Walmart is demonstrating how Inflation can lead to deflation. The major Box-Store stated during its earnings report that it needs to lower the prices of non-household necessities because inflation has caused people to only buy the necessities. If Walmart and others want people to buy a new crock pot or one of the t-shirts with a funny saying on it, the prices will have to come down. This unfortunately means there is probably no relief in sight for the price of eggs, milk and bread.

 

The German, and EU in general, reliance on Russian Energy problem is going to get scary when winter hits. The Russian State-Run energy company Gazprom said its halting the flow of natural gas to Germany starting Wednesday to 20% of the typical capacity. The reason given is a pipeline maintenance issue, but both sides know Gazprom is lying. This is how Russia is fighting back against western sanctions. Shutting down all those pipelines and nuclear energy facilities was a great idea,,,Right?!

 

Interesting Economic/Familial Fact: Kids with wealthier parents tend to move further away from home when they hit adulthood than kids with less wealthier parents. There is a Christian Family Value lesson somewhere in the fact, we are sure of it.

 

Extremely Woke Late Night "Comedy" show 'Full Frontal with Smantha Bee' was canceled after 7 seasons (None of which drew a big crowd). As we continue to look at media that the public is consuming (or not consuming), we see glimmers of hope that the American people have not completely lost their minds. Think: CNN+'s miserable failure, Netflix offering slight resistance to wokeism, and late-night TV losing viewers by the day.

 

Certain protesters in NYC are demanding that more be done about the Monkey Pox outbreak. 16,000 people have been infected and over 99% of these cases are men who have sex with other men (Minus Africa who has a long history with Monkey Pox). This seems like a very specific issue, affecting a very specific group of people who do a very specific thing. That a lot of specificity for Monkey Pox to be labeled a Global Pandemic.

 

Marvel is going to be making superhero movies forever. At San Diego's Comic-Con this past weekend Marvel Executives laid out plans to finish Phase 4 of the Marvel movies and teased Phase 5 & 6. The Marvel movies alone will keep Disney+ going strong as well as movie theaters, toy manufactures and video game producers. Disney keeps showing off their dominance in so many markets. We can only hope that the LGBT initiatives fade away.

 

Sometime today the Fed is expected to wrap-up their meeting and announce another 75-basis point rate increase to combat inflation. These rate hikes have been historic, but they have not caused as much stock market chaos as predicted...yet.

 

Twitter and Elon Musk continue to fight siblings in the back of the car on a long family road trip. Elon wants to terminate the deal and Twitter wants the deal to go through. Elon claims twitter has not been transparent about the number of fake accounts and Twitter, we think just plain out doesn't like Elon. The deal has already cost Elon at least $33M.

 

Important story here about how big tech earnings are going to determine the direction of the market.