million in cash, an indication of the cash burdens involved in the SPAC process. Companies must give their sponsors 20% of the shares.

“The costs are so high,” said Michael Klausner, a professor of business and law at Stanford University Law School, who has been researching and writing about the risks of SPACs and their dilutive qualities for several years. “The cash out the door is higher than what the underwriters are paid” in a standard IPO, he added.

Cash is the lifeblood of startups and many public de-SPACs are still like startups. They, too, need a lot of cash, especially if they are not generating much revenue. In the case of 23andMe, revenue ultimately slowed, as customers only needed to buy the DNA test kits once. Its efforts to expand into telehealth and drug development did not generate much revenue..

When 23andMe last reported earnings, it posted $44 million in revenue for its September quarter. That was down from $50 million a year earlier and $55 million in the September quarter of 2021, shortly after the SPAC merger. Last November, it had $127 million in cash and equivalents.

For investors, the ride has been painful. Just before the 23andMe SPAC deal closed, the stock belonging to its merger partner traded north of $266. Now shares trade under a dollar. The remaining board is now contemplating selling its vast trove of customer’s genetic data.

SPACs have been around for years, but they became popular on Wall Street in the immediate post-pandemic era, bringing life to a moribund IPO market. Despite warnings, and stricter regulations from the Securities and Exchange Commission, including additional new rules earlier this year that require enhanced disclosures, making them more aligned with traditional IPOs, SPACs continue to populate the U.S. IPO market and became popular again this year.

It turns out 23andMe is not the only de-SPAC company to go bankrupt. Debtwire’s restructuring database since 2022 tracks 40 bankruptcies among companies that went public after merging with blank-check corporations

”The frenzy of 2021 saw funding going to lots of troubled names that, frankly, never should have received this kind of financing in the first place,” John Bringardner, the executive editor of Debtwire, told MarketWatch in an email.

The bankruptcies have mostly been Chapter 11 restructurings of troubled companies, including some high profile messes such as WeWork, Bird Global, and Lordstown Motors that were able to re-emerge as streamlined businesses. He noted that there have also been two Chapter 7s, or straight liquidations — at Babylon Health, a digital healthcare company, and Electric Last Mile Solutions, a commercial EV maker.

This week, another de-SPAC company caught investor attention when its shares took a big plunge. Nuclear energy company Oklo Inc. which still has no revenue, posted a wider annual net loss and Monday, told analysts it plans to increase its spending in 2025 for operations, with plans to spend between $65 million to $80 million, up from the $38.4 million it spent in 2024. Its shares fell 17.6% this week.

Oklo went public in May 2024, in a deal that was initially poorly received, until Microsoft and Amazon began buying nuclear power sites to boost their power needs for AI data centers. As nuclear energy became a hot commodity for tech giants, Oklo’s stock hit a high above $55 in early February. It’s swiftly lost more than half its value since then.

Another problem with SPACs, is that once the blank-check company itself is formed, if they don’t find an acquisition target, typically within two years, they are required to return the money to investors and liquidate the SPAC, giving investors the impression it is a risk-free investment.

Some companies do not find appropriate acquisition targets and have to redeem the investors. “Redemption rates are extremely high,” said Klausner, referring to the process when blank-check companies have to return money to investors.

Klausner has written and litigated extensively on the huge dilution in SPAC deals. In January, he wrote that only 14% of the SPACs that merged between 2019 and 2022 were trading above $10.

“They won’t go away,” he said. “They are limping along, much to my chagrin, and I am hoping there are no real investors who are losing money. They have been warned by the market, by the SEC, by the courts. If they still want to take a gamble, that’s tough for them.”

[Cadavre Exquis]

https://www.expansion.com/economia/2025/03/29/67e7caad468aeba10e8b45b3.html

Saludos.

[Cadavre Exquis]

https://www.pressreader.com/spain/expansion-nacional-sabado/20250329/page/2/textview

La UE estudia agravar su respuesta a Trump

https://www.expansion.com/economia/financial-times/2025/03/28/67e6b282468aeb74348b4595.html

https://www.expansion.com/economia/financial-times/2025/03/28/67e6b594468aeb6c508b45ab.html

Saludos.

[Cadavre Exquis]

https://www.expansion.com/mercados/2025/03/29/67e70d68e5fdeaa5148b45a5.html

Saludos.